Pool

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Early autumn, I go on the narrow path that extends from my backyard between two apartment houses to the fence surrounding the vacant lot.  The dandelions haven’t died yet, but more of their yellow heads have grown gray and fleecy, so the path is grimmer than in the summer, and the apartment houses cast heavy shadows.

From the path, I can hear the thudding voices of the older boys in the vacant lot.  My spine tightens and I clutch the hem of my t-shirt. Their sounds crowd the air between apartments so I have to tuck my chin to my chest.  I imagine myself shrinking, fading pale as the day.  I know I can make myself a silent animal, but I can’t disappear.

I step from the dark path and no one sees me at first. The boy with the black cap and the boy with buckteeth are playing catch with a water bottle filled with brown liquid.  The short boy with freckles, the boy with the purple coat, and the boy who lives next door to me are dragging a rusted yield sign by its post to one corner of the lot.  I take a right turn at the chain link, hoping to avoid the boys’ attention as I walk the lot’s perimeter.

I hear it and I go rigid but I’m not surprised.  “It’s the tadpole!” the boy with the purple coat yells.  I can tell it’s him without looking.  I’m breathing quickly but I walk at the same pace and keep my head straight, peering as far as I can toward the horizon.  “Hey that tadpole!” the boy with the purple coat yells.

“Tadpole, come here!”  As I turn the lot’s first corner I can’t help but glance inside.  The boys are bunched together near the middle of the lot.  They see me look at them and they rush at the fence where I am walking.  “Your face is a sinkhole!” calls one of the boys.  “You are French, French, French,” says another.  They’re following me, swarming the edge of the lot and I speed up, nearly tripping at a corner.  “Eat me, tadpole,” the boy with the purple coat says.  “I’m tired.”  He’s in front of the other boys and his fingers clasp the fence.

Then I’m running and the chill air is sharp in my chest.  The boys are frenzied, yelling and running along with me.  The boy with the purple coat is shoving his body against the fence, like he’s trying to thrust himself through the chain link.

I go so fast I feel my heart ripping from me.   Finally I make it to the other side and jump the row of bushes behind the lot and lie on the ground for a minute.  All my insides are throbbing.  I still hear the boys hollering and thrashing against the chains.  I breathe in and draw myself together-the thought of my destination quiets me.  Right ahead of me, the gap in the privacy fence where two wooden slats are missing.  I step through the slats into the backyard of the abandoned house.  Its decrepitude is comforting: the paint peeling from the frames of the French doors, spider webs and dust thick as wool at the windows, the grass and its pelt of damp leaves, the paneling streaked with spray paint, the emptied pool gathering rain and twigs.

I step carefully down the swimming pool’s sloping side.  I sit on its floor, leaning against one of the walls and draw my knees to my chest.  In my mind I hold the image of the boy with the purple coat grinding himself against the fence. The acid blue of the swimming pool drenches everything but I still see his tongue held out, his face contorted with effort.  I want to drain myself, but I know even the abandoned house is gathering dust and birds’ nests, even this pool isn’t empty.  I lower myself and lie on the swimming pool’s floor, curling inward like a fist, like a fetus.