by A W Hartoin
“What do you want?” I asked them. “I’m not doing anything.”
Slick and Sydney slid out from under the chair and worked their bodies in figure eights around my ankles. I let them go at it for a few minutes, until the scent of a fresh loaf of bread lured me away. I pulled the loaves from the bread makers and popped them out of their pans onto an ancient breadboard. I carved a thick slice and steam rose from the end. The smell made me drool and filled the room with warmth and goodness. I spread a creamy layer of butter on the bread and folded it in half. Then I detected another smell mixed in with the bread. Burning plastic.
I followed the scent out onto the porch. Behind stacks of newspaper and crates of Ball mason jars, I found Caleb and Cole bent over an old sewing table. Long threads of ancient spiderwebs danced over their heads as they nodded together. A plume of grey smoke rose from the table, creating a stinky cloud hanging low above them.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
Caleb and Cole jerked around, but relaxed when they saw it was me.
“I found a way to get Luke to shave his head,” said Caleb.
I slumped. It was all so pointless. Caleb would come up with a brilliant idea, but Luke would just come up with an equally brilliant one to counteract it. It was like living in the middle of Dr. Suess’s Butter Battle Book.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “What is it?”
“Dude, it’s going to be awesome,” said Cole.
“Dude, I seriously doubt it.”
Cole plopped down on an old camp stool and pulled a pink and white striped shower cap over his hair. Caleb held up a heat gun and moved behind Cole. There was a melted blob of blue plastic on the table they’d been hovering over, but still I wasn’t worried. Caleb couldn’t possibly be getting ready to do what it looked like.
“Okay. First I’m going to try it at twelve inches. Ready, Cole.” Caleb flipped on the heat gun. It sounded like a blow dryer, but the coils inside were red hot.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“It only takes a split second to melt a shower cap. I just have to see how close I have to get to have the melted plastic bond to hair.” Caleb turned the nozzle towards Cole’s head.
“Stop. No.” I crossed the few feet between us holding my slice of bread like a flag of truce.
“Don’t be a wussy,” said Caleb. “It won’t hurt him…probably. Plus, I paid him.”
“Twenty bucks,” said Cole. “Easiest money I ever made.”
“Are you stupid?” I asked. “He can’t melt plastic to your head. You’ll get burned.”
“Nah. I’ll just cut my hair. No biggie.”
“I don’t give a shit about your hair. Your scalp might get burned.”
Cole thought for a moment. “You’re right. Forty bucks.”
“Done,” said Caleb.
“No, no forty bucks. No, nothing. You’re not doing it.” I snatched the shower cap off Cole’s head and tossed it behind me.
“I’m doing it, Pup. Unless, of course, you have a better offer,” said Caleb.
I didn’t have a better offer. Telling Aunt Calla would make me a snitch and Caleb would just do it when she wasn’t paying attention, which was most of the time.
“I’ll do it,” I said, startling myself.
“You’ll melt it to his hair?” asked Caleb.
“How’s that any different?” asked Cole.
“It’s not,” I said. “But nobody’s melting anything. I’ll…shave Luke’s head for you.”
Caleb leaned on the table, his muscles taut. He fingered the heat gun’s on/off switch. “No offense, Pup, but if I had a hard time, you don’t have a shot.”
“I’ll figure something out,” I said.
“In exchange for what?” Caleb’s attention flowed over me, hot as the heat gun.
“I want you to help me with Greenbow.” I couldn’t believe it. It was perfect. It couldn’t have worked out better, if I’d actually planned it.
“So it’s kind of a win-win situation,” said Caleb, switching off the heat gun.
“It’s not a win-win. I don’t win shit. What about my forty bucks?” Cole stood up. He looked ready to throw down over not getting his scalp burnt off.
“I’ll give you my dessert,” I said.
Cole grumbled.
“For a whole week.”
“You’re getting warmer.”
“Mine too,” said Caleb. “A whole week. You’ll gain ten pounds.”
“All right, Puppy. But the next time I want to cheat off you in algebra, you have to let me,” said Cole.
