Neon Angel Page 3

  “He just stood there,” my father said in a voice that was suddenly weak. “Just stood there with the gun still in his hand, and his head clean gone. Then the body calmly sat down on a bench. Then it fell over on the floor. My gun was still in his hand.”

  My father was a drinker. A social drinker—my parents threw these amazing parties, where they’d listen to Dean Martin or the Mills Brothers singing “Shine, little glow-worm, glimmer, glimmer, shine little glow-worm, glimmer!” and Dad would be behind the bar they had built in the family room, mixing cocktails, telling stories, and playing the genial host. But other times he would drink alone, and his face would look older somehow. His eyes were distant, lost in some far-off memory. When I’d see him like that, I’d ask, “Are you okay, Daddy?” He’d snap back to reality, give me a smile, and say, “I’m doing great, Kitten, I feel like a tiger.” My father was a hero in the war, and now sometimes I felt that he was unable to adjust to the role of everyday man. I could see that there was some unfathomable sadness in my father’s heart, something deeper, and darker than a child like me could ever comprehend.

  “Daddy!”

  We raced, dripping wet, through the den and toward the front door. Mom was already opening the door, and there, with the sun spilling in from behind him, was Dad. Donnie barged past all of us, and leaped into his arms, still dripping, and Dad was smiling and he dropped the suitcases to the ground so he could catch him. Suddenly we were all on him, all talking to him at once, telling him about everything that had gone on in the four weeks since he left: “Marie and I are starting seventh grade!” “Some new neighbors moved in next door!” “I learned to do flips into the pool!” Dad was laughing, and shaking his head, and trying to listen, but it was too much to follow . . . Donnie was asking, “Do you want a drink, Dad? Are you thirsty?”

  “Are you hungry?” Marie interrupted. “We have barbecue!”

  I was pulling on my father’s sleeve. “Do you want to go for a swim? It’ll cool you off!”

  Dad couldn’t answer, he just smiled and kissed us, happily overwhelmed by all of the commotion. He looked at us like he never wanted to take his eyes off of us ever again. He took a step inside, and I said, “I’ll get your suitcases, Dad!”

  “Can you handle them, Kitten?”

  “Sure!”

  I reached down, grasped the thick leather handles, and prepared myself for the weight of the heavy cases.

  Except something was wrong.

  When I picked them up, they lifted easily. Far too easily. I started carrying them toward Mom and Dad’s bedroom, and with every step I took, they seemed lighter and lighter. An empty feeling started to grow in the pit of my stomach as I realized something terrible. Something that made me wish I hadn’t even woken up that morning. Something more terrible than anything that had happened since Dad left a month ago.

  I realized that the suitcases were empty. They weren’t meant for bringing things home. They were meant for taking things away.

  In the bedroom, I silently put the cases down. I walked over to Dad’s closet and opened it up. It looked sparse in there: Dad had taken a lot of his stuff with him when he left last month. I ran my hands across the remaining clothes—my father’s shirts, slacks, and sport coats. Taking the sleeve of one in my hands, I pressed it to my face. I breathed in, deeply. It smelled like my father’s Old Spice. A sweet-painful feeling came over me. I hoped silently that he’d leave this jacket here. I heard someone behind me and spun around, scared that I had been caught snooping, but it was only Marie.

  She was standing in the doorway, watching me silently. Her face was a mixture of confusion and hurt. She already knew what I knew, in that strange way that twins can pick up on each other’s thoughts. Finally she said, “What do you think he’ll take this time?”

  I shook my head slightly.

  “Do you think he’ll take his clothes?” Marie asked, walking toward me. “Or the furniture? Maybe even the car?”

  Suddenly full of self-righteous fury, I screamed, “Is that all you care about? The stupid CAR?”

  Marie looked hurt, and I immediately felt bad because I knew it was not Marie I was mad at. I was just mad, and scared, and I needed to vent. Marie just happened to be the one standing there.

