Onward Toward What We're Going Toward (41 page)

Russ didn't know what she was talking about.

“The tree-planting internship Greenleaf sponsors every summer in Alberta, Canada,”Tyler said.

Then Russ remembered the application Jacob had given him, which he'd stuffed in his backpack and forgotten about.

“We could use someone like you,” Ginger said. “Someone with a business mind.”

Tyler slid another application across the table. “Give it some thought,” he said.

Russ did give it some thought. In fact, he thought about it so much that he couldn't sleep that night. But it wasn't the prospect of planting trees in Canada that was keeping him awake, although he did think that would be pretty cool. Rather, it was Ginger Beauchamp. Had she been flirting with him that afternoon? She had to be. Why else would she be kicking him under the table? Wasn't that called “footsie,” and wasn't “footsie” considered flirting? He'd had two girlfriends during his four years at ISU, but both of them had wanted him to shave his beard and cut his hair, and he didn't want to shave his beard or cut his hair. He
wanted to be who he wanted to be—a guy with a beard and long hair. Not to mention, when he told a girl he was a botany major, she would usually get this faraway look in her eyes and walk away from him while he was in the middle of talking. Ginger was different. She had tapped his shin with the toe of her boot. She had winked at him. He got out of bed, turned on the light, sat down at his desk, and filled the application out.

The internship was on the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains, several hundred miles from Calgary. Russ arrived a few days after the Fourth of July; Tyler picked him up from the train station. There were six Greenleaf members participating in the internship: Tyler, Ginger, Russ, and three other guys from colleges around the country. They all stayed in a hunting cabin without electricity or indoor plumbing. The cabin was one big open room with a kitchen area. On one wall were four bunk beds, and in the middle of the room was a table with an overhead light that was powered by a camping generator. Every few days, someone needed to go into the nearest town, Luscar, to get gas for the generator. At night, the group played cards; in the morning, they woke early and alternated making skillet breakfasts on a camping stove. After breakfast, they drove into Jasper National Park, where they spent the day planting trees and ramming long spikes into the Canadian ground to “feed” nutrients to the trees. Russ loved the work. There was a problem, however, and that problem was Ginger.

Ginger Beauchamp was a twenty-two-year-old Canadian girl who did her work without complaining, and each time it was her turn to pick a card game, she picked Hearts. She had a gap between her front teeth, but despite the gap, she was a pretty girl with a slight build, like a cheerleader's, and auburn hair. She was fond of wearing cutoff jean shorts around the cabin and a gingham shirt that she tied up to show her belly button. Most nights before bed, she would lie in her bunk and read. Russ would lie on his side, his head on his arm, watching her hold the tiny penlight,
her eyes raking across the pages. He imagined a life with her unfolding like the narrative of a novel: event after event; good days, bad days, and in-between days; conflict, tension, and resolution. They'd buy a house, a farm, something outside Middleville, where they'd grow trees together, maybe have a couple of dogs. Cows. Chickens. They'd have a baby one day. It all seemed so clear in his imagination, so perfect.

Unfortunately, the other guys in the group had fallen for Ginger, too, and it seemed that Tyler was the frontrunner. They'd gone to high school together, and from conversations with the other guys, Russ found out that the two of them had once dated, though they weren't currently a couple. One of the other guys, Nathan, from upstate New York, who'd started a Greenleaf charter at Syracuse, said he was “lying in the weeds, just waiting for his time to pounce.” They all were. Around the card table, Russ could feel the tension. All eyes were on Ginger, on every move she made. When she shuffled the deck, the guys watched her, their tongues basically hanging out of their mouths like dogs. Russ kept looking under the table to see if Ginger was tapping anyone else's shin. She was always sitting Indian-style in her chair. Once, when Russ looked under the table, she asked, “What's under there, Russell?” For some reason, she called him Russell, although Russ was his full name, and after a while, the other guys took to calling him Russell Muscle.

Russ knew he needed to stake his claim, needed to prove himself. So he started to do what any guy would do: he “flexed his muscles” to show Ginger he was the type of man who would be good for her. When they all sat around at night, passing a joint (something Russ now liked doing, although he'd never done it before coming to Canada), he tried to be funny, lively, a good time kind of guy. When they planted trees, he planted twice as many as anyone else. At meals, he ate twice as much as anyone else. When they played cards, he played to win; a few times, he even cheated to make sure that he won.

And then, one afternoon while they were out planting trees, Ginger spotted a pinecone hanging on a branch about three stories up, dangling like a Christmas ornament. She pointed it out to everyone. The other guys admired the pinecone and went about unloading sandwiches and sodas from the cooler and spreading out a blanket. Tyler rolled a joint. Russ, however, knew that he had to climb the tree and get that pinecone for her. He started climbing. Ginger watched him while she ate her sandwich; the other guys ignored him, or did their best to ignore him, as they passed around the joint. The smell of cannabis wafted up to Russ's nostrils. He wanted to be down on the ground with them, smoking the joint. He was only about ten feet from the pinecone, but those last ten feet were precarious, as the pine tree was beginning to triangle. He climbed up another branch and tried grabbing the pinecone, but it was still out of reach. He adjusted himself and prepared to climb a little higher—one more branch and he was pretty sure he'd be high enough to get it. He looked down and saw Ginger looking up. She waved. The other guys were laughing. Russ made his move. He stepped up on the branch and shifted his weight onto that foot. At that moment, he heard a loud crack. He didn't even have time to scream as he lost his balance and thudded to the ground. Ginger put her hand over her mouth. The other guys looked over at him and laughed even harder. On the ground, Russ's whole body felt like it had been pumped full of air and was about to explode. He let out a moan and managed to say, “Oh, shit.”

