'He lives in the ground. He’s waiting in Jutland.”
'Oh. Was that your mom?'
'My daddy,' I said. 'He’s sleeping, I guess. That’s all he does.'
'Oh. He’s pretty too.”
'I know. Me and Classique made him pretty.”
Dickens’ head wobbled. His eyes were half-closed as he inhaled.
Then he glanced at me, making a careless pattern in the dirt with his fingers, saying, 'The old lady lived there, at What Rocks. That was when I was little. See, the door was open. She could’ve been there too, but I knew she wasn’t but maybe she was. I’m always getting in trouble that way, when I’m wrong.”
His toenails were yellow. The scar on his bald head was pink like a blister.
'What happened to your head?”
'Nothing -- except when I was little they cut inside. Well, I wasn’t that little. But when I was younger they did because I’m epileptic. Couldn’t even mow a lawn. So they cut my brain. Now I have two brains so I’m not epileptic no more, only sometimes.'
'What is it?”
'Like this-”
He rolled his eyes into his skull. His body began twitching. His hands rose, trembling. Then he stopped and rubbed at the scar.
'See, only sometimes it happens since this.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I asked, 'Do you have a pool?”
'No. Can’t swim. I’ll drown. Can’t splash in pools or drive a car. Can’t bowl either.'
'I don’t swim. In the tub I do. But I don’t drive cars or bowl.'
'Me either. I get a seizure then I sink in the pool like a penny. I get a seizure and the bowling ball smashes my feet. I drived before but that was bad and if I do it now Dell says I get arrested or worse. So I can’t drive to save my life, not even if I’m bloody or my arm’s chopped off.”
'If you drive you’ll go-'
I rolled my eyes and twitched for a moment.
'Yeah. That’s what’ll happen all right.'
Then we both smiled. And in the silence that followed we fidgeted, inarticulate, and dug patterns in the dirt.
The Johnsongrass swayed overhead and around, murmuring.
'Say, I was meaning to say,” Dickens finally said, 'I’ve got a submarine. It’s big enough for me. See, then I don’t have to swim anyway.'
'Can I play in it?”
At first he said sure, and then he went, 'I don’t know, maybe tomorrow you can. I don’t know.'
'But I’d like to see it because I like submarines. And maybe you’d play in it with me.”
'I guess. Thing is, you’ve got to hold my hand, okay? Then you can come with me there.”
'Okay.”
'That way we don’t get lost from each other.'
'Okay.'
He extended a slender hand. So I took it. And his palm was warmer than mine. Then he led the way, trudging through the Johnsongrass, trampling stalks, where hoppers sprang from underfoot like tiny land mines. And as we wandered parallel with the grazing pasture -- the hull of the school bus looming -- I said, 'Fireflies visit me in the bus at nighttime.”
Dickens squeezed my hand.
'That’s a bad place,' he said, sounding fearful. 'It’s wrong there.''
But I didn’t ask why.
You’re a sissy, I thought. That’s how come you talk like that. That’s how come you’re scared all the time.
A hopper clung to my shin; I let it ride on me until we left the sorghum -- then I slapped it dead.
Dickens was saying, 'I’ve got a million pennies.”
We were side-by-side, stepping between railroad ties. And I kept looking back in case a train was coming.
'I’ll show you.”
He released my hand and began walking faster, leaving me behind, his flip-flops going clomp clomp clomp. His butt jiggled in the trunks. It was funny. His legs were hairy and skinny. He reminded me of a flamingo, a white flamingo.
'You’re a bird!'
'Not really,' he said, bending on the tracks, pointing at a rail. 'A bird doesn't have pennies, but I’ve got lots.'
And he did have lots. They were on the rail, pressed into flat blobs of copper; hundreds of them -- fused, overlapping -- stretching for yards.
'You’re rich.”
'I will be. Because someday they’ll get squished together and make a big penny. The world’s biggest penny. Do you know how much that’ll be?'
'A million dollars.'
'At least. And I’ll buy a boat then. Or a real submarine-”
A real submarine? He reached for my hand.
'-that’s much better than the one I got.'
But he didn’t have a submarine to show me. It was a wigwam built from mesquite branches and weeds, in the embankment beside the tracks. And it was packed with junk -- a mangled bicycle, smashed cans, three shredded tires. There wasn’t room to play or sit. There wasn’t even a periscope.
'She’s Lisa,' he told me, pulling the goggles to his eyes. 'Vessels underwater have girl names. Boats on top do too. Well, some of them do.”
I asked about the bicycle, with its twisted frame and crushed spokes.
'Shark attack.'
And the tires. And the cans.
'Monster shark.'
Then he explained.
The junk was bait. He was a great shark hunter, exploring the South Pacific in his submarine. Mostly he used pennies for bait, but sometimes he found bigger lure for his prey. Then he hid in the wigwam and waited. And soon the monster shark came gliding along the tracks, jaws thrashing, mashing anything in its path -- a bicycle, beer cans, old tires, helpless pennies. Nothing escaped.
'The only way to kill that shark is to blow it up,” he said. 'Rocks and spears don’t work, believe me. I’m lucky I’m alive.'
His voice suddenly sounded deep, not sissy. He cocked an eyebrow. And I thought he seemed brave, and older -- like a captain. But when the cowbell clanked in the distance, he became Dickens again.
'Uh-oh,” he said. 'I need to be home. You too. You can’t be in here without me. It’s my submarine.'
He grabbed my hand and we ducked out of the wigwam.
The cowbell continued clanking and clanking.
And Dell was somewhere shouting: 'Dickens! Home! Dickens! Home! Dickens-'
'We can play tomorrow,” he said, letting go of my hand. 'Don’t get in my submarine without meI”
Then he scurried away -- foot in front of foot, elbows swinging, head straight, clomp clomp.
'Bye, friend!” I called after him, waving. 'Don’t drown!”
But he didn’t turn and wave. He didn’t say anything as he went.
'Come visit me tomorrow! ”
And I knew Dell had pound cake for him. And apple juice. She probably had the picnic basket all ready. My stomach grumbled.
After that I returned to What Rocks -- ”Stinky Fart Rocks,” I said to myself -- where my father’s lunch had
