ABOUT THE AUTHOR

TINA HIGGINS is a student in the MFA program at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Close to the Ground

By Tina Higgins


Mom says, “Well, this feels a lot better, doesn’t it, Josie?”

“Guess so,” I say.

The bar is air-conditioned and our trailer’s so hot you can’t even breathe. It makes your lungs feel sticky. Mom and I were lying around in our underwear all morning after I woke Daddy up for work. He was late again today and I knew he would be since he drank last night and him and Mom were up late fighting again when I was trying to sleep. When I was lying in bed this morning, I knew Daddy hadn’t gotten up on time since the air didn’t smell like coffee and when it’s this hot, smells get even stronger and thicker. Mom and Daddy’s cigarette smoke gets harder to breathe in and the slimy dishes in the sink and old food in the garbage smell awful when it’s hot like this. It feels like the stink grabs you when you walk by and doesn’t want to let go. But the lilacs smell even sweeter in the heat, so it’s not all bad. 

I don’t want to be at The Loon mostly because our neighbor, Bobby Thompson, is here too. He’s got a yard full of junk cars he’s always leaning into or crawling under. Since Daddy went to jail that one night, Mom’s been hanging around with Bobby way too much when Daddy’s gone at work. Daddy hates Bobby. He always says, “I don’t trust that fucker any further than I can throw him but if it comes down to it, I could throw Bobby pretty far.” Then he laughs like he’s never said it before and I laugh too because in my head, I can see Daddy picking up stinky Bobby real high just like a bale of hay and throwing him way up in the sky like Superman would. Things would be a lot better if Bobby would just go away or at least, if Mom would stop going across the street to his house every afternoon when Daddy isn’t there to see.

I also don’t want to be here because I thought Mom and I were having fun watching cartoons and lying around mostly naked with no one around to see. We ate grape Popsicles and sucked on ice cubes for breakfast and everything was going fine until she decided she needed a drink. She said it was just for the air conditioning but I heard Daddy call her a whore last night and I heard Mom tell him he was fucked up and crazy and then I heard the table tip over and Mom was crying. She always needs a drink when they fight like that. She’s got a big bruise on the side of her face today. She’s trying to cover it with her hair and make-up but since it’s so hot the make-up just keeps sort of melting off. She yelled at me from the bathroom, “Fuck, why’s it have to be so God damn hot out? I can’t even get my make-up to stay on. Josie! We’re going to The Loon. Get dressed.” That’s what she said as I was finishing my second Popsicle. And that was that. Here we are. And there she is sitting next to Bobby, leaning close to him and smiling.

Lenny’s behind the bar wiping it down and staring over at Mom and Bobby. I can tell he’s trying to hear what they’re talking about over the Willie Nelson song coming through the two speakers behind the bar. He keeps tipping his head in their direction and checking on Mom’s drink. “Need another yet, Laura?”

“Sure, why not? Thanks, Lenny,” she says.

There isn’t much to do here except draw and play video games but usually Lenny and I draw pictures together for a while before I go to the pinball machine. I get a piece of paper out from my drawing book and just make a squiggle on the page and then Lenny takes the pencil and makes a picture out of the squiggle and then it’s my turn.

“I see you got your paper all set. Let me make you a drink before we start. I could use one, too.”  Lenny makes the best Shirley Temples with extra, extra cherries and some on the side too. And he only drinks Coke without any whiskey or anything in it. He told me he quit drinking that poison a long time ago.

“I bet I can guess what you’re going to draw today, Lenny,” I say.

“Oh yeah? Well, suppose I surprise you and draw something different?”

“You won’t.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” he says.

No matter what kind of squiggle I make on the paper, Lenny always makes a bear out of it. If it’s funny shaped, with something weird coming out of its belly, Lenny’ll say it’s got a tumor. If it’s got things shooting out of its head, Lenny’ll say they’re horns ’cause the devil’s got a hold of him. I like to draw a lot of different things though, and Lenny always gets real excited about whatever I draw and passes it around the bar so everyone can see. Lenny always says, “You got a real gift, Josie. It’s like God’s working his magic through you.” And then he’ll say to whoever’s sitting closest, “Now, look at this one! Good Lord! Isn’t she amazing?” Sometimes, I just keep on drawing from Lenny’s squiggle for a long time and then when I think I got it all out, I’ll color it in with markers or colored pencils. That’s mostly how I keep myself busy when Mom brings me up to the bar and when I get bored of drawing, I play pinball.

