The World of Normal Boys

by K. M. Soehnlein

  He’s not familiar with this end of town. There’s a shopping plaza with a big hardware store he’s visited once or twice with his father, and the only Chinese takeout place for miles, the one Uncle Stan insists uses pigeon meat in the chicken dishes. Beyond that, he’s not sure. He keeps moving forward, until the road narrows a bit and the streetlights are less frequent, the houses are smaller and less packed together. In the distance he can see the bright perimeter of a cemetery, a row of gravestones glowing behind a chain link fence and then the impenetrable darkness beyond. It’s so obviously ghostly he snickers a panicky laugh, no way he’s going to ride any closer to that. He cuts sharply to the left, enough distance between him and the nearest approaching car to get him across Green and onto a side street he hopes will lead him back on course.

  His thighs are starting to ache, and the underside of his butt where he didn’t even know he had muscles. A persistent itch is circling across his scabbed palms. He slows down a bit to catch his breath and feels the air against his sweaty face. His ears ring before they adjust to the noises fading behind him. Gentler sounds make their way in: the click of a car door, a couple of voices from someone’s front stoop, some muffled TV dialogue drifting from an open window.

  A car starts up in a driveway, he glimpses the back of a black man’s head in the orange interior light. Farther down he sees a couple of small figures chasing each other across their lawn, black kids, younger than himself, and a woman, also black, taking out her trash. She squints her eyes at him and watches as he passes by. A sign above a mechanic’s shop on a corner: Marble Road Auto Body. Marble Road: his first reaction is disbelief, that this place really exists beyond the fearsome stories he’s heard—like the one Larry told him about a gang of black girls who jumped a white girl walking down Marble Road and wedged a miniature-golf pencil up her ass. He had an image in his head of high rise apartment buildings, gangs of young men hanging out, and funk music blasting from big cars, like a miniature Harlem, or the opening credits on Good Times. But this place is so quiet, and not even quiet enough to be scary. It’s just another part of Greenlawn. The only thing that strikes him as really different is the road, which is more cracked, and weedy at the curb. The streets in his neighborhood get paved every year.

  He turns at the next intersection for no reason at all, just full of doubt, needing to change directions. His bike chinks and rattles over the broken-up macadam. Some lights up ahead: a baseball field, a few cars parked at the edge of the glow. Two girls and two boys on the hood, one of them smoking. A bass line thumping lightly under their conversation. A face turns toward him, a halo of light on slicked down, straightened hair. A girl’s voice: “Hey? Who’s that?”

  Another girl: “It’s a white boy.”

  A guy’s voice, duller: “Some white boy got lost.”

  “Ooo.” This from one of the girls.

  “Hey, where you going, boy?”

  For a split second, he thinks about asking for directions but his feet impulsively push harder on the pedals—an impulse so old he doesn’t think he’s ever not had it. He rides away, away from a taunt he can’t comprehend and the tail end of bored laughter. And now it seems like he’s been riding for hours, and he’s wondering if he’s going anywhere at all.

  Chapter Five

  He makes it to a road that he recognizes, running beneath a vast slope of dead, flattened grass. Surrounded by chain link at the top is a mansion, a gray silhouette against the sky, that’s been uninhabited for years and is rumored to be haunted. In the winter kids sleigh all the way down from the fence, though it’s dangerous because you have to turn sharply at the bottom or wind up in the line of traffic. Up ahead are two more landmarks: the Dairy Queen, where he and Victoria used to hang out before she went away for the summer, and beyond that the town dump, where he’s accompanied his father with bottles and newspapers for recycling. A CLOSED UNTIL APRIL sign is nailed to the front of the Dairy Queen.

  The parking lot is lit up but empty—except for a van parked near the back, which seems suspicious to him. He wheels his bike toward the pay phone. He’s got some change in his pocket but isn’t sure who to call. Nana Rena, by now mad with worry? Maybe Uncle Stan is back at the house. She’ll send him out looking; everyone will be pissed off. As he rounds the corner of the low building he’s startled by a noise.

  A boy his age is sitting on the ground, his head tilted back against the wall. Robin can see dried blood around the boy’s nostrils, little clay-colored flakes on the white stretch of his upper lip. He’s wearing a baseball cap; dark hair pokes out around his ears and neck. His ears are the perfect kind of ears, delicate and flat, the right size for his thin face. Robin’s seen this guy before, in school.

