Les Petites - A Short Story Collection

Carvings, Faults, and Fissures

"I wrote this," Dave says softly.

I hated this book, carved in with a bottle opener, right underneath the shelving spot of A Complete History of Agricultural Advances in the Fertile Crescent.

Classes haven't yet begun. The library is free of students, and even the brush of skin against wood feels like a blaring invitation for Millicent Frewburg – who is somehow still alive and working at the very same desk she used to – to come and write a pink "Noise Warning" slip.

He points to the message. His fingers are much larger now. Leathery, hard, beaten by years of landscaping work.

By contrast, Remy's are young and veiny and soft. The sort of hands meant to be pulling books off these shelves. He looks at the pale grooves, touching them with fingers that have chipped nail polish and skull rings. "Kinda sad that they haven't changed the shelves since then."

"I think the pilgrims used these shelves too," Dave jokes dryly, replacing the book.

"Hey, uh, orientation is starting soon." The eighteen-year-old fiddles with the zipper on his dark hoodie. "I gotta go. Thanks for showing me around campus though. And helping me move in."

Dave's heart starts to crack, little fissures and faults – words that call back to Geology 101 – shooting through him, the preludes to much heavier quakes to come. But he summons a proud expression. "Yeah. Of course. I should get going anyway. Remember to call."

"I will."

Remy doesn't know that he's lying, but Dave understands the truth of the matter.

A call will probably never come, save for moments where funds run low and stress runs high. Novelty, celebration, homework, and the intricacies of preparing meals in a dorm room will capture Remy's heart and mind in the coming months. The coming years.

Biology 132. Introduction to Animal Behavior and Physiology. Images of little birds jumping alone out of nests. Little leatherbacks swimming across the sand in search of the sea. Young lions plodding out into the savannah in search of a new pack.

All the predators that chase them in the documentaries.

But Remy will face the obstacles. He's faced much worse.

Dave hugs the boy once more before he sets off into a new life, and the two walk in opposite directions. One to the student center, the other to the parking lot.

Dave clambers into the dirt-scented Ford pickup, prays for it to start with no problems, and slowly rumbles his way back to a home with no lioness and no other cubs.

The keys rattle the junk bowl by the front door of the apartment. His boots become the lone residents of the shoe rack that had once housed dozens of teenage boy sneakers.

And then his pocket shakes. A text message.

A picture.

A picture that seals the fissures and faults and makes it difficult to see through growing tears. A picture showing the very same carving on the library shelf, but with four new words right beside it.

I love you, Dad.