  “No!” she said suddenly, her cheeks reddening. Then she added in a little voice, “All I mean is that if he only takes his clothes . . . then that probably means that he’ll still come back sometime. That’s all.”

  I looked away from her and said, “He’s got two suitcases. How do you think he’s going to take the furniture, genius?”

  “I know!” Marie said, coming over and standing inches from me. I felt her presence behind me, our bodies almost touching. I didn’t turn to look at her. “So that’s good, right? I mean, it’s not like he showed up with a U-Haul. If he’d had a U-Haul, then you know it’s bad news. But, I mean, he wouldn’t just up and leave like that! This is his house! His pool! The furniture is his . . . the business, too! People don’t just up and leave all of that stuff, do they?”

  I shrugged, but Marie carried on regardless.

  “No, if he just takes his clothes, then that means that he has to come back.”

  Marie was trying to sound strong and decisive, but every statement came out of her mouth sounding like a question. I sighed. I thought to myself, People DO just up and leave. He already upped and left. What’s going to be different this time? Instead, I said, “You’re right. Let’s see what he takes.”

  When Dad came into the bedroom to pack, he placed his glass down on the wooden dressing table without a coaster. I was about to say something, because Mom hated it when he did that, but I stopped myself, realizing that I didn’t really care. I watched the glass as it sat there, half full of a watery mixture of Scotch and melting ice, the condensation creeping down the outside, the water stain forming against the wood. Mom always complained that Dad should use coasters, and Dad always said that he forgot. There were little water stains from my father’s glasses all over the house. Little mementos of him. Little traces of what once was.

  Slowly, my father started taking his clothes off of the hangers. Then he stopped, and turned to me.

  “You don’t have to watch, Kitten,” he said. “Why don’t you go play in the pool?”

  I shook my head. “I’ve been in the pool all day. I want to stay here. With you.” I didn’t know where my mom was. I could hear Donnie screaming and splashing in the pool, oblivious to everything that was going on. Marie was in our bedroom, upset, pretending to watch TV. Daddy packed his jacket, the one that smelled like him. He packed quickly, and I watched how easily the two suitcases swallowed everything that was hanging in the closets. I started to feel an irrational hatred toward those stupid suitcases. He was only taking his clothes. Even though Marie said that was a good thing, I had a bad feeling about all of this. I felt sick deep in the pit of my stomach. Trying to ignore it, I said, “Are you coming back to visit soon? I mean . . . will we see you on weekends and stuff? What about next weekend?”

  When my father looked at me, I got scared because he looked different. He looked old, tired, and sad. His eyes were bloodshot, and his face was creased with pain and worry. My father usually looked so handsome, so much younger than all of the other fathers at my school, but today he looked drained, worn out. Like he had aged twenty years. That same look that came over his face when he was sitting in his chair, silently brooding over God knows what awful memory of the war. He turned away again, and picked up the Scotch. He took a long sip, and replaced it on the water ring. Barely looking at me, he said, “Kitten . . . I guess your mom didn’t tell you . . .”

  The moment he said this I wanted to cry, because I knew what was coming. Whenever Dad said that, it meant bad news. Not just bad news, but the kind of life-changing bad news that hits you with the force of an atomic blast. “I guess your mom didn’t tell you . . . Grandpa died,” or “I guess your mom didn’t tell you . . . we’re getting a divorce.”

 
This time it was a doozy, though, and for a moment I thought that I must have misheard him, or that this was all some kind of terrible dream, and I was still hidden away in my bedroom, twisting and turning in a fitful sleep.

  “I guess your mom didn’t tell you,” my father said this time. “I’m moving to Texas.”

  I stood there, my mouth gaping open but no words coming out. I felt my face flush, and a wave of sickness pass through me. It was a feeling that no twelve-year-old should ever feel. I managed to croak the word “Texas?” back at him. I mean . . . Aunt Evie’s house seemed like it was far away. But Texas? As in the Alamo, and cowboys and stuff? As in a thousand miles away? TEXAS?