  “What’s up?” Robin says, digging into his pocket for a dime.

  The boy stares at him, startled. His face is sad or angry or something that sends out a warning. He wipes the bloodstain from under his nose with the cuff of his flannel shirt.

  Robin puts a dime into the slot. No dial tone. He flicks the coin-return lever but gets nothing back.

  “It doesn’t work,” the boy mutters.

  “Oh,” Robin says, and then just stands there. “The hospital’s not far from here?”

  The boys squints up at him. “I don’t need no fucking hospital.”

  “No, I mean for me.”

  “What’s wrong with you? You sick?”

  “No, my brother is. He’s . . . hurt.”

  The boy shoots a quick look toward the van at the back of the lot. Robin sees some motion in the trees behind the vehicle, makes out the blurry figure of a man stooped over, picking something up. Then the boy stands up, dusts off the seat of his jeans, and speaks. “I know who you are.”

  Now Robin recognizes him from phys. ed.: the other kid hanging out at the top of the bleachers, trying to avoid the Skins vs. Shirts punchball game. “Yeah, yeah, I remember. Gym class. Pintack? Fourth period?”

  “I fuckin’ hate that guy,” the boy spits out. “Fuckin’ asshole jock. He fuckin’ hates me and I hate him back.”

  Robin nods, happy for something in common. “Yeah, I can’t stand him. He acts so tough and gets everyone all riled up about all those stupid games and—”

  “Yeah, I know about you,” he interrupts.

  Robin tries to figure out what he means—does he know him from somewhere besides gym class?

  The boy starts walking away toward the van, muttering, “Shit.” He’s caught sight of the man back by the van, who has emerged from the woods, carrying a plastic garbage bag stuffed full. He’s also in a flannel shirt, jeans, and a cap: the logo is General Motors. He’s not very tall but there’s something instantly mean about him. He clears a big gob from his throat and spits against the gravel. When he looks their way he drops the bag.

  “Get the fuck over here,” he yells.

  Robin watches Scott take his time. There, he’s remembered the boy’s name: Scott Schatz. He’s one of those kids no one pays any attention to, though Robin’s always been curious about him. How has Scott managed to sit out the same games as Robin but avoid the kind of name calling Robin has put up with?

  “I got another bag back there,” the man says to Scott. “Go get it.” Robin can’t figure out what’s going on back there. Is this man barking orders Scott’s father? His mind races: a dead body in the bag, a pile of drugs, something illegal. One too many weird possibilities. Just get out of here. He’s pretty sure that there’s a turn somewhere not too far down the road that would curve him back toward Tappan Boulevard. Pretty sure, but not positive, and his instincts have been off all night. And then Scott turns back to him and lifts up his index finger as if to say, Wait one minute, and there’s something in his eyes, not quite comforting, but friendly in a simple way, for which Robin feels instantly grateful. So he decides to wait. Maybe Scott will give him directions after he does whatever it is being demanded of him. He takes a deep, steadying breath and leans his bike on its kickstand.

  The man a
t the van has opened a beer and is swigging it down. Scott returns from the woods, dragging another full bag with both hands. He struggles to lift it into the back of the van until the man gets impatient and does it for him, shoving Scott out of the way. Then they talk for a minute in very low voices, glancing back his way. Finally Scott waves Robin over.

  The man asks in a slurry voice, “You going to the hospital?”

  “Yeah,” Robin answers timidly.

  “What the hell you doing over here?”

  “I got lost. I wound up driving around Marble Road.”

  “Hah!” The man spits again. “You’re lucky you didn’t get the shit kicked outta you.” He chugs his beer.

  Scott rolls his eyes and frowns. “Shut up, Dad. You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Dad, Robin thinks. This scary guy is Scott’s father.

  Scott looks at Robin. “We practically live on Marble Road.”

  “Practically ain’t the same as actually,” Mr. Schatz says. He crushes the empty can in his hand and chucks it at Scott. “Throw your bike in the back.”

  “You don’t have to. I mean, you could just tell me how to get there.”

  Scott reaches out and grabs his handle bars. “It’s not that close, man.” Together they lift the bike in the van. The front wheel falls on one of the bags and the insides let out a tinny crunch.

