“More or less,” she says.
“That wouldn’t be much fun,” I argue.
“Life isn’t much fun,” she counters. “Not most of the time anyway. Mostly we’re all just a bunch of Lindas.”
“Are you?” I ask.
“Sure,” she says. “I’m perfectly ordinary. Nothing special about me.”
“I don’t know,” I say. “I don’t think most people could come up with a story like that. Especially not when a total stranger asks them to do it.”
“Maybe this is my one shining moment,” the girl says. “It will never get any better than it is right now. I should probably hang up so that I can enjoy the thrill before it’s gone.”
And then she does. At first I think she’s just being funny. But she’s really not there. And for some reason, it makes me sad. I don’t know why, because really her story kind of sucked. But she was right about one thing—it was the truth. I guess I like that.
I consider calling her again. I’ve never wanted to do that with any of the storytellers before. But I don’t even know what number I dialed. That’s part of what makes the game interesting. Besides, I think, what else would we have to say to each other? She was probably right to hang up. But I still would have liked to at least thank her for her story.
I put the phone down. Then I realize that my room is filled with fireflies. Dozens and dozens of them. Their blinking lights twinkle as they form constellations over my desk and swoop like meteors through the dark. There’s something magical about the way they’re behaving, as if this is all some kind of choreographed ballet.
This goes on for a long time. Then the fireflies start leaving through the open window, back out into the yard, until eventually there’s only one left. This one lands on the needle of the record player. It sits there and blinks steadily on and off, like a beacon.
Because I have lived with Hank, Starletta, and Clodine for my whole life, I believe in magic. Despite what I said about the toads at breakfast. And something about this feels like magic.
“What?” I say to the firefly. “Am I supposed to do something? Was I supposed to count how many of you there were so that Hank can tell me what it means?”
The firefly puts its light on and flies away, drifting lazily toward the window. I half expect to look up and see a bunch of them spelling out a word or forming a symbol of some kind. But there’s just the one, and pretty soon it’s gone as well.
I lie down again and stare at the ceiling. I think about the girl on the phone, and wonder where she is. Is she also lying in a bed in a dark room, unable to sleep because it’s so hot? Is she thinking about the strange boy who called her up, and wondering who he is? Maybe she’s telling someone else about it. (Hey, listen to this weird thing that just happened.) Or maybe she’s already forgotten about it.
The sound of laughter floats up from downstairs. The Grands are still up, of course, talking about who-knows-what. I consider going down and asking them about fireflies. I’m sure they have an opinion about them; they have opinions about everything. Maybe I’ll tell them about Tom Swift, or the girl on the phone. (It occurs to me that either one could be the interesting thing the toads predicted.) Or maybe I’ll ask them to tell me about my mother. Or the curse. All of a sudden, I have a lot of things on my mind.
Instead, I go to the cardboard box and take out album number three. Revolver. The Beatles. 1966. I slip the headphones over my ears, set the record on the turntable, and gently put the needle down. The countdown that begins “Taxman” starts, and I mouth the words.
The note my mother included with this album is one of the shortest.
A lot of people think the Beatles are the greatest band that ever existed. Maybe they are. I think what they really did was show the world what music could be, and other bands took it from there. This album is all about ideas.
I didn’t understand what she meant by that when I first read her note. And I didn’t like Revolver for a long time, even though there are songs on it that pretty much everyone knows, like “Eleanor Rigby” and “Yellow Submarine.” But the more I listened to it, the more I started to hear the ideas she was talking about. Sometimes it would be just a couple of words, or a few particular notes. They would stay in my head after the album was done playing, or pop up when I was thinking about something completely different. But little by little, these bits and pieces grew into bigger ideas, and the songs started to mean something to me.
I think that’s what she meant, that listening to what the Beatles have to say in the songs on Revolver makes me think about other things in different ways. Like the music turns on another part of my brain or something. It’s hard to explain.
Suddenly, I’m very tired. I close my eyes and listen as Eleanor Rigby wears the face that she keeps in a jar by the door. I make it through “I’m Only Sleeping” and “Love You To.” But by the second chorus of “Here, There and Everywhere” I’m drifting off.
I dream of fireflies. They come into the room through the window, a large group of them. They swirl over the bed. And then they start to sing.
sleep and dream your heart’s desire
sleep and dream the face of love
when you need me, call my name
i’ll come to you and keep you safe
The voice is a woman’s. It comes from each of the fireflies, but really it’s just one voice being shared among them. It sounds familiar, but I can’t place it.
in my arms find rest and comfort
in your bed sleep warm and dream
night will pass in hours untroubled
till you wake at morning’s gleam
The words are barely a whisper now. I know I’ve heard this song before. I search my mind, trying to remember where, trying to hold on to the melody and replay it over and over until a memory forms. But it slips away, becomes something else, an indistinct murmur that clouds my thoughts and lulls me to sleep. I try to sing the words to myself, to keep them alive, but they’re gone now, nothing more than the gentle thrumming of firefly light. I let it surround me, a luminescent cocoon of gold and green, and I sleep.
Four
I call Tom Swift on Wednesday morning. This year my father has hired Becky Roth to help out at the Eezy-Freezy a couple of days a week, and she’s there today, so I’m off. I’m supposed to be painting the front porch floor, but Hank, Starletta, and Clodine are camped out there in rocking chairs because it’s too hot in the kitchen, even for them. They’re drinking iced tea and discussing what it means that the hydrangeas have come out a particularly bright shade of blue this year.
I hope that Tom answers the phone, but it’s an older man. I hesitate for a moment before asking, “Is Jennifer available?”
“Just a minute,” the man answers. Then I hear him say, “It’s for you.”
Then Tom is on the line. “Hello?” he says, sounding suspicious, like maybe I’m somebody calling to try to sell him car insurance.
“Hi,” I say. “This is Sam.”
He doesn’t say anything.
“From the Eezy-Freezy,” I add.
“I remember,” he says finally, still sounding unsure. Then nothing.
“I was wondering if you wanted to go tubing today,” I tell him. “They usually open the dam around noon, and that raises the water level downstream and makes the rapids a little faster.”