The Bear in a Muddy Tutu Read online

  THE BEAR IN A MUDDY TUTU

  Cole Alpaugh

  Seattle, WA

  Published by Camel Press

  PO Box 70515

  Seattle, WA 98127

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Cover design by Sabrina Sun

  Contact: [email protected]

  Copyright © 2011 by Cole Alpaugh

  ISBN (Paper): 978-1-60381-825-4

  ISBN (Cloth): 978-1-60381-826-1

  ISBN (eBook): 978-1-60381-827-8

  For Tylea, Kat, and Regan.

  And for my amazing wife, Amy,

  whose dancing would be

  the envy of Gracie.

  Acknowledgments

  Special thanks to the editing talents of Catherine Treadgold, and to the energy of my agent, Dawn Dowdle. And to Stephanie Nebel for showing so many people what is possible.

  Advance Praise for the Bear in a Muddy Tutu

  “From the first page to the last, Cole Alpaugh had my attention. His zany and colorful characters and style of writing put me in mind of one of my favorite authors, John Irving. I suspect that I have found my next new favorite author.”

  —Michelle Hessling, Publisher, The Wayne Independent

  “Pick up The Bear in a Muddy Tutu if you enjoy taking a literary journey that is twisted, peopled by characters who are social misfits, caught up in events that range from bizarrely tragic to merely sad. Reminded me in a way of A

  Confederacy of Dunces.”

  —Molly Rodgers, Library Director, Wayne County Public

  Library

  “Reading The Bear in a Muddy Tutu is like running away with the circus. You won’t regret the emotional ride or the fantastic people you meet, but you might regret not getting to stay longer.”

  —Regan Leigh, writer/blogger

  “A deftly written story driven by raw and vivid characters and rich with evocative language and colorful descriptions. With every page another layer is peeled back as this fascinating, magical tale unfolds—sad or humorous, but always thoughtful. Alpaugh’s writing does not rely on cheap tricks or predictable plot points, but slowly pulls you in and compels you to stick around for a while. Rest assured, in The Bear in a Muddy Tutu, you will constantly be surprised by what happens next.”

  —Rhiannon Ellis, author of Bonded In Brazil

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 1

  Billy Wayne felt like he’d grown wings, a couple of bone and feather things ready to fly him away from this lousy place. His head ached a little, like it always did. But it wouldn’t for much longer, not when he got these wings working.

  “You walk out that door and you ain’t never allowed back in, Billy Wayne Hooduk!” his mother shouted, the recliner under her bottom groaning from the massive weight. But Billy Wayne knew better. He was all too familiar with the mumbled pleadings in her tortured dreams. For a thousand nights he had cringed at the far edge of her bed, which reeked of the talcum powder she used on the sores under her breasts. He’d listened in the dark to her fear of him ever leaving, each word another pound of burden pressing down on his chest. Who would do the laundry and the shopping? Who would use the pumice stone on her corns? Who would help her out of bed to the toilet and wipe up her mess?

  “I’m a fat old lady and I’m going to die alone in my own filth!”

  Billy Wayne—who had baked his own birthday cake and bought his own thirtieth birthday present two weeks earlier—stopped on the top step, just on the other side of the storm door. He turned and squinted into the darkness. He could see the back of his mother’s chair, her blubbery right arm draped over one side, a wad of tissues dangling. A soap opera flickered beyond the lunch tray he’d left for her. Billy Wayne recognized that the moment he dared turn his back and walk down the cracked front steps of his mother’s house in Asbury Park, New Jersey, his life would change forever. He swore it would. It was his time. Once he had gone, nothing could bring him back, especially not his mother’s threats.

  Billy Wayne put down the small green Samsonite suitcase he was carrying to open the book that had caused these turn of events, this new chapter in his life. The book was due back at the library in three days, but the nice lady behind the library desk would just have to order a new copy. Libraries must get all their books for free since they let you read them for nothing. And this book had become Billy Wayne’s bible, more precious to him than it would be to anyone else. Billy Wayne needed it. It had surely been written for him.

  How to Become a Cult Leader in 50 Easy Steps had caught his eye as he was browsing in the Religion Section. He’d fumbled the skinny book off the shelf, knowing right away that he had been meant to find it. He opened to the first chapter, and there it was in black and white:

  “How do you know you are the Chosen One?”

  Billy Wayne read on.

  “Do you hear voices in your head when nobody else is around?”

  “Yes!” Billy Wayne was alone between the stacks, shaking his head. “Almost all the time.”

  “Have you noticed that people have come to rely on you more and more?”

  “The bed pan,” Billy Wayne said with a mixture of wonder and disgust.

  “Do you feel the suffering of the sick on your back?”

  “Oh, God.” Billy Wayne was almost in tears of ecstasy and revulsion. “I have to sponge her privates.”

  “Have you been persecuted for your beliefs?”

