A Song for Carmine Read online

  * * *

  The day the hospital tells us Pa is better off at home, that there’s not much to be done at this point, that the machine will help him breathe and we should make things as easy as possible for him, we sign a pink piece of paper and take him home. It takes more to sign a marketing deal, I think, than it does to deliver news like this.

  My mind drifts to other things late that night. I can’t get that girl off my mind, the Buckhead T-shirt she was wearing and the smart smile, her long legs, the energy circulating around her, even the way she walked away from me.

  I toss and turn in the twin bed and think of her again. The left side of my brain tries to remind me of blondes and blue eyes, but the right, the soft and tender cerebellum of mine, remembers every detail about her, the mixture of lust and confusion I felt.

  I can hear Ma out in the kitchen, smell the cigarette smoke lingering in the morning, feel the living room light pushing in under my door. It’s a weird feeling, preparing for death, an ending. The hospice nurse tells Ma and me it’s our job to keep him comfortable, but I am not sure what exactly that means.

  I pull on some clothes and step out of my room. I pass Pa’s room and hear him cough, feel the vibration of his oxygen machine, keep going, head toward the coffeepot in the kitchen.

  “How he’s doing, Ma?”

  She’s sitting at the table sewing some buttons on one of Pa’s pajama shirts; she runs her hand up and down its crease as she goes.

  I pull up a chair beside her and sip my coffee slowly. It’s barely past six in the morning; I’ve only been asleep a few hours.

  “I don’t know. I don’t know. Your pa, he’s a fighter and he ain’t done fighting yet, but I don’t think it will be much longer. He knows he can’t win this one. He don’t even really want to.” She cuts the thread and ties the final knot before folding the shirt up and moving on to another, a baby blue one, thin from laundry; it’s been pressed and starched.

  “He always did like a good fight, didn’t he?” I take another sip of my coffee and look at her softly, my eyes turned in. “You know what I mean, Ma.”

  She stops sewing for a minute and looks at me, like she’s looking directly at my bones, past me, deeper and at something she doesn’t know much about anymore but is familiar still, pulling, like a tree knows its own branches.

  “Yeah, I know what you mean.” She gets up and refills both our cups and tells me that hospice has put him on morphine and that he’ll probably sleep more and more and that there are other things to expect, like confusion and dementia and emotional effects; it might be different every day.

  “If you’ve got anything to say to your old pa, you’d better say it soon, son.” She folds the last shirt and gets up from the table.

  I’m listening, trying to connect with her words, but they all seem to be disconnected, just things people say at times like this.

  “I’m real glad you’re here, Carmine; we need to be together. We need to remember the good.” She pushes her thick hand across the table to me and rests it on top of my own. I feel the calluses on her fingertips, remember them on my back as she washed me in the tub, the way she used to pull my tube socks up way high and hold my hand as we crossed the street.

  “Yeah,” I say, leaning my head to one side, squinting my eyes but meeting hers. I rinse my cup and then head out the front door again.

  * * *

  I walk and walk, end up in corners of town I’ve never seen, stare in shop windows full of antiques, a bakery selling nothing but cupcakes, a kids’ dance school. My legs feel hot and I try not to think much, but something about the morning air, the golden sun peeking through the sky, makes me remember being in the fifth grade, gangly and hot, gentle and kind. It’s the special thing all kids have—until life squashes it.

  The end of the year had come around, and the school was holding its annual science fair. I had built a volcano out of hobby-store clay and inside had mixed together something lethal enough to get smoke to rise up its crooked sides. I spent hours on it in the kitchen each night, and I could feel Ma’s and Pa’s soft eyes on me, gentle and approving, quiet for once.

  I remember that on this day, I thought of nothing but that brown clay in my hands, the anticipation of getting that smoke to billow out for me, the thought that Pa might want to help, that life could be something other than Jesus and guilt and fighting for redemption.

