by Joe Meno
As you are walking home, you are trying to remember the cheers your older sister Melanie used to practice when you shared the same room. This was before she disappeared last year, stealing your small white piggy bank, which contained nearly three hundred dollars, saved from babysitting the previous summer. Melanie is now somewhere in Arizona with an older man named Ron who is no one you have ever met. You imagine him with rough hands and a mustache. Melanie sent you a letter recently telling you she wishes she never left. You carry the letter at the bottom of your school bag and hope she is not dead.
“Ready? Okay!” is about the only part of Melanie’s cheers that you can remember, but you repeat the phrase again and again, pronouncing it with each step.
A strange brown station wagon pulls up beside you as you continue to absent-mindedly rehearse, remembering the staged smile on your older sister’s pretty face. A good-looking man with dark hair and a black eye patch unrolls the passenger’s side window and calls to you.
“Hello!” he shouts. “Can you help me, please?”
You look at the man and know at once that he is seriously troubled. You know at once that he means you harm. The shape of his chin is weak and his mouth is soft and resigned. You approach the passenger’s side door and stare down and see his hands are white and trembling. You can easily imagine him strangling you to death with those hands and think perhaps death by strangling would not be so bad.
“I will give you fifty dollars if you’ll come sit next to me.”
You look down into his face and know if you get in the car, nothing will be the same for you ever again. You think this is one of those moments, this is one of those moments where everything changes.
If you do decide to climb into the car with the mysterious man, go to page 3.
If you decide to turn and just keep on walking, practicing the cheers of your older sister, who may already be dead, go to page 8 instead.
You open the station wagon door and climb inside. With his black eye patch on, the mysterious man looks handsome and daring, a buccaneer from a romance novel you’ve just read.
“What do you want me to do?” you ask, all out of breath.
“I want you to hold my hand.”
His large pale hand reaches out for your small dainty one. You close your eyes and imagine this as the final moment of your life. You are pleased to think people will certainly be surprised when they find your body somewhere in the woods, naked, marked with the signs of struggle, a struggle no one ever thought about until this grave instant, this instant where a strange man took your hand. But he does not try to strangle you. The man folds his chin against his chest and immediately begins crying. You sit beside him and he holds your hand and continues to cry, then he stops, apologizes, and gives you the fifty dollars as promised: two twenties and a wrinkled ten.
“You’ve kept me from doing something,” he whispers, still holding your hand. “I was going to do something awful to myself.”
You look down at your feet and see a dirty brown paper bag and suddenly know there is a weapon of some kind, a knife or a gun, resting silently inside, the man’s desperate fingerprints smudgy on its shapeless handle. You also realize the man is not a man at all but a boy, seventeen or eighteen at the oldest. This is clearly his parents’ car since there is a small religious figure on the dash and a needle and yarn resting beside you on the seat. You see what you thought was a mustache is the same desperate unshaven fuzz of the boys who pass you in the hallway. You let go of this strange boy’s hand and now feel like you’ve forgotten how to breathe.
You fold the money into your pocket and climb out in a hurry. As you’re leaving, the boy asks, “May I see you again?” You take out a pen and write down your real name, address, and telephone number on the back of his hand, then walk away without talking.
As you head on home, you wonder what your father would think of what has just happened. You wonder if he is watching over you, or, like everything else you believe, only a dream.
If you decide to go on believing that love continues after death, go to page 4.
If you decide that death is the end of all things, go to page 16.
* * *
You decide to go on believing death is not the end. You decide to keep on believing that love is greater than any mortal divide. You think of the hospital before your father died and the odor you could not place. You would sit beside him, his soft gray eyes closed and sad, the sound of the machine beside him breathing mechanically, his hand resting beside yours, crossed with strange-looking blue veins. Every day after school, when you went to visit, you wore the yellow-and-white striped sweater he had given you for your last birthday. It was too small and was tight in the shoulders but you wore it every time you went to visit anyway.
