“Touché.”
“Okay.”
“Okay, what?”
“I’m in,” said Law. “You tell me when and where we take these guys.”
“Thanks, but this is my fight. No use having the whole school to hate both of us.”
“But…”
I raised a stop-sign palm to within an inch of his nose. “I appreciate it, bro, but I’ve got this solo.”
He shrugged and nodded. “Okay, but if you need me, I’m there.”
Revenge isn’t something you share with a friend. The injury had been mine and so would be the sweet taste of vengeance. As the school counselor said, I needed to channel my energies. Okay, so maybe kicking Lance and Jamel’s butts wasn’t exactly constructive, but I was convinced channeling my energies in their direction sure would make me feel better. A feeling I barely remembered.
After school on Friday, Law and I were sitting on my front stoop talking. I had something I wanted to ask but was hesitant to approach the subject. Our conversation bounced all over the place, and eventually landed on my mom’s death. Law asked why I thought God took her, and I had no realistic answer.
To steer the conversation away from me, I asked, “How about you? Did you ever wonder what you did to deserve such a lousy father?”
Law shrugged. “I never gave it much thought.”
“You’re not a bad guy, and everybody loves your mom, so why did God, fate, or whatever, deal you guys a dad like yours?”
Law leaned forward and asked, “What’s this about? You never cared about my… uh, about Rusmir before.” I could see Law’s jaw tighten.
“It’s not about anything,” I said.
As we sat in silence, I must have squirmed a bit, because Law said, “I know something’s on your mind. Out with it.”
I inhaled a huge gasp of air and blew it out. “I need you to be my second.”
“Your second what?”
I explained that in American history class, Mr. Daniels talked about how popular dueling was in the eighteenth century. The offended party would challenge his opponent to a duel, and it was the second’s job to take care of the arrangements, and make sure the other guy and his second didn’t cheat.
“The second was even supposed to be ready to shoot the other dueler if he tried to run away,” I told him, but intentionally omitted the part where the second’s first obligation was to try to negotiate a peaceful resolution. We were waaaay past that point.
What I actually needed was a lookout to make sure I wasn’t caught as I gave Lance and Jamel the pounding they so rightly deserved. One at a time. I’m vengeful, not stupid.
The next morning Law asked Sherri Watts, who not only works in the Admin office but also has a major thing for him, to look up where Lance Brighton and Jamel Crockett’s sixth period classes were. My plan was to catch them, Lance one day, and Jamel the next, on their way to the team locker room. I would shove them between two of the temporary storage buildings behind the gym, and proceed to unleash a good old-fashioned butt kicking. To time it right, I needed to know where in the school they would be coming from. East Wing, five minutes, West Wing, two or three more.
“I’ll help, but I want you to promise me something.”
I expected him to make me promise not to kill either Lance or Jamel, or to promise I’d quit if he gave me the signal, but his request took a completely different tack.
“What?” I asked.
He said, “I want you to promise to call Lisa and ask her out again. She keeps asking how you’re doing and what’s going on with you.” Law smiled and winked. “To tell the truth, I think she really likes you—a lot.”
“I’ll think about it,” I told him. “But tomorrow Lance Brighton will learn a little something about the Bible. The part where it says, ‘Whatever a man sows, that will he also reap,’ and tomorrow,” I said, “Lance is going to reap a beating.”
“Like I said, I’m your lookout,” Law signaled a thumbs-up. “And if you need it, your backup.” He stood, dusted off the seat of his pants, and motioned to the front door. “I’ve got a critical question for you. Do you have any ice cream in the fridge?”
»»•««
To get from his sixth period algebra to the locker room in the phys-ed building, Lance “Pretty Boy” Brighton would most likely exit by the rear door on the east side of the main building. Instead of following the sidewalk all the way around the three temporary buildings sitting behind the main building, he would, as usual, blow off the “Keep off the Grass” signs, and take a shortcut between two of the three temporaries. A connecting porch blocked the path between the first two, so he would cut between the second and third. When he did, I would be waiting, not thirty feet from where they’d jumped me. Sort of poetic, isn’t it?
