Meteors in August (13 page)

I told myself I didn't want to go through her dumb haunted house anyway. I didn't want to be blindfolded and have my hand forced into a bowl of cold spaghetti while someone whispered I was touching a human brain. I had no desire to get my nose full of water bobbing for apples. I said it over and over as I shuffled through dried leaves, taking the long way home.

Mr. Lippman heard me talking mean to Marlene by the lockers and kept me after school. That gave me extra time to think about how much fun I was going to have cutting up a frog with that girl. When Mr. Lippman set me free, the sky was woolly in the bleak half-dark. Only one car still squatted in the lot—not Mr. Lippman's; he walked everywhere and was proud of it. This was Gil Harding's brown Duster. It glistened under the yellow lights, all its windows clouded by the hot breath inside.

I'd noticed the Duster in the lot other nights, but I could never see who Gil had pinned to the seat because the windows were steamed. This night I did see. Gil stepped out of the car to take a piss, making no effort to hide himself. He was the only boy I knew who would pee in the middle of an empty parking lot without so much as taking a glance around to be sure he wouldn't scare any old ladies.

The girl in the car sat up, and in the sudden flash of light from the dome I saw the unmistakable flick of the head, the way Gwen Holler tossed her ponytail over her shoulder. She finally had the real thing: Gil Harding's yellow fingers, stained from cigarettes, stroking her face and breasts.

Gil caught me watching him and turned to face me; then he laughed, shaking the last drops of piss from his penis. Gwen leaned out her window to see who was there. Her look was bored, distracted; she wanted Gil to get back in the car. She peered in my direction without a whiff of embarrassment or remorse, turned her head as if I were nothing more than a stray dog. Her indifference drowned me. I wished we were boys so I could wait for her after school some night and pummel her with my fists.

On Monday, we pithed and mutilated our frogs. Marlene got sick and had to run to the bathroom when she saw how complete the creature was, a little man with bowed legs. I had to finish the job alone. This is all I learned: the tiny muscle of the heart felt tough and hard between my fingertips.

I sprinted home that night, my coat open, my scarf flying. The air stung my lungs like slivers of ice. Even in the cold, I could smell my own hands.

13

IN JANUARY
and February it seemed winter in Montana would never end. The fog rolled into the valley and sat, unable to rise. In the morning, when the pink light was still trapped behind the mountains, I heard the bare trees groaning in the wind, their black trunks swaying.

The sky was white for days at a time. If the mist broke enough to reveal the foothills, they too were white, and the distant pines were dark and colorless. Along our block, the dry bark of birch trees peeled like paper. Only the willows held a promise of change, their thin orange limbs quavering with the slightest breeze.

By March we had hope. Winter came and went half a dozen times in a single month. The first heavy rain was too cold to wash away the piles of crusty snow. Pools appeared in the yards, and ice lakes spread across the treacherous streets. Every night the ponds froze.

The lakes melted by noon and slowly shrank. Snow piles were splattered with mud and pocked by dog piss. Day by day, the long yellow grass of our lawn was unburied. It lay flat on the ground like an old woman's matted hair, and the pools turned the color of the grass or the rusty color of dead leaves that we hadn't raked before the first snow came.

The first day that the roads were clear enough I pumped up my bicycle tires and pedaled to Moon Lake after school. Haze hovered over the fields, but the sky above had cleared and the light was pale and gold. Clumps of trees and houses rose out of the fog like the ghosts of a deserted town. For a moment I saw the steeple of an abandoned church, but filmy clouds curled around it, and the vision disappeared.

Moon Lake was eighteen miles long and five miles wide, but it was depth that gave this water strength. Mountains plunged straight down to the waterline, and beneath the surface more mountains rose and fell. I thought about the glacier that had chiseled this lake. Two-ton boulders on the beach reminded me of the power of ice, the slow, relentless energy of the frozen river that had towed chunks of mountains in its wake so many centuries ago. I stood on the beach, listening to the frightening sound of ice cracking.

Three days later the surface broke and the thick green waves piled slabs along the shore. The lake looked swollen and green, ready to take anyone who dared to come too near. After that, I stayed on the safe streets of Willis.

