Hold Fast to Guard Us

The guy upstairs is tap dancing again. He clacks crisply against the hardwood floor, and it’s good, really precise. I bet his shoes gleam like newly minted coins. I bet the rest of him’s in athletic wear, tank top, Adidas track pants. I bet his calves bulge like swollen balloons, that he’s sweating up a storm. The room steams, he’s sweating so much. I’m betting he has to open his windows, and maybe that’s why I can hear it echo off the back of the brick-walled hot tub facility on the other side of the alley outside my patio, where you just know strangers are fucking in uncomfortably humid rooms. It’s that kind of place. Times like these, I wish I’d stayed at Le Cordon Bleu. Pasadena—not the one in Paris. But that was a long time ago, and I think they shuttered the Pasadena campus a couple years back. So I couldn’t go back and finish, even if I wanted, even if they let me in again.

My cell phone buzzes and even without looking at the caller ID I know it’s Mom, and even though I love her I don’t really want to explain to her why I feel like blowing my brains out, so I don’t answer. It occurs to me while the phone’s buzzing that I might be completely wrong about the guy upstairs. Maybe he’s classier than I thought. He’s decked out right now in the whole Fred Astaire get-up, hair coiffed and parted so exactly you’d think he did it with a straightedge. He’s training for a competition, his big night. His girlfriend will be there, or his boyfriend, his whole family in the stands. Do dancing competitions have stands? I could be wrong—you never know what you might be wrong about.

I don’t want to talk to Mom because I know what she’s going to say. She’s going to ask whether I’ve talked to Garrett, my brother, which I haven’t. It’s not that he offended me, or that I’m holding some ancient grudge, it’s just that I don’t want to talk to him. There’s no real reason for it. Mom likes to leave these extensive voice messages. She’ll probably analyze my avoidance, draw it back to some childhood trauma where he pulled my hair or decapitated one of my Beanie Babies or something. “You know he’ll want to hear from you, June,” she’ll say. “Don’t you owe him a phone call, at least?” I don’t want to hear it, because it’s not like that at all. It’s not complicated. When he wants to talk, I’ll talk. That’s all there is to it. What I also don’t want to hear is the tap dancing, which—has it gotten louder? Maybe it’s not tap dancing. Maybe I’m wrong about that, too. Maybe he’s taking a jackhammer to his countertops.

I grab my phone, my keys, and my wallet, and take off. If I drive right now, I’m going to commit some form of vehicular manslaughter, so walking it is. It’s cold for a Santa Clarita evening, which means not cold at all. The street’s quilted in light mist. Somewhere up ahead a traffic light beams through. Palm fronds scattered all over the sidewalk. I’m headed for the park I never go to, because in my warped frame of mind I think it’s going to calm me down. I imagine I’m headed to the botanical garden where Mom worked before she opened the flower shop, my tiny wrinkled hand in her huge shear-worn fingers. In my imagination, Garrett’s not around, even though in reality I’m sure he was.

The tap dancer moved in a week ago, about the same time Garrett’s daughter died. She was really young. I’m not sure how young, exactly. Leukemia, Mom said, nothing they could’ve done about it. It went faster than I thought, from the first time she called to tell me about it to the call about the death. Which was when the tap dancer moved in. I thought it was sort of cool, at first; I’d always wanted to get into dancing, something like that. Even though intellectually I knew it was going to annoy the hell out of me. It isn’t like he’s inconsiderate about it or anything. He never goes past six, typically, even though today it’s a little late for my taste. He doesn’t go more than an hour at a time. When he moved in, he came downstairs to warn me, since I’m the only person directly below. He seemed pretty sheepish, actually, when I opened the door. A solidly built guy, brown-skinned, hair flopping straight over his ears. If you asked me, I’d say his eyes are black, even though it’s probably just that they’re really dark brown. A large birthmark on his left cheek, hairy, like one of those kids’ books where you can feel some furry texture through a hole in the page.

“Hi,” he said breathlessly. “I’m a tap dancer.”

I said, “Good for you,” since I didn’t know who he was at that point. He’s got an accent I can’t place.

