Sun & Spoon (3 page)

“What about her jerk alert?” Spoon said under his breath. “It never stops ringing.”

It was annoying to Spoon that Joanie had such an effect on Pa. Several times, Spoon caught Pa glancing at Joanie with adoring eyes, then chuckling, as if he were unable to do anything but marvel at her and delight in her. During the short span of a couple of hours, Pa referred to her with more than one term of endearment: My Sweet Ragamuffin, Pa's Little Geyser (because of her unkempt hair), Joan of My Heart.

Spoon was no competition. He didn't sing; he didn't dance; he didn't drag a suitcase full of sticks around with him, calling attention to himself. Spoon could wiggle his ears, but that was about it. Subtle in comparison. Pa could wiggle his ears, too, and they used to do it together regularly, hamming it up like a vaudeville act. They had only done it once since Gram had died, and then only half-heartedly.

As Pa swiped at a tangle of cobweb curtains with a rag, Spoon looked right at him and wiggled his ears with fierce determination. Pa didn't respond. He seemed to squint at a spot on the rafters, his heavy silver eyebrows drawing together, then he continued to work on the cobwebs.

The morning wore on, and Spoon carried out many tasks. He lugged old broken windows to the curb and stacked them. He peeled moldy, rippled Con-Tact paper off some shelves, shelves that Pa would reline later. He bundled damp magazines with string, then piled them into neat towers.

While he worked, he thought of all the ways in which Pa had changed since Gram's death. Pa seemed more bony, and pale. His eyes were still icy blue, but they were often pink rimmed and watery. And most distressing to Spoon was how easily Pa could be distracted now, how sometimes he seemed to be focused on something far, far away, or focused on nothing at all.

And there were other things. Things Pa didn't do any longer. He didn't wiggle his ears. Or tell as many silly jokes as he used to. Or religiously follow the Brewers. And he didn't play cards.

Gram, Pa, and Spoon used to play triple solitaire any chance they could get. They played at Gram and Pa's round dining-room table. A few times a week, Spoon stopped by their house for a hand or two on his way home from school; they played any time of day during the summer. They each had their own deck of cards, rubber banded and stored in the bottom middle drawer of Gram's breakfront.

“We could still play cards?” Spoon had said to Pa sometime in June and again at the beginning of July. The last time, the time in July, Spoon had added, “You and me? You know,
double
solitaire.”

Pa tapped his chin and stroked his neck. His eyes fastened onto something in the breakfront. “I saw two squirrels this morning in the lilac bushes, doing acrobatics like I've never seen.” His voice trailed off. “Very funny . . .”

Spoon had been particularly stung by Pa's response, but he knew that it didn't have anything to do with him. And Pa made a point of ruffling Spoon's hair about a dozen times that afternoon, as if in apology.

Spoon's parents called Pa at least once a day, or visited with vegetables from the garden or a sack of groceries from the store. They invited him for dinner frequently, and he came over to their house every Sunday for brunch. Gram and Pa used to host the weekly brunch, but Pa had asked to change it. Scott and Kay agreed to the change instantly; they were both simply relieved and happy that Pa wanted to continue the tradition in some way. “I just don't want him to dwindle,” Kay had a new habit of saying.

Despite all the changes, Pa still kept a supply of root beer especially for Spoon in the basement refrigerator, and the jar of Coffee Nips on the kitchen counter never emptied. They were small things, but they were reassuring.

The garage was becoming noticeably tidy. Although Spoon was concentrating on the cleanup, his search for something of Gram's was always on his mind. He poked here and there, sneaking peeks in drawers and boxes. Twice he announced that he was going to the house to use the bathroom (he didn't really have to go), so that he could snoop a bit alone. “I'll be right back,” he said both times.

On his second trip, as he was pawing through the junk drawer in the pantry, Joanie startled him, her pointy hood jutting out from behind the door. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“I told you I came in the house to pee,” Spoon said angrily, cramming a nest of odds and ends back into the drawer and jamming it closed. “If you want all the details, just let me know.”

“You didn't pee in
here,
did you?” she asked, horrified.

“Maybe I did,” he snapped. He flew by her and stormed back to the garage.

