33 Snowfish (14 page)

Then for some reason I went, “Likeded ain’t no word,” cuz I remember how them spelling nuns was slapping their pointers on the blackboard cuz I used it wrong once. I was supposed to put it in a sentence and go to the front of the class and say that shit out loud to the rest of the retards, and I tried saying I likeded Nerds and chocolate milk and them nuns started slapping their pointers up against the blackboard and popping off about how I wasn’t
improving
and shit, and then later on Sister Blister came over to me all hush hush and made me write, “I liked the Nerds and the chocolate milk,” correctly like skeighty-eight times, and she made me underline
liked
so I wouldn’t mess it up no more. I think that’s why I said that shit to Seldom.

Seldom just looked at me with that little kid face again and went, “Likeded’s a goddog word.”

I was like, “No it ain’t.”

“Is too.”

“Is not.”

“
Shoo
. . .”

Then I looked over at Seldom and he was staring right in my eyes, still waiting for me to come up with something else about the Christmas tree, and let me tell you, when that old nigger wants to stare at you, he’ll do it so hard you think you can hear the
blood
floating in your veins and shit, so I went, “I like how . . .”

“Yeah?”

“I like how —”

“Easter’s comin’.”

I was like, “Damn, Seldom, let me say the shit!”

“Well, go ’head and say it then. Quit stallin’!”

I waited for him to start rocking again and then I went, “I like how the reflection looks . . . in the window,” and I said it kind of slow cuz for some reason that shit was like almost
impossible
to say.

Seldom went, “What about it?”

“I like it cuz . . . it’s like there’s two trees. Like it’s double, okay?
Damn!
”

Then we was quiet again. I swear, for some reason, saying that shit was like pulling a
bone
out of my stomach.

After a minute, Seldom went, “You ain’t never had no tree, have you?”

I was like, “I had a tree.”

“When?”

“I had one.”

“Shoo.”

“One night when I stayed at this juvy hotel in Franklin Park. They had a tree there. Right where you signed the book.”

“Right where you signed the book? You sure?”

“Yeah, it was blue.”

“A blue tree?”

“It was fake.”

“Good Godfrey.”

“I liked it.”

“Prolly smelled like a furniture store.”

“I slept under it.”

“You did?”

“Right on the snow.”

Seldom waited a few seconds after that and went, “I ’spose the snow was blue, too.”

I was like,
“It was white.”

Then we didn’t say nothing and I threw the last few pieces of popcorn into the fire. After they popped I felt like talking for some reason, so I went, “I couldn’t never sleep in them wack beds they had.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know.”

Seldom went, “I know why.”

And even though I knew it was a trap, I was like, “Why?”

Then he went, “Cuz you so ornery.”

“I ain’t ornery.”

“Ornery as a bowl fulla bees.”

“I just ain’t used to sleeping in no bed, okay?”

Then Seldom was quiet for a minute. You could hear the rocking chair creaking. He didn’t seem like he was gonna say nothing so I kept going.

I went, “Them beds at them Rockdale juvy hotels is too skinny, anyways. Felt like you was laying in a coffin and shit.”

Seldom didn’t say nothing about that. Instead he went, “You slept all night under a blue Christmas tree?”

“Till the security pig kicked me out.”

“Why’d he kick you out?”

“Cuz he caught me trying to steal some presents.”

“Jimster.”

“Wasn’t shit in ’em ’cept for some Styrofoam.”

“Good Godfrey.”

“And peanuts. You’d think them juvy hotel people would give a kid more than some Styrofoam peanuts. That place was wack, anyways.”

“You a character.”

“
You
a character.”

“Crazy Jimster.”

“Crazy Seldom.”

Then Seldom made this face like he
was
crazy, with his long pink tongue flopping out of his mouth like some half-cooked fish and his big white eyes popping.

On top of that, he flipped his bottom teeth out at me and that shit made me laugh.

Seldom went, “Got you to smile.”

I was like, “I ain’t smiling,” but I was smiling so hard I could feel it in my feet and shit.

“Don’t do it too much you might hurt yourself.”

I tried to stop but I couldn’t. It felt like feathers was flying through my body, from the top of my head all the way down to my toes. I laughed like that for like two minutes, and those two minutes felt all loose and jangly, cuz it was like the three of us — me and Seldom and the baby — it was like the three of us was all warm from the fireplace and from throwing the popcorn at the tree and from just
being
there together and shit.

But then after a minute, for some reason I started
eating
that laughter, and about halfway through eating it I started crying. I don’t know why. And it wasn’t just no normal little-bitch cry; that shit felt like it was coming out of my
feet
and my
ass
and the
bones in my back
.

Then, the next thing I knew, I was walking over to Seldom where he was rocking in his rocking chair. It was like my legs was going on their own, one, two, three. And then I was like on my knees and shit and hugging his long bony shins. And I cried into his legs for a long time and he just sat there and rocked away, going, “It’s okay, Jimster. It’s gonna be okay.” And he said it like skeighty-eight times with his old scratchy voice.

The fire smelled all thick and sweet and that reflection of the Christmas tree was kinda shining in the window and you could see the snow falling through it.

I’ll never forget how good them long bony shins felt in my arms. And I’ll never forget the sound of that rocking chair creaking back and forth. And I’ll never forget how Seldom’s hand was like a big warm hat holding my head together.

