Martin Marten (9781466843691) (32 page)

61

OFFICIALLY, BASKETBALL WORKOUTS
did not begin until October 1, but Moon and everyone else who wanted to play ball for the Zag was in the gym or the weight room or both every afternoon, partly to be sure the coach saw you at work and partly from the sure knowledge that when tryouts started, if you were not in tiptop shape and on your game, you had no chance, for it was clear from the first open gym period that there were a
lot
more ballplayers this year, somehow, and something was different about the ones who had been merely good last year—Moon among them.

It had been evident from the first few minutes. Usually ten or fifteen guys might show up for open gym, some serious about scrimmaging but most just horsing around or killing time before a later theater or choir practice or a ride home. But this time nearly thirty guys were there when the door opened, with more straggling in later. For a few minutes, guys milled around, shooting freely at either end and on the lower baskets on the sides, and then the varsity captains, brothers whose dad worked at the lodge, set up teams for brief scrimmages, knockout fashion—winner stays on court, loser to the end of the waiting teams. To their credit they did not pack teams with last year’s players, although they did anoint their respective teams to open play. Moon’s team was first challenger, and they won, mostly because he got nearly every rebound at either end of the floor. They won a second game, a third, a fourth, and in each game, Moon hammered the boards as hard as he could, although by now the other players were diligently trying to keep him out of the lane. By the fifth game, the coach was standing outside the gym doors, watching. By the seventh game, Dave and a few cross-country guys were watching too, as word had spread. Moon’s team finally lost to a team that the brothers did pack with last year’s starters, but when the game ended, guys shook hands and meant it. Moon had scored only two baskets in eight games, both on the simplest of shots from as close as you could possibly get to the basket, but even the coach, who had tried to keep track of rebounds and blocked shots, had lost count.

Man, that was amazing, says Dave on the way home. People stopped what they were doing to watch
you
play ball.
That
never happened before.

Moon laughs. I tell you, Dave, he says, I know what to do now. I know where to be without thinking about it. And I know what not to do and where not to be. It’s like I finally speak the language. You know how when you are trying to learn something and you have to think about each part of it, and then finally you realize you are just
doing
it without thinking about it? That’s what it feels like. That’s the first time it ever happened like that. I felt totally comfortable, like I knew what I was doing for a change. I don’t think I ever felt like that before, except while making sandwiches.

You going to tell your folks?

Well, says Moon, Dad is in Borneo, and Mom is in Iceland, I think. Although today she might still be in Denmark. Not sure of the schedule. I would Skype them, but what would I say? That I didn’t totally geek up for a change?

You know, says Dave, what if you actually turned out to be a good ballplayer and I turned out to be a good runner? What if we turned out to be good students? What if we were actually good at the things we wanted to be good at?

Unthinkable, said Moon. Apocalypse. Armageddon. That would mean we would have futures. Nah. I just had a good game, and you had a good run. Let’s not get crazy.

Hey, come for dinner, says Dave. Maria will be thrilled.

What’s for dinner?

Trout. Somebody at the lodge caught a mess and gave them to us.

What a coincidence, says Moon. Trout is the only thing I eat now, for religious reasons. I am in a new religion where I have to eat huge amounts of trout. In butter. With mustard. A little salt. Dill, if you have any.

You can explain your religion to my mom yourself, you goof.

I might have to move in if there’s trout every day at your house. We might have to switch places. I always wanted a kid sister anyway and Maria is the Cadillac of kid sisters. I think she is going to be governor someday. I bet she is governor before she graduates from high school. If I become her brother now I will be in good before she is elected, and she will give me a cushy post. Is that Maria on the roof? Why is she on the roof?

Moon! says Maria’s voice. Are you staying for dinner? Say yes. I need your help with a project. Do you have your iPad? Say yes.

Where are you, Madam Governor?

Up on the roof, says Maria. I am making a galactic map, and
you
are going to help me. Right after dinner. Dinner is trout. Mom says she knew you were coming for dinner as soon as she put the first fillet in the pan. She says she could hear you smelling it from a mile away. Help me down? Let’s eat. Then you can help me. Hi, Dave.

Hello, Governor, says Dave with a smile. Good day?

