Blackburn

by Bradley Denton

  “That’s what happens,” Todd shouted. “That’s what happens when you get help from a pussy.”

  For the first time since Jimmy had come down from the tower, Todd looked at him. And grinned.

  Jimmy turned to resume the two-mile walk home. Jasmine went into the ditch, her shoes squishing on the wet ground at the bottom, and ran ahead. She thunked Doll-Baby’s head on fence posts as she went.

  “Won’t that hurt her?” Jimmy asked.

  “She likes it,” Jasmine said.

  As they passed the shattered batwing, Jimmy threw his own kite into the road with it. He kept the tail.

  * * *

  When Dad got home that evening, he came into the kitchen and said “Supper fixed?” to Mom. This was a sign of trouble. Jimmy tried to get out the back door.

  “Where you think you’re going?”

  Too late. “Nowhere.”

  “Nowhere what?”

  “Nowhere, sir.”

  “You get your chores done? You smash those cans like I told you?”

  “Yes, sir. I put them in grocery sacks.”

  Dad looked as if he were trying to think of something wrong with that.

  “He was good today,” Mom said. “He took care of Jasmine this afternoon so I could get some things done.”

  Jasmine popped into the kitchen. “He was too pussy to fight Todd Boyle.”

  Jimmy heard his heartbeat in his head. He tried to open the door, but Dad gripped his arm before he could turn the knob.

  “You say that word to your sister?” Dad shook Jimmy so hard that his shoulder popped.

  Jimmy was mad. “I didn’t do nothing.”

  Dad opened the door and dragged Jimmy across the yard into the garage. He propelled Jimmy facefirst against the pickup fender and told him to drop his pants.

  Jimmy let his jeans and briefs fall around his ankles. Then he gripped the rim of the wheel well, palms up. He would not cry.

  He heard Dad take the piece of fiberglass fishing rod from its nails. It whished through the air twice. Jimmy shut his eyes and clamped his teeth. He would not cry.

  The rod hissed a third time and bit into his buttocks. He sucked air through his teeth.

  “You gonna teach your sister nasty words?” Dad asked.

  “No,” Jimmy said. Eat shit.

  The rod hit the backs of his thighs. Jimmy yelped before he could stop himself. Dried mud inside the wheel well crumbled between his fingers.

  “No what?” Dad asked.

  “No sir,” Jimmy answered. He heard his saliva drip onto the fender. Queer bait.

  The rod hit his thighs again, with an even hotter sting. His nose began to run. Tears squeezed past his eyelids.

  “You gonna backtalk me any more?” Dad asked.

  “No sir.” Fuck Nixon.

  “Carl.” It was Mom. Jimmy knew better than to look around. “Jasmine says that James didn’t say that word to her. She says it was another boy, being mean.”

  “I ain’t whipping him for talking dirty,” Dad said. “I’m whipping him for talking back.”

  Mom’s shoes crunched on the concrete as she left.

  The rod whished through the air twice.

  Jimmy cried.

  When Dad was through, he put the rod back on its nails and said, “Turn around.”

  Jimmy did as he was told. His legs and bottom burned as if matches touched them in a hundred places.

  Dad put his thumbs in his pockets. “Was some punk bothering your sister?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did you whip his ass?”

  “No, sir.”

  Dad looked at him for a long time. “Guess I raised a sissy,” he said then. “Didn’t I?”

  Jimmy had to answer. “Yes, sir.”

  Dad went to the door. “Pull up your pants,” he said, and went out.

  * * *

  Jimmy lay in bed reading a Green Lantern comic book. He had already read it ten or fifteen times, but he wanted to keep its events sharp. The new issue was on the rack at the IGA, and he would buy it on Saturday after Mom gave him his allowance.

  He was sweating in his windowless room, and the sweat made his welts sting. In a few weeks, when it was hot enough, Mom would let him sleep on the couch in the living room.

  After he finished the comic, the welts hurt worse. He wondered how Dad would like it if he were the one who was whipped every time he said something wrong. Jimmy looked at his own fishing rod in the corner. Maybe in a few years, he would see if he could give as good as he got.

