A Plague Year

by Edward Bloor

  Arthur muttered, “Enemy spotted, cuz.” He spit on the ground. “Look at that. It’s a damn jamboree down there.”

  The Scouts, all dressed in brown shirts, scrambled to unload their trees and set them up. A small group of Scout mothers took up positions along the chicken wire next to our lot. They started calling loudly to our customers, “Don’t buy from them! They’re outsiders! Support your local Scouts! Help your Scouts raise money,” and so on.

  The tactic worked. Some of our customers crossed over to the other lot to buy their trees. (It didn’t help that the Scouts had a better selection.)

  The sales battle continued, with us barely hanging in there, until about 9:00 p.m. That’s when the street traffic stopped abruptly. The Boy Scout lot extinguished its lights first; then we shut ours down.

  As we were cleaning up, Arthur got into an argument with a Scout mother. They were both standing where the fences met. I heard the mother say, “Why don’t you go back where you came from and sell your trees?”

  Arthur told her, with fake politeness, “We paid for this lot, ma’am, and we have the right to sell here.”

  “You come from Pennsylvania,” she pointed out. “It says right there on your sign. You should go back there.”

  “Pennsylvania. That’s right. Caldera, Pennsylvania. You ever heard of that?”

  “No.”

  “It’s kinda like hell. All fire and sulfur. Are you telling me to go to hell? Because that would not be a Christian thing to do, ma’am. That might, ironically, bring the wrath of God down on you.”

  I laughed at that, but Warren did not. He interrupted Arthur. “That’s enough! Let’s close up.” He called over to his brother, “Jimmy, take the boys back to the hotel. You all get some sleep. I’ll stay in the truck and watch the merchandise.”

  So the three of us trekked across the long asphalt parking lot, exhausted but mostly happy.

  Jimmy bought a six-pack of beer and a two-liter bottle of Coke in the hotel store while Arthur called for a pizza delivery. We ate the pizza and watched holiday specials—including the cartoon version of Frosty the Snowman. (At the end, Frosty does not melt to death. He escapes to the North Pole and lives forever. I wondered what Warren would say about that.)

  Jimmy fell asleep right after Frosty. As it turned out, that was exactly what Arthur had been waiting for. He gestured for me to follow him out of the room, so I did. He whispered, “Vengeance time, cuz. The Lord’s vengeance. You down with it?”

  “Uh, sure.”

  “Do what I do, then. And don’t make a sound.”

  “Okay.”

  We slipped back through the parking lot like phantoms. Arthur led the way in a straight diagonal line, southeastward, toward Maguire Road. I saw our flatbed truck to the left, but I did not see any sign of Warren inside.

  Soon, we were right behind the Boy Scout lot. When we reached the chicken wire, Arthur stretched it back so that there was enough room to squeeze through.

  He did, and I followed.

  He army-crawled on his elbows, with me copying him, to the back of the men’s porta-potty. My nose twitched at the acrid smell of chemicals from inside it. (I hoped that was all I was smelling.)

  Arthur turned and whispered, “Start digging.”

  He showed me what he meant. He dug into the sand with a cupped hand and pulled out as much of the sandy dirt as he could. I did the same thing on my side. We worked steadily for about five minutes, carving out a sizable hole beneath the back of the big green coffin-like box.

  When Arthur was satisfied that we had dug enough, he slapped at my shoulder. He started back, army-crawling along the same path, so I did, too. We squeezed through the chicken wire and moved, quickly and stealthily, back to our hotel room door. Neither of us made a sound.

  The next morning at eight, I stuffed my notebook in my pocket and followed Jimmy and Arthur to the lot. Jimmy rapped on the window of the truck to wake Warren. He handed Warren a huge cup of coffee.

  Arthur and I drifted over to the tree pen. I did a quick count and established that thirty-four trees remained, meaning we had sold sixteen. (It had seemed like more.)

