They understood the Young Fun Now.
Every Labor Day, Mom and I came back for more. We took part in their pig roasts, lemonade stands, and beer buckets, their loud stereos and rambunctious kids, their flag wavings and fireworkings and food gorgings. We did so with gumption and hunger and thirst, knowing full well it would be another 364 days before those offerings came back around. (That first year, we went back for Memorial Day—bupkis. Nothing. Like an empty baseball stadium. Same with Fourth of July. I guess Utopia Court was more like Narnia than the looking-glass in that respect. It was never where—or rather, when—you thought it would be.) Bottom line: in the face of suburban mediocrity, Utopia Court provided an honest-to-God mutiny, and we loved every mutinous minute.
So there’s the setup.
Now for the teardown.
Last year, just as the fireworks were picking up steam, Mom set down her beer and began saying thank-yous and good-nights. Something was wrong—we’d never left so early. But I didn’t argue. What mattered to her mattered to me. Reluctantly, I followed her back to the other side of the looking-glass. We admired the fireworks from a distance, holding hands as we walked (yes, I held hands with my mother, but then, nothing about our relationship has ever been traditional). Suddenly, Mom stopped dead in her tracks. This image—of my mother’s silhouette against a black sky backdrop, as majestic fires exploded all around—is a memory I have tucked in my back pocket, one I can pull out and examine at will, to remember her like that forever and ever and ever and ever and ever . . . infinite forevers. “Mary,” she whispered. She wasn’t looking at me, and I could tell her mind was somewhere I could never be. I waited for whatever it was Mom wanted to say, because that’s how it used to be with us. There was no need for prodding. For a few minutes, we stood there on the quiet sidewalk, stuck between mutiny and mediocrity. As the distant fireworks dwindled, our sidewalk became darker, as if Utopia’s pyrotechnics had been the city’s only source of light. Just then, Mom let go of my hand, and turned. “I was lovely once,” she whispered. “But he never loved me once.”
Her tone was familiar, like the lyric of some dark-eyed youth singing tragic clichés. But Mom was no youth, and this was no cliché.
“Who?” I said softly. “Dad?”
She never answered. Eventually, she began walking toward our house, toward mediocrity, away from the glorious mutiny. I followed her the rest of the way in silence.
I remember this like it was yesterday.
I remember because it was the last time we held hands.
Signing off,
Mary Iris Malone,
Mutineer Extraordinaire
“NOW THOSE ARE some interesting shoes. Where does a person get shoes like that?”
I guess I’ve held the old lady off for as long as possible. “Goodwill,” I say, stuffing my journal in my backpack.
“Which one?”
“I don’t . . . really remember.”
“Hmm. Very strappy, aren’t they? And colorful.”
The old lady is right. Only the eighties, with its fuchsia-infused electro-pop, could have produced high-top footwear of such dazzling flamboyance. Four Velcro straps apiece, just in case. There’s a whole platoon of unworn sneakers in my closet at home, Kathy’s attempts to replace more pieces of my old life. “My stepmother hates them,” I say, leaning back in my seat.
The old woman wrinkles her forehead, leans over for a better look. “Well, I’m quite taken with them. They’ve got pizzazz, don’t you know.”
“Thanks,” I say, smiling. Who says pizzazz? I look down at her white leather walking shoes, complete with three-inch soles and a wide Velcro band. “Yours are cool, too.”
What starts as a chuckle ends in a deep, hearty laugh. “Oh yes,” she says, lifting both feet off the ground. “Très chic, non?”
I’ll admit, initially, I’d been wary of sitting next to an old lady: the beehive hairdos, the knit turtlenecks, the smell of onion soup and imminent death. But as the bus had been packed, I’d had very limited options when it came to a seatmate; it was either the old lady, the glassy-eyed Poncho Man, or a three-hundred-pound Jabba the Hutt look-alike. So I sat. Beehive hair? Check. Knit turtleneck? Check. Nothing to rile the geriatric gestapo. But her smell . . .
I’ve been trying to place it ever since I sat down. It is decidedly un-geriatric. It’s like . . . potpourri, maybe. Abandoned attics, handmade quilts. Fucking fresh-baked cookies, with . . . a hint of cinnamon. That’s it exactly.
God, I love cinnamon.
The old lady shifts in her seat, accidentally dropping her purse to the floor. In her lap, I see a wooden container no larger than a shoe box. It has a deep red hue and a brass lock, but what stands out most is the way her left hand is holding it: white-knuckled and for dear life.