I took long walks through town. Neighbors' dogs followed me. They romped in the dirty snow, delighted by the smell of earth oozing up from the softening ground. They leaped at me and left muddy paw prints on my clothes. When I scolded them, they only barked and jumped higher.

By that spring I had promised myself I would give up on Gwen Holler. But I was still trying to make her notice me, and I wonder if she may have been responsible, in a roundabout way, for what happened between me and her brother Zachary that first warm day in April.

Gwen had begun wearing pantyhose and short skirts. Her lashes were black and thick with mascara; she painted her lids violet one day and amber the next. I thought she might pay attention to me if I followed her example. I had no money for makeup, but I found an old orange lipstick tucked in the back of a drawer in the bathroom, and I borrowed a pair of stockings from my mother—or stole them, depending on how you looked at it. I spent an entire evening shortening a skirt, ripping out my stitches three times before I got the hem close to right.

The next morning I leaned close to the mirror. I'd teased my hair so it didn't look so wispy. My mouth was wide; I reminded myself to smile carefully and not show too many teeth. I powdered my nose to hide my freckles. I had a good nose, not fine like Nina's or my mother's but not too big. It was acceptable. My eyebrows were too dark and thick, but there wasn't time to pluck them.

Of course my efforts were in vain. Gwen didn't take any interest in my sloppy imitation and would not have been flattered if I'd told her I wanted to look like her. I must've lost my head for a minute. I was four inches taller than Gwen. My butt was flat where hers was high and curved. She knew how to cross her legs in a short skirt; my thighs ached at the end of the day from pressing my knees together. I couldn't wait for school to end. I thought sure some smart-mouthed boy would make fun of my outfit before the day was over.

When the final bell rang, I charged for the door and cut down alleys toward Wyoming Way. I'd been taking the long route home since last fall, past Freda Graves's house, never knowing what I expected to see, but always hoping. Today all the shades were drawn tight, and I had the idea that Freda was inside, alone in the dark with God. She had secrets. I believed she saved the best prayers for herself and that she knew her God in ways her small congregation couldn't imagine. Even after people blamed Freda Graves for what happened to Myron Evans and Elliot Foot, a part of me still clung to the possibility that the woman had a special vision. Her God had eyes to watch her and fingers to stroke her hair. She embraced a God I only glimpsed. When she made mistakes, her God shook her so hard she could not stand. And when she couldn't bear it a moment longer, her generous God clutched her to His breast and wept.

I'd just passed Mrs. Graves's house when I realized somebody was on my tail. I whirled once and saw a bush tremble. I spun again and saw the toes of a boy's sneakers poking out behind a tree. On the third try, I caught him and stood face-to-face with Zachary Holler.

I put my fists on my hips and waited.

“You've got scrawny legs,” Zack said.

I tried to stare him down, but my short skirt exposed me. I had no defense: my bony knees were an indisputable fact.

Finally Zack said, “But you don't look too bad.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“I mean you're not too ugly.”

“Thanks again.”

“I used to think you were.”

“So what?”

“So, I was just thinking that since I was walking this way anyway …”

“Yeah?”

“I was thinking I'd walk with you.”

I reminded myself that I hated Zack Holler. I thought of him strangling Myron Evans's poor cat; I saw him prancing around me and Gwen, making fools of us, making Gwen decide she didn't want to play any more games with me, ever.

“Well, can I?” he said.

“Can you what?”

He snorted and looked at me as if I'd been cheated when they handed out brains. “Can I walk you home?”

“Free country,” I said. I turned and he loped after me. I tried to catch a sideways glance at him without letting on I cared that he was there. I thought of him the way I knew Nina would, and I felt proud that a high school boy who played football and baseball was trotting down the street to keep up with me. I hoped someone would see us. I hoped the whole school would hear that Zachary Holler was seen walking with Lizzie Macon.

He grinned—a wide, close-lipped grin that spread across his face so fast I forgot myself long enough to think he looked sweet. But I recovered. I wanted to tell him he'd made my life miserable by doing what he did to me and Gwen, but I couldn't get the words past my tight throat. I gritted my teeth and lunged forward as if I were fighting the force of some old winter wind.