  He sat up and pulled the rod onto the bed. It was a six-foot length of thick black fiberglass. Its Zebco 404 reel was loaded with a hundred yards of twenty-pound test monofilament. At Christmas, Dad had said he’d chosen the sturdy pole and strong line so that Jimmy could catch some really big ones. So far, though, they had only gone fishing once. Dad had gotten disgusted with Jimmy for having trouble threading a worm onto a hook. “If you ain’t going to fish right,” Dad had said, “you might as well not fish at all.” Then he had thrown their stuff into the pickup and driven them home. Several times over the next week, Jimmy had dug up worms near the septic tank and practiced. But it had been for nothing.

  The door opened. “That’s it, James,” Mom said. She pulled the string to turn off the light. “Time to go to sleep.”

  Jimmy put his fishing rod back in the corner. “’Night, Mom.”

  She stood framed in the doorway. “You aren’t bleeding, are you, honey?”

  “No.” The cut on his thigh was small. His jeans had been stuck to it, but it had only bled a little when he’d pulled them down.

  “All right,” Mom said. “Just be sure to be respectful from now on, and you won’t be spanked any more.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “That’s a boy. Good night, dear.”

  “’Night.”

  She closed the door, and Jimmy lay still, listening. As usual, Jasmine threw a fit at having to go to bed. Also as usual, Mom soothed her until she settled down. Then Mom and Dad had a fight. Jimmy scrambled the words in his head.

  When the fight was over, Dad watched the end of the Thursday Night Movie and Mom took a bath. Jimmy tried to hear the movie through the noise of running water. There were sirens and gunfire. Usually these sounds put him right to sleep, but tonight his welts kept him awake.

  He was still awake after Mom and Dad had gone to bed and Dad was snoring. Jimmy waited until he was sure that Mom must be asleep too, and then he got up. He dressed without turning on the light. When his shoes were tied, he opened his door just enough and slipped into the kitchen. He closed it so that there was no click.

  At the back door, he paused. Dad was still snoring, so Jimmy took the key from the nail over Mom’s wringer washer. He couldn’t unlock the deadbolt without making noise, but he didn’t think Mom and Dad would hear. If Jasmine did, she might wake up crying for fear of monsters. But that wasn’t unusual. If she kept it up long enough, Mom might come to tell her it was only a bad dream. Jasmine had lots of bad dreams, and Mom no longer looked in on Jimmy just because his sister was bawling.

  Jimmy unlocked the bolt, opened the door, and stepped outside. He closed the door and relocked the bolt, then crept around the house into the front yard. When he reached the road, he jumped into the ditch and ran toward town.

  He could see the water tower ahead. It was like a silhouette of the Tin Woodman, black against the purple sky.

  * * *

  Dogs in town barked at Jimmy, and a few lights came on. The dogs didn’t scare him. He and dogs got along. Some of their owners, though, might call Officer Johnston, the Wantoda cop. Johnston loved grabbing kids out after curfew. But only one car passed Jimmy before he reached the Boyles’, and he was able to hide behind a parked van. The car wasn’t Johnston.

  The Boyles didn’t have a dog. A white cat ran from Jimmy as he came up the driveway, but he wasn’t startled. The house was dark, as were all the houses on this street. He went to the backyard gate, stoppe
d to listen, and climbed over. The chain-link rattled as if in a breeze.

  Jimmy crawled through the grass like a lizard. He kept close to the flower bed that Mrs. Boyle had lined with chunks of granite. He would be chigger-bit, but that was better than being seen. Some of the windows above him were open, so he was careful to be quiet. He slithered behind the house, hoping Todd’s window wasn’t open too. He wanted to break glass. He had been invited over here once, before Todd had turned into Boss Stud, and he remembered that Todd’s room had blue carpeting on the floor and a portable TV on the dresser. If the TV was still there, maybe he could hit it with the granite boulder he would heave inside.

  A wail made him freeze. It came from the window directly above. Jimmy remained still until he heard voices from deeper within the house, and then he crawled over the rocks into the flower bed. He pressed against the house’s foundation. A yellow rectangle shone onto the grass where he had been.

  “Are you dirty, sweetheart?” Mrs. Boyle’s groggy voice asked. The wail continued. “No? Hungry?” A moment later the wail stopped.

  The foundation was cool and gritty against Jimmy’s cheek. Petals tickled his nose.