I nodded. “Done.”
Cole left to go spy on the girls and Frank. Caleb put the heat gun away and examined the melted shower cap. “That worked out well.”
“I guess.” I was starting to feel less sure about the deal every second. If Caleb couldn’t shave Luke’s head, how was I going to do it?
“Yeah, plastic can meld to skin. I wasn’t so sure the hair would be enough protection.”
“But you were going to do it anyway.”
“Only one way to find out,” said Caleb.
“You’re nuts.”
“That’s what Professor Klein says. I’m gonna start working on Miss Pritchett and you start thinking about Luke. It’s a pretty good trade when you think about it. And now I can forget about you wrecking our notebook.”
Caleb stepped off the porch and walked toward the woods where his chemical supplies were stored.
It wasn’t a fair trade. Greenbow and Miss Pritchett were frigging idiots. Luke wasn’t. He was going to kick my ass. How’d I ever get myself into this? I sat on the kitchen table and stuffed the rest of my bread in my mouth. It tasted like burnt plastic.
Chapter Thirty-two
CALEB CAME THROUGH for me in fine fashion. The tiny balls he and Luke used to glue Miss Pritchett’s car to her parking space were also water soluble. Caleb just happened to have a larger version in the foot locker. He injected a ball with fabric dye, snuck over to Miss Pritchett’s house, and dropped it in her washer.
“So what’ll happen?” asked Frank when I told him about it.
“When water hits the ball, it’ll dissolve, and release the dye. She’ll have a washer full of pink clothes.”
“Oh man, that’s sweet and you didn’t have to do anything. Awesome.” Cole stretched out on a blanket next to the creek. It was just the three of us. Luke and Caleb were still fighting, and the girls were working on their fan blogs and doing each other’s hair.
I stepped into the creek and shivered at the cold. It was a hot day, over a hundred degrees. The water, in comparison, felt like it had ice cubes floating in it. After my feet adjusted, I slid the rest of my body under. The water was pale green with bits of gunk floating in it. Minnows swam with me and nibbled my skin as I swam down to the tree that trapped Luke and started the war between my cousins. I tugged at the branch, but couldn’t make it budge. We’d have to drag it out with a tractor or saw it apart under water. The incident put a big damper on fun at the creek. Nobody wanted to dive, swing on the rope, much less launch a trike. It sucked. The creek was the best part of summer.
I swam past the tree, took a look at a couple mammoth catfish resting under the root ball, and tried to catch a sunfish with my bare hands. When I tired of the chase, I swam back to the shore and collapsed on the blanket. My skin remained wet and cool, but the summer humidity made the air heavy and oppressive. It took effort just to get my lungs to expand.
“So what are you going to do about Luke?” asked Frank.
I opened my eyes to slits, no energy to do more. My mind wouldn’t come into focus, lazy as the horsefly that landed on my knee but couldn’t be bothered to bite me.
“Puppy, you better do something soon,” said Cole. “Luke hasn’t had an accident in days. Caleb says he’s due.”
“I can’t think. I’m too tired.”
Frank stood up and a shower of sand fell from his shorts. A few particles landed on my arm and I studied the
m, each unique in the bright sunlight.
“Don’t you wish Luke got tired? Maybe he wouldn’t have so many accidents,” said Frank.
“Luke doesn’t get tired, does he?” I flicked a piece of sand off my arm.
“No shit. The guy’s like on speed or something,” answered Cole.
“If he was asleep, it’d be easy to shave his head.”
“Caleb tried, remember?” Frank stepped into the water and let out a sigh.
“Yeah, but he didn’t stay asleep, did he?” I flicked a piece of sand off my arm. “He’s a light sleeper. That’s a problem. But if I could get him to stay asleep...”
“My dad takes Tylenol PM,” said Cole.
“Nah. Not strong enough. My mom takes some stuff when she’s working a lot. She can’t turn off her mind sometimes.”
“If it can knock out your mom, it’ll definitely knock out Luke. Can I help?” asked Cole.
