“No. I won’t ask her anything.”
“Why won’t anybody help me?” Andrew whimpered.
Jerri didn’t leave her room. Andrew wanted to fight her. He wanted me to fight alongside him. I wanted nothing to do with it.
“Get out of here,” I told him.
CHAPTER 35: DID I SAY BARBARIAN?
Because Andrew wasn’t the only one I had to fight.
Ken Johnson.
He was just a couple of weeks from leaving for the University of Iowa, for the big time really. Why did he bother with me? Why was he such a pecker? He worked out half the time at the college and half the time with us at the high school.
When he was with us at weights, he’d do his best to make me look stupid. Usually, he’d just make bad jokes, which fewer and fewer of the honkies laughed at. He’d say crap like “Don’t pop your squirrel nut” when I was squatting. Sometimes, he’d get close to me while I stretched, separated from my classmates, and he’d say, “Team’s so screwed to be depending on a squirrel nut. There’s going to be a lot of disappointment around here come fall.”
“Guess we’ll see,” I’d say.
On one hand, I figured he was right. I didn’t really know how to play football. It’s possible I might fumble every time someone tackled me. At night, when I was half asleep and the barbarian wasn’t in control of my emotions, I’d actually hear Ken’s asshole voice in my head: “There’s going to be a lot of disappointment around here come fall.”
I could see the headlines in the sports page: BLUFFTON BLOWS AS REINSTEIN’S FUMBLES/BUMBLES FUEL ANOTHER LOSS.
This fact, the fact of my total lack of football experience, scared me. My heart pumped too hard. My mouth was dry. I had to fight.
REINSTEIN CATCHES FUMBLE-ITIS, BLUFFTON DISEASED AGAIN!
Ken Johnson.
CHAPTER 36: DON'T GET THE WRONG IDEA…
These weeks in July were the best ever, sort of. They were. Even with Ken Johnson, etc.
I had lots of friends. Not just Cody and Karpinski but Abby Sauter and Jess Withrow too. I’d get texts from them all day long, and I’d write funny things back, which made them call me hilarious. I also had a girlfriend who was separate from anything Ken knew. She was even more big league than him. She wasn’t one in like a million soon-to-be college athletes. She was the one in a million. She was the best. And she was fearless. And she loved me because I was gentle and weird. And I knew something else: I could tell from looking at him. Not only was I nearly as big as Ken, but I was faster. He’s squat and really explosive. I’m explosive but longer. I could stretch and beat his ass. I knew it. I could beat his ass. Felton the Barbarian.
At night, when the barbarian was asleep, Ken scared me, Andrew scared me, Jerri scared me.
In the daytime? Felton the Barbarian did really well.
CHAPTER 37: BARBARIAN NOT ALWAYS GOOD
On the Tuesday of the third week of July, Andrew locked himself in the downstairs bathroom for like three hours, seriously, doing nothing at all (no bathroom-type noise). My running shorts were in there on the floor. To hit the Mound, I needed my shorts. I waited for a while, then knocked and asked him to throw my shorts out. In response, he sang (I wouldn’t call it singing) some kind of terrible song (literally, I do not kid, he sang, over and over, soup is good food, makes a great meal). I waited for him to stop. But he didn’t stop.
Then I went vaguely ape shit and pounded on the door. I shouted loud, “Let me the hell in there!”
Even though I knew she could hear me, Jerri was upstairs in bed with the TV on, so she could do nothing.
Andrew fell totally quiet and didn’t let me in. So I went to my bedroom and got on my computer and sent emails to Abby, Jess, Cody, Reese, Karpinski, even Gus (who I had sort of stopped communicating with because he really let me down or so I thought. He thought I let him down. A week before, he’d emailed a long letter about how I’d abandoned him, which seemed like bull since I’d tried to tell him about Jerri earlier in the summer and he hadn’t even given a crap at all). I tried to relax while emailing, tried to be funny (ha ha) about my brother (ha ha) who was locked in the bathroom.
Another hour passed, and he didn’t come out, an hour when I could’ve been biking out to the Mound or running up it. Released from this hellhole. So I pounded again. This time, Andrew said, “Go away, Felton. I’m busy.”
