Americana Triptych

Kim Chinquee

INDEPENDENCE

It was the third of July, which meant tomorrow was a celebration: every year parades and fireworks, hot-dog stands and corn roasts, the same vendors setting up balloons and water races. Ring tosses, prizes of stuffed monkeys, rock-band T-shirts, mirrors with images of skulls, unicorns, and horses. The penny toss, where you could attempt to toss coins into any bowl of fish and win that fish in a plastic bag. Tugs of war between legions, and a fireman’s game, where two teams of men donned suits, getting on opposing sides, aiming hoses up at an empty beer keg hanging from a clothesline higher than the treetops, trying to make their goal, everyone getting wet. Hamburger stands where my Grandma and Grandpa Krupp worked for the American Legion, serving one-dollar cups of Pabst, my grandma wobbling from the hungry to the cashbox, putting burgers on buns, my grandpa holding up the stub to show his missing middle finger, his smile getting wider, his wink tighter with every beer he drank. All this came after the parade, which started around noon, a buffet of 4-H and business floats, the shiny antique cars with their loud horns, the fire trucks shooting off their sirens, the bands marching, trumpeting off-key, and the American Legion with the old men aiming up their rifles, sounding on command. Clowns, people riding horses sideways, and the Old Old Ollie always had an exhibition on the back of his Ford, a skit of chubby, shirtless men getting drunk on brandy. It was the gossip of the town beforehand, wondering what Old Ollie had come up with, the crowd then laughing and clapping as his truck passed, chanting, Old Old Ollie! Beforehand, the parade lined up at the high school lot, waiting for the town’s noon horn, the sheriff leading the pack. The whole town was on vacation. Sidewalks, lawns filled up with folding chairs and blankets, strollers and umbrellas. 

The town was usually quiet from the outside. Now people sat and waited with their beverages and fans, radios, repellent, babies, bottles, bundles. Kids carried empty paper bags that would house their future Tootsie Rolls and Dum-Dums, treats tossed from the parade. Some ran onto the street, grabbing handfuls. As a child, I watched, never brave enough to leave the sidewalk, content at collecting what landed at my feet. My sister Shelly was the same way. We were shy, preferring the safety of our bedrooms. 

One Fourth of July my aunt had a baby, and while news went around, my mom and her siblings celebrating at the beer tent, I sat on a swing, thinking about babies, getting sprinkled, watching people as they shot darts and tried to pop balloons then hung onto stuffed dogs and unicorns and wieners—I watched the little fish getting hit with pennies, people carrying them away in plastic baggies. My mom never let me play those games, saying it only wasted money. I wanted to try so badly. I thought maybe I could win. 

The park was always packed, people moving from the lawns and sidewalks after the parade, some indulging in an afternoon of baseball, some lounging at the beer tent, some playing games or watching them, some just sitting on the grass, nurturing their children. Fireworks were like any other fireworks. I was afraid of them.

At home, we had three channels, a TV with a round knob, where we’d watch shows like Fantasy Island and The Love Boat, my dad having a thing for The Dukes of Hazzard. It was the only time I saw him laughing, watching Boss Hogg in his white suit, smoking his cigar and saying things sarcastic. We’d be sitting on the brown sectional, on one of its square pieces, and I’d be more interested in my father’s laughing than the show itself, thinking what did it take for me to make him laugh? There were many nights of eating Cheese Puffs, all of us on our parts of the sofa, in the living room, watching that same show, with Daisy Duke and her long legs, heels, and shorts, and then I’d watch Bo and Luke trying to outsmart, speeding up and around and away and over things in their fast red car. 

I was thirteen. After a 4-H card party, where my father won the door prize of a pound of cheddar, he went around the farm on his John Deere, beeping its horn, waving to my mom and my sister Shelly and me. He didn’t eat at dinnertime, and I was used to him devouring. He sat there stirring up his mashed potatoes with a spoon, tried cutting with a knife, dotting the arrangement with the peas and corn from my mother’s garden. None of this was normal, and my mom said she was trying to get him to pray harder, that he needed church. I said OK and went about my business, listening to the radio, finding the America Top 40. My mother mowed the lawn, Shelly was quiet in her bedroom, and I painted my nails in the bathroom—sitting on the toilet, lid down, my foot up against the roll holder, putting paint on my big toenail, feeling kind of pretty, thinking of Jeff, a boy I had liked since kindergarten: blond and blue-eyed, always smiling like a secret. We had lots of secrets, the two of us saying in our notes things like, “You’re cute.” And “I think I really like you.” 

