Hot Tar
Joey Ferrara ran barefoot across the street, blubbering and holding his arm aloft with a melting purple popsicle dripping down his chubby arm, all the way to his armpit. The noise he was making was the pre-cry kind that children do, saving up for the real thing when they reached their mother. Rhonda wondered where Joey had gotten a popsicle at this hour of the morning, and if he had eaten any breakfast. Without moving her head, her eyes turned to Mr. Smolinski’s house. His front door was open which meant he was up for the day. Rhonda thought she saw him at the screen but couldn’t be sure. She and her brother were not allowed to go to Mr. Smolinski’s house.
Rhonda heard the screen door slam at the Ferarra house and the wailing began. She couldn’t make out what Joey said, something about his popsicle fell and now it’s melting. She tensed to hear Mrs. Ferrara’s reaction. Even this early, things could be bad. She didn’t hear any yelling and relaxed. Joey was like a little brother to her; she had cared for him every day the summer he was born, three years ago this past June. Mrs. Ferrara had been overwhelmed with the arrival of her seventh son in as many years.
It was only 8 am, and the day was already unbearably hot and humid. It was the steamy kind of day where waves rise off the cement and warp the horizon. It seemed the heatwave had been going on forever. Rhonda stood at the kitchen sink and poured orange juice into a glass. She raised it to her lips while keeping an eye on the corner.
Rhonda’s family lived at the intersection of two residential streets in a Midwest middle-class neighborhood where practically everyone’s last name ended in a vowel. Second generation European immigrants mostly. Kids gathered at Boardman and George Streets throughout the day when looking for something to do. Talk was exchanged about school, friends, neighbors, siblings, and updates on punishments that would explain who was missing that day. Newsworthy information was shared too, like the day everyone found out about Mrs. Feeney.
“You know, my uncle says she was a topless go-go dancer,” Robbie Sinelli was wide-eyed. Everyone else’s eyes bulged, too.
“What is a go-go dancer?” one of the little kids’ noses wrinkled up.
“She dances naked and people give her money, you idiot. Haven’t you heard of it?” Robbie said. “I dare you to go to her door and ask her.”
“Ewwww,” more wrinkled noses, and a handful of the little kids ran off.
It was a record-breaking hot summer. The world was upside down. The Vietnam war raged on senselessly and Rhonda’s mom cried a lot because her son was over there. Watergate trials were on the news and presidential impeachment loomed. Locally, racial tensions were high. Busing and desegregation were on the school board’s upcoming agenda for the year. Rhonda’s parents watched the news every night. Her dad shouted at the TV.
Rhonda was still at the sink, still waking up, when two boys walked into view from around the Galinski house, the first house she could see on Boardman beyond the corner. The rows of identical ranch houses with two-car garages that went on forever had either gray, beige, or red brick. It was the only way to tell them apart, except where broken up by the occasional two-story colonial. The kids said those were the rich people’s houses.
As the boys grew closer to the corner, Rhonda recognized them to be the Rocco twins who lived one block east. They were out early, she thought. They had no sisters or brothers her age, so she didn’t remember their names. They crossed the street as they neared George while being careful not to step in the hot tar in the road. When they got half-way across the street, Mr. Smolinksi’s screen door opened. His head poked out and he called to them. They turned back and made their way toward his house, again skipping over the tar. They hesitated for a minute on the porch and then disappeared inside.
The black tar used to fill in the cracks of the roads would get as hot as molten lava, and it could burn the flesh of even the most seasoned summer feet. Older kids knew not to step in the melted tar and would hopscotch around it when crossing the street. Most kids went barefoot through the summer or had one pair of shoes to see them through, and God help you if your Mom saw tar on them. No amount of scrubbing could get that stuff off.
It was a popular prank to get a little kid who didn’t know any better to step in the tar for the first time. An older kid usually put them up to it, while everyone stood back to enjoy a laugh. The prank turned tragic that day when the youngest Ferrara boy, Joey was put up to it.
The sun seared the flesh on Rhonda’s arms as she walked back to her house at 2 pm. Mrs. Ferrara reeked of vodka, as usual. Rhonda was annoyed. She had forgotten that she had asked Rhonda to babysit for a few hours that afternoon. It was clear Mrs. Ferrara wasn’t going anywhere. Crossing the street, she glanced with mild interest at the group of boys gathered at the corner. They looked hot, dusty, and bored.
“Joey, c’ mere,” Tony yelled from the corner, head down waving his arm. There were probably ten kids standing around the corner that sweltering afternoon, but only two of the Ferrara boys, which was unusual. Joey heard the summons, popped up from the porch two houses away, and ran over as fast as his three-year-old chubby little legs could manage.
