Sons of the 613

by Michael Rubens

  Not a slap, an open-hand blow to the side of the head, Josh’s palm nearly the size of Tim’s skull. The impact is so loud that I make a coughing, gaspy sound. It’s a lazy, relaxed swing for Josh, but it literally knocks Tim to the ground. His eyes glaze for a moment. He’s propped up unevenly on one hand and one elbow, looking at Josh, stunned.

  Everyone is frozen. Me. The Assholes. Any kids left in the immediate area. We’re all rigid and wide-eyed and terrified, me maybe more than anyone, because I know Josh, know what he’s like when the rage shuts off his brain.

  Tim starts to cry.

  I don’t feel any satisfaction or triumph, no sense of revenge. I just feel more frightened and want it to stop.

  “All right,” says Josh, “let’s go.”

  He grabs me, no more gently than he treated Tim, and starts marching me away.

  Behind us, Tim blubbers the inevitable cry of the helpless victim, the very cliché I probably would have blurted if I’d been able to speak: “I’m going to sue you! I’m going to tell my dad!”

  Josh stops.

  “Wait here,” he says, turns, strides purposefully toward Tim, accelerating as he goes: step step stepSTEPSTEP. Tim doesn’t even try to scramble away, because he still can’t believe it, can’t believe this full-grown man would actually do anything else. Josh grabs him by the arms and lifts him effortlessly until they’re nose-to-nose, like he’s done to me.

  “Where do you live?” he says. “Where?” He gives Tim a shake. “I want to go home with you right now. I want to meet your dad. Because I’m going to fucking KILL HIM.”

  Tim is bawling. The other kids are bawling. I am bawling. The earth has cracked open and Satan is here.

  Josh drops Tim. Tim collapses on the ground. Josh stalks back to me and says, “Let’s go.”

  How do you walk away from something like that?

  If you’re Josh, you just do, like nothing much happened, your little brother trailing after you.

  He leads me to the parking lot. The car is there. He opens the back door and tosses my bag and my books in, not in any special hurry. I can almost hear the sirens drawing closer. If you’re a grown-up, you can’t just hit a kid. You can’t, even if the kid deserves it. Dozens of other kids saw what happened. Maybe a teacher did, too.

  But there are no sirens. No police arrive. Josh closes the rear door, gestures with his chin for me to get in, gets in next to me, and starts the car. Some kids are gathered at a respectful distance, watching us, but no teacher comes running out of the school, saying, “Stop! Stop! I saw you!”

  We drive out of the parking lot, no one hindering us. But that can’t be the end of it. Not even Josh can get away with something like this.

  When we get home, the house is on fire.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  FIRE

  The only thing Josh says to me as we’re driving, not looking at me: “I taught you, like, fifty times how to bump and roll out of the mount. Fifty times. You could have dumped him easily.”

  That’s it. That’s when we really do start hearing sirens. Sirens that are following us. Someone called the police. They saw what happened and dialed 911, and now Josh is going to jail. It sounds like they’ve sent the entire department—so many sirens, horns blaring, the racket going from zero to one hundred in what seems like seconds.

  I twist and look behind us and feel like gagging. There’s a cop car right on our tail, lights flashing, squawking the horn.

  “What the hell?” says Josh.

  “You have to pull over!” I say, my heart thumping. “Pull over!”

  Josh swears, then pulls off to the right—and the cop car accelerates by us, and as we’re about to pull away from the curb again a fire truck appears and roars by, then a second and a third.

  We follow them down Valley View and watch them take the right turn that we have to take. They’re still ahead of us, leading us to our block.

  “Where are they going?” says Josh.

  To our house, it turns out.

  We get there just as the third fire truck pulls up and stops. Firemen are already clambering out of the other two trucks, grabbing tools that look like medieval weapons, shrugging beat-up yellow oxygen tanks onto their backs. Lisa and Patrick are on the front porch. Patrick is talking to one of the firemen, gesturing, the fireman nodding and trying to move into the house, eager to disengage from Patrick and get to the job at hand, waving at other firemen to follow.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” says Josh, parking the car half on our lawn and hopping out, leaving the door open behind him. Lisa spots him and comes running across the yard to meet him, yelling, “The stove! The stove was on fire!”

