The One You Get by Jason Tougaw

Author:Jason Tougaw
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dzanc Books
Published: 2017-04-09T04:00:00+00:00

18

THE REAL IDAHO

Observer memory:

There’s a kid looking out a window from a small white house. His mom, who is five feet tall and has short, thick, curly hair, is standing next to him, her hand on his shoulder. They’re watching a 1970 beige Mercedes 280SL pull away from the curb. They watch until it pulls up to the corner and turns right out of sight and then keep watching. They don’t say anything, and they don’t cry.

Field memory:

“Boog, come here.” There’s something wrong, or she wouldn’t call me that. She knows I’m too old for it. The DWI behind her, my mom finally found us a house to rent, a little bungalow in Escondido just a few blocks from Nanny. She’s in the kitchen and I’m in the living room, facing the front window and the television, my back to her.

“Why?”

“I want to talk to you about something.”

“What?”

“The Grill is going under. That lady who owns it is shutting it down.”

“So Nanny won’t work there?”

“No. She has to go to Idaho, to live with Lee.” She means the real Idaho, the state. Lee is my mom’s cousin, the one who lived with them as a teenager because his parents were murdered.

Lee lives in Sun Valley. He’s a divorced alcoholic with two kids, Chris and Laura. Chris is my age and lives with Lee. Laura is fifteen and lives with her mom. Nanny will be taking care of Chris when Lee is flying. Lee flies drunk. It’s a well-known family fact.

“She’s going to Idaho to live with Lee.” The sentence seizes me.

“She’s moving from Idaho Street to Idaho?” It’s all I can think to say.

I’m stuck in that sentence for weeks. I help Nanny pack. I help her move her antiques into storage, including the painting of the dream girl. I have a final dinner with her, my mom, and Craig. We eat filet mignon. I watch as the Mercedes pulls from the curb. I take phone calls and listen to stories about Chris sledding in the snow and what she is making him for dinner.

One day, a package arrives: stickers with a red filigree border and blue lettering on the inside that read JASON in an ornate typeface. There is a Polaroid in the envelope, of the Mercedes covered in mounds of snow. The windows are partially clear of the white stuff, and you can see a little of the dark brown interior. There’s a house in the background. The Mercedes is saying, “Aren’t you proud of me? I’ve been through so much since I saw you last. I’m worldly, and I’m surviving even though I’m frozen. Everybody in Sun Valley is rich.”

I take one of the stickers and wrap it around the white border on the bottom of the Polaroid. There isn’t enough space for the whole thing, so only the top half of my name shows.

Memory uses a variety of tricks to twist the past to the needs of the present. An observer memory is a view of

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