“Hey Joey, check out this stuff, it’s like silly putty. Put your toes in it,” Tony said gesturing toward a patch of tar.
Joey was game but paused to look around at all the faces. Slowly he bent down to test it with a finger first while keeping two wary eyes on his audience. He had six older brothers, and this wasn’t the first time he’d been tricked.
Crouched low, balancing on the curb’s edge, Joey moved one carefully pointed finger closer toward the tar. He kept his eyes on everyone.
“Stand up. Just step on it,” Tony said. “It’s really squishy. Do it, Joey.” His tone was casual confident. You can trust me, I’m your brother.
Joey kept watching the faces, beginning to grin a little as his finger leaned in closer to the gooey goo. He teetered on the curb. A swell of encouragement arose as the other kids chimed in, “C’mon Joey, do it.” The ruckus captured Rhonda’s attention and she paused at her side door to watch.
Joey teetered and then tottered, and suddenly lost his balance on the curb perch and pitched forward. His arms thrust forward to break the fall and one whole hand planted flat in the middle of the tar. His face looked up in terror and he let out a howl to wake the dead.
Rolling back onto the grass, his right arm shot into the air clutching the offended hand at the wrist. Jill was just arriving at the corner and rushed toward Joey, while the boys fell back laughing. Joey’s big round face turned red as a ripe tomato and screams in every octave belted forth. Rhonda bounded toward Jill who was trying to wrangle Joey into her arms. The girls picked him up together while he screamed and kicked and arched backward. The boys doubled over and laughed harder and harder. That made Joey howl even louder.
Rhonda was cooing, “Ok Joey, Joey, it’s ok. I’ve got you.”
Eventually, Ronnie Selenksi bent over, deciding to test the tar for himself and another boy pushed him from behind. He deftly jumped over the patch of tar. That started a contest and others joined in the pushing. Pretty soon all the boys were engaged in who could push the other to get someone to step in the tar. Ronnie’s brother Tommy finally lost his balance in the scuffle and slipped in the tar, did a flailing dance to recover, and landed on his knees. The boys roared again.
“Oh, man. Look at your shoe. It melted.” One of the boys pointed at the rubber that hung like stringy cheese on the side of Tommy’s shoe.
“Wow” and “whoa”, everyone gaped at the shoe. Tony walked over and bent down to tap at the tar with a pointed index finger as Joey had a few minutes ago. No one pushed him. “That stuff is hot as hell,” Tony said.
The boys looked at each other. A moment of silence passed between them. Tony turned to gaze in the direction of his house where Joey’s screams could be heard ratcheting up again. Joey might be really hurt.
“Mom is going to kill you,” Sal shouted straight into Tony’s face. “Joey is probably burned bad.”
“Nooo,” Tony tried to shrug it off. “She will be drunk and forget by the time we get home. And you aren’t going to say a word.”
Sal taunted him with more threats. Tony took off after Sal, who dodged quickly, zig-zagging to avoid his brother’s attack. The rest of the boys ran after them, everyone headed in the same direction. There were trees to climb. There were forts to check on. Where the new high school was being built, construction workers left plenty of scrap material around for building things.
Rhonda had never seen a hand blow up like Joey’s did, round like a pancake. It happened so fast right in front of her at the end of his chubby baby wrist. She tried not to look but every time she did it was fatter and redder. She had never seen an ambulance up close before, either. The sirens’ screams lured more kids toward the Ferrara house, a herd of elk leaping through the neighborhood, hopping fences, drawn toward the sound. It brought the Neighborhood Moms running, too.
Jill and Rhonda were inside the Ferrara house where confusion erupted. Mrs. Ferrara knocked over a liter bottle of vodka pushing the girls out of the way to grab Joey. Then she stepped on a piece of broken glass. She slipped on the wet tile, falling backward with Joey in her arms. The medical techs who rushed in were looking for the source of injury on the purple-stained right underarm of the howling Joey until they saw his left hand. Then they saw Mrs. Ferrara’s foot.
Mrs. Ferrara hobbled toward the ambulance while sputtering vengeance to whoever had done this to her poor Joey, calling on saints for help, then calling for revenge. While Mrs. Ferrara climbed into the back of the ambulance, the Moms joined in a chorus of encouragements and assurances in a great show of solidarity; one Mom promised to stick at the house for the rest of the Ferrara kids, another Mom shouted she would feed them, and yet another one yelled out she would bring a jello salad. Other Moms were inside cleaning up broken glass and blood. And probably snooping.
Even as the sirens were becoming faint in the distance, the Neighborhood Moms who had responded lingered in front of the Ferrara house. This kind of excitement did not happen every day. Everyone chattered at once guessing what had happened to Joey.
