Tone 1:4

I hate Sundays. Especially late in the day. Bad things happen on Sunday evening. The Wonderful World of Disney really didn’t come on in colour like the advertisement said it would. Not if you have a black and white T.V. What did I know about receptors and decoders and tri-colour reproducers? Give me a break. I was 7 years old. I thought that was the wonderful thing about it– the show would ride in on a full colour horse and make your T.V. a colour T.V. for an hour. You know, just like the fairy with the wand turns the peacock. That explains a lot I guess about my childhood. I was a hopeful romantic. The guys in the Alamo would hold out. Ole Yeller wouldn’t die at the end. The horse with the broken leg wouldn’t get put down.

Momma died on Sunday. Sunday morning. Bad things happen early in the day, too. I’ll tell you more about that later. She got buried the next Sunday because Father wanted to keep her around until the most dreadful rainy day in local history rolled around. That was my 12-year-old version of the events. Father said we needed to give people time to travel from her hometown and there was something about the availability of a certain pastor. So, my take on events has been tempered over the years as I have matured and my ability to see things clearly has developed: Father wanted to keep her around until the most dreadful rainy day in local history rolled around so that total strangers from out of town could get drenched, too.

To be fair, it rained all week anyway. Maybe he was prescient – and foresaw the memorable scenes of the mourners sloshing to the graveside, their two-inch deep footprints filling up with rainwater. And women’s shoes getting pulled off of their feet by the cemetery swamp monster. And the umbrella’s still up even under the tent because the canvas was so saturated it was leaking.  He was a memory-maker. Kodak had nothing on him. A cinematographer. Fellini neither.

Boy, was I glad it was Monday. And when Tone finally showed up, I’d have somebody to talk to.  But I got to talk to Flack first. Well not exactly talk.

When I got into work I checked my mail cubby and sure enough there was a scrawled note from Flack. He had finally noticed the van. “I’m gonna have to dock you for the scratches on the van.”

I’ve got a whole glove compartment full of these types of notes. To be precise, Flack has a glove compartment full of them. But the passel of notes do belong to me.

Some people keep parking tickets. I keep these notes from my crazy boss. They’re all kinds of colours – white and pink and yellow and light blue. What’s the word? Pastels. They’re never addressed. And they’re never signed. Just the pronouncement. “I’m gonna have to dock you for the gas you used to go by the video store out by the county line.” There were lots of those. “Get the beer bottles out of the van.” Those were always on white paper and in red magic marker and in really BIG LETTERS. Quite a few of those, too.

The love notes began about 2 years ago. By that time, he was too afraid of me to tell me face to face: afraid that I would quit, but mostly afraid that I would lock him in the refrigerated display case. It was right there in his little weasely eyes: “I sure hope M.C. doesn’t lock me in the refrigerated display case.” Even though I really couldn’t have locked him in the display case anyway. I could have, perhaps, put a broomstick through the adjacent handles like Dustin Hoffman does with the cross in the church doors at the end of The Graduate, but that would have only held for a little while. Not that I ever thought about it.

At least that’s how I translated Flack’s look - that look of fearful superiority. That let’s-remember-who’s-really-the-loser-here kind of look. It was even there the very first time I met him.

I had responded to the ad in the paper (it’s still stuck in a book somewhere): “Wanted. Organized/mature individual for part-time floral delivery and general help around the shop. Must have relatively clean driving record. Apply in person at Flack’s Flowers.” No address. No phone number. Maybe that was the first test. The first in his series of scenarios in his scenario-based interview technique. So I looked it up. Somebody puts “relatively clean” language in a want-ad – I might actually have a chance. My driving record (at the time) was totally clean. I had even driven away from the scene of Studly-Done-Me-Wrongly groaning against the headboard and my wife screaming at me with a sheet wrapped around her well under the speed limit and fairly straight though I was shaking like crazy.

So I show up at Flack’s Flowers. A tall woman with her head on fire was at the counter. I introduced myself and asked, “Are you the Flack in Flack’s Flowers?” The flaming lady laughed and said, “No, I’m the missus, darling.” That’s exactly what she said, “the missus.” And she flashed her big diamond to prove it. Actually, she held out her right hand parallel with the floor as if to say, “You can kiss it now.” I shook it instead, gradually rotating our paired hands back to side by side instead of hers on top.  She had a proper firm handshake – and then she covered both of our linked right hands with her left. Flashing that dangerously large diamond.

