Shimmy Bang Sparkle(7)

“Hi, hi, hi!” I said as I opened the screen, holding it ajar with my hip. I maneuvered the wheelchair inside, and Priscilla danced in circles on two feet with her paws extended, one tutu shy of YouTube superstardom.

Mr. Bozeman was on his couch, as always. He was thin and frail and sat under a tattered afghan on his ancient green-and-brown plaid sofa. Columbo was on television. Peter Falk was acting strategically confused as he scratched his forehead and mouthed soundless words behind the mute icon on the screen.

When Mr. Bozeman saw the lamp, he dropped the remote onto the afghan. “Stella! How did you . . . Stella!”

Priscilla celebrated the return of Elvis with a delighted pounce on her stuffed frog, followed by a wet squelching of the squeaker. Mr. Bozeman’s eyes glistened with the reflection of Columbo, and I felt the instant sting in my nose of happiness tears too. It had been a tragedy that I had been able to stop; I’d seen it happening from my apartment that morning. Big Ed came in his old jalopy and offered surely next to nothing for all Mr. Bozeman’s most prized possessions, in exchange for just enough to get by this month. And I hadn’t been willing to stand by and let it happen.

His joy was contagious, but I knew it was only a Band-Aid on a much bigger problem. If I was going to help Mr. Bozeman in any long-lasting way, it was going to take something much bigger than a two-carat princess cut. And yet, the Band-Aid helped quiet my worry, at least a little. For now. Until Mr. Bozeman went and got tangled up gambling on horses again.

“Next time you need money,” I said as I put Elvis back on the side table where he belonged, next to Mr. Bozeman’s prescription bottles and glass of water, “call me, OK? Not Big Ed.”

“But how ever did you manage to pay for it all?” he asked, as bright and cheery as a kid on Christmas morning, hugging his toaster and beaming. I plugged in the lamp and switched it on, which brightened up the small, dim room a lot. It was still a bit frowsy, but the light did help. I took the Stetson off the lamp and handed it to Mr. Bozeman. Instantly, he went from a frail and somewhat feeble old man to the young wrangler who’d probably once swaggered across Texas, leaving dozens of Lone Star belles swooning in his wake.

I put a hand on my hip and smiled at him. “Promise me, cowboy.” Priscilla jumped up on the couch next to Mr. Bozeman and gave him a lick on the cheek. Her pink ID tag jingled against the side of the toaster.

For an instant, there was defiant shimmer in Mr. Bozeman’s rheumy eyes. I could almost hear him telling me, I never asked for anybody’s help,

Stella, dear! But we’d danced this dance a dozen times, and though I did understand what he meant, it didn’t mean I wasn’t always going to help him. And so finally, he tipped his hat, bowed his head, grinned, and gave me a long, drawling, “Yeeeeeeesssss, maaaaaaaaaa’am.”



I rehung the cuckoo clock over the cuckoo clock–shaped outline on the wallpaper, and Mr. Bozeman turned up the volume on Columbo. I refilled Priscilla’s water bowl, which was a little something I found on clearance a while ago at Marshalls. On the side it said THE QUEEN DRINKS FROM THIS CHALICE. While Mr. Bozeman was distracted by his show, and after I had bustled around the kitchen for a while, making dinner for Priscilla and a sandwich for Mr. Bozeman, I carefully removed the cigar box where he hid his money from the drawer underneath the oven. He kept it between two glass pans, held together by two enormous rubber bands. I’d seen it once when he tried to pay me for some groceries I had gotten for him after he’d had hip surgery. The cigar box was made of tin, with a dusky flamenco dancer on the lid, lifting her frilled skirt and showing her leg. She was old-fashioned but still delightfully saucy. Inside I found a few hundred dollars, along with a handful of change. To that, I added the extra cash I’d gotten for the ring, then carefully, oh-so-carefully, put the glass pans together, rubber banded them closed, and placed the whole contraption in the oven storage drawer. Taking the drawer handle in both hands and lifting it to minimize the noise, I slid the drawer shut with painstaking care so as not to let the pans rattle and give me away.

I poured Mr. Bozeman a glass of apple juice, placed it on a doily next to Elvis, and headed back outside to contemplate how exactly I was going to get the oxygen compressor inside. I slid my seat forward and popped it off the rails so that the headrest leaned against the steering wheel. The machine sat lopsidedly in the back seat, and I gave it a shove to get a sense of what I was up against. The thing was as heavy and cumbersome as an old tube television set; I was strong, but I wasn’t that strong. For the first time in ages, I thought to myself, Now this is when I could really use a man . . .

Which was when my thinking was interrupted by the sound of footsteps. Heavy, confident ones accompanied by a metallic clinking. To my right, lo and behold, there was a man. Swagger, ink, and boots.

Nick.

“Hey, sunshine,” he said, with a flick of his chin. He took off his sunglasses and ran his palm through his thick, dark hair.

My first thought was, How can a man be that good-looking? Followed immediately by, Uh-oh SpaghettiOs. Because there was no good reason whatsoever that he’d be here, unless . . . “Did you . . . follow me?”

My plan for tonight, to celebrate a job well done, had been to pop a huge bowl of popcorn and watch the new season of Twin Peaks in my pj’s. But if he’d followed me, it meant he knew something. And if he knew anything at all, it was goodbye Twin Peaks and hello Bad News Bears.