The Summer I Died: A Thriller

by Ryan C. Thomas

  Great, that was all I needed, Tooth spreading stories. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Tooth. We’d been friends since kindergarten, when he stole my cookies and I socked him in the eye—the only time I’d ever beat him in a fight, and even then I probably would have gotten a good ass-kicking had the teachers not pulled us apart and made us apologize. Then they made us play together; I guess they fancied themselves diplomats. Anyway, the next week we figured out that by working together, we could distract the teacher long enough to steal the good toys away from the other kids during playtime. You might be thinking I was the brains and he was the brawn, but actually it was the other way around. Don’t get me wrong, he was definitely stronger, but he was much better at getting people’s attention, and I was adept at being invisible, which made swiping Matchbox cars all the more easy. If they’d only known what they’d created.

  Tooth and I had been through everything together, which was weird, because our interests began to split in junior high school. I got hooked on science fiction and became an expert on comic books, and Tooth took an interest in beer. But I guess we realized we’d always stay friends, especially after the two nights we’d spent together in jail when we were sixteen.

  See, we thought it would be funny to steal the lawn ornaments off everybody’s yards in town. You know, those obnoxious little ceramic gnomes and cardboard sheep that people think add flare and fun to a garden. Well, we must have stolen about a hundred of them, went over to the police station and started placing them all over the little lawn out front. I don’t remember how many cops we got in our town, I think five now that Bruce French is one, but anyway, usually they’re out driving around and only Mrs. Stefanko is in the office answering calls. But we apparently have the worst luck around, because they were having a meeting that night, and after Tooth and I finished putting the last gnome on the hood of one of the cop cars they all came waltzing out the door and caught us red-handed.

  The incident made the local paper, complete with photos, and because my parents, who are both teachers at the high school, were in Boston for some teacher conference, I had to wait in the cell till they could come back and get me. Tooth’s father, tired of his shenanigans, actually told the officers to keep him locked up till he thought about what he’d done. So we spent two entire days as cellmates. It was the first time in a while that we’d really talked, not just got drunk together.

  It was the first time I realized that Tooth was smarter than he let on, that his poor grades didn’t mean he was dumb. He was just interested in other things besides fractions and social studies. He said he was gonna learn how to build motorcycles, that he was gonna build one and take Route 66 out to California like in a book he read. Which also surprised me, because I didn’t know Tooth read. He was always making fun of me for picking up the latest Frank Miller or Todd McFarlane comic. I guess we just had different tastes in reading, but I felt maybe I had never given him credit beyond the growing alcoholic most people took him for.

  He was still laughing at the bee. I punched him back. “Fuck off! I’d like to see you shoot a bee off the lip of a trash can.”

  “I bet I could.”

  “Yeah, right. It’s your turn. Go back and hit it.”

  He gave me a shove and sprinted back to where I left the gun. Like some Hollywood detective, he rolled on the ground and came up with the gun in his hand. Standing next to the barrel, I yelled, “Wait a sec!” And threw my arms up and dove to the side. When I heard the report I nearly wet myself, went weak-kneed expecting my guts to explode out of my back. Thankfully, I heard the bong as the bullet struck its target and not me.

  “Youmotherfucker!” I yelled. “Don’t mess around! It’s a gun!”

  He just kept laughing like a toddler all hopped up on sugar. He went and picked up his hat, which had flipped away during his stunt, and put it on his head backwards. He aimed the gun again and said, “Move. I got one shot left.”

  I jumped up and ran out to the tree line. This time when he fired, I plugged my ears. Again, he hit the barrel. I had to hand it to him, he had good aim, a regular Billy the Kid. Together, we walked over to check on the bee. Tooth’s two shots had struck about a foot below it each time. The bee was still buzzing, still fused to the trashcan.

  “Yeah, all right,” he said. “So I can’t hit it. But it’s not like you aimed for it. You hit it by accident and that still makes you a pussy.”

  “Bite me,” I said, bending down to look at the bee.

  “I’m hungry. Let’s get outta here and get some fuel. Lucy Graves works over at the Wendy’s now, and they got these tight uniforms, and I swear her nipples are so big you can hang your hat on ’em.”

