Summer on the Moon (8 page)

The General took a deep drag … then choked. “Out of practice.” He thumped his chest with a fist. “I quit when Mary O’Malley got sick.”

“Who’s Mary O’Malley?” Socko fiddled with the match.

“What do you mean, ‘Who’s Mary O’Malley?’” The old man whipped the matches out of Socko’s hand and bent a match down with his thumb. In a heartbeat a tiny blue flame wavered above the closed matchbook.

“I mean, who’s Mary O’Malley?” Socko figured she was the General’s dead wife, but who used a last name when talking about their wife?

The old man stared at the flame. “You hear that, honey? The boy doesn’t even know who you are.” He blew the flame out with a damp puff and watched the smoke rise. “Mary O’Malley was my wife of fifty-four years—also your great-grandmother. Doesn’t anyone care about family in this family?”

“I don’t. Not unless that family cares about mom and me.”

“Caring goes two ways!” The General’s cold blue eye stared at him. “Never heard a peep from your mother until I had a house to offer, not even when her grandmother died.”

“We didn’t even know she’d died! Nancy doesn’t talk about you guys, so it’s not our fault.”

The old man crossed his legs and jiggled his foot. He took a drag on his cigarette, then coughed.

“You think Mary O’Malley would want you to smoke?” Socko asked.

“Don’t know why she would. She never did before.” He took another drag. “I picked up the habit when I was in the army. GIs smoke when they’re bored. They smoke when they’re scared. Between bored and scared, that about covers army life.” The General shook his head. “I don’t get scared anymore, but with Mary O’Malley gone, I sure do get bored. If I smoke and die sooner? Good.”

“Come on, nobody wants to die.”

“What do I have to live for?” The General pulled a cloth handkerchief out of his pocket and coughed into it. “Your mother’s cooking?” He tossed the matchbook at Socko. “Here. Play with fire while I go to the john.”

Socko thumb-popped the match head against the striker. He wasted four matches before the General rolled back into the room. He never did get the trick to work.

Day one of the new life dragged on forever. The General constantly ordered him around. “Get me a drink of water!” “Put my valise behind the goll-durn sofa!” The cell phone in Socko’s pocket bumped against his leg with each step, reminding him,
call Damien, call Damien
. When the General dozed off in his chair, Socko snuck upstairs and hit redial. He counted five rings before someone picked up.

“Yeah?”

“Can I speak to Damien?”

“Dunno where heezat.” Damien’s mom sounded skunk drunk.

Maybe his friend was safe, hanging out one floor above in their old apartment. But what if he wasn’t? “Tell him to call me, okay?”

“Who’re you?”

“Socko.”

“Socko z’gone.”

“I’m calling from my new place. Tell him—” Socko heard the phone clatter against something hard—probably the floor. “Hello, hello?” Two of Delia’s precious emergency minutes passed while he listened to dead air.

“I eat lunch at twelve o’clock sharp. That was four hours ago,” the General complained. “My stomach sounds like John Philip Sousa and his whole dad-blamed marching band.”

Socko didn’t care about the General’s musical stomach—his stomach was making music too—he was worried about his mom. Delia had been off shift for an hour, but without a car, how was she supposed to get home?

Now when the cell phone bumped his leg, he willed it to ring and be his mom, even if she was just calling to say she was stranded at the Phat. He didn’t want to call her because of the “emergency minutes” thing, but in ten more minutes he would.

Nine.

Eight.

The General was grumbling about “breach of contract” when the bright blast of a car horn sounded in the front yard.

Socko ran outside. “You borrowed Manuel’s car?”

“Sort of.” Delia grabbed the overloaded Phat sack from the seat beside her. When she hugged him, Socko smelled fryer grease. It always got in her clothes, her hair, everything. “How’s himself?” she asked.

“Complaining.”

“So what else is new?”

They went into the kitchen where the General had already positioned his wheelchair beside the microwave.

“Lunch.” Delia put the bag on his knees. “And supper.”

