01000111 01110010 01100001 01110110 01100101 01101100 01111001 00100000 01101001 01101100 01101100
Gravely ill.
01010011 01110111 01101001 01100110 01110100 01101110 01100101 01110011 01110011 00100000 01101101 01101111 01110011 01110100 00100000 01101001 01101101 01110000 01100101 01110010 01100001 01110100 01101001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101011 01100101 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01101000 01101111 01101101 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101100 01101001 01110110 01100101 00101110 00001010
Swiftness most imperative to make it home alive.
Dibs and I read it and then suck air and stare wide-eyed at each other across Mr. Lord.
“Mr. Lord,” I say. “We really and truly need your help. Please.”
He looks up from his paper.
I watch the edges of his mouth curl up again, showing that same coffee-toothed smile.
Then he nods just once, like he really means it.
July 9, 1947—6:15 p.m.
They arrive in the middle of a massive red dust devil right after suppertime.
Three large Army Air Force trucks with big white stars painted on the doors barreling down the road.
But we’re ready for them.
We first see them coming in the distance, kicking up loose dirt and gravel, while we eat Chocolate Swirl ice cream from big bowls out on the front porch.
Momma and Daddy with Baby Kay on the porch swing, and Dibs and me on the front steps.
“Here they come,” I say, looking over my shoulder at Daddy.
Baby Kay is too busy focusing on the tiny bites Momma is spooning out for her to notice. “Mo,” she demands. “Mo ocklit swull!”
Daddy gives a nod to Dibs and me to let us know it’s all going to be okay. And I know it will be. Because he says so. Even if he says so with his eyes and not his words.
They’ve already been to Dibs’s house.
The trucks and the men in their uniforms.
Some in fatigues and others in their tan button-downs with the tie tucked tight inside their shirt just under the third button. Dibs says there was only one wearing a dark olive jacket with stars on the epaulets. Dibs can’t remember how many stars, but he did say the officer was bald as a cue ball.
Just like Lex Luthor.
They searched the house top to bottom, finding every single piece Dibs had collected out there. And they left with a warning.
He’d better not go and spout off about what he’d seen out in the desert to anyone or there’d be consequences to pay.
Big round tires turn up our dirt drive, kicking up even more dust.
Roaring engines whirl and sputter.
Daddy stands tall and strong, filled with his courage, his jaw rigid and his eyes locked on the parade of military vehicles making their way up our drive.
It reminds me of Obie.
Same jaw.
Same stance.
Same courage.
“All right, everyone,” Daddy tells us. “Let’s head inside.”
* * *
Angry boots pound the dirt outside, then up each step of the porch.
Boom…Boom…Boom…
Low voices grumble.
Clark Kent is whining, his nails scraping the porch as he paces it, staying true to his duty. Even he is filled with his very own doggy courage.
An angry fist slams hard against the screen door.
Bang…Bang…Bang…
“Army Air Force.” A deep voice cuts through the steamy kitchen. “Official business.”
Bang…Bang…Bang…
There was never a reason to be scared of the Army Air Force before. They fight the bad guys. They preserve life and freedom. They protect us and keep us safe from the evil in the world. Daddy was even one of them, and same with Mr. Lord. Mr. Lord had two stars, and stars are a real big deal in the military.
They’re the good guys.
Dibs and I sit like statues at the kitchen table and Momma takes Baby Kay into the back while Daddy lets the soldiers in.
One man in an olive jacket with three stars on his shoulders steps forward, removes his hat, and tucks it under his arm.
Bald as a cue ball.
Dibs wide-eyes me and mouths two words. “Lex Luthor.”
“I’m Lieutenant General Nesbit Jones,” the man tells Daddy. “Lieutenant Colonel Affinito, I presume?”
“That’s right,” Daddy says. “Can I help you with something, sir?”
“We are here to talk to you about the activity that has taken place out in a field past the Foster Ranch.”
“I guess you haven’t seen the papers,” Daddy says. “Looks like that was nothing but a weather balloon, fellas. Sorry you made the trip out for nothing.”
The man turns to look at me and then at Dibs and then back at Daddy.
“You been out that way?” he asks.
“No, sir.” Daddy stands tall with his arms crossed.
There’s a minute of silence while the three-star general decides whether to believe Daddy.
“Anyone else in this household been out that way that you know of?” He side-eyes us again.
Dibs croaks a swallow.
“No, sir,” Daddy tells the man.
There’s another moment of silence while the man considers Daddy’s answer.
“I understand you have two children. Is that right?”
“Three,” Daddy corrects him.
The man pulls a small tablet from his pocket and flips to the page he’s looking for “Right.” He nods. “I need to speak to…” He squints down at the page. “Obie…Obie Affinito,” he says, looking back up at Daddy.
Daddy doesn’t say anything for a bunch of Mississippis, and with each one, my heart beats even faster.
“Our son Obie passed last year.”
The man nods again, pulls out a pen from the same pocket where he got the tablet, and makes a mark across the name written on the page with one quick, heavy motion.
Daddy’s eyes meet mine.
