by Rob Dircks
Bradline flicks his toothpick aside, to join the million or so others he’s littered the path with over the years. “We’ll get you out. You just leave that to the experts. We have ways. We’re working on it with your dad, and, um…”
“And, um?”
“…and your mother.”
9
My What?!
“My what?!”
“Your mother. Listen, Paper, things are moving pretty fast…”
Dad tries to calm me down, to keep me from hitting my head again on the countertop. Lying on the linoleum floor squeezed into a corner of the kitchen with him, installing this reclaimed oven in Nana’s newish trailer, playing with a methane gas line, is not my happy place at the moment. Normally I love this kind of time with Dad, because I’m the only one of us three that can install the more complicated gear, fix machinery, and improvise. He always looks at me when we work together, with this mysterious smile, like he’s looking into his own past.
But not today. Neither one of us is smiling today.
Nana’s busy with what she’s considering for the moment the “important” stuff – hanging donated knickknackery on the walls – but really, I think she’s just avoiding the “Mom” issue, and me, and Rock, and Scissors, and Dad, like we’re the 2044 Thailand virus outbreak.
I slap the ratchet wrench into his palm. “I don’t have a mother.”
“Yes you do.”
“No I don’t.”
He looks up, pleading. “Rock. Scissors. Help me out here.”
Scissors, who’s installing cabinet doors above us with Rock, kicks him in the heel. “Help you out? You betrayed us, Dad. And I’m not being melodramatic. What the hell?”
“I didn’t betray anyone. Listen…”
But Rock stands firm. “I am not listening to this.” Then she rubs her belly, which is probably not the right thing to do at that moment. “Do you realize…?” and tears burst from her eyes. The stress of the past twenty-four hours – from the potential departure of her sister Paper to Los Angeles, to the loss of our childhood home, to the discovery that Dad was secretly corresponding with our absent mother, to having a six-month-old baby inside her – it all finally gets to her. She wails like the infant she’ll be delivering in a few months.
Dad, always a softie for waterworks – which, admittedly, all three of us have taken advantage of since we discovered its power many years ago – jumps to his feet, hitting his head on the countertop, screaming “Fuck!” and then, “Oh, sorry. Excuse my French. No, Rock, listen. All of you, come here.”
So we stand around the new counter, glaring at Dad, stewing. Nana quietly slips out to the living room to attend to some crucial towel folding she’s forgotten.
Duggie, who’s gluing the curled-up corners of the linoleum back down in the far corner of the little dining area, gets up off his knees and joins us, giddy, ready for whatever game he thinks we’re about to start playing. “Can I go first?”
“Duggie…” Dad politely motions for him to leave.
“Yes, Mister Farris?”
Dad motions again, and points to the door for emphasis.
“Yes, Mister Farris. Nice day out. Rain’s finally stopped.”
“Duggie. Go outside.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
Duggie’s brain finally clicks, and he bounds out the new screen door, but not before casting one last backward glance at Scissors and giving her a shy little two-finger wave.
Rock is still whimpering, but manages a laugh. “Forget little old Mars. That one’s over the Moon for you, Siz.”
I add what I think is the necessary clarity. “The Moon is smaller than Mars. By a lot. Not something to forget.”
“Yeah, okay Paper. Whatever. Blah blah science nerd stuff. Scissors knows what I mean. Don’t you, Siz?”
Scissors’ cheeks are red, though I can’t tell whether it’s from blushing or being angry. “Hey! You two. We’re supposed to be super pissed at Dad right now. Focus.”
So we refocus our rage on Dad. But before more shouts or tears can start, he clears his throat. “Your mother, her name is Jane, she is alive and well. Well-ish. She had a difficult childhood of her own, very bad, like a lot of childhoods here, much worse than yours I’d add. She couldn’t handle being a mother, I guess. Did what she thought was best for you. So she snuck out of Fill City One. I don’t know why or how, I’ve never known anyone else to do it. Please don’t hate her.”
“Don’t hate her? How do you not hate her? How can you not be more angry at her? She abandoned us! All of us!”
