The Secrets on Chicory Lane: A Novel(12)
Mr. Alpine switched his attention to Eddie. “Well, then, Eddie, my good friend, why don’t you come over? I have some new comics for you.”
I sensed Eddie hesitate, but then he said, “All right.”
“Good. We’ll have some fun. Maybe I’ll beat you at Battleship this time.” He turned to me and said, “Eddie’s the Battleship king.”
That was news to me, but I didn’t really mind.
“Oh,” he added, “speaking of the parade, I’m organizing a float with a bunch of school kids on it. Would you two like to be on it? Want to be in the Fourth of July parade?”
It sounded like fun, and we happily agreed. I left Eddie to chat with Mr. Alpine, venturing off to look at the new books in the children’s room. When Eddie finally joined me at the shelves, I said, “Mr. Alpine almost treats you like his son.”
At first, Eddie didn’t respond. Then he made a little sarcastic laugh. “He’d be a better dad than my real one. Mr. Alpine is pretty cool.”
I agreed with Eddie. That was back then.
Among everything else that happened that one carefree summer day, lost in the sea of forgotten memories, I do recollect one thing: Eddie and I planned to get together the next day.
We were going to play in the bomb shelter.
5
That afternoon in the fallout shelter represented a significant moment in my childhood. I can’t replay the entire episode in my head, just brief glimpses of what happened, vague emotions, snippets of conversations. It was the first sexual experience I ever had with the opposite gender—at twelve years old. Sometimes I’d ask myself if what we did was “normal” for curious kids. Wasn’t there an expression for it? Kids playing doctor? That’s all it was. Show me yours, and I’ll show you mine.
But no—as an adult, I became more educated on the subject of sexual development in children, and I now realize that this was inappropriate behavior for our age group. “Playing doctor” normally occurs between the ages of five and seven, and there is usually no sexual gratification component to it. It’s simple, natural curiosity. What Eddie and I did at our age was not innocent activity. The fact that it was mutual doesn’t make much difference.
I met Eddie at the park after lunch, and we went back to his house. Eddie’s father was away, and his mother was in the living room, watching television and smoking cigarettes. Eddie led me to the backyard by way of the wooden gate on one side of the house. Everyone on the block had fences. The bomb shelter door was located on one side of the yard near the house. It appeared extremely large and heavy to me. Made of metal, it sat about a foot off the ground as if it had grown out of the grass, one end slightly higher than the other. I don’t remember it being locked. Eddie simply went over, grasped the handle, and pulled it open. It squeaked. A wooden staircase led down into the darkness. I’d been inside before with a group of other kids, and Mr. Newcott had yelled at us. The place was supposedly off-limits to Eddie and his friends, and poor Eddie got a beating because of it. From then on, we only dared to venture into its depths when Eddie’s dad was away.
“Are you sure this is all right?” I asked, looking around. I was more concerned about doing something grown-ups would disapprove of rather than worried about going into the shelter alone with Eddie. I wanted to go in there with him. I trusted him. Nevertheless, I was nervous—but excited at the same time.
“It’ll be fine. Come on.”
I gingerly descended, guided by the daylight streaming through the open door. Eddie followed and closed the door above us. He flipped a switch near the top of the stairs and the lights came on.
The space was large and rectangular shaped, I’m guessing twenty by thirty feet in size. Two cots, covered in small mattresses, sheets, and blankets, sat on opposite sides of the room. A third cot was placed perpendicular to those. Shelves on the wall behind the cot were stocked with dusty old canned goods and nonperishables, likely dating back to the late fifties or early sixties. Big jugs of water that Mr. Newcott must have filled himself sat on the floor beneath the shelves. I spotted flashlights, batteries, candles, and boxes of matches. Behind the stairs was a toilet hidden by a privacy screen, or a door—I can’t remember. Maybe it was a partition that you could slide open. The commode actually flushed! I thought it was amazing that they could build a bathroom underground.
I also had other things on my mind. Oh my gosh, I thought. I am alone with Eddie. It was definitely a thrill, but to tell the truth, I felt a little claustrophobic. The uneasiness was alleviated when Eddie took my hand and led me to one of the cots. We sat and inexplicably started giggling. We were being naughty—and it was fun.
“No one comes down here anymore, so I don’t understand why we’re not supposed to play in it,” Eddie said. “I come here all the time when my dad is gone. It’s my ‘secret cave.’ Oh, and guess what: I have the best hiding place in here.” He stood and gestured for me to follow him back to where the toilet was. Getting on his knees, he crawled behind it. Eddie traced his fingers around the edge of a concrete slab in the floor and somehow got it to move. Grabbing hold of the edges, he lifted it, revealing a perfectly square cubbyhole in the ground, lined in concrete, maybe twelve inches deep.
“I call it ‘Davy Jones’s Locker,’” he explained. “I’m pretty sure it was made to store valuables—you know, money and jewels and stuff.” At that moment, the hole contained his valuables—comic books, magazines, a knife, some small toys, and I don’t know what else. I asked about the knife. He just shrugged and said it used to belong to his grandfather. It was more of a sentimental keepsake rather than an item he might use as a weapon.