All night, wind swept the alley and rain seeped in under the thin mattress in Lucy’s packing crate. She slept fitfully, damp seeping into her bones. In the morning, the sun chased white clouds across the narrow stretch of blue visible above the alley. And there, lying in oil-soaked rainwater, was a spray of orange blossoms, blown in from the L.A. flower market several streets over.
Testing her joints, Lucy stooped to lift the flowers to her face. An airy sweetness overpowered the smell of asphalt and urine. A robin perched on the iron railing of the fire escape overhead broke into song and flew up over the roof and away from the alley. “Wait for me,” Lucy said.
She dove back into her crate and sorted through her things, choosing a blanket, a comb, her toothbrush, an orange sweater, and an extra pair of socks. She selected a torn and stained paperback, “The Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson.” She stuffed it all into a burlap shopping bag, checked her jeans pocket for her money, $37.23, and pulled her Reeboks from under her pillow.
Lucy’s one luxury was a pair of shoes that fit, not begged or stolen, but purchased in the garment district with money begged or stolen, and sometimes earned. She needed good shoes for walking. She walked when she was hungry or afraid or when she couldn’t sleep, through dark streets, past sleeping bodies curled in blankets in doorways that the next morning would be swept clean.
This morning, as she tied her shoelaces, she heard her father’s voice. “Put your shoes on Lucy.” She turned, half expecting to see him. But if he was anywhere, he’d be in his heaven, and he’d long ago sentenced her to hell.
“Put your shoes on, Lucy.” He used to say it whenever she was to sing the opening hymn in his church. She had said it to herself when she ran away at 17, blindly following a guitar player she’d met at a concert.
She tied a frayed straw hat under her chin and buttoned a sprig of orange blossoms onto her shirt. At the end of the alley, her back warmed by sunshine, she took one last look at the garbage-strewn passageway between a burned-out shell of a building and a nearly empty apartment house where she’d lived until the smell of clogged toilets and moldy carpets drove her out.
Lucy walked by the soup kitchen where she sometimes peeled potatoes, cleared tables, or washed dishes. She passed the city library where she spent rainy afternoons reading novels. She met workers and retail clerks on their way to work, knowing there were things about her that made her invisible to them: her stringy, unwashed hair, the gap from a missing tooth, her ill-fitting clothing. Another middle-age homeless woman avoided her eyes, as if Lucy were a mirror into which she chose not to gaze.
Lucy’s feet alone would not take her far enough this morning so she put out her thumb not far from the on ramp of a freeway heading east.
A trucker pulled over. He was going to Lake Elsinore. Lucy pictured blue water and trees, forgetting, for the moment, that she was in Southern California. She climbed in.
The driver had curly red hair and he looked as if he had grown up out of the cracked leather seat. There was a bed in back and she wondered what the trucker expected in exchange for the ride, but all he seemed to want was someone to listen as he shared the bare bones of his life. After a while, he asked where she was headed and for lack of a real answer, she said, “The Midwest.”
That set her to thinking about the parsonage in Larkspur, Ill., the childhood home she’d left behind 30 years ago. After the guitar player dumped her, she’d drifted west, waitressing, singing with itinerant musicians, eventually turning tricks. Afraid to go home, then ashamed to go home. The years went by in a blur. Men. Alcohol. A baby signed away. A long stay in the county hospital after a botched abortion. Drugs, but never needles. Needles meant never going back.
Two hours down the road, the freeway cut through hills clothed in the low vegetation of the semidesert, green now from winter rains. Clusters of lupine and wild mustard grew along the road, and below, a line of trees followed a creek. At the low drone of an airplane, Lucy looked up to see parachutes floating above the hills.
The trucker dropped her off at the back entrance of Albertson’s supermarket, a few blocks above the lake’s edge. She fished a loaf of bread and a few apples from a trash bin. A woman unloading a shopping cart eyed her warily. Time to move on.
Feeling strange without tall buildings around her, Lucy followed the highway downhill, along the north end of the lake. On the left were several shady campgrounds, fenced in, with signs demanding camping fees. On the opposite side of the road were strip malls, interspersed with vacant lots, an abandoned orchard, and a boarded-up motel.
On the west side of the lake, she turned back at the edge of a residential area. The motel, with its carelessly boarded-up cabins, tempted her with thoughts of a roof overhead, but in the end she climbed through sagging barbed wire into the abandoned orange grove. She hid her bag in some wild mustard growing under a tree.
