“You’ve lost it.”
“I have to do this.”
“What am I supposed to tell them? That I give you my car?”
“Nah,” I said. “When they find out, tell them I just took it. That I knew where you kept your keys. You had no idea.”
Victor didn’t respond to this right away. We both drank again from our beer and we looked to the street and where the streetlights cast their yellow light. The air already smelled a little of fall. I finished my cigarette and I knew I didn’t have to say anything else, that Victor was going to give me the car, because he was my brother and I had told him what I needed to do. I was going to find her and he was not going to get in the way.
Victor did two things for me the following night. First, he left his old Chevy sedan in front of my house. And second, on the front bench seat, was a map of New England and on it he had drawn in red a line from Galilee, Rhode Island to Lincoln, Connecticut. He had done exactly what I asked him to do. Gone to the library and found out where her school, Miss Watson’s, was. And brought me the directions to find it.
I waited until midnight, smoking in my bedroom window. My oilskin bag was already packed, as it had been when I left for the island. I had no idea how long it would take the police to respond when I cut the bracelet. There would not be many cars on the road this time of night and that was a risk. Though I thought it would be easier to go in the dark. I thought they would take longer to get here. Besides, they didn’t have any reason to think I’d be in a car. They’d probably check my skiff first, and by that time, I might have already crossed state lines.
Before I left, I stopped for a moment in front of Berta’s room. The door was slightly ajar and I could see her on the bed. She often slept like she was in a coffin, on her back, her short arms crossed on her chest. She was like this tonight and I stood in silence and watched the slow rise and fall of her breath. This was going to hurt her, my doing this, and I knew that in no time at all a pounding on the door would awaken her. Then the house would be full of state police. It broke my heart to do this to her, but I no longer felt like I had a choice.
I made my way down the stairs and then to the front door. I walked out and into the night. In the front yard, I stopped and looked up through the trees to the sky. It was overcast and there was no starlight or moonlight, just a low black ceiling. I put my bag on the ground and unzipped it and took out my fishing knife. I got down on one knee and I put the blade under the bracelet. The knife was sharp and it took one quick tug and it was off. I stood and tossed it over my shoulder and ran for the car.
I put my bag on the seat and turned the ignition and it started right up and I drove off through the still neighborhood. There was a shortcut that would take me on back roads out toward Route 1 and I took this, wanting to stay away from the harbor and the obvious routes.
I drove past the small darkened houses, many of them with skiffs in the driveways, fishing equipment on the lawns. I drove quickly but not too quickly and soon I reached the state highway and I turned onto it and I was the only car. I drove north, away from the coast. I kept looking in my rearview mirror but there was nothing. Then, from in front of me, I saw them coming at me, two state troopers, lights flashing. They passed by me, heading toward Galilee, and I breathed in deep when we passed, looking back to see if they were turning around, but they did not.
Soon I reached Route 1 and there were other cars out here and I relaxed a little bit. I stayed around the speed limit. Victor’s car was a hunk of junk, but it had a valid inspection sticker and everything essential worked. There was a good deal of rust around the wheels and the upholstery on the backseat was all torn up. But it drove okay as long as you didn’t try to go too fast. Then the wheel shook underneath your fingers and it felt like it was tough to control.
My goal that night was to get out of Rhode Island. It sounds funny to say it now, but I had never been out of Rhode Island before. Unless you count on a boat, in which case I had almost been to Greenland.
I reached Providence an hour later and cars were whizzing by me on either side now. Victor’s radio didn’t work so the only sound was the highway, the engine, the other cars. I felt my mood brightening in a way it had not since I had last seen Hannah. I was moving again and there was something freeing about taking action, being in control of things. I had the car and the road and I could make my own decisions. And I was coming to find Hannah. This was the most important thing of all.
At two in the morning, I crossed into Connecticut on Route 6. First there was a sign that said leaving Rhode Island and then another welcoming me to Connecticut. I went through the center of a few small towns, deserted at this time of night, and then into a pine forest. I had the window down as I smoked and the air was silent and still and cool. The sky had cleared as I moved inland and a half-moon showed between drifting clouds above. I was the only car on the road and for a moment I thought about killing my headlights, rolling down the other windows, and becoming as much a part of the night as I could.
I slept in a small state park, driving the car down a narrow tree-lined road to a parking area that looked abandoned. I put the car in the far corner under the cover of large pines. With the dark car and the shadows it would have been hard to see unless you shined a headlight right on it. Now that I was no longer driving, I was bone-tired. I laid my bedroll out on the backseat of the car and used the rest of my bag as a pillow. I kicked off my boots and tried to get comfortable. The space was too small for my limbs but for the first time in a while, I had no trouble sleeping. I don’t even remember slipping under. One moment I was looking through the back window at the trees and the sky and the next thing I knew bright sunlight rained down on me. It was a dreamless night and that was how tired I was. The day came before I knew it.
