A Stone's Throw-- Short Story By Maddie Fenster

By Maddie Fenster

Footsteps weren’t something that this little boy was accustomed to. The only footsteps

he ever heard were his own. Every once in a while, he heard the engine of a car speeding by on

the Interstate, but they were few and far between. There was a single bird that flew overhead

twice a day — once in the mornings, and once in the evenings — and it occasionally let out a

crow, but other than that, the air was mostly still. On this particular morning, the little boy

woke up to a world that seemed quieter than usual. He could hear his heartbeat in his ears. He

could hear some sort of a whine, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. It was so quiet, he

thought he could almost hear the heatwaves rumbling over the cracked dirt.

He dipped his little plastic cup into a bucket that used to be filled with water but now

was almost empty. He’d have to make the long trek to the stream again, soon. He allowed

himself ​

one, two, three​

sips of water before pouring the rest back into the bucket. The sound

echoed weirdly in the hollow air. The boy was too young to know what exactly was making him

feel strange, but he knew that something was off.

He ignored his instincts, as little boys often do, and made his way to the roof of the

building, as he did every morning. He took a stone from his little pile. There were only a few

left; he’d have to collect more, soon. He stood up, shaded his eyes with his hand and squinted

against the sun. He could see the stones he’d thrown before cluttered on the street below him.

He took the stone in his throwing arm and raised his arm above his head before throwing the

stone as hard as he could. ​

One, two, three ​

seconds before he heard it hit the ground and clatter as

it rolled to a stop. It wasn’t any further than his furthest stone: somewhere around the middle.

He shrugged. It didn’t matter. He did it again. This stone fell slightly short of the original one. A

third stone landed a couple feet further than the first. He went back downstairs. He’d throw

them further tomorrow.

He’d made his own little space. The rest of the city would never look like a place that

could harbor life, but he’d made his own space. In a gas station, behind the cashier’s counter,

was a living nook. There was a blanket, all ratty and torn from years of use. There was a

children’s storybook. The boy couldn’t read it, of course, but he liked the pictures. His fingers

had worn the colors off the pages at the edges and corners. His almost-empty bucket of water

was always placed on top of the counter. He couldn’t reach it, but he climbed up and sat on the

counter while he drank. It made him feel big.

He didn’t have anything pressing to do that day. He knew he should go back to the

stream and get water, or go back down the street and lug his rocks back to the roof, but he

didn’t want to. The day was warm and musty, and he didn’t want to be outside.

He was sitting in his little nook when he realized what was making him feel funny. He

was hearing footsteps. He looked at his own feet; he wasn’t walking. He immediately ducked

into a cupboard and hid. Footsteps mean people, and people could mean one of two things —

danger or help. Sometimes the grown-ups were nice. Other times, they were mean. So he hid.

He heard a clattering noise. The foot had probably kicked one of his rocks. He peeked

out from inside his cupboard. He couldn’t see anything from his nook in the gas station. All he

could see was his blanket and storybook. Quietly, he reached out of the cupboard and grabbed

his storybook. He let it fall open in his lap. The spine had creased so the story always opened to

his favorite page, the one he’d spend hours staring at. A little boy hid, clutching a golden egg,

from a giant beast. He stared at the page for a few brief seconds before gently shutting the book

again. He tucked it under his blanket. He examined the paint peeling off the wood opposite him.

He reached across the cupboard and pulled it away. It fell away with a slight ripping noise and

crumbled in his sweaty palm. The day was warm, and he was warming up the whole cupboard.

The footsteps still pounded in the street. Was the person going away?

He heard the bird cry out. The call seemed to echo around the city. The boy stayed silent.

The footsteps pounded outside. Suddenly, the boy froze. The door to the gas station had opened,

the little bell chiming pleasantly to alert a cashier in a far off world that a customer had arrived.

