Duck Boy (30 page)

The ocean boiled and bubbled, burping small bits of recognizable things to its
surface: cars, furniture, and clothes, mingled with human parts. Steve saw his
mother approaching him like a robot.

“Mother, I want to save you,” Steve said through his tears. “I must save
you.”

“You cannot do this!” she said with a snarl. She moved her hands towards the
ocean as if to summon something from within it. A storm of demonic faces swept
over him, howling and eating his breath.

Steve was tired and angry. He closed his eyes to try and block them out, but
the demons and ghosts poured towards him in his thoughts. Steve opened his eyes
and shouted into them.

“Mom, Mom!” Steve shouted. No response. She needed a breath of life from her
stone. Steve turned back towards the ocean, to the torrent of apparitions
pouring over and through him. “Bring me the sacred book of Mrs. Susan Best, the
book that belonged to Mrs. May Pankratz before her. Bring it to me, now!”

The book materialized on the shores beside Mrs. Best’s feet. Several demonic
images attempted to pick up the book, but pulled their hands away quickly as if
the book burned their fingers. Steve touched his stone, knelt down, and picked
up the book carefully. This book was ragged, and nearly in pieces, just as he
remembered.

The body of Mrs. Best seemed to see what Steve was doing and tried to disassemble
itself quickly before Steve was able to save her.

Steve stepped towards her. Mrs. Best had begun to disintegrate into a cloud
of fragments. He tagged the cloud of pieces with his mother’s book. The pieces
of her body hesitated for a moment, as if they didn’t know whether to stay or
leave.

Steve stared at her, holding the sacred book to her disintegrated body as
best he could. Suddenly, the pieces seemed to melt together. Her body returned
to its whole self. The vacancy in the core of her being suddenly looked
occupied, and a gentle, familiar flame returned to her eyes.

The flow of demon ghosts stopped abruptly. She blinked several times as if
she were waking up from a long nap. She turned her head slowly, scanning the
surroundings with a puzzled look on her face—the wrinkled, tired look of her
eyes reappeared, and her hair flopped into a disorganized lump on the side of
her head.

“Where am I?” she asked in a tired, confused voice. She noticed Steve
standing in front of her. “Steve! What are you doing here?”

Steve hadn’t heard the question. He had grabbed his mother in a ferocious
hug. “How did you get here, Steve?” she asked, returning his embrace.

“It’s a long story.” The ground underneath them started to tremble and
growl, the ocean snarled and snapped before him. The two of them released each
other, both of them realizing there was much more work to be done before any
celebration. “Here’s your notebook,” Steve said to his mom, with tears in his
eyes. In his hand he held her notepad that he’d pulled out from his bag. Steve
suddenly felt awkward, and he didn’t know what to do, so he handed the notebook
to her.

Steve held her Benu stone. “When I give you your Benu stone, you’ll be
transported back to our house,” he declared, his eyes fixed on his mother’s
glowing face. “Just touch your stone with one hand and your notebook with the
other, and you’ll end up back at home,” he repeated to be sure she understood.
“You know how you got here with the dictionary and your Benu stone? Well, your
notebook and your stone will take you back home,” Steve said, tears streaming
down his face. He slipped her Benu stone into the pocket of her sweater. “I’ll
see you there once I’m done here.”

He walked towards the edge of the ocean, leaving his mother some distance
back, when the mask materialized in front of Steve. “You cannot leave this
world,” thundered the mask. “You are ours. You promised yourself to us. We have
categories, files, and places to put each piece of you. You have violated our world
twice, too. You are thrice ours.”

Steve plunged one hand into his backpack. He pulled out his stone and held
it in one hand while he fumbled to find his notebook with the other.

Get out of here now. Get out before anything else
happens.

As he juggled his Benu stone, fumbling inside his bag, he lost his grip and
watched the stone tumble—spinning from his hands into the Ocean of Pieces.

Duck Boy. Duck Boy.

As it touched the surface of the ocean, it puffed into a blue cloud of fragments
and added itself to the ocean of pieces. Steve opened his mouth to yell, but
nothing came out.

Duck Boy. Duck Boy. I’m dead.

Steve stood there waiting for something to happen. Nothing. There was
nothing else to do but pay the price.

“Show me what price I must pay and I will pay it,” Steve shouted angrily at
the mask.

“We must put you into the ocean of fragments, one piece at time,” the mask
said.

“You are only a scrap-yard of molecules,” Steve yelled at the mask.

“You must enter the ocean,” said the mask. “Stand still and we will give you
the gift of sleep,” said the mask with a sweet smile.

Steve walked towards the ocean.

“Stop,” the mask ordered. “I will disassemble you before you enter the Ocean
of Pieces.”

But the thought of standing there was too agonizing.

Let’s get this over with.

Without another thought to stop him, Steve dove into the Ocean of Pieces.

He felt nothing, at first, as he floated down through the globs and bits of
things.

I wonder if this is how Richard died.

His mind conjured a picture of Richard, wet, drowned, lying on the bedroom
floor.

As he sank deeper into the airy muck, he felt as if he’d fallen into acid.
His skin began to burn. It felt like the liquid in this ocean was trying to
dissolve his body. He remembered how this world had dissolved the parts of his
finger.

It’s probably trying to break me apart, Steve thought. I’m going to end up
in pieces.

But from somewhere inside of Steve, a new strength found its wings: he found
something inside of him that wanted to fight back.

I am whole.

And then he had a thought that almost made him laugh.

I am Duck Boy. Duck Boy floats.

