Steering Toward Normal

by Rebecca Petruck

  He pushed his way in, then stopped, not sure what he had thought to do. “Uh. Happy birthday?”

  She smiled one of those smiles that looked more sad than happy, and then she hugged him again. He let her.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  He nodded and pulled away. When she brushed his hair off his forehead, he let her do that, too. Then he grinned and messed it up again. This time her smile was real. Before he could say something stupid, Diggy dashed away, this time in the right direction to collect his gear, and he was kind of glad that Wayne trailed him again so he could say, “I’m sorry about your grandma.”

  “She’ll be okay,” Wayne said. “She gets worked up sometimes, but my aunts always know what to do.”

  A few people slapped Diggy on the back, laughing and shaking their heads at the same time. No one seemed mad at him, though a few moms definitely gave him the stink-eye.

  “That wasn’t so bad, actually,” Wayne said.

  “Did you want it to crash into her house?” Diggy asked incredulously.

  “I meant Pop. I thought he’d be madder.”

  Diggy winced. Pop was mad, all right. Diggy hadn’t gotten away with anything. “You know he doesn’t yell much.” There would definitely be grounding, though. Diggy had no idea what other form of torture Pop would inflict, but there’d be something.

  When they got to the launch pad, slipped sideways now in the rain-softened ground, Diggy remembered their tribute to Mrs. Graf. “Maybe your mom’s spirit will protect us.”

  Wayne had grabbed Diggy’s duffel but froze for several long seconds before slowly standing up again, his back to Diggy, and shaking off the drying mud from the bag, making Diggy pause, too.

  Mrs. Graf’s funeral was the first one Diggy had ever gone to. The coffin was made of pale golden wood polished to such a high gloss, it glowed. It had hovered over a sunbaked hole whose sides looked more like chiseled rock than dirt. Dark-clothed people topped with gray faces had circled the coffin. Wayne had been his palest ever. That had been at the beginning of the school year, and now school was over.

  “It’s not really that long ago, is it?” Diggy said.

  Wayne stared at the duffel bag.

  Diggy felt like he should say something else, but he couldn’t think of anything. After a while, he came up with, “Think she still would have liked this?”

  “The Fourth was her favorite holiday.” He slanted a weird look at Diggy. “Your mom would have liked it, too.”

  It was Diggy’s turn to freeze. Wayne had that tone, like he knew something. “What do you mean?”

  “She listed fireworks as one of her favorite things.”

  Diggy spoke very slowly and clearly. “You’ve still got those yearbooks?”

  “Of course,” Wayne bit out, defensive but trying to act like he wasn’t. “I’ve been studying them. That’s my business.”

  “She’s my mom!”

  “You don’t want her.”

  “She doesn’t want me!”

  “You don’t know that. That’s why we should find her.” Wayne almost sounded like he was begging. “She might be trying to find you.”

  “I’m exactly where she left me!” Diggy shouted. “It’s called logic, Wayne!”

  “Maybe Pop kept her from you,” Wayne said back. “Did you ever think of that? Maybe she wanted to come home, but Pop wouldn’t let her.”

  The idea stopped Diggy. He blinked. A lot. “He wouldn’t do that.”

  “Are you sure?”

  All it took was three seconds. “Yes,” Diggy said firmly. “I’m sure. Pop wouldn’t do that.” Diggy knew it absolutely. Pop might make him crazy sometimes, even furious, but he had always tried to be straight with Diggy. If Diggy stopped believing that, he couldn’t believe anything about the world.

  “We should find her anyway,” Wayne said. “To ask why she left, if nothing else.”

  Now Diggy felt like an E-class motor on the verge of ignition. He jerked at the launch rod, breaking the two pieces apart before he’d gotten it all the way out of the ground.

  “‘Why’ matters,” Wayne argued.

  Diggy pulled at the bottom half of the launch rod, feeling too tired to get a good grip on it. He knew “why” mattered—he didn’t need Wayne to tell him that. Diggy had wondered “why” his entire life. Which was also how he knew that getting the answer to “why” wouldn’t really matter at all.

