The Grounding of Group 6 Read online

  O.K., he thought—and now his mind was working as he liked it to, on normal cruising speed—they needed some supplies, a lot of them. So…money was a big concern. And space to store things in. Yeah, and transportation.

  “Hey, knock-knock. You decent?” Ludi’s voice, from near the door.

  “Ask if they’re awake first, stupid.” That was Sara. “‘Decent’ is subjective. What you call real indecent could be someone else’s way of life.”

  Nat was glad to hear her laughing, being foolish. Kids were meant to snap back fast from things, but these kids weren’t really kids, and knowing that your parents paid to have you killed seemed to qualify as something more than “things.” Ludi’d seemed the least affected of the five, but you could never tell. He’d have to really keep an eye on all of them. That thought was so avuncular it made him smile. Dirty old uncle.

  “Look, barge right in,” said Marigold. “They won’t mind. This is strictly an anything-goes type scene. D’you suppose his girl Friday worried about walking in on Robinson Caruso?” Marigold was a hard one to figure, thought Nat. She seemed extremely tough and cynical, but maybe that was all an act.

  “Good afternoon,” said Nat. “Yes, do come in. You must be the maids. Or is it room service? Orange juice, fresh squeezed, three eggs over easy with grilled ham, and English muffins. Coffee.”

  “Well,” said Marigold, pretending to write, “we’ll have to make a substitution here and there. We’re out of orange juice and eggs and ham and muffins. May I suggest the tuna-noodle casserole?”

  “Yuk!” said Sully, sitting up in bed. He smiled at the girls; he smiled at Nat; Coke still lay there with his eyes closed. Sully looked as fresh as butter in the mornings; sleep never seemed to leave a mark on him: his eyes were wide and bright, his short hair flopped in place, he even smelled good, if you got that close. He had a yellow T-shirt on that he was growing out of, so there was skin between the bottom of the T-shirt and the sleeping bag that lay across his lap. Looking at him sitting there, Marigold decided he was worth at least an 8—still in the Prep department, maybe, but a really nice little bod. Odetta and herself had made a scorecard at the country club at home: I through 10 in four divisions, Boys, Prep, Men, and Seniors (yet!). Skinny guys like Coke were hard to rate, they found, but she had always scored them kind of high. O.D. would have a snake when she found out that Marigold was…well, marooned with guys who averaged an 8. If she ever did find out, that is.

  “…story with supplies?” Sully was saying.

  “High priority,” said Nat. He slid his legs out of his sleeping bag. He had on track shorts and a long-sleeved baseball undershirt: solid blue from cuffs to shoulders, white in the body, with long tails. “Spare me tuna-wiggle in the morning. Um, look. Let’s make some…pancakes maybe? And then get down to business.” Marigold nodded her agreement. Give those legs a 9, she thought.

  For the next hour, people just did ordinary morning things, the way they might have anywhere. Already they could feel a different atmosphere, as if the space between them had been redefined, and softened. Before, they’d been a group of travelers—people on a trip to somewhere else. Their main thing wasn’t journeying, and everybody knew it; the future was what mattered. Now, the present was the future, too, you might say—as far as anyone could see or tell. Most people didn’t notice it in quite those terms, but living in the present felt a good deal better in a lot of ways. If only they could keep the past from messing up their minds.…Coke was very quiet, more laid-back than ever.

  They sat around the outdoor fireplace to talk; by now they did that automatically, even going back to the places that they’d had the night before. All three girls were barefoot, for the moment; they all had shorts on, too, and when they sat, they sprawled, and touched each other. Marigold restructured one of Sara’s braids; Ludi, lying back, had propped her feet on Sara’s knees. Ludi’s legs were not the least bit skinny—they had been developed, worked on. Her thighs and fanny were the tip-offs: a skater’s engine room, thought Nat. Or maybe she’s a dancer. He realized she wasn’t such a kid at all. Height and faces fooled you, lots of times.

  Nat had a plan to offer. How about, he said, they just rest up that day—it being after noon already—but leave at next day’s dawn for Boynton Falls? His thought was that he’d try to cash a check from Coldbrook Country School, an old one. If he could, then they’d be golden—at least in terms of money for supplies. He showed them those humongous checks (“Blood money,” said Coke). They started in to make a list.

