6. Molly
Alex hasto duck his head to get into my van, even with his boots off. Being made in miniature sure has its advantages—I’m certain Alex wouldn’t fit in my bed.
Not that I’m going to test that theory out, mind you.
I point behind him. “The front seats are storage areas when I’m parked. Then over here,” I continue, waving my arms, “is my kitchen-slash-bathroom-slash-pantry-slash-closet.” Alex does a full turn to face Vaniel’s back end. His eyes roam over everything: the white cabinets that I love, the gray subway tiles, the propane stove. That last one I’m really thankful for right now. If I’d gone electric, I wouldn’t be able to cook with my batteries on the decline. It is a pain to deal with propane, though. I have to ventilate it properly and the tank I store is really small, so I have to refill frequently.
Alex looks at me, one eyebrow raised. “Bathroom?”
I grin and grasp the handle of the deep bottom drawer on Vaniel’s right side. I pull it out and showcase the composting toilet with a wave of jazz hands.
“It’s clean, I promise. Ethel’s letting me use the bathroom in the pole barn.”
Alex crouches down. “How does this work?”
Huh. Most non-vanlifers I meet have zero interest in learning about my bathroom, if they’re not flat-out grossed out by it.
I lift the lid to show him how liquid and solid waste separates and then show him the clean bucket with the actuator, which turns the compost. I pull out my composting bags for the solid decomposed waste and explain that the liquid waste goes into a toilet at the next convenient location—or into the soil if I’m out in nature.
“What do you use for your carbon?”
I show him the coco fiber. “Do you compost on the farm?”
“Of course,” Alex says, turning the package over and reading the back. “But first, we have a digester in the back which vents off biogas, and then we turn the digested waste into compost.”
“What do you use for your carbon?” I can’t believe I’m having a conversation with my new boss about composting and poop.
“Mostly bedding, hay, or spoiled feed. In the summer, we can supplement with fresh corn stalks from local farms. We have a program for our neighbors who don’t treat their lawns to bring their raked leaves to us in the fall. If we have to supplement, we use biochar.”
“What’s a digester?” I ask, circling back.
Alex looks up at me. “I’ll show you next week, if you want.”
“Sure,” I say, hands on my hips. When Alex stands, I nudge the drawer closed with one foot and turn. “This is my office-slash-dining-room-slash-bedroom.” On each side of the van are two seats against the wall. The one on the right side has a pivoting table to turn it into my office. Past that, up against Vaniel’s back doors, is my bed. It’s really more like a daybed, a single (custom) mattress with walls enclosing three sides. “I have a board I can place here”—I indicate the space between the two seats—“and then a pillow and foam topper that I can spread out to make a bigger bed for two. But I rarely do that since it’s just me. And then I don’t have to worry about putting it away every time I want to sit down at my table.”
“An office? For work?”
“Well, yeah. But it’s mostly for when I video chat with my dad or with friends. Like, I have a book club that meets once a month, so I sit here to talk to them.”
Alex puts his large palm on the tabletop and bends down to look at the bottom side. He moves the table around experimentally. It’s a special table that can fold down but also can swing around three-hundred-and-sixty degrees. When Alex discovers this, he crouches to look at the mechanism.
I fold my arms on my chest and watch him, one corner of my mouth curled up in a smile. He’s curious, and I like that about him. During my time on the road, I’ve found that curious people are the most interesting.
When he finishes inspecting the table, he stands and puts a hand on my bed and presses, like he’s testing the mattress. I half expect him to lie down?—
“Oh my god,” I say, laughing at the image in my head.
“What?”
“Lie down.”
“What?”
“Lie down on the bed. I wanna see if you fit.”
Alex grumbles, but he obliges me anyway, and I think I catch the edges of a smile as he turns to put his head on my pillow. He lays down, tucking his feet flat on the mattress, knees pointed to the ceiling.
“Well, I think it’s safe to say you aren’t cut out for van life.”
“No shit,” he deadpans. He moves, but I put out a hand.
“Wait, wait. Let me take a picture, for Ethel.”
“Gran doesn’t want a picture of me in this bed.” His voice is slightly bitter, but he doesn’t move.
