by Jan Carson
Malcolm’s mother never finished her Blizzard. It turned to ice cream water and dribbled all across the dashboard like a river of seagull poop. No one said anything about the Blizzard river. They just kept driving, state to state, rented room to room, swapping wheels when the tires fell off. The Oranges left their elderly relatives like signposts all the way back to California. By the time they got good and proper east only four Oranges remained: father, mother, Malcolm and his soon to be smaller brother, still gestating thickly under Mrs Orange’s shirt.
‘What say we get ourselves a pet?’ Malcolm would ask his father every time the opportunity arose: birthdays, Christmas, funeral services. ‘What say we get a big, dumb dog, or a kitty – a smart little kitty with green, grey eyes – a rabbit even? It’ll take the edge off the loneliness. It’ll make the backseat seem more like home.’ (Malcolm Orange was not, for one second, speaking truthfully about the rabbit. While dogs and cats and killer whales roam the planet unloved, no self-respecting child will ever be properly satisfied with a rabbit).
‘Nope,’ his father consistently replied, and eventually bought him a substitutionary tennis racquet. ‘No pets for you, young man. Pets die and I can’t afford another funeral this year.’
The racquet would not hit right. It was abnormally holey, even for a tennis racquet. At the time Malcolm Orange suspected it the
dumbest present he’d ever got given. Much later, when his father had finally disappeared – pointing the Volvo in the general direction of Mexico and leaving them stranded in Oregon with little more than a heap of balding tires to keep the child support coming – Malcolm got to reconsidering his tennis racquet. Resurrecting it from the laundry basket, he played endless, angry games of Wimbledon up against the gable wall of the retirement chalet which would come to pass for home, all the time punishing his racquet for the very fact that it could not talk back.
Less than two weeks after the giving (and ungrateful receiving) of Malcolm’s tennis racquet, the Oranges had left town again.
Waking early one morning to find his parents already up and glaring furiously at each other over the breakfast table, Malcolm Orange was already anticipating an unsatisfactory outcome. At eleven years old (almost twelve), with eighteen states trailing behind his backside, Malcolm knew his father’s moving speech better than the Pledge of Allegiance, the Lord’s Prayer and the opening scenes of Star Wars combined.
When it arrived – one minute and forty-five seconds into Malcolm’s daily bowl of Captain Crunch – the speech fell predictably flat on the kitchen floor, dropping like one side of an ill-timed high five.
‘The east coast is not for us,’ insisted Malcolm’s father. ‘There’s an honest-to-God fortune awaiting us on the west coast. Let’s get rolling, Oranges.’ The speech, as tradition dictated, was accompanied by a peal of nervous laughter, a politician’s smile and a thick, paternal hand placed on the back of Malcolm’s neck; one part disciplinary pinch, one part half-assed hug.
Malcolm Orange was, as usual, unconvinced but, for the time being, eleven years old and therefore incapable of anything but forced consent.
‘I’ll pack my stuff,’ he said, already wondering if his brand-new tennis racquet would make it into the Volvo’s trunk when so many perfectly reasonable sticks and thrift store bicycles had tried, bravely pleaded, and failed.
His mother remained at the breakfast table, absentmindedly drinking from an already empty juice glass. ‘It’s extremely odd,’ Malcolm had thought (even though these were early days, long before his absent father left, succinctly explaining all abnormalities in the Orange household), ‘despite the baby growing inside her mom seems to be shrinking. With every state she appears smaller. I’m not sure if this is considered normal for pregnant women.’
Having no previous experience in this department, Malcolm Orange made a mental note to stop the very next enormously pregnant lady he came across and enquire as to exactly what was considered normal when having a baby.
That afternoon when the Volvo – heaving under the extra weight of unborn passengers, tennis racquets and antique dressers – finally left the east coast for west, Malcolm’s mother was carrying nothing more than a carrier bag full of recipe books and the clothes she’d been sleeping in for the last two weeks. She was tremendously fat and very uncomfortable, struggling to wedge her belly underneath the Volvo’s crummy dashboard.
