Hemingway Tradition (3 page)

“I didn't like the topic.” I scowled.

Mom tossed the remote control onto the coffee table. “Since when has that ever mattered? You've had some pretty bizarre assignments over the years, Shaw, but you've always managed to turn them into something interesting.” She paused. “That's because you're a writer.”

“No!” The word leaped into the air between us. “You've got the wrong Sebring! Dad was the one who was the writer!”

“Then it would stand to reason that's where you get it from, don't you think?” Mom replied calmly. “Your father was a writer. So are you.”

I shook my head fiercely. “No!” I said again. “You're wrong. I'm not a writer. Dad just
wanted
me to be one.”

Mom frowned and sat forward on the couch.
“Shaw, you're not making any sense. You love writing. From the time you were old enough to know what books were, you've been making up stories. I can't remember when you wanted to be anything but an author like your dad. You have no idea how thrilled he was about that. And how proud. He couldn't wait for you to grow up so that the two of you could write the novel to end all novels. Don't you remember? You used to sit with your heads together for hours planning it.”

The vision of my dad as I'd last seen him flashed into my brain in brilliant, gory detail. For some reason, the memory didn't seem to know it was supposed to fade. I winced. And then suddenly I started to tremble, as if an earthquake had started up deep inside me and was working its way to the surface. Already my knees felt weak, and my hands were starting to sweat.

I picked up my bag and threw my mom a parting glare. “Well, in case you haven't noticed, the plan has changed,” I snarled.

Then I stomped off to my room.

One minute you're standing on solid ground; the next — you're falling. Write about the experience
.

I shook my head. Where did Miss Boswell dig up these lame writing themes?

I glanced at the clock. It was ten to eight. Mom would be back from her dinner meeting in an hour. I wanted to have the assignment out of the way before then. Otherwise she'd
ask to see it. After our run-in the other night, I wasn't all that anxious to share.

I took a deep breath and read the theme again — out loud. It didn't help. The topic was still awful. I tried to think of some story possibilities anyway. Avalanche? Trap door in a floor? Earthquake? Falling off a cliff? Yeah, right. Like every kid in the class wasn't going to write about those things.

What do you care?
I argued with myself.

As long as I completed the assignment and got a passing grade, it shouldn't matter what I wrote. Of course, thinking that and actually believing it weren't quite the same thing. My father had trained me better than I realized.

It was kind of ironic how that had worked out. While my dad was alive, I'd wanted to be just like him. But since his death, I was working all the time to prove we were entirely different.

To anyone besides me, and maybe my mom, that would probably seem really dumb. After all, my dad was a great guy. Everyone
liked him. He was smart, passionate about his work and family, and he loved life.

At least I always thought he loved life. But according to the note he left, he'd had problems that were too big to handle. Problems I hadn't known anything about.

Woooff!
Like a gasoline explosion, the blistering vision of his death began to burn the back of my eyes. I squeezed them shut, trying to extinguish the fire.

Why wouldn't that memory leave me alone?

“Go away!” I growled through clenched teeth.

And then, as if all I'd had to do was ask, the blood-soaked bedroom began to dissolve. It slid down the walls of my mind as if it were being hosed into a storm sewer. I watched with fascination. I felt the tension in my body drain away with the dirty water.

Gradually I became aware of a gentle rocking. And then the lazy lapping of waves on the hull of a small boat. My body melted deeper into the molded seat of the runabout
and I squinted at the sunlight winking on the water. Dad, wearing the old, threadbare sweater he kept strictly for fishing, was stretched out on the seat across from me with his feet propped on the gunwale. His eyes were closed, and his long, lean body was swaying with the rhythm of the boat. His fishing rod lay across his lap, its line dangling idly in the water, slack and then taut as the current tugged on it. My line was hanging out the other side of the boat. But Dad and I weren't really fishing. In fact, we hadn't checked our bait in over an hour. It was enough that we were sharing the morning in that secluded cove.

