Pretty Paper Read online

  “A heater exploded in the old house where they were staying. They were sleeping up in the attic and the firemen couldn’t get to them in time.”

  “You mean . . .”

  “They’re gone, Vernon. They’re gone.”

  —

  On this gray paper I write what I remember of those days. On the day of my parents’ funeral, the sky was gray. Grandma’s face was ashen gray. The walls of the church were gray. The old preacher had unruly gray hair and spoke in words that made no sense to me. He praised my parents as God-fearing people, a man and woman who loved and cared for their family and friends. But hardly any of their friends had bothered to show up. And the truth was that this minister didn’t know my mother or father, who never had even attended his church. He was saying all these things for Grandma. He respected Grandma ’cause Grandma knew God. But my parents didn’t.

  At that moment, neither did I. God was as gray and lifeless as the corpses in the coffins in front of the pulpit. If God is all good, how did my life turn out all bad? What did I do to deserve these parents? Why did they leave me? And why did they die in a fire? I guessed it was because my father was dead drunk and couldn’t help either Mom or himself get out. But I didn’t really know, and I didn’t really care. So if I didn’t care, why was I crying my eyes out? Why was I sobbing uncontrollably? Why did my grandmother have to take me, a fifteen-year-old boy, and cradle me in her arms like a baby? These two people were never there for me to begin with . . . so what difference did it make that they were dead? They’d always been dead to me. I’d been an idiot for believing otherwise. Now no more fooling. Now stark reality.

  I know it’s a strong word, but I had hatred in my heart. Hatred for my father. Hatred for hypocritical preachers who say beautiful things about dead people who are anything but beautiful. Hatred for life that gives you hope and then turns hope into a cruel joke. Hatred for everything and everyone but my grandmother, who held me close to her, held me in the church, held me in the car driving to the cemetery, held me as we stood in front of the empty graves and watched the coffins sink into the ground. Grandma never let me go.

  “I’ll never let you go,” she whispered in my ear. “I’ll never stop loving you, and neither will God.”

  Grandma, bless her heart, did all she could. After the funeral, she bought a Christmas tree and decorated the house with bright red Christmas flowers. She cooked all my favorite foods. But it was still the saddest Christmas of my life.

  It’s one thing to be sad during normal days. But during Christmas, the season of good cheer, sadness weighed on me twice as heavy. Didn’t help when the carolers came by to sing their songs about baby Jesus. Didn’t help to sit in church, listening to some cheerful sermon and seeing happy faces all around me. Everyone’s happiness only added to my unhappiness.

  It was a long dark winter, the longest and darkest I’d ever known. I kept picturing the fire. I imagined my mother trying to rouse my father from his drunken sleep, trying to drag him from the room, trying to save him, only to . . .

  I had to turn off my mind. I had to turn off my imagination. I’d look out the window instead and stare up at the slate-gray sky. Winter dragged on. I thought winter would never end, that for the first time in the history of the world, the seasons would never change. It would be winter forever, and my frozen heart would never feel warmth again.

  —

  I’m writing on pink paper because I’m remembering the sunrise on a spring morning when everything changed. It happened in April. I got up earlier than usual. Something felt different. I looked out the window and saw a streak of pink brighten up the bottom of the sky. I can’t tell you why, but watching the darkness lift into light, I could feel my heart lift.

  My heart had been lead heavy. The heaviness got increasingly worse because I wasn’t talking. I kept it all inside. My grandmother knew to let me be. She knew I was suffering in silence and that no coaxing could get me to open up. So instead of lecturing me or forcing the Bible down my throat, she’d reassure me of only two things—that she loved me, and that God loved me. I knew she did, but I still didn’t know about God. I also wondered why Grandma never doubted God, since God hadn’t given her such a great life.

  The dark cloud of doubt had been hanging over my head ever since my parents’ death. In spite of Grandma’s efforts, Christmas had been miserable. I hadn’t even bothered to open the gift my mother had left for me.

