Dirt

Chapter 7

In the morning, Galen couldn’t shake the feeling that his mother was the enemy. All his life, maybe. It was hard to tell how far back. When had she turned against him, and why?

He hadn’t been able to sleep. He’d wandered the orchard until some time past four. So getting up at seven was hell. He was a kind of ghost, but he didn’t have the energy to try to use that in some way. Packing didn’t make any sense. A mismatched bunch of clothing crammed into a duffel, and he put five new C batteries into his tape recorder, brought all his tapes. He brought the old spearfishing lance that had somehow become his, passed down from one of his mother’s men. Packed his pocketknife and binoculars and hiking compass. Hid several issues of Hustler in his clothing, and also packed Siddhartha, The Prophet, and Jonathan Livingston Seagull.

You can’t bring that, his mother said when he came downstairs with the lance.

I’m bringing it.

It won’t fit.

I’ll stick it out the window.

His mother was wearing an apron. She’d been making sandwiches, no doubt, probably up already for hours. Cabin trips were a very big deal for her. There’s nothing to spear, she said.

Trout, he said.

The trout in that creek are six inches long, Galen. If you’re lucky. And most of the water is less than a foot deep.

There are a few deeper holes.

You’re not bringing it.

Then I’m not going.

She walked away into the kitchen and came back with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Damn you, she said, and she threw the sandwich at him. A soft puff against his chest and it fell to the floor, separated. Peanut butter facedown, strawberry jam up.

You throw like a girl, he said, and he picked up the sandwich, put it together, and started eating.

She stood in front of him and cried. Shoulders slumped, head down, her hair curled, and wearing that apron. She just stood there and cried.

Normally he’d feel tremendously guilty and give her a hug. Normally he’d want to make things up to her. But something had changed. He didn’t like her. I don’t know who you think your audience is, he finally said, and he carried his lance out to the car.

The mafia showed up as he was packing his things away. Jennifer wearing a pink sweatshirt with the hood up, looking sleepy. Hard to believe she’d been so vicious. She looked soft and edible.

The air wasn’t too hot yet, but the sun was up and so bright Galen was squinting. He never saw this time of day. Everything pale, washed-out. No depth. A two-dimensional world, a cardboard cutout. The hedge and the walnut trees in the same vertical plane though they were a hundred feet apart. Galen reached out to try to fit his hand in the gap.

What are you doing? his aunt asked.

It looked for a second like I could touch where the hedge and trees meet.

Yeah, she said. I thought that was probably it. Maybe you should try again.

Galen put his hand down. His aunt made him feel like a stupid little boy, and he didn’t like that feeling.

What’s wrong? his aunt said. You were almost there. Go ahead and touch it.

Galen walked into the house, through the foyer and dining room into the kitchen. His mother was slumped in a kitchen chair. Can I help? he asked.

She didn’t look up but pointed at a picnic basket on the table. A wicker basket covered by a red-checked cloth, another perfect idea, the dream of a picnic basket. Galen picked it up and walked out to the car.

Little Suzie-Q, his aunt said. I’d like to take a shit in that basket.

Galen felt protective of the basket now. He got in the backseat with it on his lap and his lance poking out the open window, a kind of guardian of old. Jennifer a few feet away, slouched against her door, trying to fall back asleep, and his aunt in the passenger seat, all of them waiting.

The car heating in the sun, and Galen’s mother took her time. Walked slowly out, got in without a word, and drove them away down the hedge lane.

They make the most wonderful pumpkin pies, Galen mumbled as they passed Bel-Air.

No one responded. They really are the most wonderful pies, he said. The pumpkin especially.

Galen’s grandmother was not ready for the trip. That was one thing about losing your memory. You could never be ready for anything.

Today? she asked. She looked frightened.

Yes, Mom.

But I haven’t packed.

We packed your things last week. We have a suitcase set aside.

I need to go home, she said. I need to go home to gather my things.

We’re going to the cabin, Mom.

I need to go home.

You love the cabin, Mom. We always have a wonderful time there. We go every summer. We use the old cast-iron stove, and you fix chicken and dumplings.

Why won’t you take me home?

Galen’s mother turned around, her back to her mother. I can’t do this today, she said quietly. One of you will need to bring her to the car. Her suitcase is in the closet.

What are you doing? Galen’s grandmother asked.