  “She threw all my Screw magazines in the trash and said I was a dirty sinner boy,” said Billy Wayne in a hushed voice.

  “Are you ready to rise from the ashes and take your place as the Chosen One?”

  Billy Wayne’s hands were shaking as he closed the book and clasped it to his thumping chest, letting the epiphany take full hold. Sweat dripped down his back, making his shirt stick to his skin.

  “I am ready.” All these books about Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and the Rastafarian movement were stupid fakes, Billy Wayne thought. He ran his hand over the shiny cover of this marvelous book as he turned it over and over. He didn’t expect to find an author’s photo and so he wasn’t disappointed. Did the Bible have photographs?

  He opened back up to the first chapter. “Repeat these words:
I am God.”

  “I am God.” Coming from his mouth the words sounded hollow and whiney.

  He tried again, deeper, with more authority: “I am God.” Better, he thought, much, much better.

  “How does saying those words make you feel?” he read.

  Billy Wayne squinted in concentration, making an all-out effort to come up with an honest answer. He was overwhelmed with the notion that he must answer sincerely, not taking the usual shortcuts. His mother had nagged him about shortcuts—how he never finished anything he started, if he even got around to starting in the first place. Having enough money to supplement her disability checks was all she’d ever aspired to. As a teenager, Billy Wayne had written down all the names of the neighbors he was going to approach about cutting their lawns—all little square plots of grass that would take a few minutes each. He copied three dozen names from mailboxes and the phone book, but then he was distracted by a toy store flyer. Billy Wayne’s new list was for all the cool new toys he planned to buy with at least some of the money he was going to earn. A day later, he grew bored of the toys he thought he had wanted. And the whole idea of waking up on Saturday mornings and mowing lawns seemed like so much work. What was in it for him, anyway? Billy Wayne spent his weekends behind sticky bowls half filled with brightly colored milk and a few remaining soggy bits of sugary cereal, entertained by violent cartoons.

  Billy Wayne was barely a teenager when he came to accept his mother’s assessment regarding the hill of beans he was destined never to amount to. Billy Wayne liked beans, especially smothered in catsup and honey, so the abuse rolled right off his plump back.

  How did speaking the words “I am God” make him feel? Standing amid all the shelves of books—dispensing advice on dieting, having better sex, and making tons of cash selling real estate with no money down—Billy Wayne came up with what he considered an accurate assessment: “They make me feel big.”

  Billy Wayne Hooduk dug through his jeans pocket, found his library card, and handed it to the nice lady at the front desk. He stood nervously in front of the circulation computer as she scanned the bright yellow card and the bar code on the book. Tucking the receipt inside the front cover, she handed it back with a smile.

  “It’s due back in two weeks,” said the kind library lady.

  “God bless you.” The words caught in his throat as he took the extraordinary book from her. What was supposed to be his first loving benediction came out a mumbled thank you, for all of his newfound confidence had already washed away. Billy Wayne turned from what was surely now a disparaging smile and ran for the door, heading home to pack his Samsonite and try out his new wings.

  Chapter 2

  The steady onshore breeze stacked the dark clouds into a wall less than a quarter mile from the Jersey shore, the wind forming an invisible barrier to lightning-filled cumulus clouds trying to push east. Billy Wayne sat on a boardwalk bench, enjoying the warm sunshine, while thunder rumbled behind him. It was a powerful feeling having all that energy right over his shoulder. He imagined he could summon it if necessary.

  It was the last Thursday in May, and only a few people were stretched out across towels on the deep white sand. A bevy of kites were flapping in the distance, and a troop of industrious kids were busy digging a hole large enough to park a dune buggy in. Or maybe they were preparing to trap a dune buggy, Billy Wayne thought.

  He gazed across the wide expanse of beach at the gray ocean, his Samsonite between his knees and the pages of his holy book open on his lap.

  “I am God,” Billy Wayne practiced. The cool sea breeze that slapped at the pages was refreshing on his face.

  Billy Wayne had parked his ’63 Dodge Dart at a meter right behind his bench. His mother was just four miles away, but the three small towns wedged in between were enough of a barrier for Billy Wayne to bask in his independence from everything but the parking meter. He cupped a damp nickel in his left hand, ready to drop it in should a cop happen along. He had eleven hundred dollars stuffed, tucked, and hidden in five different places on his person. He’d learned the method for protecting against muggers during a segment of Good Morning America. There was no telling how long it would be before his followers would start turning over their life savings, so he was prudently trying to conserve every last penny. Proselytizing was not going to pay off anytime soon. Billy Wayne knew he needed to keep reading.

  Step number three from How to Become a Cult Leader in 50 Easy Steps: “Appearance and grooming: it is extremely important to wear a suit and tie when first recruiting followers. People must see you as authoritative. Picture yourself a school teacher who is also a door-to-door salesman. Your face and hands should have a nice tan, which can easily be applied. After establishing your following, appearance and grooming can and should be ignored. Think existentialism here. You will be seen as more spiritual with greasy tangled hair and body odor.”

