Pulling up Stakes and Other Piercing Stories Page 3

  Katya crossed to the foot of the bed and stood by the box of cookies for a moment. She stroked the bright quilt that was draped over the mattress, then returned to the window. She glanced toward the sky as the glow of a nearby explosion — a direct hit on an ammunition stockpile — highlighted her face.

  Jorgi felt her tears burn small holes in his heart. Katya never cried. Not when she'd fallen and cut her knee so bad it had bled all day and half the night. Not when they'd gone nearly a week without food. Not even when she asked him about their parents. Now, she wept as if she'd just lost all her dreams.

  "Katya, don't cry," Jorgi said, trying to comfort his sister. As he looked around the room, he understood. In peace time, they'd slept in a truck and eaten scraps. That was the only life Katya knew. Until the fighting started. When the war came, it brought them food, soft beds, fireworks, and games.

  When the war is over... He thought of the way people said those words. It was with the same voice that said One day, when I'm rich, or If I were in charge or a thousand other impossible hopes.

  Jorgi put his arm around Katya's thin shoulders. "It was a silly thing for me to say. A joke. That's all. A stupid joke. The war will never end."

  "Promise?" she asked, huddling close to her brother.

  Jorgi nodded. "I promise." In the sky, an anti-aircraft shell exploded like a bright star. Not the first star of the night, but maybe still good enough. "The war will never end," he told Katya, making a promise, making a wish.

  The Heroic Quest of Douglas McGawain

  It was dark out. And stormy. No matter. We were warm and dry, and well cuddled. I was on the couch with Tracy, watching a movie down in her rec room. Rick and Debbie were with us, also well cuddled. Life was good. The night was young. If I were frozen in this moment for all of eternity, I'd be happy. And, as I said, well cuddled.

  I'd only been going out with Tracy for two months, but I'd never met anyone who fit so well into every part of my life. Whether we were studying, dancing, driving, sharing a sundae, playing table tennis, walking in the park, hanging out or cuddling, it felt right. We belonged together.

  While the moment couldn't last forever, I expected it to at least last until we watched the movies we'd rented.

  Then chivalry reared its ugly head.

  Debbie drained the soda from her glass and shook it. Rick, like any well-trained guy, responded to the clinking in the manner in which we'd all been conditioned. "I'll get it." He rose from his seat and carried the glass upstairs.

  He returned a moment later, the glass still empty.

  "Got any more diet Dr. Pepper?" he asked Tracy.

  "Just what was up in the fridge," she said. "I guess we're out."

  I wasn't surprised. For all her charm, beauty, wit, and magnificence, for all that I adored her, I was well aware that Tracy had an insignificant flaw. She wasn't great at planning ahead. She tended to run out of things. For that very reason, I'd brought a twelve pack of Mountain Dew with me. I didn't mind. Her flaw offered me countless chances to play the hero.

  "No big deal," Debbie said. "I can drink something else."

  "There's plenty of Dew," I said.

  Rick constructed an optical triangle, glancing from the glass to Debbie to some distant point beyond the wall in the general direction of the cold, wet world.

  "I'll go for some," he said.

  The triangle graduated to a quadrilateral as he included me in his circuit. I loosened my grip on Tracy. There were rules for this sort of thing. My response was as ritually ordained as saying "Bless you" to a sneeze. I spoke the required phrase. "I'll go with you."

  "You sure?" Rick asked, initiating the second round.

  "Yup." End of ritual.

  No big deal. We'd hop in the car. Drive to the nearest store. Grab some soda. Maybe some chips. And return as heroes. To be suitably rewarded with strokes and kisses for our bravery.

  No big deal at all.

  "Hang on," Tracy said as I walked toward the door.

  This, too, was part of the ritual. She had a craving. Yet more chance for me to save the day with Cool Ranch Doritos, Twizzlers, or some other object to satisfy her desires. Instead of telling me what she wanted, she rooted through her purse. I waited patiently, pleased by an opportunity to be gallant.

  Tracy frowned, shuffled through the contents a bit more, then shook her head, pulled out her wallet, and held out a ten-dollar bill. That was odd. I was more than happy to pay for her craving.

