Roadside Bodhisattva Part 15

He came in just as I was spreading grape jelly over my last piece of toast.

"If it isnt Rip van Winkle! I thought Id have to sleep rough outside, what with all those snores you were putting out."

"Just because youre some kind of superhuman guy who doesnt ever need to rest more than a couple of hours every night, doesnt mean were all so lucky. I was beat. And besides, what else was I gonna do but sleep? Everyone split on me. And you can forget the snoring joke. I fell for the farting gag once before, but you wont catch me twice."

"The mark of a wise man." Sid swung onto a stool and Sonny set a cup of coffee down at his place. Just then a battered old school bus pulled up outside and beeped its horn. All the new guys hurried to gulp down their last bits of breakfast, then rushed outside. They piled onto the bus, and it pulled away.

"Whats their story?"

"You just met the new long-term lodgers at Deer Park. Theyre migrant workers who come up here early in the growing season to work on the farms. Lettuce, potatoes, apple orchards. They do all the grunt work. Most of em live in pretty shabby conditions, in shacks and trailers provided by the farm owners. Theyre trying to save up everything they earn to send back home. Even so, they end up spending a lot. The owners charge through the nose for everything. Anyhow, I found a dozen guys who were the worst off of them all. They were sleeping under bushes and cooking over open fires. Just no room at the inn for em. So I told them about the cottages here, quoted them a rate that seemed fair to them, which even included breakfast. Two to a cottage was all Id allow, although they wanted to cram in more when they heard how reasonable the rent was. Got the farm owners to provide transportation on the cheap every morning and night. Now, Ann is guaranteed one-hundred-percent occupancy for about six months of every year. Her incomes gonna double or triple on those units. No more fly-by-night Peyton Place stuff that leaves half the cabins empty half the time. Shes set for at least six months of the year. In the winter, the lovebirds can take over again. Along with the extra dough the increased trade at the Diner is bringing in, Ann shouldnt have any money worries anymore."

"Pretty smart. I guess those beaners are good for something then."

Sid lowered his coffee cup like it was a bottle of nitroglycerin. "What did you call those men?"

"I, uh-its just a word kids used to use at school-"

Sids face looked like a rigid mask of one of those angry Tibetan deities my folks used have posters of. He leaned forward until this scary wooden mask was about three inches away from me.

"Dont ever let me catch that lousy slur coming out of your mouth one more time, even by accident, Kid. These men are not 'beaners or 'wetbacks or 'burros, understand? Theyre people like you or me, caught in some tough circ.u.mstances, doing the best they can. I think youve got a good heart and a good head on your shoulders. In fact, I know it. And I know you didnt mean any harm by that dumba.s.s remark. But some words are hard to retract, once theyre loose. And the last thing we need at Deer Park is tension among all the folks who have to live here. You got me?"

"Uh, sure, Sid. I didnt mean-well, Im sorry, thats all."

Sid pulled back from me with an honest and instant smile. Thats how he was, like the weather or a cat or the ocean. One minute one way, the next minute totally changed, with no signs to show things had ever been different.

"Kid, so long as you can learn and apologize, you are okay in my book."

Yasmine seemed down pretty much all the time lately, and for some reason her sadness got to me. Out of all the people at Deer Park, she was the one I would have said meant the least to me. Oh, sure, she had been a little more pleasant, a little more open, since she had had that sloppy breakdown in front of me. And she had scored some major points with me by standing up to suv guy and making him look like even more of a wuss than he was. But I never felt I had ever really gotten too deep past the tough front she put up for everyone. And every now and then, Id still get digs about my "wasteful" habits, or have to listen to these boring speeches about how the whole world could be improved if everyone would just do what Yasmine did. So when you factor everything together, there was really no reason why I should have let Yasmines gloomy silence about her mothers troubles bother me. But it did.

Oh, sure, maybe her being a hot chick had something to do with my interest. Sue wasnt falling all over herself to enlist me as her new boyfriend, even though she had apparently dumped Jayzee, and for all I knew she was getting it on with this guy Bruno. So it was easy enough for my mind to wander toward an actual babe I worked side by side with. But Yasmine was close enough to almost twice my age, I figured, that me hooking up with her was about as likely as Sid stocking the juke box with decent music. So I could rule that angle out pretty honestly. No, what really got to me was the picture of Yasmine hanging out hour after hour at the hospital with her sick mother, then going home alone to eat cold tofu or some other horrible good-for-you California gunk.

So one afternoon, as Yasmine was handing me my share of her tips, I said, "Uh, Yasmine, you going to visit your mom now?"

Yasmines face scrunched up. "Yeah."

"Hows she doing?"

"Not so good."

I waited for her to say more, but she didnt, so I said, "Want some company?"

She reacted like Id slugged her. "Company? At the hospital? Who? You?"

"Sure, why not?"

