Chapter 12
Due to the fact that the strange guy in the work boots, bib overalls, plaid shirt, and straw hat was taking his pickaxe to Liberty Lane outside of AMOR once again, I didn’t make it directly to Starbuck’s for a cup of coffee.
Like the day before, a police officer was leaning up against the building next door to the radio station, watching the man work.
I Only Want to Be with You by Dusty Springfield was the song du jour on AMOR, but I wasn’t sure where I remembered the song from well enough to remember the name or artist. It was funny, standing there, watching the man take the pickaxe to the street with the song coming from all directions from speakers spread throughout town.
Strange metallic “clangs” interspersed with the echoey sound of the song was distracting.
It was probably just what I needed to take my mind off of my encounter with Jack and the humiliation I’d thrust upon myself.
For more than was probably a good idea, I stared at the man knocking out a hole in the concrete of one of the main streets of downtown Possibly.
Then I’d watched the cop for a while, wondering why he just leaned against the building and smiled at the man doing his…
work? Upon inspecting the man and his work for a bit longer than I had previously, I realized that I had been right.
He was knocking out pieces of the concrete and replacing them with different colored bricks, all of them in a different color of the rainbow.
His holes and placement were a bit erratic and scattered—he certainly hadn’t kept up a pattern—but I could see what he was attempting to do.
A street made of rainbows.
It was kind of cool. Odd, but cool. The fact that the police officer—and apparently, everyone else in town—was fine with the man doing it was extraordinary.
Everywhere else I’d ever been would have at least arrested a person for doing such a thing.
At best, a huge fine would be doled out to the person caught doing what this man had been doing for what looked like some time.
At worst, someone would get thrown into jail anywhere else in the country.
For how long, who knows? Probably a lot longer than anyone would want to spend in jail.
The tram started to roll down Liberty Lane, towards the other end by the creek, as I stood there watching the man tear up the street.
The conductor gave me a nod as he rolled by at a pace slower than a person strolls, and I nodded back.
I forced myself to smile. If you’re polite to the crazies, they tend to leave you alone.
Or, at least, they don’t act as crazy around you.
That’s what I’ve found everywhere I’ve ever been, anyway.
As I stood there watching the man tear up the street, I felt like everyone in town was watching me, even though I knew they weren’t. I was familiar with the feeling. Embarrassing the hell out of yourself does that to a person.
Why’d I have to talk to Jack about school and stuff?
The guy probably didn’t even want me around.
Why hasn’t Mom texted or called me?
Thoughts swirled through my head and my heart couldn’t decide which emotion to settle on as my eyes glazed over until I wasn’t really watching the man tear up the street anymore.
Sure, I was looking in his general direction, but I really wasn’t seeing much.
What had just happened at Jack’s place kept replaying in my head.
Why had I even mentioned my thoughts about school and the future?
In fact, why did those things even pop into my head?
It had only been a few days since Mom had dropped me off at the end of Two-Mile Trail.
As I’d walked down the dirt road, lugging my suitcases along, the thought of Mom eventually returning—probably before summer was over—and saving me from Possibly had been on my mind.
Why had I suddenly shifted from thinking about Mom rescuing me at some point soon to thinking about where I would be going to school in a few months?
Then it hit me.
I’d been on the road with Mom for a decade.
Since I was six years old. It was the only life I’d known for a long time.
But it wasn’t really a good life. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mom and everything, but bouncing from city to city, motel to motel, having a different uncle every time—it wasn’t great.
In fact, I didn’t really like it all that much.
At least, not once I realized how lonely it was to be on the road with an underemployed actress.
So, when I realized that I had a chance to stay in one place for a while and maybe make a friend or…something…it had excited me.
But I’d gotten ahead of myself.
Without me realizing it, my feet had been spurred into action by my thoughts.
I didn’t want to stand around being ticked off and embarrassed.
My feet had an idea of how to keep my mind occupied and distracted from the last few hours.
A minute later, I found myself walking up to the big pirate ship in the center of downtown.
A cup of coffee would make me feel better.
Especially one loaded with chocolate, milk, and foam.
There was no longer a man in a green-screen suit waiting out front.
