by J. Warren
I picked the bike up, and made sure it was still working. He was looking off at something. “What?” I asked.
“Those trees,” he said, pointing. The trees sprang up along the edge of the golf course that butted up against the edge of the interstate. I told him as much, and he said “I’ve never been outside of town.”
I got on the bike, and tilted it for him to kick his leg over. “Where are we going?” he asked.
“It’s a surprise,” I’d said, and kicked the bike into motion.
My mind was wandering back and forth from those times to the now. My shoes crunching over the dead grass was competing with the sound of those tires whispering over the soft, wet grass of then. I can still hear him breathing, his back against me. I can remember feeling his shoulder blades against the edges of my chest.
We cleared the other end of the golf course, and the tires went silent again. The blacktop stretched out before us. I pedaled faster, and he relaxed.
After a time, we came to the field. The first time he saw the little plastic domes, all lit up on the inside, he gasped. I slowed the bike down gradually. When I stopped, he climbed off slowly. I did, as well, and walked the bike off into the ditch. I laid it down so that passing cars couldn’t see it; he stared at the domes from the ditch the whole time. We walked out onto the dirt together.
“I’ve been coming here a year or so, now,” I said. He nodded.
We got to the nearest dome, and I opened it. We stepped inside. I turned around to close the door behind us, and when I returned, he was already sitting Indian-style near the speakers. His eyes were closed. I sat down next to him. I don’t know how long we were there, just quiet, just being. After a long time, I felt like I should look at my watch. When I started to, though, he said “Don’t.”
“We might need to get going—,” I started.
“No,” he said.
I un-tensed my shoulders, and let my arm go back into my lap. He inhaled, then exhaled in one strong breath.
“What were you doing out tonight?” I asked.
He opened his eyes, and without looking at me said “Mom sometimes goes a little crazy. I have to get out when she gets like that.”
I’d seen a movie about a woman who went crazy. She’d started running around and yelling and breaking things. I tried to imagine Randy’s mom doing that, but couldn’t. “What—what does she do?” I asked.
“She just cries and cries,” he said, looking down at his own knees, “she won’t stop crying.”
“Oh,” I said. For some reason, I could picture that very clearly. “What—umm—what does she cry about?”
“I don’t know,” he said, “she just keeps saying ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again.” I could hear his voice quiver a little. I could tell something awful was about to happen, but I didn’t know what. I felt like I had to do something to stop it.
“Randall,” I said, grinning.
“Shut up,” he said, still not looking.
“Ran-dall,” I said, singing-songy.
“You promised,” he said. When he swung his face around to look at me, I felt like I’d been punched. He’d already been crying. His eyes were huge and puffy. There were little wet streaks running from his eyes to his jaw.
I reached out before I could stop myself, and put my hand on his shoulder, “I’m sorry,” I said. He looked down and his whole body shook. He was already crying. He was already crying, I kept thinking. I was stunned by what was happening; I’d never seen any other boys cry, ever. I mean, little kids, yeah, but not big kids like us. I thought I was the only one who still did.
Then he moved over toward me, and put his head on my shoulder. I didn’t know what to do, but before I could decide, my arms went around him. He was so small. His face was turned away from mine, and his hair smelled like sweat. I didn’t mind, though. I didn’t know what to do, but I didn’t mind. Then he started to quiet down some, and I started to think about what I’d say to him when he sat up. I didn’t know that, either. That made my stomach tight. What would I say? What would I do?
Back in now, I could see up ahead, the break in the tree-line that meant the end of the roadside trees and the beginning of the field. My shoes made soft whispering sounds on the asphalt. They seemed to be talking to each other. I wondered what some writer guy would make of that.
When he did sit up, he used his whole arm to wipe his eyes. He sniffled a lot. “I’m sorry,” he said, eventually.
“For what?” I asked.
He pointed, and the upper arm of my shirt was soaked through. I looked back at him, and said “Oh.”
“Don’t laugh, okay?” he said.
“I won’t,” I said.
“Promise?” he asked.
“Yeah, promise. We gotta’ go, though,” I said. I stood up. He inhaled, and I heard him almost sob, but catch himself. I offered him my hand, and he took it. I pulled him up, and we walked back to the bike. All the way back to town, we were quiet. His head was just under my chin, and his shoulder blades were against my chest. I didn’t want it to end.
When we pulled up at the end of his street, I realized just how close to my house he lived. “That one,” he said, pointing. Our two streets backed up against each other. His backyard was only four down from mine. I said so, and he smiled. “Will you come get me next time?” he asked. I said I would. I sat there and watched him climb back in his window. When he leaned back out, waved, then closed pulled his window shut, I biked home, and fell asleep.
Standing in that field again, I can feel my knees go wobbly. The field that used to go off into the horizon didn’t, anymore. While I’d been away, someone has bought the part I always called “the side field;” the part that hadn’t been used by the little greenhouse domes. Standing there, all I could see were the wrecked ruin of the little domes, and acres on acres of cornstalks.
