by Ron Irwin
We descended into the catacombs beneath the boats and set to work on the machines. I rowed next to Perry, who started gasping for breath after a seven-hundred-meter piece—just a few minutes of effort—and bent double against the foot stretchers with his eyes bulging. Ruth sat next to him, wrote down his slightly improved time. Perry studiously ignored her, knowing that she was paying attention to him at Channing’s request because the erg was his special weakness. He glanced at me. “You okay, Carrey?
“You don’t need to take that crap, Jumbo.”
“You know how he is.”
“I know how he is.”
He rubbed his knee. “This sucks. I want to get out on the water.”
Ruth spoke, finally, looking down at her clipboard. “Spring is months away, John. You still have to deal with a whole winter in this place.”
Two machines over, Connor finished his second seven-hundred-meter piece and rowed it off on the machine, then laid the handle against the cage gently, as if it were alive. He leaned over, looked at Perry and me sitting there and shook his head, checked his watch. Then he stood up. He came over and looked down at Perry’s knee, Perry’s leg as big around as both of mine, pale and hairy. Connor looked at it as if something had suddenly occurred to him. “You’re going to be able to row on that, right Jumbo?”
Perry nodded, stood up, eye to eye with Connor. His head was perfectly round, and his hair clung to the sides of it like a helmet, thick and bushy as a dog’s.
Ruth looked up at both of them, a diminutive referee. “Perry, seriously, should I have you booked in for treatment on that knee?”
“Nah.” Perry was breathing hard, I realized. His recovery off the machine was awful. “My knee is cool. It always eases up after a while.”
Connor pointed at the weight bar we kept in the corner of the room. When we’d cleaned up the week before somebody had stacked the extra forty-five pound weights on either side of it, three on each side.
“How much is six times forty-five, Perry?”
Perry’s mouth worked as he thought.
Connor made a disgusted sound. “It’s two hundred and seventy pounds, you goof. Add an additional forty-five for the bar and we come to three hundred and fifteen. Do you think you can clean that?”
“Hell, yeah.” Perry sounded just a tad too eager. The repentant zealot, wanting to make amends with the high priest of crew.
“That’s impossible.” Connor wiped his mouth, looked Perry up and down. “Don’t lie to me.”
Perry sized up the bar. He slowly rolled it from the corner and stood in front of it. Even the guys on the ergometers stopped rowing. Perry looked over at Connor. “I can lift it. Yeah, I can.”
“To your chin?”
“I can lift it and throw it, if you want me to.”
“Ten dollars right now says you can’t.”
Ruth was watching this with increasing alarm. “Wait. This is dumb, you guys. John’s hurt, I don’t think—”
“Shut up, Ruth. Jumbo is fine. He needs to toughen up. That erg is kicking his ass.”
“John, you don’t need to do this. Coach hasn’t called for any heavy lifting yet. It’s not on the program.”
Connor laughed. “Who cares what’s on the program? This is just a wager. Between gentlemen. Jumbo says he can lift it and I want to see him do it.”
“Connor, I really—”
“Shut up, Ruth.”
Ruth’s face set in anger and she looked up at Perry. “John, you don’t need to do this, okay?”
Connor’s eyes flashed. “He damn well does, Ruth.”
Perry shrugged. He set his eyes on the bar. He licked his lips and wiped his wrist across his nose, stood over the weights, reached down with his fleshy palms and tested the bar, released it. Then he rolled his neck, shook out his paws and circled his shoulders, breathing hard the whole time. It was a transformation. He looked like the work of a sculptor who had been asked to carve a huge human figure and not bother with the details. He was menacing, indestructible. His was a body meant to lift and work and absorb pain.
He was squaring off over three hundred and fifteen pounds. Dead weight, clean and jerk. I considered what would happen to me if I tried it with even two hundred. I’d been on a job back home with an ex-army guy named Quayne McAllister, who’d tried to roll a sixty gallon drum full of silica gel out a loading dock and had caught its full weight when it rolled back in on him. He’d hit the floor clutching his twisted spine and howling; raspy, high-pitched screeches of pain that had brought my father running into the room yelling at me to call an ambulance. I still remembered my father rolling him on his stomach while the grown man with two sons older than me lay there snorting in the dust like some animal he’d found gutshot in the road. After that McAllister was just another guy at work with a back brace and tape on his wrists who walked with a limp.
