Free Migratory Animals by Mary Helen Specht Page B

Rally, and first destination of the night.
    We were young and afraid of nothing except being left behind. We did drugs out of boredom. We did them for fun. But we also did them for reasons I didn’t entirely understand at the time. We did them to be momentarily released from the irony that lay like a waxy film on our skin and tongues and eyeballs. We did them so for once we could say exactly what we meant.
    We held hands in a chain, blocking the rednecks and shitkickers behind us, as we walked up the concrete ramp to our seats, where we squirmed and twirled and laughed at everything. We passed red plastic cups of beer from hand to hand. We swayed and yelled as Gravedigger or Eradicator or Carolina Crusher revved their neon-painted engines and jumped and smashed cars in the dirt arena below, our depth perception so altered it seemed the big-wheeled trucks were mere inches from busting into the stands and making a bloody mess of the chanting crowd.
    Flannery crawled onto Santiago’s lap, and they began to kiss, their lips sucking at each other as he put his hand up her floral skirt and along her dimpled thigh. I leaned over and grabbed her shoulder, yelling into her ear, “I love you guys together!,” and so they pulled me from my seat and onto Santiago’s lap, too, all hugging and giggling and making fools of ourselves. I did love them.
    Steven was gone for what seemed like ages, finally returning with more beers and a dazed group of children. We ran fingers through their hair and said we would never have kids ourselves, but that they seemed all right. They could be our little brothers and sisters and come home with us, we said. We gave them handfuls of popcorn and sips of our beer. At some point, they wandered away.
    Molly kept trying to get everyone to look at the lights overhead, and we rolled our eyes at her for being such a trip novice, but she was right. The lights blinked and expanded above us like little broken pieces of firmament.
    We left and threaded through the parking lot looking for the Honey Wagon. It was dark. Your father kept saying, “It’s gone. I knew it wouldbe gone. I knew it. It’s gone. It’s really gone.” I kissed him hard. We found the Honey Wagon and jumped in through the windows.
    We went to a park, the one across from the roundabout with the big triple-layered fountain in the middle. It was after hours, and the water wasn’t running. Brandon gripped a pink glow stick between his teeth and held Molly’s hand, leading her toward the playground, where they disappeared for a while inside an orange metal teepee. By the time they came back, we were all lying on the grass and on each other’s bellies and chests and arms, looking up at the stars. Mooning, we liked to call it. Thinking about how great we would become and about all the ways we were going to change the world.
    I began to pluck long blades of the Saint Augustine grass and twist them into a tight braid. I said I was weaving our destinies together. Or maybe it was a nest for the bird I felt I had become, each in-breath thrusting me higher.
    Molly sank down beside Flannery and looked up to where we all were looking, into the black and bright. She reached over and took the woven braid of grass from my outstretched palm.
    This is where we belong, Molly said. We will stay like this forever, she said.
    Yes, we said.
    Yeah.
    Sure.
    Why not?
    Yes.
    Yes.

HARRY
    L ying in the dark, his hand straying into the cool, empty side of the bed next to him, Harry struggled to let go of the buzzing thoughts that threatened to keep him awake for hours. It had always been hard for him to fall asleep alone. Harry sneezed. And then he sneezed again.
    Harry’s mother had taught him two things about the Finnish culture from which they were allegedly descended: the equivalent for “cheers” was “ kippis ,” and sneezing twice in a row was bad luck (although three times in a row was good luck in