  "Could you get me some tampons while you're out."

  An electrical storm danced through my brain as it tried to make sense of those words.

  Oh my god.

  Tampons?

  Guys don't buy tampons. We just don't. Everybody knows that. "Uh...?" I sorted through a thousand potential excuses. They all sucked. Besides, this wasn't some nameless damsel in distress. This was Tracy.

  As I reached for the money, the chivalric code wrestled with unknown worlds. Under any other circumstance whatever, I was supposed to say, "That's okay. My treat."

  But tampons? Does a guy pick up the tab?

  Clueless, I took the money.

  Tracy spoke. A brand. A variety. A box color. "Want to write it down?" she asked.

  "I got it," I said, repeating the details to myself. Knowing I could never allow the existence of hard evidence in the form of a written mention.

  Rick was silent as we dashed through the rain to the car.

  "You ever...?" I asked when I got inside.

  He shook his head. We drove to the Seven Eleven which, despite its name, was open well past midnight. Rick went to the cooler. I scanned the aisles. There they were. A couple small boxes. I stared at them, trying to decipher the meanings of the words and compare them against the phrases Tracy had spoken. Light, medium, heavy, super, extra, carefree, fancy, and on and on like sacred words from the chanted mantra of a foreign cult.

  "You ready?" Rick asked. He stood at the end of the aisle, holding the soda in a bag, obviously unwilling to move any closer.

  A woman headed down the aisle. I shifted my attention away from the tampons and grabbed something else. Oh crap — hemorrhoid suppositories. I tossed the box back on the shelf and snatched the first masculine thing I saw. Shaving cream. "Hey," I called to Rick. "Look. This one's extra rich for dealing with manly stubble." I rubbed my cheek and tried to appear deep in thought.

  The woman stared at me for an instant, then grabbed a bottle of Tylenol and moved on.

  I sighed and studied the boxes again.

  "Just pick one," Rick said. "What's the difference?"

  I shook my head. Tracy had entrusted me. I wasn't going to fail. She'd always been there when I needed her.

  "Let's go to Shop Rite," I said.

  We drove onto Rt. 309 to the Shop Rite in the strip mall. As we pulled into the lot, I could see it was closed.

  But past the rows of shut stores, at the far end, I spotted salvation. "Big Wayne's is open," I said. It was a discount warehouse. Dad had gotten us a family membership. I didn't go there much, except when I wanted to load up on school supplies, or huge quantities of frozen burritos.

  Rick pulled to the curb by Big Wayne's. "I'll wait here," he said.

  Bastard. But I couldn't blame him. I wouldn't want to be anywhere near a guy buying tampons, either.

  "Right back." I got out of the car and went in, praying to the great Earth Mother that Big Wayne's would have tampons.

  Oh man, did they have tampons.

  A whole freaking aisle. Boxes in every color. Boxes in every brand. Boxes in every length, width, and voltage for all I knew. But every single one of the boxes was about half the size of a full grown bull elephant.

  Damn. There was no way I could pretend to study shaving cream. Anyone facing these shelves was after only one thing. At least the aisle was empty of other shoppers for the moment.

  I found the section with Tracy's brand. But that was just the beginning. Good lord. There were so many varieties, I started to question m
y own limited grasp of female anatomy. It couldn't be this complicated.

  There. Up at the top. Blue boxes. She'd said blue. And the words matched those she'd spoken. I'd found them.

  Eight feet off the floor.

  I jumped and tried to grab a box.

  I was barely able to bump it with my fingers. I looked around for a ladder. Nothing in sight. I jumped again, and managed to prod the box slightly from the shelf. Four more jumps, and I got it jutting out far enough that I could knock it free.

  Along with about twenty other boxes.

  Thanks to a panicked leap backwards, I avoided being killed by the sharp corner of a box holding hundreds of tampons. Wouldn't that make a great headline?

  But I had what I needed.

  I've always cleaned up my own messes. Until now. I left the aisle, and the pile of boxes. The twinge of guilt was a nice break from the stew of embarrassment, shame, fear, and confusion I'd been steeping in since I'd left the house.

