Judas Tree – Novella One - 3. The Conclusion

Part 6: Star War Cards and Kmart Queers

Bright summer Saturdays rolled past. I was able to convince my dad to drop me off at Flo’s farm almost every weekend, and pick me up at the end of the day. As autumn rolled around, Rex was kidnapped. A neighbor reported a strange car stopping, getting Rex inside and driving away.

Mysteriously, a couple of miserable days later for Flo, she opened her door, and in walked Rex with wagging tail. Flo said it must have been his toothy smile that put the would-be stealers off from keeping him. Even bad guys sometimes know to do the right thing, and they brought Rex home.

“Look at what I got.” I fished out a stack of cards from my pants pocket. Jeremy and I were lying on the floor of his and Jake’s bedroom. A window, with a frilly yellow lace curtain, flapped periodically as a warm autumn breeze blew in before drifting out again through the open bedroom door to the landing and enclosed staircase. Above where Jeremy and I lay, the ceiling was papered with world maps from the folds of old National Geographic magazines, and models of airplanes floated and rode the window-stream on unseeable fishing line.

I went on with pride. “I got them from the McDonald’s at Saint Clair Square.”

Jake, sitting barefoot and in jean shorts on his bed, bent down to see my cards. I gave him half, then the other half to Jeremy.

“Whoa . . . !” Jeremy sputtered. “Cool!”

I bent close to see Jeremy looking at Princess Leia, which he flipped to Chewbacca.

Jake sat cross-legged at the edge of his bed, and I leaned in on his leg to see what he was looking at. He had Luke Skywalker. He asked me, “You got these at the Mall? At the McDonalds there . . . ?”

I explained knowingly, “You’ve got to buy a few happy meals, then you get the set.”

“Neat!” Jeremy exclaimed, standing and switching fistfuls of cards with Jake. I lay back on the floor with hands proudly behind my head.

Jake rang out in hopeful expectation, “I know this Christmas, they’re gonna have the best toys for this movie – I can’t wait!”

“Did I ever tell you”—I savored the fact that I was about to drop a bombshell—“that I have the Eagle 1, from Space: 1999? At home?”

I sat up to see Jake and Jeremy look slack-jawed at each other. They had never met an only child like me.

“You must be rich!” Jeremy slammed me – the worst of accusations among us kids.

“My parents didn’t buy it,” I explained. “It was a gift from Willetta.” And they let it go.

“Next time,” Jake asked with intense sincerity, “will you bring it with you?”

“Okay,” I said, and I meant it – if I could remember.

“Let’s play Battleship,” Jeremy said as he gathered my Star Wars cards and pressed them into my hands.

Jake scooted on his bed, propping his back against the wall, and I first noticed a bruise on his leg. I kneeled and saw a scratch on his neck, then more on his face. I asked low, as Jeremy was noisily tossing game boxes from out of their closet, “What happened?” I motioned to his neck with mine as the example. “You all right?”

Jake stiffened; he paused. His eyes darted from the closet to me. He said, “It’s nothing.” I could see his throat tighten and swallow. “I’m all right.” Then he did some kind of weird smile; it seemed warm, but kind of afraid too.

“Battleship!” Jeremy sang out, running over with the two bulky cases cradled in his arms. “Who’s first?” He plopped down full force onto his knees and set the games on the floor by me.

“Simon is,” Jake said.

“Red or blue?” Jeremy asked me.

“Blue,” I said.

Jeremy spun my game around and I lay on my stomach as he unlatched the flap of his, and started sorting his pieces. We both organized them carefully and gave a signal that we were ready to begin playing in earnest competition. Jeremy mimicked my posture, and propped his head on his palms. His socked feet gyrated in the air over his head and gray corduroys.

Later, during the game, we started talking again.

“F-8,” Jeremy said.

“Dang it!” I cried. “A second hit.” Pause. “J-4.”

“Miss-sss,” Jeremy sputtered out to my face.

“You still think your dog is”—I went limp-wristed—”that way?”

“B-6,” Jeremy said. “Yeah, nobody ever changes things like that . . . . ”

“Miss. Well, I remember the first time I heard the words f*g, f*gg*t, queer. Um – C-2.”