  The first sign of life at the Scouts’ lot was the arrival of the Scout master’s SUV. He got out and entered their tree pen. He was holding a huge cup of coffee, too. Arthur and I watched him on and off for about ten minutes. Suddenly Arthur emitted a short, sharp psst. He snapped his head in the direction of the Scouts’ lot. I looked and saw that the Scout master was walking rapidly toward the men’s porta-potty.

  My eyes focused in on him like binoculars. My heart started to pound. I whispered to myself, “Please. Please do it. Do it.”

  And he did.

  The big man opened the door of the green box and stepped inside. Just a few seconds later, just long enough for him to pull down his shorts and sit, the green box started to move. It was a slight tipping move at first. We heard a muffled cry, and then the whole thing tilted back crazily.

  The cry turned into a yell as the big green box crashed backward down the hill, making a cracking and then a sloshing sound.

  Arthur and I both doubled over, laughing hysterically, until we couldn’t breathe. It took a full minute for us to recover enough to look up again. By then the Scout master, his shorts pulled most of the way back up, had pushed up the coffin lid of the porta-potty. He struggled to climb over one side, turning enough to show us a very wet, very suspicious-looking stain on the back of his decorated shirt.

  He half crawled up the sandy hill to our side. His face was bright red. He looked right past us and screamed at Warren, “You’ll pay for this!”

  Then he turned and stomped away. That stain on his back was suspicious, all right.

  Warren watched him go, looking very confused. He motioned for Arthur to come over to the truck, so I followed. “What’s going on? Why’s he yelling?”

  Arthur smiled at me. He told Warren, “Uh, I think he had a problem using the rest room facilities.”

  “What?”

  “I’m thinking it was all those medals on his shirt. You know? Weighing him down?”

  “Arthur? What the hell are you talking about?”

  Arthur’s smile faded. He tried to explain. “We did the porta-potty.”

  Warren’s voice was all business. “What does that mean?”

  “We rigged it so the next guy in it would fall over.”

  Warren and Jimmy looked over at the toppled green box. Arthur added, “It was payback for last year. For the air horn. We got them back good!”

  Arthur tried smiling again, but they were definitely not smiling back.

  Warren snapped at him, “Damn it, Arthur! Why did you do that?”

  “Like I said—payback, that’s all.”

  “That’s all?” Warren looked around like he was frightened. He turned toward the hotel room and then toward the truck.

  Arthur’s face fell. He whispered in an agonized voice, “Oh no, Warren. You’re holdin’?”

  “Shut up.”

  Warren turned away. He was soon huddled with Jimmy, whispering.

  I asked Arthur, “What? What’s going on?”

  “Damn. We should not have done that, cuz. Things are different this year. Warren’s holdin’.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “He’s got drugs on him.”

  “What? Where?”

  “In the truck. In the room. Both? I don’t know.”

  A sheriff’s car arrived before Warren and Jimmy could even formulate a plan. A skinny young guy got out and approached quickly, freezing us all in our places. He stopped when a squawking noise came out of the speaker on his shoulder. He responded to the voice and then just stood still, surveying the scene. The woman deputy from the day before pulled in a minute later.

  She walked right up to Warren and informed him, “If what I just heard is right, Mr. Giles, you are looking at a charge of criminal mischief.”

  Warren said, “I don’t know what you heard.”


  “I thought we had an understanding yesterday. I guess I was wrong.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The woman deputy scrutinized Warren carefully, especially his eyes. She nodded briefly. Then she pointed back toward the parking area. “Do you mind if I look in your truck?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Why?”

  Warren replied politely but firmly, “There’s no why about it. It’s my truck, and I say you can’t look in it. That’s my right as an American.”

  “I got a police dog. He won’t have to go into that truck. He’ll know from out here what’s in it. Do I call for him or not?”

  Warren shrugged. “Go ahead and call. I like dogs.”

  I could see that the deputy didn’t really want to. She tried again. “I’m just doing my job here, sir. How about some cooperation.”

