KooKooLand (36 page)

“It's the law,” Virginia sobbed. “You can't stop me.”

I hovered right behind her, not wanting her to go either.

“She's gotta go sometime,” Shirley choked out. “You were fifteen when you left YaYa and Papou's and—”

“I was going off to frickin' war, not to screw around,” he shot back, which didn't make sense since he was always bragging about making it over there with a bunch of German dolls.

“I'm just saying, she's grown-up—”

Jimmy stuck his face right into Shirley's.

“Keep your snout out. She's not even your goddamn kid.”

While Jimmy was distracted by Shirley, Virginia bobbed and weaved around him and made it out the front door.

Jimmy went tearing after her.

Sylvester shot out the front door like he wanted to jump in one of those shopping bags.

I stood frozen for a moment, then charged outside too, with Shirley right behind.

Jimmy was slapping and kicking Virginia all the way down the sidewalk as she tried to get away.

“Jim, don't!” cried Shirley.

“Don't hurt her!” I sobbed.

He didn't seem to hear us. He looked like he was in a trance. He kept slapping and kicking.

I was sure he was gonna kill her. I had to do something. So I jumped on his back and wrapped my scrawny arms around his broad chest like when he used to carry me through the Combat Zone.

“Leave her alone leave her alone leave her alone!” I screamed, my face scrunched up like a little fist.

He stumbled back like he was drunk as a skunk, which he was, and I held on for dear life.

“Get in the house or you'll be next,” he bellowed.

My sneak attack gave Virginia an opening. She broke free and took off down the street, looking back once.

“I'm sorry,” she moaned. I knew what she meant. Sorry to leave us. Sorry for what he might do to me now.

Jimmy finally shook me off. I landed on my keister and quickly scrambled back up.

Several neighbors were peering out their windows. The Greek girls across the street looked horrified. Their older brother, who was home from the service, stepped outside in his uniform.

“What's the trouble, Jimmy?” he called out.

“Trouble? My goddamn daughters, that's the goddamn trouble.”

“If you don't calm down, somebody's gonna call the cops.”

“Oh yeah? Who's gonna call the cops? You?'

“I didn't say me. But somebody—”

“You call yourself a Greek? Greeks mind their own business. Greeks keep family business within the family. They don't call any cops. You think you're some tough guy in a uniform? Well, come over here, tough guy. I'll fight you.”

“I'm not going to fight you, Jimmy. I'd lose. We both know that.”

“Goddamn right,” Jimmy said.

The Greek boy came across the street and approached Jimmy like he was trying to tame a tiger. He talked to Jimmy in Greek. Jimmy eyed the guy suspiciously, then laughed a few times and started throwing the baloney. He asked the kid if he wanted to marry his oldest daughter and take her off his hands, but the kid said he wasn't in the market for a wife and Jimmy told him that was smart, told him to make it with a lot of women all over the world like he had done in the merchant marine. He lit a cancer stick and invited the kid in for a nightcap, but the kid said no thanks. Jimmy said it was too bad he didn't have a son like him who knew how to respect his elders, and told him to kill a few gooks for him. Then he turned to me and Shirley.

“Get your asses inside,” he said. “You're causing a goddamn scene.”

We scurried inside, not knowing what would happen once we got in there.

But Jimmy didn't do anything. He just told Shirley that he was starving and to make him a couple of fried egg sandwiches. Then he went in to watch
The Jackie Gleason Show
.

He said only one more thing that night about Virginia leaving.

Good goddamn riddance.

But Virginia didn't go very far.

She just moved in with her friend, Angela, who lived one street over in the projects. Angela was about Susan's age and already had three brats who Virginia sometimes babysat. I babysat them myself once. They hurled a dump truck at my noggin and dumped the Oscar Mayer wieners I was supposed to feed them in a puddle of mud.

Virginia said the brats weren't so bad once you got to know them, and insisted Angela was a great mother. For her, Angela could do no wrong. Angela was her Susan.

Jimmy disagreed. He said Angela was a goddamn whore and a goddamn idiot for having so many goddamn brats.

