The Power of Laughter

Tanzy pressed her tanned face to the oak door. Damn the thick wood! It was hard to discern the muffled voices bickering on the other side. She had already missed half the excitement pressing the wild flowers she had plucked from the green forest floor behind her house not even an hour before.

“They’re very good children, Mr. Withers. It may be the ideal...”

“She’s not ready!”

When did Father Brown get here? And why was her father so cross with him?

“Mr. Withers, give him a chance. Please.”

That was Lucy. Tanzy had been laying in the sun reading with her in the forest clearing earlier that day. Well, Lucy had been reading some old Victorian fiction she had brought from the library to her. Tanzy had been lazing under the warm sky breaking to hunt for flowers to keep herself from falling asleep while listening to the strange and stoic stories.

Her mother’s voice was too soft to cull any new revelation from this side of her bedroom door, but it was soothing, and it seemed to Tanzy everyone was in agreement over the good children Father James had mentioned except for Mr. Withers.

“I don’t like it!”

Whatever the situation, Father had capitulated to the trio in the small living room with him. Tanzy had a sudden feeling she should jump back onto her twin sized bed and act casual. She barely had time to smooth the pale yellow quilt before her mother opened the door and sat down beside her. Lucy set a colorful sheet of paper with large block print on the white colonial bedside table and sat in the rocking chair beside it, beaming at Tanzy.

“Tanz, we've decided you won’t be going to the library tomorrow, we’d like you to -”

“But I don’t want to be stuck at home all day, Mom! I always go out on Saturday!” Tanzy cried.

Lucy clapped her hands together and leaned towards Tanzy with wide, excited eyes.

“You won’t be stuck at home Tanz! You’ll be here with me.”

Lucy held the paper out to her as she said this, punctuating her statement with a slim finger tapping on LIFE TEEN BBQ.

Tanzy snatched the paper out of Lucy’s delicate hand and read the flyer.

“Life Teen?”

“It’s the teenagers’ formation at the Church, honey.”

Tanzy flipped her attention towards her mother.

“Why a formation? Don’t they have mass in their homes every Sunday?”

Her mother paused at his.

“Well, they go to the Church for Mass on Sundays.”

This was too much for her. She bolted from the bed towards the door, holding it open for Lucy and her mother.

“Get out of my room. Now!”

Lucy’s excitement was immediately extinguished. She stood up from the rocking chair and walked out, only pausing to put a soft, commiserative hand on Tanzy’s shoulder . Tanzy barely heard the front door close. Her mother hadn't moved.

“You too, Mom.”

Tanzy’s lower lip began to tremble and her eyes started to sting. Her mother’s quiet exit was barely discernible through her hot tears.

She didn't have the strength to slam the door. She leaned into it until she heard it click into place, and slid against it’s strength until she sat on the floor. Dropping her head into her hands, she let herself sob.

She thought about her trips with Lucy to the small, bright library on the outskirts of town. It’s walls were outnumbered by the windows she gazed out of while Lucy flitted from one bookshelf to the next, searching for just the right book to read to her in the forest clearing. It was on the outskirts of town, just a few miles closer than her own home. She would watch the cocky little mockingbirds hop from branch to thin acacian branch, competing with the squirrels over whatever kind of things birds and squirrels fought for. Sometimes she would spy a rare cardinal or an elusive child her own age. They never said anything to her. At most she would get a glance that fell when she returned the look. The silence was chalked up to the sign on the door that said “As a courtesy to readers we request you please be quiet” but now she wondered.

Why didn't she go to Mass with everyone else? Did all the other kids in town have their own Lucy that came to their homes or did they all meet in some mysterious building to do their lessons together? Was there something wrong with her?

She let her head loll back and hit the door absorbed with these questions. She stayed that way for some time, staring out the paned window on the opposite wall, ignoring the worried voices in the living room. She didn't see through it. She didn't watch the sun slowly set and the night take over. One minute she was lost in her own thoughts, and the next she saw that the moon lit her room, and she followed that pale light to her small bed and slept.

A hesitant knocking at her door woke her.

“Honey? May I come in?”

“Come in,” she slurred as her eyes tried to focus.

Mrs. Withers stepped in while smoothing her white apron over her camel housecoat.

“Tanzy, would you like Lucy to take you to the church event?”

“I guess.”

“I think it would be nice for you to spend time with children your own age. You’re thirteen, we should have done this sooner.”

“Done what sooner? Eat barbecue?”

“Don’t be smart, Tanz, you should have been with children your own age before now.”

“Then why wasn't I? What’s wrong with me?”

“Nothing’s wrong with you! We just worry.”

“Why does Dad say I shouldn't? I heard him yesterday!”

“Why don’t you get dressed and speak to him yourself?”

