After Dakota (24 page)

They climb through the loose flap in the fence and run as fast as they can across the open lawn. Bryce tries to keep up with Geoff, his only ally tonight since Cam is off bumping uglies with British Betty. It’s hard to run and hold on to a carton of eggs.

The kids from other schools run together in packs. Glow sticks dance in the dark like green bones. Laughter and war whoops all around. White projectiles. Everyone zigs, zags, does whatever they can to not get hit.

The moon is an oily orange yolk in a black pan.

Bryce follows Geoff over the grassy hill. Pale
X
’s up ahead. Not
X
’s – crosses. He figures out where they are.

Crack!
He’s hit in the ear.

He ducks for safety behind two headstones. He picks shell out of his hair; not much he can do about the ooze down his neck other than wipe it with his hand, then wipe his hand on the grass.

Geoff takes two eggs from the carton, launches them like fastballs. A disembodied male voice yells a string of swear words.

Geoff says, “Got him! Fuck yeah!” An egg or three – return fire – break on the other side of their barricade.

They’re on the move again, Geoff weaving through the maze of headstones. Bryce kicks over a vase of flowers by accident and keeps going because he can’t see where it is and can’t risk slowing down to look.

Popopopopopopopopop
explodes from his distant right.

“Sounds like some bitch brought a paintball gun!” Geoff exclaims.

They stop again, hidden, and catch their breath. Bryce asks, “Don’t you think it’s disrespectful to have an egg war here?”

“These people are dead. What do they care?”

“So you wouldn’t care if a bunch of kids were running all over your grave.”

“I don’t even want a grave, dude. Big expensive coffin and shit? For what? My family has my permission to dump my body in the woods.” Girls giggle nearby. Geoff says, “At your ten o’clock,” takes an egg in each hand and runs.

They find the gigglers: Franny and Bibi from Sandia. In this light they could be cute, or not. Bryce chooses to believe they are. Geoff pulls a metal flask from his pocket and pretty soon the four of them aren’t in the war anymore; they sit in a secluded spot and pass the drink around. Whatever’s inside tastes like warm paint thinner but Bryce swallows anyway each time it comes to him.

Geoff tells dirty jokes. Bryce could contribute dozens of knock-knock jokes except none of them are dirty.

The sounds of combat seem far away across the acreage.

The girl with braids finds a piece of shell in Bryce’s hair. The girl without braids takes out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He declines her offer, ends up holding the flask while everyone else smokes. He once would’ve been worried about
lung
cancer.

He sees the words flicker in the pocket of flame but thinks he’s imagining. Or hallucinating.

He borrows the lighter, gets it going after three weak tries. He wasn’t hallucinating. Geoff leans against the headstone:

DAKOTA MARIE VANZANT

1963 – 1983

love is the sky and i am for you
just so long and long enough

Bryce stares until the flame cuts out, then keeps staring. He says, “No way” because of all the places to end up, what are the chances? He wishes he hadn’t said that because now they all want to know What? What is it? Do you know her?

No, he doesn’t, but he did. He knew her and now he’s sitting… here.

Heavy footsteps – a lot them – pound the grass nearby. Geoff and the girls are up and gone. Bryce should go, too. He came here to have fun and the fun is running away.

He should go.

“Claire.”

She ponders the great wall of cereal boxes in Albertson’s. Earlier tonight she’d been in Buzzed Head’s garage, inhaling model glue fumes from a paper bag. Not the best, but when it’s all that’s available…

Now she stares at Frankenberry, Boo Berry, Count Chocula, and feels like she might tip over at any moment.

“Earth to Claire.”

She turns toward the voice. Justin Vance. With his hair spiky again.

“What are doing at this Albertson’s?” he asks. “Isn’t there one by your house?”

“You know where I live?”

“Yeah, don’t you remember when – ”

She reaches up, pats the crispy spikes on his head. “You should always keep your hair like this,” she giggles. “You’re way cuter.”

Justin’s face contorts, processing, as the boys come down the aisle: Ricky, Buzzed Head, CAT, Stringy Hair carrying the two six-packs of beer.

“What’s up, skinny bones?” Ricky says at Justin.

“Just talking to Claire, dude,” he answers back.

They all chime in then –
dood, dood, dooooood
– like the monkey cage at the zoo.

Victor points. “You got something on your shirt, dude.” When Justin looks down, he gets smacked in the chin.

“Leave him alone, you guys,” Claire says.

