Middle of Nowhere (11 page)

IT TOOK HOURS
to clear out the cabin. We emptied it and burned most of the stuff. Artie and I did. Mrs. Burt sat on a rock and told us what to do. Rip down the curtains and burn them. Burn the rugs. Burn any books that had been chewed up, which was most of them.

There were two bedrooms in the cabin. We burned the old clothes that were in the drawers there, all the bedding, and the mattresses that were half-shredded and full of ants and smelled like pee.

In one of the bedrooms I found an old wooden Coca-Cola crate with a board nailed over the top, but when I came out of the cabin carrying it, Mrs. Burt shouted, “Not that! Put it down.” I set it by the corner of the cabin, away from the giant mountain of junk we had piled up.

When the cabin was empty except for the table and chairs and the stove, we set fire to all the junk. We were careful to stack it away from the cabin where there was a natural clearing. Even so, Mrs. Burt made us haul water in a bucket from the lake and soak the ground all around first.

Then she took the kerosene that we'd found in a rusty can and splashed it on. She and I went to opposite sides of the pile with the matches.

In a burst it lit, flames shooting high. Horrible black smoke gushed, full of fluttering ash.

“Step back,” she told us.

From a safe distance, her hands gripping the walker, she stared as all those things from her past burned. I thought she would be sad. She was frowning, but the lenses of her glasses reflected the fire and seemed to sparkle, as though she was glad, too.

After the fire had burned down, she had us pour buckets of water over the ashes, just in case. Then she told us we looked like a couple of chimney sweeps. I didn't know what she meant, but I was happy because she let us strip and jump in the water without the life jackets, which were still in the Bel Air. At the shoreline the water wasn't too deep and Mrs. Burt waded in and stayed next to Artie.

Later she marched us out and made us stand in the trees to soap ourselves. This was to keep soap out of the lake. The lake was going to be everything for us, she said. Drinking water, bathtub, where we got our food. We had to keep it clean. So we rinsed off in the trees with buckets of water tipped over our soapy heads. She let us go back in the lake if we promised to stay near shore. Even then she stood and watched us the whole time.

While we were splashing around, Artie spotted a canoe. It followed a curved line from the end of the lake, coming closer, fast. Mrs. Burt hurried us out and gathered us behind her like a mother hen.

A stranger glided in, his wooden canoe making a scraping sound as it bumped up on the shore. He was old, with a beard and a leather hat stained darker where he had sweated through it. His face looked leathery, too. Artie stiffened next to me, because of the beard.

For a moment Mrs. Burt and the man just stared at each other. Then, slowly, the man seemed to recognize Mrs. Burt.

“Mavis?”

“That isn't Spar Munro,” Mrs. Burt answered.

“It is,” he said and she started laughing. The old man smiled back with teeth worse than Mrs. Burt's. “I saw smoke. Thought the place was on fire.”

“We're clearing out the junk.”

“Ah,” he said, looking at us wrapped in towels behind Mrs. Burt. “Those Marianne's kids?”

“Yes,” she said. “Boys, this is an old friend, Mr. Munro. You still living out here or just summering now?”

“Living.”

“Want to step out?” she asked.

“I can see you're busy. Maybe another time.”

“You been keeping an eye on this place, Spar?”

“Sort of. I only had to drive people away once or twice.”

“Well, I thank you,” said Mrs. Burt.

“There were squirrels!” Artie exclaimed, and Mr. Munro laughed and waved with the big leather glove of his hand. Pushing off the bottom with the paddle, he about-faced the canoe and slipped away as fast as he came.

As soon as he was out of earshot, Mrs. Burt said, “Doesn't he look old, boys? Ancient! How old would you say he is?”

“Twenty-nine,” Artie guessed.

“Come on! He looks about eighty to me. He's not even seventy, I'm pretty sure of that, cause he's younger than me.” She straightened her knitted cap and patted it with both hands. “Also, he can't count. Marianne's kids? Ha! If Marianne had kids they'd be all grown up!”

After I unloaded most of the Bel Air, which took about a hundred trips, I got my first wood-chopping lesson.

Mrs. Burt poked along the edge of the trees until she found a fallen log she liked. I dragged it up on two stones and cut it into same-size lengths with the saw. Mrs. Burt called this “bucking.” Then we found a nice flat rock for me to chop against. She demonstrated with the first couple of pieces, me standing close in case she lost her balance. Then I took over. I stood the log up on the rock, tapped the ax into the end of it until it stuck, lifted the log and ax together, and brought them down
.

Crack!
What a sweet sound. The log split in half.

We made a proper fire pit nearer to the cabin by collecting rocks and arranging them in a circle. Mrs. Burt got me to set up kindling in a tepee shape over some twigs and dried leaves. After the flames got going, I added larger and larger pieces of wood and, before I knew it, I'd built my first bonfire. For supper we roasted hotdogs over it, on sticks, just like they do in books.

Artie danced around waving his in the air.

“Is that your sword?” Mrs. Burt asked.

“It's my magic wand.”

“If it was a sword, you could knight us.”

She explained that to become a knight the king laid his sword on you and pronounced you so. She used me as an example.

“I pronounce you Sir Curtis.”

“I pronounce you Sir Mrs. Burt,” Artie said, laying the greasy hotdog on her shoulder.

“Imagine that,” she said. “Knighted with a wiener.”

