My One Square Inch of Alaska (9781101602850)

by Short, Sharon

  “Not only that,” Mr. Kincaid said, “but each company is donating a thousand dollars to Will’s family to help with his medical costs!” The audience broke into applause.

  I looked around, taking in familiar faces of people who seemed genuinely happy for Will—Big Terry and Shirley and Ralph from Grandma’s diner; Mr. and Mrs. Leis (her face was wet with tears, and I thought, She understands how serious Will’s condition really is); Will’s fifth-grade teacher; his friends Tony, Suze, and Harold and Herman, and their parents. Of course Grandma, Daddy, and Miss Bettina were there, and Jimmy and Babs, both of whom kept looking at me apologetically.

  Small ceremony. What a joke—on us. When I’d agreed to it, I hadn’t understood that Mr. Kincaid and Mr. Denton were going to turn Will’s condition into a promotional opportunity for both of their companies.

  I looked back at Will. He gazed at me with his wide blue eyes: Get me out of here.

  Suddenly, Mr. Kincaid stopped talking and hoisted Will onto a stool hidden behind the podium. Will’s face peered over the top. He stared out at the crowd, his wide eyes darting back and forth, with a growing look of panic on his face.

  Will, who with all his shenanigans seemed like the most confident, outgoing boy, had never spoken in public before, and it was clear that this was going to be expected of him—but he hadn’t been forewarned. Neither, of course, had I.

  But then Mr. Kincaid was finally thrusting a frame at Will, saying, “On behalf of the Sunshine Bakery—”

  “And on behalf of Groverton Pulp and Paper,” added Mr. Denton, beaming at the cameras.

  “We are pleased to present to William Everett Lane an official deed to one square inch of the Territory of Alaska!” Mr. Kincaid concluded.

  The crowd applauded. Will snagged the framed deed from Mr. Kincaid and held it to his chest, hugging it tightly, as if he was afraid it would be snatched back from him.

  As the crowd started to quiet, Mr. Kincaid said, “Now, I’m sure you’re excited to get your picture taken with the radio Sergeant Striker here”—the actor in the bad costume gave a cheesy smile at the cameras and a little wave of his hand—“but we have an even bigger surprise. In a few weeks, we’ll arrange to fly you out to Hollywood to have your photo taken with Chase Monahue, the television Sergeant Striker, so your photo can be on boxes of Marvel Puffs! What do you think of that, young man?”

  The radio Sergeant Striker actor looked angry.

  “Did I…did I win the essay contest?” Will asked. “I barely get C’s in English.”

  All the men at the podium laughed and some of the audience tittered nervously. “No, but that’s OK,” said Mr. Kincaid. “After all, you’re a special young man.”

  Will frowned. “But that’s not fair to whoever wrote—”

  Mr. Denton cut him off with an overly hearty chortle. “Of course it is.” Then he gazed out at the crowd with a somber expression. “But it also takes a long time to make these boxes, and of course, while there’s a strike, the boxes can’t be made.” Mr. Kincaid nodded solemnly. Babs’s father, Mr. Wickham, looked pleased as his reporter took photos of the stunned faces in the crowd. “Now, I’m sure we’d all love for this special young man, one of Groverton’s own, to be on those boxes, especially in his special condition, but first the United Paperworkers International Union locals…”

  Will looked confused, not understanding the nasty trick Mr. Kincaid and Mr. Denton had just pulled, or the angry murmurs starting to grow in the crowd. I started toward Will, but Daddy was quicker, shoving past a startled Mr. Kincaid and radio Sergeant Striker to Will’s side. Daddy grabbed the check for medical bills from Mr. Kincaid’s hand and tucked it inside his jacket pocket.

  Then he nudged the evil Sunshine Bakery man out of the way, and said into the microphone, “Will says thank you for the deed and for the check.” He gently lifted Will off the stool. Will ran to me, and I clasped him in my arms. Miss Bettina put a hand on my shoulder.

  “But now there’s something I have to say,” Daddy went on. The crowd hushed, nervous but eager to hear. “And that is my boy will not be a pawn in some tricky game to end this strike! I should have spoken out years ago, when I was management and Mr. Frederick McDonnell came to me about safety issues. I’m sorry I didn’t.”