“Wow, you gonna let a girl stick up for you, skinny bones?” Ricky puts his arm around Justin’s shoulders. Justin ducks away.

Her voice comes out tiny. “See you around, Justin.”

In Ricky’s car, parked around the back of the 7-11. Ricky and Claire sit in front, the others folded in the back.

She’s going to walk in and attempt to buy beer. Ricky had a new fake ID that got confiscated at Albertson’s, which he ranted about for the whole drive here: the drinking age should be eighteen and what kind of country is this where it’s easier to get drugs than booze?

Ricky holds up a wad of wrinkled bills. “Get a twelver.”

Claire can almost walk straight by the time she gets around to the bright front of the store.

The young-ish cashier listens to a Walkman, bopping his head. His glance lingers on Claire’s bare legs under her skirt. Somewhere between the freezers and the beer, Claire blacks out for a second (or two?), tilts over and knocks several bags of Fritos to the floor.

She sets the cardboard box full of Pabst Blue Ribbon cans on the counter. It’s no big deal because she’s twenty-one and buys these things all the time. The cashier (Julian, according to his nametag) rings the items up.

Claire’s reflection, under a thick coating of makeup, stands in the glass door. She and Julian in here under white light; outside the store could be drifting through outer space.

“You got ID?” he asks, loudly.

She meets his eyes, smiles like Ricky told her. “What time d’you get off?”

He puts the headphones around his neck; the music is louder now but still not recognizable. “What time what?”

“What-time-do-you-get-off?” Like talking to a retard. Keep smiling.

“Coupla hours. Why?”

“Let me buy this and you can come party with me and my girlfriends later.”

“How old?”

“Twenty.” Then she adds, “How old are you, Julian?”

“Twenty-five.”

“Cool. We like mature guys.” Instead of waiting for the connections to fire in his brain, she pulls a paper napkin from the dispenser and asks him for a pen.

“Why d’you only paint your nails on one side?” he asks while she writes.

“Tell you later.”

“Isabel,” he reads off the napkin when she hands it back. Below the name is the real Isabel’s phone number; this will be better than all of Claire and Ricky’s prank phone calls.

“Call us when you’re off and I’ll give you directions.”

Back in the car, Claire holds up a bag.

“Radical!” CAT exclaims.

Ricky pulls her to him and kisses her.

From there they drive up a twisty road into the foothills, past regular houselights, then occasional houselights, then into darkness. Claire lays her head against Ricky’s shoulder while he steers. The air that washes over them through the open windows cools as they ascend.

Ricky turns off the road, cuts the engine and the lights but leaves the music on. Like they’re suspended in midair. The miniature Albuquerque twinkles far below like a landscape of spilled jewels.

Ricky passes beers and his new cassette case to the back seat. “That’s the title?” Buzzed Head asks. “
MCMLXXXIV
?”

“It’s like Latin or something,” Stringy Hair says with authority. “Not sure how you pronounce it.”

The guys in back take turns sounding out the letters, cracking themselves up. Claire doesn’t like beer, but this is cold and feels good going down.

Stringy Hair hands her the case. “Help us out here, smart girl.”

On the front, a picture of a young angel smoking a cigarette. “They’re Roman numerals,” Ricky says. “It means nineteen eighty-four.”

They look at him like he’s Moses come down the mountain. “Whoa, smart girl, you are rubbing off on Ricky!” CAT exclaims.

Buzzed Head lights up the sad remains of a joint. Somewhere overhead, a plane thunders by, drowning out a song about Panama, shaking the car.

“Bomber,” Stringy Hair pronounces. “Been a lot of ‘em lately. My mom called the base to complain cuz her pictures keep falling off the wall.”

Ricky sucks on the joint, face folded in tight. “You guys think we’re gonna bomb the Russians?” he asks in a pinched voice.

Buzzed Head says, “Ronnie will kick their asses! U.S.A., baby!”

Claire takes the nub next, sucks hard; what comes out is like car exhaust. Someone in the back seat says, “Anyone seen that old lady on the Wendy’s commercial?”

“WHERE’S THE BEEF?” Buzzed Head screams.

“Where’s the beef?” Ricky counters in an old lady voice, and the car is full of cackling and foot stomping. If Claire were more high she could see herself laughing with them; instead this feels too much like being with Bryce and Cameron. Being in her real life.

