by David Klass
I also thought about the Phenom and Kris, and what I should do with the information Mouse had tossed my way. I admit I had a strong urge to take the news article over to Kris’s house and show it to her. In my fantasy, she would read it, and her parents would read about the drug-abusing louse their daughter was dating, and I would say, “See, I told you he was no good. I may not have known much, but I knew that.”
When I got back from my run, Kris’s parents’ station wagon was gone from her driveway, and Antonio’s sports car was sitting there instead. Kris and Antonio weren’t in the car. They also weren’t out on her balcony, which meant they were most likely somewhere inside her house, alone together. I tried to convince myself they were watching TV in the den, or studying together at her living room table, but I admit I didn’t completely succeed. My imagination tortured me. I couldn’t see her bedroom from my own, and I resisted the urge to climb up on the roof.
Instead, I walked to my desk, picked up the manila envelope with the news clipping inside it, and ripped it in half. And then I tore it in quarters, and then in still smaller pieces till it was confetti.
I opened my hand and watched the bits of paper sift down into my trash can. Kris had picked the guy she wanted to go out with, and she was in love with him, and she looked very happy. I had ratted on my best friend and it had worked out for the best, but it didn’t seem like such a good idea to make a habit out of being a squealer. My fantasy of exposing Antonio, of proving that he was no good, was just jealous wishful thinking.
Mouse was right. I would have to tough this one out.
27
Those were the dark days. Mouse was gone, Kris was with Antonio, and a chilling breath of November winter began to blow through Lawndale. Cold drizzle fell for days on end, at times surging into a driving rain, at other times lessening to a low-hanging mist, but never completely going away. As if washed down by persistent rain, leaves let go of the trees and dive-bombed their final kamikaze routes to the pavement.
Our school was relatively quiet—the police and metal detectors seemed to be doing their job. Most of the action took place in the center of town, at the intersection of Broad and Main, where rival parents’ groups had set up tables. One group supported the security measures and was collecting names on a petition to ask the board to appoint Vice Principal Tobias as principal. These parents passed out leaflets quoting Dr. LaFarge about the necessity of what he called “Measured Intervention to Prevent the Escalation of School Violence.”
Across Broad Avenue, two or three parents manned a second table from morning till night, crouching under umbrellas and passing out leaflets that claimed: “Isolated cases of violence in schools cannot be stamped out by turning those schools into armed camps.” They were collecting names on a petition demanding that the School Board search for a new principal outside our system, and that they end the contract of Dr. LaFarge as a consultant.
Each side had its loudmouths and know-it-alls, so the decibel level at Broad and Main sometimes got pretty high. I was passed brochures from both tables, but I have to admit, I couldn’t really find the energy to care. I wasn’t sleeping more than a few hours a night, I wasn’t eating much, and I just couldn’t seem to find a way to enjoy my life. I started watching a lot of late-night TV, and several times I was surprised when my dad padded down the stairs in his socks and shorts to join me. “What’s wrong with you?” he would ask as he plopped down on an overstuffed armchair.
“Nothing,” I would reply. “Can’t sleep. Upset stomach. Ate too much spaghetti. What about you?”
“Bad back,” he would mumble. “Must have thrown it out at the car wash. Forget this movie, it’s a dud. Find something good to watch.” And we would sit there together, not talking, watching whatever old movies and stupid shows were on at two in the morning.
The wet weather continued and our soccer field became flooded, so we began practicing in the gym. One rainy night, when I had tossed and turned for hours, and couldn’t bear any more mindless late-night TV, I walked out into the storm. It was just drizzling when I left home without an umbrella or a raincoat, but the drizzle stiffened to a hard rain and soon my clothes were soaked. It was a great way to catch pneumonia, but I didn’t care—the colder it got and the harder it rained, the more numb I felt, and that was what I wanted. Wind howled around me but couldn’t blow me over, and sheets of icy rain slapped my face and blinded me, but I wiped my eyes clear and kept walking.
I reached the business district of Lawndale and all the main intersections of my town were dark and empty, as if the driving rain had washed people and traffic into the storm drains. I walked on, to Lawndale High School—the deserted building looked ominous. Don’t ask me why, but I headed right for it, and began to slog around the muddy grounds.
As I walked on alone, the storm came alive all around me. Lightning flashed through tree branches and flickered off iron-grated windows, so that horrific faces with gaping mouths appeared and disappeared on the school’s walls. Peals of thunder chased me, getting closer and louder, and the wind howled angrily down at me from the open throat of a furious November night.
Lawndale High did seem haunted by tormented spirits. I can’t say for sure whether they were long-dead Indian braves or Revolutionary War soldiers, or my own fears and despair at losing friends and letting go of what had been a mostly happy childhood. All I can say is that I felt something eerie and powerful swirling around me in that storm—I think somewhere on that hellish walk I said goodbye to my childhood and realized how brief life really is. One day I would be my father’s age, one day even older; one day I would wake and look in the mirror and see an old man, and soon after that become as cold and empty as the night wind that whipped through the willow trees.
