Tortoises, Rings, and Racing Machines
Monday, May 16, 2005
Collette had felt quite miserable Sunday afternoon and into the night. Finally at 9:30 after a plate of sliced strawberries, a warm shower, a mug of peach white tea, and some medicine, her aches left. She woke up a good number of times during the night. Once, OLeif was snoring, another time she thought she smelled something burning and walked out to the kitchen to be sure the stove burner was turned off from the tea (it was), and other times she woke up to turn over. But somehow, she was feeling better, just slightly weak from hunger. She hoped Monday would see better things.
Meanwhile, Joe had come back from the Scout weekend at Skyway (where fifteen hundred Scouts had trod), looking healthily trim, sun-burned, and muscular.
“Joe! You’re so burned!” Mom came up to hug him. “What happened?”
“I fell asleep.” Joe explained, looking quite red.
At lunch, he described some of what went on.
“Who was that little kid hitting you?” Dad asked as he passed the tortilla dish.
“Oh, that guy. Yeah – he just liked to hit me for no reason.”
“You shouldn’t let him do that.”
“Oh, he was just having fun.”
Some snickers went around the table from Francis and Linnea. (Carrie was at work and Rose was at a Bible study, or there surely would have been a comment or two.)
“Isn’t he that kid that was getting in trouble all the time?”
“Yeah. But he’s just a funny guy… And, oh, you should have seen it. After we set everything up, Wally, Curly, and I were just lying on our backs in the sun, watching the clouds. And as we lay there,” he demonstrated with his hands, “the clouds just started expanding, growing bigger and bigger. And the storm starting forming right there. It was so awesome.” He passed the rice to Mom. “And then this lady pulls up in a Pontiac while we’re laying there. And she asks to talk with our Scoutmaster. Apparently, she had just lost four of her huge tortoises.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes. Four gigantic tortoises. She had already found one of them further away and figured that the others were coming our way.”
“Did you ever see them?”
“No.” Joe shook his head in bewilderment.
It was one of those strange tales. But on the other side of things, when Mom and Carrie-Bri stopped by later to bring Collette her tea, Carrie displayed a healthy bronze tan. And…
“Check it out guys,” she lifted the very edge of her shirt.
There was the belly-button ring, looking very silver and very painful, though the skin wasn’t even red around it.
“Awesome,” OLeif exclaimed.
“Whoa – I bet it hurt like crazy.” Collette looked at it from where her head lay on the pillows.
“Yeah, it hurt so bad.”
“You got it done at the same place I got my tattoos, right?” OLeif asked.
“Yeah, they were good.”
OLeif agreed.
“And I’m going to get an Elvis charm when this is healed.” Carrie grinned. “But at work, I forgot it was there, because I really couldn’t feel it. So I picked up a full rack of trays, and it pressed right up against me… It hurt soooo bad. But I couldn’t drop the dishes. So I staggered into the buffet, with sweat pouring down my face.”
“Oh, gosh,” Collette winced, just thinking about it.
“And you missed a good concert, you guys…” She plopped herself on the edge of the bed. “It was so cool. There were these giant flames of fire that went up, and there were these huge banners flying right above them.”
“Whoa!” Collette laughed despite her pain. “The Savvis Center burns down tonight from concert prop-failure…”
Carrie laughed. “OLeif, you nerd, what are you playing?”
“Nothing.” OLeif was engrossed in a miniclip game on the computer, matching little green froggies with googly eyes. “I don’t really know yet.” He laughed and switched to a flying saucer game.
All in all, the day could have been much worse, and ended much better than she had thought it might.
Collette was recovering from another stomachache, although not nearly as bad as the evening before. Mom, Joe, Francis, and Linnea had just dropped her off while out running errands. Francis and Linnea were arguing in the back and copy-catting and laughing.
“Linnea’s such a baby-head.”
“Linnea’s such a baby-head.”
Giggle, giggle.
“Linnea is a silly goose.”
“Linnea is a silly goose.”
Giggle, giggle.
“Hey, Collette.”
“Yes, Francis?”
“What’s a ‘sam site?’”
Francis ignored Linnea and continued reading his combat computer reference book. He was always finding new terms within the pages.
“Not sure, Francis. Try and look it up somewhere else.”
Meanwhile, Mom and Joe were discussing how Dad wanted to start a lounge band, how Joe wanted to start his own race-car company, and how Carrie was convinced that Joe would one day be a millionaire. They passed a little German house on a wooded plot.
“Oh, I love that house,” Joe watched it pass. “When I’m single, or married, I’d like to buy that house.”
“It is cute,” Mom agreed. “But I wouldn’t like it right by the road like this. And I know that if we ever leave our house, I would want to live in something just like the Rock House. I guess we’re getting a little old for that. But then again, Uncle Hilario and Aunt Corliss are moving into a new place… I can’t really think of them as being that old. They look younger than that.”
“I know – it doesn’t seem like they’re in their fifties.” Collette agreed.
“I know. Wally was saying the other day how he couldn’t believe Dad was in his forties. He thought you guys were in your thirties,” Joe said to Mom. “And I thought Mr. Hobcoggin was in his thirties, but he’s forty.”
“And Mrs. Hobcoggin is forty-one.”
“Yeah – but that’s not old anyway.”
“Well, I guess we’re not too old to move into something new. Of course, there’s the thought of starting all those house payments over again.”
“Don’t you worry, Mom,” Joe assured her. “Just wait till I’m a millionaire, if I ever am, and I’ll make all those house payments for you… If I’m ever a millionaire, I wouldn’t like to keep it all to myself. I’d like to buy things at random for people. And I could help Dad start his lounge band.”
“I know it,” Mom turned onto Kimberly Road. “That’s what he’s determined to do. He’d have Uncle Clarence and Uncle Balthasar in there. Uncle Mo… And he’d be the lead singer, he says.” She smiled.
“Dad really does have a very good voice,” Joe added. “I told him he did.”
“He does,” Mom agreed. “He would have a good time, wouldn’t he?”
It was another one of those times that Collette wished she had the resources to help Dad get a lounge band together, give Joe the start he needed to structure a racing company, and Carrie the means to reach the Secret Service, and Mom the Rock House… they were dreams, but sometimes, sometimes things changed.