Tideland

by Mitch Cullin

  "Oh. Was that your mom?"

  "My daddy," I said. "He’s sleeping, I guess. That’s all he does."

  "Oh. He’s pretty too.”

  "I know. Me and Classique made him pretty.”

  Dickens’ head wobbled. His eyes were half-closed as he inhaled.

  Then he glanced at me, making a careless pattern in the dirt with his fingers, saying, "The old lady lived there, at What Rocks. That was when I was little. See, the door was open. She could’ve been there too, but I knew she wasn’t but maybe she was. I’m always getting in trouble that way, when I’m wrong.”

  His toenails were yellow. The scar on his bald head was pink like a blister.

  "What happened to your head?”

  "Nothing -- except when I was little they cut inside. Well, I wasn’t that little. But when I was younger they did because I’m epileptic. Couldn’t even mow a lawn. So they cut my brain. Now I have two brains so I’m not epileptic no more, only sometimes."

  "What is it?”

  "Like this-”

  He rolled his eyes into his skull. His body began twitching. His hands rose, trembling. Then he stopped and rubbed at the scar.

  "See, only sometimes it happens since this.”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I asked, "Do you have a pool?”

  "No. Can’t swim. I’ll drown. Can’t splash in pools or drive a car. Can’t bowl either."

  "I don’t swim. In the tub I do. But I don’t drive cars or bowl."

  "Me either. I get a seizure then I sink in the pool like a penny. I get a seizure and the bowling ball smashes my feet. I drived before but that was bad and if I do it now Dell says I get arrested or worse. So I can’t drive to save my life, not even if I’m bloody or my arm’s chopped off.”

  "If you drive you’ll go-"

  I rolled my eyes and twitched for a moment.

  "Yeah. That’s what’ll happen all right."

  Then we both smiled. And in the silence that followed we fidgeted, inarticulate, and dug patterns in the dirt.

  The Johnsongrass swayed overhead and around, murmuring.

  "Say, I was meaning to say,” Dickens finally said, "I’ve got a submarine. It’s big enough for me. See, then I don’t have to swim anyway."

  "Can I play in it?”

  At first he said sure, and then he went, "I don’t know, maybe tomorrow you can. I don’t know."

  "But I’d like to see it because I like submarines. And maybe you’d play in it with me.”

  "I guess. Thing is, you’ve got to hold my hand, okay? Then you can come with me there.”

  "Okay.”

  "That way we don’t get lost from each other."

  "Okay."

  He extended a slender hand. So I took it. And his palm was warmer than mine. Then he led the way, trudging through the Johnsongrass, trampling stalks, where hoppers sprang from underfoot like tiny land mines. And as we wandered parallel with the grazing pasture -- the hull of the school bus looming -- I said, "Fireflies visit me in the bus at nighttime.”

  Dickens squeezed my hand.

  "That’s a bad place," he said, sounding fearful. "It’s wrong there.''

  But I didn’t ask why.

  You’re a sissy, I thought. That’s how come you talk like that. That’s how come you’re scared all the time.

  A hopper clung to my shin; I let it ride on me until we left the sorghum -- then I slapped it dead.

  Dickens was saying, "I’ve got a million pennies.”

  We were side-by-side, stepping between railroad ties. And I kept looking back in case a train was coming.

  "I’ll show you.”

  He released my hand and began walking faster, leaving me behind, his flip-flops going clomp clomp clomp. His butt jiggled in the trunks. It was funny. His legs were hairy and skinny. He reminded me of a flamingo, a white flamingo.

  "You’re a bird!"

  "Not really," he said, bending on the tracks, pointing at a rail. "A bird doesn't have pennies, but I’ve got lots."

  And he did have lots. They were on the rail, pressed into flat blobs of copper; hundreds of them -- fused, overlapping -- stretching for yards.

  "You’re rich.”

  "I will be. Because someday they’ll get squished together and make a big penny. The world’s biggest penny. Do you know how much that’ll be?"

  "A million dollars."

  "At least. And I’ll buy a boat then. Or a real submarine-”

  A real submarine? He reached for my hand.

  "-that’s much better than the one I got."

