Why Aren't You Smiling? Read online

  “All right,” said my mother with a sigh. “I’ll call you tomorrow.” I wished I’d figured out a way not to leave Rick’s number with her, but had found that degree of manipulation beyond my capabilities.

  “OK, bye.” I hung up and turned to Rick with a bright smile that implored him to ignore the unseemly call. “So, where can I put my stuff?”

  “What’s this about someone wanting to use the phone?” asked Beth.

  I felt my face redden. “White lie. She’s overprotective.”

  Rick stood up. “I guess you can stay in my room for now.” Beth shot him a dagger-eyed glare but he ignored her. I picked up my suitcase and followed him down the hall. Rick’s room, lit only by an uncovered bulb on the ceiling, was small and austere, containing an old wooden dresser and an unmade single bed. The walls were empty except for a large plaster crucifix on which hung an anemic Jesus with raspberry red blood trickling from his impaled hands and crown of thorns. I set down my suitcase by the bed and went to look out the window, which faced a scraggly vegetable garden currently getting inundated by the monsoon. I was also thrilled to see a teepee in the distance.

  “May be time for an ark,” said Rick with a lame smile.

  “What’s the teepee for? Do you have Indians here?”

  “No,” said Rick. “Jonas put it up. He’s found some amazing parallels between the teachings of Jesus and some Native American Holy Men and eventually he wants to set up like an Indian-style church. For now, he keeps his Turkish hookah out there.”

  I felt a wave of exhaustion (I hadn’t slept a wink the night before) and sat on the bed. “Could I take a nap? Guess the bus ride wore me out.”

  “Sure,” said Rick. “We can talk more later.” He bestowed another smile on me, this one kindly, and left the room. I pulled a tee-shirt out of my suitcase and dried myself off as best I could, then curled up under the covers and quickly lost consciousness.

  I woke in total darkness feeling dehydrated and disoriented. I wasn’t used to sleeping in strange houses and it felt weird not knowing what or who was in the next room. A tinge of fear washed the sleep out of my system. I hopped out of bed, went over to the half-open window and peered out. The rain had stopped and a black velvet sky sparkled with far more stars than I was used to. I would’ve enjoyed staring at the heavens longer, but nature called so I went out into the dimly lit hallway in search of a bathroom. As I did, I passed a door from behind which I heard muffled voices, some familiar, some not. Was there anything in the Ten Commandments about eavesdropping? Not that I could recall. I leaned in for a listen.

  – There were, like, what? A dozen kids here last Friday after school? In and out, in and out. Way too fucking obvious.

  – Might as well hang a sign on the door.

  – One after the other. They come in, stay five minutes, and leave smiling. The pigs aren’t stupid.

  – I don’t think we should call them pigs.

  – They’re God’s children, too. (This from a voice that might have been Rick’s.)

  – How Christian is it to be, like, turning a profit and keeping secrets? It’s like we’re, I dunno, business people or something.

  – Dealing pot’s hardly money-changing in a temple. We’re providing a tool for spiritual uplift.

  – And that runaway…

  – His parents know he’s here. (This was almost definitely Rick.)

  – He’s a minor. What if his parents freak out and come looking for him? What if his parents go to the police and they come looking for him?

  – Leonard has a very spiritual nature. (This was definitely Rick.) He needs us.

  – I’m more worried about all the kids.

  – It’s not rocket science. You choose one or two for pick-ups and drop-offs. Distributors. Middle-men.

  – I dunno. I feel like when kids come here to cop they let their guard down, they’re more open to The Word. (Definitely Rick again.) I mean, let’s not forget we’re here to preach the Gospel.

  – Find some enterprising kids, but you know, cool, and get ’em to go out to make contact with the kids who won’t come here. Bet we could double business.

  – This isn’t a business.

  – At least we gotta start meeting the kids away from this house. That lady down the street is always peeking at us from behind her curtains.

  – She’s an old biddy. That’s what old biddies do. They snoop and peek.

  – She’s gonna call the cops.

  – I hate all this sneaking and lying.

  – We’re thinking about this the wrong way. With any problem you start by asking, What would Jesus do?

  – Sack of shit old biddy always peeking at us.

