“I knew you’d be here,” said Topping to Bartholomew who was
tucked in behind stacks of gardening books.
“Aren’t I always here?
I assume you’re looking up jobs,” said Bartholomew happy to see his
friend.
“Actually, I’m looking at books about painting cars.”
“So, you’re working for Uncle Cy again?” asked Bartholomew
as he closed a book on garden design.
Topping looked down, picked up a book and ran his fingers
over the spine. “No, he hasn’t had me
back, yet. Well, just one day a couple
of weeks ago, but now it’s almost March and I don’t know when he’ll call.”
Bartholomew smiled at Topping. “I’m sure his work will pick up soon. It’s getting warmer out and people will want
to show off their cars.”
Topping squinted at Bartholomew and shrugged, “Yeah,
maybe.”
Bartholomew wondered what he could do to help Topping. He hated seeing him so down. Then he said it without even thinking, “Do
you want to paint my car?”
Topping looked at him. He wasn’t sure if it was a joke or
just a bad attempt to make him feel better.
Bartholomew couldn’t believe he had said it. But then he thought to himself, “Why not?”
“Topping, I want you to paint my car,” said Bartholomew.
“No…no, I couldn’t.
It’s expensive to do and it’s a nice car just like it is.”
“No it’s not. My car
is white with a big pink stripe down each side. That is not nice, or pretty
or anything but ugly,” said Bartholomew realizing that he never really had
liked the color of that car.
“But Bartholomew, painting a car isn’t easy and the paint is
expensive…and there’s no place to paint it…and, and … it’s expensive,” said
Topping.
“Geez, you make it sound like painting a car is expensive,”
joked Bartholomew. “Paint it at Uncle
Cy’s place after-hours and I will pay you.”
“No, you can’t pay me, I’m your friend!” protested Topping.
Other people in the library started to stare disapprovingly at the two of them.
Firmly but more quietly, Bartholomew looked straight at
Topping and said, “Design a new paint job for my car and I will pay for the
paint and five hundred dollars for you.
Don’t worry, Uncle Jeffrey submitted my taxes in early February and I
just got my return. I can cover this.”
Topping didn’t know what to say. He stood quietly for a while but then leaned
forward and whispered to Bartholomew, “It’s going to have flames. I hope you don’t mind a 1974 Peugeot with
flames.”
Bartholomew looked up and answered, “As long as you get rid
of the pink, I don’t care what you do.”
Thinking for a moment, he then added, “But flames would be cool. Way cool.”
Topping pulled up a chair and sat across the table from
Bartholomew. They turned their attention
to the stack of gardening books.
“What are you going to plant?” asked Topping.
“I’m not sure, yet.
Tomatoes, peppers, and kale for sure.
Some lettuce. Other than that, I
don’t know. The problem is I’m not sure where I am going to plant. And I want enough room for you and Charlotte
and other people to plant, too.”
“Aren’t you planting in your yard?” asked Topping.
“No, it’s too shady.
I have a big old oak tree that was planted there by my
great-great-grandfather, and it covers the entire back yard. And the front yard
is small and shady, too - it’s a really
big tree,” said Bartholomew holding his arms out to indicate a sense of
largeness. “I was thinking of maybe
planting at the end of my street. It
ends at a railroad track and there is a big space. Certainly big enough for a garden.”
“I’ll help you build it,” said Topping.
“What?” asked Bartholomew.
“I’ll help you build your garden. Your helping me do something I want to do, so
I’ll help you do something you want to do,” said Topping.
Bartholomew stared at him for only a moment and then said,
“All right. Good. I’ll let you know when I start. But it’s going to be big.”
“Big enough for chickens?” asked Topping with a grin.
Bartholomew laughed.
“Yeah, Claire and her chickens.
That’s dubious.”
“I can’t believe she wants you to have chickens in your
garden,” said Topping shaking his head.
“I can’t believe her and Ned are still living together. And it’s your fault,” accused Bartholomew.
“My fault?! How the
fuck you figure it’s my fault?”
“You’re the one that had the New Years Eve party. She never went home after that, did she? Stayed at Ned’s that night and every night
since.”
