Willy comes in through the back door, drops his barn coat on the bench, kicks off his mud-covered boots, and pads sock-footed to the kitchen table where he slumps into a chair. At the counter his mother whisks batter and turns.
“Good morning my little man.”
“G’ morning mom.”
“You were up early.”
Willy takes the orange juice his mother has waiting for him and drains half the glass in two gulps.
“You hungry?”
Willy nods, then says “Dad needed some extra bails for the cows.”
Willy is only ten but he is a hard worker. He loves being in the barn, in the fields. Yes, she thinks, Willy’s destined to be a farmer. She smiles, turns back to the counter, exchanges the whisk for a big spoon, and ladles batter onto a waiting griddle. The hiss on the hot steel and the smell of breakfast fills the kitchen.
The phone rings and Willy’s mom answers. Willy pays little attention. She talks for a few minutes while flipping pancakes and then hangs up. Willy waits, fork in one hand, syrup in the other. His mother brings a short stack to the table.
“That was Mr. O’Connor, Quinn’s dad. He just had a load of wood dropped off and needs help splitting and stacking it. Wanted to know if you’d be around to help him, Quinn, and his brother. He said he’d pay you.”
Willy’s dad has come in from the barn and caught the tail end of the conversation. Willy turns to his dad.
“Fine with me,” his father says. “You’ve done your work here.”
Willy knows that’s not the truth. There’s always more work to be done.
Willy looks at his mom.
“Fine with me,” she says.
After breakfast Willy puts his boots back on, grabs his barn coat and leather gloves, and walks the long dirt driveway toward the O’Connors’. The sky is a heavy grey, threatening sleet or maybe cold rains that sink to the bone. The O’Connors live maybe a quarter mile away, on the other side of Woodside Road in a development called Highland Farms. More than once Willy’d heard his dad grumble how these developers would come in and tear up a nice hayfield for a collection of big houses and then give the development some name that made it seem like something it was not. “Orchard Estates. My foot. Where are the apple trees?” Highland Farms was pretty much the same. The houses were all fancy, some with pools, all of them with nice paved driveways, manicured lawns with lacrosse nets or elaborate swing sets, or both.
Willy turns back toward his house, a nice New England farmhouse even it if is a little worn. A few shutters are missing, and brambles grow over the far end of what was once the root cellar. Chickens poke around the coop. The big barn, built by Willy’s great grandfather a hundred years ago, could use some paint, maybe more than that, but it is solid and has weathered a century of Maine winters. A few piles of spoiled hay sit next to a rust-covered tractor that was put out to pasture years ago and is now covered with vines. A dozen beef cows linger in the field beyond. Willy’s father and Clayton now work the farm. Clayton isn’t family but he might as well be. He’d worked for Willy’s grandfather and now Willy’s father. Clayton never married. Said farming was his only love. Willy turns back up the driveway and keeps walking.
When the O’Connors moved in last year, Willy’s mom made them a pie with blackberries from the garden. That’s when Willy met Quinn. They were the same age and rode the same bus to school. They’d hung out a few times, Quinn coming down to the farm where they’d catch frogs in the stream, build forts in the woods or sit on the tractor and pretend to drive it around. But other than those first few visits, Quinn hung out mostly with the kids at Highland Farms, the soccer players, the cool kids. Clayton once said that Quinn hung out with the J. Crew crowd while Willy was more the Carhartt crowd. It wasn’t so bad though. Quinn was okay.
As Willy walks up the driveway, he sees Mr. O’Connor fussing with a rented woodsplitter, filling the gas tank, figuring out what the levers do. Quinn and his brother Travis stand beside two cords of unsplit, unseasoned hardwood dumped in a pile in a corner of the driveway near the basketball hoop. Travis is wearing shorts and a big sweatshirt, its hood pulled over a baseball cap. His hands are sunk deep into the sweatshirt’s pockets and he shivers, stomping his sneakers on the pavement.
“Dad, how long is this going to take? I’m freezing.”
“I told you to wear a jacket, Travis. You’ll probably warm up once we get started.”
