Blossoms and the Green Phantom (7 page)

The day of his meeting with old man Benson had been the scariest day of Junior’s life. It had started out to be a nice summer day. Junior had been passing old man Benson’s farm, and he had noticed some tiny baby watermelons on some vines.

Junior had never seen baby watermelons before, and he had been so excited that he had ducked under the fence and walked into the garden. He went down the rows, admiring one baby watermelon after another, and then he had bent and touched one. He had not picked it or harmed it in any way—Junior would never have done such a thing. He just wanted to see if they were soft or hard.

As he touched, however, a long shadow fell over him. Junior glanced up. He was looking directly into the end of a double-barreled shotgun.

Junior gasped with fright. He fell back, sitting directly on two baby watermelons and crushing them.

Old man Benson said one word. “Git.”

Junior said two. “Yes, sir.”

Junior ran for home as fast as he could, and he had never laid eyes on old man Benson since. He never wanted to either.

“Maybe old man Benson will see it,” Ralphie said. Old man Benson was known countywide for his meanness. “If he does, good-bye, Phantom.” Ralphie lifted a make-believe shotgun. “Pow! PowPowPow! Pow.”

Junior spun around, his face twisted with horror. He began to run toward old man Benson’s farm. Ralphie’s
pows
had gone straight to Junior’s heart.

“Junior, wait,” Maggie yelled. Junior kept running. “Come on, you guys,” Maggie said. “We got to go with him.”

The three of them ran down the hill after Junior. “Wait!” Ralphie said. Ralphie’s voice had the sound of an army command, and even Junior paused. Ralphie pointed up to show them that they were outrunning the Phantom.

They looked skyward. The Phantom was directly over their heads, and it was beginning to sink. Junior raised his arms and coaxed it toward him with little pulling motions of his hands. The Phantom continued on course toward the Benson farm.

“I bet it’s going to land in the garden,” Vern said.

That thought made tears come to Junior’s eyes. He knew what old man Benson did to things that landed in his garden. “I can’t look,” he said. He covered his eyes. “Tell me what happens.”

“Junior, open your eyes,” Maggie said. “You’re acting silly. The Phantom is not real. It’s something you made. It’s a thing.”

“It is not!”

“It is!”

“Not to me,” Junior said.

“Your sister’s right,” Ralphie said. “There are other air mattresses, other garbage bags, more”—he swallowed hard—“helium.” He hated to think he might have to use more of his mom’s helium, but he had had enough running around the countryside for one night. His leg hurt and he wanted to be in his bedroll.

Junior’s eyes were wide with astonishment. “There’s only one Green Phantom,” he said, “can’t you understand that? That is the only Green Phantom in the whole world!”

To Junior, this was true. Junior knew he could never do it again. He could never get the mattresses to bend the same way, never get those polka dots back in the exact same place. And even if he did, he wouldn’t love the second Green Phantom as much as he loved this one.

The Green Phantom had now moved past the garden. It swept gently over the barn. It brushed the weather vane. The tip of the vane punctured one of the garbage bags, and this had a toppling effect.

The Phantom began to go out of control.

Junior gasped with pain and fright.

Then everything happened at once. The helium went out of the garbage bag in a rush, and the Phantom began a downward spiral. There was a rustling sound, a gush of air, a moan. Every sound tore Junior’s heart because these were the exact sounds, he knew, that a dying creature would make.

Then with one final, silken sigh, the Green Phantom came to its resting place—the roof of old man Benson’s chicken house.

In silence the four of them took in this new development—the Green Phantom on the chicken house.

The only one of them who knew what to do about it was Ralphie, but he had decided not to be the one to say, “Well, that’s it, folks, one Green Phantom down the tube. Let’s go home.” Ralphie knew that would be the signal for Junior to start crying again, and while Junior would most likely end up in tears anyway, Ralphie did not want to be the one to cause them. Maggie had been giving him glances of admiration all day—first when he said he could get the helium, then when he got the helium, then when he put it in.

So Ralphie stood with his hands behind his back, waiting for someone else to break Junior’s heart. He glanced sideways at Junior to see how he was taking it.

