"But maybe she’s still there-"
"And she’ll invite us for a tea party or picnic because she loves Daddy and she’s our friend too. That’s why she won’t drink our blood. Anyway, she doesn’t do that anymore, Dickens said so."
My stomach grumbled; the baby was kicking around. That’s why my belly always tingled while Dickens and I squished our lips together -- every peck caused the baby to grow a little more. I should have known.
"Better tell Dickens," I said. "I think a baby is in me from kissing. I think it’s Classique, I think. She"s coming back."
"Let’s go tell,” Cut ’N Style said. "Let’s touch the dynamite.”
And as we drifted from the steps, a shiver shot through me, beginning at the base of my neck and rippling down my spine. I pictured Dell and Dickens' dark house -- the windows locked, the shades shutting out the daylight -- their bee-stung mother dozing somewhere inside.
A castle is safer than a home or a farmhouse, I thought. A castle keeps bees and ants from attacking everyone.
When we arrived, their house seemed as unknowable and forsaken as ever. On either side of the gravel walkway, the beds that once fostered tomatoes and squash were now barren, just upturned soil and withering vines. The dirt yard was littered with bootprints and twigs. And moving onto the porch, I noticed that the yellow floodlight no longer glowed above the front door; the imagined queen mother of all fireflies was defunct.
I knocked -- quietly at first, three soft raps with my knuckles.
"Hello," I said, addressing the door. "It’s me."
I paused, expecting Dell or Dickens to answer. But neither came.
"It’s Jeliza-Rose.”
I knocked harder -- knock knock knock -- then paused again.
"It’s really a nice day for a tea party so me and Cut ’N Style are here in case you’re not too busy."
I put an ear against the door, held my breath, and listened; nothing -- not a creak or a bump or the clomp of flip-flops
"Maybe they’re sleeping," I told Cut ’N Style. "Maybe they're in town.”
Maybe they’re hiding, she thought. Maybe they’re at What Rocks looking for us.
"Maybe.”
After that, we tramped from the porch and went alongside the house. And ignoring the sudden pangs in my stomach, I skipped toward the backyard, heading where the weeds and foxtails thrived, where the Ford pickup with the cracked windshield sat. But the Ford was gone.
Stopping near the house, I stood between the curvy ruts left by the pickup’s tires, and spotted Dickens -- out of his captain’s uniform, dressed like a farmer -- unlocking the padlock on the storage shed door.
Tell him, Cut 'N Style was thinking. Tell him you’ve got a baby and he’ll show you his secret. He said he would.
Dickens pushed the door open and entered the shed. So I hurried across the backyard, running over the beaten trail, hoping to surprise him. I wanted to tell him that I loved him so much and that Classique was coming back as my Barbie baby. I planned on surprising him with -- Sweet prince, Classique is on her way; and those words would’ve sailed past the shed doorway had I not seen the squirrel -- if I hadn’t hesitated before the shady doorway, gazing to my right at a wooden hutch, puzzled by the tufts of gray fur bulging through the chicken wire, the puffy tail curling in on itself.
Was he dead? No. Asleep? No. Wide awake -- lying still with his paws on his muzzle, breathing deeply, watching me with black eyes. See what she's done to me, Jeliza-Rose. See what happens when you’re small and hungry all the time. You get trapped and stuck in a cage. I’m a prisoner. I'm doomed.
I felt sad for him. He wasn’t a monster or a nasty thing, only a squirrel, and now he didn’t seem so mean. But I didn't dare stick my fingers in the hutch to pet him; if I did, he might bite me. He might confuse me for Dell and chomp my fingers off.
Know what she’ll do to me? Go in the shed and you’ll understand. Look for yourself Thats right, go on-
And what did I find when stepping beyond the doorway? A long folding table and wide shelves, each surface crammed with Dell’s handiwork, novelties and what-nots, some finished, some in progress. On and around the table - lamps with deer antlers for a base, an antler hat rack, foot stools (the legs formed by two pairs of antlers), deer foot lamps, a dozen or so deer foot thermometers. But it was the shelves that held my attention -- a fierce-looking tabby cat ready to pounce on a coiled rattlesnake, squirrels clutching acorns, three rabbits huddled together, a raccoon with a trout in its paws, another tabby biting into the head of a bat, an upside-down armadillo, a convincing jackalope sitting upright; all glassy-eyed creatures, inanimate and posed, mounted like trophies on varnished flat cuts of wood. This was where Dell kept Death at bay, where she saved silent souls from going into the ground. But I didn’t want to end up like those creatures-frozen and on a shelf; I didn’t want to be stuck like that forever. Might as well go into the ground, I thought. If you can’t run around and yell and cut muffins, you might as well be dead.
And there was Dickens, in a corner, his backside to me, unloading a duffel bag, removing paper towels and rubber gloves.
"It’s a zoo room,” I said.
Upon hearing my voice, his body rigored and he shrieked -- dropping the paper towels and gloves, turning sharply with a hand clamped to his mouth; the shrill continued, passing his fingers, filling the shed. So terrifying and startling was his scream that I began yelling too. And for a moment the two of us faced one another, bellowing as if we were being murdered, until the air escaped our lungs.
