A Matter of Life and Death or Something (9 page)

(Meanwhile my real dad was relaxing in a rocking chair in his house on his pigeon farm. He was a pigeon breeder, but he didn't do it to come up with mutated cool-looking ones. My real dad knew a way to breed pigeons that were normal looking, except they were almost as big as Great Danes, and they had strong biceps underneath all the feathers. They were farming pigeons.

My real mom had helped develop the formula for it. Also, she was in charge of teaching the pigeons to speak English, so that they could understand the commands well. She had written a textbook on Englishing animals, especially pigeons, and it was a bestseller. The most interesting thing that her research found was that pigeons were extraordinarily good at learning English except that, for some reason, they had a huge amount of trouble with verbs and the order that stuff happened in. Her book was one of those really expiring books that people liked to read together in clubs, and this television lady liked to talk about.

While my real mom was out of town to be on the television lady's show, my real dad was rocking in his chair, thinking about how easy life was for him. He was thinking about how all he had to do was make the pigeons do everything, and sit around and wait for the money to pour in. He was not thinking about me. He was also not lonely and wondering if I turned into an amazing drawer or not. Then one of the strongest and greyest pigeons flew in through the open window and landed in front of him.

“We are sickening of the way you treated us,” the pigeon said. “We haven't going to be taken it anymore.”

Hundreds of other huge pigeons flew in through the window and made a crowd behind the first one.

“We tire of watching you sitting in your about to be rocked chair while we slaved in the fields in the sun,” said another bird from the back row, and he swooped in with ropes and tied my real dad to the rocking chair.

“Let's see you having been relaxed
now,
” they all said, and pushed the chair way back and let it swing way forward. They rocked him back and forth, back and forth.

“But I don't understand,” said my dizzy dad, “I gave you everything you have! I put a roof over your heads, food on your tables, I give you plenty of vacation time!”

“We have been
pigeons,
” the first pigeon said. “We are not needing roofs over our heads, we have needed to be flying. We will be able to have found our own food, with no tables, and our vacations will have lasted forever! We will have been—”)

Then there was a loud popping sound and I was sitting at a big table with everyone in a dining room, getting served pancake breakfast. The bubble gum girl from the desk was coming towards the table with two plates stacked with pancakes that were almost as big as the plates. She dropped one off in front of me, and one in front of Simon, who was cleaning his glasses across the table from me. “Thank you very much,” Simon said, and the girl said nothing at all and walked back to the kitchen and came back with pancakes for Max and Maxine too. “Thank you,” said Aunt Maxine, and Uncle Max said, “Wow.” Simon pulled his black coat off his shoulders and hung it on the back of his seat. I watched him reach for the little jug of maple syrup and carefully pour it on top of his pancakes. He started with a big dot in the centre and then spiralled it outwards in a snail-shell pattern, almost as fast as a snail, too. “Please pass it after you're done with it, Arthur,” Maxine said. Simon handed me the little jug and I didn't use it, I just passed it sideways to Maxine. “You don't want any?” she asked.

“I'm not hungry.”

Simon frowned at me.

“But you love pancakes.”

“Sometimes,” I said.

I examined the pancakes. They were possibly the nicest pancakes I had ever seen, really, and I know what makes a good pancake good. These ones were perfectly yellow with hints of golden brown painted on top. They were big, almost perfect circles, and when you poked them they felt like a delicious pillow, not like a rubbery tire. Simon had his hands folded and his eyes closed, because he was saying a little prayer before eating. I usually did that too, not because I wanted to be like Simon or anything, but because I thought it was good to say thank you for getting to eat. But this time I had to say a prayer about
not
eating.

“Hello God,” I said in my brain, “thanks for the pancakes. If you care about the syrup and the trees and everything, please tell me somehow and I won't eat it. Okay goodbye.”

I opened my eyes and looked around at all the people, stuffing the food into their mouths. I cut off a piece of my pancake and chewed on it. It was only about 60% good-tasting. I know what makes a good pancake good, and pancakes without syrup are pretty terrible.

“Mmm,” Uncle Max mumbled with his mouth full. Aunt Maxine smiled.

I reached for the syrup and somehow—I have no idea how, because I am
not
a clumsy person—I knocked over the little jug and syrup spilled out all over the table. That was kind of a disaster, because the tablecloth was bright white and very clean.

