by Trent Reedy
… And now I hear the sound of someone climbing up the metal steps of the guard tower. I have to stop writing before I’m caught.
Love,
Dad
I went to our old phone in the dining room. With Mary in the living room watching TV, I was grateful for the long cord on the receiver so I could call from the kitchen in relative privacy. I dialed Ed Hughes’s number, then held my finger over the button to hang up. There was still time to get out of this right while it was ringing.
Someone picked up. “This is Ed,” came the voice. “Hello?”
I quickly put the receiver to my face. “Um, hello, Mr. Hughes. This is Michael Wilson.”
“Mark’s boy?”
“Yes. I’m sorry to bother you, but I —”
“No bother at all. Wow, I was wondering if you’d ever call. How the heck are you? What can I do for you?” He sounded upbeat, excited maybe. My heart beat faster. Could this be it? Was he hoping I’d figure out that he’d been mailing the letters?
My damp hands slipped a little on the plastic phone. “I’m, um, I’m fine, actually. This is going to sound crazy, but I’d like to find out if you know —”
“About your old man? You bet I do. You know, your dad died a hero, fighting for our freedom.”
My spirits sank upon hearing the same old lines. “Did he ever leave you letters to send to me?” I said.
“Well, no,” Hughes went on. “He never left me anything. If he had, I would have given it to you or your mother years ago. But he was a terrific worker.”
We talked for a little while longer. Ed told me more about what a great employee Dad had been, how he’d sometimes sing old classic rock songs on the job. It wasn’t the information I’d been hoping for, but I loved knowing more about my father.
After my conversation with Ed, I started calling Todd Nelsons. Several of them lived in Iowa City, where all the letters had been postmarked, so I figured I’d start there. I found the right guy on my second try.
“Little Mikey Wilson?” said Todd. “How can you possibly be old enough to even use a telephone? You know your numbers and everything?”
I laughed politely. “Do you have a few moments to talk?” I asked. “I could call back later if —”
“No, no, this is fine. Wow. So the time has finally come.”
That could mean anything, and I forced myself not to get my hopes up. “I know you’re busy, so I’ll get right to the point,” I said. “I want to know if my dad gave you letters years ago for you to mail to me this year.”
“You’re getting letters from your dad?”
Was he playing dumb to throw me off the trail? But why would anyone do that? “Yes, I am. Do you know who is sending them?”
“Wow, kid, I wish I did. Sorry. Me and your dad were great friends. He tell you ’bout the time we was four-wheeling in my parents’ pasture, and I crashed the thing and broke my leg?”
“No, he didn’t,” I said.
Todd laughed. “It was a bad break, bone sticking out through the skin and blood everywhere. No cell phones in them days, you see. Couldn’t call for help. Your old man bandaged me up with his own shirt, and then carried me over a mile all the way back to my folks’ house. I almost passed out from the pain while your dad ran the whole way with me on his back. If I’d have been alone, I probably would have bled out and died. Great man, your father.
“I wish I would have done a better job staying in touch after I graduated high school. I kept telling myself, ‘I’ll call him tomorrow. Next week. I’ll go visit him next month.’ That’s how it goes, I guess. People drift apart, keep putting things off. Then one day it was too late.” There was quiet on the line for a moment. “Still, we remember him for who he was and the good he did, right? He was a great friend to me. A hero, when you get right down to it.”
It was a disappointment that Todd Nelson wasn’t the Mystery Mailer, but it turned out that he was a pretty nice guy. He and I went on for a while longer, reminiscing about my father and the good times they’d had together. I was glad Dad had given me the opportunity to talk to him.
* * *
At football practice Tuesday night, Coach broke us up into groups. Offensive ends were with the receivers and quarterbacks. The drill was that the receiver or end would run a pass route, Karn or Gabe would throw him the pass, then the receiver had to run upfield, and a guy from a different line had to tackle him. After you did the tackle, you were up to catch.
