…take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind down the foggy ruins of time far past the frozen leaves the haunted frightened trees out to the windy beach far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow
Mr. Tambourine Man Bob Dylan
~~~~~~~
When Mr. Vickers chose to paint with the Angels—and his demons, still—he left behind quite a large manuscript that was in effect one of the longest suicide notes on record. He also left instructions that I serve as literary mid-wife and see it breathe the life of publication, even in its enormity and exactly as he saw it. This I have only somewhat faithfully been able to do. While he certainly had a "touch of the poet," he was after all a painter. His medium was color. What follows then in this volume, for the most part in his own words, is half of the story. The beginning.
Elliott Keebler Senior arts editor The New York Times
~~~~~~~~~
Chapter One
There was a squirrel I aimed to shoot Oh but how could I With him so cute The way he eats Tiny hands in honest prayer The way he holds himself so neat Those button-black eyes watching me there Grey-brown back, question-mark tail And a snow-white tummy? On second thought I'd rather shoot mommy But don't you tell.
"Heeere goat, c'mon goat…yeah, you with th' goatee, ya dumb shit."
Joseph Vickers is calling to any one of the dozen or so goats Miz Holloway keeps in a large, rolling, grassy lot next to her big house on Washington Avenue. Why there are goats grazing anywhere in Maurepas, Mississippi during the late 1950's is certainly a question worth asking it would seem. Joseph has never asked, however, nor has he heard anyone else question the presence of a herd of pet goats in the little fishing village—they'd just always been there. Annette Vickers, Joseph's sister, sitting on the whitewashed split rail fence that surrounds the Holloway property, also doesn't ponder why there are Billy goats here for her ten year-old brother to curse at. She just wants to go home. "They all have beards, you ninny. And cussing won't make you sound any bigger," she tells him. Jumping down from the fence showing all of her almost thirteen year-old legs from under the pleated, plaid skirt she'd worn to school, Annette dramatically gathers her books—to Joseph, his sister seems to do everything with some measure of drama. "Come on! I have homework. I want to go home." "So, go on. C'mere ya stupid goat…homework? You never do homework." There's just a bit of a pause before Joseph winks at the goats, the oaks, the actual babbling creek and says over his shoulder, "Hey, sis…where's Japan?" "Don't you dare start that again! I knew where Japan was…and you'd better stop telling that lie." "No ya di'n't…you said, 'What part of the country is Japan in?' 'N when Lucian tol' ya, you said, 'Oh…I wondered why we went to war with a State.' Ya did." Joseph watches his sister for that jutting jaw he knows so well. It comes, along with all of its petulant fury. "I Didn't say it—and that's enough! Period!" Then, "And even if I did," she begins to taunt him, "you only know stuff because you read books so daddy will like you better than me." "A least I can read," Joseph digs back. But, as always, he's just a little afraid of that jutting jaw. "I can read as well as you can…I just don't waste my time. I have better things to do. Like going home!" With that she turns and walks down the road leading toward the beach. Without looking back, Annette adds, "You'd better come on, that colored contractor is coming to talk to daddy. We'll have to help mom with the house." "I know he's comin'…aw, t' hell wi'd you goats," Joseph says. But then, quickly, with a touch more urgency than he wants to voice, "Wait up, sis…I'm coming!" Bolting over the fence, Joseph races to catch up and-after establishing a lead of a stride or two-flings back at his sister, "So what's your hurry? Mom'll have ever'thin' perfect when we get home." He says it with all the conviction necessary for making it so. Because it has to be. But the look his sister gives him is not a safe harbor. "Well. She will...she'll be better today, I know it..." Because somehow he must make the hymns stop ringing in his head. "...she hardly sang at all this mornin'?" Softly, yet firmly, with a maturity and compassion beyond her years, Annette answers her little brother. "Jo Jo...you're right, she only hummed this morning. I think we'd best go home and see what we can do to help." A hot, nauseating fear, which has lain mostly dormant throughout the school day, now explodes in the stomach of little Joseph Vickers. (In years to come, as an older man, he will describe this sensation to psychiatrists as that of a cold, alien fist ramming up through his anal cavity and jerking his insides down and outward. He will know this pain, and the rushing panic which always follows, many times and in many situations. So often, in fact, just the anticipation of it becomes the dominant factor of his life. He will later even give it a name-the Hammer. But on this Spring day of 1958 it is new, terribly new.) It's all so unfair. How can he have this hurt? This fear? This…some- thing? He's only a kid. A happy kid! He lives on the beach in a big white house. He has a collie named Prince. He has a best friend named Lucian—who does everything better than anyone else and who likes him better than anyone else—the best friend anybody could ever have. He has a smart daddy and a real pretty mother. He even has grandparents who live by the Atlantic Ocean in Florida where they go every summer. So why is he so scared, and what has happened to stink up his 10 year-old world? Mother has changed. And although he doesn't know why she's changed, he knows that she has and nothing will ever be the same again. So he walks with his sister down Washington Avenue, under oak trees older than most fears, towards an even