“Your mom’s looking pretty tired today, Joe. Her and Dad fighting again last night?”

“Yeah, but it wasn’t too bad this time.”

“You clean up the mess this morning?”

“I just put the table back up right but it’s not heavy or nothing.”

“They weren’t getting along too well when they walked out of here last night after your mom closed up. Figured they’d be fighting later on. Your dad get himself to work on time?”

“No, but he was just a little late. I woke him up.”

Lenny nods his head and looks down at the squiggle I made like he’s thinking real hard about what kind of bear he should draw this time. Lenny’s pretty old, a lot older than Daddy and his hair’s longer than mine and mostly grey but there’s some black left in it, too. He’s got real small yellow teeth that look like little squares of corn stuck up in his gums. I keep thinking I should tell him not to smile so much cause his teeth make him look kinda gross but I haven’t told him that yet. It would be weird if Lenny didn’t smile at me all the time like he does.

“Hey, it’s your favorite song. Want me to turn it up?” Lenny asks.

“Yeah. Thanks, Lenny. Why’s your bear got such big feet?”

Lenny’s whole body shakes when he laughs.

“Elephantitis.”

“Whatever that is. And what’s that hump on his back from?”

“The weight of the world, kid, the weight of the world.”

This is me and Daddy’s song, the one about an angel who Willy Nelson saved after she crashed to the ground. Me and Daddy sing it real loud together while we dance and he swings me all around the kitchen. I always know when it’s time for our song cause he winks at me and starts moving the table and chairs out of the way and when he starts doing that, I get the tape out and start rewinding it so it’s all ready to go. We’ve played the tape so many times you can barely read the writing on it anymore. When I press play Daddy tries singing like Willie even though his voice is too deep but he tries anyway. So he kind of howls the beginning of the song like a wolf with a cold and he holds his hand in a fist up to his lips like a microphone and it makes me laugh every time. My favorite part of the song is when Willie sings “I would rather see you up than see you down” because that’s when Daddy picks me up real high till my head touches the ceiling and then he swings me down by the floor. I keep thinking that one of these times, he just might drop me and I don’t think it would hurt all that much but it would ruin the dance for sure. I must get a scared look on my face that makes him laugh and he says, “Don’t be scared baby girl, I gotchya.”

Bobby yells down to me and says, “Hey, Josie, come on over here and say hi. You mad at me or something?”

I can tell Bobby’s been sitting at the bar for a while cause his face is all red, the way it gets when he’s drunk, and since his hair’s so blonde you can almost see through it, it’s real easy to tell when he’s drunk.

“Hold on now, Bobby, the girl’s gotta concentrate,” Lenny yells back.

“Thanks, Lenny.” I whisper. “Don’t feel like talking to him today.”

“I know the feeling.”

“But I got a new joke for her. Hey, Josie? What did the fish say when it hit a wall?”

“Damn,” I say.  “You already told me that one.”

“I did? Okay, how about this one . . .”

“Now just leave the girl alone. She’s doing important work down here.” Lenny’s the best friend ever.

“Fine. Fine,” Bobby whines, “Got some quarters sitting down here when you’re ready.”

I just nod my head because I really am trying to concentrate. I’m trying to draw a picture from Lenny’s squiggle of what Daddy looked like this morning sleeping on the couch with his head in his armpit and his wavy black hair falling over his face. He was just wearing his work pants, still dirty from yesterday and no shirt or socks. Just his nose and some of his lips and chin were showing from under his hair and his back was shiny with sweat. I had to shake him a little to get him up and he jumped like I was the police coming to get him and then he wiped his hands hard up and down his face a few times. Then he looked up at me and smiled.

“What time is it, baby girl?”

“Seven, Daddy. I think you might be late.”

“Yep, I am. Good thing I got you around.” He gave me a kiss on the tip of my nose and got up and headed for the bathroom. I made a wish because that’s what Daddy taught me a long time ago; make wishes on kisses, since if you have to wait around for a star to drop you won’t get many wishes out of the deal. I wished that Daddy wouldn’t get in trouble for being late to work again.