His thoughts became fuzzy, like a TV that lost its signal. Words became
strings of sounds in his head. He thought of his hands and feet as himself. And
as he thought about himself, the burning sensation left his skin. He thought of
his own body as it might appear in a mirror. The picture of himself, with his
arms and legs dissolved into fuzzy blobs of color. The color lifted from the
image and mixed with the light of his mind, until Steve gave up thinking for a
moment, slipping into nothingness.

The image of his Benu stone floated into his thoughts. Its blue oval shape
jolted him as it jumped into his consciousness. As it touched his thoughts,
shock waves shot from his head to his toes, and a new thought shouted down the
corridors of his brain.

I don’t need to pretend I’m whole. I AM whole.

The airy muck he was floating in suddenly felt wet. He realized he couldn’t
breathe. Immediately, he surged upwards, kicking towards the surface. He
thrashed upward towards that dim gray light of the dawn. With a final push, he
broke through the surface, gasping for air.

The mask hovered near the edge of the ocean, not moving towards Steve. Steve
flailed and splashed to the edge of the ocean and stepped out near the mask,
drenched by the water. He walked over to the mask. It seemed to be having
difficulty holding itself together. It trembled and twisted as if it was
fighting with itself.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” the mask said in a horrible raspy voice.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” it repeated, but its voice sounded odd, as if
its voice had speeded up. “You shouldn’t have done that,” it repeated a third
time; this time the voice seemed unusually slow.

Steve watched the mask, its pieces pulling apart, and then together, like it
was arguing with itself.

“I am not pieces. I am whole. There is nothing you can do to change that
except to kill me. But you can’t even do that unless I agree. Your world is
made of nothing—images, letters, atoms. How can you even exist? You’re snippets
of things from here and there—garbage and glue. I alone recognize what you are.
You are pieces held together by nothing.” He dripped with the wetness of the
ocean on the shore.

The mask trembled and twisted, though expressionless. It tried to hold
itself together. Part of it fell away into a powdery cloud of
fragments—swarming like gnats. Part of it burst into flames. Part of it
crumbled to dust, and dropped to the ground and disappeared. And the mask was
gone.

Steve knew something about this world had changed, though he wasn’t sure
just what it was. He sat down on the shiny black surface to catch his breath
and think about how he might get home again.

Mom’s home.

Though he hadn’t slept for a long time, he felt the blaze of new life
energizing him.

The mask was gone. The mask was in charge of this world, and had
disintegrated. The World of Pieces seemed to have stabilized, resting as he
rested.

Who is in charge of this world now?

Steve yelled hello several times in every direction, trying to summon any
other thing that might be in charge of this world. Someone has to be around
somewhere, he thought. Nothing. Steve cupped his hands and shouted as loud as
he could, “What am I supposed to do now?” He repeated this to himself several
times trying to make something, or someone, help him and give him some
direction. Nothing.

As he pondered what had just occurred, he was suddenly struck by an odd and
exhilarating thought.

Maybe I’m the master of this world.

Steve decided to put his thought to a test, so he turned to face the ocean.
“Listen to me, ocean,” he said. Steve focused on the ocean. “Fire,” he said and
the ocean exploded into an inferno of intense heat. Steve backed away from the
edge of the burning ocean. “Water,” he said to the ocean, and the ocean
flattened into a bed of calm water. Steve ran his hand through the ocean, and
his hand was wet. “Grapes,” he said quietly. And a cluster of the most
succulent grapes he had ever seen appeared in front of him. He reached out
towards them and plucked a grape and ate it. A superb, succulent grape flavor
exploded in his mouth.

“Give me my Benu stone.”

Steve watched as the ocean rushed to push the fragments of his Benu stone together
on the edge of the shore. Steve turned to pick up his backpack, which still sat
on the shore. He picked up his stone and placed it in the bag.

It’s mine. This is my world now.

Steve had once belonged to it, now it belonged to him.

“You are my world now,” Steve said to everything and nothing. “You will
listen to me. I am a Whole One: I am the Duck Boy.”

“Hello, Steve,” yelled a voice. Steve nearly jumped out of his skin, shocked
that anyone was around at all. He scanned the horizon—at the top of a polished
glass hill stood his mother. She had seen the whole thing.

“Mom?” Steve broke into a run towards her. She didn’t return his call, but
simply held her arms open wide. Steve met her open arms in a crushing bear hug.

“You waited for me,” he declared in a joyful voice. “You waited for me.”

“What did you think I’d do?” his mom asked. “I’m not going to leave you here
all alone.”

Steve hugged her tighter.

“You were gone for a very, very long time, Son. I was really worried about
you. Let’s go home,” Mrs. Best suggested. Steve nodded without speaking. He
pulled his stone out of his backpack and placed it in his pocket. Then he
grabbed his notebook.

“Are you ready, Mom?” She nodded and grinned.

Steve swung his backpack over his shoulder and grabbed his plaque and
notepad. He kept his eye on his mom, who did the same thing with her stone and
notebook. The two of them burst into spirals of bright light.

Chapter 24

To break the death-grip of silence hovering in the Best house, Lindsay
walked to the window and looked up at the sky. She studied the stars as they
burned their way through the dark night sky.

“Beautiful night,” she said absently, hoping someone might want to notice
along with her. Then, as she watched, a streak of light flashed across the sky.

Uncle Edward sat on the couch holding Aunt Shannon’s hand, both looking lost
and helpless. Aunt Shannon held her head with her other hand and wept silently.
Mr. Best slouched in Mrs. Best’s chair, dark and speechless.

Death’s pall, dull and leaden, strangled the air in the room. But then,
suddenly, there was a wink of light and the air tore open above them. A huge
burst of light hovered above Mr. Best, slowly spinning down upon him. Mr. Best
was thrown across the floor and landed in a mound in front of the couch. Mrs.
Best materialized in the chair she’d disappeared from.