James Van Pelt - Flying in the Heart of the Lafayette Escadrille

Lines of yellow drops marched away from the hole in the floor down the pipes to release one by one several feet away. The plink of dripping water and the heavy, humid air made the cellar seem subterranean, like he was hundreds of feet underground instead of a few steps from his kitchen. He braced his hand on one of the joists and an inch of rotten wood sloughed off. The splinters felt spongy and weightless in his fingers. He dug his screwdriver deeply into the joist. He figured, at least here, only the sheer mass of the thick timbers kept the house from collapsing into its own foundation. He gazed sourly at the other joists and wondered how much more damage he would find as he searched for the main valve.

Two pipes rattled loosely when he shook them. A rusty iron one he guessed was the gas, and a slightly newer pipe he hoped was the water line. He followed it with his light as it went through joist after joist until it ran down the wall and into a wooden hatch set into the floor next to the old water heater.

A leather strap served as a handle. He wrapped it around his hand and grunted as he pulled the water-logged door open. A moist, vegetable smell floated against his face when he lay on the floor to look into the hole. Green and black fungus coated all eight of the valves within. Fortunately, the new valve was on top of the old ones. Thomas reached down, spreading his legs for leverage, and he twisted it. The valve creaked, but didn’t move. His fingers slipped.

He slid more of his chest over the hole, bracing himself with one hand against a wet pipe. He heard someone on the stairs.

“Daddy, I’m filming your feet.” The camera’s bright light filled the top quarter of the hole, but the contrast made Thomas’s hand invisible. He couldn’t tell what he was holding onto.

“Dolby, come shine the light for me.”

“I can’t. I just wanted another blank tape. I’m recording the dragon.”

“Tapes are in the TV cabinet, but come hold the light first.”

The light blinked out. Dolby’s feet pounded across the kitchen. Thomas sighed and waited for his eyes to adjust to the dim light from his flashlight that was on the edge of the hole. He twisted again with no result. The valve was too slippery.

Thomas rummaged through the drawers in the kitchen looking for a rag. His wife mopped water off the tile.

“Why don’t you turn the water off?” she said.

“The valve’s stuck.” He picked up a cloth placemat and held it up to her.

“That’s our wedding present from Aunt Mary.”

“I’ve never seen it before.”

“I’m waiting for a special occasion.”

He put it back in the drawer and opened another filled with plastic spoons and forks. He shut it.

“What do you need?” she asked.

“An old towel or something.”

“I threw them out when we moved.”

“What can I use?”

She dropped the mop—its handle bounced—dug impatiently into a laundry basket and tossed him one of his older shirts. “There.” The shirt landed at his feet, a sleeve draped over his left foot.

“How’s your head?” he asked.

“Wonderful. I can stand it. A flood in the kitchen doesn’t help. I thought men were supposed to know about plumbing.”

“My dad never taught me,” he said.

“Fine, then, blame your dad.”

“Sorry,” he said, and felt awkward because “sorry” wasn’t really the right response. He picked up the shirt. “It’ll be dark soon. Don’t you think Dolby should come in?”

She sat in a kitchen chair, massaged her eyebrows with her thumbs. “He says he’s found a dragon. Have you been telling him stories again? If he wakes up screaming tonight…”

Thomas squeezed the shirt into a ball. “One dragon story months ago. If he ignores it, it will go away.”

“The dragon or the nightmare?”

“Yeah,” said Thomas.

“You call him.”

Thomas put the shirt on the table and opened the back door screen. His wife rested her face in her hands. He saw just her nose and a slice of her lips.

The last edge of the sun setting behind him, Dolby stood on a stump in the back yard pointing the bulky camera at the roof. Thomas called him.

“I can’t come now, Daddy. He’s right above you.”

Thomas resisted the urge to look up. “Don’t make me tell you twice.”

Dolby jumped down and stomped into the house, the camera slapping awkwardly against his legs. Thomas turned sideways to let him in.

“Did you see him?” said Dolby, his face red and angry. “Is it the same one?”

“No,” said Thomas.

“Don’t you want to see him?”

“What I want is for you to get ready for bed.”

“I’m going to watch my tape.”

“It’s after your bedtime. No TV after bedtime, son.” Thomas let the door swing shut behind him. The screen pressed against his palms like coarse sandpaper.

“I want to watch this, though. I filmed it.”

“No.”

Dolby glared at him and then at his mother, her hands still over her face. “It’s not fair!” He threw the heavy camera on the floor. Something delicate crunched inside; a lens rolled across the tile and under the refrigerator.

All of Thomas’s muscles locked. For a second he could see himself stepping forward, bringing his hand around and slapping his son, a full body weight swing that would take his head off. So Thomas didn’t move. He knew he couldn’t move.

The boy, crying, ran out of the room. His feet drummed on the stairs, and then his bedroom door slammed shut.

Water hissed out of the leak under the sink; a new peninsula of wetness formed on the recently mopped floor.

Thomas exhaled and realized he’d been holding his breath, then said, “What are we going to do?”

“I’ll pick it up.”

“About Dolby. What are we going to do about him?”

His wife bent stiffly, as if her back hurt too, and lifted the camera by its strap from the floor. Broken parts shifted inside. “He’s your son.”

“Our son.”

“I didn’t tell him about dragons.” She dropped the camera in the trash can.

“Maybe it can be fixed.”

She snorted. “I’m going to bed.”

“I’ll turn the water off, and then be up.”

She paused at the doorway, rested her hand on the door frame. “Don’t bother.” Her head leaned against her arm. “I’ll be asleep.”

In the cellar, the flashlight flickered. Thomas slapped it angrily against his palm and the light brightened to a dull yellow. He shined it the length of the cellar towards the sump where the floor glistened, but the pool was gone. The pump’s motor whined. Black algae covered the stone floor. He wondered how long it had been since the pump had been turned on and how algae could grow without light. He discovered the float valve on the sump was missing. If he hadn’t come downstairs, he figured, the bearing would have burned out by morning. He pressed the button on the wall, and the motor’s noise dropped into the silence of dripping. Water stained the rough stone walls. How often did the cellar need to be pumped?

At the trap door, he dropped onto his chest, reached into the hole and wrapped the shirt around the valve. It turned stiffly, and the constricted water shrieked at the end of the last rotation. Thomas rolled to a sitting position, suddenly exhausted.

Gradually, the flashlight dimmed, then winked out, and he lowered his head to his forearms.

He thought about his father who had never taught him anything, except maybe that you can always run away. He didn’t know much about him. A few photographs and a box full of tools were all he had, and now Thomas had to raise a son. Thomas remembered one evening a week after Dad had left. He sat dry-eyed but desperately alone on his kitchen porch step. The horizon glowed faintly orange. The dragon came to him, flying out of the sunset, then landed in the yard and consoled him. For a year after whenever he was most alone, the dragon came. When the hurt faded away, when Thomas found other friends, the dragon quit coming. Thomas hardly missed him. But now, he thought, he would rather have had a father. What does a father do? he thought. What does a father do when his son doesn’t listen to him and his wife is so distant that when they are in the same bed late at night the father is afraid to breathe because she may hear him? Thomas’s father had taken the magic escape. He had ridden the dragon and never returned.