meal. This beat the hell out of breakfast back home, which usually consisted of Raisin Bran and warm pulpy orange juice.
The orange juice here was warm, but Andrew didn’t mind; he and Nick wolfed down their meals with an unnatural speed. Margaret came back into the kitchen to find their plates empty and both boys leaning back in their chairs, and she sighed. “You boys are somethin’ else,” she said.
Nick had no work or chores to do, so the two decided to go play around in town. A day without school always looked good to Andrew, and today he didn’t even have to play truant. There’s no such thing as hooky if you’re in a universe without school, so the boy reasoned his hands were clean. Not even Aunt Margaret’s warning as they walked down the stoop could diminish Andrew’s wonder.
“Now you boys be careful,” she said, wiping her greasy hands on a kitchen towel. Both boys turned to face her.
“Aw, what’s to worry ‘bout, Auntie?” Nick asked. He was practically dancing at the prospect of hanging out with his new friend. “Ye know I’ve been up, under, and around the town more times than I can count.” He took a look at his fingers as if to prove the fact.
“I know ye have, but still somethin’ seems the matter around Sunsetville recently.” She lifted her eyes, surveying the street she lived on. “A funny smell, you could say. And it’s not just the sewers giving up that smell, if you know it. But listen here boys, stay out of the sewers. Yer both too young to be down there in the dark.”
“Yes’m,” both boys said in unison. Andrew looked strangely at Nick. He hasn’t told her he works down there some days, he realized. Looks like I’m not the only one keeping secrets from my family. And then he thought, maybe everyone does.
“Good,” Aunt Margaret said, her eyes still on the street. The neighborhood was out and about at this hour, she knew, and yet things were calm and quiet. “Now scram you too, and don’t let me catch ye till sunset! But don’t ye be late neither!” And the boys set off, chasing each other down the street through the hot morning air.
“Boys’ll be boys,” said Aunt Margaret. But there was something about that Andrew boy… she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Sure, there was something odd about him. Maybe it was the way he spoke. Margaret had a different way of talking than most of the city folk around Sunsetville, but she’d never heard anyone talk the way he did. Where exactly did the boy say he was from? She couldn’t remember. She couldn’t put her finger on it.
II
Andrew would remember that morning for the rest of his life. He wasn’t sure why; he was too young to really understand the beauty and wonder that filled his soul and emblazoned his spirit. Children have a way loving what’s new and fresh, embracing the day with wonder and naiveté. Andrew was too young to grasp this, however; he just couldn’t put his finger on it.
The boys sprinted to the center of the town, filled with the hustle-and-bustle of merchants, workers, and tourists. Strange people moved here and there around the boys, who jumped around the crates and boxes around the market. Occasionally a merchant would scold them for jumping on his stuff and the two boys would scurry away from the boxes, hiding behind some more. They chased a furry brown dog around the town square for an hour, and the dog chased them around for an hour more. At one point Andrew, not looking where he was going, ran straight into a man carrying several boxes. Andrew spun away from the man, who tottered and wavered, nearly dropping the boxes. The man was about to regain his balance when Nick, sprinting from the yipping dog, tripped and took out the man’s legs, who cried out in dismay as he collapsed onto the pavement. His boxes rained down around Nick and him, the former looking embarrassed and little dazed. Then the dog leapt into the arms of the man and began licking his face, who laughed uncontrollably at the rambunctious mongrel’s antics.
Exhausted from the morning’s escapades, Andrew collapsed upon the scaffolding of a tower in the center of town. The scaffolding faced the Time-Table Clock Tower. Andrew sat about five feet off the ground, dangling his feet over the edge, bathing in the morning sunshine. Behind him the clock face on the Time-Table ticked away. Andrew paid it no attention. He was lost in pure ecstasy, engulfed in one of those rare moments of childhood when independence and a lack of responsibility coincide perfectly. An adult would’ve felt the pressures of the day beating around his skull; a child would normally grow bored of sitting around. In that moment of time Andrew lived forever. The people below hustled and cried out, but they could not disturb the boy. They moved in fast-forward; he didn’t move at all. Time had stopped for Andrew Tollson. He felt free; free of responsibility, free of worry, free of doubt.
Nick napped below in the shade of the wall. Andrew thought he looked comfortable in the grass, but his own mind was too alive to sleep. In his head he saw visions of glory and freedom in this world. The boy gazed beyond the walls of Sunsetville. He saw tall castles on steep green hillsides, with hordes of horsed men riding across a bridge over a sparkling blue moat around the courtyard. He saw country people out in the fields, working for themselves and their family. He saw great ships upon vast blue oceans, setting out to discover new land, new people, new worlds. He saw freedom and independence, and he saw a beauty in his mind and felt it in his soul. It was a fleeting beauty, the kind that only lasts for a few minutes before it becomes a memory that will only be recalled for a moment for the rest of time. He’d remember that beauty when he felt his hands dry and dirty from a long day; he’d remember that beauty when he felt the morning breeze rush through his hair. He’d never feel it again, but the memory remains.
The bells within the Time-Table rang out eleven times. Andrew looked up at the great face of the tower. He felt the time ticking away.
What happened to that feeling? He wondered, looking around frantically. Nick stirred at the sound of the great bells ringing out through the square. The people in the square continued their frantic dance through the stifling noon heat. Andrew realized he’d spent the morning in a daze.
“It’s the clock,” the boy murmured, looking up at the great tower. But it wasn’t the clock; not quite, he realized. It was time. For a kid who played truant as often as he did, he really wasn’t used to feeling like he was wasting time. Now he did. He felt some responsibility, some longing to get moving. He didn’t exactly love the feeling, but he couldn’t deny it.
“But where?” he wondered, and Nick, who had lumbered over to him, gave Andrew a confused look.
“Where’s what?” Nick asked, as he rubbed his eyes and yawned.
“Where do we go?” Andrew asked. “Where?”
Nick shrugged. “I usually hang around ‘ere on my days off, see if any of my friends show up.” Andrew shook his head.
“I mean, what now? What’s next?” Nick, who really had no idea what Andrew was asking, came up with a suitable answer.
“I’m getting hungry. Shall we go home? Hopefully my aunt’s made some lunch.” Andrew sighed. He supposed Nick wasn’t cut out for a mission like his. He was a gunfighter. Nick was just a boy.
“Let’s head back,” Andrew said. Nick began to walk up the street.
“That’s good,” Nick said. “My aunt makes great lunches, you see. They put you right to sleep. An afternoon nap it is!”
III
Andrew feigned sleep for a few minutes until Nick began to snore. Then he slid out of bed and began to put his things together. He tucked the gun in his waistband of his shorts. He took a look in the mirror on Nicks’ wall and stifled laughter at his new clothing.
I