The dirt didn’t make little noises under my shoes like it used to. It didn’t move, or billow in the wind, either. The dirt that used to smell so good had become just a thick layer of dust. I got to the first collapsed dome, and pulled back some of the plastic. Underneath were a pile of wood, and dried up plant remains. The air was thick with decay. I closed the flap immediately.
Another memory started to form, in my head; one that I had left behind a long time ago. We’d been inside one of the domes together. I could see Randy start to form, his face very close to mine in the memory. Then I remembered that I’d glanced from his face up at the dome ceiling. I stopped the memory there, looking down at the heap of plastic and wood before me. I couldn’t bear to look at what remained. I was afraid of what the rest of that memory would reveal if I let it form. Some writer guy would say I was haunted, probably; that this was a graveyard for the past. I never could think up stuff like that.
I walked away from the field, back out onto the road. The entire time I got that feeling; the one where you’re watching a movie, and the character walks out of a room, but you can see that just behind him, a hand reaches out of the darkness. I kept expecting to feel it on my shoulder.
Back up on the road, I could look along the trail I’d come from. The town’s lights were cold white just above the tops of the trees. I smiled. Funny, in all the remembering I’d ever done, I’d forgotten that the path out of town was uphill. I never remember that.
The door squeaked a little when I came in. I half expected Sarah to be waiting up for me. I thought I’d come in, close the door quietly, turn and see the tiny flare of her cigarette against the deep black of the room. I felt disappointed when it wasn’t there, in a way.
Getting up the stairs quietly, and into my room, was a little harder than I remembered, but no one woke. I shut the door, watching the patterns of light from the window play across it. I stopped for a second; I’d always wanted to be an artist, and paint that pattern. Something about the light on the doorway made me feel cold, but in a peaceful way. I don’t know; some writer guy would probably say that better. All I know is how it made me feel. It was like see
ing an old friend after a long time away looking at that pattern again.
I toed out of my shoes, and was hit by the sour smell of them. ‘Of me’, I thought. I’d always liked that smell; my smell when I was younger. It hadn’t been as strong, then, and it had something more—young about it. I didn’t know any difference, then; it was just my smell. It was my smell. Thinking back on it, though, I could tell. Susan had told me that the best piece of advice her mother had ever given her was ‘don’t get old; just get more comfortable in your skin’. I thought about that, watching my silhouette on the wall as I stripped. I remembered being wafer thin through the middle, and whip-cord strong through the legs, arms. I never got the large belly of my father, but I thickened. I grew a stomach in place of the hollow that used to separate my ribs from my legs. I grew fur, as well. I couldn’t make it out in the shadow on the wall, but I knew it was there. I stood for a moment, in the cold cold air of my room, just feeling my body.
When I got under the sheets, it wasn’t Susan or even the old phantom of the bodiless hand that I thought about. I didn’t think about anything. In that still hour, it was only me, my body, and the explosion that curled me around my center; then, sleep.
FIFTEEN
I was riding on the back of an airplane as though it were a horse. I kept thinking that I should adjust the straps, some; that the saddle was loose. The sky was perfectly clear and when I looked up, there was a gorgeous red sunset. It seemed as though it were calling toward me. When I looked back down, though, the plane had changed into a long, black car.
The next thing I knew, I was inside, and too small to look over the seats. I could see the ropes around my wrists. I remember the hum of the air past the windows. The driver’s shoulder seemed miles away. The whole inside of the car was lit in the garish red of that same sunset I’d seen earlier. The driver started to turn around, and just as I was about to see the face of who ever it was, my eyes snapped open. My bedroom door was open, and Sarah was standing halfway to the bed.
“I’m sorry,” she said. Her face meant there was more she wanted to say.
“It’s okay,” I mumbled, and burrowed deeper into the pillow.
“Mom’s almost finished making breakfast,” she said, and walked to the bed. She put an arm on my thigh, “She says she’d like you to come down.”
I nodded without opening my eyes. I felt Sarah sit down.
“What was it about?” she asked.
“The dream?” I mumbled, still not opening my eyes.
“Yes.”
I waited a moment, then said “I was on an airplane headed into the sunset.”
She sucked in air past her teeth.
“What?” I asked, opening my eyes.
“Nothing. Was that all?” she was concentrating hard on the carpet near my empty bookcase.
“No,” I said, “then I was Randy McPherson.”
“Oh,” she said, standing. She walked to the door without turning around. At the doorway she said, “come on, before it gets cold.”
“Sarah?” I asked. She stopped. “What does it mean?” She shook her head without turning around, then walked away.
The room was still cold, but light streamed in past the blinds. I closed my eyes and thought, seven. Back in the apartment, this much light with this little warmth would have meant about seven in the morning. The cold pockets under the sheet contracted against my skin as I stretched. My body felt small. I pulled the blanket back and picked up my jeans off the floor.
“Good morning, dear,” my mother said as I came into the kitchen.
“Shirt,” my father said without looking up from his paper. He sipped his coffee.
I stood fixed for a moment. “Sorry,” I said, “I left it upstairs.” My mother shrugged and set a plate of pancakes on the table.
“Eat, before it gets cold,” she said.