Chic got his first look at Russ's girlfriend, Ginger, through binoculars a few days after they arrived back in Middleville. The rumors around town said that Russ had gone off and broken almost every bone in his body, and that, like his father, he had found himself a woman from some faraway place and brought her back
to Middleville. Chic spotted the two of them in the kitchen, where Ginger was hand-feeding Russ slices of apple dipped in peanut butter. The kitchen table was covered in flowers and get-well cards. Russ had broken both of his arms and his left leg. After each slice of apple, Ginger wiped Russ's mouth with a napkin. Chic wasn't sure what he had been expecting, but the girl looked just like any other girl.

Russ's fall had inspired Chic. After hearing the news, he had written three poems, after not having written one in nearly a decade. He mailed Russ a get-well card and included one of the poems. He'd come to the bridge with his binoculars to watch him open it. He imagined Russ and Ginger passing the card back and forth. He imagined them laughing. He imagined Russ hanging the card on the fridge. He imagined his brother and Lijy reading it. He imagined Erika reading it. He imagined them all smiling at its poignancy. He imagined the card hanging on the fridge for months and beginning to fade in the sun.

After eating an apple slice, Russ picked up a card from the table and read it. He smiled. Ginger took the card from him, read it, and smiled, too. Chic tried to zoom in on the card, to see if it was his, but there was no zooming, of course, with binoculars. He leaned over the railing of the bridge, trying to get closer. It had to be his card; it had to be his poem. His poetry was bringing people joy. His heart was pounding, and he felt connected to Russ and Ginger. Not connected like he was holding them or hugging them, but connected like jumper cables went from his heart to their hearts, from his brain to theirs, and even though he might not be happy, his words were making others happy. He leaned a little bit farther, then lost his balance and flipped over the railing. He caught himself, and was hanging by one hand, the water below him. He could hear the current rushing. He only had to let himself fall. He knew the water was deep enough. He would be all right. He would survive. He closed his eyes, held his breath, and let go.

Coming up out of the water, Chic gasped and flailed his arms. He felt like the biggest idiot in the world. He'd just fallen off a bridge while spying on his nephew and his new girlfriend. What kind of grown man does something like that? He swam to shore and climbed on the bank, using the weeds to pull himself out of the water. His clothes were soggy and heavy. His shoes squished with every step on the muddy bank. He slumped up the bank to the bridge. He hoped Russ and Ginger hadn't heard him. The bridge was over a hundred yards downriver, so they probably hadn't. He picked up the binoculars and looked through them. Ginger was feeding Russ another slice of apple. Neither of them were aware that outside of the kitchen, an entire world was spinning and churning and that people like Chic were falling off bridges. Not even Chic was aware of the outside world. He was aware only of himself, his wet shoes, his soggy clothes, the drips of water running down his cheeks like tears.

 

Each day, Diane prepared for Dr. Peale by toasting a Pop-Tart. When the Pop-Tart was ready, she smeared it with butter and carried it to the living room, where she clicked on the radio and snuggled into the couch. Each bite was heavenly. She would probably eat the whole box. And that was okay. She could listen to the
The Art of Living
and eat a box of Pop-Tarts, then go to the store and purchase more Pop-Tarts and come home and listen to Dr. Peale and eat more Pop-Tarts.

But, deep inside of her, something breathed its hot breath on her heart. That something told her to get on the Airdyne exercise bike. Remove the laundry hanging on the handlebars and lying across the seat. Get off the couch, and get on the bike. The same motivation that had made her join the bowling league now pushed her to get up, brush the Pop-Tart crumbs off the front of her nightgown, and click off the radio. She bounded up the stairs and, without taking off her nightgown, put on her sneakers, double-knotting the laces. Back down in the living room, the wall clock said it was almost four. She had a little over an hour before Chic got home from work. She threw off the laundry and opened the drapes. Sunlight washed into the living room. She was transfixed, staring at the exercise bicycle. Maybe this was how it would happen. She'd begin a new chapter. It wasn't too late. It was never too late. She could hear Dr. Peale's voice in her head.

She got on the bike and began to pedal. The front wheel fan came to life. She worked the handlebars back and forth. A bit of sweat beaded up on her forehead, and she wiped it with her left
hand. She tasted it. It tasted awful, but it was her sweat, produced by her body. She was in motion. She was moving. She pedaled faster and moved her arms back and forth. Sweat trickled down the side of her face. The wheel fan whooshed. On the coffee table, the pages of the
TV Guide
fluttered, and the napkin she'd used during lunch blew onto the carpet.

After about five minutes, she couldn't keep going, and stopped. The room was silent, except for the buzz of activity inside of her, cells ping-ponging around her skull, reminding her that being alive had a palpable undercurrent that sounded like a dull drone of interstate traffic way off in the distance. She'd actually done something, and she was tired, actually tired. Her legs felt rubbery. She could feel her heart beat under her breast. She wiped the sweat from her forehead. She felt, maybe, a little bit better. She also felt hungry.