Under the Overtree

by James A. Moore

Mark put the gloves on and Tyler pointed to the heavy bag. Tyler quickly adjusted the anchoring chain, giving the bag almost no slack, as it was hung from the ceiling and now chained to the floor. “Now, I’m going to step away from the bag and you can whack away at it as you tell me what’s on your mind.”

  So saying Tyler stepped back and Mark looked skeptically at the punching bag. “You want me to hit this?”

  “No, I want you to French kiss it. Of course, I want you to hit it. That’s what it’s there for. And get that goofy look off of your face; I told you to hit it and I mean HIT IT, trust me, it’s very therapeutic.”

  Mark shook his head and took a halfhearted swing that barely grazed the bag. Tyler groaned in disgust and looked him in the face. “My mother can hit a bag harder than that. Tell me your story and hit the bag, I’ll be right here listening, but you’re too goddamn tense to just sit there.”

  Mark finally caught on and started telling his tale, punctuating words with a savage strike to the bag. “Remember how Cassie and I had that big fight a couple of weeks ago?” Mark hit the bag, which let out a satisfying “Whump” with each strike. “Well, we had that fight because of Lisa Scarrabelli.”—Whump—“I guess you already know about that, don’t you?” Whump. He acknowledged Ty’s nod and continued. “Well, I got angry, mostly with myself I guess,”—Whump—“when Cassie walked away from me.”

  He stalled in his conversation, spending several minutes doing nothing but taking swings at the bag, strikes that got progressively harder. “Well, I got to thinking about how Tommy had been giving you grief at school,”—Whump—“and I decided to have a talk with him.”—Whump—“I never expected to get into a fight with him, but he sorta makes it easy to want to fight.” Mark paused long enough in the swings and in his story, to remove his dress shirt and tie and coat. The gloves went back on and Tyler marveled at the sight of Mark’s body; he didn’t look any larger exactly, just firmer than he had before. Tyler imagined the muscles in his friend’s body were almost like steel.

  “I told him I’d heard about what he tried to do,”—Whump—“and he said that it was your fault, that you made Lisa break up with him.”—Whump—“Well, I told him that was a bunch of shit and said that she had been considering breaking up with him for a long time,”—Whump—“that’s what she told me, when she took me out to dinner, back when you got grounded.”—Whump—“He started calling me a liar and calling me names.”—Whump—“I thought about how he’d helped get me trashed last year,”—WHUMP—“and I started getting really angry. I started calling him names back.” WHUMP! Tyler noticed the increase in force that Mark was using on the bag and actually worried briefly that his father would be awakened. He decided it was okay, because his father was on the third floor and they were in the basement. Otherwise, he would have made Mark stop.

  “He hit me, Tyler.”—WHUMP—“He hauled off with his fist and knocked me on my ass. I never even saw it coming.”—WHUMP—“And when I tried to get up,”—WHA-WHUMP—“he kicked me in my stomach. I thought I was going to spit blood.” Mark hit the bag in a flurry of punches that seemed to Tyler to be too fast for the human eye to catch. Tyler guessed that if he’d hit it one more time, the canvas would tear open, spilling out sand. In his mind’s eye, he pictured what that same savage assault would have done if it had connected with, oh, say, Tommy Blake’s rib cage. He felt rather queasy at the image.

  “I don’t really remember anything after that, I just sort of blacked out. I didn’t even give it another thought, until I heard that Tommy didn’t show up at school. I thought maybe I’d managed to get in a few good ones and he was hurt bad enough to stay at home. Ty, I was hoping that I’d hurt him that bad.” Mark looked at him, desperately hoping that he was making his point. “What if I did? What if I killed him?”

  Mark pulled the gloves off of his hands and Tyler could see the red knuckles on his fists. He looked up and saw Mark’s face crack, like fine porcelain dropped from the top of the house. “Ty, I’m scared. I don’t remember.”

