What I Came to Tell You (26 page)

“Told her I was going to the bathroom,” he said, looking over his shoulder.

“Why don’t you dance with somebody else?” Grover asked.

“I don’t feel like it,” Sam said.

“You like Ashley,” Grover said accusingly.

“What if I do?”

“She is pretty,” Grover said. “When you subtract her personality.”

Sam saw Ashley coming toward him and darted off toward the boys’ bathroom. After a couple more waltzes, Mr. Godleski stepped up to the microphone. “Ladies and gentlemen, we’ll wind up the eighty-ninth Isaac Claxton Christmas Waltz with a special request.”

Grover made his way across the crowded gym floor in the direction of Emma Lee. The band played the melody a couple of times through and then Mr. Godleski stepped up to the microphone and started singing in his high, nasally voice.

Grover needn’t have worried about Mr. Godleski knowing the words. He sang it like he’d sang it hundreds of times before, like the words were part of him. It was a song about someone remembering the night of a dance when he lost his girlfriend to an old friend he’d introduced her to. As Mr. Godleski sang, Grover imagined Emma Lee as a little girl riding her father’s feet, squealing and laughing, while he danced her around the grandmother’s cabin. Then he thought how neither father nor daughter could’ve known what was coming to change everything. Even good memories had a sadness to them, because they were memories.

After Mr. Godleski had sung the song through one time, he
stepped back from the microphone and rejoined the band as they played through the melody again. Grover dodged through the dancing couples but didn’t see Emma Lee anywhere. He was running out of time. The song would be over before he could get to her. Someone tapped him on the shoulder. Emma Lee held out her arms and they began to waltz. As they danced around the gym floor, Grover saw her eyes were glistening.

“Thank you,” she said.

They danced around the gym floor, having to go much slower with all the couples crowding the floor. Mr. Godleski stepped up to the microphone and sang the song again. This time, he sang it a little slower, a little sadder, and Grover thought it was one of the most beautiful songs he’d ever heard. As Mr. Godleski sang the words,
Now I know just how much I have lost
, Grover looked into Emma Lee’s eyes, thinking about this girl who, after the Christmas Waltz, would be gone. But the dancing didn’t let him stay in his head. The weight of Emma Lee in his arms as they circled the floor, the press of her back against his hand, the warmth of her other hand in his, all kept him firmly in the gym. Moving across the crowded floor, Grover felt more with her than he’d ever felt.

“What wonderful music.” Mrs. Dillingham had climbed on stage and was speaking into the microphone. “Please join me in giving Buncombe Turnpike a hand.” The gym thundered with applause and whistles as Mr. Godleski and the other men bowed.

Grover and Emma Lee stood looking at each other. Then they started out of the gym together and into the lobby, where parents were waiting to pick up their kids.

“Doesn’t Sis look like a movie star?” Clay said, coming up.

“There they are.” Leila gave Grover a hug. “Don’t you look handsome?”

“How’s the Bamboo Forest?” Clay asked. “Any new weavings?”

“A few,” Grover said.

“A few?” Sudie’d walked in with their father. “He’s made a whole hallway.”

Sudie and Clay moved off by themselves, talking a mile a minute.

Their father talked to several parents in the crowd and then made his way over to them. Their father stopped smiling when he saw Leila, and Leila did the same.

“I didn’t know y’all were coming,” their father said to Leila.

“Emma Lee promised Grover,” Leila said.

“It’s good to see you,” their father said to Leila.

“Sorry we missed y’all when you came up to Roan Mountain,” she said.

“We were already up that way getting a tree,” his father said.

“You’ll have to bring the kids up again,” Leila said. “Maybe they could spend a night with us.” Leila looked at their father, then looked away. “Well, I guess we better get on back up the mountain.”

“Right,” his father said.

“Could we go for hot chocolate?” Clay asked.

“I’ve got to get up pretty early tomorrow,” Leila said.

“Come on, Mama,” Clay said. “Can’t we visit a little bit?”

“I’m not even sure where we could get hot chocolate this time of night,” their father said.

“Bean Streets,” Sudie said.

“What do you think, Leila?” their father asked.

Leila glanced at Clay and Emma Lee, then looked back at their father. “Oh, I guess it wouldn’t hurt to get back a little later.”

