Trouble (23 page)

The sky had decided on the deep gold. It gilded all the sharp edges of the red pines, and the straight granite rock faces cut out along the road, and the wispy clouds still being pulled in long streamers after the storm front. The air itself was dashed with flecks of gold, and they drove through a shining haze—though they could hardly see it. The shining seemed always just off to the side, almost invisible, but there. And it was while trying to catch hold of it somehow—to fix it in focus—that Henry first saw the lake that lay between two dark green hills.

The golden sky had coalesced in its water and its flat surface shone dully, like the gold of a medieval illumination. Down the center of the lake was a long incandescent streak, streaming like a path for the Resurrected to march hand in hand to Glory. They all three stared at it—Black Dog, too—and when the road turned to follow the abrupt bend of the lake, the sun off the gold water shouted into their eyes. Chay slowed down. None of them wanted the shouting to end.

Slowly they traveled around the shoreline, and as the angle grew less, so the light grew less, and the water changed from gold to a duller flat sheen. Black Dog whined—Henry figured he knew what she felt, the lake was so beautiful—except that pretty soon she let him know that he really didn't know what she felt, which was more in the way of her getting out of the truck and finding a soft, grassy place than appreciating the view. No matter what happens, there is always the business of the world to attend to, Henry remembered.

And so, just before they reached the end of the lake, Henry asked Chay to stop at a dirt turnoff, which happened to be the driveway to the Rustic Lake Resort Cottages—which really did not look like cottages that you would attach the word "resort" to, and which turned out to be owned by a short and balding man in a Florida-bright shirt with palm trees at the shoulders and pockets who came right out holding an egg salad sandwich and said that he didn't appreciate someone stopping by his Rustic Lake Resort Cottages to run their dog. He might have pointed out a lot more that he didn't appreciate about the three of them except that he saw the quicksilver flash of Sanborn's father's credit card. Henry, who didn't see a single car near any of the Rustic Lake Resort Cottages, figured that Mr. Florida Bright Shirt would put up with a dog and a whole lot more if a credit card was flashing. And he did.

But not without fussing when he got them into the resort office.

"Last time I rented out one of my cottages to three guys, they wrecked the place. Lamps pulled off the walls, shower curtain torn down, water everywhere, the whole deluxe carpet soaked, top bunk crashed down on top of the bottom bunk. I never have figured how someone didn't get killed in there."

"We'll be careful not to get killed," said Sanborn.

"You'd better be careful not to get killed," said Mr. Florida Bright Shirt. "And if you do, don't break anything while you're doing it."

He took an imprint of Sanborn's father's credit card, and Sanborn signed below it. The man looked at the signature, then at Sanborn. "You twenty-one?" he said.

"On my last birthday," said Sanborn.

Mr. Florida Bright Shirt, who was obviously thinking about all the empty parking spaces in front of the rest of the cabins and the big
VACANCY
sign in his resort office window, didn't ask any more questions. He handed them a key. "You got to jiggle the handle on the toilet to make it stop running," he said. "If you don't, the thing'll run all night long."

"Thanks for telling us that," said Sanborn.

"Breakfast is over there in the morning." He pointed to a bare counter with coffee stains. "And don't come too early."

They went to find Cottage 4.

"Be sure to watch the sky tonight," he called after them. "There's supposed to be a meteor shower. Not like in August, but enough so it'll be worth watching."

"We'll do that," said Henry.

"You're lucky you're this far north," Mr. Florida Bright Shirt said, "where you can see so clear."

Henry turned to look out over the lake—which no longer shimmered with gold, but glowed to match a sky that had finally decided to blush into red after all. Still, the red didn't really look like a blush, Henry thought; it was deeper, more ominous than that. Henry could imagine that sky appearing somewhere in a folktale, just before a huge battle or the death of a king or the sinking of a ship. Or before the end of a great and noble people.

C
OTTAGE
4
WAS DOWN BY THE WATER,
and when they got there, they stood by the canoe beached on the rooted shore. Black Dog nosed around to see what had come up at the lapping edge.

"It doesn't look like a bad lake to swim in," said Henry.