Great
day. Did I tell you I love you today?

You did this morning when I left.

Did you tell me you love me?

Once this morning and twice last night. Let’s eat.

*   *   *

I think I love you, says Emma Jackson to the morning waitress, but I don’t think it’s working out, and I don’t think I want to be together anymore, because I don’t feel like we fit, although I think I love you. I’m so sorry. I feel awful. But I love you, and I want to be honest and straight. So to speak. I’m so sorry.

They are sitting on the edge of Emma Jackson’s bed. Her bed is narrow. There is a faded blue blanket on it. The blanket was woven by her grandmother. There is a small desk by her bed. On the desk are photographs of her parents and her grandparents and her brother who was a sailor before he. Emma and her family never finish that sentence anymore. On the walls there are three paintings by the morning waitress. The morning waitress loves to play with shape and color and considers most works of art to be too nervously representational and not willing to simply play with shape and color in ways that perhaps make the viewer reconsider the shape and color of the things we think we know, like desks and beds and morning waitresses.

I love you too, says the morning waitress. I think we do fit. I think we fit great. I’d like to see how we could fit even better. I’d like to try to fit with a house and children and work. I’d like to try to fit in other places like Wales or Nicaragua. Somewhere by the sea. I think you came to the mountain because you should be by the sea and yet you are running away from it because of your brother. I think you and I fit, but you don’t fit here. That’s what I think.

They sit silently for a few minutes. Emma Jackson reaches for the morning waitress’s hand to hold hands, but the morning waitress smiles and lifts her hand and cups Emma Jackson’s face and says, listen, I would wait years for you if I thought we had a chance, but I think you have a long road before
you
fit with you. That’s what I think. I love you, and I’ll always want to know if you are happy. You stay in touch, okay? Just send me a card here and there with one sentence. Write a poem in one sentence, and I will translate the poem to see if you are getting close to fitting you to you. Will you do that?

Yes, whispers Emma Jackson.

Maybe what will happen is that you will actually meet Billy Beaton. Or Miss Billie Beaton.

Maybe.

But it’s not someone else, you know.

I know.

You’ll get there.

I don’t know.

I think you will.

I’m so sorry.

I love you too, Emma.

Will you be my date at the wedding?

Unwedding. Yes. Of course. A not-date at a not-wedding. How apt.

I’m so sorry.

Me too.

And they sit there for another four or five moments, inside love and pain and love. If you were a painter, you could paint the lean slump of their bodies, the stilled birds of their hands, the bright shapeless paintings behind them, the drift of dust motes, the faraway thrum of cars leaving, the thrill of thrushes, the seethe of the wind. If you were a painter, you could try to paint the way people who love each other can be untogether. You could try to paint that. It would be hard to paint, but you could try if you just used shape and color. You could have two shapes of two different colors almost touching but not quite, not anymore.

