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“You better be,” she laughed through her tears, wiping furiously at her runny nose. “Or I’ll come dragging you home myself.” Tapping her right hand on the roof of the silver Honda, she licked her lips.
“You go on now, baby. Wanna beat that morning traffic.” She glanced at him one last time before turning around and walking back towards the small pale-yellow house he’d lived in his entire life. Morning rush-hour in Eden consisted mostly of the odd John Deere or two, along with the school bus and a few pick-up trucks that had seen better days. But still.
Ethan nodded to himself before he gazed out of the dusty windshield. Time to go. As he turned the key and the engine sprung to life, his mom yelled over the shoulder of her pink floral dress.
“Don’t you forget now, sweetheart. Every night. You call me every night.”
Throwing one last glimpse in the rearview mirror, he waved at his mom before pulling out into the US 87 leaving his hometown Eden, population now 3581, behind.
CHAPTER TWO
Matty – Then
“WHAT DO YOUmean it’s too far?” Matty looked annoyed at his best friend who was measuring out the distance between the Ouachita National Forest and Maine on the East Coast. The tip of Ethan’s tongue was sticking out between his lips, which told Matty that he was in deep concentration. It was a habit Ethan had had since kindergarten when they’d practiced using scissors in Ms. Clark’s class. Matty hadn’t been able to get a hang of it until Ethan had asked Ms. Clark for a left-handed pair of scissors. So typical of Ethan to always notice small things that others paid no attention to. It had always been like that, Ethan being Matty’s protector.
“It just is, Matty. I mean, c’mon… it’s like… at least…” Ethan trailed off, once again losing himself in calculating the distance between the two small Xs on the hand-drawn map.
They’d started the map nearly four years ago when they were both eight. Matty had been in the hospital for two nights after dropping a dinner plate on the kitchen floor. A broken arm for a broken plate. That was the logic of the Craig household. Matty’s mom had told the doctor that Matty had always been a clumsy child and that tripping down the stairs to the basement was nothing unusual when it came to her eight-year-old. Matty didn’t recall ever falling down the stairs to the basement, because the basement was really creepy so why would he even go there? But since his mom told the nice doctor that he’d fallen down the stairs, Matty figured it must be right. The year before, he’d taken afallfrom the black cherry tree in their backyard. Overhearing her talking to the young ER doctor, Matty had tasted the word on his tongue.Clumsy.It ran in the family, he guessed. His mom had always beenclumsyherself. Spending two nights in the hospital wasn’t that bad, though. He got to have green and pink Jell-O’s ? -as many as he wanted ? -and he got to watch all his favorite cartoons on the small TV hanging from the mint-colored wall.
“Look, if you really wanna go to the ocean, we can go.” Two sea-green eyes looked at him, the green sometimes blue when the sun was just right on the Texas sky.
“Really?” Matty blurted as he flung himself at his best friend, making Ethan yell as he lost his balance and landed on his back. “We can go?” Matty swallowed back the lump in his throat as he soaked up the broad smile building on Ethan’s face. The best thing in the fucking world was Ethan’s smile. Along with red cherry popsicles, Captain Crunch and bugs. Matty knew that you weren’t supposed to curse. Good boys didn’t do that, but heck, his own father was Chief of Police in Eden, and he cursed all the time.
“Sure, man. Why not? But we gotta make it the last stop.” Ethan sported a frown between his auburn brows. The same frown that Mrs. Bishop always got when they would steal cookies from the cream-colored jar above the stove or forget to close the fence to the chicken coop. Ethan’s mom scowled momentarily when they messed up and then with a twinkle in her green eyes, she’d call themrascalsorrugratsor stuff like that before she shooed them inside to wash up. Later, over dinner, she would tell Ethan’s dad about all the stuff they’d been up to, and he’d pretend to be mad, winking at them conspiratorially when Ethan’s mom was busy gathering the used plates.
After dinner they’d help clean up the toolshed as punishment, but Matty always thought that it was a strange kinda punishment, because afterwards Mr. Bishop would make a fire in the old, beat-up oil barrel and they would make S’mores. If it was a real awesome night, he’d get to sleep over in Ethan’s room with the cool lamp that cast stars and spaceships on the ceiling, tucked in under the soft blue comforter that smelled of laundry detergent and something that was just entirely Ethan.
Those were the rare nights, though. On most nights, his father’s SUV would pull up in front of the Bishops’ porch and he would talk to Mr. Bishop about the closing of yet another oil field while he’d politely thank Mrs. Bishop for putting up with histroublemaker of a son.Matty would then get in the SUV and while he’d look back at Ethan’s house, he’d feel the same strange tightening in his chest, which he always felt, when his best friend was out of sight.