  But he didn’t have a submarine to show me. It was a wigwam built from mesquite branches and weeds, in the embankment beside the tracks. And it was packed with junk -- a mangled bicycle, smashed cans, three shredded tires. There wasn’t room to play or sit. There wasn’t even a periscope.

  "She’s Lisa," he told me, pulling the goggles to his eyes. "Vessels underwater have girl names. Boats on top do too. Well, some of them do.”

  I asked about the bicycle, with its twisted frame and crushed spokes.

  "Shark attack."

  And the tires. And the cans.

  "Monster shark."

  Then he explained.

  The junk was bait. He was a great shark hunter, exploring the South Pacific in his submarine. Mostly he used pennies for bait, but sometimes he found bigger lure for his prey. Then he hid in the wigwam and waited. And soon the monster shark came gliding along the tracks, jaws thrashing, mashing anything in its path -- a bicycle, beer cans, old tires, helpless pennies. Nothing escaped.

  "The only way to kill that shark is to blow it up,” he said. "Rocks and spears don’t work, believe me. I’m lucky I’m alive."

  His voice suddenly sounded deep, not sissy. He cocked an eyebrow. And I thought he seemed brave, and older -- like a captain. But when the cowbell clanked in the distance, he became Dickens again.

  "Uh-oh,” he said. "I need to be home. You too. You can’t be in here without me. It’s my submarine."

  He grabbed my hand and we ducked out of the wigwam.

  The cowbell continued clanking and clanking.

  And Dell was somewhere shouting: "Dickens! Home! Dickens! Home! Dickens-"

  "We can play tomorrow,” he said, letting go of my hand. "Don’t get in my submarine without meI”

  Then he scurried away -- foot in front of foot, elbows swinging, head straight, clomp clomp.

  "Bye, friend!” I called after him, waving. "Don’t drown!”

  But he didn’t turn and wave. He didn’t say anything as he went.

  "Come visit me tomorrow! ”

  And I knew Dell had pound cake for him. And apple juice. She probably had the picnic basket all ready. My stomach grumbled.

  After that I returned to What Rocks -- ”Stinky Fart Rocks,” I said to myself -- where my father’s lunch had been stolen, carted past the open door by a robber. Cracker crumbs were scattered across the living room floor, rnorsels for the ants to claim. And the squirrel rampaged on the roof, chattering and creating a racket -- his teeth, I imagined, smeared with peanut butter.

  13

  Dickens didn’t come for me the next day.

  I ate saltines on the porch steps and waited, listening to the noisy cicadas, hoping that a quarry boom would suddenly erupt and silence them for a while. Then I played Shark Attack with Classique. She was a goldfish on my fingertip, swimming in front of me while I chomped at her.

  "Don’t eat me! Don’t eat me!"

  "Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-!”

  And when I put her in my mouth she tasted worse than cough syrup. Some strands of her hair got under my tongue, and I had to spit them out. Then I kept spitting until I couldn’t taste her anymore.

  "You’re gross,” I told her. "You’re dirty."

  "You love Dickens," she said.

  "No, I don’t! How do you know?"

  "You love him because he’s a shark hunter. You want to kiss the cut on his head and hold hands.”

  "And he has a submarine too
.'’

  "Except it’s fake.”

  "But he’s going to be rich and buy a real one. He has more pennies than you. But I won’t show you if you don’t shut up that I love him, Classique, because I don’t really.”

  Dickens was a flamingo. He walked funny. But he hunted the monster shark. And he was my friend.

  "He’s a sissy."

  "Sometimes he’s a captain too.”

  In Lisa he roamed the South Pacific. Perhaps he appeared on TV -- that’s where I always saw boats and oceans and submarines and sharks. I might’ve seen him on PBS -- his submersible exploring the remains of the Titanic -- and didn't even know it was Dickens at the helm.

  "He’s sailing under the seas."

  "So he’s not coming."

  "But maybe he will."

  "Maybe he forgot where What Rocks is-"

  "And he’s searching."

  "Because we’re in danger.”

  What Rocks was sinking fast; it’d just hit an iceberg. Soon I'd be swallowing saltwater. So would Classique. We had to stay afloat until Dickens rescued us. He was our only hope.

  "Come on,” I said. "Don’t give up. We have to swim for dry land.”

  "But I can’t swim."

  "Dog paddle," I said. "Dog paddle like the wind!"