“Hey, slow down,” he said, grabbing my arm. “We're gonna get home too fast.”

He was almost laughing; he was laughing at me, at my pride. He was walking me home because he knew what a joke it was to be seen with a girl like me. My eyes stung. The last thing in the world I meant to do was give Zack Holler something to snigger about with the boys.

I shook him loose and darted down the block. He must have been stunned because he stood there yelling before he tore after me. Something steered me away from my house. Later I thought it was the devil, but right then I believed my father might be home early. If he saw me being chased down the street by a boy, he'd have me over his knee before I caught a breath.

I headed toward the gully, figuring I could lose Zack in the woods. My skinny legs were good for something—I was fast. The smartest thing I could have done would have been to stop dead in my tracks. Zack would have left me alone if I'd just let him prove he could wear me out. He was like a dog chasing a pack rat. Only a fool dog wants to catch a rat; but once he's after it, no hound will give it up.

Without thinking, I ran straight for the tree house. I didn't realize how stupid I'd been till I swayed in the branches and Zack came scrambling up the ladder. Then I remembered how I'd cornered Gwen that day, how she thought she was so safe and I thought I was so clever, because once you're in the tree house and someone else is at the door, there's no way out except to fly.

Zack Holler jumped me like a wolf on a weasel in the dead of winter. He had a hunger. He nipped at my neck. His teeth tugged my lips. Kissing Zachary was nothing at all like kissing Gwen. His mouth was dry and his tongue filled my mouth till I thought I'd choke.

He pawed and pushed. I didn't have time to worry about what I was supposed to do with my hands before I was falling to the floor and Zack was falling on top of me and my skirt was riding up around my thighs. Zack clawed at my stockings till they ripped from belly to knee. I said
no
a dozen times, but maybe not out loud. My fingernails dug into the flesh of his back. He moved on me faster and faster. His belt buckle cut into my stomach; the stiff denim of his jeans gnawed at my bare skin, and I pleaded with him to slow down, to stop, he was hurting me; I was sure someone would hear us in the tree house, someone would see it rocking and know. But no one came. No one heard Zack cry out, unless my father heard it piercing through his brain above the roar of rough logs being sheared as he left the mill.

Zack collapsed on top of me and drifted off to sleep. My legs felt prickly and hot, like I'd rolled in poison ivy. The smell of us made me giddy, made me think of putting my whole face down in a barrel of apples being pressed into cider.

I liked that smell, though I knew it would be bad soon enough, something sweet turning to vinegar in the warm afternoon. I could have pushed Zack off: he was in no mood to wrestle. But I lay there. In the end, Zack was the first to go.

Daddy sat on the porch swing. It was past five. He'd been off work for an hour or two, so I knew he'd had time to suck down more than a couple of beers. He spotted me when I was still a block off, and I felt his stare as I dawdled along toward the house. I'd buried Mom's tattered pantyhose in the gully. My naked legs were scratched and dirty, my hair a tangled mat. It was plain my father didn't like what he saw, even at a distance. The idea of turning around and tearing down the street to avoid the whole scene crossed my mind, but I didn't know where to run. Only Nina could fool our father; only Nina knew him well enough to hide forever.

The instant I touched the steps of his house he was on me. He grabbed my wrist and jerked me onto the porch, then shoved me inside the house, giving my behind a sharp jab with his knee as I stumbled through the doorway.

“Where've you been, dressed like that?” he shouted. Mother ran out from the kitchen to see what the ruckus was.

“Calm yourself,” she said, trying to wedge between us. My father had already worked himself into a sweat. Mom knew the slapping would start if she didn't do something fast. Daddy pushed her out of his way with one hand and said, “Did you see your daughter leave the house today?” She refused to answer. The beer on his breath smelled sweet and strong and made me remember.

“What have I told you about girls who put that crap all over their faces?” he said to me. “What did I say I'd do if I ever caught you ratting your hair and wearing your skirt halfway up your ass?”