  – Oh, very loving, very compassionate.

  – Someday all the freaks and heads in this nation are gonna get together for some direct action. Put the police state out of business.

  – Is that supposed to be Christian thinking?

  – Christ and the money-changers, that was direct action.

  The conversation was starting to confuse me, plus I had to pee so bad I was dancing in place. I reluctantly tore myself away and crept down the hallway, quietly trying doors until I found the bathroom. Inside I had a moment to reflect. Rick’s desire to help me was heartening, but I hoped it came from something other than mere duty. I wanted to be his friend. Either my flush or squeaky floor boards must have alerted everyone that I was awake because on returning to the hall I saw that the door to the room I’d been eavesdropping on (the kitchen) was open. Rick, Beth, Jonas, and three people I didn’t know were sitting at a round table covered with the remains of a spaghetti dinner.

  “Hey, Little Lenny,” Rick welcomed me with a huge grin. “Hungry?”

  I went up and stood in the doorway. “Starving.” The kitchen was a fright. Ugly paper in a diamond pattern of sunflowers and old-time tea kettles peeled from the walls, the gray linoleum floor was caked with grime, the sink overflowed with dirty dishes, and a prehistoric fridge grumbled like a dump truck.

  “Meet the Forever Family.” Rick made the introductions with a proprietary flourish of his hand. “You know Beth and Jonas. This is Marjorie, Beth’s sister.” He pointed to a schoolmarmishly handsome woman of about thirty. “And this is Susan.” He indicated a blonde in her late teens smiling serenely but still somehow managing to look annoyingly cheerleaderish. “And Bob.” A burly guy in his late twenties with a long black beard and frizzy hair hanging halfway down his back. Though the Forever Family wore the bedraggled rags of countrified hippies – overalls and bandanas and such – they also wore identical necklaces with little gold crosses. I thought the jewelry looked prissy next to all the soiled and faded denim.

  Everyone made friendly greeting noises and I responded with my own hellos, wishing as I did that my still damp jeans and Rolling Stones tee-shirt weren’t so spanking new.

  Rick pointed to a chair. “Siddown ’n’ have some dinner.”

  I sat.

  “Here ya go, Leonard,” said Susan, sweetly smiling as she ladled the last of the spaghetti from a green plastic bowl onto her plate and shoving it in front of me. “Eat up.”

  “Thanks,” I said, a bit shocked and put out that I wasn’t getting a clean plate. “Where do you keep your forks?” I looked toward the cabinet drawers.

  Still smiling, Susan took her fork and plunged it into my spaghetti. I cringed inwardly. Surely the utensil was festering with germs. For politeness’ sake, I forced myself to take a bite. It reminded me of the school cafeteria, all ketchupy sauce and mushy noodles. I managed to stammer out a cheery, “Thanks!”

  “Tastes better spiced,” said Bob, leaning across the table and sprinkling a shaker of green flakes over my food.

  “That looks great,” I said. Bob kept sprinkling.

  “Enough. The sauce is already dosed,” snapped Marjorie. I imagined her smacking his hand with a ruler.

  “The higher you get, the closer to God,” smiled Jonas.

  “Don’t get the kid too
wasted to eat,” said Beth.

  Rick must have seen the distressed look on my face because he chuckled (though not unkindly). “Pot’s an herb, too, just like oregano.”

  Bob stopped shaking and grinned proudly. “Homegrown.” He walked over to the sink and scowled at the dirty dishes.

  I looked at my plate. Well, if Rick thought it was OK, I wouldn’t worry. “Do you have any milk or soda?”

  “There’s wine,” offered Jonas.

  “Cool.” I wasn’t about to admit I’d never drunk alcohol before.

  Jonas poured some red wine into a jumbo-sized Dixie cup and set it in front of me. I was so thirsty I gulped it down despite the nasty taste. Why did people like this stuff?

  “You gonna eat without thanking the Big Man?” accused Marjorie, a little sternly.

  It took me a second to figure out what she was talking about. When I did, I turned to Rick. “I don’t really know any prayers.”

  Rick put his hand on my shoulder, sending electric tingles through my flesh. “Prayer is telepathic communication with God. You don’t have to say anything. Just beam him your thoughts of love and gratitude.”

