Such a Pretty Face (44 page)

The Athertons were having a kick-off spaghetti dinner and auction the following month at Danny’s school and accepting items to sell for additional funds. A local band would play, as would the elementary school band, the middle school jazz band, and the high school marching and jazz bands. The choruses from all three schools would also sing. There would be four solos, and following that, a musical talent show.

It was called “Songs for Danny.”

People who wanted to donate items could drop them off at the school.

That night I primed a chair in white. I asked it questions. How do you feel when you’re alone? Do you like being alone? What do you like about yourself? What do you not like about yourself? Why aren’t you braver?

The chair didn’t answer.

How come you’re silent? What do you hear in your head when you’re silent? Does silence scare you?

I leaned back and sighed. All right, I said to that plain wood chair now all primed with white. A simple question: What’s your name?

Loud and clear I heard it.

My name’s Danny.

I asked Zena to come home with me after derby practice the next week to see the Danny Chair.

I’d landed a face-plant and come home with a bruise on my cheek, which went well with the bruises on my left arm from another practice.

I was so nervous as I unlocked the garage door I could barely push it up. The chair was in the middle of the floor, over plastic. The only people I ever let see my chairs were Polly and Lance, and they were wildly enthusiastic and loved them because they loved me.

Zena, dressed in a purple sheath with red knee-high go-go boots and beaded chains and bright red lipstick, had been telling a hilarious story about one of the attorneys at work who she’d seen at a party sporting a purple Mohawk and pink tights two months ago. He ended up wearing a martini glass upside down on his head.

As I pushed the garage door the rest of the way up, Zena dropped her red purse to the ground.

“Good God,” she said. “Good God in heaven with all his flying, drunken angels, would you look at that!”

Me and Zena had to get the help of two neighbors to load the Danny Chair into The Mobster the evening of the Songs for Danny auction. It was good that Jake was out of town, in Seattle for work, so I didn’t have to deal with hiding one more thing from him—my demented obsession with chairs.

Neither of the neighbors was helpful at first, because they wanted to walk around it, stare, and touch.

“It’s incredible…magnificent…. You did this, Stevie? You did it? You’re an artist. A talent…brilliant…. I had no idea! Are there more? There are? Can we see them? When? You do the sawing yourself? And the painting? Who taught you? How did you put this together?”

I blushed, I stuttered, I hemmed and hawed, but I was thrilled. They liked the Danny Chair! We loaded the chair up and the neighbors waved us off.

I felt bad I hadn’t delivered the chair earlier, but with my regular job, my chicken job, visiting Polly, and the hours and hours I’d spent at roller derby practice getting me up to speed so I could “knock someone else’s teeth out,” as Zena said, and heart-throbbing Jake, I’d been busy.

Zena and I watched people walking in and out of the school with wicker baskets filled with treats and lotions. One guy hauled in a minibarbeque. Someone else had a girl’s pink bike. Another person had a picnic basket with wine.

I was such an idiot. What was I thinking?
Why didn’t I donate a basket of lotions?

“Get out of The Mobster, Stevie,” Zena said.

“I can’t. I can’t move.”
Why didn’t I donate a boom box?

“Get out and help me move this magical thing into the gym.”

“No. I’ve changed my mind. They’re not going to want this. They can’t. It’s a monstrosity. A joke. It’s insulting. Let’s go home.”
Why didn’t I donate a skateboard?

She groaned. “You’re pathetic. It’s not a monstrosity. It’s art. They’ll love it. Now, get out of the car and help me or I’ll trip you during roller derby practice.”

“You’ve already done that many times, you miniature maniac.” I turned to her. “Can you do it? Please?”
Why didn’t I donate some of my abundance of vegetables?

“You have got to be kidding. I can’t lift that thing myself.”

It was true. We’d need help getting it out of The Mobster and we’d need help getting it back in the truck when the people in charge of the auction told us to get, get,
get out,
their faces appalled, offended.

Zena clambered out of the truck, her purple miniskirt coming to midthigh over her red tights. I lunged for her. She slithered through my hands.

“Hello there,” she called to three football player–type men. “Could you give us a hand?”

They could. After they walked around the chair, stared, touched it, and asked me lots of questions. “I will never in my life see a chair that cool again,” one said. “Darn, but that’s way, way cool. Awesome.”

