How Sweet It Is - Alice J. Wisler [40]
twenty
Hi, Deirdre,” Jonas says as he shuffles across the kitchen. His bandana is the color of a male cardinal, matching his wrinkled, red button-down shirt. I wonder if he ever irons. Or owns an iron.
“Want some soup?” I ask him.
“Soup?” He fills his lungs with the aroma from the kitchen. “Did I get here in time for dinner?” He produces a wide grin. Then he wants to know, “What’s inside?”
Grandpa said to taste all the flavors. I’ll let Jonas guess what’s in the soup. “You can eat some and then tell me.”
“I tell you?”
“Yes.”
“Will I like the soup?” He says each word slowly, in monotone. I could pick out his voice in a crowd any day. I have never known anyone who speaks like Jonas. Come to think of it, I have never known another mentally handicapped man.
I recall how, last time he was here, he shifted from foot to foot and said, “Yes siree” in almost every sentence. Could it be that Jonas actually feels comfortable around me now?
I refill my bowl and prepare one for him. He joins me at the dining room table. He eats without saying a word, fingers gripping the spoon, each bite absorbed by his ample mouth. I listen to the violins playing from the CD in the living room as Jonas methodically chews, even though one really doesn’t need to chew soup.
“Did you make this?” he asks as he reaches over to the napkin dispenser and pulls out a paper napkin to wipe his lips.
“I did. What do you think?”
Looking into his bowl, he says, “This is good. Lots of tastes in here.”
“Like?”
Closing his eyes, he recites his list. “Butter, peanuts, peanut butter, parsley, cream, milk, chicken, paprika, and… and… oil!”
I smile, amazed by his ability to pick out all those ingredients. I know what’s in the soup and yet I’m not certain I can taste each ingredient. “No oil,” I tell him. “But everything else is right.”
Jonas grins. “Well,” he says, “I got 99.9 percent of it right.” He seems pleased. “Pretty clever for a retard. Huh?”
I am surprised to hear him call himself this word.
“What is this music?” he asks as he strums his fingers against the top of the table.
“Vivaldi. Do you listen to music?”
His belt buckle says EAGLES in bronze letters. Pointing at it, he claims, “Eagles are what I like.”
Of course, I know this. People usually hum or sing what they like, and Jonas sang lines from his favorite Eagles songs as he tapped on the cabin’s water pipes during his first visit.
When he’s finished wiping his mouth, I ask, “So, Jonas, did you come by to check the pipes?”
“No, no pipes today.” He places the napkin by his bowl.
“You knew I was making soup and came by for that?”
“No, no soup.”
“No pipes and no soup?”
“A book.”
“A book?”
“Ernest let me borrow it. I forgot to give it back. Then he died.”
Jonas pushes away from the table, stands, and says, “Wait here, Deirdre.” He leaves the cabin, I hear a truck door open and slam, and then Jonas is inside once more. In his hand is a hardback book with a silly cover. Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Dr. Seuss. “Your grandfather let me borrow it.” Jonas hands me the book.
Miriam claimed this book meant a lot to her when she heard Grandpa read it. And now I hold Grandpa’s own copy.
“Thank you, Jonas.”
Jonas motions toward the bookcase in the living room. “It belongs there.”
“I’ll put it there, then.”
He says he’ll do it, and I watch his tall body kneel at the bottom of the bookshelf, where he fits the book between two others. He stands, brushes off his knees with his hands, and gives me another wide smile. “Today is your day, Deirdre!” he sings. “You’ll move mountains!”
Could this be another line from an Eagles song?
“Your grandfather told me that I can do whatever I put my mind in.”
Grinning, I ask, “And what do you put your mind in?”
“Peace, praiseworthy, excellent, and noble.”
This sounds vaguely familiar, like a Bible verse. Perhaps it’s one I see every day on the wall at The Center,