Wally

by Rowan Massey

  “I know. Sorry.” I shrugged and sagged my shoulders. It was the end of a very short era. “You guys go eat without me.”

  They complained, so did I, and then I left them to go down the streets on my own. I walked onto the empty field half an hour later, reminded of when the three of us had danced early in the day. But I didn’t see Doc anywhere. The volunteers hadn’t even shown up yet.

  A car horn honked, and I spun to my right. Doc’s SUV was parked down by the corner. I jogged over to the SUV, opening the door and hopping in. I slammed the door.

  “Hey,” he said, distracted by something on his phone, “I need your help. We can’t keep neglecting the fielder research. I’m still working on Upsilon, but I’ll have to manage both. Can you stay on your toes for me?”

  He lowered the phone and looked over to me. I nodded but hoped whatever he needed wouldn’t take ten hours of work every day or anything.

  “I haven’t gone around asking my questions in a long time,” he said. “I want to catch everyone on my list and go through the usual questionnaire.”

  I let my head fall back onto the headrest while he reached into the back seat to grab clip boards and papers out of a crate behind his seat. He was going to turn me into a joke on the field.

  When he handed me a list of names and a clipboard, he saw the look on my face and said, “What?”

  “Everybody’s going to be saying I’m a giant dork,” I said, slapping the papers onto my knee.

  He threw his head back and laughed. I didn’t appreciate that.

  “I’m sorry, Wally,” he said, still laughing. “God, I haven’t laughed in a while. I forget how fragile a teenager’s image can be. Are you telling me you won’t do it?”

  I rolled my eyes and turned my head to the window. He let me sit there and think, but he was bouncing his pen on the steering wheel, waiting for an answer.

  “I guess I have to,” I said, shrugging up to my ears.

  He laughed again. “Good. Okay. The volunteers will be here any minute. You know, I was just hoping the kids would be more open to talking to you. I didn’t think about you being embarrassed about it.”

  “It’s okay,” I grumbled. “It’s my job.” But maybe not for long.

  “You need a pen,” he said. “Look in the glove compartment.”

  I opened it and fished around in the napkins, random papers, and trash he had in there. There was no pen. I closed the compartment with a little too much of a slam, then cringed. I was mostly tense because I was thinking about the conversation I needed to have with him eventually.

  “Are you that upset about it?” he asked.

  “No, it’s not that.” I avoided looking at him and ran my finger down the list of names he’d given me.

  “So what is it?”

  I tried to build up my courage and just say it, just ask.

  “Are you messing with the batches? Are they really normal?” I was scared to watch his reaction, but looked at him out of the corner of my eye. There was a twitchy blink, but he didn’t look guilty other than that.

  “I told you. I’m not doing that. The batches are normal.”

  “Then why is everybody feeling bad?” My fingernails scratched at the leg of my jeans. Why couldn’t he just tell the truth?

  “Well, maybe these questionnaires can help us figure that out, but I have a lot I’m working on right now, okay?”

  I decided to look right at him and tell him how I knew he was lying.

  “I needed fielders early because Spitz was in the battle when Red House got blown up. I took some from your cabinet from three months ago. It worked. It worked better than anything we’ve had for a while. That means something’s wrong with your batches. And you would know what’s in every batch we’re getting. So are you doing this or not?”

  I’d caught him. I could see it in his face. He was surprised, his eyebrows lifting further up his face with everything I said, but then his face fell into a guilty frown. He looked away from me to where the volunteers had showed up and started setting up.

  “Wally…” he started.

  “You lied to me,” I said, tossing the stupid clipboard into the crate behind him. “Why did you have to lie? You’re just like Avi. You act like you’re so much better than him and London, but all of you fuckers just want to use us as lab rats! Just because you’re rich doesn’t mean you get to play around with our lives!”

  His head snapped around to look at me, and he shook his head over and over.

  “No, Wally, absolutely not. That’s not what I’m trying to do.”

