On the Run

by Tristan Bancks

“Read your magazine,” Dad snipped.

  “This wasn’t the deal.”

  “Let’s just pretend we’re adults for a minute, April. Think about it,” Dad said. “Oi, Big Ears!”

  Ben knew who Dad was talking about. He poked his head into the doorway. Dad gave Mum a look and walked toward Ben, who swallowed hard. Dad placed a hand on the back of his neck and spun him around so that they were both looking into the cabin.

  “What do you think?” Dad said. The room was cleaned, restored, and only smelled vaguely of mold now.

  “Not bad,” Ben said.

  “Apart from listening in on conversations, you’ve played hard, done good.” Dad took his hand off Ben’s neck. “Pull my finger.”

  Ben did.

  Parp. A sharp, loud trumpet sound from Dad’s behind.

  “Ray!” Mum said.

  Ben laughed, but Dad didn’t crack a smile. He never did, which made it even funnier.

  “I’ve got to find some reception up the hill, make some calls.” Dad headed for the car, grabbing his new phone off the front seat. He had bought himself and Mum new phones on the way up the coast and dumped their old ones in a garbage can outside the store. He walked off up the dirt road.

  Ben watched until he disappeared around the corner. Mum went back to the far side of the clearing to lie on a rock in the sun. Olive sang loudly to herself and marched up and down a low tree branch, holding the branch above her for stability, barking orders to invisible people on the ground, something about her kingdom and loyal subjects. Ben wandered into the cabin. He looked up into the open roof space, his eyes settling on the crumpled black plastic sitting on a timber slat toward the back of the cabin.

  Ben pushed the door closed and crossed the floor. He climbed onto the workbench to get a better view. He would be quiet and get this over with quickly.

  THE SECRET

  He stood on his tiptoes and strained to see but he was too far away. Dad had used a chair to reach into the roof area, but Ben was not tall enough for that and the table looked too rickety to hold his weight.

  Hungry.

  So hungry. He had eaten a tiny morsel of the Kit Kat as they cleaned up the cabin but that was it.

  He slipped down off the workbench and tried to push it but it wouldn’t budge. He moved in behind it and put all his weight against it, shoving with everything he had. It moved a few inches, grinding across the wooden floor. He gave it another push, then crept to the door and looked out. No Dad. Mum still lying, lizardlike, on her rock on the opposite side of the clearing.

  Ben rushed back across the cabin floor and pushed the workbench a few more inches. He stopped, listened, breathed hard, shoved it again. Another low wood-on-wood groan. He wondered if he’d be able to reach the plastic now but decided he needed to get at least a foot closer. He ran to the door and checked again, heart thumping lickety-split. Mum rolled over on her rock to face the cabin.

  “What are you doing?” she called across the clearing.

  “Nothing,” he yelled back. “Just bored.”

  “Well, find something to do,” she said, closing her eyes.

  Olive was at the base of the tree now, still addressing her loyal subjects.

  He ducked back inside. He would have to push the workbench across the floor in one almighty shove. It would be loud but otherwise it would take forever and Dad would return. He gripped the thick timber edges of the old bench, stretched one leg back behind him, and readied himself.

  “One, two, three…” he whispered. The workbench screamed across the floor and came to a stop. So loud. He stood, breathless.

  “Hi,” said a voice. Ben’s heart leaped from his throat. He turned to the door.

  “Shhh!” he hissed at Olive. “Get out!”

  She stood there, bottom lip out, then she pointed at him and screamed, “You’re mean!” and ran away.

  Ben eased the door closed. He heard Mum ask what had happened. He jumped up on the workbench, reaching as high as he could. His fingers managed to push the black plastic aside enough to scrape the bottom of something, but not quite enough to get a hold on it. He reached again and opened the plastic farther.

  Ben recognized the bag as soon as he saw it. It was gray nylon with black handles. He positioned his toes on the very edge of the workbench and reached for the stars, pinching a corner of the nylon. He steadied himself and pulled at the tiny corner of material. He seized a handful of bag and lost balance, falling off the edge of the bench, pulling the bag down on top of him. Large clumps of something fell out.

