We Could Be Heroes

by Margaret Finnegan

  “We can climb right over,” Maisie said, lifting her feet one after the other onto the lowest slat and encouraging Hank to do the same. “My neighbor doesn’t mind.

  “Hey, Booler!” she called, jumping down from the top of the fence and into the other yard. The neighbor’s yard was bigger than Maisie’s, but that was because the house it belonged to was much smaller. In fact, it was tiny. It was run-down too, with peeling paint and one windowpane covered with wood. It was the kind of house that trick-or-treaters might shy away from, afraid that it could harbor ghosts or ghouls, but Maisie did not seem afraid, and so Hank was not afraid, just slightly alarmed.

  Hank had not spent much time with animals, but he had seen his fair share of Animal Planet, and he could tell that the dog was a pit bull. It was almost entirely silver except for its neck and paws, which were white. It had a square face with almond-shaped eyes and a lolling, happy tongue.

  “Why is it tied to the tree?” Hank asked.

  Maisie sighed dramatically. “Isn’t it awful?” she said as two other dogs bounded into the yard. One was big and black, the other small and golden. Hank guessed they were mutts. They rushed up to Maisie and nuzzled her with their snouts. When she squatted down they knocked her over and started licking her everywhere, making her laugh. The dog tied to the tree barked and jumped left and right with springlike legs that brought his whole body straight up in the air.

  “Hey there, Cowboy,” Maisie said, pulling herself up and petting the bigger mixed breed. “Hey there, Honey,” she said to the smaller one. “This is Hank. He goes to my school.”

  Hank took a step forward. He put out his hands and the dogs gathered round to sniff them. He could not help but sniff the dogs back because the stench of them rose like a cloud and settled right around Hank’s nose. They smelled of dirt and just a little bit of skunk. Still, their noses felt wet and cool against his skin and their whiskers tickled.

  He smiled. “Nice doggies.”

  Behind them, the tied-up dog whined.

  “Don’t worry, you little cutie-pie,” Maisie said, walking over to the other dog. “We haven’t forgotten you. You’re a good boy, aren’t you?”

  Hank and the other dogs followed Maisie, who, upon reaching the pit bull, knelt on one knee and ignored the mud seeping into her jeans. She pulled her face close and breathed him in. The dog sniffed Maisie in return and his muscles seemed to loosen. He let out a wobbly sigh and licked Maisie’s chin.

  “Hank, this is Booler,” said Maisie.

  Hank squatted next to Maisie. He took a hand and ran it across the dog’s side, which was dusty and slick, and one whiff of him proved that he was even smellier than Cowboy and Honey combined.

  Hank said, “Hey, boy.”

  “Booler’s a good dog,” said Maisie. “Cowboy and Honey are good too, but this guy is a big love.” The pit bull dropped his head onto Maisie’s knee and she began to scratch his scalp.

  The other dogs circled round the tree, peed, and then began a loop around the backyard, stopping, sniffing, peeing with abandon at each plant and rock and even on the corner of the wooden doghouse nestled under the maple tree. Every once in a while they would come back to Maisie and Hank, demand affection, and then return to their pee-filled explorations.

  “How come he’s tied to the tree and the other dogs aren’t?” Hank asked.

  Maisie sighed even louder and more theatrically than before. “Well, it’s a real disgrace. Booler started having seizures and Mr. Jorgensen—that’s my neighbor, he’s pretty old—says that Booler is just too much to handle now. You know what a seizure is?”

  Hank opened his mouth to answer, but Maisie just continued on.

  “Well,” said Maisie, “there are these things called neurons in your brain, and they tell each other information, and sometimes, for some people—or dogs—they get too excited, and then your body has a seizure.”

  “And Booler has them?”

  “Yep. He falls to the ground and shakes. And when you call his name he doesn’t hear you at all, and when it’s over he doesn’t want to play. He just wants to sleep.” She stroked Booler some more.

