The Anything Box

But these last two were strangers—as I was—in this wistful gathering ofpeople who were trying to turn back twenty-five years. I sat through theevening, trying to trace in the masks around me the bright spirits that hadrun with me into Miss Ebo's enchantment. I looked for Jackie. I asked for Jackie. He was hidden away in some protected place, eternally being his darkshining things, afraid—too afraid—of even shallowness ever to walk in thelight again.
There were speeches. There was laughter. There was clowning. But always theunderlying strain, the rebellion, the silent crying out, the fear and mistrustThey asked me to talk.I stood, leaning against the teacher's desk, and looked down into the
carefully empty faces.
"You have forgotten," I said. "You have all forgotten Miss Ebo."
"Miss Ebo?" The name was a pursing on all the lips, a furrow on the brows.Only one or two smiled even tentatively. "Remember Miss Ebo?"
"If you have forgotten," I said, "it's a long time ago. If you remember, itwas only yesterday. But even if you have forgotten her, I can see that youhaven't forgotten the lessons she taught you. Only you have remembered the
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wrong part. You only half learned the lessons. You've eaten the husks andthrown the grain away. She tried to tell you. She tried to teach you. Butyou've all forgotten. Not a one of you remembers that if you turn the pageeveryone will live happily ever after, because it was written that way. You'reall stranded in the introduction to the story. You work yourselves all up tothe climax of terror or fear or imminent disaster, but you never turn thepage. You go back and live it again and again and again.
"Turn the page! Believe again! You have forgotten how to believe inanything beyond your chosen treadmill. You have grown out of the fairy taleage, you say. But what have you grown into? Do you like it?" I leaned forwardand tried to catch evasive eyes. "With your hopeless, scalding tears at nightand your dry-eyed misery when you waken. Do you like it?
"What would you give to be able to walk once more into a morning that isa-tiptoe with expectancy, magical with possibilities, bright with a suredelight? Miss Ebo taught us how. She gave us the promise and hope. She taughtus all that everyone will finally live happily ever after because it iswritten that way. All we have to do is let loose long enough to turn the page.Why don't you?" They laughed politely when I finished. I was always the turnerof phrases. Wasn't that clever? Fairy tales! Well— The last car drove awayfrom the school. I stood by the fence in the dark schoolyard and let the nightwash over me.
Then I was a child again, crying against the cold mesh fence—hopeless,scalding tears in the night.
"Miss Ebo. Miss Ebo!" My words were only a twisted shaping of my mouth."They have forgotten. Let me forget too. Surely it must be easier to forgetthat there is a page to be turned than to know it's there and not be able toturn it! How long? How long must I remember?"
A sudden little wind scooted a paper sibilantly across the sidewalk . . .forever after . . . forever after . ..
Stevie and The Dark
The Dark lived in a hole in the bank of the sand wash where Stevie liked to play. The Dark wanted to come out, but Stevie had fixed it so it couldn't Heput a row of special little magic rocks in front of the hole. Stevie knew theywere magic because he found them himself and they felt like magic. When youare as old as Stevie—five—a whole hand of years old—you know lots of thingsand you know what magic feels like.
Stevie had the rocks in his pocket when he first found The Dark. He hadbeen digging a garage in the side of the wash when a piece of the bank cameloose and slid down onto him. One rock hit him on the forehead hard enough tomake him cry—if he had been only four. But Stevie was five, so he wiped theblood with the back of his hand and scraped away the dirt to find the bigspoon Mommy let him take to dig with. Then he saw that the hole was great bigand his spoon was just inside it. So he reached in for it and The Dark cameout a little ways and touched Stevie. It covered up his hand clear to thewrist and when Stevie jerked away, his hand was cold and all skinned acrossthe back. For a minute it was white and stiff, then the blood came out and ithurt and Stevie got mad. So he took out the magic rocks and put the little redone down in front of the hole. The Dark came out again with just a littlefinger-piece and touched the red rock, but it didn't like the magic so itstarted to push around it. Stevie put down the other little rocks—the roundsmooth white ones and the smooth yellow ones.
The Dark made a lot of little fingers that were trying to get past themagic. There was just one hole left, so Stevie put down the black-see-throughrock he found that morning. Then The Dark pulled back all the little fingersand began to pour over the black rock. So, quick like a rabbit, Stevie drew amagic in the sand and The Dark pulled back into the hole again. Then Steviemarked King's X all around the hole and ran to get some more magic rocks. He
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found a white one with a band of blue around the middle and another yellowone. He went back and put the rocks in front of the hole and rubbed out theKing's X. The Dark got mad and piled up behind the rocks until it was higherthan Stevie's head.
Stevie was scared, but he stood still and held tight to his pocket piece.He knew that was the magicest of all. Juanito had told him so and Juanitoknew. He was ten years old and the one who told Stevie about magic in thefirst place. He had helped Stevie make the magic. He was the one who did thewriting on the pocket piece. Of course, Stevie would know how to write afterhe went to school, but that was a long time away.
The Dark couldn't ever hurt him while he held the magic, but it was kind ofscary to see The Dark standing up like that in the bright hot sunshine. TheDark didn't have any head or arms or legs or body. It didn't have any eyeseither, but it was looking at Stevie. It didn't have any mouth, but it wasmumbling at Stevie. He could hear it inside his head and the mumbles werehate, so Stevie squatted down in the sand and drew a magic again—a bigmagic—and The Dark jerked back into the hole. Stevie turned and ran as fast ashe could until the mumbles in his ears turned into fast wind and the sound of rattling rocks on the road.
Next day Arnold came with his mother to visit at Stevie's house. Steviedidn't like Arnold. He was a tattle-tale and a crybaby even if he was a wholehand and two more fingers old. Stevie took him down to the sand wash to play.They didn't go down where The Dark was, but while they were digging tunnelsaround the roots of the cottonwood tree, Stevie could feel The Dark, like along deep thunder that only your bones could hear—not your ears. He knew thebig magic he wrote in the sand was gone and The Dark was trying to get pastthe magic rocks.
Pretty soon Arnold began to brag.
"I got a space gun."
Stevie threw some more sand backwards. "So've I," he said.
"I got a two-wheel bike."
Stevie sat back on his heels. "Honest?"
"Sure!" Arnold talked real smarty. "You're too little to have a two-wheelbike. You couldn't ride it if you had one."
"Could too." Stevie went back to his digging, feeling bad inside. He hadfallen off Rusty's bike when he tried to ride it. Arnold didn't know itthough.
"Could not," Arnold caved in his tunnel. "I've got a BB gun and a real sawand a cat with three-and-a-half legs."
Stevie sat down in the sand. What could you get better than a cat withthree-and-a-half legs? He traced a magic in the sand.