Jerk, California

  My heart pauses in its rhythm. I scour the ground, search the bag, turn it inside out. No tassel.

  “Handsome Sam, reporting for graduation, sir.” I salute and break into a gallop.

  “Pomp and Circumstance” fills the air, and I streak toward the line of graduates snaked behind the stands. By the time I reach my classmates, the first rows of seats have filled.

  “Where—where am I s’posed to—to be?” I huff at Lars. He looks at me—the raisin—from head to toe. His mouth opens, and then clamps shut. Lars lifts a finger and points to the third row, where an open seat glints in the sunlight.

  Dahlgren, D. Carrier—oh no. They already seated the Cs!

  I push in front of Lars, puff out air, and let loose with a violent head shake—one last free one before walking into the fishbowl. My right hand supports the limp corner of my cap and the left smoothes down my gown, and I saunter into the Colosseum. I glance at the lions around me and break into a cold sweat. My peers look hungry. I break free from the line, stumble over knees, and topple into my seat. Third-row center.

  “Where you been?” Dave Cartwright whispers from the left. “Man, you stink.”

  “I know. Our car broke down. I had to run.”

  My body fills with deceit’s tension and leaps. I stretch my neck, my shoulders, anything to mask the twitch.

  “Whoa, horsey.” Dave scoots his chair away from me. “You gonna be buckin’ like that for two hours?”

  The next lie comes so easily. So easily it doesn’t feel like lying. “Just stretchin’, you know? Got to get comfortable if I’m going to sit here all morning. But I need a tassel. Mom jammed all my stuff in a bag and forgot it.”

  I reach beneath my chair and pluck three dandelions. After twisting the stems together, I wrap them ’round the button on my cap. “There!” A yellow bouquet hangs down, and the third row laughs. Maybe Naomi is laughing.

  Dave seems to forget my horsiness for the time being.

  I peek over my shoulder. Mom and Old Bill stand near the bleachers with Baby Lane’s stroller. I face the front and swallow hard. It’s just too much. The hype, the audience. Their eyes.

  At first, I will my jumps to a few shoulder spasms, but as each speaker “inspires” me, tension leaps to my voice box. Coughs and throat clearings morph into hums and grunts. As the commencement address begins, I’m in rough shape.

  But not as bad as Mildred Moury.

  At 102 years old, she’s to give the keynote. The honor is, of course, due to her age. I agree that triple digits are a noteworthy milestone. But the vision of her slumped in a wheelchair, fresh from the Mitrista Manor Retirement Facility, doesn’t fill me with hope for my future.

  Her introduction lasts forever, and by the time the valedictorian cranks the microphone to Mildred’s level, my spasms are in full bloom.

  “Teachers, parents, young people.” Pauses between words could hold entire sentences. I bounce my knee. Anything to give the jumpiness a better way to express itself.

  Never works.

  “Hum. Hum. Hum-hum.” Staccato sounds shoot from my mouth, but lucky for me, Mildred’s hearing left a decade ago, and she continues unfazed.

  “Each one of you can reach your dreams. Each—”

  I don’t know whose breath I feel in my ear. But the whisper floats in, lands in my throat’s uncontrollable magnification chamber, and bursts out my mouth.

  “Stupid!”

  “—one of you can succeed.”

  The first three rows spin and stare while behind me a chuckle spreads. I fake a couple coughlike sounds but can’t make it sound like the word. Mildred doesn’t miss a beat.

  “Now I know many of you young people think I’m old. A lot of you think I’m—”

  Whisper.

  “Pissy!” I bite my lip and stare at the ground. Three dandelions fall from my cap and I trample them into the earth as laughter erupts around me. My vision blurs and it’s not from sweat.

  God, please, make them stop!

  I squeeze my eyelids tight and my body shakes. I lean forward. Far as I can.

  “Now I have much more to say, but if I did, you might think I’m—”

  The whisper strengthens. It’s calculated, calm, hideous. And effective.

  “An asshole!”

  “Shut up, Carrier!” Dave elbows me hard.

  I can’t. I can’t!

  “And knock it off back there.” Dave hisses at the row behind. “It ain’t funny no more.”

