Hometown

by Marsha Qualey

  I don’t care.

  That’s obvious. For how long?

  Two weeks. You’re not grounded, but you’re not driving.

  Two weeks without a car? You’re kidding!

  Dead serious.

  No way. I won’t.

  You will. Know why? Because I can make things even worse. This house isn’t a democracy. I’m the father, you’re the kid, and I’m in charge. Keys, please.

  Good News—

  After that, nothing to do but stay away from each other. Nothing to do but go to bed. While he brushed his teeth, Border remembered the phone machine. The old man said he’d phoned in the morning, but there had been a call in the afternoon. He’d heard the ringing from his room and hadn’t bothered to play any messages later, certain they were all from his dad.

  Sure enough—one from the school secretary, then three calls from his father.

  Beep number five and his head jerked with the hello.

  Hello, gorgeous guys. I bet you don’t have any idea where I am. I’m not so sure I do, exactly speaking, but I do know I’m having an adventure. Here’s what happened: I got off the plane in Atlanta, right? And there was this sign that said “Welcome to Atlanta. Visit the World of Coca-Cola.” Coke is my poison, you know that, so I figured, what the heck, New Mexico can wait. I got a cab and took the tour and saw how they made the stuff. Only it wasn’t the real factory, just a fake one for the tour, but it was still pretty neat. And there were these women on the tour—you know the type, Old Town tourists with white hair, jogging suits, sneakers—and they said the World of Coke was almost as good as the Hershey chocolate plant in—where else?—Hershey, Pennsylvania. So I figured I oughta see that. My grandparents—oh boy, Border, wait till you hear about them—gave me all this money, so don’t worry about me, Dad. Anyway, wait, I need to stuff a few quarters…

  Okay. I’m in Pennsylvania, at least for the next thirty minutes, then the bus leaves. Bus tickets are so much cheaper than airfare. Think I can get a refund on the part of the ticket I didn’t use? By the way, those women were wrong. The Hershey tour was a dud. Coke was much better. So, how’s Minnesota? How’s the job, Dad? Everything okay? Were you guys worried about me? Sorry about that. Would you mind calling Mom? Thanks. See ya.

  Dana.

  Out and In—

  Border and his father argued about who would make the call to New Mexico.

  “She’s your sister, it’s your mother, you call.”

  “I’m going to bed. After all, you’re in charge.”

  Border took an atlas to his room. Dana had piled up credits in high school and graduated a semester early. “I want to get out and get going,” she’d told Border. He found Atlanta and then Hershey on the map. He closed his eyes and circled his finger over North America. “She could be going here.” Tap. Tennessee. “Or here.” Tap. Maine. “Here.” Tap. Oops, the Arctic Circle. Maybe not.

  He thought about his father’s grim smile when he’d pocketed the Volvo keys. So pleased with himself, so glad he’d devised a suitable punishment. In charge. Border tapped the map on Minnesota. “Me,” he said. “Here.”

  Dana was out, Dana was going.

  Border was in, Border was stuck.

  Lunchroom—

  Hey, Jacob, okay if I sit here?

  Sure. You guys met Border? Chuck chuck chuck chuck chuck. Move over for him. You move over. What is this stuff, beef barf? Anyone done with those math problems? Lookit Jenny K.; lookit that body; please, just once in my life. You make your own lunch? Don’t New Mexicans have accents? Maybe it’s pork puke. How come you walked to school? Screw the problems; I’ll be in summer school anyway. Who’s going to the game? Is New Mexico where the Grand Canyon is? Presser is the worst math teacher. Do you speak Spanish? I ditched once, ran into my grandmother at the video store. Who can drive to the game? Not Chuck. His name is Border, bugbrain. There’s the bell. Border Bugbrain? I thought it was Baker.

  Friday Night—

  It was cold in the hockey arena. Border zipped his jacket, bummed some gloves, then borrowed a scarf, and still he was cold. He stamped his feet until they hurt, hunched his shoulders, hugged himself. Around him, a thousand fans screamed and cheered, shooting up and down in the seats. Border shivered.

  Jacob took pity and suggested they leave. “I should have warned you that it’s cold in here. Long underwear is usually a good idea.”

