If You Find This

by Matthew Baker

  I was studying notecards during math when Jordan snuck over. This week I was learning about imaginary numbers, like “i,” which is the square root of–1. “i” doesn’t exist, but mathematicians use it anyway, because it’s useful for solving certain problems.

  “Did you ask Boylover to come to the ghosthouse again tonight?” Jordan (piano)muttered, crouching by my desk.

  “Zeke’s going to help me find the heirlooms,” I(piano) said, still looking at the notecards.

  “I don’t trust that thief anywhere near the ghosthouse while my grandpa’s there,” Jordan (piano)muttered, pretending to fix a shoelace.

  “Noted,”(piano) said.

  The first few weeks of school, I took my eleventh-grade math class at the high school, with eleventh graders, obviously. But in the hallway after class, the eleventh graders would shove me, and throw bottles at me, and once locked me in a locker. So now instead once a week the eleventh-grade math teacher walks over and teaches me that week’s concepts and leaves me that week’s homework.

  So during other school days I sit in a normal seventh-grade algebra class, and while Jordan and Leah Keen and the Geluso twins learn about graph trees and bound variables, I work through my homework at a desk in the back. No one is supposed to bother me. I’m supposed to concentrate on the calculus.

  “I’ve always hated that kid,” Jordan (piano)muttered, still fiddling with the shoelace.

  Then the math teacher spotted him and (forte)called him to the chalkboard to solve a problem for the class.

  My mom’s car was parked at the curb, across from the buses. She was wearing hoop earrings and a gray sweatshirt. She had the day off.

  “Let’s grab groceries,” my mom (forte)said.

  I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t say no. When my mom gets upset, she likes to buy green tea, dark chocolate, and yogurt, and then eat them all together. As upset as she was about Grandpa Rose, we were going to be buying a whole cartload of chocolate bars. I got into the car.

  “Another man wandered away from the rest home yesterday,” my mom (forte)said. She dug through her purse. “His name is Edmond Dykhouse.” She handed me a photograph of Grandpa Dykhouse. “If you see him anywhere, Nicholas, you need to tell someone.”

  I looked at the photograph. I sat very still. I handed her the photograph.

  “I memorized his face,” I(glissando) said.

  A fact is something that’s the same at any age, but a belief is something different. That’s the hardest thing about being eleven. Before you’re eleven you’ll believe whatever your parents tell you, but once you’re eleven you have to start choosing what to believe, and sometimes that puts you at odds with your parents. My mom worked for the rest home. She loved it—she believed in it—but I had come to stand against it.

  “They’ve been reported missing persons,” my mom (forte)said.

  We drove to the grocer. The grocer is downtown, across from the arcade and exactly the same size. Some grandfathers in raincoats were perched on a bench there, probably waiting for some grandmothers. The raincoats were majorly illogical. The sky had zero clouds.

  My mom eyed the grandfathers through the window while we shopped, like she thought that if she kept staring one of them might transform into Grandpa Rose.

  “I printed flyers with his picture, spent all day going from door to door, looking for somebody who had seen him,” my mom (forte)said. “People hardly glanced at the flyer. Everybody was busy with their own problems. One woman, she wouldn’t take the flyer of Grandpa Rose, but she made me take a flyer of her missing parrots.”

  My mom wheeled an empty cart. I realized suddenly that even if my mom didn’t believe that the heirlooms existed, she still might remember something that could help us find them. But I knew I had to be careful what I asked about. If I asked the wrong question, or phrased a question the wrong way, or spoke in the wrong tone of voice, she might get suspicious. I would have to be sure never to ask too many at once.

  I tried to keep my voice casualchitchat.

  “Grandpa Rose was born here, in this town?” I (forte)said.

  “Yes,” my mom (forte)said.

  “And grew up here?” I (forte)said.

  “In town somewhere,” my mom (forte)said. “He never talked about his childhood.” The cart’s wheels (mezzo-forte)rattled across the tiles. “Neither did Grandma Rose. Grandpa Rose was never home, and she wouldn’t talk about him when he was gone. It was like she would pretend he didn’t exist.”