  I catch up to them as one of the cops steps in front of Josh, saying, “Whoa, big guy, can’t go in there right now.” Then he says, “Hey, are you Josh Kaplan? Man, I used to watch you wrestle. You were amazing . . .”

  Lisa is still babbling about how the skillet caught on fire because of the sausages that Patrick forgot about and how it spread to the wood countertop when he dumped water on it and the countertop started to burn and there was smoke and flames and she called 911. I can see through the open front door. It looks smoky in there. Patrick is coming over now, saying, “Dude, I’m soooo sorry . . .”

  It doesn’t take long for the all-clear signal. They lead us through the still-smoky house to the kitchen. All the sliding doors and the door to the garage are open to help air the place out. I don’t want to be around Josh, but I’m curious enough that I stay for a bit. We gather around the stove as one of the firemen goes over the details with Josh and describes what they did, which is pretty obvious: The countertop that borders the stove has a big blackened patch on it, a patch that is also covered with white powder from the firefighters’ dry chemical extinguishers.

  “When you have a grease fire in a skillet like this,” the firefighter says to Josh, who nods in annoyance, the hurry-up-and-finish-because-I-already-know-what-you’re-going-to-say nod, “you don’t want to put water on it. You just want to cover it—”

  “With the lid, yes. I know,” says Josh, glaring at Patrick, who is scratching the back of his own head and grimacing.

  As soon as the firefighters start to file out, I slip out the door to the back porch. Patrick is still apologizing to Josh, who looks like he’s considering rebreaking his jaw. As I leave, Patrick points to me and says, “What happened to him?”

  “That one?” Josh says. “I went to his school to make sure he wasn’t skipping, and . . . screw it. Don’t even get me started with that pussy.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  IN WHICH SAGE ADVICE IS RECEIVED FROM AN UNLIKELY SOURCE

  MERIT BADGE: DEFIANCE

  I sit by the creek and cry. I think blubber is the right word. I sit there and blubber and hate myself. Then I climb into the tent and lie there and blubber some more, until I’m puffy-eyed and blubbered out. Josh is right. I could have fought back, but I didn’t, I just lay there weak and useless. And that’s what I am—weak and useless, and everyone at school knows it.

  While I’m lying on my back, staring up at the roof of the tent, I hear someone approaching. Go away, Josh, I think. Then there’s a sort of poofy thump as a hand knocks on the side of the tent like it’s a door, the whole tent shimmying. I also hear some sort of crackling noise.

  “Hey,” says a male voice. It takes me a second to realize it’s Patrick.

  “Hey, little dude,” he says, “you in there?”

  “What.”

  “You in there? You awake?”

  I let that one pass. “What do you want?”

  “Can I come in?”

  He fumbles with one of the enclosures.

  “That’s the window,” I say.

  “Oh,” says Patrick. “Where’s the friggin’ front of this thing? Oh, here.”

  He finally manages to get the front partially unzipped, and it flops open, his lean, pockmarked face framed by the irregular aperture.

  “I brought snacks,”
he says, holding up a bag of chips, which explains the crackling noise I heard before. He puts the bag down. “I also got these,” he adds, now holding up two cans of beer.

  “I don’t drink beer.”

  “Oh. Oh, okay. Well, more for me, I guess.”

  He’s still filling the frame of the tent, nodding at me. I don’t know what else to do, so I just lie there looking back at him. After a few moments of that he says, “You gonna come out and talk, or you gonna make me sit here like an asshole?”

  We sit on the grass, looking out beyond the creek. Patrick doesn’t say anything at first, concentrating on a beer and the chips. I note that he’s also brought along the rest of a six-pack.

  “You’re sure you don’t want one?” he says, spraying me with a few soggy spit wads of chewed-up Doritos.

  “I’m good.”

  “’Kay.” Slurp. “Man, I had to get out of there. Your brother is pissed at me, boy. Damn.” He pauses to drink, then stuff some more chips in his mouth. “Got a temper, that guy. But he’s solid. I love him. He’s like my brother. I mean, you know. Not like you and he are brothers, but in here.” He knocks a fist against his chest.