It was a brutal drill. Coach kept yelling at each guy to hit harder. I waited in line. Someone stepped right up behind me so that his face mask hit the back of my helmet. “You’re dead, Wilson,” Rhodes said. “I’m going to knock the snot out of you.”
I took a deep breath and rubbed my sweaty palms on my pants over my thigh pads. Coach blew the whistle and Karn dropped back to pass as Clint Stewart ran out from the line of scrimmage. He caught a quick pass and I launched forward. Clint tried a pathetic attempt at a juke step to fake me out, but all it did was slow him down. I hit him low and ran forward, dumping him on his back hard and then running for the loose ball. I dropped down to wrap my body around it.
“Good work, Wilson! That’s what I want to see! Let’s go! Your turn.” Coach slapped his clipboard against his thigh.
I went to stand next to the quarterback. Karn shot me a nasty grin. Coach blew the whistle and I ran out, but Karn threw a high, wobbly pass that took forever in the air. I caught it and tried to move upfield, but Rhodes had started his approach earlier than he was supposed to. I had just enough time to grab the ball and drop my shoulders a little bit before he crushed into my gut and put me down.
Rhodes got up in my face, glaring at me through our face masks. “Dead, Wilson. You should quit the team.”
I pushed him off me. He’d knocked the wind from me and it hurt when I got up. I wanted another turn. “Coach!” I tried to yell. I waved at him, but he was checking something on his clipboard.
Rhodes took his position for the next pass. It was Monty’s chance to tackle the receiver. Coach wasn’t watching, so I pushed Monty aside. “I’ll pay you back,” I whispered to him. Monty grinned and let me have the shot.
Coach blew the whistle and Rhodes ran his route. Karn hit him square in the chest with a perfect short pass. I bolted for the guy. In the second before we collided, I could see Rhodes’s glare. I knew he wasn’t going to try to fake me out or sidestep me. He would try to come through me, and I would hurt him.
The crushing hit rattled us both, but I pumped my legs, wrapped my arms around his thighs, and kept driving. Rhodes fell right at the point of contact. It wasn’t as good a tackle as I’d thrown on Clint, but I’d taken Rhodes down. I stood up and jogged back toward the end of the line.
“Wilson!” Coach Carter shouted. “Did you just go twice?”
“Sorry, Coach,” I said. “I messed up.”
“Yeah, you messed up! Looks like you messed up Rhodes here! Get up, Rhodes!”
Nick stood up and walked out of the way so the next two could go. I couldn’t help but grin when I saw him limping a little.
* * *
Through the rest of the week, it took everything I had to keep slogging through school, farmwork, and tough football practices. Thursday night’s team supper was in Iowa City, and without a ride, I couldn’t go.
I kept waiting for a new letter and rereading the ones Dad had already sent. I wondered how I would complete my missions to take a chance with a girl and to do something nice for Mom and Mary, while I struggled with my first mission of football.
Friday night in Kalona went much better than our first game. Two early touchdowns put us in the lead twelve to zero going into halftime. Both defenses held up well until near the end of the third quarter, when a Pioneer fullback broke through and scored on a forty-yard run. After that, the defensive battle continued until the game ended with the Roughriders winning twelve to seven. It was so close that Coach didn’t rotate subs in. I only played on kickoff and kick return, so I
had three kickoff plays and two return plays, making sure to drill at least one Pioneer per play. Derek had come out to watch me, but I had so few minutes on the field that I almost regretted him wasting his time driving the seven miles to see the game.
I made it home before Mom got off work and went to my attic to finish the study guide for the second act of Hamlet. After a while, a knock on wood sounded behind me. I jumped in my chair and spun around to see Mom’s head and shoulders above floor level on the staircase. “Whatcha doing?”
“Geez, Mom, don’t you knock?”
“I just did.” She came in and sat on the end of my bed. I slid my chair back to keep my bruised arms out of sight. She looked around. “Why do you keep it so dark up here? Why not turn on the overhead light?”
