The truth was he had become infatuated with a showgirl. And when her performances moved from Boston to New York, Bucky tagged along. He withdrew his savings and took an entire chorus line of girls out to dinner at one of the city’s most exorbitant restaurants. He came home broke, and his parents promptly shipped him off to be an apprentice in a textiles factory in rural Quebec. It was a freezing little village. The work was miserable. It was one of the saddest parts of his biography.
I had to believe North Branch was better than the frozen plains of Quebec, but it was just as empty on that Sunday afternoon. Everything was closed and the streets were completely bereft of humans. I walked my bike over the cobblestones looking for HELP WANTED signs in the shopwindows. My nose had been running for the last hour, and my eyes were sore from crying. I tried hard to ignore my numbed feet and my hunger, and imagine a bright new life for myself instead.
The diversion only lasted so long. Hope dissolves quickly in the cold. I passed the dark windows of The Record Collector and Small World Paints. Neither advertised the need for an unskilled teen. I passed a drugstore and a jeweler’s. Finally, I rounded a corner and immediately spied what I thought was a mirage. A neon pink OPEN sign in the window of a hole-in-the-wall cafeteria. The Canteen, it was called. I counted the odd two dollars and coins in my pocket. $3.63. I locked my bike to a drainpipe and brought my guitar in with me. The warm breath of the café’s interior almost made me cry all over again, but I held myself together and sat down on a stool at the counter.
Within seconds, a plastic menu slapped down in front of me and an overfull glass of water came after it. I looked up to see a tall middle-aged woman nudging at a pair of glasses. She wore thick bifocals. Her face was tired but friendly.
“A traveling musician,” she said. “Isn’t it a little chilly to be out on the road?”
“Yes,” I said, “it is.”
I looked down at the menu, and when I glanced up moments later, she was gone. There were only a few other patrons in the place. An old man filling out a crossword. A young family in church clothes eating hamburgers. Everything on the menu was too much money. Six dollars for the “baskets,” sandwiches and french fries. I looked up again and the woman was walking by.
“Can you prepare a grilled cheese sandwich?” I asked.
“Impossible,” she said. Then she smiled. “It’s cheese and bread. I think we can handle it.”
“How much does that cost?”
“Four-fifty for the basket.”
“What about . . . with no basket?”
“Three even without fries,” she said.
I nodded my assent. She scribbled on a light green ticket and strode away on her tall legs. I watched as she glided into a small open kitchen. She stuck my ticket up on a metal wheel, and an older man promptly grabbed some buttered bread, and tossed it on a large grill. The smell of the cooking butter spilled out into the cafeteria and I shut my eyes. I was alone. Ordering food at a restaurant for the first time.
It wasn’t long before I started to remember my first grilled cheese. Two perfect halves, dipped in ketchup. An ice-cold grape drink on the side. The next time the waitress appeared I asked her politely where the pay telephone was. The truth was I had only one real option left. I watched the church family carefully on my way to the phone. In the old days they might have come for a tour of the dome after their meal. I might have sold them a magnet or a Bucky Ball. That was all over now.
I paged through the phone book for the Whitcombs’ home number just to make sure I had it right. I deposited my change and dialed. Janice answered on the third ring.
“Whitcomb residence,” she said.
“Mrs. Whitcomb.”
“Sebastian? Is that you?”
“It is,” I said.
“Did you want to speak with Jared? He’s changing out of his church garb right now, I’m afraid. Actually, I can’t really tell the difference between his church clothes and the regular ones . . .”
“I called to talk to you,” I said.
There was a pause on the line.
“Oh,” she said.
“Mrs. Whitcomb,” I said. “It appears I’ve become homeless.”
I tried to laugh, but nothing came out.
“What are you talking about?” she said.
“Nana asked me to leave this morning. I’ve been temporarily displaced. And I’m not sure what my next course of action should be. I . . .”
“Where are you?” she interrupted.