The General lifted out burgers one by one, handing them to Socko, then glared into the bag. He popped the lid on a Styrofoam box. “What in the Sam Hill is this?”

“Crispy Fried Salad,” Delia said. “It’s a new Phat Burger special.”

Socko opened the microwave door. “You said you wanted vegetables.” He stuck in three burgers.

The General poked at the contents of the box. “These aren’t vegetables!” He slung the Crispy Fried Salad, bag and all, into the trash.

Socko reached into the can to rescue it. The chicken nuggety things on top of the salad had looked pretty good.

“Two questions, Delia Marie,” the General rumbled. “Number one: do you cook at all? Because our arrangement included room
and
board.”

Socko held the Styrofoam box in his hand. What part of “free food” did the General not get?

“I cook sometimes,” said Delia.

The General glared up at her through a forest of eyebrow hairs. “Define sometimes.”

“You know, now and then.” She could cook if she had to, although not too well. “What was the second question?”

“Where’d you get the jalopy?”

“It’s a loaner from Manuel,” said Socko. “He works at Phat Burger too.”

“It is Manuel’s,” said Delia, “but it’s not a loaner. Here’s the good news!” She clapped her hands. “For just five hundred dollars—that’s five hundred—it’s all yours, General!” She smiled, but Socko knew the smile covered the way she really felt—which was desperate.

“Five hundred’s a steal!” said Socko, hoping the General wouldn’t take a good look at what he was buying. Delia had to have that car to get to work, and Socko needed a ride back to the old neighborhood.

The General rolled to the window. “Great car. It would look right at home in a junkyard.” He crossed his arms over his stained sweater-vest. “What would I need with a car, Delia Marie? You said it yourself—being as old as dirt, I am no longer qualified to drive.”

“
I
can drive
you
around. Like a chauffeur. It’s a sweet ride. Please say yes.” She walked over to him, her palms pressed together. “Pretty please?”

The General stared at the sweet ride. “Orange and turquoise. I guess for five hundred it’s asking too much to have the paint on the doors match.”

“It’s festive … like a party on wheels!” said Delia.

“It runs good and it’s cheap,” Socko added. Who cared about the paint job? With wheels, Socko could check on Damien tomorrow. Even slaves must’ve had a day off now and then.

“The way
you
drive, you have no business taking a car out on the highway in the first place,” said the General.

Delia stood over the wheelchair. “There is no bus out here. I was told there was, but there isn’t. Without this car I can’t get to work.”

The General drummed his fingers on the arm of his wheelchair. “I’ll
lend
you the money. With interest.”

“Interest? Come on, General. We’re family!”

“Really? You never even told Sacko here about Mary O’Malley.”

“What would I have told him? That I once had a grandmother who made great sugar cookies? That’s about all I remember. I was seven the last time I saw her. You two just disappeared from my life!”

The old man let his breath out slowly. “Maybe you should ask
Nancy
about that!” He winced as he slid a knobby, arthritic hand into his pants pocket and brought out a checkbook. He opened the checkbook’s plastic cover. “Five hundred at 12 percent is my best offer,” he declared. “Take it or leave it.”

Delia clenched her fists. “Forget it! I’ll get a loan from Insta-Cash.”

Socko put a hand on his mother’s arm. “Remember the time you got money for asthma medicine there?” Delia had taken an Insta-Cash payday loan just once, and only because Socko needed to breathe. “It cost you twenty to borrow a hundred for a week.” It didn’t take a math whiz to know that was more than 12 percent.

Delia sat down slowly on a kitchen chair. One by one she pulled out the bobby pins that held her hat in place. “You win, old man.” She looked as limp as the paper hat in her hands. “Make the check out to Manuel Garcia.”

The General clicked the pen point in and out. “On one condition. Tomorrow you get me something with roughage before my plumbing clogs up.”

Socko let out an exasperated sigh. In one day he had heard enough about his great-grandfather’s “plumbing” to last a lifetime, but he was sure the subject would come up again. And again.

He was gazing out the window at their new three-tone car when a familiar voice inside his head said,
Genius idea! Jack the car and come home
.

