“Come in,” I whispered.
“Is your dad home?”
“He won’t come out.”
Suddenly my dad yelled, “Eric!”
“Yeah?” I shouted back.
“Get me a Dr. Pepper.”
“Sure. I need to go to the bathroom first.” I turned to Grace. “C’mon. Hurry.”
We slunk around the corner to the bathroom. I quickly turned the shower on full and steam filled the room. Grace tried to take her clothes off but her hands were trembling so badly she couldn’t do it. I pulled off her coat, then knelt down and untied her shoes. When she had stepped out of them, I pulled her socks down and off. She tried to un-button her blouse but she couldn’t push the buttons through. She looked at me helplessly. I suppose this would be most teenage boys’ ultimate fantasy, but I was a young fourteen and was as terrified as I was mystified by the opposite sex.
I reached my hand inside the shower. The water was scalding. I adjusted the knobs until it was warm. “Get in,” I said.
“…my clothes…”
“Just get in. You’re already wet.”
She stepped inside the shower. The first minute or so she shivered as the hot water soaked through her clothing. Then she seemed to relax.
“I’ll be back,” I said.
As I was shutting the bathroom door my dad called again. “Eric, where’s my Dr. Pepper?”
“Coming.”
I got a glass from the cupboard, a bottle opener and a bottle of soda out of the refrigerator and brought them to him. Even though much of the dexterity had returned to his hands, he was still unable to open a bottle. I pried off the bottle cap and poured the soda into the glass. “Here you are.”
He stared at me. “Why are your pants all wet?”
I looked down. My pants were soaked. “I was walking by the creek and kind of fell in.”
“Through the ice?”
“Yeah.”
“What were you doing by the creek?”
“Walking.”
He just looked at me blankly. He likely would have said more but he seemed pretty much baffled by most things I did these days. “It sounds like there’s water running.”
“Yeah, uh, it’s the toilet…you know how it runs sometimes.”
“It sounds like the shower.”
Just then the Bee pulled into the driveway.
“Looks like Mom came home early,” my father said.
Now I was worried. “I’m going to take a shower,” I said. “Mom wouldn’t want me to catch a chill.” I hurried back to the bathroom. Grace’s clothes were in a pile on the floor outside the shower.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Yes.” She sounded normal again.
“You scared me,” I said.
“Me too.”
“We have a problem. My mom just got home.”
She stuck her head out. “What do we do?”
“Just stay in there, I’ll figure something out.”
“I need some clothes.”
“I’ll find some.”
Fortunately my mom saved my clothes after I grew out of them for Joel. I could hear my brother talking to my mother in the hall. When their voices quieted, I opened the door a crack and peered out. Joel was just a few yards away. “Hey,” I called in a loud whisper.
He turned to me. “What?”
“Get me some of my old clothes from the hand-me-down box.”
“Why?”
“Grace fell in the creek.”
It took a moment for him to make the connection. “Is she in there?”
“Yes.”
“With you?”
“Just get the clothes,” I said. “And don’t let Mom see you.”
As if on cue, my mom came around the corner. “What are you doing?”
“I was just asking Joel to get me some dry clothes. I fell in the creek.”
“Through the ice?”
“Yeah.”
“What were you doing by the creek?”
“Walking.”
She looked at me with the same blank expression my father had. Then she said, “Supper will be ready in a half hour.”
When she was gone, Joel asked, “What should I get?”
“Just something warm. Not my summer clothes.”
“Does she want underwear too?”
I thought about it. “I guess.”
I shut and locked the door. A few minutes later Joel knocked. I cracked open the door; he was holding a stack of clothes.
“Did you get socks?”
“You didn’t say to.”
“Of course she needs socks. Where’s Mom right now?”
“She’s making dinner.”
“I’ve got to get Grace out of here.” I thought for a moment. “I need you to create a diversion.”
Joel smiled and nodded his approval. He had read enough comic books that the idea of creating a diversion clearly pleased him. “I know. I’ll put a dishcloth on one of the stove burners and start a fire in the kitchen. Then, while Mom’s trying to put it out, you could sneak her out the back.”
I looked at him. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Just ask her to help you with your homework.”
“What kind of distraction is that?”
“If the house is on fire, we’re all in trouble.”
“I don’t have any homework.”
“Make some up.”
The shower shut off.
“Just give us five minutes. Make sure Mom’s in the kitchen. I’ll take Grace out through our bedroom window.”
“I can’t believe you’re in there with a naked girl.”
“Just do it.” I shut and locked the door.
“Could you get me a towel?” Grace whispered.
I took one from the towel rack and turning my head handed it around the corner of the shower. “Joel got you some clothes.”
“Thanks.”
“I’ll just put them on the floor. You can wear them until yours are dry. My parents think I’m showering, so I need to stay in here. I promise I won’t look.”
“Okay.”
A few minutes later she stepped out of the shower. “I’m dressed.” I turned around. She looked better, though it was odd seeing her in my clothes. She looked at herself in the mirror and grinned. “I’ve never worn boy’s underwear before.”
