by Leah Thomas
“You know, the more you talk, the more I don’t like you,” I tell him, but it’s not true. I don’t know why Officer Newton’s helping us. I’m just glad he is.
Phil’s basement smells faintly of boy feet, and friendly as John seems, it looks like he needs a shower. Still, I’ll take this dingy space over Gus’s house any day, and not just ’cause of the costume totes.
“Here’s an idea.” If Phil’s self-conscious about the glittering golden stars on his robes, you’d never know. “Let’s cosplay instead. Shave your head. Embrace Natalie Portman, Kalyn. Commit to the bit.”
I flip him the bird. “Got the faces, Sarah?”
She passes me a stack of paper and a giant bottle of Elmer’s. The printouts are still warm; they’ve got that weird watermelon-y wet-ink smell. Sarah sprinted to the copy room while we sneaked out of the library and met us in the parking lot within four minutes.
I stare at Dad’s blown-up mug shot. “Honestly. He just looks young, doesn’t he?”
“He could be anyone.” I’m not sure when Gus got up, or how long I spent staring at that black-and-white face. “You okay?”
“Yeah. You, Wondergus?”
“It’s just . . . I can’t believe Mom didn’t come after me today.”
I called my mom once we got here, left a message explaining our whole plan. But Gus didn’t call anyone. “Did you want her to?”
“No. I mean. What’ll she say if she sees me doing this?”
I squeeze his shoulder. “Truth is, Gus, it doesn’t really matter what she says.”
Who knows if that’s true. I’ve gone and said it anyhow.
Phil claps his hands. “John? Can you kit us out with headgear also?”
John digs through the totes again. He tosses two knights’ visors, an army helmet, and a football helmet onto the couch. “Those are your options. Also, as an older sibling, I feel obligated to disapprove of all this.”
Phil’s stick arms are long enough to scoop up all four helmets. “But you don’t?”
“I’ve got a soft spot for role-playing.” He shrugs. “And it’s good to see you doing something for someone else.”
“See.” I shove a football helmet over my head. “You’re dressing me after all.”
Gus smiles grimly and slaps my dad’s glue-smothered face over my visor. The world goes dark, until Gus pokes Dad’s eyes out. I’m not sure if Gus can tell through pencil holes, but I’m meeting his big, wiry eyes.
There just ain’t much town to Samsboro. The parade route starts in the loading area behind Glen’s grocery store, then winds around the front and turns right down Main Street. All told, it’ll cover less than fifteen blocks.
All this morning’s sunshine wore out the daylight’s batteries. Sarah has Phil pull into the employee lot. He just manages not to run down any Rotary Club ladies. Sarah yanks off her robes and mask to go check things out. “People expect me to make an appearance, as a class rep. They won’t think twice about me asking questions.”
People swarm the back lot. The streetlights reveal bodies every so often, kids moving between papier-mâché monstrosities. The marching band waits in messy rows, warming up their instruments, while homecoming queen nominees are being propped up on old convertibles. They look pretty, in pastel colors and too-tight updos.
My hair’s tucked away in an angry bird’s nest, but strands keep slipping out of the helmet. I’d rip the damn thing off, except it took the combined efforts of Gus, Phil, and Sarah to hide it all away to begin with.
I sit in the back of the Death Van, trying not to sweat. Farther down the procession I spy the churning rabble of the football team, all rarin’ to jog down a street before they’ve gotta jog around a field. I wonder if Eli is with them. Or did I really hurt him?
Teachers patrol the rows, looking high-strung—they are teachers—but excited. The whole scene’s as Hicksville as you’d expect, and there’s no hint that half these kids spat at me earlier today. I don’t see any Spences Behind Fences signs.
We’ve got a sign, a message sprayed onto a bedsheet. John used some kind of special model primer to do it. He took the time to tell us it cost him eighteen bucks a can. “But it’s made to prep Warhammer figures. Seems appropriate.”
“It would seem no one expects you to make an appearance,” Phil observes.
“Yeah.” Gus landed a knight’s helmet. He can lift his visor, but his face is lost in shadow. I hope he doesn’t regret this yet.