“I like it like this.”
“All gloomy and depressing?”
Actually, I liked the way the circle of light from my desk lamp focused me on my reading. “You want the light on?”
“No,” she said. “You can leave it off. That’s fine. It’s a little weird to sit here, where it’s mostly dark, but that’s fine.”
I rubbed my eyes. I hated it when she did the “that’s fine” guilt-trip routine. “If that’s fine, then I’ll leave the light off.”
Mom closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “The reason I came up here is that I’ve been thinking.”
“Angels and ministers of grace defend us.” I stole that line from Hamlet.
“You’re a good boy, Mikey. I know that things have been kind of tense between us lately, and … I want you to know that no matter how old you are, you’ll always be my boy. I’ll always love you.”
“I know, Mom, and —”
“Just — just hear me out on this, okay?” She held her hand up. “You’re a good boy, and you help me so much. Sometimes I don’t show enough appreciation, and I’m sorry about that. I got to thinking about how we argued about that Muslim girl. I was a little unreasonable, and I wanted to say I’m sorry.”
A little unreasonable?
“It’s not so much that she’s a Muslim,” Mom said, “but that you just sneaked her over here without my permission. You know I don’t like people coming over and seeing our run-down house.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t ask, Mom, but the house isn’t that bad.”
“It’s embarrassing, Michael.”
“Isma thought my attic was cool. What was embarrassing was how you acted when you met her.”
“I know. I know. I’m sorry. But Mikey, soon you’ll be reaching that age where you start thinking about girls more.”
Soon? I’d start thinking about girls soon? How young did she think I was?
“Your body is changing and you might notice strange feelings when …”
I stood up, scraping my metal chair across the wood floor as loud as I could. There were plenty of times I wished I could have a real conversation with my mother, but no way did I want to listen to her talk about the birds and the bees. “Like I said, Mom, I’m really sorry. It won’t happen again. But you know, I have a ton of reading for English class. I should get to it.”
“All I’m saying is you don’t have to rush to get a girlfriend and everything. Think about all the pretty girls you’ll meet in college. Right now you need to focus on school.”
How could she offer advice that was so completely the opposite of what Dad had said? He wanted me to enjoy my time in high school, while she didn’t want me to have a life until college. Anyway, for the hundred millionth time, Isma and I were not going out. I struggled to keep my voice even. “We were only working on a school project.” Even if Isma and I did start dating, did Mom think we’d get married immediately so that I’d never go out with any of those college girls? Maybe she did. After all, that’s what happened with her and Dad.
“Just take your time. Don’t be in such a rush to grow up.” Mom stood up and hugged me. “You’re such a good boy, Mikey. But if you’re going to read, make sure you have more light. It’s not good for your eyes, reading when it’s so dark like this.”
“I will, Mom.” I forced a smile. “Thanks for coming up here and everything.”
She gave a little finger wave and went downstairs. When she was gone, I sat down at my desk. Dad had asked me to be patient with her. I was trying.
On Monday, Isma and I were picked first to deliver our talk on the Civil War, its causes, and its important battles. I thought I would be more nervous, but Isma’s early preparation had, well … prepared us. Still, I didn’t relax fully until Isma finally switched to the last slide.
“Although statistics are incomplete, most estimates suggest that over 620,000 men died in the Civil War,” she said.
“An estimate of the total number of dead and wounded is about 1.1 million,” I continued. “With Americans killing Americans, it was the deadliest war by far in American history.”
“To put it into perspective, while the Civil War cost 620,000 lives,” Isma said, “in our wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan, only about 6,280 have died. That’s —”
“Because of people like you,” Clint Stewart whispered.
Isma stared at Clint openmouthed, her hands tightly gripping her note cards. I waited for some outrage from Coach Carter, but he only glanced up from the notes he’d been writing, looking confused. He must have missed Clint’s comment.