I don’t really remember walking home that night. When I finally made it back I took a long, hot shower, but when I was done I still felt cold. I thought of getting into bed and trying to fall asleep, but the hike through the storm had left me in a strange, slightly feverish state. I looked around my room, and the sports trophies on their shelves seemed to press in on me, to mock me.
I dragged an old trunk out of my closet and packed the trophies away inside it, one by one. The first one was the hardest, but then they got easier and easier to take down and stow away. Next, I took out the photograph of my mother that I had kept hidden in my room for so many years, as if holding on to her image would somehow magically bring her back. I studied her pretty face for a few seconds, and then put the photo into the trunk with the trophies, and closed the top.
The room felt a little lonely with so many bare shelves, but also somehow less tormenting. I got into bed and pulled the blanket over my head, and mercifully soon fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
The next morning I woke up with a slight fever, a runny nose, and a cough. My dad said I should stay home from school, but we had a game to play, so I went in anyway. On a soccer field dotted with puddles, my team won its final regular-season game, six to one, and qualified for the first time ever for the county tournament.
Antonio’s mother came to that final regular-season game and sat next to his father on the front row of bleachers. She was a tall blond woman who looked like a movie star and didn’t talk to anyone. Antonio scored five of our six goals, proving that a rain-soaked field could work to his advantage, as his quick moves caused opposing players to skid and slide and fall into puddles the size of ponds.
By the time the game was over, I was covered in mud from head to foot. I was heading off to the locker room to shower up when Dianne Hutchings intercepted me near our bleachers. “Hey,” she said, “Joe, congratulations. You guys kicked butt.”
“I didn’t know you were a soccer fan.”
“Never been to a game before in my life,” she said. “But I’ve been reading about your team in the sports pages. And I was off from the hospital this afternoon. I figured if I came I might have a chance to talk to you.”
“What about?” I asked.
“J
ust wanted to apologize for breaking all that stuff.”
“My dad didn’t mind too much,” I told her.
“I didn’t come to apologize to him,” she said. “He’s the one who owes me an apology. But I felt bad that you had to walk into that situation. It was pretty ugly.”
“I’ve seen worse,” I told her.
“Really?” She sounded incredulous.
“No, not really. That was by far the worst.”
Dianne smiled, and then she laughed. “How can you make fun of me when you’re covered in mud?”
“Actually I’m about to go shower up.” I sneezed.
“Better hurry,” she said. And then, “Want a ride home? I’ll wait for you.”
“Okay,” I said. “As long as you promise not to throw anything at me in the car.”
I showered, got dressed, and found her red sports car waiting in the parking lot. I sneezed again when I got in, and she handed me a scented yellow tissue. “You okay?”
“Never better.”
“You look like crud,” she said.
“Is that a medical term?”
“Really, you look awful. Are you sick?”
“A bit.”
“Mind, body, or soul?” she asked.
“All of the above. Are we gonna just sit here?”
She headed out of the parking lot. “Want to talk about it?”
“Not really,” I said.
“That’s not a no,” she pointed out. “Come on, let’s go for a drive.”
“Where to?” I asked.
“Enemy territory,” she said.
We headed up Fort Lee Road, crested the Palisades, and started descending. Pretty soon we were driving through Bankside. It was a hardscrabble town that clung to the steep slope by the most precarious of grips—a lot of the small businesses we passed were closed and shut up, but a dozen bars were open for late afternoon drinkers. We passed a closed paint factory with broken windows and chains across the gate, and an auto junkyard guarded by a one-eyed German shepherd that came running to a corner of the fence to snarl ferociously at our car as Dianne waited for the light to change. “You been here much?” she asked.
“Driven through,” I told her.
“It’s a good town,” she said. “A tight town. I wouldn’t trade growing up here for anything.”
“Do you still live here?”
“Are you crazy?” she replied with a laugh. “Nineteen years was enough. That’s the family business.”
A big faded green sign proclaimed HUTCHINGS BODY WORK AND DETAILING. The sign reminded me a lot of my dad’s sign advertising BRICKMAN CAR WASH. Dianne slowed as we went by, and I saw a long, squat building made of sheet metal, with open areas where cars were being worked on. Several men in the open yard recognized the red sports car and waved at Dianne, who waved back. I spotted Slade, wrench in hand, lift his head from behind a hood and watch us cruise past.
Dianne continued on through Bankside, to the edge of town, which was literally the west bank of the Hudson River. There was a ribbon of park down there, right by the water’s edge, with a sandy baseball field I had played on a few times. One legend held that ten years ago a Bankside crowd got so angry at an umpire for making questionable calls that they stuffed him in a trash can and threw the can into the river. Supposedly, the poor guy drifted half a mile downstream before he was fished out.
Dianne pulled over near the backstop to the baseball field and shut off the engine. We sat for a while in silence. “So, you have enough plates left to eat off?” she asked.
“Barely,” I told her.
“I just light up sometimes, and I can’t really control my temper,” she confessed. “Has your dad moved on?”
“Moved on where?”
“Has he found another girlfriend yet?”
“Not yet,” I told her.
“He will,” she said, staring out at the river. “He’s got a smooth line.”
“I guess he must.”
For a long moment she was silent. Then she asked, softly, “So he doesn’t talk about me at all?” and she swung her eyes from the river to me for a second.
