Holding Your Breath

They played Sardines every Monday night that summer, and every Monday, the Rooney kids made a giant can of Chef Boyardee with a side of baby carrots and a scoop of Jif. It was an easy, quick dinner because Roz didn’t care if the Chef Boyardee was heated, so they didn’t bother. They could leave dinner on a plate for her, though when they returned at bedtime, she’d be curled on the couch, the raviolis congealing. In the morning, the plate would be picked over, bites taken from so many ravioli and carrots as if she couldn’t finish what she’d started.

Now they found the other kids lined up near the swings at the center of Fishbone. Though it made no sense, Cherine and one of the Jenkin twins were picking teams. They were arguing about something, but when they saw the Rooneys, they waved it all away.

“Make Little Rooney it,” someone called out as they gathered.

Since the start of summer, there had been a general consensus that at five—by far the youngest one there—little Rooney would hide. He—along with his brother—were the only ones in Fishbone under nine who were comfortable running around alone in the dark, and the littlest Rooney had a particular knack for finding good hiding spots.

Cherine patted Little Rooney on the head, and so it was decided.

He took off running, and the others lay in the grass on their bellies, hands cupping their eyes, and counted.

He didn’t think he was better at hiding than anyone else, unless size helped. But that didn’t make sense: eventually they would discover and press against him, ruining what had been a good spot. But he liked being it. Or at least those moments he was tucked into himself, picturing the older kids skittering about, desperate only to find him and pile in close.

This week, he had a plan, and the last few days, he’d prepared.

He lifted the blue tarp covering Ms. Gloria’s wood pile, ducking underneath, to squeeze into the gap between the wood and the back of her house. Hiding kids rarely picked this spot because it was wedge-shaped, tapering so that as more kids crammed in, the one who was it was forced further into the narrowing space and slowly suffocated.

But he’d fixed all that.

He waited, giddy, wishing he could see the kids darting about, eyeing each other in case someone suddenly disappeared.

In a huff, Spider was suddenly beside him, trying to control his breathing, and a moment later, one of the Jenkins pressed in, pulling the tarp down after himself.

“You totally gave it away,” he said, and Spider shushed him.

A few minutes later, Shanti wormed in, followed by James and Jamal, and when the big kids started furiously whispering about something, Little Rooney wriggled out the back through the tiniest gap he’d created the previous day.

It was only a few seconds of exposed running before he was safe in the brambles behind Ms. Gloria’s where he crawled a little ways, then followed a long line of bushes uphill until he reached Joe O’Malley’s old delivery truck at the top. It was a favorite hiding spot: though you were easily found lying under the front of the truck, you could watch everyone running through the yards below.

He could see the post office, the windows flush and brimming in the waning light. Nearby, a woodpecker hammered against something metal. He watched as Tanner Brodkey and his wiener dog walked along the green, Tanner tugging the leash whenever the dog stopped to sniff. Then Shanti ran past them. Everyone was searching again.

He supposed it wasn’t against the rules—abandoning a hiding spot for another—because there was no rule. No one had thought to do it before.

He waited again, and soon enough, when six kids were lined side to side under the front of the truck, banishing him to the rear as he knew they would, he scooted himself backwards and slipped away.

Fishbone consisted of a tic-tac-toe grid of gravel streets, cupped within the arcing ends of the aptly named Crescent Pond. The pond naturally became a three-sided boundary for their games, with the paved road stretching between the pond’s two tips acting as the fourth border.

He ran for the piece of pond nearest him, skirting the edge until he reached Sandy Beach, then down the wooden dock to the ladder where he eased himself into the water up to his neck.

No one had ever hidden in the pond. He knew the older kids would say it was off-limits, but he didn’t care.

The sun had set, and the water was cooling. The tiniest of fish nibbled at his arm. With a sudden ache, he hoped his mom might eat their dinner tonight. He imagined her licking peanut butter from a carrot, just as he always did, because peanut butter was best by itself. It occurred to him that many foods were better separated into their basic parts: the cheese on pizza, Ramen from its soup, the insides of Oreos, apples from the pie.

Again, he felt the giddiness of being alone, the delicious anxiety of waiting. Like holding your breath. That second of calm stillness inside as you wait, knowing that soon enough you’ll breathe again.

He heard someone shout for him, his name ricocheting across the pond. “Come out. You have to play right.”

From much farther off, his brother called for him, then someone else joined in.

He felt glorious. Like he owned the world.

A tremble in the ladder, then he heard footsteps on the dock. Someone whispering. There was at least two of them. He swung himself around the ladder to hide beneath the dock, and when the footsteps were above, he held his breath and went under. His best time was nineteen seconds, and as he waited, his mother’s voice echoed in his head, Go on, go on. Don’t wait for me. Don’t wait. 

“Go on, go on,” he broadcast towards the kids above him. “Get away from me. Get away.”

He felt a sudden, seizing hate. He wanted them gone, dead, forever and ever. 

He needed to breathe, and came up carefully, quietly. 

“No one will tell her,” he heard Shanti say. Someone else was crying.

Then his sister’s voice, “If we don’t find him, someone will tell their parent, and then everyone will be out looking, and she’ll know. She won’t talk to us for weeks.”

He remembered the last time. His brother swarmed by paper wasps and rushed to the hospital, how no one could find Roz that whole day and into the night. And when she appeared, despite everyone telling her it was a freak accident, she wouldn’t look at them or talk to them for days and days, maybe weeks and months.

He felt the ladder rattle as if someone was standing on a rung, and Shanti screamed his name. He sank underwater again, hands over his ears, and counted. He couldn’t bear his sister’s crying.

He heard their footsteps knocking in his head, and he surfaced. It was getting dark and he was getting cold, but he wouldn’t reveal himself. Not yet. Not until he heard someone’s parent singing his name, calling, Come out, come out, wherever you are.