Sorta Like a Rock Star(65)
Suddenly, Joan of Old’s head is on the screen, which completely shocks me for obvious reasons. The shot is a close-up, so her wrinkly face is gigantic. I can see the pillow behind her head, and it looks like she is having trouble breathing. Her wrinkly eyelids look really pink and her skin looks like wax, or maybe ancient cheese.
“I’m probably already dead by now,” Joan of Old’s pink wrinkly enormous eyeless head says. “For those of you who don’t know, Amber and I used to battle every Wednesday afternoon. Her strange little boyfriends recorded this several days ago, which was fortuitous, because I am probably gone and buried by now, yes—but especially because I vowed to make Amber cry before I died, and I always keep my word, Ms. Appleton, Princess of Hope. Today is the day I defeat you, once and for all. The doctors say this is the end of the road for me. It’s about time. My body is going to return to dust. Good riddance! Now I understand the town is having some sort of pep rally for you because of what happened to your mother and because you were so constantly on your guard that you are no longer able to defend yourself, like Nietzsche said. I hear you’ve lost hope, and—regardless of my philosophical views—you’re far too young for that. What will you have to look forward to in old age, if you become a nihilist before you hit eighteen?”
Joan of Old starts coughing very badly here, but then recovers.
“I want to say two things to you before I die. One. My Lawrence was a German philosophy professor, hence my obsession with Nietzsche. Here is a quote I never got around to sharing with you: ‘We should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once. And we should call every truth false which was not accompanied by at least one laugh.’ That was my Lawrence’s favorite quote. He used to dance me around the house every night. Every. Single. Night. And how we would laugh. He was a beautiful man, who died far too young, but he would have absolutely loved you. Keep making people laugh, Amber. At least until you are old and gray. Laugh at yourself and others will always laugh with you. Even mean old defeated women like me.”
Joan of Old coughs again.
“Two. I’ve got some bucks left over—and I’m leaving my entire estate to The Amber Appleton Community Service College Fund, which is what your friends have established without your knowing it. My son Teddy hasn’t come to visit me in eleven years, so screw him! Bye-bye, Amber. See you in hell.”
Joan of Old smiles the last grin of a dying woman—which is huge and beautiful—and then she says, “I finally got you, didn’t I?”
I’m crying now onstage even though I’m not exactly sure what is happening.
The film cuts to the old folk’s common room at the home. My old able-legged silver-haired friends are gathered around my wheelchair-bound silver-headed friends. With his oxygen bottle by his side, Old Man Linder steps forward and says, “Kid, you were the only one who came to visit us when we needed a good laugh. Life is a long, long race, and the finish is often lonely. Even our own flesh and blood—many of our sons and daughters—abandoned us at some point, so when we heard about what happened to your mother, we all wrote you into our wills. Some of us are giving more than others, but you should be all set covering your Bryn Mawr tuition over the next five years or so. Maybe there’ll be some left over for law school too.”
The audience is clapping now, camera crews are rolling film, women are crying, and I’m still not sure what the hell is going on.
But then Franks and The Five walk out onto the stage.
Franks has a live microphone. He says, “I’ve never met a person with more spirit, I’ve never met a person with more hope and love in her heart, I’ve never met a more deserving person than Amber Appleton. She never thinks of herself first. She’s always thinking up some crazy scheme to help others, whether they want help or not. Well, Amber, this time it was The Five who thought up a plan to help you in your time of need.”
Ricky, Chad on Das Boot, Jared, Ty, and Lex Pinkston dressed as a Puerto Rican gang member—they are all smiling at me.
“You are loved, Amber Appleton,” Franks says.
“So this money is for me?” I ask.
“It’s your college fund.”
“What about Bobby Big Boy’s operation? How will I pay for that?”
“She wants to know how she’s going to pay for her dog’s operation,” Franks says into his microphone, and the audience starts laughing—as if everyone is in on the joke except me.
Dr. Weissmuller stands up in the third row, smiles, and yells, “On the house!”
The audience cheers again, and then some bright loser starts yelling, “Speech! Speech! Speech!”
The chant catches on, and then Franks is handing me the live microphone.
I’m still crying a little.
“Thank you, everyone. I’m not really sure this is real, or what it means exactly. I hope my mom is looking down on us tonight,” I say and then pause, because I start to cry a little harder.
I swallow and think about my mom.
She’d have liked to see this.
She would have crapped her pants when that last number flashed up on the screen.
“I don’t know what else to say. I’m speechless. Thanks.”
I hand the live microphone back to Franks, and he says, “Thanks for coming, everyone. You make me proud to live in Childress—the town that takes care of its own. Drive home safely!”