Jerk, California

  “Boozin’ Billy. Last night you lived up to the name.”

  I lean back against a limb, fold my arms, and stare hard into the man who smacked my mom. And even though I feel ugly, a smile crawls across my face.

  “One. Two.” Key after key soars through the air. Into the bar’s dented gutter, down its chimney, onto the sidewalk.

  You hurt Mom? Clank!

  How dare you touch her. Pling!

  Your key-counting days are over. Tunk!

  “Thirty.” I palm the largest key. It’s heavy and old and on its shaft I see scratch marks. I look closer. The scratches become letters. JK. My initials—the real ones before he stole them.

  “Hey, what do you want me to do with the water?” A confused Jace stares at the glass he holds.

  “Keep it.” I turn the key over in my hand. Just keep it.

  I slip number thirty into my back pocket.

  A half hour later, I have Old Bill seated upright. He thanks me Bill-fashion.

  “What the hell am I doing in a tree? Huh, boy? Answer me!”

  “Countin’ squirrels, maybe?” I scamper down. “My job here is done. See you at the house.”

  His Saturday-morning curses fade as I jog toward home.

  After making one more stop.

  I unearth the stake that supports George’s shingle and stride into his machine shed. Minutes later, I’m back outside, and I sink a new stake deep into dirt. I straighten to admire the freshly painted sign that will greet George the Coot after work today.

  WHEN DO I MOVE IN?

  “I’ve got to be crazy.” I turn from Coot’s farm and dash home, a cool breeze at my back.

  chapter eleven

  MOM SMILES AT ME OVER HER AFTERNOON COFFEE. I frown over my sandwich.

  “This would be your time to say,‘ Wow, big step, Sam,’ or ‘I’ll sure miss you.’”

  Mom pauses and sets down her drink. Takes her way too long to think of something nice.

  “Stop.” I scratch at a dried glob of jelly on the tabletop. “Don’t bother.”

  She reaches across the table and cups her hands over my fidgety pair. “I know I haven’t always done well by you.” The wind howls and the door creaks and Mom’s gaze darts toward it. She checks the clock and looks relieved. Not Old Bill yet.

  “I should’ve done so many things different,” she says.“There are things I should’ve told you. Things Bill threw out that you should have seen.” Again, she checks the door, and then lowers her voice. “I’m talking about your father.” Mom keeps confessing, but I don’t want to hear this now and tune her out. I only want to pull my hands away from hers, get up, and walk away from the table, where she now cries. Can’t stand hearing Mom cry.

  “Forget it,” I say. “Old Bill told me all I want to hear.”

  Mom breathes deep and squeezes my hands. “Promise me something?”

  “Yeah. Whatever you say.”

  “Ask George about your dad.”

  I lean back. “That was sneaky.”

  Wednesday morning arrives, and Old Bill is AWOL, probably stuck in some maple. It’s moving day, and I wait for Coot on our porch. The Coot’s Ford sputters into our turnaround. I wince and scan the street. Good thing I told him to come early.

  Coot steps out and stretches. “Beautiful day for a move!” He slams the driver’s door, reopens it, and slams it twice more. “Crazy door. Startin’ to stick.”

  “Okay, okay.” I whisper, “Can you leave it for now?” Down the road, there are lights inside the Severs’ farmhouse.“Maybe you could help me inside. I need to carry more things down.”

  Coot descends steps like Mildred makes graduation speeches, slow and full of pauses.

  “Can you move faster?” I hiss and bump his back with a box of clothes.

  “Yep.” Coot hesitates, and then takes another lazy step.

  I rush past him as soon as we hit the floorboards. Pushing out into morning, I dash to the truck, dump my load in the truckbed, and race back inside. Coot still hasn’t reached the door. I hold it open, tap my foot, and exhale as loud as I can. But he grins big and dumb and I know he didn’t get the hint. Coot shuffles on by and whistles his way to the pickup. Through the screen, I watch his slow meander.

  Keep going. Keep going.

  Coot stops, stares at the sunrise before he tosses my pillows into the truck with another stretch and a yawn. His frame lightens as headlamps approach. He squints and smiles at the oncoming car and gives a big wave.