“Yes,” Clay said.

“But we can’t stay long,” she said.

They started out the front door but Emma Lee stopped. “My coat.”

“I’ll get it.” Grover trotted back into the gym. Most of the kids were gone. Miss Snyder, Mrs. Dillingham and a couple of teachers were carrying food and punch back to the kitchen. Mr. Godleski and his band were packing up. Grover found Emma Lee’s coat draped over the same chair he’d put it on. He was heading back when he spotted Sam leaning against the wall.

“Where’s Ashley?” Grover asked.

Sam nodded toward the girls’ restroom. “She went in there with a couple of her friends. What all do girls do in the restroom anyway?”

Grover shrugged.

“I can’t believe Emma Lee came all the way down from Bakersville to dance with you,” Sam said. “I saw you dance with Mira a couple of times too. You danced with the two prettiest girls in the whole place.” Sam nodded at the coat in Grover’s hands. “That’s Emma Lee’s, isn’t it?”

“We’re going to Bean Streets with her family,” Grover said.

Sam put his hand on Grover’s shoulder. “When it comes to advice about girls, next time
I’m
coming to
you
.”

They heard girls’ voices coming out of the bathroom.

“Uh-oh,” Sam said.

“See you later,” Grover said.

“Have fun for the both of us,” Sam called after him.

Just before the gym door closed after him, Grover heard Ashley say, “What was
that
supposed to mean, Sam? Don’t you have fun with me? You
better
have fun with me.…”

Bean Streets was so crowded that after they got their hot chocolates they had to wait for tables to clear. A good many people were dressed up like they’d been to a concert or a play. Some Claxton kids from the Christmas Waltz were there with their parents. Then there were the usual hippie-ish tattooed dreadlocked quasi street people, whose dogs, tied up outside, pawed at the window.

Grover couldn’t walk into Bean Streets anymore without checking for Matthew. In fact he couldn’t go by Riverside or ride the bus downtown or even walk down his street without checking for him. He hadn’t seen him once since the night his father had told him Matthew had been the driver. It made him wonder if somehow Matthew knew he knew and was avoiding him.

“Why don’t the kids sit there,” their father said to Leila, as a table of four women got up to leave. “We can sit over there.” He pointed to a table for two by the window.

So Grover, Sudie, Emma Lee and Clay sat at their own table. Grover and Emma Lee ended up sitting in such a way that they could see their father and Leila across the room from them. Sudie
and Clay sat with their backs to their parents. The four of them talked for a while, but then Grover began watching his father and Leila, even though they were too far away to hear what they were saying. For a long time his father and Leila hadn’t talked at all. They mostly looked out the window and sipped on their hot chocolate.

“We miss y’all,” Sudie said. “The neighborhood isn’t the same.”

“Nothing against Bakersville,” Clay said. “Just feels kind of on the slow side after living in Asheville. Doesn’t it, Sis?”

Emma Lee nodded but was also keeping an eye on Leila and their father, who talked some now but didn’t smile.

“I’m a city boy at heart,” Clay said, looking around at all the people in Bean Streets.

Grover and Emma Lee glanced at each other. Something was being decided in the conversation between their parents. Leila’s eyes had reddened and their father looked down, tracing his finger around his cup. The more he watched them not talking, not smiling, not offering the least glimmer of hope, the angrier Grover felt.

“Mr. Lunsford says he’s cutting down the Bamboo Forest,” Sudie said.

“He can’t do that,” Clay said.

“Daddy says it’s his land and he can do what he wants to with it.”

“Grover,” Emma Lee said.

Grover looked away from their parents and tried to focus on Emma Lee.

“You didn’t tell me about Mr. Lunsford,” Emma Lee said.

“What’s there to tell?” Grover said, trying to hold back the anger in his words.

“I’m your friend,” Emma Lee said.

“So?” Grover said, feeling his face heat up.

“I’d want to know something like that,” she said.

“It’s the end of everything, okay?!” Grover said, hearing himself shout. “It’s the end of everything and there’s nothing you or anybody else can do about it!”

Bean Streets grew quiet, except for a couple of the street people who laughed about something. Grover ran out the front door and started down Biltmore Avenue, hands thrust deep in his coat pockets.

