The Tricky Part

by Martin Moran

  I didn’t know any of the other boys on the bus—a pair of brothers who lived on a farm in Loveland, some kids from Boulder who seemed to know each other from school, and a few others from out Nebraska way. Kip and Steve and the few other Bob-campers I’d met along the way were elsewhere this season. It seemed I was the only repeat camper from Bright Raven the summer before. How we’d all come to be here on a school bus in the middle of Wyoming was another mystery in the vague life of Bob. There’d been no fliers that I could remember, no real brochures, no parental permission slips. The whole adventure sprung from the seat of his pants.

  Long after a lunch of peanut butter and jelly, well after dark, we were still driving toward Jackson, toward some ranch he’d lined up as our base camp. I could see that, despite all the Coca-Cola, he was sleepy at the wheel. Karen yelled out at one point when he nearly swiped an abandoned car parked along the shoulder of the road. Those who were dozing were startled awake.

  “Let me drive,” Karen said.

  “No,” he snapped. “You don’t have a chauffeur’s license.”

  A few miles later, Bob yanked the wheel and drove the bus right into the tumbleweeds, where he came to a halt next to a barbed-wire fence. He acted as though he knew exactly where we were, as if this was a campsite he’d reserved.

  “Everybody grab your sleeping bags and get out.”

  We stood in the weeds and watched as he crawled atop the bus and untied the blue tarp that covered the rafts. Then we helped him lay it on the bumpy ground. We peed near the fence, then unfolded our bags and lined them up in two rows, tight as sardines, along the square of plastic. I glanced up at the shifting pattern of clouds and starlight.

  “What if it rains?” I asked.

  “Oh, for chrissakes, think positive,” he said.

  Bob and Karen took a walk after all us boys laid down. When they returned, Karen went to sleep somewhere inside the bus—the floor? I wondered—and Bob squeezed his bag in next to mine. As we drifted to sleep, the only sound was the occasional, rocket-like whoosh of semitrucks approaching, then racing past, on the nearby interstate.

  His hand awakened me. My eyes opened to sagebrush and tumbleweeds bejeweled with dew, our sleeping bags wet and shimmering with first light. It was cold and the sky clear. His fingers worked the zipper, wandered toward my belly. I had wondered if it might stop, now that he had a girlfriend, now that I was older, but I guessed not and answered his reach, scooted silently into his cocoon.

  His warmth surprised me, surprises me still. The texture of skin, the way our bodies fit together. His lotion was stashed in his bag; he snapped open the lid and in no time was pumping between my thighs. The routine. I watched the sky, the last stars folding away into chalky blue. And then, as if called there, my gaze landed three sleeping bags away, square into the bright, brown pierce of Robin Hedrick’s eyes.

  At sixteen, he was the oldest camper on the trip. A somber, lanky guy from Illinois, he’d said very little to anyone outside of his dry comments regarding hicks and haystacks. Bob had told me how Robin was taking time away from the divorce, the trouble, at home. There was something about him, not just his age, which commanded respect. His silence, his cool, Chicago composure, and now he was wide-awake, looking at me, at my face jerking across the pile of clothes that was my pillow. The dawn had brightened enough so that I was sure he was seeing it clearly—that I was in Bob’s bag, Bob’s arms, that sex of some sort was going on. Perhaps it was because his face was so calm, but, instead of flinching, I kept looking at Robin as Bob pumped away.

  Robin raised a brow: Is it what I think?

  I rolled my eyes: Yeah . . . weird . . . he’s a pervert . . . Oh well . . . life’s funny, isn’t it?

  Robin blinked: Yeah, funny.

  There were things, I realized, that I was dying to clarify. Key points I wanted to explain—out loud. I kept trying to send thoughts across the cold air, across the gently breathing boys: It doesn’t hurt, don’t worry. He isn’t inside me; he’s just rubbing against me. No big deal. This felt, still feels, like a very important distinction. Something I wanted Robin to know.

  Robin, I feared, didn’t understand, and I was plotting how I’d find him later, pull him aside and tell him to please keep it quiet and isn’t Bob queer and don’t worry, I’m cool, I’m not this . . . that way . . . and this was all going through my head when Bob came, and not quietly. I was sure Robin heard the groan because his eyes widened, blazed for a few seconds, as though he was witnessing a car accident, and then he looked away. Bob reached around to service me and I scrambled back into my bag, used my T-shirt to clean my thighs.