older Gulf of Mexico. It is only half-a-mile down the two lane concrete road from Miz Holloway's goats, all of whom have now come over to the fence to be petted. But Joseph and Annette have walked on over the hill and they can see the water spreading out before them as the animals' indignant bleating follows. (Actually what they see is not the Gulf of Mexico, that is out beyond the barrier islands. The body of water stretching blue and wide as they walk closer is really the Bay of Beauvoir: here, Pierre Lemoine de Iberville landed in 1699 and built Fort Maurepas, not a 1000 yards from where Joseph and Annette now live.) Walking in troubled silence they come to the beach road and, turning back to their left, begin the climb up to the house. Seeing the cream colored '55 Ford Fairlane in the driveway, Joseph says, "Pop must've come home early. See? I tol' ya ever'thin' would be alright." Annette doesn't answer, she just rolls her dark brown eyes at his forced logic, shifts her books from one hip to the other, and continues up the sharply sloping hill which is their front yard. Delaying the inevitable, Joseph stops to pick up a hickory nut newly fallen from the massive old tree above the birdbath. Winding up as if he were on the Little League diamond he hurls the golf ball-sized nut towards a dull rusty-green light post rising in an art deco curve from the concrete seawall which separates the white sand from the small road. At the instant of release in his Drysdale-like delivery he hears his mother's mournful voice sing hauntingly from inside the house:
"He walks with me, and he talks with me and he tells me I am his own..."
And the panic grows. It isn't that she sings hymns. He enjoys singing them himself—sometimes. Well, not so much anymore. Church hasn't been much fun lately. Not since Mr. Claude and Miz Shirley started all that holy roly bull at the last revival. That damned Revival. There had been revivals before, plenty of them. But never like the last one. Even at his tender age it was only with disgust that he had witnessed the emotionally embarrassing scenes of grown-up, otherwise normal people being shamed into coming forward and throwing packs of cigarettes, whiskey bottles, magazines, books, and phonograph records onto the pile growing like an obscene goiter in front of the choir loft in the wood frame First Baptist Church on Porter Avenue. After tossing the sinful debris of their backsliding lives, each was intimidated into giving teary testimonials describing in ever increasing detail just how far they had strayed from "The Way Of The Cross". And there, off to the left, front pew, had sat Miz Shipley the real instigator, sitting so piously, so constipated in her stiff black dress, smelling of body odor drenched in Ben Franklin's Five & Dime perfume, wearing her grandma shoes and her coarse black hair up in a tight sanctimonious bun with bifocals jammed onto her thick peasant nose. And she wasn't even old! Well, not like his Uncle Homer was old-she wanted to look like that, probably worked at it. Joseph didn't understand why, but he just knew that wasn't natural. He loved Jesus. At least he was trying to—he certainly wanted to. He had walked the aisle and asked to be "Baptized in the blood of the lamb" when he was only 6; all by himself he'd let Reverend Dodge put him in a cheap, white cotton gown and take him into that giant tank with the thick glass wall while the entire congregation watched him be dunked under the strangely warm water. It had been his own decision, too, made over donuts at a revival, back when revivals had still been fun. Yes, he'd been a reasonably good Christian boy until all this holy roly crap. But it just seemed so ignorant. He had noticed, however, that no one else appeared disgusted by the recent goings-on at the First Baptist Church of Maurepas. Everyone else just seemed scared. Either afraid of actually being whisked off to a fiery Hell, or worse yet, being branded by Miz Shipley and her puppets, Mr. Claude and Miz Shirley, as bad enough sinners to warrant the trip—which had to be every bit as terrible as Damnation itself! Hell? Even Lucian tip-toed around when all the shouting started. But his pop wasn't afraid. Francis Vickers didn't go to church. He even told people, especially his mother's friends from the church, that there wasn't any God. But that was just to get a reaction out of them (it always worked, too). Joseph knows better. His father explained things to him. Francis Vickers believed in a different kind of a god than the one being fearfully worshipped on Porter Avenue. Although Joseph doesn't fully understand everything his father tells him, he definitely prefers thinking about his father's God to the one that Miz Shipley uses to scare the grown-ups. No, the panic isn't caused by the fact his mother sings hymns, she has always done that. It is one of the things he loves most about his pretty mother: her blonde, sunny good looks and sweet, cheerful voice make him extra proud of his mom. She sings like an angel. It is, however, forever embedded in his nightmares that it was his mother's face he saw smiling down from the choir loft that awful day of the last revival, as she prepared to lift her magnificent voice in celebration of the unseemly confessions at the little church. But still, it isn't the hymns. It's the way she sings them now; sometimes lifelessly, tonelessly, methodically, in a monotone, her blue-eyed face a glassy mask. When she speaks to you or looks at you she doesn't connect. She is there, you're there, but somehow nothing fits anymore. She answers a question that hasn't been asked. She smiles when she should be mad or sad or nothing. And she's sad when she should be glad. There is something wrong. Terribly wrong. He doesn't understand why or what. He only knows that his mother isn't inside the pretty woman anymore.