  We drifted from the steps -- my arms parting the waves - and let the tide carry us away. Then we were underwater, gliding past the seaweed-sorghum. I held my breath for as long as possible. But it was hard. So I transformed into an octopus, my fingers fluttering like tentacles. Classique became a seahorse. And in the grazing pasture, we swam around the upturned Titanic, where minnow-hoppers darted in and out of the busted windows.

  "It sank to the bottom of the sea," I told Classique, gazing into the murky interior of the wreck.

  "No one survived," she said. "It’s spooky."

  "Let’s go.”

  We floated over the rise to see if Dell was in her meadow. But she wasn’t. So we swam off -- eventually surfacing by the tracks, panting for air near Dickens’ wigwam. We’d almost drowned.

  "The monster shark could be anywhere," I told Classique, stooping. "We better be on the lookout.”

  The squashed pennies stretched along the rail like misshapen drops from a candle. And I tried peeling one up, but it wouldn’t budge. The shark had crushed it good and proper.

  "It’s dangerous here. We’re safer in the submarine,"

  I imagined the shark racing forward, teeth snapping as it sailed after us. ·

  "Shark attack!” I yelled.

  And Classique and I scrambled across the tracks, down the embankment, and into Lisa. But Dickens wasn’t waiting inside. He wasn’t at the helm, goggles in place, searching the ocean floor for What Rocks and me. And the wigwam didn’t seem any more like a submarine than it had the day before.

  "Shark attack”

  Lisa was falling to pieces, and Classique hated her. She thought the wigwam smelled worse than What Rocks. With all the junk and the dirt, she thought Lisa was more of a wreck than the bus; part of the shotgun roof had caved in overnight, several long mesquite branches lay crosswise on the crunched bicycle, other branches covered the shredded tires, others stood vertical -- stabbing the ground and jutting out the gap in the roof. The collapse sliced the wigwam in half, making the already confined interior more cramped.

  Lisa’s been sunk, I thought. Dickens can’t swim. He isn’t even an octopus or a seahorse.

  "The pirate did it,” Classique said. "She boarded the submarine and took him prisoner. The captain will walk the plank for sure. She’ll drown him because she’s a pig. She left you in the field. She’s trouble.”

  And Dell came to mind -- pound cake in one hand, her lips wet with apple juice, her dark lens glinting in the afternoon sunlight. She was out there somewhere, waving a sword above her head -- "Aye! Aye!" -- or pressing the tip of the sword against Dickens’ spine as his flip-flops clomped toward the end of a plank.

  "Save him! Save the captain-"

  "--or he’s shark food!"

  But we didn’t have to save Dickens after all. He was fine, mumbling to himself and smiling, raking the front yard of his and Dell’s home. And he wasn’t in flip-flops or a swimming suit. The goggles weren’t on his forehead. He had on a red baseball cap and a T-shirt. He wore jeans and cowboy boots. He looked like a farmer.

  "He’s not a captain or a prisoner-”

  "-or anything.”

  Classique and I were cloistered among mesquites, spying behind a juniper bush, watching as Dickens went in circles. He kept going around and around, raking his bootprints, mumbling and smiling, mumbling and smiling. He couldn’t get it right. Soon as a patch was raked, he’d turn and step backwards into it. His bootprints were everywhere.

  And Dell was there too, wearing her hood and mittens, picking tomatoes and squash in her garden, setting the vegetables into a plastic bag, tossing some aside. And she was whistling to herself. But every now and then she’d pause, telling Dickens, "No, no, see -- you’ve forgotten a spot, of course. Pay attention."

  She’d point, jabbing a finger.

  "Not there -- there."

  And Dickens would scan the dirt, searching for what he’d missed. He’d step backwards, creating new bootprints.

  "Right there. Yes, right there.”

  Then he’d rake nervously at the bootprints before him, mumbling and smiling, mumbling and smiling.

  "No, no, see -- now there’s more. You’re messing it all up as you go. Pay attention, right?"

  It could’ve continued for hours -- Dell pointing, Dickens raking and making fresh bootprints -- except Patrick the Bagger Boy arrived in his Nissan. The horn honked twice as the pickup truck came bouncing over the bumpy driveway, sunlight reflecting off the windshield.

