Apple in the Earth

by C.T. Millis

  Chapter 20

  “Does anyone need the stapler, the stapler,” Ms. Hopcke repeated to the class. She wandered between the desks holding the stapler in the air and offered it to every student who was at work creating paper envelopes to hold Valentine’s Day cards. James used blue construction paper, traced his hand over it, smeared the uneven edge of a glue stick over the design, and filled that up with silver glitter. After writing his name in black sharpie, he raised his hand for the stapler,

  “Thank you,”

  “You’re welcome, don’t forget the other side,” Ms. Hopcke said while he finished stapling the slot. “Okay, everyone wrap up, when you are done, line up outside of the classroom.”

  One by one, the students slipped out, leaving their envelopes taped to the edge of their desk to receive valentines. When James was done, he went outside of the classroom to stand near Sophie in line.

  “How many do you think you’ll get?” James asked, running his hand along the grey cement between bricks in the wall.

  “Oh, I don’t know, no more than last year,”

  “Yeah, do you think you’ll get any candy?”

  “I hope so,” she smiled,

  “Okay, first person in line, go in and drop off your valentines, come out when you’re done,” Sonny walked into the classroom with a sly smile, “and don’t take too long!” Ms. Hopke called after him.

  When he was done, another student went in, and another. Soon Sophie came in, and when she was done she sat down with the other kids in the hallway who already went into the classroom. James opened and closed the door. He went to his backpack, and pulled out three pink heart-shaped lollipops and a piece of notebook paper. On the paper, he wrote:

  Sophie,

  Thank you for being my friend,

  it means a lot.

  -James

  He folded the notebook paper around the lollipops and walked over to her desk. He went to open her envelope, which was yellow with red lopsided hearts spelling out her name, but it was already held open. He glanced at it and it was filled with cards and candy, he stuffed his gifts in the envelope and hurried out of the room.

  After three other kids went into the classroom to give their valentines cards and gifts, Ms. Hopcke called the sitting students to attention.

  “You guys behaved very well, you can go ahead and get your book bags and your envelopes, and go home, we only have five minutes left.” After they got their envelopes, Sophie and James walked outside together. On the way out of the front door to the building, Paul said,

  “Have a great day, Sophie,” she looked at him confused, created some sort of smile, and replied,

  “You too.”

  The sun made the air almost warm, and they walked with smiles away from the school, talking about spring. When they got into the tree house, Sophie dumped out her yellow envelope onto the wood floor of the tree house. The spilling paper sounded like water, and thunks from the candy dropping out started to create a hollow rhythm.

  “You do yours!” Sophie said. James did, and only one thing fell out, a box of sweethearts fell out, with a handmade Valentines’ Day card after it.

  “Oh-” Sophie caught herself letting out, after seeing that her card was the only one. James turned the card towards him, and opened it. On the front there was one dog, smiling through the wax of crayons. Inside, there were two dogs, paws around one another, and in Sophie’s handwriting, it said:

  To my true friend, be my Valentine.

  Love,

  Soph

  James hugged Sophie and told her to start reading her cards. What followed was a mixed procession of proclamations of love as well as girlish side-splitting remarks about who was a better friend. From Sonny:

  You are really pretty and I love you

  They both laughed at how the tough kid was suddenly sappy, drawing hearts instead of o’s throughout the note. She got one from one of the girls who was fawning over her the day before:

  I know you like me better because I’m cooler than Janice,

  I won’t tell her, I promise.

  They laughed again and kept reading. Each note, card, or gift was more ridiculous than the last. There was a cheap ring from a quarter machine, sweethearts, and chocolates. Sophie opened a box of them and started to share the brown squares with James.

  The last card she got to was the one from James, after she read it, her eyes started watering up, and she leaned over the pile of Valentine’s day cards to hug him for a long time.

  “James, the only card that matters in here is from you,”

  “I got you the lollipops, too,” he smiled, she picked one up.

  “The rest of them, they only want to be my friend because I don’t have my glasses, or they only like me because of that,” she sniffled and wiped her nose on her sleeve, “because I’m not wearing my glasses, they ignored me before.” Sophie started ripping cards in half, and putting each half in different piles.