In their buns, even without the ketchup I forgot in the car, they tasted good. Better than microwaved.

After the fire had burned down to embers, Mrs. Burt put the kettle on for tea. She said the cabin was too dirty to sleep inside. We would spend the night under the stars. I went around cutting pine boughs to make mattresses. Then Artie and I unrolled our new sleeping bags.

“Bindlestiffs,” said Mrs. Burt by the fire.

“What?”

“That's what we called bedrolls. Bindlestiffs. I don't know why.”

We got comfy in our bindlestiffs. The boughs were lumpy, but every time I moved they gave off a woodsy smell, like air-freshener spray. Mrs. Burt slurped and burped. The fire made crinkling-­paper sounds.

The night noises were new. The ones I was used to — sirens and traffic and people in the other apartments arguing or playing their stereos too loud — were far away.

Years ago, when I stayed with the Pennypackers, it had seemed like the wilderness because of all the trees, but there were still wide streets and two-car garages and telephone poles and strip malls.

There were none of those things here. We were in the wild.

Something rustled in the trees and Artie snuggled close to me.

“A squirrel! A squirrel is coming!”

“Probably a mouse,” said Mrs. Burt. “Squirrels go to bed the same time we do.”

Then we heard a really creepy sound, like the craziest, loneliest person in the world calling out for help. Artie sat up with a gasp.

“Loon,” said Mrs. Burt.

“Mom!” Artie cried.

“You bring that lotion down from the Chevy?” Mrs. Burt asked me.

I wriggled out of my bag and went and got it.

After Artie settled, I lay back and watched the light show of stars coming out. I'd never done that before. Somehow I had the idea that they switched on like streetlights. But as the pink faded from the sky, more and more stars crowded out the darkness. I fell asleep, and when I woke up in the middle of the night, there were even more of them. Stars sprayed out above me like frozen fireworks, a whole part of the sky so thick with them it looked white.

I didn't get it. In the city, where did the stars go?

THE NEXT DAY
the sun woke me up earlier than I'd ever been up in my whole life. I didn't care because when I sat up and looked around, the lake was there. A whole lake with a sun and clouds floating in it, like the sky lying on the ground. It seemed like it was mine.

I made another fire and Mrs. Burt cooked us hash browns and sausages and eggs in a cast-iron pan, one of the few things we hadn't burned, because we couldn't. It was indestructible. The food tasted better than all her other breakfasts just because it was cooked over a real fire.

Then we got to work scrubbing out the cabin. I even had to get on the roof and be a chimney sweep, which meant I jammed a long stick down the stovepipe to clear out any bird or squirrel nests.

When we were done, Mrs. Burt said that it was going to be a very cozy place to live.

“You boys sure worked hard. I think you deserve a treat. I think you deserve a little fishing. What do you say?”

“Yeah!”

With the rods propped against the walker and Mrs. Burt settled on a rock, she prepared the tackle. We were after trout, she said. The lures she chose were silver with four orange beads. I thought they would make good earrings. If I ever got my ears pierced like Mr. Bryant, I'd wear lures.

Mrs. Burt handed us the rods. She used the walker to get up, but set it aside once she was standing where she wanted to be on the shore. She was much steadier on her feet now. I passed her my rod and she waved us to one side. We had to be very, very careful when we cast not to hook each other, or her. In fact, Artie wasn't allowed to cast, only to reel in.

She unlocked the reel, tipped the rod back over her shoulder, flung it straight. The lure winged out, then plopped into the water a long way away. Then she started reeling, slowly turning the handle, humming. As soon as we could see the lure in the water, she reeled faster.

“You don't want to get it snagged on the bottom.” She cast a few more times, then passed the rod to me.

“Be careful you don't cross lines with us,” she said. Then she and Artie and the thingie moved farther down the shore.

I unlocked the reel, drew back the rod, snapped it forward.

Wheee!!!
The lure sailed out over the water and splashed down. I began to reel in, praying for a fish. I didn't know what I'd do if I caught a fish, but I wanted one. The reel
click-click-clicked
. My hopes got even higher. When I saw the lure sparkling under the water, I reeled faster, not even disappointed, just ready to cast and hope all over again.

But it turned out a big part of fishing is waiting, which is something little kids don't do well. Mrs. Burt had promised Artie a fish and now she had to get him to stay still for long enough that a fish would get interested in his hook. She started making up a story about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Her knights were more like lumberjacks. She was King Arthur's mulligan mixer, the only woman around. As a prank one of the logger knights stole her measuring cup and hid it in the forest. These knights were always pulling pranks, she said, like cutting the buttons off each other's Stanfields.

In the middle of the story, Artie's line jerked and the rod almost pulled right out of his hands.

“Hold on, Artie!” Mrs. Burt cried.

Behind him, her hands over his, she helped him reel in. The tip of his rod bent over the water and suddenly the fish burst through the surface, flipping and twisting in the air.

Artie shrieked and ran back to the cabin.

“Give me a hand here, Curtis,” Mrs. Burt called, trying to grab the slippery body dancing on the line.

I started to reel in. Then I felt a pull, too.

For something only ten inches long, that trout was strong. We played tug-of-war for a minute, fish pulling me, me pulling fish, Mrs. Burt yelling instructions and still trying to grab hold of Artie's fish. My heart thrashed as hard as the trout.