Fish in the Sky (11 page)

Three men step off the cargo ship. One is wearing a long gray overcoat, with black pants and a white sweater underneath. That’s my dad. I turn away and pretend I’m looking at the ships. They come closer, and I can hear their voices and their footsteps on the wooden dock, and then I look up to him. He doesn’t notice me, maybe thinking this is just some boy looking at the ships.

So I say, “Dad?”

They stop all at once and look at me, and for a moment, it’s as if he doesn’t recognize me, then he smiles.

“Josh!” he says, and comes to me and embraces me. The smell of Old Spice fills my lungs. His sweater has just been washed and smells of soap.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, surprised but still smiling.

“Just, you know, looking at the ships.”

“Well, what do you know? This is my son,” he says to the others, and they say, “Hello,” but then they stand there waiting, as if they want him to go with them. He asks if I’m doing anything special and I say, “No.”

“I’ll meet you later,” he says to his mates, and Dad and I stroll the dock in the direction of the center of town.

I want to hold his hand, but it’s too childish. I want to know all about what happened, but it’s too silly to ask. I want to tell him how proud I am, but I can’t. Instead I stick my hands deep into my pockets.

We stroll up the main street. The weather is calm, a drizzle of rain now and then. Dad is chatting about how mild this winter has been, and I agree. Then he asks how I’m doing at school and I say just fine and he asks how I’m doing in this subject or the other, but when I tell him that I’m not very good at arithmetic he says that’s not good enough, that I must work harder at it, and I agree completely. Then we don’t talk anymore but just walk, and he asks me if I want to come with him to the grand old hotel on the waterfront so we can have a bite to eat and I say sure and we go into the hotel and we take a seat at a table in the bar. He orders some coffee and asks what I’d like to have, maybe waffles and whipped cream? I say sure and he orders some waffles and hot chocolate for me and lights a cigar. And because there’s just the two of us there and the weather is so fine outside and the hotel bar is almost empty and the waffles taste so great with whipped cream and jam and the fragrance of the cigar is so sweet, I start to tell him that sometimes there’s some fighting at school, that occasionally I get in a fight. He looks a little surprised.

“Really?” he says.

And I tell him that Tom is constantly picking a fight with me and there’s nothing else to do but beat him up a bit, just to get some peace.

“I see,” he says.

But then this blissful moment sort of goes a little bit to my head. The fragrance of the cigar smoke and his aftershave, his voice in my ears, and I start to tell him about how three big boys followed me home after school and were going to beat me up so badly that I wouldn’t be able to walk again.

“It was the day you were mentioned on the news,” I say.

“Really,” he says.

“So I just told them that my dad was the machinist on
Orca,
and if they were going to beat me up, they’d better be careful. And guess what? They didn’t dare to touch me! Didn’t dare to come any closer but just limped away with their tails between their legs.”

“Really?” he says and takes a puff from the cigar. “What does your mother say about your fighting?”

“Nuthin’,” I say. “I’m not fighting all the time, but then I usually win.”

“Well, that’s good,” he says. “More waffles?”

“Please,” I say, utterly happy and completely bursting with joy, but I try not to show it and keep cool like him, looking around me uninterested, sucking bits of waffles from between my teeth by putting the tip of my tongue up against my right eyetooth, curling my upper lip, and making a sharp short sucking noise like he does. Then a new serving of waffles is brought to the table and I have some more, although I’ve had more than enough, but I notice he slides his wristwatch from under his coat sleeve and gives it a glance. Then my heart starts to beat faster in my chest.

“Well, Josh, son,” he says. “It was so good to see you.”

“Are you leaving?”

“Um, yeah, I was going to meet my mates for a while,” he says, and puts his cigar down on the ashtray.

“But I haven’t finished,” I say apologetically.

“You just take your time and finish up, OK?”

He stands up and I have my mouth full and my face is sweating from all the hot chocolate, but he bends down and kisses me on the cheek and pats my head and I can barely swallow the mouthful to ask when the ship will leave.

“Not for a week, at least.”

“Will you be staying at Auntie Carol’s?”

“N-No, I’ll be going to the country in the morning to Suzy, my girlfriend.”

“Really?” I say.