  “Sophie! Don’t do that, you’ll ruin them!” But she kept it up,

  “James, the only card that matters is yours,” she explained, when she was done ripping them all in half, she divided the candy among the two piles, and slid one toward them. “You’re so much of my friend that you deserve half of these,”

  James hugged her, “Sophie, you’re so nice, you really didn’t have to do that-”

  “No, I had to, most people don’t know, they don’t understand-” she sniffled again, “they don’t understand what really matters, who really matters.” she smiled at him.

  “But you matter, I swear-” she interrupted herself, “I swear, when I get my new glasses, I’m never taking them off, not even when I sleep!”

  “Sophie, you are really pretty without them, don’t you want a boyfriend?”

  “No,” she said, too soon.

  “Why not?”

  “It never works out,” she looked out the window.

  “What never works out?”

  “People,” she said.

  “Well, you’re parents-”

  “My parents,” she began, “are getting divorced.” They were quiet for a while.

  “They told me yesterday, after school.”

  “I’m so sorry, Sophie.”

  “No, James, it could be worse, so much worse.” She looked at him, “It isn’t as bad as what happened to you. I’m so sorry for what happened to you.”

  “It’s just like he hasn’t come back yet,”

  “But he isn’t James, he isn’t coming back,” she started to get worked up, “and my parents aren’t going to love each other again, and there is a war and people are dying every day-” she raised her voice for the first time since James knew her, “and all these people care about is who is friends with who, who can get a boyfriend, who has the most valentines.”

  The branches creaked like an old person’s bones outside.

  “They aren’t like us, James, they aren’t like us.” and she shoveled half the valentines into her envelope.

  “Thank you for being like me,” James told her.

  James broke the silence.

  “Do you want to meet my mom?”

  “Well, yeah, that would be perfect,” she started moving to the ladder, “I don’t want to go home right now.” She began descending the ladder backwards, facing out towards the woods. James followed her doing the same thing.

  “You can really see so much more,” she said as they made their way towards James’ house, “if you just do something like turn yourself around on the ladder, if you just take a risk.”

  James was thinking about how winter did not last very long. He glimpsed behind him while spinning every few steps and smiled at Sophie, he never looked long enough to make more of her features than a flash of golden hair. When they were close to the house, he turned around to her again, and when he faced his house, he saw a strange car in the driveway. James stopped spinning and slowed down so Sophie was walking beside him.
>
  “Is that-”

  “My dad’s car,” Sophie interrupted.

  “That’s so weird, maybe he is apologizing for how the other parents were at the PTA meeting,”

  “What happened at the PTA meeting?” Sophie asked, and they both stopped walking. James looked down at his feet and moved some of the dirt around.

  “They all wanted to talk about the kick ball field, but my mom kept talking about when our house got papered,” he looked up at Sophie, “my mom said someone told her that if I had a father, I would know how to handle the other kids my age-”

  “You wouldn’t be so afraid?”

  “Yeah,”

  “My father told me about that after the PTA meeting, he said that he told that to your mom.”

  “So he must be apologizing!” James exclaimed. Sophie nodded and looked at the car again. They were quiet for a while before Sophie said,

  “I skipped lunch today, I still have a few dollars, do you want to go to the gas station and get ice cream or something?” James thought about it,

  “Sure, you’d do that Soph?”

  “Yeah, it’s Valentine’s day, we should celebrate.”

  They walked away from James’ house and toward the gas station. When they got to the end of the street James tapped Sophie on the shoulder and began running, she ran after him until they could hear their pounding feet on the cement of the gas station parking lot. They stopped running and smiled at one another while they caught their breath. James could hear the neon lights on the gas station sign humming and buzzing. He walked up to the door and opened it for Sophie with a slight bow. She laughed and walked in and they made their way to the ice cream case.

  Leaning over it, their unsteady breath fogged up the glass on the top of the ice cream case.

  “The fudge pops are really good!” said the teenage attendant. Sophie, usually shy, perked up.