I’m in the bathroom sitting on the toilet. The water’s going in the shower and there’s so much steam it’s like I’m in a cloud. I like getting the steam up in the bathroom so I can make Pigmy feet on the mirror.

All of the sudden the door opens and Seldom’s standing there, ducking his head in.

He goes, “Hey, Jimster.”

I’m like, “Hey what?”

“How come you don’t never wash yourself?”

I go, “I do.”

Then he goes, “No you don’t. You turn the water on but you don’t never get in. You just sit there on the toilet like you doin’ now.”

“I get in.”

“No you don’t.”

I’m like, “Shows what you know.”

Then Seldom says, “You don’t got no reason to lie to me.”

“I ain’t lyin’.”

“You know the door don’t close all the way. I see you sittin’ there like that every time. Either sittin’ there or playin’ that game on the mirror. What’s that game you always playin’, anyway?”

I go, “I ain’t playin’ no game.”

He waves some steam away from his face and goes, “Wastin’ all that water. What kinda sense is that?”

I go, “You waste more water than me.”

“Shoo.”

I go, “You gotta use more water to clean them old skanky bones.”

“The only thing I’m wastin is my time tryin’ to talk some sense into you.”

Then I don’t say nothing. I just stick my hand under the water and flick it at him. He ducks all low like I’m throwing rocks at him or some shit.

He goes, “Stop, now,” and starts reaching out for this little wack-looking towel that he keeps over the sink. He finally grabs it and wipes his face, and he wipes that shit a lot longer than he has to.

Then he goes, “And you smell terrible.”

I go, “
You
smell terrible.”

“You need to take some soap and water to your dirty self.”

“I don’t need to do shit.”

“Fine. Suit yourself. I’m just trying to help you.”

I’m like, “I don’t need no help.”

He says, “You sure don’t, do you. You don’t never need nothin’ from no one.”

Now the steam is going out into the house and he’s waving at it like it’s a bunch of mosquitoes or some shit.

“I put them extra washcloths in there and everything for you, too,” he says, still waving at that steam.

Then I flick some more water at him and he takes these big long bow-legged steps across the bathroom and reaches into the shower and turns the water off.

“Ain’t no one gonna like bein’ around you, smellin’ like you do. That’s why Deuce don’t like you.”

I go, “Can’t I get no privacy? What do you care what I’m doin’ in here?”

He just stands there looking at them Pigmy feet I made on the mirror. For a minute I think he might reach out and touch one, but instead of touching one he goes, “And why don’t you never wash your hair? I bought you that fancy shampoo and everything. That dippity-doo stuff that smells like soda pop.”

I just look at him staring at them Pigmy feet and go, “Wash your own hair.” Then I go, “Oh yeah, you don’t got none.”

He goes, “Ha ha, very funny.”

And I’m like, “Ha ha, very funny,” right back at him.

“So funny I forgot my keys.”

I say, “That don’t even make no sense.”

“Forgot my keys and forgot my knees. Trees, bees, and a truckloada fleas.”

It usually makes me laugh when he says that crazy shit, but I hide it pretty good. I feel like I pretty much got his ass beat this time.

But then Seldom comes real close and looks at me and sees how my face is starting to lift cuz of that stuff he said about the trees and the bees and the fleas living in that truck, so he reaches down real quick — and that old nigger can get quick when he wants to — he reaches down and sticks his thumbs in my ribs. Whenever he does that I can’t help but laugh cuz of how long and bony them old creaky thumbs are. When I jump he lifts the toilet seat and holds it up and stares into the bowl like he’s staring at a dead rat.

Then he lowers the seat and goes, “And flush the durn toilet, Jimster. I don’t want to be always walkin’ in on your slops like that.”

I go, “
You
flush the dang toilet.”

Then he goes, “I didn’t say dang I said durn,” and he says it all quick like he won.

I just go, “
Durn
toilet. Whatever.”

Then he thumbs me in the ribs again and I laugh and a little green booger flies out of my nose and sticks to my shirt.

Now Seldom’s laughing, too. And he’s laughing so hard he’s gotta lean up against the sink so he won’t fall in the shower.

He goes, “You a piece of work, Jimster,” and then he reaches over and flushes the toilet. “A real piece of work.”

The night after we took the tree down and dragged it out back next to the shed I woke up under the kitchen table all strange and wack-feeling.

The baby was sleeping real good and the moonlight from the kitchen window was reaching into the TV and laying on his face all soft and blue and quiet. It was so blue it even made the seam in his forehead look kinda blue.

I crawled out from under the kitchen table and walked into Seldom’s room. It was cold and I was kinda shivering and you could feel the air from the basement coming through the cracks in the floor. I had them astronaut legs and it felt like I was walking in a time warp and shit.

Through the living room window I could see the Christmas tree laying next to the shed. It was all sad and wack-looking, like somebody shot it with a
gat
or some shit. There was still some popcorn stuck in the branches.

I had to open the door to Seldom’s room real quiet, cuz it squeaks like them old creaky shinbones in his legs.

There ain’t shit in his room but his big old bed that looks like a boat and this wooden box that he keeps near the bed. He always keeps half of his teeth soaking in a glass of water, and next to the glass is this picture of him and his wife from when they was married. It’s black-and-white like them pictures you see in newspapers and it’s got a date on the frame. I can’t do the math right but you can tell that that shit is like skeighty-eight years old cuz the corners is all skanked and yellow.