Later, just as Spoon was about to give up hope for the morning, he spotted something promising hanging from a nail in a dark corner behind some crates. The something was rusty and appeared to be a key—an oddly shaped one. Spoon plucked it down from the wall. He sniffed it and turned it in his fingers. Orange-brown dust rubbed off on his skin. “What is this?” Spoon asked Pa, holding it out on his palm.

“Ah,” Pa breathed, dropping his eyes to the key. “A skate key. You don't see those around anymore.”

“Was it Gram's?” Spoon asked loudly, excited by the prospect. This could be exactly what I'm looking for, he thought. He squinted and threw his chin out, the way he sometimes did when he willed something to happen.

Pa scratched his eyebrow. His cheek twitched, as if hearing the word
Gram
had set off a small tremor inside him. “No, no,” Pa replied with an effort, looking away for a second. “This was your father's. He used to wear it around his neck. I wonder where the skates are. Probably hidden here somewhere.”

“Oh,” said Spoon in a thin voice.

“Let's see,” Joanie said. She snatched the key from her brother's hand. She held it up to the light. “Can I have it? Please?”

“Well,” said Pa, “your brother found it.” Pa turned toward Spoon.

Joanie jumped up and down.

“Take it,” Spoon said. “Take it.” He realized that he'd better be careful on two accounts. One, if he found something good, he didn't want Joanie to know because she'd want it. And, two, he felt as though he needed to be delicate with Pa where it concerned Gram; he didn't want to upset him.

All of a sudden, Spoon's stomach growled.

“Spoon's clock and my watch say it's lunchtime,” Pa stated, holding out his arm and studying his bare wrist quizzically, making a little joke. “This place is in good order. Why don't we wash up and get something to eat?”

Spoon felt empty in every way. He was starving. He missed Gram. He missed the old Pa—the ear-wiggling, card-playing one. And he still hadn't found what he was looking for.

I
NSTEAD
OF DOING THE USUAL THING
—having lunch at the kitchen table—Pa led them to the dining room. “Since you both fixed such creative food,” he said, “I thought it would be fitting to eat out here. It's more fancy.”

“We deserve to be fancy,” Joanie said proudly. “We worked hard.”

“Yes, we did,” said Pa. “And I thank you both.”

Spoon was so hungry he ate two peanut butter and banana sandwiches (sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar). He drank two bottles of root beer as well.

Joanie decided that she wanted milk mixed with honey and chocolate syrup, which Pa was nice enough to let her have. She sipped it noisily from a gravy boat. “This is called kitty soup,” she declared. “And it's delicious. Meow.”

“You are so weird,” Spoon said, shaking his head.

Compared to his grandchildren's concoctions, Pa's lunch seemed particularly ordinary—a big salad and some crackers and cheese.

“We specially delivered that lettuce,” Joanie said between slurps, pointing to Pa's salad. “Like a mailman, only better.”

Pa laughed softly and nodded.

Except for Joanie's occasional insight—“Fancy trees wear gold leaves, and they like kitty soup better than rain.” “Fancy cats purr when their kitty soup gets caught in their neck with a bumblebee.”—the lunch was a quiet one.

Spoon noticed that there was a stack of
New Yorker
magazines on Gram's chair and a potted grapefruit plant at her place on the table. He wondered if Pa had set those things there purposely so that no one would sit where Gram always had.

When in the dining room, one couldn't help but think of Gram. More than anyplace else in the house, this was where her presence was felt most strongly. Gram had collected suns, and they hung all around, orbiting the table like colorful planets in some fantastic solar system. The four walls were covered with suns fashioned from different materials—wood, clay, plaster, metal. Stained-glass suns dangled in the windows. Gram had owned more than two hundred of them from all over the world. They were big and small, shiny and dull, delicate and sturdy, ornamental and plain. Some were gifts, and some Gram had bought when she and Pa had been traveling. Spoon, Joanie, and Charlie had made a few of them—nothing but clumsy attempts, in Spoon's opinion. Kay had sculpted some of the best ones; they were clay and she had fired them in the kiln at the school where she taught.