Law’s job would be to act as my lookout and to keep any other students from taking the same shortcut. He said, “I’ll just tell them one of the assistant principals asked me to make sure everyone kept off the grass, and that I was supposed to take down the names of anyone cutting through. That way, you shouldn’t be interrupted while you have your little knuckle chat with Lance.” It was a solid plan.
I said, “If you see a teacher or coach coming, yell, ‘Yo, Jimmy, where ya been?’”
“Who’s Jimmy?”
“Nobody. It’s just a signal.”
“I don’t understand. Is this Jimmy going to be there too?”
Is he kidding?
“He can’t be there, Law. He doesn’t exist.”
“Then how is he going to help me warn you if somebody’s coming or not?”
Frustrated, I growled, “Gee, Law, buddy, you are supposed to warn me. I was just using the name Jimmy like a code word.”
Law said, “Bazinga!” And laughed.
Yeah, he got me. It didn’t happen often, but he got me good.
After sixth period, we both made a beeline for the east exit, me from Mrs. Coleman’s government class across from the library and Law from Spanish class near the west door.
I arranged for Cathy Spire, a girl I knew from church, to drop my books off at my locker. I wanted to be sure to beat Lance out the east door. I asked Law what he was doing with his books. He said, “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be there.”
Knowing Law, he’d probably spook some poor freshman into holding them until he came back.
I waited in the grassy area between the two temporaries. A row of thick bushes blocked the view from the far end of the little alleyway on the back side. Law guarded the other. I pressed my back against the building behind a large electrical box about ten feet from the end, making myself as stealthy as possible.
Everything went according to my pernicious plan, pernicious being my latest vocabulary builder word. Law and I were in place a full five minutes before Lance came out the door. Oblivious to his impending doom, he left the sidewalk, as if on cue, and headed straight for the shortcut. Lance took two steps past me before he realized his fate.
I grabbed his right wrist with my left hand, spun him around, and shoved my right forearm against his throat. Using my sixty-pound weight advantage, I slammed him into the wall with such force the whole building shook from the impact. Anyone inside would come running outside to investigate. I didn’t care. Adrenaline was in the driver’s seat.
Lance’s eyes widened, but when he tried to speak, nothing came out. I wasn’t sure whether he was frozen by fear, or if the body slam had forced the air from his lungs. I leaned my face within two inches of his, and in my best Master of Vengeance voice said, “I ought to break both your legs for what you did to me.”
What I saw in his eyes was raw, paralyzing fear. I drew my right hand back in a rock-hard clenched fist. I shifted my weight forward to maximize the force of the blow to his face, but in the nanosecond between that shift and the punch, Lance whimpered. Time froze, and in that instant, my adrenaline-driven hate waned. The anger was there, and the evil voice in my head was screaming, “Do it! Do it!” But I couldn’t. I wanted to be
at him into oblivion. He deserved it. I’d even convinced myself he needed it, but I couldn’t pull the trigger.
I grabbed the front of his jacket with both hands and jerked him away from the wall. I lifted him off his feet, spun him around a hundred-eighty degrees, and heaved him into the other building with twice the force I used to slam him into Building Two. The metal siding crunched, and the whole building shook as though it might topple off its foundation.
Lance’s jaw slackened, and his eyes popped wide, like some cartoon character. Half a blink more, and he slumped to the ground in a heap. He stared up at me with a gaunt, hollow expression, all color drained from his face.
From the walkway, Law’s voice rang out. “Jimmy, what was that?”
I hustled around the corner to the back alleyway, circled around to the main sidewalk, and blended in with the crowd of guys gathering in front of the temporary buildings. Over my shoulder, I saw Mr. Oliver, the assistant principal, stepping between Buildings Two and Three. Two B-teamers stopped to peek around the hedge between the buildings. The one we called Dough Boy yelped, “Oh my Lord, it’s Lance Brighton!”