Joel knocked again on the door. He held some socks. His math textbook was under his arm.
“Hi, Joel,” Grace said.
“Hi.” He frowned at me. “I already know how to do all this.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. He started to walk away. “Wait.”
“What?”
“Is Dad still in the living room?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Go.” We waited a few more minutes before I again peeked out the door. I could hear my mother talking. I turned back to Grace. She was wrapping her wet clothes in a towel. “Let’s go.”
Grace followed me around the corner to our bedroom. I locked the door behind us. “We’ll go out the window.”
“What about my shoes?”
I hadn’t thought about that. “You’ll have to wear my snow boots. They’re in the kitchen. You better hide in the closet while I get them.”
She went inside, crouching beneath a curtain of hanging clothes. I shut the door and walked out to the kitchen, trying my best to look like I wasn’t hiding a girl in my bedroom closet. Joel looked at me quizzically.
My mother looked up. “I thought you took a shower.”
“I did.”
“And you put the same clothes back on?”
“I mean, I’m about to take a shower.”
I grabbed my boots and hurried past them. Fortunately my mother’s attention had shifted back to helping Joel. When I got back to my room I locked the door again, then opened the closet. Grace was sitting cross-legged on the floor. “Here.”
She slipped her feet into the boots.
I went to the bedroom window
and tried to open it. It was stuck and it took both of us to get it open. I climbed out the window first, then helped Grace out. We kept to the perimeter of the yard and out of view of the windows until we were far enough from the house to safely cut across the yard. We were panting from the exertion when we finally got back inside the clubhouse. Grace climbed inside the sleeping bag, then lay back on the mattress.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“Better,” she said. “It felt good to shower.”
We were both quiet, and then Grace started laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
“Everything,” she said. “I’m crawling through windows and wearing boys’ underwear.” She put her hand on my leg. “Are you going to school tomorrow?”
“Yeah.”
“I have some things in my locker. Would you mind getting them?”
“Sure. What do you need?”
“Just bring everything. But the most important thing is a red cloth pouch. Whatever you do, don’t lose it.”
“A red cloth pouch,” I repeated.
“You’ll need my locker combination.” She took a pen and a piece of paper out of her school bag and wrote it down. She also wrote “red cloth pouch” and underlined it three times. “Here you go.”
I folded the paper and put it in my pocket. “I better get back inside before my mom finds out I’m gone. She thinks I’m taking a shower.” I got down to crawl out.
“Eric, thanks for saving me.”
I looked up at her. She had an expression I’d never seen on a girl’s face, at least not one looking at me. I wasn’t sure what it meant, but I liked it.
“You’re my hero.”
“Any time,” I said.
As I walked back to the house I realized that I really had saved her. Of course I wasn’t about to win any awards, as technically I’d put her in danger to begin with, but when you’re a fourteen-year-old boy with acne and a bad haircut, it felt good to be somebody’s hero.
CHAPTER Eight
Last night, Eric brought me a two-week old newspaper.
There was an article about a riot that started when a negro
enrolled at the University of Mississippi. It seems strange
to me that we could put a man in outer space but have
trouble putting a black man in college.
GRACE’S DIARY
MONDAY, OCT. 15
I hated being back at school, which would have been true even without having Grace in my clubhouse, but somehow her being there made it worse. The day passed at glacial speed and all day I sat, chewing on my pencil while my thoughts revolved around Grace.
Spanish was my last class of the day and for some reason I kept looking back to the corner of the room where Grace usually sat. I felt strangely important being the only one who knew where she was. Mrs. Waller was going down the roll when she suddenly looked up. “Has anyone seen Madeline Webb?”
I looked straight ahead.
“Anyone?”
“I think she’s sick,” a voice said from the back of the room. “I heard she had pneumonia.”
“Oh.” She made a mark on the attendance sheet, put it back in her desk, and started the class.
As soon as the bell rang I set out for Grace’s locker. It wasn’t easy to find. It was one of a dozen lockers on an obscure row placed in no man’s land. It was like the builders of the school had realized they had some extra lockers sitting around and someone said, “Hey, let’s put them there.” I probably wouldn’t have found it if I hadn’t taken a break from my search to look for a water fountain and stumbled across it.
I took the folded paper with the locker combination out of my pocket and began turning the dial. It felt a little like I was breaking into a safe. It took me a couple tries to get the door open.
Inside Grace’s locker there was a mirror taped to the inside of the door and several pictures of cheerleaders cut from magazines taped to the sidewalls. I saw a stack of folded clothes sitting on the bottom of the locker and it occurred to me that she had been planning her escape for some time. Underneath the clothes was the red cloth pouch. It was nearly as thick as a brick but flexible. I wanted to look inside but didn’t. I figured if it was that important it was best I didn’t know.
I collected everything inside and was stowing it all in my knapsack when someone said, “What do you think you’re doing?”
