Boys Life

screen to tell you about the life that had been. It would be a living memorial to the generations who had gone on before, and you could hear their voices though those voices had been stilled for a hundred years. It seemed to me, as I walked in the presence of all those stilled voices that would never be heard again, that we were a wasteful breed. We had thrown away the past, and our future was impoverished for it.
    I came to Davy Ray’s grave. The headstone hadn’t arrived yet, but a flat stone marker was set into the bare earth. He was neither at the bottom of the hill nor at the top; he occupied the middle ground. I sat down beside the marker, taking care not to trample on the slight mound that rain would settle and spring would sprout. I looked out into the darkness, under the cold, sharp moon. In the sunlight, I knew, there was a panoramic view of Zephyr and the hills from here. You could see the gargoyle bridge, and the Tecumseh River. You could see the railroad track as it wound its way through those hills, and the trestle as it crossed the river on its passage through Zephyr to the larger towns. It was a nice view, if you had eyes to see it. I somehow doubted that Davy Ray cared much whether he had a view of the hills and river or if his grave overlooked a swamp bowl. Such things might be important to the grievers, but not so much to the leavers.
    “Gosh,” I said, and my breath drifted out. “I sure am mixed up.”
    Had I expected Davy Ray to answer? No, I had not. Thus I was not disappointed at the silence.
    “I don’t know if you’re in darkness or heaven,” I said. “I don’t know what would be so great about heaven if you can’t get in a little trouble there. It sounds like church to me. Church is fine for an hour on Sunday, but I wouldn’t want to live there. And I wouldn’t want darkness, either. Just nothin’ and nothin’ and more nothin’. Everythin’ you ever thought or did or believed just gone, like a ripple in a pond that nobody sees.” I pulled my knees up to my chest, and locked my arms around them. “No voice to speak, no eyes to see, no ears, nothin’ at all. Then what are we born for, Davy Ray?”
    This question, as well, elicited a burst of silence.
    “And I can’t figure this faith thing out,” I went on. “Mom says I ought to have it. Reverend Lovoy says I’ve got to have it. But what if there’s nothin’ to have faith in, Davy Ray? What if faith is just like talkin’ on a telephone when there’s nobody on the other end, but you don’t know nobody’s there until you ask ’em a question and they don’t answer? Wouldn’t it make you go kind of crazy, to think you spent all that time jawin’ to thin air?”
    I was doing some jawing to empty air myself, I realized. But I was comforted, knowing Davy Ray was lying beside me. I shifted over to a place where the brown grass was unmarked by shovels and I reclined on my back. I stared up at the awesome stars. “Look at that,” I said. “Just look at that sky. Looks like the Demon blew her nose on black velvet, huh?” I smiled, thinking Davy Ray would’ve gotten a kick out of that. “Not really,” I said. “Can you see that sky from where you are?”
    Silence and more silence.
    I folded my arms across my chest. It didn’t seem so cold, with my back against the earth. My head was next to Davy Ray’s. “I got whipped today,” I confided. “Dad really blistered me. Maybe I deserved it. But Leatherlungs deserves to get whipped, too, doesn’t she? How come nobody listens to kids, even when they’ve got somethin’ to say?” I sighed, and my breath rose toward Capricorn. “I can’t write that apology, Davy Ray. I just can’t, and nobody’s gonna make me. Maybe I was wrong, but I was only half wrong, and they want me to say I was whole wrong. I can’t write it. What am I gonna do?”
    I heard it then.
    Not Davy Ray’s voice, chiding me.
    But a train’s whistle, off in the distance.
    The freight was coming through.
    I sat up. Off in the hills I could see the headlight like a moving star as the train wound toward Zephyr. I watched it coming.
    The freight would slow down as it approached the Tecumseh trestle. It always did. It would slow down even more as it crossed the trestle, its heavy wheels making the old structure moan and clatter.
    As it came off the trestle, it would be slow enough to catch if someone had a mind to.
    The moment wouldn’t last very long. The freight would pick up speed, and by