Following My Own Footsteps Read online

  I squatted down beside him. "Your mother's going to be looking for you soon," I said. Though I didn't have a watch, I swear I could hear the last notes of the "Young Widder Brown" organ music fading away on radios all over Grandville.

  "Leave me alone," William whispered. "Just let me stay here, let me die."

  "Don't be stupid." I grabbed him under the arms but he fought me with all the strength he had. Puny as he was, I couldn't seem to drag him to the wheelchair, so I dropped him and pulled the wheelchair close to him.

  The sun beat down on me hotter and hotter. Sweat ran down my back. A mosquito buzzed around my head. Gnats bit my ears. Suddenly anger began swelling in my skull like a huge red bubble. If it broke, I'd hit William, I knew I would, I wouldn't be able to stop my self from hitting him. I wanted to hit him and hit him again till he did what I told him to.

  I backed away, scared of myself. William just lay where he was. He had no idea what I was thinking.

  Somehow I managed to swallow my temper. I swear I could almost taste it. Strong and ugly and thick enough to gag me. I forced myself to uncurl my fists, to remember William wasn't Langerman. He couldn't hit me back. He was little and helpless, like Victor or Ernie.

  When I was sure it was safe, I got William under the arms again. He was too tired to fight me, but he sure didn't help. I just about busted a gut getting him into that stupid wheelchair. I felt like a soldier rescuing a wounded buddy, but the only thanks I got from William was a string of cuss words that would have gotten his mouth washed out with soap if his mother had heard them.

  He didn't say another word. It didn't matter much because I didn't have breath to waste talking. I thought I'd die pushing the wheelchair back up the slope to the path. All that kept me going was pretending I was Donny. A Kraut platoon was looking for me. I was ducking mortar fire, outrunning the Nazis, sly as a fox and twice as fast, saving my buddy's life.

  The trouble was, I ended up caught behind enemy lines. As I pushed the wheelchair around the corner of our street, heading for the final run right down the middle, who did I see blocking the sidewalk but Mrs. Sullivan and Grandma.

  At the sight of his mother, William started crying again, but I kept on going. What else could I do? Mrs. Sullivan gave me a look of such pure hatred I almost dropped dead on the spot. Without saying a word to me, she grabbed the wheelchair and pushed it into her yard.

  Before Grandma dragged me home, I saw Mrs. Sullivan lift William out of the chair and carry him inside. He looked at me once, his eyes just as full of hate as his mother's.

  Though I expected a beating like I'd never had before, Grandma sent me straight upstairs for a bath. She'd talk to me when I was clean, she said.

  For once I didn't argue. A tub full of water might be just the thing to drown myself in. I actually tried submerging like a submarine but I ended up blowing bubbles and surfacing. There was no sense dying yet.

  When I was presentable, Grandma sat me down at the kitchen table. Mama was on the back steps watching the little kids play under the sprinkler. I could see her profile from my chair. Every now and then she'd say something like, "Don't be so rough with Bobby, Victor." Or, "Careful, June, don't step on that bee." Ordinary mother things.

  "I'd like to hear your side of this, Gordon," said Grandma.

  I glanced at her, surprised she didn't sound mad. She wasn't screaming or threatening me or anything. But I supposed I'd soon find myself traipsing next door to apologize again to Mrs. Sullivan and William.

  "I was just trying to help," I mumbled. "I know it sounds dumb, but I thought I could teach William to walk. Like Heidi helps Clara in that stupid book you read to June."

  Grandma sighed. "Shirley says William is very delicate. She doesn't think he'll ever walk again. Lacks the strength. Sometimes I wonder, though. Shirley's so protective, so fearful. Maybe if she..." Grandma stopped and shook her head. "Just leave William alone, Gordon."

  "But if he really tried—"

  "He's doing the best he can," Grandma put in.

  I hung my head. "I know he is, but..."

  "But what?" Grandma asked when I let my sentence trail off unfinished.

  I shrugged. The thing was, I couldn't imagine wanting to do something and not being able to. Even math and all that other boring school stuff. If I truly wanted to figure percentages and change decimals into fractions, I probably could. I just didn't want to. So I didn't try. It was as simple as that. Wasn't it?

