With that as our setting, all three of us were overjoyed to hear from Uncle Palaver and learn that he was stopping by for a day or two on his way to what he called a "gig.' in Raleigh, North Carolina, where he was going to meet up with Destiny after she had visited her family. Mama had had little to smile about during the past few weeks, and just talking to her brother on the phone was enough to restore some of the familiar and cherished gleam in her eyes and blush in her cheeks. She began immediately to plan a wonderful dinner for the day Uncle Palaver arrived.
In my heart of hearts. I hoped and prayed that Uncle Palaver's visit would soften Daddy and perhaps restore him to how he had been before all this meanness and avoidance had begun. Surely, he wouldn't be unpleasant while Uncle Palaver was here. No matter what was bothering him, he was never one to wear his heart on his sleeve, as Mama would say. He hated watching all those television shows on which people would reveal their most intimate and private information.
"The next thing we'll see is a show with a camera and microphones in Catholic confessional booths," he said. "The priest will turn to the audience and get a consensus about what punishment or acts of contrition the sinner should perform."
If anything bothered Daddy, he would never show it in front of other people, and on those rare occasions when we had private family problems, he would die before revealing the slightest hint of it at a dinner party Mama prepared or any other sort of social gathering.
"We're giving up so much of ourselves when we give up our privacy issues," he told us all at dinner once. "People don't even know what self-respect is anymore. They should feel shame and keep their problems to themselves. Being ashamed about something isn't all that terrible. It has some purpose. It works as a deterrent. Nowadays, kids aren't ashamed about poor grades or misbehavior. Their parents aren't ashamed about being caught in adultery, getting divorced, going bankrupt. They just visit one of these talk shows and spill their guts in front of millions of psychological and emotional voyeurs. I'd rather be caught dead," he muttered.
Mama agreed but had to admit she watched some of those shows. Brenda was more like Daddy and thought he was one-hundred-percent correct.
"People lay their troubles on you all the time in school," she said. "The locker-room gossip about parents, boyfriends, and brothers and sisters sickens me."
"Hey, there's a new show." Daddy piped up, laughing. 'The Locker Room."
Brenda laughed. too.
Those dinners and days were beginning to feel like distant dreams.
In any case, we all felt confident that Daddy would behave more like the old Daddy we knew and loved when Uncle Palaver was visiting. Brenda said it would be like a prison camp being spruced up for an inspection by some international human rights agency.
"Maybe he'll smile again, but it will be like a mask. I'm afraid," she predicted.
As it turned out. I wished he had worn any sort of smile, mask or not. When he heard Uncle Palaver was coming, he muttered. "That's all we need now," and stormed off to his home office, closing the door as he had done so many nights recently. He would remain in there until bedtime. Because Brenda and I were in our rooms doing homework or Brenda was at an away game. Mama ended up sitting and watching television for hours alone. A number of times. I pretended to have completed my homework when I hadn't, just so I could keep her company. It broke my heart knowing she was sitting by herself, trying to knit or do some needlepoint project, the light of the television flashing over her. I failed a math exam and a history exam because I didn't study.
Actually, my grades, though not anything to rave about before, took a real nosedive during these days. I couldn't help being distracted in class, missing notes, not listening to the teachers. Something Daddy had said or done the night before usually haunted me all the following day. My best friend in all the world. Jamie Stanley, thought I had gown bored with her because nothing she said got me very excited or interested. Finally, one day when she asked me a question and I didn't respond, she slapped her books on the cafeteria table where we were sitting and told me she wasn't going to bother talking to me or calling me anymore. She picked herself up and moved to sit with some other students, and suddenly. I felt more alone than I thought possible.
Uncle Palaver's arrival loomed larger and larger on my hope and wish meter. I couldn't wait for him to come. He always brought Brenda and me some special and unique present he had found on his travels. I had an elephant that raised its trunk and roared when I pressed a button on its leg, a lobster that sang "Sea of Love", and a canary that chirped every time I was a half foot in front of it. Brenda had a bubble machine, a handheld massage machine that relaxed aching and stiff muscles, and, most cherished of all, a volleyball signed by the women's volleyball team from the last Olympics. Daddy expressed doubts about its authenticity.
