Dallas was still holding his stick. The boy’s eyes moved from Dallas to James to Felix. He did not know them. And they did not know him. He struggled to get a word out.
“My name is . . .” He stared at James. “Jason Brock,” he said finally. Then he looked at Dallas. His eyes traveled down the stick, and his lips trembled when he saw the blood. “I’m seven.”
Dallas raised his weapon slightly and pointed it at him. He looked over at Felix and James, who had not, since they reached the bottom of the hill, taken their eyes off the boy.
“We’re taking your fort,” Dallas declared, wiping sweat from his face with the back of his hand.
The boy nodded and bit his bottom lip. “I want to go home,” he whispered, trembling in the leaves.
“So do I,” said Felix.
Dallas let the stick drop to the ground. They watched Jason Brock clamber up the hill and disappear over the ridge.
CHAPTER FIVE
“LORD, WE PRAY THAT YOU WATCH OVER US at this time, as we gather as a family to enjoy this meal. We pray that we always remember to keep You in our hearts when we lie down, and when we speak, and when we go about the broad paths. Please, Father, send Your spirit to the grieving family members of those who lost their lives in the Beirut embassy. We know that You are now embracing them in the heavens, but we ask that You continue to watch over their loved ones who remain on earth. We also pray that You watch over Dallas.”
Dallas opened his left eye and peeked at his father, hands clasped together at the head of the table, eyes shut tightly. Dallas closed his eye and kept his head down.
“We know that out of the mouth of babes, Your kingdom bubbles forth. He is a precious gift to us, given by the power of Your holy spirit, and we make this supplication so that he may act as a light to Your roadway. We pray that he resist the temptation to misbehave as other children do, and that he remain peaceable with all of Your creations, Lord. For these things we pray in the name of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”
“Amen,” Dallas and his mother said in unison. Dallas would not look up at his father until he saw him pick up his knife and fork and cut into his pork chop.
His father, Michael, was a frail man, with wiry arms and a size-thirty waist. He wore thin-rimmed spectacles that sat on a small, slightly pointed nose. Though Dallas’s hair was raven black, his father’s was strawberry blond, straight as a pin, and parted to one side. His hairstyle hadn’t changed in years. The dinner table usually remained silent until Mr. Darwin decided it was time to speak. Often he would tell a story about something that had happened at his job, distributing auto parts to area garages and private homes. Occasionally he would ask his wife, Rebecca, about her job, as a hall monitor and aide at T. Walter High School. He hadn’t asked her about it lately.
Dallas was a picky eater, and moved the food around on his plate, hoping to give the appearance that he was digging in. He had lost his appetite, trying to shake the image of Jason Brock cowering under the bloody stick he’d waved at him. He heard his father’s fork and knife drop onto his half-empty plate with a metallic jingle. He looked up, startled.
“I almost forgot,” Mr. Darwin said, looking at Dallas.“Good deeds.”
Dallas searched his mind for a moment. “I don’t have one,” he said with a heavy sigh, and went back to toying with his food.
“Come on,” his father prodded, “you know that every Friday we share what good deeds we did for other people.”
“I forgot it was Friday,” mumbled Dallas.
“And why do we do good deeds?”
Dallas peered at his father to gauge if he needed to answer. A warm smile spread across Mr. Darwin’s face.
“Because it’s part of our worship to God,” Dallas answered.
“Why is it a part of our worship?”
Dallas looked over at his mother, eating as if nothing was happening. “Because we are God’s messengers on earth and everything we do we must do to prove our love and worship to God,” he replied flatly.
“We must be without blemish before the eyes of unbelievers,” said his mother. “So no one can say, Oh, look at that Dallas Darwin, he says he’s a Christian, but look at all the things he does, right?”
Dallas nodded and looked down at his plate.
“You’re getting almost to that age where you have to decide for yourself whether you’re going to be committed to the Lord,” his father tacked on. “Part of what identifies you with the Lord’s flock are the good deeds you do. So let’s hear it.”