There’s a knock on the side of the van. Sarah looks twice back the way she came and slides the door shut behind her.
“The class floats will enter the procession right after the fire department and marching band. After the floats comes the football team and then the VFW reps. And finally, after all that comes the homecoming court on their convertibles, led by the underclassmen honor guard winners on a hayride pulled by a Munch-O Mills tractor.”
“I don’t get a convertible? Guess I’m less likely to get assassinated.”
“That’s not funny,” Gus says.
“I know. I got enough death threats today.”
“Did you really?” Phil, interest obviously piqued.
He’s asked about my day a dozen times, but I’m not dyin’ to relive it. Even if you’re raised on a diet of persecution, it takes time to digest. Maybe one day I’ll tell my friends about how I went into the bathroom for just one second without Officer Newton, and a girl I’ve never even seen called me a whore—as if that had anything to do with anything—and I retaliated by blowing her a kiss, and she retaliated by wrapping her skinny hand around what hair I had left and yanking it—
Sarah looks concerned. I can’t tell what Gus looks, because he’s got his visor pulled down. All I see when I look at him is Dad’s decoupaged, warped face.
“I think it’d be better if we don’t climb onto the hayride until the last second before it starts moving,” Sarah says. “Otherwise, there’s a good chance a teacher will see us and pull us off. Maybe they’ll pull us off anyway, once the other honor guards see us.”
“But I won the vote. Where’s the justice?”
Sarah’s lips twist. “Do you even think it exists?”
“Nah. Spy any dummies out there?”
Sarah opens her mouth and closes it again. “No. No dummies.”
Gus groans.
“How ominous,” Phil says.
I don’t flinch. “Spill it, Sarah.”
“Well . . . okay. It’s not everyone. But I noticed kids in the marching band and on the football team are wearing blue buttons on their shirts. I asked around, and Kaleb told me they’re supposed to represent solidarity with the Ellis family and the police department.”
Officer Newton, lounging in the passenger seat, speaks up at last. “What the hell does any of this have to do with the police department?”
“Gus, the buttons have your dad’s picture on them.”
Gus is a statue, head and shoulder cocked.
I cackle. “It’ll be a genuine face-off.”
Sarah nods. “I spoke to Kara—she’s on the junior honor guard. She won’t do anything if we show up. Neither will her boyfriend, Rob—he’s the other rep. I can’t speak for the sophomores. But one of them, Alex Rucinski? His dad’s a cop.”
Gus speaks right through the paper. “So why do we have to fly, I mean, go on the hayride? We can join the parade somewhere else.”
“Where’s a Trojan horse when you need one?” is Phil’s useless contribution.
“Do we need a float?” Gus asks. “If the parade is slow enough that veterans can walk, we can, too.”
The next pause is awkward as all get-out. Officer Newton doesn’t seem to mind; he keeps flipping through a Pathfinder manual.
“I considered that,” Sarah says, not looking at Gus, “but . . . I mean . . .”
“I can walk two miles. Don’t look at me—don’t not look at me like that.”
“We know you can walk it,” I tell Gus. “But . . . hell. There’s
no nice way to say this. Your gait is gonna be a big giveaway, Gus, even under robes like this.”
“So? People will figure out it’s me.” Gus lifts his visor. “Maybe I want them to.”
Freakin’ Gus. “Wait, hold up—these masks were your idea!”
“They’re not masks.”
“Um, I think wearing a guy’s mug shot on your head counts as a mask. I mean, it’s not pantyhose or a Guy Fawkes head, but we could rob a bank like this—”
“Ah, but Gus never called them masks. He called them costumes.” Phil holds up a finger. “Costumes are a form of disguise. Disguise plays a huge role in Shakespearean drama, and serves a variety of functions. In most masquerades, disguises are more a form of self-expression. Gus sees these robes as a statement. Not a deception. Yes?”
Gus nods. “This is a protest. I’m not hiding.”
“So you were arranging a funeral procession.” It’s inappropriate as hell, how giddy Phil’s getting. “Fantastic! Fine entertainment!”
