The Evolution of Ethan Poe, page 12
I’m feeling a little self-satisfied after my marvelous day, despite the fact that I’m trying hard not to let on that I’m leaning to the left to lighten the load on the other side of my ass. I’m also still flush—inside, anyway—with the knowledge that I’ve now had sex twice, and I’ll bet Kyle is a virgin in any sense of the word that involves another person. I say, “Kyle, don’t tell me you’re still stumbling over that hand! Haven’t you got yourself under control yet?” I dump a forkful of Mom’s chicken casserole into my mouth and turn a smug face toward my odd brother. He doesn’t reply, just keeps his head down. I can see that his ears are pink, and I have to stifle a giggle.
On Sunday morning before Mom takes Kyle to church, work glove and all—she won’t let him drive if he won’t use his right hand—she tells me to ask Etta for one of the signs about common sense.
“Why?”
“Someone stole our other one.”
Oh, great. But—so, Mom didn’t take it down herself? It was stolen? Weird.
When I get to Etta’s, she’s on the phone with someone, and the look on her face makes it seem like it’s an unpleasant call. Two is standing a few feet from her in the kitchen, alert and watching her closely, on guard for some reason I can’t fathom. When she hangs up the phone she looks rattled. Etta. The lady who doesn’t hesitate in a crisis.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Oh, yes. Yes, of course. It’s just—never mind. Listen, I’ve got the signs stored in the shed. It’s up the hill in back a little, in the trees. Can you go up and start collecting some? I’ll be up in a minute.”
I head that way; I didn’t know there was a shed up there. It’s a lot bigger than the shed in my backyard, and it’s in better shape. The door’s not locked, so I open it and go in, and I start stacking signs up just outside, trying to judge how many will fit into the Forester.
As I step out with what I gauge to be the last few, pulling the door shut behind me, I’m surprised to see a dog trot around from the back of the shed, out of the woods. It’s surprised to see me, too, I gather, because it stops short and stands stock still, and so do I. And then I realize that it’s not a dog at all. It’s a coyote.
I know there are coyotes in the area. You can hear them call sometimes, and in the spring they make really weird sounds during mating season. But I’ve never seen one up close and personal. And then, suddenly, there’s another one. And then a third. And the way they’re all looking at me gives me a really bad feeling.
Slowly I set the signs down and pick up just one of them. Maybe I’ll need a shield? Do coyotes ever attack people? As I stand straight again, one of them moves to stand in front of me, and the other two start to circle around, one in each direction. They’re surrounding me!
I’m thinking, you know, time to yell for help, but first I back up against the shed door; at least they can’t attack me from that direction, and maybe I could get inside. I look around to see where the other coyotes are, and coming from the direction of the house I see a tawny blur practically flying toward me.
It’s Two. He’s silent as a ghost and, boy, does he mean business. The coyotes hear something, though, and I guess they decide I’m less dangerous, because all three of them look toward the dog. Two throws himself right at the closest coyote, but it moves just enough to avoid getting caught in those powerful jaws. There’s a snarling scuffle, and the other coyotes start to move toward the fighting pair. I’m wondering if I should step in swinging my sign when I hear a loud crack.
Etta’s standing about halfway between the house and the shed, and she’s just fired a shotgun into the air. The two coyotes that aren’t in the fight take off. Etta runs over to me and trades her gun for my sign, which she uses to separate the other two animals. At the same time, she makes this shrill whistle. Two steps back from the sign and sits down, and the coyote turns tail and races into the woods.
Two shakes his head like a boxer coming out of a tough round, and Etta and I stand there, panting, adrenaline pounding in my ears and hers, too, no doubt. We look at each other, then we look at Two, whose eyes are on her face.
She sets down the sign and works over the dog with her hands, I guess looking for damage. She doesn’t find any. He’s panting, too, but he doesn’t look upset. He doesn’t look scared. He doesn’t even look angry. Just one day in the life of a pit bull, it would seem.
