Steinbeck’s Ghost

by Lewis Buzbee

  “And with that,” Miss Babb said. “Let’s take a break. We’ve got an awful lot of. cookies to eat.”

  After the break, Miss Babb took over. She explained the library’s predicament as clearly as she could; it cost the city more than eight million dollars a year to fund the library, and there was no longer any money for that. Travis could tell by all the head- nodding and long sighs around the table that everyone knew what was going on. And they were obviously not pleased.

  Miss Babb changed gears quickly. Yes, the outlook was grim, but there was no time to dwell on that, that would get them nowhere. There was work to be done.

  First, she told them, they had to raise money, anything they could get to keep the library open, even if only for an extra day. Every day the library was open meant it wasn’t closed. And second, they had to raise awareness, had to let everyone in Salinas, and all over the world, know about the impending doom. Publicity was key.

  Travis was nodding now, his frustration falling away as a sense of hope for the library came into Miss Babb’s voice. Of course, Travis thought, if everyone everywhere knew, they would not let the library close. He was amazed that his feelings could swing so quickly, and simply because of words.

  “I have two words for you,” Miss Babb said. “John Steinbeck. This is, after all, the John Steinbeck Library. We cannot overlook that. With that name behind us, people have to pay attention. We’re very lucky about that.” There was more nodding and jotting on pads of paper. “Readers around the world love his books. Clearly, his library—by which I mean ours—cannot be closed.”

  Travis thought of all the tourists who tramped through Salinas looking for Steinbeck’s places and characters. If everyone who’d ever read a Steinbeck book would just send in one dollar, Salinas could build a library as big as a football stadium. It was a crazy idea, he knew, but just maybe … He started to put up his hand. No, it really was a crazy idea.

  Miss Babb wanted them all to know that the Save Our Library committee was not alone, that it was only one of many committees getting to work on the problem. The library’s director and administration were working hard with the city to find a solution—cutting hours, cutting staff and services, anything to stay open. Rally Salinas, which Miss Babb called an “umbrella organization,” would coordinate the different committees and spearhead the publicity drive. The National Steinbeck Center would help, too. Travis imagined all the other people at all the other tables around town, everyone nodding and sighing and being frustrated and hopeful.

  “But you all,” she said, “you are the people who actually use the library, so it’s important that your voices be heard. The voices of the readers.”

  “What do we do first?” Travis asked. He hadn’t really meant to say anything, but now seemed a good time, and he felt that if he didn’t say something, his head was going to explode.

  “You always ask the right question, Mr. Williams. I count on you for that.” Miss Babb smiled at him.

  She handed out flyers with all the news on them, along with the phone numbers and e-mail addresses of the mayor and the city council. Committee members should pass out flyers to anyone who would take them and urge people to contact the city government. This was the first wave of publicity, but it was only the beginning.

  What about money? Couldn’t they raise money? A bake sale, a book sale, a garage sale? The questions were flying.

  “Absolutely,” Miss Babb said. “Who’s going to volunteer?”

  Hil’s hand shot up.

  “Me and T,” he said. “We can do a car wash. Three bucks a pop.”

  Travis did the math. Or close enough.

  “But we’d have to wash three million cars.”

  “Fine, five bucks,” Hil said. “And that’s not the point. No way we can raise that much money. But we go out on the corner, and some people stop and get their cars washed. That can’t hurt. And everybody sees us. And our ginormous Save Our Library banner.”

  “Okay,” Travis said. “I’m in.”

  “And by the way,” Hil said. “The banner should have a giant sun on it, don’t you think? The flyers should, too.”

  Miss Babb looked at Hil, her head tilted.

  “Well, it’s S-O- L, isn’t it, Save Our Library?” Hil said. He looked around, but no one answered. “Sol? It’s Spanish for the sun.”

  “Oh, that’s perfect, Hilario,” Miss Babb said. “Can anyone draw a sun?”

  To Travis’s surprise, the man in the important-looking suit raised his hand.

