The Withdrawal Method

BIG CITY GIRLS

NORMALLY ALEX LIKED snow days, when the county buses couldn't make it past RR #2 and school was cancelled. But today Alex and Ginny's mom had invited Ginny's friends over to their house, their house on the quiet empty road with no name with nothing else around, not even cows. The girls were fifth graders, Alex was seven; there were four of them and one of him. When it was just him and his sister, they called each other Dirk — Hi there Dirk, How you doing Dirk. But the one time Alex had called her Dirk around her friends Ginny pretended he wasn't even there.

From the back door of Ginny and Alex's house the snow stretched along the yard to the fence, across the fields, all the way to the wall of trees at the edge of the woods. Then it was the woods and the woods were black and went forever. A girl named Althea had gone in there back in the fall and never come out. She was home-schooled and no one the kids from the county school knew, not really. Althea had either been taken by someone or got lost, it wasn't clear. At one point her footprints just disappeared.

Because of Althea, Ginny and Alex had instructions not under any circumstances to leave the yard — today, the snow day, or any day. Who knows who's out there? Alex's mom said, gesturing toward the woods. Stay where I can see you.

Ginny also had instructions to include her brother, so she and her friends let him help build a snow fort. They put him in charge of rolling up snowballs around the yard, which he did, channelling muddy stripes into the lawn and then dumping his snowballs for Karen and Heather to add to the walls of the fort. Ginny was the packer. Shayna watched.

When the fort was done Alex went to crawl inside but Shayna blocked the entrance. Pretending her breath was cigarette smoke she explained that if the walls collapsed someone would need to go alert the rescue crew, and Alex should be that someone. So he wasn't allowed in the fort; he had to stay on guard outside.

Alex was left alone with nothing but a view of the fields piled high with white and perfect and boring all the way to the woods. He tried breathing smoke the way Shayna had, tilting his head back and blasting it upward. The cloud puffed up and evaporated quickly into the sky. It had snowed through the night and stopped that morning but still the sky was low, the grey splitting finally in cracks of blue.

Turning back to the fort Alex pictured the avalanche of it coming down and wondered who the rescue crew was. Was it his father? His father was at work. His mom was upstairs with sherry and Guiding Light. Alex wiped snot from his nose with the back of his mitten and laid his hand on the fort. Gently he tested the wall. It seemed solid enough. The girls were quiet. What was going on?

After a while they came out and stood with Alex looking around the yard for something to do. Shayna pointed to the woods. I don't believe it's too dangerous, she said. When my sisters were our age they played hide-and-seek in there all the time.

No one had a reply to that, which worried Alex. We're not supposed to, he said, and Ginny shot him a quick, sharp look. Everyone stood around not saying anything, gazing off at the black thatch of trees across the field. What was Shayna going to do? The silence and waiting made the air seem icier, whistling up under Alex's toque and needling its way into his ears. But then Shayna just said, Oh, whatever-so it was time to go inside.

The girls followed Shayna and Alex followed the girls into the mudroom. It smelled of laundry. Everyone piled their coats and snowpants onto the washer-dryer and left their Duckies in a grey-brown puddle in a heap on the floor, beside the empty spot where Alex's father's workboots sat at night and two rusty foot-shaped blotches marked the tiles like bloodstains. The room was warm except near the door, where winter light streamed in white through a small window. The window was like a sheet of ice. Outside it was the winter.

In the kitchen Ginny got out the peanut butter and they all went into the den licking spoons. Alex and Ginny sat on the couch, Heather and Karen lay on the floor, and Shayna lounged in Alex's father's chair with her legs draped up over the back of it, head upside down, hair hanging over the footrest. The straps of her overalls slipped to the sides and between them two nubs poked out of her shirt. They made Alex's stomach churn in a gurgling, snaky way. He buried his face into one of the couch cushions and screamed as loud as he could. When he turned back flushed and blinking, the girls were looking at him strangely. What, it's fun, he said.

The den was a brown room; there was a fireplace with fake logs you ignited with a switch. Ginny turned on the fire and brought out Clue. Alex made a grab for Professor Plum. He was always Professor Plum and Ginny was always Miss Scarlet — although this time Shayna took Miss Scarlet and Ginny had to be Colonel Mustard, who was the colour of diarrhea.

