Hit the Road, Manny: A Manny Files Novel (13 page)

The hotel in Salt Lake City was called the Little America. It was a weird burgundy color and had a big courtyard with a swimming pool in the middle of it. The lounge chairs at the pool had crisp white towels rolled up on them, and there was a stereo system that was playing “Young at Heart” by Frank Sinatra.

Frank Sinatra music wasn’t playing in the lobby. Instead a man in a tuxedo was playing a big, shiny black piano next to five big couches. There was a chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and all the countertops were white marble.

“I feel like I’ve traveled back in time,” said India.

“Do I look younger?” asked the manny.

“No. You still look thirty-four, but you look like a thirty-four-year-old at a nineteen fifties hotel,” India said before she jumped out of the way of a gold luggage cart that was being pushed by a blond bellhop in an all-white uniform and hat. The hat had a strap that went around his chin, and his name tag said
CHIP
.

Mom stared at him, and Dad caught her. She claimed that she was admiring his perfect skin. “He doesn’t look like he’s ever had a piece of chocolate in his life,” she said. Chocolate makes Mom’s face break out in pimples like a teenager’s. So do periods.

Our hotel room was on the top floor and had a balcony that overlooked the city. Mom pointed out the Mormon Temple and the capitol building. The temple looked like a white castle with sharp points at the top.

Lulu read parts of
To Kill a Mockingbird
out loud while Belly looked down at the city and pointed things out. A trolley car. A “Got Milk?” billboard. Bird poop on the windshields of cars below. She kept scanning the city until she found something to point out.

“PARADE!” shouted Belly as she jumped up and down and pointed down to a street a couple of blocks away. There was a line of floats and marching bands along the street. Then she ran to the bathroom, screaming and holding herself because her excitement was too much to hold in. Belly loves parades. They make her pee.

Belly ran back out to the balcony before her pants were even all the way up. “CAN HER GO? THEY’RE THROWING SUGAR! HER NEEDS SUGAR!” she screamed as she straightened her Hello Kitty panties, which were twisted around her waist and looked uncomfortable. Belly calls all candy sugar.

“I need sugar too!” the manny screamed, even though it was obvious that he didn’t.

“Let’s go see what the parade is for,” Mom said.

The manny and Belly gave each other a high five, and then the manny held on to his palm like Belly had slapped him too hard. She giggled.

We raced through the hotel lobby and past the piano player, who was taking a break outside the carousel doors. He looked like a mobster in his tuxedo, glancing at his watch and smoking a cigarette. I told India that he probably played the piano during the daytime and threw people with cement blocks on their feet into the Great Salt Lake at night. India laughed but couldn’t say anything back because Belly had ahold of her hand and was pulling her down the street toward the parade.

The parade hadn’t started yet, but people were lining up, getting ready for it to begin. There were police all around, on horses and motorcycles. Mom told Belly that the police were there to make sure that kids didn’t take more than their fair share of candy that was thrown off of the parade floats. Belly looked scared. The only thing that keeps her from causing trouble is the threat of jail.

We stood at the very beginning of the parade, where the organizer was telling which float, band, or group to go next through a megaphone. The first to go were a bunch of women in jeans and black leather boots on motorcycles. Belly held her ears as the bikes roared away. I could feel the noise inside my chest. The same way I can feel fireworks shows in my toes. The crowd cheered. So did the people waiting for their turn to go. After the bikes went, thirty men in Speedo swimsuits holding volleyballs started walking behind a sign that said
SALT LAKE CITY WATER POLO
. One of them carried a stereo that was playing a David Bowie song that Lulu has on her iPod. The one that goes, “Take a look at the Lawman beating up the wrong guy,” and where “Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow.” It’s a weird song. Lulu sang along, but she covered her eyes with her hands. She hates Speedo swimsuits. I’ve never seen a water polo team in a parade before, especially in their swimsuits. India said that it was a “flock of
Glamour
Don’ts.”

“Aha,” said the manny like he had figured out what the celebration was about. Mom squeezed his arm like she was in on his discovery.

Belly ran all over the street, grabbing candy that was thrown from floats. A man who was running for sheriff threw Jolly Ranchers from on top of a horse. A Delta Airlines float shaped like an airplane threw out Delta Airlines necklaces. The Salt Lake Men’s Choir sang, “‘R-E-S-P-EC-T,’” and threw out chewing gum. Belly picked up three pieces but then handed two of them to smaller kids when she spotted a policeman standing on the corner. She waved to the policeman and pretended that she was helping other kids get candy.

The next float standing in line to go had a big sign that said PFLAG. I’m not sure how you say it, but I think the
P
is silent, like in the word “psychic.” The lady at the front of the float had a microphone. She pointed at the manny and said, “Hey, cute guy with the sunhat, do you want to ride on our float?”

The manny looked around and then dramatically pointed to himself and mouthed, “Me?” like they do in the movies when they’re crowned homecoming queen. Then he yelled, “Only because you said I was cute,” and started to climb up on the float.