“Actually, she did me a favor. She got her freedom, or whatever she was looking for. And I got the better part of the deal.” He looks around at us intently. “I got you three.” And for the first time today we see his way-too-calm smile, which can be either totally reassuring or totally annoying.
“Silver lining.” I try to say it with anger, but we can’t really argue his point. We are the apples of his eye, after all. Who wouldn’t want to raise three girls like us on his own?
“I still hate her.”
“Me too.”
“Me three.”
Dad has lost this round. “Well, okay, how about this: You can hate her. Fine. But don’t hate me for trying to help her.”
“Help her?”
“Oh, did I say help?”
“Yes, you said help, Dad.”
“Well, she, uh, needed a few credits and some parenting advice last year, so she snuck me a letter and an untraceable phone.”
“Parenting advice?”
“Well, it seems… no, I don’t want to tell you. You’ll gang up on me. I’ll tell you some other time. A calmer time.”
Rock stamps her foot and crosses her arms. Menacing. “Don’t you think it’s a little late for that, Dad?”
“Okay, okay. It seems… you’ve all got a brother.”
“A BROTHER?!”
Rock nearly faints. Scissors face palms. I try to wrap my head around it. “We have a brother. Did you really just say that?”
“A half-brother.”
“So this Jane person married again, and had a kid, after running away from her trial run with good ol’ Harlon and his three daughters?”
“Come on, Paper. It’s not like that. I didn’t say she got married again. She didn’t. And I didn’t say she could handle it either. She can’t. She’s a terrible mother. The poor kid. Only six years old and he doesn’t know which way is up.”
Scissors picks up her screwdriver and walks away. “Good story, bro. I’ve already erased it from my memory banks. Just let me know when any of this has something to do with me.”
“Actually, Scissors…”
“Oh, come on, Dad. Enough surprises for today. And I’m sorry, with all due respect, that smile of yours is getting annoying.”
“No. I’m serious. Scissors, I’ll need you and Rock to do me a favor. We’ll be smuggling Paper out of here tonight, we don’t have any more time, to get on the road with your mother – please don’t hit me for mentioning her – she has a way to get Paper out to Los Angeles. But Paper can’t look like herself. Just in case. No one can make the connection. She needs to look different. Much different. I need you to give her a haircut. And do something about the color.”
Rock and Scissors lock eyes on each other and smile, the smile of an evil supervillain duo. Then they turn to me, and Rock picks up a knife from the counter. “Hey Paper. Hear that?”
And I run out of the house screaming.
10
Goodbyes
I’m not attached to my hair, it’s not like that.
But the three of us all have had long, thick, dark braids going all the way down our backs, for as long as I can remember. It’s just never been any other way. When we were little and bickered – which was pretty frequent to be honest, and we still fight like feral dogs over a bone sometimes – we would threaten to cut off each other’s braids in the middle of the night. I can remember mornings waking up in a panic to feel if
mine was still there.
But it was always still there. Of course it was. The three of us would sit in “braid circles” weaving intricate patterns for each other, taking time to make sure they were perfect, because everything else we had was either dirty or damaged, or simply smelled bad. Some of my favorite memories were of those braid circles.
Huh. Maybe I am attached to my hair.
Scissors isn’t looking quite so sentimental. “Ah, revenge! For all those earlobe flicks. Finally!”
She and Rock have me pinned against a light pole. “Siz. Please don’t. I’ll bring you back a Mars rock.”
Rock snorts. “What the hell does she want with a Mars rock? Look around.”
I look around, and yes, we’re in a section of the nearest fill reserved for concrete. Rocks twenty-five feet high. “Point taken. But you don’t really want to do this. Do you guys?”
“Of course not. Well, maybe just a little. It would be cool to see what we would look like with something different for once. Wouldn’t it? Like a blonde crew cut.”
“Ha! You’re kidding.”
Scissors reveals the scissors from her satchel.
Oh my God. She’s not kidding.
I close my eyes.