  “Mr. Jorgensen says that tying Booler to the tree is the only way to keep him safe. But that’s a load of hooey. You can see that it’s just too lonely out here for Booler. Mr. Jorgensen only comes out to feed him. Cowboy and Honey come out sometimes, and they’re nice and all, but—you see them—they want to play and run around. Poor Booler can only watch. I mean—look—that rope is probably only ten feet long. He gets so sad. He barks and whines. I hear him all the time. I come out here whenever I can, but you can see it’s not enough.

  “Plus, those seizures really scare Booler. They scare him so much that he can hardly breathe when he even thinks about them. He doesn’t want to be all alone out here having a seizure. He wants to be with someone who loves him.”

  A hole was opening in Hank’s chest. In his mind’s eye he saw the dog, alone, sad, a tiny silver planet in a universe of blue velvet. No one to talk to. No mother to hug. No baby brother to kiss. Scared.

  Hank could sense the a’a feeling taking over. And it wasn’t just his a’a—it was like Booler’s a’a was filling him up too. It was like he and Booler were watercolors. The dog’s loneliness became Hank’s loneliness. The dog’s fear became Hank’s fear. It was like the boy in the book all over again. Hank pulled out the three rocks from his pocket.

  “This is slate,” he said, holding the rock in front of the dog. “And look, this is chalk. You can use the chalk to write on the slate.” He pulled the chalk across the slate, leaving a small white line.

  “Booler is young,” said Maisie. “He’s only two years old. That’s practically a puppy. He’s got a whole life ahead of him! And he can do tricks. Watch.”

  She stood up. The dog stood too. “Sit, Booler.”

  The dog sat.

  “Down, Booler.”

  The dog lay down.

  “Shake, Booler.” The dog offered a paw for Maisie to hold.

  She turned to Hank. “And that’s just a few of the things he can do. He is a very good watchdog. Whenever anyone comes down the street, Booler bolts up and barks his head off.”

  Hank’s hand began to swirl. The pit bull was such a smart dog—such a smart, lonely, scared dog. It was too much. It was making him too sad. He tried to push down the a’a.

  “I want to look at the rocks now,” said Hank.

  “In a minute,” Maisie said, ignoring him for the third time that afternoon. “The thing is, Mr. Jorgensen doesn’t really take care of Booler. You know who picks up the dog poop out here? Me. When I first started visiting Booler, dog poop was everywhere. It was poop-land-mine central. Booler hated it. It was stinky and gross. So I cleaned it up and I keep it clean. For Booler. It’s pretty disgusting work too.”

  “It’s still stinky,” said Hank. “These dogs smell. A lot.”

  “That’s because Mr. Jorgensen doesn’t bathe them!” Maisie started counting off on her fingers. “He doesn’t bathe them. He doesn’t pick up their poop. He doesn’t brush their teeth. He doesn’t play with them. And those are all things you have to do if you have a dog! I know because I used to have a dog, but then she died because she got very old.

  “I offered to take Booler off Mr. Jorgensen’s hands, but—can you believe it?—he said no! He says Booler wouldn’t want to live anywhere else and that Booler is fine with everything the way it is. Mr. Jorgensen is crazy stubborn.”

  Hank looked back at Maisie’s house. The bubbling a’a reached behind his eyes. “You’re making me sad.”

  “Hey! I have an idea!” Maisie said, a little too loudly and with a jarring snap of her fingers. “Why don’t you take Booler? If we could get Booler to your house, he could live with you and Mr. Jorgensen would never know. Wouldn’t that be great? I bet your family would be so happy to have such a great dog.”

  Hank blinked. He had already had to get used to a baby brother. Now a dog? Hank looked back at Booler. Booler
was a nice dog. Booler was a sad dog, and seeing such a sad dog made Hank sad, but Hank was not a metamorphic rock. It was a very interesting fact that metamorphic rocks withstood high heat and pressure until they turned into a whole new kind of rock, but he could not have pebbles and sand and baby brothers and dogs globbing onto him, changing him, changing his world. His fingers folded around his rocks and his fist began to swirl.

  “I don’t have a dog.”

  “That’s okay,” Maisie assured him. “Booler will like being an only dog, and you can feed him, and give him a soapy bath, and he can sleep at the foot of your bed, and you can be best friends.”

