It Started with a Whisper

by A W Hartoin

  “Got a problem with Luke, Frankie?” Caleb slapped Frank on the back.

  “No, no,” he said. “I just got to go to the bathroom. Maybe I could switch with Carrie?”

  “Fine with me, but we don’t have time to switch right now. Me and Puppy will do this shift alone. Go take your dump,” said Luke.

  Frank whispered his thanks and jogged off the dock, enjoying the hollow pounding under his feet. He ran back to the house in search of April. Today was the day. He’d eat a couple of the cookies Mrs. MacClarity gave him and he’d talk to April. They’d have a real conversation. No “Pass the butter.” If he could pull off that first talk he wouldn’t need Mrs. MacClarity’s brand of courage again for a long time. He’d stick the last two in the freezer for the emergency she’d spoken of, the SATs or his first date. All he needed now was the ability to act, and Mrs. MacClarity had given him that in chocolate form.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  LUKE’S INFORMATION WASN’T quite accurate. Jason Greenbow was not at work. He was slumped on the grass beside Miss Pritchett’s house in a sagging lawn chair and appeared to be passed out cold. There were twenty or so beer cans scattered on the lawn. A few were crushed and from the red ring on Jason’s forehead, I guessed that’s what he crushed them with.

  Luke and I crouched behind a blackberry bramble, waiting to see what would happen when a summer drizzle started up, spattering my arms and neck. The wet felt good, a brief relief from the heat. A chorus of grasshoppers sang unseen around us and a light breeze brought the smell of vomit and rotting garbage from Miss Pritchett’s house to the bramble.

  Just as we settled in, Miss Pritchett came out of the house. She stomped to her boyfriend and kicked him in the shin. Jason grunted and settled deeper into the chair. Miss Pritchett screeched at him and spit in his face. He didn’t respond, so she went around the yard picking up beer cans and throwing them at him. Cans plinked against his head, spraying old beer in golden arcs around his body.

  Then she screamed a string of profanity that was so long and cold it seemed to hang around the yard like ice fog, sharp and brittle. I’d never heard anything like it and that was saying something, considering Mom’s propensity to curse over every incident large and small.

  Miss Pritchett went back into the house and Luke stared after her with shock on his face. His expression was shocking in itself. Luke was usually ready for anything and the thought that Miss Pritchett had rendered him speechless was almost more stunning than Miss Pritchett cursing.

  Five minutes after Miss Pritchett disappeared, Jason stirred. In one enormous heave, he flipped out of the lawn chair and onto his stomach. He lay spread-eagle on the lawn, snoring and sucking bits of grass into his nostrils.

  “Come on,” said Luke. “Let’s go.”

  I turned away from the house, but Luke grabbed my shoulder.

  “No, man. This way.” He pointed to the house.

  “We’re supposed to be doing recon, and they’re both home,” I whispered.

  “Look, he’s passed out and she’s too pissed to notice us. Let’s get a look at the inside.”

  I groaned and tried to think of an argument against the plan, but I was too slow. Luke was already creeping across the lawn, passing within ten feet of Jason Greenbow. I said a silent prayer to Ernest and followed Luke, inching past a puddle of vomit, beer cans, and some cat shit to the window Luke was crouching under. He had his backpack off and was fitting the spy cam onto a black plastic stick. He flipped several switches, connected a slim cable to a small rectangular box, and handed it to me.

  I opened the lid of the box and saw a tiny view screen. It showed my own head bent over the screen.

  “Sweet, isn’t it?” Luke grinned and telescoped the camera up towards the windowsill. I signaled him when I could see into the house and pressed record. There wasn’t much to see. We had a good view of Miss Pritchett’s living room and it wasn’t very big. Miss Pritchett sat with her back to the camera on a dirt brown sofa, watching some trashy reality show and drinking a diet soda. The TV sat on what looked like a rickety microwave stand surrounded by VHS tapes and DVDs. The coffee table sagged under the weight of stacks of paper and magazines. The other chair in the room was piled with laundry.

  Luke squatted motionless for a couple minutes, then he collapsed the plastic stick, and handed me the camera.

