him. He didn’t look, in case there wasn’t.
Liberty dropped the tattered bamboo shade.
Teddy’s room was low-ceilinged and narrow. The walls were stained a muddy color, and there was a red rug on the floor. Half the ceiling was covered with the silver bears from Klondike Bar ice cream wrappers. Liberty took two wrappers from her pocket, found a paste pot in the desk and pressed two more bears upon the ceiling.
Teddy had begun collecting the wrappers after his mother had gone away. When she disappeared, he had first become deeply interested in cartography. He made elaborate maps and memorized airplane routes and bus schedules. He learned wilderness techniques and how to read a compass, determined to track his mother down. Then Duane had taken him aside for a little talk. He told Teddy that his mom had become a freak, that she had grown whiskers, and that he should hope that she never came back. If she came back, he should fight against her as though he were fighting against the forces of evil for his very life. Duane had told him (and he told him, he said, reluctantly) that if his mom came back it would likely be for no other purpose than to cut his little pecker off, put it on a key chain and present it to her girlfriend.
“Remember at the county fair last year, son, do you remember that tent we went into?”
“The Ambassadors from Mars were in that tent, Daddy.”
“Well, yeah, they was, but remember what was in there too was that individual who bit off hens’ heads.”
“I couldn’t see that too well, Daddy.”
“Well, that individual hates chickens like the way your momma hates us men now,” Duane said. “So forget momma,son. Be on your guard, but put her right out of your mind.”
Not long after Duane’s metaphorical chat, Teddy began breathing oddly and wetting the bed and waking in the night with terrible dreams of something gaunt and bearded, like the person he had almost seen in the tent, chuckling and tearing at him, snipping off his fingertips with its teeth and pulling his toes out with its teeth in the same way he had been taught by Liberty to get the meat out of an artichoke leaf. In the night he imagined his mother calling to him … Teddeee … Teddeee … a pale stretched-out skinny sound … calling and laughing and groaning to him.
He decided he needed a little magical protection, something he could devise for himself, so he began collecting the silvery paper bears. The phalanx of bears would protect him when he slept, when he could not be on guard. Their thick cold coats would muffle the sounds of chuckling and tearing and calling. They had already caused the dreams to change their nature, and he felt that when he had gathered enough of the bears, when the ceiling was complete, the terrible dreams would stop.
The bears marched glittering across the ceiling. Teddy was getting there, Liberty thought. He was almost there.
Teddy rushed into the room. “Liberty!” he said. “Do you know that during the Second World War, the Americans were going to use bat bombs against Japan? They were going to tie little cylinders filled with napalm to the bats’ chests and drop thousands of them from airplanes. They would be in hibernation, but as they fell from the planes they’d wake out of hibernation and then they’d go into buildings and houses and after a few hours they’d blow up.”
“Where did you hear that?”
“I’m taking a course at the junior college called Oddities of War.” He took the egg out of his pocket and examined it. “Still with us,” he said. “You know, it’s hard to take care of an egg. A baby’s easier to watch than an egg, isn’t it, Liberty? It’s so much bigger. It would be hard to lose a baby. Some of the girls in my class have lost their eggs already. They think it’s a stupid assignment. Liberty, do you know that at that party Daddy and Janiella had, our pool got broken? Daddy broke it. He was just fooling around, Janiella
Liberty dropped the tattered bamboo shade.
Teddy’s room was low-ceilinged and narrow. The walls were stained a muddy color, and there was a red rug on the floor. Half the ceiling was covered with the silver bears from Klondike Bar ice cream wrappers. Liberty took two wrappers from her pocket, found a paste pot in the desk and pressed two more bears upon the ceiling.
Teddy had begun collecting the wrappers after his mother had gone away. When she disappeared, he had first become deeply interested in cartography. He made elaborate maps and memorized airplane routes and bus schedules. He learned wilderness techniques and how to read a compass, determined to track his mother down. Then Duane had taken him aside for a little talk. He told Teddy that his mom had become a freak, that she had grown whiskers, and that he should hope that she never came back. If she came back, he should fight against her as though he were fighting against the forces of evil for his very life. Duane had told him (and he told him, he said, reluctantly) that if his mom came back it would likely be for no other purpose than to cut his little pecker off, put it on a key chain and present it to her girlfriend.
“Remember at the county fair last year, son, do you remember that tent we went into?”
“The Ambassadors from Mars were in that tent, Daddy.”
“Well, yeah, they was, but remember what was in there too was that individual who bit off hens’ heads.”
“I couldn’t see that too well, Daddy.”
“Well, that individual hates chickens like the way your momma hates us men now,” Duane said. “So forget momma,son. Be on your guard, but put her right out of your mind.”
Not long after Duane’s metaphorical chat, Teddy began breathing oddly and wetting the bed and waking in the night with terrible dreams of something gaunt and bearded, like the person he had almost seen in the tent, chuckling and tearing at him, snipping off his fingertips with its teeth and pulling his toes out with its teeth in the same way he had been taught by Liberty to get the meat out of an artichoke leaf. In the night he imagined his mother calling to him … Teddeee … Teddeee … a pale stretched-out skinny sound … calling and laughing and groaning to him.
He decided he needed a little magical protection, something he could devise for himself, so he began collecting the silvery paper bears. The phalanx of bears would protect him when he slept, when he could not be on guard. Their thick cold coats would muffle the sounds of chuckling and tearing and calling. They had already caused the dreams to change their nature, and he felt that when he had gathered enough of the bears, when the ceiling was complete, the terrible dreams would stop.
The bears marched glittering across the ceiling. Teddy was getting there, Liberty thought. He was almost there.
Teddy rushed into the room. “Liberty!” he said. “Do you know that during the Second World War, the Americans were going to use bat bombs against Japan? They were going to tie little cylinders filled with napalm to the bats’ chests and drop thousands of them from airplanes. They would be in hibernation, but as they fell from the planes they’d wake out of hibernation and then they’d go into buildings and houses and after a few hours they’d blow up.”
“Where did you hear that?”
“I’m taking a course at the junior college called Oddities of War.” He took the egg out of his pocket and examined it. “Still with us,” he said. “You know, it’s hard to take care of an egg. A baby’s easier to watch than an egg, isn’t it, Liberty? It’s so much bigger. It would be hard to lose a baby. Some of the girls in my class have lost their eggs already. They think it’s a stupid assignment. Liberty, do you know that at that party Daddy and Janiella had, our pool got broken? Daddy broke it. He was just fooling around, Janiella
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