Between the Roots

by A. N. McDermott

  The hole, can I get to the hole in time? Is John there? The hole, the dog's doing. As Sammy raced he remembered how small the hole was. Poor John, no one was there to help him under the fence. Did he get there in time to squeeze through?

  Another bark, Sammy ran faster. The dog knows where I'm going. The dog set a trap. We fell for it. We uncovered the dog's hole, took his bait, and now I'm going to pay for it. As his legs carried him closer to the fence, his imagination ran wild. He could feel the seat of his pants being torn to shreds. He could see the dog ripping him into little pieces, spitting out strips of jeans and underpants and chunks of flesh.

  The fence loomed in the night. Poor, poor John. Sammy veered to the left, where he knew the hole and the helmets waited, his chest heaving, begging for relief. Poor John had he . . . ? Just then a brisk whisper cut the air. "Over here, Sammy." John stood at the open gate.

  "How'd you do it?" he gasped.

  "Heck, the darn thing was open all the time. They don't know how to lock doors around here," John said.

  "You mean we didn't have to go under the fence?"

  "Nope!"

  Sammy and John hurried to retrieve their bikes further up the road.

  At that moment the dog hit the fence and attempted to work his way free.

  "Yikes, John, he'll be out in no time!" Sammy started racing ahead of his friend toward the bikes.

  "What do you think I was doing? Just waiting for you?" John called.

  Sammy stopped, "Did you fill it in?"

  "You betcha . . . put some big rocks in there too."

  The ride along the river used marathon energy. Sammy was in the lead, his headlight eating the road. After a healthy distance he called back to John: "Walt was in the room. Some kid was teaching him."

  "Walt, being taught?" John said.

  "Something really strange is going on in there."

  "No lie."

  "Walt says he wants to meet tomorrow night at the arcade. Can you go?"

  "Did he say when?"

  "Heck, I didn't think to ask."

  Chapter Twelve: The Telling

  A SHRILL RING AWAKENED him. Sammy eyed the red numbers on his nightstand clock, "1:38 A.M." Who could be calling at this hour? A tingle of anxiety swept over him. Are the police after me, for breaking and entering? No, just entering. I haven't broken anything. Maybe they would go easy on me for just entering.

  Now fully awake, he strained to hear. His door was shut; muffled words filtered through. Sammy tossed his covers aside, slipped across the room, quietly opened his door, and listened to his mother's conversation.

  " . . . Why now? Can't it wait another year or two?" She was pleading with someone.

  Sammy crawled out of bed to listen by his open door.

  "Isn't there anyone else?"

  Sammy shifted from one foot to the other; the floor squeaked.

  "Hold on, I hear something."

  Realizing that he was the "something," Sammy closed his door, scurried back into bed, and pulled the covers over his ears and eyes as he held his breath. He could hear his mother approaching and pausing; a wave of light indicated his door opened, then closed. The footfalls disappeared.

  Who would call this late? And who could be upsetting Mom so much? Was she talking to the police? He was surprised his mother hadn't awakened him to find out his version of the story. Or was there another story? He lay awake for a long time.

  His sleepy mind knew one thing: he would talk to Walt. He would meet him at The Arcade after school.

  That morning there was no mention of the late-night phone call. His mother asked him only one question. "Sammy, is there much talk at school of the boys from the Colony awaiting trial?"

  He wished he could say "No," but she wanted the truth.

  * * *

  As Sammy and John pedaled to The Arcade, the streets were nearly deserted. The threat of a storm always kept people inside. One seemed to be brewing. When they arrived, Walt's car wasn't there.

  "Maybe he won't show," John said.

  "I think he will. He really looked anxious," Sammy said.

  "He was just surprised to see you in the building."

  "I think he knows I suspect something."

  They chained their bikes to the post in front of The Arcade. A worker with little else to do readjusted a banner in the window and waved at the boys.

  "Shall we wait here for him, or go inside?"

  "Let's go inside and sit at a table."