Lucy walked quickly along Lakeshore Drive on the east side of the lake. A fence kept her away from the shabby dwellings and private picnic areas hugging the lake. On the other side of the road, houses in various stages of decay alternated with a liquor store, a palm reader, and several small churches. She walked quickly, head down, exposed beneath open sky. Near the south end of the lake, she reached the public beach, with its welcoming row of Porta-potties. She felt less conspicuous among the transient population planted under umbrellas or on beach towels. The few trees here were stunted and the water was brown, but the sky overhead was a blue bowl, and parachutes opened like flowers overhead. Stems first with buds, then blossoms bursting forth. Red, yellow, blue, orange. A bouquet of tiny people bloomed briefly before wilting on the ground.
That night, a chorus of crickets wrapped Lucy in a cocoon of sound, bringing dreams of her girlhood. The next morning, she awoke to a vision of opening, like a flower, against the blue sky. Sleeping on the damp ground made her hip joints ache, so she spent $3 on a mildewed tent from Goodwill, trusting its tan color to blend into the tall weeds. She pitched it deep in the grove, beneath a tree that yielded undersize oranges.
Each morning, Lucy promised herself she would hike up to the freeway, put out her thumb, and head east. Each night found her back in her tent. She discovered a place just off Lakeshore Drive called Compassion’s Door that served free meals twice a week. In between, she lived mostly on sour oranges and bread and peanut butter from a church food closet. She foraged in the residential area on the eve of trash days. She began to accumulate things. A pair of khaki pants that fit, with a single mustard stain above the knee. A green T-shirt. A jacketless paperback of Robert Frost’s poems. She found a broken guitar and leaned it against the wall of her tent.
In dawn’s half-light, the guitar took on human form and its vagrant strings stirred like lecturing fingers. It spoke to her in her father’s voice, warning her against anything outside the parsonage and the plain square brick church. It spoke of her soprano voice, floating above the congregation and out the door. It wept her widowed mother’s tears the last time she called home. It reminded her of the L.A. county hospital, her taut belly mountainous on the stretcher, a child lifted from a sea of blood. When the nurse had brought it in, Lucy turned her head on the pillow. To her it remained forever faceless, nameless, genderless. The guitar spoke of things that in the city would have sent her walking. Here, she offered them to the fading stars.
The next day Lucy perched on the dam at the south end of the lake and watched the parachutes and wondered how often one of them failed and if that would be such a terrible end. Wasn’t falling from the sky a better way to go than in a bed at the county hospital or bleeding in an alley from a stab wound or huddled in a doorway on a rainy night? She tallied up what she would miss. Crickets singing to the night. The stars, so close here in the foothills of the Ortega Mountains. The progress of the moon across the sky. The cool dawn. When they found her, they wouldn’t know her name.
On her next trip to Compassion’s Door, Lucy took one of their business cards, wrote her name on the back, and tucked it into her pocket. She wondered if her mother was still living, and if so, where? In some immaculate, sinless house? Or had she broken free, and at what price?
Weeks passed and the summer heat intensified. She acquired a one-piece bathing suit that lifted her tired breasts and concealed the puffy C-section scar that ran from below her naval to above her pubic bone. On Sunday, picnickers spread blankets beneath umbrellas and cooked over miniature grills and watched their children dig in the sand and play in the murky water. Lucy drifted on the edge of this activity, breathing in the smell of hot dogs and Kentucky Fried Chicken. Almost blending in.
She often wandered to the far end of the lake. The parachutes floated against the blue, reminding her of jellyfish she once saw in an aquarium, the hypnotic way they shot up, then floated down, tentacles trailing like loose strings, just to do it all over again.
One afternoon, a strange impulse drove her beyond the dam, into dry scrub, where she tried her once-clear soprano voice. It cracked and veered out of control. She shrugged and watched a small plane seed the sky with parachutes. One by one, they floated down, the last one drifting off course, toward the lake. It was a woman. As her feet touched the sand, a gust of wind caught the parachute. The woman tried to dig in her heels, but the parachute billowed and dragged her over the ground.
Lucy reached her just as the wind slackened. Without thinking, she gathered an armful of yellow silk. The woman struggled to her feet, freed herself from the harness, and the two of them dashed about, gathering in the parachute, which continued to flail in the wind. When they came together with their shared bundle, Lucy let go, stepping back.
“Thanks,” the woman said shakily as she rotated her shoulders and turned her head gingerly from side to side, grimacing.
Lucy’s mouth was dry and she trembled before this woman in the red jumpsuit who was so much in the world. But she needed to know. Haltingly, she asked, “What’s it like, to fall?”
Under the woman’s gaze, she became conscious of her own gray streaked hair, dull with soap from public restrooms. The missing tooth. The woman smiled tremulously and offered a hand. “I’m Kate.”
Lucy’s own name sounded foreign on her tongue, it had been so long since she’d given it away. She forced the question again: “How does it feel, to be up there … floating … ” She almost babbled something about jellyfish.
