Take Your Turn, Teddy Read online

  The knot in Teddy’s throat continued to build, and it was heavier than the sick feeling that was there moments before. Tears built in Teddy’s ducts and merged the cream mitt’s colors with the green yard, like an artist with too much water on his brush.

  He missed his dad.

  “Come on, Teddy! I can keep moving until you start, you know!”

  Teddy threw his head back, forcing the tears to subside. The darkening sky wasn’t blue, but a grey color that seemed to reflect his sadness.

  “Still going! Going, going—”

  Teddy was beginning to realize the struggle his mother felt of hiding her pain. Kids don’t think of their mothers as sad people. But that’s what she had to have been, because that’s how he felt. He had never known pain like this. A single tear spilled over, but Teddy was quick to wipe it away.

  “Not here,” Teddy said aloud to himself. “Not now.”

  You’re okay, Teddy.

  The shadow could reach him beyond the house, into the cornfield, and at the pond. Teddy liked it. It allowed those moments of lonesomeness to pass more quickly.

  “Thanks, Shadow. We’ll come to see you soon.”

  Good, Teddy.

  “Teddy? Are you still out there?”

  Ali had kept going, just like she teased. Teddy barely heard her. It was more like the wind’s afterthought than a shout.

  He didn’t want to scare her, so Teddy cleared his throat and conjured a single shout, “Richard!”

  Ali’s voice was then completely swallowed by the gulp of wind the field took in. Without much choice and fear of leaving his friend in what seemed to be a brewing storm, Teddy stepped inside. He wondered if pilots above could see the corn curve into a smile as a willing victim wandered in.

  Teddy only took a few steps before he realized why Ali wanted to go just before sunset. They would’ve been too hot during the day to wear long sleeves. And she told Teddy, “You always wear long sleeves when you run through the cornfield, so you don’t get burnt.”

  As thick corn leaves brushed against the bare part of his neck, Teddy learned firsthand, Ali was right. It stung.

  “Richard!”

  He didn’t like the cornfield. Teddy wanted to get Ali and go. Of course, he had to find her first. Ali wouldn’t have come on her own, no matter what Teddy said. She was past the niceties of letting Teddy win. Ali beat Teddy at nearly every game. Teddy still beat the shadow in tic-tac-toe, but the shadow promised Teddy he was simply the superior strategist.

  “Richard!”

  Teddy took another step and moved behind the final spot that wasn’t surrounded by corn. He looked ahead and saw there wasn’t much of a path. He had to navigate only by his friend’s wind-suffocated voice.

  A thick leaf whipped Teddy’s hand, hard and quick. He balled his hands into fists and his covered elbows to split the leaves as much as he could.

  “Richard!”

  Blackbirds, crows Teddy figured, were flying overhead. They shrieked at one another, and he wondered if they were saying something like, “Look at the scared little boy about to be lost in the cornfield.”

  Teddy shook his head in annoyance. He needed to find Ali.

  Teddy took a deep breath and found his release of it shaky. He took a left turn.

  “Richard!”

  Nothing from Ali. Only the birds answered. One flew down from the group and perched itself on something farther back in the field. It poked its head over the top, like the creator of a maze watching its visitors follow the wrong twist and turns. Its beady eyes locked on Teddy.

  “Richard!”

  The bird cocked its head and flapped its wings. Teddy hoped that meant there was movement beneath—Ali.

  “Richard!” Teddy was getting frustrated and scared as the sky rumbled and darkened. He turned behind him and couldn’t see a clear way out. He wondered if he just turned around and ran straight back if he could eventually find the way back to the house.

  The leaves swatted Teddy as he turned and moved closer to the bird. “Come on, Ali! Let’s turn back!”

  The ground was more uneven the deeper he got into the field. It seemed to emphasize the otherworldliness he felt the cornfield to be.

  Teddy’s foot missed a rise in the dirt, and he stumbled to his knees. Small pieces of rock and littered corn bit into his hands. He flicked them out and turned to study the obstacle that caught him. He was scared. Too scared to stand. Teddy was lost.