  Loud music filled the room. Mr. Lanton sat at one of the tables talking to an older gentleman. When he saw the boys, he motioned them to join him. The older gentleman was Walt. "We were waiting for you." He indicated Walt, and briskly shook hands with both Sammy and John, all business.

  "Good to see you, Mr. Lanton." Both boys sat down to join them; their surprise went unnoticed. How had Walt gotten here?

  Mr. Lanton said, "I'm trying to convince Walt to do another game night. Sit and talk. I have to get back to work." He stood, gave the table a friendly slap, and walked toward an employee who had signaled him.

  "Walt, we didn't think you were here. Where's your car?"

  "I walked, left home three hours ago so I'd be sure and be here when you guys came."

  "No kidding! That's over six miles!"

  "More like seven, I know, and in a few years I'll be running it."

  Both Sammy and John looked at each other and smiled; then they laughed, a congenial forced laugh. Walt wasn't laughing. He sat staring at them. Their laughter simmered to hesitant chuckles.

  "No, I mean it. In a few years, maybe ten at the most, I'll be running it, round trip."

  The boys looked at Walt expecting him to lighten up, crack a smile, wink, but he only looked at them, continuing to wear his solemn expression.

  "What's wrong, Walt?" Sammy asked. "Do you know what you're saying?"

  "I know exactly what I'm saying. It's time to let you in on my secret."

  John wrinkled his brow and lowered his eyes, signaling to Sammy that he was uneasy.

  "Oh, give it up, John; I'm not crazy and I'm not going to hurt anyone," Walt said firmly. He pulled a long blue envelope from his jacket pocket, laid it on the table, and covered it with both hands. "What I tell you is between us. Do you understand me?" He looked long and hard at both boys, then continued: "You have to promise on your life and your mother's life that you won't tell anyone what I am about to tell you."

  Sammy looked seriously at John, who stared back at him. A sober air fell over all three of them. This was it.

  "I mean it. Do you promise, on your life and your mother's?"

  "Sure, Walt, whatever you say," Sammy answered.

  "Say it. Say you promise."

  "I promise I won't tell anyone, on my life, and— Do I have to say my mother's?"

  Walt gave him a determined look. Sammy promised. "And you, John, you too."

  "Oh, all right." He said in a low monotone. "I promise not to tell on my life, my mom's life, my dog's life." Sammy kicked him under the table. He shut up.

  "How old would you say I am?" Walt asked.

  Sammy exaggerated on the young side to be polite. "Maybe seventy-five or seventy-six. But you sound lots younger; I mean, the words you use."

  Walt smiled, the first break in his serious demeanor since they arrived. "What do you think, John? Be honest now."

  John tilted his head to one side, then to the other as he studied the old man. "Well, to be honest, and you said to be honest . . . "

  "Right."

  "I used to think you were about eighty-five, but now I suppose I'd say about eighty."

  "What you guys are really seeing is my projected age. You're seeing the number of years I could probably still live." Walt looked for a reaction.

  "What are you talking about? Say that again." Sammy sat upright, staring at Walt.

  "This envelope contains the document of my germination, my 'birth certificate' as you call it." Walt carefully lifted the paper from the envelope and unfolde
d it. Sammy leaned forward and read it carefully, studying the date. The last name was covered, but a picture resembling an older Walt was in the corner of the paper.

  "But there's a mistake. It says you were born the same year I was." Sammy was now whispering. He turned nervously to John. "What do you see, John?"

  "So you've got a messed up birth certificate. So what?" John challenged.

  "What are you trying to tell us, Walt?" Sammy asked.

  "I'm telling you something that could get me into serious trouble." He lowered his voice and leaned in toward the boys. "I really am the same age as you. The Colony is a group of genetically age-reversed people. What looks like an old person is really a young person, and those that look young have already lived a long life, growing physically younger each day."

  "You're joking us, right?" Sammy couldn't hide the worry in his voice.

