“We’re from Glenelg,” one called back. “And you Wilde Lake people are white-trash hippies.”
Davey didn’t say anything. He was focused on the climb, his face grim. He would have no problem overtaking them.
I ran inside the house and climbed to the top floor, where I told my father breathlessly, if somewhat inaccurately, that AJ was in a fight. Alerted by this self-appointed and self-important town crier, all the adults streamed into the front yard, most still holding their drinks. By now, AJ and Davey had the two strangers cornered in an old-fashioned convertible parked along the curb. My brother and Davey stood on the outside, gripping the passenger-side door. The driver could have tried to pull away, I suppose, but the look on Davey’s face seemed to suggest that he would hold on to that door until it was wrenched from him.
“Okay, okay, let’s calm down, everyone,” my father said. “What’s going on? Davey, you start.”
He didn’t want to show favoritism by asking AJ to recount the story; I understood this somehow. Even as a child, I was acutely aware of my father’s methods.
“These ass-these guys grabbed some poor kid and pantsed him while he was chugging a beer, pulled his pants down in front of a bunch of girls. The guy’s totally humiliated. What did he ever do to you?”
“He’s a creepy little faggot, always spying on everyone. We told him to leave us alone and he didn’t,” the driver yelled.
“He’s the cast photographer,” AJ said. “That’s his job.”
“In the theater, when we’re performing. Not at the cast party. Little creep never puts his camera down.”
“You’re mad because he took a photo of you doing something you didn’t want photographed,” Davey said. “I saw you light up in my parents’ house. That was uncool.”
“Oh, who cares, you stupid nigger. You think you’re so fancy.”
In the deep, shocked silence that fell, I noticed how few black people were in attendance at the party. Davey and his parents, of course. The girl who had been Ariel’s understudy, whose skin and eyes were almost amber. Three of the waiters, and the man who had been tending the grill. Of the fifty or so people still at the party, maybe eight were black. Still, I don’t think you could have said a more shocking thing in Columbia, not at that time. We were good people. Our choice of Columbia was the ultimate proof of that. We were the people tree, sixty-six strong, indifferent to class and race.
Right. The one thing people are never indifferent to are differences. We may not mind them, we may glory in them, but we notice, don’t we? And congratulate ourselves on our tolerance and open-mindedness. But we are never indifferent.
I glimpsed Noel’s face in the crowd. I expected him to be beaming with excitement. Noel was always up for a scene, as he called it, the more dramatic the better. But his big green eyes were full of an unreadable emotion. He wasn’t enjoying this at all.
My father stepped forward and grasped the driver’s side of the car, mirroring Davey’s posture. I believed he needed to hold something to restrain himself from hitting the boy. I worried he might do something intemperate.
“You need to apologize to our hosts,” he said. “For your behavior, for your words. And then, yes, you need to leave. But not before I have your parents’ names. I will be calling them and telling them what transpired here.”
“You can’t make us tell our names,” said the boy in the driver’s seat.
“Do you honestly think I won’t learn them? Others here know who you are. The director knows. For goodness’ sake, son, I’m the state’s attorney of this county.”
“I can say whatever I want. Haven’t you ever heard of the First Amendment? And it’s not against the law to pants some faggot. It’s what they want, to be bare butt in front of a bunch of guys.”
My father seemed, for a moment, at a loss for words. Maybe that’s why I channeled the old schoolyard taunt: “Well, takes one to know one.”
There was a nervous silence, broken by the booming laugh of the grill man. He laughed much harder, I thought, than was warranted by any eight-year-old’s gibe. He bent over, holding himself. He slapped his knees, literally, wiped tears from his eyes. Others began to laugh as well. The two boys in the car blushed furiously. My father stepped away from the car, as did Davey, and the two disgraced boys drove away. They did not race off, as one might expect. They drove the speed limit, even signaled the left turn as they approached the stop sign at the end of the street.
“Our boys are good boys,” my father said to Davey’s parents. “I’m proud that they stood up for the underdog.” I expected the Robinsons to clap him on the back or send up a cheer. But they did nothing more than nod and smile tightly. Their party had been spoiled. People began making their excuses to leave, although there was plenty of light left in the May evening. My father stayed until the end, not something he usually did at social occasions.
At home that night, I asked AJ if I could borrow the Man of La Mancha cast album. But it wasn’t “The Impossible Dream” that I played over and over that night. I wanted to listen to one of Ariel’s songs: “What Does He Want of Me?” Quixote wanted Dulcinea, but not in the way other men did. She thought he was ridiculous, yet she could not laugh at him. The song stirred me in a way I could not explain. I yearned to be wanted. What would that feel like? My father and brother loved me. Even Teensy, in her cranky way, had undeniable affection for me. But what was this feeling that Dulcinea sang about, would I ever experience it? I knew it had something to do with kissing, and yet Quixote’s love was better somehow because he did not want to kiss her, which was what all the men on the soap operas wanted to do with the women they said they loved. Yet I wanted to be kissed, too. I thought I did. Maybe.
Also, what was a faggot? I had meant to ask my father on the drive home, but had forgotten in all the excitement.
JANUARY 30
Lu feels a strange frisson of nerves when she goes before the grand jury to obtain a formal indictment against Rudy Drysdale. As she predicted, Fred had failed in his attempt to obtain a bail reduction for Drysdale at a hearing earlier this week. And he put Arthur Drysdale on the stand, as Lu had hoped, which allowed her to ask if there were any violent episodes in his son’s past. The father had stammered and stuttered, even as Fred quickly objected, and Lu happily withdrew her question. They were on notice now, which was all she needed. She knew. Drysdale could take the Fifth if asked about the fake police report, a crime, if a small one. Either way, Fred has to realize now that she has something on Rudy Drysdale.
Still, she is uncharacteristically jittery. She’s gilding the lily, going for a grand jury indictment when he’s already been charged. What if the grand jury decides it’s not a murder one case? Maybe she shouldn’t have risked this.
But it’s a good trial run for the neighbor, Jonnie Forke, who can place Rudy Drysdale at the scene during the week that Mary McNally was killed. Lu has to be hard on her because she’s sure Fred is going to go after her in court. He’ll be right to do so. In her heart of hearts, Lu has trouble with anything that relies on a person’s ability to remember another person’s face. Maybe that’s her own personal bias, born of her particular inability to remember names and faces. But as the science on memory advances, she wonders how it will affect the future of criminal trials that rely on eyewitnesses. What if criminal attorneys start to use “memory experts,” the way, say, medical trials present experts on both sides of malpractice cases? Then again, the average person is reluctant to admit to a less-than-stellar memory until a certain age, although Lu knows lots of women who will cop to “mom brain” during pregnancy and menopause. The fear of dementia is part of this culture of denial, Lu believes, but she also thinks memory is part of the holy trinity of self. Ask anyone and they’ll tell you: they have a good memory, good taste, and a good sense of humor. Oh, make it the holy quartet: everyone, everyone Lu has ever met, considers themselves superb judges of character.