Suddenly a new feeling washes over me. The feeling that maybe I need to change. To take the first step. It’s just like Nana said. I’m being reborn. Like the scarab.
I open my eyes. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
So Scissors cuts my braid, and we all gasp, unsure whether to laugh, or cry, or drop everything and walk away. She looks at me, searching, a little sadness in her eyes. I nod, and she gently lays the braid into her satchel.
“It’s okay, Siz. That was the hard part. Keep cutting. And Rock, get the bleach.”
To Dad’s credit, he doesn’t laugh when I return to help him with the new refrigerator, and he pretends not to notice. “Paper, good. I need a third hand with this freon injector.”
I give him my hand, and he places it on the valve. “Great. Hold it just like that.”
“You’re not going to say anything?”
“I just did.”
“Come on, Dad.”
He studies me for a moment. Smiles. “It suits you. You look like a pixie.”
I have no idea what a pixie is, but I don’t like the sound of it.
Nana comes up from behind me and tousles my bleached little mop. “You’re my hero.”
Ahh. Hero. Now that I like the sound of.
After dark, a lift quietly arrives outside, and Tom Bradline and Duggie and a couple of others hop off.
“Okay, Harlon. We’ve arranged our end. Last-minute addition to Load 85332b, scheduled to go out on a trailer at exactly eleven-thirty p.m. We’ve lined the inside here with a special foil; it’ll fool any scanners on the way out. She can remove it later and it’ll look good as new, and it’ll get delivered, so there won’t be any inventory anomalies. Also, false bottom with four screws. She’ll have a screwdriver and a flashlight, a pouch for urine just in case, and of course, air holes. Now, let’s get her inside so we can package the whole thing up for shipping.”
I step forward to see what kind of coffin they’ve invented for me.
It’s an Ethan Allen French armoire, the color of cheese.
Of course.
Bradline sees me approach it and eyes me suspiciously. “Hey. Who’s this?” But as the words leave his mouth, recognition sweeps across his face and he begins to howl with laughter. He laughs so hard he starts coughing, God, it looks like he’s going to choke on his toothpick, or have a stroke. “Paper Farris?” are the only words he can get out before resuming his death-rattle-slash-laughing-fit.
The others stifle their snickers, prep the false bottom, and motion for me to climb inside.
“Made you some snacks for the ride. Cashews, too. Your favorite.” Duggie takes my hand and drops a bag into my palm.
I run back to my sisters, and hold them tight. Rock puts my free hand on her belly. “By the time you get back, he’ll be running around and eating his own boogers.”
Scissors gulps. “You are coming back, right?”
I kiss her on the cheek. “That’s the plan.” And I flick her earlobe. And for the first time ever, instead of swatting my hand away, she grabs it, and kisses it, and a tear runs down to her chin.
Dad fumbles in his pocket. “Wait! A picture. Stay right there.” He pulls out his ancient instant camera– he can’t use a phone for this highly incriminating photo, as every single packet of data is monitored by Fill City One Command – and hands it to one of the Body Shop crew.
“Okay, everybody. Make the face you want Paper to remember.”
The flash blinds us. Then Dad kisses the top of my head, hugs me, and pushes me away. “I’m letting you go. Because I know this isn’t goodbye.” He’s trying to hide it, but I can see him sniffing and wiping his eyes with his shirt sleeves. “Oh, hey, listen, whenever you fall down, just remember to get back in the saddle. And if you hear anyone talking down about Fillers, it’s just ignorance. Now, go show them who you are.”
I look up into his eyes. “Who am I?”
He smiles at me and shrugs. “I guess you’ll have to find out.”
“Hey, where’s Nana?” I look around, but she’s gone. I imagine this is all too much for her, this goodbye. She’s probably in her bedroom, wailing, mourning the loss of her granddaughter. Poor Nana.
But the screen door creaks, and there she is. “Forgetting something?”
She raises the Red Scarab into the air.
“Yikes! I almost forgot the Scarab!”
Nana shuffles over and places it around my neck. “Now, look at me Paper. Take a good look at me. I may not be here when you get back.”