“The Canteen cafeteria,” I said. “I think maybe if I could find employment . . . but I’m not sure that’s possible. There are some factors that don’t seem to be in my favor.”
“Don’t move,” was all she said.
“Okay,” I said. “But I just need some advice.”
Janice hung up. I removed the greasy phone slowly from my ear. I placed it on its holder and turned back to the cramped dining room. The young family was watching me. They were no longer eating. I realized I might have spoken too loudly on the telephone. I felt their eyes on me as I made my way back to the counter, but I looked straight ahead. When I sat down, I found my sandwich steaming in front of me. It sat, like the original, in two triangular halves in the exact center of a red plate. The waitress bolted past.
“Your mom coming to rescue you?” she asked over her shoulder.
“Yes,” I said. “My mom.”
She kept moving without comment. I placed my three dollars on the counter and took a bite of the crisp grilled cheese. I looked out at the Cold Hard World on the other side of the glass. Nana had told me once that everything we looked at, our roads, trees, buildings, flowers, were all just groups of moving energies and elements. And they were all seeking the path of least resistance. Humans, she said, were no different. Change was the only constant for people. I tried to find some reassurance in this fact, but instead, the only thing I could think about was my old classroom in the dome. Before Nana’s interruption, there had been days where we spent the whole afternoon in discussion about these things. Life. Energies. Time and space. Everything.
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, JANICE WHITCOMB WALKED through the door. I was still at the counter, drinking my fifth or sixth refill of ice water when I saw her. She wiped her boots on a dirty wool mat. Her eyes and cold-reddened nose peeked out of the space between an orange hat and scarf. She took a seat on the stool next to me and lowered her scarf.
“Have you paid for that?” she asked.
She pointed at my grilled cheese.
“I have,” I said. “But I don’t have enough for service. I didn’t . . . know.”
Janice reached into a deep pocket of her coat and pulled out a narrow billfold. She removed two dollar bills and set them on the counter. We both stared at them.
“Are you ready to go?” she asked.
“Where?”
I honestly meant it. I wasn’t sure where she was going to take me. She didn’t answer. She just motioned down at the bass guitar at my feet. I picked it up and she led me out to the parked van. I tightened against the cold, and lowered my neck into my coat. Exhaust swirled around the back bumper of the van. I unlocked my bike and watched while Janice loaded it in the back. I slid open the passenger door and climbed inside.
As soon as I leaned back in the seat, I realized how fatigued I was. I tried to keep my eyes open, but they kept dropping closed. Janice put the van in gear and drove slowly down the brick street. When she started speaking, I was already near sleep. But her words, calm and measured, cut through the murk somehow.
“My husband doesn’t live with us anymore,” she said.
Her voice nearly broke on the word “husband.”
“If you’re going to be staying with us, there’s no reason I should keep lying to you about that. I don’t know why I do it. But I shouldn’t. He’s gone. He won’t be around.”
“Okay,” I said. It was all I could think of to say.
“It’s still a new thing, though,” she said. “Even a few months ago, he’d drop by. The kids aren’t used to it yet.”
She flipped on the defroster, and I felt a burst of warm air from the front.
“Did he leave because of Jared?” I asked. “I mean . . . because of . . .”
“I don’t know,” she sighed. “That was part of it. But there were other reasons, too. Problems between us.”
She watched me in the rearview mirror.
“We got married young,” she said. “For one thing. And I think that when you do that, it’s hard to tell if you’re really going to be compatible down the line. Sometimes you are. And sometimes it just takes one big problem to prove that you aren’t.”
She took a deep breath. “It also helps if you don’t marry a giant selfish baby.”
I tried to keep my eyes open.
“I shouldn’t say that,” she said. “It’s not that simple.”
I waited for her to tell me more. But instead she changed gears.
“I need to ask you a couple of questions,” she said. “Can you answer some questions for me, Sebastian?”
“I can,” I said.
I tried to straighten up in my seat.
