Chapter 23
I woke up an hour later as Beth was easing Sally up to the border crossing and customs station. Beth wanted to take the US route because she was more familiar with the roads and according to her we’d get there faster. Harold and I didn’t have a clue, weren’t familiar with any particular route so we took Beth’s lead without questioning the intelligence of her decision. It didn’t matter to me; one highway was just as scary as the next whether it was in Canada or the US. Either way the prospect of driving still terrified me. Beth was behind the wheel when the Customs guy rambled through the usual set of questions. Beth lied and said we were going to visit her grandmother in Minneapolis. Harold and I nodded our heads in agreement like a couple of puppets.
“We couldn’t say we were going to Woodstock,” she argued. “They’d keep us here for hours like we were criminals. These guys hate hippies.”
“Wake me up when we get there,” I said sliding back down onto the seat and stretching my legs up over the edge of the door, locking it with my heel. I was beginning to hate that H-word. “Which will be approximately sixteen hours, so get your beauty sleep now Snow White because in a couple of hours you’ll be driving,” she said stealing a look at me through the rear view mirror. “You look like crap by the way. I saw you take off on your bike at some ungodly hour last night.”
“Were you spying on me?”
“No,” she said defensively. “I couldn’t sleep so I got up for a drink and saw you sneaking off. That’s pretty crazy given your old man and everything.”
“Look who’s talking?”
“I mean it Jo-Jo. That’s nuts.”
“Bingo!” I exclaimed.
“You think you’re crazy?” she asked.
“Certifiable,” I said, “beyond a shadow of a doubt.”
“What about me and Hank? Are we nuts too?” she asked in this real serious voice like she suddenly forgot her shrink sessions with Dr. James.
“How else can you explain it? Three losers from small town nowhere off to New York to a rock festival with a bunch of freaks in a farmer’s field. Harold and I haven’t even been any further than Duluth in our entire lives. Something crazy’s happened this summer. Either that or we’re all possessed.”
“It’s called life Jo-Jo,” she laughed. “You and Hank are experiencing life—everything a sixteen-year-old is supposed to. There’s nothing crazy about it all. And I assure you you’re not possessed.” “Oh please,” I argued. “Look at all the crap we’ve done this summer. Gone to love-ins, pretending we’re Romeo and Juliet, making out on the beach, hanging out with weird freaky people, smoking pot. That’s not Korkala and me. But you know what the really weird thing is? Our parents have gone along with all this crap? I mean what’s next? ‘Ma I wanna go live on the streets with my new boyfriend the heroin addict. That’s nice dear. Here’s some blueberry muffins.’ Something’s gone totally wrong with our parents. Two months ago they never would have agreed to this. I think they’re under a spell.” “Now that’s crazy!” she laughed. “You’re paranoid. You’ve always been the scared one. Hank wants to break out. But you don’t really. You’ve resisted anything new we wanted to try. You keep hanging onto a life you don’t even like. Admit it, you don’t want to get out of your own backyard.”
“That’s not true,” I said.
“Then what’s the problem?”
“The problem is all summer long you’ve just decided you’re going to do things and expected Korkala and I to just go along with every one of your little schemes. All that other stuff was okay. Except for the Romeo and Juliet thing. That was totally stupid. But nothing really happened. But this is big. Yeah and maybe I am a little scared. Who wouldn’t be? So what.”
“This isn’t big. This is small potatoes. A weekend getaway in the country. We’ll be back home by Monday with another experience under our belts and a few good stories to tell our grandchildren. Besides we’ve got Hank to protect us,” she said winking at him and tossing her hair the way she always did when she flirted with Harold.
“Great. I feel so much better now,” I said, closing my eyes and trying to erase the sight of Harold as my protector. “Hey!” he said. “Whadoya mean?” Harold, who had been silent the entire time, turned around and shot me this goofy look that reminded me of the old nerdy Harold pre-Beth. “In case you haven’t noticed I’ve been working on my muscles this summer. Weight lifting and stuff eh. I think I can take care of a couple of chicks.” He said holding up his arms like Popeye and flexing his bicep muscle.
“Oh please. I think I’m going to puke.”