“Doing a real good job there, Joe. As usual.” Lenny always says that.

“That your dad?”

“Yep.”

“Looks just like him. What do you think he’d do if he saw your mom with Bobby over there?”

“Nothing good,” I say and then in my head I saw Daddy throwing Bobby across the bar, up really high so he sort of skids across the ceiling tiles.

“Ain’t that the truth. Just started letting him come back in here again after the last time. God, I’m glad you weren’t here to see that, Joe. Your mom told me you were real bummed out that she couldn’t get your dad out of jail right away, but trust me, he needed to cool off in there for a while. I just hope he doesn’t show up today.”

“Daddy’s at work. He won’t show up. Don’t worry.”

“I suppose you’re right. More cherries while you work?”

“Yes, please.”

I can’t get Daddy’s hand to look the way it was this morning, hanging over the end of the couch. It was kinda curled up but not the way his hands look when he’s mad. It was looser like if he flipped it over it could hold water. I keep erasing his hand and starting over but I just can’t get it right and now I’m thinking about what Lenny just said and getting pretty nervous about Daddy being late this morning and maybe getting fired. I make a lot of wishes and most of them don’t come true so now I keep thinking that maybe he will walk in here and whenever I hear the door open I just have to look up and my stomach gets twisted like there’s broken glass in it. So far, it’s just people from town walking in; Eddie who owns the barber shop, Nancy who works at the courthouse, Johnny who pumps the gas for Mom. Since it’s Friday, everyone’s leaving work a little early. The Loon’s always real busy on the weekends. Everyone who walks in here smiles at me and says Hi and then looks down at Mom and Bobby. No one’s sitting at the end of the bar near them. Everyone’s sitting in booths on the other side or down by me peeking over my shoulder and asking me what I’m drawing. I know they’re all worried about Daddy coming in here. A lot of people were here when Daddy got really mad at Mom one night and the police had to tackle him; that’s what I heard Mom say when she was on the phone talking to Grandma the next day. There’s so many people around me, I know I’ll never get Daddy’s hand to look right. I keep hearing my daddy’s name floating around like fireflies do; Alan, Al, Al, Alan. More like crickets.

“I think I’ll go play pinball now,” I tell Lenny.

“You all done with that picture?”

“No, just bored with drawing,” I say even though it’s a lie and really I just got that nervous energy Mom always says she has.

“Hey, come here,” he says looking down at my mom and back at me. “You want me to tell your mom you’re not feeling good or something? Have her pack it up for the day?”

“If you want, but she won’t leave for a long time after that anyhow.  It doesn’t matter.”

“All right, kid. Have fun.”

Walking away, I hear Lenny say to Johnny, “Now hold on. Let me get Josie’s work off the bar so you don’t mess it all up.”

Johnny says, “What? You think I’m going to knock over my first beer? That only happens after I’ve had a dozen.” Johnny’s so skinny it looks like his skin’s just wrapped around his bones. He’s always telling funny stories and making everyone laugh so I don’t mind him too much.

Mom’s turned toward me and Bobby’s rubbing her back. Her head is tipped up a little and she’s got her eyes closed. She looks like she’s crying without tears or maybe praying for something from God. I don’t bother praying anymore, just wishing on Daddy’s kisses. They don’t always come true but last year, for my eighth birthday, I kissed Daddy a lot and kept on wishing for a new bike, the red one for sale up at Berney’s shop. Daddy kept asking what I was wishing for but I couldn’t tell him cause that would’ve for sure jinxed it. But after he kept asking and asking what I wanted for my birthday, I finally I told him about the bike; how it was red and just my size and how it had a horn on it and everything. Daddy nodded his head and said, “Yeah, you need a new bike. If I were you, I’d want that bike too.” And three days before my birthday, when I wasn’t even expecting any wishes to come true, Daddy stood outside our trailer honking his truck horn like a crazy person until I came out wondering what in the world was happening. And there it was,my red bike in the back of his truck, and Daddy was just about as excited as I was. He said, “I couldn’t wait three more days, little girl. Just couldn’t wait.” That day, Daddy sat Indian style in the yard drinking beers and watching me ride that bike as fast as I could up and down our road. He was clocking my speed on his watch and he yelled out at me, “You’re going about a hundred times faster than any car in Bobby’s yard!”

