American Rust Part 7

"I dunno," he said. "I guess home."

"I'll drive you." She stood up, naked. She was so small. "Jesus, I'm s.h.i.+tfaced," she said. "No wonder I wanted to seduce you." She smiled at him.

He was slightly hurt by the implication but he smiled anyway and his head began to feel straight again, this was as good as it would get, two old friends, occasional benefits, any more and she'd take him under and then leave him there. He was glad it had happened, a good reminder of how it was supposed to be. It was supposed to mean something, it was more than just body parts. Life was long and he would feel this way again only not with her. He couldn't figure out why he was feeling so natural about it, he hoped the feeling would last, he knew this was how he should close it. The end of one book of his life. He did not want to think about it.

"I'm glad I got to see you again," he said. He cleared his throat and made himself lean forward to kiss her forehead. She tried to pull him back to the couch.

"You might as well stay a while longer," she said. "We might as well do it all night."

"I should get home."

"I meant what I said."

"I know," he said. "I know you did."

As he was leaving, he turned to wave and saw something move in Isaac's window. He kept walking. Soon he was in the dark under the trees.

8. Lee She was lying on the couch, looking around at the home she'd grown up in but had put from her mind five years now, water- stained ceilings, patches of wallpaper curled from dry plaster, Isaac's books flung everywhere. Since she'd left, the books had filled the house. Old science textbooks he'd picked up at thrift stores, copies of National Geographic, Nature, Popular Science, National Geographic, Nature, Popular Science, piles of them on every shelf, on her mother's upright piano, the stacks of books and magazines spread across the living room in unruly ma.s.ses. It was a large room but still there seemed barely enough s.p.a.ce for her father's wheelchair to pa.s.s. Obviously, Henry had decided to tolerate it. But maybe he no longer cared. A person looking in the window would have thought the house belonged to some crazy old lady and about twenty cats. piles of them on every shelf, on her mother's upright piano, the stacks of books and magazines spread across the living room in unruly ma.s.ses. It was a large room but still there seemed barely enough s.p.a.ce for her father's wheelchair to pa.s.s. Obviously, Henry had decided to tolerate it. But maybe he no longer cared. A person looking in the window would have thought the house belonged to some crazy old lady and about twenty cats.

On one hand she loved her brother for it, his curiosity, he was always teaching himself things, but she was beginning to worry about him. He was getting more isolated and eccentric. Right, she thought. You're the one who stuck him here. It didn't seem like she'd had a choice about it. She'd always thought she had escaped just in time, outrun the sense she'd had her entire childhood that with the exception of her even-stranger younger brother, she was fundamentally alone. It was not a good way to think. It had changed completely when she got to Yale, not right away, but quickly enough, her sense of aloneness, of what she would now describe as an existential isolation, had disappeared. Her entire childhood in the Valley now seemed like a past so distant it might have been another person's life. She'd found a place she belonged. It seemed impossible she'd have to give that up and come back here.

There was a creaking from upstairs-her brother was still awake. She felt guilty. I'm working on it, she told herself. Simon's family had agreed to pay for a nurse, she'd made some phone calls, tomorrow she would start the interviews. It could not have gone any faster. Same as what they taught you as a lifeguard-you have to save yourself before you can save anyone else. That's what she was doing. She had gotten herself to solid ground and now she was coming back for her family. You sure took your time about it, she thought, but that probably wasn't true, she was just being hard on herself. She hadn't been a particularly good lifeguard, either-her body wasn't big or buoyant enough and technique only went so far. A heavy enough person would drag her under every time.

She got up and walked around the stairs, through the small dining room, and into the kitchen. Off the kitchen, in the den which had been converted to a bedroom, she heard her father snoring, the long pauses when his breathing seemed to stop. It is him, she thought. He is the problem. Her ears and neck got very hot and she had to wash her face in the sink, it was the old feeling that there were terrible things in motion and she would only understand when it was too late, it was the feeling she a.s.sociated with this house, with the entire town. She felt it every time she came home. Soon they would all be gone from it. It was a conversation she'd been planning for years, telling her father it was time for both of his kids to leave. That he could stay in the house with a nurse or move to a home, but that the time for Isaac to stay had pa.s.sed.

