Scenes Two and Three of Maybell's Bottle Rocket, Final Draft

I’m Daniel Verdin, and this is the Maybell’s Soda Can Podcast. The Maybell’s Soda Can Podcast is about a woman named Maybell; how she lived, how she died, and how she stayed dead. Most people live and die and stay dead. I know, but this time it was a near thing, her staying dead. There was a lot of magic involved, and not just the every-new-day-is-a-miracle kind of magic, the fun wizards and monsters kind of magic. Also, there was the bit about the indestructible and unmovable soda can that destroyed the world. So, that was different.

Today, Maybell is eight years old. She has bright red hair. She is manipulating a little boy and probably falling in love a little bit too. Her sister Sylvia, the blond sister, the younger sister, is up to some mess and won’t talk. Their father, Jim Vanneste trying his best.

*****

Maybell woke with purpose.  If she was not going to see the fireworks on the Fourth of July, she was going to find another way to have fireworks in her life. She got to work right after breakfast by finding her Chatty Cathy coloring book. It had been thrown in a rubber tub in her closet with a lot of other books. Then she poked around her daddy’s office until she had collected an envelope, crayons, a book of stamps, and a nice black ink pen. She selected a picture of Chatty Cathy helping her mother cook cookies and spent an hour or more coloring it. She picked that picture because she liked the design on Chatty Cathy’s skirt, but for her purposes, it could have been any other picture. She wrote,

“Because, it is you...” on the back of the picture as neatly as she could with the nice black ink pen from her daddy’s office. She used the same nice back pen to address the envelope to Cliff Cline at 208 Gower Road. She put the picture with the message in the envelope, put a stamp on the envelope, and walked down her long gravel drive way to the mail box. She put the letter in the mailbox and hoped for the best. Her trap was set.

Maybell found Sylvia sitting on the white washed porch swing eating an apple and swinging her feet to make the swing sway back and forth when she got back from the mailbox. Sylvia eyed Maybell with what was a very good try at looking nonchalant for a seven-year-old, and she said,

“What did you put in the mail?” Her voice turned up at the end to make a little song out of the question, and she turned her head to the side as she spoke. Then she squinted her eyes, all suspicious.

“Don’t worry,” said Maybell. She jutted her chin out at her sister, “Daddy said it was alright as long as I’m quiet and don’t get out of bed.”

“Hey! Don’t be like that,” said Sylvia. She hopped out of the swing and made to go. She had her hand on the door knob of the front door when Maybell said,

“What was that blue light you were playing with?” Sylvia stopped, but did not answer. She turned to face her sister, put her face in her hands, and she started to cry. Maybell watched her sister cry. She felt a little unsure if this was the right time to try to comfort her sister. She did not feel like comforting her sister right then anyway.

The best way to explain is to say this. Maybell had a habit of stealing ginger snaps from the tin in the kitchen. Her father caught her one day and told her it was wrong to sneak, which made her feel awful. It gave her a bad feeling, being caught. She was more careful when she stole ginger snaps now. She did not want any of that feeling that went with being caught.

Anyway, seeing Sylvia on the porch like that gave Maybell that same uncomfortable caught feeling she got when her dad caught her with the ginger snaps. Her throat felt funny. Her stomach turned. Her chest felt fluttery, and since she did not want to be nice to Sylvia and was nor set on being outright mean to her either, Maybell decided to wait and do nothing. That must have been the right thing to do, because Sylvia looked up at Maybell a few moments later and said,

“I don’t know.” A tear ran down Sylvia’s cheek. She walked over to Maybell and hugged her. It took a second, but Maybell hugged her sister back. Maybell and Sylvia formed a bond in that moment that they had not had before, a bond that would be strained without breaking for most of their lives. Neither of them ever knew how important that moment was, and they would both forget it ever happened before the year was over.