  You can have him, I want to say, but decide to go with silence. More slurping and munching.

  “You know, Josh, he kicked my ass once.”

  “Yeah, I heard.”

  “Yep. You know his ear? That was me.”

  “I heard.”

  “I mean, I ain’t proud of it or nothing. I was getting my ass handed to me. I mean, that boy can fight.”

  I go back to silence. If that’s where this talk is heading, I’m going back to the tent. I’m sick of Josh and how he can fight and what a big tough guy he is. I don’t care.

  “I mean, I don’t think he’s ever gotten his ass kicked,” Patrick says.

  I tease a blade of grass out of the lawn and examine the part at the bottom where the green turns to pearlescent white.

  “Probably not even as a little kid, if he ever was a little kid.”

  I nibble on the soft root, waiting for Patrick to finish so I can be alone again.

  “If you wanted to learn how to fight? He’d be, like, the most awesome teacher you could have.”

  I toss the grass away. “Yes, I know, okay?”

  “Whoa. Don’t get all heated up. You sure you don’t want a beer?”

  “No. I don’t drink.”

  “Okay.” He opens the beer that he was offering to me and starts drinking it himself. “So, what was my point?”

  That Josh is a god and we should worship him. That I’ll never be Josh. That you’re too stupid to know how to operate a flush toilet or park your car or close the freezer door or cook sausages or put out a simple grease fire or remember your own point.

  “Right,” he says, seeming to remember. “Here’s the deal: Josh knows lots about ass kicking. But he doesn’t know anything about getting his ass kicked. You follow?”

  I shrug. “I guess.”

  “He’s got nothing to teach you there. He doesn’t understand it.”

  He chugs some more and wipes his mouth with the back of his forearm—the forearm attached to the hand holding the can of beer, meaning he also manages to pour some of his beverage on himself at the same time.

  “Whoa,” he says, looking down at his shirt.

  “You know, I think I might just go back in,” I say, starting to stand up. There’s only so much moron I can handle right now.

  “Now me,” Patrick says, “I know about getting my ass kicked.”

  I pause.

  “Yeah?” I say.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  We look at each other for a moment. Then he tilts his head to the side, indicating the spot next to him where I’d been sitting. I sit.

  “Yeah,” he says, noting my renewed interest, “now we can talk. Man, I’ve had my ass kicked so many times . . .” He shakes his head, smiling. “Don’t get me wrong—I’ve dealt it, too, but damn, I know what it’s like to just get pounded.”

  He illustrates by smacking a fist into the now-empty beer can, crushing it. He tosses it aside, reaches for another, makes a gesture of offering it to me. “No? Okay.” Shhpritz. He starts to drink it himself, looking like he might have entirely forgotten that he had been talking.

  “You’re big, though,” I say, not sure if he’s done and wanting to prompt him.

  “What? Oh. Yeah. I’m big now, but I wasn’t always. And, you know, I’ve always been that guy who will talk smack to anyone—like, anyone. I mean, think about it, I got mouthy with your brother, and you know, look at that guy. So yeah, I’ve talked my way into plenty of scrapes.”

  He takes another beer break and once again seems to remember something.

  “Also, my dad used to friggin’ beat the crap out of me, pretty much all the time. Get wasted and just go off on me and my mom. Check this out.”

  He puts down his beer and reaches for my hand, his skin cold and wet from the condensation on the can. He pries open my fingers like he’s opening a multi-tool, and roughly presses my index finger against a lumpy spot on the side of his shaved head. It’s intimate and weird and off-putting, but I have to admit I also sort of appreciate it, like he assumes that this is normal, meaning he sees us as friends and equals.

  “Feel that?” he says.

  “Yes.”

  “Fireplace poker.”

  “He hit you?”

  “Yeah, man. BOOOM!”

  He swings his free arm, illustrating the blow.

  “Your dad?”

  “Yeah. Put me out cold. You should have seen the blood.”