  Ben landed awkwardly on his side. One of the clumps that had fallen from the bag lay on the floor in front of his face, lashed together with a rubber band. Ben took it in his hand and sat up. A serious-looking man with a large forehead, thick eyebrows, and a bushy mustache stared back at him from the top of the pile he was holding. All around the man were pictures of cannons, soldiers, images of battle.

  Ben was holding money. A lot of money. He had never in his life seen a single one-hundred-dollar bill. Now he clutched a wad of the green bills. He smelled it to see if it was real, but he had no idea what money was supposed to smell like. He flicked through it with his thumb. The pile of cash was two inches thick. How many hundred-dollar bills would fit into such a stack? Three hundred? Five hundred? Ben calculated it in his mind.

  Could he really be holding $50,000? He glanced around and stood up to look in the bag, which lay twisted and open on the workbench. There were fifteen or twenty identical piles of cash in the bag and on the floor.

  Dad and Mum never had spare money, even for shoes or haircuts. One of Dad’s favorite sayings was “Money makes the world go round,” but most of the time their world stood still. Ben had missed out on the science excursion on sand dune ecology a week earlier because they didn’t have the fifteen dollars. But now they had lots of money. Why wasn’t it in the bank?

  A noise out front. Ben grabbed the sports bag and stuffed the thick blocks of cash back in, carefully watching the door and window. Fear roared through him, making him clumsy. He tried to shut the bag but the zipper was broken.

  Dad said something to Mum. Ben’s throat closed. He jumped up on the workbench and reached high, trying to shove the bag back into place, but he wasn’t tall enough. He took steady aim and threw the bag onto the wide timber slat but it fell back into his hands.

  “Where’s the boy?” Dad called to Mum, his voice very near to the cabin now. Mum said something about Ben moving furniture.

  He tried again, throwing the bag up onto the timber slat that ran across the roof beams. The bag held, but one end hung down, revealing the money. Dad’s footsteps sounded on the gravelly sand near the cabin door. Ben jumped down, giving the workbench two tremendous shoves into position next to the wall just as Dad walked in. Ben breathed hard, guilt painted across his face in sweat.

  “What’re you up to?” Dad said. “Decorating?”

  Ben took a slow breath and said, “Yeah. I tried moving things around but I reckon it all looks best where you had it.”

  Dad studied him for a few seconds. Ben took long, slow breaths.

  “Can we go outside?” Ben asked.

  “What for?”

  “Explore … see the river.”

  Dad looked at him. “You sick? You never want to go outside.”

  “Yeah, but … there’s all this nature.”

  Dad eyed him, walked to the table, grabbed his keys. “I’ve got to go out.”

  “Where to?” Ben asked, an awkwardly long time after his father had spoken.

  Dad shook his head and looked at Ben, puzzled. “You’re a very strange boy.” He headed for the door.

  Ben breathed out slowly and hope flooded in. He wished his father out of the cabin with everything in his soul.

  Dad stopped in the doorway and turned, clicking his tongue like he had forgotten something. He looked up into the open roof space.

  IN WHICH BEN GETS CAUGHT

  Dad walked slowly to the back of the cabin, l
ooking up, squinting to be sure that he could see what he thought he saw. A bag hung from the roof beam, a wad of cash lolling out like a tongue.

  Ben crabbed sideways toward the door.

  “Hey!” Dad called. It didn’t sound like “Hey, you found my bag! I’d been meaning to tell you about the hundreds of thousands of dollars I’d hidden in the roof.” It was more of a “Hey, you have about a second and a half before I explode like Vesuvius.”

  Ben stopped.

  Dad turned and lunged at Ben, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck. He marched Ben to the back of the cabin and tilted his head up.

  “What is this?” he barked.

  Ben looked at the bag, hanging, threatening to fall.

  “Is everything okay?” Mum called from across the clearing.

  “Was this you?” Dad shouted at Ben, daring him to lie.

  Ben was too scared to say anything. The neck of his shirt was pulled tight against his throat. Difficult to breathe. He heard running.