*****

A letter arrived for Maybell from Cliff Cline the next day. The letter was a perfectly colored picture of G. I. Joe shooting a gun at a tank. The note on the back read,

“Maybell, I think you are swell.” He used a comma and everything. Maybell was elated and surprised to receive a response so fast. She had been nearly sure Cliff would respond, but not so sure that she did not blush and grin when she found Cliff’s note. Her plan was working. She would push forward with it. She colored another picture of Chatty Cathy. This time Chatty Cathy was in a pink sundress. Maybell put it in the mail before the end of the day. The note she wrote on the back of the picture read,

“To a guy I know…” Cliff’s response to that message arrived two days later. It was a perfectly colored picture of G. I. Joe sporting a beard and a grin. The message he wrote on the back read,

“I think you are great,” and this message frustrated Maybell. It was basically the same as his first message, and some of the thrill of getting a response at all had gone. Besides, he had two whole days to think on it. She thought he could have come up with something better than I think you are great. Maybell told Sylvia about her frustration, that Cliff could have tried harder, that he had made her wait two whole days, that she was disappointed and surprised to be disappointed, and that she did not know what to say to Cliff now. He had not given her anything to respond to. Sylvia only shrugged and said,

“I don’t know.” They both colored Chatty Cathy pictures that day, and Maybell wrote a longer note on the back of the page this time. It was about laser blasters and magic swords and how she thought the magic sword was much better than a laser blaster. Cliff responded the day after that. The two of them kept this up for twelve messages and responses. The notes grew longer and more specific until the end of the thirteenth message Maybell sent to Cliff read,

“Bring the bottle rocket with you on the first day of school. I’ll meet you at the back of the bus.” It had been a lot of work coloring in all those Chatty Cathy pictures, but it was all going to pay off on the first day of school.

*****

Maybell lay snug in her bed on the Fourth of July. She listened to the fireworks going off in the distance and thought about what it would be like to really be there to watch them. She wondered if being around fireworks was anything like being at the range when her daddy practiced shooting his guns. She wondered if anyone ever got hurt or if anything ever caught on fire in the woods because of the falling sparks.

Her father did not sit in his rocking chair reading stories in his deep rumbly voice that night. He was outside keeping the cows calm, keeping the horses calm, and patrolling the borders of their property looking for broken fences or animals in the road. He rescued some cows from their neighbors down the street that night. The cows had broken down a fence and were walking down the high way. Maybell’s daddy found them, and got them back into their field without any car wrecks or injured cows. Word about it spread, and everyone in Hickory Hollow thought he was a great man for that, at least for a while. He didn’t have to buy coffee at Julie’s Diner for a month.

Maybell would always remember that night as the first time she had ever been afraid that her daddy might get hurt. It was the first time she had ever known why he was out all night on the Fourth of July or why he did not take her to see the fireworks. Maybell also remembered that night as the first night she ever felt glad because she had taken matters into her own hands. She had found a way to fireworks that did not involve asking anyone for permission. That was a feeling she could get used to.

July and the first half of August passed quickly. Maybell fought with Sylvia, who had become more and more secretive, but they also played together. They played house, which was just like being in a house, but with imagined roles. They played tea time until Maybell decided playing tea time was silly and taught her little sister to make tea. From then on, they established a daily tea time and had real tea time instead of an imaginary one. Maybell played with her father too. He taught her cool things like how to fight, how to throw a knife, how to drive a tractor, and how to skip rocks on the pond.

*****

On the first day of school Sylvia had refused to wear the same pink and red corduroy overalls her father had picked out for Maybell. She had screamed and fussed and bargained, and now she was wearing black corduroy overalls and a white cotton shirt with lacey frills at the ends of the sleeves. She had not objected to the white canvass shoes Jim Vanneste had picked out for the two of them, so her shoes matched Maybell’s shoes. The three of them stood on the front porch that unseasonably cold late August morning with their faces scrunched against the mist and rain with the beauty in the green misty fields all around them unable to lift the drowsy, rotten, somber, sad mood three people get when they are all missing the same person at the same time in ways that are all their own. The sparrows and doves and chickadees and towhees began to chirp a morning ruckus. The cows stood by the fence looking at Jim like he owed them something. To be fair, the cows were right. The rooster-topped weather vane on the roof squeaked and squeaked and squeaked. The three of them could hear the roar of the big engine of the school bus getting closer. They could hear it roar and stop and roar and stop as it picked up the other kids on their street. Jim got down on his knees and looked both of his little girls in the eye. He said,