Etta kneels on the ground and hugs Two. I hear her voice, low: “My good boy. Good dog. Good dog.”
I manage to find my voice. “I’ve never seen anything like that. Never even seen a coyote this close before.” And, I’m dying to add, I didn’t have the vaguest idea that you had a shotgun.
She shakes her head. “No. They’re getting braver all the time. And three of them together is something to avoid.” She laughs. “Good thing we have a pit bull protecting his pack.”
“He was protecting me, though.”
“Sure. You’re in his pack now.” She smiles at the expression on my face. “Okay, so let’s get the car loaded.” She turns back toward the house, and Two and I follow along. Just like a pack. And as of today, I like this dog so much better than I ever thought I would.
We drive out onto Route 154 to plant signs with Two in the back. As soon as we get to our first planting site, on the side of the highway close to Nick’s, I turn off the engine and take my yin-yang ear cuff out of my jeans pocket and slide it onto the outside edge of my left ear.
Etta sees me. “Is your stud coming loose?”
I grin and turn my head so she can see; somehow I know I can trust her. “Nope. See?”
She laughs. “I haven’t seen an ear cuff in years! Where on earth did you get that?”
I debate for just a second. A car goes by on the highway fast, and I feel the Subaru shift a little in its wake. “Do you remember after lunch at that diner, when we sat and watched the lake?”
“Quite well.”
“I asked if you could, you know, keep a secret. You said as long as it wouldn’t hurt anyone. That still true?”
She eyes me. “Yes. But I should warn you that I need to be the one who determines what harm might be done.”
This gives me pause. But I can’t resist; I feel like I have to tell someone or I’ll burst. And in my new-slash-old leather jacket, I feel like I’m coming closer and closer to expressing who I am inside. “I got the cuff in the same place I got my tattoo.” I wait.
“Tattoo. Who gave you a tattoo? You’re underage.”
It surprises me that she knows this. “What age is that?” I know it, but does she?
“In Maine, eighteen. I know, because I have one.”
My jaw drops. “You do? Where? What is it?”
“I have the Aboriginal symbol for dingo tracks on my left shoulder. And I was fully adult when I got it.” I blink; no clue how to respond to that, other than What’s a dingo? But I don’t ask, so she says, “What’s yours?”
“Am I in trouble?”
She takes an audible breath. “Ethan, I certainly do not want to encourage you to do illegal things. You should not have gotten a tattoo, and no one should have given you one. But I gather you have it now. Are you taking care of it?”
“The guy gave me instructions and some goo. Plus, I searched online about it last night, and what he told me to do is what’s out there.”
“It sounds like this was recent. You’re monitoring it carefully? And was the work done in clean conditions?”
“I’m monitoring. He used alcohol and those gloves doctors wear.”
“And his equipment?”
What do I know about his equipment? “I’m sure of it.” By now the whole idea of talking about it seems like much less fun than I’d thought.
“So, what is it? And where?”
“It’s a yin-yang, like the ear cuff. But the white part is in rainbow stripes.”
I can see she’s about to grin, maybe even trying not to. “I sense a pattern. What’s yin-yang to you?”
“Balance.”
“Balance between extremes? Opposites? Good and evil? Earth and sky? Fire and water?”
“Um . . . I guess mostly male and female. But also not getting pulled in one direction or the other.”
“Okay, I get the male–female bit. As for not getting pulled, would that be objectivity, or is it more like withdrawal?” I shrug and shake my head, and she says, “Deliberation, or cowardice?”
That gets to me. “What?”
“It seems to me that too many people take sides before they give enough thought to what’s really going on. Either they can’t be bothered to think, or perhaps they allow themselves to be manipulated. Or both. So deliberation is a good thing, in my book. On the other hand, once you’ve deliberated, once you’ve collected and weighed the available information and considered the results, to remain uninvolved out of cowardice is taking things too far in the other direction.” She shrugs. “Some people would say that a spiritual remove, remaining uninvolved on principle, is admirable. But I think that can be taken too far, and I also think it can be like a duck blind for cowardice. A place to hide behind, and watch what’s going on from a safe distance.”