  “Pack up and meet me behind the tree,” he said.

  “But…” I didn’t have time to finish my sentence before Luke disappeared around the corner of the house. I had no idea what he was up to, but it didn’t really matter. Luke was charmed. He knew when to push and when to pull back. He had just enough hubris, psychology, and science under his belt to be really dangerous.

  I stuffed the equipment in Luke’s backpack, but instead of leaving like a sensible person I crept to the corner and peeked around it.

  Luke stood next to Miss Pritchett’s laundry lines with his Leatherman open to the blade. He stepped on an old tire and sawed on the line in an uneven fashion, fraying the cord next to the knot until only a tiny strip remained.

  In the house, Miss Pritchett yelled, “Oh my God!” Luke’s head jerked around and his feet slipped. In a slow-motion ballet, he twisted in the air before he landed face first in the middle of the tire. To his credit, Luke didn’t utter a sound, but when his face appeared over the edge of the tire, I nearly let loose a peal of laughter. A black, shiny muck coated Luke’s face. He attempted to wipe it away and motioned for me to go back to Miss Pritchett’s window. I scooted over, took a deep breath, and stood on my tiptoes. Miss Pritchett still sat on the sofa, saying words like scum bucket and tramp. I slid down the side of the house, letting my forehead bump over the edges of the siding, and blew out a deep breath.

  “What are you doing?” Luke scuttled over to me, his face slimy and dripping.

  “Nothing. We’re clear,” I whispered.

  We hurried off Miss Pritchett’s lawn and a good ways into the woods before we stopped to catch our breath.

  “That was awesome!” Luke pumped his fist in the air and slapped me on the back.

  “It was all right, I guess.” I didn’t see what Luke was so thrilled about. We could’ve been caught and now he smelled like Dad’s elderly mechanic, a guy named Bud. Bud smelled like a mixture of oil, exhaust, black licorice and a kind of schnapps called Hot Damn. Dad said he was a genius, but if that was what genius smelled like, I’d pass.

  “You stink like Bud,” I said.

  Luke laughed and flicked some ooze off his fingertips at me. “It’s the oil. It’s used.” He pulled a lump of something out of his hair and examined it. “Huh? I didn’t know oil could grow mold.”

  “Mold? Gross.”

  “It’s a small price to pay.”

  “For what?”

  “I frayed Bitch Pritchett’s laundry line. She hangs up her laundry and snap, down it goes. It’d be really sweet if some of her panties went right into the oil,” said Luke.

  “I don’t know. It’s kind of lame.”

  “I know it’s not up to our usual standards, but it will look like an accident, won’t it?”

  “I guess.”

  “Everything we do has to look like an accident. It’ll drive her crazy.” Luke pushed his slimy hair out of his face and walked towards the property line with me close behind.

  I heard a bellow in the distance behind us, a not-so-subtle suggestion to be on our way. I out paced Luke and practically ran over the line dividing me from Ernest. The cats were waiting under the No Trespassing sign. They meowed a greeting when I crossed. The wind welcomed me back with a swirl of leaves around my feet. Luke passed me with his long, confident strides. He droned on about his plans for Miss Pritchett, oblivious to the wind shaking the trees, buffeting me, and never touching him.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  “GOOD GOD, BOY! How do you do it?” Aunt Calla stood in the kitchen, her hands in the air in a gesture of surrender.

  “I don’t know,” said Luke.
“It was an accident.”

  His face and front half of his hair were coated with oil. We’d tried to scrub it off with creek water and sand, but the oil remained. Luke’s face was raw, red, and blackish. He looked like a rotting tomato.

  Aunt Calla turned to me. “Well?”

  I sat mute on a kitchen chair with my knees pulled up to my chest. I wasn’t saying anything. It was Luke’s job to come up with a good lie.

  “What have you two been doing that you got your face dipped in oil, not to mention your hair?”

  “Nothing,” said Luke. He looked apologetic, but that was as far as it went.

  “That stuff’s not going to come out easy, you know. We’ll have to shave your head,” said Aunt Calla.

  “No way.” Luke licked his grimy upper lip and grimaced.