“Uh oh,” Simon said, and he turned the jug back over. There was a gigantic puddle of brown on the tablecloth and it was soaking in. At least it was syrup, so it didn't shoot everywhere and get people wet, but it was just sitting there soaking in and laughing at me for being so clumsy.

Simon and Maxine were dabbing the table with napkins to clean up the huge sticky mess I made, and then I felt something on my shoulder. I turned my head around and it was the man-in-charge. He said “Is everything alright?” and Simon said “We had a bit of a spill but it's fine,” and the man-in-charge still had his big hairy hand on my shoulder, like grown-ups always do—they think they can just put their stupid hands on your shoulders, and mess your hair up and touch you on the cheek—and the man-in-charge asked me if I was enjoying my pancakes and I said “Don't touch me.” And he lifted his hand away and held it floating in the air like I was a hot burner on a stove, and he said “Easy, little guy” and he gave me a look like I was doing something wrong. He said “What's the matter?” and I thought about the trees losing all their sap and turning into transparent nothing and him not even caring, and I thought about ripping all the taps out and I said “I'm going to punch you,” and I transformed my hand into a fist and turned my teeth into shark teeth. The man-in-charge shook his head and looked angry but
I
was the one who was angry, and I didn't punch him but finally he walked away and Simon was staring at me like I was something gross he'd never seen before. And I didn't feel happy like you're supposed to feel when you win against someone in a fight; I didn't feel happy at all and I was even less happy because I realized I'd made my fist wrong, and not the way Max showed me one time, because I tucked my thumb inside my fingers so even if I was an expert puncher and punched the man-in-charge as hard as I ever could, I still wouldn't have actually won because I would have broken my own stupid thumb in half.

“I have to go to the bathroom,” I said, and I left Simon and everyone else and the sticky mess and went outside. I ran over to the other house and went in and that weird girl was at the desk again. She was everywhere at the same time; she was an octuplet or something. I asked about the bathroom and she said it was down the hall, so I ran down the hall and into this tiny white bathroom with red towels and my breaths were really fast. I didn't have to pee, I just needed to go away and to run somewhere. And I needed to have a sit-down. So I sat on the edge of the bathtub for about as long as it takes to pretend you're going pee. Then I stood back up and flushed the toilet and washed my hands, but I was still scared to leave the bathroom and I was still breathing excruciatingly fast so I sat back down for a couple more ice ages and thought about my deep breaths and thought about how punching doesn't make anything easier.

When I finally came out, the girl at the desk smiled at me and said, “How old are you?”

“Why?”

“Just wondering.” Her bubble gum exploded again.

“I'm ten,” I said. “How old are you?”

“I'm fifteen. My birthday was three days ago.”

“Happy birthday,” I said. “My birthday is December 5th.”

“You're pretty cute for ten,” she said.

“No I'm not,” I lied, and I walked out the door.

I carefully looked through the door of the dining room building but I didn't see the man-in-charge anywhere so I walked towards the table. Maxine was still eating, and Max and Simon seemed like they had been having a long important conversation and it was just about to end. I knew that because Simon was doing this thing he does where he leans back in his chair with his hands folded behind his head sort of like he's sunbathing, and he was shaking his head like “No,” staring straight ahead, and smiling really big. If he was doing all that, it usually meant that he had made up his mind on something, and if the next thing he did was take his glasses off his face and hold them out and stare through them like field glasses, that meant that no matter what, he would
never
change his mind.

“No, it would be fine,” I heard Max say as I was getting close to them. “It wouldn't be a big deal, and she—well, it wouldn't be a big deal.”

“I don't know,” Simon said in his tanning position. “We'll see.”

“We'll see” with Simon usually meant “No way,” but he didn't do the glasses-binoculars thing, so it was a little curious. I had no idea what they were talking about. Grown-up stuff probably. Banks and retiring and buying cars. Maybe we were finally getting a new car.

“What are you guys talking about?” I asked Simon as I sat down again.

“Adult stuff,” Uncle Max said. “Boring.”

“Let's get the
hell
out of here,” I said. I didn't really care what they were talking about. Simon said “Arthur,” 'cause I said “hell,” so I said “Sorry” and we got my pancakes boxed up for later and we left.