          “Ya’ll have fun at school.” His scraggly beard had grown down his neck. His ice blue eyes had purple bags under them. His flannel shirt was wrinkled. His jeans and work boots were already muddy from when he went out to see the cows and the chickens earlier that morning.

          “Yes sir!” shouted Maybell while Sylvia looked at the ground. Maybell nudged Sylvia, and she echoed Maybell saying, “Yes, sir,” in a whisper.

          “And Maybell,” said Jim, “I don’t want to hear from your teachers that you knocked some boy down or spat on someone or anything.” Maybell scrunched her face.

          “I wouldn’t knock no boys down. I’d kick’m in the nuts like you told me.”

          “Now, you know that’s not what I meant. You can’t just go around injuring little boys in their private parts.”

          “Why not? That’s what you said, ‘If any boys try anything you just kick’m in the nuts,’” said Maybell.

          “I know what I said, and now I’m say’n not to do that unless you really have to,” said Jim.

          “Why would I really have to?” Maybell was genuinely perplexed.

          “For now, just… You won’t… I hope, so… No kick’n little boys in their private parts today, okay?”

          “Daddy?” said Maybell.

          “Yeah?” said Jim.

          “Why do you always tell me what not to do, but you never tell Sylvia stuff not to do?”

          “Cuz, Sylvia don’t kick little boys or throw people down or ask me how to break someone’s arm or any of that.” Sylvia looked smug and said nothing. The bus arrived at the end of their long gravel driveway. It never occurred to Jim to hug his little girls or tell them how much he would miss them while they were away at school. He said,

          “Alright. Bus is here. Ya’ll best get on it. Be good. Make friends. No kick’n little boys in the nuts,” and he walked toward the barn.

          Maybell took Sylvia by the hand and they ran to the bus. The bus door opened and Mrs. McClellan said,

          “Did you miss me?” and she cackled. Mrs. McClellan had frizzy hair cut in a poufy mullet. She smelled like cigarettes and had only two fingers and a thumb on her right hand due to a childhood accident with a hatchet. Maybell knew she shouldn’t think unkind things about adults or injured people, but Mrs. McClellan’s hand looked to her like a chicken foot. It looked like she was using a big chicken foot to control the lever that opened and closed the door on the bus, and that always freaked her out, even if it was unkind and a bit unfair to be freaked out. Maybell chuckled and said,

          “Yeah, yeah, good to see you too,” and she ran to the back of the bus where Cliff was waiting for her. Cliff was wearing a full set of camouflage. He had the camouflage pants, the camouflage t-shirt, and a camouflage army jacket. His hair was dark and buzzed so close to his head that his scalp showed. He looked at Maybell with the wide brown eyes of a young boy having a big hazy unknowable emotion about a girl. Sylvia sat next to her sister and studied the floor.

          “What’s up with her?” asked Cliff, looking at Sylvia. Maybell shrugged.

          “I don’t know. She’s quiet lately. Did you bring it?”

          “Yeah,” said Cliff. He riffled through his backpack and pulled out a bottle rocket.

          “Whoa!” said Maybell, “Is this real?”

          “Sure, it is real. What else would it be?” said Cliff, and he grinned.

          “I don’t know. I can’t believe you brought it.”

          “My older brother is an idiot. I took it and stashed it just before we started setting off fireworks for the Fourth. He never noticed. I planned to get him with it when he wasn’t looking, but this is better.”

          “So, what’s your plan?” asked Maybell.

          “What?” said Cliff.

          “When do we set them off?” said Maybell.

