Little Blog on the Prairie

by Cathleen Davitt Bell

  “Trust me,” she said. “My new older brother—boy jock wonder—is constantly throwing things at me and saying ‘Think fast.’ His sister is my age and we’re supposed to be instant friends but we have nothing—we’re talking zero—in common. Her name’s Katie. I mean, we have the same name. How can we possibly be sisters, right? And you know what her nickname is? It’s Kater-tot. Her little sister, Cara—they call her Cara-tot. They like these names. Their older brother, Matt, made them up. They both think he walks on water. It’s nauseating. They’re such… girls.”

  “Good luck,” I said.

  She nodded, but didn’t say thanks. And I thought that was pretty cool.

  I didn’t talk to any of the other kids. Hat Boy was playing catch with the guy Ka had pointed out as her new older brother, Matt. Ron and Betsy’s daughter was talking to them like they were old friends. Everyone else seemed really young. I sat down with my plate of food next to my dad, and we both listened as my mom and the woman with the bow in her hair compared woodstove trivia.

  “I heard you can put a piece of paper in the oven and if it bursts into flames, it’s too hot to bake bread,” the woman said. She brushed her hair up on her forehead as if she was swatting at a fly, but it was actually the bow that was bothering her. Instead of pulling it out, which is what I would have done, or burning it, which is I guess what Ka would have done, she gave it a little friendly pat.

  “I read online that if you can keep your hand in the oven for a count of five but not more than eight, it’s the right temperature to bake,” my mom said.

  “That sounds a little hard on your hand,” the woman said, and then added, “Frankly, it’s usually my husband who cooks. When he’s too busy I just pick something up. This is a chance for me to reconnect to cooking. Or I guess I should say connect to it. I used to boil water in law school, but that was about it.”

  My mom nodded and smiled, looking smug. Maybe she’d never baked muffins in a woodstove—and she’d never gone to law school—but she took a lot of pride in cooking dinner for us every night.

  Before I’d even had a chance to finish eating, Betsy was back, shooing us along. “Your family will want to get started on the walk to your cabin,” she said. “We’re running a little behind and it will be dark before you know it. You’ve got provisions in the place to get you started. Just the basics—flour, cornmeal, salt pork, lard, coffee, some dry staples. But you’ll want to get cooking as soon as you can and eating fresh out of the garden. I’ll pack you up a supper for your first night. Gen, follow me to the kitchen.”

  In the kitchen, I watched Betsy fill a basket with food for our dinner, including a loaf of fresh bread she pulled out of the oven.

  Betsy’s daughter came into the kitchen carrying a pail of milk. Her bonnet was hanging down her back in a way I caught myself thinking looked kind of cool. She was tall like me, with her long hair done in a thick blond braid. She looked like I imagined Betsy must have when she was a girl—with rosy red cheeks, big eyes, and a pretty mouth, though there was something funny about it, like she’d just eaten something sour. I wondered if she played sports, if I would like her, what kinds of bands she liked to listen to when she wasn’t wearing this crazy dress-up costume, but then I remembered that all that was impossible. Nora wasn’t visiting. She lived here. My mom had told me on the plane Nora was homeschooled and raised pigs. It was likely she didn’t listen to music at all, unless someone actually played it on the piano.

  “Nora’s a whiz as a milker,” Betsy said. “And she helped me make up all the dolls for the great crop of little girls we have in this year.”

  “You made all those dolls?” I said. Before I could stop myself, I started to laugh. I knew it was rude, but sometimes you just can’t hold it in.

  “Oh, yes,” Betsy answered, as if my laughter was to be expected. Maybe Nora wouldn’t be offended either?

  But Nora was staring at me, her mouth hanging open.

  “I had to,” she hissed, and I pursed my lips hard, took a deep breath through my nose, and got myself mostly under control except for one last little snort.

