He came around a sharp bend in the river, a retaining wall to keep the hill from sliding down over the train tracks, and surprised two men standing at the wall with their shirts off. It was an isolated spot, and the two men had cans of spraypaint in their hands. One had a shaved head and a tattoo of an eagle that spread across his entire chest. Isaac wasn’t sure whether to turn around and go back the way he came or to keep going. Then he recognized one of them—Daryl Foster. He’d been a year behind Isaac but he’d dropped out. He worked at the Dollar Store in Charleroi. Isaac relaxed some.
“Isaac English?”
“Nice to see you, Daryl.”
“Yeah,” said Daryl, “been a while now, hasn’t it?” He was smiling; he seemed genuinely happy to see Isaac.
“How you doing?” said Daryl’s friend with the shaved head.
“Good,” said Isaac.
“It’s Nietzsche,” said Daryl, pointing at what they were spraying.
Isaac nodded. They’d written, in tall neat block letters: OUT OF LIFE’S SCHOOL OF WAR, WHAT DOESN’T KILL and there he’d interrupted them.
“Alright then, brother,” said his friend, giving Isaac a nod.
“Take it easy,” said Isaac. He took the signal and began to walk again.
“Hey,” called Daryl. “You still taking care of your dad? Shit I thought you’d be long gone, doing science experiments or something.”
“Making my escape,” Isaac called back. “If anyone asks about me…”
“Won’t say a goddamn word, brother.”
Isaac waved and kept going. That was the good thing about the Valley. There was a serious anti- authoritarian bent. Being a rat was lower than being a murderer. Even two like this are the kid’s allies, he thought. He chooses equally among heroes and murderers. Among the rich and the helpless.
He continued walking. As for Daryl hanging around the white supremacists, it was not unusual. Stormfront, they called themselves. They’d come in when the mills went under and Pennsylvania was now full of them. More than any other state, he’d read. All the hills—they can meet without anyone knowing. Still, no one took them seriously. Never heard of them hurting anyone. Of course it’s easy to say that when you’re white.
Shortly after, he passed Allenport on the opposite side of the river, the Wheeling Pittsburgh steelmill still running there, though everyone knew it was bound to close soon—they were down to one shift, only a few hundred people. There was a long train pulling out of the yard carrying sheetmetal rolls.
Next he passed through a long section of forest and then a few miles later he saw the towboat station across from Fayette City, the piers and enormous white storage tanks, a handful of towboats tied up, smokestacks and pilothouses and stubby square bows, empty barges moored along the opposite bank. The trees and brush, the green was pushing out everywhere, it was an uprising, it was above him and around him and over the water, there was not a single bare spot except for the trackbed gravel. Patch of white in the brush. Styrofoam? Legbone. Stripped and bleached, stray or suicide train jumper. Phosphorus donor. Old bones make new blooms. Regeneration. The kid has been here before. The kid has ridden Viking prows, hunted polar bear. Attempting to save his comrades, he is among the Fallen at Omaha Beach. Struck down, he rises again. Lives with honor—one of the few. The people retreat shamefaced from him and the kid stands alone. Accepts the company of the best and the worst. Accepts the company of himself.
The kid will rest a minute, he thought. The kid has not slept in seventy- two hours. He found a place along the riverbank in the heavy brush, lay out on top of his sleeping bag, and passed out quickly. It was near dark when he woke up and started walking again. You slept eight hours. Recharge. It was completely dark when he came into Fayette City, the low square houses and empty shops, the train tracks ran right at the river’s edge, a woman’s dress in the gravel. The tracks passed small white houses with manicured lawns. He was hungry again, he figured he’d come about ten miles, and he left the tracks and walked over to the main drag in search of food. There was nothing. All the stores had moved to the strip malls outside town. It’s fine, he thought. Go thirty days without eating. Long way from today. He made his way back to the tracks.
The river was black and the stars were very clear. Feels like a long time since you’ve talked to anyone. Ignore that feeling in your stomach. Sharp pain then dull pain back to sharp again. Think about something else. Closest star is twenty- five trillion miles. Proxima something. Burning before the dinosaurs. Burning still when there isn’t any human left on earth. Different galaxies, a trillion stars. However small you feel you’re nowhere close to the truth, atoms and dust- specks.
