Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls
CALIFORNIA ADVENTURE IS COLORFUL and clean. But it is also California, my home, and I did not want to be reminded of home right now. It put me in a cranky mood as we walked down the street that looked like a Los Angeles street, and past a Los Angeles souvenir store that looked like a Los Angeles souvenir store. I wanted to feel like we were someplace else. All the crowds wandering the street reminded me of freeway traffic, of driving home, of a packed hallway at a new school.
“We should have stayed in Disneyland,” I said, pulling off my sweatshirt and knotting its arms around my hips.
Bert set his hand on mine, and his eyes reflected the florescent red spinning toys some kids were waving. “Let’s buy a glow thing,” he said, pointing toward the cart that sold the new high-tech, battery-powered spinning toys, and also the old-school glowing necklaces I used to buy with my allowance money when I was little.
I shoved thoughts of the freeway and the school year aside. They were crowding in around me, but I’d deal with them later. “I would love to,” I said. I focused on deciding if I wanted the green or the purple glow necklace.
After our purchase, we rushed along down the street, already lined with people watching the rest of us frantically look for a good spot.
“Come on, Bert, how about here?” I pointed to a spot behind a couple of kids and their 40ish-year-old guardian, who appeared to be asleep on the sidewalk.
“Nah, we can do better.”
As we kept walking farther and farther down the parade route, down the street lined with people, I felt more like we were the attraction. With no other entertainment, all eyes followed us and our glowing necks and wrists as we trotted down the near-empty street. I pulled Bert closer to me.
“Slow down, Bert, I’m going to trip in front of everybody!”
He stopped, and said, “You’re right, Casey. Let’s slow down.”
Bert faced me, and bowed his head. He held out his arms, glowing purple with the arm bands I made him wrap around his wrists. I wove my fingers in his, grinning and blushing but not worrying, because it was dark and it was our last night, and these were only strangers who I’d never see again, anyway. We danced each other down the street. The world was a blur of moving glow sticks.
Until I got dizzy, and we came to a stop as I toppled into Bert, and he knocked into a trash can. I laughed, almost crying, and a little kid by the can clapped and shrieked along with me.
Fortunately, we’d ended up in a relatively deserted area. I pointed, and we collapsed on a wide stretch of clean ground. We sprawled out and listened to the nearby waterfall from the back of Grizzly Peak tumble down the Yosemite-like mountain. Soon, though, our little temporary campsite area filled with others, minutes before the parade would come by.
Even so, we had a few feet around us both, so we felt isolated. Parents were thankful to sit down, even if it was on cement, and half of the little kids were asleep, so it was peaceful. Was this the right time to show Bert the beloved souvenir I had bought? I glanced around, then discreetly dug through my bag until I accidentally found my mom’s hairbrush. She must have stuck it in by mistake. I didn’t really see how she could confuse my fun green messenger bag with her offensive fanny pack, but she did it all the time. Unless...it hit me that of course she could not confuse our bags. She was trying to help me look presentable, as she’d say, when I went out. I felt a small surge of anger at her control-freak nature, even wanting to be in charge of my hair, but then I held the little wooden brush, that still had one graying hair strand in it, and felt a bigger surge of guilt. I guess she thought she was helping me. I wondered what they were doing, if they might be here somewhere watching the parade we always watched together, but the guilt made me want to throw up.
I wiggled my arms to gaze at the glowsticks’ pattern of figure-eight-shaped light. Unveiling the new souvenir would have to wait. I needed distraction.
Bert was reclining on his hands, and he seemed equally mesmerized by the glow. We took turns choreographing our arms in a light show, and pretended not to notice the booming announcement that the parade would start soon: “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, in just twenty minutes...” The chipper announcements that sounded every five minutes thereafter only reminded me that our time together was ticking away. After the final “in just a few minutes” call sounded, I sighed with relief, glad to not have to hear a countdown anymore, when...
“Oops, excuse me,” I said, automatically apologizing to the woman who bumped into me with her stroller. I silently cursed at myself—why did I say “excuse me” to her?
The woman looked down her glasses at me and Bert—why was she wearing sunglasses at night?—and then opened her mouth. I was already smiling in an it’s-okay-don’t-worry-about-it way, when she turned to a tall guy with ashy blonde hair and too-tan skin. She said something quietly, and I couldn’t hear over the noise of parade-watchers surrounding us, but from the look the guy cast down at us, I didn’t think we were going to get an apology.