  Just then there was a knock at the door. Betsy answered it and in walked Hat Boy. As soon as he stepped into the room, he took off his hat, and seeing him without it, I realized I hadn’t taken a good look at him before. He had dark blond hair, almond-shaped brown eyes, and though he was dressed in clothes like Ron’s, he looked more normal in them—maybe because his shirt was open at the collar and I could see a braided leather necklace resting against the hollow of his throat.

  He smiled at me and for half a second, I forgot all about Camp Frontier. I forgot how tired I was, and how stupid I looked in my dress, about how I still needed to pee but was too freaked by the outhouse and the thought of undoing all the buttons.

  I looked away from him and down at my hands, which I buried in the folds of the dress. I didn’t smile back. I always do this around cute guys—Ashley teased me that I acted like they were from another species or something. I’ve never told her that on some level, I suspected that was true. What would a cute guy want from a girl like me?

  “My mom is wondering if you could pack a supper for us too,” the boy said to Betsy. “She said for me to tell you she didn’t have time this morning to figure out the cooking stuff and we’re going to be hungry tonight if we don’t bring something back.” His voice was deep and a little raspy and he was asking in a way that made me think he was really nice—and also used to getting what he wants. I glanced up again just long enough to note that his shirtsleeves were rolled up at the wrists. I found myself thinking: “Sexy,” which took me completely by surprise. “Sexy” is a word I never use except when I’m making a joke about how someone’s fly is down or they have food on their face.

  “Now, Caleb,” Betsy said. “Your mother knows very well that each family is entitled to one picnic supper when they first arrive. Your family had yours last night. You’re on your own.” She smiled, but it wasn’t the beaming, approving smile of before.

  I wondered what it was like for Ron to come home to Betsy’s disapproval after he lost one mortician job after another. Or was learning to use his brand-new fake hands. I giggled, and then realized in horror that maybe Caleb thought I was laughing at him for asking for food he wasn’t supposed to have.

  “Well,” Caleb said. “It couldn’t hurt to ask.”

  He smiled at me again, quickly, and I looked down. As soon as he was gone, I wished I’d smiled back at him. I wished I’d said something. But then again, what I really wished was that I hadn’t been dressed in a historical costume with my hair in braids.

  Suddenly, I had an idea.

  Outside, I reached into our basket, ripped off a hunk of the loaf of bread Betsy had packed for us, and found Caleb where he was standing by the benches.

  “Here,” I said, passing him the bread.

  “Thanks!” he answered. I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t say you’re welcome. I didn’t even register that it was kind of gross that he put the piece of bread directly in his pocket.

  The only person who did seem to have the ability to speak was Nora, who had stepped onto the porch in time to see me pass the bread to Caleb.

  “That’s cheating,” she said. She wasn’t talking to me, though. She was talking to Caleb. She was actually winking at him. Winking? And smiling. She had a great smile. I wished for a second I hadn’t laughed at her inside. I wished I’d done something so that she’d want to be my friend too. I laughed now, to let her know I was willing to be part of the joke. But she didn’t move or look at me. It was as if I wasn’t even there.

  6

  Here we are,” Ron said when we broke out of the woods on the path he’d been leading us through to our cabin. In the clearing in front of us, I could see a small building. Was it a shed? The outhouse?

  “That’s home,” Ron said.

  “That?” I said out loud. “That’s a house?” It was even smaller than Ron and Betsy’s. It looked—honestly—exactly
like the shed our neighbors the Ostrakazis use to store their lawnmower. And the giant snowblower that Mr. Ostrakazi never offers to loan us for our driveway, even when he sees me up to my waist shoveling. My mom thinks shoveling is good for you.

  “And there’s the barn,” Ron continued, pointing again. Get this: the barn was actually bigger than the house.

  To the left of the house was a garden surrounded by a post and rail fence, and beyond that a field that looked like a meadow. “We’ve already plowed and planted corn,” Ron explained.

  “It doesn’t look like corn,” my dad said.

  “That’s because all you can see right now are weeds. You’ve got your work cut out for you, I guess.”

  “Ah,” said my dad.

  “There’s a nice kitchen garden too,” Ron went on. “As we are committed to 1890 farming practices, we don’t use any chemical pesticides. We’re actually classified as an organic farm. That lets us sell our stuff for more on the market.