  Olive arrived in the doorway.

  “What happened?” Olive asked.

  “You go climb the tree, sweetie,” Mum said, arriving next to her.

  “But I—”

  “Go!”

  Little footsteps.

  Ben wanted to climb a tree too, for the first time in his life. Or to hide in his mum’s skirt like he had when he was two.

  “Was it you?” Dad asked.

  “I didn’t see what was in it,” Ben said.

  “What’d I tell you about stickin’ your big bib in?”

  “I don’t know,” Ben said.

  Dad was quiet then. In Ben’s experience it was never good when adults were quiet in this kind of situation.

  “I think—” Mum said.

  Dad shushed her.

  “What do you think I should do?” he said, letting go of Ben’s collar. Ben stood up straight, avoiding eye contact with his father. There was no correct answer to this question. Ben would either suggest a punishment worse than Dad had in mind or he would suggest something easier, nicer, and his father would erupt.

  Ben shrugged, concentrating on his feet. His shoelaces were grubby and splotchy. One was untied. The leather on the toe and side of his right sneaker was gray and worn from soccer. Ben closed his eyes for a moment. On the movie screen at the back of his eyelids, he watched the last ten minutes of his life in rewind, like he was scanning back over one of his movies. He wanted to reshoot every frame from the moment he entered the cabin. He wanted to stay outside, not let curiosity get the better of him. He did not want to know what was in the bag.

  “What do you think I should do about busybodies?” Dad said sharply, lifting Ben’s chin, pressing “stop” on Ben’s in-brain rewind. “What?” Dad shouted again.

  “It’s not his fault,” Mum said, taking a few steps into the cabin. Ben could see her hovering behind Dad.

  “What’s not his fault? That I can’t have a single thing to myself without someone sticking their nose into it?”

  “We sold the wreckers,” Mum said.

  Everyone was quiet. Dad blinked and straightened his body, taking in what she had said.

  “What?” Ben asked, turning to her.

  “Dad. He sold the wrecking business.”

  Ben thought about this for a second. “Did they pay cash?”

  Mum nodded and scratched her neck.

  Ben looked at Dad, who stared back. “Well, why didn’t—”

  “We thought you’d be upset,” Mum said.

  “Upset?” Ben asked. Why would she say that? Mum knew that he didn’t like the wrecking yard. It was filled with dead, broken, rusty things, and when he was there he had to search for parts or clean the toilet or restock the drinks fridge. The only good thing about the wrecking yard was when he found something interesting, like his camera, in one of the cars.

  “Right,” Ben said. “So … is the money…” He stopped. He tried to think back through the events of the past two days, but his thoughts were scrambled. He suddenly felt tired. “How long are we staying here?” he asked.

  “I need to work out what we’re doing,” Dad said.

  “… for the rest of the vacation,” Mum added.

  “Yes, for the rest of the vacation,” Dad said. “Get away from me. Go and play.”

  Ben did not need to be told twice. He slipped past his father, around his mother, grabbed his backpack from near the door, and exited the cabin. His parents began arguing. Ben walked to the edge of the steep hill and looked down through the pine forest toward the river. He had never spent time in the bush, had never left the suburbs. He did not want to go to the river. The wilderness was his enemy.

  “What did you do?” said a voice from above. Ben looked up, squinting into the sun. It was Olive sitting on the lowest branch of the tree.

  The hunger hit Ben again. It was lunchtime, and his stomach ached, but he knew there was no food.

  “I’m goin’ out!” Dad stormed out of the cabin. He was carrying the sports bag.

  “Be careful, Ray,” Mum said, following him. “And please make the arrangements today. I can’t stay here.”

  Dad climbed into the car and slammed the door.

  “Ray?”

  “Yes, I’ll make the arrangements,” he said through the window.

  “And get some clothes for the kids!”

  Dad reversed, spun the wheel, and powered off up the hill, leaving them in a cloud of swirling dust.

  Ben turned and, without a word, he let the trees take him. He let himself go off the edge of the slope and disappear. Down, down, down.

