Sinners as Saints

Odie stood Sully up to the wall, a yard stick in hand. “My, you're gettin' so big,” she commented. Sully stood at a massive four feet. “Pretty soon, honey, you're gonna be taller than me.” Another foot, another few inches.

Sully squirmed against the wall. Six am was his least favorite time of day. Although, for some reason, it was when his head was clearest. “Yeah,” he agreed. “'M gonna rocket past ya pretty soon.

Licking her lips, Odie pushed tufts of dark brown hair off Sully's forehead and kissed him there, right in the middle. “You wanna put up some cards with me, or study vocab while I get breakfast ready?”

Sully lifted a brow. “You're gonna decorate, ma?”

“Decorate... What a loaded word,” Odie laughed. Sully was a sponge. He sucked everything up and gave it back in some pretty interesting ways.

Leaning into the small bathroom, she flicked off the light. A hand ran through her wet hair before she put it up in a soft cotton shirt. “Can I play Skate?” Sully's pale blue eyes scanned the studio apartment's living room. Behind a cheap lazy boy was a bunk bed; Sully slept in the top, ma on the bottom. The room was small and cluttered.

Transitional housing. Sully didn't know the meaning of “transitional.” But he assumed that it was a place for other Mas and other Sullys to stick together. When they went outside, he noticed the people sitting on the stairwell, smoking cigarettes. Every one of them war thick coats even though it was eternal summertime. Some of them shook, too. Sometimes shook the coats right off. Their big eyes scared him.

Sully knew the meaning of eternal. It meant forever, and ever, and ever – a span of time he couldn't fathom but figured it was at least as long as two two hour TV shows. When Ma watched Forensic Files, that went on and on and on, well into the night when he couldn't keep his eyes open anymore.

“Ma,” he said.

Odie reached up for the lamp's switch. The room lit up in a pale orange light. “Huh, bub?” she said.

“Uh... I don't know how to ask.”

“Well, tell me about it. We'll figure it out.”

Sully sat in the lazy boy, the itchy fabric on his back and little legs. He only wore freshly cleaned Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle underwear and socks. Ma called 'em dirty smurf hats because when he'd go running, they'd come loose and the grey toes slipped down and folded under his feet.

Two TVs and a big ol' sound system sat against the wall, under the window. A big one, connected to an old PS2. If he could read much more than short, simple words, he still wouldn't be able to read the subtitles. The TV was old, the emblem above the buttons at the bottom: a Z shaped like a lightning bolt. Sully had vague memories of a TV just like it, but that one was dead and gone, and several versions older.

On top was a smaller one with a built in VHS player; the lady in it said it was going to be a nice day. A high of ninety-five, with a heat index of one hundred, and winds up to twenty miles an hour. Sully nodded like he knew what any of that meant. When it came down to it, he figured ninety-five was a good number. Nice and big. A lot.

“Sully?” Odie said, from the hall, or maybe the kitchen which faded into the hall.

“What, ma?” he said.

“What were you gonna ask me?” She was closer, adding clothes to the small washer in the hall closet. That's where all his clothes hung, behind the white sliding doors.

“Uh...” He said, trying to think back to what he was thinking before he sat down. “How long is... forever?” At least that's what he thought. Maybe. Sully couldn't have been sure.

The washer was started. The machine filled, the noise of the water filling the drum overtook everything else.

Odie pursed her lips in thought as she climbed into the bottom bunk bed with a cardboard box filled to the brim with library cards. It's what she did – she drove around and got free library cards, collecting them and collecting them. Before making it to Huntington, she and Sully drove around Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, and SoCal just to get library cards.

“Forever depends,” she answered. “When you go to school, ya know, chances are, you're gonna think it feels like forever. I know I did. When you learn about stars, you're gonna think five hundred billion years is forever. But even stars die. Forever... It's a concept that even I don't know a whole lot about. Guess you could say only God does.” She opened a notebook on her lap. It was almost completely filled with dates and card names. The first was Boardwalk Mid-Continent Public Library. Just three months ago, she took Sully there every Sunday, her only day off.