I’m not sold. “Look, Gus. No. No. This isn’t gonna play out like that.”
“Yes, it is.”
“What do you think’ll happen when people figure you out? They’ll realize that you’re wearing the face of your dad’s murderer—”
“Supposed,” they all say at once, and I can’t believe how it swells my heart up.
“Okay. Your dad’s supposed murderer. They’ll believe the crap that Garth and the news have been shilling about you and me, and decide I’ve voodooed you into a sinful heinous psycho love romance—”
“Yeah! Because you have!”
Imagine the quiet that follows that.
“I mean.” Gus isn’t dodging this one. Bet my face is redder than his. “It’s not heinous and it’s not psycho and it’s not romance, but I do love you, Kalyn.”
“Isn’t that nice,” Officer Newton says. Guess we all needed his sarcasm, because Sarah giggles and Phil snorts.
“Fine, Gus. Love you, too, you weirdo. And that’s why you are not getting shat on for my sake. I was okay with you guys doing the anonymous thing, tricking the rubes and whatnot, but I’m so not okay with you going down for my crimes.”
“What crimes?” Sarah asks. “Maybe your dad’s guilt is still debatable, but Kalyn, you didn’t do anything.”
“Aw, god. You guys know what I mean!”
“I’m sick of tricks!” Gus shouts. “I’m sick of pretending not to care, and people pretending to be what they aren’t! I’m sick of fences! And you know what else, Kalyn? I’m sick of lying because my parents lied and your parents lied, and people in this town don’t think past what they see. I won’t lie this time. If we want to give Samsboro the middle finger, we have to do it. It has to be our damn finger!”
I close my mouth. “Loud and clear, Gus.”
He pauses. “It was, wasn’t it? No branches.”
“Nope. So why the creepy decoupage Dads, then?”
“Dramatic flair, obviously,” Phil says.
“Gary Spence’s face will get attention. And if people realize it’s me, the poor, crippled son of the dead guy, maybe a few will think twice before throwing eggs.”
“It’ll confuse them, at least,” Officer Newton adds. “I know it’s confusin’ me.”
“Gus, you aren’t a poor, crippled son. Your family makes a respectable income.”
“Shut up, Phil,” Gus snaps.
“I’m a bad influence.” I laugh. “I don’t totally get it, but okay. I trust you, Gus.”
“Thanks, Kay.”
“I can limp, too, if you want.” I grin like the devil.
“I can say ‘shut up’ to you, too,” Gus says, but he doesn’t.
Dad’s worked a bunch of different jobs over the years. New inmates get stuck in the laundry, but maybe that’s better than cleaning toilets. “I don’t know,” Dad argues. “Toilets aren’t so personal as a guy’s boxers, when you get down to the nitty-gritty.”
No matter what job he got assigned, he said it could be worse, even after he worked in pots and pans for so long that his skin started to slough off. I figured that was his classic optimism, until Dad finally explained himself.
Off the coast of New York City, there’s a place called Hart Island. It’s what people used to call a potter’s field. This island’s where New York City buries all its unclaimed bodies. They’ve done it for more than a hundred years, and no one lives there, and they only allow visitors to take a ferry there once a month. Most graves on Hart Island don’t have markers. There are hundreds of thousands of bodies there. Dead babies, homeless people, AIDS victims, and the used-up remains of medical school cadavers.
The people who stack and bury those bodies are inmates from a nearby prison.
“That doesn’t sound so bad,” I argued, trying to be tough. “You’d get to work outside, and you’d be helping people, kind of.”
“Oh, I’m sure it’s not so bad—at first. But that kind of work would get in your head. It’d make you think about the meat of who you are and how little that meat matters. Bodies are heavier than what they weigh, Kalyn-Rose.”
I thought Dad knew what he was talking about, having moved a body himself. And it did make for some heavy thinking. What’s more awful? Being a nameless baby in a pinewood box, or being the guy paid pennies to stack nameless babies five deep in unmarked graves? How would it feel to know how little space baby coffins take up?
Until the morning of this homecoming parade, when I woke up really thinking Dad might be innocent, I’d never considered a third perspective:
How awful would it be movin’ dead babies if you’d never moved a body before?