Junior was looking up at the chicken house roof with his hands clasped beneath his chin. Probably praying, Ralphie thought.

Junior was praying, and he had been staring at the Phantom for so long that every now and then he thought his prayers had been answered. The Phantom actually seemed to slide off the chicken house, the way words slid off the page when he stared at them too long in school.

“It’s coming,” he cried in one of those optimistic moments.

Dream on, Ralphie said silently.

“Well, maybe it’s not coming right now,” he said as his vision cleared, “but I really think it’s nearer the edge, don’t you, Maggie?” Junior wisely asked the only person in the group who might spare him.

Maggie was taking her role as Junior’s mother-for-a-night seriously, and she did exactly what she knew her mother would do. She put her arm around Junior’s shoulder and squeezed him as hard as she could.

Junior knew the truth when he felt that arm on his shoulder. He waited, cringing, for the words that went with it.

“No, it isn’t, hon. It’s there to stay.”

If it had been his mother’s real arm, that might have stopped Junior. But it was just his sister’s. He squirmed out of Maggie’s grasp, spun around and faced her. His hands were on his hips.

“It is not either there to stay!”

“Junior,” Maggie began. She reached out. Junior stepped back.

“It is not there to stay because I’m getting it down.” He jabbed his thumb against his chest.

“You can’t get it down, Junior. You know Mom doesn’t allow you to get up on a roof anymore.”

“I’ll do it,” Ralphie said wearily.

“You try to do everything!” Junior cried, turning on Ralphie. “I’m getting sick and tired of you trying to take over. It’s my Phantom, not yours, and I’m going to be the one to get it down!”

Ralphie gave another of his be-my-guest gestures, and Junior turned and set off for the chicken house. He did it so fast that there was a gasp of surprise from those he left behind.

Junior was halfway to the chicken house, out in the middle of the open yard, when he decided this might have been a good time to let Ralphie help if he really wanted to. Before he could do anything gracious, however, Ralphie and Vern rushed up, one on each side, and grabbed his arms. In a sort of lop-sided crouch—Ralphie’s artificial leg held him back—they bore him to the chicken house.

Everything happened so fast then, Junior was helpless to change the outcome. Vern and Ralphie had their hands out, clasped together to boost him up. His foot went up into their hands. And then—this was so fast, it took Junior’s breath, it was like Superman taking off from the earth—Junior was flung through the air. He landed flat on his stomach on the chicken house roof.

He lay there, frozen with fear. At the same time the inside of his body—all the important things—seemed to have turned to jelly.

Junior’s eyes were squeezed shut. He always shut his eyes when there was something he desperately did not want to hear. It never worked, but he couldn’t stop himself from trying it. This time what Junior desperately did not want to hear was the sound of startled chickens.

Below him the hens were fluttering their wings and clucking to each other, responding to the soft thud they had heard, but it wasn’t that shrill clucking that would wake old man Benson. After a long moment, Junior opened his eyes.

The Phantom was right there in front of him. He could reach out and touch it. This was a real relief to Junior. He wouldn’t even have to stand up or anything—just give a little tug on the nearest air mattress. He tugged.

The Phantom bobbed toward him. One of the garbage bags brushed his forehead. Then the Phantom pulled back to its original place. Junior tugged again. Again the Phantom came so close, the garbage bag touched his head. Again it went back.

“It’s stuck.” Junior breathed these words to himself. Slowly, carefully, he got to his feet. The roof had a steep slope, and Junior did not want to fall off. He glanced down to see if Vern and Ralphie were still there. They were, and so was Maggie. He felt a little better.

“Hurry!” Maggie hissed.

Junior put one finger to his lips in a plea for total silence. He took one step. He pulled again. He could see what the trouble was now. The wire between two of the air mattresses was hooked around the edge of the roof.

He would have to pull and lift at the same time. He got a good grip on the air mattress. His whole body was set to give the biggest pull of his life. He did this at the very moment when the Phantom released itself, just bounced up into the air.