Sully got out of the chair and turned on the bottom TV. He turned the volume down low on both TVs, and turned on the sound system. The button on the PS2 when from red to green with a tiny tap. “'Mote?” he said. Odie held up a universal remote over her shoulder. It always wound up under her pillow.

“Can you change it to the Skate channel?” Sully asked, the PS2 controller in his hands.

Odie pressed the input button without turning back to the TVs. The first notes of Ozzy Osborne's “I Don't Wanna Stop” vibrated the window to the upper left of the speakers. “Turn it down, please,” Odie called over it. Sully sighed. He had one foot on the chair; he dropped it and turned around, turning the knob back.

The CD in the player was one that Sully practically made himself, solely to playing Skate. A little Pantera, a little Metallica, a little Atreyu, some other tunes Odie liked tossed in here and there.

Both their music tastes were fairly eclectic.

Sully couldn't remember exactly what Odie had told him about music. Back in Happy Rock, he was beginning to take music lessons. Piano, drums, though for some reason he'd gone through a phase where he was completely obsessed with the cello. He had to stop going to lessons a few months before they packed up and left. He cried and cried. Having to say goodbye to his teachers at Funky Monkey Music was definitely the hardest thing he'd survived through yet.

In the car on the way back to their old house in the poorer part of Happy Rock, “The Dirty Thirties,” as it was known, Sully sat in his car seat wailing. Odie was on the phone as she drove back to the house, talking to her best friend, Kari.

Odie and Sully didn't really have any family, apart from Aunt Kari. Sully didn't know a whole lot about human biology, but he was aware enough of the fact that Kari and Odie weren't related. They were friends from elementary school. Kari had a daughter, Cordelia June, who was a year younger than he. “I can't afford 'em anymore,” Odie had told her. “I'm saving up to move 'im across the country, y'know, so I had... I had to tell 'im he couldn't anymore, and goddamn, Kocknose, it'sa killin' 'im.”

When Sully closed his eyes in the back of the Plymouth '92 van, he could see little cheetah spots of where the tears were running under his eyelids.

Being five years old, and deeply consumed by memories he didn't know he had, Sully hadn't considered the strain of moving. All the things he'd leave behind. It was familiar enough. But when they got up to the porch, and in his fit, he screeched: “I'm just gonna quit music!”
Odie swiveled with the door's keys in her hands.

She knelt beside him from where he was on the top step. Her arm crushed him to her side; the slippery puff jacket she wore to beat the cold was warm on the outside from the sun. It was a bright day, a travesty of sorts: a sad day in November, and it was sunny and only cold because of the wind through sleeping, leafless trees. “I know you don't know a lot about humanity right now,” Odie whispered to him. A few kids played basketball down the street with a short plastic hoop. “But if you quit now, Jimmy, you're gonna live to regret it. We'll get'cha started back up when we get settled, okay? We'll have a good set up. That's why I'm workin' late now, y'know? That's why y'stay with Aunt Kari at night. I know it hurts on the surface, but deep down, we'd both be... miserable, absolute misery ridden without music in our lives. 'Cause it's more than frequencies and vibrations, Jim. It's pieces of somebody's soul wrapped up tight for was to open and take into ourselves. Music is a gift.”

The plastic over the broken out attic window whistled, a gust of wind forcing a shiver out of him. “Okay,” he said. Odie put her fuzzy boots down on the front step, one of two, and pulled Sully onto her lap. Her thinly gloved hands took his. “But... I don't know if that's what I wanna do.”

“Don't worry about it,” she said. They watched the houses across the street; each house, two or three stories with broken and boarded up windows. The chipped paint faded by the sun where they hadn't been built with bricks. “The first thing you need to remember about life is that it goes quick, so there's nothing to do but go with the flow. But you're taking lessons no matter what. 'Cause that's one thing my parents never did for me.”