I spoke up quickly to keep us going. “That’s only about one percent of the Civil War casualties. It’s still too many losses, but it gives you an idea of the terrible carnage of the Civil War. Its cost in human life and in resources was really —”
“Really sick,” Isma said. She glared at Clint.
* * *
I welcomed the silence in my library corner during fifth-hour study hall the next day. Monday’s practice had been tough, and rereading Dad’s letters had kept me up late after that. Somehow when I read Dad’s letters, I could almost remember the deep sound of his voice, the way he walked, and his smile. Safe behind the wooden dividers on the table, I sat back in my seat and closed my eyes.
“Sleeping?”
I opened my eyes and sat up straight. Isma dragged a chair behind the study barrier, flopped down, and folded her arms. It was the first time I’d seen her since history the day before.
“You’re still mad,” I said.
“About what?”
“About Clint and —”
“Clint’s an idiot.” She scowled like she’d just tasted something awful.
“I know. I can’t believe he said that.”
Isma leaned closer. “I can’t believe Mr. Carter would let him get away with it.”
I slid my chair back a little. “I don’t think Coach let him get away with it. He just didn’t hear it.”
“Are you kidding? Of course he heard it. He’s a jerk.”
“He’s not so bad. Anyway, there’s no way he heard Clint.”
“Oh no.” Isma sighed. “I knew it.”
“What?”
“You’re becoming one of them.”
“One of who?”
“You’re becoming a sports person. A disciple in the temple of sports worship.”
“Because I’m on the football team?”
“Because you’re on the football team, screaming with guys like Clint and his crowd, defending the coach, even though he barely teaches us anything and he’s super strict with everyone but his football players.”
“Whoa,” I said. “First, don’t lump me in with those guys.” I held my arms out. “I got bruises all over from going up against idiots like that. And I’m just playing for fun. That’s all it is. Not sports worship. Just fun.”
“To you, maybe, but not to the rest of this school or town. These books?” She motioned at the shelves behind us. “Next year Mrs. Potter won’t be able to buy as many because her purchasing budget is being cut.”
“How do you know —”
“School board meeting report,” Isma said. “It was in the paper last week. But despite library cuts, they di
d manage to find enough money for some big new machine for the weight room.” I almost said something, but she didn’t slow down. “Do you know that a starting teacher in this school makes about twenty-six thousand dollars a year? The football coach makes twelve thousand extra just for coaching a nine-game season, a little under half of a first-year teacher’s full salary for working way less than a quarter of the year. When I factor in what they pay the other coaches, plus all the money for equipment and facilities, it really makes me wonder why the school claims it can’t afford a full-time art teacher.”
“That’s because not as many kids take art class,” I said.
“Not as many kids can take art. There are only three art classes offered. I like art. I’m good at it. Zillions of people make their careers in the visual arts or graphic design. This school offers basically nothing for them.”
Even though she was angry and pointing at me, her dark eyes still held a certain kindness. Her long dark hair fell about her shoulders. I couldn’t stop looking at her. Forget Hailey Green or the Dinsler cousins on the cheerleading squad, with all their makeup and their fake tans. Isma looked great without even trying. Why had it taken me so long to realize that?
“In the next ten years, nobody from this school will go on to play professional sports. Not even major college sports. Yet the school offers everything, spends every stupid penny it has, just so kids can play dumb games.”
“Miss Rafee.” Mrs. Potter appeared around the corner of the table’s privacy wall. “While I sympathize with your outrage, you will remember that this is a library, and as such, you will keep your voice down.”
“Sorry, Mrs. Potter,” Isma whispered.
Mrs. Potter nodded, looked at us both for a moment, and walked away with a smile.
“Whoops,” Isma said. “Mom’s always telling me that I argue too much. She’s always like, ‘Don’t be so opinionated all the time.’ Daddy’s different. Some nights we’ll sit in his study for hours debating issues. I guess my argumentative side comes from him. He keeps telling me I should be a lawyer or run for Congress someday.” She shook her head. “Yeah, right, as if anyone would vote for me.”