Yasmine studied me like I had just landed from Mars. "All right. But you know this wont be pretty."

I shrugged. "If thats the way it is, thats the way it is."

"Okay. Get in the car, Kid."

I didnt even stop to tell Sid I wouldnt be helping him with afternoon ch.o.r.es. It felt like Yasmine was only barely accepting my offer, and maybe if I stepped away for even a minute shed drive off without me.

I didnt have to say much on the ride to the hospital in her putt-putting junker. Yasmine talked more than ever before, about her mother, about growing up in California, about how she hated the East Coast. She talked about California the same way my folks talked about various Buddhist paradises, like the Pure Land.

Just as we were pulling into the hospital parking lot, Yasmine said, "Kid, you know about my moms past, dont you? How she got sick?"

There was no point in lying, but I discovered I couldnt actually come right out and say the whole truth. "Your mother, she was, um, an actress-"

"She was a p.o.r.n star, Kid, a very minor one. And she picked up aids before the latest drugs came out. So by the time treatments got sophisticated, she had already suffered a lot of damage. Still, thanks to a really good doctor here, shes had some decent years since then. Thats one good thing Ill give you about the East Coast. Plenty of medical experts. But now shes on the way out." "Thats rough."

"On her? Shes got a good att.i.tude, no regrets-"

"No, I meant on you."

Yasmine didnt say anything to that.

I had never really been in a hospital before. It smelled weird, and the lights were too sharp, and either people were waiting motionless like theyd be there forever, or they were rus.h.i.+ng around like they had a dozen important places to be at once. Some of the doctors and nurses seemed real serious, others were joking like they were working in an office. It wasnt much like any hospital tv shows I had seen.

We went up to the fifth floor. Yasmine and I had to put on face masks to go into her mothers room.

Yasmines mother seemed about half the size of her daughter. Under her blankets, eyes closed, hooked up to tubes and machines, she was pretty wasted looking. Her face showed some resemblance to her daughter, but kinda like the way youd say somebodys grandmother reminded you of the newborn granddaughter. Still, my imagination let me see that Yasmines mom mustve been as s.e.xy as her daughter way back when. She still had one good feature, and that was long dark hair arranged across her pillow.

Yasmine said, "Mom, Im here," and her mother opened her eyes. Her voice was croaky. "Yasmine. You brought a friend."

"This is Kid A, Mom. Kid, this is my mother, Heather OHara."

"Please to meet you, Mrs. OHara."

"Call me Heather, Kid. And grab a seat."

I sat down. Yasmine got a hairbrush out of drawer and began gently brus.h.i.+ng her mothers hair.

"So, Kid, how do you know Yasmine?"

I explained about Deer Park. Heather closed her eyes while I talked. Eventually I ran out of stuff to say, and after a few seconds of silence, Heather opened her eyes and said, "Sounds like a nice setup. Food, friends, laughs, music, a roof over your head. What more do you need?"

I was gonna say I still wanted some of the exciting adventures I had dreamed of when I ran away from my own mother all those weeks ago, but then I decided not to contradict the sick woman.

Yasmine didnt talk a lot with her mother. It seemed like everything between them had already been said. So the three of us just sat quiet for a while, Yasmine holding her mothers hand. After about an hour Heather seemed asleep and we sc.r.a.ped our chairs back to leave. But Heather spoke.

"Yasmine, get that picture out of the drawer, please. I want your friend to have it."

"Mom, really-"

"Yes, really."

Yasmine dug in the bedstands drawer, came up with a framed color photo and handed it to me.

Heather OHara had been knock-out, drop-dead gorgeous. She was posed on some stage, wearing just her underwear and stockings and high heels, her b.o.o.bs half spilling out of her top, and holding some kind of trophy. The photo was signed "Pookie Arizona" in bright red ink.

"Thats me getting my AVN Award in nineteen-ninety-eight, my last year in the biz. 'Best Solo s.e.x Scene. The film was called-what was it called? Im not sure anymore. But maybe you could even find a tape somewhere-"

"Mom!"

Heather sighed dramatically. "Oh, Yasmine, at least let me remember when I had a body that everyone liked to look at."

Yasmine bent and kissed her mothers forehead through her surgical mask. "Ill see you tomorrow. Sleep good."

Outside in the car, I looked at the photo, then held it out to Yasmine. "Here, I dont want to cause any trouble between you and your mom. You can have this back."

"No, no, she gave it to you. Keep it."

"You sure?"

Some of Yasmines typical toughness returned to her voice. "Yes, Im sure! Thats what she wanted. Just dont go showing it around to everybody!"

"Oh, I wont. Ill put it in a safe place."

Yasmine laughed. "Like under your mattress maybe? Thats where most photos of my mother ended up."

"Well, uh-yeah, why not?"

Yasmine kept chuckling on and off all the way back to Deer Park.