  “It’s a big box,” said Grandma. “It must be something wonderful.”

  “It’ll just remind me of them,” I said. “I don’t want to be reminded.”

  “I understand, Vernon. I’ll put it in my closet. You take your time and open it whenever you like.”

  I said very little to Grandma, and at school I said nothing. Everyone knew about the tragedy. I could sense everyone’s pity, and it felt terrible. Pity was the last thing I wanted. Pity seemed to mark me as a pathetic person. I tried to push ahead and forget what had happened. I lost myself in books. Reading Huckleberry Finn and The Call of the Wild was a way of getting out of Round Rock and living in another world. Make-believe worlds were better than my real world.

  “Things change,” Grandma would say over dinner. “Nothing stays the same. Moods change. Seasons change. Good follows bad, like day follows night. Good things will happen to you. But they won’t happen on your time. They’ll happen on God’s time.”

  But what good could Grandma possibly be talking about? It was good to be reading history books, but my history teacher’s main interest was coaching basketball. When it came to learning about the American Revolution and the Civil War, he thought I asked too many questions. Mrs. Hatcher, my English teacher, encouraged me to read and write more. But early in March she became sick and had to leave. She was diagnosed with cancer. The woman who took her place was old and cranky, and had no love of literature like Mrs. Hatcher.

  I kept up with my job at the filling station. But that was monotonous. Pumping gas, checking oil, washing windshields.

  “As long as you stay steady,” Grandma would say, “you’ll be ready to receive God’s gift.”

  What gift, Grandma? I wanted to ask. Why should I believe in the fairy tale of a gift-giving God when Mrs. Hatcher is dying of cancer? What’s the point of fooling myself? But I didn’t open my mouth. Why hurt Grandma? By keeping all this inside, though, I’m not sure I knew how much I was hurting myself throughout that brutally painful winter.

  So on that spring morning when I saw a streak of pink across the sky, I felt something I hadn’t felt in months—warmth. Or maybe it was hope. Or maybe it was just happiness that the long chill was ending. I can’t explain it other than to say that the dark cloud hanging over my head seemed to be breaking up so that light—this shimmering ribbon of pink light—could shine through.

  —

  White paper seems to be the right color to describe that day in detail. White because that was the day when everything suddenly appeared fresh, bright and new. The great event happened early in the morning on the steps of the school building. The girl was walking ahead of me, stumbled and fell back into my arms. I caught her. I held her. Surprised and embarrassed, she looked up at me. Her eyes were emerald green. I had never seen eyes that green before. Her glowing eyes took my breath away. Her eyes seemed to be smiling. She had a sweet little button nose and deep dimples in her cheeks. Her thick blond hair fell over her shoulders and was cut in bangs just a few inches above her eyebrows. Her bangs gave her a mysterious look.

  “Sorry” was the first thing she said to me.

  “Nothing to be sorry about.”

  “My first day of school, and I was about to fall on my fanny.”

  I had to laugh. Girls at our school didn’t talk that way.

  “Are you new here?” I asked.

  “Yes. We just moved from Oklahoma. My name’s Marla. Marla Covington. Thanks for saving me.”

&n
bsp; “I’m Vernon. I didn’t do anything.”

  “You were in the right place at the right time. Maybe you can show me around school.”

  “Sure thing.”

  A pretty girl showing any interest in me was—well, a brand-new world. In my old world I was shy. And a loner. Because I always had to work after school, I could never go out for sports. I was big and strong enough to play football and basketball, but never got the chance. The girls latched on to the athletes. When it came to school parties and dances, I found excuses not to go. Aside from Willard Parsons, who worked at the gas station with me, I really didn’t have any friends at all. Approaching sixteen, not only hadn’t I kissed a girl, I really never had an official date.

  And then suddenly on this spring morning Marla, in her white pleated skirt and tight white blouse, came waltzing into my life. She took the lead. She was so easy to talk to I felt that I’d known her in some previous life. As I walked down the hallway with her, pointing out the auditorium and cafeteria and gym, it was like hanging out with an old friend.

