As it turned out they came apart in the deep fryer, making a greasy sort of stew. His dad had taken them to A&W instead, and there his parents had announced they were moving to Africa for a year or so, leaving their regular jobs—Miranda was a producer at a local TV station and Richard was a mechanical engineer—to teach in Zambia. The kids could come, too, they said, or move in with neighbors and finish school at home. When they changed their minds about the trip there was no explanation or special meal. Weeks had gone by and no suitcases appeared in the hall, so their children had decided they must be staying.
He heard a knock on the window behind him. There was his father, leaning his forehead on the glass, his mouth moving silently. David banged and pulled the wooden frame until it scraped up a few inches.
“Come on out.”
“I’m watching sausages.”
“Sausages don’t need watching. Come out.”
David turned the heat down under the pan and went through the back porch to the stone patio, where his dad waited.
“I want to show you something.”
“A catfish?”
“No, no, no. There aren’t any catfish in this river. If there were I’d have caught one by now.” He strode toward the three-car garage, stopping by the door farthest to the right, the one that led to his workshop. “This is much better than a catfish.”
David helped lug the door up. “You and mom are being kind of mysterious.”
His father went to a workbench against the rear wall and turned around holding something dull and gray. It was narrow and about four feet long.
“You’ve started a new model?”
“A helicopter. For you.”
“Dad!” It was a remote-control helicopter for collecting upper-level weather data. Richard had already made a plane for the same purpose that David used every week.
“Thought something that went straight up would be useful when you’re operating from the top of your building.”
“For sure. That’s great. It’s going to be a beauty!”
Miranda’s voice came from behind them. “I knew those sausages would be left to their own devices!”
She didn’t seem to mind. The look on her face reminded David of Christmas morning. She loved secrets, and she loved revealing them.
“What’s going on, Mom?”
Her smile widened, and was quickly suppressed. She began to lead the way back to the house but before they reached it the back door opened and a pajama-clad figure came out, yawning.
“Sam!”
He was thin, and his face tight with strain. But home, weeks before expected. David felt himself grinning. He opened his arms for a back-thumping hug.
THE BRETTON FAMILY got together for two weeks every year. The date varied depending on when Sam had leave, but they tried for Christmas at The Castle or summer at the cottage. This year it was supposed to be the cottage, in early August. After the initial pleasure of seeing his brother, David realized having him turn up before his scheduled break was unlikely to be a good thing. Sam didn’t offer an explanation, though, so David didn’t ask for one.
They had breakfast on the porch with Richard still talking about the remote-control helicopter and Miranda continually touching Sam as if checking that he was really there. When the meal was done she insisted “the boys” go outside rather than help with the dishes. They compromised by clearing the table then strolled down to the river, Sam still in his pajamas, bare feet stuck into a pair of olive green rubber boots left by the door.
“This place never changes,” he said. “That’s kind of nice and kind of creepy.”
“The Yard Time Forgot.” It wasn’t so much time’s fault. It was David and his dad not getting around to mowing and pruning often enough. The whole yard was overgrown, but especially where it met the river. They’d always left it a bit wild there—even before the word ecosystem had found its way into everyday conversation. Some people had parklike yards. This one was more of a storybook forest, with unexpected benches and flowers wherever Miranda decided to tuck them.
Sam kicked at the twisted shrubs and mounded grasses.
“I’ll bet we’ve got skunks.”
“And in case we do, you’re trying to annoy them?”
The absentminded kicking stopped. Sam bent over, tugging at the grass purposefully. “Look at this!”
David went closer. Lying upside down under a tangle of grass was their old cedar-and-canvas canoe.
Muttering his annoyance, Sam kept clearing away vegetation. “Out in the weather like this? Didn’t we leave it in the garage?”
“Someone must have brought it down to use.”
“Sarah!”
“Well—”
“Sarah for sure, and some guy. She’d get excited, oh my, such a romantic outing, and then she’d forget all about it.” Sam knocked on the hull. “What do you think?”
“It looks fairly solid, considering. Not past repair.”
Sam lifted one side and peered underneath. “The paddles are here.” He pulled one out. It had a rounded, beaver-tail design and only reached to his chest, just right for when he was a child. A daddy longlegs ran off the weathered wood and fell into the grass. “I’m going to have to talk to that girl.”
“Talking’s never been that useful.” From birth Sarah had been impervious to her brothers’ view of things. The canoe had been a regular source of conflict. Sarah would insist on going with them whenever they took it out on the river, but then she’d free any minnows or crayfish they caught and refuse to do her share of the paddling because it interfered with being the Lady of Shalott.
David thought Sam would want to spend a few days cleaning the canoe, patching it, maybe giving the cedar a fresh coat of marine varnish and the canvas some waterproof paint—or at least stick on some duct tape here and there—but he was already pushing it into the water.
“Are you going to help?”
“You’re doing fine, Sam.”
“You can pull it in, then.”
“The sweaty stuff’s up to you. I have to be at work in an hour.” But something got to him while he watched his brother struggle with the heavy craft. The squish of river mud or the smell of the water, he didn’t know. He kicked off his shoes and tugged off his socks, then stooped to roll up his pant legs. By then the canoe was floating. Sam knelt in the stern, his paddle hard against the riverbed.
“You’re going to get wet.”
David had already noticed that. He took a giant step from the muddy shore, one foot slipping as he heaved himself into the canoe. It rocked and he nearly tipped them both into the river.
“Idiot!” Half laughing, Sam grabbed David’s belt and pulled him down. “Never stand, remember?”
“Oh, right. It’s a gondola you stand up in.”
They didn’t have life jackets. David always used one in his own canoe, but as close as they were to the river, his parents had never owned any. The Bretton kids had grown up with the feeling that danger didn’t lurk anywhere. They were never