“Stupid,” Travis says, kicking a piece of bark frozen to the pavement.
Quinn looks no more excited about splitting wood than his brother but at least Quinn is wearing pants.
“Hey, Willy,” Quinn says.
“Hi, Quinn.”
Mr. O’Connor starts the splitter.
“Well, boys, let’s get going! Travis, you and I will put the logs on the splitter. I’ll be in charge of running the machine. Quinn, you and Willy can take the split wood and stack it behind the garage where I showed you. That work?”
Travis and Quinn grumble and move into place.
“Yes, sir,” says Willy.
After a few tries, a few dropped logs, and a few “Stupids” from Travis, the four develop a system. Mr. O’Connor and Travis wrestle a log into place. Mr. O’Connor calls “hands up.” Travis holds his hands up to show that they are away from the log and Mr. O’Connor throws the lever advancing the wedge. Logs split into manageable quarters, perfect for a crackling fire, and fall off the splitter onto the driveway. Quinn and Willy gather a couple pieces in their arms and lug them over to the far side of the garage. They chat about school, the bus, that new girl in the class who always wears a ribbon in her hair.
After about half an hour, Travis says “Dad, I’m gonna get a drink of water” and without waiting for a reply, walks toward the house. “Okay, T, but hurry back.”
Mr. O’Connor loads another log onto the splitter. Several minutes later Willy hears Mr. O’Connor: “Go inside and get your brother. He’s had plenty of time to get his drink of water.” Quinn drops the logs where he stands and heads to the house without looking back. Mr. O’Connor reaches down and loads another log onto the splitter and throws the lever. The log pops under the force of the sharp metal wedge and falls to the ground.
For thirty minutes Mr. O’Connor and Willy continue to split and stack wood. Without Quinn to talk to, Willy can actually stack more wood than the two of them working together and soon Willy is having to wait for Mr. O’Connor to finish splitting so that Willy has something to stack. Willy brings Mr. O’Connor logs, handing them to him to drop into the splitting tray. Eventually, Willy is dropping the logs into the tray as Mr. O’Connor clears split wood or digs through the pile. Mr. O’Connor makes small talk with Willy but more than once Willy hears Mr. O’Connor talking to himself: “Where are those boys?”
Willy catches him looking toward the door. Willy wonders where they are too.
But Mr. O’Connor and Willy just keep working along, with Willy loading the tray and stacking wood and Mr. O’Connor picking through the pile of unsplit logs and pushing the lever, the hydraulic piston bearing the wedge down on the cut end of a log, pushing the wedge through the logs to the metal plate at the end of the tray.
Willy spots a large round log on the pile. It is a little bigger than the others so it takes a deep squat and some grunting to get off the ground. Hugging the log, he waddles over to the splitter and dumps it into the tray. Mr. O’Connor waits, his hand resting on the lever that releases the ram. The log sits cockeyed and Willy grabs the end to adjust it so it sits right, but not before Mr. O’Connor throws the lever.
“Stop!” Willy screams.
Willy pulls his hand back as quickly as he can but the jacket’s cuff snags on something. Mr. O’Connor looks and sees the wedge advancing. He lunges for the lever but it is too late. Willy screams as the wedge moves through his hand and into the wood with the same satisfying popping sound.
The pain buckles Willy’s knees. It shoots to his head as a flash.
Willy pulls his hand free. There’ s blood everywhere.
“Jesus, oh Shit!” he hears Mr. O’Connor yell.
Willy cradles his bleeding hand against his stomach. There’s blood on this coat, on his pants, on the splitter. It hurts like nothing has ever hurt before.
“Let me see, Willy, let me see!”
Mr. O’Connor kneels beside Willy, his hands on his shoulders.
“Oh, shit, Willy, let me see.”
Willy’s knees are wobbling and the pain runs all the way up his arm, across his shoulders. His head is tingling. Slowly he pulls away his jacket and in a pool of blood he sees the damage. Mr. O’Connor sees it too.
“Oh my god Willy, we’ve got to call an ambulance, got to call your parents.” He’s talking really fast.