  “Oh, for Christ sake! You’re the biggest pain in the ass I’ve ever seen in my life.” Aunt Calla stomped out of the kitchen and I heard her rummaging around in the bathroom. She came back with a large squat jar that said “Goop” on the side.

  “What are you going to do with that?” asked Luke.

  “Put it on your head, you idiot. We have the Fourth of July picnic at school tomorrow. God knows what people will think if you show up with half your head oiled.”

  I smothered a laugh with my knees. Luke didn’t care what people thought, especially people at school. He’d consider it a good joke and might dip the other half of his head in paint.

  “Whatever. Just get it over with.” Luke took off his shirt and sat down.

  Aunt Calla scooped a handful of Goop out and plopped it on top of Luke’s head. She worked it through the front half of his hair, cursing under her breath and urging Luke to rub some into his skin.

  After a few minutes, she popped him on the back of the head. “It won’t come off.”

  “I don’t care,” said Luke.

  “Big surprise. You don’t care.” She sniffed his head. “What is this stuff? It can’t just be oil.”

  Luke yelped as Aunt Calla started working on his hair again. Bits of green slime flew off her fingertips, landing on my chair. The little blobs jiggled, looking like they might start oozing toward me. Attack of the Goop. I flicked one towards the back door, just as The Pack walked in.

  “Holy crap!” yelled Caleb. “What’d you do?”

  “Good question,” said Aunt Calla.

  “What is that stuff?” said Frank.

  “Goop,” replied Luke.

  “No, I mean the other stuff,” said Frank.

  “Oil. I had an accident.”

  “You had an accident on your face?” asked Ella.

  “Shut up, Ella Smella,” said Luke.

  Luke wouldn’t have been quite so confident if he could’ve seen himself. Aunt Calla had worked his hair into pointy rods. He looked a lot like the Statue of Liberty.

  “He can’t go to the picnic like that. He looks like a freak,” said Ella.

  “Not as much of a freak as you,” said Luke.

  Ella stalked out of the kitchen yelling “Mom” at the top of her lungs. A few seconds later, she returned with Mom in tow.

  “Wow,” said Mom. “That’s impressive even for you, Luke.”

  “Thanks. I told you I was talented,” said Luke.

  “Oh, you’re talented all right, just not at anything useful,” said Aunt Calla.

  “What about chemistry?”

  “Yeah, well, we’ve seen how you put that talent to use,” she said.

  Mom went to the sink, soaked a cloth with scalding hot water and started scrubbing Luke’s face. Luke screeched and pulled away, amid The Pack’s laughter.

  “That’s enough,” said Mom. “Girls, go to the garden and pick some veggies for dinner. Pup, go check on Mildred for me. I think she hurt her wing. The rest of you go change clothes. You smell like wet dogs.”

  I could think of a dozen things I’d rather do than check on Mildred. So she hurt her wing. So what? She spent most of her time trying to get into the feed shed with the ravens to steal grain. She probably caught it on a nail because she was too big.

  “Puppy, go,” said Mom in a dangerous voice.

  I walked out the back door, dragging my feet, and pushed open the screen door. The drizzle had stopped and the sky was a whitish blue. A wave of wet heat pressed against me as I went out onto the large granite step. Before I reached the second step, something hit me. My head plowed into the screen door and snapped it off its hinges. I stumbled back to fall headfirst into Ernest’s rosebushes, whacking my head on a rock.

  When I woke up two minutes later, Mom was cradling my head and making shushing sounds.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “Oh, nothing, honey. Just an accident,” she said.

  An accident? My head was killing me, like the time Ella cracked me with one of Mom’s sculptures. The last thing I remembered was standing on the step. How could I have an accident standing on a step?

  I reached up and felt sticky goo in my ear. “Beatrice.”

  “I’m sure she didn’t mean to, Puppy. Did you say anything to her?”

  “For Christ’s sake, Mom. I didn’t do anything. I didn’t even see her.” I pushed away Mom’s hand and tried to sit up. A bolt of pain came down from the top of my head and a wave of red-hot vomit rose in my throat to greet it. I fell back in her arms and began to feel the dozens of thorns cutting into my legs.