  "No, I'm not. It's true, every word. All those 'seniors' I brought here last fall are in my class, or a year or two ahead of me. We're all growing younger. Our minds and education are about the same as yours. Only, there are a few differences."

  A worker approached their table and asked if they wanted anything from the snack bar. Walt stopped talking, shook his head no, and waited for the intruder to walk away.

  "Your old people have such poor hearing. We old-looking people have excellent hearing; there hasn't been a chance to damage our ears. But our young-looking people are always having trouble hearing. They can run, jump, swim, you name it, but their hearing seems to be the only thing that ages while the rest of them is growing younger."

  John and Sammy listened intently. What could they believe: one simple piece of paper and an old man, an old-looking man, or their reason? This was a crazy story, invented by an overactive mind, well on its way to dementia.

  Walt continued, "You don't believe me, I can tell. But it's true. I'm not making up a story. Sammy, remember the body in the woods?"

  Sammy felt the surge of fear he was learning to control. "Yes, I can't forget."

  "That's Virginia. She's almost six months old now, but she looks younger than me. She germinated with a shorter time clock than me. Remember, Sammy. Think back. Do you remember what the washers said when they uncovered her?"

  Sammy didn't want to remember, but he could still hear the words. "Oh, this one's not for long, too bad." Now he knew the meaning of those words. He had been trying to put that living nightmare to rest for several months. Walt's words disturbed him. He knew what Walt was saying made more sense than his earlier explanation.

  "She'll only live about sixty years at the most. Me, I germinated, potentially, to about ninety years, unless something gets me first." Walt actually laughed.

  "I don't get it," John said bluntly.

  "Should I go back to the birds and the bees, sex-education? Would that help?" Walt sounded as if he were making fun of John.

  "Yeah, tell me about sex, because the way I understand it, we really didn't come from storks or cabbage plants or holes in the dirt, deep in a forest." John's attitude had taken on a brisk rudeness that Sammy suspected was hiding his fear too.

  "Well, babies in our village get made the same way babies in your villages are made. Only . . . "

  "Only what?"

  "I'm getting to that. Only, after a couple months inside their mother, a deep stirring tells the mother that she must return to the germinal forest. Nursemaids go with her to help dig the shallow pit where she deposits her living baby long before it is ready for the outside world. There is a birth like you know it, like you had, only earlier. Our babies need the richness of the earth where a heavy crust quickly forms around them. For several months, the baby germinates into a full-size person implanted with nature's time clock. When the germination process is complete, the ground around the birthing pod begins to crack. The watchers and washers are responsible for recovering the fully mature pod, digging it up, cleaning and preparing it to enter the outside world. That's our 'birth,' a very happy time."

  "Is that what I saw?" Sammy murmured, his face felt flush. He had a misgiving that he might be starting to believe a clever lie.

  "Yes, you saw the birth of Virginia. She's a dear. Really a fast learner. Already she can talk in short sentences and put puzzles together."

  "How can that be?" John said.

  "Remember, our system is working in reverse of yours, most of it anyway. All those billions of brain cells that your babies have, we also have, only they're charged with much of the knowledge of our ancestors. You poor guys have to learn everything from scratch. But we have retained some of our parents' knowledge, like language, and history, and how to control our bodies for walking before crawling. After a few weeks we don't even need diapers."

  "You mean you don't have to learn?"

  "No, we have to go to school, but our learning starts out at a progressed level. All the new 'stuff' that our parents hadn't learned, we have to learn your old-fashioned way. Most of what we learn is a triggering of inherited knowledge. We have schools too, though."

  "I think we saw one in the large room at the Colony," Sammy said.

  "Could be. I know there was a study group in the library last night."

  Last night. It seemed like months had gone by since their night trip to the Colony. So many things were beginning to make sense even as Sammy was struggling to accept what Walt had just revealed. Then it struck him. The awful reality of Walt's story, if he were telling the truth, had many implications.

  "AnLillie, is she young, or is she . . . "

  "She's my grandmother. She's the one that owns the car. She's been teaching me how to drive, but she wouldn't let me drive it alone today."

