Last Meeting of the Gorilla Club

by Sara Nickerson

  Oh, and there was a pirate captain. He shadowed Josh on the playground for a few weeks. Then one day, when Josh was stuck in the middle of the monkey bars, he limped up on his wooden leg and growled, “Well, well, well.” That’s all he ever said. Well, well, well. But they had fun playing together. He liked Josh’s Tinkertoys.

  His parents: They read some books that said imaginary friends were normal, blah-blah-blah. So for a long time they let Josh play with his old friends and kid friends and pirate captain. Then, on his eighth birthday, he invited his entire class to his house for a party. Actually, his parents invited them. And no one came. But Josh had a good time anyway because his real friends slipped through and showed up, each and every one of them.

  They played hide-and-seek. They built a pillow fort. They sang “Happy Birthday” in seven different languages and helped Josh blow out the candles. They ate as much cake as they wanted. Everyone got along, even the pirate captain.

  Josh’s parents were worried and set him up with Dr. Ted, who, they explained, was a “talking doctor.” And Dr. Ted talked. And the problem was solved. Except for Big Brother. He was the one friend Josh couldn’t let go.

  So his parents had him dig a hole in the backyard. And in it went all his baby things, including the rock Josh had painted with Big Brother’s name. “These things are gone now,” his parents said. And the problem went away.

  At least, that’s how it seemed. But even after Big Brother stopped showing up, the problem of making real friends didn’t go away. The problem of being alone didn’t go away. The problem of being different didn’t go away.

  On his second first day of school, as Josh made his way past the line of buses in the parking lot, he practiced how he would tell his mom about everything. Like Big Brother and the sparkling girl. Because he knew he was supposed to. Would she ever be able to see it the way he did? The invisible crack? Or was it something that was impossible to believe unless you’d seen it with your own eyes, starting at the age of five?

  He knew the answer, of course, and his situation made him think about that poster that his dad had, with a kitten surrounded by rocks and a puppy: Stuck between a rock and a hard place.

  It was supposed to be funny, the poster. Sometimes his dad just got funny posters. Like the other kitten one, where the kitten is clinging to a tree branch with the words, Hang in there. But both posters just made Josh sad. He was the kitten who was trying to hang in there. He was also stuck between a rock and a hard place.

  Josh passed bus #39 and kept going. When his parents had registered him at Mountain View K–8, he’d been given the option of taking that bus or walking home. He chose walking. “Even in the rain?” his mom had asked. And he’d nodded. The thing he hated most at his old school was stumbling down the bus aisle, looking for a seat.

  “Excuse me, can I sit here?”

  But now, as he squared his backpack on his shoulders and headed for the main road, Josh wasn’t so sure about his decision. He was tired and hungry. When he thought about the pizza he’d thrown away at lunch, his stomach made an angry rumble.

  Josh tried to conjure an inspirational phrase that would help him get home. Which poster quote would his dad use? The only one he could think of was “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” Which did not work. Josh was pretty sure that one would never work. Not for anything.

  Town was the same as the day before with its sidewalks and stores and people. And at the edge of town The Last Stop still advertised corn dogs, two for one, right next to the price of gasoline. Josh would have liked a corn dog. Or two. His stomach rumbled again. But he’d spent all his allowance on candy.

  Since the walk the day before had been filled with the surprising return of Big Brother and the dramatic upchucking of cornflakes and Dots, Josh hadn’t noticed how alone he was out there on the road next to the forest. How dark and creepy and cold it was. He thought about the names of the housing developments: Cougar Ridge and Bear Creek. Wilderness. Did they get their names from real cougars and bears? True wilderness?

  A branch snapped, just on the other side of the ditch. Josh started to run. All the sounds in the forest—the creepy, mysterious, twig-snapping animal sounds—seemed to run alongside him, matching his pace. His backpack pounded against his shoulder blades, his breath got wheezy, and his red raincoat made him sweat, but Josh didn’t slow down, not even when he almost tripped over an old mailbox post that was rotting on the ground.