I shrugged and turned back to Bert, watching the kids next to us play with their new stuffed animals, Mickey and Chip. The kids seemed to be in some sort of popcorn-eating contest. Watching them spill handfuls of popcorn into their mouths (and seeing one of the ever-present park sweepers milling around, debating whether he should scoop up the fallen kernels from under the kids) should have occupied my attention, but I could feel the couple still staring at me and Bert. Then I clearly heard “Disneyland is for kids” coming from behind us.
I turned my head around and saw, surprised, that both the sunglass-wearing woman and her orange-skinned companion were somehow directing this observation at me and Bert. I was confused—like when a teacher calls on you, and even though you’ve been paying attention, you’re too surprised to think.
As usual when I didn’t know the right response, I smiled as blandly as possible. Next to me, Bert shifted and sighed, which made me wonder what I had missed. Then I felt a prod from a greasy stroller wheel in the small of my back, and I got it: They wanted us to give up our space for the stroller.
I whispered, “Okay, let’s just move over,” and we smashed together (well, that wasn’t a sacrifice) as close to our neighbors as we dared.
The kids, now knee-to-knee with Bert, threw Chip into my lap and I tossed him back, relaxing. Our move had managed to come up with an extra couple of feet of free space, which was plenty of room for someone to sit and hold the kid. Or even to fit in a stroller.
Satisfied with our brilliance (but not with having tire tracks on my non-stained pair of pants), I checked my watch—the parade had started three minutes ago on the other end of the street, and it would reach us soon. I thought I could hear the music already, tinkling in the distance over the sounds of popcorn crunching next to me.
Then the guy reached between us and tapped Bert on the shoulder.
“Disneyland is for kids,” he said again, even louder than before, despite now being only a foot away. I stared at his hand near my ear.
“And we’ve made room for another,” Bert said. He spread his arm toward the prime parking spot to my right, which the woman was still standing behind, and glaring at, for some reason. I noticed their baby was asleep.
“No. Parades are for kids.”
“Sure. And whoever else is here, who’s been waiting to see it,” Bert said calmly. I caught a very small emphasis on “waiting” and wondered at the nerve of these people—just because they didn’t want to wait or plan their day, they expected us to leave so they could all sit down? And thought that running me over with their Hummer stroller was a good way to do that? I was grateful that Bert was talking—he seemed a lot cooler than me.
The guy sputtered a little, and glanced at his wife. I swear she was actually pushing the stroller onto me now.
“The stroller is on my leg,” I said to her. She looked down, but didn’t say—or do—anything.
I squashed into Bert, practically sitting on him. “They are not going to drive me out of here,” I said. He squeezed my hand.
“Of course not.” He turned back. “I’m not sure what it is you want us to do.”
“We’ve made room for the baby,” I pointed out.
The man must have realized it was outrageous to actually tell us to move so he and his wife could sit down, but he was frustrated anyway. He said, “For kids, not teenagers,” and stood behind me and Bert, pressing his white athletic shoes into me. I sat down on them, hard, and he moved back a step. I was shaking with anger. Who were these anonymous people, telling us we were too old to deserve to see a parade? (Were we too old to see a parade?)
“Pardon me,” I heard an elderly woman’s voice, a little shaky with age but still loud. I turned full around this time to find her standing behind us, leaning against a railing, looking at the man with a pleasant smile. “I’m sure you don’t realize, but you are blocking all of our views from back here, and we’ve been waiting. So has that couple.” She gestured to us.
Bert and I grinned at each other quickly, then turned back, fascinated.
She lowered her voice, and said something else to the guy. Then he and his sunglass-wearing wife, loudly clicking her stroller’s wheels around, abruptly left, spewing out comments about teenagers and all the inconsiderate people. Had I sounded like that earlier, when I was convinced humanity was doomed?
Bert and I stared. The woman and her husband, both with matching white hair and smiles, waved at us. We waved back. She put a hand to her head and switched on a pair of light-up pink antennae with flashing Mickeys bobbing on the ends.
The pink antennae! Pre-Bert, when I first saw her standing in the Indiana Jones line and felt embarrassed for her, for wearing those silly antennae. I don’t know how, maybe from the pink glow surrounding her head, but I saw her wink at me in the darkness, and I beamed. You know, those Mickey-head antennae are kind of cool after all, I thought, and smiled at absolutely everyone.