“Sure.” I could use all the help I could get.
Cole and I circled the house. Grass blades bit our legs, but we pretended not to notice as we held a running conversation on baseball past Mom’s porch to confirm her location. She had her face shield down and never looked up from her sculpture. Aunt Calla was on her porch, too, singing “O Mio Bambino Caro” and sketching on her drafting table. She didn’t miss a beat when we went past.
Once we knew where they were, we went toward the kitchen. Mom joined Aunt Calla in her song. I stopped on the granite step and let the music enter my chest. The longing and passion vibrated there. It was the right time to go after the pills. Mom and Aunt Calla only sang like that when things were about to go perfectly. Their best pieces came after moments of pure happiness and everything around them was touched by their joy in creation.
Cole tapped my shoulder. “What are we waiting for?”
“Nothing,” I said. “I was just listening.”
“To what?”
I didn’t answer. A wind kicked up and pushed me against the screen door. I opened it and then saw the long grass of the lawn whipping around in a rhythm with Mom and Aunt Calla’s voices. The ravens clustered at the shed door, staring at me, their wings spread wide.
“Puppy?” Cole asked. “What’s wrong?”
“Do you feel that?”
“What?”
“The wind.
“Dude, you’re losing it. There’s no wind. It’s dead calm out here.”
“That’s what I thought.”
We went in and found Frank making lunch with the girls. When he saw me, Frank stepped away from April and dropped a piece of cheese.
Ella looked sideways at me. “What are you two up to?”
“Nothing,” I said.
“Really,” she said. “You look guilty as a whore in church.”
April and Carrie both stopped what they were doing and eyed us with suspicion.
“We’re gonna go get some…ah…peroxide for these cuts…on our legs,” said Cole.
I wanted to pump my fist in the air. What a fantastic lie.
“What happened to your legs?” asked Carrie.
“Grass needs to be mowed,” I said.
All except April went back to what they were doing. I felt April’s eyes on my back as I walked out and went to Mom’s bathroom.
When we were out of earshot, I said, “Stay here and keep an eye out.”
Cole nodded and leaned on the wall, while I slipped into the bathroom. My feet padded over the cool, cracked tile to the front of the medicine cabinet. The mirror opened with a creak and surprised me with the sheer number of bottles on the shelf. Mom stuffed the cabinet full of ointment, dewormers, lozenges, pills, and creams. I started at the bottom and worked my way up through antibiotics, burn treatments, and painkillers for Luke and Caleb’s various accidents over the years. I found Mom’s Ambien in the middle.
Cole popped his head in. “Puppy, hurry.”
I slipped the bottle in my pocket, closed the cabinet door, and walked back to Cole in the hall.
“Somebody’s here,” Cole whispered.
A rough hand grabbed my shoulder, and Luke burrowed his head between ours.
“What are you whispering about?” he asked.
“Nothing. Who’s here?” I grasped the pill bottle in my pocket and a rush of adrenaline flooded my system.
“Shasta.”
“Oh.” I pulled at my shirt to cover my pocket.
“What are you doing? Pitching a tent?” Luke looked at me as I fussed with my shirt.
I stopped, face flushed.
“I don’t blame you. She’s enough to give any guy a stiffy. Come on. Let’s see what she wants.”
We followed Luke obediently, instead of stashing the pills in my room as we planned. Cole kept snickering into his hand, so I punched him in the kidney as we walked into the kitchen. Everyone stopped talking and watched Cole gasp and arch his back. Shasta leaned against the sink with an amused smile on her face. Her wrists were bare and the bruises gone. She looked like nothing could touch her except the sun, which had streaked her dark hair with lines of gold. It hung loose over her shoulder, silky and shimmering as Aunt Calla’s best work. She wore a new bikini top, tiny with daisies positioned right in the centers. My face grew hot and my shorts tight. I couldn’t believe it. I was going to pitch a tent, right in front of everyone, including Mom and Aunt Calla who had come in from their porches. Why did I have to think of nipples? I’d never even seen live, in-person nipples. Wait. Yes, I had. My eyes strayed to my mom, and the tightness in my pants disappeared. Nothing makes a boner go away faster than the thought of your mom’s nipples. When I was younger, she used to walk around in panties when it was hot or she’d just gotten out of the shower. Anything else I might have seen was blissfully blocked out. When I was about six, Dad said she’d better stop or she’d scar me for life. To my amazement, she did. It was one of the few times anyone told Violet Gladwell MacClarity what to do and she did it.