"He walks with me, and he talks with me and he tells me I am his own..."
The hickory nut landing squarely on the base of the light post is instantly forgotten as the dull voice freezes the salty Gulf air. Annette, with her quiet strength, calmly speaks. "Jo Jo, let's go in...daddy's here, he'll need us." Strangely, even through his blind panic, quite illogically under the circumstances, Joseph begins to argue with his sister. "That's the second time today you've called me Jo Jo. Pop said to call me Joseph. My name is not Jo Jo!" "I did not call you Jo Jo twice. And what difference does it make right now? Let's go in." "Yeah ya did, back on th' road an' just now. It makes a difference t' me an' pop...Joseph is papa Vickers's name, stupid." Annette's answer is cut off by their father's voice as he calls from the steps of the screen porch that runs the width of the old beach house. "Joseph? Annette? What are you two fighting about now ?" Annette says, a little too brightly: "Nothing, daddy...Jo Jo, I mean, Joseph called me stupid." "She is too stupid, isn't she, pop? I'm not Jo Jo, am I? Tell her, pop." "Yes, son, your name is Joseph, same as my father. But, your sister certainly isn't stupid. Come, let's you and I walk on the beach, shall we? Annette, please go inside with your mother, we shan't be long." Moving towards the house, but a little afraid to go inside alone, Annette asks, "Is...mom...alright?" To his daughter, who always seemed to him as far too old for one so young, Francis Vickers is candid. "For the moment, yes." Then, "Annette...I'm not really sure." But seeing a bottomless fear which should never be seen in any child's face he says to his son: "Joseph, everything will be fine. Just now I spoke with your grandmother Cecelia on the telephone. She'll be leaving tomorrow to come and help. You mother is only tired. She hasn't been sleeping well. And I'm sure you've been quite a lot to handle lately, haven't you, son?" Stung to the core, Joseph wants his father to know it can't possibly be his fault. Sweet baby Jesus, no. "No, sir...I've been good! Honest, pop. I haven't made her mad even once." Then, pulling himself as tall as he can, and with all the courage he has, he blurts out. "She hasn't been sleeping because she sings that song all night. I think it's the church doing it. The whole thing." As he always does in his father's presence, Joseph is enunciating every syllable correctly, just like his father. The slang words and playground drawl his father hates are gone now. "Yes...you may be right. Come, we'll walk and talk about it. Annette, go on in; I believe she's quiet now. " From the front porch steps, Annette hesitates and calls back: "Don't be long, please?" At that moment Carolyn Vickers appears on the porch. "Where are you going? Francis, why are you leaving with that boy?" Then, suddenly, in a snarl: "I suppose you're going for one of your 'talks'!" Just as quickly she slides into a toneless humming of the same hymn with a vacant smile on her face. And Far too sweetly she stops humming and coos: "Yes, sweetheart...you two run along...have fun." Then, from out of nowhere, comes a voice thundering and rasping as if from the depths of Hell itself. "FRANCIS VICKERS DON'T FORGET THAT BOY'S BEEN SAVED!" Softly, a sad smile on his face, Francis Vickers answers his wife: "Yes, dear...we'll be fine...won't you go in? Annette will help you with the house before Mr. Greene comes." She answers with a snapping hiss. "What do you mean? I don't need any help. No one ever helps me anyway. And stop looking at me like that! All of you, just stop it!" Suddenly the humming returns and she starts to enter the house. Then, pulling up stiffly, she spins and screams in that strangely guttural voice: "DON'T LET THAT BOY BE BURNED!" "Yes, dear...I will talk with him," Francis Vickers says quietly with an unconscious shake of his sharply etched face. "YOU HEAR ME? GET THEE BEHIND ME SATAN! THAT BOY HAS BEEN SAVED I" Just as quickly as the ominous tirade had begun, so did it end. Joseph sees his mother smile at someone he can't see, then begin a full throated, vibrant, melodic, beautifully phrased singing:
"He walks with me, and he talks with me and he tells me I am his own..."
