Desert, Dead Sea, Hope nicholas "Caravel, with three sails to catch the wind." she nudges the boat across the puddle. Too tall to be 14 and hair too short to look girlish. Macy crouches on her toes. "How did you get the sails so good, Macy?" "I used some of Mom's bar towels." "Oh" Claton rocks on his heels and throws stones up and out of the ditch. "Do you like it here yet?" "Don't you miss the beach, Clay? Don't you miss the boats?" "But pretend this is a really big beach." Claton feels smart saying this. Macy is quiet and Claton rubs his crew cut. "I didn't like the beach much, Mom would never let me swim. She'd always yell..." "Jellyfish, jellyfish. Get out of the water Claton J. Frances, before they drag you out to sea!" They say this together. It is almost a song in their family. A slow roar is building in the air, and Claton shoots up the side of the ditch. His head follows the slow arc of a plane’s contrail. Etching lines like a mason. In the sunlight the 8 year old's filthy clothes make him look like a refuge. "You look like a pig." Macy says, pulling the boat out of the water. "You look like a boy, a boy, a bboooooyy!" Claton and his cadence turn towards his sister. Macy shrugs and climbs out of the ditch. The pair start their walk across the stretch of desert that surrounds the airbase. Their house is new and white, like a toy in the direct sunlight. The whole scene looks fake to Macy. The desert looks as if the sun has burned away all life except for them and the distant house. "Whraaaetoooouu!" Claton squeals and jumps like a mouse. Macy jumps with surprise but looks more awkward. "What is it Clay, What is it!" She has hardly finished before Claton is gripping his sides, laughing. With his shoe he flips over a dead snake. Macy is unimpressed. "Must be a pygmy rattlesnake, see how many rattles it has?" Claton is bent over the snake, counting to himself. "About eight." Claton gingerly grabs the snake in the middle. "Its stiff like overcooked fried chicken." Again Claton expects his sister to laugh, but she is elsewhere today. To break the silence he pretends to attack the boat with the snake. "RRArrrrr, KrHissss! MMMMM Sailor Girls!" Macy twists shielding the boat from the sea serpent. ******* "He wasn't even the king of barfights, just had an uncanny ability to knock bars on their ear." "But this wasn't any bar, Mitch, it was the damn Officer's Club!" The two men in blue coveralls are howling. Stomping thier feet and slapping their thighs in the shadows of the hangar. "Anyway," Dennis wiping the tears from his eyes "The world is so small" ******** "Were you out building a pyramid my Pharaoh children?" "No, there's a drainage ditch way out there, like a little river." "Well your father will be home soon, and I don't want you lookin like dirt farmers, so wash up." The kids walk out of the kitchen as Grace ashes out the window. The world has been unmoving outside the kitchen window. There are no trees waving a breeze, no salt in the air, only still and covered in s caused more than one car accident with her looks. ****** It is a new moon that night, and it pours rain. Macy lies facing the window. She can hear the rain but can not see through the darkness. She sees Florida, and the road sign when they crossed into Georgia "Welcome to the Peach State" leaving Florida behind. Her luggage was in the moving van, and the family slowly crossed the country in their Nash Rambler. She watched the landscape fade from green to brown, across the plains, and into the desert. She is startled out of her thought by a noise outside that is not rain. She pictures a coyote and then, more cynically, a huge tumbleweed. ******** When Dennis walked out of the house at 6:00, the walkway was flooded, and it was still raining. The car started and he drove the quick 3 miles to the airfield in the early morning light. John is crawling through his window. His night was spent in the white-noise downpour. Muddy and wet he tries to be stealthy entering the room her shares with his brothers. The twins do not stir, they have long understood that their brother wanted to walk alone. ******** The only thing Macy likes about this new place is her room. In a Florida summer, sleeping becomes an art, how not to sweat, and think quietly without attracting biting insects. In Florida Macy shared a room with Claton. He would debate with her over which side of the room had a better breeze. He would pant asthmatically in his sleep, a constant soundtrack for her insomnia. Here she has her own room. Walls incredibly white. It was too bright for Macy so already the walls are covered in Beatles posters and maps of the world. Claton's frantic knock turns Macy over in bed. "Hey Macy! you got to come outside, it's nuts, you won't believe it, come on Macy!" Last time Claton woke her up like this it was in Florida. She remembers running down their street, across green lawns to find Animal Control trying to corral a crocodile that had maimed a neighbors dog. Macy rolls out of bed and into some clothes. She moves slowly just to encite Claton scratching on the other side of the door. ******* "Your father nearly drowned getting to his car this