“Grover!” his father called. Grover heard footsteps come up beside him. Then he felt a hand on his shoulder, stopping him. “What in the world was that all about?” his father said, catching his breath.

Grover shook his head and started walking again. His father followed after him, walking along beside him. “Did Emma Lee say something? Or Clay?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Grover said.

“Was it something I did?” his father asked.

Grover stopped. “I don’t know what it is. All I know is that for a little while tonight everything was okay. In fact, everything was really good, and then all of the sudden everything wasn’t. And talking about it won’t help!” Grover said, and started walking again. “Talking about things just makes them worse.”

His father walked with Grover, but didn’t say anything else. As they walked through downtown, Grover was vaguely aware of the brightly colored lights outlining buildings and hanging in storefronts. Christmas decorations made him feel left out.

“Daddy,” Grover said, “if you like Leila, then do something about it.”

They walked along for a little bit.

“Isn’t it too soon?” their father asked.

“It’ll always be too soon,” Grover said.

“Won’t it be strange for you and Sudie?” their father asked.

“Of course,” Grover said.

After they’d walked three or four blocks, Grover began to calm down. He remembered his sister. “Where’s Sudie?”

“The Roundtrees were going to drop her by Jessie’s on their way back up the mountain,” he said.

Grover felt foolish for ending the evening the way he had. The Roundtrees had gone back up the mountain, probably for good, and he hadn’t even said good-bye. By the time Grover and his father walked across downtown, Grover felt too tired to be upset. His father must’ve sensed the change, because when they turned a corner and found a city bus idling there with the door open, his father put his hand on Grover’s shoulder and said, “How about we ride the rest of the way home?”

Cold and tired, Grover nodded, and together they climbed into the light and the warmth of the bus. They were the only passengers.

His father dropped change into the change counter. Grover
always liked the sound of the coins tinkling against the glass. They sat a couple of seats behind the driver, a gray-haired man. The driver closed the door and pulled out into traffic.

After a while the bus driver looked up at them in his rearview mirror and said, “How y’all tonight?”

“Better,” his father said, “now that we’re on your bus and out of the cold.” He patted Grover’s knee.

“I know that’s right,” the bus driver said.

Grover yawned.

“Grover,” his father said, “I want you to know that you don’t ever have to take care of me. At least till it’s time for the old folks home.”

“Okay, Daddy,” he said. As if all the night’s events suddenly caught up with him, Grover felt exhausted. The bus rounded a corner, leaning him against his father. But even when the bus straightened out, he let his head stay on his father’s shoulder.

S
aturday, Grover spent all all morning in his workshop, remembering his father’s warning to check for Mr. Lunsford’s car. As usual, Sudie had come with him and was a lookout. Mr. Lunsford hadn’t returned to the Bamboo Forest, at least as far as Grover could tell. Jessie, who’d come down a couple of times to walk through the hallway again, said Mr. Lunsford had always been a little afraid of their father.

Grover had continued to work hard, knowing it was only a matter of time—weeks or even days before Mr. Lunsford had the Bamboo Forest leveled. He felt like the man in “The Pit and the Pendulum,” a story that Mrs. Caswell had had them read. The blade lowering, getting closer and closer. He could almost hear it. Wanting to make the most of the time he had left, he’d been working on his biggest weaving yet. Twelve feet wide and seven feet tall. The size of a small billboard. He’d had to a haul a stepladder into the Bamboo Forest to be able to weave in limbs high enough.

At lunchtime Sudie brought him a peanut butter and honey sandwich so he could keep working. After lunch Grover had just gotten started back working on the big weaving when Sudie called to him. “Someone’s coming.”

Grover started down the ladder.

“Never mind,” Sudie called. “It’s just Jessie.”

Grover climbed back up the ladder.

“But he’s bringing some people with him,” Sudie called.

Grover jumped down off the ladder and ran to where Sudie sat on a rock, looking through their father’s birding binoculars.

“You’re never going to believe this!” She handed him the binoculars and when he finally focused on the group, he saw that Jessie was leading Mrs. Caswell, Miss Snyder and Mrs. Dillingham straight to the Bamboo Forest.