JACK
FEELS GOOD. Maybe better than good. Maybe even the best ever. But he doesn’t know why—and now suddenly he does. It’s movement. The sheer, raw exhilaration of movement. Movement unlike any he’s ever experienced. Not the familiar movement of his own legs, or Scramjet’s spinning wheels. It’s more. The force that seemed inside him a few minutes ago now seems to be outside him again, beneath him, a current carrying him down some unseen stream, a current that’s moving faster and faster, toward … what?
He looks back. The crowd of little kids is growing, twenty, thirty upturned faces, searching the sky, poised, mitts twitching, waiting for the ball that is not coming down.
And now here she comes again. The girl, shucking dust over the flats, aiming straight at him. He takes his cap off—at least deny her that. She circles him as she did before, cutting a rolling hoop in the dust as he continues to walk. But this time she says nothing. No squawking. No insults. Just the soft crinkle of Scramjet’s tires.
He wonders if she’s trying to provoke him, daring him to reach out, start something. He remembers when they first met, both of them Snotsippers. She crashed her trike into his, not far from the DON’T sign, knocked both of them off their seats. It was an accident—to this day he’s still sure of that—but for her it quickly became something else. As he picked himself up and stood there mooning over his dented trike, debating whether to cry or not, she climbed into the saddle, backed up, and rammed his trike again. And—as he gaped like a moronic cow—again! She was a shark. A lion. She had just gotten a taste of human blood—in particular, his blood—and now there was no stopping her.
Even at that age Jack knew he had two choices: run away bawling or strike back. He struck back. He climbed onto his trike, and the two of them had their own little demolition derby. Half of Hokey Pokey came to hoot and cheer. In the end both trikes were wrecked, left in the dust, mangled wheels retching one last turn like the final flip of a dying lizard’s tail. Jack and the girl both swaggered into the howling mob, pumping arms, claiming victory.
That was the beginning, the start of a war without a cease-fire. Oh they had their bikes and their high-noon hokey pokeys and their friends—but as much as anything, they had each other. Every morning Jack awoke knowing she was somewhere out there, ready to trade him hate for hate, mock for mock. They might appear to others to ignore each other, but in fact, Jack knew, each was always acutely aware of the other, as the wary eyes of the antelope track the jackal.
Of course, sometimes the attention they gave each other got loud and trashy:
“Outta my way, germ!”
“Donkey lips!”
“Poopnose!”
“You’re so ugly your face is jealous of your butt!”
“You smell so bad the flies won’t even land on you!”
“Watermelonhead!”
“Pimplebrain!”
“Boy!”
“Girl!”
In a way that Jack cannot articulate, he knows that she has shaped his life, given him something to grow against. Out of habit he tries to ignore her as she circles him. He turns his focus inward, for something truly remarkable seems to be happening. The seething burn she has always ignited inside him—it’s gone. He feels nothing but a kind of humming, foamy peacefulness. He wonders how long he’s been smiling. And finally he has to sneak a peek, then another, because he just can’t get enough of that flying yellow ribbon.
He walks on, and the words leap from his mouth: “Remember when we busted up our trikes?”
She’s circling behind him as he says it. He can hear her pull to a stop. He wonders if she heard him. He wonders why he said it. He keeps walking.
ANA MAE
NOW THAT SHE THINKS ABOUT IT, she honestly cannot remember ever speaking to a boy, except of course things like “Takes one to know one” and “Don’t even think about it, dirtball.” Certainly she has never had a conversation with one and until this moment doubted she ever would. But here she is, thanks to the lunacy of this day, compelled in the direction of the enemy—the Amigos, as they absurdly call themselves. Two-thirds of them anyway. Maybe they can tell her what’s going on. Obviously their pal the Jack boy has been chewing on locoweed or something—anybody can see that. And Ana Mae couldn’t care less. What she does care about is the effect on Jubilee. The Jack boy seems to have acquired some sort of weird gravity, and it’s pulling her best friend into its orbit.