When the noise dies down, CAT says, “You know what drives me crazy about Wendy’s? The meat’s hot but the lettuce and stuff is cold. When you take a bite your mouth goes into shock.”

Ricky turns the cassette over. Another plane passes by when the first song starts, something something hot for teacher.

More drinking, cigarettes, butts and empty cans tossed out into the night. Some random talk about school: who’s a bitch, who’s an asshole, how teaching P.E. would be the easiest job of all time. Claire wishes for any other topic but doesn’t know what to bring up, so she looks for shooting stars.

By the time the beer and the tape are done, the air is cold enough to grow goosebumps on her arms. “Can I drive home?” she asks Ricky.

“Do you know how?”

“I’ve practiced with my dad a few times.”

They climb over each other so she’s behind the wheel. Three faces trapped in the rearview mirror. She remembers her dad’s S.M.T. checklist to do before starting a car: Seat, Mirrors, Traffic.

She looks out at the road, visible for a few yards before fading to black; it’s a mouth, waiting for her.

The steering wheel vibrates in her grip when she starts the car. Claire shifts into drive and stomps the pedal, not bothering with headlights. They fishtail around a sharp corner. Ricky slides across, pinning her to the door.

Screams and curses from the back seat.

Claire rounds the next corner and the next, waiting to feel scared, excited, nervous, anything.

Blackness ahead and behind.

She takes the next turn too sharply and loses control for a full second, and for that second knows it’s all over. The driver’s side front tire spins in emptiness. They’re about to go over the edge, tumbling down into the bottomless dark. Her life – all their lives – won’t have mattered one bit. Ricky is right. The world will go on as though they never existed.

If someone dies in a plane crash, are they left intact, or exploded into a jigsaw puzzle? What about the passengers when a car goes over a cliff?

Claire wants to look at Ricky so she can know if it’s ok with him that their story ends here tonight, this way.

Then she’s on the road again. The boys whack against the other side of the car on the next turn. Something – branches, rocks – scrapes along the car. Buzzed Head yells, “Jane, stop this crazy thing!”

Then they’re at the bottom. The car skids to a halt in some gravel. The three in the back jump out, cursing. Ricky just sits and looks at her, the two of them not in the same moment.

“What’s so funny?” he asks. “You could’ve wrecked my car!”

Claire looks at him now, a slanted curtain of darkness across half his face.

Sometimes God sends us an angel
.

She looks at him and knows she was wrong. About everything. She’s close to running out to get away from him, his car, his friends. The feeling is so sudden, so complete, that she says it aloud: “I don’t want to be here.”

Ricky tells her they can go somewhere else, ditch the others (still visible through the streaked windshield, a safe distance away), be alone. He doesn’t get it.

“I have to go home,” she replies.

What Bryce Does On His Spring Break:

He organizes his art samples. At the copy store, the birdlike woman behind the counter flips through Bryce’s stack of pages, nodding. “You did these? That’s some talent.”

He mails his art samples. His parents would normally veto the idea of art school, so they don’t need to know until the time is right. When the time is right he can tell them it’s his Last Wish.

He gets the details of sex. Sort of. Bryce first heard the big news – that Cam had put his quarter in Rosemary’s slot – the morning after it happened, but it was like a chocolate center inside the bitter exterior about the grandma. Cam’s been over for dinner at their house twice already this week, and always goes home with leftovers in a Tupperware container. Grace before every meal lately (even the ones where Cam isn’t present) includes a prayer for his family in their time of sorrow.

After the meal, the boys retreat to the basement, where Bryce pries with a vengeance. When Cam hesitates, Bryce quotes the English guy from the beginning of that Iron Maiden song: “We want info-may-shun. Info-may-shun. Info-may-shun.”

Cam shoots the other English guy’s comeback: “You won’t get it.”

“By hook or by crook, we will.”

And so on.

They once made a pledge that whoever got there first – never really in doubt – would give a full report, like someone crossing the threshold of death and bringing back news of the beyond. So Bryce hears about what a condom feels like (even though he’s tried on one of his thick lambskin ones, wanting to be prepared in case the flower plan worked); what sounds a girl makes (their only other experiences being Trevor’s scrambled channels and the night at the movie theater); whether Cam would consider hiding a tape recorder or camera, to share the wealth (which Cam takes as joke and Bryce plays off that way).

There’s still a chance Bryce could find out for himself.

He hears from colleges. Two envelopes come the same day.
We regret to inform you. We are unable to offer you
.