For the rest of the afternoon, they measured out the distance between the Rockies, which Matty had drawn using the crayons Ethan had gotten for Christmas, and the ocean. Ethan, who’d always been better in school, would calculate the mileage and the money they would need for gas and meals. Matty would write everything down meticulously in the small, yellow notebook that had their entire future lined out. Matty had never been good at spelling, but Ethan always said that it didn’t matter because he knew how to readMattishwhich took some real genius at times and a whole lotta patience.Etans and Mattys Purfekt Plases.Matty had come up with the title of their map. At first, Ethan had objected.
“There’s no such thing as a perfect place, Matty. There just ain’t.”
“Of course there is! Anything away from Eden with you, is a perfect place.” Matty had frowned at him, a pouty expression transforming his soft features. In the end, Ethan had relented, and Matty had written the title in a bright blue crayon at the top of the map.
Once they were done, they carefully folded the map and tucked it away along with the crayons and the notebook under the lose floorboard in the tree house. Matty sometimes wondered if the crayons would be all used up before they got away. Or if Ethan would have to ask for them again for another birthday or Christmas, whichever came first. Matty never asked for crayons because drawing was for girls and Nancy boys. Real boys didn’t draw. It was enough that he was sometimes mistaken for a girl when they were younger, with his sky-blue eyes and his soft blond curls. He didn’t have to act like agoddamn chicktoo, his father would hiss at him. Boys went hunting or shot at targets or got in to fist fights at school. Boys needed to learn how to become men.Realmen. Notgirlymen like those city folks his father cursed at, when he pulled them over on the highway just because he could.
Yeah, Matty figured they’d need more crayons before they could get away. In April Ethan would be twelve and then six months later, Matty would follow behind. It had always been like that, Matty following behind Ethan, trailing along. Ever since they’d met on the first day of baseball practice at the age of five and six, when Matty had tripped on the last step to the dugout.
Are you okay, honey?A soft woman’s voice had asked while two pairs of equally green eyes had stared down at him. Before Matty could answer, his father had pulled at his right arm, and Matty knew that when his father would pull at his arm, it was best to follow. It would bruise either way, but the tightness of the grip would be an indicator of his father’s mood for the rest of the day. It wasn’t that his father was ever in a good mood—at least not around his mom and him—but just like anything else, there were still degrees of his anger and meanness.
Clumsy.That’s what his father had told the nice lady with the green eyes while he placed his large hand at the back of Matty’s damp neck. Matty was aclumsy child.And a bitslowtoo.Matty had hardly felt the weight of the hand that had never touched him with kindness nor affection. Neither had he felt the dull pain in his right knee which he’d landed on, adding another bruise on top of endless layers of bruises. Instead, he’d gazed up at the boy standing next to the woman in the pretty green dress, his auburn curls surrounding his freckled face. Matty had never considered if he liked freckles or not. In fact, he didn’t recall once in his five-year long life having any opinion when it came to freckles. But from that Sunday afternoon at baseball practice and onwards, they became one of his favorite things in life along with auburn hair and green, sometimes blue eyes.
CHAPTER THREE
Ethan – Now
SEPTEMBER 30TH, 2020.The blank postcard pictured a painting of a small fishing boat at the docks of a small fisherman’s town. Well, at first, it at least appeared to be blank. But just below the postal stamp, there was a small pencil drawn star.Stella.It had to be. Ethan once again read the inscription at the bottom of the postcard. Hundreds of times over the past three years, he’d repeated those words to himself; they had almost become a prayer. Or more like a promise.Traditional fishing boat, Grant’s Harbor, Maine.
Please be there, Matty. Please wait for me. I’m sorry it took me this long, but I’m coming for you now.
CHAPTER FOUR
Ethan – Now
“THOU SHALT NOTbear false witness against thy neighbor.”Stopping for gas some thirty miles north of Waco, Ethan had just put the gas nozzle back at the gas pump when he noticed the small billboard in front of the roadside church across the street. The archaic words reverberated through him, and suddenly he was back at that fateful night three years ago.
“I really don’t know, sir.”Ethan knew it was wrong to lie. Of course, he did. Ever since he could remember, his parents and Pastor Carrington had told him so. It was a sin to lie. But what if you didn’t exactly lie? What if you just chose to keep a secret? Would that still be a sin? Ethan was pretty sure that in this case, the good Lord wouldn’t hold it against him if he kept a secret. Because the truth could be dangerous. And irreversible.