"So much of what your uncle does and says is based on illusion,'" he remarked, but Brenda never showed any doubt about it and exhibited it proudly in her room.
But lately, it wasn't the gifts we welcomed as much as Uncle Palaver's cheerful, childlike demeanor. He had become a very good magician and could do wonders with a deck of cards and sleight of hand. Like a true magician, he said he would take the secret of how he did his tricks to his grave. Most exciting was to hear his stories from his travels. There didn't appear to be a state he hadn't visited. He had even gone to Alaska and entertained soldiers on some army base.
Uncle Palaver wasn't making a lot of money, but he was no longer in any financial trouble and actually had come to repay Daddy for a loan he had given him two years ago.
From time to time, he sent Mama newspaper clippings about his Amazing Palaver show, and she had pasted them all in an album. At last, we finally had some pictures of Destiny, too. All of us were surprised to learn that she was African American, Uncle Palaver had never mentioned that fact. In all the pictures, she looked as tall as Uncle Palaver and very sexy, usually in a tight outfit or even a bathing suit.
"No wonder he's doing better on the road." Daddy quipped when he saw pictures that included Destiny. "In some of those boondock towns, that's pornographic. I guess your parents would be surprised."
Mama hushed him and told him never to say such things in front of Uncle Palaver or anyone, for that matter. Whenever she could take out her album to show one of her friends, she would. She never mentioned that Destiny might be Uncle Palaver's girlfriend, although it was easy to see people thought it. Whatever, it made him more interesting. I never imagined Daddy would be in the slightest way jealous of that. He was so accomplished and successful, how could he ever be threatened by the small
accomplishments and attention Uncle Palaver had achieved? Lately, though, he was beginning to sound that sort of a discordant note whenever he referred to Uncle Palaver.
"You blow him up too much. Nora," he warned. "People will expect to see him on television or something."
"Well, that could happen someday, couldn't it. Matt?" she asked hopefully.
"Yeah. If he stands on one, it could happen," Daddy said dryly.
I didn't think that was at all fair. I could see Uncle Palaver appearing on television someday. First, he was a very handsome, charismatic man with wavy dark brown hair that was Mama's shade and hazel eyes with green specks. He had her small nose and was lean and tall like Brenda. The childish gleam in his eyes gave him a charm that brought a smile to the faces of many people as soon as they saw him, onstage or otherwise. He had a way of reminding everyone of their childhood faiths, their own imaginings and wonder. Sleeve-less, his hands empty, he would reach up and pluck a coin out of the air as effortlessly as someone plucking a berry from a bush.
"If you can do that all day, you'll be rich in no time," Daddy once remarked in jovial tones.
"I'm rich already. Matt," Uncle Palaver had said.
Daddy had raised his eyes and smiled skeptically. but I knew in my heart what Uncle Palaver meant. He had his freedom, his love of what he was finally doing, his joy in pleasing and bringing smiles to the faces of the people he met. Yes, his life was very different from Daddy's now, He didn't have many responsibilities, no responsibility to anyone but himself since he wasn't married to Destiny. However, he had taken on a different sort of burden. He had become a happy daddy for thousands of children, a loving brother to thousands of women and men. His audiences had become his extended family, and when he performed, he bathed in their laughter and wonder. That made him feel very wealthy.
He had no home as such, just a mailbox. Instead, he and Destiny lived in a motor home with "The Amazing Palaver" written in bold red on both sides, the image of a top hat and a rabbit peeking out just under the words. The motor home was his most expensive possession. It was about twenty-eight feet long, built on a van frame with an attached cab section. It had a sleeping bunk atop the cab in addition to the bedroom in the rear. Last year. Mama and Daddy let me sleep in the bunk. It was like camping out, even though it was only in our driveway.