The Journey Back

by Priscilla Cummings

  Damn that white card. It made me think too much! I pulled it out from inside my pillowcase and got ready to tear it in half. But then I flipped it over ’cause for some reason I’d been trying to remember the last “expectation” on the back side. Number twelve. Oh, yeah. “I will actively involve myself in planning for the future and in developing my aftercare plan.” I started to smile. Mr. R. and Miss Laurie, for sure they wouldn’t think my future plans right now were very good! No . . . I felt the smile kind of slide off my face . . . they wouldn’t. They’d be ashamed.

  —

  Then it happened again.

  “Woody’s gone,” I told Nora. “He never came home last night.”

  She rolled her eyes and dropped her backpack on the picnic table. It was Saturday and Nora and I didn’t have to work until later. The three of us were headed to the river with a blanket, a deck of cards, and a picnic lunch. But I had Woody’s cell phone number with me, too. It was written on the candy wrapper that I’d pushed into my pocket. At the very least, I’d call Woody and chew him out for leaving us again. Then I might call Mom, just to see how she was doing.

  So we were down at the river. It was a pretty day. People called it Indian summer on account of how it stayed warm so late into November. Nora had already ditched her backpack so she and Luke could go off looking for sea glass along the shore. That left me alone. I knew Nora would tell me her phone wasn’t charged up. I didn’t know why she didn’t want me using it. While she was gone I took a breath, then hastily rummaged through her backpack. I pushed aside her Vocabulary for the College-Bound Student book and her Shakespeare paperback and all her notebooks with a million roses doodled all over them until I found the little, silver flip-top cell phone. I checked to be sure she wasn’t coming, then I flicked that cell open—and just stared at it. There wasn’t even a number pad. It was a broken, empty shell.

  Without skipping a beat, I snapped the phone shut, dropped it deep in the backpack, and rearranged the books. I didn’t need to ask Nora about that busted-up phone. I knew why she carried it around. She probably even had pretend conversations on it at school. I knew how she felt. Middle school was bad enough. I couldn’t imagine high school.

  Suddenly, Nora was there. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” I said, taking in a big breath. Boy, she picked up fast on a mood.

  She had a handful of colored glass that she was going to turn into jewelry. “You remind me of a joke,” she said, sitting on a rock. “What did the bartender say when a horse walked into the bar?”

  I smiled, shook my head, and shrugged. “No idea. What?”

  “Why the long face?”

  I laughed. But I didn’t know any jokes. “Don’t nod,” I told her.

  “What?”

  “Don’t nod. It’s a palindrome. The same thing forward and backward.”

  I could almost see the wheels turning in her brain. She pressed her lips together, thinking. “I have one! Fall leaves after leaves fall.”

  I frowned. “That’s not a palindrome.”

  “It is!” Nora insisted. “Not by letters, but by words.”

  “It doesn’t count then.”

  Nora scowled and set down the sea glass. When she looked skyward, thinking, the silver stud in her nose sparkled and her long shiny hair fell back loose over her shoulders. She sure was different, I thought, and she sure was pretty.

  Suddenly, she caught my eyes and just held them. I stared back until she leaned forward, elbows on her knees and face in her hands. “You know what?”

  “What?” I asked.

  “You’re really cute.”

  I snorted and dropped my eyes.

  “No. Really. You are, Dig. I couldn’t tell before because of all the poison ivy. But now that it’s gone, I can see. Even that little chip in your tooth is cute.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Get out of here.”

  “I’m serious!”

  Yikes! What do you say to a girl who’s just told you you’re cute?

  “Actually,” I began, although I knew I was going out on a limb here. “I’ve been meaning to tell you that you’re a very pretty girl.”

  Man, right away I could have kicked myself it sounded so lame.

  But before I knew it, she popped over to give me a kiss right on the lips! Surprised the heck out of me. I was not ready for that. But it sure felt nice. Real nice. Her lips were soft. I started to reach for her, but she jumped because suddenly Luke was coming up the path with a big chunk of purple glass, calling out, “Hey, you guys, look what I found! I’m going to put it in my rock collection!”

  Five minutes later, Woody came looking for us. Not only was he back, but he had barbecue, he said, hot barbecue, rolls, coleslaw, and baked beans for a feast.

  “Daddy! Daddy!” Luke shrieked happily as he ran to Woody.

  “He must’ve made a few bucks playing blackjack,” I muttered to Nora.

  “Or craps,” she whispered back.

  “Come and get it!” Woody called to us.

  Nora and I looked at each other and shrugged. “We’ll have our picnic tomorrow,” she said. “We’ll take it over to the farm.”

  I don’t think I’ve ever known what true happiness is. When people talk about finding true happiness, I’m never sure what they mean, or what it’s like, never mind how they found it. It’s true that I still had decisions to make, and things to work out in my head. But with my job at the farm, my ties to Buddy and Luke—even Woody—and the nice thing with Nora, I was getting a taste of what true happiness might be like. This is really strange, but what really took the pressure off and let me enjoy those last few days is the fact that I had died.

