The Smell of Other People's Houses

by Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock

  The only person who might have seen where Sam went got off the boat two stops back at some small port in Southeast, the rain torrential. The chicken lady hobbled down the metal off-ramp, an orange-clad ferry worker on each of her elbows, her wild hair whipping them in the face until the rain tamed it enough to sit flat against her skull. She looked like an injured bird herself, watching them load her precious chicken crate into an old Toyota truck. I could tell she wanted her chickens to go inside the cab, out of the weather. A young woman and a man got out and wrapped themselves around her, ignoring that she was wearing a garbage bag for a raincoat.

  Maybe the man who picked her up was her son, shaking hands with the car deck crew like they were old friends, but I know from listening to whispered conversation that she was listed as a missing persons case. I overheard it when Jack and I were hiding in a life raft nearby, using puffy orange life jackets as pillows. She was supposed to be in a home for the mentally ill, but somehow she just walked away without anyone noticing. Jack was torn up about that part—that nobody even noticed. And he was pretty upset when I told him we had to distance ourselves from her, so as not to be connected with a missing person. But as she got into the blue truck, I whispered, “What did you see? Did he really fall overboard?” The door slammed shut behind her, and in that instant all hope of knowing what really happened was wrung out of me like water from a washrag.

  Things between me and Jack have been tense since then.

  “I had a dream about Sam,” he tells me. I ignore him.

  “It was a bouncy dream, with a boat and some whales.”

  I say nothing.

  “It smelled like tea and flowers,” he continues.

  “Flowers are bad luck on boats,” I say.

  “Well, it smelled good, like lilacs.”

  I don’t respond.

  “Maybe we should think about going back,” he says hesitantly. “In case Sam is looking for us.”

  His incessant optimism grates on me. I used to think it was sweet, but now it just reminds me of everything we’ve lost, and I can barely hold it together. “He’s gone, Jack, so just knock it off.”

  He wraps the empty brown arms of Sam’s jacket around himself like a hug and says nothing. I’ve lost one brother, and the other one is dissolving right in front of me. Even though I’m afraid I will lose him, too, I can’t seem to stop it from happening. I don’t know how to make a new plan, not knowing where Sam is. With no good plan, I just stay the course, which I know frustrates Jack.

  He thinks I don’t see his little private connection with the night watchman, either. But I do. When the watchman makes his rounds, the big, fat key ring jangles against the leg of his blue trousers, and I feel Jack’s body alert like a cat. They make eye contact and I wonder what Jack is doing. There is part of me that wants to wave a white flag and surrender, retire from being “the man of the family,” because I’ve done such a lousy job of it anyway. But even that would take energy, and I only have enough left to keep moving every couple hours, changing spots every time the memory of Sam catches up with me.

  We have slept like french fries under heat lamps in the solarium, in the life rafts with the life jackets as pillows, under the stairwell near the car deck, and now in the little play area with the humongous plastic Legos, which is deserted because it’s three a.m. Parents have been known to leave their kids here and go off to the bar. At least, that’s what you believe if you listen to the announcements that come over the loudspeaker at least twice a day. “Will the parents of a four-year-old girl wearing a Mickey Mouse jean jacket please return to the play area on the second level.”

  For now we’re the only ones here, sleeping on thick blue mats under a sign that says DO NOT LEAVE CHILDREN UNATTENDED IN THE PLAY AREA.

  The night watchman has a clicker in his hand that I’ve grown accustomed to. He must have to click when he’s inspected a part of the ship—some sort of log—so I have heard his clicks from almost every spot on the boat. I can feel Jack relax, as if the clicker is comforting. He seems worried that maybe, like the chicken lady, nobody has even noticed we’re gone. Not even the people we were trying to get away from. I imagine he hears the night watchman’s footsteps and then click, click, someone has noticed us, two boys alone; click, click, someone sees us; click, someone cares; click, someone is turning out the lights for us. Click, click.

  —

  When I wake up alone in the play area, my first thought is that Jack has done a Sam—poof. Gone.