Here and now, the Jefferson High marching band starts playing the fight song and peels away down the road; I hear cheers of a crowd through the walls of the Death Van.
Here and now, we watch the procession move, watch floats and pretty people on convertibles fall into line as we climb through the sliding door. Here and now, we pull masks over our faces and hoods over our heads. Sarah takes my hand and I take Gus’s hand and Phil steps in behind us. Officer Newton plays caboose.
Here and now, all eyes are on the parade, and as Sarah pulls us through dawdlers in this emptying lot, we pick up our pace and suddenly, here and now, we’re disrupting the flow of parade traffic, slipping into place just yards behind the football team.
Here and now, we yank our hoods down and unfurl our slapdash banner:
We Are People Beyond Fences, We Are People Beyond Spences
It’s cryptic as hell, but I hope someone thinks it over. I hope they see us wearing mug shots and get that there are people underneath. Our lives aren’t decided by shit people did before we were even around to do shit.
As we round the first corner and escape the shadow of the football team, maybe I shouldn’t be worrying about folks stuck burying nameless babies on an island far away.
We go slowly. Not too slowly to keep up, but slowly enough to be noticed no matter how we walk. The faces lining the road quit smiling. Despite the cheering up ahead, a little patch o’ quiet encases us.
At first people are confused, but soon they’re shouting. We don’t stop. It’s chilly now that night’s arriving, but Sarah’s hand is warm and so is Gus’s, for a change.
But you know what?
Wearing Dad’s face isn’t helping. If he couldn’t stand up for himself, why are we standing up for him? I’m not sure what I’m protesting more, this town or his lies, because he couldn’t do this first.
“Gus,” I whisper, “I’m gonna take off this mask.”
Gus is one step ahead. His visor is up, and you can see the person beyond that Spence. His face is flushed and he’s limping. Before I know it I’m yanking off my helmet and letting my hacked hair unravel. People are booing, but I tuck Dad’s face under one arm and show my face instead.
Here and now, I know why I’m thinking of Hart Island.
Gus and me?
We’ve been forced to move bodies for years, but we’v
e never killed a damn one of them.
GUS
ONE OF PHIL’S Shakespeare quotes really appeals to me.
“We know what we are, but know not what we may be.”
I used to have it sticky-tacked to the inside of my locker.
Between that, my favorite snaps from Fruits—the iconic Harajuku J-fashion magazine—a sketch of Edward Elric, a photo of Francesca Martinez, a family picture of our trip to Wisconsin, and the first character sheets Phil and I ever worked on, I had a collage of the things I loved in that tiny metal cupboard. I used to leave my locker open on purpose just in case someone happened to walk by and see me.
It never happened.
There’re always more truths than one. Knowing who I am, or thinking I might know? That’s only half a truth. Because my identity will always be halfway informed by the world. It has to be informed by something. Usually we define ourselves by loving things, Doc Martens or Shakespeare or music or whatever. But if the things we love are other people, those people define us. And then they’re part of you, and they change what you know about yourself.
Who knows what we’re becoming as we march down Main Street at dusk. People along the road jeer or fall silent. I’m panting at the effort or maybe with the adrenaline. Kalyn’s hand is sweaty, but she’s not letting go.
As the five of us walk through this town, clutching a spray-painted bedsheet, hot despite the cold, it’s obvious that some people will never make the effort to see what we could be. If this is a locker we’re leaving open, not everyone cares about looking inside.
This makes my feet heavy. The fact that a hollering, red-faced stranger just tried to break through the parade barrier makes my feet heavy. Officer Newton stomping toward another heckler makes my feet heavy.
So my feet are heavy; what else is new?
I’m starting to understand that people who don’t care about us, who don’t make that effort, shouldn’t factor into who we are.
“We don’t care what you think,” I mutter under my breath. “We don’t care.”
Those words become our chant. I don’t realize I’m repeating it until Kalyn and Sarah start repeating it, too. Phil doesn’t take up the chant, but he’s so wrapped up in the story that he’s forgotten his paralyzing fear of public attention. He’s still here.