  “Damn! Now everyone will—”

  “Easy.” Mom’s reprimand, along with the smell of fresh-baked Danishes, floats from the kitchen. “I know they pop out, but try to hold that tongue.”

  I’m speechless. Twelve years of uncontrolled blurts and tics. She says nothing. Twelve years of Old Bill rips. Ignored. Then the day I leave she decides to get into my life. I stare at Mom. She stares at me. And I realize all her shame is about to walk out of her home.

  I turn back toward the crackpot set to take me away. “Let’s go, George.” I motion for him to come inside. “Lots more to get.”

  Another car slows in front of our place, and Coot hollers to the driver. I retreat into the house and give a few furious head rattles.

  “What’s wrong?” Mom asks, and wipes her hands across her apron.

  I can’t look her in the eyes. “He moves so slow.”

  “Just his way.” She turns back toward the oven.

  Like you know the inner workings of a crazy coot.

  “See that sky out there?” Coot appears in the doorway. “What smells so good, Lydia?” He turns to me and I grab his arm, yank him inside, and slam the door behind him.

  “Might want to think twice.” Coot pats me on the back. “Don’t be expecting this kind of cookin’ at my place.”

  “Don’t sweat it.” I plod upstairs, full of grunts and sniffs. “She only makes those on special occasions.” Like when they finally get the creature out of the house.

  Everything I own fits in the back of Coot’s run-down truck. We both climb in.

  “You want to say good-bye?” he asks, and starts the engine.

  “No.”

  Mom stands on the porch and waves and dabs her eye with a tissue. I can’t tell if she’s happy or sad to see me leave, so I peek at her through cracked fingers and waggle my head because this feels so pathetic.

  All across Pierce, my classmates will soon hop in their cars and turn back for that last look at smiling, sobbing parents. Then they’ll fix bright eyes on a brighter college future. Ahead of them, the open road and dorms full of crazed freshmen.

  I give Mom a feeble wave and turn toward my destination: the junky farmstead of George the Coot. I let my head fall against the window. What a proud mom she must be.

  We reach the entrance to George’s driveway, and he pulls onto the shoulder. I straighten, rub my eyes, and gasp. The signs are gone. In their place sits a rusted bulldozer with a headstone painted on the blade. Anyone passing can see it—see the name on it.

  SAMUEL CARRIER 1989-2008 IT’S TIME FOR HIM TO GO

  “What the—” All I can think of is his scythe.

  “We turn in.” Coot stares straight ahead. “It’s Jack—no more Sam. That ain’t your name. Never was. Clear?”

  “Clear? No—no! You are some kind of crazy. This ain’t funny!” I reach a quaking hand toward the door handle. “My name’s Sam.”

  Treadless tires squeal as Coot throws the truck in reverse.

  “Where we going?” I ask.

  His voice is calm. “Taking you back to Sam’s place.”

  Minutes later we skid back into my turnaround. George gets out and pitches my clothes into a heap on the lawn.

  “He’s crazy,” I whisper.

  A hand slaps my window and I jump, slowly lower the glass.

  “You don’t mind if I leave your stuff on the grass. Figure you can take those steps faster than I can.”

  Coot doesn’t wait for an answer; he reaches into the truckbed and la
unches pillows. My knee bounces, and I stare at the farm that no longer looks like home. Then I hear The Laugh.

  Oh no.

  Alan Glenn on the way to Lowell’s Construction. Don’t need to look up. Nobody has a double snort-cackle like Alan, and it’s getting nearer. A junior at MHS, he’s positioned to take Jace’s place next year as the obnoxious senior everybody likes. He’s already chosen his wimpy sidekick, and Bobby Harris walks with him now.

  “Wait.” I leap out of the truck, reach down and scoop an armload of shirts, and hurl them into the truck.

  Coot flings the shirts back onto the ground. “We’ll never get anywhere like this, Jack.”

  I grab a fistful of magazines from his hands and push him toward the cab. “Get back in.”

  He shrugs and we sit in silence. Snorty and friend laugh, and I slump down in my seat. Coot straightens.

  “Go!” I hiss from my balled-up position in the bottom of the truck.

  Coot looks down and whispers back, “Where am I going?”