With that, her mother slipped out of the room to give her privacy. Tanzy was apprehensive, but curious. The hurt was mostly gone but she was still holding a grudge against her father for not taking her side. If it was her side. The few kids she’d seen seemed to turn a cold shoulder to her. Maybe he was right. She washed up and dressed herself to join him in the breakfast nook where he was sipping on a steaming cup of black coffee and awkwardly manipulating a newspaper. She cleared her throat.

“The Tanzer is alive!” her father boomed. He had a kind face with rich brown hair graying at the temples, Tanzy’s same deep gray eyes, and rectangular spectacles hanging precariously at the tip of his aquiline nose. The nose, his long face, and of course the graying at the temples were the only features she lacked. She took after her mother’s round face and pert nose. He smiled at her now, his eyes bright. She graced him with a half hearted scowl.

“She thinks you don’t want her to go out with Lucy today, darling.”

“Preposterous! Where did you get such an idea?”

“I heard you arguing yesterday, you were the only one that said it’s a bad idea.”

“Awww c’mon now, Tanzer! I love you and I just want you to be happy. It’s just new, and it’s my job to be stern sometimes. You know your mother is too sweet for that. If it weren't for me, you’d still be wearing your Cookie Monster pajamas to the library!”

What little anger Tanzy could muster was extinguished. He had such a smooth way about him. Tanzy felt with his carefree ways and his general gusto that he would be the one to make concessions, but it was her gentle mother who could never say no. Maybe he had to play the bad guy once in a while.

“Maybe I don’t want to go.”

“Oh, honey, why in the world not?” her mother objected.

“Maybe they won’t like me. I’m not like them, I’m never around them. They all know each other.”

“Then you are just want they need!” her father interjected. “How boring that must be! Nothing new, everyone the same, you need to go in there and shake things up!”

Tanzy couldn't help but giggle a little at the idea.

“Fine. I’ll call Lucy.”

“Eat some breakfast first, you don’t want to go to a barbecue full of strangers eating like you’re starving.”

Leave it to her mother to worry about something like that.

* * * * * * * *

Lucy rapped on the front door several minutes late.

“Lucy! You’re never late,” Tanzy complained.

“You don’t want to be the first one there. This is your big debut, you should be fashionably late.”

If anyone would know, it would be Lucy. She had a freshness about her Tanzy envied. She was very grateful to have someone like her suddenly. It never occurred to her that there were ways to go about things to affect the way people looked at you until now. Lucy held the screen door as Tanzy shut the front door, and she let it fall into place as they walked across the short patio and took the two steps to the paved walkway. Lucy had a really old powder blue Volkswagen bug. You had to roll the windows down yourself and there was no power steering, but it was very cool. Tanzy liked the idea of showing up with her friend Lucy in a retro car.

It was a short, quiet drive if don’t count Lucy’s singing. It was off key, but not unpleasant. A lot of the songs she sang sounded like stories. She was singing something about a guy that was pleased to meet you, and he wanted you to guess his name. They drove through The Town, with it’s small, depression era houses of various pastel shades before taking a left onto a dirt road. She could see another small building a few minutes later. It was wooden and white much like her own, but the stained glass windows depicting Christ, his mother, and the saints told Tanzy they were about to arrive at The Church. Lucy pulled up next to a small, silver hybrid car and parked.

“Are you ready, kiddo?” she grinned.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Tanzy acquiesced.

“Alright, then. Let’s go!”

Lucy’s excitement was contagious. Tanzy couldn't stop the large smile that spread to her face. She got out of the car and followed her. They didn't go into the church, they walked around it towards the back. Her joy turned to shock when she saw a boy about a year or two younger than her sneaking about suspiciously with a strangely fat balloon. He spun to look at her, his eyes widened, and he tripped over himself, falling right onto the balloon as it burst into water. Tanzy’s body began to shake strangely, and she felt a sound bubbling out from her belly, through her chest, and out of her mouth. What was this? Was this what laughing is? As soon as she laughed the boy began to float from the ground, and he hovered about a foot over the lawn. Tanzy quit laughing immediately. The boy then fell from the air and hit the grass again. Oddly enough, he looked very excited, not what you would expect after his experience. He jumped up and ran around the corner shouting “She’s here! Come look, she’s here!”

Tanzy felt her stomach drop and she looked up at Lucy. Lucy was smiling at her.

“It’s okay Tanz, we told them about you. They’re all very excited to meet you!”

“We?”

“Well, Father Brown, really. He’s been talking and answering questions this past week between classes.”

“Telling them what?”

“That for some reason, when you laugh, you levitate the object that made you laugh! Your mother discovered it one day while she was changing your diaper. We didn't want you to know until we thought you were old enough to learn how to control it.”

“Is that why we’re here today?”

“Precisely!”