2/20/01: Weekend #3:
Denny’s, Sunday, just before noon
“He really was so cute,” I say, playing with my tinkertoy things. “I mean, the guitar was just a small part of it. It just enhanced an already cute man and made him cuter.”
“Yeah, and he was nice, too” says Jenny, backing me up. She searches through the tinkertoy bucket for the right piece. Kelly nods and smiles, diplomatically, her attention on her toy. Kathryn mutters to herself, making her tinkertoy “dogs” dance and sing in three-year-old language: “Yes, I’m home, why don’t you come inside and sit in my comfortable chairs, la la la, we won’t fight, we’ll sit in our chairs, la la la…”
The waitress with the impressive eyeliner returns with our food, so we put our mutant tinkertoy creations to one side so that there’s room for our plates. The waitress doesn’t seem to notice that we stole another basket of the toys from an empty table, thankfully – she just plunks our food down in front of us.
We survey our food. Jenny has ordered enough for an army. “I like breakfast,” she says by way of explanation. Kathryn’s round little face lights up as she looks at her food. She has ordered the smiley face breakfast, which is a few silver dollar pancakes arranged into a head with whipped cream forming eyes, nose, and mouth, and bacon for ears.
“Look,” Kathryn says, pointing to the little pictures of cartoony Harlem Globetrotters on the paper cup her orange juice came in. “Look at the mans!”
“Funny mans,” says Jenny.
“Are they nice mans?”
“Yeah, they’re nice mans,” says Jenny. I am reminded, for no apparent reason, of how Kathryn once said that “only mans die, not mommies.” It’s her understanding of mortality – the people she’s known of who’ve died have all been men. No one really wants to correct her.
“Nice mans,” repeats Kathryn, ruminatively. You should know that she has the cutest voice. It’s a little scratchy and has an inexplicable, source-less accent – kind of like a Long Island accent, only why on earth would she talk like that?
“What kind of syrup do you want?” Jenny asks her. “Do you want maple or strawberry?” I immediately have a premonition: an image of all of us covered head to two in stickiness and Kathryn laughing hysterically.
“Strawberry,” says Kathryn, and Jenny covers the face in red syrup. It looks a little ghoulish now. As Jenny starts to cut the face up into little pieces – the red liquid seeping into the cuts as she makes them – Kathryn stares out the window. “Mommy?” she says. “Are the bad owls going to come and bite us?”
“No,” says Jenny. “The bad owls stayed at Grandma Patty’s house.” She adds, to explain it to Kelly: “That’s what she calls the turkey vultures, ‘bad owls.’”
This morning when I came downstairs I found Kathryn placidly not eating her Cheerios and staring out the window. “Look at the bad owls,” she said to me, pointing at the hillside. There was a whole flock of the vultures, ominously watching the house, as if waiting for us to die so they could eat our eyes. Patty had told me about them but I didn’t really understand until I saw them. They may serve a purpose in the chain of life and stuff, but I sure as hell don’t like a whole little troop of them watching me.
“Those damn birds really are freaky,” says Jenny to me and Kelly.
“Did you see Mom shoot at them?” Kelly asks.
“No, but she says it scares ‘em off,” Jenny says.
We eat for a bit, exchange some gossip. Kelly’s boyfriend, Jeff’s girlfriend. My complete lack of a useful love life. Kelly looks the same these days as she did when she was little. Exactly. She’s just stretched out. She’s taller, obviously, and her face is thinner and longer, but if I had seen her on the street a year or so ago, before I was back in touch with them, I would have stopped her and said, “Kelly?” And she would have said, “Um?”
“Aunt Kelly!” says Kathryn, loudly.
“Yes?”
Kathryn just laughs and looks shy.
“She’s annoyed we’re not talking about her,” says Jenny.
“This morning, did you see her playing with the toy soldiers?” I ask. There are a lot of little plastic army men lying around Jenny’s mom’s house – apparently the boys shoot at them, when they’re not shooting at the birds. “Kathryn had them arranged in a circle, arm to rifle, and she said they were playing ring-around-the-rosie.”
We all agree this is very funny, and discuss for a bit how much smarter women are than men. I add: “He really was very cute. Such a cute boy. Really, the guitar was just a bonus.” Jenny and Kelly laugh.
“Eat some of your pancakes,” Jenny tells Kathryn for the umpteenth time.
“I want what you’re eating,” says Kathryn.
“You have to eat your own food,” Jenny says, and tries to give Kathryn some bites of the pancake. Kathryn won’t eat them. It’s always like pulling teeth to get Kathryn to eat. Unless it’s food on someone else’s plate. Little scavenger.