  Why did he have to tell Wayne the same thing over and over? Diggy knew Wayne was sad about his own mom, but could he really not see that keeping at Diggy about his mom was like peeling off a giant scab every time? After everything that had just happened with the rocket, Mrs. Vogl, and July, Diggy didn’t have the energy to fight about it anymore. He sighed. “Just let it go, Wayne. Please.”

  JULY’S BIRTHDAY WAS THE LAST DIGGY SAW OF THE GIRL HE LIKED. WITH THE county fair two weeks away, a new July Johnston appeared, one who started in with telling Diggy and Wayne what to wear and how to wear it. She told them to get haircuts, when to get haircuts so they wouldn’t look too fresh, and what kind of haircuts to get. The girl was just plain bossy.

  Diggy was surprised he got annoyed with her. He knew she wanted to help him do well. And he wanted to win. But this was his fourth year. She knew that he knew what to do. He could pretend most of her directions were for Wayne, but it didn’t seem that way.

  Still, the times he got testy with her, he felt like a jerk. Especially when he admitted that, though this was his fourth year, it was the first one that really mattered. He wasn’t simply competing his calf. He was meant to fill July’s boots.

  Not that he had a lot of time to worry about it. Days after July’s party and the rocket fiasco, Pop still hadn’t announced Diggy’s punishment. Which was a bad sign. Pop never did anything until his temper had cooled. If Pop waited much longer, Diggy was afraid he’d be relegated to cleaning out the septic tank, which wasn’t actually possible for him to do, but Diggy figured Pop could rig up something if it suited his mood.

  So it was almost a relief when Diggy came in from the barn one night and heard John Fogerty’s Blue Moon Swamp CD playing. Pop’s getting ready to go out meant he could blow off some steam, which was good news, as far as Diggy was concerned.

  He found Pop in the living room, wet hair combed flat, trying to button his shirt and tuck it in at the same time.

  “We’re going out?” Wayne asked.

  “I’m going out,” Pop corrected, with a pointed look at Diggy. “There’s a double-stuffed meat pizza in the freezer. Defrost some broccoli, and we’ll call it a balanced meal.”

  He went back into the hallway.

  “Going out where?” Wayne gritted out.

  Diggy didn’t bother answering. Wayne knew Pop was going to meet friends at Otto’s. Wayne had thrown away Pop’s phone messages about doing so whenever he got the chance.

  “We should stop him,” Wayne said.

  “Why?” Diggy followed.

  “So he doesn’t do to someone else what he did to our moms.”

  Diggy recoiled from the first thought that came to mind. “Uh, he’s probably just meeting friends, and he doesn’t always stay out that late anyway.”

  Wayne glared at him. “What if there are more of us out there?”

  Pop trotted down the stairs and got his leather jacket out of the hall closet.

  “I don’t feel good,” Wayne said. But he said it through his teeth and didn’t act sick at all.

  Pop squinted at him. “You don’t look sick.”

  He had that tone—that how-stupid-do-you-think-I-am tone—that Diggy heard every time he made up some lame excuse for skipping homework or chores or for why he’d gotten into a fight with Wayne again. He would have warned Wayne to scrap his plan, whatever it was, but Wayne was ahead of him.

  “I think the tuna we had for lunch was bad.”

  Diggy closed his eyes. Wayne was so bad at this. Both Pop and Diggy had had the tuna, too, and neither of them was sick.

 
; Pop shrugged the leather jacket into place across his shoulders. Wayne was big compared to Diggy, but Pop was that much bigger. He studied Wayne.

  Wayne fidgeted, his jaw tight, those giveaway red circles on his cheeks. Diggy knew Wayne’s feeble attempt had already failed, but Wayne seemed to think he still had a shot.

  Pop’s eyes narrowed. “I get to have some fun every now and then, too.”

  “Like you did with our moms?” Wayne accused.

  Now Pop’s jaw tightened. He opened his mouth, then bit back whatever he had thought to say. Instead, he said, “I like to go out by myself and be with other adults sometimes.” He spoke in a calm, reasonable tone. “Your mother liked to do the same occasionally.”

  Wayne froze. “She went out with her girlfriends.”

  Pop was gentle. “Where do you think she went?”

  “She didn’t go out with you!” Wayne’s hands were clenched at his sides.

