Mr. Hibma heard a woman in clackety shoes enter the building. She walked past his unit and stopped a ways down the hall. There was the sound of a sliding door, what sounded like a huge deck of playing cards getting shuffled, and then the door sliding shut. The click of a lock. When the woman walked back by, her steps made a cushiony sound. She was wearing sneakers now. When the woman had exited and the door had closed behind her, Mr. Hibma took up his pad and pen. He had waited a few days so he wouldn’t seem anxious. So he wouldn’t say more than he wanted to say.
D,
My victim is tiny-minded and big-footed. There are several million like her but she is the one who matters to me. It is meant to be my plight to be tortured by her and women like her my entire life, and to never do anything about it except grow bitter, but I will shape the story of my life the way I want it shaped. I am no one’s sad sack character.
Mr. H
Toby walked onto the school grounds and went into the common area and sat on some carpeted steps until the warning bell sounded, then he rose and trudged toward the library to return his pole-vaulting manual and pay his fine. He sat through math and biology, skipped Mr. Hibma’s class, then, during lunch, went outside near the portables. He’d avoided Shelby all day. He didn’t want to be at school at all, but he didn’t want to be at home either. The pole vault season was ending that evening and if he hadn’t shown up at school then he wouldn’t be allowed to participate. For some reason, he cared about finishing the season. He wanted to do something the way it was meant to be done. One thing. Toby had been the first alternate for this final county meet and the kid ahead of him had come down with bronchitis. Toby was going to face the Asian kid.
That afternoon, at the meet, Toby felt an odd lack of pressure. Shelby, sitting in the stands with her knees together and her lips pursed, did not make him nervous. Coach Scolle did not make him uneasy with his disdainful looks. Toby knew that it was all busywork. You were supposed to be cheerful about the busywork and worry about the busywork, but Toby could do neither at the moment. All he could do was succumb to it. This track meet was busywork. Dreaming was busywork. Coin flips were busywork. The Asian kid called tails. The coin broke the peak of its arch and began zipping toward the ground and Toby shot his hand out and caught it.
Another Sunday. Toby rose and put on shorts and shoes. He went to the kitchen for a handful of cereal, slugged it down with a sip of sports drink. Uncle Neal was in the living room, a room that went mostly unused, sitting on a folding chair. The last time Uncle Neal had been sitting in that spot was the day he’d hit Toby. Uncle Neal was crying or something. A book was open in his hands. When he saw Toby he pulled himself together with one great sob. His face was red, his eyebrows disarranged.
“What about the shed?” Toby asked him. “No hemlock today?”
“Done already,” said Uncle Neal. He guided the book closed, looking up at Toby.
The book had small smudgy paintings on its cover.
“I found this,” Uncle Neal said, trying to boast. “I rescued it from the trash.”
“What trash?”
“At that big gas station by the county buildings.”
The book was a collection of poetry. Uncle Neal combed his fingers over the front of it, like he was petting a cat. He snorted. “I’m getting bored with listening to the cops,” he told Toby. “I haven’t read a book since I was your age, and I want to read one more before it’s too late. It was on the very top of the garbage, on top of a newspaper.”
“Is it any good?”
“‘Forgive, Satan, virtue’s pedants.’” Uncle Neal raised an eyebrow. His throat was full. “‘All such as have broken our habits, or had none, the keepers of promises, prizewinners, meek as leaves in the wind’s circus.’”
Toby squinted. He was thinking about the poem or he was pretending to. He couldn’t tell.
“Who needs a mother?” Uncle Neal said. “Mothers aren’t everything. I had one, and look how I turned out.”
Uncle Neal’s smugness was still intact. His eyes were glassy, but he was smug as ever. Toby wanted to snatch his book from him and smack him with it.
“All mothers do is make sure you’re presentable,” Uncle Neal said. “You look presentable to me. I guess presentable for what is always the question.”
“Do me a favor,” Toby said. “Don’t ever talk about my mother.” Toby had caught Uncle Neal’s bloodshot eyes and he didn’t let go. He looked right through his uncle. “Do me a favor and don’t mention mothers to me for any reason, ever again.” He said this levelly, just the way he wanted to.
The old smirk came to life on Uncle Neal’s lips. “Okay,” he told Toby. “But now you’re going to owe me a favor.”
Shelby was getting to know the woods. She had a good idea where even the minor trails led. She knew where the turtle holes were, knew how to avoid the darkly shaded territories where snakes were likely to loiter. There were direct routes and routes that someone generous or ignorant might call scenic, half-a-dozen ways to reach the library. The substation looked dormant. There was an unfathomable current running through it, but it looked dead. The high school boys that hung out in the parking lot, crouching on their skateboards and sharing cigarettes, now recognized Shelby. As she passed, one of them doffed his cap and the rest of them laughed.
Inside, she signed up to use a computer. There was a line. She stepped over to a podium which upheld a monumental atlas. Bulgaria. The capital city was Sofia. Shelby had never heard of Sofia. It was the capital city of a major nation and she had never even heard of it. Mr. Hibma’s geography class was fairly useless when it came to geography. There were thousands of countries, and Shelby had only been in one. In over thirteen years, she’d managed to experience one nation.
Shelby shut the atlas and found a chair off by herself, near the old card catalog. She breathed the library air, which smelled like all library air. She wanted it to be a cozy smell, like blankets from an old farmhouse or something, but really it smelled like book glue and old people. Shelby was worried about Toby. She wasn’t intrigued by his darkness anymore, didn’t burn to plumb the depths of it. She cared for Toby. She knew Uncle Neal was doing something to Toby, not just the marks on his head and neck that time, but more damaging things. Something had worn the Toby out of Toby. She wanted to know exactly what went on out at that remote property. She didn’t want to go gallivanting off to a distant country without being sure Toby would be okay. She couldn’t leave him to the wolves, and that’s what Uncle Neal was. Toby was Shelby’s affair and she had to get him in order before she left.
It was her turn on a computer. She scrubbed her eyes with her palms then logged on and went to her e-mail. Inbox — one new message.
Niece of mine,
Not much new over here. Interesting things occur less frequently than they used to — generally, in the world. I quit coffee. That’s something, I guess. And I did this thing where you jump in freezing cold water for charity. It’s like you have to do one or the other in the morning — drink coffee or jump in ice water. Well, sorry to cut this short but I’m late for a flight and I can’t find anything.