  “What’s wrong?” Bob whispered.

  I buried my head in my sack, wondering what cool Robin might do. If maybe he’d find a shotgun, commit murder.

  I dunked the greasy cookie sheet. How is it, I wondered, that Bob happened to choose Robin and me for kitchen duty? The pan clattered against the sink as remnants of oatmeal and raisins drifted down into the soapy water. I scrubbed Brillo across the burnt spots and searched for a question to fill the silence.

  “Have you ever rafted?”

  Robin nodded, then flicked his black hair up and away from his dark eyes. His bangs tumbled back down toward the bridge of his nose, swept across his cheek, like a curtain closing.

  “I never have,” I said. I watched his hands, his long, slim fingers turning the spaghetti pot, drying it with a blue dishtowel. Maybe he plays keyboards, has a rock band. “I’ve always wanted to river raft.”

  The fluorescent lights hummed like bees.

  “I rafted the Grand once. In Utah. With my dad.”

  I was so grateful to hear him speak, to hear that his voice was untroubled.

  “White water?” I asked.

  “Yeah. It’s cool.”

  We fell silent again. I ran the cookie sheet under the faucet.

  “Ouch!”

  “Hot?”

  I nodded.

  “Careful.”

  I turned up the cold. He took the pan from me and began drying it with his blue cloth. The skin of his arm was olive-colored, smooth and hairless. He wore funky leather sandals, gray corduroys, and a purple T-shirt. Standing this close, he was bigger than I’d realized. A head taller than me. He seemed older than sixteen, almost like he could be someone’s dad.

  I reached for a large skillet that had been soaking on the counter. As I dunked it, I thought again of the morning, of what Robin may or may not have seen or thought. Maybe what he remembered was very little. Maybe he’d blocked it out or didn’t put it together or even really see it in the first place. Maybe he was sleep-watching and figured that what lay before him was a dream, of which he had only the vaguest memory. I often figured that. That what passed between Bob and me in the small hours was no more or less than a ghost story. Not real at all. Of no consequence. Someone else’s life. Someone else’s body. But then there was the way Robin had looked at me that morning, just before we’d gotten on the bus. The way his eyes pierced then darted when I caught his glance. I wanted to explain, to reassure him of . . . I didn’t know what. I watched my blurry hands under the murky water, circling the skillet.

  “The Grand and Colorado are the same river, aren’t they? Sort of?” I asked.

  “One becomes the other, actually. I think. Near the Utah border.”

  “Were you scared? Of the rapids, I mean?”

  “No.” He flicked his bangs again, then hooked them behind his ear so that they stayed clear of his face. He stood on tiptoe and slid the cookie sheet onto an overhead shelf. “Don’t know if this pan goes here.” He wiped his hands on his corduroys. “Doesn’t much matter, I guess.” He turned and leaned his bony hip against the counter and ran his hand slowly through his thick hair. I could feel his eyes. His face, full on, was warm, intelligent. “No, it isn’t scary,” he continued. “Running rapids is fun. You’ll see.”

  I nodded, kept cleaning the clean skillet.

  Then he asked it. “Does he do that a l
ot?”

  I stared into the dishwater as if I might find there the word to go with the truth. What’s a lot? I mouthed the opening of some answer but nothing came out. My shoulders moved slowly toward my ears, then dropped.

  “Man, that’s fucked up.”

  I put down the Brillo and lifted the heavy skillet to the faucet, rinsed it and passed it to him. He took it with both hands. He wore a silver ring with a turquoise stone . . . a girlfriend?

  “For how long?”

  I looked at the tiny patch of stubble on his chin, then right into the brown of his eyes. “What?”

  “How long has he been doing it?”

  “A while, but it doesn’t . . .” I turned to the sink, reached through the warm water, and pulled the plug from the drain. “He doesn’t . . . he doesn’t hurt me.”

  Robin studied the skillet in his hands. “Really?”

  “You know what I mean?”