  Mark’s whole body seemed to sag then and he started crying openly. Again, Tyler pulled him close and let his friend cry. “It’s gonna be okay, Mark. It’s not something that you’d do. I know you, you’d never throw the first punch.” Mark looked at him, his chest hitching desperately to grab more air. Tyler looked at him and led him back to the couch.

  “Are you so sure, Tyler? Do you really believe that I couldn’t?”

  Tyler forced himself to look in his friend’s face, as he said he was certain. His mind was thinking back to the look on Mark’s face when he shoved Cassie out of the way of the buck-shot, that only Mark seemed able to perceive as it flew towards her; the look of a wild beast, barely hidden by the thin veneer of a man’s face. Inside, he wasn’t as certain as he said he was. Inside, he prayed desperately that he would never get on Mark’s bad side and chastised himself for the doubts he had. “’Course I’m sure. Relax, I’ll help you figure out what the hell happened.”

  Again, silence fell for several minutes and then Mark looked over at him. “I wish I was so sure. I can almost feel the changes going on in my body, I don’t really look any different, but I feel different. Does that make any sense?”

  “Yeah, that happens to everybody when puberty hits. Hormone rush from hell, man.”

  Mark looked at him for a minute and then turned away from him for a moment or two, before starting to speak again. “Do you remember when I got my contact lenses, a couple of weeks after we met?”

  Tyler frowned for a second and then recalled the lenses almost as thick as his own, that Mark used to wear. “Yeah, you stood around all day, freaking ’cause you could see more of what was off to your sides. But what’s that got to do with anything?”

  Mark looked at him with a vaguely puzzled expression that scarcely hid the fact that he was looking inward, rather than at Tyler. “My vision was almost as bad as yours, Ty. Except I didn’t have any astigmatism.” Mark focused on Tyler completely and Tyler felt the intensity of his gaze. “Ty, I’m not wearing my contacts. I haven’t needed them for over a month. Have you ever known puberty to fix the eyesight of someone who was legally blind without glasses?”

  Tyler had no answer for that one, his mind was too busy refusing to believe what he’d just heard. No, he’d never heard of any such thing.

  4

  Patrick crept up the hallway and slid gracefully up the stairs to his own room. The last thing he needed was for Tyler to find out he had been eavesdropping on a private conversation. And he most certainly didn’t want Mark to find out.

  He hadn’t planned on listening in, it just sort of happened. He’d just been doing his own thing and heading down the stairs for his stash in the rec room and he heard the voices. Well, hell folks, the story he heard had just been too damn good to ignore.

  And it had also been too damn scary to ignore. It brought back to mind the things he thought he’d seen in the woods the other day. Little things, that jumped and danced in a frenzy of excitement while Tommy and Mark had it out on the football field at the school.

  The field was where he always made his deliveries: it was close to the woods in case the Sheriff should show and it was pretty much neutral territory; no muss, no fuss and he was on the way home faster than a cobra could strike. He had been on his way to make a delivery to Tommy, one of his few remaining customers, when he’d seen Mark come out of the woods, walking like a man with a mission.

  He’d known Mark almost as long as Tyler had. He was no where near as close to him, but he knew him. Or at least he’d thought he knew him, until he saw him come out of the woods that day. At first he thought it was the drugs playing with his mind and then he knew it was the drugs playing with his mind. Mark was easily three or four inches taller than he remembered him being and seeing as he’d last seen him only a few months ago, that was a hell of a lot of growth.

  But it was more than that; Mark looked meaner than it was possible for Mark to look. He walked stiff backed, like
a dog getting ready for a fight and his upper lip had pulled away from his teeth, a sneer of contempt for the guy he was about to face. He looked like he’d have fun taking on a couple of drill sergeants and maybe the Dallas Cowboys; worse still, he looked like he would have a hell of a chance of winning. It was as much in the way he carried himself, as it was in the way he had changed physically. Everybody changes at that age, Patrick himself had looked an awful lot like Tyler once upon a time, but the changes in personality, in the way he walked and the way he looked at people, it just wasn’t right.