  “Now, what’s next?” Miss Babb said.

  By the end of the meeting, five different projects were planned and the responsibilities divvied up, and the next meeting of the committee was scheduled. The city council would meet in a few weeks to make its final decision, and the committee had to be ready.

  “We’re done saving the world for today,” Miss Babb said. “See you next week. Are there any cookies left?”

  Not one crumb.

  On the way out, Travis picked up a copy of The Long Valley from the long shelves of Steinbeck’s work near the main checkout counter. The book was displayed on top, face out, on a one- book wire stand. He wasn’t finished with the books he’d checked out last week, but there was something about the library that always made him want more books. Sometimes when he was with his parents—before the move—he’d take more books than he could possibly read in the three weeks he was allowed to have them. And today, the urge to take another book was even stronger, as if he had to stock up before the library closed.

  Besides, he was already done with The Pastures of Heaven—and halfway through a second time—and something about that book was calling him to read more Steinbeck. In The Pastures of Heaven, nothing and no one were quite what they seemed. The man who told everyone he was rich had very little money. The deformed Tularecito was thought by most people to be a freak, but he turned out to be an amazingly talented artist. And the place itself, the Corral de Tierra, was imagined as a paradise, yet it was dangerous and mysterious. Maybe Steinbeck had more to tell him about those things that weren’t what they seemed; maybe Travis could learn something from Steinbeck about his own world. Couldn’t hurt to take one more book.

  Outside the evening was beautiful, deep purple and hushed. The heat had dropped again, and there was a hint of real autumn around the edges of Indian summer. Travis could smell the new season in the air—baked soil and dead leaves waiting for the first rains. There was no wind, only a gentle breeze.

  Hil’s mom and Miss Babb were talking and laughing together. Miss Babb tapped Travis on the shoulder as he went by, and smiled her thank- you smile. Hil was waiting for him.

  “Dude, Hil,” Travis said. “Great idea about the car wash. And the sun, too. Sol, I get it. I had no idea you were so into the library, I mean—”

  “I know, T,” he said. “I know what you thought. I know you’re tired of playing video games, I get it. You’re thinkin’, ol’ Hil, he’s just a vidiot, glued to the tube, sits there—”

  “No, no,” Travis said. “It’s just that I, I mean, we, well, until—”

  “Camazotz day. I know. It’s cool, T, I didn’t know either. But it doesn’t matter. We’re here now.”

  “Yeah.”

  Travis put out a robotic hand, and they executed a lengthy Camazotz handshake.

  “Travis, would you like a ride home?” Hil’s mom asked.

  He was dying to go by the Steinbeck House again, but wasn’t quite ready to tell Hil about what he’d seen there. It was probably just some teenager sneaking around, but why would a sneaky teenager break into a house to sit in the window? No, it was more than that, he just wasn’t sure what. He wanted to check into it.

  He begged off , told Hil and his mom he had an errand to run—what it might be, he’d never be able to say. He made plans with Hil to meet the next day and work out the car wash details, then fetched his bike.

  Deep into the alley, Travis spotted a small fire under a willow tree. Gitano was sitting befor
e the fire, and perched on the fire was an open tin can. Gitano stirred it slowly with a stick. The scent of pork and beans rose up to Travis.

  Travis wasn’t sure if he was happy to see Gitano. He kept wanting to see him, wanted to ask him questions. He couldn’t shake the idea that Gitano and the boy in the window, all of it, everything that had started with his return to the library, were all connected somehow. But what would you say to this tired old man? Hello, can you tell me about Camazotz?

  Gitano looked at him and smiled, then gulped down a heap of beans from a wooden spoon.

  He wanted to ride past the Steinbeck House. And then again, he didn’t. So he rode the blocks around it for a while. But that was crazy, too. The boy in the window was just a boy in the window, as Gitano was just an old man down on his luck and eating beans in an alley. What else could it be? If the boy wasn’t in the window, that would be fine with Travis, he’d have his answer. And that answer was that the world was still the same old world.

