Tumbledown (50 page)

He put on his jacket and walked with her to the parking lot.

“I’ll be making something fast and dirty tonight,” she said, “but you’re welcome to join us for whatever it turns out to be. We have beer. My husband always has beer. We’re keeping several national breweries in business.”

Candler declined, thanking her again.

“If we get real fancy,” she said, “we’ll order pizza. Everybody likes pizza.”

This time he merely smiled and waved before going to his car and tugging at its cover. He took his time, folding it carefully. He was grateful today for the task.

The thought did not fully form itself until he was behind the wheel, the engine humming softly. Karly had said that the man with whom she lived had folded sheets with her. He knew how to make a pizza. No fucking way that was the trucker. Yet someone lived with her.

The drive to Lantana Avenue would take only a handful of minutes. On the way, he passed the Fish Out of Water Saloon. A line of people stood outside the door. Happy hour, he thought. Happy hour in a blackened room.

Maura saw no good reason for the requirement of letter writing, but she trusted Barnstone and didn’t want to lose the few privileges she possessed. She sat at a lunch table trying to explain to her big sister why she liked the looks of the Onyx Rehab cafeteria, which was gray and white in alternating horizontal lines. The chairs were padded and movable, half of them the same shade of gray as the wall, and the other half, the same white. The colors made her think of the ocean, a fact that made no sense, but it was true, and letters didn’t have to make sense.

Dinner was over, but she stayed in the cafeteria to avoid Rhine, who was pursuing her. He lived off-campus and had no access to the cafeteria and the place was probably expensive, as they advertised the fresh, organic quality of the chow. She had seated herself with some of the Danker girls to listen to their general unhappiness, their attacks on their counselors, their parents. Silence was hardly her thing, but she was in the mood to be quiet. It was a celebratory silence, and the last thing she wanted was to have it cut short by Bellamy Buttfuck Rhine.

Mick had gone to his counseling session after lunch, as he always did, and he did not return. Instead, Karly was called out to join him. She came back after an hour or so, but Mick never made it back. Billy Atlas took a call in the office and spoke on the phone for a long time.

“What did they say about him?” Maura asked. “What’s wrong?”

“Don’t you worry,” Billy told her, taking Mick’s place in the assembly line, “I’ll cover his losses.” He was nowhere near as fast as Mick, but Maura liked that he was helping out. It meant that he expected Mick back.

“What happened?” She took Billy’s arm and shook it. “What’s wrong with Mick?”

Billy displayed his huge teeth, a wacky wide grin, and she knew he would give her the goods. He was the kind of man for whom secrets were a burden. Her father was like that, and she decided she would always like Billy Atlas. Whatever benefit of the doubt she had to grant him, she would. Even if he didn’t come through with what happened to Mick, she wouldn’t be upset with Billy. At the same time, she remained confident he would spill his guts.

As for Billy, he had never been able to say no to a woman. “See, Mick and Karly were talking to Jimmy, and I guess Mick didn’t like what he heard, and kinda lost it.”

Maura was not the only one listening. Rhine asked, “What did he lose, Mr. Billy Atlas?”

“It’s just Billy,” he said and shrugged. “Mr. Atlas, that’s my dad.”

“Mr. Billy Atlas,” Alonso said.

“Mick flipped out, happens to everybody.”

“Who is Jimmy?” Rhine persisted.

“Jimmy Candler is Mick’s guy,” Billy said. “His counselor.”

“Mr. James Candler,” Alonso said.

“What happened in there?” Maura demanded, but Karly was examining a spider box in that way she had and didn’t seem to hear. Maura whisked past Billy and yanked Karly by the arm. “What happened to Mick?” she demanded and everybody but Vex stopped folding boxes.

“Let’s not start jerking people’s arms,” Billy said.

“Mick’s my friend,” Karly said.

“What did you do to him?”

“We met with Mr. James Candler,” she said. “I did a test and Mick did a test in the office. It made him cry. It’s sad to see people cry.”