  If he hadn’t known better, he’d have thought that Mark was soaring on PCP. Patrick had watched a guy heavy into that kind of shit go berserk once. That had been the first time he’d considered giving up drugs. This skinny little guy, name of Stan Powers, had just gone nuts and started swinging his little fists with enough power to drop the Wildman’s personal assistant with one punch; a guy that had outweighed him by at least seventy-five pounds of solid muscle. Then he’d really gone nuts. Stan tore through the room like a fucking tornado and no amount of talk had come anywhere near to calming him down. Patrick had watched the whole thing from behind a sofa, he’d seen Stan knock over tables and people like they were balloons; he’d seen Stan break his own fists against one of the walls and keep going like it was nothing at all. And he’d watched numbly, as Stan drove his already pulped right hand into the television set, breaking the glass of the screen and electrocuting himself.

  What he’d seen when he was out on the field that night had been much worse. If he hadn’t been so deep into a peyote dream at that time, he might have believed it.

  When he was safely in his room and had the door closed and locked, he reached into his closet, feeling for the hole he’d cut into the wall behind and above the closet’s shelf and pulled out his 357 Magnum. He’d never had reason to fire it and he doubted that he ever would, but he loaded it with bullets just the same. If he ever saw Mark coming at him the way he’d come at Tommy Blake that day, he’d be ready. Not all the drugs in the world would stop a round from this baby.

  5

  The last day of school finally came and, after what seemed a few lifetimes, the final bell of the year echoed shrilly through the hallways. As the last bell rang, the halls of Charles S. Westphalen High, exploded with frenetic noise and the bodies of teenagers, free at last to do as they pleased, at least until August crept around again.

  Mark was introduced that day to a Summitville tradition; the rolling of the school. After living under the iron rule of Samuel Watkins for the majority of the year, a man who felt that chewing gum in class was tantamount to murder and should be punishable by death, the students all gathered together, free from his tyrannical rule and proceeded to toss roll after roll of toilet paper high into the air and across the school’s facade, roof and greenery. It was a day that they all dreamed of, secure in the knowledge that no harm would befall them as long as they didn’t pull any offense too serious, like spray-painting anything, or worse. To ensure that they behaved themselves, Deputy Sheriff Alan Fisk and the Big Man himself, Chuck Hanson, watched with amused grins from the sidelines. Sam the Ham had long since given up on anything that even vaguely resembled resistance to the notion and normally sat back at his desk and lit a fat and foul scented cigar, the better to enjoy the show. If anyone could be said to take it poorly, it was the staff of janitors, who really couldn’t complain too much, as they had done the very same thing in their day.

  Mark found the idea of rolling the school and not getting in trouble very strange, but considering some of the things he’d known people in the big cities he’d lived in to get away with, simply opted to enjoy himself. Twenty dollars worth of Facial quality paper later, he decided that he rather liked the tradition. But, nothing surprised him as much as when Sheriff Hanson asked for volunteers to help in the clean up and most of the students actually stayed to help. Cassie and Tyler had opted to help, so he did the same. Seeing their decision, Tony joined in as well. Around five-thirty, the majority of the clean up was done and they all wandered away in small clusters, laughing and saying good bye to those they most likely wouldn’t see until the next school year. Mark was touched and pleased by the number of people who said such good-byes to him, as well as the number who wanted him to sign their annuals; it was the first time in his life that he signed more year books than he had fingers on his left hand. He and his closest friends were joined by eight others and all of them took off for the center of town where most of the freed youths would spend the better part of the summer, talking about nothing of great import and being seen with those they cared for most in the world, their friends (friends being ever so much more important in the late teens than family).

  As night fell full and proper in the hot, dry summer air, the informal and unofficial party dispersed and most went their own ways. Each knew that by this time next year their status could have changed completely. They could be low man on the totem of inner school society, but for the present time they were all freed of the status they struggled to achieve in the school and they could all be themselves. In more than one case, people who had ignored long time friends rekindled the camaraderie that they had known the summer before, without so much as batting an eye about the entire situation. The rules were gone and the freedom to just be themselves had come back, however briefly, to remind one and all that life was for the living, life was for the young. And they were all so young that summer, younger than they ever would be again.

