“I’m leaving,” she said.
“Leaving what?”
“Leaving the city. The state.” She smiled. “Probably not the country, but maybe the country. Depends how I feel.”
I blinked, trying to understand what she was saying. When I started to talk, she held up her hand. “Listen, I was thinking about all of this stuff, about Gert and being in the hospital. There are some people I need to see, from my own family.”
“I thought you didn’t have a family. I thought they all died in Arkansas.”
“Arizona, actually. And I know I said that, and to me they’ve been dead. Not dead dead. Just…” AK47 took her chin off the cane and started slowly spinning it like a top. “I’ve been meaning to go and see them, I guess.”
“Are Gert and I going with you? Because I need to request the time off work and Carol would like at least one week’s notice before I can take time off and get approved.”
“Oh, Zelda, I know you’d go to hell and back for me. But I’m going solo on this one.”
I felt a ball in my throat.
“When are you coming back?”
Instead of answering, she told me to bring her something. “It’s in the bedroom. I wanted to have it out before you came, but I didn’t have time.” She patted her weak leg. “Limpy over here makes things difficult.”
“What is it?”
She stuck out her cane and poked me with it. “Hey. Stop asking questions. All will be revealed. It’s an envelope. On the bedside table. Bring it in here.”
There were clothes all over the bed and floor. Inside the closet, empty hangers hung from a metal rod that stretched from one side to the other. There was an envelope on the bedside table and on it AK47’s handwriting said ZELDA.
I brought it to AK47, who said to open it.
The envelope wasn’t licked closed, so all I had to do was pull the flap. Inside there were some folded papers, and when I unfolded them I saw a key attached to the front one with Scotch tape.
“Here’s what we’re going to do,” AK47 said, stretching out her hand for the papers and the key, which she pulled off and handed to me. “This is the key to my apartment. I’m going to have to get another one made for the front door, but for now there’s a code you can memorize. It’s not too hard but it works on the front door. It’s written here.” She held up the papers and tapped the top corner, where she had written 2-6-0-8. “Now, these papers here.” She flipped the pages over. “There’s a place down here where you need to sign.”
“Sign?”
“Correct. Your signature. The one you’ve been practicing.”
I told her I didn’t understand. AK47 leaned forward, and I leaned forward so that our faces were almost touching.
“These papers will transfer the lease to you. I’ve cleared it with the super of the building. He knows you’ll be taking over the apartment for me. You’ll need to get him a copy of a pay stub from the library, showing that you have an income, but you’ll be able to afford it. I’ve paid the next few months in advance already, so that should give you time to get used to paying the bills. Electricity is covered, Internet isn’t. I’ve sent you an e-mail with the details, but for the most part, you’ll sort it out.”
I sat back and stared at her, then at the apartment, which was very big all of a sudden.
“What does Gert think?” I said.
“To quote my favorite person in the world, which would be you: Gert is not part of this legend. I want you to have the apartment, not you and Gert.”
“Why would it not be for Gert too?”
She put her arms behind her head and sank into the couch. “You know, I had a lot of time to think. About what happened back there, about how you saved me, and how hairy things got with that scumbag.”
I looked at my hands. “I still have dreams sometimes about him.”
“God, Zee, me too. And it’s not fair. None of it is fair. But here’s what I think. You’ve been cleaning up Gert’s messes for long enough.”
“I don’t clean up any of his messes,” I said. “He’s very clean.”
“I don’t mean literally. I mean in life.” She sighed. “You can’t save a person who doesn’t want to be saved. God knows I’ve tried to save him. And you have too. Sometimes the people we love are also the monsters, the—what do you call them? The Grendels?”
“Gert isn’t a Grendel.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. But he’s not going to be good for you, or good for anybody, until he’s found himself.”
I turned the key over and over in my hand. It was silver and bright and as I turned it light from the metal shone on the walls and ceiling.
“He needs to write his own legend,” I said.
AK47 smiled. “Exactly.”
“I don’t know if I can have my own apartment.”
AK47 stood up, using the arm of the couch for balance. “Why not? You can always call me, and I’ve already told Big Todd, who is going to set up check-ins and help. Plus Dr. Laird. Besides, I might come back in a week and throw a wrench in this whole plan.” She held out her fist. “The point is you’re willing to give it a try. That’s what makes someone a legend.”
I said I needed some time to think about it. “When are you leaving?”
AK47 stood by her suitcases. “I’d say about now.”
I wanted to stop her from leaving, but I didn’t. She was crossing things off of her own list of things she needed to do.
We hugged and she walked out and I stood at the door. She got on the elevator and held up her fist, and I held up my fist, and from across the hallway we did a dab, even though we were too far for our fists to actually touch.
chapter thirty-seven
Every Viking home needs to be blessed, and the best way to do a blessing is to celebrate the home with all of your friends. Hamsa came, and Yoda too. Hamsa brought his uncle, who wished me a happy home and did a thing with his hands in prayer.
Marxy and Sarah-Beth came to the party together, which did not make me mad. I was very happy for them. Marxy had found someone who understood him and loved him.