  “What about the bee?”

  “What do you mean ‘what about the bee’?” he asked, as if I’d spoken in Martian.

  “We gotta kill it. I read once they can send out distress signals to other bees. It’s like a chemical scent they emit or something. Next time we come back there might be a whole swarm waiting for us.”

  “God, you are such a geek. Just kill it.”

  “With what?”

  And out of nowhere, Tooth’s boot flashed by my face and smashed the bee into nonexistence. Maybe I was imagining it, but I swear a bit of bee goo hit me in the nose. Disgusted, I wiped it off with my arm. “Thanks.”

  “What?” he said. “Better it dies quick than just stays there suffering in agony till it does. C’mon.”

  CHAPTER 2

  When we were done eating and gawking at Lucy’s huge tits, which I had to admit were as plump and firm as water balloons, we drove toward my place to catch a John Carpenter film that was scheduled to play on television later that night. Tooth insisted we pick up more beer before the movie because the food was sobering him up and he swore movies were more fun to watch when you’re drunk. I doubted the movie had anything to do with it; beer for Tooth was like water for fish.

  “Hand me that license in the glove compartment,” he told me.

  I pulled it out and read it over. “David McNulty, nineteen-seventy-one. What’s that make you, thirty-two? Yeah, right. Where’d you get this? You make it?

  “Boston,” he said, whipping it from my hand and stuffing it in his pocket.

  We were both only twenty, but Tooth looked about thirty with his two-day-old stubble and weathered face. I guess that came from working at the Dataview warehouse where he spent his days loading electrical circuit boards onto trucks. Winter lasts thirteen months in New England; I guess you couldn’t blame him for liking the booze.

  As we detoured to the packy store—as was customary to call it around here—the setting summer sun felt just the opposite, like a hot pair of jeans fresh from the drier. And with the humidity tapering off—which is usually so damn high you feel like you’re being boiled alive all day long—I felt comfortable enough to take a nap. The smell of pine trees baking in the residual heat and dried-up grass swirled into the car as we sped by. It was a good smell, reminding me of the times Tooth and I played war in my backyard as kids. Our little G.I. Joe figures storming over a sand hill to battle the forces of Cobra. The two of us lying in the dry grass, making machine gun sounds with our mouths.

  It smelled like childhood.

  We were carded at the entrance to the store by some kid with blue hair who certainly wasn’t old enough to buy anything inside, probably the owner’s son. That was a blessing, because the dumb shit fell for the fake ID. But the clerk behind the counter was eyeballing us from the minute we walked in, put down the magazine he was reading and leaned over the counter to watch us. Ah shit, I thought, and I knew we were toast; the bastard was just waiting to catch us.

  I made like I was looking for a bag of chips and drifted down an aisle. Tooth grabbed a twelve pack of Bud and dropped it on the counter with an air of authority, playing grownup as best he could.

  “Lemme see that ID,” the clerk said right away.

  I knew we were busted at this point.

  Tooth handed it over, not saying a
nything. I spotted a comic book rack and started spinning it around but all it had was kiddie shit, X-men crap that wasn’t written by anyone who actually knew anything about the X-men.

  “Son, you better get your money back,” the clerk said, tossing it back to Tooth. “I seen better fake ID’s cut out the back of cereal boxes. Tell you this, too. Some kid came in the other day with the same kind. I know where you get ’em, down in Boston, buy ’em on the corner from the crackheads. Shit, you must think I’m dense.”

  “Actually, I think you’re a retard, but that’s besides the point. This ain’t no fake ID, and if you don’t believe me, call the police and they can verify my information.”

  The clerk picked up the license a second time and held it up to the fluorescent lights overhead, laughing. Tooth gave me a quick glance and pointed at me. Oh shit, I knew what that meant: he wanted me to pinch the beer. Son of a bitch, how did he expect me to get a twelve pack under my shirt? Just walk out and say I was pregnant or something? On top of which, that night in jail had been a wake-up call for me, and I hadn’t done anything illegal to put me back there since. Well, aside from smoking some pot and drinking some beer. But shoplifting was another story. I could lose my student loans if I went to jail.