  When he heard the rumble of a motor coming up from behind Josh wondered if he should jump into the ditch again, to hide. But he wasn’t doing anything wrong. He wasn’t skipping school like the day before. He was just walking home. Like kids did. So he straightened his shoulders and looked straight ahead.

  The vehicle lumbered past with a blast of smoky air. It was a bright yellow school bus, #39. Other kids were traveling along the same forest road to their homes. The bus reminded Josh of that. It made him less afraid.

  The feeling of safety lasted all the way to the carved sign and wooden bear. “Welcome home,” the bear’s waving paw seemed to say.

  Josh looked the bear straight in the eye, grateful for his calm wooden presence. “Thanks,” he said. “See you later.”

  “Alligator,” the bear said with a wink, making Josh laugh out loud.

  #39

  “You’re missing the point!” Maxie Moon’s voice was in his ear. Lucas had forgotten that detail about her, back when they were little kids and best friends—how she used to start a conversation in the middle. It was like she always had a conversation going on in her head, and at some point the words would just spill out.

  He’d forgotten that about her.

  He’d also forgotten that if he didn’t respond, she would respond for him. So as he stayed perfectly still, with his forehead pressed against the rattling window of bus #39, Maxie Moon continued.

  “The point is, the topic is supposed to be something you want to learn about, more than anything else. Anything else. And you—what you want to learn. Capiche?”

  Oh, right. That was another thing. She threw in Italian words sometimes, like her grandmother from Italy did, who lived with their family.

  Used to live with their family.

  Lucas closed his eyes. He wanted to tell her to go away, but he’d always been told that if you wanted someone to leave you alone, ignoring was the most effective strategy.

  “So maybe,” she continued, “your Marvelous Mysteries project could be about me. About us. About how we used to be best friends. What do you think about that? Friendship? What makes people best friends? What makes them stop being best friends? Maybe it goes like this: I once had a best friend. We had the most fun together any friends can have. And then she was gone. How’s that for a start?”

  The bus lurched to a stop and Lucas opened his eyes. Only two stops left. He shouted, “Bye, Ruby!” and Ruby shouted back, “See you tomorrow.”

  “So nice,” Maxie Moon whispered.

  “Hey, Jordon,” Lucas called to his buddy who was two seats up. Jordon turned around and grinned. “You going to the Panthers game on Friday?”

  “I think so.”

  “Me too.” If he just kept talking to his friends, if he just kept talking and laughing with them, maybe she would finally get the idea. It seemed to work okay, except Jordon was getting off next along with Amir and Frankie. One by one, his friends exited the bus. Wilderness, where he lived, was the very last stop.

  Lucas turned back to the window, just in time to see a flash of red. He recognized the boy stumbling along the side of the road. It was Josh Duncan.

  “Right there.” Maxie Moon was whispering in his ear again. “The mailbox has fallen down and no one will pick it up. But you can see it, if you look close enough. And the road is there. Don’t you remember? Maybe that should be your project. The house is a mystery, don’t you think? You could go out there again. Just f
ollow the trail through the trees.”

  That’s when Lucas understood what she was saying, and where they were. It was the road into the woods that led to the house. The old Cascalenda house. Maxie Moon’s house.

  Over the years he’d done his best to ignore it. To push it out of his mind. To not see the fallen mailbox and overgrown drive. Now he jumped to his feet and lurched down the aisle.

  The bus driver glanced in his rearview mirror. “Stay seated until the bus comes to a complete stop, please.”

  Heart pounding, Lucas slid into an empty seat near the front. He wished he could make the bus go faster. What did she want? What did she want from him?

  Then he heard her in his ear again, like a buzzing that was there always but he could only tune in sometimes. “I’m here because of you. That’s why I’m here. Capiche?”