He doesn’t read past the first line on any of them, just leaves them on the kitchen counter for his dad.

He makes a playlist. The last thing he wants is a funeral like Dakota’s (except for the hot chicks), so Bryce decides on a concert format. Each band will do one song; if the bands aren’t available a DJ will suffice. His first draft is all heavy metal, but the audience should be emotional, not covering their ears. His second draft features Lou Reed, Bob Seger, Huey Lewis, even Air Supply for his mom.

He looks at pictures. During one more sleepless night, he brings all the photo albums from the overstuffed hall closet downstairs and stacks them on his bed. Each album has a theme: his parents before kids; Bryce; Claire; family vacations. Funny how life can be divided up so neatly.

Here’s his dad, the young, clean-cut pilot. Here’s his mom, like royalty in dark lipstick and a fur coat. Here are the two of them, all smiles, frozen inside a cloud of thrown rice after their wedding.

Here’s Bryce, red and wrinkly, wrapped in a blanket. Here’s Bryce’s first barbershop haircut, caught mid-scream, with his dad standing a safe distance away while the barber presses bravely on. Here’s Bryce unwrapping his Six Million Dollar Man doll at Christmas.

Here’s Claire asleep on her big brother’s stomach. Here’s Claire spreading puréed disaster across the tray of her high chair. Here’s Claire learning to ride a bike with training wheels.

Here are Bryce, Claire, and their dad blowing out candles on a birthday cake. Here are their parents, dressed for a formal occasion. Here’s the family of four, photographed by some long lost stranger, each of them under a different president at Mount Rushmore.

Every faded 4 x 6” square is a cracked egg, the memories leaking out all over him.

Bryce doesn’t realize dawn has come until he hears the grunts and squeals of the garbage truck outside.

He goes fishing. One of the photo albums holds a picture of young Bryce hoisting a mass of trout; his dad keeps mentioning going again and Bryce finally gives in.

“Big deal I play hooky from work one day,” his dad says as he unpacks the tackle box once they find a suitable spot at the lake. “They could get a rooster to do my job and no one would notice.” Father and son are the only two fishermen on the bank this mid-morning Thursday, the two of them and a bucket of original recipe Kentucky Fried Chicken for lunch. Like they used to.

The sun blazes behind them, cicadas work in the trees, trout bite and are loaded into the ice chest. “Isn’t this great?” his dad keeps repeating. “No place I’d rather be.” Lying back in the shade after lunch, he pulls out a pack of Camels, says, “Don’t give me that look” as he lights one.

“I thought you quit,” Bryce replies.

“C’mon, it’s my day off from real life.” He blows a column of smoke toward the leaves above. He says “767” to the sky before Bryce even registers the whisper of a plane.

Bryce digs in the bottom of the chicken bucket for the little crispy bits to munch on. The breeze blows wrinkles across the water.

“Gotta keep your chin up when it comes to those college applications, son. I got plenty of rejections myself. Everyone does, except those kids whose parents program ‘em to be geniuses by the time they’re five.” He dad grinds the cigarette out against the tree trunk. “What should we do for summer vacation? Maybe your last one here at home.”

How little he suspects.

“We could drive somewhere – your mother wants to see the Grand Canyon again. I suppose I have to get to the point of being able to fly without being a backseat pilot.”

“D’you still miss it?” Bryce asks.

“What you’ll learn, son, is that marriage is a series of compromises. It was important to be near you kids during these years.”

A ways down the bank, three other fishermen arrive and set up.

“Working a desk isn’t so bad, all things considered.”

Bryce says, “I need to tell you something. I’ve been trying to deal with it on my own, but I need help.”

His dad says, “These are the years when you learn a lot about yourself, who you are deep down inside. And whoever you are is how the Good Lord made you. Don’t be ashamed.” He pauses to look at what all the new yelling’s about. One of the fishermen dangles a trout as big as his arm. “Son of a gun. If we caught that, we could brag for years.”

He lights another cigarette. Bryce says, “You can’t tell Mom what I’m about to say, ok? I don’t want her having a meltdown.”

“I know your mother can be a little intimidating sometimes, but understand that we both love you to the ends of the earth.”

“Well… ” Uttering the sentence is so much harder than Bryce thought it would be.

“It’s fine, son. Go ahead and jump. I’ll catch you.”

Bryce’s mouth is so dry. “I think I…”

“Oh hell, I’ll come right out and say it for you: you’re a homosexual, right?”