  “I’m going to start a business,” my father said, as if somehow this was the most rational thing in the world. “I going into the eight-track-tape business. There’s good money in eight-track tapes. I think the eight-track has a big future . . .”

  What was it Marie had said? People don’t just leave their homes, their businesses!

  “What about the dress shop?” I stammered, cursing myself for not saying what I really meant, which was “What about US?”

  “Your mom can handle the shop just fine without me. You know your mom—she always wants to be the one who wears the pants in the family. And you know I don’t go for that kind of news, Kitten.” His voice got harder and dripped with resentment when he said the next part: “I don’t want to talk bad against your mother, Kitten . . . But I guess now she’s got what she wanted all along.”

  I opened my mouth, and then closed it again. I realized that there was nothing to say to my father anymore. We were finally beyond words. He’d come to collect his belongings, and now he was going to leave and move to Texas, and there was nothing in the world I could do about it. He knew that when he showed up today with those empty suitcases. The divorce was going through, there was no turning back. Sure, it would be months before all of the paperwork was figured out, but for all intents and purposes, when my father walked out of the house today with his suitcases full of clothes, leaving nothing but an empty closet and some water stains to remind us that he was ever there, the divorce would be final. Inside I was screaming. I could feel the tears welling up inside of me, but somehow they would not come out of my eyes.

  “It’s not the end of the world, Kitten,” he said weakly. I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to scream that it was WORSE than the end of the world. Much worse. If the world ended right now, I would be fine with it. One huge BOOM and it’s all over. But this? This is going to hurt for the rest of our lives!

  My father continued packing, unsure and unsteady. Opening drawers then closing them absently without taking anything out. “Kitten,” he said meekly, “please go play . . .” I silently turned, and walked out of the room in shock. In the bedroom, Marie was watching the TV with the sound turned down. I knew that she heard every word my father and I had said. Her face was glacial, blank.

  “Stupid Texas!” she said finally, her voice wobbling. “This whole thing stinks! Divorce shouldn’t be allowed!” Then she got up and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

  I walked slowly over to the window. The sky was still perfect; it was another beautiful sunny day in Southern California. You stop noticing the weather after a while. Even perfection can become routine. Today it should have been snowing. Or raining. There should have been lightning, and the rumble of thunder, or hailstones the size of golf balls battering against the glass. But there was none of that. There was just the sunlight, and that terrible, endless sky.

  In half an hour, my father was gone. Even Donnie knew now, although he probably didn’t grasp the enormity of what was going on. My father hugged us all at once, and we cried together. When my father held me close, I could smell his aftershave, and could feel wetness on his cheeks. The only other time I’d seen tears in Daddy’s eyes was when I was four years old, the day Grandpa died. He tried to say good-bye now, but it came out as a choking sob. We held on to him, trying to keep him from leaving. We held on for dear life. He dragged us to the door, having to pry our hands from him, tears in his eyes. Eventually he had to call our mom and say, “Marie, can you help me, please?” We clung to him, screaming, and crying, and pleading with Daddy not to go. Mom came over and started pulling our hands off him. He gave us one last long, tearful look and then disappeared. The screen door closed behind him, with a terrible, final bang.

  As I turned away from the door, I noticed a space on the wall where a picture used to be. A picture of all four of us kids. Besides the clothes, that was the only other thing he took with him. I realized just how wrong Marie really was. He only took his clothes, not because he was coming back, but because he wanted to leave everything exactly as it was for us. He didn’t want anything to be missing from our lives. Nothing, that is, but him.

  That night I lay in bed, the tears frozen on my cheeks, with my headphones on, listening to my music. The guitars swirled and cascaded in my head. I tried to listen so hard that I could disappear inside of the music. I knew that something fundamental had changed today, that nothing would ever be the same again. I felt so empty inside. Everything I knew had been taken away from me, everything that seemed so solid, and real, and warm . . . I realized that there were no guarantees in this world. Who or what could I trust in anymore? I turned the volume up, more and more, until the music was so loud and powerful that it battered against my ears and there was nothing to do but give myself up to it, surrender to it. I wanted the music to make this terrible, empty feeling go away. When I concentrated on the music hard enough, the fear and the loneliness disappeared. I was in a place where there was nothing but the music. Just the pounding, glorious, primal beat of the drums, the dizzying roar of the electric guitar. . .