  “We can stay. I’m okay.”

  “You’re freezing. Besides, it’s not worth it. Red Cedar will never make up four goals. We’ve lost this one.”

  Jacob had consumed three sodas and needed the bathroom. Border waited for him in the arena lobby, amusing himself by flipping a quarter. Heads, tails, heads, tails, tails, tails. The quarter slipped off his thumb, hit concrete, and spun. He picked it up, straightened, and spotted Bryan and two companions watching him.

  Border looked at the bathroom door. Where was Jacob? Zip, pee, zip—how long could it take? He eyed the three. He was bigger than any of them. Six-one, one-eighty. Go ahead, guys; this time he wasn’t rolling over.

  “You stupid jerks, are you actually going to fight again?”

  Liz leaned against the doorway to the girl’s john. Border smiled and relaxed. Saved. By a girl.

  “Clarissa was looking for you, Bryan.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. She said you said you’d be here.”

  “I am.”

  “She’s sitting by Jenny and the others. Michael’s there, too.”

  “Michael?” Bryan stiffened. “Why’s he sitting by her?”

  Liz shrugged.

  Bryan mumbled something and led his friends away.

  “Poor Michael,” said Border.

  “Where’s Jacob? I saw the two of you leaving. I need a ride.”

  “Bathroom. He’s—oh, there. That took long enough.”

  “Don’t get so personal,” said Jacob.

  “Can I have a ride home?” Liz asked.

  “I thought you were with Heidi and Kris tonight.”

  “I was, but ten minutes into the first period Heidi got back together with Jeremy, and then Kris heard about this party that Brett might go to. I don’t want to party, so now I need a ride.”

  “Geez,” said Border. “Michael and Clarissa and Bryan, and Heidi and Jeremy, and…and…”

  “Prince Charles and Di,” helped Jacob.

  “Is stuff like that important around here?”

  “Stuff ?” Liz asked.

  “Dating, going together.”

  “Only one thing’s bigger,” said Jacob.

  The crowd roared, the building shook, probably a Red Cedar goal.

  “Hockey?”

  Jacob tossed and caught his car keys. “Food. Let’s get some.”

  Remembering—

  Liz and Jacob couldn’t agree on a restaurant. Border listened to the argument for a while as they drove around town, then said, “I’m pretty much broke. Let’s just go to my house. Dad got groceries last night.”

  Jacob wasn’t shy and immediately hunted in the fridge and cupboards for something to eat. Liz looked elsewhere. Dropping her coat on a chair, slipping out of her shoes, she exclaimed, “It’s so weird! This house is exactly like ours, only it’s not.” She wandered out of view, looking.

  Border sat idly while the brother and sister busied themselves in his house.

  Jacob made a huge, everything-in-it omelet.

  “Gosh, Jacob,” his sister said when he called her back to the kitchen. “Make yourself at home, why don’t you?”

  “Don’t you want any?”

  She lifted plates from a shelf. “I hope you used garlic.” They kept it up while eating. Border liked the banter; it reminded him of being with Dana.

  “Found your sister yet?” Jacob asked.

  Border’s jaw dropped and egg spilled.

  “That’s not attractive,” Liz said. “Close your mouth.”

  “Sorry. It’s just, well, I was thinking of her at that exact moment,�
�� said Border. “The question surprised me.”

  “I think you should call the police,” said Jacob.

  “We’ve prayed for her,” said Liz. Jacob made a soft unhappy noise.

  “You what?”

  “During our family prayers, we said one for her.”

  “Now he’s going to think we’re really weird, Liz.”

  “What are your family prayers?” Border asked.

  “What do you think? Every day before supper, we get together and say a few prayers. Can you handle it?”

  Border speared a mushroom with his fork. “Sure. You’ll probably think I’m weird: I’ve never been to church. Not once.”

  Liz shrugged. “Families are different.”

  Jacob dropped his fork and lifted his glass of orange juice. “I’ll drink to that.”

  “Well, maybe your prayers worked,” Border said after they toasted, “because my sister has turned up. No one’s actually seen her, but she left a message on the phone machine the other day. It’s like we thought—she had to transfer planes in Atlanta and she decided she wasn’t going home. I don’t know where she is right now, but I’m pretty sure she’s okay.”