Spoon's favorite was one of the largest—a stern-looking sun from Mexico. He couldn't remember the reason, but he had named this particular sun Bob when he was younger. Bob's flinty face was divided by a deeply etched frown as thick and long as a dinner knife. A heavy brow shielded Bob's penetrating eyes. Years ago, Spoon had been convinced that Bob's eyes blinked when Spoon was alone in the dining room. As soon as anyone else entered the room, the eyes became fixed again. Bob had truly frightened Spoon, but in a deliciously pleasing way. Now, to think that Bob had scared him at all caused Spoon to smile.

“The suns are all girls, you know,” Joanie said thoughtfully, as she scooted down from her chair. “And they're watching us.”

“If they're all girls,” Spoon said, gesturing toward a brightly painted sun made from a coconut shell, “how come that one has a mustache?”

Joanie picked up the empty gravy boat and started for the kitchen. “Because,” she answered matter-of-factly, “she forgot to shave this morning.”

Spoon shot an acid look in Joanie's direction.

Pa followed Joanie with his dirty dishes. Spoon rose to follow Pa, but one of the stained-glass suns in the window caught the light of the real sun and sent off pure white flashes directly at Spoon. He sat down again, mesmerized by the gleaming orb, feeling as if he was on the brink of a meaningful thought, on the verge of solving his problem.

His eyes darted from one sun to the next. Something of Gram's.

Thinking, thinking.

Taking one of Gram's suns was an obvious choice. But each one was too important in its own way, too substantial a thing to take without permission. And Spoon couldn't bring himself to ask Pa. He considered helping himself to one of the smallest, most homely suns, but he knew that Pa would notice: there would be a nail hole, an empty spot on the wall.

Thinking, thinking.

Pa poked his head through the doorframe. “We're going back to the garage,” he said. “Joanie saw some things this morning that she wants.”

“Some bones,” Joanie piped in. “Big ones.”

“Leave the dishes,” Pa told Spoon. “I'll clean up later.”

Spoon lingered. The sun that had captured his attention was amber colored. It turned gently in the window. Spoon swayed his head from side to side in rhythm with the sun.

Thinking, thinking.

Another ray of light shone through the window, bouncing off the stained-glass suns. They sparkled like gems—topaz, rubies, emeralds, diamonds. Spoon blinked; something flashed in his mind. And in that instant he knew what he would do. He was surprised that the idea hadn't come to him sooner.

K
NEELING
, S
POON
OPENED
the bottom middle drawer of the breakfront. The three decks of cards were there, as always, packed snugly into the chock-full drawer like three birds in a nest. Spoon was sure that no one had played with the cards—much less set eyes on them—since Gram's death, and so he hesitated before picking up Gram's deck. It felt eerie to hold something Gram had used so many times, something that she, most likely, had touched last.

Spoon's deck and Pa's remained in the drawer. The backs of Pa's cards were printed in red with the symbol for the University of Wisconsin, where Pa had been a professor in the history department. Spoon's cards had Green Bay Packer helmets on them. The backs of Gram's cards were decorated with suns. Suns with faces.

Spoon closed the drawer, then sat on the floor. He unwound the rubber band from Gram's cards and shuffled them. Fifty-two suns
snap-snap-snapped
between his fingers.

For as long as Spoon could remember, Gram had used only these cards. The wear and tear was obvious. Several cards were bent, divided by white creases. Some had dog-eared corners. There was a general suppleness to the cards. And the jokers had been doctored with a felt-tip marking pen and substituted for two lost cards—the three of spades and the seven of hearts.

Again Spoon shuffled the cards. A feeling of complete certainty came over him. He knew, just knew, that the deck of cards was precisely what he had been searching for. He also knew that Pa wouldn't miss the cards, given his reaction when Spoon had asked him to play double solitaire.

Spoon flipped the cards down onto the carpet in rows, the suns facing up. One hundred and four eyes stared at him, and he stared back, intently.

Suddenly a noise from outside jostled Spoon's thoughts, and he realized that he had lost track of time. He wondered how long he had been alone in the house. Quickly he collected the cards, bound them with the rubber band, shoved them into his front pants pocket, and joined Pa and Joanie in the garage.

“Look what Pa gave me,” Joanie said. She held up a piece of driftwood that was approximately a foot long. Another piece lay at her feet. “They're my biggest bones, and they don't even fit in my suitcase with all my other bones, so Pa gave me this, too.” Joanie stepped aside to reveal an old brocade knitting bag with wooden handles.