She had always been the favorite. Their father treated Isaac like a foster child, because he, Henry English, was a big man from a line of big men, because Isaac had a curious mind and Henry English did not, and while those same faults, smallness and fine- mindedness, were acceptable in his wife and daughter, when they appeared in his son it was as if everything he had to offer, everything he had valued in himself, it had all been submerged under the character of his wife. Including her Mexican coloring, which both children had inherited. Their skin wasn't that dark, really, they just looked slightly tan, Isaac could have pa.s.sed for someone from the hills. Not so much her, though. A little more foreign. Dark eyebrows, she thought. Meanwhile Henry English was pale and red- haired. Or had been, anyway.

Their mother had come to the U.S. to study at Carnegie Mellon, and as far as Lee knew, she had never gone back. By the time her kids were born she had no trace of an accent and neither Lee nor Isaac had ever heard her speak Spanish. Right, she thought. As if Henry would have allowed that anyway. He wouldn't have been happy either if he knew you checked the box, called yourself Latina, on your college and law school applications. She'd thought it over many times, but when the time came she hadn't hesitated to do it. It was true and not true. She could look the part if she wanted, but she didn't know the language, not even a nursery rhyme-she was the daughter of a steelworker, it was a union family. At Yale she'd learned French. As far as college and graduate school went, she probably would have gotten in anyway, she had perfect SATs and nearly perfect LSATs but there were times she wished she could know for sure. Obviously it was a luxury to even wonder about it.

She took a handful of vitamins for all the wine she'd had, drank a gla.s.s of water, and went back to the living room. She couldn't get over the house-it was bigger and grander than some of the houses of her professors. Built for some businessman in 1901, the date in stone over the front door. A little ostentatious, but that was the style then. Her father loved the house more than he would ever admit. They had bought it in 1980, when things were beginning to slow, when people in the Valley were much less sure about buying big houses. Later, it had been the reason he had to take the job in Indiana, after the mill downtown had closed, living in a shack while he sent back money. In hindsight it seemed stupid. But of course that was the American Dream. You weren't supposed to get laid off if you were good at your job.

She wasn't ready to go upstairs and face her brother and decided she would sleep on the couch. Cheating had always seemed a male thing to do. She wondered why she'd slept with Poe. Maybe because she owed him, she'd made him some silent promise, the sort of promise you made with your body and she had broken it. Not so much by getting married as by not telling him. Or maybe she wanted this marriage to be over sooner rather than later, and was trying to speed up the process. No, that was not what she wanted but still, married at twenty- three, it was a little ridiculous. She had done it to show Simon she forgave him, it seemed as good a reason as any. Still there were days when he wouldn't get out of bed, barely acknowledged her existence. He was going through a hard time but maybe he had always been like that. He was going through a hard time but he'd grown up on an estate in Darien, Connecticut. He was a little bit spoiled.

Also, she still loved Poe, in a hopeless sort of way, in a way she would never love anyone else because she knew it could never go anywhere- Poe was a boy from the Valley, Poe loved the Valley, Poe had not read a book since graduating from high school.

She didn't feel sorry yet but that was probably still the endorphins. Or maybe not-Simon he'd cheated how many times, three girls she knew about and then how many others she didn't? She wondered if the statute of limitations had expired on those things. She wondered what she would do about Simon. He was already getting testy, she'd only been away two days but he wasn't doing well on his own, he'd gone to stay with his parents in Darien. From Darien it was only an hour train ride into New York, he had maybe fifty friends in the city but he didn't feel like leaving the house. It was depression but it was also a habit. It was his habit of acting helpless. To say he was a little spoiled-it was a gross understatement. If his supply of money were to somehow run out... he wouldn't make it. Maybe half of her Yale friends would make it. Most of them worked very hard, but none had any idea what it was to want something they wouldn't get. A specific lover, maybe. You're being defensive, she thought. This is better than you ever thought it could be. You are happier than anyone you know.