"Let's go, son." With his father beside him, a frightened and confused little boy walks down the hill towards the water at low tide. But, walking next to his pop and looking back at his home on the hill as Annette joins her mother in preparations for the evening's visitor, Joseph Vickers soon sails into his safe harbor. This perfect place and his perfect dad. The large, rambling, gabled old house, so typical of its time (built before the turn of the century), sitting on the green grassy hill about 100 yards from the water's edge, had been his father's dream. Every Sunday afternoon before they moved here, they'd driven by and looked at the For Sale sign, only to return to the small shotgun house on Cherokee Street in Beauvoir. Now that very house is home to the four of them. If there can be living nightmares, then, just as surely, there can be living dreams. Joseph has found his. He wants to live here forever. This is his world. The endless water. The gleaming beach. And the sleepy little village: Maurepas. As all of Mississippi, Maurepas is a segregated town. There are two schools: one for whites and one for coloreds. Joseph and Annette's school has the first through the twelfth grades all in one sprawling building. Maurepas has a volunteer mayor, three fulltime policemen, and a lot of churches. The most distinguishing quality of the town (other than its beautiful beaches) is the oak trees. There are oak trees all up and down the Mississippi Gulf Coast, but not as many great trees all in one place as here. Most especially right here. Joseph's dream house is framed by massive evergreens, plus one giant hickory tree which is reputed to be the largest any one has ever seen this far south. The old beach house sits well back on the plateau of a hill which rises quickly from the tiny road that separates the lawn from the sifting, white-powder sand. The property is 1500 feet in depth and 250 feet wide. The hill runs across the width, similar to a miniature mountain range, dropping off in front to the bay and behind into a sunken paradise of a semi-tropical rain forest. The property rights run another 1500 feet out into the bay and according to tradition 10% of all seafood harvested from in front of the house belongs to the owners. By 1958 this is not really the case any longer; out of sentiment, however, the offer is still made by some of the older oystermen and shrimpers. Today ownership of the beach has a more valuable benefit-exclusivity. In theory, that is; in practice, if one is white and behaves himself, no one minds his use of the beach. It is the "colored situation" which keeps ownership of the land and water an active topic of discussion among the families that live along the mile and a half stretch of Front Beach Drive. By the strength of old deeds—in the old South—this beach is a "white" beach. There is a problem, however: during the late '40s and early '5Os, the Army Corps of Engineers came with barges and dredges and pumped up a beach from the bottom of Beauvoir Bay. Although this created a lovely sand beach, it was done with Federal funds and of late the Eisenhower administration was finding it politically expedient to be picky about civil rights. As yet there has been no actual attempt at integration, but the subject is increasingly brought up with slight but growing alarm by the good white people of Maurepas. Still, in reality, there is little or no racial tension in the small fishing village. But then, like sea communities everywhere, it's hard to get too awfully tense about anything in Maurepas. With the bountiful Gulf even the poor eat well. And the breezes cool rich and destitute alike, so neither need air conditioning; nor "airs" for that matter. No there isn't undue strife in paradise. But, if there were, and one doesn't fuss over it too much, make a big to do, it will probably just go away. That is storm mentality. If you live by the Gulf you see the water knock down and reclaim things from time to time. But things always get rebuilt and go on the same as before until the water takes them under again. It gives a good perspective on time-given enough of it, almost everything will even out in the wash. Francis Vickers is not a native and Joseph is proud that his father is different from the other "southern bigots" (as he has heard Mr. Vickers label their neighbors). He is not at all like the fathers of Joseph's friends. But, as much as Joseph himself feels he belongs to the town and its slow, peculiar lifestyle, he enjoys the fact that his father does not. Francis Vickers is perhaps the small town's only intellectual—at least publicly. The disparity between how Joseph speaks and acts with his friends and when he is with his dad does not seem a burden to him. On the contrary, some thing tells him that the duality is for him quite natural; literally, the best of both worlds. For all his rough and tumble, Joseph loves to read and draw—he even writes poetry which he and his father have great fun editing and critiquing; poems about squirrels, seagulls, and shrimp boats. Francis Vickers is a man of medium height and slight build with a lot of wavy black hair, a large nose, and an angular pock-marked face. He wears Coke-bottle-thick eyeglasses while sporting a thin mustache. The son of an immigrant tailor he grew up in New York City during the worst of the depression, making of him a