  Hank shifted. His fist began to swirl more quickly. “I don’t like to have things on the end of my bed when I sleep.”

  “It doesn’t matter where Booler sleeps,” Maisie said, her voice getting even louder. “You’re missing the point. The point is that he would be happy because he would have a family he could really be with, and you would be happy because he is such a good dog and he would get to be your dog. And he wants to be your dog. I can tell.”

  Hank twisted round and looked at Maisie’s house. “I… I… think Booler wants to be your dog.”

  Maisie rolled her eyes. “Well, of course he wants to be my dog, but Mr. Jorgensen says no. So now Booler wants to be your dog.”

  He leaned back, desperate. “Why me?”

  “Well, Booler thinks you’re pretty brave since you tried to burn down the school just because you hate a book. I told him all about it and he really gave me his big hopeful eyes when I was talking. He could tell you had the meatballs to save him. That’s when I knew that Booler was counting on you to help him escape and to take care of him.”

  “I don’t see how he could tell you—”

  “I told you, he is very smart. He tells me a lot—with his face and stuff. Now, you’ve got to help Booler. He’s counting on you.”

  Hank stood up. Both his arms were now hanging at his sides as his hands looped round and round at the wrists. “We don’t have a dog. We have a baby. I think I should go home now.” He ran back to the fence. His hands were gripping the wooden slats when Cowboy and Honey ran up and started nudging the back of his knees.

  “No, no,” he said. “Bad dogs.”

  “Don’t call them bad dogs!” yelled Maisie. She was running toward him, her own hands balled in fists. “They just want to be your friends, like Booler. I’m telling you, Booler needs you!”

  “I… I… I gotta go.” Hank climbed over the fence. He wanted to run home but he wasn’t sure which way to go, so he ran back to the garage instead. He couldn’t even talk to Maisie when she found him. She was still yelling, standing over Hank flapping her hands around, but Hank didn’t hear anything she was saying. He just sat there and stared at the rocks in the closet as he mumbled, “I was having a good day, but now it’s a bad day. You gave me such a bad day, such a bad day.”

  Maisie stopped yelling and flapping. After a while she sat down next to Hank and began fidgeting with the laces on her shoe. Sounding a little like a frog, she said, “I just… thought you had the meatballs. I thought you’d want to help.”

  Hank shook his head. He stared at the rocks.

  Maisie said nothing.

  Their moms came.

  “What’s going on?” said Maisie’s mom, who seemed like a grown-up version of Maisie. She had the same haircut, the same red boots, the same sunny voice that seemed ever ready to switch to dangerous.

  “I didn’t mean to break him,” Maisie said guiltily.

  “Maisie Huang, what did you do?” And there it was: dangerous.

  “I’m sure it’s fine,” said Hank’s mom, leaning down to rub Hank’s back. “Hank can be wound a little tight. It’s not a good thing. It’s not a bad thing. It’s just what it is. Huh, Hank?”

  Hank nodded. He said, “I was having a good day, but now it’s a bad day.”

  He repeated the phrase again, and then again, and then again when they walked home.

  Mom held his hand with one of her hands and pushed the baby stroller with her other. She didn’t ask him what had happened. She didn’t ask him why he was upset. Instead, when they were halfway to his house, she said, “So what rocks did you bring to school today?”

  When he couldn’t even tell her that, when he could only shake his head and mumble again, “I was having a good day, but now it’s a bad day,” she pulled some string cheese out of the diaper bag and gave it to him.

  “Bad moments, even a lot of bad moments, don’t make a day. What were the good parts of your day?”

  But the good moments seemed so far away. They seemed so hard to remember. All he knew was that this was not a good moment. This was a bad moment, a moment that felt loud and sharp and heavy. He stopped walking and looked up at his mom. She knelt down and wrapped Hank in her arms. She squeezed and squeezed even when Sam started to chant, “Ma Ma Ma Ma Ma.”