I was admiring my toes when I heard my dad yelling, “Shelly, Elle! Come out!” 

I met Shelly in the hallway. We went out. Our dad told our mother to stop the mower. 

“Stop!” he said, holding his hand up like a policeman. He said, “That wedding’s for us!” and I figured he was talking about the reception that he and my mom planned on going to that night after church. He hugged my mom, then stepped back and said to Shelly and me, “I love you! I love you all!” He laughed and cried and spun around and then he even hugged us. He walked away. My mother restarted the mower. Shelly went to her room. I went back to the bathroom, looking at my figure, my face, lining my eyes, trying on different shades of makeup. While my father finished milking, my mom and sister and I prettied ourselves in our respective places. 

We went to church, like usual, my dad driving, my mother humming on the way, Shelly and I in back, looking out our windows. We parked, got out, all of us single file up the aisle, sitting in our usual spot, that same pew with a little chip on its end. I sat next to my father, Shelly on my other side, my mother next to Shelly. Next to my mom was my first-grade teacher, Mrs. Miller, whom I always was afraid of, in her horn-rimmed glasses, her stiff walk, and I had heard of the horrid way she treated children, and although I never saw anything firsthand, just the possibility sent my mind in rages. I sat and prayed for the usual: for God to help the needy, for forgiveness, then thanking God for everything. Amen. I looked up, everything familiar, the same wooden pews, the same blue hymnals, the same organ playing in the background. I couldn’t help but notice my dad’s head down, like really down, almost between his legs and his hands were tight fists resting on his knees. He never got into anything except when he was yelling at home. At church, he was like a dead guy. He never sang, he hardly ever spoke. He didn’t pray the way we were taught we were supposed to. Sometimes he fell asleep during sermons, and after he’d start snoring, my mother would tell one of us to nudge him. I noticed a bald spot on the back of his head, the hair on his neck, thinking he needed a haircut. Then he raised his head and shifted. He took those fists and hit them on his knees. He wasn’t so loud at first. And he kept on banging: fist to knees, fists to knees. He was wearing brown pants. I glanced around. Shelly looked ahead and so did my mother. I figured probably nothing surprised them. I looked at Mrs. Miller. She stared at my dad nonstop, through her glasses. I nudged Shelly. She kind of motioned for me to look ahead. Mrs. Miller kept on staring, then her husband even, and then my father whispered loudly to my mother, “Help.” I reached over and touched my mother’s arm, poking her with a finger. Her skin was warm. She looked over and smiled at my father as if she didn’t even know him, and then she looked at the altar, and then the pastor came out. I saw him step up to his pulpit. I looked up with everyone else and he started with announcements. I listened to the beginning of something, and then my father yelled, “God help me!” He said it a few times, then faded out. I shifted closer to my sister. My mother finally got up. She made her way around Shelly and me, and then she took my father, pulling him up and away. I watched them leave, and didn’t know what to do, so I just stayed there. I wondered if Shelly might have some answers but she looked blank. I moved closer to the aisle. The pastor moved on with his announcements. He told us all to sit and he invited us to pray. 

ONE OF THE POSSE

My uncle Wally points to people in the room, telling me their names: Karen, Dawn, Randy. Beth, Annette, and Sally. He says Connie died. We’re in a heated three-car garage set up for a party and it’s packed. Fridges line one wall. Another’s lined with tables filled with food: a big buffet/potluck like the ones I remember from my childhood. Long card tables populate the rest of the room, with people sitting, standing, wandering, kids running in the house and back: teens and tweens, children, toddlers.

It’s Sally’s eightieth birthday—and I remember Sally. Beth and Dawn. My mother’s cousins. The Edingers. Their mom, Leona, was my grandma’s sister.

Packers paraphernalia covers every wall, from every era. Some folks eat, some talk, some drink beer or wine or cocktails. Pop. Some play cards, rearranging decks, betting with their nickels.

The volume in the place is like an echo, loud, and I see familiar faces: versions of them older, the young ones resembling probably their mothers, fathers, siblings. Probably the kids I played with when I was small.