  “Do you miss her?” Liz asked.

  “Impossible,” said her brother.

  “Sort of,” said Border. “We didn’t live together, not since my parents broke up.”

  “Do you miss New Mexico?” asked Liz.

  “Yes.”

  “I’ve only ever lived in Red Cedar,” said Liz, “and we’ve hardly ever traveled. What’s New Mexico like?”

  Border took his time thinking about it all. What do you tell two small-town kids who pray every day with their family? Should he tell them about his friends and the hours they’d spend together drifting through the university campus or the nearby stores where they’d check out the comics, used books, vintage clothing? Or tell them how he liked to watch Alonzo at work in his body-piercing salon? Tell them about the coffee shops where he’d set out his hat and play until he’d earned enough money to feed all his friends? And pyroball? Border looked at their smooth, unblemished hands, used for praying, never singed.

  They wouldn’t get it.

  “New Mexico is pretty,” he said. “I miss the mountains.”

  “We have a mountain in Red Cedar,” said Liz.

  “What?” said Jacob.

  “Where?” asked Border.

  “There’s a nature preserve,” said Liz. “And there’s this mountain there.”

  “She’s joking,” said Jacob. “It’s just a giant boulder.”

  “I’ve climbed it,” she said.

  “You haven’t,” said her brother.

  “Have too.”

  “When?”

  “Hundreds of times.”

  “Hundreds?”

  “Often enough. Have you? Betcha can’t.”

  “Course I can.”

  “Try it.”

  “I don’t do things just because there’s a dare.”

  “Try it. Tonight.”

  Jacob frowned. “Rock climbing at night? That’s stupid.”

  “I’m up for it,” said Border.

  Liz moaned. “That was awful.”

  “What?”

  “Your joke. It was a terrible pun.”

  “Huh?”

  “You are as dense as my brother. Up for it? Rock climbing?”

  “You can’t be serious, Border,” said Jacob. “An hour ago you were freezing to death.”

  Border stacked plates. “I’m warmed up now. And besides,” he said, “I’ll put on long underwear.”

  Dogs in Baghdad—

  “Porter’s Park Preserve,” said Liz, as they drove along a dark road into a deserted parking lot, “was made possible by Porter’s Pork.”

  “That’s a good one,” said Border. “Say it three times real fast: Porter’s Pork preserves Porter’s Park Preserve.”

  They tried, they failed. They were laughing when Jacob parked the car.

  “I’m not sure we’re supposed to be here after hours,” said Liz. “Maybe this wasn’t a good idea.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t whose good idea?” asked her brother. “My idea,” said Border. “Let’s do it.”

  “A flashlight might be nice,” said Jacob. And he leaned across Border’s lap and opened the glove compartment. “Here we go and… Voila! It even works. Hooray for Mom and Dad; they’re always prepared.”

  “Not always,” said Liz as she opened the rear door. “That’s how they ended up with six kids.”

  Jacob directed the flashlight beam along a trail of packed snow. Border followed the others, vowing, as he slipped and snow spilled into his shoes, to buy boots the next day.

  The boulder loomed over the path, a massive shadow. “What do you think, twenty feet to the top?” asked Border.

  “If that.”

  “There’s a plaque on it that tells…” said Liz, and she took the light from her brother. “Here.”

  Border leaned to read.

  Glacial Erratic

  The boulder before you is probably one of the oldest objects you’ll ever touch. Geologists have dated rocks of this type at 3.6 billion years. At that time pressures deep within the earth changed the boulder from granite into gneiss. This process occurred in an area that is now the Minnesota River Valley, ninety miles northwest of this spot. Less than half a million years ago, a lobe of an ancient glacier plucked this boulder from the surrounding bedrock, then transported and deposited it at a site just north of the preserve. It was uncovered during the construction of the interstate highway. This glacial erratic measures 20 x 17 x feet and weighs about 125 tons.

  “Hey,” said Border, “that’s me. It’s talking about me.”

  Jacob laughed, but Liz said, “I don’t get it. Because you’re big?”