“Miss! Um – F-2.”

“Darn!” I glared at him. Jeremy laughed theatrically, tossing his head back impossibly far and lolling it side to side.

“Second hit. I was at Kmart in Belleville. As usual, my mom sends me off to the toy department while she shops—”

“Number . . . ?”

“Um – D-8.”

“OH – second hit.”

“What did you say . . . ?” My hand to my ear.

“Second! Hit!” Pause. “B-6.”

“Miss. And this kid starts hanging around with me. He’s my age, but he kept saying I was a ‘F*g.’ I don’t know what he means. Then he says ‘You know, F*gg*t, Gay-Boy, Queer.’ I never heard any of them, except Gay before. Funny, ain’t it? – Um – I-2.”

“Miss—”

Jake said, “What’d he tell you it means?”

“ . . . E-3.”

“Miss. A-7,” I said.

“Damn! You sank my Battleship!”

I clapped in Jeremy’s face. Suddenly Jake was serious. “Didn’t you mind him calling you that?!”

I thought about it a second. I shrugged. “It’s not nice, but he didn’t know me, so it doesn’t mean he really thought that. Maybe he said it to me ‘cause everybody says it to him.”

Jeremy laughed.

“Besides,” I continued. “How does anybody know? What does it matter . . . ?”

“It don’t matter if you know”—Jake was insistent—“it’s just important that it doesn’t seem so . . . . ” He trailed off.

I could tell Jake was upset about something, so I changed the subject. “Your folks go to church on Sundays?” The game was over.

“Boy, do they!” Jeremy said. Then he added to his brother, “You want to play?” Jake shook his head no, looking at his hands. “Suit yourself.” Jeremy and I packed up our pieces.

I asked Jake, “Catholic, or Lutheran?”

“Neither,” Jake mumbled. I was confused; what other type was there?

Jeremy picked up the game cases and went to the closet. He turned around with a soccer ball and kneed it in the air a couple of times. He said to us, “Let’s go out.”

“Not me,” Jake said. “You guys go.”

I looked at Jeremy and shook my head; meaning I’d stay here with Jake. Jeremy nodded and ran out the bedroom door.

I stood up and looked to the spot on Jake’s bed next to him. He glanced at me, then scooted over so I could sit like him, next to him.

After a pause, I asked, “So – what kind of church do they go to?”

“Evangelical.”

“What?”

“Ee-Van– It’s the kind of church where the Bible is most important. You can’t join until you’re grown up . . . then you get baptized.”

“I was baptized.”

“Not to them you weren’t. They don’t baptize children. They think if a kid dies, there’s no hope; it goes straight to Hell.”

I thought about it a second. “But we have Purgatory – or, is it Limbo? Anyway, if a baby dies, it goes there to wait for the resurrection. Why would God send a baby to Hell?! That’s weird stuff.”

“Well, not to them. Anyone dying before making a strong commitment to preach the Gospel to fellow sinners, and try to save souls as an adult, must go to Hell. Only grown-ups can be baptized and saved to go to Heaven.”

After a pause, in which Jake looked at his hands a while, and I searched his profile, I asked, “You gonna get baptized?”

He set a sad look on me. “I don’t think so.”

“ . . . Why not . . . ?”

“They don’t want me.”

“ . . . What’s wrong with them, that they don’t want a neat guy like you . . . ?”

Jake swallowed hard. He lolled his gaze up to the maps, then back down to his hands now wrenching in his lap. “My dad says I ain’t worthy – not the right kind.”

I felt bad for him. “You don’t believe in Hell, do you? I don’t.” It was an odd thing to say, but somehow it felt right.

“What?” Jake murmured.

“I mean”—I started and tried to smile at him—“if God is our Father, and down here we’re supposed to believe that our folks can only love us – no matter what kind of trouble we get into – then how can our Heavenly Father be any less for-giving than our parents? He should be more so. That’s why I don’t believe God can send anybody to Hell, ‘cause, he doesn’t hate anybody.”

Now I did go too far. It seemed instead of distracting Jake from his problems, I worsened them. He gulped a choking sob into his throat, and an unwiped tear fell fast along his reddening cheek. His hands stopped their torment, and the one closest to me reached out to take mine, but he stopped. He blinked at me, more tears fell, and he looked miserable beyond words.