  “What’s your name?” He pointed to his name tag,

  “My name is Sam,” he extended his hand, “What’s yours?”

  “I’m Sophie,” she ran over to the counter to shake his hand, and pointed at James, “and that’s James!”

  “Hi James,” Sam said.

  “Do you want some ice cream, too?” Sophie asked.

  “Oh, you don’t have to,”

  “No, really I want to!”

  James picked out three fudge pops and brought them to the counter,

  “Is that good, Soph?”

  “Yeah,” she smiled. There was nobody at the store, so after Sam rang them up, they stood where they were and started eating their ice cream.

  “Every time I come in, you’re working, you work a lot,” James said,

  “Yeah, I like it- and I need the money to pay my rent,”

  “Why don’t you live with your parents?” Sophie asked, “don’t they love you?” Sam laughed and looked down at the counter before looking back up with a sad smile,

  “My mom still does, I see her sometimes. I’m pretty sure my dad doesn’t,” Sophie and James looked at each other, “but it’s really not so bad, I like working here.”

  “Did he kick you out?” Sophie asked,

  “Yeah, right after graduation, he was in the Army-”

  “My dad was too!” James interrupted,

  “I know, I’m sorry you lost him, James.”

  “What did him being in the army have to do with you having to leave your parents house?” Sophie asked.

  “Well, he wanted me to be in the army, and I didn’t want to.” James and Sophie had their full attention on Sam, and James’ ice cream started dripping down the stick to his fingers. “So, I told the recruiting officer some things that would make it so the Army wouldn’t want me,”

  “You lied?” Sophie asked.

  “No, it was the truth,”

  “What was it?” Sophie asked,

  “The army only wants some kinds of people to fight for them,” Sam took a bite from his fudge pop and chewed on it while saying, “it worked to keep me out, because I’m different,” Sam smiled at the two kids in front of the counter almost boyishly, “I just didn’t think my dad would find out what I told the recruiting officer, but he went to basic training with him so they were really good friends.”

  “Like Soph and me?” James asked,

  “Probably closer, but yeah.”

  “Do you live with your girlfriend?” Sam chuckled,

  “No, I don’t have a girlfriend”

  “Do you have a Valentine, Sam?” Sophie asked,

  “No,” he smiled, “but it’s nice to live alone sometimes, I get to take showers for as long as I want, and I’m not home that often anyway,”

  “You’re always working?” James asked.

  “Yeah,”

  “If you have to work, why are you always so friendly, so happy.”

  “Well,” Sam thought, “I have to be here right now, and I don’t have the option to be at home, or be with the people I care about-” he looked out of the gas station window, “so I just try to be happy where I am, doing what I am doing.” He looked at James and Sophie, “I just try to be happy with where I am at, and who I am, even if other people don’t like it.” He finished his fudge pop. “You know, it’s a really weird day to eat ice cream.”

  “Why?” Sophie asked while brushing the hair off of her face.

  “Because it’s so cold!” Sam said. They all laughed. “Thank you kids so much for sharing your ice cream with me, and talking to me, that’s so nice of you.”

  “Well,” Sophie replied, “It’s Valentine’s day, and if you want, you can be our Valentine, seeing as you don’t have one.”

  “Yeah, that’s great! Thank you!” He smiled and lifted the waste basket from behind the counter to let James and Sophie throw out their popsicle sticks. After tossing them in, Sam said, “You guys stop by whenever you want, you don’t even have to buy anything!”

  “Thanks Sam!” Sophie replied,

  “Yeah, have a good day!” James said as they made their way out of the door to the parking lot again. After the door closed Sophie said,

  “He is so nice,”

  “I know, do you want to go meet Mr. Heckerman?”

  “Oh yeah, the guy who owns the tree house, yeah,” She started skipping through the sidewalk, “we still have time before dinner!”

  Sophie had not been to Mr. Heckerman’s house before that day. When they got to his sturdy door, James knocked and Mr. Heckerman called out for them to come in. As soon as they stepped into the warm living room, they heard Mr. Heckerman say;

  “Eighty five percent!”

