We ride along the trail, Andre first, then me, then Uncle Jeff. When we catch up to the group on a scenic overlook, Zena ambles over to me. “Forget what I said, A.”
“Which time?” I ask.
“About him being weird. He’s not,” Zena says, admiring Andre from behind. “He’s totally cute.”
I know, I think. “Great. Glad you think so. But we’re just friends.”
“Really? So I could ask him out?”
“No, Z, because you’re twelve.”
“Shut up,” she says.
“You’re twelve, as in twelvery young.”
“And you’re sixteen, as in sixtremelyannoyingteen.”
“Well, so is he,” I tell her. “He’s going to be a senior, and no way are you asking out a high school senior.”
“I’ve done it before,” she says with a shrug. “It’s no big deal.”
“Where was this?” I ask.
“Wall Drug. Didn’t you see us with those guys?”
“No.” I lower my sunglasses and stare at her. “You almost picked up a guy at Wall Drug?”
She shrugs.
“That’s dangerous, okay? Don’t do that,” I say. “Really, Z. Don’t.”
“But it’s okay for you to make out with Andre,” she says.
“Make out? I’ve . . . I’ve never—”
“No, but you thought about it,” she says.
Of course, I have done it, and I’ve thought about it ever since. “You’re twelvexing. You know that?”
“Oh yeah? Well, you’re sixteeny-tiny.”
I laugh. “I’m what?”
“I’ll keep it realsimple from now on, so you won’t get confused. But if you guys do make out, tell me.” She nudges her burro with her heels and takes off to catch up with Bethany.
“Right. Like I would!” I call after her.
Actually, I wish I could tell somebody. But that’s not exactly the kind of thing you put on a postcard—and definitely not to your cat back home.
When Lenny and Mrs. O’Neill get back with the groceries, there’s a minor emergency—or actually, a big emergency about a small thing. Mrs. O’Neill thought Andre had Cuddles, while Andre thought she had Cuddles.
So nobody actually had Cuddles. And Cuddles probably thought . . . everyone had deserted him in the wilderness.
Everyone in the group splits up to look for him, even the ones who never wanted him along on the trip. We spend all afternoon calling his name, hunting for him.
When he hasn’t been found by nightfall, Andre is pacing by the campfire. I’m trying to keep him company, but Andre is so stressed that he can’t quite listen to me without getting upset.
Mrs. O’Neill is inside our tent, praying, with Mom and Grandma sitting by her side, consoling her in between random calls of “Cuddles! Come back, sweetheart!”
I tell Andre that his jeans are slipping down—he wears them low but these are too low, and his underwear is showing more than usual. I go over and try to playfully adjust them, and he bats my hand away.
“I’m dealing with a lot of stuff right now. My butt is the least of my problems.”
“Okay, but I just thought—”
“What? In the missing-dog posters, my underwear might be showing?” he asks. “This is another thing my mom’s going to hold against me. Just watch. I mean, someone stole him, obviously. And it’s my fault because I was thinking about you, or maybe that makes this your fault. Instead of listening to her tell me to watch him, and—you know what?” Andre turns to me and takes a swig from a bottle of water. “The fact that he’s missing. It’s a sign.”
“It is?” I ask.
“Yes. It’s a sign that we’re supposed to run off tonight too. We’re supposed to follow his lead.”
“Right,” I say.
“What?”
I don’t know what makes me say the next thing, probably stress, but it comes out meaner than I intend. “Andre, did you notice that you constantly talk about running away, but only Cuddles has the guts to do it?” It’s supposed to be a joke, but it’s one of those jokes that has too much truth in it.
Andre looks at me like he wishes there were two buses, one to put me on and one to put him on. Like he’d rather be anywhere else in the world.
“You know what? You were right,” he says. “What you said earlier today. I don’t want a girlfriend, and I don’t want to like you.”
“I don’t want to like you either,” I say. “You just happen to be here.”
“Oh, really? I just ‘happen’ to be here. Well, no kidding. This wasn’t my plan. And what, you’d rather be spending time with the infamous Dylan, who by the way left you for the entire summer, or haven’t you noticed?”