“What’s wrong?” I took his hand. I squeezed it. I shook it a little, begging him to be honest. “You can tell me.”

“You’re too good to understand – your father is nice.”

I was confused. We were talking about my dad? About Jake’s dad? I was lost.

Suddenly, noiselessly, we looked up to the door. Jake’s father was there and watching us. Jake jerked his hand out of mine and with it wiped his tears and snorted up his newly runny nose. His dad said to me, “Run along now, Simon. Your father is waiting for you.” And he disappeared as quietly be-hind the doorframe as he had appeared.

˚˚˚˚˚

Somehow the ride home seemed twice as long that evening. With each passing milepost glinting the setting sun behind us, I felt I should be moving back to where I started. I didn’t want to leave Jake that evening – though he didn’t ask; though he couldn’t ask anything of me – it seemed stronger and stronger that he, my one true and closest friend, needed something from me. I didn’t know what – protection? How could that be? After all, I’m just a kid – and so is he.

Part 7: The Fag Tree

Fall drifted into winter. Because of icy roads, I saw Jeremy and his brother less. I know they got Star Wars fighter toys and action figures for Christmas, because we played with them in their room. They were a gift from Flo. This happened over a visit after New Years, and that reminded me that I had never brought my Space: 1999 Eagle 1 for them to see. I heard they were taking a family trip to Disney World, and I was jealous as heck. But spring came, and I pressured by dad to restart our Saturday schedule. He acted odd though. Like he knew something I didn’t. Like he was told something by Jake’s dad, though I didn’t know what. Maybe that I was a pest; it wouldn’t be the first time for that! But spring pushed me, and I pushed him.

The Saturday after my encounter with Ralph in the vestry, and my talk with Monsignor Helfgott at his dining room table, I felt I needed to see Jake. Begging my dad, he agreed to go out to Flo’s, but when I got there, Jeremy looked surprised to see me at the screened-in porch door. He let me in, but hushed me, as if I were in a sick house.

Creeping up the carpeted stairs, I could see the door to their room was closed. Halfway up, Jeremy stopped and turned to me with hoarse whispers.

“Jake’s not supposed to see—” A word was missing. “He’s not feeling too good. Don’t let my folks see you with him – okay?”

“Why?”

“Don’t ask”—he sighed, confessing—“because, my dad don’t want you around us anymore. But, I know . . . ” he said looking at the door. “That’s not fair to Jake.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Look – all right? My dad and Jake don’t get along. Last time – that time he saw you guys together, alone – Jake got it pretty bad. But after that it just got worse. This week, Jake had to miss some school . . . ” He was very earnest now. “Look, that’s a family secret, okay? You’re not gonna tell anyone – right?”

I was stunned.

“ . . . Yeah; but, no. But, what about your mom? What about Flo?"

Jeremy looked like he hated to tell me. “They know, somehow, but they act like there’s nothing they can do about it. Understand?”

I didn’t. I swallowed hard. There was a sinking nausea down there, and I thought maybe it was best for me to go, but I had to know, “What did we do? What did I do?”

Jeremy blinked in surprise. Matter-of-factly he told me, “Nothing. You did nothing; he did nothing. It’s just – my dad and Jake don’t get along. That’s all.” Jeremy’s shield was still up, but as he took a step, he sighed and was honest with me. “He don’t want Jake to be that way. It’s against God, he says. He wants Jake to snap out of it, even if my dad has to whoop it out of him, before it’s too late.” Jeremy turned to go up. I grabbed his arm and stopped him.

“Do you think he is?”

“I think I don’t care. He’s my brother either way. That means I love him, either way.”

˚˚˚˚˚

I went into their room alone. I closed the door behind me. Jake was lying on top of his sheets. He was wearing a navy tank top with red edging and white shorts. His eyes were closed, and I wasn’t prepared to see his face with cuts and a bruised eye. His arms were bruised black on the inside of his biceps, and something like kick marks were healing on his shins.

He opened his eyes and sat up with a pained grimace.

