“What did they give you?”
“It was a lesson in shortcuts,” she told him. “I get confused because they teach you a system using all the signs and words in the dialogue box, then they want you to ignore it all and use shortcuts.”
“You’ll get it okay; it’s just a matter of practice.”
“That’s easy for you to say—you’re young.”
“You’re young too,” he reminded his mother.
“I’m old enough to be out of touch when it comes to computers, you can take my word.”
“You’re only thirty-five. You’re young enough. Why not show me the lesson tomorrow? Maybe I can give you some help on it.”
“I was hoping you’d say that,” admitted his mother.
T.J. was staring up at the sky, which was turning dark, at the earliest stars making their appearance. The locusts were buzzing away loudly in their mindless mating chorus. It was different here at home than it was in the timber, yet it was the same. It might have been the same sky—was the same sky, in fact—and the same stars he’d pondered from the footbridge in the forest. He was relieved to be home, but not at peace. The young woman’s name is being withheld until such time …
His mother stood up slowly and began brushing the seat of her blue jeans. She was going inside. Before she entered the house, T.J. said to her, “I’m really exhausted, Ma. How’d you like to do my laundry for me?”
“Why would I do that? D’you have a broken arm or something?”
It wasn’t until the following morning that T.J. was able to confirm what he’d feared, that the dead girl was indeed LuAnn. He read the story twice over on his knees while hunkered over the bundle of sixty-eight plastic-wrapped newspapers dropped for him on the corner. It was a prominent story on page three, a boxed article with a large headline. It was only five in the morning, so the light was pale, but there was enough to read by if he squinted.
The story said LuAnn Flessner fell to her death from the footbridge. Had there been more water in the gorge, suggested the sheriff’s office, the fall most likely would not have been fatal. Preliminary reports fixed the time of LuAnn’s death between two and four A.M. on the previous day. Investigators would try to discover the circumstances of the fall. Was it an accident? Was it suicide? Was she pushed?
An autopsy would be performed and a coroner’s jury would be convened to conduct an inquest. There wasn’t much more information. T.J. knew, without thinking, that there would be subsequent articles and more thorough ones in other papers, the Peoria Journal-Star for instance.
He read the article one last time before loading the papers into his canvas shoulder bag and numbly folding the two or three nearest the top. He walked and folded by rote, nearly sleepwalking his way en route the long-familiar pattern of sidewalks and front porches and stoops and hallways. Full Court and Camp Shaddai and LuAnn Flessner seemed so far away and so long ago. And wasn’t there even a sleazy guy, a street agent by the name of Bee Edwards? Well, wasn’t there?
He tried not to, but he couldn’t help but wonder if he had said any of the wrong things to LuAnn. Had he made too much fun of those religious beliefs that he found so naive? If she committed suicide, was his sarcasm something that added to her problems? He tried to replay in detail the conversations he’d had with her in his memory. Should he feel any guilt? Was there something wrong with him if he didn’t?
The sun was up and there was early morning heat by the time he reached Levin’s house. He was watering his front lawn. Hose in one hand and the leashed Great Dane in the other.
When T.J. approached to hand him the folded newspaper, the man said, “I didn’t get my newspaper last week.” He didn’t say so in strident tones; he was very matter-of-fact about it.
“I know. My mother told me.”
“I tried calling the office, but they weren’t any help. It was five days I didn’t get my paper at all. What’s the story?”
“I was out of town. My mother took the route for me. She was afraid of your dog.”
“The dog is always tied up. You know that.”
“I know it, but my mother didn’t,” T.J. replied.
“Then you should have told her. That’s what you have to do if you have someone substitute for you.” Levin’s dog was lying on his stomach and chewing aggressively on a huge rubber bone. Levin, himself, a wiry, hairy guy, was wearing shorts and a sleeveless Key Largo shirt. T.J. had conversed with him before a time or two, in this same flat monotone.
“Did you hear what I said?” Levin asked him.