  I cover my ears and rock until Ms. Mildred Moury is off the podium. Jerks, like popcorn, explode every muscle on my left side, but it no longer matters. Poor Mom. Having to watch the thing I’ve become.

  Principal Rivers offers instructions about procedure and the holding of applause, but as Sarah Adington strides to the front, it’s clear he no longer controls this student body. Parents and students erupt with whoops and shouts. Even unpopular kids get “sympathy claps.” Some bleeding-heart parent wants everyone to feel special.

  Everyone.

  “Samuel Carrier.”

  Silence.

  I tremble. Not a sound but the clearing of Principal Rivers’s throat as I stand at the base of the podium stairs. I stare at him through tears, turn, and scan the crowd. Mom leans against the bleachers and cries. Old Bill hides at her side, his face buried in his hand.

  And I run. I run away from the podium, from the school, from the town. I run and listen to the sounds of confused voices. I’m at the fieldhouse before Principal Rivers’s boom restores order.

  “Quiet, please. Quiet! David Cartwright. Come on up, David.”

  I pause, rip off my gown and sweaty T-shirt, and stuff them in the trash. But not the square hat. I hurl that tasselless cap as high as I can and watch it snag the top of a backstop. “It ain’t graduation if you don’t throw your cap.”

  Dressed in only shorts and shoes, I’m good to go. Out of Mitrista, away from home and my graduation party.

  Nope. I won’t be making that one.

  chapter eight

  I RUN FAST. AND THE FASTER I RUN, THE STRONGER I feel. Sweat pours down my chest and back, but my legs won’t ease. Three miles outside of town I’m still in full stride. Desperate to run out of myself, desperate to leave my shell behind, I turn in to a field and race through wild hay. My feet stumble over the irregular terrain.

  Doesn’t matter whose land this is or who posted the three “No Trespassing” signs. Nothing matters but the number of miles I can put between graduation and me. Marsh muddies my sneakers, then my shins. I slosh into Crow Creek, the trickle that oozes all the way from Lake Mille Lacs. Herons take flight, and I thrash into the reeds.

  Fly away, lucky birds.

  Knee-deep water feels good, but I don’t deserve the feeling and scramble up the far embankment. I fall twice before I stagger to the peak.

  I cram four years of high school into two words: “Why me?” My roar bounces off an empty heaven, lands squarely on my quivering shoulders, and crumples me to my knees. For once, I can’t move.

  Humiliated in front of everyone. The whole school and the whole town and Naomi.

  I mouth her name and replay the entire ceremony.

  “Nope. She wasn’t there. She would have clapped for me.”

  Minutes pass before I stand and brush off my knees. I wipe the sting from my eyes and lift my gaze.

  “Yeah. Definitely she would have clap—oh, man.”

  Twenty acres of color stretch out before me. Colors I can’t name and don’t recognize. Except for green. It’s not one green but a hundred different greens that all blend together like they’re only one. It’s a garden. The biggest one I’ve ever seen. It has to be Coot’s.

  I know the wacko keeps one near town, but this is the first time I’ve seen it. For good reason. The whole thing hides in a hollow. Only a trespasser like me would ever know it’s here.

  I track a winding bark-chip path. It dips beneath interlocking boughs, skirts the shores of small ponds, and circles a windmill
in the garden’s center. The whole garden feels wild, including the path, which looks like it uncoiled itself and might do it again.

  The grade is steep, and I sidestep my way down to the trail. Butterflies flutter between plants that belong in my book on rain forests. Bees and hummingbirds zip around my head.

  The garden looks different now that I’m down in it. Like someone planned the thing, and it isn’t some overgrown weed bed. While it ain’t like the symmetrical flower beds on the cover of the magazines Mom steals from the hairdresser, it seems to know what it’s doing.

  My feet shuffle over the path, and I duck beneath tree limbs. One moment I’m in a small wood, the next I’m not. The trail veers left. I look back, blink, and shin a red metal chair.

  “Dang! Who planted you right there?”

  I plunk myself down on it to rub my bruise and stare at a tiny grove of apple trees just off the trail. Feels good to be hidden. I lean forward, elbows on knees, and my chin falls into my cupped hand.