lifelong Roosevelt New Dealer. He graduated with a Masters in Literature from that hot-bed of American anarchy, CCNY, in 1940. After the war, which had precluded his Doctorate, perhaps a promising writing career and brought him south in the Civil Service (his eyesight keeping him from the Armed Services—tech-writing for the new Air Force had been his next most patriotic option) with a wife and family to feed, he accepted a teaching position at the new Junior College across the bay. He is still there now, outwardly only a little bitter that his life had not kept the promise of its early potential. Joseph senses the worry gripping his father as they near the rickety pier which countless storms have left barely standing. They have been walking quietly, not talking at all, when finally Francis Vickers asks: "Son, does Mrs. Shipley come here often when I'm at work?" It doesn't strike Joseph as odd that his father would, by asking him a loaded question, openly involve him in a serious grownup problem, requiring a grownup answer. No, he accepts the question, and the welcome sense of intellectual camaraderie which enables his father to pump him for information about his mother's life. Quickly he works his young brain to decide what answer his father wants. Of course, Mrs. Shipley comes to the house on the hill often, but so do other people from the church. How often is often? And does his father feel about Mrs. Shipley the same way he does? His father never says anything kind about the woman; he is openly rude to the witch when they chance to meet. But, what will confirm his father's thinking? And, most importantly, what is his father thinking? "She comes over quite a lot, almost every day." Making up his mind, Joseph continues. "Mom and Mrs. Shipley sit on the porch, read the Bible and pray. Mostly, Mrs. Shipley tells mom she must pray harder and become a better Christian if she's ever going to save you from going to hell when you die. Dante's 'Inferno', pop, real fire and brimstone. And, you're taking me with you, she says. That's when mom cries and Mrs. Shipley prays harder and louder." "She does, does she? Tell me, son, are we in danger of our immortal souls? Or just plagued by crazy ladies?" Joseph is trying to play his part bravely; but is his father joking or is he actually asking him if his mother is crazy? The same mother who until so recently has been his soft protector with the laughing eyes and ouchless fingers? The dam bursting, he blurts out: "No, pop! Mom's not crazy, Mrs. Shipley is! Mom will be fine, as soon as grandma comes. As soon as she starts sleeping better. You'll see." A tiny sob catches in his throat, then: "She will, won't she, pop?" Spent, Joseph Vickers sheds his first full tears of the long day. "Yes, son...I believe she will. But, it's up to us, I'm afraid. She's going to need our help. But, don't cry, Joseph; we must always be strong in our minds, if not always in our hearts." After several mostly silent strides, Mr. Vickers asks his son: "How are you coming along with your theory on seagulls?" At that moment several gulls who have been perching on the pilings of the old pier take wing, chattering, soaring, swooping and diving into the shallow waters of the bay. Joseph smiles through his tears. The Gulf works her particular magic once more; a dreadful sorrow lifts, a lesser world is forgotten. Happily, father and son walk the entire circumference of the small craft harbor discussing how the early explorers, in ships no larger than the ones now in dock, must have felt upon first sighting seagulls heralding a new land and safe anchorage after a long and frightening voyage into the unknown; seagulls which were ancestors of the ones now noisily following a slowly chugging shrimp trawler into the harbor. Lesser worlds may be forgotten, yet they remain. And no amount of sea mentality or history lessons can prevent the harbor road from winding around until it again meets Front Beach Road, so Joseph and Francis Vickers soon find themselves walking back up the hill towards the house. "Joseph, this meeting with Mr. Greene is important to us. He is the lowest bidder, but they say he's good. Son, if your mother is still behaving strangely when he arrives, will you stay with her in the bedroom? I am asking a lot, I know, but would you do that for me, son?" The cold fist in the gut returns with a vengeance, forcing a bitter bile to back up into the suddenly bone-dry mouth of Joseph as he answers his dad. "Alright, pop...but, I won't have to! You'll see, she's fine. Everything is going to be better now." And, somehow, his 10 year-old heart believes it will be so—just by opening the front door. Because it has to be. But, little Joseph Vickers learns that the alien force in his bowel is there to stay when upon entering the house he and his father find Annette playing Elvis Presley records as loud as her phonograph will go and his mother sitting on a wicker stool striking large kitchen matches and flipping them into the dirty dish water as she sings in her mindless drone:
"He walks with me, and he talks with me and he tells me I am his own..."
The lit matches make an abrupt hissing noise as they strike the tepid water as a rhythmic, percussive counter-beat to "Love Me Tender" and Joseph's vomit hitting the floor as he throws up his panic, his soul, and his lunch on the sky blue linoleum tiles.