He said, “I just moved in.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Above you, I mean.”

“Oh.” The gravity of that was sinking in, but I didn’t say anything else.

“Please let me know if it is too loud, OK?”

“Will do.”

“I’m Mickey, by the way.”

“June. Thanks, Mickey.”

That was it. I haven’t spoken to him again, but he seemed nice enough. At one point I was thinking maybe I’d cook him something nice, bring it up to his door and leave it for him, like a “welcome to the apartment complex”-type thing. But I haven’t felt like cooking at home much lately, since I do it all day at work. And anyway, that was before the tap dancing started to get to me. I used to cook to de-stress, back when I was in high school, before Le Cordon Bleu. I think that was what did it for me; an environment like that turns cooking into a war zone, if you’re like me. Competitive, controlling, unable to handle criticism, prone to violent outbursts, all of the above. Tri-tip, shrimp scampi with garlic butter, vegetable frittatas, dumplings, eggs benedict—all that turned into a kind of ammunition. Product over process. If I blame the school for anything it’s for kicking me out, since the mushroom risotto wasn’t even that poisonous. The worst my roommate got was bad stomach cramps. Maybe a little diarrhea. Some light vomiting. Whatever, you get over stuff like that. She deserved it, is what I’m saying.

The park is one of those California parks that’s trying to pretend it’s not in California. Palm trees stop right at the border, no palms allowed. A thin dirt path snakes up to a kidney-shaped pond. All kinds of things growing around it: azaleas, Queen Anne’s lace. Typically, it’s pretty packed, but I don’t see anyone else around. Actually, that’s untrue. There’s a homeless guy camped out under one of the sycamores. At least I assume he’s homeless because of the overstuffed shopping cart rig. Oversized t-shirt, greased-up cargo shorts, raggedy beard, the works. It looks like he’s digging something up right between the sycamore roots. I move away from him in a way that makes it look like I’m not trying to, like his presence isn’t something that bothers me, like he’s just another guy. Which, of course, he isn’t. He’s an implicit danger, even if he’s not actually dangerous. He’s a reminder of how good I’ve got it. He’s a reminder I’ve got to be content with what I have. But maybe that’s wrong. I don’t know a thing about him, not a thing.

Getting away from him puts me closer to the pond with the flowers around it. I’ve probably never been this close to the pond; I don’t make a habit of perusing nature. Or whatever nature-adjacent category this falls into. There’s one of those old-fashioned hexagonal light-poles and a wooden bench scarred by years of teenage couples carving their initials into its surface. Mom’s always loved Queen Anne’s lace, the way it looks like a cloud from overhead, wrought from these spidery white filaments. And with a jolt I realize that’s not what this is, that someone’s made a horrible mistake. What’s growing around the pond is water hemlock. It’s an easy mistake to make; they look pretty much the same—but of course one of them kills you. After a second, I reason it’s probably not a big deal. There’s no playground, not a whole lot of families around here, and who else but a kid goes around eating unfamiliar flowers? Without thinking, I bend down to pocket one of the umbels.

I throw a glance back at the homeless guy, make sure I’m aware of his body’s position relative to mine. He’s still digging. Once I thought I might get into foraging, since I had all this plant knowledge stored in my head from Mom. It might be fun to gather wild mushrooms or something, cook them into a risotto. Come to think of it, I might have some mushrooms left at home, after all. Maybe I’ll cook tonight, assuming Mickey’s done tap dancing by the time I get back. One hopes to God.

Of course, it could be that the homeless guy isn’t digging something up so much as burying something below the roots. I used to do that kind of thing when I was a kid, bury things in the yard. They had to be specific objects: Mom’s jewelry, toys I loved or Garrett loved, Christmas gifts. I had this idea I could work magic by burying things, the way you worked magic by feeding people. The way you could make them like you just by getting them to eat something tasty. I thought the earth might work the same way: put something in, get something out, a trade. Maybe they could make mean girls cry, maybe they could get me things I wanted more, maybe they could protect my family from harm. I don’t know, I was a kid. Kids believe the stupidest things sometimes.

