Dismember

Out here in the open, the sun baked Dave’s head and face. He’d spent so long hiding in the shade, he’d almost forgotten it was summer. A bead of sweat dripped down his cheek, hung for a moment from the tip of his chin, and then fell to the dirt below.

The boy’s thrashing had almost stopped, which seemed strange to Dave. His fits of rebellion came in spurts. Throw a rock here, run away there, but never an all-out fight for his life.

Only after he’d pushed Georgie in through the passenger-side door and buckled him into his seat did Dave say calmly, “Doesn’t make any sense to run away, does it?” He pulled the belt tighter and wrapped it once all the way around the boy. Not exactly handcuffs, but it kept him from making any sudden moves, and that would have to do for now. Eventually, Dave knew, Georgie would settle down. He was a good boy. “I’d find you, son,” he said, liking the way that last word sounded. “I’ll always find you.”

He slammed the door and circled around the front of the truck, looking once at the forest around them, not expecting to see anything or anyone, just looking, remembering. He doubted he’d ever return to this particular stretch of the mountains. He wondered if the boy had already come to the same realization.

Smiling, the birthday boy dropped into the truck behind the steering wheel. He’d started the engine and slipped the transmission into reverse, about to back his way downhill when he noticed the thing hanging from the rearview mirror. A flower-scented air-freshener. His air-freshener. He rolled down his window and ripped the thing from the rearview.

“He always liked lilac.”

The boy looked at him, said nothing.

Dave flicked his wrist and sent the air-freshener spinning out the window. It didn’t fly far before making a strange dive through the air like a wing-shot bird and landing with a soft rustle in the weeds beside the road.

“Won’t need that anymore,” Dave said, wiping his bloodstained hand on his pants as if, by touching the air- freshener, he’d only now gotten the hand dirty. “This is my truck now. Mine and yours.” He rooted around on the floorboards, found an old gas receipt, and poked it onto the rearview’s adjustment lever to replace the air freshener. Then he propped his arm on the back of the seat and backed slowly down the mountain road.

The truck bounced over large rocks and pitted areas where the road had partially washed away. The few tools in the truck’s bed—a shovel, a rake, a toolbox full of old wrenches and screwdrivers—clanged and clattered while the truck continued its bumpy ride. Dave turned on the radio, which never worked well, and got no reception; the static whispered from the speakers, sounding almost peaceful, like a bubbling brook or the wind through overhead tree limbs.

Dave reached a spot in the road wide enough to turn the pickup around and did so. When they were pointed front forward and rolling along once more, Dave said, “The family truck,” as if he’d been thinking it all along.

NINE

Trevor sat on the toilet in the far stall looking down between his bare, thin legs at his dangling thingy and at the poo smeared across the cracked toilet seat. He’d almost made it, had been within four or five steps of the stall when the final cramp hit him and the back of his pants just about exploded. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it hadn’t been runny. Trevor hated runny poo, hated the way it splashed up from the toilet water and the way it got all over the place so that you couldn’t hardly ever get it all wiped off.

Of course, it was worse when it happened in your pants.

He grabbed another handful of toilet paper from the roll on the wall beside him, lifted his leg, and tried again to clean off the back of it with a series of awkward swipes.

Just a few more steps, or maybe if he’d just left the line for the merry-go-round one minute earlier. Except he hadn’t had to go one minute earlier. The urge had hit him all at once, like it sometimes did, and he hadn’t even had enough time to go back to the table and get his mommy. In fact, for one scary moment he’d thought he would unload right there in the middle of the waiting crowd. In front of those girls. Jeez. If that had happened, he probably would have curled right up in the puddle of his own stinking mess and died.

So yeah, at least it hadn’t been all bad. At least he’d made it into the bathroom and most of the way to the toilet before the gunk had run its way out of his shorts, down his legs, and onto the floor. He’d even gotten some of it into the toilet bowl—the last few squeezes, at least.

Plus Mommy and Daddy had found him. Somehow. He still hadn’t quite figured that out, but he was glad as could be. Here he was with both his mommy and his daddy taking care of him, when he could just as easily have been crying in front of a bunch of poo-covered girls and trying to explain to them that it hadn’t been his fault, that it had happened all of a sudden, that it had been the runny kind.

He dropped the dirty wad of toilet paper into the toilet and reached over his shoulder to pull on the flusher. Beyond the stalls, he heard his daddy at the sink splashing water and scrubbing at something. Probably his shoes. Trevor didn’t think he’d gotten them very dirty, just a few smears down the backs, and he was glad the shoes wouldn’t have to get trashed, too.

Stupid. He couldn’t believe how stupid he was. What kind of a kindergartener pooped his pants at the mall? Not even a kindergartner. Just a few more weeks and he’d be in the first grade. If any of his classmates found out what had gone on today, he’d be the laughing stock till the end of time. Maybe longer. They’d give him a nickname like Diarrhea or Number Two and hide toilet paper and diapers in his desk.

At least he was pretty sure his name didn’t rhyme with any of the many kinds of poop. Last year, Scotty Peterson had gone an entire morning with a booger on the tip of his nose. Ms. White had cleaned it off with a tissue before the class went to lunch, but by then Scotty had already become Snotty Peterson, and that had been the least of his troubles.

Trevor thought he was probably safe. Only his parents knew what had happened, what he had done. And why would they tell anybody? If he didn’t let it slip, Trevor didn’t think his accident would ever come back to haunt him.

He hopped off the toilet, grabbed another handful of toilet paper and twisted around until he could see the top of his naked bottom. So much poo. He thought all his insides must have been completely filled with the stuff. He doubted even an elephant could have made this much of a mess. Maybe a dinosaur. If it was sick.

“Dad,” he said, trying not to sound too pathetic, too babyish.

A few footsteps, and then, “You doing okay in there?”

“I think I got most of it,” Trevor said, “but I can’t reach everywhere.”

“Okay, give me a sec and I’ll finish up for you.”

Trevor heard some more splashing and the sound of paper towels being pulled from the dispenser. When his dad knocked on the door, he unlocked it and made a half-hearted attempt to cover his privates. His dad had seen him naked lots of times, he guessed, he shouldn’t have been embarrassed, but he was just a little all the same.

And besides, you never knew when someone else might come wandering in. He definitely didn’t want to flash his thingy at some stranger.

The towels in Daddy’s hands dripped and bubbled.

“You got ‘em soapy,” Trevor said.

“Mm-hmm,” Daddy said, spinning Trevor around and scrubbing at the backs of his legs and his bottom. “Gotta get you sparkling.”

Trevor waited patiently while his dad finished cleaning him and wiped up the remaining mess on the floor. “Dad,” he said when it appeared he was finished. “I’m sorry.”

Dad waved his hand. “As far as the mess goes, forget it. I’ve seen much worse. But you know you really should have told your mom where you were going. She was worried crazy.”

“I know,” Trevor said. “But I had to go real bad. I didn’t want to go number two out there with all those people.” He lowered his voice conspiratorially. “There were girls out there.”

“Were there?” Dad said, smiling just a little. “Pretty ones?”

Trevor rolled his eyes. “Dad.”

“Well,” Dad said, “I guess I can’t blame you too much. Now go ahead and lock this door until your mom