If You Find This

by Matthew Baker

A shape appeared there, behind the lace curtain, drifting toward the door.

  Zeke tugged my sweatshirt.

  “You’ve never met Kayley Schreiber before?” Zeke (piano)whispered.

  “Never even seen her,” I (piano)whispered.

  “Did you know she speaks binary?” Zeke (piano)whispered.

  Binary is a language computers speak. Instead of letters, it’s zeros and ones. Like 01100010011100100110111101110100011010000110010101110010. That’s what you would say if you wanted to say “brother.” I didn’t know much about the homeschooler except that she lived with her grandmother and fed birds from her hands.

  “No, why?” I (piano)whispered.

  Kayley Schreiber had bushy eyebrows, blotchy cheeks, and a freakishly large mouth. She was eating celery and wearing a shirt the size of a dress. I calculated the odds that she would have had any friends at a school like ours, which were about 0%.

  “My earring’s missing,” Kayley (mezzo-forte)said, pinching her earlobe, frowning.

  A skull earring, the shape of a keyhole, hung from her other earlobe.

  “What can be lost can be found,” her grandmother (piano)murmured, her voice all singsong, as she sprinkled herbs into a pot of (mezzo-piano)bubbling stew.

  Kayley led us along a wallpapered hallway, through a wooden door, and into a backyard of (pianissimo)chirping bats. A treehouse had been built in the branches of a huge cedar tree. Planks of wood had been hammered into the trunk. We scaled the tree from step to step, like the lines of a staff, the planks rough under my fingers.

  “Do you hate homeschool?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “Today I read a book about the history of dressmaking. Then I collected different birds’ nests to study their architecture. I love homeschool,” Kayley (forte)said.

  “Is your accent fake?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “We used to live in the Keys, where voodoo is hugely popular,” Kayley (forte)said.

  “Were you born weird?” Jordan (forte)said.

  “You can’t help your obsessions,” Kayley (forte)said.

  Jordan started to ask another question. Zeke hit Jordan. Jordan hit Zeke. We sat cross-legged. I memorized the treehouse. Dead leaves strewn across the floor. Voodoo signs chalked across the ceiling. A spiral shell on a weathered table. Bouquets of dried wildflowers. A deck of warped tarot cards. Hanging from a nail, drawn in charcoal on brown paper, a map of the smugglers’ tunnels out at the dunes.

  “Money?” Kayley (fermata)said.

  Zeke stared at his last few crumpled dollars. He chewed a lip. He handed over the money. Then he crossed his fingers, like a gambler banking on the jackpot.

  “Before I summon the spirit, I’ll read your palms,” Kayley (forte)said.

  She held Jordan’s hands, studying the lines.

  “I don’t believe in ghosts,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “A hundred years ago people didn’t believe in germs, but germs killed people anyway,” Kayley (forte)said.

  She held Zeke’s hands, studying the lines.

  “Sorry, I didn’t know he was coming,” Zeke (mezzo-forte)muttered.

  “Heard that, Boylover,” Jordan (forte)said.

  “I should charge extra,” Kayley (mezzo-forte)muttered.

  “Heard that too,” Jordan (forte)said.

  She held my hands. The charcoal map of the smugglers’ tunnels (piano)flickered with the wind.

  “Do you speak binary?” I (mezzo-piano)whispered.

  She nodded, tracing the lines in my palms with the tip of her finger. I wanted her to hold my hands forever. I had never met anyone else who spoke a language made of numbers.

  Kayley (mezzo-forte)clapped, like SHALL WE BEGIN? She shoved aside the table, pinched a stump of chalk between her fingers. With the hem of her shirt she erased a symbol from the floor.

  “A treehouse is the best place for voodoo, when you’re a beginner, because of its size,” Kayley (forte)said. She rested her fists on her hips, nodding thoughtfully, like she couldn’t help agreeing with herself. “In a normal building, with multiple rooms and layered walls, it’s tough to pinpoint the heart of the structure. But a treehouse is one room! The heart of the structure is the center of the floor.”

  She bent over the floorboards, tucking her hair behind her ears, and drew intersecting ovals with swooping lines of chalk.

  “Different seances summon different elements. A matter of voice and form. The medium’s question,” Kayley (forte)said. She flared her nostrils, and pursed her lips, concentrating. “This symbol I’m drawing summons just the voice of the spirit. The symbols that would summon the form of the spirit are way more complex.”