  As the last note rang out across the Universal Amphitheater, the lights began to go up, signaling that this really was the end of the show and there would be no more encores. My whole body was vibrating with an energy that felt like the aftermath of being struck by lightning. All of a sudden we were bathed in the fluorescent glow of the houselights, and we saw each other again—a sea of kids, bathed in sweat, makeup cracked and running down our faces, the smell of stale marijuana smoke and spilled beer everywhere . . .

  I didn’t want it to be over.

  I realized that the rest of these kids would be content now to go home, resume their lives, having let out a little of the pressure that had been building inside of them. Now they were not afraid that their skulls were just going to blow apart like a forgotten World War II land mine. But not me! I knew that this would never be enough: I needed more than that. I looked toward the stage, where people were reaching out to the roadies as they pulled away the wires on the stage, begging for a memento, a torn fragment of a set list, any smidgen of tonight at all to take away and keep.

  But mementos were not enough for me. Even Daddy’s water stains would fade away over time. I didn’t want to go back to my lonely, ordinary reality. I wanted something more . . .

  That night I was changed, altered in some profound way, and I knew that I would never be the same again. Marie and Paul could not see it as we headed back to the car . . . I felt totally different from what I had been before. Even when I was back at home, wiping away the remains of my makeup in the bathroom mirror, I could not see any physical manifestations of this change. But I could sense it, a glow inside of me that was growing with each passing moment.

  Was this what all of those religious types were talking about when they said they had been born again? I guess that must be it. All I knew was that something was going to happen, and it was going to happen soon.

  I could sense it!

  Chapter 2

  Rebel, Rebel

  Oh jeez, Cherie. Seriously . . . Mom is gonna kill you!”

  My sister was half laughing as she said this. I rolled my eyes and mimed “whatever” at her. I was chewing gum as I stared at myself in the mirror. I pursed my lips and exhaled, and a large pink bubble formed, growing, grow
ing, growing, until it popped.

  I was fifteen years old, and back then my life consisted of rock concerts and hanging out in coolest nightclubs in Hollywood. Specifically the Sugar Shack and Rodney Bingenheimer’s English Disco.

  And today, with my horrified sister’s help, I was dying my hair red, white, and blue.

  “Very patriotic.” My sister laughed when I told her what I wanted her to do. “But it ain’t the Fourth of July. It’s only May!”

  “I’m serious. Are you gonna help me, or what? I can’t do it by myself . . .”

  Marie started mocking me in a whiny voice: “I can’t do it myself, Marie!” I scowled at her, but she did get up off the chair and led the way into the bathroom. There, she took a look at my head, deciding on the best plan of attack. She separated a small portion of my hair and started braiding. “If we do it in sections, at least it might look half decent . . .” She sighed. I had to admire Marie. It had to be hard on her to see the changes I was going through. Once the braids were in place, she took one last look at me to gauge whether I was kidding. She could see in my eyes that I was not. She shook her head.

  “Mom is gonna KILL you, Cherie. She’ll freak.”

  “She’s so busy with Wolfgang she probably won’t even notice . . .”

  “Yeah, right! She’ll notice THIS!”

  “Come ON, Marie. Help me out! You know I’m going to do it anyway . . .”

  Equipped with red and blue food coloring, she squirted the runny ooze into the sections that she had skillfully braided through my long blond hair. Marie started rubbing this slimy, red gunk into one third of my hair, wearing a pair of Mom’s rubber gloves. Of course, my sister didn’t want to mess up her perfect nails. Sometimes I couldn’t believe that we were twins.