“I . . . I can’t think of one, Dad.” Dallas looked at his father, almost wishing he would ask him questions about his day, so that he could at least absolve himself of some of the guilt he felt.
“I’ll go first,” his father said. “Today I hand-delivered a carburetor to a customer who is restoring an old Buick, because the customer is handicapped and couldn’t get anyone to drive him to our store.”
Rebecca Darwin pondered this for a moment, looked at Dallas, and then back at her husband. “If he’s too handicapped to drive, then why is he restoring a car?”
A short burst of laughter escaped through Dallas’s nose. His father looked at Rebecca and shook his head playfully.
“He does it as a hobby, since he’s stuck home most of the day.” Mr. Darwin now turned his attention back to Dallas. “What’s one good deed you did this week? Come on, they can be real simple.”
Dallas thought for a moment. He couldn’t get Jason Brock out of his head. The trembling little piece of humanity was standing in the path of every good thought. That soiled cherubic face shone like a bright bulb, exposing all the dark, dirty insides of Dallas’s heart. He flashed back, quickly, to the bottom of the hill, standing there with a stick in his hand. A stick that had already flattened a nose. He had it in his hand. He raised it, with great menace. But he did not swing. A thought suddenly struck him with excitement.
“I didn’t hit a little kid with my stick today!” he blurted out, before thinking it through.
His father looked at his mother. “He was in a fight today?”
“First I heard of it,” she said, forking her peas away from her broccoli.
Mr. Darwin looked back at his son, eyeing him up and down. There was an angry, chilly look in his eye, a look that often unnerved Dallas to the point that he would almost beg for a spanking, so he could be turned away from his disapproving face. Dallas searched his mind for a way out.
“How is not hitting another human being with a stick considered a good deed?” his father asked. There was a long moment of silence. So long, Mr. Darwin picked up his fork, and with an angry sniff took another mouthful. He wouldn’t make eye contact with his son.
“I could have hit him with it,” Dallas finally mumbled, looking back down at his food. He heard the fork drop again.
“That is not the point. That is not the point, Dallas. You are a representative, not only of this household, but of your Lord God. Does this kid know you’re a Christian?”
“No.”
“Well thank God for that. At least you didn’t bring reproach on the Lord’s name. You’re dismissed from the table, go to your room.” Whenever his father passed a sentence, there was no appeal. Dallas got up without a word, and left the dining room.
Once inside his bedroom, Dallas laid down on his bed and stared up at the ceiling, his right hand folded across his chest. He began to count the things he’d done wrong, not in telling his father, but in putting himself there, standing in the tracks of wrongdoing. Like feet that run to badness, his father always said. He thought about the kid he did hit with his stick, the bigger kid who ran off and was probably dealing with questions from his parents right now. Mostly, he thought about those few words from poor, quivering Jason Brock. And yet, Dallas couldn’t beg God for mercy. He couldn’t beg for anything. He’d almost rather go without than get that feeling in his stomach that he needed to rely on someone’s kindness or mercy. He turned on his side, and rose to his knees at the head of his bed. Behind hi
s headboard, a shelf held his record player. He pulled out the new album his mother had purchased for him. Billy Joel stood, legs apart in his leather jacket, with a stone cocked back in his hand. He placed the record on the turntable and turned the dial up. He laid back down. The speakers crackled a bit, but finally the guitar screeched out. Dallas stared back up at the ceiling.
Friday night I crashed your party
Saturday I said I’m sorry
Sunday came and trashed me out again . . .
Dallas listened to the lyrics, but still felt a great heaviness lying across his chest. His eyes filled with tears. My name is Jason Brock. I’m seven. Why am I like this? Dallas wondered. Soon, he broke into giant sobs, and covered his face with his hands, crying into them with the heavy kind of sorrow that not even a guitar solo, which normally cheered him up, could stopper.