Tears sting my eyes just as Uncle Jeff’s voice pierces the darkness. “Found him!”
Everyone runs toward Uncle Jeff as he emerges from the woods, saying, “Got him! Call off the dogs! Sorry, didn’t mean that.” He nuzzles Cuddles’s chin with his finger. “You’re so little I could carry you in my postal satchel and nobody would be the wiser. Together we’d show those flying rodents a thing or two.”
He hands Cuddles to Mrs. O’Neill, who starts weeping with happiness. It’s embarrassing.
“I told you, Ma. I told you we’d find him,” says Andre.
“Wh-where was he?” she asks.
“Found him over at that campsite, dragging a Pop-Tarts wrapper around, trying to dig a hole,” Uncle Jeff says. “I thought it was a squirrel at first. So naturally I kept my distance.” His face turns sort of red. “Anyway. Just glad I could help.”
Mrs. O’Neill hugs Cuddles and offers him liver treats. “Who’s my favorite boy?” she keeps saying. Then she looks up at Andre. “I can’t believe you let this happen.”
“Ma! It wasn’t . . . he’s not . . . You know what? Forget it,” Andre says. “You should have bought Cuddles a seat on this trip—not me.” He stalks off down the small road that winds through the campground. He’s gone. I’m out of Skittles, and he’s gone.
Why did I have to say that to him? Like he wasn’t having a bad enough night already?
I feel horrible, so I decide to get ready for bed and try to forget this entire night. I grab my cosmetic bag from the tent and go over to the water pump to brush my teeth.
My mother comes over while I’m midrinse. I don’t know where she comes from, but it’s like an owl swooping out of a tree. “Ariel, we have to talk,” she says. “And I’d prefer that we get it over with tonight.”
I shake out my toothbrush and rinse my face with the cold water a few times, drying it on the bottom of my sweatshirt. “That sounds ominous.” What else can go wrong tonight?
“It’s not. But . . . look, Ariel. What I’ve been trying to say for the past few days . . . We are going to move,” she says. “For sure. I’m sorry. I didn’t know how to tell you. I’ve been trying and trying, but you don’t want to listen to me.”
“No,” I say, twisting my bag in my hands, then shoving it underneath one arm and preparing to walk off. “We can’t. I can’t.”
“We have to,” she says.
“You want to leave Dad, fine. You did that already,” I say.
“I want to leave that whole chapter of our lives behind,” she says. “I don’t want to see people pitying me, or us. I don’t want to bump into them at the grocery store.”
“So we’ll leave our neighborhood a little,” I suggest. “We’ll move a few miles away, find a new store.”
“I’m talking about leaving the state, Ariel. We need distance. My professional reputation is suffering. You can understand that.”
“But, Mom, I’m not going to leave Sarah and all of my friends. And I’ve worked so hard to be part of the team. I’ve got people who totally believe in me,” I say.
She shrugs. “You’ll stay in touch with Sarah. And as far as running, if you’re good there, you’ll be even better somewhere else.”
She doesn’t understand. She’s never understood. “What about Gran
dma and Grandpa Flack?”
“Yes, you’d miss them. So would I. But what about my parents? We’ve never lived close to them. We were going up there for two weeks, anyway, right? You’ll help pick out the neighborhood, the house. We’ll make sure it has everything you want. We’ll get a location with a good school, great running team—there are coaches who would die to have you on their team.”
“But I already have a coach,” I say. “And where we’re going . . . Dad won’t be there. At all.”
Mom shakes her head. “No. I can’t see that he will be.”
As uncomfortable as things are between us sometimes, do I really only want to see him on major holidays? “Are your parents behind all this?” I ask. I’ve loved spending this time with Grandma and Grandpa, but it’s starting to feel like a conspiracy.
“Who do you think has been helping us out? Do you think I just walked out into the backyard and found money growing on the trees? It’s my parents. I need them right now—you need them, too. I mean, sure, I have a career and we’ll build on that, but I can’t do it on my own,” Mom says.
“Well, I’m not moving,” I say.
