Zombie Hayride Page 3

  What Zander thought was happening was that he and York were falling for each other. Also, Eric and that boy were doing the same thing. You could kiss on the hayride, so that was the thing to do. And now it looked like you could touch on the dance floor, so that was another thing to do.

  It all came across like it was pretty easy. And then in Zander's mind it was like, what if something was missing here?

  Eric had helped him so much with York and it just moved so nicely. So why couldn't Eric do the same thing with a boy who obviously wanted him really bad? That part of the hayride didn't make sense, the part about Eric and the boy.

  Did the stuff with York make sense or was it a dumb stunt? Do you get to have a real boyfriend after Halloween has come and gone or is that just for October?

  If Zander didn't sleep the first night, he really didn't sleep this time around. Eric and the boy knew something, that all of this was impossible. So they looked like fools but they were wise high school boys who knew what they were doing. This was the town where you didn't get involved with anybody.

  But Zander had never gotten involved with anybody in any town, which was only his hometown when you added it up. Maybe he didn't know about this stuff. He wanted it to be so easy.

  He liked York. They were kind of shy with each other at first, then they were starting to kiss each other. Everything was going to be great from there. They couldn't keep their hands off of one another on the dance floor.

  What was wrong with Eric? He should have had a boyfriend years ago. Was Zander really the first person he had told about how he felt about someone?

  THE THIRD night of the hayride, in Zander's plan, was when he and York were boyfriends for sure and Eric also came to his senses about liking somebody. There was nothing more to it than that.

  What would Eric do with that boy? Would he walk over and sit on the same hay bale? He could play the harmonica from there, and sing. Between songs he would only need a few seconds to kiss him on the cheek. It wasn't going to change anything about the hayride but wouldn't it go a long ways toward making Eric happy?

  Zander wanted to be happy. And then along came York. It could really happen like that. Somebody sits next to your hay bale. And then you talk. And then you kiss.

  If there was something wrong, Zander wanted Eric to tell him the truth. Eric had been pretty good about that so far. He wasn't going to put things back in the bottle that were already out.

  All of those guys must have been thinking about what was going to happen next. They had just as much on the line as Zander did. Still, you couldn't look forward to a hayride more than he was looking forward to this one.

  It started out slow. All four of them were aboard along with the two dozen others or so. Zander and York had their hay bale, Eric had his. The boy was in the same place as always and he was looking hard at Eric before the full of dark had set in.

  "Where did you go last night?" York said.

  "I took another ride. I was talking to Eric, he's the harmonica player."

  "Really?"

  "See that boy over there? Eric likes him."

  York looked around. "That boy likes him back."

  "I know, right?"

  Zander was nervous. He wanted to say something about the upcoming kiss. Like a reminder that it was York's turn.

  York would know.

  It was better to leave all that unsaid.

  It took about nine minutes to get to the outer turn. Zander had checked his watch. There was the music of Eric's harmonica in the air, but nothing else. If the boy on the other hay bale had thoughts, you couldn't hear them.

  But you could follow how Eric played the harmonica in case it told you anything about the mood of the harmonica player. It didn't.

  All you could say was that he was probably thinking about his lack of a relationship with that boy because he wasn't doing a whole lot of looking in the direction of Zander and York. It was as if he knew that they would be alright.

  Maybe Zander and York had gotten it all figured out. Your first trip around is the setup. Your second trip is the payoff. Once you were able to keep track of that, you were home free. The second half was coming up soon and the dark was cooperating.

  The wagon's turn at the start point was long and gradual. They might have slowed down a little in the turns but not much. Speed was never an issue on these rides. The object was not to get there as fast as possible. It was to give people the chance to kiss.

  Zander had no idea if you could kiss someone when you weren't on the hayride. Maybe if you snuck away somewhere. And if they wanted to break the rules with you.

  It was all up to York now. The wagon had completed its turn. They were on the first leg of the final lap where it always felt like the wagon was going faster but it wasn't. Zander's watch told him that.

  In the outer turn itself, York leaned over and kissed him real slow. It was great. And after it was over, Zander felt the warmth of York's hand on the back of his neck. It lasted several seconds but he didn't look at his watch for that. It was only an estimate.

  He was going to say what York had said after their very first kiss. Or he was going to say something. York would be expecting it.

  Zander touched him on the near shoulder. "Let's go on the next ride, too."

  "Okay."

  It would be Zander's turn to kiss York.

  For the rest of this ride, he could think about how things had changed. If you could have a really nice boyfriend in this town, you didn't have to think constantly about where you came from and wanting to get back there.

  "York?"

  "Yeah?"

  "This is fun."

  York kissed him again, quick.

  Zander couldn't believe it. Were they gonna get thrown off? Was Eric in charge of enforcing the rules? Hopefully he didn't see what York just did.

  It seemed like they got away with it. Eric was singing a country song. The boy on the other hay bale was watching him, plus he seemed to know the words but you couldn't quite hear him.

  "Thanks," Zander said.

  "You bet."