  Sammy saw that John looked as astonished as he also felt.

  "She's been driving for almost sixty years, but she looks too young to have a license. So the Ancestors pulled it. That made her mad!"

  He studied their faces and smiled. He laughed as he spoke. "Sammy, you really fell for my grandma. You remind her of someone, too. At first she really thought you were an oldie like her from another colony. But the day you two ran out on us, she realized you weren't."

  "That's not funny, Walt. That's a mean trick to play on her." Sammy was upset, especially when he considered how ridiculous the whole situation seemed. "And it was a nasty one to play on me."

  "Wait a minute. Did you say another colony?" John asked.

  Walt raised his hands in silence and sat absolutely still for nearly a minute. Sammy and John both studied him. When Walt next spoke he ignored John's question. "I can't keep a secret from Ancestor Lillie," he said. With conviction he added, "So there are some things I will not tell you."

  Sammy knew this was not the time to push Walt, yet speaking of AnLillie was still open to discussion; so he asked, "What did she say when she found out I'm really a kid who didn't know anything about the Colonies?"

  "She said there are some things I should let you figure out yourself."

  Walt became serious. He scooted his chair closer to the table and leaned in. "Do I sound like an eighty-year-old guy? I'm one of you; I'm as stupid and silly as you two, except for a few knowledge buds from my parents."

  "Well, thanks, man," John snapped, "I really feel complimented. Do you really want to associate with the lower class?"

  "There's where you're wrong, all you people." Walt looked agitated. "Just because someone's been on this earth longer than someone else, doesn't make them higher or lower, as you say." Walt's voice was peppered with feeling. "Ever since I can remember, I was taught it's about respect for life, for living things, even injured dogs." He drove his words hard. "Not how much time you've chalked up breathing. There's another word we use for respect for long life, 'wisdom,' and short life, 'learning.' It's called 'caring.'" Walt was so agitated his body shook. "We just plain care for one another."

  "Whoa, heavy stuff," John said.

  "It makes you uncomfortable?"

  Sammy said, "All of this makes me uncomfortable, but I actually believe you, Wal
t."

  "I hope so, 'cause if you don't and you dare say anything to anyone, I'll be in detention for months, maybe years." The look on his face told both boys that he meant what he said. "You know, several people in this town would kill to know what I just told you. We'd be driven out of this area into some kind of freak show."

  John said, "Do you think those developers know anything about this?"

  "No, it would have busted wide open by now if they did. It's just money and greed that's driving them. They have to work with prejudice to make their point."

  Sammy allowed the strangeness of Walt's fantastic tale to sink into his brain.

  "Just imagine what damage they could do with this news."

  "Don't mess with me, Sammy. Your promise is real, remember."

  "We promised, Walt. We'll keep it."

  As incredible as it sounded, there were too many coincidences to discount Walt's story. This old man did act like a wrinkled adolescent. The entire birthing process sounded logical, especially since Sammy had seen it. A prickle of resentment bristled in Sammy. He felt tricked, the center of Walt's private joke. His attraction to AnLillie must have given Walt plenty of laughs.

  Walt interrupted his thoughts. "The Colony has worked hard to keep its identity to itself and still be able to mingle among the aging townspeople."

  "Is that what you call us? The 'aging'?" Sammy asked.

  "Most of you, but then there are others, there are 'the Links,' the . . . "

  A loud noise rocked the interior of the store. The lights blinked, leaving the room in semi-darkness for a brief moment. Another loud noise followed. It was normally too early in the year for thunder, but they could not mistake the sudden darkness and the pelting rain of a storm beginning to rage. Since February was wedged between winter and spring, rapid changes in weather were predictably common. Still, people were caught off-guard. Several pedestrians rushed inside, seeking shelter from the heavy downpour.

  "So, boys, do you like riding in the rain?" Mr. Lanton said as he approached their table. All three of them walked to the windows to watch the wild fury outside.

  "Geez, I hope this lets up," John said.