“Sometimes Jeff and his friend, you know, Josh?” Kelly begins. Jenny and I nod assent. “Yeah, well Jeff and Josh go out around town dressed as a duck and gorilla. They come in here sometimes –” and Kelly gestures to the majesty of Denny’s that surrounds us – “and just do stupid stuff, and leave. Then two months later on that show, Jackass on MTV, they’re doing the same thing.”
“This is how Jeff spends his time?” I say. It’s not really a question.
“Yeah, it’s funny. They do all sorts of stupid stuff.”
“Take a bite,” says Jenny, aiming a forkful of pancake at Kathryn. “See? Just open your mouth. Open. Open! Open your mouth!” Kathryn just laughs. She can laugh without opening her mouth enough for her mom to fit food in it. Amazing child. Jenny gives up for a moment, exhausted.
Kelly has apparently finished eating, which I guess is how she stays so skinny – she eats only slightly more than Kathryn. She begins to make the “man” demonstrated on the bucket the tinkertoy things came in.
“Meretta,” says Kathryn, covering her eyes with her hands. “You can’t see me.” This is our favorite game.
“I can see your elbows,” I say, and Kathryn squirms around so that her elbows are hidden by her knees. “Can you see me?” I ask, covering my eyes with my hands.
“I can see your hands,” says Kathryn. I hold my fingers spread apart and Kathryn says, triumphantly: “I can see your eyes! I can see your eyeballs!” Kathryn loves the word "eyeballs." She has some marbles that she thinks looks like eyes, and she likes to carry them around so she can hold them up and say, "Look at my eyeballs!" She's a strange child.
I cover my eyeballs up again, then peek out at her. "I can see your hair," I say, and she hides her head under the table. "I can see your pancakes,” I say. “If you ate them, I wouldn’t be able to see them.” Kathryn isn’t fooled by this ploy. Disgusted, she turns her attention towards her menu, which is also a little booklet of games, all featuring the Harlem Globetrotters. It’s really very odd. I didn’t know they still were around.
“Good try anyway,” says Jenny.
“He really was so cute, Kelly,” I say.
“Very cute,” says Jenny.
“And it wasn’t just because he was on stage,” I say. “I mean, there’s something about seeing someone on stage, and it just makes them sexier, like KABOOM they’re so sexy! But – he was sexy even when he was just a guy sitting at a table.”
Jenny considers this. “We should start a band,” she says. “I’ll learn bass, Loretta can play guitar, and Kelly can play drums.” Kelly laughs. “No, really, get Mike to teach you to play drums, and Loretta can practice more and get really good, and I’ll buy a bass guitar and hide it and stuff and learn to play it.”
“It would be just like the Power Puff girls when they played in a band,” I say. “Blonde Bubbles on drums, redhead Blossom on bass, and brunette Buttercup on lead guitar.”
We look around at each other for a second, and laugh. Kathryn starts whining – we’re not paying attention to her.
Jenny tries again. “Eat, come on, Kathryn, eat! Open! Open! Open up!”
“Why don’t you eat the eyes?” says Kelly.
“Yeah, eat the eyeballs!” Jenny adds.
“Eyeballs?” says Kathryn.
“Yummy eyeballs,” I say.
“Eat the eyes and tell me what they taste like," adds Kelly.
“Here, I’ll cut them up for you,” Jenny says.
“Eat them up or the man will come and get you!” says Kelly. She picks up her tinkertoy man and “walks” him towards Kathryn. As he moves he jerks around unsettlingly. Kathryn shrieks and giggles and hides her head under the seat. “If you take a bite,” Kelly adds, “he won’t come and get you.” Kathryn eats a bite, chewing it enthusiastically. “It’s good, right?” Kathryn nods.
“Wow, you really made a man,” says Jenny. “All mine are just sort of ugly smoosh things.”
“His feet are too big for his body,” Kelly notes. “I’ll give him another head.” She starts collecting pieces of body from around the table.
“So cute,” I say, mainly to myself.
“There,” says Kelly, and she has indeed. given her man another head. Another torso, in fact. Now his lurching about is quite unsteady. She makes the two pairs of arms hold onto each other, in a strange version of ring-around-the-rosie. She walks him around in circles, and the “grown ups” all start laughing.
“A scary mans!” says Jenny to her daughter. "He's going to eat your food…” Kathryn is ignoring us, concerned with her pancakes.
The strange creation looks oddly lifelike, and we can’t stop laughing. The other people in the Denny’s are looking at us.
When we stop laughing finally, we notice what Kathryn is doing. She’s stabbing her pancake face with her fork, and with each stab, she’s saying, “Ouch! Ouch! That hurts! Ouch!”
This makes us start laughing again.