Dave the Jailbird was right: I had not yet hit bottom. After Janet was gone, soon Dale left for basic training, and then Peggy went off to the university (with Stephen Knutson, who never followed through on his Corvette offer). I stayed on at the station. I smoked cigarettes, and I drank beer with Tim the night man, for whom would I pinch-hit on occasion.
Sometimes when I was alone at night, moving quickly from car to car with no time to put money in the till, my breast pocket bulged with a wad of cash. When time permitted, I rang up the gallons, deposited the money. Once, after closing, I found ten dollars still in my shirt pocket. I was driving home, and remembered that it was for some Shell No-Pest Strips, which were not under inventory. I promised myself I would return the money in the morning but I didn’t. After all, I worked hard—way harder than Kirk or Bud. I deserved a bonus.
Gradually I began to keep a few dollars every day. Occasionally I “borrowed” a new tape for the eight-track player I’d bought for the truck. I slit the cellophane wrapper with a razor blade, extracted the tape, and played it. When I tired of it, I carefully replaced the tape in its original package. I took rum-soaked Crookette cigars
without second thought. My crime was made easier because Kirk was stealing, too. I had started to notice his attention to the tire warehouse and its inventory; I was never permitted to count tires. He was a good tire salesman—especially when Mr. Davies was gone. Kirk talked tourists out of their perfectly good tires and into new ones by using a shiny penny. Tires were all about tread depth: less than five thirty-seconds of an inch was in “the danger zone,” which Kirk illustrated by pinching a penny up to the tip of Lincoln’s head, then holding it close to the befuddled customer’s eyes. “I mean, this amount of tread will probably get you back to Minneapolis,” Kirk would say. “It’s up to you.” He gave substantial discounts for cash, and in this way acquired excellent used tires, which he sold on the side. Once, when a foursome of good used Firestones came in, Kirk said, “Hey, Paul, wouldn’t a pair of those fit your truck?”
“Probably,” I said.
“Go ahead, put them on—my treat.”
I did, and Mr. Davies was never the wiser. I told my father I’d gotten them for a steal. The knowledge that Kirk and I were complicit was a kind of balm between us, and diluted the bad blood of earlier in the summer.
If I worked a night shift, I drove around for a while, usually by myself, but sometimes with girls whom I saw hanging around the pool hall, girls with strong-smelling hair spray and cigarette breath. A couple of times they wanted to go to the Hawk Lake landing and park, but I pretended indifference, pretended I had better things to
do. In truth, none of them measured up to Janet—or to Peggy, for that matter.
I also stopped Bible study with the Workers, and I sat at Meeting in the back row with my arms folded and did not sing the hymns. Then, early one Sunday morning in August, the phone rang. It was Bud from the station.
“Paul—I hate to call you on Sunday, but Kirk finally got his in a vise with somebody’s husband. He’s on the lam for a day or so until the guy calms down. Tim can’t cover for him and I can’t either. Could you come in?”
“Okay,” I said. I put on my Shell uniform in silence, and walked past my parents and out the door.
Sunday morning was not a difficult shift; nobody needed tires or an oil change or their muffler fixed. Mainly it was families stopping on their way home from church to top off the gas tank and buy a newspaper. As I attended to them, I inspected their clean clothes, their church dresses, their suits and ties, their Sunday hats. Tidy families. Families who belonged to things. Fathers who were in the Jaycees, or Rotary, or Elks. Mothers who were elementary-school teachers and volunteers at the old-age home.
In the middle of this, Mr. Davies himself drove up. “Paul! I’m very sorry,” he said through his open window. He parked his car and came over, grabbing a fresh chamois cloth on the way. “I promised you you’d never have to work on Sunday, so I want you to head home. I’ll take over.”
“Really, it’s no problem,” I said, but he would hear none of it.
“A promise is a promise,” he said. “And please apologize to your mother for me.”
Suddenly I was free on a Sunday morning, in town.
Across the street the second Lutheran service was in progress, the sound of its choir falling sweetly from its open windows. I walked to my truck, paused, then suddenly passed it by. I went across the street and up the sharp granite steps of the church. At least I had on a bow tie. The usher, an old man, handed me a program in silence and pointed to the side entrance, back pews. I slunk inside, sat down.
The church was as big as our hayloft. It had heavy-duty curving rafters that held up the roof, polished wooden pews with seat cushions, an ornate carved altar, a preacher with a microphone, and at least a couple hundred people in the audience. When the choir stopped, the preacher said something—which everybody answered in one voice. This startled me. I looked in the program, but couldn’t find where they were. This went on, the preacher speaking, the people answering, without pause or silence between. It was loud and moved fast. Then the preacher launched into his sermon. I glanced around. Most people appeared to be listening, but with the glazed look I’d seen on my father’s face at Meeting when he was especially tired. To pass the time, I paged through the hymnal. Some of the songs I vaguely recognized,
but most were different, some in Norwegian, and the music to them looked dense and complicated.
Thankfully the preacher finished, and there was rustling as everyone straightened up. People in the first rows stood up and walked forward to take communion—which was my cue to slip out. The usher had nodded off on the bench outside, so I made a clean escape back into sunlight and fragrant summer air.
I had a sudden strong desire to get home, fast, and I sped most of the way. I thought I might make the last part of Meeting, but met Mrs. Halgrimson’s and the others’ cars as they departed.
Inside, Dave was folding up the chairs with sharp clacking sounds.
“Sorry,” I said to my parents.
They turned to me.
“For everything,” I added.
My mother’s face softened. “You missed your breakfast. You must be hungry, Paul.”
“I am,” I said, but for what I didn’t know.