Stand Tall (19 page)

Two of Grandpa’s friends brought an electric pump to drain water from the basement.

Dad and Tree picked through the kitchen and garage, finding what could be saved.

They worked like machines while they still had daylight, wearing big rubber gloves. Floodwater is infectious.

Lugged trash to the Dumpster in the driveway.

Every house on Tree’s street had one.

Tree shoveled out piles of junk from the first floor into the Dumpster, smiling bravely at other neighbors who were doing the same thing.

Tree worked till he couldn’t anymore. Then the momentousness took over.

There was too much to do. How could they
ever
—

“The first rule of rebuilding is to find something positive and concentrate on that,” Grandpa said.

Tree looked at the flooded, smelly mess. “I haven’t thrown up yet.”

Grandpa laughed. “That’s a start.”

The basement water had been drained, leaving rank, thick sediment that covered the floor and walls.

Sophie threw ruined books and sports equipment into garbage bags. She’d come to help Tree with the cleanup.

Tree looked at the broken trophy case lying open on the muddy basement floor—Curtis’s and Larry’s sports certificates were all ruined. Some of the trophies were cracked.

They’d seemed so important when he was growing up.

Tree knelt down to touch a frame with smashed glass. He remembered his mother framing Curtis’s award for basketball. Remembered being in the high school auditorium when Curtis got it. Tree had applauded so hard, his hands hurt.

Tree picked up Larry’s brass home run medal and Curtis’s athlete of the year trophy, dripping mud.

All that glory covered in sludge.

Tree put them in a box.

“I’m going outside before I puke,” Sophie announced, lugging a bag up the stairs.

The Trash King picked through the rubble of what was left in his junkyard—so much of it had been ruined by the flood.

“You look at this red wagon,” he said to Tree, who’d come to help him move some of the heavy pieces. “Why did it survive? It should have been sucked up by the wind—carried down the river. But it’s here. That tells me it can take the heat. I’m not going to sell it for peanuts. I want some real cash for a tough piece like this.”

He walked over piles of rusted metal, lifted an old weather vane from the heap. Stuck it in the ground; the vane pointed north. “Still working,” he declared, “after all we’ve been through. You can look at this yard of mine, think there’s nothing left worth saving. But trash is here to remind us all that the old’s not so bad—it’s got life in it yet.”

He looked toward the sun, scratched his chin. “I’m going to put that in the brochure.”

The giant oak tree began to bud five days after the flood.

Birds were chirping in its branches.

Not one limb was out of place.

Benches were upended, lesser trees snapped in two.

It makes you appreciate a serious root system; roots planted so deep in the ground, holding steady against the storm.

Tree stood in front of the tree with Sophie. Every day at Dad’s they were making progress. A huge dehumidifier was in the basement now, drying things up. They’d ripped up the carpet, lugged it out to the street.

“I know this is a special park for you, Tree. I like nature, but too much of it makes me nervous.” A tear rolled down Sophie’s cheek.

Tree bent down. “What’s wrong?”

“I didn’t tell you ’Cause you had so much going on, but Lassie . . . she didn’t make it.”

“Oh, no.”

“It happened at the motel. She was crawling so slow. Then she just froze on the branch. I tried to get her to do the dance, but she couldn’t do it anymore.” Big sniff. “I told her, ‘I know what it’s like to not have anyone like you around. You feel like giving up sometimes.’”

Tree took her hand.

“I told her that, as a pet, she’d been true. She didn’t fetch or do tricks, but she gave back as much as a reptile can. She fell off the branch, hit the floor of the cage.” Sophie lowered her
head. “I buried her in the Dumpster in the parking lot. I said, ‘Thanks, girl, for everything. You could have been a dog if you’d had better luck.’”

“You were good to her,” Tree said. “You gave her a good life.”

Sophie nodded. “God knows I tried.”

Tree looked across the park to the roof of Temple Beth Israel, where the sign was still welcoming people home.

Just then, Nuts the squirrel showed up, nervous as anything.

“Hey, Nuts. You made it.” Tree threw him a peanut; the squirrel grabbed it, studied Sophie.

“You know this squirrel?”

“Kind of.” Tree felt stupid.

“He looks like he’s got a lot to deal with.”

Nuts shook a little, scampered off.

“So are you sleeping in the park or what, with your dad’s house all messed up?”

Tree grinned. “Actually, my mom’s house made it through fine. She invited us to stay with her until Dad’s house gets fixed.”

Sophie snorted. “Your dad, too?”

