Don't Fail Me Now(47)
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“So what’s your game?” I ask Tim as we get back on the highway heading toward the little top hat of Texas.
“I’m still fine-tuning,” he says, rubbing his chin with one hand. “But I had to go last because I didn’t want to make you guys look bad.”
“Trash talk, okay, I see how it is,” I laugh. “Bring it. Next city we stop in, it’ll be you and me, head-to-head, winner take all.”
“What do I win?” Tim asks. “A car that actually runs?”
“Go ahead, keep talking,” I say, batting my glossy lids. “You’re digging your own grave.”
We score another full tank of gas between Oklahoma City and Amarillo, split between three Good Samaritans who stop in quick succession, no dancing required. After watching Tim do it the first time, I learn to do the siphoning myself. It gives me a cheap thrill to add to my list of self-sufficiency skills, and I want to show Cass and Leah that you don’t need a man to do the dirty work for you. There are a lot of ways I don’t want to turn out like my mom, but I have to give her credit for teaching me how to survive on my own. Just as many nights as she locked herself in her bedroom with a bottle of wine, she was down under the sink perched on her bare toes, banging away at a leaky pipe with some dog-eared how-to book open on the floor next to her. She figured it out because she had to, because she didn’t have anyone else who would help voluntarily, and because she couldn’t afford to pay anyone. And that’s how she taught me to live.
Which gives me the idea. Wiping my hands off on my gasoline-splattered jeans, I know how I’m going to completely school Tim.
We drive into northern Texas on a long, cracked stretch of Route 66 dotted with pawn shops and legitimate Mexican joints that make Taco Bell look like the Disney cartoon it is, their bright storefronts faded to lazy pastels by decades of unflinching sunshine.
“Jesus saves, ask Him!” Tim says as we pass an RV park, and it takes me a minute to realize he’s reading off a bumper sticker and not just suddenly professing his Christian mission.
We reach downtown Amarillo just as the sun starts to set, and while it’s mostly as low and sparse and beige as a Texas tumbleweed, it’s still a spring Friday night, so there are people milling around outside of a few busy-looking bars and restaurants. It’s too late to execute my master plan, which requires both natural light and local library Internet access, but I know Goldie’s death rattle will still be there tomorrow—and Tim doesn’t seem to be exactly off to a running start—so I try to enjoy the warm evening breeze and turn my mind to dinner. I park in front of a big old-school theater marquee adorning an otherwise nondescript office building. It must have been gutted to make dozens of tiny, soulless cubicles, but I guess it’s nice they left the sign up. It’s a beautiful scar.
“Want to scout for food?” I ask as I turn off Goldie’s engine, giving her rusty old bones a rest. “There’s probably not much here, but if we can find a coffee shop, they should at least give us a few cups of hot water to make noodles.”
“I think I need to check my messages,” Tim says, pulling out his phone. “That okay?” I nod. He hasn’t tried to turn it on once without asking since I laid down the law yesterday.
“I’ll stay with him,” Leah says.
“What about you?” I ask Cass and Denny. “Any important calls?”
“Haha,” Cass says.
“Can we call Mom?” Denny asks.
“No, buddy, calls only go one way where Mom is.” I haven’t turned my own phone on in over twenty-four hours, too afraid of what might be waiting for me.
“Can we find a bathroom then? One where I can stand up?” The great thing about being six is that talking to your absent mother and finding a urinal to practice on are basically equally exciting.
“Sure thing,” I say, and we trudge off into the dusk, just three disheveled minors out for an adventure pee in the Texas Panhandle.
Of course the first open place we see is a Taco Bell. I mean, of course it is. Even Cass starts laughing at the irony, and she hasn’t cracked a smile since Indiana. It’s on the other side of a big highway intersection, though, so we have to wait for about ten minutes for the light to change and then dash across like frightened deer because, since no one ever walks across highways, the walk light only flashes for about five seconds. I usher Denny into the men’s room with the best instructions I can guess at and then give Cass a few bucks to get a bean burrito and a soda, because she looks so pale she could pass for a Kardashian. “You need to eat,” I tell her, shoving the bills in her clammy hand. I’m hoping we can get some downtime in California, maybe even get a room at a motel with a pool if Buck’s parting gift comes through, and spend a day lying around in the sun before we have to figure out how to rejoin civilization.
While Cass is waiting in line, I finally bite the bullet and turn on my phone. And sure enough, the voicemail icon instantly lights up.
“Hi, Michy . . . it’s been a few days, baby, and I’m ready to come home as soon as you can get that money together. I’m doing good now—well, better, anyway—and I’m ready to change a lot of things. I hope you believe me. Even if you can’t post the bail yet, could you come and see me? It’s getting lonely in here, and I miss my babies. Take care of them, okay? I know you will. You always have. You’re all they got right now, though, till I come home.” There’s a long pause, which I let myself hope is some kind of period of existential reflection until I hear her blow her nose. I forgot about the runny nose. When Mom stops using, she leaks for days. “Sorry. Anyway, I put you on the visitor list, so come anytime.” By way of goodbye, she shouts, “I’m done now. Damn, relax!” presumably at someone waiting to use the phone.