  Lucas knew one thing for certain. Maxie Moon was determined to get something from him. He had no idea what it was, but he did know this: Maxie didn’t stop until she got exactly what she wanted.

  BOXES

  With its wide sidewalks, smooth, winding streets, and manicured lawns, Bear Creek housing development was the opposite sort of creepy from the dark and untamed forest. But it was definitely creepy.

  Before the move, when they were still back in Chicago, Josh’s parents had pulled up the Bear Creek website and let him choose which color he’d like their new house to be. There were three options: beige, gray, or blue. Josh picked blue. From the photo, it had looked the cheeriest. In person, beige, gray, and blue were pretty much the same. Inside, the walls were a color called taupe. His parents had taken Josh to the hardware store and let him pick out a new color for his bedroom. He chose the exact shade of yellow that his old bedroom walls had been.

  Now, the blank taupe walls greeted him at the front door. “Mom?” he called. No answer. He found her on the floor in the living room, surrounded by cardboard boxes. She glanced up and smiled. “How’d it go today?”

  He could tell by the way she asked that she’d already been on the phone with Ms. Yoshida. “Good,” he said.

  “You had a buddy, right? Someone who showed you around?”

  “Yeah. She showed me the ropes.” His mom wanted more, he could see it in her eyes. “And I had pizza for lunch.”

  She nodded. “That’s great.”

  “Yeah.”

  He stood there, in the echo-chamber house, smelling paint fumes, not knowing what to say next. Finally his mother said, “I came up with a plan.”

  “A plan?”

  “For getting the house in order. I’m going to unpack the kitchen boxes. Then start on the living room. But before I do any of that, I need to clear some space.” She motioned to the towering stacks of boxes. “I guess you don’t know how much stuff you have until you need to move it all.”

  Josh knew he should bring up the Big Brother thing, but when he noticed that the rash on the back of her hand was even more red and bumpy, he decided to wait.

  She said, “I thought I’d move some of these to the garage for now. Will you help me with that?”

  “Sure.” Josh reached for a box while his mom sat back on her heels and pushed the hair out of her face. That’s when she seemed to notice him for real.

  “Why are you jerking your head?”

  Josh clamped his hand on his twitching neck. “I’m not.”

  She leaned forward. “Is everything really okay?”

  He stared at her rash. “Everything is great, Mom.” As he said it, he came up with a poster idea: “Never tell your mother something today that can wait until tomorrow.” He quickly picked up a box and hauled it out to the garage, accidentally kicking over one of the cans of leftover paint, the yellow he’d chosen for his room.

  “Mom!” he shouted. “I spilled the paint!” It ended up being a lucky accident because it sent her into panic mode, finding turpentine and old rags, then sopping and scraping and scrubbing the spilled paint. It meant the conversation was over. At least for the moment.

  After that they hauled box after box into the garage. Josh worked hard and fast so he wouldn’t have to talk. Every once in a while he remembered to say, “Whew!” or “So many boxes!”

  Still, he could feel his mother’s laser-beam eyes. When she went back into the house to call his dad, Josh said, “Whew!” for real and sat down on a box. Through the closed door he could hear some of what she said.

  He heard: Neck.

  And: Twitch.

  And: Worried.

  “Wow.” Big Brother stepped out from behind a pile of cardboard. “When did she get like that?”

  “She’s always this way about me now. Always looking for a sign. Ever since, you know. Ever since you.” Josh tried to hide how happy he was to see him.

  Big Brother nodded solemnly. “I feel personally responsible.”

  Josh laughed. No matter how dire the situation, Big Brother could always make him laugh. Then he stopped laughing and stared at his shoes. “I thought you might have gone away again. When I was walking home today and it was creepy by the woods and you didn’t come.”

  “But you made it home okay, didn’t you? You were brave.”

  Josh shrugged. He hadn’t felt brave. He said, “I almost told her about you.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  Josh didn’t know how to answer. He didn’t understand it himself. He thought about the girl with the shoes and sparkly shirt. How could he put words around something there weren’t really words for? And what if he did find the right words? Did that mean Big Brother would go away again? Forever this time? What would the world look like then?

