Nora & Kettle

by Lauren Nicolle Taylor

Silence.

  The door flaps open. A man approaches. He doesn’t lean down; I don’t think he wants to look us in the eyes. I watch the man’s chest move as he talks. He is a greenish shadow beneath the moonlight, his medals jingle and shine as he says, “I’m sorry.”

  My brother jumps up and pushes past the man. The man steps aside and lets him back into his mother’s room.

  I clasp my hands, look down. Blood patterns my shirt in sprinkles of red that will turn brown. Then they’ll make me wash it.

  Now we are alone.

  “Kettle?” Nora shakes my shoulder. I look up from my shirt to her concerned eyes blinking at me, blood running from both corners of her mouth like she’s in a cheesy vampire movie. “Kettle!” she says, louder this time.

  I can’t speak. She unhooks the container and takes my arm, pulling me to the ladder. Mechanically, I climb down, take my ticket, and walk the plank to land.

  Blood. Blood seeping into our clothes. Blood the color of the desert and the lines running across the giant rocks that stood sentinel over our camp. Blood is all I can think about.

  I reach the station and take my lunch. Nora copies me and follows as I make my way to the water, to the ship bones, in heavy silence. We ignore the teasing that trails after us as the men laugh at Nora’s accident.

  She is quiet, although I know she has questions. Sitting down, I take a bite of my sandwich. I watch as she takes off her shoes and dips them in the water.

  She glances at me. “You should take off your shirt and wash it,” she says.

  I stare at the waves. “You should wash your shirt too. And clean your face.”

  She narrows her eyes for a moment and then says, “Fine. Turn around.” I turn around and listen to splashing and wringing for several minutes. “Ugh!”

  I spin around suddenly. “What?” My eyes skip to her wet shirt before quickly looking away. I don’t need an answer because her shirt is completely see-through. “Oh.”

  She crosses her arms over her chest to cover herself.

  “Don’t worry. It will dry soon enough,” I say, pulling my shirt over my head and dipping it in the water. She spins around so fast she nearly tips into the water.

  I laugh. “You don’t need to turn around.”

  “I want to,” she says haughtily, and I snort. Small silence grows between us, just the seagulls squawking, and then, with her back still turned, she asks the question. “So what happened up there, Kettle? You sort of disappeared for a few minutes.”

  I sigh. Today, you get truths I’ve never uttered. Memories I’ve tried to suppress.

  “How did your mother die?” I ask to her wet back, her peachy skin showing through. Her shoulders rise up to almost touch her ears. “Kin’s mother’s death was messy and long. She was dying for almost the whole time I knew her. She had TB. It happened often in the camps. Mostly to the elderly. But well, I guess she was just lucky. When you coughed on me like that, it pulled me back there. Happens sometimes,” I say, shrugging. Happens more than I’d like.

  On her knees, she slowly shuffles around to face me, her eyes struggling not to look at my inappropriate lack of clothing. It makes me smile. I pull on the wet shirt and it sticks to my skin like glue.

  “What about your own mother? What happened to her?” she asks, blinking.

  “Kin’s mother was my mother for the four years I spent in the camp. Before that, I had no mother. At least not one who wanted me,” I say.

  “You mean, you’re an…” It’s just a word. Not a word that means much to me these days anyway.

  “An orphan,” I finish.

  “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be.”

  Her eyes search sideways. Something building inside her that she wants to say. I can sense it. A bubble of air rising in her throat.

  She spreads her arms wide and says, “My mother had a beautiful death.” It’s the oddest and most honest thing I’ve heard her say so far. She uses her hands to show me as she declares, “She flew through the air like an angel. The part after though, was like you said, messy.” The water laps loudly at our feet, slowly eroding what we thought we knew of each other and crusting our toes with salt.

  “I’m sorry.”

  She dips her head and watches the waves. “Thank you.”

  Then I spend the next ten minutes telling her in many different and colorful ways how reckless and downright stupid she was for standing up on a moving container.

  41. INDEPENDENCE

  NORA

  You should have seen me, Frankie. I was flying.

  You should have…

  You will see me.

  Soon.