"You go swimming," said Sanborn. "I'll take the hot shower."

"It looks like a village is burning somewhere past those trees," said Chay quietly.

Silence. The lapping of the water. The snuffling of Black Dog, who was getting close to the water without wetting her toes.

Henry looked out over the lake and tried to imagine what Chay was seeing—what he had seen—in a world where Trouble lived. He looked at the red sky and the red water underneath it, and he tried to see the ocean outside his own window, the vermillion sunsets, so bright that he could almost taste the colors that streamed over the waves.

But that wasn't what Chay was seeing, Henry knew.

Henry and Sanborn left him at the lake, went back to the pickup, hefted the two packs out, and carried them into a cottage that smelled of old and damp pine—because that is what it was mostly built from. Cottage 4 had one room, not big, with an old red couch, an upholstered chair with a deer pattern to match the small and broken rack of antlers mounted on the wall above it, and a tiny television on a spindly table with rabbit ear antennae sitting on top of it—not connected. A table and four chairs—from three different kitchen sets—grouped themselves beside a counter with a sink and an electric oven, trying as hard as they could to look like a kitchenette. More coffee stains. An old
Field & Stream
left on the counter for evening reading.

Sanborn pointed to the bed on one side of the room. "Chay can have that. We'll take the bunks over there. I've got bottom."

"You're like some sort of general, Sanborn."

"That's me. In control and on patrol."

"Cute."

"Thank you." Sanborn opened his pack, found some clean clothes, and went into the bathroom. "Too bad there's only one towel in here and I got it first," he called out. Then he turned the water on. It sputtered for a while before it finally settled into something like steadiness.

Henry glanced out the picture window. They should have put the table and chairs there, he thought, where you could watch the lake while you ate. The sun was gone now, its last dark light faint; he couldn't see the far shore anymore. He opened his pack and found a Hershey's chocolate bar, and remembering what happened with the apple crisp at lunch, he unwrapped it and started so that he could be finished before Black Dog could take it from him. Then he glanced out the window again.

Chay was swimming into the black-red of the lake. Sort of swimming. His stroke wasn't strong, and he was keeping his head out of the water as far as he could. Black Dog stared at him from shore, but she wasn't going to follow—even though everything in her tense body showed that she wanted to. Twice she turned and looked back at the cottage.

As Henry watched, Chay kept going—straight out.

Henry left his chocolate bar on the window ledge and went out and around Cottage 4. Black Dog ran to him, and then she ran back to the shore, then back to him, then back to the shore, whining. Henry walked to her. On the stump by the canoe, Chay had left Franklin's blue-and-yellow rugby shirt, folded neatly. The rest of his clothes were dumped into a pile.

Chay was still swimming straight out, swimming now with his head low in the water. Henry could barely see him.

He looked at the canoe. It had one oar in it—a rowboat oar. A length of dirty clothesline tied the canoe to the pine stump. There were at least two inches of water pooled inside; leaves and sticks and muck floated on top. He thought he could make out some rusty fishhooks.

Henry looked out again at Chay and panicked for a moment when he didn't see him, until he saw a stroke farther into the dark water. Chay's head was so low now that even the tiny ripples on the lake must have been splashing into his face.

Henry bent down and worked at untying the knot of the clothesline—which wasn't easy, since who knew how long ago it had been tied and how many times it had been rained on and snowed on and rained on and snowed on. He worked at it slowly at first, then frantically, until the pain his palm began to throb, and then to pierce. He ran back into the cottage—the shower was still going, steam coming from beneath the bathroom door along with some horrible song that Sanborn was mutilating—and he found the Buck knife in his pack and ran back out. The light was almost fully gone.

He sliced through the clothesline, grabbed the oar, and shoved the canoe out into the darkening lake. But before he could jump in himself, something happened that was almost, Henry thought, a miracle.

Black Dog splashed through the water and, with an impressive leap, jumped into the canoe.

It wasn't graceful, and she almost tipped the canoe over as she desperately splayed out her feet to get her balance. But after Henry settled it, she carefully went up to the bow, sat down, and turned back to Henry to tell him that she was ready, and what was he waiting for?

