Wish You Were Here by Stewart O’Nan Page B

too.” He stepped forward like a prisoner and handed it over. “When you come back from the flea market you can have your other half hour, all right?”
    â€œI don’t want to go,” Justin said.
    â€œBut you like the flea market,” she reminded him. “Remember the man with all the Hot Wheels?”
    â€œWe never get to buy any,” Sam said.
    â€œYou talk to your father about that.”
    â€œWhy don’t
they
have to go?” Justin said.
    â€œBecause
they
can take care of themselves.”
    â€œI can take care of myself.” But he realized it was a weak argument. “Do we have to?”
    â€œYes, you have to,” she said. “And no pouting. We’re going to have a wonderful time.”

4
    The first thing Ken noticed was that it wasn’t there. His mind was set on getting gas; the pump-shaped caution had popped on when he started the car. It could go another thirty miles, Lise insisted, but he didn’t want to push it. Meg and his mother and Justin were ahead of them in the van. He was just following, remarking on the familiar scenery. They came up past the golf course and by the diner and then the main gate of the Institute, decked out with hanging baskets of flowers, but when he glanced over to show Sam the Putt-Putt, to say maybe they could go tonight, all that was left was the orange-and-white fence. The snack bar was gone, demolished, and the soda machines and the windmill, the hooded fluorescents that made the air shake at dusk and the speakers that blared “Travelin’ Band” and “Mercy, Mercy Me.” Vanished, nothing now but high grass. A saggy roll of chain-link fence blocked off the parking lot, a FOR LEASE sign prominent.
    â€œWhoa,” he said, easing the 4Runner up the curve by Andriaccio’s, and Lise laid a hand on his leg as if to comfort him. She had a way of anticipating his feelings, and he wanted to say, Wait, I haven’t even started processing this. The hand stayed there, stroking him, consoling.
    â€œYour mother and I noticed it coming up,” Arlene said from the backseat.
    â€œNo one told me.”
    â€œI wonder what they did with all the balls,” Sam said.
    â€œIt’s a chain,” Ken explained. “They probably have a big warehouse somewhere that sends supplies out to other ones around the country.”
    â€œYou’d think they could make money here,” Arlene said. “With the Institute right across the street.”
    â€œThat’s an older crowd,” Ken said. “And there’s Molly World now, and that new place in Lakewood with the driving range.” He didn’t say that when he was a boy the course was deserted, just him and a few other goony kids happy to be off by themselves, the teenager behind the counter bored and listening to a different radio station. The paint was flaking off the fence even then. They didn’t bother to scrape it, just slapped another coat on top. So someone had finally pulled the plug on it.
    The idea that he could go back and shoot the lot rose and fell away again, replaced by the vain wish that he’d brought his Nikon along last year, documented all the dumb obstacles—the concrete triangles and inchworm hills, the clattering loop-the-loops and gopher holes. Close work, maybe with a fishbowl to give it that nostalgic, gritty carnival look. Too late.
    â€œI’m surprised the Institute hasn’t bought up the property,” Lise said. “With all their parking problems.”
    â€œMaybe they have,” he said.
    â€œCan we go miniature golfing?” Sam asked.
    â€œSure,” Ken said. “Maybe tomorrow.”
    The CD protected him—early Bill Evans, real Sunday-paper music. He aimed the 4Runner down the long hill by the cemetery, the snowball trees bright between the graves. A bare-chested boy with a backwards cap and work boots was cutting the grass, slouched down and riding the mower