“You’re going to tear your butt sitting on the toilet, Andrew.”
“I’m not sitting on the toilet, jerkwad!”
“Then let me in.”
“Never. Go away.”
“Let me in!”
“No.”
“Then throw my shorts out.”
“Your shorts are not my responsibility.”
“Goddamn it, Andrew. Let me in!”
“I. Am. Busy.”
Blood pounded in my veins. Barbarian blood. This acid started burning up my throat.
“Let. Me. In. Now!”
“No.”
“Now, you ass. Now! Or I’m going to kill you,” I screamed.
Andrew shouted, “Shut the hell up, Felton. I’m working.”
I bent down, breathing hard, trying to get hold of myself. Not now, Barbarian. But I couldn’t hold it in. I stood up, leaned back, and kicked the door frame as hard as I could. The kick shook the house. The kick broke the door frame in two (luckily not the door because I might have gone in there and actually killed Andrew). The reverberations knocked a picture off the wall upstairs, and glass shattered on the wood floor. Andrew screamed, “You broke the light! You broke the light!”
I scared myself. I stood back and breathed, then leaned in toward the door.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered fast. “I’m sorry, Andrew.”
“It’s completely dark in here, you asshole,” he shouted.
“Please just let me in.”
“No,” he sobbed. “Go the fuck away.”
I didn’t know what to do. What was I supposed to do? Why wasn’t Jerri stopping this? I turned and ran up the stairs. In the kitchen, the goofy caricature of me, Andrew, and Jerri that was done at the Strawberry Festival last summer, right after we got back from camping at Wyalusing, was broken on the floor. There was glass everywhere. I stepped over it and walked down the hall to Jerri’s bedroom. Unlike Andrew, I didn’t want answers about Jerri’s zombie life. I just wanted a mother to help me not kill my brother.
But I didn’t go in. Why? I could hear Jerri in there crying. I couldn’t go in. She was totally sobbing.
This was another moment when maybe I should’ve called Grandma Berba, whether she hated us or not.
Instead, I turned and ran back through the kitchen and down the stairs and out the garage and to my Schwinn Varsity, and I biked to the Mound wearing the pajama bottoms I pulled on after the route. Once at the Mound, I stripped down to my boxers, and I ran and ran and ran, crying “Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit,” and, thank God, no visitors showed up. Because I might have killed them or something because who knows about barbarians and what they’re capable of?
When I got back home, late in the day, Andrew was nowhere to be found. The light didn’t work in the bathroom. The trim or whatever from the door frame was lying on the floor. Upstairs, most of the glass had been kicked into the corner of the kitchen (but little pieces were scattered around, catching light from the window). The Strawberry Festival picture was stuffed in the trash. I could hear the TV mumbling in Jerri’s room.
What am I going to do, I wondered? Run away. Run away. I seriously considered running away, but I didn’t want to lose Aleah. I didn’t want to lose Cody. So I kept on fighting to keep my life.
I needed the Barbarian.
CHAPTER 38: KEN JOHNSON
On the Wednesday of that third week of July, all us honky backs and receivers were out at the baseball field running routes when Ken showed up with a couple of even older guys who used to play for Bluffton and now play football at some of the small D-III colleges in Wisconsin. They wanted to coach us and
tell us we were doing things all wrong.
A couple of times, I made catches and ran a little, and the older guys would say, “Jesus, that’s speed,” or whatever. Then Ken would make a squirrel nut joke, and they’d laugh as if he were funny. The more the other dudes acknowledged I was good, though, the more sort of red in the face and jerky he became.
Then he decided he would cover me.
I got a huge adrenaline kick when Ken lined up across from me. Finally, I’d get my chance. I would beat his jerk ass with my improved giant speed.
But more importantly, Ken was bigger than me. Not taller, just bigger. Even with me at 180-something, he outweighed me by twenty pounds. He used what he had.
Cody said go, and I took a step, and Ken leveled me. He exploded into me with both arms and knocked my feet right off the ground, and I landed on the back of my head.
I totally cried out like a little injured animal, like I would’ve in fourth grade or sixth grade or eighth grade even. It was an accident. The hit didn’t hurt that much, just surprised me, but I high-pitch monkey-squealed.
