Unclaimed Baggage

by Jen Doll

  I imagine myself floating up above, getting to see everything from a new perspective.

  “I haven’t been since I was a little kid,” Grant says. “Let’s do it!”

  But first we have to drop off our stuff, so we continue to trudge through the crowds as Doris points out the best funnel cake vendor and lemonade stand and the hot dogs to avoid at all costs—“The whole town had food poisoning one year!”—and throws out tips like “Never get stopped by a person with a clipboard. They’re opinion surveyors, and you’ll be stuck there for hours.”

  A few balloons have ads across their middles: There’s one with a big logo stamped across it for the local bank, and another for a lawyer named William Hastings Manning III. His picture stretches across the balloon. He’s giving an enthusiastic thumbs-up to the sky; hilariously, his thumb looks exactly like his bald head. There’s a balloon shaped like a giant pie, which is totally making me crave a slice. Others incorporate patches of color, like quilts. Some are solid bursts, some are like rainbows, and the whole effect is larger-than-life artwork, spread across the sky.

  Some people have trucks parked right next to their balloons and tents set up; others have full-blown giant motorhomes. There’s everything from those fancy silver Airstreams to little pop-up trailers, and the people, too, vary: couples walking around holding hands; parents toting little kids on their shoulders; baseball-capped, beer-bellied Southern guys playing cards while casually tending to their balloons. There are visitors who’ve come for the day to watch, setting out chairs and picnic blankets and sandwiches. There are black people and white people and brown people, Southern accents and Northern accents and even a few languages I don’t understand. And there are teenagers like us all over the place.

  “Didn’t we say the balloon festival is a must-see?” Doris asks.

  “Yes! It really is,” I say. I keep stopping to snap pictures to send to Ashton and my friends back in Illinois. “Let’s take a selfie!” I insist, so Doris and Grant huddle up next to me, and we all smile in front of the balloons we’ve come to see, which look like brightly colored spots in the distance. Baby’s first balloon festival! I write. Wish you were here!

  We reach a big white tent full of women selling baked goods. There’s a banner hanging across the front table that says MERCY CHURCH, a name I recognize because it’s the one Doris told me she and Grant both used to go to. The one with the awful youth-group director. Doris nudges me in the ribs as we get closer, and I follow her eyes to an imposing woman with a sharp nose and thin lips standing next to a giant pile of banana bread.

  “That’s her,” whispers Doris. “My waterslide shamer. Priscilla Stokes.”

  “May I help you?” says Mrs. Stokes. It’s exactly the way you ask that question when you don’t really want to help anyone but instead you want someone to feel bad for needing your help. The woman’s eyes widen, and there’s a hint of recognition. “Doris Dailey?” she asks. “My goodness, I haven’t seen you in ages! You’re so much … bigger now.”

  “Yeah, puberty will do that to you,” Doris whispers to me. “I’m no longer under five feet tall and ninety pounds and being sexually assaulted.”

  “Last I saw you, you were making a scene with that Scruggs boy. I presume by now you’ve learned how to behave in mixed company?” Mrs. Stokes eyes Grant before she turns her gaze back to Doris. “I hope you haven’t forgotten about us. Your soul must be starving for the good food of Jesus!”

  I take a moment to consider what “Jesus food” must taste like. Fishes and loaves, maybe, like in the Bible? Grape juice and wafers, like at Communion? Do puff pastries also count? Because I see a lot of those here.

  “My soul is doing fine,” says Doris. “And my mom’s a really good cook.”

  Mrs. Stokes smiles, but there’s an edge to it. “It’s a shame how busy she always is with that catering business,” she says. “Bless her heart.” The words sound nice, but they aren’t.

  Doris stiffens but doesn’t say anything.

  “I heard your aunt passed last summer,” adds Mrs. Stokes. “It’s such a sadness she couldn’t receive the blessings of the church, since she turned her back on Jesus as Lord and savior.”

  Grant makes a funny sound with his mouth, and that gets her attention.

  “Well, Grant Collins, I didn’t recognize you at first,” she tells him. “I’ve been praying for your family. I heard about your little accident back in the spring.”

