Russell Banks - Rule of the Bone

After supper we watched TV for a while but since we couldn’t figure out how to work the satellite dish the picture was lousy and all we got was Channel 5 from Plattsburgh. We kind of watched Sally Jessy Raphael and then the local news came on with some stuff about the fire which was basically the same as the newspaper had only with not as many details except that now we were presumed to have perished in the fire and weren’t missing anymore. That got us really psyched and we pumped our fists and said All right! and kept hoping there’d be interviews with our moms and all but the news guy just went on to some boring stuff about taxes being due today.

When Jeopardy came on after the news we shut the TV off and went looking through the Ridgeways’ tapes and CDs for some tunes but all they had was classical and Russ said no way with that shit although I wouldn’t’ve minded a little classical. I remembered liking it that one time when the guy gave me a lift back to Au Sable from the mall. There was a portable radio in the kitchen though and we found a pretty good rock station from Lake Placid that came in loud and clear and played old guys like Elton John and Bruce Springsteen and me and Russ amused ourselves by dissing them for a while.

Later when we knew it was dark we went looking for some firewood and when we couldn’t find any in the house we noticed that a lot of the furniture especially in the livingroom was made out of old sticks and logs, mostly birch branches and rough with the bark still on and everything, all these wobbly chairs and tables like a kid’d made them for his clubhouse. It didn’t seem like anything rich people would give a shit about and they came apart real easy so we made a fire with one of the chairs and then just lay back in front of the fireplace on some pillows from the couch and got real mellow.

At a certain point we realized that it’d be perfect if we had some weed and Russ got it into his head that the Ridgeways were dopers because they were like famous artists and his aunt had even said she’d seen some once when she was cleaning house.

Where’d she see it? I asked him.

I dunno, she never said. But let’s start sniffing, man, Russ said and he jumped up and began to feel around in all the table drawers and in the desk and even behind the books on the shelves. C’mon, Bone, give me a hand, will ya? he said. I didn’t think there was anybody who’d leave their smoke behind when they locked up their house for the whole winter but I helped him look anyhow just to shut him up.

I checked out the kitchen for a while and then went upstairs to the big bedroom where we had our sleeping bags and went through the closets and dressers but didn’t find anything. Then I pulled open the drawer of this table that was next to one of the beds and suddenly I was staring at a sandwich bag of about twenty of these neat little already rolled joints.

Excellent discovery.

Then I saw a bunch of condoms and I thought maybe there’s even some coke in here because you get greedy when you’re this lucky so I reached way into the back of the drawer and felt what I instantly knew was a gun and a small box of bullets.

The joints and the condoms I took downstairs with me and showed to Russ but not the gun and the bullets which I didn’t even tell him about although I don’t know why not except maybe because he’s so excitable and all I didn’t trust him with it. Anyhow we split up the joints fifty-fifty and I gave him all the condoms because I didn’t know when I’d get to use them if ever and he said he wanted them because it was always better to be safe than sorry and he was looking forward to screwing some of the local babes. Then we sat down on the rug in front of the fire and each smoked a joint and the evening was way perfect.

Later I asked him how long before the Ridgeways come up from Connecticut.

Long time, man, he said. Not till June probably, they won’t come till after blackfly season. Relax, man. For the next couple of months, man, this place is ours.

What about your uncle, doesn’t he ever like come inside and check things out?

Naw. He just does what he has to. He drives up and looks around and most times he doesn’t even get out of his truck. Then about a week before they come up I guess the Ridgeways call him and he drives over and turns on the water and the furnace and all that.

How’ll we know when to split?

We’ll just hafta keep listening for his truck to drive up and I guess we’ll go out the same way we came in.

What about after that?

What?

After he comes and we leave. Where do we go then?

I dunno. Jesus, Bone. Cross that bridge when we come to it, man.

I was thinking somehow Russ wasn’t into this new way of life as deep as I was. Every time I brought up the subject of Florida or California or life after now he’d try and talk about something else or he’d say we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it like it wasn’t already staring at us in the face. It was like I had gone and changed completely who I was, my name, my whole attitude, my hair even, and he hadn’t changed anything. I was the Bone now for sure but Russ was still Russ.

After the first few days time passed slower and slower until finally it didn’t seem to be passing at all. It got incredibly boring. We couldn’t even look out the windows at the view of the mountains because the windows were all blocked up and it was dark inside so we kept all the lights on day and night and slept whenever we felt like it which was most of the time. We watched TV a lot, the one lousy channel from Plattsburgh which came in all snowy and we tried playing some dumb board games that we found which are no substitute for video games that’s for sure but the Ridgeways weren’t the type for video games I guess. They did have these Jane Fonda exercise tapes that we watched on the VCR though and we got off on those for a while on account of Jane’s tights and all until neither of us could stand the squealing anymore. We ate mostly spaghetti and then sometimes for variety rice or oatmeal and drank powdered iced tea and instant coffee and Tang which is a diet you can get sick of really fast.

In the den where the animal heads and stuffed birds were they had hundreds of books but even they were boring, at least the few I tried because of the titles that made me think they might have a little sex in them like Evolution and Desire, a dog turd of a book that I couldn’t get through the first page of. And this one book I remember, Beyond the Pleasure Principle which I thought was a sex manual only it didn’t have any pictures and one called Finnegans Wake that I hoped would be a murder story with some good plotting but it turned out to be in like some strange language that was made up of mostly English words but was actually foreign. They had a whole bunch like that. I don’t know why people write books that normal people can’t read because I sure couldn’t and I was always pretty good at reading.

Russ’s uncle did drive up a few times and turn around and leave without getting out of his truck but in case he decided to get out and like check the doors we didn’t unlock or use them at all and instead went in and out of the house through the same upstairs porch we’d come in by, making sure each time to put the screen we’d cut back in place so you couldn’t hardly tell anyone had broken in unless you got right up close to it. Generally we stayed inside the house though and when we did go outside we only lurked around the yard since there really wasn’t anyplace else to go, A, because we didn’t have a car or any money and were way out in the boonies where there wasn’t anyplace for kids to hang except a Stewart’s and this one restaurant down on the main road. And B, because of Russ’s aunt and uncle and his cousins and numerous other local citizens who if they saw us would recognize Russ instantly and know we weren’t dead.