* * *
Rebecca and Michael Darwin sat in the living room clutching their coffee mugs. It was a warm night, and Michael opened the bay windows that covered almost the entire front porch of the house. The breeze drifted in, but barely. He was discussing their finances.
“So three thousand goes into this investment account and it stays there for at least five years, untouchable.”
“And it can be added to?” his wife asked.
“Any time we want, but the point is, we can’t take away from it, and as it gains interest, you know, you never can tell how things will work out in the future, with interest rates and all that. We may end up tripling our money in no time.”
“That would be nice.”
Michael dropped back down on his seat next to Rebecca and threw his arm across the back of the couch. She reached for her mug and sipped piously.
“We should have started a long time ago,” Michael added.
“And we can’t go into it at all? That’s a lot of money. What if we need it for something?”
Michael had already begun shaking his head. “Only emergencies, like if we have to total out one of the cars. This account is really restrictive, which is what we need.”
She nodded, and sipped. Her husband played with the edges of her black hair, running a handful of it through his fingers, and twirling it around his index. She hadn’t yet shown the early signs of gray that most raven-haired people get, and in the soft yellow light of the living room, she looked younger than she was. Her high cheekbones sloped inward to sunken cheeks, but the wrinkles that were beginning to form there weren’t visible in the evening light, nor were the faint crow’s feet around her eyes. She toyed with the rim of her coffee mug with slender fingers that tapered down to delicate polished nails. Rebecca hadn’t gained a pound since high school, and her collarbones were white and visible above the neckline of her shirt. Michael wanted to dive into her neck when he saw her in this light. But he vanquished the thought with the more important consideration of their money. “If we don’t touch it,” he continued, “eventually we won’t miss it, and then the sky’s the limit. It may even pay for Dallas’s tuition when the time comes.”
Speaking Dallas’s name seemed to have an effect on Michael. He strained his ears in the silence, while his wife took another sip of coffee. Michael had an odd habit of pouring an entire cup of coffee, and only taking a sip from it. He was always busy with something. “What’s Dallas doing in there?” he asked, motioning to the bedroom.
Rebecca perked her ears up. “Listening to his record,” she answered, sinking back down into the comfort of the couch. “That Billy Joel album I got him.”
Michael exhaled through his nose and sank down into the couch with her.
“I wish you wouldn’t buy him those kinds of things,” he said absently, as if he were just looking to fill the air with his voice.
“Why?”
“I don’t know. It’s not good for him. Before the Lord found me, I was like an animal on all fours, doing all sorts of things—and I listened to all sorts of debased music. He’s got too many things influencing him already . . . Those kids he runs around with. Did he tell you about this fight he was in?”
Rebeccca shook her head.
He glanced out the window, pondering. “I’ll bet I know who started it, Rebecca. It was that Illworth kid, I can bet that dollars to doughnuts.”
“How can you know that?”
“Kid’s got no parental supervision. He’s a bit of an idiot, really, a stupid kid. Probably shoots his mouth off and then Dallas gets in the middle of it.”
“Supervision,” Rebecca repeated, as though it was a dead word.
“With a father like his, how could he be expected to behave himself?”
“Janet’s a nice woman, though.”
“But the old man, Ivan? You saw him at the block party last month. Smashed the tables, and fell down. Threatened Minister Roberts.” Michael got up from the couch, distracted by a noise outside, and went to the window.
Rebecca started to laugh, and raised her mug to her lips. “He said Minister Roberts was looking funny at his wife. Can you imagine? The size of that woman? His wife back home is a hundred pounds soaking wet, he’s going to eyeball Janet?” She chuckled at her own observation, but her husband was intently watching Ivan Illworth across the street, as Ivan bashed his garbage cans into the ground, denting them.
“Here’s a perfect picture right now, Rebecca,” he said, waving her over to the window.
She rose to join him, and when she looked out, her mouth dropped open and she half-gasped, half-laughed. “What’s he doing?”
