Henry
The trap is set in Grace’s kitchen. That sounds more dramatic than it should, since no mice are in any actual danger. Still, I’m anxious because who knows if I set it up right? I imagine finding the trap busted open and peanut butter–stuffed mice sprawled across the tile like little beached whales.
A kid from Ian’s school told him about a version of A Christmas Carol with the guy from Ghostbusters, so Grace invited me over to watch Scrooged via text.
Are you one of those guys who likes Bill Murray?
Isn’t that all guys?
Great. Don’t forget Bella’s M the kids look at Grace.
“Um,” I say.
By the time Grace and I make it onto our feet and into the kitchen, Ian, Bella, and Harry Styles are already there on the floor peering into the trap.
“Look!” says Bella.
“Oh my god,” says Ian.
“Did we get one?” I ask.
“Two,” says Ian.
“They’re so little,” says Bella.
I pick up the trap and set it on the counter. I guess I figured days would pass—a week, even—before this worked, but now we’re being stared at by two frightened animals.
“Don’t hurt them, Henry!” Bella says.
When Grace told me she couldn’t kill the mice I chalked it up to kid stuff.
I get it now. One mouse hides behind the other.
They’re both terrified because they know they’re trapped, and I have to force myself to breathe as I think about, for the thousandth time this year, what Brynn’s last moments must’ve been like—knowing what was happening, knowing she couldn’t get out.
I clear my throat. “Don’t worry. I won’t.”
One of the mice eats peanut butter off its paws. Harry Styles whines. Bill Murray shouts from the TV room because none of us hit Pause. Then Grace asks what I’m pretty sure the mice are also wondering.
“Soooo, um, now what?”
I don’t often find myself an authority figure in practical situations. Today, though, I know what I’m talking about. “We need to take them somewhere.”
“Like out for drinks?” asks Grace.
“No. Just somewhere other than here.”
“But this is where they live,” says Bella.
“I know,” I say. “But they can’t stay here. We need to release them. Somewhere safe. Somewhere they’ll be happy.”
“You’re not gonna hurt them?” Bella asks.
“Nope.”
“You promise?”
Grace and I look at each other, because promises are, at best, just wishes.
“Promise,” I say.
“I know where we can go,” says Ian.
“It’s just up here a little more,” says Ian.
“I’ll take your word for it,” I say, following him into the woods.
Downtown Baltimore is as urban as it gets, but the edges of the city and surrounding suburbs feel like they were carved from unbroken nature in the Days of Yore.
A deer startles fifty feet away. As it trots off, two others appear and follow, annoyed with our traipsing.
An empty teeter-totter leans crooked up ahead, alongside a dented slide and some monkey bars.
Two girls dressed in black drift lazily back and forth on swings that are too small for them.
They stop swinging when they spot me, a grown man carrying a cage.
“There’s a stream up there,” says Ian. “They’ll like it, I bet.”
“What’s in there?” one of the swing girls asks.
“Nothing,” I say.
“Mice!” says Ian.
Two sets of sneakers plant into gravel. “Um, what? Did he say mice?”
They’re following us now, and I work up some talking points in my head in case a cop happens by and I’m forced to explain why I appear to be luring three children into a forest.
Ian stops. As far as bodies of water go, this trickle is something smaller than a stream. Rocky edges, slowly moving clumps of leaves. “See?” he says. “It’s perfect.”
“Good thinking, man.” It’s not perfect, but it’ll do. I set the cage down.
“Are they, like, your pets?” one of the girls asks. She has black-painted fingernails, matching black bangs slung across her eyes.
“No,” says Ian. “They lived in our house for a while, though. They like crackers. The Ritz ones, mostly.”
“Cool,” the other girl says.
I open the trap, and for maybe twenty seconds the mice do nothing.
From their perspectives, I get it. I might as well have put them on a tiny shuttle and launched them toward the moon.
“Go on,” I say. “You’re, um, free.” When I nudge the cage with my shoe, finally, one mouse—the braver of the two—steps onto the grass, and I take a cautious step back in case it tries to attack me.
“Are you, like, scared?” Bangs asks.
“He’s just startled,” says Ian.
The second mouse appears and stands beside its friend. They seemed normal-size back at Grace’s house but they’re impossibly small now in the open wild.
