by Jaime Clarke
By the end of the film, Roger and Reedy had returned, brazenly walking through the front door of the community center. Mr. Hancock reappeared right as the credits rolled, none the wiser. “Twenty minutes to curfew, boys,” he said in a businesslike tone. Subconsciously, we appreciated his tone as a constant from our life outside of Garden Lakes. Privately, we aped Mr. Hancock, whose nickname among the brave was Hand Job, addressing one another in parody of his brusque speech. But we obeyed his every instruction. Not to would have reduced him and would’ve shattered any semblance of what we’d come to regard as our life together, a life forged from the admonishment we’d collectively endured.
Lindy approached Mr. Hancock as the last of us filtered out of the dining hall. Lindy, whose tragic death in his thirties would traumatize his young family, would rather have asked Mr. Malagon’s permission to climb up onto the roof with his telescope, but we hadn’t seen Mr. Malagon since dinner and presumed he was busy grading our quizzes. “The lake bed is unsafe,” Lindy explained to Mr. Hancock, “what with the snake and all.”
“The roof isn’t much safer,” Mr. Hancock said, spying a glass half filled with ice and soda that someone had abandoned under the Coke spigot of the soda machine. “Why not just point that thing out your window?”
“The window faces north,” Lindy said, protesting mildly.
“No stars in the north?” Mr. Hancock looked at Lindy dubiously. He sensed that a scheme was afoot, having been ambushed by Smurf’s late-night dalliance. Never in his tenure had Mr. Hancock experienced such a flaunting of the strictures of Garden Lakes. Outwardly he blamed modern youth; inwardly he worried his age made him vulnerable to the agitations of the young.
“I’m tracking Lyra,” Lindy said. “We’ve been plotting it on the back of my job journal and—”
“We?” Mr. Hancock asked, hoping to ascertain the conspirators in this unnamed conspiracy.
“Some of the sophomores are interested in astronomy, sir,” Lindy said, adding the “sir” in a transparent bid for consent, which, astonishingly, persuaded Mr. Hancock.
The rooftop view was spectacular, as Lindy could lie on his back and probe the sky without worry that the telescope would slide from the tripod. He entertained himself watching the itinerant stars shoot against the black sky. Sensing it was near curfew, Lindy dusted himself off. For his amusement, he surveyed Garden Lakes from his new vantage point—the supply shed, the construction site, the empty playing field. A movement in the telescope caught his attention. He focused the lens, startled to see Smurf’s face fill up the telescope. He followed Smurf as Smurf hunched behind creosote bushes on the eastern edge of the development, his eyes on the lights in the windows of the houses along Regis Street.
Hands and Figs came upon Warren pacing in front of the locked dining hall door, a hastily markered sign bearing the announcement BREAKFAST CANCELED DUE TO SILVERWARE THEFT taped crookedly above the square window in the door.
“In here,” Mr. Hancock said, appearing at the end of the hall.
“Goddamn Roger,” Hands murmured.
We were herded into the chapel and directed to sit in the pews. Mr. Hancock promised to send home the first person who spoke without permission. Mr. Malagon watched anxiously from his seat on a folding chair at the front of the room.
“You boys know why you’re here,” Mr. Hancock said. He was deceptively calm, but Mr. Malagon’s countenance evinced the danger we faced. “And since asking which of you is responsible for the kitchen theft is surely a waste of your time and mine, Mr. Malagon is going to search each room in each house while you wait here with me. This will afford the guilty party or parties a few moments before they are exposed, oh”—Mr. Hancock looked at his watch—“about thirty minutes from now.”
Mr. Malagon obviously did not approve of Mr. Hancock’s theatrics but restrained himself, instead leaning over and putting his chin in his hands.
“What do you think, Mr. Malagon?” Mr. Hancock said. “Should we give the guilty party a chance for confession?” A dull dread settled over the pews. Mr. Hancock continued without losing the thread of his performance. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to ask,” he said.
No one flinched.
Mr. Hancock turned to Mr. Malagon, who stood awkwardly. “It might prove interesting to interview these boys separately,” Mr. Hancock said, wrapping up the final act. “I’m certain we’d have the answer to our question then.” He turned back toward us. “But we haven’t the time.” He gave one last look through the pews.
