Part 12 (2/2)
Del shook his head some more at me, but he was calmed down and talked again in his Christ-voice.
”Vangie, all I remember from that day they found me was the rain pouring down in my face,” he said. ”I was lost.”
”And now you're found?”
”I'm trying. I know you don't understand yet, but one day you will.”
”Maybe,” I told him, but in my heart I doubted it. The main mystery I was trying to understand was the mystery of me, Vangie, and I knew I could never learn what I needed to know in a church.
That night when we went to bed, I slept backed up against Del the way I always did, but neither of us reached for the other. All the G.o.d talk killed the desire to screw, which was a first. That more than anything convinced me of the power of religion.
I wanted nothing to do with it.
25.
THE next morning I was glad to leave the house and go to the orchard to load up. Glad to leave Del. I didn't know what to do about the baby thing or the religion thing anymore, and it all made me wonder where Del and I were headed. If Del couldn't be with me when he was drinking and I couldn't be with him when he was praising G.o.d, where did that leave us?
The whole fight was still on my mind at the farmers market, and I felt unsettled and grumpy. On my way back to my stand after going to the toilet, I did something that made the day even blacker, and I did it just by stopping by the jewelry stand to look at the bits of feldspar and rose. It was my luck that a little girl was getting her ears pierced then, and even though I knew I should not stay to watch, once I saw what was happening, I couldn't leave.
The little girl hollered when her mom put her on the high stool, and she hollered as the woman who ran the booth swabbed her ears with alcohol, and she continued to holler as the woman got out her piercing gun. When the needle went into the first ear, quick like a bite, the girl squealed higher and harder, and she kept up that high, keen sound as the woman did the second ear. At the end, the little girl's eyes looked gla.s.sy because she was crying so much, and her ears were bright red from the tops down to the buds where the earrings were. That's all those lobes were, buds, because the girl was only two or so. When the lady held a mirror up so the little girl could see, the kid didn't even look. She just hid in her mother's neck.
The whole thing made me sick, because I thought the stand was probably dirty, and I didn't like the fat woman doing the piercing, with her fat arms and the rolls of her belly straining at the front of her dress. I hated the mother because I thought if you had a kid, you should wait until she asked to have her ears pierced, because then she'd know the pain was for something. At two or three, this kid couldn't know. She had to get those bits of metal in her ears because her mom wanted them.
But I was never going to have a kid, so the whole thing was beside the point. Even thinking it was beside the point. Yet there I was, thinking it, and that made me feel even blacker. I did not ever want to grow up if it meant taking the side of people like that fat woman or the little girl's mom. I had a job, I paid rent, I wanted no one to tell me what to do ?- but that was all I wanted of adulthood. I did not want it to be up to me to change diapers or cook meals from the four food groups or get someone's ears pierced. I did not want to take care of anyone but me.
Maybe it was the black mood I was in, and maybe it was because I didn't want to go home and get preached at, but all I could think was how much I wanted to go get stoned with June. I missed her, and I was beginning to see that even if I still felt embarra.s.sed about telling her I wanted to be her boyfriend, feeling stupid or uncomfortable was still better than the blankness of not talking to her. That feeling just grew during the day, so after work I called her. It was the first time I'd dialed her number since the day she told me about the picture of Ray and Luke.
”Long time no see,” she said when she heard me. ”No hear, either. How's it hanging?”
”It's about hung,” I said, and she laughed. I could hear in her voice that she was hurt because we hadn't been speaking, but she was not so hurt that she would not talk to me.
”Things are that good, huh?”
”Things are that good,” I said.
”What's going on?”
”Nothing. Everything. It's a long story.”
”I'll listen.”
”Can I come out?” I said. ”Are you busy?”
”Everyone's gone. Come on.”
”Do you have any weed?”
She laughed then and said, ”I always have weed.”
Just hearing her say that and hearing her voice-a little husky, a little loose-sounding-made me feel better. Whatever else was going on, whatever had happened between the two of us, I knew we would be able to sit at the kitchen table, get high, and laugh. There was something easygoing in June, and that fast I knew how much and how bad I missed her.
Out at the house, it was the same scene with the dogs as the other time, with them almost knocking me down, so Lucky and Pearl got locked up again. When June and I went into the kitchen, I saw that she'd been rolling joints.
”This is for us to smoke now,” she said, pointing to the water bong with her chin. ”And these are for you to take with.” She pushed three joints toward me then, over the tabletop.
”How much do I owe you?”
”A dollar.”
”For three joints? You're crazy.”
”It's for you,” June said. That's when I knew it was a gift and not a transaction, and that we had forgiven each other for whatever happened.
”I see you're wearing that,” I said then, because when June pushed the joints toward me, I saw she had on the ring Ray gave her.
”I wear it most of the time now.”
”What's it mean?”
”It means it's easier for everyone if I wear it.”
”That's all?”
”That's all,” she said, holding the smoke in. ”What about you? Does Del ever talk about putting a ring on your finger?”
The question seemed strange to me. Even if I had a ring from Del, it would be nothing like her taking a ring from Ray at the same time she was s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g Luke. We couldn't just be two girls sitting around talking about when we might get married.
”Mostly Del talks about knocking me up.”
”Are you going to do it?”
”Get pregnant? Jesus Christ, no.” And that seemed strange to me, too, that I'd even have to say that to June. I said, ”A baby doesn't interest me at all.”
”It might interest me if I was with the right person. I might want a baby then.”
That surprised me. It didn't seem at all like her. But I didn't say, Well, who's the right person, or How are you going to be able to tell whose baby it is? I wasn't there to fight or preach. So instead I went, ”Well, I wish you luck with all of that. With choosing, I mean.”
”The choice is made,” she said. ”You know that, don't you, Vangie?”
I didn't know how the choice could be made when she was still in the house with the two of them, but I nodded. I knew she wanted me to. She waited a few seconds before she said the next thing.
”It felt good when it started. Now it just seems complicated. The lies are getting more complicated. But I don't lie to you, Vangie, and I never did. At least not for long.”
<script>