Leslie Pietrzyk: MARCO POLO • Cleaver Magazine

Fiction by Leslie Pietrzyk
MARCO POLO

1975

This July is different.

The annual block party’s always in July. The wives organize potluck sign-up sheets, lawn games, old-time cakewalk, paper plates and cups, the rest. We wheel out our Father’s Day charcoal grills and lug fold-up aluminum lawn chairs from the garage. Cops barricade a stretch of Brookside Drive with wooden sawhorses. Part of the party’s commotion: kids screeching, running, wrestling. Perpetual shouts of “Look at me” and “I’m telling.” Part of the party is calm. Wives cluster on one side of the street, at the tables loaded with Jell-O, potato salads, condiments, desserts. We husbands, wearing our King of the Grill aprons, stick to the other side, in charge of hot dogs, hamburgers, and fire.

Calm is also the novelty of the street blocked off with official but casual authority, that tickling thrill when an unknown Ford edges up Brookside, creeping to our impenetrable border. The stranger eyes our frolicking families, and we sense their confusion at this blocked path, and then their embarrassment of executing a sloppy three-, four-, or five-point turn. A stranger wouldn’t know, but Brookside Drive skirts a large park in a flood zone, meaning few cross streets. Meaning if you can’t get through, then the only way out is back the way you came.

At the annual block party, our families dissolve into delicate, distant mist. They’re safe, and when they’re safe, we men are too. Wives snap Polaroids for photo albums. “Here’s what memories are made of,” someone murmurs during set-up.

This July’s different. Eleven-year-old Donna Gilmore disappeared in January and is still missing. Some wives didn’t want the block party, while others demanded things be kept normal.

It’s not normal that cops stick around after setting up their sawhorses, and it’s not normal to recognize the cops. These are the men who politely barraged us with the same questions over and over after Donna disappeared: Where were you? Did you notice anything out of the ordinary about the Gilmores? Did your kids know Donna? Did your kids see anything? Do you know something you’re not telling us? What did you do and why did you do it? Maybe not that last question, but they don’t have to say it for us to hear it.

The wives invited the cops to stay. They bookend the party, standing steel-spined straight in the blistering Iowa sun, mirror sunglasses reflecting our happy day back at us, distorted. Officer O’Leary, or O’Shaughnessy, that kind of name, holds a thick, rubber-banded folder. Suspects? Theories? More questions? We grew up blamed—for punching our brother, teasing our sister, helping ourselves to the stack of quarters set out for the paperboy—and we continue to be blamed—for forgetting to pick up a gallon of milk, for not making enough money to install central air-conditioning. That folder, and those sentries, and the shadows they cast erase the calm. Burgers burn. There’s not enough ice for either the pop or the beer cooler. White frosting and not chocolate, a kid somehow losing a brand-new sandal. Two lawn chairs bust through, and butts hit the ground. There’s that embarrassment of a sudden drop, a world shifting into something uncomfortable. None of us is guilty, yet, somehow, we all are.

Every year, including this one, the party centers in the middle section of the block where there are plenty of leafy shade trees. This July, we also want to stick close to the above-ground backyard pool Phil Robinson installed for his lonely daughter, Donna’s friend. The kids report too many restrictive rules about that pool, but today it’s open to all, and that’s where they swarm. An adult supervises at all times thanks to a new block party sign-up sheet. Someone’s organizing pool games, probably Marco Polo, and already shouting, “No dunking!”

Those leafy shade trees? Smack in front of the Gilmores’ house. No one sees much of the Gilmores these days, except for their surly teenage boys slouching off to school or mall jobs. Now here’s the annual block party. The wives stuffed flyers in their mailbox, same as every house on the block. But the Gilmores didn’t sign up for potluck or for cleanup, didn’t call to say, “We’ve got four lawn chairs” when we know they do. Didn’t offer to buy pop or plastic forks or ice. Would they come to the party? Or wall up in their house while the party flows around them? These questions worry our wives.

We’ve got one eye on the hot dogs and the other on their house. Are they home? Garage door’s closed, so their powder-blue station wagon could be in there or not.