She still had principles-there was no longer any real reason to go to law school but she was still going. Simon was trying to talk her out of it, he wanted to do some extended traveling-there was a family house in Provence that was barely used. Only it was too cliche, blue- collar girl marries into rich family, benefits accrue. When she thought about that it made her sick. She would not take their money. Except they're happy to have you, you'll be the most well- adjusted person in their family-a scary thought. Obviously they had more money than she could reasonably expect to make in her entire life, even if she got a job at a Big Firm, which she would not do, she'd end up doing something for humanity, work for the Department of Justice or something, civil rights law. That is what everyone tells herself, she thought: I'm going to Harvard Law so I can be a public defender. Was it Harvard? She had gotten into Stanford and Columbia as well, all she had to do was pick. Actually she knew. Harvard, obviously. She couldn't help smiling. Christ you're a sn.o.bby b.i.t.c.h. That was alright. As long as you don't let anyone know. You just tell them you're going to school in Boston, and then if they ask further ... but under no circ.u.mstances offer the information otherwise. It just sounded too snotty-Harvard. It was the same as Yale but worse. What about your brother, she thought. What is your brother going to do?

She wondered if she and Poe had been loud, she wondered if Isaac was a virgin and he'd heard her having s.e.x with Poe. It would be horrible. She was not sure how much she knew him anymore. Part of her worried he was headed for serious trouble. She couldn't sleep. She opened her eyes and sat up.

She made a mental inventory of all that was wrong with the house- roof, paint and plaster on the inside, the trim around the windows was rotted, the bricks needed repointing-those were just the things her father had told her. It was a gorgeous house but it would likely cost more to fix those things than they'd get out of selling the place as is.

Because that was what was going to happen. Isaac was not going to stay here any longer, and she was not coming back, and Henry would have to accept that. He was willing to sacrifice Isaac, but she was not. Except you did, she thought. You let this go on way too long.

She wondered what they'd get for the house. In Boston or Greenwich it would sell for two million, but in the southern Mon Valley it might go for forty thousand. The neighbor's house had been empty twelve years, even the For Sale sign had faded and rotted away. The state had built a brand- new highway running north to Pittsburgh but there were never any cars on it, it was hard to imagine that in any other place, an enormous highway that no one used, the central artery, empty. Driving around New York or Philadelphia, the entire I-95 corridor, you wouldn't believe a place like this existed, and only a few hours away.

To help her get to sleep she decided to read in front of a fire. She opened the flue and piled some logs on the grate and put newspaper under them and lit the paper but after the paper burned out the logs were just smoldering, no real heat or flame. The smell of smoke filled the house and she opened the windows so the smoke detectors wouldn't go off. She was an idiot, really, how she'd managed to grow up in a town like this and still be such a girl. She did not know how to start a fire, shoot a gun, anything like that, she'd never had any interest though she'd grown up in Pennsyltucky for Christ's sake, it was embarra.s.sing. Maybe before she left she would ask her father to do that, teach her how to shoot one of his handguns, tin cans in the backyard or something. That was something he'd be happy to do.