In a small town I found a McDonald’s and pulled through the drive-through and got coffee and a sandwich. I ate on the road, which led me up and over soft rolling wooded hills. It was a nice day, sunny and mild. Now and again I looked at the map, but mostly I just drove. I liked driving, I decided, especially on a nice day. The truth was I didn’t really know where I was going. I knew where her school was but I had no idea if she would be there. I had no idea when school started and my worst fear was that because of all that had happened, that Hannah might have changed plans somehow. But Miss Watson’s was all I had to hang my hat on, and from the map it looked like I would be crossing practically the whole state of Connecticut to get there.
I drove through small farm towns that looked like they could have been anywhere. And then through towns with greens where all the old houses seemed to be white and the churches were too. Then into the glass towers of Hartford and back out again. Crossing the Connecticut River and back to small towns, more woods and hilly land. And finally, in the late afternoon, I drove down the country highway and into the town of Lincoln, home of Miss Watson’s.
I don’t know what I expected but there wasn’t much to the place. The land was pretty, I’ll say that. Mountainous compared to what I was used to. Narrow roads and steep hills. Tons of woods. But beyond that the town seemed to consist of this one road, a few stores, nice older homes right on the road, and then the school itself, a mass of brick buildings on both sides of it, surrounded by open fields and forest. I decided I would just drive by the school the first time. I slowed down passing it and the place seemed empty. In front of one of the buildings I did see a police car and this got me worried that maybe they figured out this was where I was heading. The car looked empty, though. But I didn’t see any students, or any people at all, other than one fat guy cutting grass on a riding mower and an older couple walking a dog.
It was still August. I figured school had not started yet, but I knew it wouldn’t be long. I needed a place to hunker down and wait. I needed to be patient.
I drove past the school and several towns away, on the same rural highway, I came upon a campground. It cost five bucks a night and had showers and bathrooms and the guy running the office s
howed zero interest in me. He barely looked up when I paid in advance for a week. There were a few other people camping there, but mostly it was empty. I picked a spot deep in the back and against the woods and next to a small brook. It could not be seen from any of the campsites in use. I didn’t have a tent and the last thing I needed was someone raising questions about me. I was too close for that to happen.
In the mornings I drove those winding roads to the nearest good-sized town, Litchfield, and I ate either McDonald’s or Burger King and then I drove by the school to see if anything was happening. The place was deserted. Occasionally someone who looked like a janitor or a maintenance person was walking around but that was it. No students that I could see. There was also no sign of the police car I had seen the first time I drove by and this made me feel better. No doubt half of Rhode Island was looking for me, but they hadn’t figured to look here yet. Though perhaps that was only because Hannah had not arrived.
With my one piece of work taken care of, I had nothing to do but kill time. Once I went to a matinee movie at the theater in Litchfield, which took up most of the afternoon, but I knew I couldn’t do that every day. There weren’t a lot of Portuguese boys my age in that town and like on Cross Island, I stood out. The rest of the days were interminable, to tell you the truth. I sat around my campsite and thought about home, and about Hannah, and about everything that had happened. I bought some firewood from the camp office and at night I built a fire and at least this was something to look at. I’d watch the burning logs for hours, stirring the coals with a long stick. I wished I had some beer or wine but I didn’t. I smoked cigarettes until I got so tired there was nothing left to do but curl up on my bedroll and go to sleep.
My third day there, I returned back to the campground to discover that the campsite closest to me was now occupied. It was through some thin poplars and also next to the brook. Parked there was a rusty pickup truck and one of those small popup campers in front of which, on a lawn chair, sat an old man with gray hair as long as a woman’s. It came down either side of his face and partway down his chest. He had an ample belly. It wasn’t even noon yet, but he had an open can of beer and a cigarette. He waved to me when I pulled up and I waved back. I got out of the car and stood at my meager site trying to figure out what to do about this guy who would soon know that I didn’t have a tent. That I was sleeping on the ground or in my car. I didn’t know much about camping, but the one thing I knew is that no one slept on the ground intentionally. You were on the run from something, most likely, and were probably someone to be avoided.
And as I stood next to the brook thinking this, the old man called to me. I didn’t hear what he said but I knew he was addressing me. I turned and looked at him through the small trees and he was raising his can of beer at me. I heard him clearly now. He said, “Have a beer.”
I wasn’t one to drink in the morning but I also didn’t know how to say no to that. I walked through the trees to his campsite and when he saw me coming he stood and climbed into his small camper. I didn’t know what to do so I stopped but a moment later he emerged and he had another lawn chair.
“Come on, sit down,” he said. He had a deep voice, gruff-sounding but friendly enough. I went over to him and was going to shake his hand but he just motioned at the chair. It was only about a foot away from him and facing the same way, toward my campsite, so that to look at him, I had to turn sideways. He handed me a beer and said, “I’m Terrence.”
“Anthony. Thanks.”
When I took the beer, I got a better look at him. He wore a white T-shirt and jean shorts, wool socks and sandals. His wrist had a tattoo of an anchor and on his calves, veins as thick as noodles stuck out of his skin.
“Some day, Anthony,” he said.
I looked up at the blue sky over the woods. “Yeah,” I said.
“You just passing through?” he asked.
For some reason I told him the truth. “I’m waiting for a girl.”