  She drew a spiral shell within the ovals.

  “You can’t just summon a spirit anywhere anytime. A spirit haunts a certain building. Namely, wherever that spirit died,” Kayley (forte)said. She paused, glancing up at us. Her eyebrows rose suddenly, vanishing under her bangs. “This treehouse is haunted by the spirit of its maker, who fell while building it. But through that spirit we can talk to the others in the underworld. I’ll summon its voice into the depths of the shell.”

  She tossed the chalk. She cradled the shell. She sat cross-legged on the symbol, holding an ear to the shell, shutting her eyes. The shell was pale pink, her fingernails a darker purple.

  “You may now ask the question,” Kayley (piano)murmured.

  Zeke nudged me.

  “We need to know anything anyone there knows about my grandfather, who was born here in town, and whose name is Monte Rose,” I (forte)said.

  She gripped the shell. Her eyes darted under her eyelids. Bats arced past the windows. The wind (piano)shook the tree. The floorboards (decrescendo)creaked. The charcoal map of the smugglers’ tunnels (pianissimo)flapped on its nail.

  The noise died.

  “Monte Rose?” Kayley (mezzo-forte) said.

  “Yes?” I (forte)said.

  She (piano)set the shell on the table. She looked uneasypuzzled. She frowned.

  “I’m sorry,” Kayley (mezzo-forte) said.

  “For what?” I (forte)said.

  “The dead won’t help you,” Kayley (mezzo-forte) said.

  “What did they say?” I (forte)said.

  She erased the symbol from the floor.

  “That he gave them no rest,” Kayley (piano)said.

  Zeke hopped from the tree, landing with a (piano)whump.

  “What does that mean?” Zeke (mezzo-piano)muttered.

  Jordan hopped from the tree, landing with a (piano)whomp.

  “Do you believe in ghosts, Calculator?” Jordan (mezzo-piano)said.

  “Maybe not in the ghosts of the dead,” I (mezzo-piano)whispered.

  “What then?” Jordan (mezzo-piano)said.

  I thought of my brother the tree.

  “I don’t think it’s things that used to be that haunt us, but things that could have been,” I (mezzo-piano)whispered.

  As I hopped from the planks, I saw a glint of metal in the grass. A skull earring. The metal hook a question mark with a skull for a dot. I could have set it on the door, but I didn’t. I pocketed the earring, and ducked the ivy, and bolted after the others into the trees.

  THE THIEF

  The next day was a Saturday. I(mezzo-piano) peed. I ate a bowl of cereal like sludge. I read a story in the newspaper about someone’s tractors getting stolen. I(mezzo-forte) spit toothpaste and(mezzo-forte) gargled mouthwash. I(piano) peed again. I went into my backyard to talk to my brother the tree.

  BROTHER WILL YOU ASK THE BIRDS YOU SPEAK TO WHETHER THEY ONCE SAW OUR GRANDPA ROSE HIDING A KEY ON AN ISLAND MANY YEARS AGO? my song said.

  THE BIRDS IN THESE WOODS ARE YOUNGER EVEN THAN YOU OR ME, my brother’s song said. WHEN OUR GRANDFATHER WAS HERE IT WAS NOT THESE BIRDS WHO WOULD HAVE SEEN HIM. IT WAS THEIR GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GRANDFATHERS.

  My mom was bent over the sink in the kitchen window, leafing through phone books, calling hospitals and homeless shelters to ask about Grandpa Rose. A pair of hummingbirds hovere
d around my brother, near where my dad had scarred the bark. I plucked more notes into my violin.

  THEN WILL YOU ASK THE TREES YOU SPEAK TO WHETHER THEY KNOW THE MEANING OF X18471913? my song said.

  I waited while my brother spoke to the other trees in the woods. Some of them had trunks as thick as three or five people—they were older than our house, older than our village, even.

  With the wind in his branches my brother said, THE TREES SAY THAT IS A QUESTION FOR THE STONES.

  My mom leaned through the kitchen window.

  “Someone’s at the door,” my mom(forte) shouted.

  I calculated the odds it wasn’t Zeke, which were about 0%. No one else would be willing to be seen standing at my door.

  But when I ran around my house, it wasn’t Zeke.