  “Hey ya, Daisy. Hey ya, Pumpkin,” Ron called to a pair of chickens that were pecking at the ground near the house. And then, when we still didn’t say anything he asked, “What do you think?”

  None of us, not even my mom, moved. I was trying to take in the whole expanse of it—the bigness of the woods, the bigness of the mountains that you could see beyond the field, the smallness of the house, how cool the air was now that the sun had started to set.

  Then we went inside.

  “Sweet home Alabama,” I muttered. The cabin was dark and creepy, and smelled kind of funky—like old bacon mixed with mildew and mold.

  All the time I’d been fighting with my mom back home, at least we’d been doing it, well, at home. With carpeting, wall-board instead of rough planks, and with lights on in all the rooms. Even Ron and Betsy’s tiny house felt like a palace compared to the cabin we’d just walked into. Their place had a real upstairs. All we had here was a loft with a ladder.

  It was so much worse than what I’d been imagining that the horror canceled out my ability to feel anger. I even forgot for a second how badly I needed to pee—and trust me, I had to pee pretty badly by now. “This,” I said out loud, not caring if I was being rude to Ron, “is it?”

  Ron set a lantern on the table and showed my dad how to light it. It had kerosene in it, so you held a match to a wick and turned a little key to make it burn brighter or dimmer. It wasn’t a lot of light even on the brightest setting.

  My dad looked at Gavin and me. “You can never do this,” he said. “It’s not safe for kids.”

  “We can never turn on the lights?” Gavin asked. I think he meant it to be a sarcastic question, but his voice cracked. He sounded as freaked out as I felt.

  I noticed bugs swarming around the lamp. A lot of bugs. A mosquito whined in my ear and I swatted at it. “Is there a hole in a screen or something?” I said.

  “Screens?” Ron said. “Frontier cabins in 1890 didn’t have screens. Mosquitoes were a part of life. If they’re really bad, you can run a smoky fire or close the windows.”

  “There’s no screens?” my dad said. He started to scratch at his neck.

  My mom put the basket down on the table and went to the counter that ran along the back wall. There were a couple of barrels underneath it and a few shelves above that held dishes. There was a pump mounted to one end of the counter with a basin underneath the spout—not even a real sink. “This is the kitchen,” she said, like she was speaking more to herself than to us. “Amazing. It’s so simple. Think about our convection oven, our lettuce washer, our stand mixer—even the toaster—and then look at this,” she said. “We have more counter space on the grill!”

  “You’ve got wood for the stove in the lean-to next to the house,” Ron announced. “You can try for a fire tonight, or just wait until the morning, though it does get cold. I’ll send Nora over tomorrow to make sure you are getting along okay, and next week we’ll set you up with a milk cow.” He was almost out the door before he remembered something. It was strange, he had looked so creepy in the airport and driving the van, but out here, he blended in, just like one more enormous and silent tree. I kind of wished he would stay. “You might want to clear a little bit of the forest growth from around the house,” he said to my dad. “It will help with the bear problem this place always seems to have.” He spoke casually, like he was talking about a rainstorm coming or a beautiful sunset.

  “Bear problem?” my dad echoed.

  Now, remember how I said my dad is really laid-back and lets my mom make all the rules? Well, here’s something else to know about my dad. He is totally brave and a totally great guy, but he is really scared of animals. He crosses the street if he sees a dachshund coming. He makes my aunt send her cat to the kennel when we visit, claiming allergies everyone knows he doesn’t have. We had a raccoon in the neighborhood for a while last year, and if you so much as put a paper plate on the ground during a cookout, my dad would be after you about how it would lead to exploding raccoon populations and everyone we know dying of rabies. I once saw him cower when a deer crossed the trail when we were on a hike. He has never taken us to a zoo.

  So, bears.

  “What do you mean, problem?” my dad asked. “They come into the yard?”

  “Sometimes,” said Ron. “One time we had a big teenager cub try to get into the house. I think most of them aren’t so dumb though.”