I turned to see a broad girl with short brown hair. She was at least three inches taller than me and had a look on her face like she wanted to pound me into the ground and she probably could have. “That’s not your locker.”
“Yeah, it is.”
“No, it’s not. I know that girl.”
I didn’t know if she really was a friend of Grace’s or, more likely, if the unlucky recipients of these out-of-the-way lockers all just came to know each other by circumstance, like people stranded on a deserted island.
“I’m just getting some things for her.”
I slammed the locker shut, threw my schoolbag over my shoulder and walked away, hoping she wouldn’t follow. She yelled something after me but that’s all. I looked down at my watch. I was late for the bus. I broke into a run for the north doors, which I usually avoided because the hoods were always hanging around them. Fortunately they weren’t there, but neither was my bus. I could see the last orange bus a hundred yards away from me rounding the corner of the parking lot onto Third East. I groaned. It wasn’t like I could call anyone for a ride.
I had made the walk home before and vowed never to do it again. The school was about three and a half miles from our home and it took me almost an hour to make the journey. And that was without all the snow and ice. And I was wearing my canvas converse high tops.
“Dang it!” I shouted, which was about as harsh an expletive as I ever used, and started off for home. An hour and a half later I walked in our front door, my feet soaked and numb from the cold. My father was reading a book. He looked up at me. “You’re late.”
“I missed the bus.” I wiped my feet on the scrap of carpet my mother had put by the front door. “How are you feeling?”
“Getting better,” he said, which he always said.
My dad continued to look at me with a peculiar expression I couldn’t read. The Bible says that the guilty flee when no man pursueth, I guess that’s how I was with my secret. Had he found out about Grace? Did she leave something in the bathroom? I wondered if he was waiting for me to spill the beans, like the time Joel threw a baseball through a neighbor’s window and our dad asked us everything about our afternoon—except about the broken window—until we finally caved.
“What?” I finally said.
“Look at what I’m doing.”
I looked at him and still had no idea what he was talking about. “Yeah?”
“I’m reading a book.”
What does this have to do with Grace? I thought. “I didn’t know you couldn’t read.”
“Don’t be a smart aleck,” he said. “Of course I can read. I can turn the pages.”
“Oh. That’s great.” I hoped I sounded excited.
“Darn tootin’.” He went back to his book.
I walked out of the living room into the kitchen. Joel was at the table working on a jigsaw puzzle. He looked up at me.
“Where you been?”
“I missed the bus.”
“You walked home?”
“No. I flew.”
He went back to his puzzle. “Want to help?”
“No. I’ve got to go to work.” I lowered my voice. “Have you checked on…?”
“What?”
I tilted my head toward the back door. “You know.”
“The girl?”
“Shhh!”
“I didn’t know I was supposed to.”
“She’s probably hungry.”
“It’s like having a pet,” Joel said.
I went to the pantry. I selected cans from the back of the shelf, carefully considering what I could take t
hat my mother wouldn’t miss. I grabbed a couple cans of Van de Kamp’s pork and beans, a can of Campbell’s cream of chicken soup, and a can of string beans. We had an old army cooking pan in the clubhouse and I figured she could heat things over the kerosene lamp. I cut two thick pieces of my mother’s homemade bread, and put it all in a brown grocery sack along with a can opener, a fork, a spoon, a plate, and a bowl. Then I retrieved my schoolbag and went out back. As I neared the clubhouse, I could smell something bad. When I opened the door the smell intensified. The light and nightlite was off. “Grace?”
She didn’t answer but I could hear her lightly snoring. I thought it was a little strange that she was napping this late in the afternoon. I set the paper sack inside the door, along with the things from her locker, then rode my bike to work.
CHAPTER Nine
Hawaii is the most isolated place with a big population
on the face of the earth. It even has its own time zone.
I think that’s how I feel back here.
GRACE’S DIARY
Monday at the Queen was the slowest day of the week, but that didn’t mean we had less work. Mr. Dick created what we called the Monday death list. I think he put things on there for us to do just so he wouldn’t feel like we were wasting his money, like putting all the paper money in the cash register president’s head up and facing in the same direction or changing the words on the sign up front.
The worst job was changing the oil in the fryer. Fortunately we didn’t do it often. “Grease costs money,” Mr. Dick always said, so we only changed it once a week. He would have held out longer, but after seven days of using the same grease everything we dropped into the fryer started tasting the same, be it French fries, corn dogs, or burritos.
I was alone in the back, rolling burritos and stacking them in a plastic container when Dean came back.
Dean was a master of avoiding work. In fact he was a genius at it. I think that if he worked half as hard at working as he did avoiding it, he would have had a perennial lock on Employee of the Month.
He had two main tactics. One, he would wander around the kitchen like he was looking for something, occasionally stopping to talk to people who were actually doing work. When they looked like they were about to brush him off, he’d say, “I can’t talk anymore, I gotta find that…” and he’d leave before saying what it was he was looking for.