Wally wears a Packers sweatshirt, his mustache gray, his skin rough. He’s gained weight that doesn’t make him look unhealthy. Across the table sits his wife, my aunt Linda, and, next to her, my mom. My mom and I have just driven over an hour after visiting my sister for a day in Milwaukee. Before that, a funeral in East De Pere, close to where we are now. The funeral for my high-school sweetheart, Nathan. A man whom I reunited with more than once, over the miles, over the years. That’s mostly why I’m here. Here meaning Wisconsin.

The Green Bay Packers cardigan my mom bought me two days ago at the Packers Pro Shop warms me. She buys Packer Pro Shop cards as gifts for holidays and birthdays, and since I live in New York, she said it might be more fun to just go there ourselves. There was nothing I needed but I appreciated the gesture and indulged her by indulging in finding something I might like. I already have two pairs of Packers shoes, three Packers sweatshirts, a Jordan Love jersey, Packers hat and mittens. I grew up with the Packers. I’ve lived in Buffalo over sixteen years. I’ve become more of a Bills fan.

I ask Wally if he remembers Nathan. Wally has to put his ear to my mouth to hear. I say, “He was with me the night of the auction. With that storm. After the port-a-potties blew over.”

“Everything was a blur,” says Wally. He was the one to find his brother, my uncle Dennis, after he died. That’s where Dennis and Wally and my mom and their sister Sharon grew up. Along with my grandma and her nine siblings, including Sally’s mother, Leona. Parties like the party we’re at now were regular occasions at that house. I look around, trying to find the plot of where I am now.

Next to Linda sits Barbara, the wife of another of one of my mom’s cousins. Her mom was Lila. Next to her sits a bright-cheeked, chubby boy, Jaden, probably too young for puberty, but it’s hard for me to tell.

He looks at me and says, “Are you in your twenties?”

His plate is full: a brownie, hot dogs, cake.

I say, “You’re really nice. Who paid you to say that?”

The noise volume escalates, dissolves. He smiles. I say, “Who’s your grandpa?”

Glen. Of course I remember Glen. He used to be one of the posse. He was born in ’69. I’m a little older.

I say, “We used to play games at things like these. Running around, getting high on pop.”

Wally looks at me, as well as Linda and Barb. I’m not sure my mom can hear.

We used to imitate the old people, how they’d slap their cards down. How they’d swear, holding their cigars, their cigarettes, spitting through their teeth.

Barb says Jaden gives her pedicures, since she can’t touch her toes. That seems embarrassing to me, even the fact that she would say that.

The whole inside is a shuffle, all these people mostly cousins of mine in some form or another.

After I parked the car in the driveway, walking up, we saw calves in their pens. Cows in the pastures. Silos. The familiar smell: manure. The barn where Leona’s husband hanged himself. I remember the service, the church, seeing Leona sob, her earrings hang. I was probably only ten. Their kids have such wide ranges.

EVERYTHING WAS LOUD THEN

After my mom returned from her weeklong vacation and grounded me for going to a party, I ate a dish of chocolate ice cream and then another, and then I went into the bathroom and locked the door. I turned on the shower to drown out any noise. 

This time the door flew open and my mother stood with her hand on her hip, saying she’d known there was no way I could have lost all that weight after eating all that food. I sat on the cold tiles, leaning my elbow on the pot. 

Later my mom sat on my bed. I was on the carpet with my back against the wall. Mom put a pillow over her lap. 

“I’m calling Mr. Hedke,” she said. 

I got up and put on my running shoes. 

“Where you going?” 

I’d been running to the sand dunes, where I’d try to bury myself, pretending to disappear.

“You’re grounded, remember?” 

I reminded myself that being grounded meant not seeing my on-and-off guy Dave, and we were almost back together. 

Mom left the room, and as I did jumping jacks, I could hear my grandfather talking in the kitchen. He hardly ever came to town. I heard him say he had an appointment at the VA hospital to get his eyes checked. I moved onto the floor to do sit-ups. 

“She’s impossible,” I heard Mom say while I lifted my elbows to my knees. 

“Your grandpa’s here,” she yelled to me. 

I grabbed a Kleenex from my nightstand, patted my sweat, and went out to the kitchen and sat on a chair beside my grandpa. He was stout with dark hair, and he always wore low glasses. 

