So, despite how much he talked about it last spring, the DS is utterly irrelevant to a 14-year-old whose school opened two months late, whose girlfriend now lives in Alabama and whose house now bears a permanent line of demarcation 24 inches high. For a life uprooted, videogames lose their glamours, reverting back into plastic, silicon and dust.
***
When the 17th Street Canal levee broke less than a mile from George's family's house, most of the water flowed southward and to the east, infamously pooling in the concavity that is downtown New Orleans. As for the western side of the rift, events transpired differently. Luckily, the Metairie canal wall held, and the suburb managed to avoid most of Katrina's tragic aftermath. Although the town still experienced significant flooding, it is situated a few inches higher than the neighboring parishes, and therefore, the waters stayed relatively low.
George's family's house sustained moderate damage, mostly from the initial hurricane strike. At its highest, the water only rose two feet; not inconsequential, but minor enough that George's mother and brothers refused a FEMA trailer (opting instead to live in the second floor of their house until the first could be repaired). Aside from a ruined porch and a fugitive shed, the only structural damage was located in George's old room.
During the ride home from dinner and the airport, George is like a pillar of Grecian marble, pale and blank. That water has warped his old Magic cards and wrinkled his high school yearbook doesn't bother him, not really. If anything, it's the possibility, the unknowing, that does. But there is one object about which I know he's concerned: A childhood treasure, one he's had for more than a decade.
Hanging close to a window now smashed in by Katrina is a limited edition poster of Samus Aran, circa Super Metroid era. Gleaming in her Varia Suit, she kneels among sand and rocks, with her smoking arm cannon raised upward and the lonely Zebian desert reflected in her visor. Only 2,000 were ever made, and he has #1,968. But it is more than some collector's item; this poster is a tintype of the first girl to ever steal his heart. Like every man (and most women) of his generation, part of him still loves Samus Aran. She is his adolescence, his coming-of-age, a symbol of permanence and power and invincibility. What would it mean if she had been destroyed?
The drive to his house seems to last longer than usual. When we finally arrive, George immediately shuffles upstairs, walking with awkward and forced slowness. Our luggage leans against the stairs, completely forgotten.
I follow him into his old room where a musky, sweet pungency hangs in the air; it is the smell of water stagnated, evaporated and re-condensed over many months. Perfectly nonchalant, George glances at the wall by the window. He pauses. Clearly, it takes him a few seconds to process the swirl of red and yellow, to register that, indeed, Samus Aran still crouches on his bedroom wall. His eyes linger on her for many moments, until quietly, privately, he sighs and looks away. With furrowed brows and a frown, he turns to survey the damage to the rest of the room.
Maybe some talismans really are magic.
But as we clean, I can't help but feel something indistinct and odd has transpired. I notice he avoids looking Samus' direction. Even as he carefully packs away the poster to be sent by mail to our apartment up north, he does not look too closely at her, and he does not idle in his task. Briefly, I wonder if he might blame her somehow for surviving the hurricane. Or, in light of his subtle detachment, if she had really survived at all.
***
Late one evening, the five of us have gathered in the dusty, empty kitchen for dessert. George sits with his brothers at a shabby card table, dining on pre-wrapped cookies and warm Coke. Valiantly, he tries to make conversation, but his formerly gregarious brothers are now sullen and quiet. I can hear the frustration creep into his voice. Maybe there's no use in even trying anymore.
