“My parents never do this,” Alice said. “They’re not as wildernessy as your family.”
“I thought you went camping last week,” I said.
Alice laughed. “My aunt and uncle took us up north to an RV park. We had a big-screen TV!”
“Oh,” I said.
“Definitely not wildernessy,” she said, shaking her head.
After about an hour of paddling and, thankfully, not much conversation, we passed a small island. On its banks were marks in the mud where other people had pulled their canoes ashore.
“Want to stop here?” Alice asked.
“Sure,” I said. I steered in with a hard stroke, sending the front of the canoe sliding onto the mud. Alice stepped into the water, sneakers and all, and pulled the canoe forward. Her parents may not have been wildernessy, as Alice put it, but somewhere along the line she had learned good canoeing skills.
We stowed our paddles and took off our life jackets. Alice was wearing a green tank top that showed off her strong, lean arms. I had a sneaking suspicion that her biceps might even have been bigger than mine, but I refused to look closely enough to find out.
We sat down on a rock. Alice peered into the bag her mother had given us.
“OK,” she said. “Forget what I said. I’m glad my parents love me too much.”
“Yeah?” I said.
“We’ve got sandwiches,” she said, pulling out four squares crisply wrapped in wax paper. “We’ve got cold drinks,” she continued, pulling out two water bottles glistening with condensation. “Chips, fruit, healthy vegetable matter. And best of all,” she said, reaching in with a smile, “Grandma Hattie’s mint chocolate-chip cookies!”
She offered me a sandwich, which I unwrapped and started eating.
“It’s a funny thing about those cookies. Grandma Hattie isn’t my grandma at all. She’s my friend Yolanda’s grandmother. But the cookies are so good, I might adopt Grandma Hattie.”
I wasn’t sure why Alice was telling me any of this, but at least it filled the space. I kept eating.
“God, I miss Yolanda,” she went on. “It’s so quiet up here! Don’t you think?”
I shrugged. “Sort of.”
“Doesn’t it get weird with just you and the ladies?” she asked.
I thought about how much weirder it was than Alice would ever know. A mother who spent so much time working and worrying she hardly seemed to notice she was on a beautiful lake. A grandmother writing notes to a dead man. But I shook my head. “Not really.”
“Really? You don’t need friends?”
She probably hadn’t meant to be mean, but her question stung. I put down my sandwich. “I didn’t say that,” I said. “I just don’t need to be surrounded by a bunch of popular kids to have fun.”
“Who said anything about popular kids?” Alice asked.
I shrugged.
“You think I’m popular?” she asked. She let out one of her big guffaws. “I would love for Tiffany Ellis to hear you say that. She thinks I’m a freak of nature!”
I looked at her, confused. Straight blond hair, blue eyes, long legs, toothpaste-commercial smile. Alice had to be a popular girl.
“Actually, I guess I am a freak of nature,” she said, almost to herself. She seemed proud of it. She smiled and took a bite of her sandwich.
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
She put down her sandwich. “I’m a duck.”
“Huh?” I looked for some sign she was about to burst into that familiar Jensen laughter. But she didn’t.
“I’m a beaver. A Labrador retriever.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked. For one very small moment, I was afraid Alice was about to reveal herself to be a total lunatic. It would be an uncomfortable paddle home.
“I have webbed toes!” she exclaimed.
I stared at her in disbelief. “For real?”
She nodded. “I suppose you want to see.”
“Well, yeah,” I admitted. It occurred to me that I’d never seen her barefoot.
Alice pushed off her left shoe. She wiggled her toes at me. They were different, definitely. The extra skin between them made her toes look a little short. But she didn’t look like a duck.
“That’s not so bad,” I told her. “I wouldn’t say freaky or anything.”
“Ha,” Alice retorted.
“It’s kind of, I don’t know, mermaidy,” I volunteered.
“Adam. We’re talking toes. Not fins.”
“But you look great. No one’s going to notice a little extra skin between your toes.”
She looked at me for a moment. I felt my face turn red. Out of kindness, I think, she looked away. She stared out across the water. “Yeah, well, try telling that to the flip-flop girls,” she said.
“Flip-flop girls?” I couldn’t help laughing. It seemed like a perfect way to describe the girls like Emma, Margaret, and Annie back home. “We have some of those at my school, too.”
“I hear they’re everywhere,” she said. “They’re plotting to take over the world.” Now she was smiling. She pulled her sneaker back on. “Back you go inside your cage, you little monsters,” she said to her foot.
That got us both cracking up. “OK, that was weirder than your toes are,” I told her.
“That’s all right,” she said. “I kind of like weird.”
She ate three cookies and stood up. “Ready to paddle some more?”
I nodded. We packed up the remains of our lunch in the grocery bag and stowed it in the canoe. Alice had me climb in first. Then she lifted the bow and eased it off the mud, gliding the canoe into a few inches of water before stepping inside.
“Where’d you learn how to handle a canoe?” I asked her.
She pushed off the riverbed with her paddle. “Camp Watson,” she replied. “Camp of freaks.”
“Everyone has webbed toes?” I asked.