  The birds shrieked.

  “Richard! Richard! Richard!”

  Teddy was practically pleading with Ali. He wanted out of the field. Though he couldn’t see it, he felt like the house sat behind him, eager to his distress.

  “Richard!”

  Teddy pounded his fists helplessly into the dirt. “Richard! Ali, please!”

  The wind blew through the corn, separating a group of plants. Teddy saw a red and yellow-colored splotch move. He tried to remember what color shirt Ali was wearing.

  “Ali! Ali! I’m down here!”

  The dirt swelled in front of him as the angry wind began to roar. Teddy covered his eyes, protecting them with his hands. He split his fingers to peek through and look for Ali.

  The red and yellow colors were just in front of him. Something cold grabbed his hand.

  Teddy screamed and kicked away. He opened his eyes and saw a little girl with dark hair. There was a deep incision around her neck and a mound of purple and green bruises. A worm wiggled in and out of a crater in her grey skin. One of her eyes seemed to sit further out from its socket than the other. This girl was dead.

  “Who are you?”

  Another voice came.

  Come back, Teddy. Come back to the house now.

  Teddy closed his eyes, shook his head, and opened his eyes. It wasn’t a dream. He was there, and the girl was too, and so was a small violet-colored bag before him. It was coated in dirt, and Teddy noticed a hole in the earth beside him. The girl dug it up.

  Teddy pulled on the drawstring loop at the top and emptied the contents. He knew what they were. He knew from years of putting his baby teeth under his pillow in hopes of a trade for a dollar, or in some cases, a new pack of baseball cards.

  Teddy looked to the little girl. He figured she was younger than him by at least five years.

  “Are they yours?”

  The girl, with her pointer finger in her mouth, nodded yes and then no.

  “Some?”

  She nodded, yes.

  Teddy examined the teeth. He had never seen so many at once like that. And a mixture of both little and big teeth.

  “Who did this?”

  The girl stood. There was still just enough light amongst the grey clouds. She stepped from behind two corn stalks, and shoved them together, dipping them downward and creating a shadow in the dirt.

  Teddy, you need to come home, now.

  A chill, the same chill Teddy had felt in the house, encapsulated him. The little girl stepped further into the corn, but the two she restructured crumbled to ash and feathered away like dead skin.

  “Teddy? Teddy? Can you hear me? We have to go back. It’s going to storm!”

  Excited to hear Ali, Teddy left the teeth in the dirt and ran for his friend.

  “Ali! I’m over here.”

  The corn shuffled as the two ran toward one another, nearly running into each other. Teddy couldn’t help it; he threw himself forward and hugged Ali. She hugged him back.

  “I didn’t know it was supposed to storm,” Ali said.

  She pulled herself from Teddy, and they wiped the dirt from their clothes. Ali walked in front of Teddy, pulling him along naturally and with ease, turning to her memorization of the corn’s unmarked path.

  As she did, Teddy turned back. There was no sign of the little girl. And he couldn’t help but notice, Ali was wearing blue.

  15

  Ali and
Teddy made their way through the backyard as the thunder in the clouds paired with heavy rain.

  Teddy was surprised to see the back door wide open. Ali, as though she had been Teddy’s friend for years, stepped right inside the entryway. Teddy’s mother was sitting in an old wicker chair in the corner. Her knees were crisscrossed, her long hair fell loosely around her face, and she had a pen hanging out of her mouth. The swelling of her lips had nearly gone down entirely, but there was a deep scar on the corner that Teddy thought his mother would likely carry the rest of her life.

  His mother tapped the velvet-covered notepad in her lap, and Teddy could see the bruising on her hands from when she tried to cover her face was lightening up too. She was healing, and she was writing, something she used to love to do during thunderstorms. For the first time, in as long as Teddy could remember, she was at peace, listening to the rain through the open door and humming one of Teddy’s favorite songs, “Puff the Magic Dragon.”