Kids in bathing suits dash across lawns, merging in and out of packs, a screeching herd that veers clear of crossing Donna’s yard, doesn’t step on Donna’s grass. Wayne’s grass. We can say his name. And hers. Wayne and Annette Gilmore. Our neighbors.

Their grass is tinged brown, weedy with dandelions. Needs cutting. It’s a lawn to warn us, to show us what happens if we let up on fertilizer, weed killer, sprinklers, and Saturday afternoon mowing. The longer we stare at that scraggly excuse for grass, the more we understand that Wayne Gilmore, his wife, and those hooligan boys won’t join the block party.

So we pop the tabs on our beer cans and settle into the good folding chairs we set aside for ourselves. Time to watch the fire get ashy in the grills. That’s what we’d do if the cops weren’t here. But because they’re here, we dump in another bag or two of Kingsford and squirt a bracing arc of clear lighter fluid, sucking up pungent fumes and inhaling sharp pain through our noses. Soak the briquettes. In our own backyards, we’re constrained, told “Be careful” by watchful wives, and we coax only the flames necessary to char the dogs or cook the burgers through or sear some sirloins, if we’re lucky.

At the block party, today, with the Gilmores’ house right there, with the cops hemming us in, we let loose with the lighter fluid, half a can, whole can. Make it rage, for once. Maybe this fire’s a warning, like Wayne Gilmore’s grass. “Throw a match,” someone says. And we do, after taking a careful step back.

It’s almost time for the distraction of tug-of-war, dads against kids. The wives are agitated, shooing kids away from third and fourth trips to the dessert table loaded with brownies and Rice Krispie treats.

Someone’s driving to Hy-Vee for marshmallows because kids expect to roast marshmallows, but no one signed up to bring them. “And graham crackers,” the wives call. “The blue box. And Hershey bars, without almonds. Write it down.” It’s someone whose house—therefore car—is outside the perimeter the cops set up, and we watch the cops watch the Impala back down the driveway and ease down the block toward First Avenue. Such a basic thing. What are lists and phone calls for if marshmallows are overlooked?

The Gilmore front door opens. The click of a doorknob, the creak of a screen door shouldn’t cut into a full-fledged party, but it’s like we all hear. A block party isn’t silent, but we feel silence the way a blanket takes a minute to settle right over a body.

Wayne’s framed in the center of the door, gazing out. He’s not a big man, but right now, he seems to overflow the door jamb, the narrow porch of the ranch house, the crab-grassy lawn, this party itself. He’s either lost weight or gained it, or it’s shifted to create both more of him and less. He hasn’t noticed the dark, blotchy stain on his chest pocket.

Both cops tighten.

Over from the Robinsons’ backyard, a girl’s voice calls out, wobbly and hopeful, high-pitched and sweet, “Marco?” and the group returns with a cackle, “Polo!” Traditions start as simple as this: next year, they’ll play Marco Polo, and the year after and after, as long as Phil Robinson’s got that pool.

A moment later, Wayne turns away, replaced by his wife, Donna’s mother, wearing her long, pale nightgown. She does this now, drifts through the front yard like a purposeful ghost, pacing the perimeter of grass, walking an identical rectangle over and over, on and on, until someone leads her back inside, usually Wayne, but sometimes one of the boys. When they touch her, she riles like a cat with fur rubbed wrong, and it can turn a little rough. Back the next day, the next; she rarely skips, like there’s a set number of steps she’s got to get to. What’s that number? We wonder privately, when’s enough? It’s been six months since Donna disappeared.

Today, a couple of wives wave or maybe swat at flies. We’re on the far side of the street and can’t be expected to see everything.

“Marco?” Hesitation, dwindling hope. No one likes being “it.”

“Polo!” Laughter. Kids’ games are cruel, this one especially, with someone forced to stand alone, then lunge and thrash blindly through the water, desperate to tag the elusive, mocking kids who splash out of reach.