After your father had been in the hospital for three months, you told him it was time he got a haircut. He agreed. A nurse came in and tied a white smock around his neck and gave him a trim. He looked handsome, like a movie star. He was thirty-nine, only thirty-nine. He looked one hundred. You did not care. You combed his hair and he asked where your mother was. You lied and said she was working.
When he died, you made a promise to yourself not to cry. Not ever. You have not broken this promise yet, but have come very close, and this, this moment now, walking home alone, thinking also of the strange boy in the station wagon, this may be one of those times.
If you decide to go home and practice for cheerleading tryouts tomorrow instead, go to page 5.
If you decide to start crying and finally break that promise, go to page 15.
In the school locker room the next day, you undress before cheerleading tryouts and become terrified of how white your legs look. You notice Hope Chang, a varsity member of the cheerleading squad, slipping out of her jean skirt, her legs like a swimsuit model, her bust womanly and thrumming. You realize that what you are doing now is just as painful as stabbing yourself, worse possibly, because suicide, in its own way, at least has an end. This, this prolonged heartache, this living day to day, it is these moments, these deep, deep, howling moments, these upturned, dark, and woeful moments, these clawing, coffin-shaped moments, these nail-through-the-palm-of-your-hand moments, these every-breath-you-take-is-full-of-baby-spiders moments, it is these moments that are by far much more frightening.
In the gym, in front of the coach, your legs begin to buckle. The coach is a small, dark-eyed woman, her hair long and unbrushed, a silent sign of the grief from having lost one of her own. She is clearly bereaved, clearly struggling to keep herself from crying. She looks over the nine or ten girls there for tryouts and then whispers, the sound of her voice a dull, unanswerable question, “Who among you, like Jessica, has the guts to climb to the top of the human pyramid? Who among you is willing to threaten life and limb, staring into the dark profundity of death, at the screaming height of halftime, just like our dear Jessica?”
You take a small, hesitant step forward, raising your little hand. The coach nods and blows her whistle, and immediately the six living members of the cheerleading squad assemble, young, darling, skin both shiny and scrubbed. They begin a cheer and one by one start to form a gigantic human pyramid. The coach, wiping a flurry of tears from her eyes, nods at you and you walk forward, taking Hope Chang’s hand. You climb upward, completely ready for this to be it, your final moment, your often-imagined death.
You don’t die, however. Somehow, somehow you manage to stand, only wishing this would be the end.
You are at home now and staring at yourself in the mirror. You do not like what you see. You do not ever like what you see except for your knees. They are the only thing remotely tolerable, but as you know, no one besides you ever notices your knees. You hold the red-and-white cheerleading uniform in front of your small, narrow body and cannot imagine how you will look wearing it: It is the soft, professionally cleaned garment of a dead girl, and like a lost letter, you imagine it carries some of Jessica Bennet’s secrets. Along the ruffled wrist is the mark of wh
at may be the remains of a kiss left by Brad Armstrong, the moment before they pressed one another against the rear of Jessica Bennet’s red-and-white jeep: the pressure of his hands insistent, his mouth muttering angry requests Jessica would never be able to argue against. There along the frilly skirt is what must be a dewdrop of a tear from when Jessica strained in agony, holding Hope Chang above her head, breathing through the brightest smile she could force, at the head of the Founder’s Day parade, the whole town and boyfriend Brad looking on proudly. Were they already talking about breaking up? Had he left a mumbled phone message or passed some imbecilic note detailing the reason why Jessica was no longer the one for him? Had he even told her or had she seen him laughing at some else’s jokes and just known? Searching for evidence, you inspect the uniform carefully and discover a small unwound thread spiraling loose from its spot along the edge of the narrow waist. There, like Morse code, in nearly invisible white knots, you are certain she has spelled out the word Brad.
The phone rings and, as no one ever calls for you, you are quite surprised when your mother, from down the hall, shouts out your name. So unsure are you of the call that you stare at the pink sparkle phone at the foot of your bed as if it is another piece of furniture and not a telephone at all. You pick up the receiver and speak, though not confidently, and the voice that responds is the voice of the boy who, just yesterday afternoon, was holding your hand and crying.