The footsteps paced back and forth. He heard the scraping of metal on metal, canned food being

pulled from the shelves. The boy frowned. That was ​

his ​

food. The cupboard was opened just a

crack. He saw the intruder’s shadow cast on the wall, loud and menacing. It danced and

fluttered as the shape paced back and forth. He held his sleeve over his mouth to keep his

breathing quiet.

The boy was hungry. He was always hungry. His stomach growled. The footsteps

stopped. The boy held his breath. The shadow stood still. The world stopped. The bird called out

again.

And then the shadow moved away. The bell chimed as the intruder left the gas station.

The boy exhaled. He was safe. But he was still a little boy, and little boys are, by nature, curious.

He peeked out of the cupboard. The person had definitely left the gas station. He was safe, at

least for the time being. He pushed lightly on the cupboard door, and winced slightly when the

hinges creaked. He crawled out of his space and peeked out of the window. He could still hear

footsteps, but the figure was nowhere to be seen.

The boy tiptoed to the back closet. Inside was a staircase, which he climbed to get to the

roof. He crouched when he got closer to the edge, so nobody could see him. The little boy

frowned when he saw that his rocks had been displaced. It was early morning, and the sun was

still hugging the horizon. Shadows were long. He saw the intruder’s shadow before he saw her.

The heatwaves slithering on the ground distorted his vision of her. She wasn’t a grown-up.

The little boy had never seen another person that small, at least not for a long time. A

little girl skipped down the street, kicking rocks as she went. Her blonde hair danced despite

the lack of breeze. Her footsteps fell softly and didn’t seem to follow any pattern. A bag was

slung over one shoulder, weighed down with, presumably, the cans of food she’d stolen from the

gas station. The little boy was bothered by her presence — she was disrupting his routine — but

he felt more discomfort than danger. She didn’t look dangerous. She looked small, and she

looked happy, but she didn’t look dangerous. Her footsteps seemed to match in rhythm with his

heartbeat, which didn’t seem to be following any regular pattern, either.

The little boy stayed hidden. He watched her. It was intriguing, seeing the way she

walked. She kept kicking his rocks. Without thinking, the little boy took a pebble from his stash

on the roof and tossed it onto the street below. It took ​

one, two, two and a half​

seconds to hit the

ground. As soon as it did, he ducked even lower, only his eyes peeking over the roof. He saw the

little girl stop in her path, stare at the area on the ground where the pebble had fallen. She

walked over to it, picked it up, and put it in her pocket. Then, she kept walking. The bird cawed.

It sounded solemn and grave, like a warning. He could hear the cries, but couldn’t see the bird

flying overhead. Where was he?

He threw a second stone off the roof, followed by a third. The girl pocketed those as well.

She didn’t pick up any of the stones that were already on the ground, just the ones the boy was

tossing. She didn’t look up, didn’t try to look for where the stones were coming from. The boy

decided he would stay on the roof, because the roof was safe, but then the bird landed a few

yards away from him. He’d never seen the bird up close before; he’d only seen it flying over the

town. It was fat and black and had shiny, mean-looking eyes. The boy and the bird stared at each

other for what could’ve been mere seconds or several minutes, he didn’t know. The sun beat

down on them. The bird opened its black beak. Slowly, the boy crawled to the staircase. He liked

the bird better from far away.

His feet carried him downstairs. It was all loud, the crowing bird and his thumping heart

and his shuffling footsteps and the girl kicking rocks, he could hear it all and it wouldn’t stop.

Finally, he was in the gas station. He could see the girl’s shadow through the window and he

could see the pebbles getting kicked around, but he couldn’t see her. He gulped. He eyed his

safe little corner behind the cash register. He wanted to go there, outside was too hot. A stone

clattered.

The boy breathed in deep and moved to the door. The bell chimed loudly, seemingly

shattering the morning air. The crow stopped crying out. The pebbles stopped clattering. The

boy looked up to find the little girl staring back at him. He was staring at the girl, the girl was

staring at him, he was staring at the crow, the crow was staring back at him, the crow called out

again.