  “No,” Pop said, his voice still low. “She didn’t. I’m only trying to explain that every now and then grown-ups need to have time on their own to have fun with friends their age. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

  “Except when you say ‘fun,’ you mean ‘sex.’”

  “No. I don’t. But that part of my life is personal. It’s not anything you get to comment on.”

  “Why not? I’m the result of it, aren’t I? Did you lie to her? Did you tell her you cared?” Wayne’s voice got higher and more shrill with every syllable.

  Pop’s face was like stone. “I cared about your mother.”

  Wayne snorted. “And Diggy’s mom, and some other kid out there waiting to be left on our doorstep?”

  “I learn from my mistakes,” Pop bit out. Then he chewed his lip. “I should have been more careful with your moms. That was my mistake.” Pop looked away, his eyes seeing some time long ago, before the boys. “I cared about them both.” He zeroed back in on Diggy and Wayne. “But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t as stupid as any other twenty-something college kid.”

  Wayne breathed heavily—Diggy could see his back expand with each fast breath—but apparently he was out of words.

  The boys watched Pop zip up his coat. At the kitchen door, he slipped into his good boots. “You could try to be in bed before I get home.”

  Diggy nodded. He didn’t think Pop would have much fun tonight.

  Wayne stared.

  Pop left.

  They stood in the kitchen, listening to the pickup’s engine turn over and its tires crunch gravel. The sound of the motor faded.

  “We’re mistakes.”

  Wayne’s teeth were clenched so tightly, Diggy was surprised he was able to get any words out at all.

  “He didn’t mean it like that.” But Diggy’s stomach turned over again, remembering Pop’s words. Thinking about him all those months ago when Wayne arrived, saying, We have to.

  Wayne lurched out the kitchen door.

  Diggy followed. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to see what he does.” He opened the barn doors. “I’m going to stop him if he goes off with a girl.”

  “This is stupid. Pop’s a good person.”

  “Why?” Wayne stared at him. “Because he took you in when he had no other choice?”

  The words hit Diggy like a fist, but he refused to go down. “Because he took you in.”

  Wayne shook his head.

  Diggy followed Wayne into the barn just to follow him, but then his brain caught up. “How do you think you’re getting into town?”

  Wayne grabbed keys off the hook and walked to the tractor.

  “No,” Diggy groaned. Then he shouted, “You are not taking the tractor!”

  The engine cranked on Wayne’s first try.

  Wayne messed around with gears and levers until the tractor bucked forward a few feet, and Diggy had to take several large steps to get out of the way. He knew it had been a bad idea for Pop to show the guy how to drive it. Diggy waved his arms. “Wayne! Stop! You won’t make it into town.”

  Wayne looked down. “Do you think he ever tried to find your mom? Do you wonder if he tried to give you back? Why aren’t you as mad as me?”

  “I am!” Diggy shouted back.

  He blinked fast, but the words stayed said. He was mad. He had been mad at Pop all year, but he thought it was for taking Wayne’s side all the time, for being so worried about Wayne’s feelings. Diggy knew the whole thing he’d done with the rocket was because he was mad at Pop. But he had never let himself think that part of the reason he was mad was about his mom. But it was there. He could feel it, a tangle of barbed wire wrapped around his chest.

  Wayne got the tractor moving more smoothly and headed down the drive.

  Diggy jogged beside him. “What will you do when you get there? You can’t do anything!”

  Wayne got to the end of the drive and slowed to make the turn onto the gravel road. He looked both ways.

  Diggy hopped onto the tractor’s steps and got ahold of the door handle. The door swung open, and Diggy swung wide, a foot slipping off a step. The toe of his sneaker caught on one of the treads of the slowly turning giant tire and pulled him down. His one-handed grip loosened. He kicked his toe free and pulled as hard as could, swinging himself back around. He hung from the open door with feet braced against a step as the tractor jostled and stopped.

  “You coming?” Wayne asked.

  “It’s not worth it, Wayne. Turn around.”

  “Get in, or get off.” Wayne shifted back into gear.

  Diggy climbed into the cab. It wasn’t designed for two people. He leaned against the back glass, bracing his hip on the seat and a hand on the roof. He spread his feet wide but still wobbled when Wayne got the tractor going again.