  Billy Wayne adjusted his clip-on tie. Each time he’d summoned the courage to approach what appeared to be a lost soul, he lost his nerve. He’d been left standing awkwardly on one foot, stuttering a squeaky apology and cowering away, armpits dripping with sweat.

  He looked down, examined his pudgy hands, and made a resolution to stop biting his fingernails.

  Step number four: “If you are in shape and have a muscular physique, skip ahead. If you are fat, then you need to practice what is called ‘Successfat.’ ‘Successfat’ is a belief system wherein the fatter someone is, the more successful he has been in life. Most of the great kings and rulers in history have been terrible gluttons. This is you! Rise above your waistline! Don’t slouch and continually pull your suit jacket over your great belly. No, a true Successfat celebrates his corpulence, patting his or her bay window without chagrin. Smile wide and warm and throw those meaty paws out and shake hands like you’re sealing a deal, because you just may be!”

  Billy Wayne sat up straighter and let his suit jacket fall away to his side to proudly display his fat belly. He smiled broadly, reaching out to shake an invisible follower’s hand.

  “Hey, what’s your problem, buddy?” came a startled female voice in front of Billy Wayne, who immediately recoiled his hand as if electrocuted by the passing bikini bottom. “You fucking sicko!”

  Billy Wayne flinched, expecting to be hit, but the woman was more than two benches away by the time he dared open his eyes. Her legs, glistening with suntan lotion, were made even longer by the inline skates. The bikini bottom he’d touched was cut way up over her tan hips. Billy Wayne guiltily watched her jiggling rear end grow smaller. Then he grabbed his suitcase and book, retreated to his Dart, and backed out onto the empty street to search for a cheap motel. Being God required careful fine-tuning. He needed to read and work on his recruiting skills.

  On the lookout for the most faded paint and missing signage letters, Billy Wayne swung the Dart into the spot nearest the Belmar Arms Motel office door.

  “It’s forty-nine dollars and no hookers,” said the leathery old man behind the counter. “Cash only.”

  Billy Wayne pulled off his right shoe and removed a moist pile of twenties and fifties. He peeled off two limp fifties and pushed them across the counter. The desk clerk eyed the bills but wasn’t prepared to pick them up.

  “Sorry,” Billy Wayne said. “The rest is in my underwear.”

  “Room twelve.” The old man snatched a key out of a large coop of mail slots and slapped it down next to the bills. “And no hookers.”

  “I swear.” Billy Wayne grabbed the key and headed back out to reposition his car in front of door number twelve.

  The soap in the tiny shower stall smelled like a urinal cake, but the near-scalding water emptied his sinuses and cleared his head, which seemed to hurt a little less since he’d left home. Billy Wayne twisted both knobs to “off” and leaned out of the curtain to listen for his mother’s phantom voice. A puddle formed on the moldy tiles as he strained to hear; thirty years of incessant heckling was going to take some time to eject from his h
ead.

  Billy Wayne resumed lathering, wondering how long it would take before he was free from the haunting demands that had overshadowed every event in his life, including the only time he’d ever made love to a girl.

  “Billy Wayne,” his mother had said. “You get right off that dirty tramp!”

  It had been four years ago, just before his mother had lost the ability to climb the stairs to the second floor of their house. Even then, she’d had to struggle, taking a long rest on the landing then using the railing to hoist herself up one step at a time.

  Billy Wayne had snuck his girlfriend in through the kitchen door. At forty, Betty Katz was more of a woman than a girl. And since he’d had to pay her twenty-five dollars, she didn’t exactly qualify as a girlfriend. But Billy Wayne wanted his first time to be special. He didn’t want it to take place where she’d first suggested—in the backseat of his Dart, down behind the closed drugstore.

  “You got a real nice house,” Betty said, as Billy Wayne pulled her quickly toward the stairs, the music from The Price is Right wafting in from the living room.

  “Shhh.” Billy Wayne hurried her up the stairs to a small bedroom his mother kept ready for when her sister came to visit. “In here.”

  Behind the closed door, Billy Wayne tried to relax a little. He smelled her wonderful perfume and hoped it covered any bad smells he might be giving off. Betty was thick around the middle, and her large bosoms resting on her belly made her almost pumpkin-like. But her skin was so clean and soft that Billy Wayne nearly swooned in anticipation of what was about to happen.

  Betty snapped her gum coyly, twisted a finger in her curly brown hair, and seemed to be waiting for Billy Wayne to make a move.

  “What should I do?” Billy Wayne stood directly in front of her, looking her over from head to toe, clueless as to where to begin or how sex really worked. The thin material of her flowered blouse barely covered her breasts; the powder-blue stretch pants showed off every voluptuous curve and cellulite divot.