  “Boy, this is going to be a lot to carry,” Sully said. “How far is Boynton Falls from here?”

  “It is a haul,” said Nat. “And that’s why I’ve been wondering about a car. Just some old junk. We could hide it off the road somewhere, I think. And even though we couldn’t get stuff all the way to here, it sure as hell would mean a lot less packing on our backs.”

  “Hey,” said Ludi, sitting up. She looked at Sara. “How about that house? The one from yesterday? With all the porches?”

  Sara nodded, turned to Nat. “We found this house—a really nice one—on the way to”—she shook her head—“school.” She made a face. “It’s got its own long private road, and tons and tons of space. Maybe—I don’t know—five, six miles from here. Or more?” She looked around the Group. “I’m terrible at distances.”

  “My God,” said Nat. “I think I know the place you mean. I’d forgotten all about it. Looks sort of Swiss? But lots of sundecks? Yeah. Hmm. That’s really a thought. It sure is private, that’s for sure.”

  “And it sure looks elegant,” said Marigold. She held up a cautionary palm. “Not to knock the Lodge at all,” she said. “It’s just a different decorating scheme. For instance, they’ve got mattresses down there, and—how you say?—a toilet with ze floosh attachment. And an oven just the perfect size for quiche Lor-raines and devil’s foods and Key lime pies and pizzas! I, of course, would never touch fattening foods like that. …” Suddenly she bunched her fingers into fists and bounced up and down in her seat. “Oh, Natty! Can we? Can-we, can-we? Just borrow it a while? All the other kids have places in the country.”

  Sara said, “You mean, break in? And live in it? Boy, I’d feel pretty funny breaking into someone’s house, I think. And anyway, don’t you think they use it weekends all the time?”

  “Either way, it looks like it’d be a great place to drop off supplies,” Ludi said. “If we got a car, that is. We could probably put the stuff in one of their woodsheds, even, and then make as many trips as we have to, to get it all up here.”

  “Jeez—are we ever going to be in shape,” said Sully, rubbing up and down his thighs.

  “Look,” said Nat. “Um, well, I hadn’t thought of anything like that before, but maybe Marigold has got a good idea. I don’t like the thought of breaking into someone’s house,” he said to Sara. “And I’m sure she doesn’t, either.” Marigold popped her eyes real wide and shook her head, her fingers on her breast. “But it just occurred to me—it wouldn’t be too bad if we had lots of different… hideouts, sort of. This could be our major base, the main one. But if we stashed some food and stuff in lots of places, why then, we’d be a lot more mobile. And supposing someone stumbled into here, we’d still have other places we could go to.” Nat’s imagination shifted into high: he could see them finding caves and throwing up a lean-to here and there—and tree houses! My God, a tree house would be fun. And every place well stocked and cozy: cookies, hams, and cocoa—YUM! He knew he wasn’t being “realistic,” but …

  “Shit,” said Marigold, “I didn’t mean we’d hurt the place at all.” She touched Sara on the knee. “Moi? Marigoldilocks?” Sara smiled. “Seriously. I just meant to use it for a while. We could clean it every Friday morning—Coke could—and clear out.” Coke didn’t bat an eye. “And anything we broke, we’d leave some money in the sugar bowl or somewhere.” She turned to Nat. “Right?”

  “Yeah, sure,” he said. “Provided we can get some money in the first p
lace.”

  “O.K.,” said Marigold, “let’s take a vote. All those in favor of renting the Swiss family Robinsons’ place for a little while, raise their right hand.” Five hands went up, Sara’s with a little sigh, a shrug, a slightly pained smile. “All those opposed?” No one. “Hey, Coke, you didn’t vote,” she said.

  “I didn’t see the point,” said Coke. “Chances are, I might not be there, ever. I’m going home, remember? I told you that last night.”

  Marigold made a mouth at him. “Come on,” she said. “You cut that out. You can’t go home. It doesn’t make any sense. Everybody tell him to cut out this shit, O.K.?”

  And everybody did—all at once, at first. Coke didn’t look at them, but just sat staring at the ground between his feet and giving little head shakes. He kept curling a strand of his long black hair around a finger; curling it, releasing it, and curling it back up again.