The Phantom sailed up, over Junior’s head, and onto the ground. Junior went down hard. The resulting bang as Junior struck the tin roof of the henhouse was like an explosion.

The chickens reacted immediately. There were instant shrieks of alarm and shrill cries. Within five seconds it seemed to Junior that a minimum of one thousand hens were flapping their wings and shrieking at the top of their lungs.

A dog began to bark at the house.

“The lights are on!” Vern yelled.

Ralphie saw a figure in the upstairs window. “It’s old man Benson,” he cried, “and his shotgun!”

The window was thrown up. The barrel of the shotgun came out. Maggie, Ralphie, and Vern bolted for the cornfield.

“We’ll be back,” Maggie cried over her shoulder.

Junior watched them go, and the sight of them disappearing into the rows of corn was the worst thing he had ever seen in his life. Even Maggie’s words brought him no comfort. He knew they would never come back. He never would have if he had gotten away.

Junior had always hated to be left behind, but there was something terrible and final about this particular desertion. In desperation, he looked down at the ground. It was a long way down. He could jump, but the last time he had done that, he had broken his legs.

Somebody tell me what to do, he begged.

It was old man Benson who made the decision for Junior. Old man Benson came out in the yard with his shotgun.

Junior flattened himself against the roof. Old man Benson crossed the yard and looked at the Green Phantom. He walked around it. He kicked it with his foot. The Phantom responded with a light bounce.

Old man Benson walked around the yard like a soldier on patrol. He looked behind the barn. He circled the henhouse. Junior did not breathe. Then old man Benson went to the house and sat down in a rocking chair on the porch. Junior knew the double-barreled shotgun was across his knees.

“Who was it?” his wife called.

“Some kids.”

“What were they after?”

“Some fool thing.”

“Come back to bed.”

“I’ll set out here awhile. One of them said they’d be back.”

Junior let out all his breath in a long, hopeless sigh. He knew then that he would be spending the rest of his life on the roof of old man Benson’s henhouse.

“Are you telling me that you left your own brother on the top of a chicken house?”

Vicki Blossom had been sitting on the porch steps for over two hours, staring up at the night sky. She had wanted to see the Green Phantom so that she could truthfully tell Junior how beautiful it had been. At the same time she had been listening for the telephone.

As the hours passed, however, and the phone did not ring and she did not see the Phantom, her feeling of doom had increased. By the time she saw the kids running up the road, she knew the worst had happened.

She stood up. She made a quick head count. There were only three children running up the road. Junior was not one of them.

Vicki Blossom could not move for a moment. She just stood there waiting with a heart of lead for the bad news. Even so, it stunned her.

“You left Junior on the roof of a chicken house?” she asked again.

The living room light was behind Vicki Blossom, so the children could not see her face, but none of them particularly wanted to. The way she was standing and the fury in her voice said it all.

Maggie was the oldest of the Blossom children, so she had felt it was her responsibility to break the news, to gasp out the original “Mom, Junior’s on the roof of old man Benson’s chicken house.”

Vern said, “We didn’t do it on purpose, Mom.”

“Your own brother?”

Maggie hung her head in shame. This was the first time in weeks that her mother had been disappointed in her. Even when Maggie fell off Sandy Boy, her mother had praised her for trying with something like “Almost!” Now Maggie was in disgrace and she knew it. What was worse, she deserved it. She had been Junior’s mother for the night, and she had done the most terrible thing a mother could do—desert her child.

“And why, may I ask, did you let your brother climb up on a chicken house in the first place?”

“Mom, he wanted to,” Vern said.

“And you let him?”

“Mom—”

“Three big strong kids could not stop one little boy from climbing up on a chicken house? Is that what you expect me to believe?”

Maggie nodded dumbly.

“Not one of you had the guts to climb up on the chicken house yourselves?”

“We offered but—”

“I’m not interested in your offers, only your actions.”

They knew then that Vicki Blossom was not interested in their answers either. The three of them stood in silence.

“And then what? The three big strong kids ran off like cowards? I tell you one thing. If Junior hurts himself because of you, I will never forgive any of you. Never!”