Pineapple Upside Down Cake

No one is pretending anymore. A disgusting former noose that brought America to the brink only to fall for the sweetness in nightmares sold as a constitution revisioning. That’s how Papa Jimmy described it after I told him how my teacher presented it in her lesson. One of his mini rants during his morning routine of black lemon tea and skunk-ish smoke. He talked, whether he had an audience or not, and greeted the new audience happily without needing feedback between breaths. Dad says it’s how he used to plan routes. My mom and dad stopped volunteering to listen a long time ago. I guess war stories can only be so interesting in the revisit, although they let him stay while he was ‘stranded’ but beyond that, silence. Dad never said why. The most he would betray was the inner battle cry he’s amazing at hiding. I felt that he wasn’t the only one silently asking for quiet forgetfulness from all of us. I refuse to try to forget to look for what I don’t know. “That-a girl.” Wish other adults weren’t so secretly sad in conversations. Or a deep nostril exhale before abruptly changing the subject. Nervous laughter sounded the same as laughs at dirty jokes in kid-friendly movies. Not Papa Jimmy; he cackled even before he left two years ago with his ‘I’ll be back’ line referencing what Dad called a dumb kids movie from decades ago.

They decided to take me and my little brother south to be in Carolina on the last three days of 2050. Turns out I really do have cousins, aunts, uncles, and plenty of friends in the family who knew of the Dante name. At least with Papa Jimmy there, I’d fit in some place. Someone better explain the reminisces of the mass destruction I traveled fourteen hours through. I charted a lot of it on a map I picked up at one of the rest stops; thus, the condemned and abandoned ones can be asked about, too, if there’s time. I couldn’t believe the number of circles I collected in the former capital alone. I’d have to wait for the next pass for the educational jungle gym. Mom said it was more important we compensate for the clogged roads and ruined bridges despite my argument that people probably left supplies, gas, food, etc. I’m glad she said no. She probably considered four extra hours with a puking little brother with the inner turmoil that could kill the resolve of the most violent dictator. My dad says I should be so lucky to make jokes like that just to be hit with the ‘when you’re older’ card when I asked why. I’ve been left to my own imagination to analyze the boarded-up businesses covered in simplistic but half-a-block graffiti and the tales of whimsy they share. It’ll have to do until the morning. “this used to be where they first tried those ultraviolet lights, remember babe?”

“For you lusty nights dodging curfew,” Mom responded.

Ugh, grown-up parties. No, we’ll be fine, tucked away with movies from the nineties with cousins who didn’t like my first impression. Apparently, I’m a nerd. Only if my little brother could talk, he'd probably ask what all that noise is and blame me without thought. It’s like the first time they have ever eaten together. We jumped on the bed, throwing hard candies we were told were too old to be edible. Not sure why they keep them or the empty dresser with carved floral designs that weigh a ton if our attempts to move it said anything. If it was a little closer to the missing portion of wall, almost like the plan was to remodel to join the rooms, then we could play The Smoke Below into the middle room with the bunk beds. By the end of that one movie with the real people and an annoying killer rabbit, I had to see what was so funny. I would’ve drawn the short straw if I could. I made sure they started something called Heavy Metal, created in 2000 before I tip-toed to the top of the steps. One step at a time in the dark of the thin staircase with the broken stair lift. Each step, a test of my feet’s visibility to the cheery drinkers as more of my legs descended from the ceiling amid the baluster spindles. I managed to eavesdrop on a story from great uncle Anthony.

“—Where’s your steering wheel? And I’m yelling; you knew these checks were coming, Jimmy,” he began in laughter, bringing everyone with him as he mimed struggling with a car door. “And him and that drug runner you were fucking—ooo. Sorry, Stacey. Built their Revolt-Mobil like those goddamn Duke boys. Then I hear them outside the garage door. I’m thinking; if these soldiers are below E-4, we may have a chance, but Dennis, that dry-snitching little shit. Jim, how did he phrase it?”

“Come on. You like high art. Come get your Nazi gold. Think we got a vintage Post Malone vinyl somewhere.” It led to an explosion of laughter. “I swear when he patted the door—I had to wonder if my challenger had the clearance to plow over all of them. After shitting myself first.”

“That was the skin of our teeth.” Great uncle Anthony added.

“What happened to the gear?” Aunt Daisy asked.