  “Don’t you rip those goddamn things,” Mr. Schatz says, “or you’ll be carrying cans to the drop off one by one between your fucking teeth.”

  “Shut up, we’re not ripping nothing,” Scott says. “C’mon,” he says to Robin and climbs in. Robin props himself at Scott’s side. Scott reaches across him, the tail of his oversize wool shirt brushing prickly against Robin’s arm, and shuts the door. It’s dark as a cave.

  Mr. Schatz starts up the motor. Rock-and-roll music jangles the air. Robin thinks it must be Elvis, but he’s never been able to tell any of those ’50s singers apart. The air inside grows stuffy very quickly, filled with the stench coming from the empty cans: moldy beer, rotting sugar. Then there’s sharp burning of a match and a cloud of smoke from Mr. Schatz’s cigarette. Scott calls out to his father, “Hey, pass the smokes back.”

  Mr. Schatz ignores him. Scott picks up a can and hurls it into the dash. “C‘mon, give ’em over.”

  “You better calm down, motherfucker, or you’re gonna get it.”

  Scott rubs his nose self-consciously. “A little late for that,” he mutters.

  Robin nods and says, “Guess so,” which is all he can come up with. He hasn’t been hit by his father since he got a spanking at age six for who knows why—he can’t even imagine getting a bloody nose from him. Scott acts as if it’s not such a big deal, but with his eyes adjusting to the darkness, Robin can again make out that sad-angry combination he first saw on Scott’s face.

  Scott stamps his feet on the metal floor a couple of time. “Cigarettes, man!” he yells over the doo-wop harmonies.

  “You’re too young to smoke,” Mr. Schatz yells back, but in the tone of voice that sounds like he doesn’t really care. A pack of Winstons comes flying back at them and bounces off the spokes of Robin’s bike.

  Scott squints at him. “You don’t smoke probably.”

  “I’ve smoked my mother’s cigarettes plenty.” A lie: only once or twice, with mostly unpleasant results.

  “You can have a drag of mine. I don’t want you hacking to death.”

  Robin forces a laugh. “OK, that’s fuckin’ cool,” he says. He thinks he should say things like “fuckin’ cool” with Scott.

  Scott pulls a match from his pocket and lights one. Even with all the hardness in his expression, Scott has a face that Robin thinks of as cute, which is just one more thing for him to be nervous about. He’s glad when the match goes out. Scott takes a drag and coughs a little himself. “They’re getting rid of the bottle bill next month, so we’re getting everything we can now,” he explains.

  “That’s a good idea,” Robin says, taking the cigarette from Scott’s fingers.

  “It’s a fuckin’ hassle is what it is. Every fuckin’ night for a fuckin’ week.”

  Mr. Schatz yells from the front, “Don’t you start that shit again.”

  Scott pulls his cap over his eyes and then drops his fist into the bag. Another groan of aluminum. Robin brings the cigarette to his mouth and sucks in. For a second it’s just warm, and then it’s like something is trapped in his throat and he can’t breathe. He tries not to cough, which only makes it worse. He can’t see or hear anything for what seems like forever. There’s a slap on his back, flat and hard, Scott’s hand. He pats him a few times until the coughing stops, lets his hand rest there until Robin calms down.

  “Sorry,” Robin says.

  Scott takes the cigarette back and drags in on it. “It’s a bad fuckin’ habit anyway.”

  “Warning: Smoking may be hazardous to your health,” Robin recites.

  “Yeah, just like parents.”

  Robin shakes his head. “I feel a little dizzy.”

  Scott moves over. “You wanna rest?”

  “OK.” He pivots so they’re side by side, shoulder blades wedged between the bent edge of plastic-covered cans, Scott blowing smoke above them like a chimney.

  “So your name is Robin, right?”

  “Uh-huh. And you’re Scott?”

  “Bingo.”

  Robin can feel his heartbeat speeding up. It always surprises him when anyone knows his name, even though he knows everyone’s name at school: these little mental files he has going all the time, gathering information, mapping out the terrain around him. Is Scott that kind of person, too? Or has he just heard someone picking on him in the locker room?

  “So what’s with your brother?”

  “He fell, maybe broke his neck.”

  “No way! Older brother?”

