All the Earth, Thrown to the Sky

32

Come early morning the rain was long gone. The sun was warm, and the trees, mostly tall pines, had become thicker along the track. There was water that could be seen between the pines, and those spots of water were shiny like the wet scales of a fish. But mostly there were shadows from the trees, and they lay across the water like dark logs. They were so dark it made the bright spots seem even brighter.

We got some food from our bags and sat in the doorway eating it. The day began to brighten and the shadows from the trees on the water shifted and faded and pretty soon the water was clear and bright except where there was moss and plants on the surface or growing up out of it. Birds were fluttering from tree to tree. All kinds of birds. Bluebirds and redbirds and mockingbirds and sparrows. Before long it turned hot.

I watched the water go by. There wasn’t a river or a creek, but there were some big pools out there. I thought I might like to get some worms and a pole and fish it. I knew some of the water was fed by a creek somewhere. There would be fish in the deep parts. Not big fish, but hungry fish that I could catch and eat. I was hungry all the time. Some place inside of me was always empty.

We passed a crossing where a pickup waited on the train. The pickup was stuffed with kids. When they saw us they waved at us, but we went by so quick we didn’t have time to wave back.

“I saw a sign,” Jane said. “It said Tyler, four miles.”

“We’ll be there pretty quick,” I said.

“Yeah,” Jane said, “and my thinking is we’ll start slowing down soon. I think when it’s slow enough we ought to jump off right away and not even mess with being close to the station and those bulls.”

“It may not slow enough,” Tony said.

“It will,” she said. The way she talked, you’d have thought she’d been a hobo for twenty years.

But she was right. Not long after, the train began to slow. And then it slowed a lot. I leaned out the door and looked up the track. There was nothing to see.

“I think it’s better to walk a little,” Jane said, “than be in sight of the station.”

“You said that,” I said.

“Yeah,” she said, “but I wasn’t sure anyone was listening.”

We got our bags, and when we came to a place where there was some thick-looking grass, we tossed our bags and jumped.

I couldn’t stop tumbling on the grass, and finally I fetched up against a tree with my feet in the air and my back on the ground. By the time I was on my feet, Jane had both our bags and Tony was scrambling. She brought me mine and I threw it over my shoulder. The three of us started walking along the edge of the track. The train was still going by, but it didn’t take long before it left us. We could hear those boxcars rattling for a long time, and we could see the smoke from the engine hanging in the air and we could smell it.

After a long time walking, I said, “Are you sure it said four miles and not forty miles?”

“I been thinking about that,” Jane said. “Actually, I just saw a four. But there might have been a number in front of it. Or behind it. But I did see a four.”

I stopped. “That’s a big difference from saying it was four miles, and now you’re saying you don’t know if it was four or fourteen or almost any number that either begins or ends with four.”

“I guess I got a little excited,” Jane said. “I wanted to get off. And the train did slow, didn’t it?”

I was starting to think it had just slowed because of a bad curve, and not because we were near a station, but I didn’t feel any need to say it right then. It didn’t matter. We were off the train.

“I’m tired of walking,” Tony said. “And it’s hot.”

“There’s plenty of trees,” Jane said. “We can find shade.”

“And with all those pools of water,” I said, “we can find mosquitoes in the shade.”

“And dad-burned snakes,” Tony said. “I don’t like snakes.”

“You both are such pessimists,” Jane said. “Where is your spirit of adventure?”

“Who says I have to have one?” I said.