“What are you smiling about?” Ella asked me.
I flushed again, but I couldn’t stop smiling. I was so glad my boner went away, I almost felt grateful to Mom for being so damn weird.
“What time do you want us over tomorrow?” Aunt Calla asked Shasta.
“Noon’s fine. Or whenever you can get everyone together.”
“Great. We’ll bring the ice cream. Girls, we better get started,” said Mom.
“Where are we going?” asked Cole, still rubbing his back.
“Marion asked us over for a barbecue to celebrate Shasta’s new restaurant contract. She just signed with O’Malley’s in Drayton.”
I wanted to congratulate Shasta, but I couldn’t take the chance of looking at her again.
“Puppy?” Shasta broke in on my thoughts. “Walk me to my truck?”
“Okay.” I tried to avoid looking at anything but her eyes. It was tough. My eyes really wanted to go down.
I walked beside her. At least that way I didn’t have to look at her. But I was so close. Her watermelon scent encircled me. Where’d the scent come from, her hair, her skin, her moist, shiny lips? I swallowed hard when I thought about all those parts of Shasta and swallowed again when I realized that she probably wasn’t thinking about any part of me.
She put her hand on the door handle of her truck. “You didn’t leave them alone, did you?”
Shasta was looking at me, but I stared over the truck bed.
“Puppy, you have to leave them alone.” She laid her hand on my shoulder and turned me to face her. “Puppy?”
“Maybe I did leave them alone,” I said.
“I know you didn’t.”
“How?” I asked. Her hand was still on my shoulder. I could hardly think for the warmth of it radiating through me.
“Just leave them alone, okay?”
“Is he bothering you?”
Shasta’s hand left my shoulder, but a tattoo of heat and pleasure remained on my skin. She got into the truck and tried to slam the door. I grabbed the door. Our eyes met.
&n
bsp; “What’d he do?” I asked. “I saw the bruises.”
“Nothing,” said Shasta. “Don’t worry about it. Promise you won’t do anything else.”
“Tell me what happened.”
Her eyes left mine. “Let go. I have to get home.”
I let go of the door; she slammed it, and backed away without looking at me again. She left me standing in a swirl of dust and fear for her.
Shasta stayed with me, ever present in the back of my mind. But I wasn’t allowed to brood when there was ice cream to be made. I’d chopped pecans, pistachios, walnuts, and three types of chocolate so far. Dark chocolate was the worst. The one-pound block on the cutting board was hard, dense, and liked to deflect the blade into the meat of my fingers. I’d cut my hand twice so far, and April needed another cup, finely chopped, for her last creation. Ella kept screaming at me about dripping blood on the ingredients. I should’ve followed Cole and Luke’s example and worked on the car instead. I stayed because I owed April, but I wasn’t sure her favor was worth so much pain and aggravation. My arm was sore up to the shoulder. Who knew cooking could be so miserable? It didn’t help that my mind kept straying to Shasta. Whenever I was able to block her out, doubts about my scheme to shave Luke’s head crept in. Drugging Luke might not be the way to go. Caleb had tried everything else, but it seemed wrong. Maybe, just maybe, Luke wouldn’t have any more accidents. He’d had more than his summer average so far. Things could calm down.
“Do you have the chocolate done yet?” April said over her shoulder. She was furiously stirring a pot of custard at the stove and couldn’t stop for a second.
I showed her my board. “This fine enough?”
She pursed her lips as her eyes roamed over the mound of chocolate shavings. “I guess so. Measure, please.”