“Yes. You are,” she replies. “We are.”
“Jujyfruit?” Uncle Jeff offers, shaking the box as he walks up to us at the pump, completely clueless to the fact that Mom and I have just had this major blowout.
“No!” I say. Then I change my mind and take the entire box out of his hand.
As I do, there’s a putt-putt sound getting closer and closer to our group site. Giant headlights turn into our parking area, and gradually I can make out that it’s the old red-and-white Leisure-Lee bus pulling up.
Everyone climbs out of their tents, in pajamas, wearing curlers, or missing dentures.
We all stand in suspense as the door opens with a long, slow hiss.
“Welcome aboard!” Lee says, tipping his cowboy hat to us.
Buffalo of South Dakota
The bison is the biggest land animal in the U.S. Buffalo roam free by the hundreds in Custer State Park. Warning: Do not approach. Appreciate from a distance.
Dylan,
We’re staying at Custer State Park, or as my uncle calls it, Custard State Park. Like it’s Culver’s and he’s going to order a turtle sundae.
There is lots of wildlife—no turtles though.
I stop writing. This is pathetic. I’ve sent him a dozen postcards and none of them has been any good or said anything important.
He doesn’t care, and the last thing he wrote that was interesting was probably my email address. He doesn’t spell my name right. Ever.
I could even forgive that, because it’s not a common name.
Only now that I’ve met Andre, I realize Dylan and I don’t really have much. He’s never asked about my dad. He’s mostly only talked about himself.
Still, I can’t bring myself to tell him that we’re moving. He’ll forget about me even more, and we’re not even gone yet, but by the time he gets home from camp we probably will be. That good-bye grope, on the green-and-yellow Packers beanbag chair, that was it for us.
Life never gives you enough advance warning. On anything.
Chapter Eighteen
The next morning, Lee insists on driving, and it’s frightening.
Not because he’s older and slower. It’s the opposite. He’s done the route so many times that he bombs down the road without using the brakes. He takes the curves too quickly. Lenny drops his microphone twice before he gets a chance to say anything. He’s flopping around the bus aisle like a passenger on a turbulent flight.
“This is known as the Pins and Needles Highway,” Lenny says.
“No, it isn’t. This is Iron Mountain Road,” Lee corrects him, glancing over his shoulder as he takes a tight turn.
“Yes. Ahem.” Lenny coughs. “Right, you’re right, Lee, of course. Well, maybe I misspoke because I’m on pins and needles here,” he says, “waiting for the exciting views of Mount Rushmore.”
“Lenny, be quiet and let them enjoy the scenery for a change,” Lee says.
Lenny falls into a seat and isn’t heard from again.
The views through little stone arches over the road are truly incredible. It actually is breathtaking, the way Lenny said it would be. It’s Mount Rushmore the way I’ve always seen it in photos, but in miniature. But to be fair, we are rushing it, or Lee is, anyway. I think the speed limit may have changed since the last time he drove this route. I expect him to send cars hurtling off the road in our wake.
There are oohs and aahs.
“This is just fantasterrific.” Uncle Jeff sighs beside me. I kind of want to agree, except I still hate that made-up word. I glance up ahead to see where Andre’s sitting, to see how many words he has for this view. He’s staring straight ahead and frowning, as if he has something else on his mind. There’s so much tension on the bus right now—between him and me, between him and his mom, and between me and my mom—that it could probably power the other bus’s busted engine all on its own.
We get closer and closer. Finally we drive up a long and winding hill, past lots of cars and traffic, which takes forever because we didn’t get an early start. And then we’re there. The parking lot at Mount Rushmore. The granite faces loom above us and can’t quite be believed.
“You have to experience it before you hit the gift shop,” Andre says as we walk up onto the memorial’s avenue of flags and I start to automatically peel off to the left when I see the gift shop.
We never made up, officially, after last night, but we’re talking again. I have no idea how things stand between us. I love the fact that my last bag of Skittles was sacrificed to the ground, because of what it made us do. But when I think about it and him, I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel now. Guilty? Happy? Like that was then, and this is now?