  The dance was getting started by the time they got back. York said to find him there later on. It was obvious how much he liked to dance.

  3

  Eric

  THE CHAIRS hadn't been moved from the night before. Zander took the one he had sat in during his conversation with Eric. He found himself thinking mostly about the boy on the hay bale who liked Eric. Those two hadn't done anything different on the ride they just took, Eric on the harmonica and the boy watching him. Somebody should introduce them.

  "I told you," Eric said, "didn't I?"

  People had a way of sneaking up on Zander. He motioned for Eric to take a seat.

  "You told me alright."

  Eric pinched the brim of his hat. No words.

  "Are you from here?" Zander said.

  "Yes, sir."

  That told him this place was country. Because that's who Eric was. Plus he must have taught himself a little of the Mississippi blues. All of it was way beyond Zander, who liked what he had heard.

  "I thought you were gonna kiss that boy," he said.

  Eric unbuttoned one of the two flap buttons on the pocket where he kept his harmonica. But that was all he did.

  "There's always another ride," he said.

  "Do they keep going after Halloween?"

  "No."

  "Are you gonna do it?"

  Zander had asked one question too many. Or that was how Eric looked at him. But Zander had one more question that he had to ask.

  "Did you ever kiss anybody?"

  "No."

  The conversation came to a stop. It didn't feel like it was over but it needed some space.

  Eric got up. "With marshmallows, right?"

  "Right." Zander gave him a salute, anything to make him feel like things were okay.

  The dance was going strong, a band with a fiddle player going to town on the square dance. Zander didn't belong here. He looked around in ca
se the boy from that one bale of hay was about to sneak up on him and ask him questions about Eric, like who Eric liked.

  Zander didn't have any idea what he would tell him. There's the truth and then there's a lie. You have to calculate which one is better.

  The boy wasn't around, or not within the reach of this string of lights. There wasn't much doubt he would be on the next hayride. You had to wonder what he wanted. If Eric and him wanted each other so bad, was there some reason why they couldn't get together? Didn't they see it?

  "With marshmallows," Eric said.

  "Thanks." Zander took the cup. "I got mixed up about something."

  That look crossed Eric's face, real serious and real scared.

  Okay, Zander would ask something else.

  "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

  Eric laughed. "I can tell you're not in high school."

  "What did I do?"

  "When I grow up?"

  "Oh."

  Eric took off his hat. "You wanna wear this?"

  "You know I do."

  Zander put it on. It was too big for him.

  "I wouldn't mind being a country singer," Eric said.

  Zander nodded, the brim shifting on his brow. Eric could play a mean harmonica. And he sang good, too. You had to go to Nashville. Or so Zander had heard. His parents told him things and so did his aunt. Mostly he figured they told him the truth.

  "That's why you do it on the hayride?"

  "Yeah."

  Zander looked around again. "Are those guys gonna be there?"

  "It's your turn to kiss him, isn't it?"

  In his whole life, Zander had never had a conversation like this, where you're talking about your boyfriend with one of your friends. And your friend is in high school. And your friend wants to be a country singer, only he's already there when you come right down to it.

  "Eric, why don't you kiss that boy?"

  "Maybe."

  "Do you even know his name?"

  "Kit."

  The only thing Zander could think of was the type of stuff his aunt would say about people and their relationships.

  "Did you and him use to have a relationship?"

  "It's a small town. That's why I know his name."

  Zander had an idea. Probably a pretty bad one. Eric had never kissed anybody, which could have also meant that no one had ever kissed him.

  All Zander had to do was take off the cowboy hat and walk over there and give Eric a kiss on the cheek. Then Eric wouldn't have to feel like he was the only guy who had never been kissed.

  When you had done some kissing with York, it kind of made it easy. Plus you wanted to do it again.

  The next ride would draw some people from the dance floor. Some others would come in from the road because they would have skipped the earlier stuff. There were real zombie rides in other parts of the country, according to Zander's aunt. But so far these were only the kissing rides. Maybe on Halloween the zombies would come out.

  The guy who drove the hayride wagon strolled in the direction of where it was parked. He was wearing a cowboy hat. Pretty much everybody was other than Eric.

  Zander didn't want to give it back even if it was too big for him. It was tan in color. Of course, in the red, blue, and yellow lights, who knew for sure what color it was?

  Two people were missing from the bales of hay placed around the flatbed of the wagon. So Zander went to get York.

  York said he wanted to stay behind on the dance floor. But he asked Zander to kiss him right then and there, which Zander did. And he kissed him back. You could kiss people. It was so weird.

  The other one missing on the hayride was Kit. With him, you didn't know what the reason was because he was such a total mystery anyway.

  Zander sat on the bale with Eric. He felt like a roadie for the band, in charge of the hot chocolate mugs. Also, he could take care of the harmonica if Eric needed somebody to do that. The other thing was the hat. Zander wore it so that Eric wouldn't have to.

  Their job was to make the people happy. Some of them sang along when they knew the words. Or you could see them sway back and forth or keep time with their feet.