“Yeah,” he says, and buttons his coat. “But I’ll call you very soon,” he says, and smiles. “All right?”

“Yeah.”

“All right, my boy. Good-bye, now.”

He turns away and walks to the door, but I stare at the heap of waffles in front of me and the steaming hot chocolate, the jam, and the whipped cream in a crystal bowl.

“Dad!” I call out.

He turns abruptly and looks at me, stands still and waits with a question mark in his eyes, fidgeting with his watch.

“Thanks for the waffles,” I say.

He raises his hand and smiles.

“Bon appétit. Bye-bye.”

“Bye,” I say into the empty hotel bar as he disappears out the door.

For a long time I watch the smoke rising up from the half-smoked cigar getting thinner and thinner until it disappears entirely.

I wake up with a lump in my throat, and I really don’t know why. Maybe I’m catching a cold. There’s darkness all around, but when I turn on my bedside lamp, I hear my mom is already up, listening to the radio.

She bids me good morning with a happy voice and gives my chin a quick stroke with her hand and suddenly I feel the urge to hug her, but then she has stood up from the kitchen table. Somehow I don’t have any appetite, but stare at the picture on the cereal box.

“Right,” Mom says briskly as she starts to slice the bread for my lunch, humming joyfully to herself. She slices the cheese and puts it on the bread, all the while humming along to the music on the radio. She looks at me over her shoulder.

“Do you need a bowl?” she asks, and opens the cupboard. She gets a bowl and a spoon out and puts them in front of me.

“I’m getting a sore throat,” I say. “I don’t want anything.”

She comes to me and puts her hand on my forehead for a moment, and I close my eyes.

“You don’t have a fever,” she says. “Have some hot chocolate.” She pours some milk into a small pot, puts it on the stove, and turns up the heat.

“Watch the milk, dear,” she says, and wraps my sandwich in foil, goes into the hallway, and puts on her coat and her boots. I’m standing by the stove, watching the milk get warmer until it rises up to the brim of the pot. I pour it carefully into a large cup, add three spoons of cocoa, and stir. I hear Gertrude say good-bye to Mom and go out the door, but Mom comes back into the kitchen and strokes my hair and kisses me good-bye and then she’s gone.

I wanted to tell her that I met Dad yesterday, but I didn’t. She probably would have turned all sullen and strange and silent, tightened her lips, and gone to work with a heavy cloud over her head. Anyway, I didn’t have to tell her; you don’t have to tell your mom everything. But still, I wanted her to have found my forehead warm and told me to stay at home today. I wish she would have. Somehow I’m so small on the inside, small and weak and vulnerable. The world out there is so cold and dark and gloomy, so unfriendly. There’s a buzz in my head, a knot in my stomach, and somehow I’m afraid that something terrible is going to happen.

In the bathroom, I roll up my towel, take clean sweatpants, T-shirt, and socks off the line over the tub, and put them in my bag. My cousin has left a complete mess in here. The air is full of chemicals that blend with her perfume; the shelf is covered with lipstick, mascara, eyeliner, barrettes, and hair rollers. It’s like a steel container has just crashed into the building and everything has fallen all over the place. On the floor is a wet towel, and another one has been thrown over the toilet. I pick the one on the toilet up with two fingers and put it aside. Then I pee with full force and make the stream go around and around into the water below. But then I look down and notice that something is not as it should be. Or rather, there is something more than there used to be. Some dust in my crotch? I bend over to look closer and realize that I’m growing pubic hair. Four, five, oh, God, no, maybe seven or eight dark hairs protruding from the skin on both sides of my penis, tiny, like flies’ feet. The blood rushes to my face as I stare at myself in the mirror. Pubic hair! Fireworks, in all the colors of the rainbow, explode inside me as the faint radio down in the kitchen plays the majestic sounds of a grand symphonic orchestra. Pubic hair! I’ve become a full-grown man, and it’s just a matter of minutes before a beard covers my face. Pubic hair! I will be working on the
Orca
a couple of years from now, with my very own Gillette double-blade razor and a bottle of Old Spice in my pocket!

At the same moment as victory rises within me, I hear that damned yellow whistle, blasting one long whistle in my head, and my happy smile freezes in the mirror.