  “Oh, fuck off! You act nice, but you’re a dick. You have no idea what I went through because of you. Things I usually would have just moved on from. And guess what? Now I’m back to normal. Ever since I met you, things have been shit, but now I’m back to normal, and I want everybody to have the good batches again, or else. I’ll tell everybody what you’re doing, and Barkley will know too!”

  I hadn’t planned on telling people or threatening to make sure Barkley knew, but it wasn’t a bad idea. In the heat of the moment, I noticed that I wasn’t overly emotional or wanting to cry like I might have before. I was just dealing with the situation.

  Doc’s expression went dead serious, all the guilt disappearing when he heard my threat.

  “That is not happening,” he said in a deeper voice. “Calm down. We can work this out.”

  “Yeah, you can stop fucking around with our heads. That would work things out.”

  He sucked in a breath and covered his eyes with his hand, obviously trying to get his shit together.

  “How long have you been taking the batch from three months ago?” he asked.

  “I told you. Since just after the bombing.”

  “Thank you for telling me. That’s important to know.”

  Right. For his fucking research.

  “Here’s what’s going on,” he said, lowering his hand to his lap and looking me in the eye. “Have you noticed anything else about the past month or so? There have been a quarter of the drops there were before. Each batch I’ve made has successfully weaned you all off the drug by at least seventy-five percent. That could turn into one hundred percent, Wally. I can’t turn my back on results like that. Think of your friends. All of them could live out their entire lives, right into old age.”

  With every sentence he said to me, I slid my back closer to the door until my head tapped against the glass.

  He was curing us. The asshole was curing us. I’d told him and told him why that was fucked up.

  “We want,” I said through my teeth, “to die on the field.”

  “How sure are you of that? Have you asked everyone? Some of them might disagree, and they deserve the choice.”

  Fuck, he was incredibly stupid. How long had he been around us every day? Somehow he still managed to be completely delusional. None of us would choose that.

  “We want to be happy,” I said, leaning towards him, trying to get the words through his thick skull. “Fielders are supposed to make us happy. You’re cheating us!”

  “Listen, you’ve made your choice.” He held up his hands, trying to calm me down. “I’ll make you your own batches and prove to you it’s the same one you stole. But everyone else gets a choice in this, Wally. It’s only fair. I’ll tell them myself. Let them decide. We’ll spread the word. I don’t care what Barkley thinks, alright? This is my life’s work. That thug doesn’t factor in for me. I’m already setting up my own factory somewhere else soon, and I can make whatever batches I want and smuggle them into town. In any case, I’ll be spreading the news all over the world when things are ready. Those are the facts of the matter.”

  I turned and squeezed the door handle, getting out as fast as I could. I’d never slammed the door so hard. Doc was out of my life. That fucker had never been anything but trouble, and he was in for a surprise when he started going around asking people if they wanted to be happy again or go back to feeling like shit.

  “Wally, wait!” He
called.

  He was coming around the SUV towards me. I stopped and crossed my arms, facing him.

  “You don’t think anyone will want to wean off, do you? So what if we make a deal here?” he said, taking slow steps towards me like I might bite.

  “What deal?”

  “Spitz and Fiona can be told. I know you tell them everything. I’ll supply them with the old fielders if they want them. But you give me a couple weeks to deal with everything I’ve got on my plate right now before you tell any other friends. I’ll make an announcement myself. Anybody who wants the old fielders will get them. People who want to wean off will get that from me. Barkley can get his batches somewhere else after the announcement. I won’t do it anymore.”

  “Even I know Barkley won’t just let you do that,” I said. What was he thinking? “He’ll kick your ass for trying to take away his main attraction right after losing Red House.”

  “Let me handle that. All I’m asking from you is a couple weeks. Please.” He had his hands pressed together in front of his chest as if he were praying. He was begging me. “Someone I consider family is dying, and the research I’ve done on fielders is my life’s work. Please, Wally.”

