The only forest in New York City is located in Queens, in the neighborhood of Forest Hills.
He went to the closet in Brian’s room, dug through bags and boxes that he and Emma had filled, and found a change of clothes for his wife. He hardly paid attention to the items, just pants, blouse, sweater, panties, socks. He found a pair of pajamas for Brian, a onesie with footies, a red and green holiday-themed kind of thing, baby becomes an elf. But when Apollo held it up, he realized that if Brian was alive, he wouldn’t fit these clothes anymore. He’d be ten months old now. This idea struck him with a cold sadness. So chilling he had to grab some size-one pajamas quickly and jam them into the bottom of the bag and just get out of that room.
In the living room he packed the mattock, then set Emma and Brian’s clothes down on top of it. He closed the lid and lifted it. With the mattock inside, the suitcase felt heavy with violence.
Instinctively he checked his coat for his wallet, but it had been lost. No ATM card, no credit cards, no driver’s license. He had ceased to exist in any modern sense. Or more precisely, he had lost access to nearly his entire modern existence. The only totem left was his phone.
In the kitchen there were cracker crumbs on the bronze grave marker. Beside the grave marker lay his father’s book. Apollo opened the suitcase one more time. He packed the book and the grave marker. For a moment he pawed through the contents: a mattock, some clothes, a children’s book, and a gravestone. This was how you packed for a trip to another world, not another borough.
Off he went.
IT SNOWED IN Queens. Apollo left the train station—Forest Hills–71st Avenue—and as he climbed the stairs to the sidewalk, he felt the flakes against his face. The stairwell was so crowded—rush hour in full effect—that he nearly lost his grip on his suitcase twice just from all the jostling. He stopped at the top of the stairs, his arms tired from hauling the bag, but he wasn’t given any time to get his wind back because there were five hundred more men and women right behind him, and didn’t they all have things to do? Trying to stand in place would’ve been like turning his back on a cyclone. He was tossed and nearly turned over. He scurried against the nearest storefront, a Chase bank. The evening sky turned as dark as shale, and the snow came down. The thick flakes clung to umbrellas and hats, the roofs of cars and buses.
The snow continued to fall and traffic backed up on 71st Avenue. A white family had hailed a livery cab, and now the mother was loading a gaggle of children into the backseat. The father folded the stroller with expertise and walked to the back of the cab, knocking on the trunk. Both mother and father looked haggard and angry, and Apollo felt his throat tighten with envy.
Those crackers hadn’t filled him up much. Neither had four cups of water. Down the block he saw a Starbucks sign. He’d lost his wallet—all his money—but he might still get something in his belly. He had the Starbucks app on his phone. Enough on his account for a meal he could take with him into the forest. If they had sandwiches, he could even leave a trail of breadcrumbs so he and Emma and Brian might find their way out.
—
It was a cramped little Starbucks branch, long and narrow. The store had the look of a sunken living room. Enter, then climb down three stairs. There were two small tables with two chairs at each. The tables had been pushed together, and somehow nine teenagers had fit themselves into those four seats. Seven o’clock, most people returning home from work, but still a long line.
“Welcome to Starbucks. May I take your order?”
He couldn’t see the barista yet, the line ran that long. He scanned the small fridge unit where they kept sandwiches and salads, juices and milks and waters. He figured he’d clear them out, or at least as much as he could carry. He could also just grab it and run. He was in a fucking hurry, after all. The thought of committing the crime—even one so minor—caused a memory flare. He was on parole. He opened his phone and checked for recent calls. There were a few. He recognized Lillian’s number. There had been six from a 212 caller that could’ve been his PO. None had left messages. What if he swiped those sandwiches and got caught? Hard to flee when you’re hauling a suitcase. And what was inside it? Holy shit, if he was found to be a shoplifting parole violator with a digging tool and a grave marker? Why in holy hell had he brought those things? His rational mind scolded his magical thinking. He resigned himself to wait on line patiently. He’d even say sir or ma’am to the barista just to be safe.
Then this wild-looking old white man, standing five places ahead in line, leaned into the fridge unit and scooped up all the remaining food. Just like that. Those awful prepackaged sandwiches cradled in one arm, and the slightly less awful prepackaged salads in the other. He cleared the damn thing out. The old man reached the register and dropped the gathered food across the counter.
“I better get you a bag or two,” the barista said.
“Oh?” the old man said. “Do you think so, Louise? I thought I’d carry all this on my head.”
The barista ignored the words, registering only a weary fluttering in her eyes. When she brought two paper bags from under the counter, the old man leaned forward and snatched them from her. The woman didn’t even respond, only scanned each item and handed it over.
The old man leaned backward and squinted at the other customers. He looked like an old Viking gone to pasture, but a hint of the berserker still remained. Despite his age, the tall old man fairly throbbed with vitality, slim, and the skin of his face was tight against his cheeks. He had a thinning beard, and his hair, visible in wisps underneath his wool cap, looked like white lines of electricity.
“How much?” he demanded. “How much?”
“It’s right there!” a man behind him on line snapped, pointing at the register’s display.
The old man looked at the other customer and slapped the counter. “Do you know there was a time when a man might be told the price to pay? Instead of having to read it off a screen!”
“Weren’t dinosaurs alive then, too?” the man asked.
The old Viking frantically patted at his waist as if he were reaching for a gun, or a battle-ax, and seemed mystified when he found no weapon there. The man who’d made the dinosaur snap waved the old man off wearily.
The old man took his bags of Starbucks food, beaten but unbowed. He muttered to himself as he walked, head down. He slammed past the table crowded with teenagers. To Apollo’s surprise, they said nothing. Their phones held their attention.
“When Papa was away at sea,” the man grumbled as he plowed through the store and continued to mutter as he moved.