After a while Dad sighed, and without opening his eyes, he said, “I wonder if it was times like this that inspired Ernest Hemingway to write
The Old Man and the Sea
. That book was really something. Almost the entire story was set in a tiny boat with just one character — two if you count the fish. Must've made dialogue a bit of a challenge.” He opened one eye to see if I was listening.
Then satisfied that he had my attention, he shut it again and went on talking. “He was quite the outdoorsman, Hemingway was. Learned to fish in the rivers and lakes of Michigan with his dad.” He opened his eye again and smiled lazily. “Kind of like you and me.”

I put the memory on pause and stepped back to look at it. It was so real. I felt like I was living that morning all over again. Part of me wished I could drift in the boat with my dad forever. That's how I wanted to remember him —
alive
and in my life — fishing, skiing, playing golf, pulling practical jokes, sharing books and writers and writing.

Though he'd had to travel to promote his books, my father had been a homebody at heart. Early morning and late night were when he did his writing. The rest of the day was for living, so that he'd have something to write about — that's what he used to say. And anyone who ever met him knew he meant it. My dad squeezed as much out of a day as a person possibly could. It wasn't so
much that he was always on the go; it was just that he savored everything he did. For Dad, morning coffee on the deck was as special as a tropical cruise. And because he got such a kick out of everything, Mom and I did too. You might say his way of looking at life was contagious.

I felt my throat tighten. But it hadn't been real.
He
hadn't been real! The life he'd lived with Mom and me was a huge lie — loving husband, devoted father —
all a lie!
He'd said so himself.

I thought of the note he left on the dresser. It was the shortest thing he'd ever written. But it was also the most powerful. Just three sentences. C
losets are horrible places — small, dark, and crowded with secrets and lies. After a while you just can't seem to keep the door shut. I'm sorry
.

Then he took a gun and blew his life to pieces. Mine too. With one little bullet, he managed to shatter his skull and turn me into a walking box of mismatched puzzle pieces. Nothing fit anymore.

Rage and frustration began to swirl inside me like a hurricane whipping itself into a frenzy. Faster and faster it whirled, slashing at my guts and slamming my heart into my ribs. I wanted to yell it out of me, but there were no words for what I was feeling. And besides, the person I needed to yell at wasn't there to hear me.

Why, Dad? Why did you dump this on me and then leave? I believed in you, but you lied to me. So now what am I supposed to think? What am I supposed to believe? You were gay, and you killed yourself. Should I hate you for that? Or am I supposed to feel sorry for you? You should have told me.

I picked up my pen and started to write.

League volleyball started the next day.

The junior girls played first. After them it was the junior boys, then the varsity girls and finally us. With each match, the bleachers filled up a little more. By the time we took the court, the gym was packed.

The noise was incredible. We were playing Glenlawn — our longstanding rival according to Jai — so their fans were trying to
out-scream ours. And just in case that wasn't enough to clean out a person's earwax, there were horns and kazoos and warm-up music bouncing off the walls too.

I was pumped, but because I was playing a new position, I was also a little nervous. In the past, I'd always been a weak side hitter, but Mr. Hudson said my long arms were great for blocking, so he'd switched me to middle.

His theory was put to the test on the very first rally. Glenlawn served a floater to the back line.
Bump, set, smash —
we returned it. But Glenlawn dug it up and their setter made a perfect pass over to power. The hitter took his approach and I slid toward Paul, who was playing weak side. As Glenlawn's hitter went up, so did Paul and I.
Slam!
The ball ricocheted off our arms, back onto the hitter and out of play. Point, Dakota.

The next three points went to Glenlawn. We took the two after that. And on it went — seesawing back and forth the whole match. No sooner would one team go on a run than the momentum would shift, and the other
team would take the lead.

We won the first game. Glenlawn took the second. The third and deciding one went down to the wire, ending 23-21 in our favor.

Victory was sweet. Glenlawn left our gym vowing revenge.