She walks the yard early mornings or late at night, often the whole night. Our wives peer through cracked curtains, no longer bothering with the excuse of a sick child keeping them awake late-night or a fussy baby. Why’s she doing that, our wives ask, over and over. Like cops with their questions. Goddamn it, we want to say, we don’t know, but we never swear at home. Annette Gilmore bumps open the screen door with her hip, places one foot onto the porch, then the other. She’s unsteady, barefoot, pale and leached. (Eat a burger, we think.) She pushes the screen door wider than it should go, straining the hinges. Out, she seems to imply, out, as if she’s releasing unspeakable evil into the world, onto Brookside Drive, onto us.

No.

It’s only Wayne, coming through the door, maneuvering a folded card table, wielding the square of it like a shield. His eyes peep over the top, but he lumbers carelessly onto the driveway, before cutting across the crabgrass, trampling the high weeds. Dandelion seeds rise and float in his wake. We long to point out that his wife’s wearing a path in the grass. Hard to reseed once a rut’s set. We’ve wondered about the Robinsons’ pool killing that nice fescue grass in the back, but that’s his business. Maybe this yard is only Wayne Gilmore’s business. Though look: it’s right out front here, where we all have to see it.

She lets the door bang shut, folds both arms across her chest and squints her whole face, though the sun’s behind her. If it were our house, we’d fix that door with a quick adjustment to the pneumatic cylinder. Who wants slamming? Are they good parents, the cops asked. Are we good parents, we wondered. “Yes,” we told the cops. Hard to remember she’s the same as our wives: attractive, sturdy, dressing up nice for church and parties. Never too long in front of a mirror. Just a regular woman, the kind to marry.

Sharp clacks as Wayne snaps open each of the four legs of the card table then sets it upright. Clearly uneven. He presses one hand on top to test. Tilt, tilt. It’s like he doesn’t notice, and she gets the door as he passes, again pulling it wide to its limit, and again: bang. Almost immediately he’s back with a folding chair under each arm, and she’s opening the door. We’re thinking about flies, about air-conditioned air cooling the whole neighborhood.

These aren’t lawn chairs for a block party, but folding chairs that match the red vinyl table, chairs for bridge night and extra guests, for buffets in the living room with friends or Thanksgiving with all the cousins. No law’s being broken here, but still.

The chairs wobble worse than the table.

He crosses the lawn and jumps over where petunias get planted during a normal year. Grabs her hand and leads her to the card table, parks her in a chair, and once she’s settled, he perches in the other chair. He’s wearing plaid shorts, a blue shirt, sneakers. She’s in that nightgown, hair pulled back in a low ponytail, hands clutched in her lap.

“Marco! Polo!” The kids shriek these words over and over and over and over, which may be the mistake of a pool in the neighborhood, these voices slicing through our future Sunday afternoons, our true day off. Not that we’ll complain because we like our kids happy, we like our kids having fun. Because believe you me, we know who’s not shouting, who’s not having fun right now. Donna.

Anyone would shift the table to flat ground—more grass, less dirt patch. Of course, really, anyone would set the table on the driveway or carry it down here to the street. Anyone would join us.

We could say, “Join us.” Wave a hand. Walk over and grab the table, slip it into the group. Pop open lawn chairs. Lift our feet off the cooler so they can grab a beer or pop. Say, “We need you for the tug of war.” Say, “Good to see you” and ask how they’re doing.

Or the wives could. That’s what they do, organize. Organize this, we think, goddamnit.

Abruptly, Annette Gilmore calls: “I’ll wait.” Her voice scratches rough, but it could be it always did, just we forgot. She’s barely spoken since Donna disappeared, only whispers and sighs. But here she is now, shouting through the noise. It’s possible she talks an endless whirlwind in that house or alone inside her head. We never know what goes on in private.

“I’ll wait,” she rasps. At us? At who?

Her husband ignores her, studies his fingernails. The cops beam their impenetrable sunglasses his way. But he’s impenetrable too.

She leans forward in her chair, leans way over until her hair flops over her head and touches the dirt. “I’ll wait.”

“Marco! Polo!” We should tell the kids that Marco Polo’s a tedious game; that when we were Marco, of course we cheated, slitting our eyes to see who was where or tying the blindfold loose. That it’s a game with no winner or purpose, endless voices calling the same two words over and over; that the real Marco Polo was an intrepid traveler wandering for twenty-four years, who’d never bog himself down waiting for others to locate him. And all the yelling. We hate the Robinsons’ new pool.

