Watching Jimmy

Because of Reg.

Thanks to “The Group” — Susan Adach, Ann Goldring, Loris Lesynski, and Teresa Toten.
All for one and one for all.
I’d like to acknowledge my readers — Maxine and Doug Hartry, Lesley Marshall, Susan Foley, Kim Brotohusodo, Jocelyn Burke, Yvonne Thompson, and Paula Wing’s class. Thanks also to Dr. Paul O’Connor for his help; to Gaelan Burke for his singing; to Marthe Jocelyn for selecting me to be part of
Secrets
; and especially to Kathryn Cole for taking such good care of Carolyn and Jimmy; and finally, to my nana, who from her perch on a cloud said, “You seem to be having trouble, dear. Just take this down.”

U
ncle Ted said Jimmy bumped his head falling off the swing. He said Jimmy just seemed to let go of the chains when he reached the highest arc, and he fell,
thunk
, to the ground and lay still. Uncle Ted got out of his car and ran over to Jimmy. He said he talked to him. “Jimmy. Jimmy, wake up!” He said he slapped Jimmy’s face. He jiggled him. When Jimmy didn’t wake up, Uncle Ted carried him to the car and placed him gently on the back-seat of his Thunderbird convertible. He didn’t even stop to open up the door.

The last part is true. The getting out of the car, the talking, the jiggling, the slapping, the carrying, and even the laying down. The first part is not. Jimmy never fell off the swing.

It was dim in the park when it happened. The street-lights had come on above the ravine, signaling the time for all the little kids to leave. It was too dusky for the lovers, and all the cigarette-puffing teenagers were at a community dance. Uncle Ted chose the perfect time to teach Jimmy a lesson he’d never forget.

Uncle Ted thought he’d get rid of any stragglers by paying them off. He snapped a blue five-dollar bill over his head, folded it lengthwise, and passed it to the horrid Luanne Price, the tallest kid. “You’re the banker, my dear. Off you go, and mind the little ones don’t push and shove at the Dairy Bar.”

Uncle Ted just didn’t count on me, Carolyn, perched in a tree where the park and the parking lot meet.

To understand the whole story, you have to go back to the evening of the last Thursday before the end of summer holidays. I know this because Uncle Ted has made it his habit to visit Aunt Jean every Thursday ever since her eldest son, Bertie, was shot down over the English Channel during the war.

Just to be perfectly clear, I call Aunt Jean
Aunt Jean
and
Uncle Ted
Uncle Ted
, but they aren’t my real relatives — just close family friends who we’ve known forever. Uncle Ted is Aunt Jean’s brother. Her only living relative, other than her youngest son, Jimmy, of course. Aunt Jean’s husband has been dead since Jimmy was five. I barely remember him.

Jimmy and I were born ten days apart, he and his mom — Aunt Jean — live in the other half of our semi-detached house, which is the end one before you go down into the park. In fact, my bedroom and Jimmy’s are separated by a fire wall. When we were little, we used to do Morse Code messages on the wall after lights out, until Aunt Jean would scream “Stop that blooming racket!”

All my life, I’ve spent more time in Aunt Jean’s house than my own, because my mom works crazy shifts at the button factory. Aunt Jean gets paid to watch me.

Like I said, on the last Thursday of the summer holidays, Uncle Ted parked in front of Aunt Jean’s half of the semi. All the kids streamed out of their houses like ants to a picnic to see Uncle Ted’s honey of a car; a new, baby blue-and-white Thunderbird convertible with fins like wings.

All summer long, twenty times on Thursdays, Jimmy would
say to me “Yippee, it’s Uncle Ted Day. Don’t you
love that car, Carolyn? Wouldn’t you love to drive that car more than anything in the world?” Every kid in the neighborhood coveted that car, but no one more than Jimmy.

Boys are so dumb about cars. I could have said “Jimmy, you need a licence to drive a car,” or “Jimmy, you have to be sixteen to drive a car,” but what would have been the point? I ignored him.

Every Thursday during the summer of 1958, while Uncle Ted was visiting with Aunt Jean in the back kitchen, we kids swarmed the car. We jumped on the bumper. We took little kicks at the whitewall tires. We opened the doors or slid over them and fell,
plop
, onto the white leatherette seats.