  That volcano, as I birthed it, sat on the kitchen table for weeks. We ate dinner around it, our plates hitting the outside edges of the cardboard it sat on. I thought of it when I went to sleep at night; it was the first thing I went to in the morning, it was my creation, something completely within my control, and I felt connected to it. I finally had some power in the world.

  My mind will only allow me to remember bits and pieces of the rest, mostly because I don’t want to: Pa drunk, me falling asleep at the kitchen table, Ma crying in the living room, a hump of clay on the floor, so many nights ending up in rotten fights.

  When my eyes opened the next morning, I thought of the hump of clay on the floor and about how Pa never loved anything or cared about anything but Jesus and how I never knew how he was gonna get us to heaven that way.

  When I got to the kitchen that morning, my volcano sat almost exactly as I’d molded it, except at the edges, along its slopes, were Pa’s fingerprints, crooked but smooth and wide. Ma was in the living room chair smoking, quiet, but I could see her looking my way out of the corner of her eye.

  “Ma, Pa fixed my volcano, do you see it? Ma, my volcano is right there. I get to go to the fair.”

  She nodded to me from the dark living room and smiled.

  I carried that volcano, on its precarious cardboard foundation, all the way to school that day. The morning was cool and damp, and the sun squeezed itself through the tall pines in Eton and I felt proud, the mountains in the distance hovering over me protectively. My chest swelled and my pride knocked the chill out of the air, and it was enough to have this one thing.

  Later that afternoon, the science fair opened, and awards were announced; my belly was full, I didn’t want anything more. But here’s the thing: I won that science fair—the whole big thing. When they announced my name, hands began to clap loudly from the group of parents standing in the corner of my school’s gymnasium. I wasn’t expecting it, but I recognized those hands.

  When I stood up, I caught my first glimpse of Pa, his hands stretched above him, clapping, watching my volcano as it was wheeled to the front of the room. He looked around the room for me, but I stayed still, looking down at the tops of my shoes. I was so afraid of moving, of jolting the moment out of its place in time. He came up, stood next to me, behind that volcano, his hand on my shoulder, and while the cameras flashed and the applause continued, he looked at me and said, “You did good, Carmine, real good.”

  We stood in front of the volcano while the ribbon was placed on me, and I can still remember the heat of Pa’s hand on my shoulder, the sound of the applause, even the feel of that cold clay.

  * * *

  When I make it to good old Preacher Stanley again, I can’t help but smile like I’m that good boy again. I take a Styrofoam cup from the lobby, fill it up with coffee, head down the hall to his office, and sit down and wait. I’ve got a lot of work to do.

  CHAPTER 12

  THE DRIVE FROM ETON to Atlanta is for the most part uneventful, but the road rises and falls to meet you and there’s a softness to the hills; they change from green to blue to orange and then there are trees and pavement and billboards and all the stuff you see most anywhere, somehow bright and natural and terrible all at the same time.

  I am driving the old pickup truck, and I have to open my arms wide to grip the big white steering wheel, just like Ma does. I can see her fingerprints at the edges, small and pointed; her grip is stronger than I thought.

  I hear its roar and feel its uncomfortable vibration, smell the dusty vinyl and remember riding to school in this thing. Sometimes after school Pa’
d take me to deliver a piece of furniture, we’d pick up a cold Coke at a diner, and sit for a while. Times like these he’d say nothing, look in the distance beyond me; I wondered where and who he was. Pretty soon he’d come back to the Bible and that was the end of it; the space between us had to change.

  The engine drags on and the wing window that won’t close all the way whistles to me as I drive. I’m already imagining the ill-placement of this woman on that dirty stage, how she’ll be smiling but how the backs of her eyes will probably be crying the way they were the other night, a reflection. I wonder if I can tell her anything she doesn’t already know.

  My focus is singular at this point, even if it is not completely clear: I just have to know her. If I can get her name tonight, if I can get her to speak to me without a songbook in her hand, I know we can go from there.

  I drive, and I think. I remember my talk with Pastor Stanley.