  “Now who’s dense?” said her brother. He pointed to the plaque. “Like the rock, Border was picked up and dumped in Red Cedar. He doesn’t belong here.”

  “Do you really feel that way?” asked Liz.

  “I feel,” said Border, looking up and running his hands along the rock, “that maybe I can do this.” He started climbing.

  He’d climbed rocks often enough in the hills outside Albuquerque, though never at night. Still, climbing was mostly touch and balance and strength. He could hear Jacob behind him, breathing hard and grumbling.

  Border reached the top, breathless, hands cold and scraped.

  “Hello,” said Liz cheerfully. “That took a while.”

  Her brother swung a leg over the top, pulled himself up.

  “How did you get up here ahead of us?” said Border.

  “There’s an easy way up the back. It’s practically a path. If you guys had waited, I would have told you. But no, you moron males had to charge ahead.”

  Jacob rubbed his hands and swore at Liz. Border grinned. “I wish my sister were here. I bet you two would be friends.”

  “Do you like your sister?” Liz asked.

  “More or less. Depends on her hair color.” He looked around. Not much to see but a starry sky and dark patches where the trees were.

  “What do we do now?” said Jacob.

  “Enjoy it,” said Liz.

  “How do we get down?” he wondered.

  “Relax, would you?”

  “Slide on our butts, probably,” said Border. “Liz can lead the way.”

  Liz lifted her arm and pointed. “If I led you that way, we’d come to a creek.” She shifted slightly. “That way to New Mexico and,” she moved again, “that way to Kuwait.”

  “Weird, isn’t it?” said Border. “To think that while we’re sitting here with nothing to do but get cold, there’s a war going on.”

  “No one’s looking at stars in Iraq,” said Liz.

  “Probably it’s already day there,” said Jacob.

  “Then they’re looking at bomb damage,” said Border.

  “There’s no way,” Jacob said, “that you would not go crazy. I mean, if where you lived was being
bombed. Killed or crazy—some options.”

  “The noise must be incredible,” said Border. “The sound of the missiles coming down, then exploding. One after another—you’d hear them and wait for one, maybe the next one, to hit you.”

  “Like I said, you’d go crazy.”

  “Pooch certainly would,” said Liz. “She can’t handle a thunderstorm. First crack and she’s under the table whining.”

  “I don’t want to whine,” said Jacob, “but is anyone else cold?”

  “Sure,” said Liz. “It’s winter.”

  “I’m sort of cold,” said Border. “I suppose it would be smart to go.”

  No one moved. They sat, looking and listening, seeing only stars and hearing nothing more than a soft wind through bare tree branches.

  “If you were in a war,” Border asked, “would you bother to save your pet? Do people leave pets behind to go to a bomb shelter?”

  “Don’t know,” said Jacob.

  “Do other cultures even have pets? I mean kids in other places, do they have dogs or cats? Are there Labradors in Iraq?”

  “I’ve never thought about it,” said Liz.

  “And if there are pets and they get killed during the bombing, do they get buried?” Jacob asked. “Or can’t people take the time to do that?”

  “Probably not,” said Border.

  Jacob nodded. “Maybe they just get the bulldozers and—“

  Liz pounded on her brother’s arm. “Stop that. What an awful thought.”

  They quieted. Border was cold, but he didn’t want to leave, didn’t want to move. Just sat there with the others, watching the clear, peaceful sky. Thinking about war, thinking about dogs in Baghdad.

  Public Transportation—

  Snow, snow, and more snow. On Monday Border walked out of the school and got it slapped in his face. Turned to the person next to him, no one he knew, and snarled, “I hate Minnesota.” She hustled away.

  The buses were lined up, stinky exhaust choking everyone. Since losing his keys, Border had walked to school, rising early, getting home late. Two cold miles, but he had survived.

  “It’s gonna be a blizzard,” he heard through the noise, and looked down to see Liz.

  “No school tomorrow?”

  “We can hope.”

  He followed her onto a bus. It was packed, three to a seat. Jacob waved from the back. Border nodded, then he sat behind Liz, wedging in beside two skinny kids, junior high types.