  “Hi, I’m Nell Wachowski,” I say, and give a little wave with my hand, trying to divert her from my friends. “Wow, uh. That banana bread looks good.”

  “Wachowski,” says the woman. “You’re the new family in the Edwards’ old house. From somewhere up North, I hear?”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Ma’am,” she says.

  “Excuse me?” I ask. I can’t figure out why she’s calling me ma’am.

  “Yes, ma’am,” she says. “I don’t know how you Yankees are raised, but down here, when you speak to your elders, you say ‘ma’am.’”

  A group of other women have started to gather. “Oh, hello, Grant!” one of them says, doing a double take at who he’s with. “How nice to see you out and about!” Another murmurs, “Well, bless his heart,” and I’m even more sure that’s not a compliment.

  “We’ve had you on the prayer list every Sunday,” Mrs. Stokes tells him.

  Grant looks almost as uncomfortable as Doris. “No, thank you,” he says.

  “What?” asks Mrs. Stokes.

  “No, thank you,” he repeats. “I don’t want to be on your prayer list. Please take me off your prayer list.”

  “Excuse me?” she says.

  “You heard what I said,” says Grant. “Ma’am. My problems aren’t for you to discuss at church.” I’m worried he’s about to punch a loaf of banana bread. “I didn’t ask for that. I don’t want it.”

  Mrs. Stokes frowns so hard her face might stay that way.

  “Hey,” says Doris softly. “You OK?” She takes Grant’s hand.

  He nods, and I take his other hand.

  “We have to go,” says Doris tightly. She pulls a ten-dollar bill out of her pocket and leaves it on the table. “Please consider this a donation. You may think you’re doing the Lord’s work, but you’re really just using the church to be judgmental and nasty. Religion deserves better than you.”

  And then we run.

  29

  Grant

  The questions start once we’re in the woods, away from the crowds. “What just happened, exactly?” asks Nell.

  “You met the town busybody, defender of ‘ma’am,’ and, lest it be forgotten, the woman who yelled at me for being a brazen temptress on the waterslide when I was twelve years old,” explains Doris. “I’d say she was in rare form, but she was just in her usual form.”

  “Her name is Stokes?” says Nell. “As in, verb related to making things burn?”

  “Also ‘to encourage emotion,’ especially anger,” answers Doris. “Which is appropriate. How can you feel anything but mad about someone who thinks women should be delicate and timid and obedient and also, never, ever wear Minnie Mouse swimsuits since men can’t handle any sort of temptation whatsoever, even temptation brought to you by a cartoon character.”

  “Wait. Did you just say waterslide?” There’s a memory, all of a sudden, of Doris crying after her swimsuit was yanked down by that kid I used to hang out with sometimes—what was his name?

  Doris nods slowly. “So you remember?”

  It’s something I haven’t thought about in years. Teddy Scruggs, he was the kind of kid who liked pulling cats’ tails and stomping on ants. Let’s embarrass her, Chassie had said—why was she so mean, even then? Why hurt Doris, who had never done anything to anyone? I remember being angry about it when it happened. I told Scruggs to stay away from Doris after that.

  “I felt bad about that,” I say quietly.

  “You should have,” she says. “And you shouldn’t have looked at me like I
was dirt. You should have treated me like a person.”

  “I remember not knowing what to do when everyone was teasing you,” I say slowly. “I was disgusted by them, not you. And I was so scared Chassie was going to be mad at me. She hated when I talked about you, or defended you.” I’ve said sorry so many times to so many people. But this time I really mean it. “I’m really sorry.”

  “It’s OK,” she says eventually, patting my arm. “You were a different person then. And so was I. I forgive you.” She gives me a hard look. “As long as you never, ever, ever, ever do anything like that again.”

  “I won’t,” I promise. “I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.”

  “Good,” she says, and smiles, throwing her arms up at the sky. “Y’all! I’m actually just so happy we’re here!” All the rage from that conversation with Mrs. Stokes comes pouring out of her, but the anger has somehow turned to joy. “AH-OOOOOOOO! I don’t even care that I just told off Mrs. Stokes! You know what? I’m thrilled that I did! Even if my mom finds out and grounds me!”