Tess jumped down from the bleachers and ambushed me. She shoved a felt marker under my nose as if it were a microphone.

“Great game, Shaw,” she said. Her expression was serious and her voice was deep and reporterish. “Sixteen big stops in today's match. Could you tell our listeners how it feels to be the Dakota Lancers' new blocking machine?”

I made a face and pushed the felt marker away.

“You are too funny.”

She giggled and gave me a hug. “I know. It
was
an awesome game though,” she said. “And you did have some pretty amazing blocks. Why don't we grab a burger, and I can interview you for the paper. My treat,” she sweetened the pot.

“You're buying?” I waggled my eyebrows at her. “Hey, guys!” I hollered. “Tess is gonna treat us to — ” That's as far as I got before she stomped on my foot.

“Not the whole team!” she shushed me. “What do you take me for — the Bank of Canada?”

I laughed. It was so easy to rile Tess, sometimes I just couldn't resist. “Gotcha!” I said. Then I nodded toward the exit where my mom was standing.

Tess looked and waved, and my mom waved back.

“Thanks for the offer, Tess,” I said, “but I can't tonight. I already have a date with another one of my fans.”

Tess pretended to be miffed. “Fine. If that's the way you want it, I'll just have to feature some other lucky guy in my article. Have fun on your date.” Then she waved at my mom again and took off across the gym in Jai's direction.

“Exciting game,” Mom said as we walked out to the car. “I was on the edge of my seat
the whole match.” She wiped imaginary sweat from her forehead. “It's tough being a mother. I think I get as much of a workout as you do. My shoulders are still tight.”

I held out my hand for the keys. “Then you better let me drive. We wouldn't want to have an accident.”

Mom and I rehashed the game the whole way home — reliving the big kills and great plays, and agonizing over lost points and questionable calls. We were still on the subject long after we walked into our apartment.

“I am really glad I joined this team,” I said, flopping down onto the couch. “The guys are great, and Mr. Hudson is a fantastic coach. I'm learning a lot. And I don't even mind the practices — not completely anyway.”

Mom laughed. “Well, it certainly looks like they're paying off. The way you smash that ball, I sure as heck wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of it.”

I shrugged. “If we don't hammer it down the opposition's throat, they'll pound it down ours. I just wish I could do it more consistently.”

“You will,” Mom said with the total confidence of someone who doesn't actually have to do the deed.

“But you know,” I leaned back and put my feet up on the coffee table, “as much as I love to whale on that ball, I like blocking it even better. It's like I'm a brick wall or a force field or something. When the ball bounces off my arms and back at the hitter, I feel so pumped I swear I could jump right over that net. I just want to … ” I noticed a faraway look take over my mom's face.

“Earth to Mom,” I said.

Her eyes focused again. She gave her head a shake as if to clear it.

Then she said, “Did you know your dad used to play volleyball?”

I didn't answer. It had been a good evening. Why did Mom have to spoil it by bringing up Dad?

She kept on talking.

“Of course you know he played volleyball. You've heard his stories almost as many times as I have. The point is, blocking was his favorite part of the game too. He described the adrenaline rush he got from it exactly the same way you described it. He said he felt like he was going to fly over the net.” She paused and waited for me to say something.

I didn't.

So she started up again. “Don't you think that's interesting?”

“Yeah, real interesting,” I muttered, suddenly wanting out of the conversation. I pushed myself off the couch and headed for my room. “G'night.”

“Shaw?” Mom called after me. “What's the matter?”

I didn't stop.

“Nothing,” I said. “I'm just tired. G'night.”

I knew it wasn't fair walking out on Mom like that. I also knew my dad wasn't going to clear out of my life just because I refused to
talk about him. What I didn't know was that Mom knew all that too.

Not five minutes after I shut my bedroom door, she was knocking on it.

“Shaw,” she said, “may I come in? I have something you might be interested in.”

My jaw tightened. I didn't want a repeat of the other night's yelling match.