  Now, one final obstacle.

  I approached the registers. Three were open. I checked my cashier options. A teen girl. No way. An older woman. Maybe in her late thirties. Bright blond hair. Long red nails. Very sexy body. The kind of woman who could make me feel like a little boy, or cut me in half with a sneer. Nope. Last choice. An old guy. Yeah.

  As I headed for him, he flicked off the light above the register. I took a chance and plopped down the box.

  "Closed," he said.

  I implored him with my eyes. I pointed at the box. I sent a mental message, from one guy to another. I'm buying tampons, for god's sake. Help me out. It was no use.

  I carried the box to the short line at the blond woman's register. Too late, I noticed that there were a couple guys right in front of me dressed like they'd just finished a shift at a mill.

  One glanced over his shoulder, started to look away, then stared at the box in my hands. He nudged his buddy. They both looked back and laughed.

  I could feel myself shrinking to a size small enough to hide behind the box.

  God. I realized people were staring at me from all over.

  Finally, the guys in front of me were done. One blew me a kiss as he left. I put the box on the conveyor.

  The woman — her name tag said Myrna — scanned the box without even glancing at me. I handed her the money. She gave me my change and a receipt. No bag. Big Wayne's didn't believe in frills like bags.

  I couldn't believe I was going to escape without one final knife thrust.

  Then she spoke.

  "Girl friend?"

  I looked up as I grabbed the box.

  "Yeah."

  "Good for you, Sugar." Myrna gave me a tired smile. "Takes a real man to buy tampons for a lady."

  "Thanks."

  As I walked off, she called, "You ever break up, you come see me. I could use a real man."

  Whoa. The fantasy that danced through my mind was quickly extinguished by the knowledge that, whether I was a real man or not, I had a real woman. And she was waiting for me.

  Still, I was walking a bit taller when I left the store, until the wind hit me in the face.

  As I hunched over and rushed through the rain to Rick's car, I imagined the damage that would occur if the box got wet. I could see it swell to even more immense proportions, then explode, showering me in tampons.

  "Christ, put that in the trunk," Rick said when I started to get inside. "If it will fit. You planning to supply the whole field hockey team?"

  "Lighten up. They don't bite."

  He popped the trunk and I put the tampons away.

  "Can we go now?" Rick asked.

  "Absolutely."

  "Good." He pulled away from the curb. "I'm done for the night. No more errands."

  "That's for sure." I glanced at the trunk, hoping I hadn't somehow screwed up and bought the wrong thing. Outside, the rain fell even harder against the windshield.

  When we got back, I handed Tracy the box. "They didn't have anything smaller," I said. "I hope this is okay."

  "You did great." She rewarded me with a smile. "Thanks. Sorry to make you run out in the rain."

  "No problem," I said. "No problem at all."

  "My hero," Tracy said.

  "Hey, whose hero am I?" Rick asked as he handed Debbie a can of soda.

  Debbie frowned at the can, and then at Rick. "This isn't diet."

  I cuddled down on the couch with Tracy.

  "Guess I'll go get some more soda," Rick said. He glanced at me. "Yeah... I'll go out again..."

  "Hurry back," I said. Then I turned my full attention to cuddling with my lady.

  Bread on the Water

  "It's going to be a long sermon," Andy whispered to me."Yeah, we're doomed." I could tell we were in trouble all the way from the back pew. Pastor Donald had stuck so many little colored slips of paper in his Bible, it looked like a piñata. He wasn't the sort of preacher who'd share a couple short verses and set us free to enjoy the day. He really liked to hammer home his messages.

  "Turn with me to Romans twelve," Pastor Donald said.

  Andy started to snicker. "Romans twelve, Christians nothing," he whispered.

  "Ssshhh," I gave him an elbow and looked around. Mrs. Skeffington, three pews ahead and over to the left, was glaring at us. So were Mr. and Mrs. Linden, over on the right.

  "As most of you are aware," Pastor Donald said, "this is one of Paul's most important epistles."

  "Is the epistle loaded?" Andy asked.