Topping just shrugged his shoulders and flipped some more
pages. “Not my fault they shacked
up. You came to the party and you didn’t
shack up with anyone. And if Ned has his
doubts and lets a woman run all over him, that’s his problem – not mine.”
“Yeah, well I guess you don’t hear about it as much as I
do,” said Bartholomew. “He's not hanging
out at your place to get away from
Claire.” They turned their attention
back to the books.
After awhile, Bartholomew wanted to talk to Topping about
something – to get his advice – but wasn’t sure how to go about it. His eyes skimmed the surface of the book
pages while thinking about what to say.
He decided to just start talking.
“I still haven’t gone out with The Nanny.”
“Well, I’m not surprised,” said Topping.
Taken aback, Bartholomew demanded, “What do you mean by
that?”
“Geez, don’t get your underwear in a bunch, I just meant
with Geraldine missing The Nanny is probably too busy or too freaked out to
want to get together.”
“Missing?! What do
you mean Geraldine is missing?” asked Bartholomew as he pushed aside a stack of
books to better see Topping. He heard a
“shush” come from somewhere to his right.
“Didn’t you read about it in the paper? Geraldine has been missing for a couple of
weeks now. She just disappeared one
day,” said Topping.
“Wha…how, what happened?”
“Like I said, she just disappeared. No sign, no trace.”
Bartholomew sat quiet for a moment. Scenarios raced through his mind: was she
abducted by one of her “lovers,” had one of her brothers killed her, had The
Nanny done something to her? The last
time Bartholomew had seen The Nanny she had mentioned doing something illegal.
“Are you okay?” asked Topping.
Bartholomew didn’t answer.
He felt a ball of sadness inside him.
How could Geraldine be gone? He
had dated her - and now she was gone? This just doesn’t happen. This shouldn’t have happened. How?
He had always thought Geraldine was kind to him – spoke well of
him. She was wild, but Bartholomew
always knew there was a nice person inside her.
“I dated her,” said Bartholomew, half catatonic.
“I thought you said you didn’t get together with The Nanny,”
said Topping.
“No, I mean Geraldine… quite awhile ago, and she was too
wild for me. But I got a sense that she
liked me and there is a nice side to her that most people don’t see.”
Topping almost snickered when Bartholomew said that he had
dated Geraldine. But then he saw how
moved Bartholomew was by this news. “I’m
sorry. I didn’t know,” said Topping. “They didn’t say she was dead or anything
like that,” he added. “She might have
just run away. You should ask The Nanny.
Give her a call.”
Anger appeared in Bartholomew’s voice, “She’s been telling
me for the last few weeks she can’t get together because she’s too busy
dog-sitting. That it was taking up more
of her time than she thought it would. All
this time and she never has mentioned anything about Geraldine missing.”
“Dog-sitting?!” asked Topping.
“Yeah, she picked up a side job sitting somebody’s dog. I think it’s a pug.”
“And she hasn’t mentioned anything about Geraldine? That’s fucked up,” said Topping.
Bartholomew cringed inside at the sound of Topping
swearing. It didn’t seem like
appropriate language given the terrible circumstance.
“Yes, I will have to call The Nanny and ask her about this,”
said Bartholomew.
“Yeah, let me know what you find out,” said Topping. He hesitated.
“Bartholomew,…”
Bartholomew looked at Topping.
“…well, if you need anything,
you can let me know that, too.”
In the seventy days that they’d known each other,
Bartholomew and Topping had become friends.
They had been running into each other at the library every other
week. Bartholomew was very happy about
this. He had never had a friend his age
to support him when he was down. He had
never had anyone who wanted to work on projects with him and help him do what he wanted to do. His friends had always been someone to play
with, someone to have fun with – like children.
His previous friends had no idea how to comfort him or simply sit with
him when his parents had died. They
never patiently listened to him when he was unsure about things, they didn’t
know how to empathize and they never offered themselves up as emotional
support. As he thought about it, he had
never really had a friend who could help him like an adult can. Then he laughed quietly to himself, “Hmmm, am
I becoming an adult?”
___________________________________________________________
Written and illustrated by Mark Granlund
