High School Freak

by Aaron Grunn

warrants."

  "What did he do?" asked John.

  "He was known for fighting. Which in the bars of Montana isn't anything new, but for a sixteen year old it meant he made enemies quick. So by the time he was seventeen, he'd been in jail for so many fights that our local sheriff said one more and he'd lock him up for good. One bad apple and all that. Mainly it was because your old man roughed up a local rancher's son. Rich man, so you know, more consequences."

  John waited as his uncle took a sip. Hearing about his father when he was near John's age made John feel like he was older, like a father, or his father, and he pointed at the glass of wine and when Tom handed it to him, he took a sip.

  "Well, he got into another fight and found himself in jail. Looking at a long stretch. Something like a few years," Tom said shaking his head. "That's your law for you."

  "Then what?"

  "Then I helped to break him out. It was a small local jail, so all it took was walking in on the deputy, who was asleep, and knocking him out. Got the keys and we drove off to New York. Made it in two days."

  "The Impala?"

  "That's right, the Impala."

  "That makes more sense," John said.

  "It might, it might not. But it is what it is," Tom said.

  "When you came to New York everything went well?"

  "As well as it could. We moved into the Bronx trying to stay away from trouble, and started a company as movers. Easy enough work, and plenty of it in Manhattan at least."

  "Nice."

  "But your old man was never good in a small cage. He had to push the limits."

  "How?"

  "He became a fighter in one of the underground fighting rings in the City."

  "What's wrong with that?"

  "Nothing, unless you're trying to keep a low profile," Tom said as he shook his head and finished his glass of wine.

  John's mother gave a slight snore. Her neck was bent at an angle and she twitching, sleeping with apparent exhaustion.

  "How did he get caught? Why did you leave the City?"

  John's mother woke up and looked at them both, the birth of a smile on her face. "All right it's late you two. John, get to bed."

  John wanted to argue, but decided that he'd put her through enough for a day. He took in a deep breath, trying to remember this moment. It felt good, and he'd never felt closer to his mother before in his life. He gave her a kiss and went to bed.

  As John drifted to sleep in his small bed, he wondered if there was a reason they'd told him all that they told him tonight. There was something else lurking in the words they'd spoken.

  John woke up to hear some voices arguing. It was Tom and his mother, and though they were trying to be quiet, they were hissing at each other in sharp frequencies that pierced John's ears.

  "What's going on?" John said rubbing out the crust in one of his eyes as he walked into the kitchen. They jumped. John looked at the clock and saw that it was four in the morning. "Why're you up so early?"

  He looked at Tom's breakfast, half eaten eggs and bacon, on the kitchen counter.

  "You can tell him," his mother said in a hurt voice.

  "I'm heading out today."

  John stared at Tom, the sound of his own heart beating, the feeling of his blood coursing through his muscles and brain, slowing everything down. "Why?" John managed to say. His voice threatened to crack; his eyes threatened to tear up, but he maintained a stoic face. He would not feel anything for this man who, for a split second the night before, he saw as his father.

  "I've to keep moving. I'd a call last night and they told me..."

  "They?" John jumped in.

  "People I know as sources."

  John felt slighted again, though he shouldn't have been. It was only natural that Tom would not have told him everything. But given that his mother and uncle had waited so long to tell him about his father, he couldn't help his reaction. "And they said?"

  "That I need to get moving. I usually don't stay in built up areas for more than a day. I made an exception."

  John knew he should've taken it as a compliment. Instead, he took it as a slap to his face. "Well thanks so much," John said, laying the words out with the kindest voice he could fake.

  "John, don't be rude."

  "Are you ever going to come back?" John asked Tom, ignoring his mother, because he also blamed her for Tom wanting to leave.

  "Not likely."

  "No, then."

  Tom looked down at his plate of food and started to eat it.

  John felt his tears overwhelming his willpower. "Where are you going then?"

  "I don't know."

  "Or you won't say?" John said.

  "I won't say because I don't know where I'll go. I've never known where I'll go. That's the simple truth of the matter."

  John believed him and didn't reply.

  "John, he has to get moving, and that's his decision," his mother said.