  “Why wasn’t he ever home?” I (forte)said.

  “He didn’t like being there,” my mom (forte)said.

  “What was wrong with him?” I (forte)said.

  “I don’t know,” my mom (forte)said.

  My mom stopped the cart at a crate of acorn squash. She (piano)rapped her knuckles on the skin of a squash, like ARE YOU RIPE? I had probably hit my limit for research questions. Also, the answers were making me sort of upset. I moved on to the next job on my agenda, which was gathering provisions.

  “Mom? Can we get some canned vegetables? Like peas or yams or something?” I (forte)said.

  “Since when do you like canned vegetables?” my mom (forte)said.

  My mom wouldn’t eat anything unhealthy anymore, after what had happened to my brother. The doctors had said what she had eaten during the pregnancy wouldn’t have changed anything, but, still, now all she would buy were things like acorn squash and fiddlehead greens and heirloom tomatoes. We hadn’t ordered a pizza in over three years.

  “I’m really really really in the mood for peas. Can we get, like, fifty cans?” I (forte)said.

  I crossed the yard through (mezzo-forte)warbling grasshoppers and (mezzo-piano)buzzing wasps with an armful of blankets and jackets and canned vegetables. Sunlight spiked through the birch trees onto the brown grass. The leaves that had fallen onto the yard formed overlapping shapes of pale gold and dark gold and bright maroon. The ghosthouse sounded as empty as usual. The door (piano)creaked open. Grandpa Rose was eating raspberries on the staircase, with that rusty metal lantern from the shed sitting alongside him, unlit.

  “Hey kid,” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  “I’m mad at you,” I (forte)said.

  “Me?” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  I dumped everything in the entryway.

  “Why didn’t you like being home when my mom was a kid?” I (forte)said.

  “I did,” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  “You weren’t,” I (forte)said.

  “I wanted to be there. I wanted to be away,” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  “That’s impossible. Those are opposite. You can’t have felt both,” I (forte)said.

  “Don’t you know about contradictions?” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  “I can’t handle contradictions,” I (forte)said.

  Grandpa Rose frowned.

  “I’ve only ever felt contradictions,” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  “Contradictions basically break my brain,” I (forte)said.

  I turned away to stack canned peas against the fireplace, still kind of mad.

  “Hey, I warned you, kid, I never tried being good before,” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  I lobbed a bar of soap into the sink, still not talking. Grandpa Rose tilted his head, trying to catch my attention. I pitched a roll of toilet paper toward the bathtub, still not talking. Grandpa Rose slid across the stair, trying to sneak back into my line of sight. I rooted through the crumpled blankets.

  “Your Grandma Rose used to ignore me like that sometimes, too, so I already know this can’t last forever,” Grandpa Rose (forte)said, (piano)laughing.

  I threw a jacket at Grandpa Rose.

  “Don’t get it dirty,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  “This is your father’s?” Grandpa Rose (forte)said.

  “Correct,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  Grandpa Rose shrugged on the jacket. He buttoned the buttons, touched the pockets, (fermata)sniffed the collar. In band class, everyone had learn
ed new terms. Fortissimo means “play very loudly” (even louder than forte). Pianissimo means “play very softly” (even softer than piano). Fermata means “hold that note.” So if you’re playing a song and you see a note with a fermata, you just blow and blow and blow the note until you run out of breath.

  “What’s your father like?” Grandpa Rose(mezzo-forte) said.

  “I don’t know,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  “What’s your mother say?” Grandpa Rose(mezzo-forte) said.

  “I don’t know,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  “He treats her alright?” Grandpa Rose(mezzo-forte) said.

  “Like she’s queen of everything,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  Grandpa Rose nodded, (piano)grunting, scratching at his beard with both hands.

  “He would rather sleep on a couch in the Upper Peninsula than disappoint her,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  I wasn’t mad anymore, already. Grandpa Rose was freakishly good at that. His eyes had this way of sucking any mad straight out of you, until you liked him again.

