“Whoever can fish it out.”
Mr. Yoder gives me a sly smile. “I like the way you think, Miss Lucy.”
Alice laughs. “How can you fix a truck that’s drowned? By now, it’s probably dead.”
“Not always,” her dad says. “If the water ain’t salty, you can replace the engine. But that truck’s going to need a lot of cleaning on the inside, starting with the brakes, the alternator—”
“So there’s hope?”
He slings his arm around her. “Darlin’, there’s always hope.”
The two of them leave the garage.
Now I’ve got one thing left to do.
I slide my finger inside my coat, where the paper’s rolled tight.
Then I knock on the driver’s side window.
When Faron sees me, he smiles so big, I get that electric jolt, letting me know I’m still alive. He pops open the door and I scoot next to him.
“How did it go?” he asks.
I tell him that Alice made a lot of mistakes. Lots of them. She’s starting over with her dad’s help. All that matters is that she’s got choices now.
“Mr. Yoder told me to give you this.” I dig the slip of paper out of my pocket and give it to him.
“What’s this?” He squints.
“A place for you to work,” I say, turning toward the window. I gaze at the interstate, the cars whooshing back and forth.
“The area code looks kind of familiar,” he says. “It’s up in St. Pete. That’s like, an hour from Sarasota.”
I’ve driven up to St. Pete lots of times with Dad, making his delivery rounds. Faron’s right. It’s not too far. The Gulf stretches between both cities, the same warm waters that circle the entire state.
“You take the Sunshine Skyway,” he says. “You know. That big metal bridge?”
“I know where it is. I live there, remember?”
“Me too,” he says. “The girls are much cuter down in Florida. Especially this one sweet girl I know. She even laughs at all my stupid jokes.”
“Not all of them.”
“Most,” he says. “You ready to get out of here? Or we could stay in the car for a while.”
“It’s too cold,” I say, snuggling against his chest.
“There’s a way to fix that. Want me to show you?”
“Maybe later.”
“You’re right,” he says, smirking. “It’s cold.”
“I thought you never got cold.”
“Not if I’m with you, fehlerfrei,” he says, kissing my nose.
chapter thirty-one
snowbirds
We buy a one-way ticket at the bus station. The ride down to Florida costs over a hundred dollars, which is all we’ve got left. It’s Alice’s money from the craft fair. Not much. But when you add it all together, it’s more than you’d expect.
Everybody on the bus is dressed plain. I can tell who’s Old Order or Mennonite just by the color of their dresses. We’re all one big family, heading south. Now it’s their turn to stare at us, a boy and girl in sneakers and blue jeans.
We sleep for most of the trip, taking turns, leaning against the window. I watch the miles of farmland. Empty pastures. Pylon towers. Hay bales rolled like cereal nuggets. After a while, I miss my purple iPod.
“Want me to sing to you?” Faron says.
He’s not kidding.
Softly, he begins to sing.
It’s a gospel song I know by heart.
I sing along, and, for once, I don’t care if I’m in tune. The gray-haired woman next to me starts singing too. A man joins in. And another. Soon the entire bus is singing together, lifting their voices as one.
It’s the most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard.
• • •
The bus rolls into Pinecraft a couple days later. We park in the exact same spot, as always, down the block from Big Olaf’s ice cream stand. Neighbors are already lined up on Bahia Vista. They sit on lawn chairs or three-wheeled bikes. A little girl whizzes around on Rollerblades while a boy slumps in his truck, taking deep gulps from a paper bag.
I step off the bus and squint into the blazing sunlight. Faron squeezes my hand and together we walk across the road.
“There’s my dad,” I tell him.
When Dad sees me, he starts running so fast, his straw hat flies off. At first, I’m scared he’s still angry. Then he sweeps me into a hug.
“So now you’re an Amish snowbird?” he says, wiping his eyes.
There’s so much I want to tell him, but I know there’s time for that later. Time for everything. The lake filled with the bones of old cars. Alice’s farm in Maine. The Amish Market, where I was shunned, and the Old Order girl slipping into the woods, quiet as a shadow.
Dad finally lets go and then he looks at Faron. I don’t know what to expect. One thing’s for sure: I never expected Dad to shake his hand.
“I hear you’ve been watching over my Smidge,” Dad says, sizing him up and down. I’m a little embarrassed. Still, I can’t help smiling.
“Lucy’s pretty good at watching over herself,” says Faron.
“Can’t argue with you,” says Dad, winking at me. “That’s why I won’t be so worried when she’s away at college.”
Did I hear that right?
“A letter came for you,” he says.
I hug him again. “Thanks, Dad,” I whisper. He’s given me so much. Now this is the best gift of all. A chance to be free.
“You won’t go too far, I hope?” he says.
“I’ll be back to help at the shop,” I tell him, “as much as possible.”
“Good,” he says. “And it’s time we planted another orange tree. Doesn’t look right with a space missing.”
We start walking home in the late afternoon sun. In the distance, the wild parrots cackle as they swoop across the orange grove. I see me and Dad planting a new tree. Then I get another picture in my head. It’s more like something I feel. That’s why I know it’s true.
On Lido Key, a pair of Amish girls kneel in the sand with their buckets and flashlights. The tide is low in the early hours before dawn. Nobody sees them except a passing jogger. He turns his head and wonders.
In Pinecraft, the Rumspringa boys slam a basketball against the pavement. Their feet skitter around the court. It’s just them and the street lamp. An empty canal. A radio blasting songs about love lost and found again.
Not far from here, a parade of cars fills the parking lot. Their headlights spill across the picnic tables, the oak trees, the rusty baskets, for a game that nobody plays. A boy lights a cigarette for a girl he just met. They take a walk under the water tower, steal sips from a Dixie cup. Later, they steal a lot more.
I know because I feel it.
That’s the way it’s always been.
Is now.
And will be.
There’s a boy driving across the bridge. He’s speeding over the Gulf, in a hurry to meet someone. His fingernails are caked with grease. When he gets where he’s going, he will dip his mangled hands in shallow canals, in warm ponds, in swimming pools where koi fish dart in the tangled seagrass. He will be whole.
There’s a girl he’s waiting to see. She’s tired after a long day at school. A real school where she learns about the tides, the secret language that water speaks. Things come and go. This is something she understands.
The currents that slide along Lido Key flow up the coast to Maine. Seagulls dangle on the horizon. They hover above a red truck, following the shoreline. A girl in a denim jacket sits behind the wheel. Her dad rides shotgun. A gospel tune plays on the radio. It’s a song they know by heart.
The truck disappears around the corner. For a moment, the song hangs in the air. It fills in the missing spaces, swallows them up like the sky, which brightens and fades. There’s a strange kind of quiet. Then gently, it begins to snow.
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Snowbirds Page 23
