Flagged Victor (5 page)

Even more fun than building a fort of your own was destroying a fort belonging to someone else. The older boys heard about our fort but they didn’t know where we’d built it, so we changed routes every time we visited. Despite these precautions, we must have been spotted or followed, because, one day, we arrived to find it utterly destroyed. The walls were toppled, the boards smashed, the cave below the fort reeked of piss. My porn magazines were ripped into ten thousand shreds, scattered puzzle pieces of unmatched breasts and hips.

The fort had lasted only three glorious weeks. Although disappointed, we weren’t overly bitter. The building and destroying of forts was another example of natural law. It had been our duty to build it, just as it had been their duty to destroy it. Everyone accepted that.

While
building the fort, Derek and I had gone searching the nearby forest for planks and plywood pieces. Just off a path that exited to a field surrounding Penhorn Mall, we found a nest of women’s purses. We puzzled over what it could mean to find a dozen or so handbags in the weeds and brush. Eventually, we understood that someone must have stolen the bags from women shopping in the mall and dumped them in this spot. The industriousness of the activity—more than a dozen purse-snatchings—and the calculated route—each time the
snatcher had left the purses in the exact same hiding place—spoke of something dark and obsessive about criminal activity.

We searched the purses idly and discovered that many of them still had spare change, a few forms of identification, and other odds and ends like brushes and compact cases. I believed the spare change to be fair game, but Derek considered it part of the evidence that needed to be turned over to the police. It would never have occurred to me to bring the purses in, and it shocked me that Derek was so insistent. I saw the crime as completely outside our realm of concern. The only thing that mattered was the treasure we had found and the good story. The purses had long ago been written off as lost. The purse-snatcher would not be caught just because we found the stash. The crime itself was a mystery, hidden in a thicket, beyond the reach of whatever light shone in the moral universe. It was something to laugh about, not to make better.

Derek hastily gathered all the purses and driver’s licences and credit cards into his hands, while I just as hastily scooped up as many coins as I could get. We parted in mutual anger. Still indignant days later, I asked Chris, whose father, after all, was a policeman, if he would have brought the purses to the police too.

Fuck that, he said. And we laughed in FV fashion at what an idiot Derek had been.

Then
we learned about Paul’s new tree fort and plotted to bring it down.

The situation was tricky from a tactical standpoint and slightly dubious from a moral or legal one. Paul’s house was on
the street that bordered the lake. His tree fort was not exactly in his backyard but in the woods immediately behind his backyard. Wrecking it was a bit like wrecking his property. Still, we figured Paul hadn’t built the fort himself and his father had probably done the work. This gave us enough scorn to go through with what needed to be done.

On the day we discovered the fort, we climbed the makeshift railing and clambered in. Astonishingly, there were three levels, each higher than the next offset like the sprawling wings of an elaborate house. There were ladders cut through floors, and there were railings and rope swings and toys lying about, some of them clearly belonging to Paul’s younger sisters. We stood in the highest reaches and admired the view and the superb construction. Then we put the boots to it, kicking in plywood walls, wrenching up railing boards, tossing toys into the abyss. I found a rusty nail and stabbed a Stretch Armstrong doll, something I’d always wanted to do, and squeezed until fluorescent green goo oozed out of the tear in the chest.

The fort, however, was well built and resistant to our destructive activities. We’d made frustratingly little progress when Paul’s mother stormed out of the house waving a broom and screaming at us. No one feared the broom or her threats but it was also fun to run away, so we jumped down to the forest floor and tore off through the woods, laughing like lunatics.

Being
thwarted only inspired us to greater determination. We made the destruction of Paul’s fort a burning objective. We thought about the ways it could be done and debated the options
among an ever-amassing group of boys. Several smaller groups of close friends came together in one large super-group, bound by a common purpose and the righteousness of a holy cause. Should we wait until Paul’s family went on vacation? Should we bring hatchets and crowbars to tear more quickly into the walls and do as much damage as possible before discovery? Should we gather branches and leaves and light a bonfire below it? Finally, one of us came up with the perfect idea, and we gathered on the appointed night.