“Oops, sorry.” I apologized to Mr. Oliver as I “accidently on purpose” bumped his shoulder as I walked by. I wanted him to remember me as being one of the innocents in the crowd rather than the perp Lance might identify.
Law and I didn’t stick around to see what happened next.
As I reached the locker room door Law’s familiar voice asked, “Has anyone seen Jimmy? I thought I saw him walking this way.”
I laughed.
“Well?” Law pulled me aside.
“I couldn’t do it,” I told him. “I was about to. I mean, he was right there, just as we planned. I had him in my crosshairs, but couldn’t do it. It wasn’t in me.”
“Couldn’t do it? It sure sounded like you could. What were the two big explosions I heard?”
“Okay, so I managed to do it a little.”
“If that was your little, I’d hate to see your lot.”
“I did manage to slam him against one building and then the other. But I couldn’t finish him off. I wanted to pound him into a puddle of goo, but I couldn’t.”
“But they beat the…”
“I know. I know,” I interrupted. “He’s smaller than me, and he looked really scared.” I didn’t tell Law, but I sort of felt sorry for Lance and regretted slamming him into that second building so hard.
There was more going on in my head and gut than I wanted to talk about. In a quick jerking motion, I held my hands palm up toward Law. He got the message and let the subject drop.
No one mentioned Lance at weight-training, and the school’s normal grapevine was oddly silent on the subject for the rest of the day.
»»•««
At home, I thought about what Law had said about Lisa. He was right. Now there’s a scary thought. She deserved an explanation. I was ashamed of how I had treated her. I wouldn’t blame her if she never wanted to speak to me again. I didn’t have the right to get her involved in my pathetic life. I decided to sleep on it.
Dad woke Josh and me Tuesday morning by yelling from the kitchen. Normal family conversation died with Mom. We weren’t a family anymore, just three guys sharing a house. Dad’s church problems took up all his time and effort. Josh acted as though I had done something wrong by uncovering his crimes, and God seemed to be mad at all of us.
I watched as Dad set a box of cereal, three bowls, and a jug of milk out on the table, and we all ate without saying a word.
Dad finished before Josh and me, something that didn’t happen often. He gathered his worn, overstuffed briefcase and checked his tie in the hall mirror. “I’m going to stop by my office, and then pick up Mom’s stuff from her cubby at the university.” He paused a little longer than was comfortable and said, “I may see if they have some night classes I can teach.”
I guessed he needed something more to occupy his mind at night.
He retrieved his suit jacket from his room and left. No morning devotional. Every weekday morning, for as long as I could remember, no one left our house without the family gathering in the living room for what Dad called morning devotionals. He would read a scripture out of the Bible, and we would all make a comment on what it meant to us. At the end, we stood in a circle, holding hands, and prayed for God’s guidance and protection for the day.
Lately, Dad had been more detached than normal. Something was up. Maybe Dad, the ever-unbending tower of strength and confidence, had begun having his own doubts about God and religion. Was the family anchor losing its grip? Something I never thought I’d see.
I got an uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. But then, I’d been getting a lot of odd feelings in my gut lately.
When I asked Dad if there was a problem at church, he said, “It’s one of those things that happen in church government. Some folks see something one way and some see it the other.”
Funny, I never thought of church as having a government.
When I asked for details, he said, “We sometimes deal with sensitive matters, and in order for us to conduct church business frankly, we need to know the things we discuss in our meetings will remain private.” It seemed to me that church business ought to be done out in the open, but as in most things with Dad, what I thought didn’t matter.
Chapter Fifteen
As I pulled into the school parking lot that morning, Law grabbed me.
“Cujo, watch your back today. Lance’s posse isn’t going to let this go.”
I nodded.
“If you’d screwed him up bad enough, that might have ended all of this, but as it is, I think they’re gonna be madder than ever.” He leaned toward me and whispered, “Like I said, be careful, and watch your back.”