  “To that tomb thing! To move it before anyone else sees.”

  “Sorry. I like it.” Coot and I listen to Alan’s laugh fade into the distance. “’Sides, it’s on my property, mine and Jack’s. And only me or Jack can touch it.”

  “You bet I’ll touch it.” I lift the door latch, tumble onto the lawn, and bolt toward George’s place and my tombstone. I’m almost out of earshot.

  “Reckon you’ll be wantin’ the dozer key?”

  I skid, stumble, whip around.

  “Stupid, Sam!” I pound toward Coot’s truck and nearly reach it. The pickup lurches ahead.

  “You asshole! Give me that key!”

  The truck spins onto the road, and I chase after it. George the Coot drives into Pierce and turns down Main Street. He passes the service station. He chugs by the post office. He rounds the Corner, Scurvey’s Superette, Bill’s Bituminous.

  “Stop the truck, Coot!”

  Morning faces line Main Street. Faces on bodies still in pajamas. Faces with forks frozen inches from mouths. Through windows and porch screens, through the glass of Al’s Diner. No need to read the Mitrista Times today. I am the news.

  Coot waves to the faces as if he leads a parade, and the truck slows. I lunge, miss, and flop on tar.

  “Ouch.” A woman feels my pain, but I don’t have time to look. I roll, rise, and churn on.

  “Tell you what.” Coot pokes his head out as he U-turns on Main Street for the second time. “I’ll fork up this here key, and you wait to move your headstone until we discuss the matter.”

  I clench my teeth and run harder.

  “We’ll shake on it at my place.” A blast of green exhaust fills my lungs, and the truck speeds around a corner.

  “Coot!”

  I cut across Melvern’s yard, leap a fence, and surge onto 2nd Street. The truck is just ahead of me. A salty sting stabs my eyes, and I rip off my drenched T-shirt. It catches on my ears and creates a white blindfold. I yank and . . .

  Smack!

  My knee bashes metal. I topple forward into a truckbed, where I writhe and moan. My sweaty shirt clings to my face, but my smiley-face boxers ring my elbow, so I know I’m in the right truck. I twist and moan and sink deeper into my clothes. The Coot will pay.

  I’ve worked my way down to the plywood that lines the truckbed, and my tailbone rests on a hammer. I wince and reach for it. Just what I need to dent my name on that headstone—

  “Nae!” Coot’s voice calls out, and I freeze. “That you? Reckoned I wouldn’t see you till tomorrow.”

  “George? No way!” Footsteps get louder. So does her breathing. Heavenly breathing. I can hear her, feel her. I press my backside into the truckbed and pull my pillow over my face.

  “This is awesome,” Naomi says. She’s right by the truck. “I spent the night at Heather’s.” More beautiful heavy breathing. “Needed fourteen miles this morning and she said Pierce was about that.”

  “That it is,” George says. “Still serious ’bout that running?”

  “Andrew, well, Coach, wants me to do the TC marathon. It’s a big one. He thinks I have a shot in my class.” She pauses. “If you met him—he’s so different than Mom. He listens. Everything isn’t, ‘ When you get to Harvard . . .’ ”

  No one speaks for a time, but Naomi’s feet shuffle.

  “Don’t like that man, Nae.” George exhales loud and slow. “But what do I know? I’m just the gardener.”

  “No, you’re almost family.”

  I hear lips. Better be on the cheek.

  “I need to keep going. I can’t believe I ran into you.”

  “Yep. Say, before you go, I got someone you should meet.”

  Dammit, Coot. Haven’t you done enough today?

  “From the thump,” George says, “guessin’ he’s in back.”

  “Thump?” Naomi asks.

  My fingers tense and clutch the hammer, and my mouth finds the neck hole of the shirt. I bite my pillow in case she tries to move it. Sure enough, I feel a tug, but my jaws won’t let go.

  She yanks. I yell. I shoot up. She screams.

  “Naomi!” I say.

  I can’t see her because of my T-shirt. But standing in the truckbed, hammer in hand, I hear her voice a little ways off.

  “Sam? Why are you—what are you doing in George’s truck?” I reach up, rip off the shirt, and jump onto the street. My throat clears by itself.

