Rebel's Tag (4 page)

“Sam!” Indi hisses. “Don't!”

She doesn't like what I've added to roofing. I explained why I do it, but she doesn't get it. It's like this: When we leave the roof, I'll hold onto the feeling for a while. It will last until I fall asleep tonight, but by morning, it'll be gone. And I hate that. I needed to find a way to keep the feeling, and figured it would stay with me longer if I left something up there. I'd
be able to think about that thing of mine on the roof, and it would be a link to the magic.

It made sense, but I couldn't figure out what to leave. Everything I thought of, like a feather or a note stuck under a shingle, seemed lame. Plus they wouldn't last. Then one day this girl at school, Molly, told me that my astrology sign is Aquarius. She added, “And your ruler is Uranus.”

Man. A bunch of the guys were around and they cracked up. “Whoo. Sam is ruled by his anus!” Molly got all red in the face and tried tell them she meant the planet Uranus rules the sign of Aquarius, but they just howled more. Not that I could blame them.

She started blurting out all this zodiac stuff. “Uranus is a powerful planet, you idiots. It creates radical change. It's behind every rebel...”

She didn't get any further. “It's behind, all right!” someone hooted. At that point, Molly might as well have been trying to talk to a pack of baboons and she knew
it. She stomped away. The thing that stuck with me was that Uranus is connected to rebels—exactly what I was looking for. I went on the net, found the symbol for Uranus, so that's my tag. It's easy enough to draw—just the letter
H
with a circle hanging down from the cross bar.

“Make it small!” Indi says.

“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter. I do make them small. My little Uranus symbols are on quite a few roofs now, and I'll bet none of the owners have even noticed. I mean, who looks on their roof? Even if they saw something, they'd probably just think it was a leaf or whatever. And until tonight, I've always used black paint.

I have this skitter of nerves just as I press the button on the can. I don't know if it's me or if the can is faulty, but nothing comes out. Then a huge gob of paint bursts from the nozzle and spatters all over the place.

“Omigod!” Indi's eyes are bugging out.

Paint starts running down the roof, and I swipe at it with my hands. This is really
dumb because now I have paint all over my hands too.

“You're such an idiot,” Indi tells me. Like I don't know.

“Do you have a tissue or anything?” I ask.

Indi starts feeling around in her jacket pocket, and I stare at the mess. It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't red. Indi hasn't noticed that yet since color doesn't exist without light; there's only black and white and shades of gray. This is going to be bloody obvious when the sun comes up. Yeah, bloody. It will look horrible, like something got killed on the roof.

Indi hands me a tissue and says, “We should go.”

I nod. We shuffle down and when we hit the ground, I smell pipe tobacco. I stop dead and look around, straining to hear footsteps, breathing, something.

“What are you doing now?” Indi asks.

“Do you smell that?”

She frowns. “What?”

“Smoke.”

“I don't smell anything, Sam. Except paint.” She starts walking.

We walk the rest of the way home in silence. When we get there, Indi only says, “I don't want to do this anymore.”

I don't argue with her. It wasn't fun tonight. I take one more look around on the street before I go in, but the street is cold and empty.

Sunday morning there's red paint on my pants, so I stuff them in a garbage bag. If Mom asks where they are, I'll tell her I lost them at school; I forgot them in the gym and somebody swiped them. This sucks because they were the best roofing pants I had. I could keep them hidden to wear only when I go roofing. I look at the pants, wadded up in the bag, and know for sure I never want to see those stains again.

I start cleaning my room, throwing more stuff into the bag. It's partly to hide the pants and partly because for some weird reason, I actually feel like having a clean room. I just hope Mom doesn't come by
and pretend she's fainting at the sight. For a different weird reason, that would make me feel like messing it up again. Luckily, she doesn't show.

The last thing I toss into the garbage is the letter from the cradle. It's a no-brainer that I'm not going to some dumb garden to meet an old guy. Except maybe I should go, just to send a message back to Grandpa Max. Yeah. I can write letters too. I can write, “Get lost, jerk.”

But it's already almost noon, too late for this Sunday. I take the letter out of the bag and throw it on my bed. I can figure this out later. Right now, I need some air. I tell Mom I'm going for a bike ride and head out. I slow down when I get to the house.

An old couple is standing in the driveway, pointing at their roof. I notice stuff I never noticed before, like how the yard is so tidy. The house is clean white. The pale, gray roof looks brand-new. The red paint...it's really red. Some of it's still stuck under my fingernails.

Indi says she's busy, all week. Every time I call, she's out with girlfriends, or doing homework, or something. Finally I go to her house and get her to come to the door so I can show her the letter from the cradle. I wasn't going to tell her about it because I figured she'd try to talk me into going to the garden. Now I'm willing to be lectured just so things can be okay with us again.

I'm wrong.

Indi reads the letter and hands it back to me without a word.

“So,” I say. “What do you think?”

She shrugs. “What am I supposed to think?”

“I don't know. Something.”

She looks at me. “Sam, it doesn't matter what I think. It's not like you care. Do what you want.” And she starts closing the door.