The three football types carried the chair into the school and down the hallway and then put it in the center of the gym floor for the Songs for Danny auction. By then, they were being followed by at least a hundred people.

I tried to trail behind, but Zena dragged me with her.

I could hardly breathe. I had wanted to drop off the chair and leave. I had been hoping that I could slip in and out without the Athertons seeing me. I had worn a baseball cap with my curls piled up in it, a sweatshirt, and jeans. Maybe they wouldn’t recognize me. It was the mean and nasty Crystal they’d focused on.

“Somebody go and get the Athertons, they have to see this.”

“It should be in a craft museum.”

“I have never seen anything like this in my entire life.”

“That is beautiful. It’s so beautiful I’m going to cry.”

“I’m going to cry, too! It’s the perfect testament to Danny, all his loves, in one chair.”

“The Athertons are gonna love it. Here they come! Here they come! Look what someone built for your son!”

The jostling crowd pulled back, and there they were. Mr. and Mrs. Atherton, followed by the other three kids. They were grieving hard, I knew that, and there were more lines on their faces, but they were smiling until they saw the chair.

Both of their smiles dropped, their mouths gaping open in shock, as they stared up at it.

Mrs. Atherton put her hands to her face and cried.

I could tell Mr. Atherton was trying not to cry, his reddening face tight, his lips rolled in, a nerve thumping in his temple. But then their friends crowded around, thumped him on the back, kissed her on the cheek, and neither one held back anymore, the tears streaming down their cheeks, Mr. Atherton’s shoulders shaking, Mrs. Atherton saying, “Oh, for heaven’s sakes, oh, for heaven’s sakes…”

“It’s incredible,” someone breathed. “It’s incredible.”

One of their boys stood right in front of it. “Hey!” he shouted, pointing. “It says, ‘Danny’s Chair.’ Right there. See it? I can read that!”

They saw it. The three little brothers climbed up on the chair, sat down, grinned, and everybody clapped.

I shrunk back into the crowd, pulling at Zena. “We have to go,” I whispered. “They might recognize me. Come on.”

“Keep your booty on, your panties secure, your bra fastened,” Zena said. “I wanna see what happens.”

I turned to leave without the miniskirted wonder, but then people pointed at me, their smiles huge, excited, and I froze. The Athertons turned, and I was pinned to the gym floor by an enormous thunderbolt that God himself had thrown.

I saw the Athertons’ faces freeze in shock as they recognized me. They gawked at the chair, then back at me, then at the chair.

Mrs. Atherton’s expression changed from recognition, to shock, and finally understanding dawned. She fit together the pieces of a huge puzzle, a complex problem, a mystery. The mystery was the Dornshire letter, and it was now solved.

“It was you,” she said, a stunned expression on her face. She wrapped me up in a huge hug, followed by her husband. “It was
you,
wasn’t it?”

I whispered to her, “Let’s keep it a girls’ secret, shall we?”

“And Danny’s Chair goes to Alexis Shelley, for $9,200. Alexis, come on up!”

The crowd cheered and whooped as Alexis hopped to the stage. She had dressed up as a fairy for the event and had sprinkled all with fairy dust. I learned later she was a renowned biologist and Mrs. Atherton’s sister.

I was stunned by how many people were at the Songs for Danny auction. There were hundreds and hundreds of people all jammed together. The auction of my chair had been put off to the end, after the silent auction, the spaghetti dinner, and the music concerts.

I stood next to Mr. and Mrs. Atherton, who were grinning and cheering.

“I want the artist up here!” Alexis said. “Who wants the artist up here?” The crowd roared, and I was shoved up to the stage by Zena, the miniskirted wonder, who said, “Move your wiggly ass, girlfriend,” and the Athertons.

“This is the best chair I have ever seen, or will ever see!” Alexis said.

More roaring.

I smiled at Danny’s Chair. The chair that had told me he was Danny had ended up being a tiny rough draft of the one today.

I had built a seven-foot-tall green dragon chair. Danny loved reading about dragons, so I’d cut out huge wooden dragon wings for the back of the chair and painted them green and purple. They spread three feet out on either side of the chair. The back of the chair was a dragon neck and huge head. The dragon was smiling, big teeth, blue eyes. Across the dragon’s neck I’d painted a purple sign. It said, D
ANNY’S
C
HAIR
.