“Cool it Jo-Jo. We’re going to have a great time,” Beth said, slowing the Mustang down and pulling over to the side of the road. “I have to go for a pee and then I want you to take over driving Superman.”
“Yahoo! Far out man!” Harold, the Great Protector cheered, raising his arms in the air like Cassius Clay right after he knocked the snot clear out of Sonny Liston in seven rounds. Harold leapt out of the car and ran around to the driver’s side as Beth made her way to the side of the road where she dropped her panties and peed. If I looked like crap, she looked like double crap. Looking at her I realized what it was about this trip that scared me. It wasn’t the Woodstock thing, or the hippies or the fact that Harold and I were venturing out of our comfort zone and possibly entering the twilight zone, it was Beth. Was I the only one who saw that she was getting thinner and thinner? Every day she looked worse than the day before. She needed a trip to the hospital not Woodstock.
“Hank just stay on this highway until we get to Duluth which should be in a couple of hours,” she said climbing back into the car. “I’m going to go to sleep now. Wake me up when we get there. We’ll stop for coffee.” Beth’s voice faded into the leather of the car seat. She was lying on her side facing the door, the sun so bright on her face it showed all the veins beneath the surface of her skin.
Her eyes were rimmed in black, her lips pale purple. She was wearing her favorite dress, the long flowered one but I noticed it had a tiny tear at the sleeve and as always her feet were bare. There wasn’t much left of her body. It was like the dress was draped over a skeleton. I watched as her breathing became smooth and easy, as she drifted into another world somewhere.
“Korkala,” I whispered. I pulled myself as close to his head as I could so my lips were practically touching his ear. “Something’s wrong with Beth.”
“What?”
“I said, something is really wrong with Beth.”
“What are you talking about? She’s fine,” he said glancing over at Beth. “She’s sleeping.”
“Have you looked at her lately?”
“Yeah?”
“I mean really really looked at her Korkala. She’s not the same.
She’s getting really skinny.”
“No she’s not.”
“She is too. We can’t take her to Woodstock like this. We should be taking her to the hospital, to a doctor, to someone who knows what to do.”
“You are crazy! We can’t take her to the hospital. There’s nothing wrong with her. We’re going to Woodstock eh. She wants to go to Woodstock so we’re going.”
“Seriously Korkala something’s really wrong here. Our parents have been brainwashed. They’re under some kind of spell I think. So are you. I could be too. We should never have been allowed to take this trip with this girl. She needs help big time. We should be taking her to a doctor or something.”
“You have lost your mind. Nobody’s brainwashed. Beth’s right. You are paranoid.”
“Paranoid?”
“Yeah. Paranoid.”
“We have a dying girl in this car. Can’t you see that?”
“She’s not dying! She’s tired. You were tired. You slept. Are you dying?”
“You know it’s more than being a little tired. Look at her! She’s a bag of bones.”
“She’s a little thin. She’s always been that way.”
“Thin? This isn’t just thin. There are Biafrans with more body weight than her. Her veins are sticking out of her head, her eyes are black, her skin is whiter than white. What more evidence do you need?”
“Crap! Bummer! Double crap!” he cried looking over at Beth again. This time he really saw her. Harold finally saw what I had observed for weeks. “What do we do?” he asked, sounding more defeated than I had ever heard Harold sound in his life.
“I don’t know. You’re the Einstein. I know this much though we can’t go to Woodstock.”
“You’re right Jo-Jo,” Beth said suddenly, opening her eyes and giving me ‘the look’. “We’re not going.”
“What?” Harold cried, spontaneously taking his hands off the steering wheel as if it was on fire. The car swerved onto the gravel and was veering off the road when Beth reached over and grabbed the wheel, navigating the car safely back onto the pavement. “Jo-Jo’s right Hank,” she said sinking back into the seat and mopping her sweat-soaked forehead with the end of her dress.
“I’m pretty sick.”
“Ah Jeez! What a bummer!”
“Shut up Korkala!” I snapped. “I can’t think.”
“Don’t you ever get tired of it Jo-Jo?” Beth asked.
“Tired of what?”
“Of pretending to hate Hank,” she replied.
“I don’t hate Korkala,” I said.
“I know. You love him.”
“Like a brother. An annoying brother,” I repeated.
