The Stardust Lounge_ Stories From a Boy's Adolescence - Deborah Digges [26]
The quality I loved best about Stan was his benevolence, his stand against oppression. During the Vietnam War he'd been a conscientious objector. During our courting he had written me, I'll do everything I can to befriend and father to your boys.
I look down at my shabby T-shirt and jeans, my dirty bare feet. Stan falls onto our bed fully clothed, sighs, and closes his eyes. He is used up by the first weeks of intense teaching and the commutes from Maryland to Massachusetts, where he is greeted by an anxious mother and an angry stepson.
“I'm sorry about this,” I say as I lie down next to him.
“Sorry for what?” He stirs. “You didn't do anything.”
“I know but—”
“But what. You were going to say, ‘It's my kid.’ “
“Uh-huh. Sorry,” I say again, this time for making the distinction.
“Night,” he sighs.
In the morning he wakes me with a note he has found from Stephen taped to the fridge. I'm leaving for good, it reads. Don't try to find me.
Stan is fully dressed. He has showered and put on fresh clothes. I see his backpack stuffed and ready at the foot of the bed.
“I can't do this anymore,” he says as I sit up and shake myself fully awake. “I'm sorry.”
Stan hands me a mug of coffee and smooths my hair.
“Take my advice and call the police and let them deal with him. When you do, let me know.
“And by the way,” Stan adds as he readies to leave. “It seems Stephen took the dog with him, and a bag of dog food. And your car.”
Stephen kissing G.Q.
Fall, 1983
We're dancing. The boys take turns being my partner as we dance to the spinet organ playing “Shine on Harvest Moon,” and peppy versions of “Harbor Lights,” “I'll Remember You,” “Someone to Watch Over Me.” Stephen likes to plant his little feet on mine—we sidestep the maze of cables, hobble and sway across the cafe's bright linoleum.
When thirteen-year-old Charles cuts in, he places his hand on my hip and concentrates on the floor. He has just outgrown me in height and we are startled by this new perspective that renders both of us a bit shy.
His height surprises us and sadly reminds me that just now we are separated, Charles living with his father in Columbia, Stephen and I in Iowa City.
I have to lean away from him because the brim of his Stetson keeps grazing my forehead. If I swing to the snare drum beat a little too enthusiastically, Charles looks panicked. So we step deliberately, meet each other's eyes, and smile.
This Friday night, like so many others, we planned to meet at our usual spot halfway between Columbia and Iowa City—the Bloomfield, Iowa, town square—so that Stephen could spend time with his father, and Charles with me.
But my Volkswagen threw a rod in Ottumwa, a town short of our destination. After calling a tow truck from a phone booth, calling Columbia regarding our situation, I carried six-year-old Stephen piggyback along the highway, our heads down against the November wind gusting off the fields on either side of us. We made our way toward the only establishment open now, toward the shuddering pink neon rainbow of the Stardust Lounge.
The boys’ father occupies a table just off the dance floor. When we catch him looking at his watch again we wave. He throws us a resigned smile.
The evening our car breaks down in Ottumwa, it is the last night of the town's bowling league tournament. Teams are gathering at the Stardust Lounge for a celebration.
Sure enough, the boys’ young stepmother, Terri, had relayed my message to Charles and his father. They'd waited nearly an hour in Bloomfield, then phoned to discover we were marooned in Ottumwa and came ahead.
We dance among five or six couples wearing bright satin team shirts of green, gold, and blue, their names sewn on the pockets. The boys are wearing oversized clothes they love from a secondhand store in Iowa City. Stephen's well-worn denim jacket has colorful patches sewn on the front—the Roadrunner, hot cars, and trucks. Though it's November, he wears surfer pants, and his favorite Michael Jackson tennis