I knew he could be right. I probably hadn’t done myself any favors by letting Lance off the hook. It might come back to bite me in the butt. I brushed off the uneasy feeling and turned my thoughts to a more pleasant subject.
I asked Law, “Do you think Lisa will be mad at me for not calling her?”
“Way to change the subject, dude.”
“Today I’m a lover, not a fighter.” I elbowed him in the ribs.
“They say, ‘Love conquers all,’ don’t they? I know she likes you. I think she’ll be glad to hear from you.”
The bell rang, and I broke into a trot down the hall. Anyone not in their seat when tardy bell rang in two minutes was considered late and sent to the school disciplinary office for action. I normally tried to avoid that particular office so I jogged across the parking lot and sped down the hall to American history.
The morning passed without a problem. Maybe my little meeting with Lance was enough to solve our differences. After algebra, I dumped my books in my locker and headed for the cafeteria. The hallway leading to the cafeteria was jam-packed with students, so I didn’t see Jamel coming until he was almost on top of me. Fortunately, I saw him a half-second before he dove at me. Had I not seen him, he would have crushed me against the heavy steel lockers.
By sheer instinct, I sidestepped his charge. Spinning to the right, I circled behind him, and threw my weight behind his, sending our combined five hundred pounds crashing into the lockers. Jamel, not me, caught the brunt of the impact. I’d always thought of school lockers as being indestructible. It turns out they aren’t.
I moved back a step or two, and Jamel dropped to his knees, swayed from side to side, and then fell forward, banging his head into the lockers again. I watched as he slumped to the right and fell to the floor, out cold. The normal hallway chatter fell into dead silence.
The first voice I heard was Mr. Lewis, the band director. “What’s going on here?”
I didn’t say anything. I took in a slow lungful of air.
“I’m talking to you, young man.” He raised his voice but kept his distance.
I stopped and stared at him a moment or two before speaking. As my heart rate returned to near normal, I said, “He jumped me.”
I turned and walked down the hall, expecting him to say or do something to stop me, but he didn’t.
Toward the end of sixth period, a skinny girl in a blue-and-white plaid skirt and a white polo shirt appeared at the door and handed Mrs. Coleman a note. There was little doubt it was about me.
“Todd Nelson, come up here a moment, please.”
Told you.
“Report to the vice-principal’s office.” Then she added, “And don’t dawdle.”
The school had a vice principal, three assistant principals, and an assistant to the principal. With all that help, you’d think Mr. Welch would do a better job of running the school. Just saying.
I’d been expecting a summons to the office ever since the altercation in the hallway and wasn’t entirely unhappy about going to see the Vice Principal, Mrs. Havlicek. I’d been toying with the idea of asking her if she would get Coach Newcomb to let me see the video tapes of the game, thinking she might be more sympathetic. I’d never met her, but from what I had heard, she was fair and willing to hear the student’s side of things.
I signed in at the long counter. Mrs. Ingersoll, the administrative coordinator, told me to have a seat on the black leather sofa outside Mrs. Havlicek’s closed door. I hadn’t been to the school office since Mom signed me in on my first day. We had met with the registrar, a pasty-faced little man with an obvious comb-over wearing a pea-green blazer and a red-and-white plaid bowtie. I don’t remember his name. You don’t see many bowties anymore, but on the registrar, it seemed to fit.
After a short wait, the door to Mrs. Havlicek’s office opened. To my surprise, and despair, instead of the kind grandmotherly face of Emily Havlicek, the well-weathered, permanently furrowed brow of Coach Newcomb greeted me. Can life get anymore sucky than this?
He said, “Come in, Nelson.”
The man hates me. He wants me gone, and this is his chance.
I looked around the nicely appointed office, hoping upon hope I’d find Mrs. Havlicek. I didn’t.
“What’s the matter with you, Nelson?” More than anything, I despised the sneer on his face.
Half the Distance Page 11
