Absent Friends

BOYS' OWN BOOK

Chapter 9

The Women in the Tent

September 11, 1978: The Girls (Vicky)

Vicky is Tom's and has always been, nothing else ever possible. Six-year-olds on the front stoop, whispering secrets only children have; twelve-year-olds giving each other their first kiss, guessing, and rightly, what the taste of one another's lips will be.

Six years old: at least, most of the kids are six, except Markie's still five for another month, and Jack, well, Jack's already seven. It's a sticky, steamy summer day, and going to rain later, to thunder and lightning and pour down in buckets, the kids can tell. They're lying on the grass in Tom and Jack's backyard, watching the clouds roll across the sky, seeing if the clouds look like anything. People in the books their moms read them are always pointing at clouds that look like dogs or flowers or ferryboats, but the kids don't see those things, they don't see any pictures in the clouds at all.

Maybe because they're thunderclouds and they're moving, Jack says, maybe clouds only look like other things when they're just sitting there, when they don't have somewhere to go.

Vicky smiles and throws a handful of grass at Jack, as though he's making a silly joke. When she does that, Jack looks surprised.

Sally says, The kids at school said there are baby turtles in the pond in the woods. I wish we could go see them.

Markie sits up. Nobody's ever seen a baby turtle, and the kids have been hanging around the backyard since after lunch. And when Sally says something like this, about something she wants, it makes the boys all want to be the one who helps her get it. But the woods are a long way off, and it's complicated, something the moms and dads know how to do, lots of rights and lefts. Some of the kids only just learned which is their right and which is their left.

Tom doesn't say anything, and Jimmy doesn't, either, but Jack says, We can go to the pond, I know how to get there.

Sally says, You do?

Sure, says Jack, it's easy. He scrambles to his feet, dusts off his pants, says, Come on.

Markie jumps up, too, and for a minute it's only him. But then Tom rubs his hand over his head. Okay, he says.

Do we have to cross any big streets? Marian wants to know, because they're not allowed to cross the big streets, not even Jack.

No, uh-uh, says Jack. It's right over there.

So the little parade of kids follows Jack up this street and around that corner, through this empty lot and over that mud at the gate of one of the places where new houses are being built. It's a long walk, and as they go along, Vicky starts to frown. Tom looks back at her, then slows down so she can catch up to him. He whispers, I know how to get there, too. I don't know this way, but I know a different way.

Vicky asks, Do you know how to go home? And when Tom nods, she smiles at him, a big beaming smile.

And Jack does know how to get there. They come to the end of a block none of the others have been on before, a dead end at some unfamiliar trees, and Jack plunges straight in. They follow him, and he goes this way and that way and they come out at the top of a ridge, and when they look down, there's the pond and the trees they know and the path that usually takes them there, when they're with their moms and dads.

Everybody says, Hey, Jack! and Markie slaps Jack on the back, and then Tom and Jimmy do, like they're grown-ups and Jack just won a bet on the Mets. Everyone slaps Jack until Jack has to say, Hey, you guys, knock it off, but he's laughing when he says it.

But, says Sally, after everyone's through telling Jack how smart he is, but how do we get down there? Because Sally still wants to see the baby turtles.

Easy, says Jack. He sits and with his heels digging in and his hands grabbing tree roots, he half-climbs, half-slides down the steep woodsy hill, splashing at the bottom into a pile of wet leaves. Vicky's eyes are shining as she watches Jack climb down. The other kids all look at each other. It's pretty far down, but there's Jack yelling, Come on, you guys, come on! Then Markie drops down and does what Jack did. He loses his grip and tumbles the last part, and Sally puts her hand on her mouth, but Markie's laughing when he stands up from the leaves. Quickly, Vicky goes, and Jack catches her at the bottom. Come on, Vicky yells to the kids still at the top, it's easy! Then Sally goes, and Marian, who isn't sure what to do, but Jimmy helps her; and after everyone else makes it all the way down, Tom goes, and soon everyone's standing and laughing in the wet, smelly leaves at the bottom of the hill.

Then Sally holds her finger to her lips and tiptoes to the pond. The other kids quiet down and follow her. Sally points, and everyone follows her finger, and they see a little sharp rock sticking out from the water, and she whispers, That's its nose. When they stare harder, they can see it's not a rock, it really is a nose, and under the water they can see the rest of the turtle, its shell and its little feet, just floating there. No one's sure it's a baby turtle, it looks big enough to be a grown-up one, but then Markie whispers, There's another one! and when they look where he's pointing, they see that one, too, and then Jimmy sees one, and soon everyone's found one or two, Jack sees three sitting over on a rock and they're real little. Everyone agrees probably they're baby ones.

A rumbling sound comes from far away, they almost don't hear it, or they think it's a jet plane way high up. But Tom looks around at how dark it is and says, You guys, it's going to rain.

The rumbling happens again, and of course it's thunder, and the tops of the trees are moving and a swish of wind sends leaves skittering across the dirt. Look! says Markie. A snake in the water! but no one looks except Jack.

Tom says, Come on, we better go. He heads around the pond to the path they usually come on. Jimmy and Marian and Sally follow him, Sally turning her head to keep looking at the turtles.

Jack says, I'm going back that way, where we came down. It's so cool, climbing up that!

Markie looks at Tom, and then at Jack, and says, Me too, Jack, I'm coming that way, too. Jack says, Cool! And he says, Vicky, you want to come with us?

Vicky looks at the slope, all tangled with roots. Her eyes light up again, and she takes a step that way. But she stops. She looks at Jack and then at Tom, waiting on the path. Her face turns a little bit sad, just for a second, and then she smiles at Tom. Jack, she says, as she walks toward the path, come this way. I don't think we'll get home before the storm, if we go your way.

It's true that, for a time, after Jack comes back from New Haven, his dark eyes linger on Vicky, he winks at her when someone says, Hey, sorry New Haven didn't work out, and he always answers, Hey, it's okay, I won't be here that long, and besides, they got things here they don't have in New Haven. Vicky smiles and blushes. But that passes. And had you asked her then, she'd have told you this: it was like new fashions in the magazine pages. Startling ideas, answers to questions you had never asked, so you try them on in your head. And then realize they're absurd. And discard them. Sometimes maybe you turn back to one of those pages again, take another look . . . but no, still no. Vicky will marry Tom. After the wedding she'll stay in her job at the sewing store—trimmings, notions, exotic fabrics, Vicky's good with those, all the things that make what you expected into something different, special, and sparkling—just for a while, until she leaves to have their babies.

Vicky's happy.