I have noticed the tension around the Bedd family. Alex doesn’t engage very much with Ethel, and before today I would have called Alex stiff, but he looks even more tightly wound and uncomfortable when talking to his brother.
I snap the picture and pocket my phone again. I’ll show it to Ethel in the morning.
“Who’s the man?” Alex asks, breaking me out of my thoughts about the Bedd family. He’s looking at the ceiling, where I have some photos taped up. Most of them are various places I’ve been; with my best friends from home canoeing Horseshoe Lake one summer, Cadillac Ranch outside of Amarillo, Four Corners, Mystic Pizza, the furthest east I went, Kittery in Maine.
Alex is talking about the one picture I have with a man in it—my dad. The picture is old, taken a few years ago at a hockey rink where we watched a curling match together. It was before my dad’s last major PTSD episode, before we had to adjust his meds. He’s doing a lot better now, in some respects. I almost didn’t leave on this trip, but Dad kept pushing me to go. Back then, he was still doing stuff with the Wounded Warrior Project. Now, though, he hasn’t talked about it in a while, and I’m worried that he’s not getting out of the trailer much.
I don’t know how much of this is real or how much of it is in my head. I’m worried about my dad, but is it because I’m not there to take care of him?
Which is why I need to complete this trip. If I drive straight home from here, it’s about forty hours, but I won’t hit all the states, and I definitely won’t fulfill my dad’s checklist for each one—eat a meal, visit a tourist attraction, and use the restroom.
I counted Four Corners as a tourist attraction for both Colorado and Utah, ate a snack on both sides, and chugged enough water to make me have to pee—twice.
While I may have only spent a few hours in some states, I spent weeks in other states–I boondocked in the deserts of New Mexico, spent nearly fourteen days in a small beach town in Florida, and hiked part of the Appalachian Trail in Virginia. I’ve been on the road for six months, and I’ve lived a whole other life.
It has its costs, though. Once I get back in Spokane, I can see for myself if my dad’s taking his meds, meeting up with friends, seeing his therapist, and make sure his prosthetic is still fitting well, and…and, and, and.
“That’s my dad,” I tell Alex. In the picture, my dad’s prosthetic is visible, so I explain. “He lost his leg in the Gulf War.” I perch on the edge of the bed, putting my palm behind me and leaning back so I can look up at the photo. We’re not touching, but Alex stills next to me anyway. “He’s actually the reason I’m living in the van.”
“How so?”
“First of all, the trailer he lives in now isn’t much bigger than this. Getting used to living in small spaces wasn’t a problem. But mostly it’s because when I was a kid, he checked out a book from the library for me called The Mystery of the Black Raven. It was part of a series called Boxcar Children. Have you heard of it?”
“Vaguely.”
“So, these kids had a boxcar in their backyard that was their playhouse. And I loved that idea. My world was small growing up in a trailer park, and for them to have their own space was just wild to me. But we ran out of books at the library and Dad couldn’t always get reliable work. So, he started making up stories for me. The series was called ‘Molly-girl and Satoot.’ Satoot was my Husky stuffed animal, and in the stories, Molly-girl and Satoot lived in a shipping container that would travel all over the world.”
I look down at Alex, and he’s watching me intently. “I looked for a camper van with a pop-up for a long time, one that could sleep two people, but Dad decided he couldn’t go.”
“Because of his leg?”
“Maybe.” I shrug. That was his excuse, but I think it was really more about his mental health, a topic I don’t think is fair to unpack onto Alex, my boss and a near stranger. I stand up and brush myself off. “Anyway, you’ve seen the whole thing now.”
Alex unfolds from my bed, and I turn and walk away before he can loom over me.
“Will I see you tomorrow for more strawberries?” I ask as I step into my slip-on shoes and step out of the van. I retrieve Alex’s boots, and he sits in the open door and pulls them on.
“Nah, got farm work to do. I’ll see you on Thursday.” When he’s finished tying his laces, he stands. “Thank you for showing me your van. It’s very cool.”
I brighten. “Vaniel appreciates it. See you Thursday.”
Alex walks away and gives a sharp whistle. His truck is in the driveway, and in the dark of night, I see Trixie emerge from Baabara’s home and race toward him. He climbs into the truck, and I duck back inside just before the headlights illuminate my home so my boss doesn’t catch me watching him.