  “I’m doing my job, too, Officer, which is selling Christmas trees, on this lot that I paid good money for. I’ve done nothing wrong, so let me get to work.”

  “That’s your final word?”

  Warren answered, “That’s my final word.” He walked back and stood with us.

  Arthur hung his head and turned away. I think he was crying. The deputy got on her shoulder speaker, and soon a third patrol car pulled in. An officer got out, along with a big German shepherd.

  By now about a dozen Scouts and their parents had arrived and were hanging out along the wire fence.

  Then something so bizarre, so totally impossible, happened, that I just stood there with my mouth open, failing to comprehend it.

  A car pulled into our lot and sat there next to the three police cars.

  It was Mom’s Ford Taurus. And Mom got out of it.

  She walked, somewhat stiffly, right toward me, her eyes locked onto mine like a laser beam. She got within two feet and stopped. “Get in the car, Tom. Now,” she ordered.

  I started to protest. “I … I can’t. I have my stuff in the—”

  She cut me off angrily. “Now! I don’t care what you have here. Get in the car.”

  I felt scared, like a little kid. I turned to look at the others. Warren was trying to talk to the policewoman, but she was no longer listening. Jimmy was standing there looking down, just shaking his head. Arthur had fallen to his knees in the dirt; he was definitely crying.

  So I just walked to the car and got in without another word.

  Mom peeled out of the lot much too fast. (Hadn’t she seen the three police cars?) She made an illegal U-turn on Maguire Road. Then she took a quick left and a right, and we were on the Florida Turnpike, heading north.

  She did not speak for quite a while, but when she did, she really let loose. “They were all getting arrested, right? For drugs, right? This is who you want to spend Thanksgiving with? This is who you want to ride around the country with?”

  “The cops just want to talk to Warren.”

  “About drugs?”

  “No,” I lied. “About criminal mischief.”

  “What?”

  “Warren, Jimmy, Arthur—they’re not bad people, Mom. You should give them a chance.”

  That shut her up for a while. A short while. Soon she was back to haranguing me about the Food Giant, and personal responsibility, and the evil of lying, and the corrupting influence of Aunt Robin’s side of the family.

  When I could finally speak again, which was near the Georgia border, I asked her a question that had been on my mind for many miles. “How can you drive like this without stopping?”

  She blinked rapidly. Then she said, “What do you mean? I did stop. I stopped last night.”

  “Where?”

  “I don’t know. Never mind where. We’re talking about you now, not me.”

  And we did talk about me, off and on, for twelve more hours, over three more states, until we finally pulled into the carport behind our house.

  It was mind-numbing. And horrible. And I felt so bad for the guys I had left behind.

  Things had been going so well. Then everything fell apart.

  Damn Boy Scouts.

  December

  Monday, December 3, 2001

  Mom and Dad grounded me for two weeks. That made very little difference in my life, since I hardly do anything but go to school and work, and I was still allowed to do those things. I was not, however, allowed to call Arthur or to contact him in any way. Questions about the Florida trip were eating me up, but I couldn’t get any answers. Arthur had not shown up for school on Monday. He had not shown up on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday, either. So all I could do was wait.

  Mom and Dad were barely speaking to me, but it seemed like Lilly was going out of her way to. She never came right out and said it, but I think she actually respected what I’d done. (Or did she just appreciate someone else getting in trouble for a change?)

  Before school, while I was messing with the N64, she came into the parlor and stood behind me. She asked, “Can you help me find something on the computer?”

  “Sure,” I replied, figuring it was another weird sex website she’d heard about, but I was wrong. As I slid over to the Gateway, she said, “Is there a job you can do that helps drug addicts?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. I think that’s what social workers do. Ben’s always saying he got diagnosed by a social worker.”

  I searched the Internet for “social work careers.” That pulled up several sites, and I clicked on three of them. Lilly read the information over my shoulder. Each time she asked, somewhat disappointed, “Is there another one?”