They’re looking at her as she pedals toward them. They can’t believe it. She can see it in their eyes. She can’t believe it either. She hates this. She’s terrified. What if they gang up on her? She repeats to herself: “Only for Ace … only for Ace …”
She almost has to laugh. If she didn’t know better, she might think they were harmless, sitting there all innocent-looking, as if they’re not even boys, as if they’re not responsible for everything wrong in the world. Even their bikes are a mess, dented nags flopped akimbo in the dirt. The brown boy, LaJo, thinks he’s so cool. Shrugs a lot. Never smiles. Never surprised. That’s what she hates most about him, that he’s never surprised. She hit him in the back of the head with a water balloon once and all he did was slowly turn and look at her. Thing was, he didn’t stop looking. She wanted to scream Do something! but all he did was stare—a lazy, stupid stare, no less—so finally she just stuck her tongue out and took off. This was when they were little.
And the other one. Dusty. Can’t stand him for opposite reasons. Never shuts up. Whines and giggles like a Sillynilly. Tags after the Jack boy like a puppy. Still cries. Sneaks off to Snuggle Stop. He stands, his eyes getting wider and wider as she approaches, while the LaJo kid, squatting on a rock, looks lazily away, pretending she’s not here. As she brakes her bike, she decides the best way is to just plunge: “So what are you wingnuts doing to Jubilee?”
That gets LaJo’s attention. He doesn’t turn to her but his head actually cranks up a notch. Meanwhile, the Dusty boy responds brilliantly: “Huh?”
“Is this bike thing some kinda trick you’re playing on Jubilee? Some kinda joke?”
Dustymusty stupidly stares, blinks. If he says Huh? again, she’s gonna run him over—and suddenly hears herself say it, snapping at the crybaby: “Huh?”
When the answer finally comes, it’s from the other direction, the cool one: “It’s no joke.”
Glory be—it speaks! She continues to face the Dusty crybaby. “Really? How so? What’s going on?”
Something new comes into the Dusty one’s eyes. Something frightened. “It ain’t her,” he says. “It ain’t us.” His voice is wavering. “It’s him.”
She’s beginning to regret all this, but it’s too late to back out. She tries to sound demanding. “Him what?”
All she gets from Dusty is a glistening eye and a nod toward the other one. She waits, but there is only silence and the creep of the shadows. She knows she will not get an answer until she turns and faces Mr. Cool. At last she does.
“He’s going,” he says.
She hears the words but they make no sense. “Going? Where?”
The kid finally looks away, which is a relief. He does his shrug thing. “Don’t know.”
The Dusty one wails: “He’s going away! There’s only gonna be two of us! Two Amigos!” He’s not even pretending not to cry.
Ana Mae doesn’t know what else to say, to think. She knows less now than she did before. Going? How does a kid go? Why? To where? She tries to think of another question but cannot. She foot-pushes her bike backward. She climbs into the saddle and slowly pedals away, toward nowhere in particular. Going. It doesn’t make sense. She’s never known a world without the Jack boy. Without all of them. Sure, she hates them. So does Jubilee. How many times have she and Jubilee wished they would all be trampled by the herd of wild bikes? But heck, the world is the world and boys are part of it, like flies. Without them, what would there be to swat?
In the distance she sees Jubilee tracing circles around Jack. It occurs to her that she may be look
ing at this whole thing the wrong way. Maybe she and Jubilee are getting their wish. If the shrugger and the crybaby are right, the population of the world is about to lose one boy. One boy down, one boy gone. That can’t be bad.
Can it?
JUBILEE
REMEMBER WHEN we busted up our trikes?
The words poke and sniff around the hatches of her brain, looking for a way in. They make no sense. Why would he say that to her? Why would he say anything to her except call her a name? They’ve never uttered a civil sentence to each other in their whole lives. What’s he up to? Why is he acting so … so … un-Jack? Unboy?
Or is he?
