White Paint, Dutch Hills

Firsts

Photo by Ilya Chunin on Unsplash

The white paint marker was leaking through the coveralls onto his skin, again.

Roderick Gainor knew it was because he leaned against the ladder. He wasn't supposed to lean against the ladder in the tire yard. He pulled the paint marker out, leaving the black and red regular markers in the breast pocket of the coveralls.

White paint dripped onto an uninspected used tire.

He took his sleeve and wiped it, ladder started to wobble, he felt himself lose a little urine, warmer than the white paint.

Trumbley yelled “Derkie”, (errybody called him Derkie), then yelled “quittin time” just as Derkie started to gunshy dog panic he was gettin' fired.

Derkie walked to FrostyKreem, like he did every day after work except Friday, because Friday was when his mom ruined meatloaf.

He knew he smelled more like rubber and sweat than urine, and if he walked the two miles plus the Resurrection Church yard to his house to clean up, he wouldn't get back to FrostyKreem til tomorrow.

There were two picnic tables outside of FrostyKreem, three if you counted Craig Stammer's truck that was always there and at one of the regular picnic tables was Angie Leitman.

Angie Leitman didn't go to Christian church, which was weird in Buckford, and Danny Killarney always joked it was because Angie was so hot Jesus would climb down off the cross.

What Angie did do was make out with Derkie Gainor, twice now, and Derkie was already saving, in his head, for a wedding ring.

Except right now on the FrostyKreem picnic table, Angie was holding hands with some clean dude who Derkie knew damn well was at least 17, and way worse than that, had to be from Dutch Hills.

Derkie wasn't gonna start trouble. He just wasn't. He'd get banned from FrostyKreem, and he'd get sued, because every single last kid from Dutch Hills daddy was a doctor or lawyer and all their moms played tennis. Any kid in Buckford would tell you that was true.

So Roderick Gainor turned and walked back the way he came, a large swirl with banana sprinkles be damned, except as he turned, he couldn't stop himself from saying “Fuck.”

He thought he said it kinda sorta quiet, but then he heard footsteps, and he heard Angie's whole damn choir-of-whatever-religion-she-was-angels voice say “Rah-Drick!”

He kept walking but Angie caught up to him and just let loose with a whole rambling explanation about not meaning to hurt feelings and how some things in life just ain't planned, and how if he really cared about her like he said he'd want her to be happy and Derkie nodded, because that part was true, he wanted her to be happy but with him, but when he nodded she smiled and said “ I'm glad you agree.He's a good person Rah-Drick, he writes me poetry.”

Derkie stopped nodding and said “ I didn't know I was supposed to write you poetry.”

Derkie didn't want to look back toward FrostyKreem because if the guy was still sitting there he'd want to whoop his ass for showing off with poetry, so he shut his eyes and heard Angie Leitman say “Poetry isn't a supposed to thing, Rah-Drick, it's…spontaneous…I guess.”

Derkie said “ Ok, good luck,” because he couldn't think of anything else to say and he wasn't sure what spontaneous meant, so he just turned and walked away.

Angie said “ I'll see you around, Derkie,” and Derkie already missed being called Rah- Drick in that beautiful voice.

He jammed his hands in his coveralls and now all he could smell was urine and white paint and the white paint felt like it was drying to the five chest hairs that showed up around his nipples like last month.

When Calumet Avenue veered off toward his house he decided he couldn't go home yet, so he walked to his right, off the street where someone might offer him a ride home, and down into the clump of trees behind Nora's Cheesecake and just kinda wandered, sweaty and scratching at the now for sure dry white paint on his chest.

He thought about seeing Angie in school in the fall, he thought about taking the wedding ring money that kinda didn't exist yet and buying a horse and leaving Buckford forever, and when he thought about leaving Buckford forever he realized he had walked all the way to Hammett Creek, separating Buckford from Eaton.

Derkie sat down on the edge of the creek, got his ass comfortable between a elm root and some rocks, and said “ fuck poetry.”

And he thought about quitting Buckford Tire.

And he thought about his first day at Buckford Tire, thirteen, technically too young, and how they handed him the white paint pen and he thought he'd never learn all the codes and the abbreviations. He was for real scared.

And now he knew all the codes, and everything, and all he ever forgot was to not lean against the ladder, but he never got a size or tread code wrong in two years, and if he could do that, he could write poetry.

So he lay back in the dropping sun and thought about a poem he could write for Angie Leitman.

The sun warmed his face, and he didn't smell urine any more, just grass and creek, and he started to make up a poem in his head.

The poem started to come together but he didn't have anything to write on.

He opened his eyes and looked around.

There was a big light grey rock.

He had discarded the broken white paint marker, but he still had the black and red regular ones.

He leaned down on his stomach, looked around to make sure no one was anywhere nearby, tested the black marker against the grey rock.

Looking around again, he decided he could write Angie a poem on the rock, hide it, go home and get paper and come back and copy it on the paper and give it to Angie.

Looking around a third time, deciding he was alone, he wrote :

Angie, your eyes are bluer than Craig Stammer's truck.

And I'm not in love with Craig Stammer's truck.

Roderick Gainor read it back to himself.

He capped the black marker, put it in the breast pocket of his coveralls, picked up the rock and threw it into Hammett Creek.

Derkie walked home, reminding himself over and over that tomorrow he had to remember not to lean against the ladder.

***