“I heard you.” Under other circumstances, T.J. might have found the man’s displeasure a source of concern. But now he could only think of LuAnn and her long, swift free fall to the bottom of the gorge. The terror of the fatal impact and the instants before. He felt like telling Levin his missing newspapers weren’t important. Instead, he said, “What would you like me to do about it now? Do you want me to get you the back issues, the ones you missed?”
“Why would I want to read old news?”
“I don’t know. I’m askin’ what you want me to do.”
“You should get me a refund on my bill. That’s what you should do.”
“Okay, then,” T.J. replied in a flat voice to match that of his dissatisfied customer, “I’ll get you a refund.” Then, without another word, he walked on. He needed to finish the route.
TEN
T.J. took a part-time job at Hardee’s, working from three to seven, Sundays through Thursdays. He was a lobby person. He washed tables, took out trash, mopped floors, and cleaned bathrooms. He didn’t like the job, but he wanted the cash, and it was a no-brainer; after two or three days, the job itself was as rote as his paper route.
Having the job meant spending less time with Tyron, which was another benefit, as far as he was concerned. There would be more than enough time with the big guy once school started.
Although his mother couldn’t know it, he planned to use some of the extra money to rent computer time for her at Kinko’s. One evening when he returned home from work, she asked him how long he expected to keep the job.
“I don’t know,” T.J. replied.
“Are you going to work there after school starts?”
“Probably. I’ll have to start later, though; school doesn’t get out until 3:30.”
“You have to have enough time for homework, T.J. You’ve got college in your future.”
“I know, Ma.”
“With your brains, you have to go to college. You can’t ever forget that.”
“I’m not forgetting.”
“And what about basketball? What will you do when basketball practice starts?”
“I may keep the job, anyway,” T.J. informed her. “I haven’t made up my mind yet.”
“You mean you might not go out for the team?”
“I haven’t made up my mind yet,” he repeated. “There won’t be any practice till November, so I don’t have to decide now.”
By the middle of August, T.J. had a different mission for his diary. Instead of using it to record Bumpy’s activities and inclinations where college recruiters might be concerned, he employed it now as a resting place for his own reflections and self-examination. At the top of one page in particular were the words the unexamined life is not worth living. He wasn’t sure where he had heard this declaration—it probably came from Shakespeare or something—but he was convinced of its appropriateness.
He stapled together those pages that formed the first part, the section he had kept for the benefit of Coach Lindsey. They were sealed off then, but he decided against tearing them out and throwing them away. Someday, they might serve as a reminder of a lesson too important to forget.
Using the back cover of the diary because it was rigid, he paper clipped his saved newspaper articles dealing with LuAnn’s death and the subsequent investigations into it. T.J. had not attended her funeral because it was a private one for family only. One of the articles was a profile of Brother Jackson, which char
acterized him as a “charismatic will-o-the-wisp evangelist.” It revealed he was conducting revival meetings in Oklahoma at the time of her death.
The autopsy report revealed that LuAnn was pregnant, but there was no evidence of drugs in her system. The coroner’s jury, which took three weeks to render a finding, determined that her death was a “simple suicide.” No foul play was suspected.
Two other articles were interviews, one that quoted her family and schoolmates, and another that revealed the sorrow of her camp chums and counselor, Sister Simone, at Camp Shaddai. Sister Simone was quoted as saying. “Ruth Ann was a troubled but Spirit-led girl whose faith in the Lord was unconditional.”
T.J. bought a Bible at a used-book store. He couldn’t forget that last night in the wilderness when he’d had that final conversation with her, the one in which she disclosed to him her dream about the horse on the footbridge. He used a fresh page of the diary to write down some scripture: When he opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, “Come!” And I saw, and behold, a pale horse, and its rider’s name was Death, and Hades followed after him; and they were given power over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by wild beasts of the earth. T.J. wrote down Revelation, chapter and verse, but he had no idea what use, if any, he could ever make of this passage.