“Smashing his own garbage cans, apparently.”
They shook their heads. It was like watching a gorilla at the zoo marking its territory. Ivan’s apelike, husky frame thrashed the metal cans, throwing them across the yard, only to retrieve them moments later. Michael and Rebecca watched from the comfort of their living room window; it was the first time in family history that Michael finished his cup of coffee.
Halfway through his tirade, Ivan Illworth began to shout in his slurred voice
He kicked one can over, and threw another across the street with more incoherent screams.
“What’s he saying?” asked Rebecca.
“I can only make out the curse words,” Michael answered.
CHAPTER SIX
IVAN ILLWORTH STORMED INTO HIS HOUSE and slammed the front door.
“Fucking cans!” he yelled.
James was at the kitchen table with Kevin, while Janet sat in the living room watching television. She rolled her eyes when Ivan walked past her into the kitchen. Ivan looked at his two boys. He gave them that familiar expression. James could tell what he wanted. He gave in.
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing,” his father sniffed, opening the refrigerator door. James knew it would only be a few seconds before all his “nothing” poured forth a litany of grievances.
“Those fucking cans aren’t worth a shit, that’s the problem,” he began. “I try to fit an extra bag into them, they dent. I try to take a bag out, the can falls over, it dents some more. I stand the can upright and leave it, it falls over and rolls out into the street.” He paused for dramatic effect. “I went and threw the goddamn things across the street. We need plastic cans.” He took a seat between the boys.
James sat with the collar of his shirt flipped up to hide the black-and-blue line that stretched across the side of his neck from the tree branch. He knew the collar would not escape his father’s notice. His brother sat across from him; both had been sitting quietly, eating egg noodles with baked beans and onions. Kevin would be entering college after the summer, having just graduated from T. Walter High.
Ivan searched his sons’ faces for a sign of sympathy. He noticed James’s collar. “The hell are you wearing your shirt like a greaser from the ’50s for?”
His tone made James shrink a bit, and the lie he’d fixed on telling flew from his memory. He felt his lungs fill with hot air, and his mouth turned dry. His brother, seizing the moment to make fun of him, unwittingly bailed him out.
&n
bsp; “The Michael Jackson look is bringing it back,” he imitated in a high-pitched voice. His father looked at Kevin, and then back at his youngest son.
“Christ, that fruit on the TV? You’re imitating him?”
“No,” James said before he realized he was undermining his own escape.
“If you’re going to wear your collar up, wear it like James Dean, not like some fruity little black on the television.” He reached over and grabbed James’s collar. James could smell the whiskey on his breath, and felt his father’s drunken momentum lean into his neck. A dull pain rushed through him. A faint whimper escaped. His father narrowed his eyes and pulled the collar away, exposing the dark bruise.
“Oh man! Bruiser,” Kevin laughed.
“What the hell happened to you?” Ivan asked.
James looked at his brother, and then back down at his plate. “Dallas got us into a fight. We tried to run, but we got cornered. It was no big deal, this kid just hit me with a stick.”
His father stayed silent for a moment, considering his son’s neck through one open eye. “I bet it feels as bad as it looks.”
James glanced quickly at his father, and saw that he wore a slight grin. He smiled back. “It hurts like hell.”
“It hurts like hell, he says,” chuckled Ivan. “I bet it does. Ha ha. That’s a good boy.” He grabbed his son by the shoulders, shaking him around. James felt the pain scorch through his body, but he dared not cry out. “Tell me, did you give it right back as good as you got?”
Kevin sat up, seizing the opportunity. “Are you kidding? James is too sensitive for that.”
Ivan waved him off. “No, no . . . there’s a little bit of rage in this skinny body. Christ, that bruise is bigger than your whole head.” He started to laugh again.
Janet, meanwhile, had gotten up from the couch when she heard Ivan’s laughter. She reached the kitchen doorway and gasped. “What happened to you?”
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