by Ike Hamill
“I guess not,” Trina said.
“I’ll get my bag,” Gerard said.
Trina watched him. As soon as he was out of the room, she intended to find out the real story.
Maggie had already stood up. When Trina stood up too, Maggie began to guide her towards the door. Gerard didn’t even really get out of earshot. Apparently, he had stashed his bag right in the hall. As soon as he passed out of sight, he was right back in the doorway, holding a big duffel.
“Call me once a week, Gerry,” Maggie said. She tapped her cheek when she approached. He leaned forward and gave her a gentle peck.
Gerard moved around Trina and held the door open for her.
“After you,” he said.
She couldn’t get over how normal he seemed.
“I’m right behind you,” she said. She turned back to Maggie. Gerard went ahead without her. She waited until he was walking across the yard to the car.
“Aunt Maggie, I just have one or two things I need to…”
She cut Trina off. “Of course. Billy will bring you cash, twice a week for food and groceries. Let him shop for himself. He’s great with a budget. I have to go sit down now. You take care.”
Maggie had somehow maneuvered Trina to the porch. She closed the conversation by shutting the door. Trina stood there for a second and blinked. She reached up to knock on the door. Before she could, she heard a heavy deadbolt latch. The message was unmistakable. Gerard was her problem now. When she turned around, he was already in the passenger’s seat. Trina walked slowly back to the car.
[ Introduction ]
Trina drove in silence. Next to her, Gerard seemed fascinated with the view through his window.
“Has your mother been sick long?” Trina asked. The question came out wrong. She meant it as a gentle inquiry to show respect and concern. Once it left her lips, the question sounded almost like an accusation of negligence or something.
“Longer than she knew,” Gerard said. “She just found out, but apparently she has been sick a while.”
“Oh.”
“They’re going to take a bunch of things out and zap the rest,” he said. He sounded almost pleased by the idea.
“Oh,” Trina repeated.
“She’s not going to make it,” he said. “Everyone says so. It’s too far along.”
Trina covered her mouth to stop herself from saying it a third time.
“It’s okay,” he said. “Everyone dies.”
Trina stole another glance at him and tried to do the math. He couldn’t be more than twenty-five. The wedding was maybe eight years earlier, and he had been a teen then. Maybe he was younger. It didn’t seem right though. He looked like he was going on thirty-five or forty. If she had met him on the street, Trina would have thought he was older than she was.
“Not everyone is your mom,” Trina said. “I’m so sorry she has to go through this.”
Gerard nodded. “I have trouble feeling bad about it. She’s not a big fan of doctors. When you don’t want to go to the doctor, you get in big trouble.”
Trina thought about her bedroom door in the mobile home. It had a lock, but the door itself was flimsy.
She felt Gerard’s eyes on her. When she glanced over to him, he looked away.
“I go to the doctor all the time,” he said. “Checkups, injections, you name it. I’ll probably live a long, long time.”
Trina nodded.
“You don’t have to worry about me,” he said. “I’m on the Depo.”
Trina fidgeted in her seat. “Pardon?” she asked. She wasn’t sure she wanted a clarification. Maggie had told her things on the phone, and they might be things that she didn’t want to know more about.
“It’s chemical castration. It sounds scary, but it just evens me out. I don’t have to do crazy stuff on the Depo.”
“Oh?”
Trina didn’t want to know about any of this. She definitely didn’t want to sit there wondering what “Crazy Stuff” included. Then again, it was somewhat comforting.
“Just so you know—I take a walk every afternoon. I always come back. You don’t have to worry about that.”
“Okay,” Trina said. Maggie had mentioned the walks as well. Trina was supposed to expect him to walk, and she was admonished to give him no spending money. He had his allowance, but apparently he often asked for money before his walk.
Until very recently, the idea of Gerard coming to live with her was still just a notion. There was no way she would be entrusted with the care of this man. But here she was, turning down the bumpy road that led to her little house.
“I like your woods,” he said.
“They’re your woods as much as mine,” she said.
“Oh. Thank you,” he said.
“I mean they’re Prescott woods. The family owns this whole strip. They’ve got it planted.”
Gerard nodded.
She bounced the car over a big pothole and the change bounced out of her cupholder. The road was good about four days a year. In the summer, it was all washouts and puddles. In the winter, she was lucky to get plowed by the end of the day. Maggie had promised that Dincey Prescott would come over and grade the road for her in August, but Trina would believe it when she saw it.
Trina saw the trailer with fresh eyes as she rolled the car to a stop on the dirt drive. It was big for a mobile home—not a double-wide or anything, but big. There were bedrooms on both ends, a half-bath attached to her room, and a bump-out for the front porch. She kept the flowers tidy and grass mowed. Some of the siding was sagging—the lines drooped down on the right side, as if her little house had suffered a stroke—but it was pressure-washed once a year. She had even painted the pump house in the yard.
“Pretty out here,” Gerard said. “Quiet.”
Trina nodded.
“I’ll show you to your room,” she said.
“That’s funny,” Gerard said. “You sound so formal.”
Trina blushed and strode off towards her house.