“Not like a brother,” she said.
“Okay you guys,” Harold interrupted. “I am in the car you know. I’m getting a little tired of the two of you always talking about me like I’m not here.”
“We don’t do that Hank,” Beth and I said in unison.
“You do too. You’re always having these conversations around me like I’m invisible or something. I hate it. And I’m also tired of you being mad at me all the time Jo.”
“I’m not mad at you all the time,” I said, “just some of the time. And not even that often.”
“You act like it. Always jumping on everything I say or do. Criticizing me all the time like I’m some kind of idiot.”
“That’s because she loves you,” Beth said, “and she won’t admit it.”
“Now who’s talking like I’m not in the car. And for the record smart-ass, I don’t love Korkala.”
“Yes you do!” she insisted. “Just admit it and get on with your life.”
“Oh please. Are you a psychiatrist now too?”
“It doesn’t take a shrink to figure this one out.”
“Would you two just stop? Enough already eh.” Harold screamed, pulling the car over to the side of the road. “I’m not driving another second until you tell us what’s going on. Where the hell are we going?”
“Minneapolis,” Beth answered.
“Minneapolis!” I shouted.
“Okay,” Harold said, in this really fake calm voice. “Why there? I thought you hated the place? Never wanted to see it again as long as you lived, just wanted to go to New York and be this big star, blah, blah, blah.”
“I do,” she said taking a deep breath. “But there’s something I gotta do there and it can’t wait. Just drive okay Hank and I’ll tell you everything when we get there.” Beth closed her eyes again and fell back to sleep, knowing full well that Harold would do as she asked, just like he always did.
“That’s ridiculous!” I protested. “I’m not going to
Minneapolis. I’m getting out.”
“And what? Walk home?” Harold said, starting Sally and getting back on the highway. “We’re going to Minneapolis. Just like Beth said.”
“What about me?”
“This isn’t about you Jo,” Harold snapped. I’d never seen him like this before. Good old easy going never hurt a flea nerd Harold was so angry at that moment I knew that if I opened my mouth and said anything I’d regret it for the rest of my life. We drove to Duluth in miserable silence. This was a trip I had taken many times before with my parents. I sat in the back seat and watched as the familiar scenery flew by like it does when you’re going real fast on one of those tilt-a-whirl rides at the fair. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine what it was in Minneapolis that Beth had to see. It was so typical of her to turn this into a game. Pretend to be going one place than take us on this mysterious wild goose chase without any explanation. She never talked much about Minneapolis. It was always New York. When she got to New York and became a famous actress, singer, dancer, photographer. Minneapolis was the place where she grew up yet she never talked of friends or family. No one. It was as if her previous life didn’t exist. Like she made it up.
Harold’s hands were white from his death grip around the steering wheel. His hair, which had grown down to his shoulders during the course of the summer, was blowing all around his head. There was something different about the way he looked but I hadn’t been able to put my finger on it until just then.
“You’re not wearing your glasses,” I cried, slicing through the silence between us like an arrow heading straight for the bull’s eye. I lurched forward and squeezed my head between the front seats of the Mustang so I could get a better look. “Are you trying to get us all killed?”The thought of Harold driving without his glasses was more terrifying than us going to Woodstock or Minneapolis or the moon.
“Relax,” he said. “I got contacts.”
“Contacts? When?”
“Yesterday. Bought them with my first paycheck. I didn’t want to go to Woodstock looking all weird and nerdy.”
“You don’t look weird and nerdy,” I said. “Besides haven’t you noticed? Weird is a cool thing with hippies. It’s in. Finally we’re in
Korkala.”
“Well I guess it doesn’t matter now eh. Since we aren’t even going to Woodstock. Bummer. I really wanted to see Jimi
Hendrix.”
“There’ll be other concerts,” I said reassuringly, and then I did something I ordinarily would never have done had we not been in such bizarre circumstances. I started rubbing his arm and feeling his newly formed bicep muscle that was bulging out of the sleeve of his tee shirt. “Would wonders ever cease,” as Ma always said, but Harold actually looked pretty good to me with his new contacts, long hair, sun tan and bulging muscles. Absolute plong hair, sun tan and bulging muscles. Absolute proof that I had lost my mind somewhere along Highway
“Not like this,” he said, not even noticing that I had been rubbing his arm, “and how often do people like us get to go to something this big? Think about it Jo. Our lives were pretty dull until Beth came to town. A big night out for you and me was riding our bikes to the Merla Mae for a double swirl. Jeez I don’t know if I can go back to that again.”