I sat on the floor in front of him. I started telling him slowly, “I’m sorry to hear you’re not feeling well.”

“ . . . Thanks . . . . ”

After a pause, I asked, “You want to do something?” Then I remembered Jeremy’s warning. “I mean, we can play a game”—I was looking around—“here, in your room.”

“No.” Jake stood up. I could see he was in pain, so I got up to help him. He tossed back a gulp of air, steeling his nerves before he told me, “I’ve got to tell you something – but not here.”

˚˚˚˚˚

Again, I stood at the top of the landing within Flo’s loft. Again, it was dark, and again magic flooded out as Jake flipped the light switch.

I couldn’t help but smile, and when Jake saw me, for the first time in what seemed a long time, I saw his face lighten too.

We walked around, poking fingers in and out of fancy carved table supports, and across the tops of counters and glass cases. At an area where a bit of clearing formed, Jake sat down with outstretched legs. He leaned his back against a display cabinet. The lights from inside gave a halo to his chestnut hair. I sat cross-legged in front of him. I tried to smile. I asked, “So, what do you want to tell me?”

Jake’s grin was gone. It looked like I was killing him. “We took our trip to Disney World—”

“I know; lucky jerk.”

“—And it turns out, my dad found a lot of churches . . . ” There was a fleeting meeting of my gaze. “You know – his type of church . . . ” His eyes returned to watch his hands. “And, they’ve decided to move to Florida. We’re going to drive down in a couple of weeks.”

“Florida?” Saying it made me feel sick; no place ever sounded so far away. Grasping at straws, I blurted, “But you’ll be back to visit your grandma! Right . . . ?”

Jake held my eyes, and lied. “Yeah.”

“Well”—now I sighed—“we’ll see each other then.”

“ . . . Maybe . . . . ”

I just then remembered. “I brought my camera today. Remember, I told you, the Kodak that takes Polaroids? I got it for Christmas.”

“Oh. Good.”

Trying to be cheery, I added, “I brought lots of film, so we can each keep some copies—”

I was interrupted because loud sobs began to come out of Jake’s mouth and throat. I reached out a hand and put it on his forearm. He jerked it away.

“It’s gonna be all right,” I said. “Everything will work out, in the end; it always does.”

His eyes looking everywhere but me, he choked out, “Why does my dad hate me?”

I got to my knees and crawled over to Jake’s case. I copied him, and leaned my back against the lit glass by his side. He had drawn up his knees and raised his elbows on them. Now he only stared at the floor in front of his feet. I blinked in some earnest wish to make everything all right with Jake, so I lifted my arm and rested my hand across his back on his far shoulder. I was about to mouth a conventional ‘He doesn’t hate you,’ but we were clearly beyond that point. For once it was time to cut all the malarkey. It was time for one person to listen and to hear, really hear, so that two could connect in honesty.

I finally said, “I don’t know why he hates you. No father has any right to hate his kids.” I tried to chuckle, and failed. “But, why let it get you down? It’s totally his loss.”

I had to stop a moment, because it was true. I knew Jake was a great guy. I couldn’t understand how anybody, least of all his folks, could feel any different.

“If he hates you,” I continued, “it’s because he won’t let himself see you. He takes what he wants to see – maybe what he wants, doesn’t want to see in himself – and tries to fit it onto you. Maybe his mistakes make him worry about you. But”—I gripped his shoulder harder—“we’re just kids! What do we know? Only that our parents should love us, and should protect us. But, if he won’t, to hell with him. Who needs him? That’s why we’ve got brothers, right? That’s why we’ve got friends.”

There was a long pause. My hand felt funny, and heavy, on his unresponsive shoulder, so I pulled it away. I finally asked, “You gonna run away?”

“No.”

“It might be best, you know, if—”

“I can’t.”

“Why not? If it’s not safe for you—”

He cut me off again. “I can’t, because – I’ve got to protect Jeremy.”

For the life of me, I couldn’t puzzle out how that was an answer to my question. But, I nodded, and couldn’t stop myself from asking, “Protect him . . . from what . . . ? Jeremy and your dad don’t get along either?”

Jake looked shocked. “You are too good. You . . . you, just don’t get it, do you?”

I shrugged. “I might be able to.”