  It was the most comfortable his mother had looked in a long time, not just in the new house. Teddy hadn’t seen that journal in a long while. This one wasn’t for her news stories or articles she wrote at the Oakhaven Chronicle, but for a story, like the kind she used to read to him before bed. One with gentle dragons, fields of flowers, and children rescued from their homes to live out their childhood in peace and wonder.

  Teddy used to believe there was such a place, and there was such a gentle friend who could take him there. But he was learning that some things were too sweet for real life and could only exist in loopy gel ink on a page to fade with time.

  Still, Teddy hoped his mother would let him read her next story about the dragons and fields of flowers later that evening. He wanted to see what kind of kid they saved next. Maybe it would be a kid who left his whole life behind late one night after his father went on a rampage. Teddy needed to know what came next for that kid.

  He was quiet, waiting for his mother to finish her thought and look up when she was ready. He thought it had been conditioned in him as the son of a writer, but Ali, politely and unusually, was quiet and just watched Teddy’s mother too.

  After a moment, Ali tugged at Teddy’s hand, and his mother looked up from the notepad, still humming. She smiled at Teddy and his friend with such a sincere smile.

  “I was hollering for you guys when I heard the thunder, but Mr. Abraham said Ali knew her way back and you two would come along soon.”

  Ali stood tall and proud because she did just as her father said.

  “If you’re hungry, there’s some chili on the stove. It should be ready in about five. Go ahead and eat without me. I’m onto something here.”

  Teddy’s mother winked at him as she shooed him along.

  Teddy and Ali went to the kitchen, and the smell of tomatoes, onions, and chili powder flicked the hungry vibrations in his stomach.

  Are you coming soon, Teddy? We could show her the Polaroid trick.

  “Shadow.” Teddy had forgotten entirely about his secret friend in the basement.

  Teddy turned to his blonde guest, who sat at the table and waited politely to be served by her friend. Her long hair was still damp from the rain, and she shivered.

  That was Teddy’s chance.

  “Ali, wait here a second. I’ll grab you a sweatshirt or a t-shirt you can change into. We’ll put your clothes in the dryer while we eat.”

  “Thanks, Teddy.”

  Ali sat at the table, and when Teddy got to the hall, he peeked around the corner to make sure she stayed put.

  Teddy took a couple of extra stomps in place for good measure to cover any creaks the basement door might make. The light from the halls spilled down the steps. Teddy leaned forward and whispered, “It’s me, Shadow.”

  Teddy closed the basement door behind him and slowly felt his way down the unlit stairwell. Like Teddy, most people were afraid of the dark because they didn’t know what was hiding within it. But in the basement, Teddy knew what was waiting for him—a friend.

  As it had each time he came down the steps, the pull-string of the light tickled Teddy’s face, except now he responded playfully, as he would if his father was tickling him. He pulled the string.

  The shadow wasn’t hiding beneath the chair in the dark corner. It was standing, its height barely contained by the damp boards of the basement ceiling. It was taller than any person Teddy had ever seen, like how his mother described the dragons that befriended the children in her story.

  The silhouette of one of the shadow’s bony hands extended across the floor like it was pointing at Teddy. Then, the hand emerged from the concrete and came to Teddy’s shoulder. Teddy only felt a small bit of weight. He wondered if the shadow were able to move its entire being closer, if it would feel less like a projection and more like a person.

  Hi, Teddy.

  A baseball rolled from the corner.

  “I can’t play now. I just came to see if Mom put the bag with the records down here. I thought while I looked for them, I would say hi.”

  Thank you, friend. But where is the girl?

  “Oh, Ali is upstairs. I was going to grab a record for Mom and then get her a sweatshirt.” Teddy smiled and said, “It’s kind of nice, taking care of them like this, I mean. Makes me feel a little less, I don’t know—”

  Helpless.

  The grit in the shadow’s voice made it sound more like a scold than an attempt to finish Teddy’s thought.