“How’s Eileen?” he said, tapping my arm. He was missing an index finger, which he’d lost before I was born. “You coming to the party?” 

A ton of my aunts and uncles and cousins were at my grandmother’s birthday party on the dairy farm that had been in my mom’s family for over a century. My cousin Brad had outgrown his T-shirts, so he gave them to me and I wore them as pajamas. I heard about gall bladder attacks and upcoming surgeries, and Uncle Jim talked about insulin. My grandpa talked of anticipating blindness. My grandmother talked about her nine siblings, who died of heart failure. Mom got out the extra board that made the kitchen table longer. Everyone sat around it, reciting the Lord’s Prayer, and then I watched people fill their plates with stuff. I watched all the heaping bowls, people shoveling forks of food into their mouths. Turkey, potatoes, gravy, corn, casseroles, and stuffing. Ham, potato salad, seven-layer, heavenly hash. I took small bites. My cousin Brad pushed up his glasses while chewing on a drumstick, inhaling. I looked around and my uncle Russell caught my eye, then looked down at my plate. 

“On a diet?” he said. 

“I take my time.” I put a pea on my fork and lifted it, watching the bowls being passed around the table. Mom sipped, looking at me. She got a milk mustache. My grandfather buttered bread and sat it on my plate. It absorbed my turkey gravy. I cut my food with my fork, arranging the soupy bread. I tried to eat my mashed potatoes. My grandmother served banana and pecan pies, then put cookies on the table. I got up to get a glass of water, and when I returned, I watched people reloading their plates. They were singing happy birthday. Then I washed the dishes while my younger cousins played Crazy Eights and sipped their cans of soda. Mom and her sisters put the food into smaller bowls, then dropped more dishes into the water. In the living room later, as everyone talked about townspeople, I recognized names from my old school. My grandfather sat next to me. “Heard from your other grandpa?” he whispered. I’d almost forgotten. My other grandpa had disowned me after my parents divorced and I moved in with my mother. My dad was schizophrenic. 

“I saw him at the IGA,” he said. He put a hand on my knee, covering a hole. 

On the ride home, Mom unbuttoned her Levi’s. I fell asleep. When I got home, I felt like throwing up. I got ready to go running but Mom said I was still grounded. I weighed myself. I decided to starve for the next few days.

At school, I got called to Mr. Hedke’s office. I plopped on a chair. Mom faced his cluttered desk. He clicked the mouse, sat, and swiveled. A picture of a smiling family sat with him. A bulletin board covered one wall, plastered with brochures about people with problems. Square gray tiles lined the floor. It was shiny.

“You need a professional,” he said. 

“How much will it cost?” Mom said. I focused on a poster, at a girl with nice and hollow cheeks. 

“They take insurance.” Mr. Hedke got up and paced behind his desk. 

“I don’t have insurance,” my mom said. 

He said something, mentioning resources. He gave my mom a list, and after comparing prices, they made appointments with a diet therapist and a counselor named Judith. Back in Physics, I told my classmates I was talking to Mr. Hedke about my future education. I said I felt sick and had to use the bathroom. My friend Amy followed me and I told her what had happened. She said everything would be OK. We went back to class. Later Mr. Ginger pulled me aside, saying if I needed to talk, he’d listen. He was never nice to me before.

At lunchtime, I sat with my friends Gretchen and Amy at a long table at the far end of the cafeteria, where blue Go Spartans! posters were taped to the brick. Kids shuffled through the rows, carrying plastic trays, finding seats. The noise level grew. My stomach had been growling. I bought trail mix. A group of druggies who crashed the party that probably got me grounded sat at the end of our table, so Amy talked to them while I looked around. I saw a few people who were on the pom-pom squad. I put a peanut in my mouth. Gretchen ate a burger. I scanned the room some more after swallowing my peanut, and then I saw Dave talking with all the other track stars. 

“Dave asked about you,” Amy said, leaning toward me.

“Really?” 

“I told him you were grounded.” She was slicing a tomato. I put a raisin in my mouth and sucked off all the sugar.

Gretchen bit her burger, and ketchup fell on her chin. I thought about how gross it looked; I stared at her face, thinking she wasn’t fat but she wasn’t skinny either. I looked down at a spot on the table that looked like it had been dabbed with Magic Marker, and I thought about Mr. Hedke and my mother. I imagined them at a bar, talking over beer and fries about Mom finding me in the bathroom with that disgusting vomit smell. 