His head rested against her chest, snug in her jacket. “I'm glad to go.”
Her rent was only three hundred a month for the decaying house behind them. She couldn't afford to work on it. The upper levels were always colder than the lower, especially in the winter. Odie was determined to get them out of there... Even if it may not end up being a nicer place where they went. But she was done stripping at night, working at target, and needed to call her piercing master to figure out if he trusted anyone out west to show her the rest.

“Me too, punk, me too. C'mon. Let's finish up your room, huh?”
Back in the present, Sully's guy in Skate died already a few times. He didn't want to focus on it. There was something welling in his chest. Something powerful and, and...

He let his guy die another time. Standing up in the lazy boy, he put his arms over the head rest as the chair creaked backward. “Ma,” he murmured. He watched her back. Odie sat on her butt, her legs bent and pulled in the way the girls at daycare sat in dresses. Plaid and purple boxers, a sleeveless shirt that said, “Ok, but first, COFFEE.”
“Uh huh,” she answered, sticking library cards in order by date on the wall with double stick tape.

“Can we go to the beach?”

Their apartment building was one of many on Orchid Drive, a back road connected to Happy Drive. A street full of sandy beige multistory buildings surrounded by concrete gates and palm trees. Huntington Beach State Park, once out of Orchid and on the corner of Talbert, was a straight shot down Beach Boulevard with a slight left down the PCH. Five miles, eleven minutes without traffic. But on the PCH this early, there was always traffic.

“Why don't we stop at IHOP on Beach B-L-V-D before we head to the park, huh? It's a little early. People are heading to work and I don't want nothin' to do with that today, babe.” Odie had a row of library cards up; she cut rectangles of tape and started on another row.

“We never eat cooked food this early, though, ma!” Sully answered. There was a degree of hysteria in his voice. They always, always had smoothies for breakfast, and fruit bowls for lunch. He couldn't imagine eating cooked food or even meat until after four pm.

Odie laughed, finally deciding to put the cards and craft things away in the box at the end of the bed. “Well, maybe today's special.”

“You always say everyday is special,” Sully pointed out, as he went to the hall closet. He picked out red swimming trunks and a yellow surf shirt. “All of 'em!”

“Because,” Odie smiled, “Every day is. New and different and special in loads of ways. Even the rough ones.”

IHOP was right beside Seaport Square. Player's Club Tattoo was there. And rumors flew. Said the last piercer quit. Nobody seemed to know why, which was strange, because in the world of body modification, it seemed to attract little gossip boys and girls like no other.

Even if it wasn't too cool of a place to work, Odie had to start somewhere.

“It's not even seven yet,” Sully continued, stretching his toes into small black flip flops. “Do I need my wings, ma?”

Odie's feet carried her to the kitchen. She got a mug of water, threw in a couple spoonfuls of instant coffee and popped the mug into the microwave.

“Yes, of course you need your wings,” she said absently. Her thoughts were continuing on the terrain of the future; she would pop by Player's Club. See what that whole situation was about. CA-39 was all car dealerships, liquor stores, markets, squares made up like Seaport. If it wasn't dusty beige concrete it was a little building made out of wood and painted white, island shack style. The black top was always hot, and wherever you looked, just some hundred feet ahead, the heat rose up and made everything in the distance what Sully liked to call “squiggly.” “Grab the beach bag off the hook,” she told him, pointing to a prepacked tote bag hanging next to the laundry units, white with a little brown and green palm tree sewn in on the front.

In it Odie packed SPF fifty-two, tanning oil, water bottles, deflated water wings, an unopened beach ball, and a little bucket with a mini plastic shovel. A six foot umbrella sat beside the front door behind the TV set up. Their beach towels were in the dryer.

Sully grabbed the bag and attempted to grab the umbrella. Odie snatched the towels and the TV on top of the other, just as Sully was swinging the umbrella in an attempt to keep hold of it. “Careful, dude,” Odie laughed.