The 700 Club was on. From the corner of his eye he watched it on the small black-and-white TV located on an empty bookshelf. Sometimes he watched this program in the evenings, in spite of himself. There was something to learn, something perched only on the apron of his consciousness, but he felt it had something to do with the Rapture.
Once, while watching the program, he heard the Reverend Jerry Falwell say in an interview, “I expect never to die. His second coming is so imminent, I expect to join the Lord in the air. If you ever read an obituary of Jerry Falwell, rest assured that your surprise will be no greater than mine.”
When he heard that declaration, T.J. couldn’t help but think of the sermon he’d heard Sister Simone preaching that night in LuAnn’s tabernacle. The language was so similar to these words out of the mouth of Jerry Falwell.
One day near the end of August, T.J. wrote in his diary that he was tired of manipulating. He didn’t need to do that anymore. It wasn’t necessary to spend your whole life guarded and wary and searching for methods of control. A person can change, he wrote in bold letters.
But he also wondered, change to what? A basketball star? Just because of that one shining moment at Full Court camp when he shut down Ronnie Streets? That was a moment driven more by guilty desperation than by any actual goal. In and of itself, how could it be the basis for any meaningful change?
He wrote in the center of a page, I am a person in transition. He might have written more, to attempt a framework for this change of life, but the phone rang. He had to go downstairs to the kitchen to answer it.
It was Gaines, the sportswriter. “You never called me about Full Court,” he said.
“I never promised you I would.”
“So how’d it go? Anything to report?”
“It would be old news now, wouldn’t it?” said T.J. In his mind’s eye he saw LuAnn and the footbridge, but he knew it wasn’t the kind of material that the sportswriter sought. “Ishmael Greene is going to Notre Dame,” he said.
“Everybody knows that,” Gaines pointed out.
“Like I said, nothing to report.”
As soon as he hung up, he saw the papers on the table, which were forms for school registration. There was also a note from his mother that said, I signed these forms but I don’t have time to fill them out. That’s your job. Your work shirt is pressed in the second drawer. There’s leftover casserole in the oven you can warm up.
T.J. turned on the small TV that sat on the counter next to the stove. The news at noon from Channel 25 in Peoria was coming on as he fixed himself a grilled cheese sandwich. He looked at the registration forms briefly, but then Tyron was at the door. He joined T.J. at the kitchen table. He wanted to know if Coach Lindsey had called.
“If he calls,” said T.J., “He’ll be calling you.”
“Hows come?”
“Because I wrote him a note. I told him to take everything straight to you. Either you or Coach DeFreese.”
“Hows come?”
“Because it’s the right way. None of this shit needs to go through me anymore.”
There was a large economy-size box of Famous Amos Oatmeal Cremes perched next to the newspaper. Tyron reached in to pull out five or six of the cookies. “But I want you to help me,” he said.
“I didn’t say I won’t help you. If you want my advice, I’ll give you advice. But nothing goes through me anymore, okay?”
“Jesus,” muttered Tyron. His mouth was full. He was working his pick to fluff his ’fro, but it was with a searching look on his face, as if a thoughtful coiffing might help him absorb this change in strategy. Then he said, “You want to go to the arcade?”
“Not today. I have to work.”
“I wish you didn’t take that job, T.J. After work you wanta shoot?”
“Can we get in the gym?”
“We can get in. It’s open gym tonight.” Tyron spoke with his mouth full; he was working on his second handful of the oatmeal cremes.
“You know, Tyron, if you get in a college program they’re gonna want you in shape.”
“I know. Lotsa time in the weight room. Lotsa lifting. I can handle that.”
“Can you handle lots of lettuce and vegetables and fruit salad?”
“What d’you mean?”
“I mean coaches aren’t going to want you eating cookies and Moon Pies and Whoppers with fries. They’re going to want you in shape, maybe twenty pounds lighter.”
“For real?”
“For real.”
“That really sucks, T.J. In fact, that’s double-suck.”