  Jordan stumbled in the door, carrying pillows, boxes of toothpaste, bent metal spoons. His hair was matted with sweat. He grimaced.

  “I can’t stay long,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “Why?” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  “I’m grounded,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “What did you do?” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  “My sister found the dead flies I was keeping in the freezer,” Jordan (forte)said.

  He dumped everything in the entryway.

  “And then the dead frogs,” Jordan (forte)said.

  He wiped his hands on his jeans.

  “Anyway, I told my parents I kidnapped Grandpa Dykhouse,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “You what?” I (fortissimo)shouted.

  “Relax, Calculator,” Jordan (forte)said. “I knew they wouldn’t believe me. Last night we drove all over town, checking different spots for Grandpa Dykhouse. We must have driven past this place like five times. Anyway, I got bored, so I stuck my face between their seats and said, ‘Uh, by the way, I kidnapped Grandpa Dykhouse.’ After I told them, they just yelled at me and said it wasn’t funny. ‘Grandpa Dykhouse going missing is a very serious thing, Jordan.’ Whenever I say anything, they think I’m just trying to bug them. I tell them all sorts of things they would want to know, but they always ignore me.”

  Jordan tossed a pillow at Grandpa Rose.

  “Grown-ups never care about kids’ stories,” Jordan (forte)grumbled. “They never listened to Grandpa Dykhouse either. Whatever he said, they would ignore it, or laugh it off, or tell him he didn’t know what he was talking about.” He dug through his pockets, searching for something. “They think what happens to us doesn’t matter, like we’re too young or too old to be important. But what happens to us is important. What happens to us are the most important things.”

  Grandpa Dykhouse hobbled in the door with the wooden bucket from the well, water (piano)swashing in the bucket. His jeans had dirt at the knees. His jaw was lined with stubble. He looked 300% happier than the night before.

  “That was the worst night of sleep I’ve ever had,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  “Did you see any ghosts?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “No,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  “I brought the scissors you asked for,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “Hey, that reminds me, when was the last time you got your allowance?” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  He nodded toward a scrap of paper hanging from a nail in the wall.

  “Because I need some things from the pharmacy too,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  Jordan frowned, craning toward the list, squinting, mouthing words.

  “Creams? Ointments? Lozenges? Pills? What do you need all of this stuff for?” Jordan (forte)said.

  Grandpa Dykhouse (mezzo-piano)set the bucket on the fireplace, straightened his glasses.

  “You know how you kids get things like hangnails, dandruff, pimples?” Grandpa Dykhouse (mezzo-forte)said. He leaned in, making a face like someone about to get to the freakiest part of a campfire story. “Well, old people have things like that, but a hundred times worse.”

  Jordan looked horrified.

  “Alright, I’ll get you whatever you want, just keep the details to yourself,” Jordan (forte)said.

  Jordan (mezzo-piano)tore the list from the nail.

  “Anyway, listen, don’t wander too far from here. Everybody’s on the lookout for you. My parents have been passing around photos,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “We can stay busy here. Monte has a new project,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  “Monte?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “Mr. Rose,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  Grandpa Dykhouse shoved a pile of paper at Jordan. Pages torn from moldy manuals, mildewy handbooks. Someone had scrawled pencil across the pages.

  “What is this?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “Monte’s memories,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said. “Whenever he can remember something, he tells me the memory, and then I compile the memories here.”

  “We’re low on paper. Bring some, will you?” Grandpa Rose (piano)muttered, fumbling with a can of peas.

  “I’ve always wanted to write a book,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said. “When I was a kid, I wanted to write a book on the history of our town. But Monte’s story is better than history. It’s like a crime novel. I love books like that, about the underworld.”

  “Underworld? You mean where dead people live?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “No, you know, the underworld. Bootleggers, kidnappers, assassins. The criminal underworld,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said. His glasses had slid down his nose when he had bent toward the pages. He eyed us over the thick silver frame. “I’ve had to take some liberties with the story. Some of the memories from when he was younger are quite vivid, but most of the memories from when he was older have completely deteriorated. And then there are memories he remembers one way, and then later remembers a different way altogether.”