Chapter Two
"Francis, why are you letting that boy throw up on my clean floor? Now I'll have to mop before that colored man gets here." Carolyn Vickers has stopped throwing matches into the dishwater and Annette has turned off her record player. "Oh, mom, I'm sorry, I'll clean it up, really mom! No, don't get up...I can do it, I know you're tired...I'm so sorry!" Out of breath and on his knees, Joseph is franticly glancing around for something with which to wipe up his shame, but also astounded to see and hear clarity and warmth return to his mother's eyes and voice. "It's alright, son. You run along to the bathroom and wash your face, I'll clean this mess up. Francis? I knew that boy wasn't feeling well." Joseph stays on his knees in a mixture of vomit, joy, and disbelief. "Now do as I say and wash up...I'll fix you some hot soup. Then you can lie down while I sing you a song. You'll feel better in no time." Putting her lips to Joseph's forehead, she continues. "My goodness, he has a touch of fever, Francis." Either from the relief of upchucking or the return of his mother's solicitude, Joseph actually feels better than he has in days. "See, pop ? Everything is fine, exactly as I said." "What is he talking about?" Carolyn Vickers looks to her husband. "Of course, everything is fine. He only has a touch of some 24 hour bug, I'm sure." Going to the sink to wring out a dish-towel, she sees the burned out matches. "What is this? Who's been playing with matches? I can't rest for a minute without y'all making a mess. Will you look at this, Francis. Now, honey, don't just stand there. You and Annette give me a hand with this." While splashing water on his face in the bathroom, Joseph considers what has just happened. Again, he does not understand. But he's sure that something very bad is now over-at least for awhile. He begins to rinse his mouth and drink large gulps of the tap water, as always enjoying the natural pure liquid Maurepas is famous for. Joseph knows he's bright. He realizes he is brighter than all of the kids he knows, except for Len Coates, maybe, and he doesn't really count because he's a dyed-in-the-wool sissy and is only smart in science. Lucian is truly smart, especially in math, but he doesn't care about being smart-he's too cool-so that doesn't count. No. He's the smartest. All around. He's special. He knows that. But sometimes he's confused as to how he feels about being special, at least the way grownups treat him as being special. Of course, he talks like them when they're around. He tries to think as an adult. The reason he believes he can do this better than other kids his age, is that adults, as such, don't frighten him. Situations might scare him, grownup's actions sometimes make him afraid-but so do roller-coaster rides, large crowds, and great heights. No, as a sub-species, big folks don't frighten him. Instinctively he has always felt an intellectual equality (or superiority) with everyone he meets. Yet this is the very reason for most of his confusion about being considered advanced for his age; he's intelligent enough to have a nagging doubt that maybe just this absence of fear, which he already understands to be ego (as Freud defined it), makes him only to appear to be precocious. Adults really don't like having to adjust their speech or thought processes to deal with children. It is, at best, an effort to them, and, at worst, a situation of impatience or insecurity, bearing with it the guilt and accusation of not being "liked" by children. Therefore, by speaking on their level, displaying grownup ideas and concerns, their subsequent relief is manifested by a conviction that they must truly be in the company of a remarkable young boy. Is his talent for mimicry responsible? More importantly, is his conscious, deliberate attempt to emulate and please one particular adult even more specifically responsible? Was he reading classics by the age of five because he was special, or because words and ideas meant so much to his father? His father had been the only adult to ever frighten him by his mere presence. But that had been when he was much younger, before his father had sat with him in the big red leather chair balancing the large collection of grey paperbacks in The University of Chicago's Great Books Society series. He remembers well Francis Vickers making a big to-do about bringing them down from the attic and dusting off the seemingly priceless treasures from his college days while announcing loudly that he was going to teach his young son to read "the right way." At the time, Joseph sensed that this small scene bore evidence of a not forgotten conflict between his parents. Without saying so his mother projected that these books, or for some reason what they symbolized, had been the source of much tension before. But the delight he'd felt sitting in the old stuffed armchair in the living room of the little house on Cherokee Street, as his father patiently unlocked the treasures of world literature, far outweighed any realization that his mother was less glowing in her praise of his quite rapid entree into the elite world of the intelligentsia. He has never been afraid of his mother. She has always been his buddy, his best friend. Before the recent strangeness, he always knew she loved him no matter what-with her, approval isn't something to be won. But Francis Vickers has to be won. You have to achieve to gain this great man's affection and trust. Because he reads so well, Joseph's grades are always excellent and he's been the pet of every teacher he's ever had. Yet there are skills he notices other children picking up more quickly than he, technical things such as math and science. So he does wonder if he's really as smart as he's supposed to be. Of course, with his reading and comprehension skills and by trying very hard he manages to "fake" even these subjects. A doubt, however, is growing over the disparity between the praise heaped upon him and his own belief in his ability to always perform at that "Potential" level. On the other hand, it is true that he is more advanced than his schoolmates (at the least, he is certainly different). He really does love to read and his comprehension of what he reads is remarkable, his understanding of abstract, philosophical concepts is amazing for one so young. His sense of color, form, and the rhythm of social inertia is indeed keener than people twice his age. He knows this. Feels it with a complete certainty. Yet it is this very conviction which is the source of his secret fear. Yes, somehow, he does feel forever marked for distinction. "Touched". But! Does he really have the tools? Maybe it is a mistake. Maybe he has been singled out by some cosmic accident, or worse yet, branded not-arbitrarily by someone else's insecurities? All of this only partially thought out and to be reckoned with later, it is none the less a safe, happy (again) 10 year old boy who is finishing wiping his face when his sister whispers through the bathroom door. "Jo Jo? Mama just threw a match at daddy. Come on out, she's singing again."
