Zane’s Trace

I-70 WEST: MILE MARKER 82334 Miles to ZanesvilleWhen I dieI want to come backas a 1969 Plymouth Barracudamidnight blue with black-tape accents,twin dummy hood scoops,and a 440 big-block enginestuffed between the fenders.An engine so big they had to install itwith a shoehorn and a hammer.I’ve got a six-pack of Mountain Dew,a book bag filled with Pop-Tarts, a jumbo packof Sharpies, a change of socks,fifty dollars cash, a credit card in my wallet,and a loaded gun in the trunk.No rearview mirror. And no more worries.It’s just over three hundred miles to Zanesville, Ohio.A straight shot.Gotta make good time.The sun’s already up.By now they’ve probablyfound the old man’s body.I-70 WEST: MILE MARKER 80332 Miles to ZanesvilleMy mother used to read me this book,HAROLD AND THE PURPLE CRAYON.Harold was a little kid who madeanything happen just by drawing it.He could draw a horizon, or a window,or a door, or stairs, or stars or a boator a spaceship. No trouble existedthat Harold couldn’t fix. A few years laterMom kept getting sicker, so Grandpa movedin with us for good. That’s when I startedwriting on my bedroom walls.Harold had a purple crayon. I’ve got Sharpies —medium-tip mostly,the occasional king size for big ideas.I figured I could make everything work outif I just wrote on my walls. If I just wrotethe right phrase the right number of timesor in the right color. Give my mother back her mind. Calm the demons in her head. Leave the darkness far behind. If need be, take me instead.My Wyandot shaman father was notaround to give me spiritual guidance.So I created my own heaven, Zane-atopia,and I drew a picture of it on my ceiling. Zane-atopia existed at the top of Mount Guesswind, and my life was the climb. The earthly world was a dragon’s tail wrapped around the mountain’s base. The bad times were dark clouds. The good times a rainbow. A bright flash of light shone at the tip-top point of the mountain (where good people went to live with God) and inside the light was my mom and my brother, Zach, and Stanley (he’s my dad), and even the old man.All of this I drew on the ceilinguntil my arms were like lead pipesand my neck was a train wreck.But it felt good in my stomach.Like Michelangelo must have feltpainting the Sistine Chapel. Like reachingup to touch God’s fingertip.Now my walls are whispering ten miles back.I’ll never draw on them or write on them again.But I can’t help looking at the Barracuda’s dash:an empty space waiting to be filled.These Sharpies are dependable.The only thing I can count on.They’ll write on just about anything.The thought of itmakes my fingertips itch.I-70 WEST: MILE MARKER 79331 Miles to ZanesvilleI never did belong in Baltimore.It hit me like the voice of Goda few weeks ago, with summer breakgasping to an end: You don’t belong, Zane. You don’t belong.I wrote it on my walls all day. Don’t belong. Don’t belong. Don’t belong.Till I got fed up and Googled myself.And there it was, just a couple pages in:"Zanesville, Ohio — population 25,586.Home of the world’s only Y Bridge."A bridge where three roads intersect!A town named after mewith a bridge that asks, Why, why, why?I drew the bridge. I drew myself in its center.And I gave it a caption. I inked it into my walls. Zane belongs in Zanesville. Zanesville is the place for Zane.Why had I not thought of it before?Zanesville is the town where Mom is buried.I may as well be buried there too.I-70 WEST: MILE MARKER 77329 Miles to Zanesville Give my mother back her mind. Calm the demons in her head. Leave the darkness far behind. If need be, take me instead.The day I began to write on my wallsI was listening to the old manhound my mother in his usual way. Ee-liz-a-beth, this. Ee-liz-a-beth, that.My grandfather’s voice carried downthe air ducts to my basement bedroom,poisoning the stillness, dimly lit.The floor was gray cement, the walls light blue,the ceiling bright white and easy to reach.I was lying on my bed flipping a pennyand considering my options— should I smother the old man with a pillow? or plunge a knife into his black heart?heads, tails, tails, heads, tails, heads—when the penny took a wild hop,fell between the bed and the wall,and lodged in a gap behind the baseboard.And just like that, it had disappeared. Ee-liz-a-beth, this. Ee-liz-a-beth, that.That’s when I heard the music in my head.Music like a wind-up jack-in-the-box ready to pop.This was the first of the usual signs:A seizure was on its way.I-70 WEST: MILE MARKER 75327 Miles to ZanesvilleI knew from experienceI had about five minutestill the seizure hit. Ee-liz-a-beth, this. Ee-liz-a-beth, that.I broke into a sweat. I felt dizzy.I began to hear the voices.My mother. My brother. The old man.All of them calling to me.But they weren’t there.The penny is hidden, I thought.Hidden behind the baseboard.No one will know. Only me.My responsibility.I had to tell. Someone had to know.Not about the seizure,not about my mother, but the penny.So I pulled my bed away from the wall.And very carefully.Very lightly,in pencil, just above the spotwhere the penny had gone, I wrote: Penny lost here by Zane Harold Guesswind.***************ZANE'S TRACE by Allan Wolf. Copyright (c) 2007 by Allan Wolf. Published by Candlewick Press, Inc., Cambridge, MA.