  I squatted above the pages. It was like music—with a memory, there was an original performance, when the memory was composed. But afterward, even if you had notes about the original performance—pictures, diaries, mementos—every performance of the memory was somewhat different. The memory was never quite the same.

  “Is there anything about the heirlooms?” I (forte)said.

  “Nothing yet about where the heirlooms were hidden,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  “What are these heirlooms, anyway? A bunch of silverware or something?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “Monte said one of the heirlooms is a golden hammer,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  “A golden hammer?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “In Michigan, in the past, there was a tradition that if you built your own house—dug your own basement, laid your own plumbing, wired your own electric, everything—the governor would award you a golden hammer. Only the head was gold. The rest was wood. I’ve never seen one, only heard the stories,” Grandpa Dykhouse(mezzo-forte) said.

  “Pipe by pipe. Brick by brick. Shingle by shingle. That’s how he built this house,” Grandpa Rose(piano) muttered.

  Dogs (forte)barked. Something (fortissimo)clopped. Zeke peeked in the window.

  “Hey,” Zeke(mezzo-forte) said.

  “Who’s this?” Grandpa Rose (piano)muttered.

  “Zeke. My locker partner. You met him last night, remember?” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  Grandpa Rose (piano)mumbled, confused again.

  Grandpa Dykhouse shoved the sleeves of his sweater to his elbows.

  “Alright, time to wash up, Monte,” Grandpa Dykhouse (forte)said. Grandpa Dykhouse helped Grandpa Rose stand, then led the way to the bathroom, lugging the bucket. I heard water (mezzo-piano)sploshing as Grandpa Dykhouse washed Grandpa Rose’s face.

  Zeke hopped through the window with a (mezzo
-piano)jangling duffel bag. His wolfdogs (mezzo-forte)scrambled through the doorway. He (forte)barked at the wolfdogs, and the wolfdogs flopped across the floor.

  “Did you just bark, Boylover?” Jordan (forte)said.

  Zeke frowned, then (forte)barked at Jordan.

  “What a freak,” Jordan (piano)muttered.

  Jordan wasn’t wrong. But all of us were freaks. I was a misfitbrainy, Zeke was a misfitweird, Jordan was a misfitmean. We were all misfits of some power.

  Zeke emptied the duffel bag along the staircase. A stolen horn. A stolen oboe. Half of a stolen clarinet. Then—in a range of sizes—eleven pairs of stolen high-tops.

  Jordan was gaping at Zeke.

  “What?” Zeke (forte)said. “If you get to stash your grandfathers here, I get to stash some goods here too.”

  “Are those Mark Huff’s high-tops?” Jordan(mezzo-forte) said.

  “That blue pair? They were. Do you want to buy them?” Zeke(mezzo-piano) said.

  “I have enough problems with Flatface already,” Jordan(piano) said. “I can’t even imagine what he would do if he caught me wearing his shoes.”

  Zeke unfolded the blueprint against the fireplace. The ghosthouse had been drawn on it in white lines—the front of the ghosthouse, the side of the ghosthouse, the back of the ghosthouse—but so you could see through the walls in some places, like the house itself was a ghost. Notes had been added in the margins, signed with my great-grandfather’s initials.

  “There’s extra space under the floorboards in the bathroom, and in the kitchen, and in this room here. There’s a door in the side of the staircase, which somebody wallpapered. There’s a crawlspace under the porch. There’s the cellar, which somebody locked,” Zeke (forte)said.

  “A waste of time,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “What?” Zeke (forte)said.

  “There isn’t any treasure,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “When we’re rich, we’ll buy you a brain,” Zeke (forte)said.

  Zeke got the crowbar from the shed. We tore apart the floorboards in the bathroom, found empty space below. We tore apart the floorboards in the kitchen, found empty space below. We (forte)stomped upstairs to the room Zeke had marked on the blueprint, tore apart the floorboards there. We found a bent nail, the handle of a screwdriver, a nest made of torn bits of paper. We didn’t find any heirlooms.