Everything was going just swell at Deer Park. Everyone was happy, or, in Yasmines case, at least maintaining. Ann was rolling in dough. Sue was drawing tons more flash. Angie, I learned one day, had even gotten in touch with his brother, Anns ex, and talked for an hour on the phone. Sonny had become a regular sociable motor-mouth, always yakking about jazz. I swore he was even stuttering less. Yasmine kept making the same dumb joke to me, asking me how I was sleeping, if my mattress wasnt too b.u.mpy. The others were baffled why I always blushed like I was ten years old. Even the migrant workers seemed fat and sa.s.sy, like they didnt have a care in the world, werent busting their humps under the hot sun every day for minimum wage. And Sid bopped back and forth among his various charity cases like he was Mother Teresa or something, keeping everything humming, nudging here, propping up there, giving advice, cautions, encouragement and words of insight, whatever his super-genius dictated at the moment.

I was the exception to the big warm fuzzy scene. None of my deepest desires had gotten satisfied. n.o.body was really stroking me to insure I was all contented and stuff. No, I was practically invisible. Oh, I didnt forget that everyone had stood up for me with the suv geezer. It still felt awesome to remember that moment. But day to day, no one worried about what I wanted or if I was feeling okay. All I did was work, practically from sunup to sundown, spend a little time with Sue, then go off to hide in the trailer like some old dog while Sid kept busy with Ann.

I tried to bring this up with Sid one day. But after I had managed to get across that I was feeling kinda slighted and ignored, all I got from him in return was a fable. I felt like I was back in the temple.

"Kid, did you ever hear about the lion and the hyena? Once there was a poor man who prayed to G.o.d for some guidance in turning his life around. So G.o.d said, 'Go out in the wilderness and you will receive a sign. So the guy goes out in the jungle and the first scene he comes on is a lion tending to a wounded hyena. The lion is dragging carca.s.ses to the hyenas den so the hyena can feed on them and build his strength up. The lion is even licking the hyenas wounds. 'Excellent! the guy says. 'All I have to do is show my fellow villagers how desperate I am, and theyll shower me with charity. So he goes back to the village and lays down in the public square, trying to look as pitiful as he can. But the whole day goes by and n.o.body pays any attention to him. He just gets dustier and thirstier and hungrier. Finally, by nightfall, hes mighty p.i.s.sed, so he yells up to G.o.d, 'G.o.d, I got your sign and did what you said, but no one responded to my plight. Whats up? And G.o.d thunders back, 'You fool! I wanted you to copy the lion!"

I felt my face get hot. "Youre saying I dont really need any help, I should be helping others instead. Jesus, Sid, what else have I been doing since I got here? Cant you cut me a little slack? What about my problems?"

"Theyll only disappear when you forget about them, Kid." He went off then to tend his flowers.

I thought back after hed gone to the few hours Sid and I had actually been on the road, moving forward toward the unknown, from the moment we woke up under that big tree to the time we first spotted Deer Park. It was only a tiny period out of the past several weeks, but it stuck up bigger than all the days since. It was the essence of what I wanted. Just me and Sid tramping down some highway without a name, heading toward adventure, taking in the sights, making our way by our wits, talking about a million things. But it seemed impossible it would ever happen.

Every night I counted my money and thought about just striking out on my own. But every night I decided to wait another day, and see if maybe Sid wasnt getting a little itchy like me, and wouldnt be the first one to say, "Lets split." But it never happened, and finally one day I had had it, and decided to confront him.

Sid was messing with his flowers again, putting fresh ones in the ground all around the diner, to replace the ones that had stopped blooming. I went right up to him where he was kneeling, with a trowel in his hand, and said, "Sid, when the h.e.l.l are we getting out of here?"

He didnt stop digging, not taking me seriously, I guess, and that got me even more p.i.s.sed than his words.

"Kid, what are you talking about? Where do we have to go?"

"Theres a whole world out there, Sid. I want to see more of it than this little corner, which is not even all that interesting, believe me. You havent washed about three million dishes like I have, so maybe youve got a different view of this joint. But Ive gotten to the bottom of the washtub, and all Ive found there is a lot of crud."

Still poking around with his trowel and not looking at me, Sid said, "Kid, dont these people mean anything to you? Havent you made any connections with them?"

"Theyre all okay. I mean, theyre fine, I like them all good enough. But I left home looking to do the kind of wild things Jack did. I didnt set out on the road to find a subst.i.tute family. Its like youre my dad and Anns my mom. Angie and Sonnyre my uncles, Yasmines my aunt and Sue-well, Sues like my d.a.m.n sister. And thats not what I wanted."