Looking through the books she'd brought, she picked up Ulysses, Ulysses, but couldn't figure out where she'd stopped. She wondered if it was really such a great book if you could never remember what you'd just read. She liked Bloom but Stephen Dedalus bored the c.r.a.p out of her. And Molly, she'd skipped ahead to read that part. Racy for then, pages and pages of masturbating. At least she would not have to do that tonight. That was a relief. It had gotten to be a ch.o.r.e, really. Here she was, a young hot piece of a.s.s and no one to give her what for, only her own hand to depend on. She shouldn't be so hard on Simon, really. It was only because she worried about him. He had hurt that girl, it had not even been his car, it was John Bolton's car, it was John Bolton that should have been driving. John Bolton had been nearly sober but he liked to encourage Simon, the bad part of Simon. John Bolton was one friend she wished Simon didn't have. Actually, there were several others. Anyway there was the black ice on the road. That was what the investigators had determined. There was no point in even thinking about it. She had forgiven him. You did not forgive people and then change your mind later. Simon hadn't forgiven himself and that seemed like enough punishment. She wanted them to have a normal life again, it didn't have to be crazy googly eyes or anything, just back to the way it was. Except there was Poe who is so warm you want to wrap yourself around him, you see him and you cannot stop touching him. You would not be happy with Poe, she reminded herself. Poe who gets in bar fights. Poe will never leave the Valley no matter how all the blood rushes down there and everything so sensitive and wanting pressure even thinking about it now she closed her legs together very hard Poe Poe Poe she squeezed her legs harder she thought about his flat stomach and the muscles on his chest she listened her father was still asleep she slipped her hand under her skirt, no she thought, there's no need for that. She took her hand back. but couldn't figure out where she'd stopped. She wondered if it was really such a great book if you could never remember what you'd just read. She liked Bloom but Stephen Dedalus bored the c.r.a.p out of her. And Molly, she'd skipped ahead to read that part. Racy for then, pages and pages of masturbating. At least she would not have to do that tonight. That was a relief. It had gotten to be a ch.o.r.e, really. Here she was, a young hot piece of a.s.s and no one to give her what for, only her own hand to depend on. She shouldn't be so hard on Simon, really. It was only because she worried about him. He had hurt that girl, it had not even been his car, it was John Bolton's car, it was John Bolton that should have been driving. John Bolton had been nearly sober but he liked to encourage Simon, the bad part of Simon. John Bolton was one friend she wished Simon didn't have. Actually, there were several others. Anyway there was the black ice on the road. That was what the investigators had determined. There was no point in even thinking about it. She had forgiven him. You did not forgive people and then change your mind later. Simon hadn't forgiven himself and that seemed like enough punishment. She wanted them to have a normal life again, it didn't have to be crazy googly eyes or anything, just back to the way it was. Except there was Poe who is so warm you want to wrap yourself around him, you see him and you cannot stop touching him. You would not be happy with Poe, she reminded herself. Poe who gets in bar fights. Poe will never leave the Valley no matter how all the blood rushes down there and everything so sensitive and wanting pressure even thinking about it now she closed her legs together very hard Poe Poe Poe she squeezed her legs harder she thought about his flat stomach and the muscles on his chest she listened her father was still asleep she slipped her hand under her skirt, no she thought, there's no need for that. She took her hand back.

She picked up Ulysses. Ulysses. Hands are for turning pages, she decided. Leopold Bloom was having lunch. She wanted to fall asleep. She wondered if she had any Henry James. Except right there on the side table was her old copy of Hands are for turning pages, she decided. Leopold Bloom was having lunch. She wanted to fall asleep. She wondered if she had any Henry James. Except right there on the side table was her old copy of Being and Nothingness. Being and Nothingness. Sartre-that was an equally good choice, good as Ambien. What should she pick? It was a very tough decision her life was full of them. She decided to stick with Joyce, she would get as far as she could. After a few more pages she was dozing happily. Sartre-that was an equally good choice, good as Ambien. What should she pick? It was a very tough decision her life was full of them. She decided to stick with Joyce, she would get as far as she could. After a few more pages she was dozing happily.

9. Isaac There was a noise and he woke up; he hoped it was morning but there was just the blue black of night, bright stars. The TV is on, he thought, but it was not the TV It was from the porch. Poe and Lee talking. You know why. After a time he heard Poe say he loved her and she repeated it back to him and then it got quiet, he could feel the skin on his neck tingle like he was drunk. It's all of them, he thought. Lying right to your face.

They were on the porch, where his father had hung his workclothes so as not to get the dust in the house. He remembered grabbing his father's legs but his father, wearing dirty long johns, pus.h.i.+ng him away until he dressed. Is that a real memory, he wondered. Or just something you think might have happened.

He listened a while longer, heard his sister suddenly whimper. All of them, their human condition. Even your own mother waded out to sink. Pocketful of rocks. Final eyeblink, saw her whole life in it. Wonder did it make her feel good or bad.

He needed something to rinse his throat. Keep this up, he thought. Keep this up and it's back to the river in no time. He got up and stood near the open window in the cold breeze his head was swimming, he had a feeling his room was enormous, looking around in the dark it seemed the walls stretched on forever like a fever dream, he remembered his mother holding iced towels to his neck. Taught fourth and fifth grade because she couldn't handle the older ones. Old man tells everyone she was pushed. Coverup, he says, uninvestigated murder. Can't go to heaven if you kill yourself.