When she finally unhanded me, the Flackette reached under the counter and gave me a generic application.  She also handed me a pencil with no eraser, like you get at Putt-Putt. You know the little nubby orange ones. Except this one was embossed in gold with GIVE FLOWERS. Her hair matched the pencil. The gold part, too. I filled out the one-pager standing up at her cutting table as she referred to it. It was a gigantic table with a black top like you’d see in a science lab or an upholstery shop. After I finished (no way to erase – this was brilliant Psy Ops I thought) – with my pristine driving record and my not-so-pristine otherwise record – I took it back to the front counter. She glanced over it and got on the phone. “We have an applicant here.” And then I waited.

And waited. There was a chair in the corner near the front of the store. I sat there. And Mr. Flack had me wait. And wait. I figured he was reading my application. Calling around? Do employers do that before they interview somebody? Who knows.

A man with a Cubs baseball cap finally emerged from the back of the store. “I’m Flack.” I stood up and held out a hand to shake his, but he had already turned away, “Follow me.” And I followed him back to his office – I’d never seen anything like it. Dried flowers and herbs strung upside down from bare rafters. Like some very very skinny game animals hanging from the rafters of a smoke shed. Books and catalogs and balled up pieces of aluminum foil of various sizes like some kid’s solar system project – but this solar system had about 50 planets in it. A desk, I supposed under all the mess somewhere, was facing the door – he clambered behind it to prove that it was really there. “Have a seat.” Another scenario.

I found a chair after about 30 seconds, unloaded it, and held its previous contents on my lap. Mainly gardening magazines and floral catalogs, but I did notice an old Mayfair magazine as I was gathering up the collection (Glasnost comes to glamour: Miss Poland Poses). I discreetly tucked that one into the deck, which came up to the bottom of my shirt pocket.

“So your name is Michael?”

“Yessir.” I was quickly into 12-year-old mode.

“You don’t have to call me sir.”

“Okay.”

“So you filled it out in pencil?”

Okay. Another test. Wasn’t gonna say, “The Flackette gave me a pencil.” So I just said, “Yes,” I smiled my best smile and knew that I needed to stretch out my response, at least a little. “The pencil said GIVE FLOWERS.” Maybe I could salvage some points for attention to detail.

He looked down at his script (I only figured this out much later in the interview) and found what he wanted to ask next. He was lightly humming.

“So, tell me, Michael, tell me about a time when you were under lots of pressure and you did the right thing even though the circumstances seemed to call for the wrong thing.” He put little raised eyebrows, double-quotation marks with bunny rabbit fingers around “wrong.”

I can’t remember what I said to that one. I do remember my heart was flopping around in my chest like a rainbow trout in the bottom of a canoe.  Do you fish for rainbow from a canoe? Probably not.

This went on and on. Sweat was actually dropping under my armpits – drops as large as those county fair mules who leap from towers into pools of water. At the time, Flack looked cruel enough to be in that business. Flack would hum, find a question, and ask it. They usually began with “tell me about a time when.” It was almost like the Dating Game except that it wasn’t like that at all.

He finally asked me, “What would you do if you showed up at work and nobody showed up to let you in for 2 hours?”

“I wouldn’t wait for 2 hours.”

“Good answer.” Flack smiled. I think. “Okay. What about this one.” He took off his Cubs cap and hung it on a mannequin head covered with electric blue aluminum foil. It was there for that very purpose I figured. “Why should I hire you?”

“That is the question.”

“Yes it is.” Doing the little rabbit-ear quoty thing simultaneous with the “is.”

I looked around the office. How much was this guy pulling in a year, I wondered. I rotated the stack of magazines ninety degrees. Keep things simple. Twelve-year-old is good. Just make a bare-faced hopeful prediction about the future that was totally, mostly, out of my control. “I will increase your business.”

“That so?”

“Yessir.” I knew I had his attention.  He smiled at the sir. I hoped.

“You’ve been in a little trouble.”

Okay, here it is. Time to play the cards you’ve got. And I got nothing. “Yes I have. But, I think you’ll give me a chance.” Keep going. This might actually work. “I’ve been out of work for over a year, and I know the stakes. I won’t disappoint you.” Though I was thinking it, I didn’t say like the Cubs. Self-control is a great thing. I just played the mercy card, face up.

“I’ll need to check your references.” He stood up.

“Sure.” I stood up, too. And put the stack of magazines back on the chair.  My only reference was my parole officer. “There’s only one.”

“Yes, I see. That shouldn’t take long.” What I didn’t know at the time was that he had already called Charlie. He reached across the desk and we shook hands. His hands were soft and he grabbed my hand only half-way in and not thumb-hilt to thumb-hilt like you’re supposed to. In my universe anyway.