His mother hugged me too. “I know your mom’s not around, but I think she’d be proud of you.” She brought me a special Norse rune to protect the house. “You’re supposed to put it by the door. Good luck and all that.” She stopped by the letter from Dr. Kepple, which I had printed out and hung on the wall and put in a picture frame, which you can get from the Dollar Barn for a dollar and fifty cents.
“That is very special,” I said, standing beside her. “That is from Dr. Kepple, who is an expert on Vikings. People think that only men can be powerful Vikings, but they’re wrong. Women like us can be powerful too.”
Pearl smiled. “We definitely can be powerful, Zelda.”
Big Todd brought his boyfriend and helped me with the Internet bill and showed me how to create an automatic deduction for the rent to come out. Carol from the library also came. She brought two bookends so that when I started my own library, they could sit on the ends of the books and stop them from falling over.
I also invited the Viking stripper from my birthday party, who it turns out was gay and who Big Todd and Noah thought was super hot.
I showed them my Viking sword, and a new outfit that I had ordered from the Internet that was for female Vikings.
Dr. Laird came too, which I did not expect. He hadn’t responded to my e-mail inviting him.
“You came,” I said.
He was wearing his big coat and he had his wife with him. I knew it was his wife from the pictures on his desk.
“I thought I’d make an appearance.” He looked around at everyone else at the party and smiled. He introduced his wife, who shook my hand and said it was an honor to meet me. I told her it was an honor to meet her.
“This is a nice place,” Dr. Laird said.
“Thanks,” I said.
He asked if Gert was there, and I said he was invited but hadn’t come.
Yoda came over with a drink for Dr.
Laird and his wife. “I am the official drink-bringer,” he said. “And if you would like me to take your coats.” He held out his arms and took the coats to the bedroom, where the coats of everyone who came were on the bed.
“Do you think Gert will come?” I asked Dr. Laird.
“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe not. But even if he doesn’t, you’ve done a very good thing. I’m proud of you.”
He said he wanted to talk to me alone, and his wife gave him a kiss on the cheek and told him that she was going to use the ladies’ room.
“Do you remember the Viking article I gave you? The one about the woman Viking?”
I said I did.
“Do you know why I gave it to you?”
“So that I could become a hero,” I said.
“Everyone is a hero in their own lives,” he said. “That’s by default. But I wanted you to see that sometimes the world thinks something is not possible, but it turns out that they can be wrong. Even fancy scientists can be wrong.”
“Sometimes the most important things don’t fit on lists,” I said. “And sometimes those are things we don’t expect. Like this apartment.”
Dr. Laird smiled. “Sometimes the most important things don’t fit on lists. I like that.”
“Me too.”
We dabbed again.
* * *
I kept waiting for Gert to show up, but he didn’t. We had not seen each other very much since AK47 had left. She did not tell him in person that she was leaving, which I did not like but also understood. Gert could get very angry and I know she did not want to have to fight with him. At first I wanted them to fight so that Gert could convince her to stay. Now I was glad she did not get convinced.
People from the party started going home.
“If you talk to Annie, tell her we miss her,” Big Todd said, and we hugged and I said I would.
Dr. Laird said to call him to set up an appointment whenever I needed.
Once everyone left I started cleaning up and was almost finished at 10:12 p.m. when there was a knock at the door. Through the peephole I saw Gert standing in front of the door.
“You’re very late,” I said, opening the door.
“Too late?” He smiled and leaned in the doorway.
I shook my head. “You are welcome.”
He started walking into the house and I cleared my throat and pointed at the RULES FOR ZELDA’S APARTMENT. Gert saw the sheet of paper and stopped.
“Okay, okay,” he said, and took off his shoes. “I like the place.”
Gert put his hands in his pockets. He had not shaved in a long time and I knew that he had been drinking beer from how he smelled.
“Thank you.”
I made him not coffee but tea. One of the things that I learned is that I don’t like coffee, not as much as tea. I also do not like carpet, because dirt hides in it and it gets ugly and smells.
He sat on the couch and picked at a thread. I brought over the tea.
“How are you holding up?” he asked.
“Fine. How are you holding up?”
He shrugged. “Not bad.” He cleared his throat. “Have you heard anything from her?”
I had heard from her and told Gert that she was doing well. He kept picking at the thread of the couch. He asked where she was now—if she was in Arizona.
AK47 had asked me not to tell Gert things like where she was. I could tell him she was okay and safe. “But don’t tell him anything else,” she wrote in her e-mail.
“I’m not sure,” I said. “But she is okay and safe.”
Gert looked around and then rubbed his neck. “I’d really like to talk to her,” he said. “So if you know how to get in touch with her…” He trailed off and stopped rubbing his neck. “She’s not answering my e-mails.”
He had not touched his tea.
“She is on her own quest,” I said.
“Yeah.”
He took my phone from me. “Gert. Stop.”
“What’s your password?”
When I didn’t tell him, he threw it at the wall, where it bounced and fell onto the ground, making a chip in the wall.