“I’m going to be blunt,” she said, “because as much as I want to help you, my family has enough complications. Do you understand?”
“I do.”
“Good,” she said. “Then we have an understanding.”
She took a long breath. “First, I want to hear honestly: Did you really get thrown out of your house, or did you just run away after an argument? Are the police going to show up at my door?”
“Nana instructed me to leave,” I said. “She was clear about it.” She nodded.
“Are your parents really dead?” she said.
“They are.”
She flipped on her turn signal. She turned off the main thoroughfare onto the backstreets. A light sleet was falling from the sky now, and Janice switched on her wipers.
“Do you believe in God, Sebastian?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
She winced a little.
“I might,” I added, “I’m just . . .”
“Your first answer was fine,” she said.
She turned the wipers to a higher speed.
“And you understand about Jared’s condition?”
“I think so,” I said.
“It’s very possible that Jared could die,” she said. “Do you understand that?”
Her voice strained a little with the words, but she got them out.
“His body will never stop trying to reject that new heart, and that takes a toll on the health of an organ. We don’t know exactly how many years he has. Every case is different. But he’ll probably need to be back on the list for another one someday. Fifteen to twenty years is the longest they last. That’s the best-case scenario. Then he has to survive another transplant.”
“I see,” I said. It was hardly a whisper.
“Jared hasn’t told you all this?”
“No.”
“Well, he knows. He insists on hearing everything the doctors tell me.”
I was beginning to feel faint.
“It’s better to know the facts about these things in the end.” She continued to drive steadily ahead.
“This last question may be hard to answer. And I would mind my own business if I wasn’t taking you in for the time being. But here we are.”
I closed my eyes, focusing only on the sound of her voice.
“Sebastian,” she said. “Do you think your grandmother is of
sound mind
? Do you know what that means?”
“I know what you mean,” I said.
Instantly, I pictured Nana being hauled away somewhere. Back to the hospital. I saw her strapped down again to a gurney, a confused and defeated look on her face.
“I think she’ll be okay,” I said. “She’s confused. I’m sure it will pass eventually.”
We were coming up to the Whitcomb residence now, and Janice stopped talking long enough to concentrate on pulling into her garage. I watched the electric door wind up. I was starting to feel a real dizziness now. Maybe it was the information about Jared. Or just plain weariness. But my mouth was dry, and my neck was so hot. We docked in the unlit garage. Janice turned around and examined me.
“Hey,” she said, “are you okay?”
“I’m sure it will pass,” I said.
“What will pass?”
I slid down the bench seat of the van and laid my head down on the cushion.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m sure if I can only keep from emitting the wrong waves then everything will be . . .”
I couldn’t think of a way to finish the sentence so I just let out a long breath. No words were coming. I closed my eyes again and this time when I tried to open them they would not comply. After that, I remember only the sound of the driver’s-side door opening, and then Janice’s cool hand on my forehead. And as I fell into a deep sleep, I heard her voice.
“Okay,” she said, over and over. “It’s going to be okay.”
18.
Divide and Conquer
WHEN MY EYES DECIDED TO OPEN AGAIN, I WAS LYING on my back on a sofa. I was buried under a musty blanket, and there was a teeming glass of juice next to me on an end table. Also, Meredith Whitcomb was standing over me. I didn’t see her at first, all the way at the end of the couch, but my sleep-blurred vision instantly cleared when she came into view. I didn’t speak. I wasn’t sure what to say. I felt feverish, and everything came at me at once: the sound of loud music upstairs, the clamber of pots and pans in the kitchen, the warmth of the room. I took a sip of juice. Meredith sat down on the arm of the couch.
“You’re not in a coma,” she said. “I guess that’s a good thing.”
She looked sagely out the front window.
“How long was I sleeping?” I asked.
She held up five fingers.
“Five hours?”
She nodded.
“I can’t believe it.”
“My mom thinks you’re suffering from malnutrition or something. She’s cooking all the vegetables in the house. I can smell the onions in my room.”