  Mrs. Boyle began singing. “Hush, little baby, don’t you cry. Mama’s gonna sing you a lullaby…” She was accompanied by creaking wood.

  Jimmy got to his knees. Then he stood. He could just see over the windowsill. Flower-print curtains hung on the other side of the screen. There was a gap between the curtains, and he could see Mrs. Boyle in a rocking chair beside a white bassinet. The top of her robe was open and pulled to one side. Baby Tina Boyle was sucking on the exposed breast. When Baby Tina stopped for a second, the nipple stood out bright red.

  Jimmy was fascinated. When Jasmine had been a baby, he had never seen Mom feed her with anything but a bottle. And he had never seen a lady’s breast, although he had seen pictures. The real thing was more amazing.

  The door behind Mrs. Boyle opened. Jimmy almost ducked and ran, but then he saw Mr. Boyle’s sleep-puffed face. He hadn’t been spotted.

  “She okay?” Mr. Boyle asked.

  “She’s fine,” Mrs. Boyle said. “Go back to bed.”

  “Seems like she wants to eat twice as often as Todd and Chrissie did.”

  “About the same. You’re just waking up more.”

  Mr. Boyle grunted. “Is she gonna starve while we’re at Chrissie’s whatchacallit on Saturday?”

  “It’s a tonette concert. That plastic instrument is a tonette, and don’t you let Chrissie hear you refer to it as a whatchacallit. I want to buy her a flute when school starts.” Mrs. Boyle shifted Baby Tina in her arms. “I’ll get a sitter for Saturday.”

  “Why? We’ll be gone, what, from one to two-thirty? Todd can handle it.”

  “She’s a month old, and he’s just a little boy. Besides, he’d rather be out playing with his friends.”

  “He’s gonna be twelve in September. He can watch a baby sleep for an hour and a half, or I’ll know the reason why.” Mr. Boyle yawned. “Well, have fun.” He closed the door.

  Baby Tina squeaked, and Mrs. Boyle began singing again.

  Jimmy sank to the flower bed. He waited until the singing stopped and the yellow rectangle disappeared, and then he returned to the grass. He crawled back to the gate.

  He didn’t want to break Todd’s window. That would only make Boss Stud mad.

  What Jimmy wanted was to make Boss Stud dead.

  Before going home, he went to the water tower. He squirmed through the hole in the fence, went to the south leg, and began climbing. He had never done this in the dark. The rungs were wet, and one of his feet slipped when he was halfway up. The sensation of almost falling was wonderful. He tried to re-create it after a few more rungs, but it didn’t work. The slip had to be unexpected.

  On the catwalk, he leaned against the rail and gazed over the town. He hadn’t realized that a tiny burg like Wantoda had so many lights. They were spread out below him like a field of stars. It was as if he were an astronaut a billion miles from home, and the water tank were his spaceship. Down on the Potwin road, Officer Johnston’s patrol car cruised past without slowing. It was a sign to Jimmy that he could do anything.

  He made it back home and into bed without being caught.

  * * *

  Jimmy left his room as soon as Dad drove away. The garage would be his until six o’clock. He took his fishing rod and pocketknife with him when he left the house. He came back for crayons, Scotch tape, and Mom’s stapler.

  In the garage, he tore a huge sheet from Dad’s four-foot roll of brown paper. He was measuring it on the floor when Mom came looking for him.

  “What are you doing, James?”

  He looked up. “Making a kite. The other one got busted.”

  “Don’t you want breakfast first? We have Wheaties.”

  “Could I wait and come in at lunch?” He resumed his measurements.

  “I suppose so. Does your father know you’re using that paper?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Dad had granted permission for him to use it for the first kite, and he had no reason to think he couldn’t use it for a second.

  “Well, don’t use too much. We don’t know what he wants it for.”

  Jimmy doubted that Dad wanted it for anything. He had probably found it at work and taken it for no reason, as he had done with other stuff. But Jimmy knew better than to say so.

  “And be sure to put that tape measure back where you found it. You know how your father is about his tools.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Mom went away. A while later Jasmine came in carrying Doll-Baby. “Whatcha doing?” she asked.

  “What’s it look like?”

  Jasmine cocked her head. “Why’s it so big?”

  “To make up for the busted one.”