We waited until pitch dark. There were perhaps nine or ten of us in total and no one had thought to bring a flashlight. We started off into the forest, excited and eager, far enough away from our destination that anyone who saw us entering the woods from the road could not possibly have guessed where we were going. We moved silently, except for the occasional grunt or curse whenever someone got jabbed by a branch, swallowed a bug, or walked through a spiderweb. We knew the paths well. This was our lake and our woods; Paul just lived here. We turned off the path at precisely the right point and crawled up the slope in the dark through thicker forest to Paul’s backyard.

There were no lights on at his house. We hushed each other’s laughter, though each hush seemed to coax more hysterical giggling. Finally, we stood below the tall tree where the fort was perched, cherishing the intensity, trembling with the anticipation. I heard a rucksack open, then a twig snap. Someone shushed us all again.

Then a chainsaw coughed twice and throttled into a glorious roar.

The noise obliterated every other sense. The chainsaw set to
work, in whose hands I didn’t know, biting and spitting its way through the trunk of the tree. We stood back from the splinters, as though from flying sparks, glee in our hearts. Lights came on in the house. A voice yelled a warning. We ignored it. There was work to be done. Then someone else yelled, Cops! We refused to believe it. It was impossible for the police to be summoned so quickly. And yet there was no denying it when we heard the wailing siren and saw the blue and red lights strobing through the trees.

Run!

I don’t know who called out the command, but the word, as though it knocked a hornet’s nest, sent us scattering. We couldn’t see anything in the darkness, and when we ran, we ran straight into tree trunks and branches and brush and each other.

I found myself on the edge of the path closest to the swamp, alone and breathing hard. I knew the path ahead was doomed, and the path behind was trouble too. The police could cut us off at either end. They would scoop us up as we came out of the forest, and there was no way I could sneak by. I could hear bullhorns now too, muffled orders, and I saw blazing white lights arcing through the woods. That’s when I heard a whispered voice.

Bang, you’re dead.

I ducked in confusion and fear, and then experienced pure relief.

Over here.

The words lifted me up from my crouch.

Stay low.

I couldn’t tell where the voice was coming from until I saw a head pop up above the high grass in the swamp and a hand wave my way. Whoever called me was hidden behind the stone lock, probably the only cover in the area.

The stench was overwhelming, layers of stink with foul nuances like swirls of flavour in a complicated tub of ice cream. I stepped carefully but my foot immediately sunk in spongy moss and got sucked into the muck. I pulled out, losing a sneaker, and winced at the sucking sound and the pucker of dank air that rose up. Then I heard the bullhorns and knew the cops were closing in. The voice hissed for me to hurry, so I ran,
suck suck suck
, feeling lashes of tall, wet reeds against my face and tasting splatters of muck in my mouth.

It was Chris, of course. He was perched on a lip of stone, like an expert rock climber, perfectly dry. I thought he’d mock me for showing up so covered in stink and wet, bleeding from scratches, one sneaker in my hand, but he only grinned. His good mood affirmed everything right about what we were doing, and affirmed me in the process. I wasn’t mistake prone, clumsy, or stupid. I was in on a great adventure.

It took minutes for my heart to stop knocking and my breathing to settle. We waited and listened, our heads down. The cops ran down the path one way and then back again. The lights pointed beyond us and strafed through the trees, above and around.

During a quiet moment, I offered my assessment of the situation.

We’re fucked.

It was obvious. But Chris was in no mood to concede defeat.

Why would you say that? he asked.

Because we’re surrounded by cops.

So were Butch and Sundance. But they blasted their way out.

We’d seen the movie a hundred times, and still the argument continued.

Right, I said, and managed, even then, to snort in derision.

Actually, Chris said, we’ve got them right where we want them.

You think so?

In ten minutes or so they’ll give up.