“No,” I said truthfully.
“Good,” she said. “To hell with him. So, what’s bugging you, Joe? And don’t you dare tell me it’s just a touch of flu. I’m too smart for that.”
I hadn’t meant to tell her about Kris, but I guess maybe I needed to talk about her with somebody. Once I started, I couldn’t stop myself from going into a lot of detail.
“Wow,” Dianne said when I was finished, “sounds like you really love this girl.”
“I did,” I said. “For years.”
“She’s a fool,” Dianne said, looking me over carefully.
“No,” I said, “I’m the fool.”
Dianne reached out a hand and ran her fingers gently through my hair, and for a fleeting moment I thought she might try to kiss me, and things might get really weird, but she only smiled sadly. “I’m sorry you’re going through this. It’s never fun to get your heart broken, but the first time hurts worst of all. Why don’t you date someone else?”
“I’ve thought about it,” I told her. “Our soccer team’s really hot at school now. Lots of girls are coming to our games, and two or three of them have been talking to me and smiling a lot. But … it wouldn’t be fair to them.”
“Because you’re still in love with Kris?”
“Whatever,” I said with a shrug. “It just wouldn’t be fair.”
“Life’s not always fair,” Dianne Hutchings said, and her voice hardened as she said it.
I let out a colossal sneeze. She handed me another scented tissue, and switched on her car. “Let’s get you home,” she said. “And since I’m a nurse, here’s my medical opinion. Drink hot liquids. No more rolling around in the mud. Get lots of sleep.”
As we headed back through Bankside I muttered, “Easier said than done.”
28
I didn’t see the attempt to get revenge on the Phenom, but I heard all about it, and I saw the results. I wasn’t surprised to hear the news—ever since the Phenom hurt Jack Hutchings, I knew some angry water rat would eventually try to make him pay. When Antonio joined our soccer team and became the school’s big sports celebrity, I knew he was tempting fate. Since Bankside is a town of clans and blood bonds, I could have guessed it would be a family member who would make the attempt to get revenge.
Ray Hutchings was a star defensive back on the football team, and he was also on my wrestling team. He was a tough wrestler with strength and savvy, and if he had closed with the Phenom and taken him down, he probably could have gotten in a control position and done what he wanted. But from what I heard, when they squared off in a backyard at a party, Ray made the mistake of punching at long range. He landed a couple of clean shots, but then the Phenom threw some kind of side kick at him that knocked Ray off his feet and broke three of his ribs, and that was the end of that.
News of the fight circulated quickly through the student gossip hot line. I already knew about it when Ray Hutchings came to school the next day on crutches, with his ribs in some kind of cast. That was bad news for Ray and bad news for the Lawndale football team, which was heading into the playoff season already missing one key Hutchings.
The fight was never reported to the police, the cops guarding our school seemed clueless about it, and Principal Tobias’s shadowy spy network didn’t pick up the news either. I guess no kid from Bankside or Lawndale felt like sharing information with the adult world. But we all knew, and everyone was tense at school. I figured someone would go after Antonio again, or they would take it out on the soccer team, or possibly the soccer captain. When I was summoned out of history class, I figured something had happened, or that Tobias and Coyle wanted to grill me yet again. But instead of a note from the front office, I was told to head for the Guidance Department, to see Mrs. Simmons.
“Hello, Joe,” she said when I entered, “congratulations on the county tournament.”
&nb
sp; “Thanks,” I said, and sneezed.
“Why don’t you have a seat. Are you okay?”
“Never better,” I told her, sitting down carefully. I was getting tired of repeating the same lie—I would have to find a new answer to that question.
“Sorry to pull you out of class,” Mrs. Simmons said, “but something’s come up. I looked into possibilities for you …”
“You didn’t have to do that.”
“It’s my job,” she said. “I found some options. There’s the Navy. There are a few unorthodox colleges with limited classroom time that you might want to consider. But there’s one work-study program that we have to talk about today, because the deadline is pressing. Actually, I didn’t find this program, Mr. Desoto did. I talked to him about your … future … and he suggested this right away. I guess he knows one of the men who runs the program. Mr. Desoto called him, and even though you don’t fit their profile, he’s willing to interview you. But it has to be soon.”
“What’s the program?” I asked.
“It’s an old-fashioned sailing ship,” Mrs. Simmons said, “called the Sea Gypsy. There are a few such ships these days, modeled on a famous one called the Clearwater. The Sea Gypsy takes a small crew of high school graduates with strong science backgrounds on a one-year program. You learn how to sail, and you study river and marine biology, and I guess the ship does some environmental work on the Hudson River.” Mrs. Simmons passed me some pages. “Here are a few pictures and descriptions I downloaded from its Web site. Are you interested?” She grinned at me. “I would be.”
I took the pages and scanned them quickly. My eyes were drawn to a color photograph of a sailing ship flying before the wind. It looked breathtakingly beautiful. There were also photos of student crew members—they all looked like they were having fun and working hard. There was even a shot of two pretty girls in bikinis. “Sure,” I said. “I’m interested. But they won’t be interested in me.”
