***
Dylan raced up the stairs to his room. At the top landing, he stopped at the sight of James sitting on one tucked leg on the sill of the dormer window. James turned, his chin resting on his fist, and gave Dylan a cold look. He swiveled his gaze back out the window. Before James had turned away, Dylan saw something in his eyes that was frightening. It was a kind of sadness, almost like grief. Dylan realized he had missed whatever James had said.
“Pardon?”
“You and Sam must have had quite a chat about things.”
Dylan stood by the stair top, trying to remember what he’d come for, and puzzled by the statement.
“Me and Sam? He invited me to go over to Mr. Thompson’s with him. Did you know Mr. Thompson was in the war? A soldier?”
“Didn’t know. Don’t care. What I want to know is what you told Sam about me sneaking out.” James’s head swung slow to face Dylan. Dylan saw that James’s eyes were red and watery. This was the scariest. James never cried. Dylan took a step back. He tried to look thoughtful, but what he felt was a fear. He didn’t trust himself not to shake, so he leaned against his desk. Dylan didn’t ever remember being afraid of his older brother before.
“Is that why the police came for you?”
James swiveled to turn his back on Dylan, gazing down on Nash Street. He didn’t answer.
“He asked what time you left out this morning. That’s all.”
James turned back, his jaw set, lips thin. His gaze burned. “What did you tell him?”
“I said I didn’t know!” Dylan heard his voice slip on the last word, like an inexperienced skater.
James’s look softened a fraction. “They don’t arrest people for sneaking out. Something happened down to Wilson’s Store last night. They think I had something to do with it. But I didn’t.”
Dylan waited. Finally, he said, “All right. I believe you. But why does anybody think it was you?”
“I picked up something I shouldn’t have, and it makes it look bad for me. That’s all.”
“Well,” Dylan said lamely, “I’m sure it will all work out okay. Going to the fireworks tonight?”
James flashed a brief smile and turned back to the window. “One way or another, I’ll be there,” he said quietly.
11 / Anne
The black sky exploded in a pinwheel of bright green twinkles. Delighted screams and laughter bubbled from the throng arrayed on the shore of the Wicomico. James squeezed Anne’s waist, stroking her new red, white, and blue tee shirt. She turned, her face aglow for an instant in the gleam of the fireworks. She glanced around, and kissed him, soft and possessive, as the darkness enveloped them again.
The crowd was relaxed, smoke wafting the air from a thousand cigarettes, tips glowing in the dark. The threadbare pasture of the fairgrounds transformed with the arrival of the Cook Brothers Circus, the centerpiece of the Crane Landing Fourth of July. Along with the fireworks, of course. The town paused in its labors at the dock and the fields to celebrate, and neighbor reacquainted with neighbor over watermelon and smoking grills. The Lions Club had its booth with the roulette wheel. The Methodist Church was selling something this year called tie dye tee shirts—multicolored, whimsical splashes created on a plain white tee shirt, no two patterns the same.
Back in May, there was a good deal of discussion about selling the shirts, at the annual planning meeting, according to Ryan, who heard it from his mom. She, like most of the parents, thought the shirts were too flashy. But the newly installed minister, a Michael Dennis from the mainland, convinced parents that red and blue die on a white background was a fine means to encourage patriotism among the young people.
James glanced around at his neighbors, gathered in family clusters or couplings of sweethearts on old blankets covered with picnic remnants. His dark mood was in contrast to their smiles and carefree comments. Anne seemed to sense his turmoil and turned again, gazing seriously at him.
“I told you, my mom never comes to the fireworks ‘cuz of the noise, and my dad won’t leave her home by herself. Relax, would ya?” She kissed him again, lightly, and pressed back to him.
“It’s not that. I just… I’m thinking of leaving for awhile.” Under his fingers, he felt Anne stiffen. The crowd stilled again with the muffled whoosh, signaling a canister launch. High above the river, a great explosion of blue and red sparkles preceded a series of concussions, gasps, and scattered applause. From the fairgrounds, the raspy hawking from the Volunteer Fire Department’s dunking booth echoed faintly.
“But why? Where would you go?” she whispered. “How long before you come back to Crane Ridge?”
James drew a deep breath. “My dad said my mom was living in a little town called—” A screeching whistle interrupted him, and they both turned to gaze out over the river.
The crowd oohed and aahed, and James turned back to Anne, his mouth close to her ear. “She was living in a town in Texas.” He smiled. “Sugar Land. That would be my mother.”
Anne hugged him and kissed his cheek. “What makes you say that, James?”
He kissed her soft, in the glow of a blossoming rocket. “Before…she was so full of life. So happy and so much fun to be with. Not like a mother, really.” He dropped his gaze. “Imagine how crushed a woman would have to be, to…” he shuddered and she gripped him tightly.
“I’ve been thinking of her lately.” He laughed softly, as a thwump signaled another launch. “That’s not right. I’ve never stopped thinking about her.”
In the bright bloom of light, he sighed. “And just the thought of her dying out there, alone.”
He noticed Anne eying him oddly. “What?”
Anne cleared her throat. “Didn’t your mother leave you? I mean, didn’t she leave you and Dylan? And he was no more than a baby?”
“She left because of him! What my father did!” He said hotly. A few feet away, heads turned at his tone. Anne raised a finger to her lips.
A breathtaking flash drew everyone’s eyes skyward. “So you want to go to Texas? To do what?”
James sighed and slipped his free hand in hers. “I want to see where she’s buried.” He felt her steady gaze. “It’s just something I have to do. This seems like as good a time as any.”
Anne rested her head on his shoulder. “Gosh, I’ll be crazy missing you. When will you be back?”
“Well, that’s a little harder to say.” He waited through a series of bursts. “Everyone thinks I broke into Wilson’s store, and the chief tried to pin me with beating some boy real bad over in Millwood.”
“You have to stay and defend yourself, James!” Several hushes sounded in the dark. Anne lowered her voice. “Or it will never be better for you here.”
“Well, since my father came back I just don’t fit anymore.”
“I want to go with you.”
James started. “I don’t even know what I’m going to do. But it won’t be clean sheets and Nana doing my laundry. I don’t plan on being back for the start of school, and—“
“Jimmy Paxton. You think you’re the only one has a yearning to get off this stupid peninsula?”
Mr. Geiger on the next blanket over glanced their way, and then looked more closely at the two, twined sinuously on the blanket James had lifted from the linen closet.
James buried his face in Anne’s neck, and inhaled her raspberry fragrance. The crackling tune of Windy by a group called the Association grated in the temporary pause of concussions. As if Anne’s response weren’t