  “What?” James asked.

  “Eighty five percent of Valentines are bought by women.” He picked up a beaker and raised them to his goggles upon entering the room, “it tells you something about-” he stopped, lifted his goggles, and spun the water in the beaker around, “something,” he put the beaker back down and went back into the dining room where several experiments were going on at once.

  “I’m distilling things,” he looked at James, “Who’s this?”

  “My friend Sophie.”

  “Ahhhh,” he shook her hand, “and what an auspicious day to meet!” She looked quizzically at him. “Everything, I’m distilling everything liquid I could find, just to see-” he interrupted himself, “The Catholics,” he began, “the Catholics never intended for Valentine’s day to be romantic, the story behind it isn’t very romantic at all.” he lifted two vials from the table and held each in a hand, “Two Saint Valentines, one from Rome, one from Terni, born over 100 years apart,” he lifted the vials and threw them to the ground, emitting a poof and a loud noise similar to an explosion, “both martyred!” James and Sophie both Jumped back. “Both buried in Via Flaminia,” He started sweeping the glass from the rug, “It’s the only way to get out these stains,” one of the experiment stations on the dining room table was bubbling over, so Mr. Heckerman quickly extinguished the flame beneat
h it.

  “You two aren’t martyrs, are you?” they both furiously shook their head ‘no.’ “Would you like to grow a potato without planting it?” he asked.

  “Okay,” Sophie answered.

  They followed Mr. Heckerman into his pantry where he pulled a bag of old potatoes from under a shelf that held cans of soup. He pulled out one and handed it to Sophie, he pulled out another and handed it to James, then he got one for himself and filled mason jars with water. Mr. Heckerman got toothpicks from his cabinet and began sticking for around the waist of the potato. He allowed some of the growing eyes of the potato to dip into the water when he set it hovering in the Mason jar.

  “Now you guys try, make sure you get the sprouts in the water,” James and Sophie began to poke toothpicks through their potatoes and set them in the jars. “It’s amazing,” he said, getting their attention, “if the sprouts hit water, they become roots, if they hit air, they become stalks.”

  “Incredible,” Sophie whispered as she set her jar in the light of Mr. Heckerman’s window.

  “How long do you thi-” James started to ask before Mr. Heckerman interrupted him,

  “Two or three weeks,” he set his jar by the window also, “Two or three weeks before these roots become roots, these stalks become stalks, and there will be leaves, and flowers in the spring.” Sophie lit up before she started to ask,

  “What color will the potato flow-”

  “Some are white, some are purple, some are pink- it depends on the breed of potato.” he looked at James and Sophie, “I mean it, if the sprouts hit water, they become roots, if they hit air, they become stalks,” he smiled, “that is so often the case with people, what surrounds them can really change who they are,” he began looking out of the window, “It’ll just be a few weeks now, before we see leaves.”

  “It’s rare.”

  “What?” James asked of Mr. Heckerman

  “An Elephant’s sneeze, it’s the world’s biggest sneeze, you know.”

  “Really?” Sophie asked as she re-adjusted her potato vase.

  “It sounds like a boiler exploding.”

  “Have you ever heard one?” James asked.

  “Once,” he began, “My company sent me on vacation one year to India,”

  “You worked for a company?” James leaned forward,

  “A long time ago, a big company, they used a lot of my inventions,” with this, Mr. Heckerman lowered his head before starting the story again, as if he thought of each invention the company paid him for. “So, I went on this vacation, and I knew that colds were very common among elephants,” he cleared his throat, “My wife and I were on a hike with a few local tour guides watching a herd of elephants in the distance when suddenly an elephant started pacing back and forth, even walking backwards a bit, as if he were trying to get away from it-”

  “It?” Sophie asked.

  “The sneeze, I noticed all of our tour guides began to crouch down, face almost to the dirt, and begin talking very quietly, one motioned for my wife and I to do the same, so we did,” he bowed his head and put his hands to his face momentarily to show what they did, “and boy,” Mr. Heckerman laughed, “when it came, we knew, we were 200 feet away and it still was the loudest sneeze I’ve ever heard, louder than I thought I could hear- even at that distance.” He smiled. “The tour guides began to get so excited, jumping up and down, hugging one another. As we stood up, my wife told me to ask them what was going on, so I did,”

  “And what did they say?” James asked Mr. Heckerman, leaning in.

