Milk Chicken Bomb (7 page)

Deke must have cleaned his kitchen. The dishes sit on the counter in neat piles on tea towels. All the beer cans stacked in the corner. Deke opens the fridge and gets another can of beer. He gets out a bottle of root beer, a real glass bottle with a cap. You like root beer? Yeah, Deke, I like root beer. Sit down, he says. You want a glass? No thanks, Deke, no thanks. He looks in a drawer, in another one. He wedges the bottle cap against the side of the counter and hits it, pop, with the heel of his fist. The cap hops off, rattles onto the floor.

What's all this? I ask, climbing onto a chair. His table a mess of paper, some of it scribbled and some of it typed. Yellow envelopes and a page of stamps. Deke hands me the damp bottle. My paperwork, he says. He snaps open his can of beer. Use the towel, he says. Don't drip on anything. This all for Davis Howe Oceanography? I ask. He picks up a piece of paper with holes on the side, like comes out of a computer.
This here is a statement on release against collateral. And this is an affidavit asserting my financial security. I put my lips on the bottle and slurp, the fizz tickles my nose.

You're shaking, kid. Look at you. Use the towel to dry your hair. What were you doing at the bus stop?

Waiting for the bus.

Which bus? You mean the Greyhound that leaves from in front of the Red Rooster?

I guess so, yeah.

Where were you going?

I don't know. I rub the top of my head with the towel. Down the hall, you can see the the parts of Deke's house that aren't finished. There's a lightbulb hanging on a string, and electrical sockets that stick out of the wall. The walls aren't painted, they're that drywall, with putty patches here and there. Here in the kitchen the walls have wood panelling, only I don't think it's real wood. It's the shiny kind, like it's been covered in plastic. A calendar hangs above the sink, with red circles around the days, and arrows pointing from one day to another. The refrigerator hums. I can hear the dryer, spinning and thumping.

On the fridge, held on with magnets, pictures of submarines. Cut out of newpapers, or glossy from magazines. Some look like they were cut from calendars. The tops of submarines sticking out of the water, or submarines under the ocean, surrounded by rocks and coral. There's a picture, I guess you'd call it a shipyard: a submarine inside a huge building, like a barn. All covered in scaffolding. Men with craggy faces stand around holding wrenches and electric drills.

I took the bus to Swift Current once, Deke says, for a job. Hey, Deke, they said, why don't you come out here to Swift Current for some skilled labour. You know what they had me doing? He takes a long drink of beer. They had this stack of plywood. Twenty feet high. It'd been used as forms laying
down the second floor of this elementary school, and it was all full of nails. I took the bus fourteen hours into the middle of goddamn Saskatchewan for skilled labour and they had me pulling nails out of plywood for nine hours a day. You know what that is?

What's that, Deke?

That's bullshit, kid. Complete bullshit. Deke drinks some beer. How's your handwriting, kid?

My handwriting?

Here, he says. He hands me an envelope with a plastic window – you can see the red letters inside. He gives me a pen. Write your name, he says.

I write my name on the back of the envelope. Deke whistles. How come kids always got such neat handwriting? When I was a kid I sure had neat handwriting, all straight and even like yours. Look at it now, he says, waving one of the yellow pads. Even I can't read a word. You want to do me a favour?

Sure thing, Deke. I sip some root beer.

I need you to be a stockholder, he says. All you've got to do is sign some forms.

A stockholder?

Yeah, he says, in Davis Howe Oceanography Ltd. He shuffles through the stacks of paper. I figure if I can convince the bank I've got some investors, they might loosen up with the dollars. They don't give $400,000 to just anybody, kid.

I haven't got any money, Deke. I'm a kid, kids can't be stockholders.

Deke finds some paper, longer than usual, like the foolscap we get at school for writing stories. It's not like we're going to put your picture on the form, he says. You won't really be a stockholder, I just need your signature. You have a signature, kid?

I do, Deke.

Here, he says, pointing with a pen. On this line. So, what are you out so late for anyway?

I wrap the towel around my head, the way women in shampoo commercials do. I don't want to talk about it, Deke.

You boys get sent up? he asks. The dryer buzzes. Deke gets up, goes around the corner. Is that why you were at the bus stop?

I don't want to talk about it, Deke.