That’s when I noticed he was shorter than the Flackette. Much shorter. I knew that he knew I was thinking it, too. Because he launched into his virility story. It was the same story I’ve heard him tell about 40 times now, up until I finally started tuning it out or sniping at it.

Flack told all the women customers and the women sales reps – well, the  ones he thought the best looking ones – why he was called Flack.

“You know why I’m called Flack?” – he wouldn’t wait for them to ask, cause they probably wouldn’t, seeing as how most of Flack’s customers weren’t total losers like he was. Anyway, he’d tell them he was called Flack because he “picked up some shrapnel” in the war. If I was around, I’d say, “Yeah, he picked up some shrapnel in a flea market.” And, he’d tell me to do something demeaning, like cleaning the toilets or whatever else he thought would embarrass me. “That’s why I’m called Flack,” and he’d then proceed to show them the scar. Unlike Coriolanus, he wasn’t above showing a scar or two. Of course, Flack’s scar was from some pathetic farm accident or something – I can’t remember – but it sure wasn’t in the heat of battle on some foreign soil.

So after shaking my hand, Flack told me about his scar for the first time. I didn’t ask him, “Isn’t that your last name?” I just smiled and said, “Look forward to hearing from you,” with more confidence than I really had.

That’s when he gave me the I’m-really-not-the-loser-you're-the-one-with-the-shaky-resume look. “Somebody will call you.”

---

Tone showed up after lunch and I picked him up at the shop. He came out to the parking lot like usual.  I moved the oranges back to the middle of the seat. They had rolled toward the passenger side as Tone was getting in.

“So, what’s the deal with the shrunken heads?”

Tone was talking about the dried up oranges on the front seat. He hadn’t directly asked about them before. Maybe he hadn’t noticed them. No. Nothing got past Tone.

“Funny. How was school?”

“It was good.” He was waiting for me to answer his first question. 

“You really want to hear about the oranges? It’s a long story.” 

“We’ve got a long drive.” He was right, the drive up to Brookline Care Center was a haul.

How should I begin. I could start with the fact that Flack was an angel. But I went straight to Studly.  Figured Tone had already heard Flack’s version by now. Or, the Flackette’s. “So, after I killed Dudley…”

“Uh huh. Sure thing, flower man.” 

“You gonna step all over my dramatic opening, or you gonna listen? Poetic license. Just roll with it.”

“Okay. I’m all ears.” Tone then did his goofy Dumbo imitation. Hands on head like an about-to-be-arrested perp. Elbows fanning back and forth, supposedly suggesting the big floppy ears of an elephant. Get it? And then he dropped one of the ears (arms), tucked his nose near the shoulder and flopped forearm and wrist – simulating the trunk.  Does everybody I work with have weird body language quirks? It was quite a show in the confines of the van’s cab.

“You thinking about circus work if the law thing doesn’t work out?”

“Go on about this Dudley character.”

“Well, Studly was my wife’s lover as it turned out. I drove all night to get home late Saturday night. Molly was at a sleep-over at one of her buddy’s. Good for me. I was gonna roll in and surprise the wife and the whole spontaneous combustion thing was going to happen you know.”

“Where had you been?”

“Not really pertinent counselor, but I had been in Raleigh. Anyway, Dumbo darling, I had my great plans.”

“And Studly’s already implementing them?”

“That’s one way to put it.” If I haven’t mentioned it already, this Tone kid was as sharp as a Mcusta damascus gentlemen’s folder. Look it up. I had to find Flack’s Flowers.

“Go on.”

“Well, I drive up into the drive and there’s a strange car there.”

“Dudley’s.”

“Yeah. It was vaguely familiar. A silver Porsche.”

“You kidding.”

“It was just a Boxster. You know the Porsche for folks who can’t really afford a Porsche but want to tell and show everybody they have one.”

“Okay. What about the oranges.”

“Patience, Watson, patience. So I go in through the kitchen and up the stairs. It’s about 1 o’clock in the morning.”

“I don’t really know if I want to hear about the bedroom scene, Othello.”

“Just listen. I’ll keep this part short and sweet. There was music going, all the lights were on upstairs. And they were – how do I say it – in the midst.”

“That’s one way to put it.” Tone flashed the pearlies.

“Studly still had on his starched shirt and the tie was not even loosened. Next thing I knew I was giving him a woodworking demonstration.”

“Head against the headboard?”

“Yeah. The missus was screaming you’re hurting him! you’re hurting him! She always had this great sense for irony.”

“Did you really really hurt him?”