“Nana!”
“Oh, don’t be so sensitive. I’m ninety-seven, for Pete’s sake. I say that to myself every night in the mirror. You just go and have a good time. Live your dream. I’ll be fine. Now vamoose!”
“I’ll see you when I get back. Count on it.”
She nods, and waves her arms, and shoos me into the awaiting casket.
I climb in, and they secure the false bottom, and the lift starts moving.
And I instantly start sobbing and banging on the armoire. “Let me out! Let me out! This was a bad idea!”
I can hear Bradline, muffled, screaming back at me. “Shut the hell up Farris! What, do you want to get us all locked up? Or worse? It’s too late for that crap!”
“Sorry!”
I don’t know what’s happening to me. For twenty-one years, I couldn’t wait to shake off the dust and smell of Fill City One and escape. Couldn’t wait to break out of that teeny trailer stuffed with four people (and trust me, with Rock as five it was even worse), finally get away and get some time and space to myself. On my own. And now I am alone, truly alone for the first time. Totally by myself.
And it sucks.
I can’t cry again, Bradline will murder me, so I just whimper quietly. It’s a new feeling, this alone thing. I hate it.
Then my foot touches something. My satchel! How’d they sneak that in here? I fumble for my flashlight and examine the contents:
Yet another poster of Zach Larson, this one with a mustache and goatee and horns added in marker. Next to the words “You’re Going To Mars!” they’ve scribbled “(Maybe.)”
A little braid of my own hair.
A poem we wrote when we were probably around ten. It reads: “Our number is three, and in time you’ll see, what each one will be, but on this you’ll agree – there’s nothing like we!”
And this… how? My little baby sweater, with “PAPER” embroidered in big letters across the front. Somehow Nana saved it from the fire. I pull it close, feeling it against my face, and though it smells like charred wood now, it still feels soft, just like always. I know it’s only been three minutes, but wish I could see her face again.
Aha! I can! They snuck me the photo we just took.
I lift it into the light, and th
ere she is, Nana, poking her tongue out at me, and sticking her finger in Dad’s ear. I laugh. Dad, of course, is crossing his eyes and grinning like an idiot. Rock smiles and points to her dimples – she was the only one of us to have those cute dimples – as if to say, “you better get your ass back here soon so you can see these beauties again.” And Scissors puckers her lips into a kiss and gives me the finger with both hands. Duggie’s there, too, looking off to the right, blankly, as always unprepared for a picture. Even Tom Bradline is there, on one knee, barely breathing from laughing, red as a beet, pointing up to my hair. Across the bottom, Dad has scrawled Greetings from Fill City One! Wish you were here!
And right in the middle is me.
Hair butchered and blonde. Looking more sad and less excited than I should be.
I turn out the flashlight, breathing deep, holding the image of my family in my mind. In the darkness, behind my eyelids, the light still glows until it fades, and I’m alone in the dark, and I think:
So this is what it feels like to die.
I have the irresistible urge to beat on the doors of the armoire again.
But something stops me.
Little pinpricks of light.
The air holes Bradline drilled are letting in tiny points of moonlight, bouncing on the inside of the armoire inches above my face. I know it’s a stretch of the imagination, but they look like a constellation, Capricorn maybe. I lift my finger and touch the door, where Mars would be at this time of year, and follow it as it crosses the night sky, from constellation to constellation, on its journey around the sun. My finger stops at the point where I know Mars will be when Zach Larson’s ship intercepts its orbit, and I have the inexplicable feeling that I’m pointing to my own future.
A little jolt of anticipation surges through me, and I laugh.
Bradline bangs on the wood. “Shhhh! Shut up!”
I silence my laugh, but the feeling stays with me, like I’m shedding my skin and floating, up into the stars, surrendering to chance and fate, impatient to see where this ride takes me. I’m ready. And maybe, if this all actually works, I’ll float back down someday and tell everyone what space is like, what the sand of another planet’s surface feels like under your foot, and where we might all be headed together.