Nothing.
Mr. Hancock nodded at Mr. Malagon, who didn’t make eye contact as he passed on his way out.
We found Roger’s poise remarkable. Miscellaneous theories ran through our minds. Maybe Roger had dumped the silverware out in the Grove. Or behind the supply shed. Maybe he had buried it in the sand. Each solution would be unsatisfying to Mr. Hancock, we knew, and we secretly hoped Roger had left the silverware under his bed, where Mr. Malagon could easily find it.
Which was what we thought had happened when Mr. Malagon returned with Roger’s bag, the clank of silverware preceding his entrance. Consternation replaced the bemused look with which Mr. Hancock had held us during Mr. Malagon’s absence, as if he was disappointed that the silverware had been found, confirming its theft and thereby identifying a thief in our midst.
Mr. Hancock waited for Mr. Malagon to disclose the hiding place of the stolen utensils.
“Found it in Casey Murfin’s closet,” Mr. Malagon said.
The Smurf! A new respect flared up for Roger, whom none of us had considered very clever. Roger’s face betrayed little as Mr. Malagon handed the bag to Mr. Hancock, who squinted into the sack. His face clouded with anger. “Mr. Malagon will hold you here until the guilty party steps forward,” he said. “You’ll make the time up out of your meals.” He summoned his kitchen staff and led the sophomores across the hall, discarding the silverware loudly into the stainless steel sink.
Mr. Malagon closed the chapel door. The first glimmer of dawn rose though the window as he spoke. “Let me tell you not only why this prank is unfunny,” he said, “but also why it was incredibly stupid.” He crossed his arms. “You may not know about the power of cohesion yet, but let me tell you that it is essential to a working environment like this. We enjoy cohesion on campus—we’re not walking arm in arm and whistling zip-a-dee-doo-dah, but I think you’ll agree that Randolph Eagles are a tight unit. You may be surprised to know that this is not the norm. Life in public school is more scattershot. It’s hard to know whom to count on. Believe me, I’ve taught public high school, and for better or worse, there’s a difference in the social fabric.
“And, as you can guess, cohesive communities experience a better quality of life. That would’ve been the case before today, but now Mr. Hancock is angry, and an angry Mr. Hancock is detrimental to cohesion. Why? Because the only thing more important than cohesion is discipline. And now Mr. Hancock must punish someone for this . . . this idiotic exhibition.”
Mr. Malagon’s face reddened at having to appear before us as a disciplinarian. Mr. Malagon had a perfect record for never sending anyone from his classroom down to Principal Breen’s office, but this record was kept perfect only by the tacit understanding that while fear of punishment had been diminished (if not obliterated), this alleviation brought a measure of responsibility on our part: We had to know how far to take things.
Roger stood.
Mr. Malagon glanced at Roger. “Yes?”
“I know who is responsible,” Roger said.
We couldn’t guess what Roger was up to. That he would confess in open court was too incredulous even for Mr. Malagon, who looked skeptically at Roger.
Mr. Malagon waited patiently, a clamor from the kitchen piercing the air. “Well?”
“I’d rather tell you in private,” Roger said.
Mr. Malagon narrowed his eyes. “Very well,” he said. “Step out into the hall.”
Roger stepped out of his row, pushing past Warren
and Assburn, and fell in behind Mr. Malagon, both sidestepping Sprocket, who was dozing in his wheelchair.
None of us wanted to break the silence, afraid of what was going to happen next. We didn’t care if Roger was kicked out of Garden Lakes. We would’ve gladly doubled up to cover his contribution if the labor would’ve guaranteed his removal. When we learned that Roger wasn’t going to be censured after all—he hadn’t even copped to the theft, but instead ratted out Reedy, who willingly admitted that he’d taken the silverware as a joke—Figs said he would float the plot in secret.