  By the end of the third site, she sounded totally discouraged. “They all say ‘bachelor’s degree.’ What does that mean?”

  “Four years of college.”

  Lilly shook her head. “No. No way. I’m not doing that.”

  She started to leave, but I said, “Wait a minute. Let me type in ‘drug counselor.’ A site titled “Substance-Abuse Counselor” popped up, so I clicked on it. Lilly leaned over my shoulder and read along with me. The very first line, under “Education,” said “high school degree.”

  I slid out of the chair. “Here. I’ll let you read this.”

  Lilly took my place in front of the Gateway. When Mom called her for the ride to school, she was still reading.

  I waited outside Mr. Proctor’s class, like I had for five days, watching for Arthur’s approach. When I finally saw him, I waved happily, but he walked right past me without a word. I turned and followed him inside, slipping into the next desk. I hadn’t gotten one syllable out before he growled at me, “I’m not ready to talk about it yet!”

  Mrs. Cantwell hurried into the room, causing everyone to quiet down and face forward. She announced, “Mr. Proctor has called in sick today. I am in the process of getting a sub to cover this class. Until then, is there some work you could do?”

  She swiveled and looked at the whiteboard. It had the word Vocabulary written at the upper right. She said, “Jenny Weaver, is there a vocabulary assignment you could all be doing?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “What page would that start on?”

  Jenny thumbed through her vocab book. She replied, “Forty-two.”

  Mrs. Cantwell picked up a marker from the desk and printed Page 42 under Vocabulary. She told us, “All right. You all have your assignment; now get to work.” And she hurried back out.

  Most kids put their heads down.

  Arthur slapped my arm with the back of his hand. He pointed to two desks near the window and commanded, “Over there.”

  I followed him to the more secluded area. I guess he was ready to talk about it, because he plunged right in. “This is for your ears only. Understand?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay. Here’s what happened after you pulled away.” He took a deep breath and exhaled. Then he started talking, as if reading from a play script: “You pulled away. The police dog started going nuts around the truck, barking and scratching at the door like he’d found something. The sheriff lady told
Warren, ‘You can open up the truck right now, or I can send for a search warrant. It’ll be here inside of an hour.’

  “Warren told her, ‘Go ahead. Send for a search warrant, because I’m not letting you look in my truck.’

  “So all three cops and the cop dog stayed right where they were, glaring at us. The sheriff lady walked over and asked me about you. She said, ‘Where’s that other boy?’

  “I didn’t know what to say, so I played dumb. I said, ‘Who?’

  “Warren jumped in. He told her, ‘That other boy wasn’t with us. I think he was a Boy Scout.’ ”

  I laughed in spite of myself, though none of this was funny.

  Arthur frowned and continued. “So for the next hour, we had three cop cars on our lot with their lights flashing, and three cops, and a freaked-out German shepherd. How many people do you figure bought Christmas trees from us?”

  “None?”

  “That’s exactly right. So this fourth car finally pulled up, an unmarked car, and this Detective Sergeant something got out waving a piece of paper. By now the cops were pissed off at Warren because he’d made ’em do all that. They surrounded the truck. The detective sergeant showed him the paper. Warren read it. Then he said, ‘I’m still not giving permission, but I guess you’re gonna look in my truck now. It’s not locked.’

  “The lady sheriff and the K-9 team pulled open the doors and climbed in. About ten seconds later, the lady reached under the driver’s seat and pulled up a metal pipe and a Baggie with some rocks in it.”

  I had to interrupt because I didn’t understand. “Rocks?”

  “Yeah. Crystal meth. Or crack. I don’t know. Could have been either one. Doesn’t matter, really—they’re both illegal. So the lady sheriff called out to Warren, ‘Do these belong to you, Mr. Giles?’

  “Warren said, ‘Nope.’

  “Then she looked at Jimmy and me, but she was still talking to Warren. ‘I must assume they could belong to anyone who had access to this truck. In which case, you will all need to come down to the county courthouse for processing.’ ”