“There was a misunderstanding,” Billy said. “We need to all get back to work.”

“They’re
not
getting married!” Maura said. “Karly, Karly,
Karly!
” Karly looked up, startled.

“Did you tell them you’re not getting married? That you and Mick are not getting married?”

Karly smiled. “Everybody knows that,” she said. “If anybody asks, I’m not married at all, right, Billy?”

“Let’s just get back to work,” he said.

Maura plowed through ninety-three boxes in the final hour of the day, the fastest she had ever worked. Mick and Karly were
kaput,
she told herself, her fingers like tiny, independent creatures that knew just what to do with the cardboard, as if they were making nests, saving up pantyhose for the winter.

Rhine must have understood the same thing, must have seen that Karly was now open season, not that the dickface had a ghost of a chance. Maybe she, Maura, didn’t have a chance with Mick, either. Maybe she was as flaky and hopeless as Rhine, both of them pining after people who were out of their league. She didn’t want to think about that. She wanted to be happy with the news. Inexplicably, the report had the opposite effect on Rhine. He became frustrated with the boxes, tearing two of them, which earned him a demerit: tear two boxes and you had to forfeit one that you’d packed. Rhine’s face turned the red of ripe tomatoes, and he said, “Something is really bothering me.”

“Let’s say I tore that one,” Billy Atlas put in. “No point in losing any credit, right? Power to the people. Support the workingman.”

When it was time to leave, Rhine tried to pull Maura aside. “I have to tell you what I’m feeling, Maura. Maura, I have to share something, Maura.”

Maura leaned down to him. He smelled bad. She had never noticed that about him before. He stank like milk that had turned. The guy gave her the creeps. She was
not
like him.
Nothing
like him. “I already know what you’re feeling,” she said, “and here’s my broadcast for the day: we’re not the same, me and you. Hear me? I’m not like you.”

“I have to share something, Maura,” he went on, but she turned from him and zipped out to the parking lot where she boarded the van.

Rhine followed her. He rode his scooter to the workshop and was not permitted in the van, but he tapped on her window. He had to reach up to do it, and when Maura gazed down at him there was something about the part of his hair, the perfect part, the joint of flesh visible beneath it, that almost made her relent, but her desire to separate herself from the diminutive burp was greater. She moved to the other side of the van. When he raced around to that side, she returned to her original seat. He did not give up, and she continued switching places until the van pulled away, leaving Rhine sweating in the parking lot gravel.

During dinner, she spotted him again, circling the cafeteria, plastering his face to the glass. She lowered her head, ate her soup and celery and carrot sticks, pleased to witness his distress from a safe distance. He waited at the door for her, which was why she took a pen and pad of stationery from her purse, and she remained in the cafeteria to write her big sister.

She was exaggerating, but why not? She might as well make it interesting. She wanted to call him a
buttface sheepherder,
that was the term that sprang to her profane mind, but Barnstone forbade nasty language in the letters.

She wanted to tell her sister something else, something she couldn’t write, something she might not be able to put into words. It had taken her a month to admit it: leaving the dorm—sneaking out to Alonso’s—had been a mistake. Could she explain how this simple statement, which must be obvious to everyone else, shocked her? Sneaking out had shown bad judgment, had taught her that she was still a dumb-fuck.
You have to be honest with yourself,
Barnstone had said.
Not hypercritical and not rationalizing, but genuinely honest. Otherwise, you’re playing yourself for a chump.
She couldn’t tell her sister this without acknowledging her illicit acts, and such an admission would make its way back to the Center—her fucking mother would see to it—and dump her back in Cagin Dorm with its crazy precautions and no chance of continuing at the sheltered workshop, of seeing Mick. She couldn’t tell anyone but herself. Okay, okay:
maybe there were reasons for the rules.
She took a deep breath and shook her head, as if in amazement.

