I heaved the bucket out of the sink and onto the floor. “Should I count you in?”
“Yes! Wait. What’s that mean?”
“You’ll understand when I do it.”
“Okay. Do it.” Izzy gave me a very serious stare, anticipating the count-in.
“A one and a two and a three and a—” I pointed at Izzy and she belted out one of Jimmy’s songs from an album that we’d now listened to many, many times. At the parts where Jimmy’s voice turned to tossed gravel, Izzy tried to make her voice gravelly too.
I mopped the floor and sang along at the chorus. When the song ended, Izzy took a deep, shoulder-rising breath and then started all over again. She sang the song once more as I poured out the water and refilled the bucket for the second mop. Everyone walked barefoot in this house—double-mopping was essential.
We were singing Jimmy’s song, I was harmonizing with Izzy’s gravelly chorus, when Jimmy came into the kitchen. He wore his cutoff shorts and no shirt or shoes. I tried to look away from the Woody Woodpecker tattoo on his thigh, but then found myself staring at the leather-and-feather necklace nestled into the fur on his chest. I moved my head up higher to Jimmy’s electric stare.
Jimmy was a tattooed drug addict who had used heroin just yesterday, and maybe destroyed this kitchen. Still, all the great things about him—including his handsomeness and charisma—remained as powerful as always. It was easy to see why Sheba loved him so much.
“Oh Jesus Christ, Mary Jane.” Jimmy turned his head away from me and stared at the floor. Then the sink. Then at Izzy on the table. And finally back at me and then to the mop in my hand. His eyes were more sad than electric now. Even his bleached hair looked sad; it hung, as if windblown, over his eyes.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Christ almighty, Mary Jane. Izzy. Ah fuck!” Jimmy slapped his hand into his head.
Izzy stared at him, her big eyes moving from me to Jimmy and back to me. I put the mop in the bucket and leaned the handle against the counter. I didn’t know what to do. Or to say. All this: the drugs, the breaking-things fight, and now the clear remorse were brand-new to me.
“Oh, Mary Jane.” Jimmy was crying now. Real crying, tears tumbling down his cheeks. He stepped into the kitchen and pulled me into him and sobbed with his face buried into the top of my head. I’d never seen a man cry in my life. Not even in a movie.
Jimmy’s shoulders shook and he made actual noises. He was trying to talk, but the crying kept pumping out of him. Izzy hopped off the table and ran to us. She put one arm around me and one around Jimmy and buried her head between our thighs.
“I’m so sorry,” Jimmy sobbed.
“It’s okay, Jimmy, it’s okay. We’re not mad!” Izzy said.
I tried to speak, but it felt like there was a rolled ball of Wonder Bread stuck in my throat.
“You shouldn’t have had to see this.” Jimmy’s words stuttered out through his tears.
“JIMMY! We’re not mad! We love you. We’re not angry.” Izzy spoke for the two of us. I still couldn’t get out a word.
Jimmy started crying harder and then tears were rolling down my face too. I tried not to make a sound, but I could feel little hiccups coming out of me.
“It’s okay. It’s okay.” Izzy rubbed our legs with her tiny hands.
“It’s fine, I swear,” I finally said.
Jimmy pulled his head from mine, and held my face in his hands. “Oh Jesus, now I made you cry too.”
“I’m fine.” I sniffed. “I don’t know why I’m crying.” I laughed a little.
Jimmy stared at me, shaking his head; he wasn’t crying now. Izzy rubbed our legs and studied our faces. I was sniffing and laughing and still crying too.
“I’m just so sorry. I really lost control.”
“JIMMY, WE’RE NOT MAD AT YOU!” Izzy shouted. “Eat Laughing Cow with me, and Mary Jane will feed you milk too.”
Jimmy looked down at Izzy and laughed. And then I really laughed. He picked up Izzy, kissed her cheeks, and carried her to the table. “Let me finish the mopping,” he said to me.
“I’m almost done. I swear it’s fine.” I quickly grabbed the mop and went over the last corners while Jimmy and Izzy sat at the banquette and ate Laughing Cow. What had happened last night seemed so horrible. But after that cry, and then the laugh, I felt ridiculously happy.
“Do you want Mary Jane to hold the carton? She holds it good.”
“Oh, little Izzy, carton is the only way we ever did it in West Virginia. I’m a pro.” Jimmy picked up the milk carton and chugged. Then he held the carton to Izzy’s mouth, at just the right angle so it wouldn’t spill down her chin.