Chapter Three
Joseph Vickers knows the only good that can come from this terrible night is that his father will never again have to get angry when he, frightened by some nocturnal bogeyman, seeks sheltered harbor in his parent's bed. Because, he also knows, that if this night ever ends, he would never willingly return to this bed. Why? Because the bogeyman is here. Her name is Carolyn Vickers. But Joseph cannot run away as he does in his dreams. No. It is his job to comfort the bogeyman and keep it quiet. He knows he must be doing his job well; he can hear laughter coming from the big room upfront. Nothing as of yet has marred the visit of Mr. Greene, the low-bidding colored contractor. His mother is only humming now. Maybe she will continue to just hum for the rest of the evening. With a little luck she might even drift off to sleep. He knows it will do her great good if only she can sleep. Earlier, after finally exhausting the supply of kitchen matches, Carolyn Vickers had disappeared inside herself and had not spoken a word to anyone—only the endless monotone humming. She surely said a lot while directing an incendiary barrage at the three of them. None of which made any real sense to Joseph, all about fire and damnation, spoken viciously, with a coarse vulgarity that did not belong in his gentle mother's mouth. Joseph tried not to listen, so he would not have to remember. But he will always remember the flecks of spittle that formed at the corners of her mouth and grew into ugly floods and spilled down her chin. Yet she had raved on. Once, she even hit his father a disturbingly loud blow to the head with her fist when he got too close in an attempt to stamp out a stubborn match. That was too much for Joseph. "No! No! No!" Throwing himself across the room Joseph grabbed his mother's wrist, only to be flung violently to the floor as she jerked free. "GET THEE BEHIND ME LITTLE SATAN!" She threw these words back at him as he lay on the floor screaming: "No! No! Mother! No!" "God damn it, woman, you've hurt the boy!" "BURN, YOU SON OF A BITCH ANTICHRIST." "Please stop, mama, don't you know we love you?" She did stop. But not until she wore herself down gradually. Humming intermittently, she directed bursts of verbal violence at all of them as they sat warily just out of range of any blows, while she continued to sporadically strike a match and fling it in punctuation of some point only she comprehended—if that. Finally she seemed only to have energy for the humming. But her face did not soften, it remained in a hard sneering mask as the low mournful tone escaped her lips. She offered no resistance when they finally led her into the bedroom. Soon, Mr. Greene came. Francis Vickers decided that Annette should stay out front to serve the coffee in her mother's place, while Joseph stayed with her in the bedroom. Curiosity compelled Joseph to come out briefly when the towering black man arrived with a booming good cheer that reverberated hollowly through the gloomy house. "Well, well...mighty fine place you got here, Mr. Vickers. Yes indeedy, Miss McCreedy, finer'n frog's hair. Ain't that some view you folks got." "Thank you, we enjoy it. Please, come in, Mr. Greene. I would like you to meet my... "Pie. Call me Pie, everybody does." "...daughter, Annette." "Pleasure, little ma'am. Now, Pie's short for somethin', but that's a story fit for another time. And who that be poking out 'round th' door?" "That's my son, Joseph." "How you do, boy?" "I'm doing fine, Mister..." "Pie, as in blueberry, 'though I be partial to pecan." "...uh, Pie." "And Mrs. Vickers? Hope she didn't go t' no fuss. Not here to socialize, here t' build you folks a Jim Dandy of a Laundromat." "Yes. And perhaps you will. You are going to have to excuse my wife, however. She's not feeling her best and won't be joining us." "Real sorry t' hear that. Nothin' too serious I hope, 'cause we could do this another time?" "No, we wouldn't think of having you come all the way back. She will be fine, she's resting at the moment. Joseph is keeping her company. Run along and check on your mother, son. Mr. Greene—pardon me, Pie, would you care for coffee and cake? Annette will be our hostess for the evening." "Pie eat cake? Yepper 'n that's a fact." The resonance of Mr. Greene's laughter had followed Joseph as he made his way back to the humming in the bedroom. And now it isn't only fear and confusion which tears at the black hole inside of him; for the first time there is more than a little resentment growing there. Why should he have to be back here with his mother? His place is out there with his dad as the plans for the business are discussed—because his mother is damn crazy he's going to miss out on everything! Fear and resentment are not feelings Joseph is accustomed to having-especially for the pretty woman who is his mom, his buddy, his best girl. Yet fear and resentment are his only nourishment as he lies on the bed beside her staring at the ceiling trying to listen to what is being said in the front room over coffee and cake while the humming continues. It isn't fair! What has he done to make