  By the time I find Jack in the dining car playing cribbage with the night watchman, I’m too relieved to say anything. The cribbage board has ivory pegs made from walrus tusks—exactly like the one my father had. If he hadn’t left, maybe Sam would still be here, too.

  It’s too hard trying to keep track of brothers who are full of their own ideas. They’re like helium balloons. At some point you just have to let go of the string and say, “Go on, then—good-bye, safe travels,” which has got to be easier than wondering whether you’re going to hold on too tight and pop the damn thing. Is that what happened to Sam?

  I sit down across from the cribbage board. Jack won’t quite meet my eye.

  “Have you learned to count your own points, then?” I ask, trying to sound casual, but my heart is still back in the play area, beating like a terrified rabbit.

  “He’s never been able to quite get the hang of the points,” I say to the night watchman, when Jack doesn’t answer.

  “He holds his own pretty well,” the man says.

  His face is lined like a map; he’s worked outside on boats for so many years it’s creased in all the right places.

  He smiles and holds out a wide, weathered hand for me to shake. “I’m Phil,” he says.

  Then he goes back to the game.

  Jack holds his cards in front of his face, as if he’s trying to make himself disappear. How long exactly has he been sneaking off, playing cribbage with Phil?

  “Is that it, then?” I ask. “Are we in trouble?”

  I’m so tired, if Jack wants to turn us in, then let’s get it over with so I can lie down and sleep right here under this booth. I just want to curl up with the scattered cold fries, empty wrappers, and smell of rubber boots and go to sleep for a million years.

  Phil lays down a card, moves a peg, and does not look at me.

  “Years ago I was the harbormaster in a little fishing town,” he says conversationally. “One night I went into the harbor bathroom and there was a brand-new little baby. Couldn’t have been more than a couple days old at most. She still had her little shrunken umbilical cord sticking out of her belly button; it hadn’t even fallen off. She was practically blue, naked, just lying in the stainless steel sink.”

  Jack looks at me and raises an eyebrow, but I wonder where he’s going with this odd story.

  “I wrapped her in paper towels and my raincoat—which wasn’t nearly warm enough—but she was so cold and I was just worried she might not make it; I guess I went on autopilot,” he says. “Maybe I was in shock or something. It’s not like you ever expect to find something like that.”

  “Your turn,” he says to Jack, as if this is totally normal chitchat to have in the middle of a cribbage game.

  “What happened?” I whisper, afraid that he’s going to tell us the baby died.

  “Long story short, she was tough as nails and perked up pretty fast once I got her warm. There was, of course, a bunch of news attention and a search for who had left her, but no one ever turned up. She did wind up in a really nice family, moved up north,” he says. “She’s about your age now”—he nods at me—“maybe a little younger. She survived me being the first on the scene and knowing nothing about babies, and the scratchy woolen blanket that I finally found for her, and being abandoned. She was a little fireball.”

  He looks at his watch. “I have to go make my rounds,” he tells Jack, “so we can just hold this hand if you want. No cheating while I’m gone.”

  “Do you know her stil
l?” Jack asks, and Phil sits back down.

  “I lost touch,” he says, a note of sadness in his voice. “For her sake,” he adds, “in case she didn’t want to be reminded of the worst thing that ever happened to her.”

  “Maybe you were the best thing that ever happened to her,” Jack says, unable to not be himself. But his optimism stabs me in the chest, reminding me again that Sam is gone.

  “What about us?” I can’t help it. I’m so tired of running and hiding and being in charge. I think about curling myself into a semicircle and sleeping on this bench until the police come to take us back home. Surely that’s what will happen, even as I hear myself say, “We can’t go home.” My voice sounds flat, like a tire worn down to the rim.

  “It’s funny,” Phil says, as if to himself. “I took this job because every time I walked by that bathroom in the harbor, I was afraid of what I might find. It was fine; I mean, it could have been way worse. If she hadn’t been alive I don’t know what I would have done. But it still made me nervous; I didn’t want any more surprises on the job.”