Jill and Rhonda eeked their way east on George toward the corner hoping to slip away unnoticed. Some Moms had brought sticky babies with them and were shifting them from hip to hip as they all talked at once. Jill and Rhonda were almost around the corner and in a moment would be gone from sight. Rhonda’s mom was in the crowd, and Jill’s mom probably was on the phone.
Young Mrs. Finney stood in her open garage doorway shading her eyes from the sun’s glare squinting to see what was going on. She did not cross the street for two reasons. First of all, she had a four-month-old baby who was inside sleeping. And secondly, she knew the Neighborhood Moms didn’t like her much. They never invited her over for coffee and chit chat.
She was wearing her bikini like she did every day and she was smoking a cigarette like she always did. Her skin was golden and slick with baby oil. Her bleached blonde hair was coiffed, and she was far too slender and shapely for a new Mom. She had waved a couple of times. Eventually one of the Gang of Neighborhood Moms waved back. Young Mrs. Feeney yelled, “What happened?” No one answered her.
Rhonda was only fourteen and a half, but she knew that Mrs. Feeney had fabulous breasts. So did the entire neighborhood, especially every man and boy around. Being on a corner lot gave Rhonda’s Dad a voyeuristic vantage to Mrs. Feeney’s antics. Every day that summer she had the garage door open and the bikini on, coming and going from the garage to the front yard to the house to the garage again. Snap snap snap across her red painted garage floor in her flip flops with the heels. When the garage door opened each day at about noon, it was like the curtain went up.
“What happened?” Young Mrs. Feeney turned her attention toward Jill and Rhonda as they were now across the street from her house. She figured she could get an answer from one of them. She considered them neutral and besides that, they were probably just a few years younger than her. What was she, barely nineteen years old?
“Joey Ferrara burned his hand. He had to go to the hospital.”
“Was it really bad?”
Rhonda looked at Jill. “Yes, it was bad,” she rolled her eyes. She knew Mrs. Feeney couldn’t hear them and hardly see them with the sun in her eyes. “He went to the hospital, didn’t he?” she whispered.
Jill started to laugh. She couldn’t help it. They were best friends and they laughed a lot. They had been laughing since they were in third grade.
“What is so funny?” Mrs. Feeney called.
Rhonda’s mother now spotted her. They had been delayed by Mrs. Feeney.
“Rhonda!” she shouted. “Come here!”
She rolled her eyes again.
She turned to Jill. “Come with me,” her eyes pleaded.
“Did you see what happened to Joey?” Rhonda’s Mom asked hands on her hips. A dozen Moms turned their full attention to Jill and Rhonda, collectively waiting. Jill did the talking.
“Joey fell. His left hand landed on the tar.” Jill would someday be a lawyer, Rhonda thought. She gave no extraneous information and spoke with no emotion. Just the facts.
A dozen questions were hurled at the girls as Rhonda stood mute. Jill answered yes or no, and that was it. No, we don’t think anyone pushed him. No, we don’t think anyone made him do it. No, no one held his hand in the tar. Yes, he fell. Yes, we went into the Ferrara house with Joey. No, we don’t know how the bottle was broken. No, we don’t know what was in it.
The Moms were all talking at once. What could have happened, I bet Sal had something to do with it, oh poor Joey, poor Sylvia, she must be so upset, was she drinking already at two in the afternoon? Shhhhh.
And then the girls turned to escape.
“Rhonda.”
Rhonda turned back. Her mother beckoned her closer.
“Are you going to Jill’s house,” her voice was lowered.
“Yes,” she lied.
“Where else?”
No answer. Just a scowl.
“Don’t go anywhere else unless you call me for permission.” She wanted to sound stern because the other Moms might be listening. There was a rumor starting that Rhonda Jenkins was hanging out with an older boy who had recently moved to the neighborhood.
“Did you hear me?”
“Yes.”
A few of the Moms were dispersing. Mrs. Feeney’s garage was empty. There was nothing but rising thin smoke where she had just been. She always threw her cigarette butts on her grass. It drove her husband crazy. He yelled at her when he got home or when he saw her do it. He loved that lawn and mowed it every other day whether it needed to be mowed or not.
Jill and Rhonda crossed the street and walked the next seven houses to hers in silence. They paused in front of Jill’s house.
“Are you coming in?” Jill was heading up the driveway and didn’t look back.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Rhonda said and took a few steps. She hesitated, waiting for her friend to look back. They waved to each other, a little sad wave.
On that terrible hot day in August, Rhonda was fourteen years and seven months old. She was sure she was falling in love. She would remember the heat and smells and the sounds vividly that day. Joey was burned so badly he was rushed to a burn center at another hospital and was the talk of the neighborhood for days. By the time Rhonda got home that night the rest of the world would be upside down.