Sid left off digging and sat back on his heels. He looked extra sad for a moment before his face returned to a kind of neutral expression. "Listen, Kid, Im sorry things didnt work out with Sue the way you wanted. But her actions are her own affair. You cant make a woman feel what she doesnt want to feel, and you cant make her unfeel what she does feel. As for the other stuff, I never intended to come off like your father. Maybe Ive lectured you once too often, and I apologize for that. But on the whole, I thought I treated you like an adult, like my buddy."

I felt like I wasnt really explaining myself, like I was losing Sid, and I didnt want that to happen. "You did, Sid, honest, most of the time you did. Thats exactly what Im talking about. Buddies. I want us to be buddies again, on the road like Ray and j.a.phy, a couple of dharma b.u.ms."

Sid sighed. "Kid, youre letting your books blind you to reality. I warned you about that way back when we- Oh, Jesus, there goes Daddy Sid again. But its just the truth. Im not a character out of one of your books, Kid. Im just a sorry old coot who has already logged too many miles before you ever showed up. Ive spent more than my share of cold nights on steam grates and hot afternoons with my thumb out in the middle of Death Valley. Ive had enough freedom to last me the rest of my life. And if Ive picked up any wisdom on the road, Ill be d.a.m.ned if it boils down to anything more than 'be kind and watch your back. I might talk big, but in the end my words dont amount to more than a sparrowfart in a hurricane. I dont really want to be out there on the edge anymore, Kid. Now, I can understand why you feel exactly the opposite. Youre young, youre full of p.i.s.s and vinegar, youre rarin to be out where things are happening, in the middle of some fight or watching some crazy s.h.i.+t go down or bouncing around in some strange gals bed. But all thats old hat for me. What I found here at Deer Park, even if it looks boring and limited to you, means more to me than anything I had on the road. At least thats how I feel right now. Thats why I plan on staying here a while."

Sids last sentence shocked the h.e.l.l out of me. I didnt really believe he would ever say such a thing. I had kept hoping right up to this minute that maybe hed argue for a week or a month more at Deer Park, just to rest up and save some more bucks. But instead he had totally dropped out of our whole enterprise, for no good reason that I could see. Now I was on my own.

Sid plucked a flower that had a broken stem and started twirling it between his fingers, staring at it like it held the secret of the universe. Then he looked up at me with a tired smile on his face and wide eyes that seemed to hold all the sadness in the world. But I was too angry to respond to this puppydog s.h.i.+t.

"Sid, I dont understand anything except that youre blowing me off for no good reason at all."

Sid tossed the flower to the ground. "Its a d.a.m.n shame you feel that way, Kid. But your ignorance dont change a thing I said."

I gave up arguing then, left him planting his f.u.c.king flowers because I didnt want him to see me crying.

bookmark Chapter Six

Six.

I should have left Deer Park right then, as soon as Sid admitted he wasnt getting back on the road with me. But I didnt.

Things would have been a lot different if I had.

But I was still anxious about my money. I had seven-hundred and fifty dollars saved up, and thought I could get my stash up to a thousand if I stayed a week or two longer. That seemed like a good amount to carry me for a long time. Maybe I could make it to Texas, or Mexico. Maybe Id check out Seattle. I had heard there was a cool band scene in Omaha. Maybe Id even visit California, see if it was everything Yasmine said it was.

So after I quit crying, I went to burn up some of my anger. I swore up a storm while whacking some tall weeds with a stick on the outskirts of the Park, and then I gritted my teeth, told myself that I could hang in there for just two more paydays, ignoring Sid and doing my job. How bad could things get between him and me? He didnt seem to be holding a grudge. And I hardly saw him anymore outside of the job. While we worked together Id talk about nothing but the job at hand. As for the rest of the Deer Park crew, I had no beef with them, not even with Sue, who had made her choice that didnt include me. Saying goodbye would be awkward, but I wasnt stupid enough to announce my plans ahead of time. That would just make a long, drawn-out scene, with people trying to convince me to stay, or getting all weepy over my departure. Or so I imagined it. No, when it came time to go, Id just split with a smile and a wave of my hand, like Jack hopping a freight. Id have to hope Sid didnt tip my hand in the meantime. But I hadnt given him anything specific to work with.

So the next morning I got up, resolved to go about my day like nothing had changed.

But I didnt count on Sonnys accident.

I got into the diner at six, and the first thing I noticed was that the Hispanic guys were not their usual chattering selves. They seemed b.u.mmed by some bad news. Then I spotted Sid behind the grille. If Sid was cooking, the guy who thought mixing beans and ravioli together made a gourmet meal, that was bad news enough to b.u.m out anyone.

"Wheres Sonny?"

Sid said, "Dont know. He just never showed up. Anns got me here bas.h.i.+ng out the orders."

Ann came over, her brown-grey hair all flyaway, nervous-looking as a pigeon in the middle of a cat posse. "This is not like him. Hes never been late once. I called up his house, but Evelyn didnt answer. Kid, Im really worried."