  He looked at me, Will, and Miss Bettina. “I’m sorry about a lot of things. But now I say, as I’ve written in letters to the editor and will keep writing, the majority of workers at the mill need and deserve union protection, including safety measures. And it’s in all of our best interests for the mill management to—”

  Suddenly, someone ran into the lobby. Mr. Baker, our neighbor from across the street, shouted out his news. “I just came from the mill. There’s a fire in the storage yard!” The crowd gasped. Most of the workers typically crossed through the storage yard to clock in through a back entry, and that’s where most of the picketers were marching. “People are trapped. We need as many volunteer firefighters as we can get!”

  The crowd broke up, people shoving and hurrying to exit the newspaper lobby. Daddy came down from the podium to us.

  Grandma glared at him. “Porter, what was all that about? Turning a shining moment for the Lanes into—”

  Miss Bettina interrupted. “Oh, shut up, Lorene. This wasn’t about you to begin with.”

  “Daddy,” I said quietly, as Grandma, thankfully, walked away, “I’m really proud of you.”

  He looked at me, a smile starting to form on his weary face…but then he stared at the shoulder of my dress again, at the lace. He touched it gently and the smile vanished.

  He knew. The other dresses were one thing, but I should have let Mama’s wedding gown be.

  Daddy’s hand dropped from the lace. He looked at Miss Bettina. “I’m going to go help.”

  “I’m going with you,” she said.

  Will looked up at me. “I want to go to MayJune’s,” he said. “I want to see Trusty.”

  MayJune was waiting on her front porch swing, with Trusty at her feet. I’d barely pulled the car to a stop on the dirt and gravel road in front of her tiny house when Will jumped out and ran up her small, hilly patch of front yard to the porch. Dusk softened the scene, as if I were already immersed in a gauzy, distant memory: Trusty jumping up, tail wagging, to greet Will; Will sitting down beside MayJune, making the porch swing sway; MayJune pulling the afghan on her lap over him, then leaning over to gaze with admiration at his deed to his one square inch of Alaska.

  That moment is one of my favorite memories of Will and MayJune.

  I looked away from the porch scene, tears suddenly pricking my eyes, and took my time putting the top back up on Mama’s convertible. By the time I joined them on the porch, I was dry-eyed. MayJune and Will were sipping tea. I sat down across from them on a turquoise metal porch chair. MayJune pointed at a mug, steam still rising from the top, on a small table.

  I picked up the mug, inhaled the steam—lemony and sweet smelling all at once—and took a sip, mm-mmming my approval. This was a new concoction.

  “Lemon verbena, sassafras, and honey,” MayJune said, smiling so that her eyes crinkled up in that familiar, comforting way.

  I took another sip, suddenly parched for the comfort and ease that the tea offered, and thought, Of course MayJune didn’t come to the ceremony at Groverton Daily News. Somehow, she’d known that we’d need to take refuge at her small house, with her and her strange herbal teas, had even surmised when we’d come by so that our hot tea would be ready. That was MayJune’s way.

  She looked down at the deed and put her arm around Will and gave him a squeeze. “My, my, look at that! Our Will is a landowner!” Will beamed. Trusty bumped his head against Will’s knee and Will laughed, then reached down to scratch him between his ears. His tail thumped even harder against the porch.

  The dog looked mostly healed, a crookedness to his right ear and a slight limp the only signs of how badly he’d been hurt. And, of course, he still didn’t bark. I wondered if he’d ever get h
is voice back. Or if he’d ever trust me. But I was glad to see him getting better.

  Will and I filled MayJune in on the goings-on at the news conference and the fire at the paper mill. She shook her head and clucked and said, “Oh my.” Then, for a little while, we all stayed comfortable in our quietness, because with MayJune, it was easy to just…be.

  But then behind MayJune and Will, a few yards from the porch, an impossible sight caught my eye. I pressed my eyes shut, opened them again, stared, and sure enough, its outline barely illuminated by MayJune’s porch light, was a teardrop camper. I knew in my gut that it was the camper Trusty had been so cruelly chained to in Stedman’s Scrapyard the first time I’d seen him.