  Nell throws her fists up to the sky, too, and yells, “WHOOOOOOOOOO,” releasing a whole party keg of emotions. I start to yell, too, except out of me comes words: “HELLLLLLLLL YESSSSSSSSS!” I shout. We’re all spinning around and screaming and laughing, and we eventually collapse on the ground, giggling at each other and our general ridiculousness. We’re sweating bullets. Brian was right; it’s a scorcher already. But no one says a word to complain.

  * * *

  We find a patch of grass that Doris deems acceptable for setting up camp according to her list of priorities: (1) no traces of animal droppings; (2) dry, firm, even earth underneath us; (3) other campers in the distance but nobody close enough to hear us breathe—or talk. Even though the plan was to have the girls in one tent and me in the other, Doris suggests we just use my larger tent and bunk up together. “That way we can tell ghost stories,” she says, looking mischievous.

  “And we only have to put together one tent,” says Nell. If they’re cool with it, I don’t see any reason to say no.

  I turn to the contraption I’ve been lugging around and get ready to make it bend to my will and—presto, change-o—become a tent. I’m a big strong dude, I’ve got this covered, right? But it’s got long pieces and short pieces and metal poles and big partitions of cloth in different sizes, and I have no idea what goes where. When Nell pulls up instructions on her cell phone, it’s as if the words were written in another language. I regret my flippant last remark to Brian.

  “What the hell is a ‘fly sheet’?” I ask, expecting no answer, but Doris, who has been quietly watching me fiddle with the equipment, pipes up.

  “That’s the outer tent, the waterproof part,” she explains, pointing. Then she takes the poles and lays them out on the ground along with the different pieces of fabric. “Where’s the ground cloth?” she asks. When Nell and I simply stare back, she takes the ground cloth from me and shakes her head slightly, with a hint of a smile. She pitches the goddamn tent pretty much all on her own, except for occasionally telling me to hold a pole upright or to use a hammer to pound in the stakes. All of a sudden, there’s a functional, standing, real-as-day tent out of what might as well have been a pile of garbage in my hands.

  “Wow” is all I can say, wiping sweat off my face.

  Nell gives Doris a hug. “How did you do that?” she asks.

  “I watched a video on YouTube this morning,” Doris says, lifting the entrance flap and crawling inside. Nell creeps in after her, and I follow. I like the space of this tent, the air contained inside of it. It’s big enough that we can sleep side by side with some room between us, and the low ceiling feels safe, protective. It’s quiet in here; the thrum of the crowds that aren’t that far away can’t penetrate the woods. This, like the stockroom at Unclaimed, like the pink playhouse, is a space just for us. Doris unclips the sleeping bag attached to the bottom of her backpack and unrolls the bag neatly in the far corner of the tent.

  “Voilà!” she says. “Instant sleeping arrangements.” She steps outside to pull the cooler her mom has packed with food up close to the tent so we can reach it but won’t trip over it, and I internally punch myself again for being such a failure at doing things.

  “Doris,” says Nell, who’s still stuck on the tent accomplishment, “you’re a genius.” Doris kind of blushes. “Well, I did just watch the video today, and there was a really cute guy in it, so maybe I paid extra attention. But, Grant, remember Camp Shining Sumac?”

  “A cute guy?” I say, wondering for a second what Doris considers cute in a dude. “And yeah, the name sounds familiar.”

  “Church camp,” Doris tells Nell, ignoring my other question. “About two hours south of here. Sometimes the Mercy Church families would go on these retreats. There was a father/daughter-father/son one and we all slept in tents in the woods.”

  “Oh, you know, I do remember,” I say. “My dad took me there the summer I turned eight so we could bond ‘man-to-man’ with God. Whatever that means. He cheated on my mom not too long after that and left town.” The girls are quiet, so I press on. “Mostly I remember playing football with him and a bunch of other guys in the big field. And pretending to pray when we had those moments of silence, but really watching to see what everyone’s faces looked like with their eyes closed. And drinking bug juice.”