Even her-she lived only for herself. Got tired and checked out. Easy to be generous when it doesn't matter but when the hard decisions come you see what they all choose. It doesn't matter doing right when it's easy. Her, Poe, Lee, the old man. As if they're the only ones alive on earth. Meanwhile you're always expecting different. It is your own fault expecting things.

You are the one who let her go-watched her walking down the driveway, last you saw of her. Maybe the last anyone saw of her. Maybe she saw someone along the way. Wish she did and wish she didn't. That was the happiest you'd seen her in a while. Went up to your room and then saw her walking. Seemed out of place but didn't know what. A nice day, she was going for a walk. Back to your reading. Time Time magazine. I was reading magazine. I was reading Time Time magazine when my mother died. If I had chased her down, he thought. Why would you have-there was no reason. Nice day for a walk. What no one knows about you. I didn't know, he thought. Alright alright alright. Put it out of your mind. magazine when my mother died. If I had chased her down, he thought. Why would you have-there was no reason. Nice day for a walk. What no one knows about you. I didn't know, he thought. Alright alright alright. Put it out of your mind.

He stood in the dark listening. The voices started again, giggling, then the porch door opened and closed. He watched them walk out into the driveway holding hands, kissing their good- byes. Maybe you only care because they're happy, he thought. But he didn't think that was true. Poe was walking alone across the dark lawn, down the hill toward the road, Isaac watched him and the strange way he had of bouncing on his toes. Poe turned again and waved to Lee. That's all, you're being petty. Angry because they are happy. Then he thought no, it has nothing to do with that. It's because of what they have inside. But somehow you've turned out worst of all of them.

He reached for the light but it was too late, there was a loose fluttery feeling in his chest, his heart was beating faster than it ever had and his legs went loose and he sat down. There was a warm feeling like he was p.i.s.sing himself. Faulty wiring. He took deep breaths but it was beating too fast, fluttering too fast to pump blood. Like the kid who died at soccer. Didn't confess. Please G.o.d, he thought. He sat against the wall and he couldn't get enough air and he was distantly aware of being cold again and wet everywhere. He tried to call out for his sister but he couldn't and then the feeling began to pa.s.s. He felt embarra.s.sed.

You need to get out of here, he felt more than thought. On shaky legs he got himself up and turned on the light, examined himself, his thin naked body, there was almost no substance to it. He was still shaking and wanted to sit back down but he made himself stand until his legs felt strong again. He was clammy with sweat but that was all. Get up and get moving. Get. Out. Of here. He wiped himself off with a s.h.i.+rt and grimaced. Look at you-when it comes down to it you think Lord G.o.d come and save me. Confession get my pardons. Christ, he thought. He felt embarra.s.sed though of course there was no one to be embarra.s.sed in front of. Go on and pay a visit to St. James. Dear old Father Anthony, moral guide and choirboy fondler. Ten Hail Marys and a b.l.o.w.j.o.b. Jerry what's- his- name, the kid from Lee's year, had a breakdown. Meanwhile half the town still goes-easier to believe that young Jerry was a liar. Diddle our sons but you can't shake our faith.

He knew it wasn't true about his sister. She was not a bad person. Their mother dying, it had driven Lee away, she'd gone off to college right after. He didn't think she'd chosen another life, not exactly, but a different path had been offered and eventually she'd decided to take it. How can you blame her? You made one visit to New Haven and knew it was right for her. Probably right for you, too, but too late for that. No, he thought, that's just your pride.

Most of what he needed was in the backpack he'd left by the machine shop. That was the first order of business. It was a crime scene but so what. He couldn't believe they'd been so stupid today, just walked through the field. It would have been easy to stake the place out and make sure no one was watching. Lessons of hindsight. You are not playing by the same rules as last week, even. No more stupid mistakes. He found a spare set of thermals and began dressing, his heavy cargo pants, a heavy flannel s.h.i.+rt, wool sweater. Get your fis.h.i.+ng knife, you might need it.

He bent the sheath loop backwards so it would sit inside his waistband and still clip to his belt. He looked at himself in the mirror, a knife in his belt, and felt ridiculous. Go down and talk to your sister. No, it's too late for that. It was stupid but there seemed to be no way around it. You're going to die alone, he thought. This isn't kid's stuff anymore.