With the flames dancing Karen as Mrs. Peacock made her first suggestion, nudging her glasses up onto the bridge of her nose and making notes when she was shown the Billiard Room by Heather. Then it was Shayna's turn: she sighed and made some wild guess at what was in the envelope and, before anyone could stop her, slid down from her chair and checked.

Look, I was wrong, she said, and laid out the cards: Candlestick, Miss Scarlet, Professor Plum. Hey big boy, said Shayna to Alex, that's you and me.

Who did that? demanded Karen. There's supposed to be one person, not two. There's not even a room in there. Now the game's over anyway. Gosh!

Everyone looked around for something to look at that wasn't Karen.

Maybe Miss Scarlet and Professor Plum were having fun with the candlestick, said Shayna, climbing back into her chair. Her nipples puckered. Alex squirmed.

In the Secret Passageway! screamed Heather, whose bedroom was a shrine to the New Kid on the Block Jordan Knight.

Professor Plum and Miss Scarlet in the Secret Passageway with the candlestick!

Alex jumped up and grabbed the little metal candlestick from the board and held it to the zipper of his jeans, made a pissing noise, and waggled his crotch around like a maniac. Candle-dick! Candle-dick! he yelled, and pretended to pee all over everything.

Heather and Karen collapsed and held each other laughing on the rug, tears running down their faces. Ginny looked on anxiously. Shayna watched smirking from her chair.

Then the laughing was over. Alex stood panting with cards and pieces and murderous implements from the Clue game strewn all around him on the floor.

Candle-dick! hollered Alex, but no one responded. He looked at Shayna. Sit down, she said.

Yeah, said Ginny. Sit down Alex.

Alex sat down, right where he was.

It sucks here, said Shayna. It's boring. It's gay.

Ginny looked jerkily around the den. We could watch a video, she said. We've got Short Circuit 2. Or play TurboGrafx? Or do a puzzle? Or read YM?

Gay, said Shayna.

If we lived in the city we could go somewhere, said Heather. I bet kids in the city get the day off school for snow days and just go wherever they want.

Yeah, we could take the subway.

We could go to a museum, said Karen, but she was ignored.

We could go shopping.

We could steal a lion from the zoo, suggested Alex.

Or drink coffee in a cafe. Or a beer!

Wine, corrected Shayna. Or screwdrivers. My sisters always drink screwdrivers.

But what if we got stuck there and it was night? said Karen. What if we got trapped?

We'd get raped, said Shayna.

This was exciting, there was murmuring. Alex had a vague idea of what rape meant: it was something dark and wet with a lot of pushing and afterwards a woman knelt crying in the street. It was usually raining. Were there knives? Sometimes there were knives.

Who'd rape us?

A black person, said Heather.

That's racist, said Shayna. Alex nodded. His best friend Richard was a black person.

A homeless person, said Ginny.

Everyone agreed, she had nailed it.

With AIDS! Karen added. Then we'd get AIDS.

And on drugs, said Heather, trying to redeem herself.

And a hook, said Alex, bouncing.

The girls looked at him.

Alex ran up to his room to get his hook. He made a pirate noise as he bounded back downstairs with it sticking out of his sleeve. On his way toward the den he heard Ginny saying his name and something else that sounded tired. He paused for a minute in the hallway and slid the hook into his sleeve before entering quietly. All four girls were sitting in a circle on the rug. Karen was taking notes. Alex stood on the periphery, hook concealed, not sure what to do.

Okay, Karen was saying, writing. Okay, she said.

We'd go to the movies first.

No, to dinner. Dinner, then a movie. Then dancing in a dance club!

What movie?

A rated-R movie. Something with adult situations.

One with Jordan, said Heather. In adult situations.

Heath-er!

Ginny had once told Alex that Heather loved Jordan Knight so much that some nights she would just cry and cry and cry.

Maybe if we were in the city you'd get to meet Jordan Knight.

Maybe he'd ask you to marry him.

Heather's face flushed. She leaned forward, into the conversation, to envelop herself in its potential. Alex came and sat down just outside the circle of girls. No one seemed to notice him.

Maybe Jordan Knight would rape you, said Shayna.

I'd rape him, screamed Heather. She looked around to challenge anyone who might question her. I would, she warbled. I would!

There was a creak and another creak from upstairs and then Alex's mom's face was looming moonlike over the landing. Heather clamped a hand over her mouth.

