J. J. White

 

 

“Do you know Janet Geary?” my mother asked.

I did.

Janet made life tolerable in my intolerable world that without her, just occupied space, pushing, separating, defining life from an existence left void of anything that otherwise might be interesting.

She jumped up on the Mr.-Lee’s-third-period-science-class-wobbly-twenty-year-old-at least-desk, with its inkwell holes and jackknife etched love oaths of graduated students who, like us, were never taught science or math or any other subject by Mr. Lee—because—because—because he was black and he’d say, you white kids never get black history, well you’ll get it from me and we did.

And Janet—sweet muse Janet, kicking barefoot, wonderfully balanced on top of the love oath etched desk top—singing a cappella—Jagger style, Satisfaction, as if she were the only one in the room, trancelike, zombielike, flirtatious and gyrating to the imaginary band. “I can’t get no—I can’t get no—satisfaction.”

But it didn’t matter how off key or inane the surreal dance-song was. I watched enthralled, entranced, sexually stimulated by the gyrations, the translucent mesh blouse revealing perfect breasts as they swayed opposite her intentions. Body left—breasts right—body right—breasts left.

My dreams exposed; my fantasy of the asphalt black bottoms of her feet playfully entangled with mine. A fantasy, a dream, wanton hope of a boy who feared fear, feared chance, feared life, but desired Janet, who cared nothing of the destination, but lived for the ride, baby!

“Yeah, I think she’s in one of my classes,” I replied to my mother, knowing anytime she asked me if I knew someone, something bad must have happened to them. Mom was an ER nurse who lived to describe the previous night’s excitement. I knew then that Janet was dead, or hurt, or under arrest—the only three things that ever happened to wild white trash girls in our neighborhood.

Janet’s dance resumed, halted only by a pause to smile at me, like a master smiles at her new puppy, its wide eyes gazing in utter adoration for the all knowing god of an owner and Janet knew—oh she knew the look I gave her, and would think—You may want me, boy, but it’ll never happen in this lifetime because there’s so much more in this world than just your puppy dog eyes to latch onto.

She belted out the song—“When I’m drivin’ in my car—and that man came on the radio…” and we all felt it now, the whole class moved by her intensity, the wobbly metal legs of the desk straining under her weight, ready to buckle—saved by the black six-foot-four Mr. Lee, presenting his hand to Janet like she was the queen herself, helping her off the desk that other girls would comment on later as having showcased the redneck chick when she made a spectacle of herself, but I didn’t care.

She stepped down and brushed my face with the see through gauze blouse intentionally, no, maybe not intentionally, but later, alone, at night, in the dark, I would recall it as intentionally.

She frowned at Mr. Lee, the uppity Negro, as she’d say later about how some uppity Negroes just didn’t know how to have fun and only wanted to talk about black history in science class that nobody remembers anyway. Well—maybe Crispus Attucks or Malcolm X would be indelibly etched in our minds when we were old and boredom caressed us like a Tuesday afternoon stripper.

My mother continued. “They came in about three this morning, her, Gordon Patterson and Billy Hale. The boys were okay.”

That meant Janet wasn’t, but I knew that earlier by the way my mother had asked if I knew Janet.

The impromptu song over, the impromptu dance interrupted, replaced with placid, pleasing quiet in the double-wide plywood, Plexiglas, persimmon smelling, portable classroom, sheltering placid, pleasing us from the heat and rain and a world without Janet, no different than the world inside, where one as correct as I could never be with one so uncivilized, uncouth, unintelligible, unattainable, unworldly as her.

Mr. Lee opened the portable’s door to—what? Let air in? Let air out? The butterfly flew high above his head, flitting up and down, left and right, drawn by the flames, the inferno, where the fun was, and where it would always be, to those that embrace the action and excitement that’s inherently repelled by one’s instincts she’d never experience. It flitted until it didn’t, and landed in the center of the universe, too compelled by her charisma to escape.

Janet smashed it with the palm of her hand, wiped its guts on her jeans and drummed to an imaginary song on the desktop with the tips of her fingers.

“She was DOA,” Mom continued. “She went half-way through the windshield when the car flipped. They were drunk, of course.”

Of course, I thought.

“Her head must have hit the pavement and scraped along the road because her scalp was nearly pulled off her head. Did you know the boys?”

I nodded. “I know Gordon.”

She continued. “He’s fine, so’s Billy Hale. I don’t know what kind of parent would let teenagers drive around at two o’clock in the morning. Did you say you knew her?”

“Some.”

“Well—she’s dead, now.”

Not entirely—when there’s left something, an imprint, a remnant of existence left to pine, to dwell, to obsess on, like the outline of a block of wood on a driveway, it’s silhouette frozen by the spray of a dollar thirty-nine black paint can or the indelible body imprint on a bachelor’s mattress.

The butterfly’s dead, but at least it flew.

 

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