“How did it feel?” Kate gave a nervous laugh. “Great. Until the landing. They said something like that could happen, but I spent all day in that class, learning how to fall, and still I missed the target by half a mile. My next birthday I’ll ask for jewelry.” She pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket. “Here. You take this.” The paper shook in the woman’s trembling hand.
It was a voucher for two more jumps. Lucy held it, fear and excitement clogging her throat.
“Maybe they’ll let you redeem one of the jumps for the training. Maybe you could sell it,” the woman said.
Lucy mumbled thanks, but Kate motioned her silent. “You saved my neck.” She moved her head cautiously and made a face. “Looks like I’ll need a chiropractor anyway.” Lucy retreated before the onslaught of Kate’s friends bearing down.
All that night, in Lucy’s dreams, she floated, the earth below spread like a feast. The next day she took the bus to the airfield.
She found a collection of low wooden buildings arranged around a dusty courtyard: a small cafe, an outside bar, deserted now in the heat, a store selling jumping gear and T-shirts. Off to the left, a small plane with no door rested on the ground, and in the distance were several hangars and a collection of hang gliders. Grass and trees ran downhill to an awning-covered patio where a handful of people sat on chairs, listening to an instructor.
Lucy squatted beneath a tree and watched, just out of earshot. After a while, the class lined up before a wooden platform, about 4 feet high. There they practiced falling, backward, into the sand. She watched them all afternoon until their plane roared into the sky, leveled off, and released its cargo to bloom in the heavens. She watched them land, studying how they gathered their knees in at the last moment, to roll on impact.
That night, Lucy walked south on Lakeshore Drive, then along the deserted beach to the lake’s end. She climbed to the top of the dam and continued east, across pebbly dirt and desert plants. In the moonlight, the wooden platform loomed large, almost like a gallows. She climbed the steps and tried to fall backward. It was hard, letting go. She fell again and again until she learned to relax, to trust. She gathered her knees to her chest on impact and rolled to the right, as she’d seen the others do. Even after she’d mastered the technique, she fell and fell and fell again as the moon traveled across the sky. She fell until the earth held the imprint of her body.
The next morning, Kate returned to the airfield, smelling of shampoo fished from a bin of donated cosmetics at Compassion’s Door. She’d filed her nails with an emery board, also from the donation bin. Her hair was in a ponytail fastened with a rubber band from a discarded bunch of celery found in a grocery Dumpster. She wore the khaki pants and green T-shirt.
Knees trembling, she approached the jumpmaster as he came out of the cafe carrying a steaming cup of coffee. She held out the vouchers. “Kate gave me these,” she said. Glancing at the name on the form, she added, “Kate Champion. She said I could have them.” Why hadn’t she thought to memorize Kate’s full name? Now for sure he’d think she’d stolen them.
He looked at her as if she had “homeless” branded on her forehead, but there was the training platform, and the imprint of her body in the sand, where a few hours before she’d learned to trust the earth to catch her. It would have to catch her now. She squared her shoulders and stood her ground.
Frowning he hesitated, then took the voucher. “Did you bring the certificate?”
“The what?”
“Proof you’ve taken the training. I can’t take you up without it.”
“Kate said … ” She faltered, sweat gathering in her armpits and in the hollow between her breasts, causing her to shiver in the cool dawn. “This is for two jumps. She said maybe you’d accept one for the training.”
He shook his head. “Sorry. Wouldn’t cover it. You need another 50 bucks.” He handed back the voucher, about to turn away.
“Wait. I’ll clean the snack bar … wash dishes … whatever you say … for as long as it takes.” She spoke in a rush, not sure what was coming until the words were out. “I’ll clean toilets. Just let me go up. Just once.” Her own voice came to her from a great distance.
He stared at her for a moment, then said, almost to himself, “Madge has been bitching about needing somebody … ” He sighed, then added, “Look, I’m not promising anything, but stick around for a while. I’ve got eight signed up for today. I can take nine. If no one else shows up … well … we’ll see.”
She nodded and stepped quickly away before he could change his mind. But she was filled with a curious knowing. This thing was going to happen.
They came in pairs, laughing and boosting each other’s courage. Housewives on an adventure. Best friends on a dare. Two middle-age sisters. The day before, at least half had been men, but for some reason, today only women showed up, a fact for which Lucy was obscurely grateful. They were dressed in old sweats or cut-off jeans and sweat-stained baseball caps. Her Reeboks were in far better condition than any of their flip-flops and ragged sandals. If Lucy stood out at all, it was because she was the best dressed. She hovered at the edge of the growing circle, hands buried in her pockets, fingers crossed.