My cheeks burn.
My teeth clench.
My eyes narrow.
The mad comes quick this time, first down in my belly and then all the way up to my brain. It’s strong and fierce and makes me clutch my fingers into fists and think of the kinds of words that Momma wouldn’t like one bit.
Dibs must have his own storm brewing inside him, because he stands up then, shoving the kitchen chair back and letting it scrape against the floorboards. “You don’t need to cross him out of your pad like that!” he shouts. “Like he doesn’t matter. He may not matter to you, but he matters to us.”
The man stares wide-eyed at him. “Didn’t we talk to you out at the Butte place?”
Dibs puffs up his bony chest in the lieutenant general’s direction. “That’s right,” he says.
“I think you’re in enough trouble, son. Best to keep your mouth closed.”
Daddy puts a hand on Dibs’s shoulder. “Dibs, why don’t you go in with Mrs. Affinito and the baby.”
Dibs nods and gives Lex Luthor one more good glare, and then he makes his way out of the kitchen. “It’s down-and-out rude is what it is,” he keeps muttering as he heads to the back.
The man looks down at his tablet again, and then at me. “Are you…Mylo?” he asks. “Mylo Eugene Affinito?”
I don’t say anything.
“Mind if I talk to the boy?” he asks Daddy.
“I’ve already told you,” Daddy says. “No one’s been out that way.”
“I imagine you’ve already heard we collected pieces out at the Butte farm,” the lieutenant general says.
“So?”
The man smiles. “Do you mind?” He motions to the table.
Daddy nods.
The man sits.
“Lieutenant General Jones, sir,” one of the soldiers says. “Would you like us to search the property outside?”
Lex Luthor nods and places his hat on the table without ever once taking his eyes off me.
I watch the men through the kitchen window as they scatter across the ranch, and that’s when I see something out of the corner of my eye.
Moon Shadow’s fine-threaded tan flight suit.
After Momma washed the Chocolate Swirl stains from it, she hung it out to dry on the line right between Dad’s Fruit of the Looms and her cotton dresses.
We forgot the clothesline.
Lex Luthor reaches inside his front jacket pocket and tosses a crumpled-up tinfoil Martian mind-control-prevention skullcap across the table in my direction.
I stare down at it.
“Want to tell me something?” His words float above him in a bubble like any other supervillain in any Superman comic book.
I fill my lungs all the way to the top and bring my eyes up to meet his. “About what?” I ask him.
He smiles again. A straight-lipped smile without any teeth to it.
Sweat beads pop out on my chin.
The rooster clock ticks over the sink.
The fan blows on high.
And a single drip of sweat slides down the side of my temple.
But I won’t blink.
The longer he stares, the more sweat beads pop out. They’re everywhere now as he stares me down. Waiting for me to break.
My heart is pounding.
Inside I’m hoping with all that’s in me that the men don’t notice the flight suit of the Moontian from Europa that we are harboring in a very special hiding spot.
“Don’t sit there presuming I’m stupid, boy!” the lieutenant general shouts, scaring Baby Kay in the back bedroom.
She howls good and loud, just like with the lightning. Probably thinking in her tiny brain that if she howls the loudest he might just go away.
She howls again.
He leans in close. “I’m a lot smarter than you think I am.”
I don’t say a word.
“I know you were out there.”
I don’t blink.
“You want to know how I know?”
I won’t give him the satisfaction.
“Your friend Mordecai Lord,” he tells me.
I blink and look over at Daddy.
He’s pacing now, back and forth in front of the stove, his arms still crossed.
Chin on his chest.
His jaw rigid.
Eyes locked.
I shake my head at the lieutenant general. “No, he didn’t,” I tell him. “He wouldn’t say any such thing.”
“My boy just delivers bread to Mordecai Lord’s place once a week,” Daddy says.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to hear it from the boy,” Lex Luthor barks at him over his shoulder, never once taking his eyes off me.
Another sweat bead drips down the side of my temple.
The long hand on the clock hits the twelve, and a mini rooster pops out of a small wooden door and crows seven times. When it’s done, it goes back to ticking.
Tick…Tick…Tick…
“Answer me!” the booming voice shouts.
I jump.
Baby Kay howls her loudest howl yet.
“I—I—” I start. “I forgot the question.”
He shoves the kitchen chair back with his tree-trunk legs and it crashes to the floor.
I don’t know what Momma would charge in the swear jar for something like that but I bet it’s a whole lot more than a nickel. No one has ever done anything like that to Momma’s house before.
“Let’s go. Right now!” he shouts, his palms flat on the table and the tip of his nose close to mine.
So close that a speck of angry spit lands right on me.
Baby Kay howls again from the back bedroom.
He leans even closer. “You better start talking,” he demands with a cloud of coffee breath.
“I told you, he wasn’t out there,” Daddy answers for me again, louder this time. “He doesn’t know what you’re talking about. I won’t stand here and have you bully him into saying something he doesn’t know anything about.”
“Tell him he was here with us and that’s the end of it!” Momma hollers from the back bedroom.