“Maybe, but you need to know what you’re gettin’ yourself into.”
Their conversation was interrupted when the sports came on. The lead story was Ishmael Greene’s announcement that he would attend Notre Dame after graduation. On the screen were Ishmael, his parents, and his high school coach at a press conference. For style points, Ishmael was wearing a Notre Dame hat.
When the reporter switched to the list of baseball scores, Tyron said, “Jesus, T.J. I can’t believe he did it right in front of TV and everything.”
“That would be Ishmael.”
“I want to do that. Can I do that?”
“Do what? You’re not thinkin’ about Notre Dame again?”
“No, I wanna go on TV like that. I wanna go on TV and announce for North State.”
“You can’t do that now.”
“Why?”
“Because they haven’t even offered you a scholarship yet. A person can’t announce where they’re going until they get a scholarship offer.”
“Maybe when I get the scholarship offer, then I can.”
T.J. shrugged, then rubbed his eyes. This has to be karma, he couldn’t help thinking. “Look, Tyron. Goin’ on TV like Ishmael’s doin’ is just for show, you know what I mean?”
“No.” As if for spite, he shoved two more cookies into his mouth.
“Ishmael’s a Parade all-American. He’s even a USA Today all-American. He loves the spotlight. But comin’ on TV and sayin’ that he’s going to Notre Dame doesn’t mean anything. Nothing’s official until you sign your letter of intent, and you’re not allowed to do that until November. You see what I mean? It’s all for show.”
“Then why’s he doin’ it if it doesn’t mean nothin’?”
“Like I told you, because he loves the spotlight. That, and the fact that other recruiters will probably leave him alone now.”
“I like it when recruiters call.”
“I know you do.”
The fatigue generated by this conversation was evident in Tyron’s slumping body language. He said, “Okay, so wha
t about the open gym? You wanta shoot?”
“What time is it open?” T.J. asked him.
“Six to ten.”
“I don’t get off till seven. I’ll be there at seven-thirty.”
“I wish you didn’t take that job at Hardee’s, T.J.”
ELEVEN
The first full day of school was on a Friday. To get through senior English with Mrs. Rubin, you had to start with Hamlet. Mrs. Rubin was a no-nonsense, old-line teacher without a surplus of patience.
To get to the back issues of area newspapers, which T.J. sought to do after school, you had to go through Rita Esposito, who was much younger than Mrs. Rubin in years, but not in behavior. Rita was the editor of the school newspaper, the Herald, as well as senior library aide for Mr. Hunter, the school librarian.
T.J. started by telling Rita he needed to search through some back issues of newspapers. “I’ll be real careful not to mess them up,” he promised.
“No can do, T.J. You have to write down the issues you want to see, and if we have them we’ll bring them out to you.”
“Come on, Rita; this is me, okay? I told you I’ll keep them in order. Don’t you trust me?”
“It’s not a matter of trust,” she said tersely. “It’s a matter of procedures. Even if I wanted to let you back there, Mr. Hunter doesn’t allow it.”
They were standing at the reference desk, which formed a long U, at least fifty feet in its perimeter. T.J. could look from here through the windows, which formed part of the wall of the back issue room, where the newspapers were stacked on floor-to-ceiling bookcases. Rita’s black hair was tied back severely into a tight ponytail. She wore little, if any, makeup and her horn-rimmed glasses were bent slightly askew. Her officious behavior wouldn’t go down any easier if she were a babe, T.J. thought to himself. In fact, her colorless face and form fit the role she played perfectly.
“It’s just that I’m not exactly sure what dates I need,” he admitted. “If I could kind of sort through some of the back papers, I might be able to figure it out.”
“Mr. Hunter used to let people sort through all the time,” replied Rita quickly. “That’s why the papers were always out of sequence or had parts missing. There’s no point arguing this, because I don’t make the rules. Here’s a search form, if you want to fill it out.” She pushed him a small white card that was clearly a refugee from the old card catalog.
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