“Me either,” I agreed, “but the truth is we won’t be going back. You can never go back when your life has changed as much as ours has. Even if on the outside—to people who don’t know us—we look the same you and me we’ll know just how different we are, how much our lives have changed.”
“Yeah. I guess. I just wish we could go on like this forever. I’d like to just keep driving. Take Beth to Minneapolis and then just keep on going. Travel all around the States, camp out, meet new people. Like in Easy Rider. Never go back to that dump again.” “What about my parents and your mom?”
“We could send them postcards of all the places we’ve seen. And at Christmas we could go home to visit for a few days. Then right back on the road. Like Jack Kerouac. And once we’ve seen all there is to see in the States, we go to Europe and trip around there for a few years. There’s lots to see over there.”
“How do we get to Europe? How would we live?”
“We could get odd jobs and stuff. They’ve got bakeries all over the world. I could do that. You could get a job as a waitress.” “Now look who’s the crazy one!”
“Maybe I am. But if this is crazy then I want to stay this way. I mean haven’t things been better Jo. Since Beth I mean.” “Uh-huh,” I said. “In some ways yeah.”
“I mean, don’t you feel so much more alive? Like life is so much bigger and brighter. Everything is an adventure since she came. Even the little things we do like eating a bag of cookies is exciting.” “Yeah. I know what you mean. It’s like the volume’s been turned up on everything. Like we were deaf and blind before she came. I get scared sometimes too. I mean how can you live your whole life at this intensity without burning out? That’s what she’s done—burned out I mean.”
“No she hasn’t. How can someone be burned out at sixteen?” “Age has nothing to do with it. It’s the way she does things— everything’s so extreme, nothing is halfway with her. You can’t live at warp speed forever.”
When we got to Duluth Harold found an A and Dub. The guy had radar when it came to that place. He could find one anywhere. Harold gave the carhop our order while I went with Beth to the washroom. She appeared to be running a fever, although it was hard to tell because the heat was unbearable, worse than at home if that was possible. She rested her head on my shoulder as I walked with her to the can. Inside it was cool and smelled of that stuff they put in public toilets to give the illusion that they’re clean. I helped her onto the toilet and went for a pee in the next stall. I soaked paper towels in cold water and held them on her forehead and then she started to puke in the sink.
“Oh God!” I gasped. “I think we should take you to the hospital.” “I’m fine. I just needed to puke. It’s so damn hot,” she said wiping her neck and chest with the wet towel. “I’ll be as good as new as soon as I eat something.”
“Are you sure?”
“Uh-huh,” she said, running the cold water and splashing it on her face. “Let’s go eat. Hank will be worrying about us. You know him. Five minutes too long in the can and the world’s coming to an end.”
“Yeah, well this time I think he’s right. I’m scared Beth.” “Stop! Just stop Jo-Jo,” she cried, looking pitifully at me through the mirror, which was cracked making our faces appear distorted and freakish. Our voices bounced off the walls making everything we said sound hollow like we were inside a tin can. It was like we were in the ‘fun-house’ at the circus with those mirrors that made you real tall and thin or short and fat. “I’m fine,” she said taking a deep breath, “or at least I will be once I eat a Momma. Honest.”
Harold and I exchanged worried looks as I helped Beth back into the Mustang. “I think we should put the hood up,” I said. “She’s burning up.”
“I am not. Leave the hood the way it is Hank. Jo-Jo is starting to sound like my mother. Well maybe not my mother,” she laughed. “You mean my mother,” Harold said and then we all started to laugh and for awhile everything seemed normal.