Everything okay down there? Are you girls being nice to Alex?

Yes Mom, said Ginny.

Alex?

Yes Mom, said Alex.

Did you have lunch? What did you have?

Peanut-butter sandwiches.

Good. There's RC Colas in the fridge but just one each okay?

And then the face was gone. There were two more creaks from upstairs and the wheeze and click of the bedroom door closing.

They sat in silence for a minute. Shayna stood up.

Okay, said Shayna. Let's play a game.

ALEX SAT WAITING in the closet, which was big for a closet but small in the dark. The smell was of must and mothballs and feet. From the crack at the bottom of the door came a thin golden band of light that dissolved a few inches in. Alex's face itched underneath the balaclava the girls had made him wear. He scratched at his ear with the pirate hook. When he'd finally showed it to her, Shayna had said it was a good thing for a rapist to have. She'd touched him on the arm and Alex had felt the warmth of her hand there all the way to the closet where he'd shut himself in. Even now he could still feel it tingling.

From down the hall he could hear whispering. Who would come first?

It took forever. The girls went upstairs and there was some giggling and faintly he heard his mom say, Careful with my things! Then all four girls came clomping back downstairs and they moved into the kitchen and were up to something in there, doing a tour of the house but actually it was the city, with Karen narrating the sights. This ended back in the den, now a nightclub: there was music and dancing, and then the music went off and there was whispering, and then the whispering stopped. Alex strained to hear anything, more talk or footsteps so he'd know that his part of the game had begun. Although maybe the silence meant that Alex should get ready. But how? He straightened the balaclava and raised his hook.

After a minute or so came the whisper of socks along the hall's parquet. Alex waited, waited, and just as the footsteps neared the closet he swung the door open and pounced and grabbed the girl standing there and hauled her back into the closet, slamming the door behind him.

Alex was on top of the girl. He held his hook to her throat.

Can you be Jordan Knight when you rape me? said Heather's voice in the dark.

Okay, what do I say?

Just be slow and nice, she said.

Okay, said Alex. Okay.

But he wasn't sure what came next. Heather lay beneath him, motionless. Alex looked up and, realizing the door was open, went and closed it. He lay back down on top of Heather and began wriggling, slowly and nicely, arms at his sides while Heather held her breath. But there was something. A smell. Alex stopped wriggling. He sniffed. Heather was wearing his mom's perfume, the potpourri and syrup of it thick on her neck.

I think it's done, said Alex.

Heather exhaled a big whoosh of air into the dark.

Alex rolled off her. They lay there in silence for a minute, side by side.

I guess I'm dead now, said Heather. Where do I go?

With his hook, Alex nudged Heather toward the back of the closet where the shoes were lined up. There, he said. Back there.

She sat down with the shoes. Alex stuck his head into the hallway. Who's next?

You dumbshit, yelled Ginny. We're supposed to come looking for her!

Alex went back inside the closet. He sat there for a while, pulling the balaclava up for air, listening to Heather breathe, wondering if they were doing something he might get in crap for. He imagined his father coming home, finding kids in the closet and losing it, smacking his son all the way up to his room and then locking him in.

Footsteps came from the hallway. Alex put his mask back on and readied himself to spring.

It was Shayna. Alex wrapped his arms around her waist and tackled her full force into the closet. As he climbed on top of her he could feel the little blisters of her nipples pushing against his chest. Shayna squirmed beneath his body and Alex struggled to hold her down. Her breaths were deep and the smell of peanut butter came gusting over his face with each one. He'd left the door open and a wedge of light angled into the closet from the hall, right over their faces.

Shayna said nothing, just kept panting and writhing, rippling her hips up and down, her pelvis against his. He pushed against her, hardening. She moaned. He pushed again: his sweatpants, her overalls. She moaned again. He kept going, imagining her nipples, those buds. Alex felt greedy. He stopped pushing and, using his elbows to pin her arms down, ran his thumbs across Shayna's little breasts. She stiffened. Something was wrong.

No no no, yelled Shayna, wriggling away. No!

Alex loosened his grip, and the second he did Shayna bucked and flipped him, pinning him there. Her fingernails dug sharply into his wrists. From the shadows in the back of the closet, Heather gasped.

What are you doing? said Alex.