Instead, it looked like Levi Lee had given up on being one with the hull of Starbuck’s.
Instead, he had decided that dressing in all silver from head to toe, plus applying silver make up to his exposed skin, and walking around like a robot was the thing to do.
Levi Lee had on a silver tux—which I didn’t figure they sold in Possibly—a silver top hat, silver shoes, silver socks, and his hands and face had been painted silver.
He was doing a passable robot walk, but it wasn’t perfect.
When he saw me approach, he raised an arm jerkily and waved back and forth like a metronome.
“Hello, new guy!” he announced.
“Hello. New. Guy,” I repeated in a robot voice.
“Right!” Levi Lee announced. “Hello. I. Am. Levi. Lee.”
“Pretty good, man.” I congratulated him on the voice. “Uh, give up on the green suit or something?”
Levi Lee nodded jerkily. He was definitely better at being a robot than he was being part of Starbuck’s hull.
I watched him for a minute as he moved his arms and legs as if they were on screws and pins, moving them robotically as he walked and waved—sometimes at nothing at all.
His head turned back and forth smoothly, as though upon a well-oiled caster.
Every movement was a little too smooth and quickly performed, though.
Levi Lee had the basics down, but he wasn’t fully convincing as a robot.
However, I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he should rehearse more.
Of course, I didn’t know why he wanted to be a robot—or part of the hull—so, I didn’t know what he’d be rehearsing for, really.
No one stopped, aside from myself—to watch Levi Lee perform his strange robot routine outside of Starbuck’s.
In fact, while I stood there watching him, three different people entered the coffee shop and one left, and none of them even seemed to notice him.
He definitely should have tried being a hull that day.
He was more than invisible to everyone except me.
“You’re doing pretty good, man.” I only lied a little. “Pretty soon, people will think that robots are taking over Possibly.”
“You really think so?” Levi Lee stopped his movements immediately and gasped with pleasure.
“Yeah.” I shrugged. “Just stop breaking character, ya’ know?”
Levi Lee kicked at the ground, realizing he had messed up his routine yet again.
“You’ll get it,” I said. “Just keep working.”
Levi Lee went back into a robot pose and began moving his arms, legs, and head as he had been before, though he seemed to have lost a little confidence.
“Just don’t get so mad at yourself when you mess up,” I suggested. “That makes you nervous or something, I think.”
“You’re. Right,” he responded robotically and his movements improved slightly.
“You’re getting it, man!” I cheered him on.
Levi Lee let a small smile come to his lips but I could tell his concentration ratcheted up higher as he tried to make himself seem even more robotic.
It suddenly dawned on me that Levi Lee just needed someone to believe in him and encourage him.
He was a pretty friendly guy, and he was always willing to carry on a conversation, so maybe he would talk to me about the people in Possibly since Jack wouldn’t.
“Hey, Robot Levi Lee?” I asked.
“Yes?” he responded perfectly as a robot.
“Would you mind being human Levi Lee for a minute?” I asked. “Just take a little break? Maybe you can help me with something.”
Levi Lee immediately fell out of the robot routine, looking excited as a puppy dog at the opportunity to help out someone else. I was just glad he had on normal pants that weren’t tight like the green-screen suit I’d seen him in the first few days I’d been in town.
“I’m at your service, my good man.” Levi Lee bowed his head.
“Awesome.” I tried not to wince at his weirdness. “Do you know anything about the barn? Ya’ know? Further down the creek and just two streets over?”
“Well, sure.” Levi Lee grinned. “You can’t really miss a big red barn in Possibly, after all.”
“Right,” I said. “But I was wondering if you could tell me what goes on in there?”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, like, late at night I see lights coming from there,” I explained. “Lasers one night and then something that looked like the glow of Christmas lights. I just wanted to know what that’s all about?”
“Hmmmm.” Levi Lee reached up to scratch his chin.
“Jack said that Auguste Anderson lives there, and—”
“They do,” Levi Lee agreed.
“—I don’t understand why there’s a light show every night?” I continued. “Everywhere else in town is pitch black at night. Except the barn. Well, I think the lights always go off at midnight, but…well…what’s going on there?”