Virginia steered clear of our street for several weeks. But shortly after I began eighth grade, she started to sneak back home to see Shirley and me when Jimmy's car was gone. That's how I found out she had become crazy about a drummer named Dennis. One Friday night when Shirley was working and Jimmy was out clubbing, Virginia took me to see Dennis play. I put on a pink miniskirt and some white lipstick and we smoked a little pot on the way there. I didn't feel anything from the pot, but I pretended that I did. The gorilla guarding the front door winked at me and let us right in 'cause I looked old for my age. I was jittery with excitement. When we got inside, though, my excitement took a nosedive. The
joint was a real dump. It smelled like Clorox and vomit, and the floor was sticky with crud. One corner had been turned into a makeshift stage illuminated by a few dim colored lights. Dennis's band was already playing. I could tell right away they stank. Dennis couldn't keep a beat, but I had to admit he was pretty cute. He had ropes of dirty-blond hair that whipped his eyeballs when he drummed.

“We're madly in love,” said Virginia, as I watched Dennis flirting with a bunch of skanks between sets.

“Isn't he ever gonna come over here?” I asked.

“He's gotta say hi to his fans. That's how it is when you're dating a musician. It's kinda hard. I've gotta share him with the world.”

Dennis never came over to say hi to us, so I never did get to meet him.

I thought I would down the road 'cause Virginia said they'd be getting married one day, possibly in Golden Gate Park.

But a few months later, Virginia showed up at our apartment crying her eyes out. Dennis had dumped her when she tried to pressure him into moving up the date of their nuptials. She looked like she'd put on some weight and confessed to being so heartbroken she was eating Angela out of house and home.

“Good goddamn riddance,” I said, trying to make her feel better and glad that Dennis was out of the picture.

As the weeks passed, Virginia continued to show up crying and continued to get fatter. Finally she broke down and told Shirley and me that she might be in the family way.

“He only put it in a little ways,” she sobbed. “He said I couldn't get pregnant that way. He says it must be someone else's, but it isn't. I only did it with him 'cause I thought we were getting married.”

“Boys only care about one thing,” moaned Shirley. “I told you that.”

“No you didn't. You never told me anything about the birds and the bees.”

“I—I thought I did,” Shirley stammered.

“I don't want a brat,” Virginia sobbed. “I threw myself down the stairs at Angela's but nothin' happened.”

“I could kill that Dennis. I could shoot him dead,” I blurted out.

“It's not his fault. It's my fault,” Virginia insisted.

“We have to tell your father,” Shirley finally said. “He's going to find out anyway when word gets around that you're big as a house.”

“I might as well just kill myself,” Virginia whimpered, “before he goes and does it himself.”

For the next few weeks I could barely concentrate in school. I was afraid I'd come home one day and find Virginia with her brains blown out. I pictured
Jimmy tossing her bloated body off the
Aristotle Onassis
and telling people she must've gone to KooKooLand with all the other kooks. I racked my brain to figure a way out of the mess but couldn't come up with anything.

Then, one day, I came home from school and saw a note Shirley had left for Jimmy before she went to bed.

The rabbit died
the note said. I had no idea what it meant, but I found out when Jimmy got home.

“The test came back positive. Your whore of a sister got herself knocked up. Virginia's no goddamn virgin. But don't tell anyone or I'll knock your teeth down your throat.”

I acted like it was news and held my breath to see if he was going for his shotgun.

But Jimmy had another solution.

“I'm getting rid of that brat. I'll be damned if I'm gonna let her drag our name through the mud.”

He got on the phone with Dr. C. Even though he was speaking in Greek, I could tell he was begging, and when that didn't work, threatening.

Finally, he hung up.

“I talked him into it,” he said. “But we all have to keep our big traps shut or he could lose his license again—for good this time.”

“I'll keep it on a stone wall, Daddy. Forever 'n' ever.”

When Virginia found out Jimmy was saving her from the mess she had gotten in, she threw her arms around him, sobbing, and told him he was the best father in the whole world.