The arm rails were the dragon’s arms. Instead of claws, though, I cut out a baseball and a catcher’s mitt and attached them to the front. The legs of the chair were dragon legs. I cut out huge claws and attached them with nails and painted them black with purple toenails. I painted musical notes on the stomach and neck.

It was, I thought to myself, trying to be modest, quite a sight.

“Here she is, folks, Stevie Barrett! Artist extraordinaire!” The crowd roared, Zena hooted, Mr. and Mrs. Atherton cried.

I cried, too. I couldn’t help it.

“But folks,” the fairy said, throwing more gold fairy dust, “I got a little secret. I’m not keeping the chair. I’m giving it to my beautiful sister and her husband. They’re going to put it in the entryway of ‘Danny’s House,’ where we’ll all work together to help families in need. Danny’s Dragon Chair is going to be the first thing people see when they walk in.” The fairy started to cry through her words. “It’s gonna be magical! It’s gonna be enchanting! It’s the best damn chair ever, and Danny’s House is gonna help one sick or hurt kid after another, yes, we are! Yes, we are!”

Deafening.

Absolutely deafening.

Zena took the e-mails and addresses of people who were interested in my chairs at the auction and promised I would get back to all of them.

I was soon deluged in orders for chairs.

Deluged.

Me.

Stevie Barrett.

Truly crazy person.

People wanted to buy my chairs.

I couldn’t even believe it.

Zena picked me up on the way to derby practice. She insisted on seeing my chairs in my garage.

“You’re going to have a Stevie’s Chair Fest,” she told me, tapping her foot.

“No way.”

“Yep. Way.” She shook her black wedge of hair. She was wearing jeans tucked into boots that went over her knees, two tanks, and silver chains. “Two weeks, Stevie. Hip, hop, get ready.” She took out her cell phone camera and snapped pictures of my chairs, dragging them outside for the shots.

“No way.”

“Yes. I’m going to e-mail the people from Lance’s party and people at the office and the Athertons and the Break Your Neck Booties.”

“No, those are my amateur chairs. They’re a peek into a twirling, swirling, troubled mind—that would be my mind. They’re kooky and hormone charged and troublesome…”

Then on Monday, a week later, Cherie dropped a newspaper on my keyboard. “There ya go, sweetie. Hope you’re ready to roll.”

My jaw dropped.

Zena smirked.

My chairs were in the newspaper. People were “respectfully invited” to my home
that Saturday
to come and buy them.

Cherie had paid for a colored ad. She hit me on the back. “Something tells me, Stevie, that you’re going to want to get your ass home for the rest of the week and work your skinny tail off.”

On the way home I called Mr. Pingle and told him why I needed to take the weekend off. “Those were your chairs in the newspaper?
Your
chairs! You’re a genius! An artist! My! My! I’m coming, Stevie! I’m coming! Cluck cluck!”

“Cluck cluck!” I shouted back, knowing that would make him happy. “Cluck! Cluck!”

We gobbled off.

Jake came by my house after work.

I looked up from my band saw and felt this rush of pure joy at seeing him.

The other night we’d gone walking together in the forest in the hills above Portland, then we’d had a picnic. We didn’t ever seem to stop talking.

“Jake, hi,” I said. I stepped away from my saw. I was creating a tail for a lion chair. I walked over to give him a hug, but stopped when I saw his expression.

“Stevie.” He held out the newspaper ad. “I’m learning more about you all the time.”

“It was Zena. She came over and took photos of my chairs, and then my boss, Cherie, put an ad in the paper and now…I’m selling the chairs on Saturday.”

He smiled at me, but he was holding back, I knew it. “You’re incredibly talented. Can I see the chairs?”

“Yes, of course.” I choked down my fear, and dared to dare. I showed him all the chairs, and he was profuse in his praise.

“You didn’t tell me that you build and paint chairs.”

“No, I didn’t. I do it as a hobby, as a stress release. It’s how I work out my issues, my problems, life…. I am not real stable, I’ve told you that, a bit crazed, fraught with numerous strange worries, definitely tilted off center….”

“Why didn’t you share this with me?”