Galen’s mother left the room then, and Galen looked at his aunt.

You come back here, Suzie-Q, Galen’s grandmother said.

I don’t even exist, Galen’s aunt said. Ask her if I’m here, and you’ll find out. Jennifer doesn’t exist either. We’re invisible. So it’s all on you.

Grandma, Galen said. We get to go to the cabin. We’ll have hot chocolate.

Where is your mother?

Galen walked over to her closet and took out the small suitcase. Looks like you’re ready to go, he said. Mom’s in the car.

She’s in the car?

Yeah, we’re going to the cabin.

Okay, she said, and just like that they walked out.

Galen’s grandmother sat in front. Galen and the mafia in the back, Jennifer jammed in the middle. The feel of her thigh, plump and firm against his bony leg. He wanted her to be wearing shorts, but she wore sweatpants. If only the others could just disappear.

The day hot now, the air from the open windows getting hotter as they passed fields of dry yellow grass. Galen could feel a bead of sweat trickle down his chest, and Jennifer was in a panic suddenly to get rid of her sweatshirt. All elbows, Galen’s aunt complaining, but Galen had a chance to see Jennifer’s bare arm and armpit, the curve to her breast in only a tank top, so close to his mouth. He turned away, looked out the side window so his aunt wouldn’t catch him.

The open windows at highway speed made it impossible to speak, and this was a relief to everyone, it seemed. Even his mother and aunt might get along if they could just live in a blast furnace. Words could only cause trouble. Galen enjoyed the peace, watched the landscape slip past, yellow grass dotted with oaks, the hills beginning to take shape, long curves of road climbing into pine trees, the gold rush country, the place of nostalgia for his grandmother who loved Hallmark cards and watched Bonanza on TV. Her perfect world was a small western town in which all words were sweet and empty.

Galen didn’t know how his grandmother was possible. He had brought her into this existence to help him learn something, but how was her real life convincing? Could she really care about that TV ranch, with Hoss and all the other folk?

The smell of pines, the road wide, and the Buick floating and dipping. They rose higher into mountains, taller trees, more shade, and his mother pulled onto the shoulder. I’m just going to let it cool down a bit, she said. So we don’t boil over.

They all piled out. Steep rock rising thirty feet from the side of the road. A mountainside dug and blasted. The air still hot despite the elevation and the shade. Galen walked over to the rock and scrabbled up a few feet to where he could lean against it, cool on his face and hands.

Rock brother, Jennifer said.

I’m touching another time, Galen said. When they cut into this mountain, they opened up another time. I wonder when it was.

The Freakazoic, Jennifer said. All the animals were skinny then and ran around doing random shit.

Helen laughed. Good one, Jennifer, she said.

You’re not quiet enough to be at peace, Galen said. He closed his eyes and breathed in the rock, old smell. If all the world were illusion, only an old soul could have dreamed something so solid into existence. But what if the world were real, and only the people illusions, and the surface of things? The surface mutable, but not the core. Nothing Galen had read made any of this clear. It could be that this rock was real, and in that case it should be treated with a different kind of reverence. Galen breathed out a low note, deep in his throat, an ancient guttural song for the rock.

Oh please, his aunt said, but he ignored her. He repeated the low note, again and again, and then sang something up high, and then low again, and the song began to surge in him. His arms and face flat against the cool rock, and the rock was giving back an echo, very faint, but enough for him to hear up close. He was singing with the rock now.

So talented, he heard his grandmother say. My talented grandson. And this was disrupting his focus. Why wouldn’t they all just vanish?

I can’t stand it, his mother said. We’re going. I don’t care if the car overheats. Galen, get in the car.

Galen tried to hold on to the song and to the rock, tried to feel its spirit, but once his mother had decided, she wouldn’t stop. There’d be no way to focus, so he gave up. Let his arms down and sighed and stepped carefully through scree to the road.

I was just getting somewhere, he said.

What a shame to lose that, his aunt said.

You have a lot of incarnations left, Galen said. You’ve only just started.

His aunt laughed, and kept laughing as they got in the car again. Jennifer had a few chuckles too, the laughter contagious.

Stop that, Galen’s grandmother said, but they kept laughing, and his mother pulled onto the road again and there was the rushing of the air and their laughter that was entirely mean, not real laughter, no joy in it, and Galen looked out his side window and tried to ignore.