‘It’s you or the dresser, sweetheart. We’ve only got room for one or the other,’ joked Malcolm’s father as he watched his wife slowly maneuver into the passenger seat. ‘I’m guessing the dresser will come in more useful in the long run.’
It was not a very funny joke. No one laughed.
Malcolm’s brother had appeared somewhere outside Chicago, struggling to make his presence known in the parking lot of a Ross Dress for Less. ‘How convenient,’ his father exclaimed, shaking his wife’s hand wildly, ‘you can buy yourself a cheap frock to fit your new flat belly.’
With no input from Malcolm Orange – who had for the greater part of his mother’s pregnancy been rooting for Wolverine – they named the baby Ross. Sensing the battle already lost, Malcolm made one final stab at ownership.
‘What about Wolverine for a middle name?’ he proposed, mere minutes after the placenta had slithered free, disappearing forever into the bark dust beneath a parking lot palm tree.
‘Shut up, Malcolm,’ his father replied, turning to glare at him over the Volvo’s seat back. ‘This baby only needs one name. What would it do with a second one? Second names only make folks uppity and far too big for their own britches. One name was good enough for your ma and me. It was good enough for you when you were a tiny critter and it’ll suffice for this little guy. You need to shut your mouth and fix your ma a cigarette. Stop talking nonsense or we’ll leave you here in Chicago for good. Truth be told, that’s not such a bad idea. We only ever wanted one kid anyway, didn’t we Martha?’
Malcolm’s mother said nothing. She was busy cleaning the goop off the baby with a packet of Kleenex and a half-drunk bottle of Evian. She had already deflated to half the size she’d been in Denny’s that morning when Malcolm and his father had wedged her into a corner booth and watched, stupefied, as she clawed her way through three helpings of buckwheat pancakes and syrup. It was a mystery to Malcolm, for Ross was only one-third the size of his mother’s belly. Perhaps, he eventually concluded, some of the breakfast pancakes had slipped out while she was pushing.
‘I’m going to call him Wolverine anyway,’ Malcolm Orange announced, pettily.
‘Over my dead body you are,’ his father replied. ‘Call him anything but Ross and we’re leaving you at the next Greyhound station.’
It was at this point in the conversation that Malcolm Orange suddenly, and without hope of retrieval completely lost interest in his new brother and turned his attention to the pursuit of a proper pet; a crocodile ideally.
Malcolm was entirely justified in his indifference.
Ross would prove to be an absolutely mediocre baby, given to neither miracles, misbehavior, nor any of the more disgusting infant illnesses which might have allowed him some room for growth in Malcolm’s estimation. Ross expanded at the normal rate for an average boy child, slept a lot, occasionally barfed and developed the charming habit of smiling when spoken to. Malcolm couldn’t have been more disappointed. He’d hoped for conjoined twins, a brother with tentacles or at very least a couple of extra digits, something to impress strangers with. Unfortunately the new baby’s only redeemable feature seemed to be its ongoing lack of hair. Ross would remain bald as a coot ’til the day he turned three and woke freakishly and unexpectedly hairy with enough wild auburn curls to justify a ponytail.
It was five weeks and three days before the Oranges could officially call themselves west. Eight days should have sufficed, twelve at very most, but the tires came off in Nebraska, once again in Wyoming and a final infuriating time on the border of Idaho and Oregon. They were cheap tires, incorrectly fitted; the kind of ti
res which had kept Mr Orange rolling indiscriminately through the mid-sized towns and cities of North America for the better part of twenty-five years.
The Oranges were forced to drop temporary anchor on the Oregon border while Malcolm’s father went foraging for new tires. Tires did not grow on trees, especially in the outermost armpit of Idaho, and it would take almost an entire month for the Volvo to get back on its feet. In the interim Malcolm’s mother did laundry for the local folks, hauling their tired sheets and blouses down the main street in a stolen shopping cart. She washed, ironed, folded and stacked in the local laundromat while Ross dozed complicitly in a sports bag at her feet. Malcolm was now old enough to help with sorting colors and would do a full load for the reasonable price of one stick of Wrigley’s gum, un-chewed. Returning the freshly steamed laundry door to door with both children in tow, Mrs Orange charged five bucks more than the laundromat and though this was far from a fortune, even for the Oranges, it was enough to keep the entire family in Ramen noodles and Snickers bars.