  “Well, kiddo,” he leaned forward and looked at James right in the eye, “they told me it was a highly regarded good luck sign.”

  “Regarded? What does that mean?” Sophie asked,

  “Considered, it means thought of,” Mr. Heckerman answered her. After thinking, James asked,

  “Why were you all on the ground?”

  “The tour guides were praying, praying to realize their wishes,”

  “Wow,” Sophie’s jaw dropped, “Did yours come true?”

  “I didn’t wish, I had no idea what was going on!” At this all three of them laughed.

  “I wish I could go to India,” James said.

  “I wish I could go somewhere, I’m so tired of this place.” Sophie added.

  “Hey, do you kids want to try something?”

  “What’s that?” Sophie asked,

  “Lets send it a letter,”

  “Send what a letter?”

  “Anywhere else, ask them how they live,”

  “How will we know what address to send it to?”

  “We could attach it to a balloon, the letter, we could let it float into the atmosphere, drift a while, and deflate back to earth.”

  “What would we ask them?” James questioned.

  “Well, what they do for a living, how old they are, what they think is fun,” he looked at Sophie, “It could go across state lines, you know.” Her eyes brightened up and she smiled.

  They got out paper and envelopes. They each wrote questions on the paper with an envelope that had Mr. Heckerman’s address on it. They each licked a stamp with a fluttering American flag and stuck it to the envelope. They put both in plastic bags that snapped closed and tied that to some string.

  In the middle of blowing up their balloons, Sophie put hers to her mouth and breathed in the helium. In a high mouse voice, she asked,

  “Do you really think anyone will find it, and if they do, will they write us?” Laughing, James sucked in helium, too,

  “Of course they will, wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes!” She squeaked and the both of them collapsed in a pile of laughing on Mr Heckerman’s basement floor. Mr. Heckerman himself took a lung-full of helium and scolded them,

  “Now, kids! This is serious business, we are communicating with others, others who we would not usually meet. This is a great opportunity-” He filled his lungs again with helium, “this is a great opportunity for us to connect, to learn something about someone who isn’t us!”When Mr. Heckerman said ‘someone,’ his voice returned to normal and he sounded all too serious, which made the kids laugh even more. At some point, Sophie sucked in the rest of the helium from her balloon and laughed loud and high like a siren signaling the approach of a tornado.

  They pulled themselves together and tied their strings to the balloon,

  “Deja Vous, James?” Mr. Heckerman asked,

  “Yeah, but I like this time better.”

  “Me too.”

  “What are you guys talking about? What’s Day-Jah Voo, is that like Voodoo?”

  “No, Soph,” James started to explain, “it means it feels like we’ve done this before, the balloons.”

  “Ohhhh, okay,” she skipped out of the door to the backyard and instantly let go of her balloon. “Keep rising!” Sophie called after it, “Just keep going, don’t stop, go higher! Go faster!” James smiled at her and let his balloon go, “East,” he whispered, “go east.”

  Mr. Heckerman let his go as well, and for some reason, his balloon seemed to slumber up to the atmosphere slower than the other two.

  “There it goes, where it will land, nobody knows,”

  “Nobody knows,” Sophie solemnly echoed.

  “Do you guys know what eye drops are made of?”

  “What?” James and Sophie asked in unison,

  “Just the regular ones at the grocery store have salt, salt usually hurts eyes,”

  “Why don’t eye drops hurt?” Sophie asked,

  “Well, there is such a small amount of salt, that it helps to replace tears, and it doesn’t hurt, it helps.”

  “But the Ocean has too much salt,” James added,

  “It has too much salt for eyes,” Mr. Heckerman corrected, “But just enough salt for all the ocean animals, if it didn’t hurt our eyes- we might be in there more often, and where would the fish live?”

  “On our plates!” Sophie jested.