“I knew you were going to say that. No, it’s for girls like me who like S-C-I-E-N-C-E. We spend all day solving mysteries, cracking codes, splicing genes.”
“Splicing genes?”
“Just making sure you were listening,” she said.
“You still haven’t explained your boating skills.”
“This is Minnesota, Adam. If they didn’t teach you ten thousand lake sports at summer camp, they could be accused of child neglect. Even at Geek Camp.”
“I believe that, actually,” I told her.
We began paddling upstream, slowly now, with the laziness that comes after a good meal in the warm sun.
“So, what do you do all day?” Alice asked me. “Since you’re not watching TV or playing computer games.”
“I don’t know. Like I told your mom: swim, canoe, play cards . . .” It wasn’t a very exciting list. I was tempted to lie and tell her I was building a small sailboat or rewiring the cabin’s electricity. Instead, I confessed, “I guess I spend a lot of time sitting around. Lying in the hammock. Sketching comic strips — that kind of thing.”
“Ooh, comic strips! That sounds interesting,” Alice said. “Are you working on a book or something?”
“No, nothing that impressive,” I said. “But I invented this superhero for myself the other day, since I’m the only one at the cabin with a fully functioning brain.” I told her about how I’d come up with the idea for Memory Guy and the ways he would save people from their bouts of forgetfulness.
“Would he swoop in and help kids if they blanked out in the middle of a test?” Alice asked. “Now that could be useful.”
“Or cheating,” I said.
“Ha! Good point!” she said. “But I like this Memory Guy thing. It’s geeky, but it’s got potential.”
I couldn’t tell if she was being serious, but I accepted it as a compliment. We drifted into a comfortable silence again.
The river was quiet and empty along this stretch. We passed a green heron clinging to a partially submerged branch, eyes fixed and back hunched like a new kid at school hoping to escape
notice. When I pointed this out to Alice, she said if he didn’t want to be noticed, he probably shouldn’t be wearing yellow leggings.
“Or a green poncho,” I added. “Actually, he’s dressed a lot like the kids in our high school’s marching band.”
“For real?” Alice asked.
“They wear green coats and yellow pants. School colors,” I explained.
“Spiffy,” Alice said. “Are you in band?”
“I’m learning trumpet,” I told her. “But I think I’ll stick with jazz band. They let you wear black and white.”
We could have kept paddling for longer; after a few more miles, the Potato River emptied out into Potato Lake. But when we hit a stretch of river so shallow we had to get out and walk, we decided it was time to turn back. Alice pulled the bow of the canoe around while I guided the stern. The cool river water bubbled in through the hole in my sneakers.
“My parents are probably approaching level-five worry by now,” Alice said.
“On a scale of . . . ?”
“Six.”
“Then maybe you should call them,” I said.
Alice shook her head. “I can’t.”
“Doesn’t your cell phone work out here?” I asked.
“I don’t have a cell phone,” Alice said.
“Yes, you do — in your shorts pocket,” I said.
“Good one, Memory Guy,” Alice said. “But, really, I just brought this.” She reached into her pocket with her free hand and pulled out a little pack of Kleenex. “It’s much more useful than a cell phone. And much quieter, too.”
I grinned. Alice wasn’t quite what I’d expected.
Once we were back paddling with the current, it didn’t take us long to reach our lunch spot. I spotted a couple of our footprints in the mud. As if reading my mind, Alice pointed toward them and said, “Aren’t those duck prints?”
“Ha-ha,” I said. But I liked the fact that we’d left our mark on the site, however impermanently. “We should call it Duck Island from now on,” I told Alice.
“Only if you promise not to tell why.”
“Deal,” I said.
We passed through the marsh into the open water, which had filled up with fishing boats, sailboats, and even a couple of pontoon boats. It felt like a crowd after the emptiness of the river, but Alice didn’t seem to mind. She gave a friendly wave to the occupants of every boat we passed.
“Do you guys ever water-ski up here?” she asked me.
“No way,” I said. “Grandma hates speedboats. She says they’re so noisy she can’t hear the loons.”
“Well, that’s true,” Alice said. “I never thought about that before.”
When we reached Alice’s dock, both of her parents were there, scrubbing the steps even though there didn’t seem to be anything on them.
Mr. Jensen stood up. “Hello, sailors!” he called cheerfully. “We thought maybe you two had paddled to Lake Superior!”
Mrs. Jensen gave us a smile, but there was a worried look in her eyes. “You must not have had cell service out on the lake,” she told Alice. “I called half a dozen times.”
I felt like I should make excuses and explain where we’d been, but Alice just laughed. She hopped out of the canoe, then knelt and held it for me while I made my way to the bow seat.
“See you, Memory Guy,” she whispered.
“Later, Duck,” I whispered back.
I gave her parents a polite wave and headed home.
“THERE YOU ARE,” my mother said when I finally arrived back at the cabin. She was shelling peas at the kitchen table. “I would have gotten worried if I still thought you were out there on your own.”
I poured a glass of lemonade and didn’t say anything.
“Mrs. Jensen called midday when she couldn’t reach Alice on her cell phone. You didn’t say you were paddling with her.”
