Emit

by Jack Beal

  I bet old-meat-belly sent Willy into the kitchen to fetch him a snack. Racing around the house, I stop at the kitchen window and let out a grunt. The blinds are drawn. There’s only one way to know if Willy’s in there.

  Crunching my hand into a ball, I lift my fist to the windowpane. I tap once softly and then twice a bit louder: W. I wait a few seconds before tapping twice softly: I. I continue until I’ve spelled out Willy.

  Nothing. I make my way back to the TV room window. I’m not sure what possesses me—it’s way too risky—but I do it, all the same. First I tap W. Then I, L, L and Y.

  The meatball sits up starkly. After glancing nervously toward Mrs. Sawyer, he creeps carefully to the window. My pulse is racing as he draws nearer. The only thing keeping our two noses from touching is a thin windowpane. I hold my breath, fearful of fogging up the glass. Willy narrows his eyes, peering into the night. The way he pivots his head this way and that makes me think of a snake tracking its prey. It sends chills down my spine. I hate snakes.

  Then I hear it. One soft tap and then two louder taps: W. Four soft taps: H. A short pause, and then three louder bangs: O. Who?

  When I’ve finished spelling out my name, the meatball’s mouth gapes open. He holds a finger to his lips as if to tell me not to make another sound.

  After the back door whooshes shut, the boy steps out into the light. He’s got to be twice, maybe three times my size.

  “Where’s Willy?” I cry.

  “Shhh! Or my mom will hear!”

  “What do you mean? Who are you and what did you do with my friend?”

  The meatball doesn’t answer. Instead, slapping a flabby hand over my mouth, he drags me to the edge of the yard with the other. He only lets go when we’ve made it to the sprawling oak Willy and I used to spend hours climbing. Up in the tree is a little house missing a couple panels. It looks battered by the wind and rain. Weird. I’ve never seen it before.

  “Up in the treehouse! Quick!” he says with a shove.

  Now I might be smaller than the other guy, but I’ve got one thing he doesn’t. In case you’re still wondering, it’s dirt-covered and has a handle in the shape of a capital T.

  I yank my shovel from where it’s been fastened on my back and swing it wildly in the air. “Not before you tell me where Willy is!”

  I guess I’m a lot more intimidating than I thought because the kid freezes in his tracks. And that’s not all. Despite the darkness, it’s plain to see the tears streaming down his chubby cheeks.

  Now I’m feeling my oats. “You go and you fetch Willy for me right now! Or you’re going to get it!”

  “But, but…” he stammers. “Can’t you see, Robbie? It’s me, Willy!”

  Does this oversized chunk of beef think I was born yesterday? “I’m not stupid!” I cry, approaching the big fat liar again, shovel raised.

  Wide-eyed, he lurches backward. The imposter untucks his button-down shirt and lifts it up as high as his ribs. With each uneasy breath, I watch the gelatinous glob of a belly shimmy and shake. “Is Willy inside of there?” I tremble, shovel still raised.

  “No, you dimwit! And stop poking fun at my stomach! The scar!”

  This time, I’m the one to stagger backward. Sure enough, the skin under his left ribcage is marked with a long, jagged scar. Willy’s scar. The one I gave him last summer.

  “Willy?”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you! Come on!” he says, clambering up the wooden planks nailed into the tree’s bark. I shadow Willy up the rickety ladder and in through the trap door.

  “But how…?”

  When he turns back to me, a fiery expression has taken hold of his face. I hug my knees into my chest like a shield. But in the end, his features soften, and Willy only shrugs.

  “What’s happened to you? What’s happened to everybody?”

  “What’s happened to us?” His voice rises a tone. “More like, what happened to you?”

  I look down at myself. Same collared shirt. Same pair of slacks. Same saddle shoes. “I haven’t changed at all! You’re the one that’s gone and…and…gotten all big and fat!”

  I guess I’ve offended him because his bottom lip trembles noticeably. “The doctor says I’m average for my age.”

  “The doctor needs to get his eyes checked! I’ve never seen a seven-year-old with a middle like yours before!”

  Willy cuts in. “I’m not seven anymore, Robbie. I turned thirteen last month.”

  “Oh yeah?” I counter, trying to outsmart him. “Then what class are you in?”

  “I’m in the seventh grade.”

  I glance down at my fingers, ready to do the math, but all I can see is how tiny they are compared to Willy’s. “But how did you grow up when…I…when I…” The end of the sentence won’t seem to come.

  Shamefaced, Willy looks away. “I don’t know, Robbie. Nobody knows what happened after…”

  “After what?” My voice is blaring.

  “After you…disappeared.”

  I want to holler that he’s lying. That I’m sick and tired of this stupid game. That it’s not funny anymore. But my tonsils are suddenly clogging my throat.

  “It was the day you got that dirty old shovel. That was the last time I saw you.” He swallows hard.

  My mind zaps back to the Fourth of July. I see myself lumbering back across the thin strip of asphalt separating our two houses, dragging the shovel behind me in the dirt. I’m teary-eyed because Willy wouldn’t let me play.

  “And then?”