IN THE CAR on the drive home Max and me played the scribble game in my sketchbook again, but soon it got boring and I couldn't stop thinking about the most important and serious thing I had to do in my life at that moment, which was obviously to figure out where the Phil notebook came from, and what I was supposed to do with it, and if anyone could help me out. I was almost thinking maybe I should just phone 9-1-1, and also in the two days since my interview with Mrs. Beckham I must have almost-searched the internet for him a hundred times. But every time I was about to click the button I got the biggest throat lump. And once I clicked it and then closed the window right away 'cause Simon came into the kitchen, so I didn't see anything and I was glad. Both searching him and calling the police scared the heck out of me, and also for some reason it felt like I wouldn't find the right clues that way.

So when we drove past the orange fossil rock again, which was on my side this time, Max passed me a scribble and I looked at it for a bit, acting like I was scheming about what to draw, but I really wasn't. Max had his head against the window, checking out the scenery and the sun that was falling down in the sky but wasn't quite setting yet. I flipped the page and wrote him a little note instead of a drawing.

UNCLE MAX I HAVE A TOP SECRET THING TO TALK TO YOU ABOUT OK?

I handed the paper over to him and he glanced back at me, confused his eyebrows, then read it, and wrote back. He handed the sketchbook back over.

sure thing guy.

I FOUND SOMEONE'S JOURNAL IN THE WOODS. IT'S A SERIOUS JOURNAL. I HAVE STARTED TO GO AROUND INTERVIEWING THE GROANUPS ON MY STREET. I NEED SOME HELP.

(Now when I look at the pages in my sketchbook where we passed our notes, I can't believe I ever thought Max would be the best person to ask for help, but like I said, I was in
way
over my brain.) Uncle Max wrote:

sounds like an adventure. where do I sign up?

NOWHERE. I JUST NEED YOU TO LISTEN TO THE TAPES I WILL RECORD. THEY WILL BE SENT TO YOU IN THE MAIL. THEY WILL NOT BE THE SELF-DESTRUCTING KIND. YOU CAN LISTEN TO THEM AND SEND ME BACK A REPORT LIKE IF YOU THINK THE PEOPLE ARE LYING OR JUST STUPID OR IF YOU THINK THERE WAS A CLUE THAT I MISSED OR IF YOU THINK I MIGHT BE ASKING DUMB QUESTIONS. OK?

roger that. rendez-vous at the checkpoint in 0400 hours.

WHAT THE HECK?

I mean I would love to help.

I spend more time looking in mirrors than I should, watching “ME” ME ME ME ME, but I'm not convinced I'm related to my reflection. I'm not sure whether it looks like me or not, but it's not the image that throws me off, it's the way it behaves. When I move my hand, so does my reflection.
Always.
I've always thought I had much more in common with my shadow.

I'd much rather watch my shadow move, as it walks home through the snowy park in the night. I like how—no, I guess I really
respect
how when my legs cross over each other back and forth, they don't do the same in the shadow's reality. The thin black rectangles bulge up to accommodate a passing bump, or spill downwards off the edge of the path, then they leap back up onto the snowbank. When I approach the next lamp post and the icy ground glistens pale yellow, my shadow quickly reels itself in and cringes beneath me, buried under my feet, then starts to grow back, stretching way out in front of me. I can try to describe its motion all I want, but the truth is I never know exactly where I'll find my shadow, and often it's off somewhere I couldn't have predicted—wildly projected up onto a wall I've never noticed, or cloaking some window I myself will never get to look through—and I just like that.

This sure is one big clean room. A couple of makeshift hallways shaped by padded burlap-chic barrier things, comfortable carpet chairs with wooden arms and cushy seats, also burlap-chic. The tile floor pretends to be cleaner than it really is. The walls and wall things are covered in sun-washed posters from long lost eras of poster design, shouting the truth about chlamydia, smoking and depression in hyper-neon Technicolor. A wheelchair.

Everything seems wrapped in plastic, even though only half of it actually is. A suggestions box, a Tupperware crate of stuffed animals under a low table. The radio is playing the piece of music entitled “Eye of the Tiger.” One of the wall's posters hangs from its feet, the top pieces of tape having finally given up, admirable, they've been holding fast since '83. Only the poster's pale back is showing. Everyone here looks annoyed and then bored and then annoyed at being bored. Does the flaccid poster secretly hold some key to it all? Why am I too well-behaved to go flip it and check? What could it possibly say? “LIFE IS JUST A BIG THING MADE OF SMALL THINGS”—“THE ONLY WRONG IS THE WORD ‘WRONG'”—“THE REAL TRUTH ABOUT IT, THE WAY OUT OF THE