“Even Bradley. She said it was going to take a lot of work to get the house right, that no one should have to sleep in a hotel, and that she and Dad were adults and could handle this. We’re going there tonight.”

Sophie looked at the white oak. “You’ve got a strange family, Tree.”

Tree didn’t say it, but he thought this was a very good sign. Maybe his mother wanted to work things out with his father.

He wondered if something awful, like a flood, could have a good side.

Dad, Tree, Grandpa, and Bradley stood on Mom’s front porch.

They had been working hard at the house. They looked and smelled it, too.

Dad rang the bell. “Okay,” he said nervously. “This is going to be fine.”

Tree bit his lip, hoping like crazy.

Mom answered the door, looking really pretty in a blue sweater and skirt.

Her hands went up. “You’re
early.
”

Bradley went right to her.

Dad croaked, “You said come before dinner.”

“I
said
come
after
dinner.”

“We can come back,” said Dad.

“No, just come in. Tree, wipe your feet. Leo, how are you?” They came inside. “This is going to be a little complicated, but we’re all adults.”

I’m twelve
, Tree thought.
I just look older.

The doorbell rang.

Mom smoothed her skirt, announced shrilly, “I have a date.”

Her first date in twenty-three years.

“Oh,” Dad said strangely.

Doorbell again.

“And that’s him. So we’re all just going to deal with it.”

She smiled too bright, opened the door to Richard Blunt, an average-size, average-looking person.

“Richard,” Mom said.

“Jan, you look lovely.”

Grandpa sniffed.

Tree coughed.

Dad shoved his hands into his pockets.

Conan spoke for them all—hurled himself in complete fury at Richard Blunt’s ankle with a clear purpose: tearing it to shreds.

“
Bad dog!
” Mom grabbed Conan, handed him to Tree.

Good dog
, Tree thought as Conan flailed.

“Are you all right?” Mom asked. “He’s never done that before.”

Richard Blunt nodded warily.

“Richard, this is my son Tree.”

Hand extended. “You’re back from college?”

Tree shook it. “I’m in middle school.”

Richard Blunt looked up.

“And due to the flood, I have some houseguests.” Mom glared at Dad, who was dank and damp and looked like he’d slept in the park. “Richard, this is my ex . . . this is my former . . . 
this is the father of my children.
”

“How’s it going?” Dad said.

Richard Blunt nodded.

“And
this
,” Mom said, “is my former father . . . I mean . . . in-law . . .”

Grandpa took a lurching step forward, shook hands.

Not to be forgotten, Bradley walked to Mom’s side.

“And
this
,” Mom shouted, “
is my former dog.
”

Bradley’s cloudy eyes looked up in undying loyalty.

There is no such thing as a former dog.

It was a toss-up as to which was worse.

The introductions, or when Mom and Richard Blunt tried to leave.

The front door was stuck. And Tree, trying to help, made the mistake of putting Conan down, which caused Conan to go back to his original idea of tearing Richard Blunt’s ankle to bloody shreds, which caused Mom to shriek, “
Remove that animal!
” as she raced out the door.

Tree, Dad, and Grandpa stood there. No one knew what to say.

Then, finally . . .

Dad: “That guy’s a real turkey.”

Grandpa: “He has sneaky eyes. I don’t trust him.”

Tree didn’t say what he was thinking.

He couldn’t believe his mother would go out with anyone except his father.

He couldn’t believe he’d thought that all this togetherness was a good idea.

They cooked pasta in the kitchen and ate it silently.

They waited at the kitchen table until she came home.

She walked into the kitchen, saw the dirty dishes.

“You could have at least cleaned up,” she snarled at Dad, who said nothing, which never helped.

Then Dad unfolded the new sleep-away couch too hard and busted the spring, and it sat there, half opened—a huge, broken thing. He lugged the mattress onto the floor.

“I’ll leave in the morning, Jan. Get a hotel room.”

“Oh, yes,” she shouted, “make
me
the unreasonable one.”

“You don’t need any help with that,” he muttered.

Tree was listening from the kitchen, doing the dishes. Grandpa had gone to bed. Don’t fight, he thought.

Too late.

“How
typical
,” she shouted, “to use sarcasm.”

Dad said sarcasm was better than hair-trigger emotion.

“You always need the last word, don’t you, Mark?”

“Whatever you say, Jan.”

Tree wanted to march in there, tell them they were both wrong.

Stop fighting.
He wanted to shout it.

Just for tonight, can’t you stop fighting?

Slam.
That was her bedroom door.