The longer she goes on, the more I shrink into my shoulders. I like the idea of being objective, of taking time to think about the reality of something. But I know—I know too well—that I also like the idea of the duck blind, a place where I can stand off to the side without calling attention to the fact that I’m standing off to the side. I don’t know what to say.
Etta says, “It seems like you have some thinking to do about this. Don’t let me . . . um . . . manipulate you into taking a stand about what your adopted symbol means to you.” She grins at me for real now. “Where is it?”
I glance at her sideways, kind of from under my eyebrows. “It’s on my right rear cheek.”
She laughs. “That’s classic. But Ethan, it’s also a way to keep it out of sight. Behind the duck blind. I’m not saying you should have it on your face, and I’m not saying you chose the wrong spot at all. Just let the location be a part of your analysis when you consider what you’ve done and what it means.”
No; not nearly as fun as I’d hoped. “So am I in trouble?”
She shakes her head. “Not from me. Who else knows? Besides whoever gave it to you.”
“Max.” There. That was something else I’d been dying to say. That Max is in my life. I kind of want her to ask about him, but she’s just nodding her head slightly, chewing her lower lip a little like she’s considering something.
She decides not to go there, apparently. I mean, to a place where I can talk about Max. “Well, if we don’t get started, we’ll never get all these signs planted!”
We plant the first signs near Nick’s, then farther up the road and into the other towns that fall under the school board’s jurisdiction. The Forester can hold lots of signs, and we plant all of them but one, which I have to save for Mom. It’s not a bad day for this kind of work, actually. It’s chilly but not freezing, the air feels good, and there are white puffs sailing through the blue overhead.
At the last spot, Etta takes Two on his leash for a short walk into the woods while I wait in the car on the side of the road. I watch them go down the hill from the roadside, Two pacing himself to stay at her side. They disappear into the woods, but not for long. Soon they emerge again, and I hear Etta call to me from below, where she and Two are standing. He’s staring up at the car, mouth open, tongue hanging out a little.
“Ethan! Open the back door toward me.” I have to get out of the car to do this, but okay. Then, “Call Two!”
Call Two? Not so very long ago, my response to the idea of calling him to run toward me would have been something like, Oh, well, it’s a good day to die. But everything’s changed between us now. I cup my hands around my mouth. “TWO!”
She releases his leash, and he charges up the hill. Suddenly I realize I’m in his path: the inside of the car. I step aside and watch the light brown streak fly past me and into the backseat. Then he turns around, panting and happy. I can’t resist. I reach in and scratch behind his ears, and he laps my hand.
On the way back Etta has me pull into a Friendly’s. She gives Two some water and a dog treat, and then he waits in the car while Etta and I go in for a late take-out lunch. We don’t eat inside because of Two, but there are a few picnic tables in the sun, and we’re already dressed for being outdoors, so we sit there with Two’s lead tied to the table leg. He lies on the ground, eyes half closed, breathing through his mouth and smiling.
I watch Two for a bit while I eat one of my two burgers. He seems so unthreatening, and yet this morning he practically saved my life. “I guess Two deserves his reputation.”
“What reputation is that?”
“Well, you know. Everyone says he’s ferocious, that maybe he’s even killed somebody.”
Etta laughs. “I’ve had him since he was a year old. He’s eight now, and in all that time he’s never bitten any human.”
“But—”
“He’s a pit bull, Ethan. He had a reputation before he was born. And, mind you, if someone tried to hurt one of us, he’d protect us. Not just from coyotes. Even from a human. But otherwise, he’s a dog. Not a monster.”
“How come I’m in his pack now?”
“I’ve let him know that by the way I treat you. And pack members protect each other.”
I stop chewing, a sense of shock coming over me that softens quickly to something warm. My eyes start to fasten on to Etta’s face, but I’m not ready to respond to what she’s said or to any questions about why I’m staring at her. So I stare at Two instead. The rule is not to do that, but he’s not looking at me.