That night Richard Millhouse Nixon announced his resignation of the presidency. While Rhonda’s parents gaped and gasped at this inevitable, yet historical moment along with the rest of the world, she was wrapped in the arms of a boy who was four years older than her. She had fought at first. She was scared, but eventually gave in and pretended it was ok. While he was on top of her he said, “I thought this is what you wanted? Aren’t we going steady?”
When Rhonda walked home past curfew that night, she was braced for the punishment she would surely receive. Before she passed Jill’s house, she crossed to the other side of the street and tried to blend into the shadows of the trees. She knew no one would understand what had happened, except maybe Jill.
There was an eerie silence in the humid air when Rhonda tiptoed into her house. It was dark, but had she seen a car pull out of the driveway? She braced herself for her parent’s anger and interrogation. Something felt different, the kitchen seemed yellowish and Rhonda later remembered thinking it was lit with the wrong kind of bulb.
Instead of yelling when her mother saw her, Rhonda’s mother let out a wail like a wounded animal. Rhonda couldn’t tell where the sound came from at first and then she saw her mother leaning into the refrigerator half silhouetted in the thick, sallow light. She looked like she meant to squeeze inside. Her mouth was twisted unnaturally, her lips writhing with silent cries. Her father was sitting on the family room floor, cross-legged, rocking back and forth with his back against the couch. His face was stone when he spoke.
Rhonda’s brother who was serving in Vietnam had been killed in an attack. The officers had just left the house. Her father started reciting the details that resulted in the occurrence of his death with a voice that had been hollowed out. Rhonda later remembered it as a far-off echo.
She crumpled to the ground. She didn’t pass out, rather she lost the support of her legs. She landed in front of her father and looked into his empty eyes. He didn’t blink. He didn’t see her.
The night air was stingy and offered no relief, took no pity on the family. The three of them stayed in the family room all night. They had forgotten how to move their arms and legs, and no one wanted to be alone.
In the morning when Rhonda woke, her mother and she were plastered with sweat to the naugahyde couch, their feet entangled, heads at opposite ends. Her hair was stuck to the back of her neck. Her father was still on the family room floor, his face planted in the tri-colored green shag rug. His shirt was shellacked to his back. It was starting out to be another stifling, hot day.
Rhonda went to the phone to call her father’s office to say he wouldn’t be at work that day. The number was pinned to the wall next to the phone for emergencies. There had never been a time before now that the number had to be dialed.
It was 8 am. Rhonda turned to the kitchen to start coffee for her parents.
At the kitchen window, Rhonda checked the corner of Boardman and George. No one was there yet. To her right on Boardman, Rhonda could see the Feeney house and next to it, Mr. Swolinski’s door was open. He was standing on his porch looking at the front page of the newspaper. He held a purple popsicle in one hand. Rhonda scowled. Further down she could see the garage of Jill’s house. Her comfort. To her left on George was the Ferrara house. There were usually bikes on the lawn and toys spilling off the porch. Someone had cleaned up.
Joey. The tears started.
A door slammed and a car started. The day was trying to start though the one before held it hostage. Rhonda turned the water on at the kitchen sink to drown out her crying. Nothing so momentous had happened in her whole life, and then yesterday everything. If the president hadn’t resigned…if she hadn’t lied and just gone to Jill’s…if she had been home on time, her brother might not have died. She was afraid Joey would die, too, because of her.
*************
Five days after the worst day of her life, Rhonda was sitting on the top step of the porch at the Ferrara house. The heatwave had finally broken with a thunderstorm the night before. Mr. Ferrara had brought Joey home during the storm. Rhonda hadn’t seen Mrs. Ferrara since she got into the back of the ambulance with Joey.
Rhonda was cradling Joey in her lap, rocking him, and humming as a pleasant breeze surrounded them. Her lips were brushing the sandy brown waves at his crown. He was in that delicious space between almost asleep and barely aware. A car backfiring at the corner caused him to startle. Rhonda held Joey closer and he went back to that beautiful cloud called Carefree. Rhonda was softly singing “Bridge Over Troubled Waters”, which she knew all the words to because she had sung it in the school choir. She was crying ever so lightly, thinking of her brother’s upcoming funeral. She was thinking of how she almost lost Joey. She was thinking of a guy who wouldn’t talk to her since she ran from his house three days ago.
Rhonda was staying at the Ferrara house to help out until Mrs. Ferrara came home. Mr. Ferrara said she was visiting someone, and the next day she was still at the hospital with her foot injury. Rhonda didn’t care if she ever came home because she would be at the Ferrara house every morning until Joey went to college.
“I will never let you out of my sight,” Rhonda sang the words into her song. “ I will keep you safe forever and ever…,” she hummed.
Rhonda whispered promises to the sleeping Joey that she would be with him always, that he was never going to hurt people, and he was never going to go to war.