Some kids adjusted the radio or the aerial, but it was only Jimmy who sat behind the wheel. After all, Uncle Ted was his uncle so Jimmy should be the driver. Once Jimmy had slipped on Uncle Ted’s white gloves, none of us asked for a turn. He wore Uncle Ted’s white driving cap backwards, because otherwise, the peak blocked his vision.

“
Rummmn. Rummmmn
.” Jimmy turned an imaginary key. All the passengers ran their own engines as well. I did the running commentary, telling them what we were passing: Steeds Dairy, Bush Hardware, Armitage’s Bakery — all the
sights up and down King Street. We acted like a bunch of five year olds.

Jimmy got carried away at Ye Olde Candy Store and tooted the horn.

Uncle Ted burst out of Aunt Jean’s house hollering. “You kids get away from my car! How many times do I have to tell you?”

The kids scuttled like cockroaches back to their houses. There was only Jimmy Uncle Ted, and me left.

Uncle Ted shook his fist at Jimmy. “And to think I put you in charge!”

He turned to me. “How could you go along with him, Carolyn?” He handed each of us a chamois, and we spent the rest of his visiting time polishing fingerprints off that car.

“It’s not much of a punishment is it, Carolyn?” Jimmy grinned so wide I thought his mouth would reach his sticky-outy ears.

I do admit, now, that I liked the polishing. When you thought you were done and looked at the paint sideways, there’d be just one more print. I liked huffing my breath on the baby blue paint and then polishing the marks away. It was a challenge.

Each week the routine was the same. When Uncle Ted left, he kissed Aunt Jean good-bye. He peeled a purple ten-dollar bill from his billfold and pressed it into her hand. We gave him back the chamois. He patted my head and punched Jimmy on the right shoulder.

Hard.

A
lthough Uncle Ted Day was the most exciting day of the week, Fridays were a close second because we had group lessons at the community pool.

“What’s that on your shoulder?” I asked Jimmy one Friday.

“Just a bruise. I must have fallen.”

He couldn’t fool me. That bruise on Jimmy’s shoulder was an Uncle Ted Bruise. Each week it got darker and darker, one bruise on top of last week’s one, on top of the one from the week before, none of them getting a chance to heal between visits.

“Uncle Ted shouldn’t hit you so hard.”

“He doesn’t mean anything by it. I’m just a softy, that’s all. And he’s always swinging like a big door. He doesn’t know his own strength.”

I squinted my eyes at Jimmy. The last part sounded like Aunt Jean’s words, the part about Ted not knowing his own strength.
Hogwash!
Uncle Ted may have been as tall and as wide as a door, but he was more like a screen door to my way of thinking. There was always hot air rushing out of him.

The Thursday before school started, the one before the long weekend, was Aunt Jean’s summer wind-up Canasta tournament, but she was prepared to stay home and visit with Uncle Ted as usual.

“Go. Go. Jimmy and I will be fine,” said Uncle Ted. He gave Jimmy a little love-punch on the shoulder to prove it.

Don’t go, Aunt Jean
, I wanted to scream.
Stay home!

No words came out of my mouth and I deeply regret that. I deeply do.

Aunt Jean put on her white gloves. She pinned her straw hat on her head and snapped her purse shut. She kissed Jimmy good-bye. “Be good,” she said, including me.

When Aunt Jean was almost out of sight, Uncle Ted turned to me, “Go home and tell your mother she wants you.” I figured he wanted me to get lost so I went and sat on my porch.

“Jimmy, keep your friends away from my car.” Uncle Ted took the paper and went inside.

Jimmy’s friends swarmed all over the car as usual, but with Aunt Jean gone, Uncle Ted seemed more mad than usual. I think now that his anger had been building up all summer long.

When Jimmy got carried away and tooted the horn, Uncle Ted came out of the house screaming. Even I was scared, and I was not involved. Uncle Ted yanked Jimmy out of the car. He jumped in behind the wheel and started the engine.

“Get off. Get off, you kids! I’m moving this car.”