  I closed my eyes and did as Rick suggested, adding a special plea for protection against the all the germs and marijuana infecting my spaghetti.

  “So what exactly are you doing here?” asked Beth in a clipped voice. “I mean, what are you looking for?”

  “I’m seeking Truth,” I explained. “You know, trying to get my head together.”

  Rick shot one of his charismatic smiles at his friends. “Little Leonard is one far-out cat. He grew up without ever having been to church or hearing The Word, but followed his heart right to Jesus anyway.”

  “Actually,” I admitted, “I’m not totally sure about Jesus. I mean, when you say God is Love, that makes sense, that’s cool, but when God is this one particular man, it seems kind of not as right, somehow.”

  “Jesus wasn’t corporeal,” instructed Susan. “He was composed of pure divine energy. So he wasn’t a man at all, really.”

  “Not was,” corrected Beth, peevishly. “Is.”

  “God, I hate theology,” said Jonas. He left the room, followed by Bob who was shaking his head mournfully.

  Rick stared off with a thoughtful look. “Jesus, Love, the Divine Spirit, Buddha, the Tao… maybe they’re all different aspects of same thing.”

  I refilled my cup with wine and drank some more. For some weird reason, it wasn’t quenching my thirst.

  Marjorie knit her brows ferociously. “But, I mean, how long are you planning to stay?”

  I looked at Rick. His face was serene, beautiful, unfathomable. If he were a fire, I’d have thrown myself in and been happily consumed. “Uh, I’m not sure.”

  “Eat,” said Rick, ignoring Marjorie’s question. “You hardly touched your spaghetti.”

  I took a few mouthfuls while Rick sermonized. “Leonard, when I first got hip to the word of Jesus, I thought I could be a Christian all by myself. But it doesn’t work that way. Unless you’re willing to be a hermit, and frankly that trip is way too intense for most folks, you’re gonna have to interact with people. Buying, selling, competing, all the hassles of capitalism. You try to Love, but a thousand times a day you’re distracted by all the power and money games, the ego trips. Then I read the Book of Acts. And all that believed were together, and had all things in common; and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. You dig? It’s communism! Each gives according to his abilities, takes according to his needs. You relate to people as Brothers and Sisters in Christ, not economic units. Pretty cool, huh? And Marx was a Jew just like Jesus – is that far out, or what?”

  “Sure,” I agreed, nodding my head. “Totally far out.” Could Rick be Jewish? He did look a little like Mark Spitz, the famous swimmer whose handsomely mustachioed face and lean, sinewy body had become ubiquitous a couple years back on a popular wall poster after he won seven Olympic gold medals.

  Rick went on. “So I hooked up with the Forever Family and we’ve been trying to keep it Holy together ever since. Now, if you sincerely want to be a Christian, you’re gonna have to find a way to live as a communist in a capitalist world, find a Christian community to be part of. It’s a big commitment.”

  “I’m ready,” I said.

  “Aren’t you in, like, high school?” asked Marjorie.

  I shook my head. “That trip is nowhere. I feel I can learn more from life. You know, experiences”

  “Wasn’t much on school m’self,” Rick said.

  Beth’s mouth tightened into a thin line of irritation.

  “And,” Rick continued, “If you want… if you need a place to crash while you’re figuring shit out, you could stay here. For a little while, anyway.”

  Marjorie looked like she’d swallowed a something the wrong way.

  “Thanks,” I said. My mind began lurching around wildly. “I could maybe help out with your farming and… have you thought of chickens?

  You could make a geodesic dome for their coop and it would be….” I lost my train of thought, then re-found it. “Or ducks. Some variety of fowl for – whaddyacallit? – egg laying. For protein.”

  “Big ideas,” said Rick flashing a smile so beautiful I had to turn away and stare at the ugly wallpaper. “But no decisions tonight. It’s late, my friend, and you’re tired.”

  “No decisions,” I agreed. My mind felt disorganized, like all the words had been misfiled somehow.

  Rick squinted at me. “Hey, Lenny, you don’t look so good. Pale, kind of.”