That’s the thing about the manny. He gets asked to join in on things. Mom says it’s because the manny could have fun inside a paper bag.

“I’ll see you at the end of the parade!” the manny yelled down to us. I turned around and saw Mom and Dad laughing.

“I’m going with him!” I yelled, wanting people to think I could have fun in a paper bag too. And I didn’t want to miss anything. Like if the manny started lip-synching to “Twist and Shout” like they do in the parade in
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
.

Before Mom and Dad could object, I ran toward the float and leaped up and pulled myself on beside the manny. I turned around and waved at Mom and Dad. Lulu and India didn’t notice. They were trying to get Belly to spit out the seven pieces of gum she had shoved in her mouth. The wad was so big that when Belly finally spit it out, it looked like she’d spit out her pink chewed-up brain. A policeman stepped on it.

The float whizzed around the corner, and I started waving to people along the street. The manny stood behind me with his hands on my shoulders, making sure that I didn’t fall or lose my balance. The parade went right by the Mormon Temple. It’s even prettier up close, like an ice princess’s house.

We went by an apartment building that had balconies. There was a group of older women out there hollering and waving down at the water polo team. One of them even screamed, “We love you,” as she danced to a Beyoncé song that was now playing.

Some of the polo players yelled back, “We love you, too!”

There was a man on the float with us named Tony. He wore big wire-rimmed glasses with tinted lenses and told the manny that he was a retired airport employee.

Tony shook the manny’s hand and said, “I’m here for my son. He was just named Elementary School Teacher of the Year in his school district in Seattle.”

“Wow, that’s great,” said the manny. “You must be very proud.”

“Yes. He’s going to change the world…at least a little bit.” Then Tony threw a handful of peppermint candy out to a group of people sitting in lawn chairs on the street curb.

Next to the people in the lawn chairs was a group of people holding black signs with white writing on them and yelling things at the people in the parade.

“YOU’RE DISGUSTING!” yelled a woman in a long dress, holding a sign that said
NOT HERE
!
THIS IS GOD’S LAND
!

Another man held a sign that said
GOD HATES WHAT YOU DO
!

Tony and some others yelled back, but not meanly. They yelled, “Peace and understanding! Have a good day!” and kept waving and smiling.

“FAGGOTS!” the man yelled back.

I had heard that word before and knew that it was hateful, even more hateful than “queer.” I looked up at the manny’s eyes to see if he had heard. He looked like he couldn’t breathe or like he might throw up. Like if he exhaled, his tear dam would break. That’s what India calls it when welled-up eyes turn into flowing streams of tears. It happened to her at Grandma’s funeral when Uncle Max told the story about how Grandma had told him he was “opening up her whole life” when he told her he was gay.

Tony must have noticed the manny’s eyes too.

“Don’t let them get to you,” he said. “They don’t understand how hateful they sound. They haven’t educated themselves yet.” The manny smiled and nodded, but his eyes were watery. Then my eyes got watery. I turned around and hugged the manny around his waist, pressing my head against his stomach. He hugged me back around my head. Then the manny let go of me and started waving and smiling to the people holding the signs.

I reached into the bucket of peppermint candy and threw a handful on the ground in front of the picketers. I thought about throwing them really hard right at their heads, but I didn’t. The woman in the long dress bent down, picked one up, and unwrapped it. She looked up at me as she put it in her mouth.

I smiled at her and waved and wondered how uncomfortable her skin must be to walk around in that it would make her so mean.

I took the postcard that I was going to send to Uncle Max and wrote one to the manny and put it on his pillow that night while he was in the bathroom brushing his teeth.

Before we left Salt Lake City, we swam in the swimming pool at Little America one last time so Belly wouldn’t throw a tantrum, or as I heard Mom say, so Belly would “get tired and sleep most of the way to Las Vegas.” Lulu didn’t swim. She sat on the side with her legs in the pool and read a
USA Today
article about Katie Couric, the news anchor. Katie Couric is one of Lulu’s heroes. I read it in the hero list in her diary. She was right under Eleanor Roosevelt and right above Amelia Earhart.

Mom and Dad had taken us to eat breakfast in the cafeteria, but we ate really fast so that we could get one more swim in. The manny shoved two pieces of sausage in his mouth, storing some in his cheeks while he chewed. Mom told him to slow down and set a good example after Belly started eating right off the plate without a fork so she could finish fast. I love it when the manny gets in trouble from Mom. He pushes his bottom lip out and pouts.

Mom almost didn’t let Belly come swim with us because she gargled her orange juice at the table the way Dad does with mouthwash every morning. I kind of hoped Mom wouldn’t let Belly come swimming, because she screams and does cannonballs the whole time and drives away the other families. Mom did let her. I think Mom probably needed a break from Belly. We all need breaks from her sometimes. India says that Belly is “cute, but she is always up in your grill.” Your grill is your face.