  Diggy watched the dark road ahead. The tractor had lights, but Wayne hadn’t turned them on. Diggy waited until he got the rhythm of the ride, then quickly leaned forward and flicked the switch. The headlights shone out across the gravel.

  Diggy thought of his mom. It had been light out when she left town. Middle of the day. Maybe she had wanted to get caught. But Pop had walked through the woods to Kubat’s to talk about some new agri-engineering design idea and never even knew she was there. People who saw her on the road waved her by, smiling, even, to see such a small lady on such a big tractor. That’s how people always told the story. But maybe she had wanted to be stopped, until suddenly a line was crossed, invisible but real, and she knew she could never go back and kept riding.

  Wayne had asked if Pop had looked for her.

  Diggy had never once in his life wondered that until Wayne had started asking. There were too many things to wonder about it, and he wanted it all to stop. Had Pop ever thought about trying to make Diggy’s mom a part of their lives? If he hadn’t, why not? Was leaving him on Pop’s doorstep such a terrible thing to do, she couldn’t be forgiven? That was what Diggy had always told himself, but ever since Wayne got dumped at his house, Diggy wasn’t sure about anything anymore. Pop had always been the good guy, the one who’d kept Diggy. But if Pop didn’t have a choice …

  Diggy told himself it was the bumpy ride that made him want to puke.

  At the next turn, they finally hit asphalt. Wayne hugged the road’s shoulder so the tractor rode unevenly, lower on the right, making it a little easier for Diggy to keep his balance upright against the seat back.

  A car passed them going in the opposite direction. It was a blur of light, there and gone in moments.

  “It will be hours before we get to town,” Diggy said. Even at top speed, the tractor was a lot slower than Pop’s truck.

  Wayne breathed loudly through his nose. He didn’t care how long it took.

  “We don’t even know for sure where Pop went.”

  Wayne ignored him.

  Diggy sighed. They both knew Pop was at Otto’s.

  They rode in silence. A few more cars passed them.

  The engine coughed.

  Diggy frowned at the gauges.

  Wa
yne worked the gears. The engine grumbled.

  The ride got bumpier.

  Diggy saw that the gas gauge was on Empty just as the engine gave out. The tractor rolled a few feet, then ran out of momentum and stilled.

  Diggy crossed his arms. Closed his eyes. They were stuck miles from home with a tractor. They would be found. His mom’s story would come up. Like mother, like son.

  He fumbled the door open and went too fast down the steps. He stumbled and cracked a knee against the road. He let himself feel the pain for a few seconds, then righted himself and started walking.

  “Hey,” Wayne called out. “What are you doing?”

  Diggy turned around and marched back to the tractor. He looked up at Wayne, still seated in the cab. “You did this!” Diggy shouted. “You got me out here in a tractor.”

  “You didn’t have to come,” Wayne said loudly in return, climbing down to the road.

  “And why?” Diggy went on. “To keep Pop away from your mom? It’s too late for that!”

  “This isn’t about my mom!”

  “Yes, it is,” Diggy said, his voice breaking on a high note. “It’s about both our moms. You want it to be about Pop, but it’s not.” Diggy shook his head. He was tired of yelling. “It’s about how our moms didn’t say no.”

  Thinking that, it dawned on Diggy what else Wayne’s mom hadn’t said. “And she didn’t tell you.”

  “Go home,” Wayne snarled. “You don’t know anything.”

  He turned to climb back onto the tractor, but Diggy grabbed his arm. “She let you think Mr. Graf was your dad. She let him think it, too. She lied.”

  Wayne pushed Diggy so hard, Diggy tripped backward, couldn’t get his feet under him, and fell. His palms slid across asphalt. Seconds later, the pain registered. He struggled back to his feet, trying not to use his hands.

  “You know what’s so stupid about you being mad?” Diggy asked. He blinked to clear the wetness out of his eyes. “You had her. You had her for fourteen years, and she was great. I know she was, because I knew her, too.”

  “You don’t know anything.”

  “I know how lucky you are.”

  Wayne grabbed the front of Diggy’s shirt. “My mom’s dead!”