At track, after the second interval, I told the coach I felt sick. As I headed toward the locker room, I heard steps behind me. It was Dave. He grabbed my sleeve, telling me it was too bad I was grounded because he was having a party. He sat on the ground, telling me to wait. He removed his shoes and socks. “Be glad you’re not a sprinter.” 

“I used to run the hundred.”

He sat, untying. “You losing weight?” he said. 

The locker room was empty. I took a shower. I thought about Dave. Naked, I looked into the mirror, turning to the side, sucking in. As I stepped into my jeans, my teammates flung into the room, slamming gear into lockers. I listened to talk about Dave’s party, hoping my mom would decide to take a weekend trip like she usually did at the last minute. I dried my hair, the blower warming me. I loved the heat. I lined my eyes with brown and painted my lips pink, then said goodbye to the other girls, who were screaming under the shower. 

Mom vacuumed with her Kirby. She flicked the switch with her bare toe, making the room silent, then she reached into her pocket, unburying her car keys. “There’s a free support group tonight,” she said. “You can take the car.” 

I looked at the keys like they were candy. 

“I’m trusting you,” she said. She had never offered me the car before. She gave me directions to the psychiatric center. 

I took the car to Dave’s. His parents were always gone. While we had sex on the balcony the way we always did, Amy made out with his older adult brother, and Gretchen flirted with his cousin. Dave finally told me he loved me. 

The next week at the clinic I saw a diet therapist named Barbara. She had oily skin and big breasts. Nutrition charts lined the walls, and the skeleton hanging from a pole reminded me of Mr. Bones from Biology. Barbara weighed me. I sat and she took rubber food models out of a basket, showing me what to eat. 

While my mom waited in the lobby, I walked down a hallway to see the therapist named Judith. I sat on the sofa, which took up most of the room. Everything was pink and friendly: daisies danced in a vase on Judith’s desk. The sun shone through a tall window, creeping through the pinkish blinds, making stripes on a poster with How do you feel? in miniature italics, and the matching checkered curtains were drawn open, sailing lightly from the air-conditioner’s draft, and even Judith looked as if she’d dressed to match the room, in her soft pink suit, her subtle, natural makeup. There was a faint potpourri smell. “Only tell me what you want,” Judith said in her tender voice, tilting her head, smiling. I wondered if she was an angel. Then I decided that was stupid. “Water?” she said. I imagined Judith’s home, harmonized in soft pastels, unlike the brown of Mom’s apartment. “How long has this gone on?” she said. She removed a pencil from her holder. I looked down, across the carpet. 

“I don’t know,” I said. 

She said, “It’s good we caught it early.”

I listened as Judith warned me of all the bad things my disease could do, causing dehydration and kidney failure and ruining my teeth. I sank into the cushion. 

“How do you feel?” she said, holding a fist to her chest.

I looked at the poster where the sun shone through. “I don’t know,” I said.

Judith started writing. 

“It’s important,” Judith said, “that you think of how you feel.”

My mom announced that she was going to Door County. She reminded me that I was grounded.

After she rode away in her Toyota, I called Gretchen, whose parents were out of town too. Gretchen picked me up, and we planned to go to Dave’s party. We went to her place first and helped each other get ready. 

As we sorted through her closet, she told me she had heard about my secret. She said she had a secret too. She said she was like me.

We moved through the big blue bedroom, coordinating outfits, sampling each look. 

After a while, Gretchen said, “My mom left cheesecake for my neighbor. But he has dementia.”

I tried to think how I was feeling. 

We went to the kitchen, and Gretchen opened the fridge, pulling out the cheesecake. She grabbed spoons and knifes and plates. I followed her to the living room. She cut pieces, giving me my share. I watched her eat one, two pieces, devouring three. She finally looked at me and motioned to me with her spoon. “Well?” she said. 

I savored a bite, trying to feel. I felt fine. I had another. The more I ate, the faster I dished the food into my mouth, as if it were a race. Gretchen did the same, and we made faces at each other, saying things like Yum and This is good, laughing, talking with our mouths full. After the cake was gone, we ate nachos with cheese, going faster. 