Weak thinking, he thought. Of course it’s true. Like getting depressed about your own death. Your only duty—make the best of it. The only true sin—not appreciating life. Meanwhile there’s Charleroi on the other side, making good progress. Those cranes must be Lock Four. Wake up. He slapped his face. Felt that. On the other side of the river he could see the lights of Charleroi blanketing the hillside. He got closer to the cranes—it was the spot they had found her. In the actual lock channel they spotted her, it was only because of the contrast against the light cement walls. Lee told you that. How did she know? No one knew where she went in, only where she came out. Was taken out. Missing two weeks. Old man sure she was murdered, must have been skinheads, but then the autopsy: lungs full of water. I thirst. Found drowned, woundless otherwise—miracle she was noticed at all. River stones in her coat pockets, eleven pounds. Your educated guess. Filling your pockets with rocks from the field and checking the scale. Eleven pounds take anyone under, even Poe—precious balance keeps you afloat. The old man caught you doing it, weighing yourself. Imagining your mother walking along the river, collecting those rocks, humming. Had her own pain. Worst kind internal. Eternal. Let her off.
He began to walk faster, looking straight ahead, walk all night, put some miles between us. Sleep in the day. He was going past an old building, maybe a warehouse, when a car turned onto the small road alongside the tracks. He stepped into the bushes without knowing why and then saw a searchlight shine from the car—a cop. He squatted in the weeds until the cruiser went past, the light shone in the branches just overhead. People in the houses must have called. Hate just the sight of you. Then he thought you could just go ask him for a drink of water, but he didn’t get up until the car was long gone.
He pushed through the brush making his way toward the old building. Mouth very dry now—fixating. Mental game and you’re losing. Find a stream again. But there would be no streams—it was an industrial zone. Several minutes later he was walking down the gravel road toward the warehouse; off to one side there was an old front- end loader, abandoned and grown over with devil’s tear thumb. He picked his way through the thorns and went to the bucket and it was full of rainwater. Brushing the leaves aside, he cupped his hand into it, it tasted tannic and like metal but he swallowed it anyway just to wet his throat, then took another palmful. Might be sorry about this later, he thought.
He was nearly to the building when he had a sudden urge to use the bathroom, he barely had time to squat in the ditch by the road. Nothing to wipe. Good- bye Mr. Clean. Something in that water? Too soon for that, just shock of something in the stomach. Can’t remember the last time you felt this dirty.
He went around the warehouse, trying the doors, they were all locked but one. Shining his penlight around, the floor of the warehouse was filthy, piled with debris, people had been scavenging the copper wire and pipes. Right next to the door he’d come in through was another door that led to a small room, it looked like the office, it was cleaner and less dusty than the rest of the building. There were old file cabinets and desks. This is the spot, he thought. Smell of old piss. He took his sleeping bag out and spread it on a desk, it might have been a workbench, he couldn’t tell.
It was hard but he kept getting warmer and then he was actually comfortable and warm but he lay there and couldn’t fall asleep. Can’t stop the mind from going, try the old trick. He put his hand down his pants and pulled for a while but nothing happened. Too tired. He thought about Poe and his sister he had heard her cry out once, a stifled muffled holding your breath noise, and after a minute of thinking about it he was hard, it was a disgusting thought, his own sister, but fine he’d take it, it was the closest he’d been to actual sex in two years, not since he and Autumn Dodson had done it after her graduation party, he still was not sure why she had done it, she’d gone off to Penn State after that. Because you were the only one with a brain in the entire school. That was not the only reason—the kid took over that time, too. The kid made it happen, saying things old Isaac English never would have had the balls to say. Then you’re down on the couch in her den, she lifts up that cute little rear of hers to let you get her pants off. Then, look at you, a naked girl in front of you with her legs spread. Put your finger in her and watched it go in and out for a long time, seemed a miracle the way it was slippery like that. Lying there in the dark with his