  “At least we have our clothes on,” Jack says, which makes Phil laugh so deep and loud, I’m sure he’s going to wake up the entire ferry.

  “You guys aren’t so bad,” he says, “but I wonder what it is with me and stray kids.”

  I follow the creases on Phil’s face. Maybe the lines really are a map.

  “You two need to decide what you want to do and then let me know how I can help, within the bounds of the law,” he says, wiping his eyes from laughing so hard.

  Then he stands up again to go make his rounds, but before he leaves he lays down a brown paper towel with writing on it that I recognize as Jack’s.

  In big, blocky letters it says: CAN YOU HELP US? WE NEED TO GET BACK TO FIND MY BROTHER. PLEASE DON’T TURN US IN. WE ARE DESPRATE.

  Now it’s my turn to laugh, rocking back and forth until my gut hurts. Jack stares at me. But I can’t help it. When I’m finally able to catch my breath, I say, “We’re desprate? Jack, you really should have tried harder in spelling.”

  —

  Phil turns out to be an okay guy who doesn’t turn us in to the ship’s captain, which surprises me. In fact, I am more resigned now that Phil knows our secret, and I even let Jack choose the fake names we’ve decided to use. When he says I’ll be called Oscar and he’ll be Frank, I wonder if that was a mistake. Especially because every time he says “Oscar,” he starts humming the Oscar Mayer wiener song. Laughing was something I’d never thought I’d do again, not as Hank or Oscar or anyone, and I’m amazed how much it helps. Although without Sam, I know the darkness is always close by.

  I don’t tell Jack that I’m grateful he turned us in, but I do feel about a thousand pounds lighter now that Phil is helping us. He says a friend of his knows a family in Fairbanks willing to take us in until I turn eighteen.

  Phil warned me, though, that if I try to run off alone and we get caught again, we could get separated. The state might not care so much about me living on my own, but Jack’s still young enough to raise eyebrows.

  “I hear you, Phil. I promise, no more running.”

  It was enough to scare me into following the rules. Well, sort of. We still had to use fake names, because no way was I going to let Jack anywhere near Nathan Hodges again, either. I had a hunch that Phil knew those weren’t our real names anyway.

  In Prince Rupert Phil introduces us to Isabelle, the Canadian version of social services. She’s wearing a plaid wool skirt and short little rain boots with dogwood and fireweed blooms painted on them, as if she’s determined to blend into the scenery. Phil walks us up the ramp and gives her a hug that looks a tiny bit more than just professional, if you ask me. She turns to us and shakes our hands, much more formally. I’ve never known a woman who wore lipstick before, and this one has so much on she looks clownish. I can tell Jack is fighting the urge to laugh.

  “Hello, Frank and Oscar,” the bright-pink lips are saying. It takes me a minute to remember that we are Frank and Oscar. She opens the door of a rusty yellow Datsun that is supposed to make it all the way to Fairbanks. I’m a tad doubtful that this car will make the journey, but what choice do we have?

  Just before we climb in, Phil puts his arms around our shoulders and pulls us both in close for a hug. “She’s going to help you guys, I promise. She’s also my girlfriend, so don’t give her any trouble. She cut through a lot of red tape and is sticking her neck out here for all of us, so be nice.”

  Then he leans down close to look right into Jack’s eyes. “I hope you find your brother,” he says, slipping a square of brown paper towel into Jack’s hand. “And just in case you’re in her neck of the woods and you happen to run into her, say hello from me.”

  We wave good-bye from the back of the Datsun, and Jack unfolds the paper towel to find just one word written on it. In large letters scrawled in black marker, it says SELMA.

  I finally did hear Gran talking to someone, the night I left home clutching my suitcase and the bus ticket to Canada. This time she was the one with the long red phone cord stretched into her room; through the door I thought I heard muffled crying. I couldn’t really make out much. Just the words, “I’m sorry, Sister, I know. I didn’t know what else to do.” Gran sorry? And since when did she have a sister?