Maybe she’s underestimated boys. Or at least this one. Maybe there’s actually a tiny speck of brain goop between the ears of this one. Maybe the whole thing is a trick. Maybe she’s been looking at this whole thing the wrong way. When she awoke this morning and unspooned herself from Albert, there was the bike, the famous Scramjet, standing over her. Many times she had told the Jack kid she would ride his precious steed, just to rile him up. But she never really believed it. Now disbelief was mocking her: Yo, Ace—who says you can’t? It’s easy. Mount up! So she did, and all questions blew away with the wind in her hair.
Stolen? That’s what they all thought: she stole it. But she didn’t steal it. It came to her.
Or did it?
Maybe the Jack kid is just acting like he doesn’t want his bike anymore. Maybe this whole thing from start to finish has been no accident. Maybe she’s being set up. Maybe he snuck the bike over to her in the night where she was sleeping with Albert. Left it there for her to see when she awoke. Maybe he’s smart enough to know she couldn’t resist taking it. Keeping it. Yeah, maybe it’s all just a big act. He’s letting her think it’s hers, letting her get attached to it, pretending he doesn’t care. And then—bam!—he and his stupid Amigos will sneak in tonight when she’s sleeping and snatch it right back. And wake up all of Hokey Pokey as they howl with laughter at their big joke.
She smiles to herself. Good luck trying to get it back, A-meee-gos.
He’s at a distance now, but not too far. His jeans are crumpled around his sneaker tops. She calls: “Forget the trick, wormbrain! It’s not gonna work!”
Strange, him not fighting back. In the old days he would turn and fire a word back at her, maybe even come stomping closer, the better to splash the word in her face. And the war would be on:
“Snotball!”
“Pimple!”
“Underwear breath!”
“Moron!”
Once, in a duel that became famous across the land, it went on all day long …
“Turdface!”
“Smello!”
“Baby!”
“Infant!”
… until night came and they both fell asleep, right there, half a spit from each other, firing away till the last drooping eyelid.
But no such thing now. He keeps on walking, giving no sign that he’s heard her, leaving her no choice but to retreat to the last thing he said: Remember when we busted up our trikes? Yeah, she remembers. She remembers the satisfying crunch of trike on trike. She thought at first he was going to run off bawling. She’s glad he didn’t. That would have ruined everything. But he hung in there, climbed back in the saddle, came charging at her. By the time they were done, the trikes were wrecks and so were they, both of them wild-eyed and drooling, and she knew she had an enemy for life. Oh yeah, those were the days!
LOPEZ
FASTER.
Jack is going faster, a leaf on a current. Everything is faster, sharper. He can see the shadow of himself growing taller with every step. At this speed, he discovers, shadows can be heard: a faint scratching against the ground, as if an insect is crossing its legs. There’s a breathy whisper in the air, but there is no wind here—it’s the sun moving through the sky. Thunder booms beyond the Mountains.
The current brings him to the seesaw—and Lopez. She’s crying.
“Don’t cry,” he says. He pulls down the high end, sends her up, sits, anchors himself to keep her there. She loves up.
She’s still crying.
“Don’t go,” she says. Her little cheeks are bright with tears.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he says. “Where did you get that idea? Where would I go?”
The sound of his own question brings a new knowledge, smacks him in the face like a bad-hop grounder: he’s lying. He knows it and she knows it. This is where all the strangeness has been leading.…
Sayonara, kid.
He remembers The Story:
One day when he woke up things were different.
The Kid was not himself.
I am going away.
The bike.
The tattoo.
The current.
The train whistle.
Tomorrow I will be gone.
The Kid says it in The Story. Tomorrow. Yesterday—all the yesterdays of his life—he did not know what it meant. Now he does. Tomorrow. A day that has not happened yet. Tomorrow morning—he knows this now, he saw it in Lopez’s sad little face—tomorrow morning he will not wake up in Hokey Pokey. They seesaw without words. The only sound is the creak of the fulcrum. He doesn’t stop till he sees that her tears have dried. Her eyes never leave him. She is memorizing his face.