Then he slumped down on the duffel bag, breathless and hugging himself. My hands trembled. Cut ’N Style quivered on my finger. Outside the squirrel was chattering in the hutch, no doubt aroused by our screams.
"Not fair,” Dickens was saying, "not fair."
"You scared me good," I said.
"No, you did that to me, you did. That’s not fair.”
He was rocking, staring at his boots, mumbling something.
"But it was an accident,” I told him. "I just saw this zoo and I was coming to tell you the news but the zoo made me forget everything and I was wondering if they’re dead - they’re froze and napping, I guess. I guess that’s why we got scared because they’re pretty spooky like that."
Dickens head came up, his eyes glaring, as he exclaimed, "That’s not right ‘cause Dell makes them alive again. That’s what she does. And people are so happy they bring old dead dogs and old dead kitties and she’s Jesus how she makes them alive. And she does those-" He thrust out a hand, pointing at the lamps and foot stools and thermometers on the table. "And that’s what she sells in town when she goes to town. She’s an artist -- she says so -- and a healer.” He nodded at the shelved animals. "And they’re not spooky, they’re friends -- and you scared me and that’s not fair. I think I fainted.”
"I’m sorry," I said, crossing to where he sat.
"Don’t do that again or I’ll die, okay?”
''Okay.”
I hugged him, wrapping my arms about his shoulders, patting his neck with Cut ’N Style.
"I think I’rn sorry too,” he said. "I think so.”
Tell him, Cut ’N Style thought. Tell him.
And with my lips near his ear, I mentioned the baby. I said that he was my husband now, and that Classique would appear soon; she’d be our Barbie baby.
"We can build a castle, and Dell can marry my daddy. But you have to show me your dynamite first.”
He went rigid.
"I don’t know. That baby sounds like a strange thing -- and I can’t build a castle. I don’t know how, I don’t know.”
So I whispered, "If you show me your secret, I’ll love you forever."
He leaned his head against mine. Our cheeks brushed.
"I’ll show you," he said. "Just once only. Except not yet ‘cause I need to unpack this bag before Dell gets in. Then I’ll show you my room in Momma’s house, okay? But if I can’t unpack this bag I won’t eat tonight. So you wait, okay? But do
n’t touch nothing. You’re not supposed to be in here. This place is Dell’s place.”
"All right,” I said, withdrawing myself, "I’ll wait for my cutie. You’re my kisser."
Then I watched him slowly rise, turn, and bend over the bag. His movements were sluggish and clumsy, his awkwardness suggesting a lack of coordination, his boot heels veering outward from the tips. And after a while I got bored and snuck outside, creeping below Dell’s creatures on my way, mindful of the rattlesnake poised to strike.
Going from the shed, the sunlight blinded me; I squinted before the hutches, putting a hand above my eyes.
I'm a prisoner.
The squirrel was chattering. He paced nervously, regarding me with surreptitious looks.
"Dell will freeze you alive,” I said. "You could eat a bat or a fish.”
But she’ll have to kill me -- then she' ll freeze me alive. I'm not old dead dogs and old dead kitties. I'm a hungry squirrel.
"We’ll help you,” Cut ’N Style said.
His hutch had a little gate which was kept closed by a hook latch.
"You do it,” I told her. "I don’t want to get in trouble.”
But Cut ’N Style wasn’t worried. She flicked the hook without thinking twice.
"You’re free.”
I might have opened the little gate for him and pointed above the weeds and foxtails to the mesquites. It was there, among the trees, that he could flee. I wanted to help him more, but I didn’t. Unlatching the gate was enough.
Then I peeked into the shed, making certain Dickens hadn’t seen what we’d done. But -- with his butt aimed toward the doorway, his hands digging inside the duffel bag -- I knew he was unaware. And glancing at the hutch, I saw that the gate now hung open; the prisoner had already slipped away. He was quick, that squirrel. He understood what to do, where to go, how to hide. He wouldn’t be tricked or trapped again - and, as the sun warmed my shoulders and arms, I was glad.
21
That day, Dickens and I became ghosts.
As we tiptoed up the back steps, he said, "Can’t wake Momma so we can’t talk like this ‘less it’s in my room." His voice dropped to a whisper, "We talk like this first.”
"We’re quiet ghosts,” I said. "Your house is the witch’s cave, and we’re disappearing and we won’t get caught.”
He grinned.
"Yes, I think that’s right. I think that’s a good idea. ‘Cause Dell will wallop me for having company."
Then we entered the cave-house -- coming into the kitchen, not saying a word, holding hands, the sunlight vanishing with the push and turn of a knob. I felt nearly as blind as Cut ’N Style, but Dickens led the way, tugging gently at my arm. And we floated through darkness, two ghosts, inhaling the familiar mixture of varnish and Lysol, gliding over slippery floorboards, proceeding down a hallway lit only by a cat- shaped night-light.
What’s it like? Cut ’N Style wondered.