  No kidding. I was dead.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  * * *

  BEING DEAD

  It was Nora who told me I had died. One afternoon when I was behind the barn at the farm hosing out feed buckets, she rode her bike over. I was surprised ’cause she must’ve got out of school early and come straight over. “Hey!” she called out. I pretended like I was gonna hose her off, too, but she frowned and yelled, “Stop!” so I set the hose down and turned it off.

  “I printed this out last night at the café—it’s from news three days ago,” she said, handing me a folded piece of paper.

  Opening it, I read the news article she had found:

  SEARCH CALLED OFF FOR

  DETENTION CENTER RUNAWAY

  CUMBERLAND—A missing fourteen-year-old boy who ran away from the Cliffside Youth Detention Center six weeks ago is now believed to have drowned in the Potomac River. Authorities called off the search for the missing youth after discovering a stolen canoe likely used in the escape and clothing the youth was thought to be wearing. Efforts are now underway to recover the boy’s body.

  The search for the missing youth began in late September when the boy disappeared from the detention center. Police suspect the boy walked off the property and made his way to Route 68 where he may have stolen a tractor-trailer truck from a restaurant parking lot. The truck was later found abandoned and burning on the eastern Sideling Hill runaway truck ramp. Authorities also suspect the youth may have stolen a bicycle from campers along the C&O Canal towpath, as well as the canoe that disappeared from another campsite.

  The canoe was found partially submerged in shallow water north of Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, yesterday. A sweatshirt with the name of Cliffside Youth Center was found upstream on the opposite shore, and a hat possibly taken from the owner of the stolen truck was found floating near Dam No. 5.

  I folded the article back up and slowly pushed it into my pants pocket. When I got back to the campsite I crawled into my pup tent and slid the article inside my pillow, beside the lumpy white sock with my money and the white card. Every now and then I’d pull the paper out, unfold it, and read it ag
ain. And every time I did, my eyes misted over ’cause what it meant was that people thought I was dead.

  It was an overwhelming idea. I mean, really, what did my mom think? And poor little LeeAnn and Hank? Did they cry? What about J.T.? Did he finally soften up a little when he heard I was a goner? And how about all the kids I knew from middle school? Were they sad to hear I was dead? Would they make me a memorial garden with a sundial and black-eyed Susans like they did for Allie Burdick, who got hit by a car crossing the highway in Ocean City?

  Or would they say I deserved to die for what I done?

  I hung my head. The police thought I had drowned, which was how most people thought Ben had died when the kayak sank. He didn’t though. He was alive after he got pulled out of the river. My friend Brady brung him back to life with CPR. Only later, in the hospital, he died from aspiration pneumonia, which is what happens sometimes after people get their lungs full of water.

  Whew. I covered my face with my hands. I had to stop myself from thinking about it! Reading about my death made me think of Ben all over again and that was like sinking in quicksand. I mean, it was all so incredibly, horribly sad, but what was I supposed to do? Go kill myself ?

  Believe me, I thought about that. But I could never kill myself. That’s the ultimate cop-out. I still had a life—and I wanted to live it.

  And here’s the thing: if everyone thought I was dead, then they weren’t looking for me anymore. The pressure was off! I was handed a second chance on a silver platter. I could go home now without worrying about the police.

  But I didn’t head home right away. Because of Nora—and the fact that there was one thing I needed to do first. . . .

  —

  “You’re not my grandfather!” Luke exclaimed.

  “But I don’t have to be!” I insisted. “That paper said if your grandparents can’t make it to Grandparents Day, then you can take a special friend. Tell your teacher I’m your cousin from Texas.”

  Luke flashed his eyes at me. “You’re not supposed to talk about Texas!”

  “Oh?” I raised my eyebrows. “Why not?”

  But Luke pouted and pushed away his paper plate with the grilled cheese crusts. Then he got up and went into his tent.

  “All right then. Tell them I’m your cousin from Ohio!” I called after him.

  No answer. It was pretty obvious he didn’t want me going to school with him. But I was determined. I needed to talk to his teacher.

  Two days later, I took a shower and shaved what little stubble I had. I combed my hair, which was getting kind of long, and put on my clean set of clothes—jeans and a long-sleeved dark blue T-shirt. I even wiped off my boots so I didn’t track any horse manure into Harwick Elementary School.

  In the hazy light of early morning, I walked with Luke to the entrance of the campground where the Number 23 bus picked up three kids. Woody had no idea what I was doing.

  “It’s Grandparents Day,” I told the bus driver when I climbed aboard with Luke. “He doesn’t have grandparents nearby so I’m kind of like his guest. I’m his cousin Gerry from Toledo.”

  The bus driver, a fat woman with long, gray wavy hair and greasy bangs, looked at me over her glasses and just kind of shrugged. Like she didn’t care.

  So Luke and me took a seat together toward the back.

  “It’s my cousin Gerry,” Luke told a little boy who had turned around from the seat in front of us to stare at me.

  “You’re lucky,” the boy said sadly. “I don’t have anyone to bring.”

  “You should see him play basketball,” Luke said.

  The kid perked up. “Cool! Are you staying for recess?”