  "William hates me now," I said. "And I don't even know why." To my complete disgust, tears welled up in my eyes. When one splashed on the table, I wiped it away fast with my thumb, hoping Grandma wouldn't see. I'd never cried about anything in my whole life and I didn't want to start now.

  Grandma was silent a moment. "Maybe William believed you," she said at last. "Maybe you convinced him he could walk if he tried hard enough. And then he couldn't after all."

  I pictured William lying there in the grass, trying to pull himself along by his arms, red-faced, sweating, cussing me. I also remembered how I'd wanted to hit him. I couldn't tell Grandma that. "Do you think he'll ever forgive me?"

  This time Grandma was quiet for so long I thought she'd fallen asleep or something. "Forgiving's not easy," she said at last. "I guess that's why so many people leave it up to God."

  I looked at her sharply, wondering if she was thinking about the old man. I doubt even God had enough mercy in his heart to forgive him.

  If she guessed my thoughts, Grandma didn't let on. "Come help me shell peas for dinner," she said, patting my hand. "It'll take your mind off William for a while."

  Grandma and I sat at the table side by side. Peas pinged into the bowl. Outside, the little kids shrieked and laughed. Once Mama laughed too.

  After a while I asked Grandma if she was going to make me go next door and apologize to Mrs. Sullivan.

  She shook her head. "I don't think she wants to see you anytime soon, Gordon. I'll explain what you were trying to do and tell her how sorry you are. Maybe that will help."

  When I went to my room that night, I sat on the edge of my bed for a long time staring at William's house. I hadn't smoked once since I'd come to Grandma's, but I'd have given anything for a cigarette now. If Mama wasn't so careful of her Luckies, I'd have stolen one, but she carried them in her pocket. Never left them lying around. I guess that's what shortages do to people. Make them into misers. Well, maybe when the war was over I'd have all the cigarettes I wanted.

  I tried shining my flashlight at William's window to see if he'd come and talk but he didn't. Not even when I clicked the light off and on in our special code—SOS, SOS.

  Finally I gave up and used my flashlight to read the Hardy Boys book William had loaned me back in the good old days when we were friends. He owned the whole set and he'd been letting me borrow them one by one. This was the best yet, and I was sorry I couldn't talk to him about it. We could have acted it out in his backyard if I hadn't made him hate me forever.

  Sixteen

  For a couple of days, I kept an eye on William's house—even sat in the tree for hours to get a good view of his yard—but he didn't come outside. He didn't spy on me from behind his window curtain, either. Finally Grandma told me he and his mother had gone to visit relatives in the country. Mrs. Sullivan had said they needed a change of scene—which probably meant they needed to get away from me.

  I told myself William was just a dumb old cripple and I was tired of sitting around his house. But it wasn't true. He was my best and only friend and I really missed him. Without William, there was absolutely nothing to do and nobody to talk to except June. And I couldn't count on her because she was almost always playing with a silly, giggly girl named Nancy who lived down the street.

  Not long after school let out for the summer, something happened that cheered me up, at least for a while. Donny came home. He just showed up at the front door one hot afternoon in July. Hadn't told anyone he was coming. Wanted to surprise us, he said.

  I swear I har
dly knew him. Maybe it was his uniform, but he seemed different. Taller, skinnier—older. Not just three years older, but some other kind of older I didn't understand.

  Mama seemed happy to see him. She hugged him and kissed him and told him he looked "just like your daddy when he was your age."

  That wiped the smile off Donny's face fast enough, but Mama didn't notice. She was calling the little kids inside, telling them their big brother was home. "Donny," she said. "It's Donny. Don't you remember?"

  The boys hung back like a litter of puppies huddling together for safety, but June flung her arms around Donny and carried on as if he was her hero.

  All the while everybody, including Grandma, was making a fuss over Donny, I was stealing looks at his duffel bag, wondering if he'd brought home souvenirs. I was hoping for a Nazi helmet. Or an Iron Cross. I'd seen Langerman wearing both last week. He said his cousin had given them to him. Bragging as usual, making me so sore I wanted to punch him. Would have if his mother hadn't come along in her car and picked him up.