Halloween, I thought. Black enough for bog men, black enough to fool bees that it’s bedtime.
Each door we passed was shut -- except one, beyond which I glimpsed the shadowy outline of a mounted game head, an elk perhaps, hanging above a sofa, its massive antlers like branches, bifurcating upward and almost touching the ceiling.
Dickens pulled me further along, around a corner, away from the night-light. Another hallway? A doorway?
What’s it like now?
Don’t know. Can’t tell.
He let go of my hand. And suddenly I heard a click and an overhead lightbulb flickered on -- so bright, so unexpected, stunning my sight for a moment.
"My room," he announced, closing the door.
His room -- cramped, untidy, befitting a pack rat. Stacked along a wall were National Geographic magazines, hundreds of them, in five or six precarious piles. The floor was a clutter of T-shirts and socks, underwear and jeans, his flip-flops and swimming suit, Coke cans and plates with dried food, spoons and forks -- more National Geographics, the pages spread, a chance collage of deserts, starry skies, constellations, killer whales, ocean sunsets and schooners and coral reefs.
"Sometimes it’s messy," he said. "Sometimes things stick to your feet, so you better get on my bed so you don’t crush nothing important, okay?"
''Okay.”
Tacked over his bed was a map, not Denmark, but some- where else, somewhere with wide ranges and long valleys, indistinct, very blue and strange. And the bed -- where he asked me to sit -- just a drooping cot, the sheets a green sleeping bag, the pillow a bunched ski jacket.
"I got treasure,” he was saying, on his knees, reaching beneath the cot. "I’m rich sometimes. I discover fortunes.”
Then he hauled out a tackle box, setting it in my lap. I watched as he knelt between my legs, unfastening the clasps and lifting the top, revealing his prized booty, mostly small things. A gold cuff link, his blue goggles, Army the arm, a bulging Christmas stocking.
And pennies -- maybe a thousand, or a zillion?
"Fifty-four. That's almost a hundred, I think. Look at these, I found these sornewhere.”
A pair of false teeth; I held them, pretending the teeth were biting Cut ’N Style’s head.
"Chomp chomp,” I said. "Chomp chomp chomp.”
Dickens frowned.
"Don’t do that,” he said. "That’s wrong.”
Then he took the teeth, exchanging them for the bulky Christmas stocking.
My stomach grumbled.
"Is there candy in it?”
"No, the secret," he told me, shaking the stocking, letting the contents drop to the cot.
"Dynamites," I whispered.
Dynamite, he explained, with time fuses and blasting caps; both sticks weren’t really sticks at all -- not even red like in cartoons -- but slender tan tubes, fashioned from wood pulp or paperboard. In my hands, they felt lighter than rocks.
"How do you boom them?”
"Like firecrackers, I think,” he said, his voice rising with excitement. "Like a war bomb!” Then his cheeks puffed and deflated, and he made an exploding noise.
"Kaboom!” I said, tapping a tube with Cut ’N Style’s chin.
His palms slid up my legs, scooting under my dress, stopping on my thighs.
"Like the end of the world. But if you use them you can’t use them ever again. Then they’re worthless junk, just blown to bits. So I’ll keep them ‘til I’m an old man and then I’ll kill that shark with Lisa and be a hero, I'm pretty sure.”
"I’ll help you. That way we can be on TV.”
"‘Cause you love me.”
"I’m your wife forever."
He laid me back on the cot, where I clutched the dynamite -- a tube in each hand -- and gazed up at the odd map. And as he pressed an ear to my stomach, his fingers touched my panties.
"That baby’s sleeping,” he said. "It’s snoring."
"She’s growing," I told him. "She’s coming tonight or tomorrow."
"I bet it’s pretty. I bet it’s pretty like you.”
He was over me now, looking down at my face. But my attention was on the map, on its aquamarine details, the jagged ridges and broad basins.
"Where’s that place?" I asked.
"The whole bottom of the sea,” he told me.
The whole bottom? I couldn’t comprehend it.
He mentioned that the deepest part of the ocean plunged further below the surface than the highest mountain stretched above it. And undiscovered countries existed in the depths, entire cities with people and dogs. There were castles and farms beneath the seas. There were husbands and wives and babies and ghosts.
"And silly kissers too. Kissers that do this-"
He stuck his tongue out and wiggled it at me.
"Yuck.”
Then I wiggled my tongue. We’d never kissed like that, but the idea made the tingles begin. Dickens’ mouth hovered near my mouth. I raised my head, shutting my eyes, forgetting the map and the dynamite in my fists.
Yuck, Cut ’N Style thought. Yuck.
; He thrust against me, gripping my wrists, causing the cot to bump bump bump the wall. And as soon as our tongues met, something crashed on the other side of the wall, seemingly rattled loose by the cot’s repeated thumping; I heard it hit the floor and bounce.
My eyes shot open. Dickens’ head jerked sideways.
"Uh-oh," he said, his body tensing. "It’s Momma, I think."
Then he climbed from the cot, crossing to the door, listening for sounds in the hallway.
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