  Click.

  I jump to my feet, and my chair topples backward with a thud.

  “Startled you, did I?”

  Not twenty paces off, George the Coot stares at a Polaroid camera.

  I frown. “You take my picture?”

  “You in my garden?”

  I’m quiet and still.

  “Darn thing takes so lo—there, you’re starting to come in.”

  What precisely made George into a coot was a mystery. Simply always had been. And not just to kids; adults called him that, too. No one meant harm by the nick. Heck, when Mom said it, it almost rang with fondness. George was the nearest thing to a legend we had in Pierce. He had a sordid past—that much we all knew—but what that sordidness entailed we hadn’t a clue. This gave our imaginations plenty of room to operate. When that boy was found dead near Princeton? “Well, I hope they checked Coot’s place. He killed a man once, you know.” When vandals spray-painted the high school? “Bet Coot’s givin’ them scoundrels room ’n board.” All this made it an occasion—something to mention at the dinner table—whenever anyone got a good, up-close look at the man.

  I’ve never talked to the Coot. But now the graying, leather-skinned gardener holds my picture in front of his eyes.

  “Reckon I’ll name it The Thinker.” George hobbles closer and shows me the photo. Yeah, he caught me in the pose.

  “Why’d you take my picture?”

  “Why’d you bolt the ceremony, kid?”

  He was there.

  My shoulder bounces. “You must not have seen the whole thing, Coo—” I stop myself short, bite my lip, and stare at wood chips.

  “Saw the whole show.” George moves right in front of me. I feel his eyes. “From your late entrance to the last runaway part. Had my fingers in my mouth to give a whistle the moment your foot hit that first step.” He looks up. “Hell, I wouldn’t have missed Jack Keegan’s graduation for anything in this world.”

  My gaze shoots to his, but the Coot’s eyes slip free. He approaches the nearest tree and strokes an apple blossom.“Do you know this tree started with a black seed?”

  Jack Keegan? News flash. Old Bill changed my name sixteen years ago.

  “Yep. A black seed. I put it in brown earth, set it in with clear water, and let golden sun strike it.” He bends a branch and sniffs pink petals.

  And you got no business bringing it back now.

  “It grew a green shoot that turned into brown bark surrounding milky-white wood and burst green leaves that popped white-and-pink flowers, which’ll turn into red-and-yellow apples filled with white flesh and more black seeds. That’s a lot of beauty come out from a hard little shell.”

  “How do you know—”

  “Your name?” He faces me. “You should have been at your party. Good cake. And those cute little ham sandwiches? Mm, Mm.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  The Coot scratches his head and strokes his stubble. “No way you could make sense of anything right now. I left a note for you. It’d be a good idea to take a peek at it.” A faint smile cracks his strong jaw. It’s not a happy grin, but I can’t figure it out, so it must be sympathy, which I don’t need. I scuff his bark chips with my toe and glance up for his reaction. The Coot is gone.

  “But I didn’t invite you to the party.”

  “You ain’t invited me to nothing, Jack.” The Coot sounds a long way off. “Your dad did.”

  Figures. Old Bill and an old Coot, partners in humiliation. Probably out drinking and making fun of my name.

  I kick the downed chair, but the garden muffles the hollow clang. I whip around, retrace my steps, and pause at the edge of the garden.

  “And the name is Sam!”

  I slip inside our screen door. Helium-filled balloons, victims of the rattling box fan, bounce around the ceiling and scoff: CONGRATS GRADUATE. Red, frosted letters on a sheet cake minus one piece, smirk from the kitchen table—WAY TO GO, SAM!

  Shut up, stupid cake.

  An army of red plastic cups surrounds our punch bowl, each filled with a half inch of melted ice cube.

  I glare at the cake’s missing corner. “One guest. What a party. Should have invited Leslie and the Sunshine Club.” I exhale long and slow. I thought Mom would invite a friend or two.

  As I stomp toward the stairs, my gaze falls on the stool beneath the phone and the open guest book.

  Mr. George Rankin.

  He really was here.

  “How embarrassing. The only person I can get to a party is the Coot.” A basket for cards sits beneath the stool. One stained and dog-eared envelope looks up at me.