  John studied his uncle's face. In his mind he was slowly waking up and realized something: he would become his uncle. There was no way around it. Was that all he had to look forward to in life? "Are they coming here?" John asked.

  "That's the word," Tom said his mouth half full.

  John stared at the food, the smell of the bacon hit his brain and he felt his stomach rumble. As if to second the thought, his head went dizzy for a second. "Because they saw you?"

  "Yup."

  "What about us?"

  "I don't know."

  John glanced at his mother. "Are we in danger?"

  "We've always been in danger," she said.

  The thought of men, multiple men who didn't care one lick for his life, scared John. "They're looking for dad, right? Why don't you tell them that he doesn't have anything to do with us?"

  "They're not going to listen," Tom said, his voice turning on a nagging tone. "Do not try to talk to these people. Besides there is a reason they're after your father, and that's the same reason that they will soon be after you."

  "They know about me?" John asked, still trying to come to grips with this situation.

  "No, they don't. But they know your mother, and if they find that she's given birth, they'll know whose son you are."

  "But they don't know I'm..."

  "John," Tom said, his voice low and stern. "This isn't something you want to test. They will know that you are your father's son, and they'll test you until they find out how special you are."

  "Then?"

  Tom's head fell down on his feet. "They'll use you until they can't use you anymore and that will be that."

  "And mom?"

  Tom shrugged.

  John knew what that meant, or at least he thought he did. An invisible hand gripped his heart, and pushed it up his throat. He wanted to vomit.

  "Eat something," Tom said and pushed his eggs in front of John.

  John's mother placed her arm around him. "I'm sorry John. I really am."

  It took a few seconds before John's thoughts could reach out and grasp what was happening and a few more seconds before he calmed down and his heart stopped having a seizure.

  "And you're just going to let them do that to us?" John asked Tom.

  "You're both more than welcome to come with," Tom said.

  "No," John's mother snapped at Tom. "Don't even think about it. I've given him a normal life for this long, and I'm not about to stop."

  John heard the hurt and defensiveness in his mother's voice. He now wished that he could've severed all ties with his father and his uncle.

  "So you're leaving," John said with as little emotion as he could force into words.

  "That's right. I'll drop you off to school. Is that all right?" asked Tom.

  John wanted that. Just another moment to talk to his uncle would be so therapeutic, but he felt he would only get more attached and make saying good-bye that much harder. Perhaps, he thought for a second, he should try to never talk to another human being again.

  "Don't worry," John said. "You should he
ad off." As he spoke he felt tears rise up and one rolled down his cheek. He turned, hoping that Tom didn't see it.

  "Hey there," Tom said and embraced him. "Take it easy. I'd like to drop you off, but if not, that's fine too."

  John nodded.

  "Another thing, love," his mother said. "We will have to be extra careful from now on. I want you to come back right after school. No hanging around anywhere. And if you see someone odd, give me a call. All right?"

  John smiled for his mother and hugged her. He watched, as if in a movie, as she got ready for work and drove off. John sat on the couch and closed his eyes. Inside his body he felt, as he drifted off, all the recent information rearranging his insides.

  "John, John."

  John awoke and for a second thought he was staring at his father, the one in the picture.

  "You've got to get going, John."

  John looked at the clock on the wall. He was late.

  "What time does school start?" asked Tom.

  John couldn't get over the idea that Tom could have been his father. "Soon," John said, his voice cracked.

  "Come, I'll give you a ride."

  John ate some food, brushed his teeth ad locked the door. He felt sure that Tom was observing him like a proud father would.

  John hopped in the car, and listened to the engine rumble.

  He wanted to ask so many questions that he ended up watching the neighborhood go by instead. He wished that he'd written down the questions from when he was a kid and drew pictures of his father, or when he went somewhere with his mother and wondered why she didn't have a man next to her like the other mothers.

  "Take care," John said and opened the car door.

  "John, listen," Tom said, his hand grasping John's shoulder. "Take this."

  John looked down and saw something that looked like a black matchbox, but it was made out of plastic.

  "What's this?"

  "It's to contact me. You run into trouble, you or your