George Singleton ~ Gerald’s Last Girlfriend

Finally, after a full year of col­lege on cam­pus his junior year, Gerald came home to find out that his par­ents secured him a job work­ing for his uncle Leo, a wealthy man who’d oper­at­ed a small engine repair shop for thir­ty years—Gerald’s mother’s broth­er, who sup­pos­ed­ly fixed push and rid­ing lawn mow­ers, weed eaters, tillers, chain­saws, and mope­ds. Uncle Leo dropped out of high school in the eleventh grade, after tak­ing every course avail­able at the county’s one voca­tion­al school, back in the ear­ly nineties, his spe­cial­ty being Electricity and Horticulture. Gerald’s moth­er and father both grad­u­at­ed col­lege, his moth­er a nurse, his father an archi­tect. They, the par­ents, nev­er under­stood how come they didn’t own an in-ground Olympic-sized pool, a house with five bed­rooms, acreage that allowed for goats and hors­es and don­keys, plus four rental prop­er­ty hous­es on par with where Gerald grew up. Your broth­er didn’t even make it to high school, right? Gerald’s father said often. Motherfucker! Life ain’t fair.

            On Gerald’s first day of work, mak­ing min­i­mum wage to sweep the con­crete floor, answer the phone, pull hard on starter cords, and shove nice mar­i­jua­na buds into the ersatz small engine gaso­line recep­ta­cles, Uncle Leo said, This is between us. Maybe I do a lit­tle more than I say. It is what it is.

            One of Gerald’s English pro­fes­sors, a woman who taught a class titled Virginia Woolf’s Swimming Lessons, admon­ished her gag­gle of stu­dents from ever utter­ing It is what it is, which meant noth­ing. The pro­fes­sor added on, And don’t fuck­ing say those oth­ers, though she nev­er expound­ed on what they might be.

            Gerald, Uncle Leo said on that first day. Gerald, Gerald, Gerald. He said, Tell me all about col­lege, boy. College! How many states are you away, some­thing like three or four? Damn. Way to go. You’re up in Virginia, right?

            Gerald said, I don’t want to get arrest­ed, Uncle Leo.

            Uncle Leo said, Nothing against you, you know, but I’m help­ing you out because of your momma.

            Gerald looked around the quon­set hut. He smelled dope, clear­ly. He said, Well.

            Uncle Leo smiled. He held the broom he’d hand over to his nephew present­ly. Tell me about col­lege, son. What’s your major? You got a girlfriend?

            Gerald felt his tes­ti­cles rise. He said, Yes, I got a girl­friend, Uncle Leo.

            The last time he’d seen his uncle had been at a lake­side fam­i­ly reunion. His uncle stood off to the side, nod­ding and smil­ing, while every­one else took off on jet skis while not wear­ing prop­er life jackets.

            Tell me about her, Uncle Leo said. He hand­ed over the large sweep broom.

            Gerald said, My girlfriend’s name is Billings. They are study­ing English, like I am, though they are a lot smarter. They come from Chevy Chase, Maryland, which is kind of where rich peo­ple live, peo­ple not like I am, Uncle Leo.

            Gerald held the broom. He didn’t want any­one ever talk­ing to him again. His  uncle said, Tell me more. Tell me everything.

            Well, They aren’t like every oth­er female on cam­pus. They won’t join a soror­i­ty, just like I won’t join a fra­ter­ni­ty. They study English and post-Post-mod­ern lan­guage, but Billings likes Shakespeare more than I do. I like con­tem­po­rary south­ern, you know. Billings got named such because of where they got con­ceived. Their par­ents might be old hip­pies, or some­thing. At least envi­ron­men­tal­ists. Their parents—Mr. and Mrs. Radford—happen to both be lawyers now, or at least lob­by­ists in D.C. They both have pony­tails. Anyway, as for Billings, they like the same kind of music I do, and they vol­un­teer at a soup kitchen like I do, and they even­tu­al­ly want to teach English as a Second Language, maybe down on the Texas bor­der. They’re pret­ty amaz­ing. They’re aller­gic to bananas and straw­ber­ries and can­taloupe, just like I am. They’re maybe my per­fect match, com­pared to the oth­er women on cam­pus, I swear. I’m hop­ing they’ll be able to come down here this sum­mer. They and I want to go vis­it Myrtle Beach at some point.

            Gerald’s uncle reached into an old Toro’s two-cycle fuel tank and pulled out a bud. From his shirt pock­et he extract­ed a glass pipe. He said, Boy, are you dat­ing con­joined twins?

~

George Singleton has pub­lished ten col­lec­tions of sto­ries, two nov­els, and two books of essays. He’s a mem­ber of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, and lives in South Carolina.