  “Why are the kids at this school so stuck-up?” she asked.

  “Some are, some aren’t.”

  “You don’t seem stuck-up.”

  “Got nothing to be stuck-up about.”

  That made her laugh. I couldn’t remember making a girl laugh before. Marla laughed easily. Nothing was forced. Everything flowed naturally.

  “You better show me to my homeroom.”

  I was disappointed to learn she and I had different homerooms.

  “Hope we have some classes together, Vernon,” she said when I left her.

  We didn’t, but that made me think about her all the more. Other than learning her name and that she was a new student, I didn’t know anything about her. I had wanted to say, “Look for me at lunchtime,” but I didn’t. I had wanted to ask for her phone number, but I chickened out. For the rest of the day, wherever I was, I stretched my neck looking for her. After school, I waited by the main door hoping to see her on her way out, but she never appeared. I felt like I’d lost out completely. But even if I had seen her, I’d’ve probably just frozen up. She was too good to be true.

  —

  I’m changing colors now, going from white to turquoise because turquoise is the blue-green color of surprise and discovery. I need turquoise to remind me of the shock—the beautiful shock—that happened that very evening. It was a Thursday, the night when Grandma worked late at her job.

  When I got off from the gas station at seven, I’d walk over to Luby’s Cafeteria and eat the leftovers Grandma had saved me. It was only a half mile away. I went in the back door and saw Grandma taking cornbread out of the oven.

  “Hi, honey,” she said. “You look different.”

  “I do?”

  “You look like you’re waiting for something to happen.”

  Before I could figure out how to reply, Marla walked by carrying a container of green beans.

  “Meet our newest helper,” said Grandma. “She just came on today. Marla, this is my grandson, Vernon.”

  My heart beating wildly, I couldn’t pretend not to be overjoyed. I was all smiles—and so was she.

  “Hey, Vernon, another nice coincidence,” said Marla.

  “And so you already know each other,” said Grandma.

  “Only seconds before we met, he had me in his arms,” Marla said.

  Grandma looked puzzled.

  Marla explained, “I tripped walking up the steps to school and he caught me.”

  “Well, that’s Vernon,” said Grandma. “Always there when you need him. Best friend you’ll ever have.”

  “I bet that’s right,” said Marla, looking at me with smiling eyes.

  “I’m fixing you a plate right now,” Grandma told me. “You hungry?”

  “Starved.”

  I took my food and sat at an empty table at the back of the restaurant, knowing closing time was eight p.m. My plan was to wait till then and see if I could walk Marla home.

  “You waiting to see me home?” she asked as she walked by me a few minutes after eight.

  “If you want me to,” I said.

  “It’s far. Maybe two miles. You don’t have a car, do you?”

  “Nope.”

  “I could call my dad.”

  “Or we could walk. Weather’s nice.”

  “Okay, let’s brave it.”

  I told Grandma what we were doing and she began to say that she could drive us, but she caught on. She withheld that suggestion and said, “Beautiful night for walking.”

  “Good night, Mrs. Goodson,” Marla said to Grandma. “Thanks for helping me through my first day on the job.”

  “You’re doing just fine, darling.”

  “You know something,” said Marla, directing her words at both me and Grandma, “I really am doing just fine.”

  As we started walking, Marla drew close to me. Our arms were nearly touching. Only a fraction of an inch separated us. The half-moon was a yellowish glow. The air was still.

  “It’s the warmest night of the year,” I said.

  “It was freezing cold when we left Oklahoma,” said Marla.

  “Is that where you were born?”

  “I was born in Colorado, but we’ve been moving ever since. Dad’s a truck driver. They change his route all the time.”

  “Changing schools all the time must be hard,” I said.

  “What’s hard is that the day after we moved here, Dad got laid off. So Mom and I have to work. We’re broke. We’re always broke. I hate being broke.”