“I called to thank you,” he mumbles. “And to apologize.”
“Apologize?” you say.
“For scaring you. I’m sorry to scare you like that.”
“I wasn’t scared,” you say and realize you are not lying.
“I have been driving around thinking these things for a long time. I have been driving around and thinking maybe I don’t deserve to be alive.”
You whisper the word, “Why?”
You whisper it quickly and wonder if he is still there listening, and there is a silent beeping on the line before his voice returns and he asks: “What’s the worst thing you ever did?” His voice is turning to static and you suddenly feel like you are once again in the car with him.
The answer you are thinking of is this: I did not love my dad enough to keep him from dying.
“I don’t know,” you say. “I haven’t done anything really bad, I guess.”
“I got in a car accident and killed my friend,” he says. “We got in an accident because I wasn’t paying attention. We were holding hands. It was this game we used to play. It was a secret, I guess. He let go of mine and I went to grab his and then we got in an accident.” He breathes, and it sounds like he might start to cry. “I lost an eye,” he adds. “It doesn’t really matter—the eye, I mean.”
The phone feels like it is a silent hand on your throat and you hold it away from your face, checking to be sure you are still breathing.
“I’ve been thinking about killing myself,” the boy says. “But now I feel okay. I feel like I have a friend.”
“Okay,” you say.
“I think I’m going to start crying, if that’s okay.”
“Okay,” you say.
If you decide to close your eyes, let the boy cry for the next three hours, fall asleep, wake up, walk down the hall to be sure your mother is still breathing, pick up the phone, and continue to listen to the young man weeping, go to page 7.
If you decide to hang up the phone right then, go to page 13.
Hands on hips, your shoulders back, you stand with the other six cheerleaders before the silent crowd: It’s six months later and it’s the middle of the big game and your team, the Tigers, are winning. You scan the cheering bleachers for the strange boy’s face: handsome, reserved, with the eye patch, a little dramatic, a little scary. You finally find him sitting there in the middle of the sixth row. He is wearing a dark green army jacket and is staring back at you. He looks sad and beautiful, like a watercolor in a hospital room. Just then, a referee blows his whistle and you realize the Trenton Tigers are up 52–46. Tara Armstrong, the shortest of the girls on the squad, tugs the back of your uniform and you discover you haven’t heard what cheer has been called. You glance once more over your shoulder at the mysterious boy and then back at your squad, who are all standing patiently, waiting for you to get ready.
Hope Chang shouts, “Ready?” and the squad cries out in unison: “Okay!”
You’re on top and you know it!
We’re right with you, so let’s show it!
You begin your ascent up the human pyramid. You imagine falling and cracking your skull, the crowd dulled to quick silence by your dramatic death. You imagine what they would say, your grainy picture on the front of the school newspaper. You imagine your friends Patrick and Corey staring at the photo and nodding coyly.
When you reach the top of the human pyramid, unsteady, grasping the hem of Tara Armstrong’s shoulder, you see the small square of the gym wavering beneath you. You hear your teammates cheering and the crowd clapping and the sound of your heart beating hard against both terror and death. You see how small the world you have known has always been and smile, then closing your eyes, you fall backwards into the arms of the other cheerleaders, their hands gently catching you, falling right past death, just as you have always practiced.
illustration by
Todd Baxter
Miniature elephants are very popular: There are ads for these tiny pets on the radio and on television and in the pages of a number of up-to-the-minute magazines. Miniature elephants are quite affectionate and the most quiet of all household pets, or so their advertising suggests. Sadly, at this point, miniature elephants are the only elephants left.
Mr. Larchmont, an umbrella salesman and widower, is often lonely: His associates and loved ones sensibly convince him to buy a miniature elephant. There is something about his disposition that suggests he may enjoy a miniature elephant: His face is long and wrinkled and his movements are often quite slow.