  CULPAM POENA PREMIT COMES

  Ben flew steeply down, dodging thick, rough chocolate-brown tree trunks, his feet deep in pine needles. Sun lit him in sharp bursts as he thundered into the valley. The water-rush became ever louder, filling him up.

  The river emerged through the trees, and Ben began to slow, digging his heels into the damp black soil beneath. He came to a skidding stop at the large, mossy sandstone boulders that led down to the water. The river was about thirty feet wide. Sun hit the surface in patches, revealing muddy brown rocks beneath. Ben wondered how deep it was. Downstream there was a small waterfall leading to a lower section of river. On the far side, a sheer sandstone cliff soared a hundred feet above Ben’s head. Fishbone ferns poked from cracks and scars in the cliff. The wall ran along the river’s edge as far up- and downstream as he could see.

  Thirst tore at him then. He jumped onto a small boulder that was shaped almost like a pyramid and leaped from rock to rock, careful to avoid the slippery-looking patches of moss. He was halfway down to the water when he thought about snakes. They liked rocks. He had a book on snakes at home, a library book that he had never returned. (After snakes, his greatest fear was ever going back to the public library, in case he was arrested for theft.) Ben loved to scare himself in the comfort of his bedroom, but out here he couldn’t shut the book and stop the fear. Nature was real and true and terrible.

  He paused on a rock and looked up the hill, thinking of running back to the safety of the cabin. Which was worse? Snakes or his family? Fear told him to get off the rocks, but thirst drove him down to the water. He pulled his school socks up to his knees and stepped carefully, eyes darting all around, waiting for venomous fangs to emerge from a crevice and end him. He stepped onto a mossy green rock near the water, slipping and breaking his fall with the palms of his hands. The sting screamed, and he quickly dipped his hands into the fast-moving river. The water was cold, soothing the sting. His throat and stomach howled for liquid.

  Ben looked upstream, wondering if the water was safe to drink. He cupped water in his hands. There were tiny specks of moss and other plant matter floating in it, but Ben’s thirst was too great. He brought the cupped handful to his mouth and gulped it down. He scooped his hands in again and sucked the water back into his throat. It felt so good and cold that his head and insides lit up. He scooped again and slurped thirstily, drinking water till his belly ached. He s
plashed his face and collapsed back onto the mossy rock, another boulder behind him making a backrest.

  There was something uncomfortable in Ben’s back pocket. He took it out. The book he had taken from the cabin. My Side of the Mountain. Ben flicked through. There were illustrations showing how to make a trap for deer and a fishhook out of twigs. He read the back cover. It was about a kid named Sam Gribley who runs away from home in New York City to live in the Catskill Mountains by himself. He sleeps inside a tree and survives off the land. Ben threw the book onto the rock next to him. His eyes darted around. He knew that he would have no chance out here alone. Ben’s survival skills included hunting for leftovers in the fridge, lowering bread into the toaster, and switching on the heater when it was cold. None of these talents would be useful here.

  He breathed hard and sat up straight. He felt better, even with a bellyache. It was cooler down by the water. The moist, woodsy air and the steady shhh sound of the river seemed to swallow him and make him part of it all. Ben looked up through the ferns and spiky plants sticking out of the rocks, but he couldn’t see the cabin.

  “Mum,” he called.

  No response.

  “Mum!”

  The echo of his own voice off the rocks.

  He was alone. Just Ben. And river and bird and frog. And snake.

  He stood and lifted a palm-size rock and threw it into the river just to see the splash. He stuffed the book back into his pocket and grabbed another rock, throwing it as high as he could, the impact kicking splash all over him and putting a smile on his face for the first time in days.

  As Ben turned to look for another rock he saw something move at the corner of his vision. It was a rabbit, a light gray one, hopping from the tree line to the top rock. It stopped, looked down at him, still. Ben began to move slowly up the rocks, but the rabbit skittered off the way it had come. He smiled again, looking all around. At home the closest thing he had to his own secret place was the crusty patch of land at the back of the wrecking yard. The tall grass there was peppered with graffiti-stained cars and the trains speeding by were loud and annoying. But here there was nothing man-made. Only Ben.