Bingo Brown and the Language of Love Read online

  “Bingo, I think I sent Melissa’s letter to you and yours to Melissa.”

  Bingo’s shoulders collapsed with relief. “Oh, is that all? That’s nothing, nothing,” he said gallantly.

  “You don’t know what the letters said.”

  “Well, that’s true, but—”

  “If you did, you wouldn’t say it was nothing.”

  “Oh?”

  “You would say it was, like, the opposite of nothing.”

  Bingo waited. He was incapable of further speech. He had even used up all his ohs.

  “So, Bingo, I have come to ask for a favor.”

  Bingo waited limply.

  “When you get your letter and open it, if you see that it starts out ‘Dear Melissa,’ please don’t read the rest, please! Promise!”

  “I never read other people’s mail.”

  “You mean that?”

  Bingo nodded.

  “Oh, Bingo, you are just as nice as Melissa always said you were. Thank you, thank—”

  For one terrible moment Bingo thought she was going to take his hand. Maybe even press her lips against it.

  He got quickly to his feet. He folded his arms around Misty and tucked his hands in his armpits.

  Anyway, he knew one thing. He had had enough mixed-sex conversations to last him an eternity, even infinity. The National Enquirer could do what they would with it. “Boy Swears Off Mixed-Sex Conversations for Infinity.”

  “I have to go now,” he said.

  “Did I come at a bad time? I’m sorry. But I just saw you sitting there, you know, and I had to stop you from reading the letter. I just had to. You just don’t know what the letter said or you’d—”

  Bingo reached for the doorknob.

  “Excuse me. I have something important to do.”

  “Cook?”

  Bingo shook his head and went into the house.

  He had not lied. He did have something important to do, one of the most important things he had ever done in his life: collapse.

  He did this on the sofa, with Misty in the crook of his arm like a football.

  The scent of overcooked lasagna flowed from the kitchen, calling him, but Bingo did not respond.

  The Kiss

  BINGO LAY WITH HIS eyes closed. He was trying to remember the last time his mom and dad had been happy, the last time he had seen them happy.

  He sighed as he remembered. The last time his mom and dad had been happy was the worst day of Bingo’s life—the rainy afternoon he and Melissa had said goodbye.

  It was the day Melissa had moved. The rain had been falling steadily since dawn.

  Bingo had intended to ride his bike over to say goodbye, but because it was raining so hard, his parents drove him. After Bingo’s good-bye, they were going to Bingo’s grandmother’s birthday supper.

  The car was full of presents and balloons, and the balloons were for some reason attracted to Bingo’s dad. They kept bobbing over to his head.

  His dad batted them away. “Nance, get these fool balloons away from me. Why do they keep coming at my head?”

  “They probably recognize a similar empty space and think it’s one of them.” His mom laughed.

  “This is not funny, Nance. I’m going to have a wreck if these balloons don’t leave me alone.”

  Bingo had not joined in the laughter. He was going to say good-bye to the woman he loved.

  They pulled up in front of Melissa’s, and Bingo got out. The front porch was like a stage. The light was on; the curtain seemed to be rising.

  Bingo climbed the steps and stood at the door. Movers, Melissa’s brothers, her mother passed around him. Bingo was only aware of the door that Melissa would come through.

  At last she came. The sight of her made him weak in the knees.

  She had on bibbed shorts and a flashy green shirt. There, was a pink ribbon in her gypsy hair. She said softly, “Hi, Bingo.”

  He said, “Hi.”

  She said, “I was afraid we wouldn’t get to say goodbye.”

  He said, “I wouldn’t have let that happen.”

  There was a pause while they looked at each other. They had eye contact. When you had eye contact with Melissa, Bingo realized, you knew you were having eye contact. He felt as if his eyes were popping out of his head.

  Blindly, he groped for her hand. Her fingers curled around his.

  Melissa said, “Will you write to me?”

  Suddenly, with a start, Bingo realized that what Melissa was really saying was, “Will you love me forever?”