At the pet store, Mr. Larchmont, black umbrella in hand, stands curiously before the tiny tanks of glass. He is searching for the smallest, weakest-looking elephant he can find: He is searching for a miniature animal to match the exact size of his heart. He spots a tiny elephant, more miniature than the rest, in the corner of the cage: It is sleeping in a nest of old newspapers and is white with narrow, pinkish toes. It blinks its bashful eyes as the pet store employee pinches it by the wrinkly skin behind its neck and hands it to Mr. Larchmont in a tiny white box.
—We’re going to be dear friends, says Mr. Larchmont.
—I hope so, the pet store employee says. But it doesn’t always work out. These miniature elephants, well, they’re very sensitive. They die quite frequently. If you’re looking for a pet for your kid, well, we have some miniature horses that are very nice.
—That’s okay, replies Mr. Larchmont. This elephant and I, we’re going to be dear friends.
So they are: Mr. Larchmont and his miniature elephant often walk thoughtfully through the city, enjoying the summer afternoon, the animal stalking clumsily along the sidewalk, Mr. Larchmont reading that day’s newspaper, carrying his black umbrella, his black bowler riding atop his head, as he tiptoes slowly behind his pet.
—Bravo, Mr. Larchmont says, as the miniature elephant splashes through a puddle. Carry on, old friend, he says.
The miniature elephant often sleeps in a bureau drawer among Mr. Larchmont’s old ties, underwear, socks, and dress shirts. It drinks water from a broken pipe beneath the bathroom sink. It will only eat miniature vegetables, which Mr. Larchmont buys from a strange foreign store at the end of his street. The miniature elephant enjoys stopping on the sidewalk in front of the city’s oldest bakery, where the baker, a kindly old man with a white beard, will often serve him a tiny pink cake.
People will see Mr. Larchmont and the miniature elephant strolling about and will often ask these questions:
—How old is it?
—What’s its name?
—How does it stay so tiny?
/>
Usually Mr. Larchmont does not answer, pretending to be very busy reading his newspaper.
One day, strolling along the pavement, the miniature elephant stops and refuses to keep walking. Mr. Larchmont smiles and stares down, urging it kindly with the toe of his wingtip. But the miniature elephant does not move. Mr. Larchmont hunches beside it and notices the tiny creature has closed its eyes and its tiny white head is bowed, like a statue of an old man in serious thought.
—What has you troubled, old chum? Mr. Larchmont asks, but the miniature elephant does not respond. It is then, turning, staring down into a sewer grate, that Mr. Larchmont spies a human hand: He shudders as he notices the wrinkles and a pink ring on one of its narrow fingers. Curiously saddened, the miniature elephant stands before the abandoned hand and only bows his head further. Mr. Larchmont, touched by his companion’s sympathy, gently lifts the animal into his palm and steps away from the trying scene in a hurry.
On their walks then, the miniature elephant will often stop, sadly bowing its head, whenever they traipse unto the silent shadow of unmarked death. Mr. Larchmont will search about and after some time discover the cause of the elephant’s malady: a dead pigeon lying belly-up beside the curb, a yellowed roach motel hidden in the corner of a doorstep, a bouquet of plastic flowers marking the spot where a traffic accident occurred. The miniature elephant’s sense of grief is uncanny. Once, the animal stops at a grimy alley which is filled with several dozen bright yellow mousetraps. In each is a small brown or gray mouse, their tawny sides crushed by the aching jaws of the traps. All twelve mice are dead. The elephant blinks its eyes and turns away, ashamed.
Another afternoon, strolling before the shambles of fresh meat hanging in the window of a Chinese butcher shop, the miniature elephant pauses and lets out a long, baleful sound, like a broken trumpet being blown from a very old steeple.
An entirely awful incident takes place when Mr. Larchmont, reading the day’s headlines, forgets the direction he is traveling and looks up, finding he is in front of the city’s oldest cemetery. The miniature elephant only closes its eyes and curls itself into a small, compact stone, before Mr. Larchmont picks the animal up and moves away, apologizing.