morning." Grace says this, staring at their narrow flooded walkway. Claton is running windsprints on the submerged sidewalk. Macy feels a shiver and smiles. Grace stands smoking still in her nightgown. "So just stay out of the undertow and keep the mud out of the house." Grace walks off, back to her bedroom. ****** “Well, Dennis, it hasn’t been five days, and you already brought the monsoon season with you.” “So it seems. I know this isn’t too unusual. Did I tell you that I grew up in New Mexico?” “Whereabouts?” Mitch and Dennis are standing in the open hangar doors, out across the tarmac taxiways the sun is eating the puddles and creating hard shadows under the jets. “Las Cruces” ****** While the heat cooked off many of the puddles by noon, the ground was slick and the cracks of the desert have disappeared. Overnight plants have blossomed and dotted the desert with flowers and green leaves. The ditch is full of water again, up too Claton’s waist at points. Claton shirtless and in cutoffs is hopping around and turning orange from the mud. “So where are we now Cortes?” “We are on the Colorado river Claton, we are stumbling through the unknown and starving.” “Oh come on Macy, why is everything always bad with you?” Macy shrugs. “Great Macy, I’ll eat some mud.” Macy is standing with her pants rolled. Her boat is taken by the current until it hangs up on a rock. Leaning against the wall of the ditch Macy seems vital surrounded by this water. She wishes there was some where on her maps that was unknown, somewhere she could be the first, and get away from all the history that fills her head. A chunk of mud grazes Claton’s head, and he spins to see the twins peering over the edge. Macy turns to look as Claton returns their volley. “Where’s John?” Claton asks. “He’s behind you!” The twins yell, and as Claton turns around, he is promptly smacked in the back of the head with mud. John is not behind Claton. and to survive he ducks into the knee-deep water and dashes towards Macy. When Claton stands up near her, her expression halts the twins assault. “Where is John?” Macy asks this time. The twins drop their playfulness as they reply in simultaneously. “He’s tired, doesn’t sleep well.” “He’s sleeping.” ******* A dark lake, fed by an abandoned inter-coastal waterway. Derelict boats rest half in the water, rusting waterlines and peeling paint. John swims in the oily water, sky is a flat gray, there are no shadows. He sees ripples, and something surfaces close to him. It is a naiad, it glides towards him leaving no wake, kissing it he smells gasoline on its breath. ******* Why does Dennis have to take the car to work? It’s so close. What if I need something from somewhere other than our shitty commissary? I want my hands to stop shaking. I want a drink. Just for some clarity, just something to do besides chasing the laundry across the desert. ******* “I’m goin driving. All this unpacking, tidy-wife business makes me crazy.” “Why can’t I come too Mom?” Claton sounds curious and worried. Macy understands, her mother needs a drink. “I’ll be back before Dad comes home.” “How is Dad getting home?” Macy says souding irritated. “Oh, he’s started trading rides with some guy from work.” Grace leaves her children with their breakfast, she has already smoked five cigarettes this morning, waiting for the chance to leave. ******** “Come on, let’s both go.” “Clay I don’t feel like it today.” Claton leaves his sister behind reluctantly. Macy pulls out her pile of 45’s from a box. ”I wonder if anyone out here actually knows who the Beatles are?” She stands up and strips off her clothes. In the mirror she sees that the Nevada sun has given her a strange farmer’s tan that clashes with the tan lines of her Florida swimsuit. Macy just wants a day out of the Nevada sun, a day surrounded by the sounds of her records. Something familiar and comforting as she reads about Sri Lanka and Iceland in a National Geographic. ******* “Forty miles and still no liquor store” Grace is getting irritated with the flatness of the landscape. “This is the middle of goddamn nowhere.” “Nowhere, Nowhere....” She hums, tapping the dashboard. ******* “Where’s John and Tim” “John is helping our mom with something for church and Tim he has...diarrhea.” Jeremy giggles and so does Claton. “How long have you lived here?” “Since about kindergarten.” “What’s school like here?” “There aren’t enough kids on base to a have a school, so we have to ride the bus awhile.” “So you and Tim are identical. But who is older?” “I am older by twenty-five minutes, but still John is always in charge.” The ditch has dried up, and the two boys walk through the ankle-deep mud. “Have you ever been to the tunnels?” Jeremy looks very excited asking this. “Uh, Uh.” Claton shakes his curious head. ****** Grace pulls in with a squeal and a cloud of dust thrown into the wind. “Hallelujah!” ****** “Yeah, Las Vegas is about the only thing to do for a thousand miles.” “But how expensive is it Mitch?” Dennis is uneasy when his frugalness is so apparent. “They just want you to gamble. The dinners are three bucks at most, steaks, great steaks.” Mitch’s eyes raise, three more months at this assignment