The Quarry
a short story by
Don Shogren
Copyright 2012 Don Shogren
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, either living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The Quarry
Flattened by heat pressing down from the frame of rafters and plywood sheathing above, I listen to that maple tree branch scratching along the gutter outside the corner of my attic room. I'm in storage here, above the garage, and air conditioning isn't part of the service. It's a price I pay for privacy—always a price—and maybe I was in too big a hurry to cut the deal. In sixty-two … no … make that sixty-one days, I'll be out of here.
Last Thursday night, at one of my blessedly few dinner table encounters with Father, I'd floated the idea of getting a window unit. With mocking enthusiasm for my initiative, he'd looked up from his Time magazine long enough to say, "Good idea. Why don't you go buy one?" A challenge. Everything is a challenge with him and me. That tree branch over in the corner is another one. It wouldn't take more than five minutes for either one of us to drag a ladder out of the garage and saw the thing off, but there you go.
I could just get up and turn on the old shop fan standing not six feet to the left of my bed. I at least imagine myself doing it—imagine cool air feathering across my shoulders—that hypnotic, low murmur easing me back into sleep.
Still I lie, under this stifling depression.
As a lazy compromise, I focus on the rush of hot wind rustling the oaks out in the front yard. This seems to help. If I lie still … very, very still, I might bear this heat. I slow my breath.
"Rrrrrrrring!" Not three feet from my Zen head, that old black phone on the TV tray that serves as my nightstand jumps to life, and it's all wrong. I look at the … "Rrrrrrrring!" … Little Ben clock next to it. Seven thirty. On a Sunday! A time for old men … "Rrrrrrrring!" … and delivery boys, and not any eighteen-year-old, … "Rrrrrrrring!" … ever!
"Rrrrrrrring!" It's not going to stop. Bolting upright, I grab off the receiver violently. "Who is this?" I ask, somewhere between puzzled and this-better-be-good.
"Who do you think it is, dork?"
It's very good. It's Anneli, the main reason for having my own phone line out here. Father is still ticked off about my having it installed without his go-ahead—or maybe it's because, in the heat of battle, I'd hit him with, "Just some of that initiative you're always looking for, Pop." They really don't like it when you pick up the tear gas and throw it back at them.
Anneli's family moved into town last year, from north of Philadelphia, somewhere. She doesn't hang with the "A" girls—she's kinda kooky, or as she would say, trippy, for that crowd. She doesn't wear the right stuff. She doesn't say the right stuff. The "A" boys don't get her, either, and that is some seriously bad thinking on their parts. She grabbed me at a play rehearsal one night, and I've been pinching myself ever since.
"Yes, Dear," I tell her. It's a joke with us. One day, I was just imitating Father with it (to my own horror), but she thought it was cute. Now, when I have nothing clever, I'm to answer "Yes, dear." Turns out I'm not clever more often than I thought.
"Hot," she says. "Beach."
I imagine her lying next to me on the beach … then better yet, clinging to me while I hold on to the anchor chain in the cool, dark spaces under the swimming raft. It doesn't require a lot of imagination—these things last happened yesterday.
"You driving?" I ask.
"Fifteen minutes," she informs me. "Check your dirty clothes pile for change, and we can stop at the Pig and get some munchies."
"I'll be ready," I tell her—an understatement.
We say our quick goodbyes and hang up. A lot of the time we don't talk so much—there are just so many hours in the day.
I'm trying to decide if I should bother to take a shower before we go. I look at the bed. It's kinda sweaty and messy, and I don't doubt that I look about the same. The problem is, the bathroom is in the main part of the house, and I don't want to run into my parents, who will be doing their Sunday Tribune and coffee bit. I'm sure they won't be able to resist getting to the bottom of something as rare as a sighting of me before noon. The phone rings again. She's already changing the plan, I think, unsurprised.
"Yes, dear," I answer.
"Goodrich! I didn't know you cared."