“Maaaan! So, we cleared the rolling checks and we’re booking it in the dark. Buck ten—buck twenty like butter out of the town. Then I’m watching the signs, and they’re talking about Norfolk. So, I say, ‘Bro, we going the right way?’ he downshifts; puts my head on the dash. In the middle of the road, he goes, ‘Gee, navigator, I don’t know; where’s your map?’ We had to flip-a-bitch and go back fifteen miles for the missed turn--.” As everyone laughed, I caught my mom’s look of rageful disapproval. She smiled and shook her head. Then she put on a smirk and nodded me in the direction of the top of the stairs. I think Papa Jimmy saw me flee, then said as I was out of sight, “Also, I just remembered, where the fuck was your shotgun, dude?”

“Dessert. Pies I’ve never seen, orange sherbet, pecan pie, and something called New York cheese cake with strawberries covered in ruby red glaze, all laid out in the once-depleted buffet line. There was the big brown cake that looked burnt and crispy and was topped with a circular fruit. Grandma Stacy seemed extremely proud of that one. Papa Jimmy skipped the others and went straight for it as I skipped it, rolling my eyes hard so everyone behind me knew. Next thing I knew, he added a super tiny portion with a sliver of pineapple from the corner. “Don’t know until you try it, right?” Sure, I was being petty, planning to take that initial smell, then give him a little see-food but, holy shit, that cake was incredible. “Language!” The caramelized sugar top cradling cinnamon-covered pineapples that showed me divinity in food form. I turned to ask what it was called, but he was gone, dragged off by my dad and my mother’s sister. Oh, so also my aunt. Wow. Plastic plate of cake slices and a plastic fork in hand, I followed them to the back porch window, where they started unpacking boxes outside to reveal colorful cylinders.

“Come on, this is goo—”

“Dad, this might be, but what about the day after?”

“That’s not why I invited you—”

“Then why, huh? Why act like this? Is this your grand makeup tour?”

“Maybe it’s Maybelline.” Papa Jimmy smiled, but my dad didn’t. Papa Jimmy poked at him with a couple jokey body jabs, getting a reluctant smile that snapped shut. He smacked his hand down. “I don’t regret what I had to do. Nothing I can do, but I can show you what we were surviving for, what the hell was being done--”

“Stop it! There’s always a choice—”

“Boy, you wanted my answer.” My dad helped him carry a box up the ramp onto the garage roof. I lost a little until they returned. “—we were thinking of you, the next us. And you’re right; when you were a kid, it was easier. It suddenly got hard and confusing. The schools closed down; the markets only sold the same things with the same banned chemicals we spent our entire lives hearing were poisonous; it got real scary. You didn’t deserve that or what we had to do to stop the fuck holes doing it. This—this night was impossible even when you were a kid. This unity, this community—you think the people who volunteered for the work camps got the easy life they promised? You think we would have stayed together? Did you ever see the inside? Exactly, I’m not dead. I’m sorry I brought you into the world as it turned horrible and that, as a generation, we saw it coming and did very little. But I never stopped fighting and won’t stop trying to make things better for both of you.”

“That your hero speech?”

“I never wanted or tried to be a hero. Shit some of those dead or alive bounty papers still literally call me a villain. I’m used to it….” I couldn’t see his face after he turned to wipe his nose, but he stopped for a while. “I needed to be your father. That’s it. Name a faction that stopped me.”

“Shows what you know. I enjoy a good day’s work.” Dad said after a long pause. Papa Jimmy made that face when he planned to speak out of turn with lots of swears but stopped short for the kids in the room. I’ve heard them all already, so… Then he caught my dad’s smirk and the crinkly old boxer demeanor that melted in chuckles while reaching for another huge box. Then some yelled out for another go-fish player.

The fireworks were incredible, and we were sent to bed after the swirly red, white, and blue, which is how I learned what the word Crescendo means. I don’t know if I’ve ever been this comfortable in a strange place. Up north, it’s cozy in a sleeping atop the rubble way. A sizable room crammed to its limit to where the bed has one entrance and one exit. My brother and I share a room but not a bed, which is great until winter hits. The entire city felt like living around structural messes, over-peppered with litter that Mom says was there before things got bad. Despite not being a part of any row house where one in every eight might have a family living there, being in the middle of nowhere, warmed by the mesh of sleeping bags and blankets near a crackling fire, put me to sleep quicker than I ever expected. I could believe without a doubt that the sky had grown since we left. Somehow, it didn’t make the fireworks look small. I think I woke with a cousin’s foot in my face and was too comfortable to jump up right away, but of course, I did. We filled the living room, making the tip-toe game to the kitchen a minefield. I was nearly startled to death seeing Papa Jimmy sitting alone in the orange glow of the stove light facing the window, eating a piece of Pineapple Upside Down Cake. He offered me a piece if I didn’t tell Grandma Stacy.

