Paintings from the Cave (12 page)

“But what about us? We live here too. They can’t just kick us out.”

“No one really knows we’ve been living with Grandpa, Jamie. It wasn’t exactly official or legal. We don’t want
to call attention to ourselves because then Social Services will get involved.”

“We don’t want that.”

“Right. So we’ve got to clear out.”

We went back to the place we used to live.

We stayed for less than five minutes.

Nothing had changed since the day Grandpa took us away. The place was still full of empty bottles and loaded strangers. We saw a guy slap the woman who used to be our mother, holding her hair in one hand and yelling in her face about money.

But it was worth it because that’s when Erik took the car. It was a piece of crap, he said, but no one would miss something this beat-up and the kind of people who hung out at the place we used to live wouldn’t have insurance so nobody would come looking for it or get too upset that it was gone. He fixed it at the garage and it ran pretty good. Good enough for us.

We used to visit Grandpa every day. Erik said not to take it personally that Grandpa couldn’t remember who we were.

“In his heart, he still knows us, Jamie, and we should act like he’s still there. Just treat him like normal, even though he doesn’t seem like the same person.”

We only go once a week now, though. We bring him lemon drops and read the sports section to him. He might not know who we are, but we can tell that he
likes to hear the baseball stats and football plays and basketball team lineups. The newspapers are usually old, from the waiting room on the first floor, but he doesn’t notice and we don’t care. We still like being with him, even if he doesn’t know it’s us.

I walk up the stairs to Grandpa’s room on the fourth floor—I don’t like to take the elevators because it creeps me out to be in a small place—and when I get to the door of his room, I can see that he’s asleep.

I hate to say this, but I’m getting to like those visits best. The kind where I can just sit there in his quiet room and draw. Today I sketch Grandpa asleep in his bed. Well, actually, I just draw his hand resting on top of the blanket. I’m trying to draw his knuckles, which look so much bigger than the rest of his fingers, when I notice that he’s got big ugly purple bruises on his wrists, just under the sleeves of his bathrobe.

I push back one sleeve and I see that he’s got bruises that go all the way around his wrist. His skin is so papery and thin and the marks aren’t just dark like when I get them, but black-purple-green-yellow and blotchy.

“Those are from the restraints.” I turn to the voice from the door. It’s Nan, the nicest of the aides who works on his floor. There’s a lot of turnover at the place so we hardly ever know the people taking care of Grandpa. Which is good, Erik says, because if we don’t know them, they don’t know us, and that’s how we like things.

“He got agitated the other day,” Nan explained, “and we were worried he might fall out of bed in the night, so we put soft restraints on him to keep him safe.”

I don’t know what to say. What do you say when you find out someone has been tied down? I might know what to say, but I know I’m not going to tell Erik; it would just be one more thing for him to worry about.

Nan looks at me from the door, a little sad, I think. She knows that Erik and I are the only ones who visit Grandpa and she takes good care of him, she calls him “Mr. Dixon” and not just “dear” like some of the other staff do.

“Come with me,” she says, and turns to leave the room.

I pat Grandpa’s hand and start to say goodbye, but instead, I rip out the picture I’d been sketching of his hand and sign it, “From your grandson Jamie (the shorter one).” I prop it up on his bedside table so he’ll see it when he wakes up. Then I turn and hustle after Nan, who’s waiting for me by a food cart near the elevator.

“Here.” She thrusts a paper bag at me. “These folks don’t eat half their meals anyway. Take a couple of sandwiches and some pudding cups to share with that handsome brother of yours.” She winks and pushes the cart down the hall before I can think of how to thank her.

I turn and head down the stairs, dinner in my hand and twenty bucks in my pocket. Other than finding out
that Grandpa’s getting worse, which I kind of already knew anyway even if I don’t like to think about it much because there’s nothing I can do to stop it, it’s a pretty good day.

I jog-trot to Trudy’s place because it’s getting dark and I know Erik will be waiting for me by the outside door. We always go in and out of Trudy’s place together so that we’re not too much of a distraction to her. I don’t know how you could distract someone who just sits in her bedroom watching TV and drinking beer all night after she gets home from work, but I do what Erik says.

I’m not going to tell him about the money I made yet and I’m definitely not going to bring up Grandpa’s restraints, but I can’t wait to show him that we’re not eating leftover burgers tonight.

I
love the library.

Every day after school I go there to do my homework. The library started out as another free fun place Erik found; we could go there and use their computers or slip into the big meeting room for programs where there’s sometimes a plate of leftover cookies in the back.

I wish we could sleep in the library because it’s warm and clean and I like the smell of books, but Erik says it’s too risky to even try to hide out and crash there. Libraries are owned by the government and we do all we can to stay off that radar since we’re kind of illegal—two minors living on their own and all. He won’t even let me get a library card.

“You’d have to show proof of residency,” he explained. “The school district might not realize our address is phony, but for sure a librarian would. They’re sharp and they pay attention. We don’t want them checking the address and figuring out we’re not exactly what we say we are.”

Erik’s Rule #5: Stay off the grid, out of sight, out of the loop, don’t do anything to call attention to yourself because the least little thing could trip you up.