This, you pervert, said Shayna, and she balled her fists and rained blows at Alex's face, his shoulders, his chest. No no no, she said. Stop, moaned Alex, turtling. Please, stop, please.

Shayna pulled away. Alex relaxed, thankful it was over, but then Shayna screamed, No! again and came down hard with a knee to his crotch. For a moment the closet blazed white, as though a flashbulb had gone off in the dark. Alex wilted. Then the door opened wider and Shayna was pushing through and gone.

I got away, she was telling the other girls, as a dull ache spread from Alex's groin to his stomach. There's a rapist in that alleyway! I think he killed Heather!

Heather crawled out from the back of the closet and climbed over Alex. She stood in the hallway looking unsure where to go.

Let's call the police! Alex heard someone cry, possibly Karen. There was a weird bristly fish in his guts and now it was swimming up his throat. Was he dying? He shut his eyes.

WHEN THE POLICE came Alex had to go to jail. Jail was his room upstairs. The girls collected in the hallway behind Ginny, the tallest, the only one who could reach the lock. In his sister's eyes was a resigned look as she stood there. Put the pervert away, said Shayna. Ginny paused. Sorry Dirk, she mouthed, and then closed the door. The deadbolt rattled into place and the girls' footsteps faded downstairs. No one besides his father had ever locked Alex in his room. Ginny was forbidden to do it. Even his mom had never done it before.

Alex sat on the bed. His balls ached very much. After a few minutes he pulled his Detroit Pistons wastebasket over and barfed a sour peanut-buttery paste into it. He covered the barf with handfuls of Kleenex, then sat back on the bed and stayed there very quietly for a very long time, trying to hear what was going on.

Maybe they were still playing the game, he thought. Maybe his part was to sit here and wait, maybe it wasn't over, maybe there would be a trial. But what was the game? Alex tried to find words for it. He couldn't.

There was no sound of the girls though — nothing from downstairs, just the faint faraway chatter of the TV in his mom's room down the hall. He imagined her in there lying on her bed and lay down then too, on top of his Star Wars sheets.

Staring up at the bars of sunlight that played through the blinds onto the ceiling, Alex thought about the moment when he had felt those bumps on Shayna's chest, how softly he had touched them. He hated her. She was mean, a bitch, and she had squared him and then he had puked. And what sort of sister was Ginny? He punched his pillow hard and then punched it again. His pillow was Shayna's face, it was Ginny's face. Alex hit it, he bit it, he screamed into it, he screamed and roared and screamed.

But then Alex pulled away, hot and itchy. He lay there on his bed until the light fanning through the blinds began to go coppery and slow. Soon his mom would head downstairs to start fixing supper. Soon his father would be home and finding Alex locked into his room. There would be hell to pay, and Alex would be the one to pay it. Soon the day would be over, and soon it would be night.

Alex got up and went to his window. He pulled the cord, the blinds went clattering up. Outside the clouds were gone. The sky was clear and the sun was dipping below the treeline of the woods; golden bands filtered through the empty branches. The tops of the trees were frosted with ice, glimmering silver in the dusky light, and the shadows of the trees were long purple scraggles on the snow. But the trees themselves were black. The trees were the woods and the woods were a cave out there past the fence. The woods were a dark, grinning mouth.

Why had the girl Althea gone in there? Those first few weeks in the fall Alex was sure one day he'd be playing in the yard and she'd come wandering out of the trees and across the field and stand at the fence, confused and lost. But she would like him — they were both Als. She would feel safe with Alex and he would take her inside his house and make her hot chocolate. He would call her family and tell them she was okay — or an ambulance, or the cops. But Alex didn't think those thoughts now. He thought instead of Althea's body, frozen and blue, appearing under a snowbank when everything thawed in the spring.

Alex's eyes followed the shadows of the trees, stretching now in the red cleft of sun all the way back across the field, toward the house, past the fence to the square patch that was his family's yard. And then he looked down, directly down, to the space behind the house where the snow fort now lay in ruins. Beside it were the girls.

With the light deepening they seemed too defined, too real, as though someone had cut their pictures from a magazine and laid them down there, one by one, side by side. Their faces were turned up toward the house although they couldn't see Alex, he knew, framed in his bedroom window. It was still too light outside and too dark in his room. So Alex stood there watching them, unseen: four girls on their backs in a line, making angels in the snow.