Palo Alto Stories

“If you brush like that you’re going to ruin your gums.”

“No I’m not.”

“Do it like this.” He took his brush and did strokes in only one direction at a time, starting from the gums he went down on the top teeth and then up on the bottom teeth. My dad’s teeth were long and nice, except one was a little yellow. He also had heavy eyelids that made him look a little evil.

We went to bed. I lay in the bed with Alex but he didn’t wake up. My eyes got used to the dark and I wandered them down the red band of Indian patterns at the top of the wall. The design was like one long zigzagging tu

In the morning we ate in the great hall. The walls were made of stone and there was a fire in the huge stone fireplace in the center. The pillars around the room were huge, made out of real trees.

“Pancakes are good for hiking,” my father said. “Try to eat all of them.” I tried. I had pancakes and orange juice and hot chocolate and Alex had French toast and hot chocolate and my father ate scrambled eggs and bacon and black coffee. It was all stuff that we didn’t usually eat; we usually had cereal at home. There were also little circular plastic jelly containers with pictures of fruit on them, dewy orange slices, a huge glistening strawberry, two raspberries, side by side, plump and wet. I didn’t have any toast because of the pancakes, but I lined the jellies up at the top of my plate. Five colorful circles.

“Alex only ate half of his French toast,” I said. Three halves of the French toast were soaked in a swamp of syrup.

“He’s smaller.”

“Why do I have to eat all my pancakes?”

“You don’t. But they’re good for energy. That’s what hikers do, they eat a bunch of carbohydrates and your body keeps them inside as spare energy when you need it. If we’re going to go to Yosemite Falls, then you’ll need your energy.”

“Can we go down the waterfall?” said Alex.

“No, stupid, you’d die,” I said.

“Don’t say that. Yes, you would die. The waterfall is very powerful and there are rocks at the bottom. But every once in a while someone gets trapped in the current at the top and they go over by accident.”

“And they die?” said Alex.

“Yup.”

“I don’t want to die,” said Alex.

“ Everyonedies,” I said.

“I’m not going to.”

“You have to,” I said. “You’re going to freakin’ die.”

“Chris, stop.” My dad didn’t get loud but he took my hand and squeezed. “Alex,” he said to my brother. “You might have to die, but it will be okay.” Alex shook his head. “Dying isn’t bad, it’s just another trip. Like our trip here, to Yosemite. It’s like going to another Yosemite.”

Alex said, “I hate Yosemite and I hate dying.” My dad was done with his eggs and had only half a piece of bacon left neatly at the side of his plate. He had put his knife and fork in the center to signal that he was finished. I put my knife and fork the same way on top of the last downy pancake.

My dad sipped his coffee then put the mug down and said, “I know you boys don’t like coming to Yosemite. But I think when you’re older you’ll appreciate it. I never had a place like this when I was young. And if you really don’t like it, we never need to come again. Okay?”

“I want to never come again,” said Alex.

“I like Yosemite,” I said.

“You can go on the waterfall and die,” said Alex.

“Shut up,” I said. I mashed one of his French toasts with my thumb. Alex whined and it looked like he was going to cry.

“Alex, stop. Chris, stop.” We both sat still. “Listen. Neither of you is going to die for a very long time. I promise. And when you do, you can go anywhere you want. It doesn’t have to be Yosemite. It can be any place.”

“Round Table,” said Alex. He meant Round Table Pizza.

On the trail we walked in a line. I was last. We had our puffy jackets on but it wasn’t too cold. Mine was brown and lighter brown, Alex’s was red and blue, and my dad’s was all blue, bigger and less puffy. I told myself brown was better than red and blue.

The sun was low and shot shafts of gold at an angle through the trees. From far away I could see insects and atmosphere dancing, but when I walked through the light it was warm and the insects were gone. The ground was dry. No one was around. It was just us walking.

Our first stop was supposed to be a bunch of caves. My dad pointed up off the trail and we walked up an incline. After a bit, as we walked up the hill, I could see some people standing in front of the caves. When we got closer, I saw that they were a man and a woman in their thirties, wearing shorts and hiking boots and backpacks. The man had light curly hair like mine but his was down to his ears, and the woman had long, straight brown hair. Her legs were thin like a horse’s, and on her knee there was a purple brown scab.

“How’s it going?” my dad said.

“Not bad,” the man said. “Some candles here.” We walked up closer and saw that there was a large circle of white candles in the dirt. The circle was large enough for a person to lie in the middle. “There’s another one in there,” the man said and pointed up toward the cave. My father said nothing, but he took Alex’s hand.

Not long before, I had gone to see The Little Mermaidwith my mom and Alex at the Old Mill Theater. Seeing movies was one of our traditions. In the middle of the movie I got up and went to the bathroom. On the way back I looked into another theater and saw a few minutes of a movie called The First Power. Lou Diamond Phillips was in it. I loved him as Chavez in Young Gunsso I watched. I knew that it was about the devil and I wasn’t supposed to watch. The killer had tied up a woman and put her in the middle of a circle of candles. She was gagged and scared. The killer told her to relax and said he was going to say his prayers backward.

“Heaven, in art which father our are father which art in Heaven.” I left and went back to The Little Mermaidbut I couldn’t forget what I saw.

My father didn’t let us look at the candles in the cave, so we kept walking. He held Alex’s hand and I walked a little behind them. My father and brother both had straight brown hair. The sun was above us and it was hotter. My dad took off his jacket and I took off mine. Alex took his off and we stopped to wait for him to tie it around his waist, but he couldn’t do it so my dad carried it for him.

The next stop was El Capitan. It was a tall, boxy mountain that shot straight up out of the ground. In my mind I always thought of it as yellow-orange because I thought of all the mountains in colors: Half Dome was white and gray; Mount Lyell was green; Mount Dana was pink; Matterhorn Peak was blue; but up close El Capitan wasn’t yellow-orange, it was just dirty white and chalky.

“Look at that tree,” my dad said. It was a tree with reddish bark. High up, some of the branches had been ripped away and in places the bark was ski

There was a little stream going almost next to the base of the mountain. My dad gave us time to explore on our own. I told him I didn’t want any rocks to fall on me and he promised that they wouldn’t. I had nothing to do so I found a place with some sun and I sat with my back against the mountain. I took my shoes off and let my feet feel the air. The water was very close and it trickled and sparkled. From somewhere close I could hear my brother’s voice, high and demanding, and my father’s voice, deep and calming.

Sitting in the sun I felt empty. I was a black center in the middle of all the nature. I was nothing but I could do anything. I could fill myself with anything. I said a prayer. I asked God that I would never be like my father. I told God that I didn’t want to have sons. I said that if I died I would like to have done something good before that happened. I prayed that my brother would die, and then I took it back.