  Travis stopped in front of the house. The light was on in the attic window; the boy was at the desk, his head down, not looking up. He was concentrating.

  Night was coming on. It was much darker than the last time Travis was here—man, he was going to be so late—and because of that, because the night outside was darker, the lights inside brighter, and the contrast between the two sharper, he could see the attic in more detail. It was clear that the boy was writing something. Every once in a while, he’d bring the pen to his face, tapping the end of it against his cheek; he was thinking. Then the pen would disappear, return to the paper.

  The boy’s head was moving back and forth now, slowly, following the trail of words he left on the page. Occasionally, he’d look up at the ceiling; occasionally, he’d look out the window. Travis waved once when he did this, but the boy didn’t respond. Then, as the image of the boy came into sharper focus, Travis saw, quite clearly, that this boy had large ears, ears that stuck way out. Just like Steinbeck.

  Travis actually felt a chill down his spine. And then he said out loud the words he’d been dying to say out loud, “It is Steinbeck’s ghost.” The words rang in the air, and the world stayed pretty much the same. The words sounded true, and there was no denying them.

  Travis did a little dance on the sidewalk, a sort of goofy, Hilario kind of dance, to see if that would rouse the figure in the window. But no, the boy kept writing. Travis was sure of this: The boy in the window was writing something. A police car came around the corner a block away, and Travis jumped on his bike and headed off . He wasn’t doing anything wrong, he knew that, but it was a good excuse to get away, get on home.

  The ride home was a snap, no traffic, no wind, a great night for a bike ride, and Travis thought that perhaps he’d never ridden his bike any faster. He was racing home, trying to get there before his parents had time to invent new punishments for him. But he was also way too excited to ride any other way.

  So much had happened in the last few days—the library, Gitano, and yes, that really was Steinbeck’s ghost—but he didn’t know what to do with it all. He wasn’t afraid of what was happening, and was pretty sure zombies and ghouls weren’t suddenly going to be chasing him down the street. He knew these things were all connected—but how, and why? What did this mean? His brain was an enormous hamster wheel with hundreds of hamsters spinning around and around. So he pedaled to keep up with the hamsters, pedaled and panted and flew all the way home.

  He shot off Natividad and was zooming down Boronda, about to glide through the gates of Bella Linda Terrace, when he saw them.

  On the ridge of the Gabilan foothills closest to Bella Linda Terrace, three black silhouettes stood looking over the valley, toward the Santa Lucia Mountains, toward Corral de Tierra. The figures were as still as stone, but they were definitely human. No movement at all, just watching.

  He skidded the bike to a stop.

  All the not- thinking he’d done on the bike ride, all the not- thinking he’d pedaled into himself, vanished. He knew who these figures were, and he knew it immediately. There was a Steinbeck story, “Flight,” where a man was being chased by sheriff ’s deputies through the Santa Lucia Mountains near Big Sur, and all during the chase, whenever the man looked up, he found three black figures standing on ridge tops high above him. The man knew they were not chasing him, they were simply watching him.

  Travis knew that the figures on the ridge below Fremont Peak were Steinbeck’s Watchers. And that story, “Flight,” was in The Long Valley, which he had in his backpack.

  He gazed up at the Watchers. They were not looking at him. They were looking far away, into the west. Then they turned in unison and disappeared from the ridge, as if they’d been waiting for Travis to arrive.

  Travis knew what he had to do, if he could just get his feet to cooperate. He was going to go home, turn on all the lights, and watch some mindless television until he fell asleep. Maybe even beg his parents for a Gamebox.

  His parents!

  He pumped all the way home and, just as he was about to cruise into the driveway, heard a car honking behind him. Travis tore into the house before his parents could say anything, grabbed the note he’d left for them off the kitchen table, and slammed into the bathroom.