and he is on the east coast with the rest of civilization. ****** “Yeah they go all the way to the other side of the road. They are a little wet now but this one is always easy to crawl through.” Jeremy and Claton peer through the culvert that ends in a distant circle of light. “Why didn’t you show Macy and me before?” “John thinks that they are dangerous. He’s just jealous, he’s getting too big to crawl through real good.” ****** Macy is restless, and leaves the house to look around base. Surrounded by the pre-fab and fresh looking asphalt with new cement curbs keeping the desert out of the street. Her house is the only one on the street with a nameplate. MSGT FRANCES “I am on Mars. The only person on the planet, I am the first girl on Mars.” she is speaking out loud. She raises her eyebrows at the following silence. She yells. “I AM THE FIRST WOMAN ON MARS!” ****** “You fall into a well Clay?” “Naw, just foolin around with Jeremy. Why are you out?” “Just looking for the rest of the children around here.” “You find any?” “Yeah, there is a playground way on the other side of base, but most of the kids were younger than you.” “Why is there nobody here Macy?” “I don’t know.” ****** Before Macy and Claton are through the front door their mother is grabbing them with excited eyes. “I’m going to Las Vegas!” “So I guess us kids aren’t going.” Macy smells the vodka tonic. Claton was smiling, but he sees what his sister is asking. “Well your father and i would like to see what it is like before we take both of you there. I don’t know how much of a kid place Las Vegas is.” Macy hates the word “kid” and goes to her room, leaving Claton to his mother’s excitement. ****** John looks over his clasped hands as his father says grace. John sees Grace through her fogged bathroom window, obscured by the glass, but he can still see her pink and shapely. ****** “Have you ever been to Las Vegas?” John looks hurt by this question. “No, my father feels Las Vegas is an evil and unholy city.” Macy is surprised, she was expecting a lush vision of lights and dancing girls. “Why would your father saw that?” “Because he’s the base chaplain.” “Oh.” John and Macy are sitting at the edge of the ditch. They have been lazily watching Timothy, Jeremy and Claton play in the ditch. ******* “There’s only so much trouble you guys can get into out here, but we still expect both of you and the house to be here on Sunday.” Dennis steps up to his children. “I trust you Macy to keep things in order. Claton,” he pauses, “listen to your sister.” He hugs them as he leaves, his arms full of baggage. ******* “Mitch, this is my wife Grace.” Dennis sees surprise in Mitch’s face. “Pleasure to meet you,” Mitch extending his hand, “Dennis didn’t mention how lovely you are.” Grace feigns embarrasment. “Yeah, Den forgets to sometimes.” Mitch’s wife Bonnie comes outside to the three leaning against the car. “Grace and Dennis, this is my wife Bonnie.” Bonnie shakes their hands. “Sorry for making you wait so long. I had to hear the end of a song.” “What song hon?” “Moon River.” ******* This time of summer in the desert makes daylight seem 18 hours long. Fingers of dusk-lit cloud stretch over John’s head. He is finishing a long walk home from far in the desert. ****** “Hold it up more.” “Like this?” “Yeah, but stop twisting it.” Claton is holding the TV antenna high over his head. Macy is trying to decipher the television static. “Macy I can’t do this forever.” “Fine, just hang it on that picture.” Claton wedges the antenna behind a frame until it won’t come out. ******* “So why don’t you have any kids?” Dennis and Grace are in the front seat of the car so they cannot see Mitch and Bonnie swallow the lumps in their throats. “We are just waiting for the right time or place for children.” Bonnie has said this line many times, and sounds rehearsed. “Like when retirement?” Grace bursts into laughter a little too abruptly. “Oh come on Grace, its none of our business.” Dennis hates when Grace is so blunt. But he forgets his irritation as he looks down the road, the sky full of enormous purple clouds. “So if we keep on like this we’ll reach Vegas just about eleven.” Mitch breaks the short silence. “Isn’t that too late for hotels?” Dennis sounds concerned. “Don’t be silly Dennis, Vegas is always open, wait till you see The Strip.” Grace turns around excitedly to Mitch. “Tell me about Vegas.” “Well, The Strip is lit up like a Christmas parade, there are midgets as doormen and the showgirls offer free drinks from trays to anyone who can stand.” ******* Knowing that Ed Sullivan still exists calms Macy down. Her and Claton are sprawled across the furniture in postures that would normally be yelled at by their father. “Clay, you are constantly asking me why I don’t like it here. Well why do you like it here?” Claton rolls over to face his sister. “I don’t know, it’s quiet? Mom says the air here is good for my asthma.” “I guess being able to breathe can make even a place like this good.” They quiet as the screen beams in life from the other side of the country. ******** Grace awakes to Dennis singing in the shower. “Yippee Yi Yah, Yippee Yi Yo, Ghost Riders in the