Steven Millhauser - We Others - New and Selected Stories

He takes a few steps to the edge of the drop, the edge of the world. Behind him’s Grandma in her chair, the floor of pine needles, the picnic table. Behind that, the sunny blankets, a field — but why stop there? Connecticut’s stretching away at his back, the monkey cage in the Beardsley Park Zoo, the Merritt Parkway with its stone bridges, then comes Grandma’s apartment on West 110th Street, and if you keep going, the Mississippi River, Pikes Peak, California. This is fun. You can do it in both directions. In front of him the slope, the sandy-earthy place at the river’s edge, Julia on her back. Then the white barrels, the wooded hills on the far bank of the river, and beyond the hills the other side of Connecticut, the trip to the whaling ship at Mystic Seaport, somewhere out there Cape Cod, the Atlantic Ocean, Africa. He likes standing here, thinking these things. He likes the picture of himself in his own mind as he stares out sternly over the river, frowning in sunlight, his fingertips resting on top of the inner tube, his other hand on his hip, Huck Finn on the shore of the Mississippi, an Indian brave with a quiver of arrows on his back, getting ready to go down to the canoes.

But he can’t stand there all day. Julia’s looking at him from where she’s resting against a barrel. She’s shading her eyes with one hand and waving him on with the other. Come on, Cap’n! Grandma’s looking up from her book to watch him. And besides, he wants the day at Indian Cove to begin, he really does, even if all he’s been trying to do since he got here is hold it back for as long as possible. There’re two ways down to the river: the hard dirt path on the other side of the pine, where the grown-ups go, or straight down the soft, crumbly slope. Gripping the inner tube under his arm, he steps over the edge and half slides half stumbles down, feeling the warm sandy earth spilling over the tops of his feet. It reminds him of salt sprinkled into his hand. He’s there — he’s made it — he’s standing on the patch of orangey sandy dirt that’s too small to be a beach. The beach they go to has real sand, lots of it, with blankets and beach umbrellas, salt water, a refreshment stand, seagulls, dead crabs, sandbars, waves. This is the shore of the river, and it’s different in different places: here the sandy orange earth, farther down some boulders and cattails, elsewhere trees and grass right at the water’s edge. This no-name place is gentler than a beach, more quiet, more shut away, with the slope behind him, the green-brown water in front of him, the white barrels moving up and down a little, as if the water’s breathing.

He starts forward, rolling his inner tube. Nine or ten steps and he’ll be at the water’s edge. He can see ripples there, like very small waves: a tidal river. If he didn’t know it was a river, he’d think he was standing by a lake. Tree branches bending down to the water hide the turn of the river on both sides, and what you see is a lake with wooded hills, a few little houses on the far shore, a pier with a tiny man fishing. He rolls his tube over the warm sand-dirt. There’re pebbles here, but no rubbery piles of seaweed, no purple-black mussel shells. A green Coke bottle, empty, stands upright and looks out of place. It belongs on the beach, tilted in the sand next to a blanket. It’s got a green shadow. Blurred footprints, a smooth flat stone good for skimming. The excitement’s building. He’s almost there.

At the water’s edge he stops. He makes sure the little waves pull back before they can touch his toes. Through the water he can see ripply sun-designs on the river bottom. They look like a chain-link fence made of light. The river is it, the beginning of his adventure, and here at the final place he stops for the last time.

Everything has led up to this moment. No, wrong, he isn’t there yet. The moment’s just ahead of him. This is the time before the waiting stops and he crosses over into what he’s been waiting for. He inhales the river-smell, takes it deep into his nostrils. He’s been moving toward the moment that’s about to happen ever since he woke up this morning, ever since last week, when his father came home from work and with his briefcase still in his hand said they’d be going to Indian Cove on Saturday if the weather held. Every day he could feel it coming closer. It was like waiting for the trip to the amusement park, like waiting for the circus tents to rise out of the fields the next town over. In another second the waiting will end. The day will officially begin. It’s what he’s been hoping for, but here at the edge of the river he doesn’t want to let the waiting go. He wants to hang on with all his might. He’s standing on the shore of the river, the brown-green ripples are breaking at his toes. The sun is shining, Julia’s waving him on, the white barrels are rising and falling gently, and what he wants is to go back to the wooden sign with the tomahawk and start waiting for the shore of the river.

What’s wrong with him? Why can’t he be like Julia? He loves this day, doesn’t he? Any second now he’ll be standing in the water up to his knees, swishing his hands around. He’ll go in up to his bathing suit. He’ll wet his chest and shoulders, hop on the tube and paddle out to Julia. He’ll laugh in the sun. Later he’ll throw himself on his blanket, feel the sun drying out his wet suit. He’ll eat a hot dog in a bun, drink pink lemonade from the jug. He’ll be sluggish with sun and happiness. At the end of the day he’ll change out of his suit in the creaking wooden bathhouse, he’ll fall asleep in the car on the way home, under the streetlights. But now, as he stands at the end of waiting, something is wrong. He’s shaken deep down, as though he’ll lose something if the day begins. If he goes into the river he’ll lose the excitement, the feeling that everything matters because he’s getting closer and closer to the moment he’s been waiting for. When you have that feeling, everything’s full of life, every leaf, every pebble. But when you begin, you’re using things up. The day starts slipping away behind you. He wants to stay on this side of things, to hold it right here. A nervousness comes over him, a chilliness in the sun. In a moment the day will begin to end. Things will rush away behind him. The day he’s been waiting for is practically over. He sees it now, he sees it: ending is everywhere. It’s right there in the beginning. They don’t tell you about it. It’s hidden away in things. Under the shining skin of the world, everything’s dead and gone. The sun is setting. The day is dying. Grandma’s lying in her coffin. Her crooked hands are crossed on her chest. His pretty mother’s growing old. Her fingers are thick and bent. Her brown hair is stringy white. No one can stop it. Julia’s dying, his father’s dying, the Coke bottle’s crumbling away to green dust. Everything’s nothing. If he stands still, if he doesn’t move a muscle, maybe he can keep it from happening. Things will stop and no one will ever die. His body’s shaking, he can’t breathe, here at the water’s edge he’s at the end of everything. You can’t live unless there’s a way to hold on to things. He can’t go back because he’s already used it up, he can’t go forward because then it all begins to end, he’s stuck in this place where nothing means anything, it’s streaming in on him like a darkness, like a sickness, he’s seen something he isn’t supposed to see, only grown-ups are allowed to see it, it’s making him old, it’s ruining everything, his temples are pounding, his eyes are pounding, he feels a scream rising in his chest, he’s going to fall down onto the sandy orange earth, “Ahoy, matey!” shouts Julia, and with a wild cry that tears through his throat he steps over the line and begins his day.