The ringer on her phone was the introduction music for Darth Vader. “Oh boy,” she muttered. “Who might you be?” Juggling a couple things at once, she opened the front door for Sully, grabbed the umbrella, and tossed the towels over one shoulder. The phone went to her ear. “Ethel's whore house, Ethel speaking!” Animated.

“Uh...” Came a voice.

“May I help you?”

“I hope so – is this –”

She snorted a laugh, recognizing the voice. “Oh, man, I'm sorry. Figured you were somebody wantin' to pick the wallet clean. You're the woman from yesterday, right? It's Odie June.”

Barb, on the other end, sighed with relief. “Thank goodness. I was hoping I hadn't been given a fake number. I spoke with a gentleman at your tattoo shop last night.”

Sully took one step at a time, the bag between both arms. “Take the rail, bub,” Odie told him before putting on her nicey nice customer service voice. “Noperino, what can I do for ya? Awful early to be callin' just for any old reason at all. Would ya like to meet up somewhere? Sully and I are headed to the IHOP on Beach Boulevard, straight shot toward the park.” Sully muddled down the stairs, the bag on one shoulder like a purse, one hand grappling the railing.

“Well,” Barb sighed. “I'm actually not free until dinner time, you know, but um... Maybe... Maybe you and S-Sully could join myself and my husband, Joe, for dinner back at our place.”

Odie's eyes followed Sully's back like a hawk as they made their way down the pale white sidewalk, through the gate, and toward Odie's van. “What might your name be?”

Barb chuckled awkwardly. “Sorry, my name's Barbara Sullivan.”

“Awesome, awesome. Uh, we're on our way out the door now – can I give you a call later, just to see what's up?”

“Yeah, sure, absolutely,” Barb answered.

“Alrighty, well – I'll talk to you soon.”

Odie wasn't surprised that Barb had done a little snooping. Perhaps, even, deep down, Odie felt it was appropriate. Yet, there was something exhausting her. She put the umbrella, the bag, and the towels in the front seat and strapped Sully into his black boxy car seat.

His eyes squinted ahead, looking toward the wide, open street ahead. The end of the road curved right, into Happy Drive. Sully knew that once they came to Happy drive, they'd take a right out, another long street, another right, and they'd be on Beach Boulevard. He was familiar with the scenery – Odie always tried to take him to the beach when they had time.

“A little fun before our lives get a little funky, huh?” she said, tightening his belt. “I just got a call from Memaw, if that's what we're still callin' 'er.”

“I told you,” Sully whispered, a hand over his eyes as he watched the street. “I told her, too, ma.”

“What're you gonna do when you meet the boys, Sull? When they hold you for the first time? What happens if they don' believe ya?” Her hands appealed to the arch of the open side door. “What're ya gonna do if they don't believe her?”

Sully pushed his hair off his forehead. The all-too-knowing-seriousness that unnerved Odie returned in his big, pale blue eyes. Two pale white scars on either side of the rounded portion of his forehead, hardly visible at his hairline, reminded her of horns. “Don't worry about it,” Sully said. His voice was soft, tiny. Gentle. “It'll be all good.”

“Jimmy,” Odie whispered, climbing into the van and taking the seat next to him. She kissed the scars, and he gazed up at her, his lips shaping into a V.

The bottom line that kept Odie going was the way Sully wasn't phased. “C'mon, ma, let's go to the beach. The day's'a wastin'.” It wasn't even seven am yet. This side of California was still sleeping. Hell, the world, unless it was working, wouldn't be awake at this time anywhere.

“Okie dokie, artichokie,” she said. Odie June was terrified. She couldn't let him know – Sully was just a kid. And beyond that, a kid with a plan. There was no telling where life with him would lead. That might've been the most comforting aspect – everything was violently uncertain, even now, though it seemed to be falling together.
​
Odie pulled off the street and headed for the Boulevard.