Henry drove the canoe out until the water covered his shins, and then he jumped in, shoved the rowboat oar against the rocky bottom to get them started, and headed out after Chay, thinking thoughts that Father Brewood would not approve of about one so-called resort owner who didn't know a rowboat oar from a canoe paddle, and wishing he was in a kayak instead.

He did not let himself paddle desperately. He paddled with precision and rhythm, following the disturbance in the water, since Chay's head was now invisible. He paddled with all the muscles that crew practice had given him—and even though he was using a rowboat oar, the canoe cut through the ripples on the lake with a speed that might have impressed even Coach Santori.

Henry felt as if the only thing aware of him was the starry host, which had come out not one by one, but all of a sudden, and that host was watching him indifferently, not particularly caring if he reached Chay or not. They wouldn't change their cold shining if he flipped the canoe over and disappeared himself. Mr. Florida Bright Shirt would care more, since he'd lose the canoe and the oar, and people aren't supposed to drown at rustic lake resorts. Trouble isn't welcome at rustic lake resorts.

Then Henry did start to row desperately, since he couldn't see any water splashing up—either because of the darkness or because there wasn't any water splashing up anymore. And in the silence under the cold stars, Black Dog barked, a single bright bark, sharp and filled with worry, and even though it seemed so small, it filled up the space of all that blackness upon the surface of the lake—where every sign of the splashing was gone.

"Chay," Henry hollered. "Chay!"

Henry paddled ahead with everything in him.

"Chay!"

"Hey," a voice called, off to his left.

Black Dog barked again.

Henry thrust the stupid rowboat oar back into the water and veered left. To Chay. Who suddenly in the darkness threw a tired and dripping hand out of the water and over the side of the canoe. His cold fingers grasped at it, and almost let go—until Henry grabbed his wrist.

Black Dog fell over herself as she tried to turn around in the narrow bow. For a moment, the canoe tipped far over, and Black Dog backed up as far as she could against the high side with a desperate yelp.

Henry leaned back, too. "Come around by the stern," he said, and when Chay didn't move, Henry drew him by his wrist along the canoe, until Chay grabbed on with his other hand, and heaved once, and then again. He flopped his chest over, and Henry reached and dragged his legs in as well. Then they sat in the canoe, both breathing quickly, Chay with his arms across his chest. It was too dark to see if he was shivering, but if he was, there wasn't much that Henry could do about it.

He told Chay to move forward, and he did, sidling past Henry and so to Black Dog, and then Henry turned the canoe around and headed back, trying to figure out which were the lights from the Rustic Lake Resort Cottages, and finally just picking one set and heading toward it.

And Chay, facing ahead, sat with Black Dog against his chest—probably to keep warm. He wrapped both his arms around her.

A loon called its eerie and lonely call, and it echoed across the lake. It called again, and all was silence—except for the chorus of bullfrogs offering their grainy chorale. Only the lightest wind breathed down on them. Darkness. Low ripples troubling themselves against the sides of the canoe. Water dripping from the stupid oar when Henry raised it from the lake.

Henry felt himself quivering.

He heard Chay begin to weep.

And then, the wail that came out of Chay was as eerie and lonely as any wail that has ever come from any throat of any loon that has ever swum on a dark and cold lake in all the world.

Henry had never heard any sound that was so fully and completely lost. Not even the sounds of his mother deep at night.

And when Chay stopped to breathe, the wail echoed and echoed and echoed around the lake, and when the echoes finally fell away, there was only silence on the water. Even the wind died down, so that they sat in a canoe that did not seem to move, and the water was so still that Henry could count the reflected stars hovering in its depths. He almost reached out to touch one, so close they seemed, and real.

"Chay," said Henry, "I was an idiot to fight you this morning. What happened was an accident. I know that. Maybe most trouble is an accident and it doesn't help to blame anyone. When the blaming is all over, you have to start living again."

In the darkness, Henry could feel Chay turning to look at him. "Is that your wise American saying for the poor Cambodian immigrant? 'Trouble is an accident'? 'Start living again'?"