"Radioactive Disney"

“Is that a promise?” Keeping something from the Keeper herself—there couldn’t be a better incentive.



“I’m serious here.”


“Trust me, so am I.”


He stands next to the Peter Pan hook rug like it is radioactive, like I need to be protected from the little boy who flies into the starry night. “I thought you might want to see this.” He turns around and delicately lifts a corner of the hook rug.


There is my dad standing beside my mother and Jack as I light the Chanukah menorah; there he is hugging mom’s bulging belly from behind with his long seventies’ hair; there we all are at Disneyworld, and dad’s arm is around mom while a toddler Jack and six year old me sit at Goofy’s feet. The entire hook rug is plastered with Howard Fluchter, of our life before things like Meadowview and Betty’s Basement ever existed. But all of the pictures are blending into one smattering of color as hot tears fill my eyes.


“My G-d you’re nosy!” Snot drips out of my nostrils.


He hands me a handkerchief from his front pocket. “No, I think that would be you.” He winks. I am not laughing. I want to hit something hard and make it hurt. Mr. McGee is looking very convenient. “Look, every day I’m here fixing up one thing or another. It was bound to happen.”


“Oh my G-d, she showed you.” I storm over to The Little Mermaid and turn it over. It is covered with snapshots of dad’s childhood.


“No. You were right the first time. I’m just nosy.” He shrugs and smiles from the corners of his eyes.


Mr. McGee’s face is nothing more than a bull’s eye. I do not feel time as I raise my hand and slap him hard on his cheek. “Leave.”


“I can’t. You know your mom wants me to watch you.” He rubs his cheek. “You’ve got brutal aim there, kid.”


“Good.” I storm out of the den and into my bedroom, slamming the door behind me.


I can hear Vinny’s cowboy boots click on the cheap vinyl floor of our kitchen. “Your mother’s still mourning kid, except she doesn’t know how. None of us do. That’s all you’re seeing here—a gal who doesn’t know how to hold on and let go.”


There is a silence that is heavy with possibility. If my heart were a sign there’d be giant caution lights blinking like crazy now as I open the door and take a chance on the man with the Ronald McDonald smile. “You really love her, don’t you?”


His puppy eyes gleam with the syrupy sweetness that sings of new beginnings. If dad could speak he’d tell me this is okay. Vinny nods his head and I collapse into him, knowing his answer long before my heart wanted to accept it.


“Hey, congratulations kid—I hear you’re a free bird again. No more detention, huh?”


“I sure am.” It doesn’t surprise me that he remembered. Nothing he will ever do will surprise me anymore. And this is a good thing, a giant teddy bear good thing.