By Curt Saltzman
The three boys leaned against the chain-link fence above the dry wash. There was Johnny and Tom and another boy who’d wanted to tag along. The day was hot and they felt the heat like a weight pushing down on them.
“Got those cigarettes?” Tom said.
Johnny took the pack of Marlboros out of the back pocket of his jeans. There were three cigarettes left. He put one in his mouth and lit it and the boys passed it around between them.
“These things get you high,” Tom said when his turn came. He was overweight and had a white scar on his upper lip from when they’d operated on his cleft palate.
“Yeah,” Johnny said. He took the cigarette and drew on it. The smoke made him dizzy and he leaned way back into the fence. He passed the cigarette to the other boy he hardly knew, who hadn’t said a word since they’d left the school, and looked down into the wash.
A trickle of water lay on the riverbed of sun-bleached cement. Beneath the water grew patches of algae the color of baize. Several crows were pecking at the stagnant water. One of the crows cawed a few times, bobbing its head up and down. After the cawing the crows flew away together. They went about fifty yards, flying slowly and circling, and landed again.
A tree by the fence gave shade further down and the boys walked over to the tree. They felt the sun more after smoking the cigarette. They removed their jackets and hung them into the crotch of the tree. Johnny and Tom wore short-sleeved shirts with button-down collars under their jackets. The other boy had on only a white t-shirt. His body was gaunt and it made him look either younger or older than the other two. It was hard to evaluate his age, like for people suffering from a chronic illness. They stood under the tree and waited. It was calm along the wash by the fence and they were alone in the sector. The sun was high, the sky blank except for a lone contrail being smudged by the wind.
After a moment they sat down in the dirt under the tree. It was an old oak that hadn’t been cut down for some reason when they’d built the wash. It had one large branch that stuck out perpendicularly from the trunk and another that grew straight upwards. The boys had their heads down and picked at the weeds growing around the trunk.
Johnny found a rock lying in the dirt and threw it down into the wash. The rock landed next to a thin piece of wood, which began sliding over the ground. It had been a snake drinking. The boys gathered rocks and threw them at the snake, but the animal climbed the levee on the other side of the riverbed. It moved rapidly and sidled out of view. They sat down again and Johnny took another cigarette out of the pack and lit it. He took a puff and passed it to the boy in the t-shirt. They were all reinvigorated now after trying to kill the snake.
“Probably a garter snake,” the boy in the t-shirt said. “They like water.” He spoke with the cigarette between his lips. The smoke entered his throat and he started coughing. Tears ran down his face.
“What’s your name, anyway?” Johnny said after the coughing ceased.
“Billy Reynolds. We’re neighbors if you want to know.”
“Don’t remember seeing you around,” Johnny said.
“My dad doesn’t like me playing in the street.”
“How’s that?”
“I dunno.”
“He’s afraid you’ll get squashed by a pickup or something,” Tom said. Everybody in town had a pickup truck.
“I dunno,” Billy said.
“You don’t have to be playing in the street, like playing ball in the street or something. You can ride your bike around.” Tom liked to work these things through thoroughly.
“My dad’s pretty strict,” Billy said. “We moved here from Denver six months ago.” He’d removed the cigarette from his mouth and let it burn down between his fingers.
“Gimme the cigarette, man,” Johnny said. Billy held the cigarette out to Johnny. His hand shook a little. “What’s the matter with you?” he asked Billy.
“Nothing.”
“What you so shaky about?”
“He’s nervy,” Tom said.
“I’m not nervy,” Billy said.
“Hold your hand out like this and we’ll see,” Johnny said. He held his own hand flat, palm downward. It was perfectly still.
“Forget that,” Billy said.
“Afraid you’ll shake?” Tom said.
“Why should I be afraid I’ll shake?”
“Who knows? Maybe you’re really a girl.”
“Maybe you’re fat in your brain,” Billy said.
Tom started to get up, his face red, but Johnny said, “Leave him alone,” and Tom sat back down. “Let’s go down into the wash,” Johnny said.
They rose and looked up at the chain-link fence. The fence was about ten feet high. The wire mesh had been twisted into barbs above the top rail. Johnny and Tom climbed to the top. One of Tom’s trouser legs got snagged going over the barbs and Johnny unsnagged it. “What you waiting for?” Johnny asked. Billy hadn’t started up yet.
“Too crowded,” Billy said. He went up and when he reached the top Johnny helped him over and got him turned around. The boys descended the fence and clambered down the levee to the riverbed. They headed in the direction of the conduit that drained the rain run-off into the wash.
They reached the storm-water conduit after walking awhile. It was a huge gray pipe made of reinforced concrete. Johnny ducked into the dark gaping mouth. The two other boys followed him inside. The sounds they made were magnified by the great hollow tube.
“This maybe isn’t safe,” Billy said.
They went a hundred feet or so before Johnny stopped and took out the pack of Marlboros. He lit the remaining cigarette and discarded the empty pack. The lighter’s flame briefly revealed the details of their faces.
They perceived the circle of daylight at the entrance to the conduit. An optical effect made the circle appear miles away. Johnny handed the cigarette over to Tom and closed his eyes. He saw strange, contorted forms, red moons surging and ebbing in a sea of yellow clouds.
“Maybe we should be getting back,” Billy said.
“Yeah, it’s pretty weird in here,” Tom said. The dampness triggered his asthma and he whistled with every breath.
“What for?” Johnny said. “This is great. Nobody can get us in here.”
“Who’d want to get us?” Billy asked.
“Who knows?” Johnny snatched the cigarette from Billy that was just burning away uselessly again and stuck it between his lips. “But they’ll never find us in here.” He took a big hit and his head felt so empty he thought he might die. He closed his eyes again and saw a field of grass. Above the grass golden flowers waved on long arching stems. Maybe there’s more than one world, he thought.
“I got to be back by five,” Billy said. He had a wristwatch with a green luminescent dial and held it up to his face in the dark.
“We got time,” Johnny said. He was getting tired of Billy.
“It’s past four. I don’t wanna be late.”
“Why should you be late?”
“I don’t want to be.”
“Good. Don’t be.”
“I want out of here,” Tom said. “This is no good for my asthma.”
“Just let me finish the cigarette,” Johnny said. He took several puffs of the Marlboro in rapid succession and flicked the butt away. “You guys are such wimps,” he said.
As they were walking back they heard a pattering noise overhead. “Sounds like rats,” Billy said. Johnny had just about had it with this kid. “They can’t get inside here anyway,” Tom said. “If they’re on the roof.” His breathing kept accelerating like some device going out of control.
The circle of light disappeared. They held their arms out in front of them as if they were blind. Johnny didn’t believe in the rat theory. “There are no rats,” he told himself, and just then a stampede of things made the whole conduit tremble.
There was an odor of something raw, like when you dig deep enough into the earth to uncover the worms, and a clamor. Tom concentrated on his breathing while Billy tried not to think of the size the rats must be. Johnny understood he would be punished for the mistakes he’d made, for smoking cigarettes at his age, for not listening to his parents telling him to stay behind the fence and not climb down here because it was dangerous. But it wasn’t that, really. They were still children. This was the end of it. It was too bad and he struggled when the water came. He’d forgotten his jacket on the oak tree.
Curt Saltzman was born and raised in Los Angeles. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Gargoyle Magazine, Sou’wester, The Bitter Oleander, Into The Void, Epiphany, and elsewhere. He lives in France.