Socko didn’t even get to make his case for catching a ride back to the old neighborhood. Delia had already left for work the next morning when the old man rammed his wheelchair into the bottom step. “Rise and shine, private. It’s way past O-dark thirty.”

O-dark thirty?
It was probably more army lingo. Socko didn’t open his eyes. One day in, and he was already sick of being the grunt in an army of two.

“Get your sorry keister down here, private. Right now.”

Socko put the pillow over his head. But the General’s weak and windy voice was like a brain worm. (No urban myth, brain worms. Socko had seen them on the Discovery Channel.) “Suit yourself,” the brain worm whispered. “But it isn’t getting any cooler out there.”

Socko shoved the pillow aside. The chilled air pumping out of the AC vent in the ceiling over his bed settled over him like a clean sheet. But when he squinted toward the window, a no-mercy sun was beating down on Moon Ridge Estates.

He threw the pillow as hard as he could and rolled off his cot. He pulled on shorts, a T-shirt, and socks, then stomped his feet into his sneakers. It was time to straighten a few things out.

The General was waiting in his wheelchair, the incomplete map of the neighborhood spread across his bony knees. The situation was an improvement over yesterday. The old guy was dressed and he had obviously fed himself—a fresh grease stain splotched the front of his shirt.

“What’re you looking at?” The General pulled his shirt front out
and took a look too. “It’s nothing but a canteen badge. Your mission today is to go farther afield and check out the Big Empty,” he wheezed. “See if we really
are
alone in this godforsaken place. Compree?”

“Don’t I even get to eat first?”

“You slept through breakfast.”

Socko shoved a pencil stub and an envelope into his pocket. Making notes during the mission would be easier than trying to remember things. He charged back upstairs and grabbed his skateboard.

While the old man went off about kids these days being soft, Socko detoured into the kitchen and slipped the cell phone into his pocket.

Outside, he dropped the skateboard onto the road and turned left. Kicking the board down Tranquility Way, he created his own hot wind. When he reached the street sign, he dragged a foot, slid to a stop, and looked back. No way the General could see him from here.

He slid the phone out of his pocket. He had tried to call his friend again the night before, letting the phone ring and ring. Someone had finally picked up, but hit the End button without saying a word. Delia had said it had to be Louise’s latest boyfriend, so it was no big deal, but Socko was worried.

He hit redial. As it rang, he imagined the phone in Damien’s apartment, buried somewhere in the mess, or sloshing around in Louise’s purse. “Come on … come on …” But no one picked up, not even the fake British voice that said, “You have reached voice mailbox two-three-seven-nine …”

“Don’t worry. Everything’s fine.” He flipped the phone shut and dropped it in his pocket. Great, now he was talking to himself.

He looked right, then left, trying to decide which way to go. If it
was
a circle, it didn’t matter which way he turned.

But he didn’t trust the signs around here. The big one out front said “Units Going Fast!” So far, the known census of Moon Ridge Estates was three. Make that two, in real time. His mom got to spend most of every day back in the old neighborhood.

It looked pretty much the same in both directions. Socko turned left. As he rolled along, he became aware of the slap of his sneaker hitting the road, the swish of the wheels. At the old place, those sounds
would have been buried under a pile of noise. Moon Ridge was so silent it was like the world had died.

Since no one was watching, he tried out a trick.

He’d never mastered an ollie on the cracked streets and sidewalks of his old neighborhood. Now he snapped the tail of the board down, slid his front foot forward, and jumped. For a second the board rose with him like it was glued to his feet, but he didn’t get much air. Landing was going to be a crash-and-burn, so he bailed, jumping off the board before he fell.

Damien was the one who could skate.

Keeping it simple, Socko carved down the street. He stopped at each corner to jot down the street name. Then he’d look back the way he’d come and forward in the direction he was going. Even though he knew turning around would take him back to Tranquility Way, he couldn’t shake the feeling he was going to get lost.

He continued to list the streets that radiated like spokes off the hub of Full Moon Circle—checking each driveway along the edge of the road for a car, each window for curtains or a face looking out. The houses, at least on the left side of the street, were getting more and more skeletal.