  “Is that…?” I pointed at the camper. Will twisted around to see where I was pointing.

  MayJune chortled. “Got it last Tuesday. ’Course, my daughter’s car doesn’t have a trailer hitch, so I thought about calling you, since your mama’s old car does have a hitch that would haul that little trailer just fine.” It does? I thought, and then realized that, yes, there was a round hitch on the back bumper. MayJune went on. “But I figured it was better if Mr. Stedman didn’t see anyone from the Lane family. I couldn’t have him haul it here; then he might see Trusty.

  “So I got Lenny—that’s my neighbor next door—to go get it with me. Mr. Stedman was happy to let it go for next to nothing. He said his old guard dog had fouled it.” MayJune shook her head. “Took all the doin’ I had in me not to tell him, well, you can’t chain up a dog and not expect him to go a little wild trying to get away.”

  MayJune took Will’s empty mug and put it on the table, and Will leaned forward and hugged Trusty.

  “Anyway, Lenny helped me get it home and clean it up. You can’t tell in the dark, but it’s a right shiny little camper now, good as new, inside and out. Lenny even found some new tires for it.”

  I stared at MayJune. “But…why?”

  She smiled. “Well, my traveling days are over. But I figured someone I know might need it.”

  Suddenly, a look passed across Will’s face and I knew, my stomach sinking, that he had a crazy idea. “I’m taking you home, Trusty,” he said.

  “Will, what are you talking about? We’ll find a good home for him later…after…if MayJune—”

  He looked up at me, anger pinching his tiny face. “No. His home is in Alaska. I’m going to go see my land there, and bring him along.”

  My heart clenched. “Will…I don’t think—”

  A sudden keening noise stopped my lecture. There was a quiet moment—just the cicadas’ slow chirp from somewhere in the dark—and then the keening squeal again. Will and I stared at Trusty. The sound had come from deep within him. MayJune laughed away our disbelief.

  “I don’t think he likes quarreling,” MayJune said. “Come on in with me, Donna. You’re shivering. Let me get you a sweater.”

  I wanted to make sure Will understood that he was definitely not going to Alaska. I’d set him straight, I thought, on the drive home.

  MayJune rose stiffly and then hobbled through her front door. Trusty jumped up to take her porch swing seat and Will put his arms around him. “You made a sound,” Will said, his own voice filled with wonder at the small miracle. “Just a little sound, but it was a sound.”

  I suddenly realized that MayJune was right—I was shivering. I went into her house and didn’t see her anywhere. I sat down on the couch in the tidy front parlor. My eyes went right to the photo album that MayJune had left out, the album I’d carefully ignored because Will had been with me.

  I picked up the album, opened it again, my hands quivering.

  “Wasn’t she a beauty?” MayJune said.

  She held a sweater out to me. I wondered how long she’d let me sit like that, alone with the photos. I’d started at the front, and was on the last page.

  “Yes,” I said, as she settled next to me on the couch. “You said she grew up loving to sing, but there is so much I don’t know about her.”

  “Like what, child?”

  The words spilled out of me. “Miss Bettina has told me the truth—that Mama was unhappy, and ran away with a man who promised to help her make a record of her singing. But I don’t know anything about why she was so restless. Was she always like that?” My voice knotted up with emotion and my struggle to hold back my tears. MayJune pulled me to her.

  “She was an only child. Her own mama was always sickly and unhappy. I don’t know why. And her daddy didn’t handle it well. There were a lot of quarrels in that household. So I think your mama sang to try to make herself happy, and it worked while she was singing. And she saw she could make other people happy.

  “As for her running away…well, honey, the biggest turns in life come when you’re paying the least attention, making small choices you don’t yet know will change everything. That’s the way it was with your mama. She made what she thought were small choices—being nice to your daddy at the club, just to be sweet and maybe get a drink or tip. Same with going back to the club, just for old times’ sake, and then taking up with that producer man. Before she knew it, she was in over her head, her choices changing her life and the lives of people around her.”