[ Walk ]
“I’m off for my walk,” Gerard said. He stood in her kitchen and put his hands on his hips.
Trina put her book down on her lap and looked at him. She hadn’t been reading. She had been looking at the same page while thinking about the crazy pervert in her guest room. Sure, he didn’t seem perverted now, but it was impossible to not think of him that way.
“Any suggestions?” he asked.
“Sorry?”
“Are there any good walks around here?”
“Oh. No,” she said. He smiled and she smiled back. “Sorry. I mean, you can’t really walk in the woods. The trails were torn up by the logging. I suppose you could walk out to the road, but it’s not exactly scenic. It’s just two-lane blacktop all the way down to the fire station.”
“Sounds delightful.”
He showed himself out, pausing at the doorknob like it was a strange new invention that he wasn’t accustomed to. When the screen door shut, she looked through her window and saw him stride across the lawn. She had a moment of panic. She always left her keys in the car. Maybe he had noticed that and planned to steal it. She got halfway out of her chair and then caught her breath as he walked right by the car. He continued out towards the long, rutted road, looking up at the canopy of trees as if he was regarding Eden.
Trina watched until she could no longer see his red shirt through the trees.
Chapter 5 : Dingus
[ Run ]
GERARD KEPT A STEADY pace until he was sure he was out of sight of the trailer. Even then, he swiveled his head all around like he was admiring the foliage. He glanced back, verified that he was far enough away, and broke into a run.
In no time, he gasped for air. He pushed through and found his stride by the time he got to the paved road. Gerard didn’t slow as he rounded the corner. He knew which way town was. He could feel it down there at the bottom of the hill. He felt all the Summer People, moving through their vacations like pleasure-seeking robots. They di
dn’t take any time to enjoy themselves. They just grasped at each summer experience to shove it into their greedy faces.
Gerard didn’t make it all the way to town before he had to slow to a walk. His feet were starting to hurt. Plus, he didn’t want his shirt to be soaked in sweat. He hated the feeling of a soggy shirt.
When he rounded the sweeping turn and saw the firehouse, he smiled. He glanced back. It was miles back to his cousin’s trailer, and it was mostly uphill. He would have to hitchhike back. There was a hot dog stand next to the firehouse. His smile broadened when he saw that. Nothing beat a good hot dog in his opinion.
Gerard walked into town with wide eyes, taking in all the details of the summer day like it was a gift for him. In a way, it was. His mom was sick, he had a new place to stay, and brand new people to meet. For once, everything was going his way.
Chapter 6 : Dunn
[ Home ]
RICKY SLOWED DOWN AND turned to watch the man in the red shirt. He had a big, goofy grin on his face. He looked like the type of guy his father would call a “Dingus.” Ricky took it to meant someone who was perpetually in the wrong place at the wrong time. That almost described the smiling man who was passing by the firehouse on Route 270. He was certainly in the wrong place. There were no summer homes south of the fire station. The only person who would be walking northbound on 270 would be a local. And this guy wasn’t a local as far as Ricky knew.
Ricky walked backwards until he got to his road and then turned in the direction of his house. Ricky was certainly a local. Both sides of his family had lived within ten miles of this house as far back as anyone could remember.
His mom wasn’t home.
The kitchen smelled of fir trees and soap. Ricky glanced in the refrigerator, didn’t find anything worthwhile, and then pounded up the steps to his bedroom. The day was heating up. A breeze was pushing his curtains inward, and it felt nice, but he closed the window anyway. This was going to be one of those days that would either get hotter and hotter until it was unbearable, or it would break into a thunderstorm by four. Either way, he didn’t want his window open. He still had a couple of hours before his shift at the ice cream stand—just enough time to work on one of his tricks and get cleaned up.
He checked his butt before he sat down on his bed. His jeans had dozens of old stains, but no new grease spots to worry about. He would hold off on the shower. Sometimes his magic got him even more sweaty than working at the marina. No sense in having to bathe twice.
He propped himself against the headboard and let his eyes fall halfway shut. He found the rhythm of his breath and let his heart rate slow as he dropped into a form of self-hypnosis. Nobody had taught him this trick. He had learned it all on his own. The world narrowed down to two tunnels—one from each eye. He let his focus slip apart and regarded the wall opposite his bed.
With his peripheral senses, he took inventory of his bedroom.
His bookcase was filled with science fiction. The plots of those books had captivated his early teenage years, but lately they weren’t so interesting. Now he was more into fantasy, and he read mostly on his tablet. The paperback books, each one discovered in the used bookstore near the dam, were relics of a forgotten obsession.
Next to the bookcase, his little desk was empty. It waited for school to start again. Ricky’s father had always said, “A clean desk is the sign of a sick mind.” He attributed the quote to Einstein. Ricky enjoyed keeping his desk clean for that reason.
On top of his bureau, Ricky sensed what he was seeking. There were two juggling balls there, next to the shaving kit his father had given him for his birthday. The third ball was missing. Ricky sucked at juggling anyway. That’s not what he intended to do with the ball.