There's still a big empty spot in the middle of Deke's bookshelf. Deke used to keep fish. He had this big aquarium, a lot of litres in it, he had blue pebbles and real plants, and a treasure chest that opened and closed. Mullen and I came over to help him strain the pebbles in the sink. You should get a diver, we told Deke, and a castle. The pump he bought didn't work, though, and all the fish suffocated. Fish need air, I guess, even in the water, which is why you have to run a hose into the treasure chest in your aquarium. To pump in the air.

Hey, Deke, I say. Seeing as I'm a stockholder in your oceanography company now, why don't you tell me the story about the submarine again?

Kid, he says, I've told you the story about the submarine seventy times.

A stockholder, Deke. With a signature.

Hey, says Deke, you want some more root beer? He comes around the corner and bangs his knee on the lip of the table. Hops over to the fridge. He sets his beer down on the counter and opens another one with one hand. Know what? I haven't got any more root beer. How about some cocoa? You like cocoa? I've got a kettle. Whoever heard about rain in November anyway? It's bunk, kid. He crouches down and roots through a cupboard. Pulls out a cutting board, a box of cereal, an electric knife. Thought I had a kettle, he says.

Deke walks over to the filing cabinet, holding his knee. Takes a key out of his pocket and fiddles with the lock. He gets out a file, brings it over to the table.

Do you know where Uzbekistan is, kid?

I don't, Deke.

Hell, he says,
I
don't even know where Uzbekistan is. But I've been there. Skilled labour, they told me. Real top wage, real good work.

Uzbekistan isn't really a place. The Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic – that's a place. That's where I've been. Quite a mouthful, eh? But everybody there, they call it Uzbekistan. Someday, they say – they get all serious when they talk about it – someday, they say, we'll live in Uzbekistan.

So it's in Russia.

Right, says Deke. Out there in the desert in Communist Russia. Now, kid, there are a lot of crooked people out there. You've got to be careful believing what people tell you. I met some characters in Calgary who claimed they had a licence from the Soviet government to set up an oil exploration company out there in the Uzbek desert. They were going to run a pipeline. Showed me all sorts of maps and graphs. Great opportunity, they said; all they needed was some skilled Western types to come along and help get things rolling. Guys with real oil–patch experience. Guys like me.

And you've got real oil–patch experience, right, Deke?

I've got real every kind of experience. So there we are, out there in the desert. First thing is, they're building a high–rise, thirty storeys, right there in the middle of the tundra. Housing for the pipeline workers. Well, turns out after an all–night plane flight and a few days' drive through I don't even know where, steppes they call them, and I get to the site and it seems there's been a filing error. No one there knew I was coming. They already have enough, what do you call them, Uzbeks around. So every morning I'd have to get into my boots and my thermals and gloves, and get my shovel. Go from floor to floor, shovelling snow out the window. The building kept filling up with snow, see, owing to all the uncovered windows. Deke drinks some beer. You ought to see that, kid. Snow flying out the window, thirty storeys up, the sun coming over the steppe or whatever you call it. Snow falling in sheets, all the way down.

Is the submarine in Uzbekistan, Deke?

The Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic, Deke says. Well, one day I show up to work, only the place is crawling with soldiers. Soviets with rifles and a lot of angry guys waving paper around. I guess there wasn't any licence after all, just a lot of hot air. Don't know how you'd be dim enough to try and pull a stunt like that over there in Communist Russia, but then again, this is the same outfit that flew me halfway around the world to shovel snow out of windows. Well, I made it out without catching any notice, drove myself back to the nearest city, where we'd flown into. Had to do a lot of waiting around and arguing to convince anybody to send me home. But it's in the airport there that I meet Alev. Alev Ahmedivich Mohammed Djazic – how's that for a mouthful, eh? And Alev Ahmedivich Mohammed Djazic is trying to get out of the Uzbek ssr too. He tells me about the submarine. How he'd got it at a surplus auction on the cheap, owing to the officer serving as auctioneer being given over to nervous fits. Nervous fits and no one else came to the auction. The naval command, though, didn't much approve of the sale and were trying to track him down. He had his submarine hidden somewhere in Turkey. Wanted to unload it cheap. Believe me, kid, $400,000 may be more money than I've got, but it's goddamn cheap for a surplus Soviet diesel submarine.