“Hi,” the little girl said. She walked towards him. Instinctively, he stepped away. His

back pressed against the glass window. He felt his tacky skin cling to the glass. She reached into

her pocket and pulled out three stones. “Are these yours?” Her voice was soft and smooth, like

the feeling of fine sand falling through calloused fingertips.

He held out his hand and took them silently. Her shirt was white — properly white, not

used-to-be-white-but-is-now-grey-white — and it stood out starkly against the background. She

was a couple inches taller than him. It made him feel small. The curves on her face were gradual,

her features seemingly blending into one another. He thought she looked like a watercolor

painting, no sharp lines. Everything about him was sharp lines, like a pen sketch. His look was

hard and chiseled despite his youth, shaped by hunger and sleep deprivation. Her face glowed

with curiosity and youth. They stood like that for a few moments, making suspicious eye contact

as each one tried to size the other up.

“I’m Ally,” she said. He nodded. “What’s your name?” The boy gulped.

“Boy,” he said confidently. His voice was hoarse from dehydration.

“‘Boy’s’ not a name.”

“They called me Boy.”

“What about a real name?”

“I don’t got one.” His words tripped over each other awkwardly.

“You don’t got a name? Everybody’s got a name.”

“Not me.”

“Pick one,” the little girl suggested.

“What do you mean?” The little boy frowned. He didn’t know you could pick a name.

“What would you call yourself?” The little boy thought back to his picture book. He

gestured for the girl to follow him inside the gas station, and she did.

“Can you read?” He asked her.

“Kinda,” she said. “Mama’s teaching me.” He nodded, satisfied, and fetched his book

from inside the cupboard.

“What’s his name?” He asked, pointing to an illustration of the blonde-haired boy. The

girl frowned and tried to take the book. He held on tight. She looked at him for a few seconds

before turning the pages, leaving the book in his hands. She examined the words, looking at the

drawings.

“Jack.”

“Then my name’s Jack,” the little boy (now Jack) said.

“Jack,” Ally repeated. She looked him up and down. “Yeah, you look like a Jack.”

Jack nodded. He thought he looked like a Jack, too.

“Why didn’t your Mom give you a name, Jack?”

“She did, I but I ‘ont remember it,” he shrugged. “They didn’t remember it either, they

called me Boy.”

“I like Jack,” Ally said. The bird crowed in agreement. “Jack, are you alone?”

He nodded. It was just him and the bird.

“Do you wanna come with me?”

“Where?”

“The truck,” she said simply. “Mom said to bring back useful things, and you look

useful.” Jack hesitated. He didn’t like grown-ups, but the girl seemed nice and besides, she had

given him a new name. His new name gave him new confidence. Jack from the book was brave,

so he could be, too.

“Okay,” he agreed. He grabbed his blanket from his cubby and shut the cupboard door.

It shut with a ​

bang ​

and a ​

click​

. It sounded like finality. Satisfied, he crossed the room and held

the door open for the Ally. The bell chimed. He waited for the bird to crow, but it stayed silent.

The pair walked down the street, kicking stones as they went. He could feel the weight of the

two stones he’d tossed from the roof in his pocket. With his blanket slung over one shoulder and

his book tucked under one arm, he followed the girl away from the mess of buildings.

Her feet landed softly, skipping and dancing like each had its own mind. Her footsteps

weren’t as loud, next to his own. His feet landed hard, following each other in a perfectly

straight line.

“Shh!” She didn’t like his loud footsteps. “The people are sleeping.”

The boy looked around, frowning. He’d been there a while, and he was pretty sure there

weren’t any other people. Especially not sleeping people. “There’s nobody here.”

The girl looked at him with baby brown eyes. “The people that used to live here. They're

asleep.”

The boy frowned. “They're dead,” he protested. “How can they be sleeping? Sleeping is

only for alive people.”

She pouted at him. “Well, I think they're sleeping.”

He still didn’t think they were sleeping, but he made his footsteps quieter anyway.