keep getting in your way.”
He always had everything under control; it made me crazy. He was too
good at running my life. “You should have told me Mom turned you in.”
Crash! I felt like the crowd was inside my head, screaming.
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“You could’ve figured it out, if you wanted to. Besides, if I had said
anything, your mom wouldn’t have bothered to be subtle. She would’ve
squashed me. She still might, even though I’m being fixed. Only by then I
won’t care. Rosproyebi tvayou mat!”
I heard Tree finishing the count. “. . . twelve, thirteen, fourteen!” No record today. Some kids began to boo, others laughed. “Time’s up, you losers!”
I glared at the two wiseguys. Montross was busy emulating sincerity.
Comrade found a way to grin for me, the same smirk he always wore when he
tortured the greeter. “It’s easier this way.”
Easier. My life was too plugging easy. I had never done anything important
by myself. Not even grow up. I wanted to smash something.
“Okay,” I said. “You asked for it.”
Comrade turned to Montross and they shook hands. I thought next they
might clap one another on the shoulder and whistle as they strolled off into the sunset together. I felt like puking. “Have fun,” said Comrade. “Da svedanya.”
“Sure.” Betraying Comrade, my best friend, brought me both pain and
pleasure at once—but not enough to satisfy the shrieking wildness within
me. The party was just starting.
Happy stood beaming beside the ruins of the Steinway. Although nothing
of what was left was more than half a meter tall, Freddy, Mike, and Bubba
had given up now that the challenge was lost. Kids were already surging
down the stairs to claim their share of the swag. I went along with them.
“Don’t worry,” announced Happy. “Plenty for everyone. Come take what
you like. Remember, guns and animals outside, if you want to hunt. The
safeties won’t release unless you go through the door. Watch out for one
another, people, we don’t want anyone shot.”
A bunch of kids were wrestling over the turkey cage; one of them
staggered backward and knocked into me. “Gobble, gobble,” she said. I
shoved her back.
“Mr. Boy! Over here.” Tree, Stennie, and Janet were waiting on the far side
of the gallery. As I crossed to them, Happy gave the sign and Stone Kinkaid
hurled the four-thousand-year-old ceramic hippo against the wall. It
shattered. Everybody cheered.
In the upper balconies, they were playing catch with a frog.
“You see who kept time?” said Janet.
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“Didn’t need to see,” I said. “I could hear. They probably heard in Elkhart.
So you like it, Tree?”
“It’s about what I expected: dumb but fun. I don’t think they . . .” The frog
sailed from the top balcony and splatted at our feet. Its legs twitched and guts spilled from its open mouth. I watched Tree’s smile turn brittle. She seemed
slightly embarrassed, as if she had just been told the price of something she
could not afford.
“This is going to be a war zone soon,” Stennie said.
“Yeah, let’s fade.” Janet towed Stennie to the stairs, swerving around the
three boys lugging Our Lady of the Bathtub out to the firing range.
“Wait.” I blocked Tree. “You’re here, so you have to destroy something. Get
with the program.”
“I have to?” She seemed doubtful. “Oh, all right—but no animals.”
A hail of antique Coke bottles crashed around Happy as she directed traffic
at the dwindling swag heap. “Hey, people, please be very careful where you
throw things.” Her amplified voice blasted us as we approached. The first
floor was a graveyard of broken glass and piano bones and bloody feathers.
Most of the good stuff was already gone.
“Any records left?” I said.
Happy wobbled closer to me. “What?” She seemed punchy, as if stunned by
the success of her own party.
“The box I gave you. From Stennie.” She pointed; I spotted it under some
cages and grabbed it. Tree and the others were on the stairs. Outside I could
hear the crackle of small-arms fire. I caught up.
“Sir! Mr. Dinosaur, please.” The press still lurked on the upper balcony.
“Matsuo Shikibu, Japanese telelink NHK. Could I speak with you for a
moment?”
“Excuse me, but this jack and I have some unfinished business.” I handed
Stennie the records and cut in front. He swayed and lashed his tail upward to
counterbalance their weight.
“Remember me?” I bowed to Shikibu.
“My apologies if I offended . . .”
“Hey, Matsuo—can I call you Matsuo? This is your first smash party, right?
Please, eyes on me. I want to explain why I was rude before. Help you
understand the local customs. You see, we’re kind of self-conscious here in
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the US. We don’t like it when someone just watches while we play. You either
join in or you’re not one of us.”
My little speech drew a crowd. “What’s he talking about?” said Janet. She
was shushed.
“So if you drop by our party and don’t have fun, people resent you,” I told
him. “No one came here today to put on a show. This is who we are. What
we believe in.”
“Yeah!” Stennie was cheerleading for the extreme Mr. Boy of old. “Tell
him.” Too bad he did not realize it was his final appearance. What was Mr.
Boy without his Comrade? “Make him feel some pain.”