The wooden floorboards sway and creak under our feet as we run around and around the gym. In the middle stands Raxel with the whistle between his teeth, leaning on his cane. Three short blows: run in place. And we run in place. One short blow: run ahead. And we run ahead. Somehow I managed to put on my gym shorts without anybody noticing anything. But after gym, I’ll have to take a shower with everybody else. What will I do then?

Two long blows: push-ups. We throw ourselves to the floor and start the push-ups. For some reason, I’m not very strong today as my mind searches wildly for some solution to the shower predicament. Raxel’s pale-blue sneakers with the white plastic over the toes appear right before my face. Then he knocks the cane to the floor right by my nose. Three knocks: everybody to their feet. We jump to our feet and get into a straight row, our white, sweaty T-shirts heaving up and down as we pant, trying to catch our breath. Raxel inspects the line with the whistle between his teeth, looks into everyone’s face, and stops in front of me and curls his forefinger. That means step out of line. I step forward.

“Growing pubic hair, are you?” I think I hear him shout, but it must be my imagination. Probably I’m not sweating enough, not strong enough, haven’t been working hard enough. He grabs my shoulders and turns me so I’m facing the thirty-eight staring eyes of all the others, so relieved that they’re not standing where I’m standing.

“Are you a wimp?” Raxel asks, and at first I don’t understand the question. But then I notice the smirk on Tom’s face and hear the boys giggle and I’m speculating if I should answer “Yes, sir” or “No, sir” like a soldier in a movie, when Raxel shouts again much louder, “Are you a wimp?”

I’m sweating more than everyone put together and my lips tremble, but it sure isn’t because I’ve thought up an answer or anything like that. I’m just staring at the bars on the wall behind the boys, staring into the opening that formed when I stepped out of the line. I’m wondering whether I shouldn’t just step back in line and disappear into the crowd when Raxel screams so loud that it echoes in the gym. The boys straighten their bodies at once from sheer fright.

“I SAID, ARE YOU A BOY OR A GIRL?”

I’m just figuring out how long it would take me to climb the bars on the wall, open the window, and jump out when two long whistles cut into my eardrums: push-ups. I throw myself to the floor and start to work, but my arms are tired. Raxel makes the boys run in circles around the gym while I fight in the middle. Sweat jumps out of every hole in my skin, and that disgusting smell from the gym floor forces itself into my nose; it’s so strong that I can feel the taste on my tongue: bitter old sweat, cheap polish, hundreds of years of sour feet.

For a long time, I sit on the bench in the locker room, waiting for the boys to go into the showers so I can sneak out. But they’re not in a hurry. The accumulated tension from the gym finds its outlet in the locker room, and, of course, Tommy is the leader. He has nothing to be ashamed of, completely bald around the pecker. Nobody has pubic hair. Nobody except for me and Ari Pineapple. But he’s not here because he’s got permission now not to attend gym.

Why didn’t I go back to bed this morning after Mom left?

When everybody’s in the shower, I try to put my clothes on. But then the door opens and Sandra enters. I’m too late to close my eyes but freeze on the spot where I sit with my hands stuck to the sock on my right foot.

“Take a shower, dear,” she says. The corners of her mouth turn downward, her eyes so big they’re about to pop out of her skull. “Quick! Shorts off !”

I stare at Sandra’s feet, praying she’ll move away. I’m about to say something, anything, just so she’ll leave, but my jaw is so stiff I can’t move it. I raise my head with great difficulty and look up, but then Sandra isn’t Sandra anymore. Instead of her head, she has the huge, slimy head of a bullfrog, with eyes as big as a soccer ball:
Rana catesbeiana.
Saliva drips from the wide corners of the frog’s mouth, and it blinks, looking straight at me. Thick eyelids move slowly downward, stretching over bulging, watery eyes, and then rise again, just as slowly. The sound of the water in the showers and the chatting of the boys grows faint and distant, and every movement becomes horribly slow. The giant eyes roll once in the frog’s head, then look straight at me again. The thin lips move apart, and the dark void opens, so the saliva dangles between the toothless lips, then wider and wider till it’s fully open and I can see straight into a terrible dark, red bottomless pit, far, far down into a never-ending throat.