  “I—I chased his truck. He calls me Jack. It started with my tombstone.”

  Naomi slowly nods and looks at George, who shrugs and turns away. She smiles, looks at me again, and bites her lip. It’s a long look and doesn’t stay in one place and I don’t know what her eyes mean. Suddenly I feel very naked.

  “Would you mind putting down the hammer?” she says.

  “No!” I drop the tool and stare at her waist. I don’t want to speak to her navel, but I can’t help it. “I mean, no, that’s fine.” Naomi glistens in her green tank and running shorts. We stand there a long time, I think.

  “Missed you at your graduation,” she finally says.

  “You were there,” I say quietly as I stand there in the street.

  Naomi walks to George’s window. “I’ll look for you tomorrow, then?”

  “Bright and early.”

  She jogs down the road, stops, and turns. “So neither of you is going to explain how you know each other, or what Sam was doing in the truck.”

  George whistles.

  “Best not,” I stammer.

  Naomi nods. “Best not.” She smiles, shakes out the muscles in her thighs, and soon disappears around the corner.

  I walk after her, make it ten paces, and stop. She saw my graduation? Oh, man.

  “I don’t understand.” I turn and call to George.

  His truck is gone, and so’s the dozer key.

  I hobble onto George’s property, stagger up the drive, and throw open the door to his truck. No keys.

  “I never leave them in the truck.” George walks out of the house.

  I look at him, hate him, and my bruised knee buckles. My face accelerates toward the gravel and arms don’t respond. I brace for impact.

  It never comes. Two arms catch me and place me firmly against the truck. Two eyes stare into mine. George’s face blurs, doubles, blurs again, so I can’t be certain, but it looks like his eyes hold tears. My head falls back against the wheel well.

  “Why are you doing this to me? What did I ever do to you?”

  George doesn’t answer. He just keeps looking. Soft looking. I blink hard. Only an idiot would move in with a wacko like this. Of course, crazy men fall into two categories—those who know Naomi and those who don’t.

  My mind returns to the tombstone. “You did say I could move it?”

  “Yeah. Waitin’ on you, kid. Need you to agree to the name change.”

  I squint and my vision clears. George crouches, his head rests in his hand. Very much The Thinker. He seems smaller, and though minutes ago I wan
ted to pummel him, now I can’t work up an ounce of anger.

  “Fine,” I say.

  He looks up.

  “As long as that headstone ain’t the start of some psycho thing.” I think of my rampage through town and groan. “Call me Jack. Why do I care? I get called a lot worse.”

  George offers a tight-lipped smile. “You want to go get your headstone?” He jingles the key in front of my face.

  “Will you?” I chew my lower lip. “It freaks me out.”

  “Yep. And we’ll get you to your room. But first, the tour.”

  chapter twelve

  WE WALK GEORGE’S PROPERTY FOR AN HOUR. HIS instructions meander like his steps and include lawn-mower operation and hornet-nest warnings, but I’m too exhausted to care. I perform my own search for quiet spaces—breaks in the shelterbelt, dips in the land. Places where others’ words can’t reach me.

  His ten-acre strip stretches down to a creek, which, if followed, leads to his other hidden parcel. The Garden Bowl.

  “Why plant a garden miles away from your—”

  “Our.”

  I shake my head. “ Whatever. Your, our, property.”

  “Them plants needed the right soil. Needed the right valley.” George looks over his overgrown slope. “This wasn’t it, is all.”

  Little else noteworthy about his grounds, except for the windmills. Behind the shed lay about ten dismantled models. Fins and shafts and rotted posts. Ten upright mills surround the heap. The towers are too short to catch wind, and they stand there like frozen midgets.

  “Imagine you want to see your bed,” George says at last.

  “Do I ever.”

  I follow George around the side of the farmhouse and stop. He pats me on the back and points down.

  “That’s a storm cellar,” I say.

  “Yep.”

  “You expect me to—”

  “Yep.”

  My shoulder leaps, calms, and jerks again. I take a deep breath, bend over, and lift rickety doors. I cast a glance at George, who nods toward descending steps. I kneel and peer down and feel like an idiot.