  Bingo said, “Yes, I will. Will you answer?” He meant, “Yes, and will you love me back forever?”

  She understood! He could see it in her eyes!

  She said, “Yes.”

  Bingo was exhilarated. It was like speaking a foreign language that no one else can understand, so you can speak it freely! Anywhere! Even in front of Melissa’s brothers and mother!

  They were speaking—Bingo gasped with insight. This was the language of love.

  “Bingo!” It was his mother calling from the car. “We’ve got to go!”

  He turned back to Melissa. “Well, good-bye.” He meant, “This is not good-bye.”

  “Bye, Bingo.” She meant, “Not by a long shot!”

  Bingo took a deep, manly breath. The moist air that filled his lungs thrilled him.

  He looked down at her. Her face was lit up as if by moonlight. Bingo realized that there was only so much that could be done with words. Even the language of love had its limitations.

  Bingo bent then, recklessly, to kiss Melissa’s cheek. He wanted to kiss her mouth, of course, but he felt Melissa’s mom had her eye on him.

  At the very moment he leaned forward, Melissa’s mom said, “Oh, Melissa, I want you to—” Melissa turned toward her mom and toward Bingo’s lips.

  Bingo kissed her mouth.

  Bingo kissed Melissa’s mouth!

  He only caught the corner, but—but! Just kissing the corner of her mouth had been so thrilling that something under his ribs, something he didn’t even know he had—maybe it was his stomach, he couldn’t be sure—anyway, this something flipped over.

  He knew it had been the same for Melissa because she had her hand over her ribs, too.

  He had a tumbling sensation, though he wasn’t falling. There was the faint scent of gingersnaps in the damp air.

  Honk! Honk!

  “Bingo! Come on! We’re ready to go!”

  He must have walked to the car. He must have gotten in. But it was like watching slides. In one slide he was on the porch staring into Melissa’s eyes. Then click! He was in the car, watching her through the rain.

  As they drove away, Bingo thought that he and Melissa belonged together. They were like two halves of an apple, a matching pair of socks, salt and pepper shakers—

  Bingo’s father interrupted his thoughts. “Are you asleep, Son?”

  Bingo’s eyes snapped open. “What time is it?”

  “Almost eleven.”

  Bingo looked around the living room. He blinked. He had been lying on the sofa since Cici left. Misty was still in the crook of his arm, snoring softly.

  “Is Mom with you?”

  “No.”

  “Where is she?”

  “She’s at your grandmother’s.”

  “Still?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is she ever coming home?”

  “I hope so.” His dad ran his hands through his hair. “Look, I’ve got to have something to eat, and then we’ll talk if you want to.”

  Bingo said, “Oh, there’s lasagna.”

  He followed his dad into the kitchen and opened the oven door. The lasagna had hardened into a small ill-smelling dark ball. He and his father eyed it together.

  “You know what I feel like having?” His dad moved toward the pantry, hands on his hips, stretching to ease his back.

  “What?”

  “Popcorn with milk. Want some?”

  “I guess.” Bingo didn’t
meet his father’s tired eyes. He knew that when his dad was a boy, his favorite food had been popcorn and milk.

  It seemed to Bingo that both his parents were going into reverse. His mom was at her mother’s, sleeping in the twin bed she had slept in as a girl. His dad was eating little kid food out of a bowl. He alone was continuing to age, and at an alarming rate.

  Bingo sat down at the table. When Bingo’s dad put his bowl of popcorn before him, Bingo ate it slowly, one piece at a time. He watched his father so intently that sometimes he raised an empty spoon to his mouth.

  His dad finished first and said, “Well.” He pushed back his bowl. “Bingo …” He spread his freckled hands flat on the table.

  “Yes?”

  “Well, I know you’ve been aware that …”

  He trailed off. Bingo said firmly, “I’ve been aware that something is very, very wrong,” to get the conversation back on track.

  His father said, “Yes, Bingo. This afternoon your mother found out for sure that—”

  There was the sound of a car horn in the driveway. Billy Wentworth shouted, “Misty, Misty, we’re home! We’re back!”