I snatched an album from the top of the stack, slipped the record out, and
held it close to Shikibu’s microcam eyes. “What does this say?”
He craned his neck to read the label. “John Coltrane, Giant Steps.”
“Very good.” I grasped the record with both hands and raised it over my
head for all to see. “We’re not picky, Matsuo. We welcome everyone.
Therefore today it is my honor to initiate you—and the home audience back
on NHK. If you’re still watching, you’re part of this too.” I broke the record
over his head.
He yelped and staggered backward and almost tripped over a dead cat.
Stone Kinkaid caught him and propped him up. “Congratulations,” said
Stennie, as he waved his claws at Japan. “You’re all extremists now.”
Shikibu gaped at me, his microcam eyes askew. A couple of kids clapped.
“There’s someone else here who has not yet joined us.” I turned on Tree.
“Another spectator.” Her smile faded.
“You leave her alone,” said Janet. “What are you, crazy?”
“I’m not going to touch her.” I held up empty hands. “No, I just want her
to ruin something. That’s why you came, isn’t it, Tree? To get a taste?” I
rifled through the box until I found what I wanted. “How about this?” I
thrust it at her.
“Oh, yeah,” said Stennie, “I meant to tell you . . .”
She took the record and scoped it briefly. When she glanced up at me, I
almost lost my nerve.
“Matsuo Shikibu, meet Treemonisha Joplin.” I clasped my hands behind
my back so no one could see me tre
mble. “The great-great-great-granddaughter
of the famous American composer, Scott Joplin. Yes, Japan, we’re all
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celebrities here in New Canaan. Now please observe.” I read the record for
him. “Piano
Rags by Scott Joplin, Volume III. Who knows, this might be the last copy. We can only hope. So, what are you waiting for, Tree? You don’t want to be a
Joplin anymore? Just wait until your folks get a peek at this. We’ll even send
GD a copy. Go ahead, enjoy.”
“Smash it!” The kids around us took up the chant. “Smash it!” Shikibu
adjusted his lenses.
“You think I won’t?” Tree pulled out the disk and threw the sleeve off the
balcony. “This is a piece of junk, Mr. Boy.” She laughed and then shattered
the album against the wall. She held on to a shard. “It doesn’t mean anything
to me.”
I heard Janet whisper. “What’s going on?”
“I think they’re having an argument.”
“You want me to be your little dream cush.” Tree tucked the piece of broken
plastic into the pocket of my baggies. “The stiff from nowhere who knows
nobody and does nothing without Mr. Boy. So you try to scare me off. You tell
me you’re so rich, you can afford to hate yourself. Stay home, you say, it’s too dangerous, we’re all crazy. Well, if you’re so sure this is poison, how come
you’ve still got your wiseguy and your cash cards? Are you going to move out
of your mom, leave town, stop getting stunted? You’re not giving it up, Mr.
Boy, so why should I?”
Shikibu turned his camera eyes on me. No one spoke.
“You’re right,” I said. “She’s right.” I could not save anyone until I saved
myself. I felt the wildness lifting me to it. I leapt onto the balcony wall and shouted for everyone to hear. “Shut up and listen, everybody! You’re all
invited to my place, okay?”
There was one last thing to smash.
“Stop this, Peter.” The greeter no longer thought I was cute. “What’re you
doing?” She trembled as if the kids spilling into her were an infection.
“I thought you’d like to meet my friends,” I said. A few had stayed behind
with Happy, who had decided to sulk after I hijacked her guests. The rest
had followed me home in a caravan so I could warn off the sentry robots.
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It was already a hall-of-fame bash. “Treemonisha Joplin, this is my mom.
Sort of.”
“Hi,” Tree held out her hand uncertainly.
The greeter was no longer the human doormat. “Get them out of me.” She
was too jumpy to be polite. “Right now!”
Someone turned up a boombox. Skitter music filled the room like a siren.
Tree said something I could not hear. When I put a hand to my ear, she
leaned close and said, “Don’t be so mean, Mr. Boy. I think she’s really
frightened.”
I grinned and nodded. “I’ll tell Cook to make us some snacks.”
Bubba and Mike carried boxes filled with the last of the swag and set them
on the coffee table. Kids fanned out, running their hands along her wrinkled
blood-hot walls, bouncing on the furniture. Stennie waved at me as he led a
bunch upstairs for a tour. A leftover cat had gotten loose and was hissing and
scratching underfoot. Some twisted kids had already stripped and were rolling
in the floor hair, getting ready to have sex.
“Get dressed, you.” The greeter kicked at them as she coiled her umbilical
to keep it from being trampled. She retreated to her wall plug. “You’re hurting me.” Although her voice rose to a scream, only half a dozen kids heard her.
She went limp and sagged to the floor.
The whole room seemed to throb, as if to some great heartbeat, and the
lights went out. It took a while for someone to kill the sound on the boombox.
“What’s wrong?” Voices called out. “Mr. Boy? Lights.”