“No, I have to hit the gift shop and get postcards,” I tell him. “Then I can write them while I sit outside and look at the faces.”
He shakes his head. “Obsessed.”
“Yeah, well. It’ll only take me a second. You can wait out here and think of two more ways to insult me,” I say.
“Hurry. It won’t take me long,” he promises.
I walk into the giant shop, overwhelmed by the choices. There isn’t just one postcard rack; there are several. I don’t know where to begin, so I go clockwise. Except that it’s sort of an angular place.
I’m looking at the big cards first, comparing buffalo and state shapes and Rushmore trivia, when I hear someone say, “Ariel?”
That voice.
I nearly fall over.
It’s my dad.
“Ha! I knew I’d see you first. Got here early just in case.” He steps around the postcard rack and gives me a big hug. He’s wearing an old tee and his faded Levi’s and he looks thin and really relaxed, the way he always did on our road trips when he didn’t have to shave and wear a tie every day and all that work stuff.
But he doesn’t look exactly the same as the last time I saw him. He looks scruffier.
“So,” he says. “How’s things?”
How’s things? Is that all he’s going to say? What is he doing here? I shrug. “Okay, if you like bus tours.”
“And things of that nature?” he says, and I know I’m supposed to laugh like I usually do because he’s making fun of Uncle Jeff, but I can’t make myself.
I start to feel nervous. I want to know why he’s here, but I’m afraid to ask. “You want to go outside? You want to, um, explain why you’re here?”
“What’s to explain? We always wanted to see Rushmore, didn’t we?” Dad puts his arm around my shoulder as we leave the store. I feel myself pulling him to the edge, not of the cliff but of the avenue of flags, because I’m hoping to shield him from Mom, and vice versa.
“So here we are,” he says. “Is it like you pictured?”
“Not exactly,” I say. See, in my vision, we all came here together, in a car. And my parents weren’t divorced and my dad wasn’t a pseudo-cri
minal who got off for lack of state’s evidence.
“No?”
“No. It’s, um, bigger.” I look over at him. “How did you know we’d be here today? This morning?”
“I’ve actually been here since yesterday, trying to meet up with you guys. Where’s your sister?”
“Oh, she’s around, definitely. I wonder where,” I say, scanning the dozens of people milling around, admiring the sculpted presidents’ faces.
Andre somehow manages to find us in the crowd, and I’m thrilled, overjoyed, grateful to see him. “Funny. I don’t see anyone I can relate to up there,” he says, pointing up at Mount Rushmore. “Where’s Martin Luther King?”
“I think they carved this in the forties,” I point out.
“Figures. So, there’s not more mountain up there to carve? There’s room,” he says, looking back at the monument. “If they can make Crazy Horse, then they can make Dr. King.”
I smile at him, so glad he’s here to defuse this really weird situation, even if he does it by creating one of his own. “Dad, this is my friend Andre.”
“Hey, how’s it going? Andre, like Agassi?”
Andre looks at me and we both roll our eyes. “Yes, that’s it exactly, Dad.”
Andre walks closer to the monument itself, and we follow him.
“You’ve been hanging out with Ariel, then you must be cool.”
“Pretty much,” Andre says.
“So is there anyone up there you can relate to?” I ask. “And let me tell you. There aren’t any women up there, either, okay?”
“Maybe I can relate to Lincoln. But he was weird, right? He had psychological problems,” Andre comments.
“No wonder you relate to him,” I say.
“Oh! Oh! Prepare to be rushed at Rushmore.” He wraps his arms around my waist and lifts me up to carry me and toss me over the edge while my dad looks at us, seeming a little left out. It’s only going to get worse, I realize as Andre sets me down, because I see my mom headed in our direction.
“Richard,” she says to him. “What on earth are you doing here?” She doesn’t yell or curse, and I kind of admire her for that. I glance at her hand to see if she’s wearing her ring that was rescued from under the bus, and she isn’t, even after all that rescue effort. Which says something. And also makes her hand look smaller and kind of strangely naked.
The Summer of Everything Page 31