  Then Mrs. Wentworth’s voice said, “Billy, don’t wake the Browns. It’s after eleven.”

  “The lights are on! They’re up! I see them! They’re still eating! Misty!”

  His sister said, “I’ll get Misty, Billy. You help Dad with the suitcases.”

  “She’s staying at my friend’s house,” Wentworth said, “so I’ll get her.”

  There was a noisy competition on the front steps. Then Billy knocked loudly on the screen.

  “Hey, Bingo! I’m here for my dog!”

  Misty came out from under the table and looked at Bingo, her wet eyes confused.

  “Bad news; they’re back,” Bingo said. “You got to go home.”

  As he picked up Misty, he glanced at his father, who was sitting with his head bowed. “I’ll be right back,” he said.

  He carried Misty to the front door, bending as he went to pick up the blanket. “Here,” he said, opening the door.

  “Misty,” Billy’s sister cried.

  “Get back! She’s mine!” Billy said.

  Bingo thrust the dog into the tangle of arms, U-turned, and went straight to the kitchen.

  His father was waiting as Bingo had left him, freckled hands spread flat on either side of his bowl, head bowed.

  Bingo took the seat opposite him. It was, Bingo thought, like people visiting in a prison waiting room, people who’d been apart so long they’d forgotten how to communicate.

  His dad cleared his throat. “Bingo,” he said.

  “Yes, goon.”

  “Bingo, your mom found out today … found out for sure today … that… Bingo, your mother’s pregnant.”

  Madness at Midnight

  BINGO LET OUT A sharp cry of pain, an animal sound he had not known his lungs and vocal cords were capable of.

  He closed his eyes. He tried to regulate his breathing, to slow his racing heart, to bring his body back to the normalcy of ten minutes ago.

  His dad was saying, “It would have been wonderful if it had happened ten years ago. Your mom wanted a second child then, a little brother or sister for you.”

  Blindly, Bingo drew in his breath. The thought was so alien, so unthinkable that his brain refused to process it.

  It had never even occurred to him ten years ago that his parents might be considering such a reckless act. He had assumed that he would be child enough for any family.

  And all the while, as he lay sleeping peacefully in the glow of his Mickey Mouse night light, they had been plotting madness. This was not the correct word, but Bingo was too tired to word search. Madness was good enough.

  “But it didn’t happen and it didn’t happen,” his dad continued, “and so your mom accepted that it wouldn’t happen and got on with her life.”

  Bingo’s tongue flicked over his dry lips. He was breathing so rapidly through his mouth that his lips were already dry again.

  “You know, Bingo, something that would make a person, like your mom, very happy at one point in her life, say when she’s twenty-eight, doesn’t make her so happy when she’s thirty-eight.”

  Another one of life’s cruel twists of fate, Bingo thought. It was as if their lives were being governed by a capricious child. “You want it now? Well, you can’t have it.” “You don’t want it anymore? Well, here it is, pal.”

  “I guess not.”

  As he spoke, Bingo opened his eyes and looked at the world. Surprisingly, it was exactly the same.

  “When she told me she thought she was going to have a baby—this was last week, before her appointment with the doctor—well, I made the mistake of being happy about it. I was happy about it, Bingo, but I probably shouldn’t have shown it so quickly.”

  “Why not?”

  “Certainly not before I showed concern for her feelings. Your mom got angry with me. Your mom can get very angry when she wants to, Bingo.”

  “I know.”

  “She said, ‘Well, of course you’d be happy, it won’t affect you. It’s not your job. It’s not your life.’ See, Bingo, after years of lousy jobs—selling Mary Kay cosmetics, Tupperware—she’s finally got something interesting, something challenging.”

  He shook his head. “Then today, when she found out for sure, she called me, and before I could say a word, she yelled, ‘Yes, and do you realize that when this baby is Bingo’s age, I’ll be fifty?’ Then she hung up.”

  Bingo did a little quick arithmetic of his own. When this baby is my age, I’ll be—He gasped aloud.