We ate lunch and Harold ordered a round of root beers for the road. About an hour later Beth instructed him to pull over while she puked up her Momma. It would be suppertime before we made it to Minneapolis and we still didn’t have a clue why we were going there. I laid on my back and watched the blue-sky overhead. It never changed except for the occasional wisp of a cloud skirting by. I thought about Woodstock and wondered what it would have been like to be there. I thought about Robert. I could still feel his skin, the smell of his body next to mine, the soft, fine hairs on his chest, his lips gentle and tender as they explored my face. Gone. A memory that would eventually turn into a dream, no different than all the others, no different than Harold and I taking off on some odyssey around the world. A dream. A stinking lousy dream. I had no proof that he existed. Except for one thing: a burn on the inside of my right leg just above the ankle that was the size of a pea pod that had already blistered and if I was lucky it would scar. And this scar from the muffler on Robert’s motorcycle would be a lifelong reminder of him, proof that he did exist, that once when I was sixteen I rode on the back of a motorcycle, touched the muffler with the side of my leg, cried out in the dark not knowing what had caused this searing pain, branded forever. “I guess I should have warned you about that,” he said. “I’m sorry.” Don’t be, I thought. It was worth it. Now I have proof that last night was just another fantasy screaming around inside my head.
“We’re almost there,” Harold announced. I guess I had fallen asleep. He reached over and touched Beth’s shoulder. She opened her eyes and smiled, that irresistible smile that had been charming Harold and I and everyone else who met her all summer. “The sign said Minneapolis is ten miles ahead. Where do you want me to go Beth?”
“Here,” Beth said, reaching into the glove compartment and pulling out a slip of paper with an address scribbled on it and a street map of Minneapolis. “Here’s the address and this will tell us how to get there. Take the map Jo-Jo and be Hank’s navigator.” I took the map and unfolded it looking for some clue as to where we were going. “What’s the address?” I asked, tracing the lines of the streets with my finger. A
. The legend said Jefferson Street was A
. I found the co-ordinates and traced the horizontal and vertical lines until the two converged. It wasn’t exactly rocket science but for me it was right up there. I traced the lines back to where we were on the highway just outside the city limits of Minneapolis and followed it to the address Beth had given us. “Okay,” I said. “I know exactly where we’re going.” I followed the streets from where we were on the map to Jefferson Street tracing them with my finger. I gave Harold the directions, guiding him street-by-street, block-by-block, drawing us closer and closer to our mysterious destination. “Which way does he turn on Jefferson, Beth? Right or left?”
“Left,” she said without opening her eyes.
“Now are you going to tell us where we’re going?” I asked.
“Soon,” is all she said.
“Soon? How soon can it get? We’re practically there.”
“Patience Jo-Jo. You’d think that after a summer with me you’d have learned something about the art of patience.”
“Oh yes master,” I said in this phony Chinese accent. “I have learned much about patience since my apprenticeship with you began. I have none!”
Beth and I laughed while Harold stared straight ahead, his eyes wide open and his hands glued to the steering wheel like it was the only thing keeping him in the car. The truth was I had learned much from Beth but nothing she taught me could prepare me for what happened in the next twenty-four hours.
“That’s it there Hank,” she said pointing to this big ancient brick building with ivy growing up the sidewalls and over the windows. “Pull over and just park in front.”
“What is this place Beth?” Harold asked, his voice barely audible. He was afraid, more afraid than I’ve ever seen him in his entire life. “Why are we here?”
“You’ll see,” is all she would say.
“It looks kinda creepy,” he said.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Beth said, turning to him and peeling his hand off the steering wheel. “Help me out of the car Hank.”
Harold jumped out of the car like a frightened jackrabbit while I leapt over the back door and fell to my knees on the other side. Stabbing pain shot right through my body like a bolt of lightening as my knees skidded across the sidewalk. They were scraped and bleeding but in some weird way I welcomed the pain—at least it was real unlike the nightmare we had been living since we left home that morning.
We stood on either side of Beth and held her up as she walked. She was so light either one of us could have picked her up and carried her. I bet Dan weighed more. We walked in silence to the front entrance of the place. It looked like an old mansion, kind of like that place in Gone With the Wind only without the plantation and Scarlet. As we climbed the steps my heart began to race with fear or excitement. I couldn’t tell. Inside the place was quiet except for the sound of a television off in the distance and smelled old, the kind of smell old houses filled with old people shed. Laced throughout the old was the smell of medicine. My throat tightened; I wanted to let out a scream and run back to the safety of the Mustang. I looked over at Harold whose expression hadn’t changed since Duluth, which meant he was scared. Big time. He didn’t like this any more than I did but somewhere deep inside both of us we knew we had surrendered our will back home in our driveway. Once again Beth was running the show.