I used the downstairs bathroom. She used her private one. As I shoved a finger down my throat, I tried to think of something lovely. While I thought of kissing Dave, vomit flew into the toilet. I tried to think of something awful. I had a picture of my father. Then my grandfather. He’d said he loved me, angry, leaving. My father again. I got mixed up. I kept on until my stomach felt like it was empty. I was finally relieved. I wiped the toilet and sprayed the room with Lysol. I washed my hands and face and swirled my mouth with someone’s Listerine. 

Gretchen was waiting upstairs. We looked at each other. She was smiling. “Let’s get ready,” she said.

After showers, we put on makeup, drinking Bud Ice Light, listening to Billy Idol. We danced around, curling one another’s hair. Then we picked up Amy and we all went to the party.

Dave kissed me right away, and after about ten minutes, he spilled his drink on me and passed out in his bedroom. I had a few more beers before Gretchen took me home. I said thanks, a little tipsy.

At home, I searched the cupboards. As I took small bites, I tried to think of how I felt, but it took too much effort, so I ate more, and just kept on until everything was empty. 

I crawled under my covers, trying to get warm. Everything was spinning, so I closed my eyes, trying to still the whirling. But that didn’t work, so I got up, feeling nauseous, smelling my skirt, which smelled of Dave’s spilled drink. I removed my clothes, checking the inward cave between my pelvic bones, relieved it was still there. 

I woke to the doorbell and looked at my alarm clock. It was 10:00 a.m. I answered, seeing my grandfather, the one I liked, the one without his finger.

“You look like hell,” he said. The room filled up with his cologne.

I told him I had to use the bathroom. I washed my face and brushed my teeth, then looked into the toilet to make sure it was clean. I went to my room, changing. When I got back to the kitchen, he was starting on the coffee. I watched the old grounds topple over in the trashcan. 

“Everything OK?” he said, pouring water in the maker.

After the coffee was done, we sat around the table, watching a red hummingbird dance outside the window, sucking on the feeder that my mom had hung early on. 

I put my hands around my cup.

I looked at my grandfather as he stared at the flapping bird that sucked the syrup. 

“I feel sick,” I said.

Grandpa rose and filled his cup, then darted closer to the window, which scared the bird away. “You might feel better if you talked more. Maybe to your mother. Stop thinking so hard about your father.”

My dad had a nervous breakdown in church. I was sitting right beside him. He kept yelling: Lord help me, Lord help me, Lord help me.

After that, he was in an institution. After my mom left him, my parents sold my dad’s family’s Century Farm, which was down the road from where my mother grew up. I moved to the city, to the apartment with my mother.

After Mom came home, she sailed from room to room, singing. 

I sat at the top of the stairs, listening to her unpack in her downstairs bedroom. I thought about doing things with her: a run around the track, a walk around the block, tennis at the park. Or maybe something like a board game. Stratego or Boggle or Scrabble. Something like we used to when she was with my father. 

I heard her voice over the zipping sound. She was on the phone. I heard her say, “I wish her father was well enough to keep her.” 

Judith asked more questions. I sat looking at the pink.

“Did you think of how you felt?” She put her palm over her chest. 

I told her I felt shitty. 

When she called my mother into the room, she told my mom that I was making progress. I liked Judith. She had a nice face. I found her voice pretty. 

“She’s still doing it,” my mother said. 

I looked down at the floor.

“She won’t get better overnight,” Judith said. “Your girl is really suffering.”

“I don’t see it,” my mother said. 

My face felt hot. I could feel my stomach rumbling. 

Judith told my mother she could help me.

I was asked to leave so I sat in the lobby. I looked down at the checkered floor, examining the tiles. 

When I felt a presence, I looked up, seeing the statue of my mother. She asked if I was ready, so I nodded, and I followed her to the car.

She said I was a disappointment.

As she drove, I stared out the window. I imagined jumping into traffic, getting smashed into a thousand little pieces. A loud and angry semi passed by on the highway. 

I looked at my mother. At her jutting chin. 

I felt pathetic. Mad. I wanted to say something but I didn’t know what to say. 

I looked straight, thinking about something Judith had said, about the consciousness of my emotions. I wondered how long I’d have to look to find them.

“I can’t make you better,” my mother said, switching on her blinker.

I at least knew that. I, at least, knew some things.