Sky.” His voice is deep and suits his build. Grace feels refreshed although last evening she had wrested some drinks off the dancing trays of the floor girls. Their hotel room is on the top floor and Las Vegas spreads outside their window. The pillows smell crisp and clean, and Grace smiles knowing that Dennis is splurging a bit on their stay, like their honeymoon in Hawaii. “I’m a new man.” Dennis emerges from the steam of the bathroom in a white button-up shirt and jeans. “You almost look like a civilian Den.” What you expected me to wear my coveralls in this town?” ******* John awakes to the gospel. GOSPEL 1420AM. The twins’ beds are empty and John has no desire to stir. But the radio from his father’s study gets him to his feet and out the front door. Saturdays aren’t as exciting as they used to be. On Saturdays a man named Cook used to take his jet on “equipment inspection” flights. John would walk out into the desert and watch Cook peel across the sky in spins and rolls. And since the desert is so empty Cook would sometimes fly just thirty or so feet from the ground. The twins would fight like Cowboys and indians, but John would watch Cook fill up the vast desert air with a howl. ******* “Make your own sandwich.” “Macy MACY MACY, please, please PLEASE?” “What would you do if I was not here?” “Starve.” Macy crosses her arms and refuses to move. Claton gives up pleading and starts opening all the cupboard doors. He is not used to the new kitchen and has already run into the kitchen table once disoriented. Claton stops in front of the far left cupboard door and looks at Macy. A bottle of Smirnoff and Beefeater sit among the recently unpacked tableware. “I think I’ll make myself a drink.” Claton jokes and pretends to be his drunk mother. Macy runs over slamming shut all the cupboard doors. She is angry but her eyes get wide with surprise when she sees John’s silhouette on the kitchen window. He waves and points at the door. ******* “Wish we had a convertible.” Grace says, looking all around as Las Vegas slides by the window. Bonnie nods in silent agreement. Mitch pipes up, “Yeah it would be nice, but if that top doesn’t shut jeust right your car could turn into a swimming pool.” “That’s a strange thing to bring up. “ Bonnie says this while looking through her purse for something. “Well when we were eating breakfast I read in the paper that there are gonna be big storms all over Nevada and Utah.” “Should we call the kids Grace?” Dennis looks over at her. Grace never makes eye contact and says, “Nah, they’ll be fine, this won’t be their first storm.” ******* “That was the best sandwich I’ve ever had!” Claton beams at John. “Thanks, I could make more.” “No I think were fine.” Macy replies, “How did you learn to make food like that?” “Well before my father became a minister he wanted to be a cook, and he went to a culinary school, but had some weird religious epihany making some French dessert. If you guys ever come over he’ll probably tell you that story along with many others.” John feels he’s talking too much, “Anyway he taught me some things like I am going to a chef someday.” Macy is interested in John’s face and words. He doesn’t act like Florida boys that would fight for her attention. “Well what do you want to be?” she asks. “Oh, maybe an astronaut.” “Yeah me too!” Macy cuts off his sentence, John smiles. Macy feels slightly embarrassed and looks up and away with her smile. Claton smiles too and giggles at his sister. The three are quiet at the table for a second. “What is there to do here on a Saturday, or just any day?” Macy asks intently. John looks at her but then just shrugs still thinking. “II mean there isn’t even a movie theatre here!” Macy is talking very excitedly, and Claton sees her unhappiness in the energy. John is off guard but finds something to say. “Well there used to be a guy who would do acrobatics in his jet all morning long.” “But where is he now?” Macy asks. “His plane broke apart in flight.” Macy and Claton look at John questioningly with their eyes. “It disintegrated. I didn’t see it happen though.” “What happened to the pilot?” Macy asks urgently. “He died.” “Did they find him?” Claton asks totally engaged. “They found enough pieces to fill a shoe box. When they had his viewing they just had a picture.” Claton looks with amazement, John continues. “If you go a couple miles west of here you can still find small pieces of his plane. ****** “I told you the buffets here were amazing.” Mitch has been excited all day, happy he had convinced Dennis to come. Dennis seems to say, “You were right.” but his mouth is full and he decides to just grin and nod. The two wives had been grabbing drinks all day, and they laughed at their husbands exchange. ****** “Looks like its gonna rain Macy.” Claton turns from the window and returns to the couch. “Fine with me.” Macy never looks away from the television. “I think I’m gonna walk around.” “Why now?” Macy finally looks at Claton. “Well Mom never lets us wander around when its getting dark. Its kind of pretty right now.” “Alright, stay out as long as you want. Just be back before 8PM tomorrow.” MAcy jokingly says. “Don’t you mean “twenty-hundred hour”” Claton mimics his father while getting up from the couch, and heads for the door jacket in hand. As he shuts the door Macy thinks of the liquor in the cupboard. ******** “I’d like to meet your children sometime. They sound very nice.” Bonnie isn’t slurring quite yet but the sentence flow with her buzz. “Yeah but they can be a handful at times.” Grace sips on her water, she has slowed down a bit with her alcohol. She is too entertained by Mitch and Dennis to retire to her room drunk by eight’o’clock. The two men are running around like children between the aisles of nickel-slots. They are showing each other their various jackpots and debating over which machine is the luckiest. ****** Macy has seen her mother mix enough gin & tonics to mix one that did not taste too much like a Christmas tree. Afraid Claton may surprise her with the liquor out, she has shut herself in her bedroom. She has started to write a letter to a friend in Florida, but by the third drink she had fallen into the ecstasy of playing her 45’s loud, dancing and yelling along. ******* Mitch has pressured Dennis into enough beers that they are talking loudly at the table. Grace remembers her husband in college, always vital and in motion. Slowly with their first assignment, Macy and then Claton, Dennis has turned into his father, becoming frugal and sedentary. But tonight Grace sees a chemistry between the two men that turns Dennis into the college boy he was. "Hey Graces, Mitch and i are gonna pool some money and tear up some blackjack tables." "As long as we can buy a convertible tomorrow its fine with me. Get otta here you kids." Grace points them away with her cigarette. "I think I'll go powder my nose," she says this with her evil movie star grin, and walks to the bathroom. Grace reaches the door and can hear someone vomiting loudly. "Christ." She pushes open the door, walks across the tiles to an open stall. "Grace is that you?" a voice comes from the next stall. "Bonnie what are you doing?" "I saw your shoes, they're such nice shoes." Bonnie says this between deep gasps. Grace leaves her stall to find Bonnie splayed out next to the toilet. Yellow vomit covers the toilet, but surprisingly none on Bonnie's cocktail dress. "Oh Jesus." Grace mutters and tries to get Bonnie off the floor. "I'm barren." Bonnie says quietly. "What I can't hear you honey, come on lets get up and get some water." Bonnie pushes Grace's hands off her. "I'm barren, I AM BARREN." Bonnie looks at grace with contempt. Grace does not want to deal with this sort of drunkenness. She can hear Bonnie wailing between sobs as the bathroom door closes. "I'M BARREN YOU BITCH." ******* It has really started to pour in the last 15 minutes and John regrets not bringing his jacket. The desert becomes black at night when there is a storm. No moon, only the distant house lights. John is trying to clear his head in the rain. He feels that Macy is too young. He's sixteen, she's fourteen. "You're a real loser John, sixteen and you don't even have a car, you might as well be fourteen." The downpour eats up many of his words. Puddles are everywhere as he heads towards Macy and Claton's house, which has flickering windows of a television's blue light. John sees something very pale on the ground up ahead. It looks like a body. John takes a deep breath as he pushes back his hair. Macy is curled in a ball around her boat, mud is on her naked feet. Her long legs are tucked under her tanned arms. John walks away, then turns back around. He just looks at her, she hasn't stirred at all even though he is standing right above her. Crouching and just looks at her, small breasts covered by the flowing rain. He reaches and touches her bare thigh. She is warm, and John finds himself walking away seconds afterward. ****** Claton reached the ditch when it was only sprinkling. As it started to rain harder he slogged through the ditch looking at his feet. He likes this desert wet, and can see the dark shadows of the culvert ahead. The culvert has about an inch of water it as Claton looked into the culvert. It was dark and Claton was silent and thinking. He couldn't see the end of the culvert as he crawled in the first few feet. Halfway through the water had risen half a foot. Claton was a little anxious, but he knew that it would be faster to keep going forward. Suddenly Claton felt his hands sink into a pile of mud that had been deposited by the earlier rains. He could feel it rise to within inches of the culvert's top. Water started rushing in faster as the rain storm's roar grew. The water was cold already, but with Claton crouched on all fours he was shivering. He started clawing through the mud and looked back knowing that it would take too long to try to crawl out backwards. When he stopped feeling his arms he was turned with his nose just above the water. He never panicked because his limbs were too numb to respond. ****** Within two years Macy had moved with her parents to the west coast. She hardly went outside and grew to be pale and slender. The ditch was paved over with concrete, the culverts were covered with grates, and the streets were filled with children.