“Not really. But, they went to the cops two days later and from there I was sunk.”

Tone let me marinate for awhile before bringing me back around to the oranges. He’d be a great lawyer. Or detective. “The oranges?”

“Well, after I left the young star-crossed lovers, I went to the all-night grocery store.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Where you been, Tomeo, women go shopping for underwear to relieve stress. We real men go to the grocery store after a third-degree assault.”  I needed a breather. “You want to stop and get something to drink?”

I pulled into the 7-Eleven. We still had about 10 miles to go to BCC. One thing about Flack, he cast a big net. I emptied the garbage from lunch – it’s a recurring theme, don’t you know – and we grabbed some drinks. It was a hot day and the a.c. was barely hanging on. Good thing I packed the ice tent for the roses.

“Okay, M.C. Let’s hear the rest of it.”

“So I go shopping. Up and down every aisle with an empty cart. Every aisle in both directions. And then I circled back toward the fresh fruits and vegetables. I stood before the pile of oranges for a long long time.”

“Okay, we’re finally at the oranges.”

“And then I started my search. I literally looked at every one of them – using the cart as a staging and sorting area. I was picky about my oranges anyway. But that night I was especially picky. The stock boy, who was my age, approached once, and then he retreated after I said, I’m looking for my wife’s wedding ring. True enough I guess. It at least allowed him to leave me alone.”

“What were you really looking for?”

“Hold your horses. Wasn’t really keyed in on ripeness, size, or softness. But the label. The purple Sunkist label had to be perfect for the occasion. And I finally found them: Sunk and unkist.” 

“Cute.”

“No kidding. You’re sitting beside them right now.” Tone thought I was pulling his leg. No way a grown man buys two oranges with just the perfectly ironic label. No way.

“Sounds like a tall tale to me. Sort of like killing the Dudley.”

“His real name was Dwight, by the way.”

“As in Eisenhower?”

“Well, that connection actually came later.  My brain first riffed toward D-wight, Do-right, Dudley.”

“Okay. You’re a totally jilted lunatic lover. I get it now.”  I could tell Tone was wondering if he had gone too far with that one. 

“So I placed the two oranges in my otherwise empty cart in the little seat where parents place their children – I had returned all the rejects back to the orange pile. The stock man looked relieved.  And there were my oranges, my little fraternal twins, little junior miss and junior mister sitting there quietly and content.” 

“And that was that?”

“Yep. And they’ve been with me ever since.”

“Signifying what exactly?”

And that’s when we arrived at Brookline. I didn’t have a glib answer. So, the timing was good. I almost said, “They’re family,” but that would take some explanation. More than I wanted to get into. “I’ll have to get back to you on that one.” So, I found a parking spot and we headed into the nursing home.

---

We ran into Chuck as soon as we went in the front entrance. He was chasing his mop around in the foyer.

“Hey Chuck. This is Tone.”

Chuck waved his Chuck wave, which was a hybrid of a half-salute (chest high) and a move a majorette would make. “How’s it?” Chuck worked as an aide at the nursing home which basically meant he cleaned up all the time - the floor, the residents, the beds. He smiled all the time and he wore a Skid-Lid bicycle helmet to protect his head. He was a kindred spirit for my cracked head for sure.

He always said, "How's it?" whenever he saw you. At first I thought he was saying, "House it" and checked to see if my fly was open. I guess that's beside the point. But basically, Chuck was always there. He even had a small room which used to be a mop closet but now it had a little bunk, a lamp, a 6-inch black and white t.v. from Radio Shack and a bunch of mops and buckets. So, it was still a mop closet.

"What was he wearing?"

"You not up on early-80's bicycle headgear there Tone? Our friend Chucky was sporting a Skid-Lid bicycle helmet.”

Tone grimaced. 

We found Mr. J floating around in the hall. “You wanna give him the roses?”

Tone reached out for the gigantic bouquet. It was four dozen red roses. He approached Mr. J and gently sat the vased bouquet in his lap. “Got it?”

Mr. J nodded and hugged the crystal with his two gnarly hands. “This is from your daughter in Paris. Happy birthday!” Tone handed him the card that I had written out. “You need us to read it for you?” Mr. J nodded no.

Tone bent over and kissed him on the forehead. And we began to leave. We heard (Mr. J’s first words that I had ever heard),“God bless you sir!” after we were about 20 feet away. We looked back and the old man lowered his chin into the flurry of roses, a slight bow. We both backed up the rest of the way down the hall until we lost eye contact with him. Like two butlers leaving the presence of a very great and powerful man.