  Eric stayed away from the blues. That time he did it for Zander was about the only time he did. But he had come across like a natural blues artist.

  Zander took the hat off and leaned toward Eric, a message on his lips.

  "Kit's not here."

  Eric added a shoulder motion to his harmonica playing that seemed to say yeah, he knew.

  Zander wanted to know what was going on between those two. Did they have a history that went back to the 8th grade or so and then it all blew up?

  He leaned in again. "What about a blues number?"

  Eric did a nod in time with the song. The riders were in for a treat. Zander didn't even like the blues, but there was something about the way Eric did it. He played the part so well that you wanted to tell him everything was going to be alright. Either that or you wanted to take him over to Kit's house and say, "You guys need to figure this out."

  When you had a great relationship with York, you could afford to think about other people's relationships. Besides, Zander was an expert at this stuff. He must have picked up a lot of the nitty-gritty from his aunt, who gossiped about what people did with other people and apparently you could learn a lot from it.

  Eric had never kissed anybody. What if Kit had done it to Eric back in the 8th grade? Then something went wrong. Once you find somebody who likes you, things are not supposed to go wrong. What happens if they do?

  Aunt Lily would have a field day with this one. Not that Zander was ever going to mention it to her. But maybe she would start talking about someone she knew a hundred years ago who it happened to and then Zander would take in every word when Aunt Lily was telling it to his mother.

  Something like, Kit really liked Eric but Eric was too immature at the time to handle the responsibilities of a serious relationship. That was the type of stuff Aunt Lily always said. Among other things, she was very judgmental. That was another word Zander had learned from her because she made it a point to let people know that she was the least judgmental of people. "Far be it from me," she would say, "to judge what other people do."

  Eric sang the blues like he meant it. The crowd responded with hoots and shouts. They were a country music crowd but they knew something real when they heard it.

  Also, they broke the rules on the second half of the trip and kissed more than once. Plus they put their arms around one another and they weren't supposed to do that.

  Zander nudged Eric. "You caused it, you know."

  "What if I did?"

  You didn't want anybody to report him. And Zander never would. He would lie for him before he would let that happen.

  They walked over to get some more hot chocolate. York was out on the dance floor. Kit, you got the feeling, was using the dark to conceal himself while he watched everything that was going on.

  A disturbing thought occurred to Zander.

  "Eric, what happens the day after Halloween?"

  "Nothing happens."

  And then Eric acted like that was an answer, which it wasn't. How would people kiss? He wouldn't even deal with the obvious question.

  "Can you walk me home?" Zander said.

  "Sure."

  Lights on the county road were far apart and they weren't even that bright to begin with. No one would know what you were talking about.

  "Did you tell York goodbye?" Eric said.

  "I kissed him before the last ride."

  The gravel under their feet made some sounds in rhythm.

  "What did you want to talk to me about?" Eric said.

  "Kit."

  Eric got out his harmonica. "I wanna hear you play this."

  "You know I can't."

  "Come on."

  Zander took it. He made a few bad sounds on it. But it surprised him he could make any sounds at all. So he decided to pretend he was a blues harmonica player. Afte
r a really bad riff, he decided he was also the singer.

  "I got those Halloween-is-almost-over blues."

  Eric laughed, really hard.

  "Gimme that thing," he said.

  He tried to grab it but Zander spun away.

  "No, I've got those Halloween blues, man."

  Zander played another riff just to taunt him.

  "Okay," Eric said. "You're the blues man."

  The plan was to introduce Eric to Aunt Lily. She would go to work on him in the kitchen until any and all secrets of his relationship with Kit in the 8th grade wouldn't have a chance of staying secret.

  But when they got as far as the mailbox, Eric stopped.

  "Can you make it from here?" he said.

  Zander looked at the front porch and back. "Yeah."

  "I guess I'll see you tomorrow."

  "You wanna come in?"

  "Another time."

  Eric turned back in the direction they had arrived from.

  "Wait." Zander followed. "Your harmonica."

  He put it in his shirt pocket for him and fastened the two buttons.

  "I almost forgot that," Eric said.

  "Oh, wait." Zander gave him his hat, too.

  "What else of mine did you take?"

  Zander spread his arms out like he wasn't holding anything. "I think that's it."

  "Are you coming to the hayride?"

  "There aren't that many left."

  Zander watched him go but you couldn't see him very far.

  Zander got past Aunt Lily and his parents. Aunt Lily would have blown up Eric's world of secrets. She would have blown up Zander's, too, if he hadn't gotten by. He could tell lies better in the morning.

  Not long after he got up to his room, he could hear his aunt's voice calling out his name.

  "Your friend is here."

  He was pretty excited Eric had come back. Most likely Aunt Lily had already started in on him, like finding out which local family he was part of and she would have known their whole history going back farther than the county records.

  If she was a judgmental person, which she wasn't, she could have added that he would make a very nice friend for you or that he was not an appropriate choice. Usually they were not appropriate.