  He placed the skillet upside down on the counter in front of him, then turned to me. His eyes were kind and I loved him for that. That he hadn’t screamed or snarled or snickered. He seemed incredibly calm. I stared at the place across his chest where it was written, in white letters, The Grateful Dead. I wanted to press my ear there and listen for his heart, to hear him tell me what I hoped was true—my secret was safe with him. The sink suddenly gurgled, sucking down the dirty water. We both stared toward the drain, at the swirling muck, until it was gone. Then we were called to bed.

  It was to be a two-day camping trip. We rose before dawn to pack our bags and drive to the river.

  A night of rain had given way to a morning washed clean and clear. Wyoming’s sky was a bright and tender blue sailing over the tall pines that hugged the Green River.

  “It’s running high,” Bob said, his voice containing his excitement as barely as the banks contained the swollen current.

  He crouched to check the pressure and air caps on each raft and then walked around to make sure every boy had tied his life vest properly. He took charge of one boat, made Karen captain of the other, and divvied up oars and campers between the two. I was placed with her, a wooden paddle in my hands, front and starboard.

  We lifted the rafts and moved them to the edge of the water.

  “Listen up,” Bob said. “We all need to work together. Keep your eyes peeled for rocks.” He looked right at me, though he was addressing the group. “If you land in the drink, point your feet downriver.” This made him laugh. He raised his fist high in the air, whooped loudly, and cried, “Let’s go!”

  Everyone cheered. We slid the rafts into the water and shoved off.

  Not five minutes later there came the unmistakable roar of white water. A thrill rippled through the ranks and lodged itself as dread in the pit of my stomach. I looked down and pulled the straps of my life vest as tightly as they would go.

  “Look sharp!” Bob yelled from his raft, thirty yards behind us. He let out another stupid whoop—his idea of an Indian battle cry—then screamed again, “Avoid the rocks!” His voice, full of delight, skipped across the clear, placid water and down toward the approaching rumble.

  The sound of it was like hell’s thunder. We’ll be juice, I was convinced, pulverized, then swallowed. We picked up speed as the river narrowed, and within seconds we were in it, rising and falling in the wavy, foamy mix. Water splashed and soaked my legs, sprayed across my cheeks. The blessed land, the lucky rooted trees, were calmly passing us by.

  Karen screamed orders. “Row, row! To the left, the left. Harder!” Lord Jesus, what kind of sport was this? I wondered. The Green, it seemed, had become a monster, a mortal enemy. The happy hollers from the boys around me ricocheted across the waves. Was I the only one hating this? We rose and dipped; shooting past ripped-up trees that had lodged against sharp, merciless rocks.

  A huge, flat-faced boulder rose before us. “Hard left, hard left!” Karen cried. I rowed frantically, my arms burning, but the stubborn current had its way and we rammed straight into the rock. Half the raft slid right up onto the mossy face of granite so that I thought—it wasn’t thought but sheer panic—we were going to die. I let out a shriek then cried, “We’re gonna flip!” With that, my feet took me right out of the raft and up onto the boulder, where I promptly dropped my oar and clutched at whatever crags I could find. I crouched on the tiny summit like a trapped and trembling toad, whispering: igneous, igneous, specks of mica.

  “Get back in!” Karen screamed as the raft slid immediately backward into the water, did a wild 360-degree turn, and continued its plunge downriver. I turned upriver where I heard a muffled version of Bob’s orders. Through the mist of churned-up water I saw his mouth moving, his arm pointing frantically in my direction. They tried like mad to steer their raft toward me for a rescue but the river wouldn’t have it. They didn’t even come close to my perch. As they tumbled by, the boys, including Robin, had just enough time to lift their hands and offer me a mirthful, merciless so long.

  “Stay put!” Bob screamed. “Just stay put.”

  I squatted on the tip of my midriver peak for more than an hour. An hour of solitude amid the roiling soup, an eternity to reflect upon my cowardice. Meanwhile, far downstream, they struggled to get the rafts ashore, hike through horribly thick brush, and get back on the water to perform the rescue.

  “Hop down!” Bob yelled as his wobbly boat lurched toward me. I fell toward his outstretched arms and then straight into a puddle at the center of the raft. There I remained, soaked and silent, avoiding contact with anyone and everyone for the rest of the day.