“Indi! Come on. Of course I care. You're my best friend. Aren't you?”

“What's that supposed to mean?” she asks.

I don't know what to say, but I have to say something. I go with, “Huh?”

She does an eye roll. “Are you stupid or what?”

“I guess I'm stupid.”

“Too right, you're stupid!” she says. “Anyone with half a brain would know they owe me an apology.”

“I owe you an apology?”

Now Indi doesn't know what to say.
Or at least I hope that's why she doesn't say anything. She just glares. I think fast. “Kidding! You know I'm sorry.”

“Oh really? For what?” I recognize that look on her face. It's the one that says,
Go ahead. Just try it. And it better be good!
Scary.

“For...for messing up the paint.”

“Wrong answer!” The door slams shut.

I stand there, staring at the door for a minute. Then I yell, “And I'm sorry for being a guy who doesn't know what you're talking about!”

Mr. Bains opens the door. “Samuel?” he says.

“Yes, Mr. Bains,” I say.

“You should go now.”

I nod. “Okay.”

Then he adds, “And in my opinion, nobody knows what these girls are talking about at times like this. Not even them.”

Before the door closes again, I hear Indi shriek, “Dad!”

Mr. Bains can be an all right guy.
There are tall white walls around the Dr. Sun Yat Sen gardens. I pause before going through the gate. I'm still not sure I want to be here, but it seems like the smartest move. I have this bad feeling that if I ignore Grandpa Max's letter it'll keep bugging me. Sometimes it's just easier to deal with things—especially when those things are like slivers festering under your skin.

I walk in and look around. The pond is easy enough to spot; it's right there, shiny in the spring sun. It's only when I walk up to the edge that I notice gravel paths curving off in several directions, winding between flowery shrubs. Quite a few people are wandering around, but I don't see anyone wearing a plaid cap. A tall Chinese pagoda stands on one side of the pond, and opposite that is another wall with a round gate set into a bridge. It looks pretty cool, like something out of a movie.

The first path I try comes to a doorway leading into a little office. I learn they charge a fee to visit that part of the garden,
so I turn and head back the other way. I find benches set here and there near the pond, but none of them hold anyone that looks like Henry Chan. Maybe it would be easier to find the turtles? I position myself on a bridge and watch the water. Orange and white fish flash beneath the surface, and a Canada goose cruises by. When I spot a turtle, only the knob of his head sticks out of the water. I keep watching as he glides toward a large flat rock. Two other turtles are already parked on the rock, and the swimmer decides to join them. His neck comes straining out from his shell as he plants two front feet on the rock and starts climbing. You'd think he was taking on a mountain, the way he has to work for that rock. When he finally makes it, I feel like someone should give him a medal. Then I look up and meet the gaze of an old guy wearing large glasses and a plaid cap. Was he sitting right there the whole time?

“Um, excuse me,” I say. “Are you Henry Chan?”

He nods. “And you are Samuel Connor.” It isn't a question.

“Yeah, that's me. My grandfather told me to meet you here.”

“It's about time you showed up. What took you so long?” he asks.

“Pardon me?”

“Never mind. You are here now. And here, time moves differently. Like a turtle.”

I'm not sure what he means. It's true that nothing in the garden is moving very fast, but I didn't come here to talk about that. I just want him to give me whatever he's got. Still, maybe some small talk has to happen first.

“You like turtles?” I ask.

He considers this for quite a while.

Finally he says, “Why do you need to know?”

“Uh. Well. I don't.”

“Then why did you ask? Are there not more important things that you wish to discuss?”

This guy is sort of rude. “Like what?”

And he says,
“Wisdom is better than
rubies. All the things that may be desired can't be compared to it.”

My skin prickles with goose bumps. I stare at him, and his dark eyes behind those big glasses stare back. How could he know? He can't know about the ruby ring.

He smiles and adds, “That's one of your grandfather's favorite quotes from the bible. Did you know that?”

“No, no I didn't.”

“Hmmm,” he says. “What do you know about your grandfather?”

“Not much,” I mutter.

“I didn't think so. He regrets that,” says Henry. “He used to sit right here on this bench and tell me about you.”

“He did?”

“Yes, and he told me he wished he had been wise. And he wished for you to be wise. Do you know the difference between being smart and being wise?”

I shrug.

“Being smart means you have learned some things. Being wise means that you
understand what you've learned—and therefore you know you are ignorant.”

“What?”

He chuckles. “Never mind. It is merely a thought. Now, here, I have something for you.” He sticks his hand into his coat pocket, withdraws it and holds his closed fist out toward me.

I open my hand, and he places a gold pocket watch in my palm. “Max said to tell you how sorry he is that he hasn't given you real time. This is a fine watch he carried, even though it doesn't work.”

“It doesn't work?” I press a tiny button on the top of the watch and the cover springs open. The face of the watch looks back at me, and its hands are still. On the other side of the watch, three human faces look back at me: Grandpa Max, Dad and my own.

Henry says, “Your grandfather told me that picture was taken just a week before your father's death.”

“First time I've seen it.” I stare at the faces. I know them.