  The phone conversation was still going on in the other room, and he could hear the high pitch of his mother’s voice.

  “Listen,” Big Brother said quickly. “You need to make some changes around here. That’s what the move was all about, right?”

  “We moved for Dad’s job.”

  “Right, but it’s also for you. To start over. To make friends. Don’t forget—I’m here to help you. Like a big brother is supposed to.”

  Josh pushed at boxes. “Then help me find the Lego,” he said.

  “I’m not here to play with Legos.”

  “First of all, they are just called Lego. Not Legos. Second of all, you don’t actually play with Lego. You create worlds.” Josh hated the way his voice sounded right then—like a cranky five-year-old—but he couldn’t stop. “What? You think you’re too old for Lego? You think I’m too old for Lego? Is that what this is about?”

  “No one is ever too old for Legos,” Big Brother said calmly. “But you are facing some monumental challenges with this move. And Dad’s not home to share his inspiring poster quotes—”

  Josh couldn’t help it. He laughed again.

  “And Mom does not have a clue about the social realities of a new school. So that leaves me, Big Brother. We’ll play with Legos after we find your bike.”

  “My bike? My bike?” Josh didn’t laugh this time. “You know I don’t ride my bike. Not since that last time. I don’t think we even brought it. Remember when those jerks chased me? Remember that dog?”

  “Find your bike,” he said. “Or else—”

  “Or else what?”

  “Joshua Duncan!”

  Josh spun around to see his mom in the doorway, arms folded over her chest and hair pulled back in a tight new ponytail. “Who are you talking to?” She narrowed her eyes into extreme laser-beam mode.

  “I think you’re supposed to say ‘whom.’”

  “Well, then. Whom are you talking to?”

  “That sounds weird, though, doesn’t it? Maybe, ‘to whom are you talking—’”

  “Josh.” She took a step closer.

  “I was just looking for . . . I was looking for my bike.”

  “But you were talking. I heard you.”

/>   (Don’t even talk to yourself!)

  “I wasn’t talking, Mom. I might have been singing. I don’t know. Honestly, I was just looking for my bike.”

  What followed was a monumental stare-down. “Do not look away,” Big Brother whispered in Josh’s ear. “Even though her eyes are so freaky right now.”

  His eyes started to water, but Josh stayed still and forced them not to blink. Finally his mom broke her stare. She muttered, “We need some fresh air in here,” and pushed the garage door button. As the door rumbled open, she said, “Those paint fumes are not good for your lungs.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She mumbled something more about the mess, how turpentine was toxic, and the rags were a fire hazard.

  “Mom, I said I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to kick over—”

  “You never ride your bike.” It came out like an accusation.

  “Yeah, but now I will. All the kids do. Isn’t that why we moved here? So I would ride my bike and stuff?”

  “What about a helmet? You are not riding a bike without a helmet.”

  “I have one somewhere.” Josh turned and faced the boxes, all labeled with thick black marker: LIVING ROOM, DINING ROOM, KITCHEN, FRAGILES, BABY. He froze, holding on to BABY.

  “What’s the matter?” Big Brother, in his ear.

  Josh’s head felt dizzy. He was still touching the box with the baby stuff. For a moment his hand tingled.

  “Oh yeah,” Big Brother whispered. “Sad. Now find your helmet.”

  Josh pushed the box aside and busied himself with the next stack until he found the one he was looking for: JOSH SPORT.

  Ripping it open, he dug past unused roller blades and shin guards and baseball gloves until he found it, at the very bottom. He yanked it out and set it on his head. “See?” he said.

  The helmet might have fit okay when Josh was six or seven, but now he had to pull hard at the straps to be able to pinch them together under his chin. He managed to move his mouth just enough to say, “So do you know where my bike is?”