  Just then my stomach began to fizzle and roil. The flowers of the wallpaper started spinning and I opened my mouth to speak but couldn’t. My brain was spinning inside my skull, my dinner was spinning in my stomach, and something sinister was creeping up my gullet. On instinct I bolted up and raced to the bathroom, arriving just in time to lean over the toilet and expel the entire contents of my stomach, a torrent of wine and spaghetti along with the liverwurst sandwich and potato chips I’d eaten for lunch. My mouth tasted like vinegary garbage and a foul stench flew into my nostrils. I stood shakily.

  “You OK?” came Susan’s voice from the hallway.

  “I think so.” I rinsed my mouth with metallic-tasting water from the sink.

  Susan came into the bathroom as I flushed the toilet. “Whoa. Pretty intense.”

  “I’m all right now.” I felt my cheeks redden with embarrassment. Could I have made a worst first impression on the Forever Family? The bathroom began to tilt ominously. “I sort of think I better lie down.” I lurched past Susan into the hall.

  Rick took my arm. “Come,” he said. I allowed myself to be led to the living room couch, on which I gratefully collapsed. Being horizontal felt great, and I had the oddest sensation of floating. Then the room began to tilt and I closed my eyes.

  “You’ll be OK,” said Rick, kneeling over me. “Just rest. G’night, little Leonard.” As I slid down into the black hole of unconsciousness, I thought I might have felt Rick’s lips gently bestow my forehead with the lightest and holiest of kisses.

  After a night of too many dreams, none remembered, I woke face down on the couch. My head felt as if it were getting squeezed in a vice, my mouth tasted like mold, and I was pretty sure someone had turned Earth’s gravity up to full blast. I rolled onto my back and lay there for several minutes, waiting for I didn’t know what. Then I realized I was perishing of thirst and lugged my body into the kitchen where I drank three tall glasses of water in rapid succession. My body instantly felt better, even though the sun bathed everything in a white light that made my head ache. My brain fuzzily assembled the evidence and concluded that I’d been drunk and was experiencing a hangover. Booze, I decided, was even more awful than pot. Why did adults like it so much? Did it affect them differently? I went back and sat on the couch feeling grubby (I still had on my clothes from the day before) and exhausted. Without meaning to, I thought how much more pleasant it was to wak
e up wearing freshly laundered pajamas in the comfort and familiarity of my parents’ home. I hadn’t even been gone 24 hours and I was homesick. Pathetic.

  Remembering my promise, I called home again. This time I got my father, a lucky break since he was far less chatty on the phone than my mother. I tried to sound chipper and wholesome. “Hey, Dad! It’s me, calling from the ranch.”

  “Leonard, my boy!”

  “You should see it up here, it’s really great.” I plumbed my imagination for something to add. “We had flapjacks for breakfast.”

  “Not like down here in poor sad old California where we only have pancakes.”

  “Up here they call ’em flapjacks. We’re going horseback riding later.”

  “You’ve never ridden a horse, Leonard.”

  “Well, they’re going to teach me. I’m really looking forward to it. In fact, I have to go now. They’re saddling up. Tell Mom I love her and not to worry.”

  “OK. Don’t fall off the horse.”

  “I won’t. Bye.” With great relief, I hung up.

  To keep busy while waiting for everyone to wake up, I made an examination of my surroundings. The couch and overstuffed armchairs of the living room sagged with age, herds of dust bunnies roamed the floors, and behind the curtains, the windows were so grimy they looked frosted. I thought this reflected well on the Forever Family. They weren’t hung up on superficial stuff like housekeeping or interior decorating. I also discovered that Rick or someone had thoughtfully put my suitcase under the coffee table during the night. I took out one of three pairs of jeans and one of a half-dozen tee-shirts (I hadn’t imagined needing much else) and went to the bathroom hoping to take a shower before donning my new clothes. Though I looked everywhere, I couldn’t find any clean towels. I wandered into the hall to search for a linen closet. Just then a somnambulistic-looking and completely naked Bob tromped into the hallway.

  “Good morning,” I said, keeping my eyes averted from his body (covered in thick black hair like a grizzly bear) and my voice low so as not to wake the rest of the household. “Is there possibly a towel I could use?”

  Bob ran his meaty hand over his face and suppressed a yawn. “We just use whichever’s dry.”