  I’ve lost my breath. My heart. It’s all coming fast and hard, and it’s exhilarating. Kettle, this strange boy, this strange mix of responsible and courageous, he’s shoved me from the nest. And I can fly.

  “Nora, did you hear me?” He slaps water at me, and I flinch. “You need to promise me you will be more careful this time. Please.” The concern in his eyes is sweet and foreign. I’m used to disgust and rage flaming in a man’s irises.

  I nod. My arms locked over my wet chest. He waits, eyebrows raised, for me to actually say the words. “Okay, okay. I promise.”

  I chew on my bottom lip and glance at him sideways. I have so many questions to ask him. Where did he come from? How did he get here all the way from the Arizona desert? What happened to his real parents? Does he even know who they are? I also now know for sure that he is one of those Lost Children. He was in the camps.

  He sits with his elbows resting on his knees, turns his head slowly. “What?”

  “So Kin, your adop—ted bro—ther…” I span the words over several seconds, waiting for an eyebrow arch, a response to tell me that’s the right or wrong word. He doesn’t say anything, nor stop me. “Why can’t you inquire about him at the hospital? Is it because of your circumstance, you know, being…”

  “…a street kid?”

  I nod and bring a blush with it.

  Kettle’s eyes are serious, narrowed as he talks. “No, not exactly. It’s because Kin and I are runaways. We’re meant to be in Homes. The cops have been looking for us for a long time.”

  I purse my lips. “Really? Even after all this time?” I sigh. “Don’t they have anything better to do?”

  He stares down at his lap, an answer or a story there. “Just coz the war is over doesn’t mean people forget. At least, they don’t forget about people like me. They like to know where we are and what we’re doing at all times. If I showed my face at the hospital, they’d detain me and then what would happen to the boys, to our home?”

  I see the fear in his eyes, feel that he really believes his words, and I understand. I know it’s difficult to shed years of abuse. Like a plant trained over a frame, my body has grown rigid and able to take a punch. Kettle’s has grown to seek the ground and learned to hide. After a while, you don’t know how to do anything else. But I’m not so sure he needs to keep running. Things have changed. “Are you sure that’s what would happen?” I ask warily.

  He crosses his arms and his expression darkens. “I can’t take the risk.”

  And maybe he’s right. I understand losing so much you can’t stand the idea of losing more.

  I am resolute. My branches lean down, offering him some sunlight. “Okay then. I want to help you find him.” These words—I want to. They are like raspberry cordial dripped on my tongue. They are words I’ve barely spoken until a few days ago and I owe him big because he gave me the chance to use them.

  His head drops down and he laughs softly as he shakes his head.

  “That’s funny?” I ask, confused.

  He looks up, eyes full of stories, rolls and rolls of script written in dark blue ink. “No. I just thought I would have to work really hard to convince you to help me and here you are, just offering it to me.”

  The horn blows and we jump up and walk back to the loading area. I tuck my hair in and glance down at my shirt. He was right
. It’s already dry, a little stiff but at least it’s not transparent. “I’m going to need some different clothes if I’m going to be convincing at the hospital.”

  “We’ll go in a few days, when the docks are closed,” he mutters as we approach the group of men waiting to be assigned.

  A larger man shoves Kettle as he passes, grumbling the words, “Go home, Nip.”

  Kettle keeps walking like he wasn’t touched and I just stand there, eyes wide until he has to circle around and take me by the arm to pull me away from the horrible man.

  “How can you…?” I start.

  “It’s not worth it,” he replies with hard-edged sadness in his tone. Softly, fists clenched, words calm but driven with anger, he mutters, “It’s never worth it.”

  We start the second part of the shift, and I abide his wishes and am more careful.

  ***

  “Kite! Kite!” Heavy, uneven footsteps approach from behind. I’m slumped forward, barely able to lift my legs. I am so happy and exhausted, my muscles burning, but it’s a good pain. It’s not about bruises, bones cracking, or organs being squashed to make room for a fist. This is my own pain, something I earned for hard work. “Kite!”

  Kettle carefully nudges me. “Black is calling you.”