  Teddy only nodded.

  “Anyway, Mom is writing. So, I wanted to find the Sgt. Pepper’s album for her. She likes music when she writes, and she’s a big Beatles fan. I don’t think I’ve told you about them yet.”

  The shadow was quiet.

  “You wouldn’t know where it is. Would you?” Teddy asked.

  The shadow’s eyes opened and closed as its head leaned forward from the wall.

  Living room.

  “Oh, right. Mom didn’t want to put them down here. She was worried they’d get wet.”

  Yes.

  Teddy turned to go back up the steps but was stopped by warmth on the back of his neck.

  You’ll come back. Won’t you, Teddy?

  Teddy stopped at the top step and said, “Yes.”

  He hurried to the living room, knowing Ali was waiting on him. In plain sight sat the reusable produce bag he had placed all the records in the night they left.

  Having the same thought, it looked like his mother had already set up the record player on the far side of the living room, away from the window that scared Teddy so much when they first got to the house in Indiana.

  Teddy flipped through some of the greats—funny enough, one was Moving by Pete, Paul, and Mary—until he found the one he was looking for, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. He set the record on the Crosley and placed the needle on top. Then, Teddy skipped up the stairs to save his shivering friend from a case of pneumonia, ignoring any creaks on his way.

  Teddy could hear the British group from Liverpool singing below. He opened his closet and grabbed a Cubs sweatshirt for himself and an Indianapolis Indians crewneck his grandparents had sent him for Ali.

  Excited for chili and to tell Ali everything he knew about The Beatles—after all, she’d gotten to be the know-it-all in their friendship so far—Teddy returned downstairs.

  Ali had helped herself to a bowl of chili and had already downed half of it. Teddy laughed at her as he tossed the Indians sweatshirt at her.

  “There’s a bathroom in my mom’s room. You can change in there.”

  Ali went, and Teddy peeked into the entryway near the back door. He was happy to see his mother was still hard at work. She smiled at Teddy, “Thanks for the music, Teddy Bear. Could you turn it up a bit?”

  “Yes, Mom.”

  As Teddy stood over the record player, he felt heat on the back of his neck. It intensified, and Teddy said, “Ow, ow. Shadow, what are you doing?”
r />   Someone is here, Teddy.

  But the pain didn’t subside; it continued to grow. Teddy hunched over, as though the heat was an anvil weighing him down.

  “Shadow, it’s probably just Mr. Abraham.”

  It’s not.

  Teddy stood and shook the shadow off in annoyance. Then, he heard his mother’s voice from the back. Her voice was firm as she said, “Absolutely not. No, no. No way.”

  Teddy moved up the hall with his back pressed against it for cover, like in the police shows he watched with his dad.

  Teddy could see his mother had her hands on her hips and was shaking her head. Her face was beet red and full of anger.

  He took another step.

  “Mom?”

  “Teddy, I want you to go up to your room and lock the door. Now.”

  Someone on the other side of her. The man stepped out and said, “Lila, listen to me. Please.”

  Teddy knew that voice. He would know it anywhere. The shadow was right. It was not Mr. Abraham.

  Teddy crept through the hall and closer to the entryway they were standing in. His mother snapped her neck and shouted, “Teddy, no. Not another step. Upstairs. Go.”

  The man took another step forward, and Teddy couldn’t believe it when he said, “My little Bambino. How are you, bud?”

  Teddy froze. He felt a wave of energy surge through his body. Only he didn’t know what he was supposed to do with it. What was that feeling? Was it relief, anxiousness, anger? Was it possible to be all of the above?

  Teddy was almost relieved when his mother stepped in front of him, forcing his father to step back into the rain. “Do not speak to him, Arthur. You’ve done enough. Now, I want you to leave.”

  Teddy’s father looked rough. His hair was messy, unlike its usual tight and clean style. The circles under his father’s eyes were dark. Pairing those with his gaunt cheekbones, his father looked like he had come to them from beyond the grave.