by C. G. Cooper
Falling back to Earth was a bitch.
Chapter Twenty-Six
We’d gotten back from a tour of my new school.
“How was it?” Mom asked.
“It smells like old chalk and mildew,” I said.
She cocked her head at me. “Is that a proper thing to say?”
“It’s the truth.”
“What is that?” asked Larry.
“James, you should learn to hold your tongue sometimes.”
“What’s ‘mildew’?” Larry pressed.
“It’s a bunch of dirty spores that go in through your nose and slither up to your brain. If the doctors don’t get to them in time, they—”
“James! Don’t scare your brother.”
Larry’s eyes were wide, but he wasn’t scared. I put my finger to my lips, and he got the drill. I would continue the tale of the brain-eating mildew later.
“Mom, do I have to go to school?” I asked, refocusing on the road ahead.
“Of course you do.”
“Why?”
“Are you sure you want me to answer that question?”
“I know. Because if we don’t go, we’ll be dumb, right?”
Mom’s face turned momentarily to look at me. She tried to seem shocked, but I saw the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Who told you that?”
I shrugged.
“Well, I don’t think that’s appropriate.”
“Did you always love school, Mom?” I asked. I’d seen the gap in her armor. What kid wouldn’t dive in?
“Not always.”
“See?”
“You don’t have to love it all the time.”
“All the same, you say we should do things that we love. Like Dad and prisons.”
She thought on that for a long moment, maybe a couple of miles on the road. Mom was careful with her words now. She knew my game.
“That’s true. You should do what you love.”
“Do you love being a parent?”
I assumed the answer would come right out. Mom was one of those mothers, I thought. But she paused. The pause went on for much longer than I liked. I started to feel an itch on my neck.
The words then came out as if she’d rehearsed them. “Of course I do. Of course. I love my children.”
Regardless, that wasn’t what I’d asked. I’d asked my mom if she loved being a parent—a small difference, perhaps, but a difference nonetheless.
“Here we are,” Mom said as we pulled up to the house. “Boys, help with the bags, will you?”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I left Larry to his nap and went to find my four-wheeler, which I tucked into a dry spot next to the greenhouse. I could see upon my approach that Carlisle had wiped it down as he did every morning whether I’d ridden it or not.
I was about to knock on the greenhouse door when I heard talking.
I knew that voice.
I put my ear to the door. All I could hear were broken muffles.
“Ever . . . and your friends . . . be in . . .”
I eased the door open a crack, careful not to let it squeak. As soon as the humid air hit me, I knew the voice belonged to Brady Bruce. My flight response told me to run home. I wanted nothing to do with the man.
I heard Carlisle say, “Yes, Boss.”
I couldn’t leave Carlisle alone with that man, no matter the consequences. But what could I do? I was only a kid, and Brady Bruce was a gimlet-eyed freak-a-zoid who could grind me into the ground like a cigarette butt.
I took a deep breath and went left, skirting the plants that effortlessly concealed my approach. Tomatoes. Green beans. Squash. I ignored every one of them. My focus was dead ahead.
“You tell me what you’ve got going with the Allen family,” demanded Bruce.
“I don’t know what you mean, Boss.”
I was careful to step around a pile of debris we’d clipped from the plants the day before.
“You know what I mean. You’ve got a meal ticket, and I want it.”
“I swear, Boss. Nothing’s going on.”
I could see them now; Carlisle was standing with his hat in his hands. Brady Bruce had his stick out. That damned stick. Just the sight of it gave me nightmares.
“You are a lying son of a bitch,” Bruce said, poking Carlisle in the chest with the thing. “I heard about your little four-wheeler project. You telling me you didn’t get nothing out of that?”
“Nothing, Boss. I swear.”
Carlisle wasn’t cowering. I admired that.
Quick as a whip, the nightstick swung and hit Carlisle in the meaty part of his upper arm. Carlisle’s face flinched, but other than that, he didn’t move. Then the stick came from the left and hit him on the other side. Carlisle still didn’t move.
But I did.
“I saw that!” I said, rushing in, not sure what power was moving my legs. My insides felt like jelly, and my stomach was about to heave. My words weren’t mine but came up from some primal place within my troubled little soul. “You touch him one more time, and I’ll tell my dad!”
Bruce’s face registered surprise. That surprise turned into his supplicating smile, the one that made me want to puke and run. And not necessarily in that order.
“Well if it isn’t our little sport. How ya’ doing, kid?”
“My name’s Jimmy. If you don’t leave right now . . .”
He threw his head back and laughed. “What? You’re gonna tell your daddy on me?” He held up his arms; the nightstick still clutched in his meaty fist. “Don’t hurt me, mister! I give up!”
He laughed again.
The words stuck in my mouth. The guard was so big and seemed to be getting bigger with every second. By the time Carlisle spoke, I could have sworn Brady Bruce was as tall as a mountain.
“Why don’t you let me take him home, Boss?”
Bruce thought about that. He thought about that long and hard.
“You two better stay out of my way, you hear me?”
“Yes, Boss,” Carlisle said.