  I slowly turn around, and Mister Black is waddling toward me with an envelope. “Good first day, son,” he says, smacking the envelope of cash into my palm. I hold it up to my eyes and grin. My first paycheck.

  “Thanks!” I say in a low voice. Kettle snickers at my side as Black hands him another envelope and limps away.

  “Feels good, right?” he asks.

  I nod as we walk toward the gate, stinking of sweat, squinting into the sun, and aching for a bed. “Feels good,” I agree.

  He slaps me on the back and I cough, startled. “Sorry,” he mumbles, looking down at the ground that’s leaking heat back into our sunburned faces.

  “It’s ok,” I say, wishing that it really was and that the slap he just gave me didn’t send my whole body into a shock of shuddering, shivering fear.

  I have a long way to go, I can tell. But that’s life. That’s my life. One foot in front of the other. Courage. Toes testing first. Even if what’s beneath is unsteady, a bridge made of brittle bones and broken shoelaces, I can do this. Eyes forward and keep on walking.

  “You did well today,” he says with a wary smile. The words beat one, two, three, four like the knock of a door inside my heart. This is my acceptance.

  ***

  “Where are we going?” I ask when Kettle steers us away from the subway station and toward a group of buildings blanched black as coal. The sun attempts to sweep the walls clean with rays of pink and gold but fails, a murky yellow wash dripping down the walls instead. I blink up at the washing lines strung between them, flapping in the cooling breeze like wedding bunting. Faint smells of soap and linen rush over my skin, mixing with the salt and sweat of the docks.

  Kettle looks up and down as we cross the street and shakes his head, leading me around the corner. “We don’t sleep in the tunnel every night. It’s too conspicuous.”

  My wooden legs struggle to catch up with him. He peeks his head in the alley between the next two buildings where it’s dark, dirty and lined with large metal bins on wheels that stink of garbage. There is no clean laundry hanging from the sky here, just a rectangle of graying air lined by broken windows. “You have a second home?” I gasp, my eyes wide with surprise.

  Kettle snorts and sweeps his arm out grandly. “Sure. Welcome to my fall home. It’s a little draughty, but the views, as you can tell, are spectacular! The cardboard mattresses are real good for your back too.”

  Shut your mouth. I’m gaping. I can’t sleep here. I… I… “We sleep here?” I ask, pointing at the slimy, stained stones that slope into a drain in the center of the alley.

  Kettle nods, his face serious. “We sleep here.”

  Stepping into the shadowed space, I try not to look as afraid as I am. I lift one arm and grip my elbow, biting my lip as I mumble, “Okay.”

  Kettle seems surprised. “Okay?”

  I’m not saying it again, so I just nod.

  “All right, well, how about you find some clean-ish cardboard for us to sleep on and I’ll get us some dinner?” He motions to a dumpster that appears to growl at us with cardboard hanging from its metal jaws and slings his bag over my shoulder, removing his wallet. “Look after this.”

  I want to say wait, don’t leave me here, but I don’t. I clamp my mouth shut and let him go, while I stand in the middle of a slow dripping stream of foul-smelling water and try to work up the courage to touch one of the bins.

  I think I let myself forget, pushed it out of my mind somehow, that Kettle, the boys, they’re really homeless. And this is how they live every day. It’s how they survive, and I shouldn’t complain.

  I hold my breath and stomp over to a bin that looks slightly less wet and slimy, and start pulling old boxes out for us to sit on. A screen door slams and I duck down behind the bin, listening to a slopping, squishy sound as food scraps are dumped right by my head. The smell of rotting lettuce, off milk, and cigarette smoke makes me gag. I press a fist to my mouth and try to stay still. A man yells to another man at the door in an Asian language I don’t recognize, finishes his smoke, and goes back inside.

  I gather up my cardboard and move further away from the where he came out, which was clearly the back door to a restaurant or café of some sort.

  I dump it all in the small space between another dumpster and a large stack of wooden pallets and sigh shakily. Once I’ve run several pieces up the wall and along the floor, I stand back and admire my work, pushing my hair from my face and shivering. It’s getting darker by the second. Where is he?