“Just hold on, Willy, just like that, just hold on. I’ll go….”
But as Mr. O’Connor turns to run to the house he stumbles and falls, fainting on the driveway.
Willy stands on the cold pavement looking at Mr. O’Connor lying on the ground.
He hugs his bleeding hand pressing it into his coat.
“Mr. O’Connor?”
He kicks the man’s leg lightly with his boot.
“Mr. O’Connor?”
No movement.
And then Willy does what any ten-year old boy would do: he runs home to his mother leaving Mr. O’Connor, an idling splitter and two fingers behind.
Willy lies on the couch, his bandaged hand resting on a pillow at his side. His father sits in a recliner near him. A television broadcasts some college football game. Willy doesn’t know the score. Doesn’t even know who’s playing. His hand throbs.
His father pretends to watch the game but Willy catches him looking over toward the bandaged hand. He looks pained.
At the hospital they closed the wounds where Willy’s index and middle finger had once been. With no fingers to reattach, it was a matter of cleaning things up and putting a few stiches over the end of two metacarpal stumps. The doctor did it all behind a low shroud with a nurse helping, handing the doctor this thing or that. Willy could see his mom alternately watching the doctor and looking at Willy. Willy couldn’t feel a thing. Maybe a little tugging. But he saw his mom grimace a few times and shake her head. Her eyes were watery. After a six or so hours they sent Willy and his mom home with a little paper bag full of pills and extra bandages, Willy’s bloody jacket in a plastic bag.
The O’Connors come by the house. Mr. O’Connor tells Willy how sorry he is for what happened. He kneels by Willy for a few minutes and seemed to say the same thing over and over: “I’m so sorry. It was an accident. You’re such a tough boy.” Quinn stands behind his dad and doesn’t say a word. He just stands there, staring, fiddling with his jacket. Willy’s folks don’t say much to Mr. O’Connor but Willy notices his dad giving Mr. O’Connor the same look Willy has seen when he can’t understand why people do the things they do.
The grownups go into the kitchen and Quinn follows his dad, still fiddling with his jacket. Willy hears Mr. O’Connor in the kitchen with Willy’s parents, saying the same thing all over again. “I’m so sorry. It was an accident. He’s such a tough boy.” Willy hears his mother say it is okay, yes, it was an accident, but Willy can tell his mom doesn’t mean it. She just wants Mr. O’Connor to leave. Willy’s dad doesn’t say a word. Soon he just walks away, leaving Mr. O’Connor and Quinn standing there with Willy’s mom, and joins Willy in front of the television. Eventually Mr. O’Connor and Quinn leave. Willy hears his mom say “Good night” and close the front door. His dad lets out an audible sigh.
Willy’s mom lets Willy stay home from school on Monday. He probably could have stayed home a second day but his hand does not hurt that much and so Willy, with one hand bandaged into a gauze fist, walks to the end of his driveway to wait for the bus to school with half a dozen kids from Highland Farms.
Travis and Quinn are not at the bus stop. As the bus pulls up, Willy sees them go by in the back seat of their mom’s car. Apparently, they’re getting a ride to school. Willy gives Quinn a wave but Quinn does not look up. As he gets on the bus, all the kids watch him. A few whisper. He finds an empty seat, the one he always sits in right over the wheel well, and sloughs off his backpack onto the seat beside him. He keeps his gauzed hand in his coat pocket.
Tracy, a girl from his class, leans over the back of Willy’s seat, putting her hands and chin on the green plastic.
“Hi Willy.”
“Hey.” Willy twists to face her.
“Is it true?”
“Is what true?”
“What Travis said, that you got two of your fingers cut off? That you stuck your hand in his dad’s wood splitter?”
Tracy looks to Willy’s coat pocket and then to Willy.
Willy looks at Tracy. He is about to say something but stops. He looks across the aisle and sees the Covell twins both watching him, their stares alternating from his face to where his hand is jammed into his pocket. He turns away from the girls and rides the rest of the way to school looking out the bus window absently, his head resting against the cold glass.