Deke gets up, looks in a cupboard. Pulls out some white sugar cubes in a bowl. A jar of nuts. The Uzbeks, they drink coffee out of tiny cups, he says. And all the women keep their heads covered. It's hot, kid. Real hot. I mean, I was there in the winter and it was pretty cold, but they told me that in the summer it gets real hot. He drinks some beer. Spills a bit on his chin. He yawns.

What I need, Deke says, looking around his house, is somebody who can work detail, with wood. I'm good with the wiring and the drywall and all that, but I'd like to peel off the laminate, get some real sharp work done. No more of this
low–rent shit. No wonder nobody gives me any money, kid. No wonder. How old are you?

Ten, Deke. I'm ten. And a half.

Ten and a half, Deke says. He pulls a cigarette out of his shirt pocket. His fingers shake. Ten and a half.

Deke puts the cigarette in his mouth but doesn't light it. He closes his eyes. I sit and watch him, with his eyes closed, till his chest starts moving real slow-like. He sniffles. Hey, Deke, I say. He doesn't say anything. Hey, Deke, I think I ought to go home now. Unless it's all right if I stay here? Deke's chest rises and falls. He snorts.

I turn on Deke's
TV
. At home I'd have to be in bed by now, but I figure since I'm staying with a grown-up, it'll be all right if I stay up awhile. Besides, if I go to bed now, I'll just be lying there, wide awake. It's no good, lying there not sleeping, feeling itchy and twitchy, twisting all around, your mind all busy and worrying. It's the worst feeling. It's better to just stay up. Sure, I'll be tired tomorrow, but I'm pretty used to being tired.

On
TV
there's a Western. A cowboy, beat up, hunched over the saddle of his horse. The cowboy rides into town and everybody hides. The priest locks the door to the church. Kids hide under the planks in the sidewalk. The cowboy gets down off his horse, woozy-like, you can see how he's all beat up. Draws his gun and stands there, in the middle of the town. Waiting.

At school today I'm pretty lucky that I'm invisible, 'cause the Dead Kids have got all frozen, like snowmen. They wobble back and forth, holding their lunch pails with their scraggly stick arms, the carrots on their faces drip. They can't talk, the frozen Dead Kids at school today, on account of their frozen mouths I guess. They all yowl and howl, and lurch around. Good thing I'm invisible today, so they leave me alone. At recess I sit under the stairwell and read some comic books.

Not very often, but sometimes, I spend the whole day under the stairwell. I'll bring some comic books in my bag, or draw. Giant octopuses maybe, they're always good for a laugh, or I also like to draw flying saucers wrecking cities with their death rays. I like to draw rockets, fat in the middle, with fins. Sometimes I like to sit under the stairwell and bounce my tennis ball, real quiet–like, 'cause they always come looking for me when I'm not in class. It's pretty hard to pick the right stairwell where you won't get caught right away.

Mr. Weissman draws shapes on the chalkboard. Stops now and then to push his heavy glasses back up his nose. A quadrilateral has four sides. A square is a kind of quadrilateral. A polygon has more than two sides. Is a quadrilateral a polygon? I know he told us, but I can remember only so much math.

Mr. Weissman draws and talks, shapes and numbers, his back to us. I think he forgets we're here. At first I thought geometry would be fun, with the drawing, with the rulers and compasses, but it turns out it's just another trick to make you do math.

Dwayne Klatz pulls the point out of a ballpoint pen. Taps the hollow plastic tube on his desk. He tears a page corner out of his science book. Rolls it between his fingers.

And this shape? asks Mr. Weissman. A polygon, somebody says. A trapezoid, says somebody else.

Dwayne Klatz may not be such a Dead Kid. He fidgets in class. Taps the side of his desk. Drums his fingers. Dwayne Klatz always wears overalls, he's always pulling stuff out of the big pocket in the front: red Monopoly hotels, hockey cards, elastic bands. He chews the paper in his mouth. Works his jaw, chews and chews. Looks over at Mullen sitting in front of me. Grins and shows the paper between his teeth.

Mullen looks around the classroom. Points to the front row, where all the front-row girls sit, writing in their coiled notebooks with their long, sharp pencils. Girls always have long pencils with sharp points. Never short little stubs with flat lead. They never chew the ends or bite off the erasers.