  I knew I shouldn't have sat back here with Andy. But I liked hanging out with him. Except when he got goofy. Which was more than half the time. Right now, he'd buried his face in his hands. I could hear snorts spilling out as he tried to muffle the laughter.

  "Knock it off, Andy," I said. "It wasn't that funny."

  Pastor Donald started to read out loud. "Verse twenty tells us, 'if your enemy is hungry, feed him.'"

  "Feed him some knuckles," Andy said, lifting his face from his hands.

  I checked out my parents, up front. They hadn't looked back. Not yet. Neither had Andy's parents. If I could get Andy to calm down, everything would be okay. "Just cut it out," I said. "All right?"

  No such luck. Andy was on a roll. And Pastor Donald was about to hand him even better material to work with. After a brief visit with the Good Samaritan in Luke, and a short hop through Ecclesiastes, he landed squarely in James, chapter two, verse fifteen.

  If a brother or sister be naked...

  "If a sister be naked, I'm staying," Andy said. "If a brother be naked, I'm splitting."

  ...and destitute of daily food,

  "I thought destitutes made good money." He scratched his head. "Hold it. I think I got my 'tutes mixed up."

  And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?

  "Doth?" Andy said, stretching it out wetly like Daffy Duck. "Doth who? Doth Vader?" He looked at me and raised one eyebrow. "Be ye warm, Tommy?"

  As I reached over to smack Andy, the shadow of assistant Pastor John fell across us.

  "Out," he whispered, pointing at the door with one hand and clutching the edge of the pew with the other. I could almost hear the wood splintering beneath his grip.

  "I wasn't doing anything," I said.

  His index finger curled in, joining the rest of his fist. "Out. Both of you."

  Andy shrugged and slipped past me. I followed him toward the door, hoping nobody noticed that we'd just been banished from church. As I glanced back, I saw that Mrs. Skeffington was following our exodus with the gloating satisfaction of someone who has just seen her worst enemy caught stealing money from the collection plate. No doubt, she'd make sure that my parents didn't remain uninformed of my transgression.

  My only consolation was the sight of Pastor Donald's Bible, which still had enough slips in it to fuel a small fire. I was going to miss a ton of scripture.

  I could still hear Pastor
Donald as the door closed behind me. "We are here to help others. Friend, enemy, brother, sister, neighbor, stranger — it doesn't matter."

  Apparently, Andy could hear him, too. "Butcher, baker, candlestick maker," he said, getting in one last shot.

  I pushed him, but not too hard. It felt good to be free.

  "So, whatcha want to do?" Andy asked when we'd walked down the steps to the street.

  "I want to snap your head off," I said.

  "Now that's not very Christian." Andy pointed over his shoulder. "You should spend more time in church."

  "Look who's talking." I wanted to be angry, but what the heck — it was a beautiful autumn day, cold and crisp, without a cloud in the sky. And my fate was at least an hour and a half away. Between the sermon and the singing, church wouldn't get out until eleven. I slipped into my jacket.

  Andy was already walking toward the center of town. "What do you feel like doing?" I asked when I'd caught up with him.

  "I don't know. How much money you got?"

  I looked through my wallet. "Enough for a couple orders of fries and some shakes," I said. "But not enough for a cruise to the Bahamas."

  "Guess we'll have to settle for the fries." Andy checked his own wallet. "I think I can upgrade our meal in the direction of a couple burgers."

  We headed toward the Bridgeview Diner. When we were half a block away, I noticed a guy huddled in the entrance of a small office building across the street. He noticed me, too. He stood and headed toward us in a way that reminded me of how my cat acts when I open the fridge.

  "Man, he's going to ask for spare change," I said. His hand was already out. I hated dealing with bums.

  "I never give them money," Andy said.

  I was glad to hear that. I figured they probably just spent it on booze.

  Sure enough, the guy reached us before we could get to the door of the diner. I took a step back. He looked pretty grubby. His wool plaid jacket was so worn that the squares were all the same color. I dropped my gaze, and found myself staring at shoes that had split on the sides and were now wrapped with twine. "Could you boys spare some money? I haven't eaten in a while." His voice was so quiet I almost couldn't make out the words.