Greyhound Summer: The Party’s Over

Photo by crownjewej82 on Flickr

Just joining me? Catch up on the Greyhound Summer story here.

So, there I was with the papers that say, in bold gray-on-blue lettering, what I have refused to hear him saying: YOU ARE NOT WANTED.  How many Greyhound logos did I have to have slapped in my palm to get the message? I could feel the image burn like a brand when my fingers closed around the packet. And would you believe that I still wouldn’t let myself believe it?

“Thanks, Daddy. Really, this is too much. I’m fine just hanging out with you for the summer.”

Obviously, he wasn’t fine with it. I know it’s pathetic that I wouldn’t let it go. I’m twenty-two and still clinging like a little girl. Most grads want to get far away from their parents as fast as they can. But then, most haven’t had their upbringing outsourced to the relatives.

“That’s the other part of the surprise,” Willa chirped (and she did sound like a bird, with a voice so bright I felt an urge to cover my eyes) as she shot me that be-a-good-girl-and-don’t-make-trouble look the wives get.

My Dad frowned, looking from her to me, like he felt an undercurrent and couldn’t quite puzzle it out.

Willa rummaged in a purse big enough to hold a guitar.

I don’t dislike Willa. I’ve never had any bad feelings toward any of the wives. I can’t say those feelings were mutual. I’m not sure why.

Willa made more chirping sounds and produced a handful of CDs.

She gave one to each of us. Why Eddie and Nadine each needed their own, I don’t know. The label was obviously indie, which meant there’d be cases of these in somebody’s garage. Probably Willa’s. It looked like she was going for the let-me-manage-your-career-to-stardom role. I preferred manager wives to let-me-be-your-mother wives. But, a mother wife would have been more helpful this summer.

I stared at my Dad’s picture under the cellophane wrapper. My fingers itched to reach out and touch his hand resting on the table, feel it warm under my own. My thumbs stroked down the sides of his plastic-wrapped face instead.

“One of my friends recorded this CD for your Daddy. We’re going on tour for the summer to promote it.”

Ah, the summer tour circuit — county fairs, and plenty of bottom tier bars like this one. How long would Willa last? Would those stars in her eyes came crashing to earth under the reality of searching for that big break that always fizzles to nothing and cracks your heart in two on the way down?

I turned the CD over in my hands, sliding my finger down the slick wrapping as I scanned the list of songs, hoping I looked like I was really reading. I wondered why my Dad didn’t give up on marriage, or music. How do you keep believing things will work out, when they never do?

“Well, isn’t that something,” Eddie said, flipping the case from one hand to the other. His voice boomed as loud as a radio announcer’s and the light caught the gleam of a toothy smile hidden beneath his bird’s nest beard.

Nadine followed Eddie’s lead. “I guess we have ourselves a double celebration.” She emptied the beer pitcher into my glass and flagged down the waitress.

You can probably guess — I’m not socially gifted. I’m the kid that has to be pushed to go play with the others. I learned early that playing music got you out of having to think up things to talk about. But after this round of bad beer and pizza, throw in my stage fright and I wouldn’t last five minutes on stage.

Everyone was quiet, waiting for me to say something. I looked across the room at the cowboy and he was looking back in a way that made my stomach feel like the surf was up. I could make a fool of myself by sitting here and starting to cry in front of everyone, or I could make a bigger fool of myself by joining my Dad on stage, but it occurred to me just then that I had a third option.

“Yes, ” I said, my voice as chirpy as Willa’s,  “we have some serious celebrating to do. Play something lively this next set, Daddy. I’m gonna go ask this cowboy to dance.”

I don’t think they believed me. I didn’t believe myself. I lost my nerve halfway there and decided to walk on past him and down the hall to the ladies’ room. But he was watching and, when I got close, he did the asking.

He said his name was Wade, and he said it with a southern drawl that made you want to wade right in and listen to his voice roll over your eardrums forever.  Turns out he was a rodeo cowboy, a bull rider. By the time Wade and I had got past introductions and onto the dance floor, my dad was up on the stage, bellowing a slow song about a drunk, no-good womanizer.

So, Daddy was pissed. Well, so was I. I ought to really blow his circuits and go home with the guy.

Wade moved around the floor with surprising grace for a guy with a limp. I’d been hoping he was a worse dancer than me, but it was easy enough to find his rhythm and listening to him talk I forgot to feel awkward. He was warm. Romantic. Even with my Dad sending him death glares. And, he didn’t seem put off by the gang back at the table staring holes through us.

Being a bull rider and all, I thought he would hang on until the end of the song signaled the end of the ride and then scramble for the safety of the bar. But he kept on dancing, even after the music stopped, even through Dad’s long speech about the next song — Daddy really hated musicians who rambled on about every song before they sang it — and even though the next song had an impossibly choppy rhythm.

One hand rested on my hip, and after a little bit his thumb worked under the hem of my tank top, stroking at the bare skin just above my low-riding jeans, a course calloused texture against my soft skin that plucked a shiver from me. I tipped my head back to look up at him, my long hair skimmed over his fingers and against my back where my top had ridden up. His eyes were almost closed, the way I know I close mine when I’m lost in a song. His other hand curved around the back of my neck, the thumb stroking just behind my ear, and the fingertips resting along the vertebrae in a way that made me think of fretting notes on the neck of a guitar.

When he noticed me studying him, he smiled and we talked more trivia. He was from Texas, and in New Jersey for the rodeo at Cowtown on Saturday night. Apparently, Cowtown was just a bit west of here and a Mecca for guys on the rodeo circuit. I told him I was born in Texas, but was from a little bit of everywhere. He joked that if he was going to get home without being beat up by the band, I’d have to go along and protect him. I warned him that my going along would bring Aunt Nadine down on his head and he’d be better off taking his chances with the band.

Then somewhere in the middle of talking about nothing, he asked, “So what’s the family feud all about?”

Funny, a stranger can see there’s a problem and my family can’t. But maybe that’s not exactly true. They see the problem, but we pretend our way around it. Who has the energy for all that drama?

“No feud,” I said. “It’s my graduation party.”

It was too bizarre an answer not to be the truth. He could have asked a hundred questions: Why aren’t there friends your age here? Why here? Does your family follow you around and watch you on all your dates too? Are you home-schooled or something?

It says a lot about people, what they ask, and what they don’t.

“Hell,” was all Wade said.

And it was.