*   *   *

Cosmas is not on his bicycle for a change. He is in his orange jumpsuit kneeling on Mrs. Robinson’s grave. Hers is on the right. He has already worked Mr. Robinson’s grave this morning. Mr. Robinson is on the left. That is how the Robinsons moved through the world together when they were alive, and that is how they sleep together now that they are in another form. Cosmas is wearing an orange bandanna. He is thinking that Mr. and Mrs. Robinson have produced a
stunning
crop of tomatoes. It’s hard to get good tomatoes this high on the mountain, what with the dusty ashy soil and the cool nights and the way the sun sears through the thin air sometimes on wild hot days, but the Robinsons, by god, have done it with verve and panache. You could do better with the basil next year, says Cosmas very gently, but your garlic production is superb, and the tomatoes are just crazy good. I am going to eat two tomatoes for dinner tonight in your honor and save the rest for the wedding. Yes, wedding. That’s what I came to tell you this morning. Yes, Miss Moss and Dickie Douglas. Finally.
She
asked
him
finally
in
the river. He says she only asked him finally because she was weary of him asking her twice a day. He says he would have asked her twice a day for the rest of his life if necessary. He says you can hear no any given number of times as long as there’s a chance someday of having yes in your startled ear. She says it’s
not
a wedding and
not
a marriage, and there’s no marriage license and no joint tax filing and no joint checking account. Yes, she has a bee in her bonnet about all that, but they
are
actually plighting troth on Friday. Dickie says the day was chosen because it’s Joel Palmer’s birthday and Maria gets to wear the sneakers found in the glacier, but Ginny says Friday is the one day of the week named for a woman, and that’s the day for her. She says Friday is named for a woman who lived on a snowcapped mountain and could see through time. Yes, they asked me to be the celebrant. No, I am not to use the words
preside
or
wed
or
join
or
marry
or
pronounce
or anything like that. Ginny says she and Dickie are coming to an agreement with their friends and neighbors, and we are all there to celebrate together, and no one is in charge of the moment, not even she and Dickie, but because I am the tallest of all of us, I can stand with them and be master of ceremonies, sort of. She says their only request of me is to wear my jumpsuit and not some flowing billowing robe or gown or cloak or whatever. She says orange is the color of October and that will be apt and suitable. She says Dickie wanted Edwin to be master of ceremonies but Edwin declined, which is a good thing, because where would we find an orange jumpsuit big enough for a horse? She says she wishes more than anything in the world that you two were there and that she will certainly weep bitterly that you are not standing there next to her beaming as she too takes the leap you took toward each other, because that’s why she is leaping toward Dickie, because you leapt toward each other every hour of every day, and she saw that and admired that and watched your gentle patience and affection and respect and reverence for each other in every little aspect of your lives, which were of course not little at all, which she says is the greatest lesson she ever learned and what she wants to try to reach with Dickie. She says if she and Dickie can be anything like you two, then she will account their lives a roaring success even if the generator in the store keeps wheezing and dying and the milk keeps going bad a day too early and Dickie brings in one too many raccoon pelts, a woman can only take so many raccoon pelts hanging in the shed to dry before she goes stark-raving mad and starts wearing orange jumpsuits and growing vegetables in cemeteries and talking to the graves of friends. I’ll come tomorrow to collect the garlic, okay? And then Friday morning for the tomatoes. You keep working on the tomatoes until then. I’m thinking we could try turnips and parsnips after that. I think we can get one more crop in before snowfall. You want to try kale? Think about it. I’ll be back tomorrow for the garlic. I miss you awfully too. I miss you terribly. I wish I could hear your voices. I wish I could hear you laugh. I bet you are laughing right now, right through the tomatoes. These are unbelievable tomatoes. I miss you. Sleep well. I’ll be here in the morning.

62

THE DOG WHO HAD DECIDED
to live with Mr. Shapiro, the one who had survived his first year in the deepest wildest forests in North America, generally arose with Mr. Shapiro in the morning and companionably ate breakfast with him, and then, when Mr. Shapiro went off to work, the dog explored generally, soaking up information and scent, studying the style and story of his new place. For the first few days his explorations were of the cabin and yard and neighborhood, trying to make sense of ostensible boundaries. The other dogs nearby, after some initial disagreements and debates, agreed to allow him free passage through their territories. The human beings nearby, as a rule, did not care overmuch about a trotting dog, although the golf course manager was rude and intemperate in his language and twice tried to hit him with low flat drives with a five iron. The two adult coyotes who lived not far from the right-field fence at the high school were afraid of him and went to ground at his approach; and it was only one testy raven who ever harassed him on a regular basis. The dog thought more than once that he might catch and eat that damned raven, more on principle than from hunger, but the conflict was resolved one morning when the dog actually did catch the raven, who had come an inch too close, and pinned it to the ground with both of his front paws and communicated in clear and relatively patient fashion that he had no particular problem with ravens individually or collectively or as a species, and any raven that had a problem with
him
was mistaken in that belief and imprisoned in a misguided concept, and that further harassment was a poor idea from every conceivable angle and that henceforth he would expect, as the raven could expect, not quite friendship as much as something like a truce or a polite neutrality or an agreement not to disagree. The raven understood and expressed something like an apology. As the dog thought later, the raven’s apology could not be said to have been delivered with anything like what you would call grace, but it
had
been genuine, insofar as he could tell, and certainly the raven did not afterwards dive upon or otherwise harass or badger the dog or fly off to recruit his or her companions for a confrontation in numbers.