          “Oh, um… now?” said Cliff.

          “In the bus?” said Maybell.

          “Out the window,” said Cliff.

          “Oh, okay,” said Maybell.  She looked at Cliff with expectation. He was only nine, but that look made him feel like a man. He opened the bus window, held the bottle rocket out the window by the end of the stick, and produced a cigarette lighter from his back pocket. He winked at Maybell and clicked the lighter next to the bottle rocket’s wick outside the window. It didn’t light. He started clicking the lighter franticly. He could not get the lighter to hold a flame. Maybell touched his arm and he sat back down in his seat in a huff. Maybell said,

          “Maybe we should just wait until the bus stops.” Sylvia tugged on Maybell’s arm. Maybell leaned in to listen to her sister. Sylvia pulled Maybell in very close and whispered in her ear. Maybell could feel Sylvia’s lips on her ear as she whispered. Sylvia said,

          “I can do it.”

          “You can do what?”

          “I can do it, Maybell. Let me see the rocket,” said Sylvia.

          “No,” said Maybell.

          “Please,” said Sylvia. Cliff nudged Maybell on the shoulder.

          “It’s alright,” he said, “I won’t give her the lighter. There’s no trouble if she’s just looking at it.”

          Maybell shrugged. Cliff handed the bottle rocket to Sylvia. Sylvia pointed the bottle rocket toward the front of the bus and snapped her fingers. A small blue orb of energy the size of a pencil eraser appeared in front of Sylvia. She cupped the hand she had snapped and brought it under the tiny blue orb of energy until she seemed to be holding. It hovered an inch from her hand. She brought the orb to the bottle rocket. The wick lit. There was a shower of sparks as the wick burned. The rocket zipped off toward the front of the bus. It hit the front windshield, zipped along the windshield toward the door, got stuck, and blew up with a bang and a shower of sparks.

The bus screeched to a halt that threw all the kids on the bus forward in their seats. All the other boys and girls on the bus were reacting saying, “What?” and screaming and pointing and acting exactly like children who just saw a bottle rocket explode in a school bus. They were manic, accusatory, and suddenly quiet again when Mrs. McClellan came storming up the center aisle of the bus. She grabbed on to seats as she marched to the back of the bus. Maybell kept her eye on Mrs. McClellan’s three fingered hand as it grabbed seat after seat, and in her mind, she created a mental picture of Mrs. McClellan as an angry pterodactyl rushing to the back of the bus and grabbing seats with the little three fingered hands pterodactyls have on their wings. She knew that it was wrong to think of Mrs. McClellan that way, but she couldn’t help it. She also knew that she had just seen something very important, and that her little sister was very vulnerable right now. It was too much to process. She had started to giggle about it by the time Mrs. McClellan reached the back of the bus.

          “What’s so funny young lady?” said Mrs. McClellan, who was not a caricature of a pterodactyl, who was a full-grown woman in authority. Mrs. McClellan, standing very close to Maybell with her face flushed red and her eyes wide with anger was, suddenly, very frightening to Maybell. Maybell did not say anything. “Well?” said Mrs. McClellan. The three children sat still unable to do or say anything. “Alright, you three in the back seat, you had to light it somehow. Stand up. Empty your pockets. Chop, chop.” Maybell, Cliff, and Sylvia stood. They emptied their pockets. When Cliff pulled the lighter from his pocket, Mrs. McClellan took it from him. She said,

          “Young man, can you explain how a bottle rocket went off in my bus and how you just happen to have a lighter on you?”

          Cliff pointed at Sylvia. He said, “I’ve never seen anything like it. She…” and that is when Maybell kicked him squarely in the nuts.

*****

          This has been the second episode of The Maybell’s Soda Can Podcast. The music and story are written and recorded by me, Daniel Verdin. You can help the podcast out by giving it a clap on the Anchor app, by writing a review, by liking the Daniel Verdin facebook page, and by telling your friends. Thanks so much. I appreciate you. Catch you next time.