  “We don’t have much money either.”

  “Your grandma’s a nice lady. Does she live with you and your folks?”

  “It’s just me and her. My folks are gone.”

  “What do you mean, ‘gone’?”

  I hesitated and then, seeing how Marla liked straight talk, I said, “Dead.”

  “Oh, wow. I’m so sorry. When did it happen?”

  “This past winter. A fire. They were in an old house, trapped in the attic when a heater exploded.”

  “That’s horrible.”

  “If you want to know the truth—” I began to say before cutting myself off.

  “I do want to know the truth.”

  “I think my father was too drunk to save himself or Mom.”

  That stopped Marla in her tracks. “Sounds like my dad. He drinks like a fish. He even drinks on his long hauls. I’m always scared he’s gonna run off the road and take some poor innocent soul with him.”

  In these few seconds, I had shared information with Marla that I hadn’t shared with anyone. And in turn, she was completely candid with me. I wanted to tell her how much her honesty meant to me, but I didn’t. For a few seconds we just stood there in silence. I waited until she started walking again. I stayed close by her side. We passed by the Dairy Queen, which, was closing up for the night. Down the street, the 7-Eleven was still open.

  “Want a candy bar?” Marla asked.

  “Sure.”

  “I’m buying,” she said. “Snickers okay?”

  “I like Snickers.”

  “One Snickers for two,” she told the man behind the counter.

  She tore off the wrapper and offered me a bite.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “You have sisters and brothers?” she asked as we walked on.

  “No. How about you?”

  “Only child. Spoiled child.”

  “You don’t seem spoiled,” I said.

  “You don’t know me.”

  “I want to.”

  I want to—those three words unexpectedly fell out of my mouth. They seemed so pushy. They didn’t seem like anything I’d say to a girl. But I said them because I meant them. I might have also said: I know this is crazy, I know we just met
, but I love you, I love everything about you, I love the way you look, the way you talk, the way you’re so honest and relaxed and unworried, I love the way it feels to be walking next to you, I love being in your company, I love how you just fell into my life, fell in my arms, I love how we wound up alone on this dark road behind the farmers’ market and the way the light of the moon is making me feel like we’re walking through a dream, a beautiful dream where for the first time ever, I feel close to a beautiful girl who doesn’t intimidate me or make me uncomfortable, who gives me the courage to reach out and just touch her cheek.

  I did that. I actually reached over and touched her cheek. She smiled and reached over and touched mine.

  We stopped and she said, “It’s been a great day so far. It’s been a great night. And I honestly think we both feel like kissing. So we might as well just go on and do it. Why not?”

  I didn’t hesitate. When our lips met, I closed my eyes. She opened her mouth so our tongues could touch. I tasted chocolate. My heart was hammering. It was the sweetest moment of my life.

  —

  I know red represented anger before, but now I’m writing on red paper for different reasons. Red also reminds me of desire. Like most teenage boys, I had strong desires before, but Marla took it to a whole different level. Marla threw me into a tailspin.

  That night, I couldn’t sleep. When I walked her to the door of the small run-down house on the outskirts of town that she shared with her folks, she moved us into the shadows so we could kiss again. Our second kiss lasted longer than the first. During our second kiss, she pressed against me so I could feel the fullness of her breasts. She felt how much I wanted her, and she didn’t back away. She liked how I’d grown excited. She was excited. She said, “You made this the best day ever. I hated the idea of moving here and not knowing anyone and having to look for an after-school job. But right away I found a job and made a friend. Now I see that everything’s gonna be great.” And with a final kiss, she sent me on my way.

  The heat of that kiss had me tossing and turning. I can’t say why, but something inside told me to finally go in the closet and open the Christmas present that had been sitting there since my mother had given it to me before Christmas. I tore off the paper and saw it was a Stella Harmony acoustic guitar. The neck was a dark brown. The curved body was sunburst wood. What happened next has to be written in yellow.