For a few weeks, Willy is a reluctant celebrity.
“Man, I bet it hurt like crazy!”
“How are you going to eat?”
“What did Mr. O’Connor do with the fingers?”
Willy goes to school with his hand in the gauze and his fist, for the most part, in his jacket pocket.
At home, Willy and his mom remove the gauze.
“Things seem to be healing pretty well, Willy. Does your hand hurt?”
Willy moves his hand gingerly. Moves the muscles that would have moved his fingers.
“It doesn’t hurt too bad. A little. But only when I touch it.”
“You probably don’t need to keep it all wrapped up if you don’t want to.”
But for a month when Willy goes to school, his hand is wrapped and in his pocket. When he gets home, he unwraps it and either does his school work or heads out to the barn to do this chore or that: gather the chicken eggs, sweep the hay from the barn floor, check on the new calf. Life at home returns to normal as Willy gets used to doing things a little differently. Figuring out how to hold a shovel, brush his teeth, button his shirt.
At breakfast, Willy finishes his cereal and wraps his hand for school. His mother sits across from him, sipping tea.
“Willy, I think the hand looks pretty good.”
Willy looks at his hand.
“You know, Sweety, you can’t cover it forever.”
Willy looks to his mother, at the roll of gauze and to his hand.
“You can do it,” she says.
Willy walks to the bus stop and rides to school, his hand in his coat pocket, but once at school he takes his jacket off and drapes it over the seat at his desk. He pulls his books and homework from his backpack and folds his hands on his desk before him. That’s when he notices Tracy, sitting at her desk, slightly behind his, staring. Flushed, Willy crosses his arms, his hands in his armpits, and waits for class to start.
Willy endures a long day of once again being the subject of stares, whispers and another round of the questions he’d been asked a month ago. On the bus home he finds himself sitting next to Quinn. Travis and some of the bigger kids sit at the back of the bus, laughing loudly, but Willy and Quinn ignore them and fall into conversation, just like before. For the first time in a while, Willy thinks his school world might be getting back to normal. As the bus pulls to a stop Willy follows Quinn, Travis, and a few others up the aisle and out the bus door. Willy turns to Quinn.
“Hey, I’ll see you tomorrow. Good luck with the math homework.”
“Yeah,” Quinn says, “and that boring reading stuff.”
As the bus pulls away, Willy hears a knocking on the bus window and he looks. One of Travis’ friends, Kyle, waves to Willy, giving him the thumb and pinky “Hang loose!” wave. Willy smiles and waves back. Travis’ friends laugh and point. Willy can see a few of the other big kids on the bus laughing too. For the second time that day, Willy flushes and jams his hand back into his coat pocket. He turns to Quinn who just looks at his feet and starts walking toward his house with a few other kids, leaving Willy standing alone by the road as the bus pulls away.
Clayton pulls out of the driveway as Willy walks toward the house. He stops his pickup and leans over to roll down the window as Willy approaches.
“Why you hangin’ your head so low, Willy?”
Willy says nothing and keeps walking past Clayton’s idling truck. Clayton watches him pass. For a moment he sits. He watches Willy recede in the rearview, shuffling down the driveway toward the house. After a moment Clayton drops the transmission into drive and heads home.
The next morning before school, Willy is eating a hot blueberry muffin having finished a few before-school chores when Clayton comes in from the barn. He takes off his coat and lays it on the mudroom bench before coming into the kitchen.
“Well, this is a surprise,” Willy’s mother says.
“I could smell those fresh-baked muffins all the way out to the barn, Sarah. They were calling me in.”
Willy’s mother pulls a clean plate from the cupboard and drops a muffin on it. She reaches for a mug and pours Clayton a cup of coffee as Clayton pulls a chair to sit opposite Willy at the table.
“Thank you, Sarah,” Clayton says, smiling. She returns the smile.
“I’ll to go out to the barn to see if Tom wants to join us.”
Willy watches her leave as Clayton dabs butter on the steaming muffin. A renewed aroma of warmth fills the air. Willy watches Clayton. His weathered hands, gnarled knuckles, deep creases and scars, and then Willy notices something he’s never seen before. Clayton’s missing his left pinky finger.