  He releases my hand, then briefly touches the spot himself. “A friggin’ fireplace poker,” he says quietly, rubbing it, then drops his hand. He’s looking off now, privately reliving the event, his features twisted and pained. Looking at him, I feel a surge of surprise and then embarrassment, because I realize that he’s about to start crying.

  “Buuuuuuuurrrrp” is what comes out instead. Then his uncomfortable expression vanishes and he looks fine.

  “Anyways,” he says, continuing on like nothing happened, “I know pretty much every flavor of beat-down. My dad, freaks like your brother, friggin’ biker gangs ganging up on me—that’s the worst, can’t do anything about it, people kicking you in the ribs and the head and crap when you’re on the ground. Oh, yeah—I got stabbed once, also.”

  “Stabbed.”

  “Yeah, right in the side. Dude with a butterfly knife.”

  My particular beat-down is starting to seem less horrific.

  “You know,” he says, “everyone gets beat up.”

  “Not my brother.”

  “Maybe not your brother. Yet. But he will, he keeps going the way he is.”

  “Yeah . . .” I say, and he detects the doubt in my voice, that I’m agreeing just to indulge him.

  “Everyone,” he repeats. “And the point is this. Listen to me. Are you listening?”

  “Yes.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “I am.”

  “Fine. Here’s the point: Getting beat up doesn’t make you less of a man.”

  He was right: I wasn’t really listening before. Now I am, because he’s answering a question I didn’t even know I was asking.

  “Yeah, you hear me now,” he says, seeing my expression. “See, it ain’t ever fair. Never. Either you’ve got more guys or they’ve got more guys, or you’re bigger or he’s bigger, or you’re on your game or he is . . . whatever. It’s never fair. And so you get your ass kicked. But it’s just one of those things. It does not make you less of a man,” he repeats. “I would say it’s actually part of being a man.”

  He looks at me, dropping his head a bit to align his gaze with mine.

  “You get it?” he says, and I don’t expect this at all, don’t expect Patrick the Ear Chewer to be like this, to out of nowhere seem like he has some intelligence and wisdom in him and to offer me this kindness. I can’t help the tears welling up, and I have to
drop my gaze.

  “Yeah,” he says, and gives me a few pats on the back while I hang my head and sniffle. “Sucks, right?”

  I nod, my head still down, wanting to say something but not wanting any sobs to come out.

  “Yeah, it sucks,” he says. I hear another beer being opened.

  “Here.” He holds the can of beer down low so that it appears in my field of vision. “Here,” he repeats, and I take it this time.

  “Cheers.” He knocks his can against mine and drinks. I look at my beer for a moment, hesitating, and then take a sip. I don’t like the flavor any more than I ever have, but it seems like the right thing to do at this moment.

  “I’ll tell you what I learned over the years,” says Patrick. “If you’re gonna get the shit kicked out of you, there’s not much you can do about it. If you can give a beating before you get one, great. But the most important thing is this: When you get stomped you can’t let them know they got to you. Right? You get punched, yeah, that hurts and all that. But it’s your pride they’re trying to hurt. And they can’t take that from you. The next time you see them, you walk around with your head up, like Fuck you. You kicked my ass? So what. So what. I’m still the man, and you got nothing. Nothing. Right?”

  He looks at me, and I nod.

  “My dad, he used to leave me all bloody and torn up, and you know what I’d say? I’d say, ‘All right, I’m heading out now, you have a good day.’ Just like that. Never let him know I was scared. That’s punk rock, yo. Show him, you got nothing. You say it.”

  “What?”

  “Say it. ‘You got nothin’.’”

  “I don’t know . . .”

  “Try it. Trust me. ‘You got nothing.’”

  “Uh . . . you got nothing?”

  “No. Jesus. You got nothing.” He jabs a finger at me.

  “You got nothing.”

  “Better. Big. Like you got some balls.”

  “I think that’s the problem.”

  “No, no, it’s all about pretending. Put on the show. ‘You got nothing.’”

  I can see what’s going on. Patrick wants this to be a big moment. A breakthrough moment. I’m teary and we’re sitting here bonding and he wants to go the next step. I appreciate his advice, but I feel ridiculous.