Terrence laughed at this. “Waiting for a girl? Doesn’t seem a great place for that.”
“She goes to the school the next town over.”
“The one on 75?”
“That’s it,” I said.
Terrence took a cigarette out and lighted it and I got one of my own and did the same. “I should be working,” he said. “But I just got here. Take a day off and start tomorrow.”
“What kind of work?”
“Mushrooms,” he said. “Yup. I harvest mushrooms.”
“For real?”
“Oh, yeah. These hills are full of ’em. And if you get the right ones, they’re worth a pretty penny.”
“So you just go into the woods and look for them?”
“No, no, there’s much more to it than that.” He pointed to his head. “You got to use this. Know where they’re hiding. What kind. Chanterelles and oysters, lobster mushrooms, hen-of-the-woods, you name it.”
“Hen-of-the-woods?” I said.
“Yup. Those are huge. Found one at the base of an old tree a few miles from here last year. Thing barely fit in the bed of my truck. Got three hundred dollars for it from a restaurant owner in New York. That was a good day. Bought a lot of beer that did.”
“I bet,” I said.
“Anyway,” Terrence said, and for a moment we sat in silence. I had not really talked to anyone since Victor came into my small yard in Galilee and I realized how much I missed other people. Then Terrence said, “What do you do when you’re not waiting for a girl, Anthony?”
“I’m a fisherman,” I said.
“Yeah? Where’s that?”
“Galilee, Rhode Island.”
“Ah,” he said. “Know it well.”
“You do?”
Terrence pointed to his wrist, and the tattoo of the anchor. “Merchant Marines. Twenty-five years. I been in and out of that old harbor more than a few times.”
“I work on a swordboat,” I said.
“That’s some work,” he said.
“Yeah,” I said, “I miss it.”
“That’s what girls will do to you,” he said. “Mess up what you like. I travel light myself. Of course I’m not your age anymore. I used to wait for girls, myself.”
“This girl is worth it,” I said.
Terrence reached down to the cooler underneath his chair and brought out two more beers. “Drink up,” he said, and I drained the rest of that first beer and took the second one from him. “Drink up and tell me about her.”
I looked over at him. I saw his eyes for the first time clearly and they were the strangest shade of gray. I looked at his tattoo and his long hair and then I looked beyond him to his rusty pickup truck. And I thought that there are whole bunches of people that nobody knows about who live outside of normal things. Men who live on their own terms and make a living how they can, even if it means picking mushrooms in the woods. Who go where they want and when they want. Who answer to only themselves. Terrence was one of these men and I realized sitting next to him drinking beer in the morning that I was too.
I said, “She’s something.”
“What do you like about her the most?”
“Her eyes,” I said. “Maybe her freckles.”
Terrence nodded. “The eyes. What color?”
“Green. But not just any green. Bright. Beautiful.”
“What color is her hair?”
“Kind of red. More blond. It changes with the sun.”
“I like that,” said Terrence. “Especially redheads.”
“Yeah, it’s nice.”
“How about her titties?”
I laughed. “Her titties?”
Terrence smiled. “She got titties, don’t she?”
“Yeah,” I said, though I didn’t really like the question.
“How are they?”
“They’re fine,” I said, a little firmly.
“Is she skinny or fat?”
“She’s skinny.”
Terrence made a hrmph sound. “I like a little meat on mine,
” he said. “Some cushion, you know what I mean.”
I drank from my beer. I had a sudden feeling of not wanting to be there anymore. I looked over at Terrence and I saw him differently now, less benign, and I knew it was because I didn’t like him talking about Hannah like that. He didn’t know her and it was none of his business what she looked like. But there was something Terrence could do for me that I couldn’t for myself.
I said, “Terrence, what do you think about buying me some beer? My money. I buy, you fly. Some to buy some for yourself too.”
His eyes narrowed. “How old are you?”
“Seventeen.”
He pulled on one side of his long hair. “I took you for older. All right,” he said. “You got to drive, though.”
We finished the beers we had and then we drove into Litchfield in Victor’s Chevy. We must have looked like quite the pair, the long-haired heavyset old man, and the thin Portuguese boy. In the car, Terrence smelled funky, like cigarettes and beer, but like the woods too, perhaps like the mushrooms he harvested for money. I was glad he was getting me the beer, but I think I was even happier to get some separation between us. We could split up when we got back. We could split up and I wouldn’t have to answer any more of his questions about Hannah, and have to see through his eyes what he thought about her.
Terrence asked me to eat with him that night. He had a small cookstove and I didn’t know how to say no and so we sat together and got drunk on beer and ate some cheap steak he fried up with onions in a cast-iron skillet. He made some potatoes out of a box too and it was lousy food but it tasted sort of good after all the fast food I had been eating.
Afterwards we sat in the lawn chairs and it was a clear and beautiful night though the wind that came through the trees held some of the winter to come. I put on my coat but it still made me shiver. All that beer had completely gone to my head too and this might have contributed to the cold I was feeling. Terrence and I talked about fishing for a while, and then he told more about his life. How he chased the good weather, moving south when winter started to come.
Envious Moon Page 11