Willy stares for a moment and then lifts his gaze. Clayton looks across the table at him.
“I never noticed your finger, Clayton.” Willy says, nodding to Clayton’s hand.
Clayton looks at his hand.
“What do you mean, Willy?”
“You’re missing your little finger.”
“Oh my goodness, Willy, you’re right!” Clayton looks at his right hand, then his left, then his right.
“I’ve only got nine fingers!”
Clayton laughs. Willy finds himself smiling.
“It happened when I was just a baby. Seems I was bothering my big brother so he thought it’d be funny to put a muskrat trap on the floor to teach me a lesson. Well, it taught me a lesson all right. Snapped my finger clean off. I screamed like a banshee! Then when my mother came in and saw what had happened and what my brother had done, well, let’s just say she taught my brother a lesson too. Hoo boy.” Clayton laughs and takes bite of his muffin. Willy does the same.
“Willy, let me tell you something. When I went to school, what with missing a finger and all, there were kids that made fun of me. ‘Clayton can’t count to ten cause he’s missing a finger.’ ‘Clayton this.’ ‘Clayton that.’ And one day I came home all hang-headed and feeling sorry for myself, and my father pulls me aside and he gives me a big hug and he said ‘Clayton, one who gains strength from overcoming obstacles possesses the only strength which can overcome adversity.’ And I remember looking at my dad and he smiles and says, ‘I don’t really know what that has to do with anything but I like the quote so I said it.’ Well, we both had a laugh at that. But what I think he was tryin’ to say is this finger thing, right now it seems like the end of the world but it’s not. The whole missing a finger for me, and for you, Willy, it’s just an obstacle. And when that big crisis comes, when that big adversity comes, it’s gonna be you that figures it out. You’ll be better than the whole rest of them.”
A thumping comes at the back door, stomping the barn dirt from shoes, and then they hear the back door opens as Sarah comes into the kitchen. Clayton rises from the table, and puts the coffee cup in the sink.
“Well, I’d better be getting back to it. Thank you for the muffin, Sarah.”
Turning to the door, Clayton gives Willy a wink.
“Have a good day at school, Willy. Go get the work done.”
Willy walks up the driveway, thinking about what Clayton said. If Clayton could get through school missing a finger, then he can too.
At school he stops jamming his hands in his pockets. He raises his hand when he has a question. He acts as if he’s no different from the rest of the kids. At first the kids stare, they ask their stupid questions, but after a while most of them treat Willy just like they had before the accident. Tracy is the first. When Willy no longer sees her staring at his hand during class, he knows things are getting back to normal. There are still times when Willy feels different than the kids who live in Highland Farms, days when he wears his barn coat to school and the girls wrinkle their noses at the smell, but they’d always done that. The J. Crew crowd and the Carhartt crowd. But for the most part, things are back to normal.
There are, of course, a couple of the kids who do not let it go. Travis and some of his friends continue to take pleasure in teasing Willy, flashing the “hang loose” to Willy and laughing a little too hard. Willy waits for Quinn to tell Travis to cut it out but Quinn just shakes his head and looks at his feet. Tries to pretend he didn’t see it. So Willy just keeps thinking of what Clayton said.
On a sunny afternoon in April, Willy walks to the boat landing at the head of the bay with his clamming rake and wire basket. He has an hour before low tide and from the landing he plans to check the mudflats next to the channel to see if he can dig up a peck to bring home.
Willy sees Travis and Kyle near the skiffs that the fisherman use. They throw rocks into the mud, laughing at the splat. “Aw, dude, it’s like poop. It’s like the squirts.”
Willy walks past the pair when Travis sees him.
“Hey Willy,” Travis calls. “what are you doing? Going to dig some clams?”
Willy is too close to pretend he doesn’t hear, so he stops.
“Yeah.”
Travis comes over to Willy and inspects the basket, the rake.
“I like clams.” Travis says with the smirk. “You like clams, Kyle?”