The thing was right at the limit of his capability. It was the perfect size and shape to practice with. In fact, the ball and the two metal rings were at the center of his latest masterpiece.
Ricky whispered to himself, “Pick it up.” Old words meaning the same thing echoed in his imagination.
He felt the weight of it in his mind.
When he was sure he had it, he whispered, “Move it.”
The ball floated into his vision. It was so still, so static in space, that it didn’t look real. Ricky’s heart beat faster, nearly doubling in its pace, as he brought his eyes into focus. He saw the ball hanging there and his breath quickened.
Without whispering, he willed the ball to rise up even higher. It didn’t budge. This was the next thing he had to master. He had to be able to control the thing without whispering to it. The movement of his lips would ruin the trick. Every gesture and every word that left his mouth had to be part of the illusion. Presentation was at least fifty-percent of his act. Without that, people would think he was a hack. Nobody had to tell Ricky this.
“Up,” he whispered. The ball obeyed.
“Spin.” It spun.
He felt the exertion down in his guts. A muscle in his back spasmed with the effort. Sweat began to drip down his forehead and Ricky clenched his teeth to hold the spinning ball in the air.
This was his workout, and he would keep at it until levitating the ball was second nature. Maybe he could even graduate to a baseball, or a softball.
“Lower,” he whispered. He tried to relax his leg muscles, and then his hands. He fought for control of his own muscles.
“Ricky?” his mom asked.
His door banged open. The ball fell to the floor.
She had a handful of mail. She took one look at her sweaty son, propped up with pillows on his bed, and then she looked away.
“Your door has a latch on it,” she said. She exited quickly and closed the door behind herself. Through the thick door he heard her say, “Use it!” As she walked down the hall, he heard her muttering something about how he was fifteen and should know better by now.
Ricky took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He wondered what a heart attack felt like.
[ Work ]
By the time he got out of the shower, dressed, and went back downstairs, his mother was able to make eye contact with him.
“Can I get a ride down to Dawn’s? My shift starts in five minutes.”
“And your plan was to spring this on me so I would have to drive you? What if I was too busy? What if I had already left?”
“Never mind. I can walk down there in time.”
“You never could,” she said. She was muttering to herself as she picked up her keys from the counter. “You would show up ten minutes late, sweating like a firehose, and lose that cushy job of yours. Are you going to get moving or what?”
He rushed to hold open the door for her. After she pushed through, he trotted to get to the car before she did. He knew her moods. When she was like this, she was just as likely to give him a ride as drive off without him.
Ricky slipped into the car and strapped on his seatbelt.
He searched his brain for something to distract her with. He could never stump his mom on local gossip. Mary Dunn got all her gossip from Louise Townsend, and according to most, Louise got her gossip from the Devil himself. By the time news filtered down to Dawn’s store or the Grand Shore Marina, it had already filtered through Mary’s ears.
Still, Ricky had one thing she wouldn’t know about.
“I saw a Dingus today,” he said.
“Oh? Did you?” she asked. For a fraction of second, he thought he had a scoop. “About twenty-five, red shirt? That’s Gerard Dingus. He’s staying with Trina Prescott for the summer. Well, some say it’s for the summer. I’m half convinced that he will have a permanent home out at Trina’s. His mom is not faring too well.”
Ricky opened his mouth and then closed it again. He couldn’t imagine how she knew exactly who he was talking about. It was the name. He had seen the man and automatically tagged him with the name “Dingus.” Ricky narrowed his eyes as his mom took a left on 270. He wondered if maybe his new found skill with levitation had come with another benefit. He wondered if maybe he had g
otten a little second sight as well. Then again, he hadn’t guessed that the man’s name was Dingus, he had just put the uncharitable label on him because of the stupid grin on his face. It was probably coincidence.
“At seven?” his mother asked.
“What?”
“How do you get anyone’s ice cream order right if you can’t listen for more than one sentence at a time?”
“I don’t take the order,” he said. He was a scooper. The way they worked down at Dawn’s, there was a writer and a scooper. Ricky never talked to the customers, he just filled the orders.
“You know what I mean. It was a rhetorical question.”
“What was?”
His mom looked at him with her lips pressed into a tight, straight line. She was upset about something, but he had no idea what.
“Every day I thank God that you’re strong and pretty, Ricky.” She patted his arm.
[ Shop ]
Dawn’s store was on the left. Mary turned right. She knew the psychology of the summer people. If she had taken a left into the parking lot of Dawn’s, she would have waited forever trying to back out of one of those slanted spaces. None of the Summer People going south on 270 would have given her an inch of space to back out. The only way to get out of those spaces was to get lucky and find a Summer Person who wanted to take her spot.
Somehow in the strange psychology of Summer People, she would easily get someone to stop and wait if she was trying to take a left turn out of the bait store parking lot. They were a weird bunch. But it wasn’t just the ease of exit that made her turn right. She also had to pick up her little boy, George. To pick him up, she would first need to find him. He had left the house that afternoon with a heavy can full of fat, stretchy earthworms. He was either using them to pull in pike from the stream, or he had sold them to Roger Emmonds to re-sell in his bait store.