  “Yeah!” Luke suddenly got excited. “You are, aren’t you, Gerry? Can you show some of the kids how you do a layup?”

  I grinned. “Sure.”

  A bunch of moms greeted us at Luke’s school. They had a card table spread with stick-on labels and felt-tip pens. “GERRY,” I wrote in big black letters before slapping the label on my T-shirt.

  “Welcome, Gerry!” one of the moms said. “It’s really nice of you to make the effort to be here today.”

  I think Luke was changing his mind about me going to school with him. He reached up and took my hand and led me down the hallway to his room. On the way, he pointed up on the wall to show me the turkey he had drawn using his hand as a pattern. All the other turkeys taped to the wall had little poems underneath.

  “Where’s your poem?” I asked Luke.

  “I didn’t have time to finish,” he said.

  Exactly, I thought to myself. He can’t read so he can’t write either. I had asked him about all this a couple nights ago.

  “Yes,” he had insisted. “Of course I can read.”

  “Then read me the last chapter of Tornado,” I challenged him.

  “No.” He crossed his arms. “I don’t have to.”

  “No. But you and me, we both know you can’t read.”

  Luke pouted and stared at the floor.

  “Don’t do you no good to pretend you’re somebody you aren’t,” I told him. “It’ll catch up to you someday and by then, maybe, it’ll be too late.”

  Wow. Had I really said that to him? Me? The great pretender?

  “Come on, dude,” I said. “You don’t want to be late for class.”

  Been a long time since I was in third grade, but the room looked and felt familiar to me with the little desks, the sound of pencils being sharpened, and the smell of those chalkboards beside the big clock on the wall.

  Luke’s teacher, Mrs. Buckley, had tight curly hair and wore a long yellow sweater over a flowery skirt. Her acorn earrings swung back and forth while she shook hands with us “grandparents.” I waited my turn and explained again who I was. She said she was really glad that I had come all the way from Ohio. Well, I thought, we’d see about that.

  Luke sat at his regular desk while I took a seat in the back with a few older people. We listened to the announcements, then we did the Pledge, and while the kids stood and sang a song about Thanksgiving, I tried to rehearse in my head what I was going to say to Mrs. Buckley. I wasn’t a lick nervous about talking to that teacher. I figured she’d probably be insulted if some stranger told her one of her students was fakin’ it and didn’t know how to read. But I didn’t care what she thought ’cause it was Luke I was trying to help. I think that’s what being dead did for me. It made me fearless. Like what did I have to lose?

  Recess became my opportunity. Us grandparents and special friends were told we could either go out on the playground with the kids, or stay behind for coffee and doughnuts in the teachers’ lounge. Two of the people in my group went outside while the others headed for the doughnuts.

  “I’ll be right there,” I told Luke. “Get your friends together and try to find a basketball.”

  Meanwhile, I kept an eye on Mrs. Buckley. When the room was empty and she was stacking papers on her desk, I approached and cleared my throat.

  “Oh, my!” she exclaimed, putting a hand on her chest.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to scare you. But I wonder if I could tell you something about Luke, my little cousin, while I have the chance.”

  “Surely,” she said, squinting at my name tag. “Have a seat, Gerry.”

  So I sat down in the front desk and she sat behind hers and I cleared my throat again. “I could be wrong,” I said, beginning with the words I’d practiced in my head, “but I think Luke doesn’t know how to read.”

  “Really?” Her eyebrows shot up and she folded her hands on her desk.

  “Really,” I said. “I think he memorizes lines and tries to fool you.”

  “But he did such a great job reading from Tornado.”

  “Think back, Mrs. Buckley. Did Luke read the first chapter or two? Did you hear him
read from the middle or the end of that book? Like the chapter about the cat? Or the turtle maybe?”

  Mrs. Buckley’s brow wrinkled. “No,” she said. “I don’t think so. He read to us from Chapter One. I remember. He raised his hand and asked if he could start.”

  So we had us a talk. Mrs. Buckley promised to do some one-on-one testing and tried to explain how with thirty-five kids in the class and no teacher’s aide and all the testing she couldn’t give the kids the individual attention they needed. I could see Luke and about five little boys with their faces pressed up against the glass window behind Mrs. Buckley making faces. Luke had a basketball in his hands and was throwing it up and down.

  “I gotta go now,” I said. “Thanks for your time.”

  Mrs. Buckley thanked me and said again how nice it was for me to come all the way from Illinois. I ignored her little blooper and nodded, hoping she’d at least heard me right about Luke.

  Boy, I hoped I did the right thing, but who knew? At least it wasn’t a wasted day. I had fun with the kids at recess and us grandparents and special friends got treated to a nice lunch in the classroom. A couple moms had brought in a whole spread with chicken salad, potato rolls, chips, green Jell-O—and orange frosted cupcakes that I hoped weren’t leftovers from a Halloween party ’cause Halloween was like three weeks ago.

  —

  “Dammit, I’m mad!” Nora said angrily, settling her hands on her hips.

  “What do you mean you’re mad? What at?”

  Her scowl melted into a smile. “It’s a palindrome! I finally thought of one!”

  I smiled. “Ah, you got me. You’re right. It is.”