  “When we choose to forgive, we choose to lay aside our right to extract our revenge. In the moment of making that decision, we choose God, we choose peace, and the path of forgiveness is shown to us.”

  He stood up and grabbed a stone mug off the table and sipped it, one leg over the other; he smiled at me gently, like he always does. Down the hall, I heard the pans bang and the women talk. “When we take this step and try to forgive someone, we begin to find reasons for our hearts to turn toward mercy instead of malice.”

  I held very still and watched his soft pink lips move. I’ve been running and gunning my whole life, the world full of monsters; I have never thought about more than the woman or the buck in front of me. I don’t know if I can see Pa as just a man with a pulse, an old guy with cancer, much less myself.

  “The problem with forgiveness, you see, is not being able to forgive ourselves. When we choose not to forgive ourselves, the consequence is a destructive and hateful path. It’s that simple.”

  At the Shack, the parking lot is full, but I somehow know she’s folded in the walls of the building, I feel it so clearly, in the nerves of my arms and legs, in the buzz in my head. What am I doing here? I’ve never chased a woman—and a black one at that! I sit for another long minute before going in.

  The club is as it was before, unrestrained and vacant, full of lights and colors and agendas. I find a table in the corner, near the stage, and wait. I order a plain Coke and search the room for her, imagine what I’ll say, what I am really feeling, remember how I’ve picked up every other woman in my life, and wonder if any of it is important. Will she feel the old hate in my bones? Know that even though I’ve never even befriended a black person that I somehow know we have something to offer each other?

  When she comes out from behind the stage, I am startled by the tenderness I feel within me; uncomfortable with it, I look away from her just as it seems she might be recognizing me. She introduces herself as Z, and her eyes gloss over, as though she’s somewhere else. I don’t want to, but I wave the waitress down and order a shot of tequila. It feels smooth sliding down the back of my throat, and when I look at her through the cloud of smoke in the room, I feel better, my upper hand assuring me that she can’t hurt me.

  The rest of the evening comes easier to me. I drink a lot, feel my old suit hanging on my old bones, watch her and pretend she is a work of art I might want to buy, an investment. I study her colors and the depth of her lines; I work the room.

  “Why do you come here?” I ask the light-haired girl with long, full legs and small ears sitting next to me. She leans across the table toward me; I can feel her need to conquer me.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Z’s braids sliding across her breasts, the twist of curl at the ends, her arms strong as she carries a tray of drinks to a table.

  “I don’t know; I guess the same reason everyone else does, to have fun.” She looks around the room vacantly; her eyes are so blue and so young, and without imagining it, I think about taking her home, remember the nurse from a few weeks ago.

  “Why do you come here?” she asks as she gets up, now on her feet, moving her hips back and forth to the DJ’s drum. I smile and look at her for a long time before I answer her because she thinks she has me, and in a way she does, the old skin enveloping me, but sliding off, the way a snake gets rid of its scales.

  “I’m looking for someone.” I head to the bar to sober up and figure out how to approach Z without sounding too heavy or too light or as though I have an agenda, some making-up to do, or like the man I’ve always been and the hundreds she sees each night.

  The girl heads to the dance floor and finds a set of arms to climb into. I order another drink and chew on the ice slowly.

  For the last hour of the night, I sit and wait and watch her. I let my mind wander away at times and think of my mother at home or about odd career paths like becoming a race car driver or what squash blossoms taste like and if I could actually change the oil in the old truck.

  When the music stops and the white lights come on, giving everyone a tired glow, I know I’ll need to make a move before the bouncer is throwing me out and I have to drive the long road home to Eton without a single connection to her.

  I get up from the bar and find her in the corner of the room, wiping a round table, her wood tray tucked under her arm. She breathes audibly as she pushes the towel in circles on the top of the table. Her skin is buttery and her clothes hug her, but I try not to think of her in only these terms.