  “Ugh, why is that even a thing?” says Nell.

  “It’s surprisingly delicious,” I offer. “Sweet and refreshing! I could use some right now.”

  “How about regular water?” she asks. She pulls a bottle out of the cooler and hands it to me, and I chug it down. I’m so thirsty, I realize. Must be the long trek across the field in this heat. My head is kind of pounding, too. I try to ignore it.

  “Do you remember singing ‘Michael, Row the Boat Ashore’ in rounds at the fire pit?” asks Doris. “That song still just pops out of nowhere into my head. I’ll start humming it at work completely involuntarily.” She hums it again, and the sound seems to insulate the thudding in my skull a little bit.

  “There was a workshop on how to set up a tent back then,” she says. “My dad loves that stuff, putting things together and taking them apart. I guess the information stuck, or maybe I have some of those genes, too.”

  I can’t remember that workshop (I’m sure Dad and I skipped it in favor of something pigskin-related), but I also haven’t thought about Camp Shining Sumac in years.

  And that’s when I get this spinny sensation, like I’m drunk, even though I haven’t had a drink in days.

  “Whoa,” I say. “That was—whoa.”

  “Are you OK? Grant? Hey?” I hear voices and feel something cold on my forehead. I open my eyes, and Nell, who is at my feet—I’m lying down now—says, “Thank God, you’re alive!”

  “What happened?” I ask.

  Doris speaks from behind me; she’s holding a towel full of ice to my head. “You were sitting there, saying you were dizzy. And all of a sudden, your eyes kind of went back in your head and then you were just blank.”

  “You were really pale,” says Nell. “And you felt kind of clammy. We tried to talk to you, but you didn’t answer, and then we got scared, so we laid you down here.”

  “Have you been drinking?” asks Doris. “Please tell us the truth; this is important.”

  “I haven’t!” I say. “I haven’t had a drink since before that night in the playhouse. The nail polish trick is working.” I show them my hands, as if that’s proof of anything. In this case, it really is.

  “Maybe it’s some kind of withdrawal symptom,” says Nell. “Can that happen?”

  “Maybe,” says Doris, though she doesn’t sound too sure. “Grant, was it a seizure? Do you have epilepsy or something? You can tell us. We’re your friends.”

  “I don’t have anything that I know of,” I say. “But I know that sometimes when I’m drinking, I black out. Sometimes I don’t remember what’s happened. Could that happen when I’m sober, too?” I feel scared all
of a sudden.

  Nell looks at me solemnly. I try to get up, but Doris presses my shoulders back down. “Just lie there for a minute or two,” she says. “I’m Googling to figure out what to do, but I’m pretty sure you shouldn’t make any sudden movements.” She reads her phone. “They say that ‘vasovagal syncope’—that’s a ‘common faint’—can happen in moments of fear or distress. Are you upset about something? I don’t think that our walk across the field counts as extreme exercise. I mean, it’s hot, but is it heatstroke hot?”

  “How long was I out?” I ask.

  “Just a few seconds,” says Nell.

  Even though I’m freaked out, part of me is kind of enjoying their attention. But my head throbs angrily back at my voice. “Ow. Do you have any Advil?” I ask, and Nell starts to rummage through her stuff to find me some medicine, which she passes over to Doris, who puts the pills into my mouth from above along with a swig of water from a bottle she’s got next to her. I swallow and then laugh and say exactly what comes to my head, which is “This must be what a threesome is like.” And then I feel mortified, except they both start laughing.

  “Yeah, right,” says Doris. “If you want things to get really sexy, maybe you’ll fall down and break your nose.”

  “Hot,” says Nell. “So hot.”

  “I really do think I can sit up, though,” I say a few minutes later, because it’s hard to think with two girls staring down at me in concern, not to mention I’m afraid the situation really could get a little “sexy,” if you know what I mean, or at least, my body might think so and do something inappropriate. “You know, maybe I’ve been having these little blackouts for a while,” I say, thinking. “But what if I’ve been too drunk to know? Sometimes there are moments I’ve forgotten that pop up from the middle of nowhere, like when you suddenly remember a dream.”