  “A note from a Coot. What a joke.”

  I pick up the tattered letter, turn it over, and my breath catches.

  To my son, Jack.

  “Crap!” I whip it back onto the floor.

  The envelope’s old and I stand there frozen and wait for someone to tell me what the hell is going on, why the town crazy delivered a note from a dead man. I stare and wonder why my heart pounds over a piece of yellow paper. I nudge it with my toe, glance around, and snatch it off the floor.

  That sure isn’t Mom’s writing.

  I sprint up the steps, slam my door behind me, and attack one side of the envelope. My hand jerks, and I rip the letter in two.

  Slumping against the wall, I slide to the floor and piece together the paper.

  Dear Jack,

  Congratulations, son. You did it, and I’m so proud of you. Wish I knew what you need to hear right now. Wish I was there to say it. I’m sure Lydia will choose a good man to follow me. But if it all goes wrong, I’m leaving you and this note in George’s hands.

  Remember whose you are.

  You are loved,

  Dad

  I stare at the last two lines. I can read the words, but I’ve no place to put them and nothing to stick them to and they bounce off meaningless.

  “The writing jumps around,” I whisper. “One big scribble. There’s Tourette’s all over this thing.” I ball up the letter. “Ain’t for me anyway—my name’s Sam. No one’s putting me in the hands of that loser Coot.” My hand constricts, crunches the note tighter. “Remember who I am? Looks like the son of a twitch. Great inheritance, Dad. I’ll add it to the love I’m already gettin’ today.”

  My head falls back with a thump, and I shut my eyes, leave them shut as footsteps in the hall grow heavy. Soon Old Bill’s rasp grates through my closed door.

  “Hey in there! You know how much gas I burned searchin’ for you?”

  “He’s had enough today,” Mom calls out.

  My eyes shoot open. It’s been years since Mom offered a word in my defense.

  “Him?” Old Bill hollers. “What about me? Larry and Randy from the quarry couldn’t stop talking about your son’s little performance. Should’ve sold tickets, they said. So I don’t want to hear no more about me canning his party or throwin’ Coot out on his crazy ear. Boy’s own dad left him nothing. Nothing! Now I’m supposed to pick up the ta
b. Kid’s had enough fun at my expense without me giving him a party!”

  “He can’t help it. You should know about—”

  “Enough!”

  The fierce jingle at Old Bill’s side disappears, and I can hear him count in the distance.

  I flatten the note over my thigh, read it once more. A good man to follow? If it all goes wrong?

  “Well, Dad, got that right.”

  chapter nine

  I MISS MY MORNING RUN BY FOUR HOURS, UNDERSTANDABLE after yesterday’s postceremony dash. Aching legs flop down the stairs and collapse into a kitchen chair. Breakfast will be cake.

  Mom clanks around the kitchen and doesn’t slow to greet me. She doesn’t turn either, and minutes pass before she speaks. “I’m so sorry about graduation. I can’t imagine how that felt.”

  I address the back of her head. “Yeah.” I stuff my mouth with chocolate. “Least I get a lot of leftovers.”

  “You had a visitor yesterday.”

  “I know, crazy old—”

  “A friend of Heather’s. My, but she was a pretty girl.”

  Icing spews from my lips. A big glob clings to my chin before it plops onto my lap.

  “She seemed very nice. Bill spoke with her.”

  “Oh no, no.” I push back from the table, stand, and start to pace. “She was there? She was here? You’re kidding me! What did Bill say? What did she say?”

  “I couldn’t hear, and she wouldn’t come in.” Mom sighs. “You can imagine how frustrating that was for me.”

  “For you? What about for me? Great. Just—nothing? You didn’t hear—”

  “Relax. She didn’t know about the party. Bill said she came to thank you for something or other.” Mom plunges a dish beneath the water.

  My hands race through my hair, and both shoulders jerk. “Words. I need her exact words.” I lean over the table. “Bill won’t tell me. You must have heard something?”

  Mom slows, cocks her head, and leans against the counter on one elbow. “Well, now that you’re talking, it seems I might have caught the tail end.”