  Before I went out to wait for the bus, she had said only that I didn’t have to worry—she had made all the arrangements and that I wouldn’t be alone. I searched her face, trying to figure out if I was being punished or if she really did think she was helping. I’m honestly not sure, but her face was softer than I’d ever seen it. She patted my shoulder and said, “Be good,” and then mysteriously added, “Just try to understand.”

  But mostly I tried not to think about anything as the bus drove farther and farther into the Canadian Yukon. I was finally going to the place that had swallowed up my dad. It felt vast and empty except for trees and mountains and wide, open spaces. I doubted I would ever understand anything. After days of traveling on a very bumpy road that did no favors for my bladder, we pulled up to the abbey gates and I read the delightful sign, OUR LADY OF PERPETUAL SORROW. Really, Gran? You have outdone yourself this time.

  That was already three weeks ago, but it feels like forever.

  My belly is so round, I can put the white wicker clothes basket over it and pretend it’s just a big ball of laundry. At this moment, instead of a baby, I could be pregnant with four flat sheets, two tea towels, and a pillowcase. Don’t I wish.

  My job here at the abbey is to take the laundry off the line for the Sisters. I say laundry, but there’s only ever sheets and towels and sometimes my own clothes, because the nuns do their own washing and I doubt they own real clothes, but I don’t know for sure. Living with Gran was good practice for not asking too many questions, even when a person is suddenly sent to a convent in another country and is the youngest person there by about seven hundred years.

  I’m making a list of questions anyway, in case someone unexpectedly says to me, “So, Ruth, is there anything you’d like to know before your life goes any farther down this black hole?” In no particular order: Are there ever any other girls like me who come here? Will the people who adopt my baby be kind? What will happen to me afterward? Does God hate me?

  Some days I take that last one off the list because I think the answer’s probably obvious, but Sister Bernadette did tell me once that God only operates from a place of love. Then she hurried off really fast like she had something in her eye.

  I haven’t heard from anyone since I’ve been here. I didn’t really expect to, but it makes it a million times lonelier and gives me a couple more questions for my list: Are they even curious about where I am? Do Selma and Lily ever wonder about me? Does Dumpling still have my note?

  The flip side is that it’s also kind of nice no one can see me, now that I’m the size of a house. I can’t believe I still have months to go; how much bigger can I possibly get?

  The nuns are all ri
ght, except for Sister Agnes, who I can tell is not happy that I’m here. Her face looks like a sprouted potato, but it’s her personality that sticks with you. Gran would call it having “no front porch”—you can pretty much see straight into her mind, like looking into a cluttered living room, and it’s obvious how she feels. I’d have known even if I hadn’t overheard her talking to Sister Bernadette. They didn’t know I was in the pantry, right off the kitchen where they were obviously arguing.

  SISTER AGNES: I really thought Mother Superior had had enough of her nonsense by now.

  SISTER BERNADETTE: Oh, Sister Agnes—how can you hold such a grudge after all this time?

  SISTER AGNES: It’s like an illness that just keeps getting passed on down the line in that family.

  SISTER BERNADETTE: The abbess would disapprove of your assessment, Sister.

  SISTER AGNES: The abbess did her best with Marguerite and obviously it had no effect.

  SISTER BERNADETTE: OH, SISTER, HUSH.

  SISTER AGNES: I can understand once, but three times? When is she going to put her foot down?

  I was so confused that the name Marguerite went sailing right over my head. If the Sisters hadn’t opened the pantry door at just that moment, I might have caught on sooner, but they found me sitting on a big bag of rice with a box of crackers in my hand, crumbs all down the front of me, and suddenly I had bigger fish to fry. (I get really hungry between meals.) Finding me in there only seemed to have proved some point that Sister Agnes was trying to make, because she looked at Sister Bernadette with an I-told-you-so expression.

  Sister Bernadette and Sister Agnes are so ancient, they could easily be ghosts. But they bicker like sisters. I didn’t realize nuns could be so human—holding grudges, arguing, making faces at each other and then storming away from disagreements like large winged bats. It’s this unforeseen display of humanness that makes me feel better about them, like they’re real people. Hearing them also makes me miss Lily in the most unexpected way.