Both doorbones swung open, and I saw a bughead silhouetted against the
twilit sky. Shikibu in his microcams. “Party’s over,” Mom said over her speaker system. There was nervous laughter. “Leave before I call the cops. Peter, go to your room right now. I want to speak to you.”
As the stampede began, I found Tree’s hand. “Wait for me?” I pulled her
close. “I’ll only be a minute.”
“What are you going to do?” She sounded frightened. It felt good to be
taken so seriously.
“I’m moving out, chucking all this. I’m going to be a working stiff.” I
chuckled. “Think your dad would give me a job?”
“Look out, dumbscut! Hey, hey. Don’t push!”
Tree dragged me out of the way. “You’re crazy.”
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“I know. That’s why I have to get out of Mom.”
“Listen,” she said, “you’ve never been poor, you have no idea . . . Only a
rich kid would think it’s easy being a stiff. Just go up, apologize, tell her it won’t happen again. Then change things later on, if you want. Believe me,
life will be a lot simpler if you hang on to the money.”
“I can’t. Will you wait?”
“You want me to tell you it’s okay to be stupid, is that it? Well, I’ve been poor, Mr. Boy, and still am, and I don’t recommend it. So don’t expect me to
stand around and clap while you throw away something I’ve always wanted.”
She spun away from me, and I lost her in the darkness. I wanted to catch up
with her, but I knew I had to do Mom now or I would lose my nerve.
As I was fumbling my way upstairs, I heard stragglers coming down. “On
your right,” I called. Bodies nudged by me.
“Mr. Boy, is that you?” I recognized Stennie’s voice.
“He’s gone,” I said.
Seven flights up, the lights were on. Nanny waited on the landing outside
my rooms, her umbilical stretched nearly to its limit. She was the only
remote that was physically able to get to my floor, and this was as close as
she could come.
It had been a while since I had seen her; Mom did not use her much
anymore and I rarely visited, even though the nursery was only one flight
down. But this was the remote who used to pick me up when I cried and who
had changed my diapers and who taught me how to turn on my roombrain.
She had skin so pale you could almost see veins and long black hair piled
high on her head. I never thought of her as having a body because she always
wore dark turtlenecks and long woolen skirts and silky pantyhose. Nanny was
a smile and warm hands and the smell of fresh pillowcases. Once upon a
time, I thought her the most beautiful creature in the world. Back then I
would have done anything she said.
She was not smiling now. “I don’t know how you expect me to trust you
anymore, Peter.” Nanny had never been a very good scold. “Those brats were
out of control. I can’t let you put me in danger this way.”
“If you wanted someone to trust, maybe you shouldn’t have had me stunted.
You got exactly what you ordered, the never-ending kid. Well, kids don’t
have to be responsible.”
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“What do you mean, what I ordered? It’s what you wanted, too.”
“Is it? Did you ever ask? I was only ten, the first time, too young to kno
w
better. For a long time I did it to please you. Getting stunted was the only
thing I did that seemed important to you. But you never explained. You never sat me down and said, ‘This is the life you’ll have and this is what you’ll miss and this is how you’ll feel about it.’”
“You want to grow up, is that it?” She was trying to threaten me. “You want
to work and worry and get old and die someday?” She had no idea what we
were talking about.
“I can’t live this way anymore, Nanny.”
At first she acted stunned, as if I had spoken in Albanian. Then her
expression hardened when she realized she had lost her hold on me. She was
ugly when she was angry. “They put you up to this.” Her gaze narrowed in
accusation. “That little black cush you’ve been seeing. Those realists!”
I had always managed to hide my anger from Mom. Right up until then.
“How do you know about her?” I had never told her about Tree.
“Peter, they live in a mall!”
Comrade was right. “You’ve been spying on me.” When she did not deny it,
I went berserk. “You liar.” I slammed my fist into her belly. “You said you
wouldn’t watch.” She staggered and fell onto her umbilical, crimping it. As
she twitched on the floor, I pounced. “You promised.” I slapped her face.
“Promised.” I hit her again. Her hair had come undone and her eyes rolled
back in their sockets and her face was slack. She made no effort to protect
herself. Mom was retreating from this remote too, but I was not going to let
her get away.
“Mom!” I rolled off Nanny. “I’m coming up, Mom! You hear? Get ready.” I was
crying; it had been a long time since I had cried. Not something Mr. Boy did.
I scrambled up to the long landing at the shoulders. At one end another
circular stairway wound up into the torch; in the middle, four steps led into
the neck. It was the only doorbone I had never seen open; I had no idea how
to get through.
“Mom, I’m here.” I pounded. “Mom! You hear me?”
Silence.
“Let me in, Mom.” I smashed myself against the doorbone. Pain branched
through my shoulder like lightning, but it felt great because Mom shuddered
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from the impact. I backed up and, in a frenzy, hurled myself again. Something
warm dripped on my cheek. She was bleeding from the hinges. I aimed a
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