During his month in Idaho, Malcolm Orange awarded himself an early summer vacation. Preoccupied with missing tires and other people’s bed sheets, his parents simply shrugged their collective shoulders and complied.
‘If someone stops you from Social Services,’ his father advised, ‘just tell them you’ve got yourself a dose of cancer. See, if you’ve got the cancer you don’t have to go to school. You can do whatever the hell you feel like and the Social Services can’t say a thing. We’ll be gone before they find out you’re lying.’
(Faking cancer was a trick Malcolm Orange’s father had employed on several previous occasions; effortlessly wangling his way out of various responsibilities, including jury duty and several of Malcolm’s own birthday parties.)
Though he often fantasized about being taken into care and forcibly placed with a family who did not live in a Volvo, though he was permanently ready to display bruises and boot marks (self-inflicted), and fully capable of lying his father into the county jail, no one from Social Services ever stopped Malcolm Orange.
Disinterested as the Social Services were – finding their time better spent in pursuit of teenage arsonists, stolen babies and those unfortunate children forced to sleep in fridges and family-sized suitcases – the elderly population of Milton, Idaho were greatly intrigued by the apparition of Malcolm Orange.
Perhaps it was the diminishing stature of the elderly, the curved spines and arthritic stoops, which thrust Malcolm Orange into eye line every time the older folk stepped over their front doormats; perhaps it was the fact that nothing of interest had occurred in Milton, Idaho since the enormous potato of ’65; perhaps it was God himself, drawing the two parties together, like a pair of mismatched carpet slippers; more likely it was the ever-present nature of the boy who, suddenly shot of school routine, spent entire days lingering on the curb outside the library, flicking spit balls at the wall of the post office and rooting through the Main Street garbage cans for the last dregs of soda pop cans, but the over-sixties soon began to notice him.
At first they kept their distance, observing the boy from behind the window in the local deli, discussing him delicately over their coffee cups, their needlework and short-loan library books. The next town over had recently endured a spate of crimes against the elderly orchestrated by a seven-year-old girl with a BB gun, and subsequently the older contingent held their interest at a sensible distance of fifteen feet. Having observed Malcolm without incident for the better part of a week, their suspicion gradually turned from caution to concern.
A delegation comprised of two formidable ladies and a Golden Retriever was duly formed and dispatched to the far side of the street. At the last minute a bar of out-of-date Hershey’s was added to the ensemble as a kind of peace offering-cum-conversation starter. The remainder of the elderly population congregated behind the deli’s gingham curtains to offer moral support and instant back-up should an unpleasant incident occur.
The Golden Retriever led the charge.
He was a dog of advanced days – one hundred and fifteen canine years on his next birthday – and in his old age had grown excessively suspicious of change; preferring to eat, sleep and deliver his daily shit in exactly the same well-appointed spot. (A persistent yellowing patch in the grass beneath the elementary school flagpole not only infuriated the school’s custodian but also bore witness to the Retriever’s love of routine.)
Occasionally answering to the name ‘Dog’ or ‘Boy’, and most often ‘Here You’, the Golden Retriever, some six owners into his career, had managed to remain anonymous for almost a decade, carefully concealing the mortifying truth writ large on his Kennel Club papers. His first owner had greatly admired the world’s favorite British Prime Minister and, in homage, had forced upon his dog the ridiculously pompous moniker of Winston. Not a single soul in Milton, Idaho had ever called him Winston. The Retriever was exceedingly glad of the fact. He had come to relish his anonymity. At some point in the not too distant future he fully intended to take this ugly little secret to the pet cemetery on the far side of town and bury it beneath an unmarked headstone.
There were several annoying constants Winston had lately come to detest. These included dry dog food (of the variety favored by younger couples and veterinary clinics), outfits for animals, and little boys in thrift store pants who, in Winston’s one hundred and thirteen years of accumulated experience, were always up to no good.