  “And then what? You never showed up at the fair for the pie-eating contest. Or to school on Monday morning. I never saw you again. Nobody did, for that matter.”

  “Why didn’t anybody come looking for me?” I croak.

  “But they did! We all did! In the beginning, they sent out search parties and the whole town was out looking. But as time went by, the cops called off the searches. Said chances were too slim.”

  The question burning inside of me leaves the hairs on my arms all pricked up. They look like those hairy worms Willy and I used to catch and put into jars, hoping they’d turn into butterflies. They never had. “How long? How long have I been missing?”

  Willy picks at the scab on his knee and glances out of the clubhouse window. “Six years.”

  My gaze settles back onto Willy’s belly. “So…while I’ve stayed the same, everyone else is…six years older?”

  Something indescribable spreads over Willy’s face. Hesitantly, he nods.

  The pieces are uncomfortably falling into place. “Then it was your mom I saw yesterday, wasn’t it?”

  A long streak of red is leaking out of his knee. He licks the blood off his finger. “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “But if everyone knew I’d been missing, why did she go and take off like that? She looked at me like…she saw a ghost.”

  Willy gulps loudly. “In a way, she did.”

  “Then you all thought…” I can’t bring myself to finish.

  As our eyes lock, he doesn’t have to say the words. Everybody thought you were dead.

  But that’s not all. He’s hiding something else. I can see it in his gaze. “What is it?” My teeth chatter noisily.

  Willy’s eyes burn into mine, unblinking. When he finally speaks, his voice is spongy and yielding. “Your dad…”

  My mind races. Whatever’s happened to me has also happened to my dad!

  “They found your dad. He was still alive when they pulled him out of the ashes.”

  “What ashes?” I interrupt, hopping irately to my feet. “Whe
re is he now? Take me to him!”

  “I can’t,” Willy begins. But I’m not listening.

  “Take me to my dad now! Or else!” I threaten, sticking the shovel out sword-like in front of me.

  Willy’s shoulders hunch up. “Fine.” He ducks into the trap door and disappears down the ladder. “Are you coming or not?” he calls up.

  Willy slides a loose board from the bottom of the shed before putting it back in its place. Key in hand, he opens the shed and disappears inside.

  A minute later, the neighborhood houses are blurring together. White-knuckled, I clench onto the handlebars for dear life as Willy peddles into the night.

  Outside of the neighborhood, Willy picks up the pace. The wind is hitting my face so hard that my eyes close against their will. In the end, it’s the rich scent of dried clay that helps me get my bearings. The familiar scent envelops me like a cocoon. I smile. Once I find Dad, everything will be better. Dad knows how to fix everything.

  But my reverie is short-lived. I guess I wasn’t prepared for Willy to hit the brakes.

  “Robbie? Are you okay?” As my vision clears, Willy’s standing over me, hand outstretched. But I don’t reach for it. The bowing archway looms above our heads, with its pair of hand-holding angels dangling below the words “Corona Cemetery.” My body’s paralyzed. My mind’s not in much better shape.

  “You asked me to take you…”

  My brain defogs gradually. “Wait. What?” No!”

  “I’m sorry…”

  “No! You’re not sorry!” I scream. “My dad’s not dead!”

  Willy leaves me sobbing on the ground. He leans his bike up against the high arched wall and retreats cautiously into the graveyard.

  When my tears finally run dry, I push myself to my feet. I follow the lone ray of Willy’s flashlight until we’re standing side by side. He tilts the beam downward, allowing it to illuminate the moss-ridden stone. My dad’s name is written on it.

  Something invisible knocks the air out of me. I fall to my knees, whispering feebly, “It can’t be.”

  “I’m sorry, Robbie.” He puts his large hand on my small one. “I know it’s him. I watched them put him down there.”

  Rivers of tears and snot stream down my face. I don’t try wiping them away. “You were there?”

  Willy nods.

  “Tell me what happened.”

  He plops down beside me. “It all started a day or two after the fair. All these men in green suits came, asking lots of questions. I was young…” he looks at me reluctantly before continuing. “I didn’t understand what was happening. Mom told me to go to my room. So, of course, I hid behind the baluster to listen. I heard them saying they’d found your dad. And he was alive. He was hurt badly, but alive. The first thing he did was ask about you. You were supposed to…”

  His voice trails off. I finish Willy’s sentence. “I was supposed to be playing with you.”

  Willy moves his head slowly up and down. “My mom was supposed to keep an eye out for you when your dad wasn’t around. They had this agreement. But on the day you…disappeared…I’d told her we were going to go down to the farm and play soldier.” Voice quavering, he continues. “I thought you were going to get a P-38! How could I have known you’d only get a rotten old shovel?”

  I know I should tell Willy it’s not his fault. But something won’t let me.

  “Mom figured we’d be fine if she went out for a while.”

  “Where did she go?”

  “I don’t know!” He’s irritated. “To the market or the bakery. Does it matter? The main thing was that your dad said you were supposed to be with us. And then you went missing.”

  “What happened next?”