You didn't have to leave this way. Only now you do. Took the car the other day up to Charleroi and then you were on 70 West and you kept going, just to see what it felt like, nearly ran out of gas and got home after dark, he was waiting for you. Sitting on the porch, just waiting for you in the dark. Meanwhile you are twenty years old.

I had an appointment with Terry Hart that I missed.

Why didn't you ask him to pick you up?

You know I don't like to do that.

Alright, you told him. you told him. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

It's my car, he told you. he told you. Don't borrow it again unless you tell me where you're going and when you'll be back. Don't borrow it again unless you tell me where you're going and when you'll be back.

Knew he was pus.h.i.+ng you-the car was your only freedom. But that is his way. Could have lent you the money to buy a car but didn't. When you got that job in the Carnegie Library-two hours each way on the bus-he got sick all of a sudden. Four visits to the doctor in a week. Wanted you home but wouldn't say it. That was his way of telling you. And you gave in. Some part of you was happy to give in. The same part of you that has kept you here waiting two years now.

The air in his room suddenly felt thin and he had an urge to get outside as quickly as possible but he took a final look around and made himself think. There was the ceramic bank his mother had given him, he hadn't wanted to break it before, it was in the shape of a schoolhouse and it had been full for years but now he cracked it on the edge of the dresser, took the dollars and the quarters, counted it, thirty- two fifty, left the rest of the change on the bed. Rifling his desk for anything else he needed to bring, Social Security card, anything, but he'd packed so carefully the last time that there was nothing. Everything-the money, his journals, everything else-was in his surplus Alice pack sitting under that pile of sc.r.a.p metal in the field. Unless someone found it. Unlikely, he decided. They had no reason to search the field, everything they needed was in that building. He glanced briefly at the picture of his mother over his desk but it didn't inspire any sort of feeling. It is because of her checking out that you lost Lee and now you've lost Poe as well. Or maybe that happened a long time ago. Either way it's better that you know it.

He got his spare schoolbag and put a blanket and extra socks in it just in case. In case nothing. You need to get the other pack. After a final inventory he went softly down the stairs, found his sister asleep on the couch, her foot tucked in a hole in the torn plaid cover. He watched her as he laced up his boots. Cheats on her husband, falls fast asleep. Miraculous conscience. Deleted at birth. These are just things you are saying to yourself, he thought.

She opened her eyes, groggy, not sure who was there. He walked past her toward the door.

"Isaac?" she said. "Where are you going?"

"Nowhere."

"Wait a second, then."

"I heard you and Poe."

She looked confused and then she was more awake, she looked again at his backpack, his coat and hat and hiking boots. She untangled herself and stood up quickly. "Hold on," she said. "It isn't how it sounded. It isn't anything. It's an old thing but now it's over."

"You told him you loved him, Lee."

"Isaac."

"I believe you. I know that somehow in your mind, both of those things can be true."

"Just hear me out."

She took another step toward him and b.u.mped a pile of ancient books, which fell heavily to the floor, startling her. For a second he seemed to see her clearly, her hair disheveled, hollows under her eyes, the grand old living room now filled with junk, so different from the way their mother had kept things. The house literally falling apart around her. She didn't know how to handle any of it. The only thing she knew how to do was leave.

"Soon we'll both be out of here," she said. "We're really close."

"It doesn't matter anymore."

She looked confused and then the old man began calling out from his bedroom. Isaac ignored it.

"Should we check on him?"

"He does that in his sleep every night."

She nodded. Because nothing is required of her, he thought. Then he was angry again.

"I swear this is all about to get fixed."

"You were a day too late," he told her. Before he could hear her reply he was out the front door, making his way toward the road in the dark.