When he came to a house with no walls at all, he dragged his foot and stopped. Bare studs framed rectangles of sky. He stepped on the tail of his skateboard and picked it up. Board under his arm, he trotted up the front steps and through the gaping door frame.

The house must have been standing unfinished for a long time. The warped floorboards creaked under his feet.

Stairs to the second story had been roughed in, but there was no railing, just a pair of holes at the outside edge of each riser where the spindles of the railings would go. He tested a step with one foot. It felt solid.

When he reached the landing, he stopped and listened. Somewhere in Moon Ridge Estates there had to be a crew hammering, running saws, mixing concrete.

All Socko heard was his own breathing.

He peered through the gaps between beams that ran from future wall to future wall. His skateboard looked awfully small on the floor below.

If he were here, Damien would dare him to tightrope-walk across a beam—then Delia’s voice in his head drowned out the dare. “No disasters, Socko. We got no medical.”

If there was a place as cool as this at the Kludge, it would have been Tarantula territory.

Then Socko remembered, there
was
a place this cool at the Kludge—a fire escape chute a tenant could jump into from any floor. The official warnings about “emergency use only” and the unofficial spray-painted silhouette of a tarantula on the entry doors had stopped Socko and Damien from trying the chute until one day they were so bored, they’d dared each other. Deciding to go for the maximum ride, they wrenched open the door on the roof. The air inside the tube smelled hot and metallic. Damien sat, legs in the tube. Socko climbed in behind him, one leg on either side of his skinny friend.

“Ahhhhhh …”
Screaming, they careened through the dark. But when their feet smacked the lever at the bottom of the escape tube, the door did not pop open and dump them in the alley behind the Kludge. Instead they heard an evil laugh from outside the door, followed by a too-familiar voice. “Good luck getting out, suckas.”

After numerous back-slides during their crawl up the slick tube, they emerged on the second floor sweat-drenched and dehydrated, but they had learned a lesson. The chute, like every other inch of the neighborhood, was claimed territory.

But the house with no walls wasn’t. In fact, as far as he could tell, none of Moon Ridge had been claimed.

He took in the view from his perch with new eyes. The vacant houses, roads, and dirt yards that went on all the way to the horizon—Rapp couldn’t even
imagine
a territory as big as this—and all of it could be Socko’s.

But he needed to
do
something to stake his claim. His stomach clenched, because he knew what it was. He had to walk across the
not-yet-there second floor and he had to do it the way Damien would. Anyone could balance with their feet on two separate beams and waddle across. This situation called for a little tightrope walking.

Through the joists he spied a two-by-four lying on the floor below.

The board flexed with each step as he carried it up the stairs on one shoulder. He tested the weight of it as it rested in both hands; he slid one sneaker onto the beam, then slid his foot back again.

He put down the board and pried off his sneakers, then peeled his sweaty tube socks off too, tossing shoes and socks down through an opening between the beams for easy access later.

It was weird to be barefoot outside—or sort of outside. In the city he never went barefoot except in the apartment. He’d heard too many warnings from his mom about rusty nails and lockjaw. But by walking the beam barefoot, he could get a grip with his toes, which meant he would be safer—Delia would like that.

With the extra weight of the board in his hands and the hot beam testing his will, he walked, step by step, away from the staircase and out over absolutely nothing.

When he reached the middle of the beam, he looked down—the brochure hadn’t lied about the “cathedral ceilings.” The distance to the floor was so spectacular he felt a little dizzy.

He was trying to figure out just how far he’d fall if his foot slipped when he heard the distant growl of a car engine approaching from behind. He whipped around. Because he didn’t take into account that he was at the center of the turn and that the ends of the two-by-four would be moving much faster, the force of momentum took him by surprise. His felt his feet slide out from under him, but he couldn’t do a thing.