“I keep my dad off of Jeremy. If I’m not there—” Jake couldn’t go on. Was that . . . shame on Jake’s face? That look – the same as on Ralph, the same as on the Monsignor – sent a cold shiver down my back. I did not understand. Jake hadn’t done anything; that much I knew.

To hell with it, I put my hand back across his back. I rocked Jake a quiet moment, trying to get him to cheer up, and then, as softly as I could, I added, “So, who cares if you’re Gay—”

Jake pushed me back, toppling my shoulder to the floor. He stood and bent a mean glare down on me. His fist drew back in full anger to punch me. “I ain’t no F*gg*t!” he said, and spittle stung my eyes. I thought he would hit me, but after another moment, he stumbled backwards a couple of paces like a drunk on TV.

I stood myself up. I stood myself up to him. I really didn’t care if he wanted to hit me. If his dad had hit him because of me, then somehow it seemed only fair that Jake sock me one for it.

“Okay!” I said, half-reaching for his forearm. “So you ain’t. So your dad’s a big fat jerk. So you feel like shit ‘cause he treats you like shit. I bet he’s just like that kid in Kmart – he says it to others cause he hears it a lot, or heard it a lot when he was your age. Maybe he can’t help but pass it along . . . but – you missed my point. My point is – who cares? Who cares if a girl loves a girl, or a boy a boy – what difference does it make?”

“Difference!” he shouted, knocking my arm back. “It’s the difference between love and hate; that’s all! Between life and death . . . that’s . . . all—” Suddenly, his fury was spent. He pleadingly locked onto my gaze. “Not even you can be too good to understand the difference between living and dying. Like love and hate, we usually don’t get to choose which.”

I didn’t know what to say. Jake pushed past me. He moved away, over to a cabinet full of porcelain children with rose swags and trees with swings. After a long moment, Jake murmured something down to them, and I had to go up behind him to hear.

“You want to know the truth . . . ?” he repeated.

“About what?”

“Why they call it a F*g Tree?”

“Okay, yes.”

“My dad says it’s called that, because down in Australia, it’s the tree they used to hang guys like me. He says, one day, he’ll string me up there himself.”

I put my fist into his hand from behind and forced him to turn to me. I wasn’t giving up on Jake. “Why do you care what your dad thinks? You ain’t; you ain’t. You are; you are – to hell with him – you’re the one that matters.”

“I care because he says God doesn’t want me like that.”

“But,” I said and blinked, because this seemed obvious to me, “it’s God that makes people. He doesn’t make mistakes. However the way you are, the way any of us are, it’s because God wants us that way.”

Jake seemed confused. But soon his darting expression settled into something that looked like relief.

I squeezed his hand and then shook it up to his shoulder. “Right?” I asked. “Right!” I demanded.

He let out a long breath he’d been hiding from me. I felt his hand grip mine in return.

“Right,” he said.

I led Jake back over to the case we had been leaning on. I made him sit. I sat and put my arm around him.

“Think of all the fun you’ll have in Florida. I wish I was going! You’ll get to go to Disney World every day – you’ll get to swim with Flipper . . . ” Now I was excited. “You’ll love it . . . !”

But Jake looked worse yet. He propped the back of his head on the cabinet, and again a tear went from the corner of his eye and fell slowly into the corner of his mouth.

“Don’t worry,” I whispered. “Things will get better with your old man. Down there, things will change. I just know it. You wait and see.”

Jake reached up and put both arms around me. I felt his wild tears on my cheek. As he sobbed, his were joined with mine.

“I’m gonna miss you,” he choked out.

For some reason, I lifted my hand. I stroked the haloed chestnut hair of this boy two years older than me as if he were an infant. I soothed it over and over again as he cried, and I tried to say “I’m gonna miss you too” but, I don’t think anything came out.

     ˚˚˚˚˚

In my dad’s truck, as we rolled away from the twilight, I held up a Polaroid square. In the breeze that flapped in from the black farm soil beyond, I looked at Jake and me standing arm in arm. Flo had rustled us up against the side of her barn, by the living room, and set Rex to sit at our touching feet. “Smile!” she had called out – and Jake, and me, we couldn’t smile – how? – it seemed all of humanity in the two of us had never smiled before in our lives. For Jake and me it was an impossible request. For us, the act of holding on was enough – more than enough. But for Rex, the familiar command caused him on cue, no doubt because he was happy, to bare his teeth and brush the grass with his tail.