“I don’t think they know what to do?” says Ian.
“Get out of here,” I whisper. “Go.”
Then, quite suddenly and startlingly, they do, at full speed toward god knows where.
“Bye, mice,” says Ian.
And good luck, I think.
“Are they gonna be okay, do you think?”
“Oh yeah,” I say. “Lots of food—a stream. You picked a good spot.”
Ian has volunteered to carry the trap back, and he’s holding it like a football. It’s just us again because the girls got bored and went back to the swings after the mice bolted. The sun is sinking, so the streetlights have come on along with Christmas lights on a few houses.
“I really like the book you got me,” says Ian.
“I’m glad, buddy,” I say.
“My mom said you’re an artist.”
“Nah. You’re the real artist. I just design displays for potato chip companies.”
We happen through a circle of yellow streetlight, and I see that he’s smiling.
This is the first time we’ve been alone together, Ian and I, so I give him a good look.
I like his big hoodie and the way he walks on the balls of his feet, leaning forward slightly, like he’s eager to see what comes next.
His artiness, though, and how gentle he seems, makes me worry for him.
These are great traits to have in life, but as a kid they can be vulnerabilities.
I know nothing about what it’s like to be a boy right now.
As we walk, I wonder how he fits in. Are the hierarchies of youth as cruel and defined as they were when I was a kid?
Are there still bullies? If so, is he one of their targets?
I had a keen sense of schoolyard danger in my youth, and I was good at avoiding it.
Does Ian know how to do that, too, or does he wander right into it, forward-leaning and oblivious?
“So, how are things?” I ask him.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean…things. School, friends. Just, how are you, Ian? Good?”
“Um, yeah, pretty good, I guess. My dad died, though.”
This obviously isn’t funny, but I laugh at the bluntness. “I know,” I say. “And that’s a big deal. But…aside from that, I mean.”
He looks up at the dimming sky and thinks. “Well, there is one thing.”
Now I’m worried because I can only assume I’m unqualified to help with whatever he’s about to tell me. “What is it?”
“There’s an art contest at school,” he says.
I laugh again, this time out of relief. “An art contest?”
“Yeah, a Christmas one. Or, well, holidays.” He tells me the parameters—how it can be any medium: painting, sketching, crayon even. “Except for the spelling bee, it’s pretty much the only thing at school you can win that’s not sports,” he says. “And I’m not a very good speller.”
“Ian.”
“What?”
“You can totally win.”
“Really?”
“Why not?”
“I’m only in sixth grade. I’m not even in junior high yet.”
“Eh,” I say, “junior high kids are mostly artless assholes.”
He laughs, shocked, and I realize I probably shouldn’t say “assholes” in front of a kid. His house is just ahead—the one with the tipped-over recycling bin.
“Do you think you could help me with my picture?” he asks.
“Absolutely, I can.”
I’m not the sort of person who accepts invitations quickly.
I hem and I haw. I say things that are precursors to “no,” like, Lemme look at my schedule, or I’ll get back to you.
Brynn used to tease me about it, how “no” was my default setting when it came to human interaction.
However, I just said yes to Ian so fast that it startled both of us.
“Yay,” he says. “Thanks.”
I tell him to text me his number. “I’ll reply so you’ll have mine. We can send each other stuff, like inspiration. My work friend Win and I do that all the time. We can be creative partners.”
“Yeah,” Ian says. “Awesome.”
I pick up Grace’s recycling bin, which, Ian tells me, goes in the backyard. As I follow him around the house, I slow down and see Grace and Bella through the kitchen window drinking from mugs of hot chocolate. It looks nice in there, warm and welcoming.
“I kinda think that movie scared Bella,” Ian says.
“You think?”
“The ghost guy,” he says. “His eyes were gross.”
“Yeah, I can see how that’d be scary.”
We get to the back of the house. Some worn outdoor furniture, a storm door that doesn’t close all the way. I set the bin under an outdoor light.
“Do you believe in ghosts?” Ian asks.
“I’ve never really thought about it,” I say. “Do you?”
“Not really,” he says. “I’m pretty sure my mom does, though.”
“Why do you say that?”
He shifts the empty mouse trap from one arm to the other. “I hear her talking to my dad sometimes.”