  “Don’t wean people off any more than you already have without telling them,” I said, thinking it through. “For two weeks, you change nothing. And if I bring you somebody who had a trauma and needs the real thing, they get the real thing.” It made me feel dizzy to be making demands from Dr. Sardana, someone who I’d admired, someone who I knew was powerful. But there I was, settling the terms of a deal with the devil. I told myself it didn’t matter. I did feel sorry for him and knew he was working himself to death. Nando had been forgiven for murder. Dr. Sardana would probably get my forgiveness right after I danced. The field would go back to normal as soon as Doc realized nobody wanted his cure. He would be upset when he finally realized it was all for nothing. I pitied him.

  Doc put his hand out for me to shake.

  “Deal?” he asked.

  I shook his hand. “Deal,” I said. “And I don’t want to ask people to do your questionnaire.”

  He gave me a small smile. “That’s alright.”

  “I’m gonna go find my friends,” I said. “Let’s just go cool off. I’ll see you later.”

  He nodded. “Thanks, Wally. You’re being very mature about this. I know it wasn’t easy to compromise.”

  “Yeah, you’re welcome.”

  I backed up and turned to walk away. His footsteps told me he’d done the same.

  Since I was starting to need to dance, my anger might have been a little more intense than it would have been during the rest of the day. The frustration over Doc’s lies gave me the energy to stomp down the sidewalk, back towards where I knew my friends and boyfriend would be. The argument went on in my head for blocks, but I kept telling myself it was over and everything would turn out.

  When I passed by a cheap cafe, I decided it was a good day to treat myself. After buying two hot biscuits and smearing grape jelly on them, I sat outside on the curb where my friends would be sure to see me if they had finished eating and passed by on their way to the field. Even after finishing my food, I must have sat there for a long while, lost in my racing thoughts.

  “Wally, what are you doing?” Nando was pedaling the cart down the other side of the street, calling to me. Spitz and Fiona were sitting in the cart behind him, and they turned around to look.

  I stood and jogged across the street to them.

  “Don’t ask,” I said, not ready to talk about it. I jumped over the side of the cart and sat behind Spitz and Fiona. Everybody could dance first before they had to hear about Doc.

  “Well, I can go two more blocks with you guys,” Nando said, smiling his crooked smile at me. “Then I’m getting a ride to the river.”

  “I miss you dealing on the field,” I told him, and reached out to him even though he was too far to touch. He’d turned to face the street and pedal us along.

  “I can’t say I miss it much,” he said, half-turning his head towards me, “because I see you in any case. But I do miss working with Rydel. I never see him anymore.”

  I twisted to look at Spitz, the back of his blond head so familiar, and could imagine how Nando must feel. Not even wanting to think about it, I settled into the corner and shut my eyes, letting the air hit my face.

  ◆◆◆

  Spitz and Fiona were dancing—faces bloody and tilted back—right next to me when I came back from being a god. I’d been holding a musical galaxy in my hands, just staring at it in amazement. It was hard to go from that to being so small and dependent on my body. I was swaying, the world wobbling side to side. Stumbling out to the edge of the crowd, I found a dry spot on the ground to sit and watch them dance, trying to imagine what music they heard.

  I was so satisfied with what was right in front of me, that I didn’t think about anything else, especially not Doc, until I saw him walking around with his clipboard, just like in the old days. I thought of the wheel of emotions he’d shown me when he’d hired me, each pie slice with its own feeling and color. The Wally that had existed in between then and now hadn’t been able to live at a ten, but I was at a ten right then, and that meant all along none of it had mattered.

  Spitz and Fiona came towards me, one after the other, as if their dances had started and ended at the same time. How did they do that?

  I stood and opened my arms wide. With grins on their faces, they came to me and we pressed our bodies together. Our foreheads touched, and we all had each other’s blood on our faces. Fiona’s dirty braid brushed against my cheek, her ribbons ruined.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said. “I have stuff to tell you guys.”

