24

Candles were for emergencies. Most nights the only light we had was from the fire. It was always out when we woke up, and one morning there was a thin sheet of ice in the water bottle. Every day it got colder, and we spent a lot of time gathering wood.

I hardly ever thought about the way we used to live. I hardly thought about my parents. If I did think about them, it was like something that had happened a long time ago. Like a story or a movie.

We were always together, Bubber and King and me. We went everywhere, but never to our old neighborhood. Bubber got food a lot of times when I couldn’t, and King sniffed out good garbage.

I saved everything. Tin cans, bottles, and newspapers. I found some pieces of carpet in the garbage and put them on the floor, on our beds, and nailed one piece over the window.

One day it was so cold we couldn’t stay in the cave. We went from building to building, warming our hands over the radiators. When anyone came, we went right out. “Where are we going?” Bubber said.

“We’re walking.”

“Where are we walking?”

“We’re walking where we’re walking.” But then I thought, he’s only in first grade, and I gave him a geography lesson. This way, traveling around the city, he would learn a lot. “The Bronx,” I said, “is surrounded on three sides by water. On the east there’s Long Island Sound and on the west there’s the Hudson River. And on the south it’s either the Harlem River or the East River, I don’t remember which. So you could say that whatever way we’re walking, we’re walking toward the water. Unless we’re going north. Now you tell me.”

“The Bronx,” he said, “is surrounded on three sides by water. On the east there’s Long Island Sound and on the west there’s the Hudson River.…”

“Very good,” I said. “A plus and a gold star.”

Bubber liked that. He wanted more. “Read that sign,” I said, pointing to a drugstore. It said “Biologicals” and “Alka Seltzer.” Bubber got the b sound and then he got stuck.

“Scratch that,” I said, and I gave him something he knew. “What’s two times one?”

“Two times one is two. Two times two is four. Two times three is six.”

He knew a lot of his times tables for a first grader.

“Two times nine is eighteen. Two times ten is twenty.”

“Okay. Good. Which way isn’t the water? North, east, south, or west?”

“North.”

“Good.” Teaching Bubber helped make the time pass.

One night I went back to our building. Our windows were dar. I ran in and checked our mailbox, then ran out again.

Every day was different, and every morning Bubber said the same thing. “I’m hungry.”

Sometimes we went to the library. They had good bathrooms. I read stories to Bubber and tried to get him to read some of the words. There were a lot of men in the library, reading the newspapers or sleeping with their heads on their arms.

One day we were walking along the edge of the tracks and saw something glinting through the bare trees. It was an abandoned 1929 Ford. The windows had been smashed and everything had been taken out, but in the bushes we found two wheels with the tires still on them. We rolled the tires to the junk man under the Third Avenue el. “We’ll probably get five dollars for them,” I told Bubber.

“We’ll be rich,” Bubber said. “What will we buy?”

“Nothing,” I said. “We’re going to save the money.”

Bubber threw down the wheel. “Then you roll it. I’m not going.”

“What do you want? I was just teasing. You want me to buy gloves?”

He nodded.

“How about me?”

“Two pairs of gloves,” he said.

“Okay, what else?”

“Two Baby Ruths, two Mary Janes, two Milky Ways and—”

“Hold it, hold it. How about shoes?”

“Two pairs of shoes, two hats, two jackets, and two Mounds bars and two packs of candy cigarettes.”

“Hold it, hold it, hold it. There’s nothing left. We spent it all.”

“Okay,” Bubber said, “two pairs of gloves, then we go to the candy store.”

“Okay. Start pushing.”

The junkyard was in an old horse barn. There were auto parts piled on the floor—batteries and tires and carburetors—and hubcaps on the walls. The junk man came out to look at the wheels. He was fat and he wore khaki pants and a Sam Browne belt with a big ring of keys. “What’d they come off of?”

“A 1929 Ford.”

“You got the other wheels? Bring the other wheels and I’ll give you a good price.”

“How much for these?”

He turned the wheels over. “I got a warehouse full of Ford wheels.”

“It’s a good tire. They’re both good.” I thought he’d give two dollars.

He kicked the tires. “Two bits. Two bits apiece. Quarter for each one.” He pulled a greasy leather purse from his pocket.

“Is that all?”

He snapped his purse shut. “Forget it. Take your wheels out of here. I don’t want them.”

“What are we going to do with them?”

“That’s your problem. I was only doing you a favor.”

“Come on, Starkey, give the kid a break.”

I looked around. The voice had come from the rag pile. A tall boy sat up and grinned at me. He wore a hat with the brim cut off and the crown cut out in diamonds and squares. He wasn’t that much older than me. “Those wheels are worth two bucks apiece, at least.”

“Hey, Whitey, what am I running, a charity or a business?” He bit off the end of his cigar and spit it out. “Okay, kid, one buck. Take it or leave it.”

Whitey nodded to me. “Take it.”

I held out my hand. The junk man gave me a dollar.