  I swallowed hard. I’d done that. Made small choices. Answering Mr. Cahill’s ad and thinking I could get away with keeping my modeling job with him secret in a town like Groverton. Skipping school with Babs and meeting Jimmy. Even making Mama’s clothes over, deep down knowing Daddy would eventually see what I’d done and be hurt by it.

  I sat back up. “Thank you, MayJune.” I closed the photo album. “I guess I’d better get Will on home.” I stood up and stepped out onto the porch.

  Will and Trusty were gone.

  I found them a half hour later, walking on the dirt and gravel road along the Tangy River.

  “Will Everett Lane!” I hollered from the car. “What are you doing?”

  He ignored me and kept walking, his framed deed tucked under one arm, Trusty trotting along by his side.

  “Come get in this car now! You scared the living daylights out of me!”

  He kept on walking.

  I slammed the car to a stop, turned off the ignition, jumped out of the car, and ran over to him, grabbing him by the shoulders. Trusty jumped on me, knocking me down, his body on top of mine, his teeth bared over my face. I could feel the growl deep in his body, his willingness to tear into me to—as he saw it—protect Will.

  “Trusty, get off of her,” Will said. He grabbed Trusty by the scruff and gave a little yank.

  Reluctantly, Trusty crawled off of me, but kept guarding Will. I sat up slowly. My back was already hurting where I’d hit the ground. I rubbed the back of my head. “You didn’t sound too worried about Trusty ripping my face off.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Will said. His voice was tired. “He wouldn’t really hurt you.”

  “Uh-huh. What are you doing, running off like that?”

  “I’m going to Alaska. With Trusty,” he said.

  I stood up, felt my back. The lace on my dress was ripped. I hoped I could fix it—a trivial thought, I know, in that moment, but somehow it mattered to me.

  “By walking?”

  Will stuck out his chin. “I was going back to our house, on the other bridge, ’cause I figured you wouldn’t think to come this way, and then get my money. I could buy a bus ticket.”

  “All the way to Alaska?”

  “Well, part of the way. And then we could hitchhike. Or walk. Trusty would protect me.”

  “You know the bus driver wouldn’t let a dog on the bus. Not a scary one like Trusty.”

  “Well, then we’ll just hitchhike and walk all the way.” Even with the tiredness, Will’s voice was defiant.

  “Will,” I said. “You got the deed. Trusty is safe at MayJune’s. Why are you doing this?”

  “Because,” he said. “I want to. I want to see my land. I want to get Trusty back home.”

  “You’re tired, and so am I. Let’s get Trusty back
to MayJune’s, and go home. We’ll talk about this in the morning—”

  “No! You’ll just try to talk me out of going to Alaska!”

  I didn’t say anything. Will knew me well. He was right.

  “Donna, I need to ask you something, and you have to swear to tell the truth.”

  I gave him a little smile, thinking I knew him well—that he was going to ask me how I found him, and that I would say that after searching around MayJune’s house, I knew him well enough after all to realize he’d take this route home. “Sure,” I said.

  “Do you swear?”

  “I swear.”

  “Cross-your-heart-and-hope-to-die swear?”

  I winced at his use of that phrase, but said, “Cross my heart and hope to die, I swear I’ll answer your question with the truth.”

  And then Will asked his question, proving that I didn’t entirely know him as well as I thought.

  “Donna, am I gonna die soon?”

  When I could breathe again, each word came out painfully, like I was spitting up shards of glass. “Dr. Marshall says it’s hard to know how your blood disease—how the leukemia—will progress, that sometimes miracles can happen, and—”

  “I want to know! I want someone to tell me the truth! Am I gonna die soon?”

  I stared past him and noticed, for the first time since I’d frantically started driving around to find Will, the harvest moon hanging full and orange over the river and trees, so big that it looked like we could just reach over the river and pluck it down.

  Like a ripe persimmon.

  I pressed my eyes shut.

  The truth.

  All our lives, we hadn’t heard the truth.

  We’d heard what people wanted us to hear. That Mama had died, when she hadn’t. She’d simply chafed, like a trapped animal, at the life she’d thought she should want, until she couldn’t bear it and ran away.