  Jordan stood on my stoop, his hands on his knees, bent over panting. His cheeks hollowing when he inhaled, billowing when he exhaled. The armpits of his shirt wet with sweat.

  “I was just downtown,” Jordan(piano) panted.

  He waved toward downtown.

  “I saw Boylover. At the antique shop. Trying to sell your grandpa’s music box,” Jordan(mezzo-piano) panted.

  He waved toward the ghosthouse.

  “He stole it,” Jordan(mezzo-forte) panted.

  My bow dropped into the grass. My violin dropped into the grass. I was dumbfoundedbetrayed.

  “We have to get it back!” I(forte) said.

  Jordan stood up, wiping sweat from his cheeks.

  “What’s this ‘we’? I only tag along for treasure hunting. With anything else, you’re on your own,” Jordan(forte) said.

  He crossed into Emma Dirge’s yard, then walked down Emma Dirge’s driveway, so he wouldn’t have to be seen walking down from mine.

  I ran to the ghosthouse to tell Grandpa Rose, but as I rounded the bend in the road, Zeke and his wolfdogs came slipping from the woods.

  “Hey,” Zeke(forte) said.

  When your locker partner has betrayed you by stealing your only living grandfather’s only worldly possession, what’s right and what’s wrong isn’t a matter of fact. It’s a matter of belief. And, at that moment, I believed the logical thing was to tackle the thief.

  So I ran at Zeke.

  “Whoa whoa whoa…!” Zeke(forte) shouted.

  I tackled Zeke into the road. We rolled across the painted lines, our bodies leapfrogging.

  “Where’s the music box?” I(fortissimo) shouted.

  “What are you talking about?” Zeke(fortissimo) shouted. He tried to shove me off. His wolfdogs(forte) snarled, crouching to pounce. “It’s at the ghosthouse!”

  “Jordan saw you trying to sell it!” I(forte) shouted.

  A truck whipped around the bend, dead leaves scattering in its wake. As the truck(fermata) blared its horn, we scrambled out of the road into the woods, then watched the truck blow past the spot where we had been.

  Zeke’s wolfdogs were still(piano) growling. My elbows were tingling where my skin had been peeled raw by the gravel.

  “I had to know whether the heirlooms were actually worth anything or whether we were wasting our time,” Zeke(forte) said. “My grandfather was friends with the woman who owns the antique shop, before he died, and she helps me with things sometimes. So I took the music box there to find out what it was worth. But afterward I returned it. It’s in the ghosthouse again.”

  “Show me,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  We hiked up the hill, through sunny ferns, shadowed boulders, the rotting white trunks of fallen birch trees. Grandpa Rose was smoking on the porch of the ghosthouse, feeding raspberries to birds. Grandpa Dykhouse was reading the endnote of some book. My elbows were bleeding.

  “Boys,” Grandpa Rose(forte) nodded.

  “Hungry?” Grandpa Dykhouse(forte) said.

  We shook our heads, then hopped through the living room window.

  I unlocked Grandpa Rose’s suitcase. The music box was inside, tucked between pairs of socks with gold toes.

  “See?” Zeke(fermata) said. “I didn’t steal it. I only steal from kids who hate me. They steal my happiness, so I steal stuff from them.”

  By now my fingers knew every hooked gouge and jagged scrape on the bottom of the music box. There wasn’t even a single new scuff or nick. I popped the lid. The same parts were there, on the inside, as always. Nothing was missing that hadn’t been missing all along. Someone had even cleaned the dust from the hinges.

  “Did you learn anything about the heirlooms?” I(forte) said.

  “When the owner saw the music box, she said she would have to take out a loan if she was going to buy it. It was priceless, she said. A handful of these music boxes still exist, but none that works,” Zeke(forte) said. “But then she wound it. And when she saw it was broken, everything changed. Broken, it’s worth the same as the others. A couple hundred dollars, tops.”

  I stuffed the music box back into the suitcase.

  “What about the other heirlooms?” I(forte) said.

  “The hammer, the clock, and the revolver, she said a lot, a fortune, and nearly priceless,” Zeke(forte) said. “Probably. In that order. Provided they aren’t broken.”

  That night at the ghosthouse I told Jordan what Zeke had said.

  Jordan only(forte) laughed.