“And you?” Bruce said, pointing his nightstick at my face. “You need to stay out of trouble. I don’t want to have to report you to your daddy. He’s a good man and doesn’t need to be worrying about you getting into trouble with the inmates.”
All I could do was nod feebly.
Bruce laughed.
The nightstick swung, sweeping every item taller than a sheet of paper off Carlisle’s desk. “Tch, tch, tch. Clean this shit up, boy, before I write you up for being a slob.”
He winked at me, and then he was gone, swinging his stick at his side.
“You okay?” Carlisle asked when the bully was gone.
I nodded, however, I felt anything but okay.
“I hate him,” I said. I knew I didn’t need to say it.
“Every man gets his due in the end.”
“Why does he act like that?”
Carlisle looked at the mess on the floor and bit his lip. “You know, some men got so much hate inside them, and for no one but themselves. The hate gets so bad that they need to lash out at others before it builds up to the point where it chokes them to death.”
“So, you’re saying I should feel sorry for Brady Bruce?”
Carlisle chuckled warmly. “We all got choices to make about what we do with our feelings. I’d say every man in this prison, including Boss Bruce there, made the wrong choice at one point or another in that regard. The difference is, folks doing their number in here are trying to make it right. Dunno if I can say the same for Boss Bruce.”
He knelt and began picking his belongings up off the floor. I stooped down to help him.
“Nah, don’t do that. The boss told me to do it. I don’t want you getting in any more trouble.”
Reluctantly, I stood, my hands jittery at my sides.
Carlisle looked up at me. “Don’t look so upset.”
Mortification ran all over me. I’d hoped it wasn’t showing that I wanted to cry.
&nbs
p; He looked back down at his stuff and repeated, “Yep. Every man gets his due.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“Jimmy! Jimmy!” Larry’s voice shocked me awake. It was 5:38 am. When I finally realized what he was yelling about; I had to bury my hands underneath my pillow to avoid smacking him.
There was no way around it. School was finally upon me like a boulder racing downhill.
I was going into the fifth grade, and I’d been to a total of five schools in five years. I approached it like an aged coal miner stepping into the metal elevator for the thousandth time.
“Aren’t you excited, James? A new school!” Mom said she inspected my backpack to make sure I had everything. She straightened the collar of my shirt. I tried to wriggle free.
“Look at me,” she said, and there was sadness in her eyes. I didn’t get it. I wasn’t being shipped off to battle. In eight hours, I’d be back in this very spot, and she’d be praying for a single, sacred moment of peace and quiet.
“I wanna go on the bus!” Larry said.
Mom laughed. The sadness was gone temporarily. “Are you excited about seeing the bus?”
“Yes!” He jumped up and down like his underwear was made of hamsters. He continued to chatter away as Mom walked us down the drive, past the gate, and onto the main road that came from town out to the prison.
“Am I the first stop?” I asked.
“Yes.”
I exhaled sharply. The anxiety had finally hit, as it always did at this very moment. After all, a new school was a new school. There would be the humiliating introduction of yours truly to the class. A hundred eyes would be boring into me like hand drills. There would be the equally embarrassing task of finding someone to sit next to at lunch. Class was easy. Teachers always assigned seats. Not lunch. As far as my new schoolmates were concerned, I might as well be a leper. Or worse, a communist.
“I’m so excited for you, James,” Mom said. I could hear the waterworks coming. I decided to throw her a lifeline.
“I’ll be fine, Mom. I promise.”
That seemed to make it worse. There was no pleasing this woman.
Larry ran around Mom and grabbed my hand. The strange thing was that I needed that more than I realized. Something about his touch gave me the courage for the day. Nothing gives your life meaning like the simple fact of being needed, no matter how trivial the moment.
“Don’t you look,” Mom searched for the word, “handsome. I wish I’d brought the camera.”
God, handsome. If words could wound—
Not to mention the thought of a picture. I never understood parents taking photographs on the first day of school. Didn’t they know we were nervous enough? I didn’t need the awkward pose, the gushing, and all that so that she could stare at a permanent record of my anxiety.
A large engine started as a mumble in the distance then grew to a roar, and here was the bus, farting out enough exhaust to destroy an ecosystem. I saw the white hair of the driver. The bus was empty. First on and last off as always—the longest ride by a mile. Lucky prison kid.
As the bus braked to a squealing stop, Mom bent down to give me one last hug.
“Thank you, James, for being such a young man about this.”
“You’re welcome,” I said, not knowing what else to say to that. Truth be told, at that moment, all I wanted to do was rush into her arms and have her tell me everything would be okay. But I didn’t. I gave her a stoic response and ushered my thumping heart onto the bus.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The James Allen Report on Patrick Henry Elementary School, Slater, Virginia:
Playground: First-rate. One of those metal tube-slides that could give you a concussion and tetanus simultaneously. Perfect. Swings, fine, but for girls. A short slope on one side of the field adjoining the blacktop. Great for tumbling.
The gym: Smells like sweat and Comet. The climbing rope looks like it couldn’t hold a sweater button, let alone a medium-sized ten-year-old.
The teachers: A proper mix of young and old. The young ones overly sweet, the old ones patient, but with permanent scowls.