Even though I don’t have a library card, I borrow books anyway. I find a book, read as much as I can after I’ve gotten my homework done and then, until I’ve finished it, I stash the book in the natural science and mathematics section in the back corner. No one goes there much so it’s safe. When I’m done reading the book, I put it back where I found it.

I have this trick I do to find the next book I’m going to read. I walk over to the stacks, close my eyes and reach for a book. It’s nice to be surprised like that and I’m hardly ever disappointed in what I pick.

I’m done with my homework and I need a new book so I wander between the shelves until I find the right place. I never know where it’s going to be, I just know that I keep moving until something tells me I’m where I’m supposed to be. Then I shut my eyes, reach out and take the first book I touch. I open my eyes, look down and see the words
Annie Oakley
on the cover above a picture of an old-fashioned woman with a pistol in her
hand. There’s something about her eyes that makes me want to open the book, even though I’m not really into history, and especially not history about girls and guns.

I take the book back to my seat, glance through it, and before I know it, I’m reading a biography of Annie Oakley. No, I’m not just reading, I’m sucked into the book in that great way where you lose track of time and you can’t remember where you are and the words on the page are more real than what’s around you.

Annie Oakley was a trick shooter in the eighteen hundreds, but that’s not why I like reading about her. The part about Annie Oakley that really hit me was when I found out how she had such terrible foster parents that she called them wolves because they beat her and worked her nearly to death and, although the book didn’t come right out and say it, probably hurt her in ways kids shouldn’t be hurt.

Like me and Erik.

It’s like being part of a club no one wants to join, but one where you can recognize the other people who belong because you know what it’s like and, in ways you can’t even explain, you understand each other.

But Annie Oakley didn’t let that part of her life wreck her and she made something of herself later, when she got away, and she became rich and famous because of her shooting skill.

Even though it’s crazy, even though she’s been dead forever, I got the feeling that I would have liked Annie
Oakley. Drawing and shooting aren’t anything like each other, but I kind of thought I knew what she must have felt like when she found out she was good at something that most other people aren’t.

As I’m reading and wishing I’d gotten the chance to know Annie Oakley, I reach into my backpack to grab a sketchbook because I want to draw her. As I pull out the sketchbook, a flyer falls to the floor. Mrs. Fitzgerald handed them out in art class this afternoon, but I haven’t read it.

It’s an announcement for an art competition. Artists, singers, dancers, actors, writers and sculptors of any age and skill level can submit their work for a cash prize and an exhibition or performance during the month-long city culture fair. The top five winners will present their work at a reception.

Artists are supposed to submit a portfolio of fifteen to twenty-five pieces.

I can’t help getting excited. Greg thought my drawings were good enough to get homes for the dogs, so maybe I have what it takes to enter the contest.

I flip through my sketches. I don’t have anywhere near fifteen finished pieces. But the last day to enter is six weeks away and maybe that gives me enough time.

The pages are full of partial sketches and crossed-out attempts and I’ve hardly completed anything. But Greg recognized some of the dogs I’ve drawn. So I could
probably work on finishing some works-in-progress, and do a few new ones.

I flip to a drawing of one of my favorites at the dog run—a spunky little corgi with the brightest, smartest look. If dogs had jobs, I just know this one would be a librarian dog.

I grab a pencil to finish this picture. I close my eyes, trying to remember exactly what the dog looked like so I can get it down on paper. I’m frustrated, though, because I can’t imagine him clearly enough. I open my eyes and see the librarian at the circulation desk. He’s got his head cocked the same way as the corgi at the park. I smile at myself, but I capture the tilt of the dog’s head. Somehow, between what I already had on the page, what I remember and what I can see in the librarian, I get the angle and the shadows just right.

For the first time, I feel like a real artist.

W
e didn’t work it out, officially, but Erik and I take turns having bad dreams about what it was like in the time before Grandpa took us away. Seems every few nights we wind up hugging in the dark with one of us going “Shhh, it’s okay, I’m here, you’re safe, it was only a dream, go back to sleep now.” The only thing that changes is who’s doing the shushing and who’s shaking and sweating, sick to his stomach from the memories.

Erik’s Rule #6: Stuff from the dark doesn’t get talked about in the light. Ever.

Tonight, it’s his turn to wake up and mine to do the shushing.

I’m still feeling smooth and even from my time at the library and I’m busy picturing drawings I want to
make for the portfolio, so while he pulls himself together, I imagine the sketches I’m going to do. And I know that even if we don’t talk about the memories in the night, I’m going to have to find a way to draw them.

We lie there awake for a while—no matter who has the dreams, neither of us can go back to sleep right away—and I remember that I’ve got to tell him about working at the shelter or he’ll worry about where I am and what I’m doing.

“I’m going to start volunteering at the shelter in the afternoons. For the service hours requirement at school.”

“Oh,” he says, “that’s nice. Dogs.” His voice is getting sleepy and I can tell that pictures of the dog run are replacing whatever dreams woke us both up.

I think about my plan not to tell him I’m earning money drawing the dogs until I have a chunk of change I can show him. I can’t decide if I want to impress him or surprise him. I don’t think I’ve ever done either, so it’s all good.