  “Ok, I’m calling the cops because I’ve had enough of this fake ID bullshit. It’s a waste of my time.”

  “Why, what else you got to do?” Tooth said smartly. “Hang out in the back and beat your meat to porno mags? I noticed some are missing from the stand. You’re all outta the faggot ones. They in the back room where you eat your lunch? Little bit of PB and J and a side of man meat?”

  That poor clerk, old as he was, didn’t really know how to answer that. He just started shaking a little, really pissed, like he was going to pull out that gun you know he had under the counter and blow Tooth’s head off.

  “Get out now or I will call the cops!”

  “Go ahead, but I ain’t leaving till I get my beer. You stupid fuck!”

  Taking the bait, the clerk mumbled something and picked up the phone behind the counter. I knew there was no way I was gonna get all the beer out the door without being seen, so I moused over to a bin full of $3.99 nips. I took six and stuffed them in my socks and pulled my pant legs over them, the whole time thinking how this would look to my college advisors should I get caught.

  The boy at the door was preoccupied with the scene Tooth was making, probably wondering if this was a holdup or something, so I figured I hadn’t been seen.

  I went back to the comic books and selected a cheesy looking Batman comic with Killer Croc on the cover. It looked like it had been written for six year olds. I went and put it on the counter.

  You know you’ve got a remarkable relationship with someone when you can read each other’s minds. We did that a lot, Tooth and I. Like, I would ask, “Hey, you remember that movie with the guy?” and he would answer, “Yeah, Bloodfist 4.” And he was right. We just always knew what each other was thinking. And even if we didn’t know right away, it didn’t take more than one clue for either of us to catch on.

  So when I put the comic on the counter, Tooth knew I had the goods and swiped his ID out of the clerk’s hand and said, “You know what, fuck this. We’re going to the packy on Deerfield. No sale for you, buddy.”

  The clerk was as red as a horny monkey’s ass. “Can I buy this?” I asked him, pointing to the comic.

  He leaned over and yelled, “No! Now get out!”

  “C’mon,” Tooth said, giving the man his customary one-fingered salute.

  The poor clerk was so upset he mangled his threat as we left. “If you ever come back I’ll fuck you good.”

  “See, you are a fag,” Tooth yelled back.

  On the way out I picked up a bag of chips and tossed it to the door boy. It confused the hell out of him, but it also kept his eyes off my socks, which were bulging like I had elephantiasis of the ankles.

  In the car Tooth slammed his head back against the headrest a few times before turning the ignition on.

  “What dumbass prick went to Boston and got an ID from the same place as me. If I find him I’ll kick his father’s ass. What did you get anyway?”

  I pulled the nips out from my socks as we drove out of the parking lot. “Just these. Two cherry-flavored vodkas, two orange liqueurs, and two mint schnapps.”

  “Perfect, and what did you get for yourself?”

  CHAPTER 3

  I suppose since you’ve followed my story this far, I should tell you why Tooth is called Tooth. It also figures into why we were headed to my house instead of his.

  When Tooth was ten, his father ran him over with his car. He didn’t do it on purpose, but it wasn’t exactly an accident either. See, Tooth’s dad has a drinking problem. I guess that’s no biggie these days; who doesn’t know somebody who drinks a lot? And I guess you can make a comparison between my friend and his father, but where Tooth is what I prefer to call a functioning alcoholic—or at least he’s on his way to being—his father is a straight up drunk.

  He’s not a bad man, not in any way. In fact he was once a minister, back when Tooth was a toddler; probably where he first took to drinking if you ask me. He’s quite the caring man when he’s sober, but the last time he was sober, well, let’s just say that was back when you had to get your ass up out of the recliner and turn the knob on the TV to change channels.

  Tooth was in the driveway playing with some action figures, Star Wars or He-Man and whatnot, and his father got the idea he had to go to see his father—which would be Tooth’s grandfather—who’d been dead over a decade. Well, you know where this is going. Drunk to the point of seeing ghosts, his father got in the car and backed down the driveway, taking Tooth under the car with him. Tooth rolled all the way underneath, missing the wheels by some divine intervention, and popped out the front where he went rolling into the bushes. When he sat up screaming bloody murder, he was missing six of his front teeth.

