“Go play with yourself!” Car shouted over her shoulder.
As she watched her great-grandmother weave the wheelbarrow among the raised beds, Clementine thought about how furious Pay would be. It had been his idea that they help. He thought May-May was too old to be out here all alone.
“I’m sorry, May-May,” Clementine said, picking up her shovel again. “I want to help.”
May-May wouldn’t even look at her. “You’re all done for today.”
Pay would be waiting for her at home, and Car would already have blamed Clementine for everything. So she went in the opposite direction, passing through the garden and into the empty lot. She was halfway across when she lifted her eyes and saw something strange on the porch of the house on Bernadine Street: the tall, gangly, clown-looking guy, slumped against the house, as if he’d been shot. But even from the top porch step, Clementine didn’t see any blood. Unless his coat was hiding it.
“Are you dead?” she said.
His eyes opened slowly, and it seemed to take them a moment to focus in on her.
“What’s your name?” she said.
He righted himself, pushing his palms against the peeling porch floor. “Dobbs.”
She came another step closer and stood there looking down on him.
“What’s yours?” he said.
“Clementine.”
He leaned his head against the dirty siding. His eyes looked as though they might close again. “Really?”
“You got a problem with it?”
He pressed a thumb into each of his temples. “It’s just unusual.”
“There’s a song,” she said. “There’s a fruit. It’s more usual than yours.”
“How old are you?”
She put her hands on her hips and thrust out her chest, her trademarked impersonation of Car. “Too young to be your girlfriend.”
“I figured.”
Her gaze wandered over the surface of the porch. It was all so much more depressing now that someone was actually living here. “Your house is terrible.”
He shrugged. “Where do you live?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
He got up slowly, one hand against the wall for support. “Are you like this with everyone you meet?”
“Just suspicious people.”
He moved toward the open door.
He’d dumped the mattress in the middle of the floor. Against the wall were the table and chair. His junk was all over the place, a few pieces of clothing, a flashlight, wrappers, and cans.
She said, “It’s even worse on the inside.”
She lost him for a moment in the glare and the shadows. When she found him again, he was standing at the table, lifting a plastic jug to his lips. The water seemed to miss his mouth completely, pouring down the front of his coat.
“Why are you wearing that?” she said. “It’s not winter anymore. Aren’t you hot?”
His right eye twitched. And then the twitch traveled to his nose and on to his other eye. It was like a tremor spreading across his face, making every stop along the way.
“I think you might be dying,” she said.
He groaned into his chair, which rocked on uneven legs. “Just tired.”
“Weren’t you just sleeping?”
“Was I?”
“You’re weird.”
Clementine turned to look out the open door. From the tower upstairs, she could see past the brush and shrubs to May-May’s garden and, past the garden, to May-May and Pay’s houses. From down here, though, she couldn’t see anything.
“What kind of hoodlum are you?” she said.
His head fell sideways. “How old are you?”
She stepped back out onto the porch. “I have to go.”
On Monday a cat Clementine had never seen before crawled under the pricker bush in the lot beside May-May’s garden. She waited two days before poking it with a stick.
Science! Would the cat shrivel up and turn to dust? Would rats come and pick its bones? Would she get to see what it looked like on the inside?
For the rest of the week, she raced to the pricker bush after school with her notebook.
Day 3: It stinks. Looks the same.
Day 4: It stinks even more. Fur is falling off. Flies all over the place.
Day 5: Something ate its butt. It smells disgusting. Covered in ants.
On day six, her mother found out about her fractions test, and Clementine was grounded until day nine.
By then the cat had lost almost all its fur and its stomach was puffy, and Clementine was afraid that if she poked the cat again, it would explode, and she’d get covered in guts.
On day ten, she spent the afternoon at home watching cartoons. Car, for a change, was somewhere else.
The next morning Clementine was on her way to school, less than a block away, with exactly two minutes to spare, when Dobbs appeared, turning the corner at the old fire station, coming straight toward her. Clementine was wearing shorts and a T-shirt, and he was in the same heavy coat as always. There was no one else on the street but the two of them. She waved, and he kept right on going, like she was invisible.
He turned onto Bernadine Street, heading home. She thought about following him, but the bell was going to go off at any second, and she knew what would happen if she got another tardy.
The next morning the same thing happened all over again: Clementine going to school, Dobbs going the other way. Same time, same place.
It occurred to her he must’ve been out all night. And he was only now returning home.
But where in the world could he have been?
§
Her mistake was saying she felt sick before asking what was for dinner. When she sat down at the table that night, there was spaghetti with garlicky bread, and her mother had even made meatballs. Clementine knew if she made a pig of herself now, her mother would see she’d been lying. So instead she picked at her plate while Mama and May and Pay and Car twirled birds’ nests on their forks and crammed them into their mouths. They were so busy stuffing themselves, they didn’t notice Clementine slipping pieces of bread into her pocket.
As Car went back for a second helping, Clementine clenched her stomach and moaned. “May I be excused?”
Pay looked like he was going to give her his usual you’regonnastayinyourseattileveryone’sdone, but then he raised a paper napkin to his lips and nodded toward the stairs.
Clementine went up and then straight out the window and over to Bernadine Street.
* * *
It was dark by the time Dobbs finally appeared on the porch, shutting the door behind him. Clementine’s knees were woven with the impressions of grass and twigs. It was getting cold, and she wished she’d brought a sweatshirt.
He was easy to follow. She didn’t even have to be directly behind him. Every once in a while he disappeared in a screen of trees and bushes, but she never lost his trail, even with blocks of empty lots between them. She knew these streets better than anyone.
But after a few minutes, they’d left the neighborhood behind. She couldn’t see Pay’s house anymore. There were empty homes and storefronts, but they weren’t the ones she was used to.
They must have gone twenty blocks. Most of the street signs were missing. She kept track of the turns using landmarks: broken fences, burned-out cars, heaps of junk. Just when it was starting to seem like they were wandering aimlessly, Dobbs turned down a narrow alley. At the end of the alley was a warehouse, two stories tall. Brick and cinderblock, all of it old and crumbly. Around the side there was a garage. Clementine was close enough behind him that when he lifted the overhead door, she saw a big van parked inside.
The door rattled shut behind him.
There were windows, but they were too high for her to see through. On the ground all around were scraps of metal. They were sharp and cold and rusty and boring and they didn’t look like anything. The only sound was the drone of the highway coming from she couldn’t tell where.