  “You’re supposed to lock her up,” I said.

  Mom plucked something out of my forehead, probably a thorn. “I was afraid this would happen. I caught her licking the lock a couple of times. I guess she found a way to open it. She’s very intelligent.”

  “She’s not smart. She’s stupid and dumb and an idiot. When are you calling the farm?” I fingered the goo in my ear and smiled. It was worth a broken head to get rid of Beatrice and maybe Shasta would come to pick her up. Being attacked by a llama probably wouldn’t add to my appeal, but at least I could see her.

  “Call them for what?”

  “To get Beatrice.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “She attacked me, Mom. She’s a meany.” I paused for a second. Did I just say meany? A burst of laughter around me confirmed it.

  “He said meany,” said Caleb, snorting.

  I tried to sit up to defend myself, but white stars burst in my vision and I vomited on my crotch.

  “Shit,” Mom said. “Calla, call Dr. Jobs. I think we need to take him in.”

  “No, no. I’m okay,” I said. “I don’t need to go to the doctor, really.”

  I could rouse myself, white stars or not, if it meant avoiding the doctor and possible shots.

  “Jobs will decide that. Don’t move,” said Mom.

  “I’m okay.”

  “Yeah, yeah, you’re swell.”

  She kept stroking my forehead and murmuring until Aunt Calla came back.

  “What did he say?” Mom asked her.

  “Bring him in. It’s probably a concussion,” said Aunt Calla, still holding the phone and a pair of gym shorts.

  Caleb and Luke lifted me out of the rosebush, enduring the thorns but bitching about the vomit and Beatrice goo. Mom told them to shut up, and then she pulled off my shorts and replaced them with the vomit-free pair. She did it before I realized Carrie was there and had seen me in my underpants.

  “Aw, Mom!” I said as Luke and Caleb half-carried, half-dragged me to the car.

  “What? What happened? Are you going to puke again?” asked Mom.

  “No, never mind,” I said. It didn’t matter. It was only Carrie. Now if it had been Shasta that would’ve been a different thing all together.

  They laid me on the backseat of Aunt Calla’s car and propped up my head with a pillow. April put a large mixing bowl on the floor in case I felt like puking again, then ran a light finger across my forehead.

  Outside the car, Ella said, “Do you think he’ll get a shot?”

  “Shut up, Ella,” said April. “Pup doesn’t need to
hear that.”

  “I’m just saying.”

  “Well, don’t,” said Mom. “Keep your thoughts to yourself. This family could use a little more discretion, if you ask me.”

  “I have discretion,” said Ella.

  “Right,” said Luke. “You have discretion and I have a PhD.”

  “I have more discretion than you have brains,” said Ella.

  “At least I’ll have a PhD someday. You’ll never have discretion.”

  Luke and Ella walked away, continuing to squabble until they were out of earshot.

  Frank’s voice wavered. “A shot? They don’t give shots for concussions, do they?”

  “Maybe, but you’re not getting one. Don’t be such a girl,” said Cole.

  “I’m not a girl,” said Frank.

  “Are so.”

  “Am not.”

  The rest of the voices faded and I lay counting the stars tattooed on the inside of my eyelids until I heard a beating wing.

  “What’s that?” I asked, just as something heavy and honking was dropped on my chest.

  “Here, hold Mildred,” said Mom.

  “What, what?”

  “Hold her.” She put my hands on either side of Mildred and pressed. Then she slammed the door and slid into the driver’s seat. “I figure we may as well take Mildred to the vet, if we have to go to town.”

  “But I’m hurt.”

  Mildred honked again, spraying a light mist across my knees.

  “Not your hands. Really, Puppy, just hold on to her. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

  Mildred honked and I realized my face was at the business end of a very large, well-fed goose.

  “Oh, God,” I said.

  “What?”

  “What if she poops?”

  “She’s not going to poop.”

  “She poops all the time. She’s practically incontinent,” I said.

  “Oh, she is not and you don’t even know what incontinent means.”

  “It means she can’t stop pooping.”

  “Well, don’t think about it,” said Mom.