  We headed out holding hands, like always, like we always should and would, and got in the cart. I pedaled. Instead of talking, I sang, and they sang with me. We were all a little tired, so we sang lazy, skipping lyrics that we didn’t care about remembering and picking it up where we did remember. In the end, between the three of us, every part of the song came out of somebody’s mouth, so it was complete.

  When we got to me and Nando’s, he was outside smoking a cigarette. I’d forgotten he’d been given a few hours of work that night. He’d stopped smoking inside because it was fucking up my sinuses so that I couldn’t breathe in my sleep and I kicked around all night.

  “Do you have time before work, Spitz?” I asked. “We need to talk.”

  He got out the phone I’d stolen from Doc’s and looked at the time.

  “Yeah, we can chill a few minutes,” he said.

  He and Fiona sat on the back of the cart, and I sat next to Nando on the stoop.

  “So…Doc confessed today that he’s been fucking around with our batches of fielders. Everyone’s fielders,” I said.

  The reactions were what I expected. Fiona looked mad, Spitz looked worried, and Nando looked curious. I told them all about the conversation I’d had with him, and about the deal I’d made.

  “Was it wrong for me to make that deal?” I asked, needing their opinions. “I know it shouldn’t be my choice.”

  They were all silent, thinking, which made me sink down, wondering if they would all think I’d handled it badly.

  “I don’t see how it matters,” Nando said. “It’s just two weeks. Everything will blow over pretty fast after that.”

  “I don’t know, will it?” Spitz said, rubbing at the dried blood on his neck. “How many people will take Doc’s drugs? How the fuck will Barkley react to this shit? Might be a huge mess coming at us.”

  “Nobody will want to wean off,” I said with a smirk. “It will blow over because his plan will be a total failure. Barkley won’t have to react because we will. We’ll all be saying no fucking thanks.”

  Spitz frowned and shook his head, but Fiona spoke before he did.

  “I’m sure as shit doing better on the older batch,” she said, smiling, and put an arm around Spitz. “Don’t worry, baby. He’s right. And I f
eel sorry for the Doc too. It won’t be easy for the old man when he gets disappointed, and his friend is dying and all. I would have made the deal with him too.”

  “But…I…” Spitz was staring hard at his boots. He took a big breath and blew it out. “I might want to wean off.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked. That was impossible for him to want, so I didn’t get it.

  He looked up at Nando without raising his head. “I’m with Dread Red now,” he said. “I’m supposed to be protecting the town. How can I do that if…I’m not saying I’m not taking it again if I end up wanting to kill myself and feeling fucked up like I was, but if I weaned off so I could defend the town, I could take it to feel better for a day or two, and then wean off again. It wouldn’t have to be…it doesn’t have to be our lives anymore. We can be more than that. Wally, we don’t have to die.”

  Nando kept sitting up straighter while he listened, and he put his cigarette out on the cold steps.

  “You have a point, Spitz,” he said.

  I couldn’t believe it. I had my mouth open, staring at the both of them. Fucking crazy shit heads! How could Spitz care about fighting that much? It wasn’t him. It wasn’t my Spitz.

  Nando went on. “This town needs guys like you to toughen up like I did. It’s hard, but we need you. I know how fucked up fighting can be, but it gets a little easier, and the town will be safer. Our families are safer if we’re on top of things.”

  “How is he not on top of things?” Fiona said defensively. “He’s doing good, and his job is easy.”

  “As soon as there’s another fight…” Spitz said, but didn’t finish his sentence.

  “Wally,” Nando said, turning to me, “if he’s in a battle and gets trapped, he’ll die of withdrawal. Or he’ll just go into withdrawal and not be able to defend himself. Worse than that, the guys around him will have to pick up the slack and try to keep him alive instead of focusing on Ten Block.”

  “This is bullshit,” Fiona snapped, but Spitz put a hand on hers and rubbed it. She looked at him with confusion. “Who are you? You care more about fighting than being a fielder all of a sudden? What happened to everything you guys always told me about one night on the field being better than anything, and death not mattering…nothing else mattering?”