  “One tried to get into the house,” my dad repeated quietly. He wasn’t asking a question. Merely stating what Ron had said as if he were translating from a foreign language. As in, I’m sorry, I don’t speak Crazy, I must have heard you wrong…

  “Just the one time,” Ron said, and then, as if it wasn’t really worth explaining further, he changed the subject. “If one of you kids can toss some scraps to the chickens and lock them up in the coop before you go in for the night, I’m sure they’d be much obliged.”

  “Is that wise?” my dad said. “To let the chickens run around loose during the day with a bear on the prowl?”

  Ron smiled—was he laughing at my dad? “It’s full summer. The bears aren’t hungry now,” he said. “There’s plenty for them to eat out in the woods.”

  And then he was gone, and it was just my dad, Gavin, and me, sitting in hard-backed chairs around a rough wooden table with a (smoking) lamp on it. As soon as my mom finished running her hands along the surface of everything, saying, “See how useful every piece of furniture has to be to merit being built at all? Ron made everything by hand!” She joined us at the table. It was freezing in the cabin.

  “So!” Mom said. And it was clear we were all supposed to be as excited about this as she was.

  “So,” my dad answered. “I thought this was going to be a resort?”

  “A resort would teach us nothing,” my mom said firmly.

  My dad looked up at the ceiling, where you could see a lot of spiderwebs. And also, after your eyes adjusted to the dark, spiders.

  “I feel like our family’s closer already,” I said. It didn’t even come out funny, and no one laughed.

  Meanwhile, Gavin started to look around. My mom began to unpack Betsy’s food. My dad covered one of my hands with his.

  “I think I found the TV!” Gavin shouted, and when I turned my head with a jerk, he was like, “Just kidding.”

  I didn’t move from the table as my mom found a knife and sliced up the bread. There was butter shaped in a ball and wrapped in a cloth, and she spread some on each slice. The milk in the jug was still kind of warm and way thicker than I am used to. After a few sips I didn’t want any more. But the bread and butter were amazing. The butter tasted richer than normal, and also, in a strange way, cleaner. It melted onto the soft, still-warm bread. We each got a piece of ham too.

  “That’s it?” my dad said when he’d finished his serving. He had his face buried in the bucket. “No leftover apple pie? I only had one piece at the picnic.”

  I didn’t mention that I’d given half the bread to the cute guy. “Well, tom
orrow, we’ll make more food,” my mom said. She was already paging through a cookbook she’d found next to an enormous Bible, the only pieces of reading material in the place. “Look at this!” Mom said. She flipped to the front of the book, and pushed it into the glow of the lamp. “This was published in 1882.”

  “Whatever,” I said, standing up. I couldn’t take it anymore. Not just the cabin, but the by-now-pretty-overwhelming need to pee. My grandma once said that when you hold it too long, your eyes turn yellow. If that was true, my eyes must look like two lemons popping out of their sockets.

  The sky was still lighter than the dark mass of trees when I crossed through the yard, but inside the outhouse, it was pitch-black. I couldn’t see if there was a bench or just a hole in the ground like my mom said they had when she studied abroad in France.

  The darkness did nothing to interfere with my olfactory perception, however. I was almost rocked backward by the smell. Immediately I slammed the door shut and took deep breaths of uncontaminated air. Even the worst Porta Potties do not compare.

  But when I say I had to pee, I’m not being casual. I’d been holding it now for four hours and it wasn’t lost on me that Betsy had said I would only have one change of clothes. I took another deep breath and opened the outhouse door.

  I groped forward, reaching for where I expected the bench to be. It was there, but it was also… wet. Wet? Wet!! Why? Because it was covered in black mold scum? It was too dark to say what I was touching. But there was one thing I could say for sure. I was not going to sit down on any slimy, wet, smelly wooden toilet seat I couldn’t see. I planted one thick-soled boot up on the bench and felt around with my toe for the opening. Once I had located it, I hauled the rest of my body into a standing position over the spot where I took the hole to be.