You figure?

I know cops.

I couldn’t argue with that.

Then, he added, we can cut back up to the tree house and give it a shove. I bet it falls right over.

That’s when I knew he was insane.

Maybe not, huh, Chris said, conceding he was joking.

Maybe not, I said.

Next time, we bring explosives. Stack them up under the tree. Light the fuse.

Boom, I said.

We giggled, and then stopped. A noise out there. We were so fucked.

How are we going to do this, Chris?

Blow the tree house up?

Get home without, you know, the whole getting caught thing.

Fuck if I know.

He said it casually as ever, but a wave of sympathy came over me because of the rare honesty. It seemed tragic to me, in that moment, that Chris should experience the reality I knew
so well, that the universe conspired deliberately to thwart you, that cockblocking your goals and pissing on your dreams was part of the overall purpose of the cosmos. So, bravely, I resolved to work with him to figure a way out.

We considered the options. Even if the cops gave up on the woods, they could just park in the darkness of the street on our side of the lake and watch for boys walking out. The safest way home was to approach from a secondary street farther out on the orbital rings. If we had the rubber dinghy, we could row through the swamp into the forest and climb out the far end. But we’d never get there in the dark on foot. What to do?

I got it, Chris announced. We’ll swim.

Swim where?

To the other end of the lake.

The idea was preposterous. Like climbing Mount Everest. We’d never once swam the entire length of the lake, even in daylight, even with the rubber dinghy trailing alongside.

If we can get to the other end, Chris continued, we can hook around and cut through backyards until we’re at my house.

As if swimming the lake in the dark was a given.

I don’t want to drown.

In this fucking lake? I bet it’s been ten years since anyone drowned here.

Thanks. I feel much better. What about our clothes?

With Chris, it was always best to argue in terms of practicality. If you argued for better judgment or out of fear of the consequences, he only got more determined.

But Chris had thought about our clothes too.

We bundle them up and hold them over our heads.

So we took off our clothes, everything but underwear, and wrapped them tight around our shoes and stepped into the water. The temperature seemed warm and pleasant at first, but then began to cool. I tried to glide sideways, as Chris was doing, and hold my clothes above my head. We made our way like dark otters.

But the distance was farther than we realized, which was the predictable flaw in Chris’s otherwise perfect plan. Soon my arms grew too tired to hold my clothes aloft, and it was either sputter and drown, or lower my arms and hug the clothes as best I could to my chest. By the time I got to the shore, I’d lost both sneakers and one sock, and my jeans and shirt were sodden with water. Even Chris’s clothes were wet. Still, we were alive, gloriously alive, and we lay on our backs, breathing hard and staring at the benevolent stars above, filled with joy at our audacious escape.

Then we slogged home. My bare feet slapped the pavement, my clothes trailed water. When we got closer to our immediate neighbourhood, we cut up through a series of backyards to Chris’s house. His parents were in bed. I waited in the basement while he went upstairs. A few minutes later, he came down with the clothes I would need to get home. We toasted the whole adventure with a couple of well-earned beers stolen from the fridge.

That was the most amazing thing we ever pulled off, before we robbed a bank.

In 2008, long after his reputation as one of the world’s
great novelists had been established, Milan Kundera faced an accusation. I had lived for a time in the Czech town Kundera grew up in (one more stop for me in a lifetime of serial getaways), so I took particular notice of the controversy. Although the Cold War was long over in the West, it lingered in living memory in the Czech Republic. There was a heaviness to the place, a sense that the geography was the dense region of the mind where nothing escapes or is forgotten. The Communists had been into consequences. They’d made a fetish of responsibility. They kept good track of every transgression and misdeed, criminalizing ordinary life, casting every act or utterance as suspicious, regardless of context or intent, in order to retain the threat of accusation for whenever it might be needed. And so the past kept resurfacing, especially as old files got exposed to the light, like clay vessels in which prophecies or heresies (depending on your point of view) had been buried.