He put the car in gear and went forward with a jerk Then he slammed on the brakes. Forward, slam. Forward, slam, like a baby blue bucking bronco, until all the kids, laughing, fell off the car and onto the road. All except one.

Jimmy was splayed over the trunk holding on to an armrest in the backseat.

Uncle Ted zoomed off down the lane, into the park, with Jimmy on the trunk. All the kids followed.

I ran as fast as I could, I really did. My hair streamed off my neck and I galloped, trying to go faster.

When I got down into the park, the light was fading. The swings and the cat-poop sandbox and the picnic tables were blending in with the grass. Uncle Ted was
blowing hot air about how rich and important he was and handing Luanne the five-dollar bill.

I shinnied up a tree and blended in with the leaves.

When all the kids were gone, Uncle Ted turned to Jimmy, who by this time, had jumped off the car and was standing by the driver’s door. Uncle Ted punched him on his sore shoulder and then his good shoulder and then his sore shoulder.

“So you want to drive my car, do ya? Huh? Huh, you little twerp?” Jimmy kept moving back and forth during the punching and saying, “Yes, I want to drive your car!” From my perch it looked like they were doing the cha-cha dance.

Uncle Ted pushed Jimmy with two hands. “Well, you’ll have to race me then.”

Jimmy got on his mark, lined up with the front bumper of the car. Uncle Ted tooted the horn and they were off, Uncle Ted gunning, gunning, and Jimmy pumping his legs fast. He did pretty good. He ran straight down the parking lot. From my angle, I thought Jimmy won, but no,
there had to be a re-run.

On the re-run, Uncle Ted changed the rules of the race. The car cut into Jimmy’s lane. It cut him off just
missing him. Jimmy kept running. When he realized that Uncle Ted was chasing him, he went even faster. Jimmy ran out onto the grass. Ted didn’t care. He drove up and over the log that marked the end of the parking lot and onto the grass, carving doughnuts — trying to run Jimmy down. Jimmy darted. He deked. He leapt out of the way and dove into the backseat of the car.

I thought he was safe. But no, Jimmy was like a burr to be shaken loose. The car lurched and Jimmy was thrown from passenger door to passenger door and back again. Oh, those sore shoulders! Oh, the noise!

I started to scramble down from the tree. “Stop! Stop! Stop!” He didn’t hear me.

I was dangling from the lowest branch when Jimmy’s body flew out the back of the car. It arced in the air and dropped to the ground. Jimmy lay still.

The rest you know. I’m sorry I can’t tell it as fast as it happened.

Apparently Uncle Ted passed Aunt Jean coming home from Canasta. Aunt Jean tells how she cradled poor Jimmy’s head on the way to the hospital.

Jimmy didn’t go to school on the day after Labor Day. He hasn’t been to school yet, because of his head injury.

Uncle Ted still comes on Thursdays, which is fine, because Aunt Jean has no other visitors now except me, and Jimmy is a peck of trouble. A peck of trouble. Aunt Jean says that a visit from her only living relative makes a nice break. It’s something to look forward to.

It is now my job to scoot the kids away from the car, which is easy, because I have a new technique.

“Can Jimmy drive your car?” I ask Uncle Ted sweetly. “His diapers won’t leak a bit. They were just changed.”

Uncle Ted always lets him, but I have to put down the car blanket first. Jimmy sits behind the wheel and I go, “
Rummmn Rummmmn
.” He bounces up and down like a baby, and the other kids stay back and watch.

When it’s time for Uncle Ted to leave and he is handing over a ten-dollar bill, I say, “Aunt Jean could do with some more handkerchiefs on account of Jimmy’s drooling from the accident.”

Uncle Ted peels off two more bills and presses them into Aunt Jean’s hand. Then Uncle Ted goes to pat Jimmy on the head. Jimmy ducks. Ted tries to give me a love-punch in the shoulder. I put my two hands up like a shield and kick him in the ankle.

“Carolyn!” says Aunt Jean. I don’t say anything. What would be the point?

On Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday after school, I push Jimmy on the swings when no one’s watching. He hangs on tight like he always did. He loves to go really high and touch the sky.

Our Jimmy is not scared of anything or anybody.

Neither am I.