When she was sure the coast was clear, she went to her dorm, setting a fast pace, making it safely. No sign of the nitwit. She dropped off the letter at the front desk, where the Sinatra guy smiled and noted it in some file. “Consider it mailed,” he said. Such a friendly man. His name tag read
Castro.
No first name. Castro whose daughter sang “Summer Wind,” Castro who listened to the same crap song a thousand times so he and his daughter could harmonize. “Thanks,” she said to him, showing all her teeth and patting his hand on the desk.

She went to her room and did her exercises. She showered and put on the pajamas her mother had sent her. They were white with tiny blue flowers, but what Maura liked about them was their size: they were far too big. Her mother had no idea, thought she was still piggly-wiggly. She didn’t have Mick’s home number or she might have called him. It was probably better to wait out the weekend, though, give him time to get through the worst of it. Instead, she called Billy Atlas. He had given out his cell number to everyone.

“Hey, Maura,” he said, almost as if he was expecting her call. “Zup?”

She told him she wanted to know more about Mick.

“People in my position can’t talk about clients.”

“He’s my friend. Be human.” She wheedled another thirty or so seconds, ending with: “I thought you were cool. Don’t be like this.”

“You keep a secret?” He confirmed that Mick was under the impression that Karly was going to marry him. Karly had misunderstood.

“Bullshit,” Maura said. “A blind dog could have seen how Mick felt about her. She dumped him for somebody.”

“Well,” Billy said. “It could be that she’s living with someone. She needs living help.”

“Girls like her always have guys hanging around.”

“Girls like her are usually living with or married to some architect or rugby player,” Billy said, “or going out with some lawyer in New York or some guy whose old man owns Hawaii or something. But Karly—”

“Fuck a duck,” Maura replied. “He’s better off without her.”

Billy Atlas started telling her the story about having a vision while on peyote, but she cut him off and told him about dating Skinner and how one time they took acid and rode around town all night in a city bus. “We were convinced that we’d got on the wrong bus and it had taken us to some city we didn’t know. Nothing looked familiar.”

“Cool,” Billy Atlas said, and then he said, “Someone’s at the door. Gotta go.”

Maura sat on her bed, wondering what to do next. She thought about going downstairs to watch television or talk to some of the girls, but she’d have to get dressed and pretend to care about their lives. She decided to read instead, but the words kept moving around on the page. Mick was not marrying Karly, and even the printed words on anonymous sheets of paper could not be held in check.

This time when he parked on Lantana Avenue, he did not hide. He had not caused an accident on the way over. Though he stumbled on the curb, he went directly to Karly’s door.

Billy Atlas answered the door in a white T-shirt, boxer shorts, and white socks, his cell phone in his hand. He opened the door only an inch until he recognized Candler, and then he threw it open. “Jimmy!” He displayed all of his too-big teeth. “Come on in.”

“What are you doing here?” Candler asked. He eyed the boxers. “What have you done?”

Billy lifted his hand to display a gold band. “I’ve gotten married.” Candler could not speak.

Billy turned his head to call out, “Darlin’? You dressed?”

Candler backed carefully to the edge of the porch.

“Don’t be upset,” Billy said. “We wanted you at the wedding, but it was a spur of the moment thing. I almost told you about it at lunch, but you’ve got too much on your plate right now, and until last night Karly and I hadn’t even told our parents. We were on the phone till eleven. I think we’ll have a big party or something in the fall.”

Candler said nothing.

Karly appeared in jeans and a bra. “It’s Mr. James Candler,” she said. “Hi, Mr. James Candler.” She looked down at her bare feet. “I should put on more clothes.”

Billy agreed and she laughed as she trotted down the hallway. He turned back, smiling. “We were just getting cleaned up to go out to eat. Want to join us? Karly makes me shower after work. She has a charming way of suggesting it. She says, ‘Billy Atlas, you smell funny.’ ” He laughed. “I don’t wear the ring at work. Don’t worry. We’re keeping it all on the down low.”

“She’s mentally impaired,” Candler said, “and you’re her workshop supervisor.”

Billy nodded seriously. “That’s why it’s gotta be hush-hush. I figure by the fall, Karly will be on at the factory, and we can tell everyone.”