  Finally he said, “Goddamn it. Leave me alone, will you?” And he got up and started walking toward the Lodge. Then he stopped and turned to Nat. “Just get me to a road, all right? And tell me how to get to town from there. I’ve got money for the bus, or maybe I can hitch a ride.”

  “How about tomorrow?” Nat replied. “We’ll all be going on to Boynton Falls. You could just come with us.”

  “No,” said Coke, “today.” He looked real close to crying.

  And so it ended up that all of them hiked down to what they always called the Robinsons’ (Swiss family variety), even after they found out some people named Novotny owned it. Nat opened up the kitchen door with ease, using his I.D. from UVM. The other five were going to spend the night on mattresses—they’d never get to Boynton Falls before the bank closed—but Coke was leaving right away. Walking down, they’d nagged him to the point that he agreed he’d come back up, once he’d seen his parents. Sully wondered if he really would, and Sara doubted it. Ludi hoped that he’d be able to. Nat said that if they weren’t at the Robinsons’, they’d leave a note—and map, if needed—tacked inside the woodshed. He showed Coke just exactly where he meant, and shook his hand out there.

  “I wish I could talk you out of this,” he said, for about the fifteenth time.

  Coke stood there, saying nothing.

  “Well, good luck,” said Nat. “And hurry back, O.K.? It’s hard to find good help up here.” He laughed, then shrugged his shoulders, feeling foolish and incompetent. He wondered (for about the fifteenth time) if he should try to physically restrain him. He turned back toward the house.

  Marigold was standing on the porch. “You going?” she called down to Coke.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I guess so.”

  “I’ll walk you down a little ways,” she said.

  He didn’t answer anything, but waited while she came on down the outside steps. They started walking in the road.

  “I want to tell you something,” Marigold began.

  “Like what?” said Coke.

  “You’d better come back quick,” said Marigold.

  “Why?” said Coke. He knew he’d never dare to say that if he wasn’t going.

  “Because I need you here,” said Marigold. “Goddamn it.” She turned her head away from him, and stopped walking.

  Coke reached a hand out for her shoulder. He thought that she was crying, maybe, and he wouldn’t want for her to cry. But before he could touch her, she swung around real fast and faced him, and she was crying, and her face was twisted up and kind of red.

  “You selfish fucking asshole,” she screamed out at him, and then she ran right by him, up the road, running sort of like she had a dress on, straight-legged, with her hands out to the sides.

  Coke went slinking down the road, feeling worse than ever.

  Because they started from the Robinsons’, instead of Spring Lake Lodge, the trip to Boynton Falls was shortened by two hours, anyway. But still it was a hike, even taking shortcuts, as they did. By the time they reached a pasture, by a corn field that was on the edge of town, there was just an hour left for business at the bank, and very little spring in anybody’s legs.

  “Christ,” said Marigold. “Why don’t we just all lie about our ages and enlist? United States Marines. Then at least we’d get paid. And it’d be an absolute vacation after this. Plus they could teach us forty ways to liquidate our parents, if we wanted.…Look, I’m only kidding, Sully. You don’t have to look at me that way!”

  Nat had brought a sport shirt, and some khaki pants that were permanent press, and moccasins. Before they’d left the Robinsons’, he’d trimmed his hair and beard, to neaten them a little, and now he combed them both. Ludi thought he looked a little like the tennis player, Borg, except his cheekbones and his eyes were much more wide apart. He changed his clothes right there, with all of them around, seeming not the least self-conscious. He had on bright red briefs, the kind that’s like a really skimpy bathing suit.

  The plan was this. Nat, alone, would swagger into the bank and try to cash one check. Because he had I.D., and because it was the Coldbrook Country School’s own bank, he thought that they would cash it. He guessed that Doctor’d think he’d cashed his checks already—long ago, in fact—and so he wouldn’t have stopped payment when he got the news from Mrs. Ripple and her friends. He wouldn’t mail the final check, of course, but what the hell, thought Nat.

  Then, with pockets bulging, he would wander down to Ace A-l Used Cars, a block away, and use the other check to purchase Ace’s leading piece of citrus for their purposes. This he’d drive on up the road toward Suddington, and stop by…“See those pine woods right up there?” They did.