Part 2

1. Poe

It took him, he didn't know, half an hour to walk home from Lee's house. Two miles, give or take. He pa.s.sed through town, the long main drag, it was even darker than normal, no lights on anywhere except for Frank's Tavern. It seemed like forever since they'd been there but it had only been a few hours. It was long after closing time now, but the lights were still on. Everyone knew why that was. Poe was careful to not look in the windows as he pa.s.sed, you didn't know who might be in there. The bar had nearly gone out of business for back taxes but somehow Frank Meltzer came up with a bunch of money, claimed it was some aunt that gave it to him but most people said he'd flown down to Florida and driven back in a minivan full of dope. Ten- thousand- dollar paycheck, if you had a clean record you just had to call the right people, but only if your record was clean. Being a mule, they called it. But it was just like the movie said: once you were in, they didn't just let you out. He wondered if Frank Meltzer was sorry he'd done it. There was another place like that, Little Poland, supposedly the Russian mob had bought it but meanwhile the food was still good, people would drive all the way down from the city to eat there, pierogies and kielbasa.

He was making good time. He had long legs-a fast walker. He was thinking a lot. He thought you'll follow her. You'll follow her to Connecticut. Plenty of schools up there you'll get a scholars.h.i.+p. Except Christ what was wrong with him. She had moved in with her boyfriend, husband now. It was all a fantasy what he'd just had, it was not the last time they'd sleep together it didn't have that feel, it didn't have that tragic, sitting around crying feeling. But it was close. They would do it one more time and it would be horrible, s.e.x followed by five or six hours of intense bawling and holding each other and complete and utter misery. And then he would never see her again. She would not come back to the Valley he could be sure of that. Four years gone, down the tubes. Only Christ it wasn't four years, it had never been four years, it had only been fun and games that had gone on four years, it was not the same as being together. They had never been together properly except the one Christmas break three years back when she came home the whole week. One week of walking down the street and holding hands and all, kissing games, all your standard boyfriend- girlfriend activities. The rest of the time it was just s.e.x. That had seemed good at first, a pretty girl who just wanted s.e.x and not much else. You did not think those girls really existed. But now it didn't seem good at all. She would go back permanently to her other life, because that's what it was, she had two lives and this one, the one here in her hometown, this was the life she was trying to get rid of. It was another world entirely she had out there, he had not seen it but from the way she talked he could imagine it, that new world, mansions, educated people, a butler involved. It was not even doctors and lawyers, it was another level entirely. It was the level of having butlers. Only maybe those were only from movies. Butlers were outmoded, probably. He guessed it was all robotics now.

And look at him here now, walking down a dirt road, an actual dirt road, he imagined her new husband driving his BMW or whatever it was down the road, look honey, we are driving on an actual dirt road. How quaint. Well yes. He had seen a picture of the new husband once, back when he was still just a boyfriend. He looked queer. That boyfriend of hers looked like an actual h.o.m.os.e.xual. Wearing a pink oxford. Maybe that wasn't queer in Connecticut but still, that pink s.h.i.+rt, it had given Poe a good deal of satisfaction to see it in that picture. Though here he himself was on his dirt road, walking home as he had no functioning vehicle, his own home, not mansion but a doublewide trailer, just ahead of him. He could see the porch light just ahead. It was nearly five in the morning. Before going inside he took a leak in the bushes so as not to wake his mother with the bathroom noises. He was careful to be quiet-his mother she wasn't a good sleeper and if there was anyone who needed it, about three years of good sleep, it was her.

He made it into the house quietly and into his bed. Falling asleep he had to remind himself that bad things were happening to him, but that wasn't how it felt. This will all blow over, he decided.

It was late in the morning when he woke up, clearheaded, the best he'd felt in weeks, he checked the clock and knew his mother had already gone to work. He was thinking about Lee again, lying there in his bed in his room with the sun s.h.i.+ning on him. The south- facing window, he hated it, you didn't get good sleep once the sun came up. He needed to fix the curtain rod, it'd been broken for weeks now. And the tape was coming off his old posters, Kiss, why had he ever liked them anyway, plus Rage Against the Machine, someone said they were communists. The good thing was that with no curtain over the window he could see a long way, almost to the river, and on account of the sun it was already hot in the room. It felt good though he hadn't slept well. The warmth.