The missing silverware was the penultimate crime, as Mr. Hancock and Mr. Malagon discovered when the sophomores were brought back in for chapel. (Breakfast had been canceled as a penalty, but also because the sun was rising rapidly and we all knew we were about a day behind on the construction.) Mr. Hancock bade us to open our hymnals, and the cacophonous sound of butter knives falling against the tile floor rang in our ears. Reedy appeared close to passing out as Mr. Hancock lunged for him amid a torrent of curses. Some of us noticed Roger’s contentment and pleasure at seeing Mr. Hancock explode. And he later chortled when we learned of Reedy’s fate: Mr. Hancock forced him to move into his house, doubling Reedy’s reading assignments and conscripting him to be his manservant. The slump in Reedy’s posture and the lag in his step affirmed the severity of this discipline.
Mr. Hancock did not return and chapel was abbreviated by the weekly grocery delivery. Mr. Malagon took command of the sophomores while they checked in the groceries, allowing the rest of us to pass through the kitchen, grabbing an orange or banana or a bagel or muffin on our way out to the construction site.
“I need four volunteers for garbage,” Mr. Malagon called out. We weren’t clear if he meant us or the sophomores—the garbage detail was normally handled by the sophs, who collected the refuse from the community center and from each residence, riding with Mr. Hancock to the front gates, where the plastic bags were heaped like a black igloo along the side of the road for the early-Monday pickup. As could be expected, Figs and Hands volunteered directly, commandeering two sophomores as aides-de-camp. Their mission was interrupted by the exodus of the grocery truck, however. The truck revved and soldiered away from the loading dock, lightened of its load. As the truck gained its footing on the paved outer loop, we all saw it at once: the head of the rattlesnake crushed into one of the encrusted tracks, its tail and rattle swaying hypnotically in its final throes. We stood waiting for its scaly body to lunge, to make one last attack, sure that it was feigning weakness to draw us closer, wanting us to play a hand in our own misfortune.
No one was happier than Reedy when Mr. Malagon announced Mr. Hancock’s departure two days later. Rather than calling everyone together, which may have caused confusion and upset, Mr. Hancock excused himself after curfew to attend a family funeral. Some of us heard the Jeep’s engine and parted the slats in our blinds to see a pair of headlights, followed by a set of receding taillights. We had no way of knowing about the conversation that had preceded Mr. Hancock’s exit—Mr. Hancock’s proposal for bringing in a substitute, Mr. Malagon assuring Mr. Hancock that he could hold down the fort until Mr. Hancock’s return the following Sunday. We imagined Mr. Malagon relished the opportunity. He may even have had inklings of heroism, how he’d run Garden Lakes solo for five days.
“Mr. Hancock’s leave of absence is not without precedent,” Mr. Malagon explained to us at breakfast the next morning. Apparently, Mr. Hancock had once been hospitalized for an allergic reaction to a bee sting sustained during sports, though in that instance he’d been gone only overnight. To cope with Mr. Hancock’s vacancy, revolving teams of fellows would alternate between kitchen duty and construction. “I’ll float between the groups,” Mr. Malagon said. “We’ll keep to the schedule the best we can, though the sophomores will have to join us for class.” We groaned, not really caring. “Oh, and you may have to get accustomed to grilled cheese and tomato soup.” Mr. Malagon clapped his hands together and grinned.
We welcomed the change in routine. While it had been only about a week and a half since we left the civilized world, the monotony of the schedule had slowed time to an unbearable pace. A minute was an hour, just as it was when we were in class or serving Saturday detention. Not knowing which team we’d be working on each day added the necessary mystery to pry our eyes open, our alarms shrieking from our bedsides. We were also eager for the chance to prove that our selection as fellows wasn’t a mistake, that we were worthy of the honor.
Splitting shifts in the kitchen wasn’t the only emendation. To the delight of all, Mr. Malagon announced the lifting of curfew. “I’ll trust you to know when you should call it a night,” he said. “However, I retain the right to reverse this policy should it be abused.” The sophomores enjoyed the changing of the guard, however ephemeral the new regime might be. Banter around the kitchen increased during meal prep, fellows teasing sophomores and vice versa.