One final bump to the ground and he dismounts. Down she comes. He grabs her and hoists her to his shoulders and gallops off. He can’t see her face but he knows she is finally smiling, laughing, yippee-ki-yohing. She smacks his shoulder. “Giddyup, horsey!” He gallops her around Hippodrome, the kids on the painted wooden hippos crying out—“Me too! Me too!”—for a ride on Jack, and around Tantrums and its dome pipe puffing Category Two gas: violet. Now over to Cartoons and every little kid’s dream: a hop onto the stage inches from the screen. Above them Bugs Bunny is chomping a carrot and drawling, “Ehh … what’s up, Doc?” He holds Lopez so she can measure herself against Bugs’s colossal foot—she’s no bigger than his toe!
“Let’s hokey pokey!” he says.
She laughs. “Jack, you can’t make a circle with two.”
“Is that so?” he says, and they do it—they make a circle of two:
Put your right foot in,
Put your right foot out …
And then he calls funny ones:
Put your right ear in …
Put your right armpit in …
When he calls the last one …
Put your right rump in …
… she’s rolling on the ground, she’s laughing so hard.
When he returns her to the seesaw, he does it quickly. She is flushed and giddy. It’s been the experience of her life. He dumps her gently onto her seat. The word goodbye surges up his throat—he swallows it. He wants to hug her and never let go. But he knows he must leave her this way: deliriously, faintfully happy. As she makes Newbie-like gurble sounds, he touches his lips to the top of her head. He finds a rock, sets it on the other end in place of himself. She goes up, where she loves to be. She surveys Hokey Pokey. She smiles. He walks away. Runs away.
ALBERT, DESTROYER
WHERE AM I GOING?
Jack treads the dusty flats in a shower of calls—“Hey, Jack! … Hey, Jack!”—but all he hears is Where am I going?
The Hokey Pokey Man knows. Jack believes it. But where is he? Where does the Hokey Pokey Man go after the last kid is served? Jack wants to look. Wants to forget everything else and go searching and not stop until he finds the Hokey Pokey Man, finds him so he can ask Where am I going? But there is no time. It is time and there is no time, and he must move.…
He lifts his shirt. Nothing. His stomach is as unmarked as a diapered Newbie’s.
A breeze carries to him Hippodrome’s tootle: Hurry! … Hurry! …
A commotion near Tantrums. Little kids are running and triking to a shallow gully, stopping at the rim, staring. Screams come from the gully. Jack quickens his pace. Kids stand aside to let him through. A little boy lies in the d
ust. He’s curled into a ball. He’s pulled his shirt up over his head. His screams are so forceful they blow a bulge in the make-do hood. Jack scans—no blood, no snakes. The gully is only a couple of feet deep, too shallow for the boy to have hurt himself falling into it. Jack feels a tug. He turns. A wide-eyed little girl is looking up at him, terrified. She sobs: “He got exploded!”
Jack laughs from relief. He jumps into the gully, touches the boy’s bare shoulder. The boy cries, “No! No!” He peels the boy’s fingers from the shirt, pulls it back down over his torso, gets a look at his face. Through its contortions of anguish he recognizes the face of the girl’s brother. Albert. His cheeks are wet with tears, his nose snotty, his eyes clamped shut, and still he’s screaming.
Jack shakes him. “Albert—stop! It’s OK. It’s me. Jack.”
One eye opens. Then the other. Recognition. The screaming stops. Jack is figuring it’s over when suddenly the kid starts in again, pulling his shirt over his head, wailing, “I’m exploded!”
The kid has curled himself into such a perfect ball that Jack is tempted to roll him up the gullyside. He manages to lug him up, but as he goes to dump the kidball onto the ground, two arms and legs spring out and now he’s got an octopus clamping him in a death grip. “I’m exploded!”
Little kids circle closer, many of them sobbing too. Jack reminds himself to be gentle. The kid’s terror is real. Jack lowers himself to the ground, gently pries the clutching limbs away, sits the kid on his lap, turns the kid’s face to his. “Albert … Albert. Open your eyes. Look at me.”
A little-girl voice wails, “Look at him, Albert!”
Like a pair of reluctant clams, the eyes open.
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