Lex Luthor doesn’t move. “I am not going to tell you again,” he says sternly. “I’m going to need to hear it from the boy.”
I croak a swallow and look him straight in the eye. “I don’t know nothing about anything, sir,” I tell him. “Mordecai Lord is a crazy old man. All I do is bring him bread once a week. Bread Momma makes him so he doesn’t starve in that old rickety house of his.”
“Tell him about the bats!” Dibs calls.
The man’s eyes narrow into buttonhole slits. “So that’s it. You’re telling me you weren’t out there?”
“All I know is what’s in the papers.” I look back at Daddy and he nods. “Just another weather balloon.” The edges of my mouth curl up. “Right?”
“Let’s lay our cards on the table, shall we?” Lieutenant General Jones whispers. “You have something I want. No one else may know you have it, but I do.”
Moon Shadow.
He can’t know.
It’s impossible.
The others wouldn’t have said anything—we made a promise on a spit shake. No one goes back on a spit shake. It just isn’t done.
Mr. Lord wouldn’t tell them about her.
It wasn’t on a spit shake, but he meant it just the same. I know he did.
I cross my arms and lean tall and straight against the back of my chair and stare hard at Lieutenant General Jones. There’s nothing he can say to make me blink. Nothing. He can yell all he wants, but he’s getting nothing from me. I won’t break, and he can’t make me. When Dibs and I play the staring game, I always win. Dibs can’t keep a straight face for more than three Mississippis. Four, tops.
I’m the reigning champ.
And he can’t change that. Just like he can’t change what’s true, no matter what the papers say.
Do your worst, I want to say to him. I’m not afraid of you.
A soldier stomps up the front steps and pushes the screen door open enough to slip his head inside. “Sir,” he calls. “You might want to take a look at this.”
The corners of Lex Luthor’s mouth begin to curl until it’s a full-fledged smile. But not a bright smile like Daddy’s smile is, or even Mr. Lord’s. This smile is a smile that doesn’t like to lose.
And will do anything to win.
Lex Luthor puts his hat on his head and follows the soldier out the door.
“Good job, Mylo,” Daddy tells me, striding to the window and motioning for me to join him.
He places a heavy arm across my shoulders.
It feels warm and strong. Like Daddy’s finally coming back to us. The way he used to be.
It makes things feel true.
Safe.
And right again.
Together we stand and watch the soldiers huddling in a circle, examining something.
“We forgot the flight suit,” I tell him, pointing to the laundry on the line.
“That’s not it.” Daddy squints. “They’ve got something else.”
“It’s a piece from the crash site,” Dibs says, running up from behind us. “I planted it as a decoy, you know, just in case.” He smiles with his big beaver teeth at us.
“Good job, son,” Daddy says, and lays his other arm across Dibs’s shoulders. “This is a hard thing…and, well, you boys handled it just fine. I’m proud of you both.”
Although he tries to hide it, I see Dibs’s eyes water for just a second before he wipes at t
hem with the back of his arm. It makes me think he probably doesn’t hear words like that much from anyone.
July 9, 1947—7:45 p.m.
The sun is setting behind arroyos as the sky grows dark. A nighttime stage for the stars as they pop out in the sky, one by one. No monsoon blows in from the west tonight, just a welcome cool breeze that gives you a shiver and makes chicken skin pop out on your arms.
I lie still underneath it all, my head in my hands against your stone, wondering which star is yours.
More faraway stars then pop as the sky grows darker by the minute.
Must be a million of them now.
A million and one.
A million and two.
The whole thing makes me feel very small. And it seems as though the more answers I get, the more questions I have. I have more now than could ever be confined to one notebook.
The biggest question…
Who am I, and why am I here?
Looking above me at all that I still have yet to learn makes me think there is a real important answer to that question.
Maybe it’s an answer that Moon Shadow can’t give me. Or Momma or Daddy, either. Maybe it’s an answer I have to figure out all by myself.
Moon Shadow is perched on top of Mrs. Vandebrink’s stone, gassing up on the Moon’s rays in her new overalls and undershirt. And truth be told, she’s even wearing a pair of my Fruit of the Looms under there. Momma says there’s never an excuse for not having clean underwear on. I guess Momma-logic applies to Moontians, too. Momma even taught her how to scrub space germs off her four-fingered hands with the bar of Ivory. She showed her how to suds up in the crevices between the suction cups. And since Gracie’s lessons yesterday, Moon Shadow not only knows how to scrub to Z, she’s saying more words all the time.
The stars wink at me from above, sparkling and blinking in the darkening sky. I feel so small under all that space tonight. So many glowing stars mixed in the vastness. I think of all the distant places and worlds I will never ever see.
And somewhere up there…is you.
My brother.
Where are you up in all that mess, Obie? I ask. So much has happened. So much I need to tell you about.
I knew this was the place.
Here she would be safe. Between Mrs. Vandebrink and Mr. Beckman. Watched over by Gracie’s great-great-grandmother Valentina Delgado, a spirit to be reckoned with, and Magnus McDougal and Juan Santiago.
The Truth About Martians Page 18