She had almost given up when the jumpmaster handed her a clipboard. It took a moment for the words to arrange themselves into a form, absolving the jump school of responsibility for her life and limb. It was easy to fake an address, but the possibilities implied by the term “emergency contact” seemed to require an actual person. But who? The proprietor of the campground, who turned a blind eye when she slipped through the fence before dawn to use the shower? The lady at the food closet who looked the other way when Lucy, a non-resident, appeared each week for a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter? The old man at the laundromat who let her wash her clothes for free? Finally, she wrote her dead father’s name.
Seated with the others on folding chairs beneath the canopy, Lucy soaked up everything the jumpmaster said about static line jumping. She nodded in understanding when he explained that first timers couldn’t be trusted to pull their own rip cords because half of them would pass out when they jumped, and 2,500 feet of altitude didn’t allow for them to regain consciousness in time to act. She remembered how once, a knife blade at her throat in midnight shadows, she’d almost fainted, but didn’t. Why would she pass out now?
He went into detail about everything that could go wrong, and she sensed the fear around her, but she was not nervous. It was as if she’d already fallen, and her chute had failed her and she’d landed hard, but she was still here, her Reeboks firmly planted on the concrete floor beneath the folding chair.
When her turn came to fall backward from the platform, she heard the others gasp as she dropped easily in the sand, rolling on impact.
“You sure you haven’t done this before?” the jumpmaster said. She shook her head innocently.
During breaks the others began to ask her questions. “Lucy, what was that he said about a Capewell Release? Which toggle cord do we pull to go to the left? What was that he said to do if the wind … ?” She alone seemed to have retained everything the jumpmaster said. She found herself giving advice, offering encouragement, forgetting to not smile. No one seemed to notice the missing tooth.
– – –
Dressed in a red jumpsuit and heavy boots, Lucy’s shoulders were pulled back by the weight of the parachute on her back as she climbed into the tiny silver plane. Her legs encircled Terri and she rested her elbows on the knees of Sandy, positioned behind her.
Cari. Judith. Rita. Janet. Linda. Terri. Sandy. Marge. Lucy silently ticked off the names, knowing that she, in turn, would be etched in their memory of this day. With the plane’s engine roaring about them, Terri reached back over her shoulders and Lucy took the offered hands and held on. She savored the connection, conscious of the woman’s diamond ring digging into her palm, grateful that her own fingernails were presentable. And when it was Terri’s turn to jump, Lucy gave her hands an extra squeeze and shouted above the noise, “You can do it.” Terri nodded and moved up to the open door.
Then Terri was gone and Lucy scooted on her butt to the front of the plane. The jumpmaster nodded and she slid into the opening and dangled her legs over the side. The roar of blood in her ears nearly drowned the rush of wind and the engine noise. She was dimly aware of the jumpmaster behind her, attaching her parachute to the static line just inside the doorway. She looked down at the dizzying pattern of lake, town, freeway, barren land, and low mountains. She felt his hand on her shoulder as he pointed downward at a circle carved from the scrub. Much, much further down than she’d imagined.
“That’s your target,” he said. “You okay?”
She wasn’t. Fear squeezed her insides and robbed her of breath. But she remembered a flip remark he’d made during training that he’d push out anyone who hesitated too long. Surely he’d been joking, but she wasn’t taking any chances. She took a deep breath, resisting the impulse to close her eyes. She was going into this with them wide open.
She pushed off. Glancing to the right, as she’d been taught. The plane flashed silver, proof that she hadn’t blacked out. She looked up and watched her chute open into a giant red flower, with herself the stem. She floated, light and free, above her world. The lake and the town were off to the left. Somewhere in that abandoned orchard was her tent and a guitar with broken strings. Just below was the tiny airport with a snack bar and toilets to be cleaned. Beyond the low mountains were higher mountains. And over there, the freeway, linking her to the east.
Lucy floated until it was time for the earth to catch her. She rolled on impact, absorbing the blow. She felt sand and pebbles beneath her and wondered how far from the target she’d drifted, knowing also that it didn’t matter. She’d made a perfect landing.
———-
Rose Hamilton-Gottlieb’s fiction has been anthologized in “Farm Wives and Other Iowa Stories,” “Generation to Generation,” “Grow Old Along With Me, The Best Is Yet to Be,” “At Our Core: Women Writing About Power” and “Prairie Hearts.” She was a finalist in the Dana Literary Awards short fiction contest in 2003 and placed second in the National League of American Pen Women’s Soul-Making Literary Competition for 2000. “Broken Strings” was one of three stories performed in the 2006 New Short Fiction Series, described as a live literary magazine in Los Angeles. Hamilton-Gottlieb was born on a farm in Iowa and migrated to Southern California in 1964, where she raised two daughters. She’s a founding member of the Asilomar Writers Consortium and a former college instructor of history and American studies. She lives in Fullerton, Calif., with her husband.