Approaching Malcolm Orange at a righteous clip, Winston slid to a halt in front of the boy’s scabby knees and verified his suspicions with a lusty sniff of Malcolm’s crotch. As he’d expected, the sugary stench of Kool-Aid cut with piss emanated from the child’s marl-grey pants. Winston lowered his snout, ready to nip the problem in the bud and scare the kid straight out of Idaho. Instead he found himself manhandled roughly by the ears, caught in mid-attack, unable to advance or retreat.
‘Hello boy,’ Malcolm Orange whispered, ruffling Winston’s ears. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Grrrrr,’ slobbered Winston, still pinioned five inches above the boy’s lap, ‘grrrrrr.’
Misinterpreting the dog’s hostility as an invitation to instigate a long-term friendship, Malcolm Orange christened the dog Wolverine in his head and hooked both arms around its shaggy neck, hanging there like a skinny-dripped bandana.
The elderly ladies, sensing that imminent danger had been sufficiently diffused, shuffled forward to address Malcolm. Their walking aids reached Malcolm’s toes two beats before their orthopedic shoes. They viewed the boy anxiously from the towering heights of five foot three and two, respectively. The second of the elderly ladies felt a keen need to come down to the child’s level. She made a preliminary stab at bending and, having advanced no further than an arthritic half-inch closer to the ground, levered herself back to full height and wearily gave up on the curb. It had been almost sixteen years since either of these two women had bent in the fashion usually associated with bending.
‘Son,’ the first lady asked, offering the chocolate bar like a silent explanation, ‘shouldn’t you be in school?’
‘Where’s your mama?’ the second lady asked and, because nerves had got the better of her and consequently erased their preplanned script, repeated the first lady’s question. ‘Shouldn’t you be in school?’
(The Golden Retriever wisely held his tongue and lowered his backside onto the curb beside Malcolm Orange, where he made short work of the chocolate bar, still enclosed in its foil wrapper.)
‘No ma’am,’ Malcolm Orange replied, affecting an Idaho drawl, ‘I got myself a dose of cancer and I don’t want to be giving it to the other kids.’
The second lady, troubled by nerves and the recent loss of a perfectly good husband – her third of the decade – promptly burst into tears and, finding herself uncharacteristically caught without a handkerchief, dripped snot all the way down the leg of Malcolm Orange’s school pants.
Twenty minutes later Malcolm found himself permanently installed i
n the back left corner of the Milton Deli where he held court for four weeks straight. During these halcyon days a constant stream of ice cream, expensive cheese and pastrami sandwiches made its way from the counter to Malcolm’s gingham-clad table and eventually, subject to his perverse whims and affectations, the inner chambers of his ever-expanding belly.
Over the course of his month-long stay in Milton, Idaho Malcolm Orange grew fat on the generosity of the elderly. His school pants, salvaged from a Brooklyn-based thrift store, began to pinch at the middle. His T-shirts rose in resistance, crawling towards his armpits. By July Fourth both his school slacks and the second-hand Levis which completed the lower echelons of Malcolm’s wardrobe could no longer be buttoned across his waist and, with no money for spare pants forthcoming, were subsequently worn hip-hop style coasting two inches beneath his pancake butt.
‘Man oh boy,’ Mr Wilson, elderly proprietor of the Milton Deli, was heard to mutter over the latest in a towering mountain of handmade pastrami and banana rolls, ‘if I didn’t know better I’d say that kid’s a darn sight healthier than anyone else in this store. Look at him there chowing down ice cream sandwiches like the Lord himself was coming back tomorrow. He’s ten pounds heavier than he was two weeks ago. Funniest cancer I ever seen.’
When the muttering could no longer be ignored and Malcolm’s demands for tuna on rye with barbecue sauce, though never denied, were met with increasingly resentful looks, he hopped up on the counter, feet straddling a large jar of homemade jelly, and made it known that the cancer drugs caused bloating, and his ever-expanding belly, far from being a sign of health, was in fact a sure indicator of his imminent demise.