Ken stood over me and laughed. The older dudes fell all over themselves laughing.
“That’s how a squirrel sounds when it gets run over by a truck,” Ken said. Then because he’s a gentleman and because he succeeded in making me look like a donkey, he pulled me up by my shirt. “Going to have to get past d-backs, squirrel nut. Can’t pull that pussy stuff. Jay Landry is going to kill you next month if you pull that pussy stuff.”
I wanted to say “Thanks Coach,” but I didn’t.
Then he lined up again because he hadn’t gotten enough.
I looked at him, looked over at Cody, and Cody shrugged. I was completely enraged and trying to keep from just fighting him, especially because I figured he could still kill me. I didn’t want to run another pattern. But Cody picked up a ball.
My next thought was to punch Ken in the nuts when Cody said go. (What would I do then? Run away?) Then I thought I’d just fight him off the line, just go at him—maybe I can get a punch in by accident, I thought. What’s the worst that could happen? Ken might beat me dumb, I guess. So? Just fight.
But when Cody said go, something else happened. My body made a move to hit Ken. But then I sensed him coil so he could hit me. As he unwound, I slapped his right shoulder, pushed, then spun. In a flash, he was on the ground on his face, and I was ten yards downfield, the ball already delivered into my hands by Cody.
Everybody, including the older dudes, whooped.
I slowed, turned around, and jogged back toward them. As I did, Ken pushed himself off the ground, turned, and held up his hands like he wanted me to throw him the ball.
Because I’m a trusting soul or an idiot, I tossed it to him underhanded.
Before I’d taken another step, he reared back and threw the ball at my head as hard as he could. My right hand, without me even knowing it, reached up barbarian-style and caught the ball in front of my face. I held it up above me for a second, squeezing it, staring at Ken, and then I smashed it into the ground. The ball bounced away about twenty yards. Ken and I glared at each other. Everybody stood there totally silent for like two months; I guess waiting for us to fight (which I was ready to do at that point).
Cody wouldn’t let it happen though. Cody said, “That’s enough for today.”
Ken looked over at the older guys.
I exhaled, turned, walked up to Karpinski, Dern, and Reese, quietly said “See you later,” and then went over to my bike and left without another word. I rode directly to the Mound to do my running. Little bolts of lightning kept firing all over my body as I rode.
CHAPTER 39: TIRED BARBARIAN
That evening, Cody picked me up, and we went out to the deli at Walmart to have sandwiches with all the backs and receivers. On the way out, Cody said, “You hanging in there, man?”
“Yeah. Ken Johnson just pisses me off. No big deal.”
“No, I mean, you doing all right other than Ken Johnson? You haven’t been saying much lately.”
***
In the morning, on the paper route, Aleah had asked me sort of the same thing.
“What’s wrong? You’re so quiet. Are you mad? You didn’t come over last night.”
No, I wasn’t mad at all. Not at her. I’d skipped going to watch her practice because I thought I should clean my house. I mean, I’d broken that picture and the door frame, and there was trash all over.
I’d actually put in an hour or two cleaning too. But there was no point. The job was too big, especially because Andrew could dirty everything so fast.
I’d picked up the living room upstairs and swept the glass in the kitchen and then started with the TV room in the basement. While I worked downstairs, Andrew, apparently quietly because I didn’t hear him, pulled a couple of boxes out of the attic and spread the contents across the living room floor. Jerri must’ve heard him because she came out of her room and began shouting, “What the hell are you doing? What the hell are you doing? Stay out of my stuff, you little goddamn prick. You prick! You shit! You little ass!”
I ran upstairs in time to hear Andrew drop the f-bomb on her and slam the front door on his way out. Jerri was scooping up crap from the floor and crying. So the upstairs actually looked worse after I cleaned. It was a losing battle, so I quit and went for a fast bike ride, all the weeds and trees blurring, but didn’t go to Aleah’s (I had too much on my mind that needed to drain out).
The following morning on the route, I suppose I was quiet; I didn’t make jokes or anything, just delivered the papers. By the time we got to the nursing home, Aleah was staring at me.
“Are you okay, Felton?”
“Umm hmm,” I said.
“You’re quiet.”