“Get one thing straight. I'm not doin' it for you, I'm doin' it for me,” he said. “So I can show my face in front of Hank and my buddies. So they're not yuk-yuk-yukking behind my goddamn back.”

Virginia nodded. She didn't care why he was doing it or who he was doing it for. She just didn't want the brat.

Dr. C said it was too dangerous to do the thing at his office. YaYa and Papou were away in Greece and Jimmy had a key to their place, so he took Virginia over there. Shirley and I went along to take care of her.

Virginia looked scared, but I told her everything would be groovy and then I spat on her.

But things weren't so groovy.

Virginia had waited too long to tell anyone that she was in the family way. It turned out Dr. C couldn't do what he usually did. He tried something else to make Virginia lose the baby. He told Jimmy he'd done the best he could and
we'd just have to wait and see what happened and then he took off.

Jimmy took off too. He didn't want to be around any woman's blood and Shirley said there was bound to be a lot of it.

I suddenly felt dizzy.

Don't be a goddamn chicken,
pluck pluck pluck,
I scolded myself. Make believe it's Karo syrup.

Shirley offered to make Virginia and me some Greek food, but that was the last thing we wanted.

After an hour, Virginia got a stomachache. It got a little worse and a little worse. Finally she went into the bathroom and something came out of her. She took one look at it and flushed it away.

We were all relieved.

“That wasn't so bad,” Virginia said.

Then she began to bleed. She turned white as a sheet, but the sheets weren't white. Her temperature shot up and she moaned she was dying and screamed to be taken to the hospital.

I started to blubber. Shirley sent me into the other room and called Jimmy.

When Jimmy showed up, he wouldn't take Virginia to the hospital. He'd made a pact with Dr. C not to do it.

“You made your bed, you'll lie in it,” he yelled at Virginia through the closed door.

He called Dr. C and begged him to come over and see what he could do.

It seemed like forever before Dr. C got there, but maybe it wasn't.

Dr. C went into the bedroom with Virginia and closed the door.

Shirley sat there numb and Jimmy paced and I promised God I'd never do anything bad or wrong or stupid ever again if he'd just let my sister live.

God was awake and heard me.

The bleeding stopped and Virginia's temperature went down. She was so weak she could barely raise her head off the pillow. Jimmy force-fed her scrambled eggs like Papou did when she was a little girl.

She got better.

Shirley made Dr. C a farina cake to thank him.

Jimmy promised to trim his trees for nothing for the rest of his life.

Dr. C said he just wanted everyone to forget the whole thing. He insisted this was really and truly
the last time
he would bail out any Greek's misbehaving daughter.

“We dodged a bullet,” Jimmy told him. “You and me, we dodged a goddamn bullet.”

V
irginia learned her lesson. She got married a few months later, in the summer of 1968, to the first guy who asked her. He wasn't a drummer or even a guy who pretended to be one. He was a budding marine named Wayne.

I begged her not to do it, but she said she owed it to Jimmy for bailing her out of a jam.

Wayne's parents weren't too thrilled about the wedding either. Since Jimmy had no dough and said he wouldn't blow a big wad on a shindig even if he was loaded, Wayne's parents had to spring for it.

I was a bridesmaid and wore a yellow gown that Jimmy said made me look like a banana. I didn't smile for the photos. Besides hiding my Dracula teeth, I was sad about Virginia marrying a guy who bad-mouthed hippies and was gung ho to go to Vietnam.

I didn't think it was a match made in heaven.

I wasn't even sure there was such a thing.

I wanted to believe there was. I really did. I wanted to believe you could meet a guy like Dustin Hoffman in
The Graduate
and run away with him from your miserable life. I wanted to believe you could love the guy and he would love you back until you both croaked. But everywhere I looked it just seemed like men and women, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers hated each other's guts. Everyone in the projects, sooner or later, got busted up. Everyone but Jimmy and Shirley, anyway. But if I knew one thing for sure already, it was that I didn't want a ball and chain like Jimmy.

I'd rather be a goddamn old maid, I thought. That wasn't the worst thing in the world to me anymore.