In the end, my curiosity outweighs my revulsion, and I realize that’s how I feel about the homeless guy. Revulsed. At least I’ve got the decency to be ashamed of it. He smells, I realize as I come up behind him. Of course he does. Not like BO, more earthy, moldy.

I ask him, “What are you digging for?”

He grins at me, sans incisor. “Buddy told me a bunch of money’s buried over here.”

“What for?”

“What do you mean, what for?”

“I mean, why would you bury money in a park? What’s the point?”

The guy shrugs. “Fuck me. Money’s money, lady.” He goes back to his digging. He’s doing it with a pink plastic trowel, the kind a kid might use to build a sand castle. Already over the conversation, I decide to leave. Then I turn back. “What would you do?” I ask. “If you won the lottery tomorrow, what would you do with the money?”

He stops digging, thinks about it for a second. Then he says, “I’d buy a bigger shovel.”

On my way home, I thumb the umbel of hemlock in my pocket and think about what if Mickey’s still tap dancing when I get back. Jesus, just thinking about it gives me a headache. That and Mom’s voice, telling me to call Garrett, and me putting it off because what do you say to your brother whose daughter just died? And how long’s it been since we talked? Long enough that I’m sure his daughter had no memory of me. The worst thing about it being there really isn’t a reason.

Maybe I will do some cooking when I get home. I think I’ve got some portobellos, some chicken broth, a couple of shallots. I imagine cooking up a storm, slipping some water hemlock in with the rest of the ingredients. Maybe more than I need, just to make sure. I imagine taking it upstairs to Mickey’s door with a cute little note: “Welcome to the neighborhood!” No name, because then you could trace it back. Still steaming, lush-smelling. I imagine him sitting down to eat it, inhaling the aroma, tired from a solid workout. Smiling while he takes that first bite. He’ll say, “Wow, this is the best mushroom risotto I’ve ever had!” Then the thump of his body crashing to the floor—no more tap dancing. Or maybe another kind of magic. I was thinking, after all, about having myself a nice meal, the kind I haven’t cooked for myself in too long. New ingredients make for new flavors.

I’m at my door now, and I know I can’t go through with something like that. Inside, I toss the hemlock in the garbage, hoping it doesn’t kill a hungry raccoon or something. Mickey’s not tap dancing anymore, and I remind myself to be a good neighbor and hash out practice times with him. Maybe just a little earlier. Maybe not during dinner. Speaking of which, I still have to make, committed now to doing something intensive, treating myself to a good meal, a real one. Instead, I go into the coat closet by the front door, sure I bought a full-sized shovel when I planted the pomegranate tree out in the dry earth of the patio. I did, and there it is. My phone buzzes again. I don’t answer.

At the park, the homeless guy’s still at it, only under a different tree. He doesn’t hear me come up, and I tap him on the shoulder. “Trade you,” I say.

He says, “Huh?”

When he catches sight of the shovel, he grins again. It’s sort of unnerving; I can see the jagged blackness of his gums. He hands me the little pink trowel and I give him the shovel in return. It feels ancient, what we’re doing, this kind of primitive barter, item for item. There’s power in it, I think, in spite of myself.

By the pond, I dig up the water hemlock, roots and all, and toss the plants in a green metal garbage can. Maybe I should leave a note? But I don’t. I head back to where the homeless guy’s got a good square-foot hole going. Parks people probably won’t be happy.

I ask, “Find anything yet?”

“I’m getting there,” he says.

“Probably not this tree, huh?”

“No, probably not.”

“Do me a favor?”

He spits in the hole. “What do you need?”

“Bury this for me?” I hold up the trowel. He eyes it with equal parts suspicion and disbelief.

“The fuck you want to bury that for?”

I can’t explain it, but I try anyway. “For protection,” I say.

He doesn’t say anything for a minute. He’s looking at me like I’m crazy. Out on the road, a car trundles by. Somewhere, maybe on the other side of the park, someone laughs, the kind of laugh where you just know they’re happy, that things are all right for them and always will be. The guy licks his lips, nodding.

“For protection,” he says.