  The note had said he was at Hil’s, and that wouldn’t work anymore. He had to think of something else—he was just out riding around Bella Linda Terrace. That’d do. His parents believed him, but they weren’t happy he had been out after dark. They gave him the “better be more careful” lecture. Standing there in the kitchen with them, he really wanted to be angry, but he couldn’t. It was a lie, a stupid lie at that, and he had to stick to it.

  After a late dinner, Travis and his parents watched a silly cop show together, but he couldn’t relax, couldn’t get everything out of his head. He kept wanting to talk to his parents, tell them everything that had happened. But just like over the weekend, he kept his mouth shut. How did you even begin to tell your parents about ghosts and Watchers? So he watched some cops shoot at guys and drink coffee and drive recklessly: TV.

  Later, in his room, he sat at his desk for a long time and looked out at Salinas, a pearl- string of lights along the highway, and at the barely visible outline of the Santa Lucias, to where the Watchers had been watching.

  He got into bed, cracked open The Long Valley, and turned to the story called “Flight.”

  FIVE

  AFTER SCHOOL ON FRIDAY, HIL AND TRAVIS COM-PLETELY SCOPED OUT THE CAR WASH SCHEME. Hil was an excellent planner, and between the two of them, they had, they imagined, everything covered. Hil would contact the Old Stage shopping center, two blocks from the entrance to Bella Linda Terrace, and get permission to use the corner of their parking lot at the intersection of Natividad and Boronda. He would arrange to have a banner made and, with his father, figure out a way to raise it: Car Wash—Save Our Library—$5.00, and the big sun. Travis would collect the other materials, the towels and hoses and soap. He figured his parents would help with this.

  When they were done planning, they walked around Bella Linda Terrace and hit every house with a flyer. Travis noticed something he’d not seen before. Every house in Bella Linda Terrace had a satellite dish—including his own—and every dish pointed to the same spot in the sky. The houses looked as if they were scanning the galaxy for news from the Mother Planet. Travis pointed this out to Hil.

  “Yeah,” he said. “You know, the more we talk about it, the weirder this place gets. I’m gonna blame you, T. You started it. Because of you, I know I live on this really strange planet. Before you, I was perfectly happy here.”

  They agreed, though, that it was better to travel this weird planet together. With every block, Hil and Travis expanded their ideas for the Camazotz video game, imagining the unexpected worlds behind the dull facade of each neighbor’s house.

  Travis and his parents ate at Sheila’s again that weekend. Halfway through their burgers and fries, Travis brought up the library closing. He knew he had to be car
eful.

  “You hear about the library?” he asked them.

  That seemed safe enough.

  “I know,” his dad said. “It’s horrible. I love that place.”

  “Do you remember,” his mom said, “how we used to go there every Saturday?”

  “Of course I remember,” he said. She talked about the library as if it were an extinct dinosaur. “The last time we went was only a few months ago. Before we moved.”

  “Maybe we could go again,” his dad said. “That’d be nice.”

  “It’s just so stupid,” Travis said. “How could they close the library? I mean, it’s the library. People need to have free access to all that information.”

  His mom looked at him with really big eyes.

  “That’s true,” his dad said. “But you know, the taxes are already so high. There’s just not enough money.”

  “But that’s not the whole picture,” Travis said. “The state’s cut off so much money we used to get from them for things like fire and police. And libraries. The state’s making us pay for their poor planning.”

  His mom’s eyes got a lot smaller then; Travis couldn’t see into them. His dad looked at his mom, but she only looked at Travis.

  “Good point. I guess,” his dad said. “But you have to understand, Travis.” This was a bad sign. If his dad used his name, and started with “you have to understand,” he was obviously going to say something Travis did not want to understand.

  “The world’s changing,” his dad went on, “and there’s just not that kind of money anymore. At least not around here. We pay taxes, and they’re killing us. I’ll miss the library, too; I wish we could save it. But I’m sorry to say, I don’t think we can. It’s a different world nowadays, Travis. I don’t like it either.”