Alice Bliss - Laura Harrington [35]
Alice looks at Angie who raises her eyebrow, as in, who me? Are you kidding?
So it’s Alice who clumps downstairs. It’s an act, the clumping. She loves hanging out with Uncle Eddie. Every time she sees him, there’s always one shocking thing he tells her and the promise of more revelations to come.
He turns off the water and disconnects the hose. “Pay attention,” he tells her. “You could learn something.” Alice does not really need to be told to pay attention to Uncle Eddie.
“Okay, that’s the intake, that’s the outflow. My guess is, it’s the outflow. Let’s take a look.”
He inspects the hoses.
“Hoses look okay. You see anything I’m not seeing?”
It’s a rubber gasket that’s shot; that’s what he figured it would be. He took the liberty of bringing a few basic supplies with him, including a gasket. How does he know these things? He takes the hose and tells Alice to pull off the old gasket.
“It’s stuck.”
“Yank it! Give it a real tug.”
“It’s really stuck.”
“Yeah, they get corroded.”
He zaps it with some WD-40 and it comes right off.
He hands her a new gasket: “Fit that one on.”
She slips on the new gasket.
“Like I said, it’s not rocket science. Now reconnect it.”
When he squats down to test the connection, she wishes he’d wear his pants a little higher. He turns his head, catches her looking at him, and gives his jeans a hoist.
“Sorry about that, kiddo.”
“Oh, it’s nothing, I . . .”
“Nobody wants to look down an old fart’s butt.”
This cracks her up.
“Actually nobody wants to look down anybody’s butt. Way too much of that these days. It used to be your old man had to tell you to keep your pants on, now they gotta tell you to keep your pants up, too. Not that kids are listening. What did your pop tell you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Words of wisdom. Advice. That kind of thing.”
She thinks for a minute.
“I don’t think we got to that phase, yet.”
“Sure you did.”
“What, like how to live my life and stuff? I’m in the tenth grade. It’s a little early!”
“No. The basics. Like don’t kiss a girl if you just ate garlic pizza.”
She thinks again. She can’t believe she has to think about this! There should be a list, a list that comes trippingly off her tongue, of all the great things her dad told her.
“Marigolds are a natural insect repellent?”
“Apropos of . . . ?”
“How to lay out a garden?”
“Exactly! What else?”
And Uncle Eddie, unlike most adults, is not impatient for her answer. It’s okay that she’s taking her time. He just hangs in there.
“Let’s give her a little test run,” he says, and turns the washer on.
So now they’ve got the snug basement and the friendly washerfilling-up sounds and Uncle Eddie is the first person to ask her a direct question about her dad, to assume, of course they’ll talk about her dad, like it’s totally natural to talk about her dad, no problem, bring it on.
“He told me, never sell yourself short.”
“You’ll find yourself thinking of that one even when you’re forty.”
“Don’t let anybody make up your mind for you.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re as good as anybody else.”
“Right.”
“He gave me a compass when I was twelve.”
“Cool.”
“He said when I don’t know what to do, I should just stop and close my eyes for a minute and see if I can hear my inner voice. And that voice, that’s my compass.”
“Your dad loves that stuff—maps, compasses . . .”
“Yeah.”
“He’s a good dad.”
God bless Uncle Eddie for talking in the present tense.
“You know how you feel about your mom right now?”
“Yeah.”
“Like she’s this huge pain in the ass?”
“How do you know these things?”
“She’s my big sister. She’s been a pain in my ass my whole life! Anyway, you’re not gonna feel this way forever.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Couple years . . . it’ll all be different.”
“I really don’t believe you.”
“And right now, you’ve got a choice about how you want to feel and be around her.”
“I do not!”
“You do. I’m not saying it’s easy, but you’ve got a choice.”
“Like what, suddenly she’s gonna be nice to me?”
“Like maybe you could have a truce. A little cease-fire.”
“Did she tell you to do this?