“You didn’t ask,” I said. I put the glass down on the counter and started to walk away. “Did Dad call while I was out?” I asked.
“I thought he called you already,” she said.
“He missed this week,” I told her.
“Surprise, surprise,” Mom said, shelling away.
I hated the sarcasm in her voice. “He probably had to work late,” I said. “Not everyone gets to work when and where they feel like it.” I headed back to my room before she could say anything more.
To my dismay, I spotted another note in the mirror over my dresser. I opened it and began to read.
My love,
Dottie and I wear our eagle hats and march around town. But where are you? And when will I tell her our plans? Will I or won’t I will I won’t I . . .
The note drifted off like that, and this time she hadn’t even signed her name. What year did Grandma think this was? She’d made those eagle hats as a teenager! And did she really think she’d go back to the Fourth of July parade next year . . . with my grandfather?
I threw the note in my sock drawer, wishing I’d never seen it at all.
After dinner, Grandma and I played checkers while Mom finished up the dishes. Grandma had been so much more animated with Dottie around — as if seeing an old friend had really woken her up. But in her notes, she seemed to be reliving the sad times when my grandfather was away, or the moments when her life wasn’t settled. If her brain was wandering back in time, why didn’t it wander back to the best and happiest moments, like the ones Dottie loved to talk about?
“Grandma,” I said as I slid my checker piece forward, “was Dottie Lewis at your wedding?”
“Dottie?” she asked. “Of course she was. She was one of my bridesmaids!”
“So she knew my grandfather,” I pointed out. I hardly knew what to call him.
Grandma looked at me like I was the crazy one. “Well, if she was one of my bridesmaids, you would think so, wouldn’t you?”
“I’m just asking, Grandma,” I said. “I thought you said something once . . .” I hesitated.
“What?” Grandma asked.
“I don’t know. Something about how you couldn’t tell Dottie about the two of you and your plans.” My voice tightened. I was wandering out onto thin ice.
“I wonder where you heard a thing like that!” Grandma said. “Dottie Lewis introduced me to your grandfather — they were second cousins. Of course, that doesn’t mean I told her all the little details of our courtship. In fact, I’m sure I didn’t. But why would you care about a thing like that?”
“I don’t know. Never mind,” I said. Grandma jumped two of my checker pieces. I looked up at her. “But those must have been happy times. When you were getting married to your best friend’s cousin. It’s almost like you and she were becoming family!”
“Of course,” Grandma said.
“Did you do crazy creative things? Like at the Fourth of July parade?” I asked, still determined to help her remember the good stuff. But Grandma just shrugged.
“I’m not sure we were very crazy or creative by then. But the wedding cake was delicious,” she said, which should have come out sounding like a happy memory but somehow did not.
“Did I hear someone say wedding cake?” my mother asked as she strode in. “What are you two talking about?”
“Nothing,” I said.
“Nothing at all,” said Grandma. “I’m tired. And I’m going to bed.” She stood up creakily and headed off to her room.
My mother looked at me for an explanation, but I just folded the checkerboard into a V and concentrated on sliding all the checkers back into their box.
“ANYONE FEEL LIKE A WALK in the woods this morning?” Mom asked at breakfast. “There’s a nice breeze coming across the lake. It shouldn’t be too buggy.” It had been two days since Dottie’s visit, but Mom still sounded cheerful, and she and Grandma were getting along better. Maybe we needed to invite visitors over more often.
“Sure,” I said.
“I think my old bones can manage a little mosey,” Grandma said.
We started out down an over
grown path that led past a forgotten outhouse.
“You really used that thing?” I asked Grandma. It was hard to imagine having to make such a long trek in the dark of night just to pee.
She gave me one of her looks.
“We all did,” Mom said. “Especially when we had lots of family visiting. I always ended up out this way in a tent with a bunch of cousins.”
We crossed a broad grassy clearing that looked out on the lake below. Butterflies spiraled among the tallest flowers. Grasshoppers sprang out of our way as we walked.
“We should have picnics here or something,” I said, admiring the view.
“It’s where Grandma had her wedding reception,” Mom said.
“That again,” Grandma said, almost to herself.
There didn’t seem to be any obvious path out the other side of the meadow, but Grandma acted like she knew what she was doing. She stepped over a fallen log, and soon we were back under the trees.
“There used to be a slew of trails out here,” Mom said. “Ma and I kept them clear all summer. What was that stuff we sprayed on the poison ivy?”
“Something you can’t buy anymore,” Grandma said.
“Probably totally toxic,” Mom said.
“You turned out OK,” Grandma retorted.
Through the trees, we heard the drumming of a woodpecker, and it grew louder as we continued on our trail. “Where is it?” I asked.
Grandma pointed her hand up ahead to the right. I saw a flash of red, then something popping around the trunk of a tall red pine. “Is it a downy woodpecker, Grandma?” I asked.
“Hairy,” she corrected.
“I don’t know how you keep all those birds straight,” Mom said, pushing her hair out of her eyes.
“When you really care about something, you don’t forget,” Grandma said.
“I wish that were true for me,” Mom said. “I’ve forgotten so many things I used to know.”
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