Perry wrapped a leather belt around his kidneys and pulled it tight. He pushed the bar out farther, so it was between Connor and himself. “You want to try it first, Connor?” Perry looked like he meant it. As if skinny Connor Payne, with his measly one hundred and eighty-five pounds, was going to have a chance even moving the thing. Perry smiled ingratiatingly. I willed him to needle Connor just a little more. Remind Connor he was asking him to do something he himself could not.
Wadsworth, who had been watching all this from one of the weight benches, broke in. “Call it off, Connor. This is grotesque.” There was a fault line of fear in his voice.
Connor didn’t even look at him. Seemed not to have registered that Wadsworth had spoken.
Perry swung his arms out and then practiced getting into position, leveling the bar, finding just the right spot for his drive. He breathed low, from his stomach, as if sucking energy in from the close, rank air. He pursed his lips, swallowing some idea about the weight, some concept about leverage we didn’t know.
Then, in one blur of movement, he seemed to almost fall on the bar, to collapse over it and catch himself as his hands found the metal. Hunched over the bar for only a second, he drove with his legs and stepped forward at the same time. The bar came off the floor just a shade unevenly, and Perry puffed his cheeks, looking right at Connor, and ripped it upward to his shoulders, the weights rotating slightly, his knees bent just a touch, the left leg taking the greatest strain. Finally he rose, the weight parallel to his shoulders. He grinned, his face tight and florid with the effort. He sucked in a chestful of air, a strained contortion that showed his teeth. He exhaled hard and took a quick inhale. The boathouse was dead silent. We could hear Perry’s feet sliding on the floor to keep his stance, his tendons red and pulsing over his socks.
Connor leaned forward, almost into his face. “Can you get it over your head, Perry?” he needled. “Can you?”
And for that one second Perry thought about it, thought about trying for that last push and getting his body beneath it. Wadsworth tried to spot him but he was too slow. Perry gave it one last heave and stood, wavering under the strain, legs apart. Finally, he pushed the bar outward and it crashed down with a loud clatter leaving two deep indents in the blue wooden floor. Perry rocked back so his shoulders were straight. Wadsworth pounded his back, “You okay?”
Perry nodded, making fists, rolled his neck again and turned away. Wadsworth turned around furiously and pointed at Connor. “What the hell was that?”
“I thought he could do it. If you get it to your shoulders, the rest is easy.”
Wadsworth shook his head, hearing something he wasn’t sure he could believe in Connor’s voice. Connor took a quick step in his direction and spun him around. “Wads, you know what? I can’t lift that weight. Can you? Don’t even answer me. Perry’s the only one who can.”
“So fucking leave him alone, for—”
“But I can tell you something. If I could get that bar up to my shoulders, I would get it over my head. That’s the difference between Jumbo and me.”
Connor seemed to dismiss him and turned to Perry, waited whil
e he caught his breath. “Well done,” Connor said. “I’m impressed. Very impressed.” He held out his hand. Perry didn’t take it. Connor left it there between them and I willed Perry to hang tough. After a few slow seconds Perry brushed Connor’s fingers with his.
I had to look away.
Ruth pushed by the three of them and clumped up the stairs. I heard her kick open the door above and stomp past the boats and outside. Connor smiled. I got off the ergometer and pulled on my own coat and my Carrey’s Joinery hat. “Come on, Jumbo. Let’s get out of here, man.”
Connor laughed. “Screw you, Carrey. Jumbo’s fine. Look at him.”
I turned and stared at him. Jumbo was right next to me and Wadsworth was standing behind us. Connor looked at the three of us, standing his ground. Fearless.
“Where’s Jumbo’s ten bucks?”
“What?” Connor looked like he genuinely didn’t know what I was talking about.
“You bet him ten bucks he couldn’t lift that weight. Where’s your money? You owe him ten bucks.”
