the voice and the words and the love thatechoed from every surface.
"Adam, my son. Keep your brother safe. You need each other. Don't beimpatient or angry with him. Give him love."
"I will," Alan said, and he relaxed his arms so that he was holdingDanny in a hug and not a pinion. Danny relaxed back into him. "I loveyou, Dad," he said, and they trudged out of the water, out into the lastwarmth of the day's sun, to dry out on the slope of the mountainside,green grass under their bodies and wispy clouds in the sky that theywatched until the sun went out.
#
Marci followed him home a week before Christmas break. He didn't noticeher at first. She was cunning, and followed his boot prints in thesnow. A blizzard had blown up halfway through the school day, and by thetime class let out, there was fresh knee-deep powder and he had to lifteach foot high to hike through it, the shush of his snow pants and thehuff of his breath the only sounds in the icy winter evening.
She followed the deep prints of his boots on the fresh snow, stalkinghim like he stalked rabbits in the woods. When he happened to turnaround at the cave mouth, he spotted her in her yellow snow-suit,struggling up the mountainside, barely visible in the twilight.
He'd never seen an intruder on the mountain. The dirt trail that led upto the cave branched off a side road on the edge of town, and it was toorocky even for the dirt-bike kids. He stood at the cave-mouth, torn byindecision. He wanted to keep walking, head away farther uphill, awayfrom the family's den, but now she'd seen him, had waved to him. Hiscold-numb face drained of blood and his bladder hammered insistently athim. He hiked down the mountain and met her.
"Why are you here?" he said, once he was close enough to see her pale,freckled face.
"Why do you think?" she said. "I followed you home. Where do you live,Alan? Why can't I even see where you live?"
He felt tears prick at his eyes. "You just *can't*! I can't bring youhome!"
"You hate me, don't you?" she said, hands balling up into mittenedfists. "That's it."
"I don't hate you, Marci. I -- I love you," he said, surprising himself.
She punched him hard in the arm. "Shut up." She kissed his cheek withher cold, dry lips and the huff of her breath thawed his skin, making ittingle.
"Where do you live, Alan?"
He sucked air so cold it burned his lungs. "Come with me." He took hermittened hand in his and trudged up to the cave mouth.
They entered the summer cave, where the family spent its time in thewarm months, now mostly empty, save for some straw and a few scatteredbits of clothing and toys. He led her through the cave, his eyesadjusting to the gloom, back to the right-angle bend behind a stalactitebaffle, toward the sulfur reek of the hot spring on whose shores thefamily spent its winters.
"It gets dark," he said. "I'll get you a light once we're inside."
Her hand squeezed his tighter and she said nothing.
It grew darker and darker as he pushed into the cave, helping her up thegentle incline of the cave floor. He saw well in the dark -- the wholefamily did -- but he understood that for her this was a blind voyage.
They stepped out into the sulfur-spring cavern, the acoustics of theirbreathing changed by the long, flat hollow. In the dark, he sawEdward-Frederick-George playing with his matchbox cars in one corner;Davey leaned up against their mother, sucking his thumb. Billy wasnowhere in sight, probably hiding out in his room -- he would, ofcourse, have foreseen this visit.
He put her hand against the cave wall, then said, "Wait here." He let goof her and walked quickly to the heap of winter coats and boots in thecorner and dug through them for the flashlight he used to do hishomework by. It was a hand-crank number, and as he squeezed it to life,he pointed it at Marci, her face wan and scared in its light. He gavethe flashlight a few more pumps to get its flywheel spinning, thenpassed it to her.
"Just keep squeezing it," he said. "It doesn't need batteries." He tookher hand again. It was limp.
"You can put your things on the pile," he said, pointing to the coatsand boots. He was already shucking his hat and mittens and boots andsnow pants and coat. His skin flushed with the warm vapors coming off ofthe sulfur spring.
"You *live* here?" she said. The light from the flashlight was dimmingand he reached over and gave it a couple of squeezes, then handed itback to her.
"I live here. It's complicated."
Davey's eyes were open and he was staring at them with squinted eyes anda frown.
"Where are your parents?" she said.
"It's complicated," he said again, as though that explainedeverything. "This is my secret. No one else knows it."
Edward-Frederick-George tottered over to them with an armload of toycars, which he mutely offered to Marci, smiling a drooly smile. Alanpatted him on the head and knelt down. "I don't think Marci wants toplay cars, okay?" Ed nodded solemnly and went back to the edge of thepool and began running his cars through the nearly scalding water.
Marci reached out a hand ahead of her into the weak light, looked at thecrazy shadows it cast on the distant walls. "How can you live here? It'sa cave, Alan. How can you live in a cave?"
"You get used to it," Alan said. "I can't explain it all, and the partsthat I can explain, you wouldn't believe. But you've been to my homenow, Marci. I've shown you where I live."
Davey approached them, a beatific smile on his angelic face.
"This is my brother, Daniel," Alan said. "The one I told you about."
"You're his slut," Davey said. He was still smiling. "Do you touch hispeter?"
Alan flinched, suppressing a desire to smack Davey, but Marci just kneltdown and looked him in the eye. "Nope," she said. "Are you always thishorrible to strangers?"
"Yes!" Davey said, cheerfully. "I hate you, and I hate *him*," he cockedhis head Alanward. "And you're all *motherfuckers.*"
"But we're not wee horrible shits, Danny," she said. "We're notfilthy-mouthed brats who can't keep a civil tongue."
Davey snapped his head back and then forward, trying to get her in thebridge of the nose, a favorite tactic of his, but she was too fast forhim and ducked it, so that he stumbled and fell to his knees.
"Your mother's going to be very cross when she finds out how you've beenacting. You'll be lucky if you get any Christmas pressies," she said ashe struggled to his feet.
He swung a punch at her groin, and she caught his wrist and then hoistedhim to his tiptoes by his arm, then lifted him off the floor, bringinghis face up level with hers. "Stop it," she said. "*Now*."
He fell silent and narrowed his eyes as he dangled there, thinking aboutthis. Then he spat in her face. Marci shook her head slowly as the gobof spit slid down her eyebrow and over her cheek, then she spat back,nailing him square on the tip of his nose. She set him down and wipedher face with a glove.
Davey started toward her, and she lifted a hand and he flinched back andthen ran behind their mother, hiding in her tangle of wires andhoses. Marci gave the flashlight a series of hard cranks that splashedlight across the washing machine and then turned to Alan.
"That's your brother?"
Alan nodded.
"Well, I see why you didn't want me to come home with you, then."
#
Kurt was properly appreciative of Alan's bookcases and trophies, ran hisfingertips over the wood, willingly accepted some iced mint teasweetened with honey, and used a coaster without having to be asked.
"A washing machine and a mountain," he said.
"Yes," Alan said. "He kept a roof over our heads and she kept ourclothes clean."
"You've told that joke before, right?" Kurt's foot was bouncing, whichmade the chains on his pants and jacket jangle.
"And now Davey's after us," Alan said. "I don't know why it's now. Idon't know why Davey does *anything*. But he always hated me most ofall."
"So why did he snatch your brothers first?"
"I think he wants me to sweat. He wants me scared, all the time. I'm theeldest. I'm the one who left the mountain. I'm the one who came f
irst,and made all the connections with the outside world. They all looked tome to explain the world, but I never had any explanations that wouldsuit Davey."
"This is pretty weird," he said.
Alan cocked his head at Kurt. He was about thirty, old for a punk, andhad a kind of greasy sheen about him, like he didn't remember to washoften enough, despite his protestations about his cleanliness. But atthirty, he should have seen enough to let him know that the world wasboth weirder than he suspected and not so weird as certain