  “Can I help you?” she says, her body defensive, her voice direct and wiry. But her gaze softens, her eyes squint in the light, and she recognizes me.

  I don’t know what to say. I sit there looking at her.

  “Are you lost?” She’s gone hard again. I search her face for its origin, the pain that has chafed her insides and the fire that has fringed her edges. She turns around and starts wiping the table again.

  “I’m Carmine.”

  She doesn’t turn around, but I know she’s listening by the curve of her back.

  “I’m Z and I’m outta here.” She laughs quietly and walks away from me, shaking her head, and I feel a vein of anger rise up within me. I let it pass and then I follow her.

  “Listen, I’d like to have a cup of coffee with you or take a walk or sit with you a while. Can we do that?”

  I shove my hands deeper in my pockets and try to find that old confidence, my old command of women, but I feel weak within, my parents’ child, and I can’t do anything but be there, the man with no job and the dying father, the one without a clue.

  “Guy, I appreciate the offer, but I don’t go out with men that come in here. Okay?” She removes the dirty glasses from her tray, two at a time, and sets them on the bar, then wipes her hands on the towel hanging from the apron around her waist.

  “Thanks but no thanks is what I mean.” She walks to the other end of the bar, where the cash register sits, and takes out the wad of bills from her apron pocket.

  I feel confronted and excited all of a sudden, lost in some wilderness that is not my own, searching the sky for the right direction. I remember going hunting in the green hills with a group of good ol’ boys in Dallas we were trying to sell, the ad men strange-looking in camouflage. I remember the hunt of the chase, the beauty of the animals, the fire of the shot, the chase of the sale. I never once fired my gun or managed to pitch anything on the trip; it was enough to get close to the beasts and to feel the power of sharing the earth with these animals, to know the smell of those green hills.

  She counts her money and I don’t wait for her to turn around. “See, the thing is, I feel like there are things we’ve just got to share, I just know it. It doesn’t make any sense, it doesn’t, but there’s something here.”

  The room is almost empty now, the crowd thinned to the staff and a few drunkards trying to find the door, car keys being exchanged, coats pulled from their hooks. When the door opens, there is a sea of headlights, music blaring, laughter. I want to go home.

  I move the barstool beside her and lean in to the bar near her.


  “There’s this place around the corner from here. It’s dirty and it’s cheap, but I know it’s open. Let’s share one cup of coffee.”

  She keeps counting her money and looking the other way, and I am the only person left in the bar. I put my coat on and take my keys out of my pocket.

  “I’ll go there and wait for you. I hope you’ll come.”

  When I get back to the old truck, I lean against it for a long time. I watch as the cars pull out of the parking lot and everything circles around me—thoughts, images, a slight melancholy above and below me. I feel joy in my bones and slight suspicion, the world suddenly so new and foreign.

  I wonder if she’ll come or if she’ll stay away, and I realize it doesn’t matter all that much, the curves in the road. You just have to lean with them and do your best to see them coming. Still, I crave her, long for her, feel the euphoria when I think of the possibility. It is the kind of joy that stands alone.

  I turn the engine on and travel the two blocks south to the diner on the corner, the Lenox Café, a square building hanging back from the road, bright and angular. I push the accelerator softly and pull into a parking spot, but I stay in the truck, rest my head on the steering wheel, fold my feet below me.

  It is close to four in the morning, and I don’t know how long I’ve been sitting there but I can feel the sky changing outside, the dark blue changing to a gray, the sun beginning to stretch its arms.

  I hear a car pull up beside me, its lights dimmed, see her shadow inside. I feel adrenaline hit my veins, and I am alert and awake, I can feel the stubble on my face. I pull the keys from the ignition and step out to the sidewalk to meet her, rub my hands together for electricity.

  “Hi, I’m Carmine.” I speak loudly, as though I am still at the bar, stretching my words out so that she can read my lips. I shove my hands in my pockets and smile. I can see her eyes searching mine for something, but her mouth remains closed, her body stiff.