I crossed my arms. “You need to leave now,” I said, pointing to the door. “That is the most important Rule of the House—no yelling and throwing things.”
Gert picked up his shoes and walked to the door. He wiped his nose on his sleeve.
He went into the hallway and punched the wall before starting to walk, holding his shoes.
At the end of the hall he stopped and said, “Can you just come home?”
“This is my home now,” I said, and even though it was the hardest thing I have ever done, harder even than facing Toucan, I went back inside and closed the door.
I put the last dishes from the party into the sink and turned off the music and went to my room, where it was quiet and filled with shadows.
I knew, though, there were no monsters in the shadows, no Grendels in the walls. Just my breathing in the dark, and outside a bright moon hanging in the sky.
* * *
When I woke up the next morning and began getting ready for work, I saw that there was an envelope underneath the door. I bent down and picked it up and saw that the envelope had my name on it in Gert’s handwriting, which is big and with a Z that looks like the number three.
Inside was a paper that had been folded three times. It was Gert’s scholarship essay, the one he had written for college and did not want me to read.
I pressed it flat on the coffee table.
To the Rivergreen College Scholarship Committee:
My name is Gert MacLeish. I’m twenty-one years old, don’t have a high school diploma, and nobody I know has ever been to college, either.
I’m not very good at writng essays, so the only way this is going to work is if I write like I speak.
I frowned. Gert spelled writing wrong. He should have used spell-check. I took a pencil and corrected the word before I started reading again.
Some people are made to go to college, some people aren’t. I always thought I was the second kind. I played football. My grades weren’t great, but you can probably see that from my transcripts. Football was supposed to be my ticket. When my knee blew up, so did every dream I had of ever being someone.
My sister Zelda never really knew our Dad. She was young when he left. When Mom died of breast cancer, we ended up living with our Uncle Richard, a really bad dude. Zelda’s into Vikings and villains and heroes, and if there’s one villain, one dragon blowing fire on the world, it’s Uncle Richard.
She doesn’t really know how bad things got with him, how abusive. Men aren’t supposed to talk about this kind of stuff, and I don’t know why I’m mentioning it right now, except that the instructions say to talk about “mitigating circumstances.” Uncle Richard is the definition of a “mitigating circumstance.” Zelda is always talking about Grendels, these evil monsters who hide in the shadows and come for you in the dark. The longer we stayed with Uncle Richard, the more I realized that he was the one she was afraid of, the monster that came in the dark. And since Zelda couldn’t defend herself, it was up to me to defend her—to get us out of there. I’m not the type of person who asks for help, but that’s what I’m doing with this letter.
At the start of this I said there were two kinds of people, and how I was one kind—the kind that most people probably think doesn’t belong in a college classroom. Well, my sister, Zelda, she’s the other kind. Our mother was also a big drinker, and even though she got sober in the last few years before she died, she wasn’t sober when she had us. While I turned out okay, Mom’s drinking was poison for Zelda’s brain and she was born on the Fetal Alcohol Spectrum. They said she would probably never be able to read, and that she’d probably have other people taking care of her for her entire life.
They were wrong about both of those things, and she’s the reason I’m applying for this scholarship. Maybe if I can do this, she can do something like it too. The world looks at Zelda and sees someo
ne weak and defenseless. One of the things I’m most ashamed of is seeing her that way too, and not seeing how strong she can be—stronger than me, even. If I had half her strength and determination, I wouldn’t need to beg for a scholarship. In a universe that was fair, she’d be the one going to college, not me.
It’s been forever since I’ve written an essay, and this is already more than the 500 words I’m supposed to use to convince you that I belong at Rivergreen. One of the rules I remember from English class is that you should alway start with a thesis, so I guess I’m breaking the rules again and putting it right at the end.
Here goes anyway: there are people around the poker table of life whose hands aren’t perfect and they see what they have and fold right away. They don’t even bother playing. I feel like I’ve been that kind of person. But even if I don’t get into Rivergreen, even if you turn me down for the scholarship, I’m tired of folding, knowing that my sister’s the kind of person who would play her hand, no matter how bad the cards were.
While I write this she’s listening to an audiobook about Vikings, writing down important notes. For her the world is a place where courage and being part of a tribe means more than anything else—where we are all Vikings paddling together, to the beat of the same drum. And that’s the thing—all this time that I’ve been trying to protect Zelda, she’s been the only one in our tribe paddling. It’s time I got in Zelda’s boat and took a turn at the oars.
Yours,
Gert MacLeish
When I finished reading I ran to my phone and called Gert’s cell-phone number, and when he didn’t pick up I left a message saying that I did not want to close the door on him forever and that I loved him and that we will always be paddling together. My skin exploded in goose bumps when I thought about Gert thinking I did not want him in my life.
Then, from somewhere else, I heard his voice-mail sound. I looked around and dialed the phone number again.
A phone was ringing at the end of the hallway. When I followed the sound and opened the front door, I got a good bad feeling.
When We Were Vikings Page 28