The lunchroom: Smells like sweat and Comet.
Lunch itself wasn’t as bad as I’d thought it would be. The kids were nice, and two others were new to the school: a boy and a girl. The boy was a little nerdy for my taste and skinny enough for his cheekbones to show, but he was okay. His name was Kenji, and he was half-Japanese. I knew because I asked him. It was okay back then.
We didn’t hear words like diversity, and yet none of us blinked at having kids of every color in class. They were just kids. If they were cool, that was a plus. It wasn’t until we were all older that the lines of separation were drawn.
I’m still not sure why we bother to recognize how different everyone is so that we can say we’re all equal.
Kenji’s father worked for a car company and his mom stayed at home, though she spent most days with her Japanese friends. He was an only child and spent his days reading books. Lots and lots of books.
“You’d like this one, Jimmy,” he said one day, pulling a book from his zipper-bulging bag. He carried it everywhere even after our teacher said he could leave it with the rest of the book bags.
“What is it?”
He looked left and right, like he was about to tell me the combination of Fort Knox.
“Have you ever played Dungeons and Dragons?”
An excited shiver tingled down my back. “No,” I whispered. “What’s that?”
He showed me the cover of the book. It said Monster Manual on the front and had a spine-chilling picture of some multi-tentacled beast.
“I’m building a troop and I need warriors.” He looked around again. “Well, not just warriors. Magic users. Thieves. Assassins.”
This kid spoke my language.
“I like George Washington,” I said. I don’t know why I said it. I never told any other kids what I imagined when I played by myself.
Kenji didn’t laugh. He didn’t look at me with even one bugged-out eye; instead, he nodded sagely.
“Then you’re exactly who I’ve been looking for.”
From that point on, Kenji and I were inseparable at school. I had a new Tour of Duty coming.
Chapter Thirty
Kenji seemed to have an endless supply of books and an equally generous capacity to lend them to me. They were well cared for. His babies. He said his parents bought him any books he wanted because they weren't around much. That sounded like heaven to me.
It took a couple of days for me to figure out the basics of this Dungeons and Dragons game. Kenji was the self-proclaimed Dungeon Master. That was fine with me because he knew the rules. And boy did he have an imagination. He was the smartest kid in class and the best storyteller. I wondered why I was the only one who noticed the latter. To the rest of the class, he was this twittery little kid who shook when he had to get up to answer a question. But to me, he’d tell stories that had my toes tingling with excitement and suspense.
As Dungeon Master, Kenji was in charge of devising the adventures and running the game. It was a big job. There were notes to take, maps to coordinate, characters to keep track of, and treasure to divvy out. There were tons of different character types to choose from. I decided to become a ranger, mainly because Kenji said they were good with nature, sometimes had an animal companion, and were good with bows. Secretly I wanted to be an assassin, but I didn’t tell Kenji. Assassins were evil characters, and my new friend was squarely on the side of the good. His role was a Paladin, basically a super knight, and there were no more altruistic characters than Paladins. A Paladin and an assassin wouldn't have gotten along. At least that was my opinion, and I did not want to offend my new friend.
“The bottom of the tree you’re hiding in turns to fire,” Kenji said as we wound our way through some dank forest in search of a humungous cache of gold guarded by a minor demon. In reality, we were sitting at the end of our lunch table, whispering back and forth, our char
acter sheets in front of us, divided by an open folder Kenji called a “module,” whose contents only he, as Dungeon Master, could see. Presumably, it was a map of the forest and other things only a Dungeon Master could understand, like tables and probability sheets that predicted outcomes based on throws of dice. I cared nothing about those. My tree was on fire.
“The mage in the black cloak laughs as the fire licks its way up to your feet,” Kenji said.
“I’ll shoot him with my bow,” I said, my heart thumping.
Kenji handed me a twenty-sided die. “From where you’re sitting and the angle and the branches, you have to roll a seventeen or above to hit him.”
“Ahh. Come on.”
Kenji sat stone-faced, boring into me, ignoring the unfinished Wonder Bread and salami sandwich next to the open folder.
“Okay. I’ll take the shot.” I gripped the die in my hand and blew on it for luck. “Wait. Can I still get away?”
Kenji smiled. “You can.”
He was good at these little twists. The frontal assault was rarely the right path with him as Dungeon Master. He rewarded cunning, diplomacy, and kindness.
“Okay. I’m gonna jump to the next tree and flee to fight another day.”
I tried to say it as he did, all grand like something out of Shakespeare. It sounded more like Shel Silverstein.
Kenji looked down at his notes.
“You make the jump in time. Fire covers the spot you just left. You make your way from one tree to the next, your dexterity obvious as you leap like a spider monkey.” I laughed at that, imagining myself diving and snatching branches as I went. “You’ve made it to—“
The school bell rang, marking the end of the lunch period. Kenji closed the module with the solemnity of a priest ending a Gospel reading. “To be continued.”
“Come on, Kenji. What happens next?”
He grinned. “A Dungeon Master never skips ahead.”
I groaned and shook my head. “Come on.” I grabbed his brown lunch bag to take to the trash.