his world turn upside down? He tries so hard to be a good boy, but something is wrong, because things like this only happen to very bad people. His mother is insane? Or is something or someone making all of this happen to him as punishment? But for what? Is it really even happening as he thinks it is? Is there an explanation that will make it all go away? His blonde, blue-eyed, sweet, gentle mother is insane? He hears Mr. Greene's laughter louder than before. Joseph liked the big colored man instantly; at any other time his large personality would find empathy in the sunny life of the Vickers' household. But tonight his good cheer only serves to underscore for Joseph the total injustice happening here. Things aren't supposed to just go haywire. Everything okay-and then? Why? And now? Everything is wrong, very wrong, completely wrong; so, how can that big Mr. Greene be laughing? Doesn't he know that everything is all wrong? Isn't it hanging in the air? Sweet Baby Jesus, his mother has gone insane! And she's not coming back? But where has she gone? Does a brain just stop working? Snap! Or has something always been wrong and he just didn't know it? Is everything a lie? How can everything be so right, then so wrong, all wrong, everything wrong? And the man who wants to be called Pie is laughing. And his mother is humming, and...? Prince is barking! Not really barking, more of a yelp, then a long howl, and he's right under the bedroom windows. Joseph has never heard his collie sound this way before. Joseph had forgotten all about his dog this afternoon and evening; Prince hadn't been there when he and Annette had come home from school. But that was not unusual, he often roamed far from the house on the hill. But Prince is outside of the window now. And he knows. Knows what? That Carolyn Vickers is a lunatic? No, his mother wouldn't do this to him. She loves him, he loves her, she is the single greatest mother in the whole world. She is sweeter and prettier than all of his friend's mothers put together. She would never do this to him. But she did throw him to the floor. She did hit his father. She did throw lit matches. She did snarl and curse. She did speak in a strange voice. And she did FOAM AT THE MOUTH. His mother. "No, God please. I'll be a good boy!" Joseph didn't mean to speak; and is not all together sure he did. But he'd heard himself speak. And he hears Mr. Greene laugh. He hears Prince yelp and howl. And he hears his mother hum. "Mother?" Nothing. "Mom, please?" Only humming. "Mama, please don't do this to me!" Only the humming, and the distant laughter, and a sorrowful Prince. Then. Sweetly: "My son, what am I doing to you ?" Startled, confused, but with a rushing sense of relief, Joseph throws his arms about his mother's neck. "Mama! Mama, it doesn't matter now, you're okay." Carolyn Vickers answers her son by sinking her teeth into the under-flesh of his forearm. Joseph doesn't want to scream. But the pain is excruciating; the flow of blood is instantaneous and frightening to see. When he does scream—almost instantly and very loudly—he does not believe that marrow-chilling, primeval sound can possibly be coming from his mouth. He does, however, believe what he next sees: Francis Vickers is above him, smashing his fist into his wife's jaw so that it might release its bloody grip as he screams: "God damn it, woman! God damn it! You're killing him! Your son! God damn it! God damn it!" With each blow, the blood spatter flies into Joseph's face, the bed linens, and the curtain behind them. With each blow, Joseph is also screaming: "No, daddy! No! You're hurting her! Daddy! Please! stop! Don't you love mama anymore? No! Daddy! No!" Finally the vice-grip upon Joseph's arm loosens and he pulls it free. Francis Vickers freezes in motion, his right arm and fist in suspended animation above his head. Then he slowly sinks to the bed and cradles his wife's face as he cries. "Why? Why, Carolyn? My darlinq, I'm so ashamed! I didn't want to hit you. Oh, God, have mercy on us..." Too late to warn him, Joseph sees his mother's leg stiffen momentarily, then she rams her knee into his father's groin. Gasping and doubled over, Francis Vickers falls to the floor and rolls, groaning in pain, as his wife laughs and cackles at someone or something in the ceiling. It is only then that Joseph, with great shame, notices Mr. Greene standing in the door with his arm around a very frightened Annette. The big man motions for him to get out of the bed and come to the door; Joseph does not want to leave his father. "Move over by me, boy," the big man tells him with quiet authority. "Your daddy's gonna be alright." Joseph does as he is told. When he's with his sister by the door, the huge contractor picks up the pitifully moaning, greatly debilitated Francis Vickers and carries him out of the bedroom. The rest of the evening is a blur to Joseph. His mother alternately laughs, curses and sings her hymns until Dr. Fairly comes and gives her a shot. Then an ambulance is blinking in the driveway and his mother is gone; the house is quiet. Except for the humming in Joseph's head.