  “Anything wrong?” his father asked.

  “I’ll be twenty-four,” Bingo said. He repeated the unhappy number to himself. Twenty-four! He wished he had a phone in his hand so he could slam down the receiver the way his mother had. Twenty-four—Bam!

  His father went on as if Bingo had not spoken. “So now she doesn’t even want to talk to me about it at all. Actually, we’re both too upset to talk sensibly.”

  “Me too.”

  “We’ll work it out, but right now she’s over at your grandmother’s—”

  “You saw her?”

  “Oh, yes. They were sitting on the sofa, right where I knew they’d be, and your grandmother’d been saying all the right things—”

  Bingo interrupted. “Like what? What would be the right things?”

  “Like, ‘I know you’re upset; you have every right to be. It will work out. I’ll help you. You’re a strong person, you always have been.’ Things like that, things I should have said. …”

  “Oh.”

  At any other time, Bingo might have sympathized with his dad because he himself frequently said the wrong thing. Like right now. If it wasn’t for oh, Bingo would not have been able to say anything at all. But his sympathies were all for himself.

  He remembered a book his dad had had last November during election. His dad had worked at the polls, and they had given him a book titled What to Do If. And in this book were listed all the things that could possibly go wrong and what to do about them.

  Bingo needed a book like that. And he needed it now. It would give him comfort to turn to the index.

  “What to Do If: Your parents let you down by belatedly conceiving a sibling, pp. 41-45.”

  What relief to turn to page forty-one and—

  His dad blew out all the air in his lungs as he got to his feet. He was like a whale coming up after a particularly deep dive.

  “Bingo, I’ve got to go to bed. I’ve had it.”

  “I’m tired, too.”

  “We’ll talk tomorrow.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s going to work out somehow, Bingo.”

  Bingo nodded, watching the shriveled pieces of popcorn floating on the milk in his bowl.

  His dad paused in the doorway. “Aren’t you coming to bed?”

  “I’ll just clean up. …” Bingo made a magicianlike gesture over the table, as if to wave away
the hard ball of lasagna, the wet popcorn.

  “Well, don’t be too late.”

  “No.”

  Bingo kept sitting there until he heard the sound of running water in the bathroom. Then he got slowly to his feet.

  “Actually, it’s already too late,” he said.

  He was sorry Misty was not there to look at him with her sympathetic, tearful eyes. He wondered if it was too late to go over and borrow Misty. He knew if he told the Wentworths why he needed her, they would hand her over with sympathetic, tearful eyes of their own.

  With leaden arms, Bingo began to clear the table.

  Purple Smurfs

  BINGO WAS HAVING AN imaginary phone call with Melissa, since that was the only kind he was allowed to have these days.

  “Melissa, hi. It’s me, Bingo.”

  Of course he could not speak the language of love. He was no longer eligible. He would have to get right to the point, before her voice had a chance to deepen with pleasure.

  “Melissa, I have terrible news. I am going to become a brother.”

  “Bingo!” she would cry with instant sympathy. Then her voice would lower. “Oh, Bingo.”

  Bingo broke off the imaginary phone call. He remembered with a leap of heart their first real phone call. Now that had been a phone call!

  “Melissa, hi. It’s Bingo. M-member me?” His hands, his knees, his very soul had been trembling. Also his voice.

  “Bingo, is it really you?”

  “Yes.”

  “This isn’t someone playing a joke?”

  “No.”

  “Oh, I was hoping it would be you. When I heard the phone ring, I started hoping. Bingo, guess what?”

  “What?”

  “This is the first phone call I’ve gotten since we moved to Bixby.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, and you know something else?”

  “What?”

  “If I could only have one phone call, this is the phone call I would want to have.”

  A rush of burning questions brought Bingo back to the present. Will Melissa still love me when she knows I’m a brother? Can anyone love a person who may be dealing in dirty diapers? Will I be able to deal with diapers without collapsing? Does—

  There was a knock at Bingo’s window.