“Just tired this morning.”
“You haven’t really talked in a couple of days,” she said.
“I have a lot to deal with because football is coming up,” I told her.
She nodded but seemed concerned.
***
“Aleah is leaving soon. I guess I’m bummed,” I told Cody in the truck.
He knew she was going back to Chicago, so it was a good excuse.
“Sucks. Make sure she comes to your party,” he said.
I couldn’t believe anyone was throwing me a party. I couldn’t believe it was only a week and a few days away. I honestly felt like I was turning into an old man, not just some young dude about to turn sixteen. Barbarian getting old…
***
You know, I don’t even know exactly what I mean by barbarian. I just saw that Arnold Schwarzenegger movie once. Big muscley man who can beat everyone. He even punched out a camel.
***
But these were still good times.
Cody and I arrived at Walmart a little later than everyone else. When we walked into the deli aisle where there’s seating, there were more than the backs and receivers, there were like twenty honkies waiting for me, including Abby and Jess.
“Hey, what’s up?” I asked.
And, seriously, I was greeted as if I were the king of the whole wide Walmart world. Nobody liked Ken Johnson very much apparently. They actually whooped when they saw me. Karpinski said, “If Kennedy Johnson thought he could take you, he would’ve thrown a punch.” Everybody shouted “Yeah!” “He’s scared of you, Rein Stone!” Then he shouted, “Kennedy’s scared of a squirrel nut!” And right away, everybody chanted “Kennedy’s scared of a squirrel nut. Kennedy’s scared of squirrel nut,” over and over, which might have been insulting because none of those people ever called me squirrel nut anymore. But it wasn’t. What’s the problem with squirrel nut? Nothing, if Ken Johnson’s scared of it.
But the Barbarian was getting tired.
I’m so, so, so tired.
CHAPTER 40: 5:15 A.M.
There are these weird times in life that you sort of experience as if they’re memories while they’re happening. For example, the summer before, after we got back from camping and hiking at Wyalusing,
when Andrew, Jerri, and I went to the Strawberry Festival, which was at the city square downtown, I felt like I wasn’t just there having a really good time with my funny little brother and my funny mom. I sort of felt like I was watching it happen too.
It was like there was an older me remembering playing the hoop toss while Jerri and Andrew cheered. It was like the older me watched while the three of us sat still on little stools, cracking jokes while the caricature artist laughed and drew us.
The caricature artist made my Jew-fro huge, which was funny. He made Andrew’s glasses huge, which was funny. He made Jerri’s smile huge, which it really was. And the evening sun draped orange on the green grass and green trees. And an older me watched it all and remembered. I was sad and happy at the same time.
In November, right when I started growing, Jerri stopped being that Jerri. I think I knew it was about to be over while at the Strawberry Festival. The older me was remembering.
That’s how I felt on the Mound one night. Everything was really good, and my older self remembered.
It was Thursday night, the day after I’d nearly fought Ken Johnson. I ate dinner with Aleah and Ronald. Good food. Ravioli. Aleah was intent on practicing a new piece, so Cody picked me up, and me, Reese, Cody, and Karpinski drove out to the Mound—all smashed in the cab of the pickup—and climbed all the way to the top and watched the sun go down over Bluffton.
Bluffton didn’t look like Suckville at all. It was rolling and green, and as the sun set, the town’s tiny lights came on one by one and twinkled. Bluffton sort of looked like a place where elves would live.
We’d gone up there for a dumb reason, to see if Cody could throw a rock all the way down. We all tried.
And I was laughing, and an older me watched and smiled.
Karpinski threw a rock, and even though he can catch anything thrown at him (including rocks me and Reese threw pretty hard, even though he was only ten feet away from us), he totally can’t throw. He looked so dorky throwing, and he tried so hard, and he screamed really loud, and me and Cody fell over laughing. I threw a rock, but it only went halfway down. I watched the rock bounce down one side of the big M, just like my leather pouch rocks and crystals did. It was like in slow motion. Then Reese threw a rock and lost his balance, and he almost fell down the Mound, which probably would’ve killed him or at least totally maimed him, but I reached out and grabbed the waistband of his shorts and pulled him back on top of me.
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