Neverland Read Free Page B

the beauty of paradox.
    But the Retreat: From the road up, even at night, it looked misguided and senile and ready to drop. And ugly—even the surrounding trees wanted to get rid of it; they pushed against the long windows, and poked the gambrel roof. The screen of the front porch was torn and tattered, so if you sat out there at night, you’d get eaten alive by mosquitoes. Skeeters , Grampa Lee used to say. After his death, Grammy Weenie would continue the tradition and say, “Like Old Lee used to say, ‘Skeeters,’” while she swatted at the bloodsucking menaces.

7
    Helping us unpack the car, Uncle Ralph—smelling of Bay Rum and bourbon and Coke—slapped me on the shoulders and said, “Either you’re gettin’ in some whiskers on that upper lip, boy, or two caterpillars’re matin’ right under your nose.” I didn’t think it was funny, and Daddy offered me a smile as he pulled the big hard brown suitcase out of the open back of the wagon. The smile was meant as a “Yeah, Beau, he’s a jerk, all right, but it’s okay, you’re not related to him by blood.”
    Missy and Nonie ran ahead to where Grammy Weenie was sitting on the porch, and I heard my mother say to Aunt Cricket, who had run out to coo at Governor, “Why isn’t Mama coming down?”
    Aunt Cricket whispered so loudly that all of us could hear it, shooting the words out a mile a minute. “Oh, Evvie, Mama’s just not the same without Daddy. Don’t I wish he was with us, the way she’s been driving us all up the walls the whole week and getting after Sunny for just being a healthy boy . . . and it wasn’t much of an accident, she just gets, you know, dramatic when she wants attention.”
    Sumter was noticeably missing. Last I’d seen him, summer before, he was still embedded in Aunt Cricket’s shadow.
    Uncle Ralph mumbled to Dad, “Sumter was the accident.”

    My mother passed Governor to her sister and went running up to the front porch, where Missy and Nonie circled around Grammy Weenie as the old lady leaned forward in her wheelchair; the wheelchair was new—and directly related to the Sumter accident.
    Uncle Ralph tossed me a small bag to carry. “Think quick!” He lifted the twins’ two small pink suitcases and walked alongside my father, and I followed behind. The ground was muddy from a recent rain, and because my shoes got sucked down an inch or two with each step, I made sure my footsteps stayed within my father’s well-ground-in enormous steps.
    “What’s the story here?” Dad asked. His typical question: What ’ s the story , young man ?
    Uncle Ralph glanced over his shoulder at me, and I was afraid he’d say, “Little pitchers have big ears,” but he didn’t. He turned back to my father, both their steps slowing. “The old witch claims Sumter tripped her on the stairs, and Sumter says he didn’t mean to leave his Slinky lying there—all that crap kids give you. To tell you the truth, Dab, it’s been like living with Gramma Adolf Hitler for the past month—maybe she won’t be so high and mighty now.”
    “That’s Christian of you, Ralph.”
    “Not you, too, Dabney? I’m gettin’ it from all sides this summer. I thought at least a guy would know what I’m talkin’ about.”
    “I know what you’re talking about.”
    They walked the rest of the way up to the house in silence, and I tried to stay within my father’s muddy footprints, but I heard a noise above me and almost fell in the mud when I looked up.
    It was Sumter at one of the upstairs windows. He looked like he thought he was a preacher blessing us: He was flipping the bird, although as in all things he did, he didn’t have it quite right. His middle finger was extended all right, but rather than having the back of his hand facing me, he’d turned his palm outward. I wanted to remember to tell him that it looked like he was flipping the bird at himself. I set my suitcase down and waved to him because I knew he meant it as a gesture of