  The honks startled Dickens; he let the rake fall. Then, biting his bottom lip, he glanced at Dell and hugged himself.

  "Uh-oh,” he said.

  She stood upright on the gravel walkway and told him, "Go in. Stay in your room until l call you out.”

  "Okay, Dell, okay.”

  Off he went, running like crazy, still hugging himself. His boots pounded the ground, leaving more prints in the dirt. He jumped onto the porch, and, once inside the house, he slammed the front door.

  "They’ll stay far.”

  Dell drew a ring in the air. Then she clapped her hands. Then she removed the hood and helmet, placing them on the walkway, and spit into the yard.

  "They’ll mess elsewhere.”

  The Nissan had already pulled in alongside the house -- the driver’s door standing wide open. And Patrick, straining, was busy lifting two heavy paper sacks from the bed. Then he cradled them, one in each arm, and walked around to the yard, where Dell was wiping her mittens across her apron.

  "After-noon, M-m-m-iss Munro,” Patrick said.

  "Hello, Patrick,” Dell said. "ls it afternoon? My how the day flies, you know."

  She was grinning. Her voice had a friendly tone. She seemed like someone else, someone younger.

  "Yes, m-m-m-am, sure does!”

  Dell aimed a finger at the porch.

  "You can put your load there, by the door. I can bring the sacks in myself. You remembered Land O Lakes -- sweet and unsalted, yes? And the buffalo jerky?”

  He nodded. He was grinning too.

  "Of course, you remembered, yes, yes.”

  She watched as he set the sacks on the porch, lightly touching her hair, the yellow bun.

  "l appreciate all you do for me, Patrick. You’re such a , kind young man.”

  Then he was going to her on the walkway, smirking from one side of his mouth. She reached for his hand, took it, and held it against her chest.

  He stammered, "I-I-I-I-”

  "I know,” she said, "you already paid for everything?

  He nodded.

  "Right, yes, of course. Thank you, thank you."

  "W-w-w-will you?" he asked.

  "Yes, Patrick, I will. But not here, not in the ya
rd, not by the tomatoes.”

  What happened next I didn’t understand. Neither did Classique. It didn’t make any sense.

  Dell led Patrick to the side of the house, where she had him stretch out on the ground. Then she knelt down beside him. He rested a hand on her yellow bun as she unzipped his pants. And his eyes shut, his lips parted. She found his boy-thingy and held it -- ugly thingy, swollen and purple. And she kissed it, put it in her mouth for a bit. He was moving her head with his hand -- back and forth, back and forth -- gripping her bun. It was like Dell was eating something big, her cheeks were puffed. She was hungry.

  Back and forth.

  Patrick was breathing hard, moaning a little bit.

  She’s hurting him, I thought. She’s sucking his blood.

  Then Dell suddenly quit. She stood and straddled him, lifting her dress, bunching the hem in her mittens. And she squatted, pretending she was a rider and Patrick was a horse. She moved her hips around, but didn’t say anything. She wasn’t laughing or smiling, just riding along quietly. But Patrick’s fingers were scratching at the dirt. His sneakers twisted, and his lips trembled like he wanted to yell, like he just couldn’t get the words out-”H-h-h-h-h-help!" But he never screamed, only groaned and thrust upward some. His face was flushed as he uttered, "Oh, sh-sh-shit, oh-!”

  And that was it. Dell was done playing. She climbed from him, letting her hem fall around her boots. But Patrick remained on the ground, exhausted, his thingy still sticking from his pants.

  She’s a vampire, Classique thought. You’re next.

  And I didn’t want Dell doing that to me, draining my blood, putting her mouth between my legs, or riding me.

  "It’s gross,” I whispered.

  So we began sneaking away, but a juniper twig snagged my dress. When I yanked free, the bush rustled. Then we ran. We flew past the mesquites. And I worried that Dell had heard me, that she and Patrick might be chasing after me.

  Eventually, I stopped behind a tree and looked. But no one was coming. Her house was in the distance. Just then Patrick’s Nissan honked twice. He was leaving. And I figured they hadn’t spotted me running away.

  I took a deep breath.

  That rabbit-hole is nearby, Classique was thinking. Why don’t you show me it. You’re safe from them, I think.