Mr. Malagon accepted the sophomores’ offer to aid us in construction, too. We agreed to suspend the soup program temporarily (the soups to date were rotting in their containers in our refrigerators anyway), so the sophs would be free to lend a hand, mainly on cleanup but also to make uniform our various fastening techniques, some of us hammering a nail every foot or so, others spacing them even farther apart. And while the surplus workers underfoot created an element of bedlam, we were glad for the help.
Mr. Malagon rewarded our cooperation by sending out for pizzas one night, retrieving the mobile phone from Mr. Hancock’s residence to place the order. The girl who delivered the pizzas was a blond angel draped in red and blue, her baseball hat sporting the pizza company’s logo pulled down over her eyes. The dining hall fell silent as Mr. Malagon signed the credit card receipt. “I thought it was a prank,” the delivery girl said, her voice transporting us back to the real world, reminding us of our mothers and sisters and girlfriends.
“Well?” Mr. Malagon said.
We’d forgotten about the pizza. Those of us closest to the door scrambled after the delivery girl to help with the boxes. We could still smell her perfume as she pulled away, leaving us in her fragrant wake. We munched, relaxing for the first time since we arrived. Mr. Malagon joined us in telling dirty jokes (though he drew the line at Roger’s racist sprinkler joke), later excusing himself to work on the next day’s lecture. He advised the sophomores to keep up with their reading, but without the threat of quizzes, tutoring turned into bull sessions about the Randolph faculty, or boasting about Xavierites we knew, most of which we knew was bullshit, though the sophomores ate it up.
The tutoring pods broke up early and Hands suggested a game of poker, but Figs quashed the suggestion as too boring. Warren, whose unwitting complicity in an Internet scam would bilk millions from the elderly, volunteered to get the beanbags from Mr. Malagon, who had disappeared for the night, but Figs demurred. Roger challenged everyone to some Indian wrestling, and we cleared the furniture out of the front room and played several matches, Roger’s powerful thighs beating each of us handily. Warren gave Roger the most trouble, his long legs making it difficult for Roger to flip him over.
Sprocket watched from the sidelines, initially cheering on Roger’s opponents, but ultimately becoming bored by the predictable outcomes. It was barely eight o’clock when we tired of wrestling.
“Let’s drop in on Mr. Malagon,” Hands said. “Maybe he has some booze.” The idea of sharing a beer with Mr. Malagon didn’t sound as far-fetched as it probably was, but we would never know, since the idea never moved past debate.
It was well after one in the morning when we finally crawled into our beds. The four-thirty alarms hectored us from our nightstands. Assburn had slept less than any of us, though. He had fought the onslaught of sleep, making sure his residence was still before creeping out the front door, the package with Senator Quinn’s pen tucked in his pocket. He hurried across the lake bed and through the heart of East Garden Lakes. Assburn located an outcrop of rock and dug
with his hands until he’d hollowed out a space big enough to fit the package. Packing the dirt over the pen, he heard a shuffling noise in the darkness. He called out Roger’s name instinctively, but no one answered. He listened for the sound again, but the quiet spooked him further and he ran back to his room, swallowing his heavy breathing as he neared Regis Street.
Smurf, that unparalleled future slanderer and adulterer, waited until Assburn had faded into the night and then pulled on the corner of the freshly buried package until the earth let go, sand and silt caving around the hollow as the package came free of its hiding place. He turned it over in his hands, wondering what it contained.
Assburn woke relieved. Even the realization that he’d missed breakfast and would have to rush to catch up with the rest of us in chapel did not ruin his exaltation. Burying the pen in the desert was like undergoing a successful operation to remove an invisible tumor, one Assburn saw every time he looked in the mirror.
Mr. Malagon acknowledged Assburn’s tardiness with a nod, but under Mr. Malagon’s reign of self-government, hunger would be Assburn’s only punishment. The rest of us took note and wondered what would happened if, say, Assburn had missed chapel. Or class. We valued our newfound freedom too much to test Mr. Malagon, though. We’d be back on the old schedule soon enough, the days grinding away under the burden of Mr. Hancock’s omnipresence.
We labored to stay awake during chapel. Mr. Malagon, whose betrayal we’d never forgive, refrained from asking us what had kept us up so late. His response to our tiredness was to sing louder, his surge of energy underscoring our lethargy.