  "Did you kill lots of Krauts?" I asked when I had a chance. "Was the Battle of the Bulge as bad as they say? What was Berlin like? Did you see the bunker where Hitler killed himself? Do you think he's really dead?"

  I was leading Donny upstairs, carrying the duffel bag fosr him, wanting to know everything he'd seen and done over there.

  "Did you get any medals?" I went on, lugging that bag up a step at a time, feeling the weight of it pulling my arms out of their sockets. "Where are they? Can I see them?"

  At the door of the bedroom Grandma said he could have, Donny took the duffel bag. "Thanks, Gordy," he said, and shut the door in my face.

  "Hey," I shouted. "Tell me what you did, Donny. What was it like? Did you bring home some Nazi helmets?"

  There was no answer. I banged on the door. "Let me in, Donny, I want to talk to you, I want—"

  "Leave your brother alone." Grandma grabbed my arm. I hadn't even heard her coming. "He's tired—he's been on a train for hours, all the way from New York. And a ship before that. He'll talk to you when he feels like it."

  "But—"

  "No buts." Grandma led me away.

  Donny came downstairs at dinnertime. He'd changed his clothes. In a sport shirt and khaki pants, he looked ordinary. Not like a vet or anything special. Just some guy who might have spent the whole war in Grandville.

  I tried asking more questions but Donny didn't answer a single one of them. You'd think he'd gone deaf.

  "You wouldn't understand, Gordy," he said at last. "You weren't there. Now shut up and let me eat my dinner."

  That was the whole point. I wasn't there, I didn't understand, but how would I ever know if he didn't tell me? I opened my mouth to argue, but Grandma gave me a warning look. Then Mama started telling Donny about the old man's job in Bakersfield.

  "They plan to convert the plant after Japan surrenders," she said. "They'll manufacture other things for peacetime. Radios and electrical stuff. So Roger will keep his job."

  Donny raised one eyebrow, but all he said was, "That's good, Ma, that's real good. But what's it got to do with us?"

  "He's your father, Donny," said Mama, as if there was some chance the war had made my brother forget.

  Donny sipped his iced tea. "So?"

  Mama's face flushed. "He's getting a house for us. He'll be coming here in August. We'll go back to California with him then. All of us."

  I noticed Mama emphasized the part about all of us going, even though I'd already told her to count me out.

  Grandma sighed but she didn't say anything. Like me, she'd given up trying to argue Mama out of her foolishness.

  Donny set his glass down and stared at Mama. His face was as hard as mine felt. "You must be nuts."

  Without waiting for her to answer, he got up and left the room. A few seconds later, the front door slammed. Then the front gate. I watched Donny walk past the house and disappear into the summer evening.

  We all looked at his plate. He'd eaten just about half his dinner.

  "I thought he'd be pleased," Mama said.

  "Apparently you thought wrong," said Grandma. Turning to June, she said, "Eat your chicken. You need some meat on your bones."

  June made a face at the chicken, but she ate it. She knew better than to say no to Grandma.

  I don't know when Donny came home that night. I fell asleep waiting for him. But the next morning I found him on the back steps, drinking a bottle of beer and smoking a cigarette. I sat down beside him and asked if I could have a drag.

  "Hell, no," he said.

  "I smoke," I said. "I even know how to inhale."

  "Get your own cigarettes then. I'm not giving you any."

  "Will you tell me about the war, then?"

  "Can't you get it through your thick skull? There's nothing to tell you."

  I didn't like his tone of voice so I backed off a little. "Look at you," I sneered. "Big war hero, sitting there drinking beer. Mama was right, you look just like the old man."

  Donny's face reddened. For a minute I thought he was going to punch me, but he just sagged in on him self like an empty sack. "What do you expect, Gordo?" He paused to light another cigarette. "Don't forget, he's your old man too. You think you'll grow up to be the president or something?"

  I backed off some more. "You dirty SOB," I yelled. "Why did you come back if this is how you're going to act?"

  Donny swallowed a mouthful of beer and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. How often had I seen the old man do the exact same thing? "Leave me be, Gordy." His voice was flat, empty. His eyes were dead.