  Then, without another word, they walked the rest of the way home. It wasn’t that far really. Meadowlark was not much of a town, just a little place to shop and sleep on the way to the ski slopes at the top of the mountain behind it. It took about fifteen minutes to get from Maisie’s to Hank’s, but by the time they got home, the a’a feeling had lessened, and Hank, though tired, could at least tell his mom many amazing facts about his rocks, which was one of the good things he did like about his autism. He could reel off a lot of interesting facts about important things, like rocks.

  When Dad got home, he said to Hank, “I hear your playdate was a bust, buddy. Well, you can’t knock it out of the park every time.”

  “We didn’t go to the park,” said Hank. “We went to Maisie’s.”

  “I see,” said Dad. They were sitting on the couch watching Hank’s favorite movie, The Jungle Book. Mom had put Sam to sleep so it was just the three of them lined up in a row. Hank was in the middle.

  They watched The Jungle Book all the time, especially after bad days. It didn’t have anything to do with rocks, but it was funny and Hank liked that. It was about a boy, Mowgli, raised by animals in the Indian jungle.

  “You know,” said Dad. “It wasn’t always easy for Mowgli.”

  “Yeah,” said Hank, barely paying attention because it was the part where Mowgli’s best friend, Baloo the Bear, sang a funny song.

  “But his pack looked out for him,” said Dad.

  “That’s ’cuz his mom was a wolf,” said Hank.

  “Yeah. She had his back.” Dad reached across the back of the couch and ran his fingers through Hank’s mom’s hair.

  “We’ve got your back. You know that, right, Hank?” said Mom.

  “Yeah,” he said. He listened to Baloo sing and his mind drifted back to Maisie. It was really too bad she had given him a bad day. Because she had a lot of really cool rocks.

  3.

  Hank was standing in line waiting for school to start. It was the day after his playdate with Maisie and he had come to school prepared. He had one goal: to keep Maisie from bringing up Booler. If she brought up Booler he would feel super sad, and if he felt super sad he would not be able to hold back the a’a. The only way to hold back the a’a was to avoid the things that awoke the a’a: disappointment, fear, sadness, uncertainty. And the best way to avoid those things was to stick with the familiar and predictable.

  Of course, there was no guarantee she would bring up the dog.

  His mom seemed pretty certain she would not. “Believe me,” she’d said to him. “I’m sure Maisie has learned that that is not a good conversation for you two.”

  But Hank wasn’t so sure. She seemed a little bit like a barnacle, that girl. He had a feeling that once she latched on to something, she would hold on forever. And so—of course—the need for a foolproof plan. And he had one! As soon as he saw Maisie approaching, he pulled a gigantic book, titled Five Pounds of Fun Facts about Rocks and Minerals, out of his backpack. He held it like it was no big deal, like he was just carrying it for absolutely no reason.

  Sh
e said, “Hey.”

  “Hey,” he said, turning away from her and looking out across the playground.

  She moved in front of him. She seemed a little less enthusiastic than usual, which only made her motives more mysterious. “Um… I have lemon ricotta cookies in my lunch. I made them with my mom after you left. You want one?”

  He thought she might be trying to trick him, but still, it was a cookie. He gave a brisk nod.

  She took a cookie from her lunch bag and handed it to him. “They’re really good.”

  He took a bite. They were really good.

  She hesitated and then said, “So, you know that dog from yesterday? Booler?”

  Ha! He’d been right! She was just like a barnacle! He set his foolproof plan into motion, but first he shoved the cookie right in his mouth because not even the best of plans were worth the sacrifice of a really good cookie. He chewed quickly as he flipped open the book. His mouth still full, he pointed to something on the page and said, “Yes, but did you know that according to Five Pounds of Fun Facts about Rocks and Minerals one of densest rocks on the planet is peridotite?”

  She opened her mouth, but Hank barreled on. “You might be fascinated to know that diamonds are sometimes found in peridotite.” He looked up, surveyed the situation.

  She said, “But about—”

  He looked back at the book. “You will also be fascinated to know that gabbro is another one of the world’s most dense rocks.”

  Mrs. Vera came to walk them to class and saved Hank from having to regale Maisie with any more information. As they walked to class Hank watched the back of Maisie’s hair swish from side to side. He smiled. He had always known that his facts would come in handy one day. He had always known.