  As happened every time the school year ended, a few of the more daring, (normally the seniors, who would be heading away from their hometown when the holiday ended, possibly never to return) remembered Lake Overtree and decided that the time was right for a dip in the tepid lake’s refreshing waters. Preferably a dip that involved no clothing and a partner of the opposite sex. This year was nearly a record for the number of people who attended, finding their own spot on the lake’s shore; a spot with enough secrecy to allow their natural urges to take over should their partner’s be willing, but close enough to others to allow voices to carry and the occasional view of other people, the better to remember that you weren’t really all alone in the dark woods where Stoney Miles still roamed looking to catch you with his wife, or any female he might mistake for her.

  As many people showed this year with bathing suits as did without. Among those who had garments were Tyler, Tony, Cassie, Mark, Lisa, Sandy and another six people, to make an even dozen. Somehow Tyler and Lisa ended up paired together and, somehow, neither of them seemed to mind. Somehow, the rest of the group lost track of them a good while later and somehow, they never seemed to mention the fact to one another. Tony, complete with Sue Talbot on his arm, also disappeared, but he made good and damn sure that Cassie knew where he was going and what he planned to do. She pretended not to be a little bit jealous of the fact and Mark pretended not to notice her jealousy.

  Jack Watkins and Kathy Olsen, seniors who were at last free of the high school and both eagerly awaiting their letters of acceptance from the University in Denver, found a favorite spot of theirs from the year before and they took full advantage of the area, kissing and holding one another when they weren’t in the process of laughingly trying to drown each other in the waters of Overtree. They had grown up near each other and had been an item through most of their time at Westphalen. They fully expected to go to school together at the university and they planned on coming home when they had graduated and marrying. They had already picked names for the children they planned to share. Their love, they were certain, would stand the test of time with ease. That their futures were intertwined was the one thing that both were absolutely certain of and their certainty was as strong as the faith that many hold in the Lord above them. Where many of their peers had gone to the lake believing that they may never see their present partner again after the summer ended, believing that this would be their last real chance to hold and share intimate feelings with the one beside them, Jack and Kathy felt no such pressu
res. They simply enjoyed one another’s company, prepared to face whatever the future might hold for them as one spirit in two bodies.

  Even the faith of the strongest is tested from time to time. And so it was that Kathy and Jack’s resolve was tested, when, after four years of waiting, Kathy agreed to consummate their relationship. All was well, until they had finished and were in the process of stepping out of the lake’s waters. (Kathy was absolutely convinced, thanks to her girlfriend Marilee, that the waters took the sting away from losing your virginity. As was normally the case, Marilee had no idea in hell what she was talking about and she would have to let her dear friend know that, if she decided to confide in her again. But the pain had been worth it, she had made Jack happy and she had enjoyed it herself, after the initial sting.) They were in the process of stepping back to the muddy shore, when Jack cut his foot open on the plastic bag.

  With a hearty yelp of pain, he hobbled on one foot and promptly fell on his bare ass in the waters, leaving Kathy in the awkward position of trying to ensure that he was unharmed, while trying not to laugh at the stupid look on his face.

  He came out of the water howling and holding on to his ass cheek, as if he’d been stung by an angry hornet. More than slightly embarrassed, Kathy studied the wound on his injured posterior and was glad it had happened to his backside and not his front. It looked for all the world as if he’d sat on a knife. After she helped him out of the waters, where he quickly put on his clothes, she reached around at the spot where he’d cut himself and found the heavy plastic garbage bag that he had stepped and then sat on. It took all of her strength to pull the package from the waters to the shore, but she managed.

  Just as quickly as he had, she got dressed and the two of them took off for the Summitville Emergency clinic, because despite the rather humorous location, they feared that Jack might need stitches. They took the bag with them and never even bothered to look inside, it stank something fierce and they threw it in the trunk, after the fifteen-minute hike back to the school’s parking lot.