Perry said, “Rob, man, it’s cool—”
“It’s not cool. He owes you ten bucks.” I kept my eyes on Connor. If he was going to hit me, it would be right now. I damn near prayed for it.
Connor smirked. “Don’t you think I’m good for it, Roberto?”
“Pay him, then.”
Connor shrugged, walked nonchalantly to the back of the training room, fumbled through his backpack and extracted two fives from his prissy black leather wallet. He straightened, sauntered back across the room, ignoring everyone looking at us. He handed Perry the money and somehow managed to make it look condescending; like he was tipping a bell hop or something. Perry stuffed the bills in his sweatshirt. I punched Jumbo’s heavy arm. “C’mon, man. Let’s get you some air. You need to walk that off.” I turned to Connor. “You couldn’t even get that weight off the ground.”
“I don’t have to, Carrey. I have the best time on the erg of anyone in this room. Including you.”
“That’s all you have, asshole.”
Connor grinned, turned away.
Jumbo followed me upstairs and we walked through the boats to the sliding door Ruth had left hanging open. I looked around for her but she had disappeared into the last light of the day. Perry walked next to me and I could swear he was limping, just a little.
“I did it, Rob. Jesus. I’ve never done that much weight. That was badass, right?”
“It was total crap, Connor asking you to do that.”
“Naw, man. I called his bluff.”
He was walking heavily, smiling broadly, as if he’d just been given a bag of popcorn.
“Jumbo, you don’t need to take Connor’s bullshit. You could tell him to go to hell and what’s he going to do? Hit you? Not let you on the team?”
“You know it’s not that easy. And it’s cool I’m still training with you guys after quitting the erg test. I owe him for that. He could have blackballed me. Leonsis could have my place.”
“He’s not God, Jumbo.”
Perry stopped at Route 7, looked across the road. “Rob, I’ve been here for three years. I came here as a freshman, like Connor did. Like Wads and Ruth. Back then all the seniors hazed the crap out of us. Even Connor. I must have delivered a hundred pizzas into the senior garret. Connor was given a wilderness every night.”
“A wilderness?”
“He had to wait on all the kids at the rowing table. And do the whole cleanup. Without help. That’s called doing a wilderness. He was like the wilderness kid.”
“So? It didn’t make him humble.”
“But he still made the God Four. He still did it. He was the first freshman in years to make the God Four. Like, since World War One or something, when all the seniors went off to battle or caught polio or whatever. At the end of the year, somebody was waiting on him.”
Perry coughed, spat, jogged across the road and when he got to the other side he was almost winded. All I had to do to keep up with him was lengthen my stride. My walking stride.
“Last year they held the Warwick Race over at Warwick. Every year Connor’s parents come up for it. They come up in a real limo. This big silver Caddy with smoked glass windows. So, anyway, last year, they didn’t even get out. They just had their chauffeur park it near the finish line.”
Perry covered one of his huge nostrils with his thumb and blew. A stream of snot sprayed out onto the road. I tried not to puke.
“It was their message to us. They had watched two God Fours lose and they weren’t going to bother getting out of the car for the third race.”
“You want to know something, Jumbo? I didn’t know real people drove around in limos. I thought they were for, like, foreign dignitaries and kids on prom night and rock stars. A limo. And you feel sorry for him? Nice.”
“Dude, Connor is from New York. Do you think his dad, like, hails cabs and stuff? Or takes the subway?” Jumbo laughed. “Anyway, we almost beat Warwick. We had them by half a boat length into the last twenty strokes. And this guy who graduated last year, Paul Wendt, caught a crab. His oar jut sliced under the water and yanked him out of the foot stretchers. It smacked him in the jaw and he was just laid out. One more inch and he would have been tossed out of the boat.”
“Believe me, I’ve heard about it.”
“Do they call it ‘catching a crab’ where you come from?”
“Where I come from? Jumbo, Niccalsetti is just eight hours away. It’s not another country. We use the same language.”
“Niccalsetti is only eight hours away? Really?”
“It’s New York State. The state isn’t that big.”
“So, you get summer and all? I thought it always snowed there. Like, you know, Finland or Alaska or whatever. Seriously. No offense.”