It's Pennington. He has a first name, but he's from Lake Forest, where last names are apparently more the point. He calls me Goodrich because I kinda look like the UCLA/Phoenix Suns guard, Gail Goodrich, and I shoot left-handed. It could be worse. If he were from some ordinary place, like Libertyville or Gurnee, I suppose he might call me Gail. That wouldn't be good. We met at a camp in Iowa City, where I learned everything about how I'm never going to be a basketball star. Pennington is way out of my league, yet he's taken some sort of liking to me, or maybe needs a pet. He seems to think I need more adventure in my life, and whenever he calls, I swear I can hear a little lightning and thunder in the background.
"Kinda early, Pen, don't cha think?"
"Hey … ever been to the quarry?" he asks.
Now, I've never been to any quarry—mostly we just have sand and gravel pits here in the land even the glaciers gave up on—but I've heard tales, and immediately I picture my broken self sliding off some subsurface ledge, vanishing into the abyss. He lets me sink for a moment.
"What quarry?" I ask, finally.
"It's in Racine. Outta sight! You gotta see it, man."
"It sounds dangerous," I tell him. It's my role.
"It can be," he says, "but I've never led you wrong, have I, Goodrich?" He's all sincere, now. You know it's coming from a spigot he just turned on, somewhere, but you just can't help believing him. He's got big plans. He wants to be a politician.
"Tell me we're not going to break in," I say, looking for a way out.
"Nah … it's some kind of park," he says. "Not really supervised, but the city leaves it open. There's like a million freaks running around there. And babes. So let's go, huh?"
I've got plans—pretty good ones—but I tell him okay. What can I say? He's like the Pied Piper or something.
While mulling over the shower thing again, I hear the crunch of Anneli's car on the gravel drive. She's not going to like me changing the plans. I hustle down to meet her. It's like an oven outside already, as Anneli swings out of that little, cherry red Karmann Ghia her dad bought her for graduation, and I wait for her to walk over and give me a kiss or two or three, safely around the corner of the garage from prying eyes. Her still-wet, brunette hair hints of tangerines. Her lips taste of coffee and watermelon. In the small of her back, tiny beads of sweat are beginning to form, and I bring one to the tip of my tongue, as she pulls back a couple of inches. Her eyes are chocolate birthday cakes, with sparklers for candles.
"You almost ready?" she asks.
"Almost," I tell her, and she lets out a little laugh—I don't look it. "There's a minor change in the plan," I tell her, watching for any signs of displeasure. The giggle is still in her eyes, but there's a slight disconnect while she considers this. Usually, she comes up with plans, and then I weigh in on the options.
So I tell her about Pennington and the quarry and all that.
"Cool," she says. "When?" It's funny. You can go crazy anticipating her, and then there's no anticipating her.
We climb the stairs to my room, where I get ready, mindful that Mother and Father are probably watching from the kitchen alcove window. I'm sure Father thinks I should be doing something more useful with my time—like working a second job—but Anneli is t
he one thing he doesn't bug me about. That's because Mother thinks we're the cutest thing since Superman underwear, and she steps in every time. He doesn't like that. Or maybe Anneli is a force he's not ready to reckon with … that I would understand.
Pennington's entourage pulls in a few minutes later, like one of those cast-of-thousands, car-race movies, and I rush Anneli down the stairs because there's no doubt Father will dispatch Mother to find out what all this is about. When she doubles back for something, Pen spots her, and pulls me aside.
"You planning on bringing the old lady?" he asks. "The guys didn't bring theirs."
"I didn't now," I tell him, as Anneli bounces back down the stairs. Pennington gives her the once-over. She's got on her white bikini top, and I assume the bottom is underneath her pair of very short, low-rider cut-offs, decorated with a double-wooden-ring-cinched macramé belt. It's a very clever bikini. For '69, it's fairly modest, in parent's house mode, anyway. But there are laces on each