  That afternoon, we made camp along the eastern bank of the river. It was a beautiful spot, thick with pines. Through the small spaces between trees, I caught sight of jagged, snowcapped peaks. I wasn’t sure, didn’t care, if they were the Tetons and, if so, which was the one with my family name. Maybe I’d ask. Later.

  As the light softened and the air cooled, I walked the trails that wound their way along the river. The quiet, the odor of pine, was calming. I searched for dry branches and kindling for the fire. I spotted Karen, unavoidable, heading my way down the path. She was dragging a long, dead branch. As I approached her I kept quiet. I knew she was pissed at me because Bob had been upset with her—as if she could have, should have, stopped me from jumping ship, losing an oar. I moved over to pass on the right but she shifted her dead log and blocked my way.

  “That never should have happened,” she said, lifting a hand, tucking a bit of her blond hair behind each ear. She glared past me down the path. “It never would have, not if you had any balls.”

  She might as well have jabbed her fist into my stomach. I had no wind; my eyes seemed to swell with heat. I pressed the kindling I’d been holding against my chest, stared down at a thousand crisscrossed pine needles.

  “Cat got your tongue?”

  I turned to watch her lumbering, slump-shouldered frame shrink away. Say something! the voice inside me urged. She was still within sight, the broad, blue spread of her Levi-covered ass sashaying down the trail. I dug for a word, a weapon that could be hurled like a stick or a stone, but nothing would rise to my throat.

  Bob stepped over and placed his hand on the corner of my bunk near my head. He’d come from the adjacent cabin, where he and Karen were staying. He’d come to bid us all goodnight.

  “You guys did a great job on and off the water these last two days,” he said. “We covered good distance.”

  I turned my back to him and curled into the stiff sheets, which, like everything on this desolate ranch, smelled of must and mothballs. Unused and unswept for who knows how long, these cabins comprised another of Bob’s shoestring arrangements, one of his twilight zones. Nothing but ghosts and bugs seemed to live here. But after two nights camping, it felt good to be in a bed, under a roof.

  “Let’s call it lights out in five minutes, OK, guys?”

  Most of the boys were already drifting off. Robin was awake, though, across the room from me in a top bunk, and it was his face I watched, hi
s gentle eyes, as Bob leaned over and whispered into my ear.

  “You were great on that glacier today, kiddo.” His breath, his compliment, was warm on the back of my neck. “You really slid down that mother; you’re getting gutsy.” He tapped the back of my neck with one finger. “Come visit me after lights out . . . OK?”

  I held still.

  “Marty.”

  I could hear how particularly, how much, he wished to see me and I turned my face to him. He tousled my hair and I felt the crazy muddle ignite inside me, the fire of rage and want burning me up.

  Bob went for the light switch and, when I looked over, Robin tossed me a rueful grin. I tried to smile back but my face was frozen. The room went dark.

  “Goodnight, guys,” Bob said.

  The door squeaked to a close. I buried my head in the pillow, pulled the rough blanket tight around me, and knew just what I’d do, the one weapon I could think to use. Silence. I closed my eyes, determined to sleep, to stay right where I was.

  The next day—for the morning hike, for the meals, for the fishing—I stuck to my strategy. It felt right and good. In fact, I thought, I wanted this war of silence to last forever. For the rest of the trip in Wyoming, for the rest of my life. Borders closed, locked and guarded. Don’t let him get near you, I thought. I’m thirteen now, for God’s sake. Screw him, and screw his creepy girlfriend. And with every moment of my silence, with every maneuver to avoid him, a fury built within me. A mounting pressure that felt something like strength. Like balls.

  That afternoon, I stood alone, tossing horseshoes near the empty, red-stained barn. Everyone else had gone to the lake for a swim, for the good fishing, but I was practicing solitude. It was sometime near five o’clock, still very hot. The mosquitoes hadn’t yet risen off the nearby ponds. The air was dry and still. I was aiming a shoe when, with no warning at all, he appeared. I’d seen him go off swimming with the others, so I was startled. I pretended not to notice, but the white of his T-shirt, the weight of his stance, was vivid against the barn door. My heart began to bang for battle. I gripped tight to the shoe and tossed it. It landed well past the post, kicked up a puff of dirt.