His balance pole sliced through the gap between two beams and he went down with it, whacking his arm on an adjacent beam before smashing into the floor. The air left his lungs with a rush. Could lungs deflate like punctured tires? If so, he was dead. It would be weeks before anyone found him. He’d lie there and dry up like a fly on a windowsill.

The sound of the engine that had spooked him got louder and louder. He took a jagged breath and rolled up on his side. The toothy chrome grille of a black car rounded the curve in Full Moon Circle. The tinted windows were so dark Socko couldn’t see who was inside. He couldn’t even tell how many people were in there. He
could
tell by the speed, which was very slow, that whoever was in there was looking for something.

He was partly hidden by beams, and his brown T-shirt might blend in with the floor. But what about his red hair? He tried to reassure himself: this wasn’t the old neighborhood; he was safe here.

Traveling at a crawl, the car pulled even with the house.

Then it stopped.

Fear prickled Socko’s scalp. Whoever was in that car, they weren’t looking for him. They couldn’t be. Still, if the doors opened, he’d forget about being dead and run.

The engine idled and the car sat.

Taking shallow breaths, Socko smelled the warm plywood of the subfloor.

He heard a
tick
as the brake pedal released. The car began to roll slowly forward.

It seemed to take forever for the sound of the engine to die to a whisper and vanish.

As he sat up, starry explosions shot off like bottle rockets inside his head. He dropped his forehead to his knees.

He didn’t know how long he’d been sitting like that when he heard the engine again. Now he was sure—they’d seen him the last time. They were just messing with his head! Ignoring the rushing sound in his ears, he pushed himself to his feet and snatched up his shoes and skateboard. He ditched his crumpled socks and jumped through a gap between the studs of the house’s back wall, then hesitated.

He had come a long way on Full Moon Circle. Should he go back the way he had come, or continue on the Circle? The decision was critical. In such a flat landscape, a kid breaking for home would be visible from a long way off.

Taking a chance, he continued to follow the circle, but he didn’t use the road. Instead he darted from house to house, stopping behind each to listen, his sneakers dangling from one hand, his skateboard under his arm. The bare dirt burned his feet and he worried about rusty nails, but he didn’t stop to put his shoes on.

He was flattened against the side wall of a house trying to breathe when something red in the driveway caught his eye.
Hey
, thought the small corner of his brain that wasn’t in a panic,
a ripstick!
Even crazy scared, he was about to check out the figure-eight-shaped skateboard when he heard the car again. He took off running.

He couldn’t believe it! Just ahead was the sign for Tranquility Way. He’d only been five streets away from where he’d started.

He dropped the skateboard and jetted down his own street. Desperate to get inside, he abandoned the board outside the door, turned the doorknob, and fell into the cool. Letting the sneakers tucked under his arm drop, he twisted the knob lock, then put the chain across. It was so flimsy one good kick would bust it.

The General’s voice wavered from the kitchen. “That you, Sacko?”

“Yeah, it’s me.” When he walked into the kitchen, the General was filling a water glass at the sink.

“Listen,” Socko said, trying to catch his breath, “we … we gotta keep the door locked.”

The General twisted the tap shut and stared for a long moment at Socko’s dirty bare feet. “Let me guess. Our neighbors are Mafia. And they stole your shoes.”

“No, but there was this black car with tinted windows cruising real slow on Full Moon Circle.”

“Imagine that. A car on a road. You need to grow a spine, Sacko.” The paper bag map crackled as the General flattened it against the kitchen counter. “Report.” He pushed the bag toward Socko.

The old man didn’t get it. He’d probably never lived in a tough neighborhood. Socko scribbled a loopy circle, then added a few spidery lines and began copying the names of the streets that radiated from the circle, but his mind was on the dark car. His danger sensors had gone wild when it had slowed down—and it had circled three
times that he knew of. Something was definitely up with that car.

“And these?” The General’s yellow nail unerringly targeted the five unlabeled streets.

Socko shrugged. Running from the car, he hadn’t taken a lot of notes.

“Slipshod. Well, there’ll be time enough to find out tomorrow.”

Socko turned away, ready to retreat to his room to try calling Damien again, but the General pulled rank.