He would go to the library and fill out the applications for schools, April 10th now, another day advancing, it would not stop until he died. Only even then it would not stop, the day he died would be like any other day. He hoped that was a long way off. He got up and went outside in his boxer shorts, it was another beautiful day the kind that reminds you how good it is to just be breathing, no matter if nothing else is going right. You are breathing, he thought, more than many can say. He looked at his car, his 1973 Camaro, last of the small- b.u.mper models, before the government came in with its five- mile- per- hour b.u.mpers that ruined the lines of the car. He would never own one newer than 1973. You would have to be an idiot. The Camaro was sitting where the tow truck had left it a month earlier, off to the side of the driveway. Leaves and dirt on top of the new paintjob he'd paid for. He'd dropped the transmission racing Dustin McGreevy in his new WRX Subaru, Dustin going on and on about pop- off valves and turbos and then Poe had smoked him the first time but the second time Poe'd dropped the tranny, the original Turbo-matic, torn the inside of it all to pieces and they'd had to leave the Ca-maro in the ditch and Dustin had given him a ride home. So much for American steel, said Dustin. Least it isn't my mom's car, Poe told him, flicking the Jesus air freshener.

That was a lesson, he decided, McGreevy's j.a.panese car, it had only won because it hadn't destroyed itself. They knew what they were doing, the j.a.panese-plenty of steel still got made there. Special alloys. You wanted to believe in America, but anyone could tell you that the Germans and j.a.ps made the same amount of steel America did these days, and both those countries were about the size of Pennsylvania. He wasn't sure about that last fact, but he guessed it was true. Pennsylvania was a big state. Not to mention all the expensive cars were made there-overseas-Lexus, Mercedes, the list went on. Happening to the whole country, he thought, glory days are over.

Anyway he'd put almost eight grand into the Camaro, punched- out 350, Weld rims, new paint, much of it on a credit card he'd stopped making payments on. He'd probably get three or four grand all told. Maybe thirty- five hundred. Speaking realistically. It had rust. It was not a good investment. It was not like putting your money with Charles Schwab. Get something cheap, good on gas. Toyota or something. He tried to think but no, the car, that old Camaro, it hadn't gotten him any p.u.s.s.y he wouldn't have gotten otherwise. p.u.s.s.y magnet p.u.s.s.y magnet is what the guys at the hotrod shop called that car of his, but that was a bunch of bulls.h.i.+t. You could not trust people who told you things like that. The car was a loser, through and through. As his mother had said it would be. is what the guys at the hotrod shop called that car of his, but that was a bunch of bulls.h.i.+t. You could not trust people who told you things like that. The car was a loser, through and through. As his mother had said it would be.

He would put an ad up on the Internet to sell it, do it at the library when he went to do his college applications. Some stupid kid would buy it same as he had. He'd pick up an old Civic or Tercel, good on gas. Listen to yourself, he thought. Buying an actual little car like that. Unthinkable even a month ago, you are changing. You are changing in front of your own eyes. He got a hose and bucket and sprayed the leaves and dirt off and got his special car soap from the house and sudsed the Camaro so it wouldn't look so bad for a buyer. He was still wearing his boxer shorts. It felt good being out there in the sun like that, practically naked, he could feel the heat all over him.

Then he heard someone coming up the road. It sounded like his mother's Plymouth. He didn't think his mother would be back that early, but maybe so-her hands were getting worse every day. That was another thing he hadn't considered-that soon his mother would not be able to work, at least not much. Winters were h.e.l.l on her. She pulled in next to the trailer and there she was, his mother, dressed for church and him standing in his underpants in the driveway, nearly one o'clock in the afternoon. She shook her head, but not in a friendly way. She was not happy to see it.

"I'm selling it," he said, by way of making up for being caught like that.

She just looked at him.

"The car. I'm getting something that runs. I'm going to college. In September, if I can."

She didn't say anything.

"I'm gonna call that coach at Colgate College," he continued. "He said I could check in with him anytime. And there'll be other places. Either way I'll be in school by this September. And not any California University of Pennsylvania, either."

"Okay," she said. She went up onto the porch. She didn't believe him.

"I'm serious," he said.

She went inside.

He followed her in. He looked around for a pair of pants to put on, as if it would make him seem more serious.

"Are you really going," she said. "Or are you just saying that so I don't start charging you rent."

"I'm going," he said. "I'm going to the library to get the applications. Get them in the mail soon as possible."

"What about letters from your teachers and copies of your transcript?"

"Right," he said. "I'll do that, too." He had forgotten that part.

"Billy?"

"Yeah."