“Is it true that old people don’t sleep?”

“I’m figuring that out myself. The real madness is in routines that don’t register they aren’t needed.” He said.

“From the war?”

“Revolt. You’re one of the only kids who wants to know?”

“It’s history. Teachers say we should because if we don’t—”

“We’re doomed to repeat it. Glad teachers are getting better.”

“The way dad acts, it must be hard. Books say it’s a lot of killing. But not about the sacrifices or why the government fell.”

“Everyone sacrificed so much--we adjusted.”

“Were you there when the White House blew up? Teacher says it was rebels.”

“Yeah—well, no. Different set of rebels with a different perspective of an ending.”

“What about the Bayou Trek or the Battle of Sweats, or the Vally Girl Run—”

“I’ll give you one. Your dad might not appreciate it, but it’ll give you a chill pill. How about it?” I scooted closer to the table, scarfed down the rest of my slice, then slid the plate to the side. “See, your dad will tell you I got him into fighting the oppressors; not true. I wanted to save him from it. On a job, I left him in the trusted care of an old colleague out of the game. I hated it, but as they rightfully explained, it’s better than the alternative. Next to him and his family lived another, and being the horny teen Cassanova he was, locked eyes on the first girl near his age. They were protective for good reason—helicopter parenting even, but he would be her little liberator. What he didn’t know was that she had been liberated for a year, and when he was sneaking out to surprise her, she was sneaking out on her own. I called to say I was returning, so he saw this as his last chance, with her strapped to a tee and on her way to town. Without the twenty-four-hour supercenter, the lights were fairly dim, unlike now, where if you don’t feel your hand, you should pinch it, just in case. After curfew, they had to pray no one at the courthouse was monitoring the surveillance system. I found out they were, but more on that later. She was making her way to a secret meet, anticorporate, down with the American regime types. Just before she reached H.Q., He was caught knocking a Sheriff’s deputy unconscious to protect the entrance location.”

“Were you a part of that one?”

“I remained unaffiliated for a long time; however, I had received intel from the revolutionaries I ended up joining that current tactics for concealing bases and disjointed encampments were now outdated. Laws stopped mattering, so why not use the military to spy on everyone without their knowledge using thermal imaging? This connection between Mikey and the family and the Rogers—not a clue, but their HQ was my last stop before picking him up. I started underground in the sewers to reach the basement level of the ‘condemned’ YMCA building. No community, no need for the centers. I enter, and there’s my boy, black eye, tied to a chair, drooling blood from a swollen jaw. I think I punched out four people before I thought to ask why they had him in the first place. Once the sixteen-year-old girl claimed he followed her and took out a cop, I immediately picked up on the fourteen-year-old brain and all of their foolhardy flaws. “He met her earlier in town or something; she shot an eye or spoke to him, got sweet on her, and happened to follow her, not knowing what she was into. Bet the cop was an honest, hormonal mistake?” My reputation wasn’t stout back then, so only two people could vouch that I wasn’t a spy for the other side, tops. So, I dropped my warning, shared my proof, and grabbed Mr. Lovestruck. They realized those uncommon choppers flying over the last few weeks that the enemy was very sure of this hideout. I untied him, and he didn’t want to leave. Ambush on the way and all. HE WAS THE WARRIOR.”

“Weren’t you?”

“Get away driver/transport specialist, but Mikey was gearing up for the offensive. Hell, most of them were.”

“Seriously?!”

“They had them dead to rights, though, and Mikey felt the reason for this sudden bombardment was the deputy he hurt, but they were always getting them whether first, third, or last. I reminded them that the underground passage was still open, still clear, but I can’t control people,” he uttered somberly. “And they faced the onslaught. I had to carry him down to the ladder because he would’ve followed Brittany-Lee anywhere—”

“The flipping Martyr?!”

“Yeah. Most of them didn’t make it, only the few that followed me, maybe a few that ran, I don’t know. Seeing the tail end of the grenades thrown without care, white phosphorus, which the news was forced not to admit wasn’t used, he never looked at the fight the same. I don’t blame him. He blames himself despite my efforts. I would’ve liked him to learn this later as an adult with the separation of violence and rhetoric that I don’t think either of them truly understood.”

“Wow.”

“That’s the rub. Cool posters, those reenactments popping up recently with the obvious villainous perpetrator, slick fights, and chases—those were our worst parts. And they’re over. We didn’t ask for it, but we took it. Our kids didn’t deserve to inherit it, but they needed to. At the dawn of what it was all for, we fight to protect you from it.”

“With stories told like wise tales?”

“Yes, Rene. Try to get some sleep.”