Kyle nods. Willy looks to Kyle and back to Travis. He’s not sure where this is going.
Travis seems to be thinking.
“Willy, I’ll pay you ten bucks for a basket of clams.”
“No thanks,” Willy says, and he starts for the shore.
“C’mon Willy, twenty bucks.”
Willy stops and turns to Travis. “Twenty bucks for a peck of clams? How do I know you’ll pay me?”
“I’m good for it, Willy. You dig ‘em and I’ll pay you. I swear. A deal’s a deal. Heck, Willy, I’ll even row you out to where the clams are bigger and fatter than the puny ones here at the landing. I’ll show you where the clams are really big.” Travis points out into the bay.
“How we gonna get out there?” Willy asks.
Travis looks around.
“We’ll take one of these skiffs. I bet one of the old men left the oars underneath. We’ll just borrow a skiff for a little while. No one will know. C’mon Willy. Twenty bucks.”
Willy looks at Travis who’s smiling his stupid smile. He looks at Kyle. Willy loves clams but it sure would be nice to take twenty bucks from Travis. Heck, he could rake a peck of clams in an hour. Come back for more tomorrow for more if he wanted.
“Okay,” Willy says.
“Great,” says Travis, “Kyle and I will row you out and wait for you while you dig. When you’re done, we’ll row you back.”
The boys flip an aluminum skiff and drag it to the water’s edge. Willy throws in his rake and basket and climbs in the bow, Kyle in the stern, and Travis grabs the oars and starts rowing.
“It’s a ways out,“ Travis says, “but the clams are huge. You’ll see.”
Travis rows out the winding channel. Willy scans the mudflats on either side. He sees a few other clammers bent over the mud. Travis keeps rowing. After twenty minutes Travis turns the skiff to the side of the channel.
“Here we are.”
Willy looks across the wide flats. This spot looks no different than the mudflats they’ve rowed past except that there are no other clammers.
“You sure?”
“Yup. I heard the clams out here are huge. Just that no one comes out here: too much work. But you got us Willy. Now, you go clamming and I’ll give you your twenty bucks when you’re done.”
Willy looks at Travis, at Kyle, and back to Travis.
“We’ll wait right here, Willy, now c’mon, the tide’s gonna turn.”
Willy grabs his rake and the wire basket and steps onto the mud. Ten yards from the skiff, he turns to the boys. Travis is leaning toward Kyle and Kyle looks over Travis’ shoulder to Willy. Willy turns back and inspects the mud for the clams’ telltale holes. He spies a squirt several feet off and heads in that direction. He’s bent over the mud, picking out a clam, when he hears Travis laughing behind him.
“Sorry Willy, I forgot. My mom wants me home. I gotta go!”
“How am I gonna get back to shore?” Willy yells.
Travis looks around. “I’m sure someone will come by. Flag them down.”
“What about the clams?” Willy yells. “You said you’d pay me twenty bucks! A deal’s a deal you said.”
“Tell you what Willy, you drop those clams off at my house and I’ll pick them up. You’ll get your twenty bucks. A deal’s a deal.” Travis laughs and waves, his index and middle finger folded into his palm. “Hang loose Willy!”
Willy watches them go.
“Jerks,” he says.
But there is nothing he can do. He can’t run after them. He’s too far from shore to yell. No one would hear him. Someone will come by, he thinks. Might as well dig clams until I see another clammer and I can flag them down.
Soon enough the basket is full. Willy stands up straight, and placing his muddy hands on his hips he stretches his back. He notices the tide has turned, the water now creeping over the margins of the channel and across mud. He starts walking toward the edge of the channel to wait for a boat to take him to shore when he steps into a honey pot and sinks up to his knees. He tries to pull his boots out of the mud but they are stuck fast. He puts the rake and basket down using them for leverage and tries to pull his feet from the boots, but his feet don’t budge. The rising tide inches toward him. He looks to the shore and waves but it is no use. He’s too far out. He yells as loud as he can.
“Help!”