India practiced her water ballet by pointing her toes and straight legs out of the water. She kicked them and then went underwater and came up with her fluttering hands. She started doing it after she saw her friends doing synchronized swimming at the Golf and Tennis swimming pool. I can’t remember the friends’ first names. Everybody just calls them the Binger sisters, and they always wear matching swimsuits and go everywhere together, even to the bathroom. They synchronize
everything
. India must think that the Binger sisters are a
Glamour
Do, because she’s always copying them.

While India held on to the edge of the pool and practiced her toe point in the air, the manny stood in the pool and judged Belly’s and my splashes from cannonballs and screwdrivers. My splashes were bigger, but every once in a while the manny would tell Belly that she had won, and then he’d wink at me so I’d know he was just making her feel good. He even pretended to drown from one of Belly’s splashes.

“You nearly killed me!” he screeched, coughing, spitting water, and flailing around.

One of Belly’s splashes
was
big. So big that it splashed Lulu and her
USA Today
newspaper that she was reading.

“You got Katie Couric all wet,” she said, pointing to the picture that had a big, wet splotch right under Katie Couric’s chin, which made it look like a beard.

“Gosh, she really looks like Matt Lauer with that beard,” the manny joked. Matt Lauer used to be Katie Couric’s cohost on the
Today
show. He’s the one that Tom Cruise called “glib” on television. I think “glib” must mean “tall and handsome.”

Lulu didn’t think the manny was funny. She pulled her feet out of the water and walked over to a chair that was far enough away that Belly couldn’t splash liver spots all over Katie’s face. Or at least that’s what the manny said.

Belly was OC at the pool. That’s what the manny calls “out of control.” She wouldn’t just swim around nicely. She kept screaming, “WATCH THIS!” and she’d do a belly flop; or, “TEACHER’S SEAT!” and she’d jump in with her legs crossed and her back straight, like she thought teachers sit. She even mooned India when India told her that she was being inconsiderate to the other swimmers.

There weren’t many other swimmers. Just a dad with a hairy chest teaching his baby how to swim. The baby was just giggling and laughing when the dad would take him under the water. Then, when he came up, he’d scream with excitement and look like his eyes were going to pop out of his head. They kept moving to other spots in the swimming pool because Belly would get closer and closer to them, trying to splash the baby to make him laugh.

Mom and Dad walked over to the pool after they had finished breakfast.

“WATCH THIS!” Belly screamed so loudly that the entire pool area looked over at her.

She ran as fast as she could toward the pool. When she got to the edge of the pool, she got a look of terror on her face. Belly’s toes left the concrete right as she opened her mouth and threw up into the swimming pool. It landed in the water, and then
she
landed in the water…right on top of her own throw-up. Little bits of eggs Benedict and toast and bright orange liquid flew into the air. Some floated on the top of the pool. The dad and his baby quickly walked up the steps and started to dry off.

I swam to the edge and pulled myself out of the pool before Belly even came up for air. The manny ran through the water to grab Belly and pull her out. When Belly came up from underneath the water, she was already sobbing and her face was bright red.

“AAAAAHHHHHHHH!” she wailed so loudly that the swimming baby started to cry too. The dad wrapped him in a fluffy white towel, and they hurried to their hotel room.

“Come here, sweetie,” Mom said, taking Belly into a towel too and holding her the way you rock a baby. Belly kept wailing. I kept trying not to look at the barf floating on top of the swimming pool. I tried not to look at the barf on the manny’s chest. Lulu wasn’t looking. She had the Katie Couric article covering her face. She says she has a weak stomach and can’t stand to see or hear other people throw up. She once spent a school day in the principal’s office organizing his personal library because a boy threw up in her classroom and the janitor came and put that pink powder on it and let it sit for a while. Even after it was all cleaned up, she refused to go back to the classroom. Instead she sat at the principal’s big oak desk and helped him answer e-mails from concerned parents about dress codes and the school lunch program.

The hotel management didn’t sprinkle pink powder on Belly’s throw up in the pool. Instead they told Mom that they would have to drain the pool and fill it back up with new water.

“I’m so sorry,” Mom apologized.

“Don’t worry about it,” said the hotel manager. “It happens all the time.”

“Ewwww!” India and I said at the same time, and looked at each other.

Belly was still crying when we got into the RV to drive toward Las Vegas. Lulu tried to make her feel better by saying, “That article about Katie Couric sure was interesting. Did you know that
she
threw up in a swimming pool a few summers ago while they were filming a special wedding segment for the
Today
show?”

Belly stopped crying. “Really?” she said, even though she probably didn’t know who Katie Couric was.

“Yep,” said Lulu. “She just cleaned herself off and moved on with her life. Barf happens.” Then she shrugged.

The manny giggled with his shoulders when Lulu said “Barf happens.”

Belly dried off her tears with her hands and tried to move on with her life.

I grabbed the paper and scanned the article but didn’t see anything about Katie Couric barfing in a swimming pool. When I looked at Lulu, she rolled her eyes at me. I guess Lulu was just being kind.