Bobby sees me walking to the video games in the back of the bar and says, “There she is! Ready for these quarters?” Mom opens up her eyes and smiles at me real big like she hasn’t seen me in years and seeing me at all is a big surprise.

“Helloooo, my baby,” she says. “Pinball time?”

“Yeah,” I say and try to smile but really I hate it when she talks to me like that, in that baby voice. She only does it when she’s been drinking but not when she’s mad drinking. The baby voice comes out when she’s sad drinking.

“Here you go, kid.” Bobby’s always giving me quarters and I feel bad for taking them because Daddy wouldn’t like it. Bobby calls my mom Queen because he took her to prom the year she was named Queen. The first time he told me that story I asked him, “So, did that make you Prom King then?” And he just shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, finished off his can of beer and said, “Naw, I didn’t care about stuff like that back then. I was too busy working on my cars.” And when I asked Daddy why he didn’t take Mom to prom, he said, “That fucker was just waiting for me to get shipped off to Vietnam; just waiting to get his slimy hands on your mom. Just a fucking vulture, that’s all Bobby Thompson is.” And then with a half confused half annoyed look on his face he asked, “What the hell are you talking to Bobby for anyhow?” So taking his quarters makes me feel guilty but no one else is handing out money so I don’t got a lot of choices.

The game I’m playing is Daddy’s favorite. He’s a pro at pinball. So I always practice this one game, the one with the lady in a black dress with her boobs and bare legs popping out at you. She says “Thank you” and giggles when you’re doing a good job. I let my first ball fly and it bounces off a few disco balls and then comes right back at me; right down the middle over the lady’s nose and red lips, in between her boobs and over where her belly button is hiding under her dress. It doesn’t matter how many times I flip the flippers to try and stop it; straight down the middle and my first ball is lost between the lady’s legs. Daddy says it’s bad luck to lose the first ball straight away like that but whenever it’s about to happen to him, he uses his weight and jiggles the machine around. I never thought it was fair to call it luck when it’s really about how big he is compared to me. But I don’t ever tell Daddy that because he says I’ll get bigger someday and I know that when I am, I’ll jiggle that game too. Whenever Daddy does that, Lenny yells from the bar, “Hey Al! You gonna buy that game after you bust it?” and Daddy laughs and waves his arm in the air like Lenny is just a buzzing fly giving him trouble.

The back of the bar is real dark. There’s only one light bulb hanging in the corner and another one by the pool table so I feel invisible back here, like I can see everyone but they can’t see me. I like to just watch the people and sometimes I draw them sitting up at the bar, kinda bent over, with their elbows up, talking with Lenny. I don’t feel like drawing anymore today, though. And I don’t feel like playing pinball anymore either since I lost every ball and didn’t even get a free game out of the deal. I’m feeling a little sick now, like Lenny saying that made it come true but I think it’s cause we haven’t had any lunch and I’m nervous. The bar’s starting to fill up and that means that Daddy will be off work soon too and that means he might come looking for Mom, since this is where she always is if she’s not at home. Bobby and her are still sitting all alone at the end of the bar and people are still walking in and looking down at them and talking to each other about it, shaking their heads. But Mom and Bobby don’t even seem to notice. Mom’s kinda slumped over the bar with her head lying on her arm talking and Bobby’s bent down close to her with his elbows on his knees listening.

I hear Lenny say there’s a storm coming and when the door opens up again I see that the sky outside turned from bright blue to gray.

“Hey, Lenny, good thing you’re too cheap to put any windows in this place,” Johnny says real loud so everyone can hear him. He gets louder the more beers he drinks. Hank Williams, Jr. is playing now and Nancy’s holding a drink and telling a story to her friends. She always talks with her hands and swings her arms all over so her beer keeps spilling out of her glass like what would happen if you tried to drink a glass of milk on the Tilt-a-Whirl. The wind is getting stronger and the door keeps flying open and every time it does, we all look to see who it is. Just the wind. That’s all.