Annette Gilmore jumps up, and yep, there she goes, round and round her path, head down, lap one, lap two. Ten minutes of it. Anyone can see right through that white nightgown in this bright sunlight. It’s obscene. It’s impossible to get tug of war going now. Pack her off, we think, tackle her and lock her in the goddamn house until all this is over. That’s what we would do. We would handle it.

Wayne stands up and glances at the cop with the folder, the one closest to where we are, then wipes a layer of sweat off his forehead with his palm. He’s lost hair since January, widening his forehead. Anyone else would get good-natured ribbing on that.

Lap six, seven. We lose track.

We imagine approaching the cops and telling them that, yes, we do know something, that we know who’s guilty, that we’ve got information that will help, that we saw something, and we imagine ourselves explaining exactly what we saw. “Take your time,” the cops say, writing down our words. We imagine ourselves pointing at Wayne or at his wife or the two of them side by side so that the pointing includes them both; we imagine saying the names of their awful teenage boys one by one, lingering on each syllable as if it’s hard candy. Goddamnit, we even imagine one of us saying something like: It was me, I did it. That’s a lie, but we imagine one of us saying it just to make it all stop right now, today. We know what it is to be part of a team. We know sacrifice. We fix things. Who’s fixing this?

We say none of this. We have to start working on tug of war, and we uncoil the rope straight down the street, someone duct-taping each frayed end, and we’re measuring out where to tie a couple of knots on the kids’ side to give them leverage. (Kids always win, but we make it a battle.) We’re re-chalking the line so there’ll be no arguments, and we’re telling the kids they can have the chalk later but not now. None of us says those things we’re thinking, but it’s as if those unspoken words jump from our heads into Wayne Gilmore’s.

He walks toward the cop, passing close enough that we could maybe say something to him, but we’re busy with that rope and tug-of-war. He walks regular, neither fast nor slow, but still, it’s only about a minute before he’s right in front of the cop.

We would yell. We would say, “Goddamnit, do your fucking job.” We would say, “A kid doesn’t disappear.” We would punch a face into pulp. We would burn down something, anything.

Wayne drops to his knees, presses his wrists together like they’ve got magnets, and lifts them high. His head bows down, and we think his eyes are closed. We think we hear him speak: “I can’t.”

Do we hold our breath? Do we want the cop to grab the cuffs? Do we want Wayne Gilmore hauled out of the block party?

He weeps.

The cop—we remember it’s O’Brien—shakes his head, gently guides Wayne into standing. Leads him back into his house. The other cop walks up on the lawn and gets Annette with no fuss. The screen door closes softly, and then the front. They all stay inside a good long while. We could forget they’re in there, but we don’t.

The kids win tug of war.

S’mores are a hit, and the dessert table’s only empty platters.

The grills fill with spent, gray ash.

The clean-up crew moves fast, and they slide the barricades the cops forget to take away when they finally leave.

It’s late, past ten, and we’re on the couch with our wives playing Channel 2 news. It’s not possible. But there it is. From outside, a voice calling, calling: “Marco? Marco?”

Over the years, we tell this story, the block party Brookside Drive had after Donna went missing. People turn furious when they hear it. They demand to know why we were such assholes, why we didn’t go comfort the Gilmores. They say, “Why didn’t you walk over there and talk to those poor, sad parents? How could you just sit there? Why didn’t you do something?” Donna was never found, we say, needing to feel that pain too.

We keep telling the story, helpless not to. We’re old men now, most of us grandpas and great-grandpas, though we’re old enough to know we’ll never get the answer we want.

Leslie Pietrzyk’s recent collection of linked stories is set in DC, Admit This to No One. This Angel on My Chest won the 2015 Drue Heinz Literature Prize. Short stories/essays in: Ploughshares, Story, Hudson Review, Southern Review, Iowa Review, The Sun, Cincinnati Review, LitHub, Okay Donkey, Pithead Chapel, and Split Lip Magazine. Awards include a Pushcart Prize. She lives in North Carolina.