In the rose-colored light coming from behind me, Jeremy had gone into a half-gig, half-lightsaber parry when I lowered the tailgate of my dad’s truck and pulled a box forward. Jake and Jeremy peered at my Space: 1999 Eagle 1, and I said, “You guys can keep it.” And then quietly to Jake, I added, “Just don’t forget me.”

And now, rolling homeward, this picture – one snapshot – was my last tangible link to the first person I knew in my heart, without any doubt, was a true friend to me. My only consolation was in thinking that Jake too had a near-identical snapshot, and maybe, he wouldn’t forget me after all.

Part 8: Mary on Top of the World

The school bell rings loudly and sharply. Lunch break is over. Miss Hill comes up to me and takes the books, and then half- sneers, “Well, did you think about what has happened?”

I collapse into my desk chair, my eyes lighting on the pitiless, pained look, on the face of the 4th grade Madonna.

“Yes,” I said, as she puts the books back in order on the shelf.

My classmates stream in, laughing; chatting merrily about many nothings. And my mind’s eye shifts out to the school’s lobby. While the statue of Mary is different in each class – the 2nd grade one even has blond hair – the power-force of Saint Lazarus School Marys is the life-size one in the lobby corner. Here, her black hair pours out from beneath a sky-blue veil to fall over shoulders, and then down to her bent elbows, which end by coming forward with her hands locking in prayer. Her violet eyes cast gazes over all of us children who pass beneath her perch on the North Pole – America front and center, with her gold sandals crushing the Canadian prairie lands. But this Mary looks sadder than all the rest. This Mary wears a starry crown; this Mary treads on a green serpent. It writhes its way from coast to coast, and I suppose, the devil himself is ground under her heel. Yet, if she has so much power over evil, why does she cast such remorseful eyes on the children she watches? Where is evil? – In the devil’s heart, or, in our own? Where is betrayal? – In the garden’s temptation? Or, in the Judas kiss? And love? – In a helpless standing-by? Or, in Judas defiling the priests’ eternal home?

Perhaps I was wrong to tell Jake to stick to a family situation where he was an outsider. I wanted to believe what I told him – that things will get better – but I should have told him then what I thought of later. That dealing with his dad takes all the skill and planning that Jake and Jeremy use on their fan. The right approach; the correct application of force, on the right spot, and the cutting blades of his quarrels with his son would stop – would be forced to stop. Somehow though, I think I said as much to Jake without needing to spell it out. Jake knows what to do. Maybe that’s why I feel so strongly that things will get better for him – because he will know just how to make them better – even if he does have to run away, and find a new family.

And what of our hallway Madonna? Is there any safety in her powerless pity, or merely opportunity for the worst of human instincts to let things pass by, under voiceless sorrow – and how am I to know? I am just a kid.

I pull out my math book. Miss Hill starts the lesson, and a sinking feeling of being sick settles down my throat.

Yes, I had thought about what had happened, and I had swallowed hard. For what in the whole world is worse than a father not loving a son; a mother not loving a daughter; or God not loving all of us enough to keep us safe.

Outside these walls, the spring air forms swirling eddies to shake the boughs of the trees nearby. I can see them. I can sense them –

The Judas tree stands for frailty and blood-remorse. The treachery of trust itself wracks its weak branches, and guilt stains it blossoms.

The spruce is a tower of respectability – but sticky, it traps innocence with sharp needles that bear neither fruit nor flower.

The cigar tree – the F*g tree – it weeps like a willow for all those who have gone before, but it is stately. It holds its head up high, no matter what.

As I turn the page, I hope I am not about to stain it. I feel now that any betrayal of love is a betrayal of God, and worthy of action to see right done; to do right; and create right in the name of whatever is good here on Earth – the only place He has given us to live, to love, and where we all must eventually die.

I swallow hard again. This time I can taste it. This time, I know what it is I am putting into my gut. It is anger. I am angry.

~