These are probably all the same people who were here the night Daddy went to jail, drinking and talking just like they are now until Daddy got mad. Lenny brought Mom home that night. I heard them talking from my bedroom. Mom was crying and I heard Lenny begging her to go to the hospital, but she kept saying, “I’ll be fine, Lenny. I just need to lay down.” She kept saying that, “Just need to lay down,” over and over until Lenny got mad and said, “No, Laura, what you need to do is leave him. You can’t raise Josie around a man like that.”

“Alan would never hurt Joe. Never. And she loves her daddy so much, I can’t take her away from him. She’d never forgive me.”

“What, you think you’re covering up all those bruises? Between the lines he’s snorting and the booze, one of these day’s he’s not going to stop. He’s gonna kill you, Laura. You gotta take care of yourself and you gotta take care of your girl.”

“Lenny, don’t tell me how to raise my daughter. I love her. I take care of her and her dad treats her like a Goddamn princess. What the fuck do you expect me to do? Just go home, Lenny. I’m tired. Just let me lay down. Please, just go home.”

I wish we had a bigger house or I had my own house out in the back yard so I wouldn’t have to hear everything everyone says. And when Daddy slaps her, it sounds like a balloon popping only I know when it’s coming. I can tell by how Mom starts to sound like a bratty kid that he’s going to slap her soon. Before they go to bed though, Daddy always says he’s sorry a lot and cries sometimes. Mom just gets real quiet and I hear her walk by my door to her bedroom and Daddy is always sleeping on the couch when I get up. In the morning, the place is mousy quiet except for Daddy’s heavy breathing and it’s kind of nice to clean up the beer cans off the floor and empty the ashtrays and do the dishes in that quiet with no one saying anything at all.

The town sirens are going off. Must be a tornado coming and Johnny’s right that we’re lucky there’s not windows in here but the front door keeps flying open and on the ground outside I can see green leaves flying around the sidewalk. I’m tucked in tight against the wall in the only booth at the back of the bar. Bobby is coming towards me and I can feel my hands start to sweat and my cheeks get hot. He asks, “Whatchya doin’, kiddo?” And I just look down at my knees and say, “Nothin’.” But then something in me kind of lunges forward like the neighborhood dogs on their chains who jump at me and my best friend, Maggie, when we walk by and I blurt out at him, “I want you to go home, Bobby.” And he just smiles at me and blinks a lot and asks, “What for?” and I say, “You know what for, everyone knows what for. My daddy’s coming up here and Lenny doesn’t want any trouble.” Bobby sticks his hands in his front pockets and looks down at his dirty white sneakers and I work really hard to put on my meanest face so that when he looks back at me he’ll get scared but he doesn’t look back. He just shakes his head and keeps walking down the dark hallway to the bathroom that’s right next to the back door.

Just then, Daddy walks in. Everyone gets quiet for a couple seconds and then Lenny says, as he’s taking away Bobby’s half-empty glass, “Hey, Al, can I get you a beer?” My daddy smiles and says, “Hell, yeah.” Then he walks down to where my mom is sitting and takes Bobby’s stool. I’m watching it all while I’m still hiding in the booth, just waiting on things for a minute just to see what Daddy will do when Bobby comes out. He puts his arm around Mom and kissed her on her closed eyelids and takes a long drink from the bottle of beer Lenny sat down in front of him. I hear the bathroom door open and see Bobby standing there still zipping up his pants. Bobby looks up at me and I stare at him and shake my head. He looks past me and sees Daddy sitting next to Mom. Bobby nods his head at me and walks out the back door.

Looking at Mom and Daddy now, things feel all right. He’s rubbing his knuckles down the middle of her back the way she likes and she’s sitting up straight and smiling at him. Johnny is standing by Dad bouncing around like he always does when he’s telling a story and everyone seems happier than they were before. The door flies open again but there’s nothing out there, just a pinkish smoky sky and the wind howling like it’s alive. This is what I figure; wishing on kisses is still good. It kept Daddy from getting fired today but sometimes you just gotta get in the way of what’s about to happen. I kept Lenny from having a bad night and I kept Mom from making Daddy mad and I kept Daddy from getting in trouble again. God doesn’t always listen to wishes so I guess sometimes you just have to do God’s work for him. Lenny always tells me about how you learn something every day. I don’t think he’s right about every day but some days I do. Today I learned how to stop a storm.



Published January 2009