  "Go to hell," I said and ran around the house. This wasn't the Donny I'd expected. I didn't want to talk to him anymore, I didn't want to see him. He scared the living daylights out of me.

  Things got worse instead of better. It seemed Donny was just set on making us miserable. He slept till noon every day, then sat around drinking beer and smoking all afternoon. At night he'd go places with a bunch of vets he'd met at a bar on Fourth Street. Mama fussed and worried about him, Grandma nagged him, but I stayed away from him. He wasn't a hero, he didn't have any medals, he was nobody to brag about. Just a bum, that's all he was. No better than the old man.

  More than ever I missed William. If he'd been home I'd have talked to him about Donny. William would have figured out what was wrong with my brother. But days passed and William's house stayed empty. I began to think his mother was waiting for us to leave before she came home.

  I started writing a long letter to Stu, thinking he might know what to say to pull Donny out of his bad mood, but my fingers started hurting and the paper stuck to my hand and I didn't know how to spell half the words I wanted to use. After tearing up five sheets of paper, I gave up. I couldn't seem to get my thoughts into writing.

  One afternoon I got so desperate I tried talking to Grandma about Donny. "What do you think's wrong with him?" I asked her. "Why won't he talk to anybody?"

  Grandma looked up from the apple she was paring. "Be patient with your brother, Gordon. He's been through a war. Seen things you and I can't even imagine."

  "But he's home now. Why can't he just be his old self again?"

  "It takes time," she said. "Donny has to heal."

  "Huh," I snorted. "What do you mean, 'heal'? He wasn't wounded. He didn't even get a Purple Heart."

  "It doesn't matter whether he was wounded or not. He has eyes, doesn't he? Ears?"

  I picked up one of the long peels from the apple and curled it around my finger. It made a perfect red spiral, like blood from a cut. "If he doesn't watch out, he'll end up just like the old man," I muttered.

  Grandma studied the apple as if she saw a worm in it. "I hope not," she said.

  That was all she had to say on the subject. "I have a pie to bake," she said, getting to her feet. "Why don't you go outside and weed the garden? Pick some string beans for dinner, too."

  I passed June on the way and took her along with me. After we'd weeded and
filled a basket with beans, she and I sat down in the shade to rest.

  "Daddy's coming soon," June said. "Mama told me."

  "Is that supposed to make me happy?"

  June shrugged. "Will he think I've grown, Gordy? Am I bigger now that I'm seven?"

  Although I hadn't really noticed before, June was getting taller. Her legs were longer. The main difference, though, was in her smile and her eyes. She'd lost that pale, scared look that reminded me of kids in Life magazine pictures. Kids in the ruins of cities, kids getting treats from GIs, kids walking in long lines from one bombed place to another, kids with no homes, no parents, everything gone, nobody to protect them. DPs—displaced persons, they were called. Here at Grandma's, June had found a safe place.

  "You're definitely bigger, June," I said, letting it go at that.

  "You're bigger, too, Gordy."

  "Yeah," I said, "I'm bigger."

  June started giggling. "Bobby's bigger, Victor's bigger, Ernie's bigger, Donny's bigger, Mama's bigger, Grandma's bigger, the sky's bigger, the sun's bigger. Bigger, bigger, bigger—everything's bigger!"

  By now the word bigger was just a silly sound; it didn't mean anything at all. I laughed too.

  "Even Daddy." June giggled and stretched her arms toward the sky. "Daddy's bigger, bigger, biggest!"

  I stopped laughing. "June, I know Mama's been telling you all kinds of stuff about California, but wouldn't you rather stay with Grandma? Don't you remember how it was when we lived with the old man? How scared you were?"

  June folded her arms across her chest and hunched her shoulders. Without looking at me, she said, "Daddy's not like that now, Mama promised. She says he'll buy me a pony."

  "Bull," I said. "That's bull, Junie. Mama's telling you stories."

  "Why do you always have to ruin things, Gordy?" June's laughter turned to tears just as if somebody had thrown a switch. In a second, she was on her feet, running for the house as fast as she could go, pausing only long enough to scoop up the doll she'd left lying on the steps. Then she was gone. The screen door slammed shut like thunder behind her.