  His mother burst through the front door like one of those snakes popping out of a novelty can, all arms flailing and hair licking about like it was made of flames, screaming incoherently and running so fast she nearly tripped. She grabbed up her little boy and rushed him away to the end of the earth—which would be Jersey. Two weeks later, she came back and got a divorce, and Tooth got his nickname because ever since then he had to wear a bridge.

  And what I never understood after that was why Tooth asked to live with his father. My guess is, his father being a drunk and all, Tooth could pretty much do whatever he wanted.

  Anyway, things became sort of like an after school special. You had your usual child welfare services, and AA meetings, and Tooth’s parents trying to get back together and not succeeding, and you can figure the rest out.

  Going to my house was just simpler than dealing with his dad, who was always trying to get us to go to church when he was drunk, even if it was three in the morning on a Wednesday. The man obviously regretted his decision to leave the ministry and take the blue-collar route, as if in the end he’d let God down. Maybe that accounted for a lot, maybe it didn’t.

  I told Tooth to park his beat up Camaro in the driveway. My parents were gone for the weekend to Providence, visiting my grandmother who’d been complaining of back pains. She was always scared she had the latest disease she saw on CNN, even if it was only in pumpkins or something.

  Unfortunately, them being out of town didn’t mean I had run of the house. Jamie was there too, and since I’d been away at college all semester, she saw fit to assume the role of homeowner. In the few days I’d been home already, she said that things had changed since I’d been away and since I didn’t know how they were doing things now, I could just leave if I preferred. The only thing that had changed as far as I saw was that she’d moved into my old room and torn down my limited edition Daredevil and Gambit posters. While part of me debated shaving her hair off while she slept for ruining perfectly good collectables, the rational side of me decided it wasn’t worth the
fight, I’d be gone in another two months when the fall semester started.

  When we came in, she was sitting on the living room couch with a bag of rice cakes, watching some stupid chick flick with sappy music and some guy talking about feelings. I wasted no time picking up the remote and changing the channel.

  “Put it back, asshole,” she said.

  “Why don’t you go up to my room and watch TV? You know this is the only one I can watch now. Tooth and I are gonna watch a movie.”

  “Well, in case you didn’t notice, Geekmaster, I was in the middle of one.”

  “Yeah, I’ve seen it. The girl gets the guy, and somebody dies, then somebody gets married, and everybody cries and shares their feelings. It’s wonderful. Now move.”

  “Wow, you’ve watched a movie that had actual adult themes and not grown men in tights rubbing their codpieces together. ‘Oh, Boy Wonder, is that your gun or are you happy to see me?’”

  “Robin doesn’t carry a gun, Einstein.”

  “Who the fuck is Robin?”

  Tooth, who was amusing himself with our sibling rivalry, went and plopped on the couch next to her. He put his arm around her and stared at her chest. “Hey, Jamie,” he said, “ain’t seen you in a few months. You’re developing nicely.”

  She hit his hand away and stood up. “Fuck off, Mervyn. Touch me again and I’ll knock out the rest of your teeth.”

  Mervyn. That was Tooth’s real name, and also the reason he preferred to be called Tooth. He said “Mervyn” sounded too much like a verb. Jamie stormed out of the room and stomped up the stairs muttering, “Stupid geeks,” under her breath.

  “Nice move, Tooth.”

  “I figured that’d work. But I wasn’t lying either. Your sis is looking fine.”

  Truth was my sister was very attractive, and it was starting to make me nervous. She had her driver’s permit now, and I couldn’t help feeling, well, almost paternal. When she took the car out to the movies the day after I got home, it was like some giant spider had dropped down from nowhere and spun me up in a web of concern. I wanted to fight it, because I couldn’t stand my sister most of the time, but I also couldn’t shake the feeling. I didn’t need to dissect it; it came from knowing what a teenage boy thinks about—Fucking. One day you’re walking down the school corridor thinking about the new Gen 13/X-Force crossover, the next you look up and see Lucy Graves’ tits. And from that moment on, everything you see, whether it’s a chalk eraser or a folding chair, it all looks like Lucy. And you want to fuck it.