  “Younger.” He hesitates: how much should he say? But then Scott says in a very genuine voice, “That really sucks,” which opens up the floodgates. “There was this whole fucked up thing yesterday. He fell off the slide at this playground near my house, when I was up there with him. Me and him and my sister and my cousin, Larry, who’s a pain in the ass—we were all up at the top together and then, I don’t know, next thing he was on the ground, knocked out.”

  “He broke his neck? Doesn’t seem like it’s tall enough.”

  Robin considers this. How tall was the slide? Six feet, seven? Seemed tall as a house yesterday but obviously that’s not right. “I guess it doesn’t make much sense.”

  “Welcome to the fucking world.”

  Robin reaches for the cigarette and takes another drag, not very deep. This one goes down smoother. He speaks as he coughs out smoke again. “Larry says Jackson jumped off, but I think I might have done it, me and my sister, pushing.”

  Scott reaches across and takes the cigarette back. He taps his fist on Robin’s chest. “Don’t get heavy about it, man. He’ll be all right.”

  Robin wipes his eyes, which are watering from the cigarette smoke, though he wonders if Scott thinks he’s crying. He manages to croak, “Yeah, sure, thanks,” when the van makes a sharp turn and comes to a stop.

  Scott crawls to the door and swings it wide, revealing the stadium glow of the hospital grounds, green lawns sparkling under the mist of concealed night sprinklers. Robin strains under the weight of the bike until Scott helps him with it. “So, thanks again.”

  “Yeah, later.” Scott pulls a hand from his pocket and sticks it into the air between them. They shake, locking their eyes on each other. “See you in Jockville,” Scott says.

  “Yeah, I guess I have to go back to school tomorrow.”

  “I’m usually out by the wall in the back, near the breezeway. You know, before homeroom, if you wanna hang in the morning. I don’t know if it’s your crowd, probably not, all the burnouts.” He shrugs. “Whatever.”

  “OK, maybe.” Robin’s always made a point of avoiding that area—it’s definitely not his crowd, it’s more of To
dd Spicer’s crowd—but Scott’s invitation seems worth considering.

  Mr. Schatz guns the engine for emphasis. Ride or no ride, Robin hates the man. How could anyone punch their own kid bloody, especially someone as nice as Scott? As Scott closes himself back in, Robin is afraid for him, for the long night ahead, picking up other people’s castoffs to make money for that old bully. Peeling back onto Tappan and blasting out fumes, the rusty brown van is an eyesore. Robin waves, though Scott obviously can’t see him.

  And then he’s alone again. The air coats his exposed skin like a damp rag. Every piece of his body feels weak: stiff knuckles, burning thighs, cold, sooty nose. He hasn’t eaten for hours but thinks he might throw up if he did. It’s as if he’s been tricked by a few minutes of sort-of friendship into forgetting how terrible everything else is.

  The residue of tobacco is on his fingertips, a smell like hot chocolate or burned popcorn. He’ll have to find a sink inside before he sees his parents.

  The longer he stands there looking up at the building he’s been trying to get to all night long, the more he feels responsible for this entire situation. He should not go inside; he should not even show his face in public. Another TV-movie sentiment forms in his head, a voice like a prayer: Let him live and I’ll die instead. But then he thinks of his mother’s instructions: Be strong. Is it “strong” to want to die so that Jackson can live, or is that the weakest thought of all?

  When his foot lands on the big gray entrance mat, the glass and silver doors swing apart with such silent speed he feels as if he is under their control. The hospital lobby is barren, with none of the confusing activity of the emergency room the night before, and only the dimmest tremble of music in the air. Everything here is bright and angled: square, flame-orange couches without pillows, magazines inert on shiny end tables, checkerboard floor tiles waxed to a bluish gleam. His sneakers squeak with every step. On each wall hangs a many-colored mural depicting doctors and nurses and families on the mend: a man in a white lab coat rests his big hand on the shoulder of a boy whose arm sports a bulky cast; a woman holds her sleeping infant up to an approving nurse. The faces beam but to Robin they are menacing: the heads have a crude, rectangular shape to them, the bodies are stiff and cardboard flat. With his knees still wobbly and his head pounding from the ride, he feels like an alien form of life—one that sweats and throbs and does not smile. At the far end of this room is a Formica counter, where an old lady is staring intently at a single sheet of paper. She is wearing a white tunic but no cap, and Robin isn’t sure if she is a nurse or just dressed to look like one.