“Finish the story, you ignoramus.”
“So we still pulled it together. Came back over the line a boat length and a half down. By the time we’d let it run and were spinning the boat to go back to the dock, the limo was gone. They just drove away, man.”
He started lumbering toward the school. “Wadsworth’s parents took us all out to lunch after, including Channing. Connor didn’t say anything the whole time. And he never spoke to Wendt again. We won every race after that, but we lost to Warwick, and that’s all that counts to Connor because that’s the only race that counts to any of them.”
“That doesn’t excuse the fact that he’s a prick.”
“I know, Rob, dude. But it kind of explains it.”
We walked on in silence until we got to the entrance of North Dorm. Perry lived in West Dorm, still had a hike ahead of him. Students were pushing by us on their way to dinner. I was starved. Perry looked at me earnestly. “Do you think Ruth is pissed off at me?”
“I think she’s pissed off at all of us.”
“She always is. It’s kind of cool.”
“Good luck, Perry.”
“Don’t need luck. I’m stone cold, bro.” He grinned, put his hands in the air in victory, punched the sky. “I got three hundred and twelve pounds up to my shoulders, man! Can’t beat it, even on a good day!” He strode away, all the freshmen giving him a wide berth. I watched him cut across the field toward the chapel, alone, still waving his arms and making a racket.
I cupped my hands over my mouth and shouted, “You lifted three hundred and fifteen pounds!” My voice echoed against the mountain.
That stopped him. He turned, shouted back, “Really?”
“Do the math!” I couldn’t help smiling. The dork.
He stood for a second, adding. Then he whooped. Performed a ludicrous jig.
At home we had a neighbor named Feldman, back before my father had restored the house my parents currently lived in, back when we were really poor. Feldman was a drunk boilermaker who had a big St. Bernard. The dog lived in the yard of the house we shared, had his own doghouse, and during the muddy season in Niccalsetti he was covered with muck and his bushy fur clung to his great shoulders and forepaw
s. Some nights the dog used to stand out at the end of its chain and bark at nothing at all, big ferocious barks that woke my brother and me, who slept in the back room over the yard. The dog was so strong that he sometimes managed to pull the doghouse sideways, so Feldman had to drive a steel pole into the ground and chain him to that instead.
Feldman came home from the bar one night and the dog started up, straining at the end of his chain, barking for all he was worth, until Feldman started kicking him. You could hear Feldman swearing and kicking the dog, dull thuds and chops, the dog barking back strong and loud through each kick. I got up and watched through our bedroom window, the dog taking each kick and barking, just barking, and the man wailing out there in the dark, his head jogging up and down. My brother woke my dad, who went downstairs and out the back door and pulled him away from the animal. Feldman was bellowing and sobbing and my father helped him up the stairs.
Looking at Perry hiking across the quad I could hear that dog barking at the night, asking the starless sky with great fury why such a good, strong animal could be chained and kicked in such a small place.
11.
When Carolyn walked down the street with me I sometimes felt an aura rising off her. She strode on supple legs through crowds, a leopard on the prowl, consumed people’s eyes, men’s eyes. It was strong erotic juju. Men did what Carolyn wanted. They gave her tables in restaurants and made room for her at the bar. Being with her gave you instant alpha male status. I’d look at her at a party, with a glass of wine in her hand or angling a glass of scotch to her lips and feel ill with desire. We had sex across the world. In France. In Spain. In Africa. Up until two years ago, sex between us was like breathing, and we became careless, as careless as you can be about something essential that you take for granted, like sunshine or air or sleep or blood or your heart pumping.
“I think I might be pregnant,” Carolyn whispered one Saturday morning while we were making love, just as I was coming. I reared back from her in shock but when I saw the anxious, needy look on her face I felt myself melt into her. She confirmed it with a home pregnancy test and we spent a long morning talking about it in our robes, sitting in the summer sun streaming through the warehouse windows, a stained paper wisp with its magic purple lines between us. This pregnancy was a sign we were meant to be, she felt. We were going to have the child. We were going to make it work. That was that. Somehow I’d have to change my life and she’d change hers.