I pulled the chair back and sat down. My father sighed loudly, and lowered his paper enough to look into my eyes. I looked back for a second, then down at the plate. The only sound for the next few minutes was the clink of fork against the plate. Then Sarah breezed in. My father finished his coffee in one long gulp, stood, sat the paper down on the table, and walked out the garage door.
Sarah kissed mom, then fixed her plate. My mother’s face wrinkled, and I could tell she wanted to go after him. Sarah put her plate down on top of his paper, and sat in the chair he’d just left. Mom came to the table and hovered.
“Did you sleep okay, dear?” she asked.
“He had a bad dream,” Sarah said.
“It wasn’t a bad dream,” I said, “just—.”
“The dream of being on an airplane means something, Michael. Did you bother to look it up?” Sarah asked, staring at mom.
“No,” I said, “I just sort of—.”
“Researchers find that just before attempting suicide,” Sarah said, and mom flinched, “patients invariably report having dreams about being aboard an airplane.”
“Is that true?” Mom asked. I didn’t say anything.
Sarah nodded, “worse; those whose dream of flying into a sunset always make successful attempts within a few weeks time.”
“Where did you get that from?” I asked.
“It’s in the books we use for the sophomores. P-S-Y two-ten, ‘the disturbed psyche’” she said, spelling it out.
“Oh,” I said.
“Well, that can’t always be true, dear. Mikey isn’t suicidal, are you?” she said, looking from Sarah to me.
“No, mom, I’m not,” I said. Mom smiled at me, then walked away from the table. “What the hell is your problem?” I hissed at Sarah.
“I’m just telling the truth.”
“You’re being a raving bitch is what you’re doing,” I said, and then felt the shock of what I’d just done.
Sarah’s eyes got wide.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “Shit. I’m sorry, I just—why are you—?” I asked, and stopped again. Sarah’s face fell.
Before she could answer, mom came back to the table with a mug of coffee for me. “Just like you always like it, dear; two creams, two sugars.” I hadn’t ever told her that I’d stopped drinking coffee a while back. I smiled up at her, and went back to eating.
“What are you going to be doing today?” Mom asked.
“He has to drive me to the airport,” Sarah said.
“What?” mom asked, putting her open palm to the center of her chest.
“Diane called. I have to return today,” Sarah said, taking the mug mom had given me, and taking a long gulp.
“But surely you could—,” mom started.
“No,” Sarah said, “no choice. I’ve already exchanged the ticket over the phone; I’ll be leaving at about three this afternoon. Michael will take me to the airport,” she said, and finished the last of the coffee with another long swallow as she stood up.
Upstairs, she was throwing clothes from the messy stack next to her bed into the open suitcase. I smiled; mom had always made us do that. Even in hotels, the rule had been a separate dirty clothes stack for each of us in some discreet corner. I leaned against the doorframe. She finished getting the clothes packed, and looked up at me.
“What?” she asked.
“Why are you leaving?” I asked.
“You wouldn’t understand, Michael.”
After a while, I said “Look, I’m sorry about—.”
“No, you’re not. Don’t lie.”
“But I didn’t mean—.”
“Yes, you did. You may have been angry when you said it, and that made you not care enough about my feelings to tell the truth, but you meant it.”
“Well, you’re being—,”
“Being what, Michael?” she asked.
“You’ve changed,” I said, and immediately wished I hadn’t.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” I said, “listen, try not to—.”
“No, don’t change subjects. Tell me what you were going to say.”
“Not
hing, it was like one of those things where you just sort of say something and you don’t know what you meant even though you’re the one who—“
“Tell me what you were going to say.”
“I dunno—it’s like—like you’re—hurt. Like you’re really badly hurt.”
She sat down on the bed, “What makes you say that?”
“You’ve gotten—I don’t know—cold. Like that, what you just said, all of that. It was really—sharp and cold,” I told her.
“How do you mean?” she asked.
“I don’t know how to tell you what I mean. It’s just—being there—coming back— you’re different; colder.”
She sat for a moment, nodding her head as if she understood what I was saying. I relaxed my shoulders some and breathed in. Then she brought both of her palms to her face, rubbing them in hard.
“Let me tell you something, Michael,” she said, “I have been out there, seen things you wouldn’t dream of. I’ve seen just how horrible this world really is, and I’ve reacted how I thought best. I’m sorry that I couldn’t come back here and be your dear little sister anymore. I am. But what I’ve been through has made that return impossible. So you are either going to have to get to know me as I am, or walk away from me. There is no going back.”
I put my hand on her shoulder, “We all think that, Sarah, but—“
“No,” she said, too loudly, and looked around, waiting for someone to yell at her. When no one did, she said “Do. Not. Start. With that bullshit about just smiling, or hoping, or whatever other idiotic greeting card thing they’re telling you this week. This world is a horrible place to be, Michael. Life is hard and disgusting and the only option we’re given is to take it or die.”
“But don’t you see that—?”
“See that what? What is it you’re asking me to see that I haven’t already seen?” she said without turning.
“Don’t you see that we all have to figure out a way to be happy?” I said, and wondered why. I wondered if that was what I really believed. I wondered where I had heard that if it wasn’t.