His feet anchored, he twists to look up the channel. There has to be a boat coming. He can’t be the only one out here. But there are no other boats. Willy tries again to free his feet. To wrest them from his boots. The ocean creeps across the mud toward him. The sun falls closer to the horizon.
Travis and Quinn sit on the couch watching TV when the phone rings. They hear their mom pick it up.
“Oh, hello, Sarah.”
“No. Willy’s not here.”
“Yes, the boys are right here, watching TV.”
“Just a second, I’ll ask.”
Mrs. O’Connor calls from the kitchen.
“Quinn, Honey, have you seen Willy?”
“Travis saw him down at the landing this afternoon. He was going clamming. Tra-”
But before he can finish Travis slaps Quinn’s thigh and shoots him a look.
“Yea, he was going clamming…”
Quinn looks to his brother who nods approval. The truth, just not the whole truth.
The boys hear their mom from the kitchen.
“Sorry Sarah, the boys say they saw him going clamming earlier but haven’t seen him since this afternoon. I’m sure he’s perfectly fine. You know boys. Sure, if I see him I’ll give you a call and send him right home. Yup. Take care.”
The boys hear their mother put the phone back on the counter and get back to their show.
Quinn turns to his brother. “Why are you so mean to Willy?”
Travis snorts dismissively, not taking his eyes off the television, “That kid is a hick.”
After supper the phone rings again. They found Willy’s body. A half mile from shore, his legs stuck in the mud. A couple fishermen who heard he was missing went out in their boat and found him. There was nothing they could do. The water was probably a foot or two over his head at high tide. The fisherman said they only saw him ‘cause his coat was visible floating on the surface. They brought him to the shore where the cops met them.
Willy’s mom and dad were there. So was Clayton. So were a whole bunch of cops, an ambulance from the fire department, and someone who’d heard what was going on from the local paper whom the cops asked to keep a distance out of respect.
Travis and Quinn hear their parents in the kitchen. Anxious whispers. “How did he get so far out?” Why didn’t anyone see him?” They hear their mom crying.
That night Travis lies in bed staring up at a glow-in-the-dark constellation on the ceiling. There’s a tentative knock at the door and Quinn opens the door part way allowing a stream of hallway light to partially illuminate the room. He slides quietly, his back to the wall, and stops just inside the threshold.
“Travis,” he whispers, “you awake.?”
Travis rolls to face his brother, his head remaining on this pillow.
“That’s pretty weird about Willy, huh,” Quinn says. “I mean, like drowning and all that.”
Quinn waits, and then, “How do you think he got so far out there? Why did he go so far from shore?”
Travis says nothing but just looks at his brother.
Quinn fidgets with his pajamas. Travis watches him and then rolls over, his back to Quinn, his eyes falling on his bureau, on the picture of his family that is mother put in a frame, on his baseball glove, on the piggy bank his father gave him years ago. Behind him he hears Quinn say “Well, good night” and then the door closing softly. Travis lies in the dark. The ceiling stars reappear. He hears a breeze rustle the big oak outside the window. His gaze drifts to a laundry basket at the bottom of which sit a pair of pants soiled that afternoon when Kyle threw a wad of the mud from the landing. He doesn’t even like clams, he thinks.
Travis wakes with a start in the middle of the night. Disoriented he sits up on his bed and looks over his feet toward the window. The moon casts the oak tree in silhouette. The wind, stronger now, rattles the branches. In a trick of the light a three-fingered hand waves. He watches. The smell of mudflat from his dirty pants seems stronger than it did this afternoon. What does his science teacher call it? The overpowering odor of benthic desiccation? Why didn’t he throw them in the wash like his mom told him. He flops back down, putting his head on the pillow, and pulls his blanket up to his chin.
In the morning Travis wakes to the smell of low tide. How can so little mud stink so much? Damn, he thinks, he could kill Kyle right now. He’s definitely bringing the pants downstairs to the washer. He gets out of bed and is about to grab his laundry when his eyes fall on something else, a wire basket full of clams sits next to his bureau. And then he raises his head to see, scrawled across his wall, in olive grey mud: “A deal’s a deal.”
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