  “The police kept calling Mom in for questioning. Sometimes, they’d show up at the house. They asked the same questions, day in and day out, waiting for her to slip up. Mom got real jumpy. Her hair turned all white and stringy. The doctors said it was the stress. Not long after, she kept thinking she saw you. Chomping on an apple at the market. Slumped on the sofa in the sitting room. Skipping rope with the others in the school yard. The doctors said it was the guilt of having not been there to protect you. In the end, they gave her this treatment. They put these electrodes on her and shocked her until she said she didn’t see you anymore. She’s never been the same.”

  Willy’s biting his lip almost to the point of drawing blood. When he begins talking again, it’s marked with tiny dents. “I need to ask you something. Where did you go all this time?”

  I chew over his question for a long moment. How do you respond to something you don’t have the answer to? “I’m not sure,” I finally admit.

  “Well, how did you get here tonight? It’s not like you fell out of the sky!”

  “I’m here because they put me in an orphanage in Albuquerque, and I ran away.”

  “When?”

  “Today. Or, at least, I think so.”

  “Ok. That’s a start. Maybe it’s better to begin there and work backward. So today you ran away from the orphanage. And yesterday?”

  “Yesterday Officer Miller took me to his house because I had nowhere else to go.”

  “Alright. And the day before that?”

  “The day before…was when Dad and I were supposed to go to the Fourth of July Fair. The same day we were supposed to play soldier…”

  “Wait? Are you saying you only remember two days since the last time we saw each other?”

  I shake my head feverishly up and down. “That’s exactly what I’m saying. When I woke up the day before yesterday, everything was different. That’s why I had to come back. That’s why I had to find it again.”

  “Find what?”

  “The flying saucer,” I whisper.

  Willy’s eyes go wide. “That’s codswallop! There’s no such thing as a UFO!”

  “Is so!” I wage.

  “If you’re talking about the one they wrote about in the papers, you missed the update. That so-called UFO was nothing more than an old weather balloon.”

  “You’re lying!”

  “Am not!”

  “Are too! It’s not nonsense! And I’ll prove it to you!”

  “Oh yeah? How?” His tone remains unwavering, but I detect a flicker of wonder in his eye.

  “I’ll take you to where it crashed down.”

  “When?”

  “Right now.” My veins are pumping with adrenaline. “You know the Alder Ranch right off the 247. That’s where I found it!”

  “You know we can’t go now! It’s way too late. We won’t be able to see a single thing!”

  “Are you forgetting you have a flashlight?”

  “No, but that’ll draw too much attention to us. And you know as well as I do what’ll happen if Old Man Alder finds us snooping around in his fields.” Shaping his hand into a pistol, he shoots into the sky.

  I fold my arms into triangles and bock a few times like a chicken. “What? Are you afraid?”

  Willy swallows hard before diverting the question. “Aren’t you?”

  “Not as afraid as I am of getting put back in that orphanage!”

  He stares at me, pug-faced. “Fine,” he concedes. “I’ll go with you. But not now. It’s too dangerous. We’ll go first thing in the morning.”

  I don’t want to wait. I try to argue, but my pleas are wanting. Willy’s the one with the bike. And Willy says no.

  When we get back to the house, Mrs. Sawyer is still babbling away on the phone. The rollers are out of her hair, which now sits in gray and white ringlets. Deep marks
crease her face, and I can’t help but notice she looks a whole lot more than six years older.

  Once we’ve successfully snuck upstairs, Willy motions to the door beside his. “You don’t mind sleeping in the guest room, right?” Apparently, he got rid of the bunk beds years ago. But it’s ok. My back barely hits the mattress and I’m out like a light.

  The sound of the front door slamming shut rips me from my dreams. I peek through the blinds and wait for Mrs. Sawyer to get into her car and drive away. Then I streak to the wall separating Willy’s room from mine and start tapping. It takes a good, long while before Willy knocks back. Come in.

  Bolting from the guest room, I stop dead in my tracks. A man is lingering between the door jambs leading to Willy’s room. “Um…e-excuse me, s-sir,” I stutter. “I-I’m looking for W-Willy.”

  The mustache atop his lip rises like a little boat as the man utters an astonished, “Well I’ll be!” After dropping the book he’s got in his hand, he takes me by the shoulders and turns me around so many times I’m feeling as wobbly as a spinning top. Then he reaches out and touches my face, pressing my cheeks up and backward a bit, and inspecting my eyes.

  I muster up a bit of courage. “That’s rather enough, sir. If I could see Willy now… it’s important.”

  “But don’t you see, Robbie?” the man cries out. “It’s me!”

  “Good one,” I say, spinning around and looking for Willy.

  “But I am Willy” he insists.

  I tug at his shirt, ripping it up over his ribs without asking. But there’s no scar. Just locks and locks of auburn curls.

  “Oh yeah? Then prove it.”

  The man raises his index and scratches his chin. “Hmm. Let me see. Didn’t you once get a metal shovel for your birthday?”

  “Yeah, but everyone in Corona knows that! It’s my own fault for going around belly-aching about it all day.”

  “Ok,” he begins, taking the hallway down the stairs and into the kitchen. Naturally, I tail behind. “How about that time you came to play soldier, and I told you to leave unless you wanted to dig the graves?”