  I sit down, pull my knees to my chest, and a feeling of lonely sadness surrounds me like the cold. Sadness for Kettle, for his brother, and for the other boys. People shouldn’t have to live like this. I try to think and feel this now before Kettle returns. When I try to put it aside, I find I can’t. I deliberately try to turn my thoughts to Frankie and how I’m going to find her. I fish around in Kettle’s bag and find a pen. Tearing off a small square of cardboard, I quickly scribble down a list.

  The list is too short. I have three names here. Three addresses. These are the only relatives we have in the city. The only homes I can think of where he may have hidden her. Three places that may be crossed out very soon. It makes me afraid to even look.

  I hear a splash and press myself closer to the wall. Fearful, small, the confidence I had earlier pouring off me like beads of rain from an umbrella.

  I let out a rattling, relieved sigh when I realize it’s Kettle. “What’s that?” he asks, handing me something wrapped in paper. It’s warm and smells tart and sweet.

  I fold the cardboard over and tuck it into my palm. “It’s a list.”

  He can’t know who I am. Not yet.

  “A list of what?” he asks, crouching down in front of me and taking a large bite of his food.

  Lie. “Um. Of what I’ll need to get before we go to the hospital to inquire about your brother,” I say very ineffectually.

  “Oh right, let me see,” he says, expectantly holding out his hand. The sun has pushed a line of light right through the alley and it strikes my face. It will only last a few minutes and then all will be black.

  I tip my head and think, shuffling my backside on the cardboard. “I’ll definitely require a nice blouse and a skirt. Some makeup… Oh and…” I glance down at my chest.

  Kettle is staring at me, a serious expression on his face. His eyes keep going to the paper in my hand. “Yes?”

  “I’m going to need some personal items,” I whisper.

  “Huh, like what?” he asks.

  I lean closer and whisper, “Undergarments. I only have the ones I’m wearing and…”

  He jumps up suddenly, his dinner scrunched in his hand. “Oh right. Yes, of course. Um…” He rakes his f
ingers through his dark hair, his cheeks flushed. He looks down at his half-eaten food. “I’m just going to put this in the trash.” He takes a few steps backward, nearly trips over, and then walks away quickly, with me covering my mouth to stop from giggling. When he returns, the paper bag is still in his hand. He laughs awkwardly. “Huh, I hadn’t actually finished eating.” He stares down at his own hands, his earlier curiosity about my list forgotten.

  That worked well. And guilt worms its way into my thoughts.

  42. SLEEP

  KETTLE

  “Are you tired?” I ask to Nora’s open, yawning mouth. She pats her pink lips and nods. I am sad when the sun sets because she becomes a gray shadow and I can only just make out her features.

  “I can’t believe we’re going to do it all again tomorrow,” she says through another yawn. She lifts one leg and then the other, dropping them down with a thump. “I can barely move.”

  “You get used to it,” I say, squinting through the grainy light and trying to catch an expression before it becomes too dark to see her. I think a thin but satisfied smile crosses her face.

  She shifts awkwardly and sighs. “How do you sleep?” she asks, her voice gravelly with exhaustion. Her clothes rake the cardboard, making small scuffing noises.

  “Close my eyes and just…” I start.

  She shoves me gently. “No, I mean. Where…? How do you lie down?”

  I can tell by her unsure movements, her shaky voice, that she’s very uncomfortable here. I shuffle closer and our shoulders bump. She doesn’t move away, and I feel her skin shivering against mine in the cooling night air. “I don’t lie down,” I reply, very aware of how close we are.

  I show her how I arrange myself so I can sleep sitting up, and she copies me.

  We are hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder. I close my eyes as silence settles between us.

  She exhales loudly, rearranging and shifting for about half an hour. Then I hear her sniff and I think she may be crying.

  “I don’t wanna do this, Kin,” I sniff, wiping my nose with my sleeve. It’s cold and my belly hurts. A man threw us some coins, which we used to buy a roll of Lifesavers. We only ate two each. Kin says we have to save the rest. I shudder and cross my arms across my chest, but I can’t stop shivering.

  The shadows look like tall men in coats ready to grab us and take us back, and I’m scared to close my eyes.