We’re a pack, the three of us. We protect each other. That must also mean that we trust each other. And—what else? Will I be expected to do anything? Will I have to take sides?
It dawns on me that I’ve kind of already taken sides. Helping her put up her signs is just something I’ve done to get in some driving time with somebody who doesn’t make me crazy in the process, but if you don’t know that—or if it doesn’t mean enough to you—then it kind of looks like I’m for her and against Carl Phinney in this election. And, really, I couldn’t care less about the election.
“You look pensive, Ethan.”
She hasn’t asked a question, but that doesn’t mean I can sit here like a lump. But it also doesn’t mean I have to be totally honest. “Yeah. Trying to add up my driving hours so far.”
“I figure you had about four hours with just me before today. You need what—35?”
“And five of them at night.”
“Do you have a date for Friday night yet? Or are you planning to?”
I snap my head toward her. Is this her way of asking about Max? “A date?”
“Plans with someone, then.”
I shove a few fries into my mouth and shake my head. When I can speak, I say, “Friday would be great, if you’re offering to let me get in some night driving.”
“You’ve done a lot of hard work today. I don’t think you’ve had nearly enough driving time yet to compensate you fairly. Do you?” She grins at me.
I’m about to respond when I notice two people getting settled a couple of picnic tables away. They have hot coffee, it looks like, and as they sit down they get out cigs and light them, which they couldn’t have done inside, so maybe that’s why they’re out here.
One of them is my dad. The other is a woman I don’t know.
Dad’s back is toward me. I try to get a good look at the woman without being caught staring. Etta sees, though, and she looks toward them. “Isn’t that your father?”
I nod, still staring at the woman. She doesn’t look anything like Mom. Blond and fluffy, though chances are she didn’t come by either quality genetically. She’s a little heavy, but not fat, and—well, fluffy. Pink jacket, lipstick, and her hands spend enough time flitting around that I can see long pink nails. Her voice is high and a little nasal. Definitely not Mom. And in my book, not someone Dad should have bought condoms for.
The fluffy lady sees me staring, finally, and I hear her say, “Dave, that boy over there keeps staring at me.”
I drop my eyes, but I can see that Dad has turned. Then, low, I hear, “Christ. I’ll be right back.”
Yeah. Too late, Dad. You’ve been seen. He gets up and walks over, and eventually I have to look up. He says, “Hey.” It’s not our standard greeting, and I’m not sure how to respond. Plus, what do you say when you catch your father cheating on your mother?
Etta comes to my rescue. I’m in her pack. “Good to see you again.”
“Yeah. Same here. You, uh, running more errands or something?”
I hear Two’s dog tags jingle as he gets up and walks around the table toward Dad, who sees him and backs up quickly, wide eyes full on the dog.
“Please don’t back away,” Etta says. “It makes you look like prey. Anyway, he’s tied.”
Two is staring at Dad, and not in a good way. He growls. Etta turns toward him, yanks his leash sideways, snaps her fingers, and points to the ground. Two lies down again.
Wow. If I’d been Dad, I would’ve backed up, too. I guess Two warns people but not coyotes. He didn’t growl at them.
Etta turns back toward Dad, who has stopped backing away but hasn’t come closer again. Etta says, “Ethan and I have a mutually helpful arrangement. He helps me set up signs for my school board campaign, and I help him log driving hours. It’s working out very well, I think.”
He looks hard at me. “Your mother know about this?”
“She set it up.” WTF? What’s his problem? Then it dawns on me. He’s wondering why he isn’t the one helping me log driving hours. I pray he doesn’t bring it up. Then I decide to take aggressive evasive action. “Who’s your friend, Dad?”
“Oh. Uh, Connie. Just a friend.”
“She looks a little impatient. D’you think she wants to come join us?” I feel evil, but in a fun way. Or, not fun exactly; maybe righteous. Can you be righteously evil?