A woman wearing a calf-length black skirt and white longsleeved blouse buttoned to the neck, a cameo broach pinned severely between the collars so it looked like her neck was being squeezed, came out from an office and greeted Beth as if she knew her.
“Hello Beth,” she said smiling. “I was expecting you an hour ago.”
“We had car troubles,” she lied, straight-faced and all. “Mrs. Thom, these are my friends, Hank and Jo-Jo.”
She was about forty or maybe fifty. I couldn’t tell when someone got that old. They all sort of looked the same to me, middleaged blur. She scrutinized Harold and I, gave us the head to toe scan in about ten seconds then focused her attention back on Beth.
“Anything serious?”
“Flat tire.”
“Nuisance,” she said, scowling at Harold and I like we caused the fictitious flat tire. “You’ve come a long way dear. You must be tired.”
“I’m fine,” Beth said.
“Would you like some iced tea before we go up?” she asked.
“The heat—it’s unbearable, especially during the day. The iced tea helps.” “No thanks,” Beth replied. “I just need to see her. Right now if that’s all right?”
“I told her you were coming. I’m not sure how much she understands. Or what she even remembers. I thought you’d be alone.” She gave us another look, disdain written all over her face in neon. She reminded me of nurse Cratchet from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, one of the novels Beth gave me to read as part of my literary education.
“Is there a problem?” Beth asked.
“No. Of course not. It’s just that ...”
“These are my friends,” Beth said and flashed her the famous “look.”
The battleaxe gave Harold and I the once over again and shrugged her shoulders as if to say we were of no consequence. “Fine,” she said. “Let’s go up then.”
We walked to the end of the hallway to the elevator. An old man in a wheelchair was waiting outside the doors. A young woman in jeans and tee shirt stood behind him gripping the handles of the chair. She bent over and kissed the top of his head that had tufts of gray wiry hair sticking straight out like he had just been electrocuted.
“How was your visit today?” Mrs. Thom asked the girl. “It was swell. Wasn’t it gramps? We went for a long walk tonight- all the way to China.”
“All the way to China,” the old man repeated, his voice high and crackly. “All the way to China,” he muttered again under his breath.
“Tomorrow I promised to take Gramps to England. He hasn’t been to England since WW One.”
“WW One,” the old man repeated. He was starting to sound like an old parrot. My nerves were shot. My mind was racing. Why was the elevator taking so long? Was it broken? What if we got in there and then got trapped forever with parrot man? I wanted to get out of the place. It stank.
I swear the elevator fell to our floor like it was about to shatter into a million pieces and then the doors flung open with a crash; it was a scene right out of a very bad horror movie. We got on and Mrs. Thom pressed two and then three for the girl and her grandfather. The elevator was about a million degrees. I was starting to feel faint and “weak in the knees” as Ma always said when she felt like that. Harold’s comatose expression hadn’t changed since we left Duluth, that of a walking dead man seeking his grave. Beth looked anxious.
The second floor was quiet and vacant, eerily peaceful. Mrs. Thom led us to a room at the end of the corridor. She stood at the door and motioned for us to go in. At first I thought the room was empty. I wanted to close my eyes like I did sometimes when a movie got too scary or blood gory. I was trembling.
Then I saw her. She was sitting with her back to us doing something with her hands. I couldn’t really see what it was at first but when she turned I saw that she was knitting a scarf or a tube or something long and never-ending. She had long blond hair down to her waist and green cat’s eyes just like Beth’s. She smiled like she knew us.
“I’m knitting,” she said, holding up the scarf. There must have been about thirty feet of it sitting in this heap in front of her, all tangled colors, red, yellow, blue, white, green, not exactly a rainbow, not that organized, more like one of those palettes artists use to mix their paints on where one color bled into the next to form new and different colors.
“That’s an amazing scarf,” Beth said, moving towards her. Harold and I stood at the doorway and watched as Beth sat crossed legged on the floor next to the girl