  “I imagine that you’ll hear me coming,” Nat informed them, “but even if you don’t, there should be smoke.”

  Before he headed off, he handed Ludi twenty-seven dollars, all that he had left of three aunts’ birthday bounty. “Keep this for me, will you?” he besought her. “With my luck, I’ll get mugged before I even get to Boynton Falls.”

  It turned out Nat predicted right in all particulars, except the mugging part. His check was cashed, in tens and twenties, and he was smiled upon and urged to have “a real nice day.” Ace, whose other name was Wilmer T. Buchanan, also beamed approval of a Coldbrook Country check (“Good as goldmines, friend …”) for which he gave—or let Nat steal, as he expressed it—a ’69 bright orange bus, by Volkswagen. It was rather badly rusted here and there (riding shotgun, you could see the road between your feet), and the heater didn’t work at all, but, as Nat said to Ace—not once, but many times—he was heading way down south before too long, and wouldn’t need a heater anyway.

  The car did not delight Group 6, exactly.

  “I’ve heard of lemons,” Ludi said, which caused a coughing fit by Nat, “but a pumpkin?”

  “No, no,” said Marigold, a hand on Ludi’s elbow, “it’ll turn into a car at midnight, don’t you see?”

  “Isn’t it a bit conspicuous?” said Sully.

  But everyone piled in, and there was lots of room, and Nat drove briskly, valves a-chatter, down the road to Suddington, some fifty miles away, the county seat. If anyone observed them heading south, that wouldn’t matter anyway, said Nat. Driving back at night, the orange wouldn’t look so orangey, he said, and once they were at the Robinsons’ again, a transformation could take place. “Just as the brilliant butterfly becomes a caterpillar,” Nat reminded them, “so shall the Pumpkin turn to…cantaloupe, perhaps. Or something equally discreet.”

  “But,” Sully started, “…isn’t it the other…” Sara dug him in the ribs and made a funny face, and Sully laughed.

  In Suddington, they patronized a lot of different stores, and never more than two of them went anywhere together. “This may be hard for some of us,” said Marigold, a hand behind her neck, “to not be memorable, you know. Me—pretend to be a local high school girl? Maybe if I got a polyester top…and curlers…and, say, three packs of Juicy Fruit. …”

  What they bought were basics: food, some boards and tarps for storage boxes, extra nails a
nd hardware, paint. Also clothes, in mostly greens and browns and olives (“Earth tones, don’t you love them?” Marigold asked Ludi. “They bring out all the yellow in my skin”), boots for those who didn’t have them, ditto running shoes. Nat bought clothes for Coke, estimating sizes; he didn’t mention that he’d done that, though. No one mentioned Coke, and Marigold was cracking jokes, but Nat thought she, and everyone, was missing Coke a lot. It was more or less as if he’d died.

  They also bought flashlights, whistles, compasses, and first-aid kits, and axes, knives, and bows and arrows.

  “Who knows how to shoot these things?” asked Sully, handling this very ancient weapon, now made out of fiberglass and plastic.

  Ludi’d taken archery at camp, and so had Sara. Nat admitted he had “fooled around” with bows a little. No one asked to know exactly what the bows were for.

  For supper they got take-outs from a Burger King, and everybody got a little solemn at the thought of no more fast food for a while. Sully went and got a final round of fries, to pass around the Pumpkin on the way back “home,” but when they got to Boynton Falls again, there was a last request from everyone. And so Nat stopped outside a little grocery, where Sara went and got just four half gallons of Coronet All-Natural Chocolate Chip. There was a freezer at the Robinsons’, they said, and this was only Wednesday, after all.

  Going up the gravel roads, they didn’t see a single car, and half the houses that they passed were dark. The rest had maybe one room lighted, sometimes only by the silver of a TV screen. Once, they came upon two deer, standing squarely in the middle of the road, and Sara thought she saw some others in the fields they passed. Driving through the night, in such an empty, country sort of place, their whole predicament seemed more unreal than ever. And scarier, somehow—they felt exposed and vulnerable. Everyone was glad to reach the roadway to the Robinsons’, and surprised when Nat turned off the lights and stopped, perhaps a quarter mile below the house.