  Jasmine lost interest. “I wish I had a bicycle,” she said.

  “You’re too little.”

  “If I had a bicycle, I could give Doll-Baby a ride.”

  “If you’ll go away,” Jimmy said, “I’ll give Doll-Baby a ride for you.”

  “You don’t have a bicycle either,” Jasmine said, and left. She took Doll-Baby with her.

  At lunchtime, Jimmy went into the house and ate macaroni. He watched Jasmine try to feed Doll-Baby, and he helped Mom with the dishes. Then he took one of Dad’s saws and set off for Stranger Creek.

  After returning to the garage, he measured and whittled two of the willow saplings he had cut. When they were finished, he put the kite together. He attached the tail from the first kite, but added ten more shop rags from Dad’s barrel. Then he used a length of monofilament to bend the crosspiece into a bow. Finally he tied the kite to his rod and reel line and took it outside.

  It worked. It worked so well that it almost dragged him across the pasture. He let it fly at low altitude for a few minutes to be sure the paper wouldn’t tear, and then he reeled it in and took it apart. He had the pieces stashed under his bed, and the garage cleaned up, fifteen minutes before Dad came home.

  He made a special effort to be polite that evening. He didn’t want to be more sore tomorrow than he already was.

  * * *

  Jimmy didn’t care that it was daytime. If he was caught, Dad would whip him. Or maybe he would be sent to reform school. He could live with either one.

  He sat on the curb down the block from the Boyles’ and read the new Green Lantern. After a while Mr. and Mrs. Boyle and Chrissie came outside and drove away. Some older kids were riding their bikes toward Jimmy, so he stayed put until they were gone. Then, except for a man mowing his lawn two blocks away, the street was quiet. On a nice Saturday, the people of Wantoda liked to get out of town.

  Jimmy stood, folded his comic lengthwise, and put it in a back pocket. Then he picked up his backpack and crossed the street. At the Boyles’ front door, he reached into the backpack and took out the sack of cow chips he had collected that morning. He placed it on the stoop and lit it with a match. He donned his backpack. When
the bag was burning well, he rang the doorbell and sprinted to vault over the gate into the back yard.

  He was under Baby Tina’s window with a piece of granite in his hands when he heard Todd open the front door. As Todd yelled, Jimmy heaved the rock through the window screen, tearing it partway from its frame. The rock hit the carpeted floor with a thunk, but Todd was still shouting.

  Jimmy grabbed the sill and hauled himself inside. The door to the hallway was open, but he wouldn’t stay long enough for that to matter. He threw the rock outside and went to the bassinet. Baby Tina’s face was squinched up. She was wearing only a diaper, and Jimmy worried that the tough canvas of the backpack might chafe her skin. But speed was essential. He shrugged off the pack, placed its open mouth beside Baby Tina, and rolled her inside. He buckled the flap.

  Todd’s shouts stopped. Jimmy grabbed the backpack’s shoulder straps, went to the window, and leaned out to lower the pack as far as he could. When he let go, Baby Tina only had to fall a few inches. She began to wail anyway. Jimmy heard the front door close.

  “If you think I’m gonna come in there and change your pants, you’re crazy!” Todd yelled.

  Jimmy clambered through the window and dropped to the flower bed. He reached up and pulled the torn screen more or less back into place. Then he picked up the pack and ran to the gate.

  Seconds later he was walking down the street, whistling as loud as he could. But that wasn’t loud enough to drown out Baby Tina, so he shifted his weight from side to side to make the pack sway on his back. Baby Tina’s cries subsided.

  No one was on the street, and Jimmy saw no one watching from windows or doorways. Even the lawnmower man had gone inside. Jimmy turned a corner and headed for the kite-flying field.

  * * *

  He found Jasmine where he had left her. She was sitting on a bare patch of ground beside the water-tower fence, spitting into the dirt and using her finger to draw muddy squiggles.

  Jimmy glanced at the wrapped bundle beside her. “Did you do a good job guarding my stuff?”

  “Uh-huh.” She looked up at him. “You help me find Doll-Baby now?”

  Jimmy shook his head. “You have to do one more thing first.” Baby Tina squirmed and began to cry again.

  Jasmine tried to peer around Jimmy at his backpack. “Whatcha got?”