Teddy swallowed and said, “I don’t know, little man. I’m not going to sit here and tell you everything will be fine because it won’t be. If not this time, then some other time. I’m sorry about that. It’s not fair.”
“How come they won’t let me sleep at the hospital with her? Dad gets to.”
“Because you’re only thirteen,” said Teddy. “And even if you were older, I think only one person can stay there. No matter if they’re family or not.”
Clay swallowed. The brown sugar melted down his throat. “I bet if she wasn’t asleep for three days, she would have chose me. Not him.”
“That’s probably true,” said Teddy.
“Dad knows that,” said Clay. “So he should let me stay there instead of him.”
Teddy didn’t respond right away. He ate another half of a Pop-Tart and said: “Want to hear a story about your dad when he was your age?”
“All right.”
“It was 1976. And it was the bicentennial. Know what that is?”
“No.”
“It was the country’s two hundredth birthday. The revolution started in 1776, so 1976 was two hundred years. The wholesummer was like the Fourth of July. Red, white, and blue all over the place. Everyone wearing bicentennial hats and T-shirts every day. And then on the actual Fourth of July, the whole day was like times ten.”
“Was it fun?” said Clay.
“We thought it was,” said Teddy. “We were fourteen. Of course the coolest part about it, to me anyway, was the fireworks. And sometimes firecrackers. They were illegal in Minnesota, but you could buy them in Wisconsin. Only an hour away. So one day your grandpa Karl, he tells me and your dad we’re going fishing over in Wisconsin. And we did go fishing. He was a plunker like your dad.”
“What’s a plunker?” said Clay.
“Anglers who throw big lures. Or live bait. Things that make akerplunksound when they hit the water. But not fly fishermen. We’re quiet. We fished this small lake over there. Caught some nice ones. Grandpa Karl and your dad always kept their keepers. We had a cooler to put ’em in, but we didn’t have any ice for the drive back. We stopped to get some at a gas station, and there was a fireworks store right next to it.”
“Did you get some?” said Clay.
“Well,” said Teddy, “there was some begging involved. More by me than Judd. Even at fourteen years old, he was kind of a rule follower. Fireworks were legal in Wisconsin, but we didn’t live in Wisconsin. We lived right here in Minnesota where fireworks are not legal, and he had mixed feelings about breaking the law.”
“Sounds like him.”
“But I kept pushing and eventually Grandpa Karl agreed to let us get a few things. Mostly sparklers and snakes and thingsthat didn’t go boom. But he did let us get some ladyfingers, which are basically skinny firecrackers. They do the same thing but seem less dangerous. Anyway, when we were in there and Grandpa Karl was paying, I did something I shouldn’t have done. I stole a whole brick of firecrackers.”
“How’d you do that?”
“Overalls. Slipped the firecrackers in ’em and walked out. Then when we got home, I opened up a bunch of firecrackers from the brick I stole and emptied out the black powder. Now you got to promise me, Clay, I mean swear on your mother’s soul, that you’ll never try what I’m about to tell you.”
“I promise,” said Clay.
“You swear on your mother’s soul? Because if you don’t, I can’t tell you the rest of the story.”
“I swear on my mother’s soul,” said Clay.
“All right, then,” said Teddy. “You ever hear of a big firecracker called an M-80?”
“I’ve heard about ’em,” said Clay. “They’re really powerful. Can blow stuff up and everything.”
“They sure can,” said Teddy. “That’s why they’re illegal. Plenty of people out there who can only count to seven on both hands because they were messing around with M-80s.”
“Man,” said Clay.
“Manis an understatement. And I’m not proud of what I’m about to tell you. Because I had my mind set on making an M-80. I’d seen one before. They look like a big fat firecracker in a cardboard tube, and the fuse comes out of the side, not the top. I don’t know why it comes out the side, but it does. So I found a narrow cardboard tube, filled it with the black powder I tookfrom the firecrackers, plugged the ends, and drilled a little hole in the side for the fuse.”
“Did you light it?”