  “Now I wish I would have tagged along,” Jordan(mezzo-forte) said. “I would pay anything to have seen that look on his face when you tackled him.”

  A NUMBER IN THE UPPER PENINSULA

  My mom handed me the phone. I could hear television(mezzo-piano) noises. My dad always called from my uncle’s living room—that’s where my dad was sleeping now, when my dad wasn’t working at the repair shop.

  “Cold there?” my dad(forte) said.

  “Sort of,” I(mezzo-forte) said.

  “Cold here,” my dad(forte) said.

  Neither of us said anything for a while. My mom walked past with flowers for the piano. She was wearing a black cardigan over a gray shirt.

  “School alright?” my dad(forte) said.

  He sounded tired. I could hear the workweek in his voice. He doesn’t know anything about music, doesn’t know anything about math. Whatever language I speak, my dad speaks something different. Still, we had to try. Even if we couldn’t understand each other, there seemed to be something important about just getting to hear each other’s voices.

  I stared through the window at my brother the tree.

  “School’s okay,” I(mezzo-piano) said.

  I waited for him to say it, before he hung up, but he didn’t say it.

  COULD HAVE SAVED LIVES, COULD HAVE BROKEN HEARTS

  For my whole life, all of my teachers have been telling my parents the same thing. My violin teacher says I could compose symphonies. My math teachers say I could design supercomputers. My science teachers say I could become a brain surgeon, a nuclear physicist, a spaceship engineer. With my brain, they say, I could become anything.

  “I’ve never taught a kid like him,”(mezzo-forte, mezzo-piano, forte) they say. “When he grows up, he can become anything, whatever he wants.”

  It’s the worst thing about my life. Because if I can become anything—if I can become anything that I choose—then whatever I become will be my fault.

  What if I tried to compose symphonies but ended up becoming a band director instead? Then everyone I’ve ever known will say, “He could have been a brain surgeon. He could have saved lives. What a waste—spending all day teaching kids how to empty spit valves.”

  But what if I tried to become a brain surgeon and ended up becoming a foot doctor instead? Then everyone I’ve ever known will say, “He could have composed symphonies. He could have broken hearts with his music. What a waste—looking all day at people’s feet.”

  Any other kid, if he became a band director or a foot doctor, his parents would be proud of him. It’s not easy to become a band director. It’s not easy to become a foot doctor. It takes a lot of work to become those things. But if I became either of those thin
gs, my teachers would be disappointed. Whatever I become, my teachers will be disappointed. “He could have become anything,” they’ll(piano) say. “And this is all that he became.”

  Grandpa Rose and I are the same that way. That night, as we sat together on the porch of the ghosthouse, Grandpa Rose pressed his fingertips to his tattoos, I touched the earring in my pocket, and we were both thinking about the same thing. Grandpa Rose doesn’t know who he is—doesn’t remember who he was anymore. I don’t know who I am—don’t even know how to choose what to try to be.

  If I truly could become anything, I would want to become normal. I would want to be like Mark Huff, who can talk to other kids in a normal way about normal things, and who can dribble a soccer ball between the trees in his yard all day and have fun and keep laughing, and who can become a foot doctor, and no one will blame him for it.

  EMPTY BOXES

  The next three days were days of shaking heads.

  We sat on wooden chairs in the library while a librarian with gray eyes searched the catalog for books about PAWPAW ISLAND.

  “Isn’t PAWPAW also the name for a grandfather?” Jordan (pianissimo)whispered.

  “Do you mean as a nickname or something?” Zeke (pianissimo)whispered.

  “Isn’t PAWPAW also the name of a tree?” I (pianissimo)whispered.

  The librarian spun on his chair, shaking his head at us.

  “Nothing,” the librarian (forte)said.

  We stood on swaying docks at the wharf while sailors in black waders(mezzo-forte) sprayed fish guts from the decks of their boats.

  “Does anyone here collect BOTTLED SHIPS?” I (forte)shouted.

  The sailors shook their heads.

  “Has anyone heard of PAWPAW ISLAND?” I (forte)shouted.

  The sailors shook their heads again.

  We waited on a bench across from the antique shop while Zeke and the owner gestured at each other inside.

  “Listen, Calculator, I’ve been thinking. What do we need Boylover for? Why don’t we split those heirlooms two ways instead of three?” Jordan (piano)whispered as the owner waved goodbye.