Under the Bridge

by Michael Harmon

  “With what?”

  Sid leaned back, hitching his thumb toward them. “I heard Will doesn’t like you too much. I also heard he’s setting up shop selling dope. He has a line from Texas. A big one.”

  A squirrel clawed at my belly. “So he is dealing?”

  Sid nodded. “He caught up with Mike Thorburne over the weekend. Word is Will gave him a choice. Sell for him or end up in the hospital. Mike’s his bitch now.”

  Piper looked across the park. “Why don’t we head on over with you, Tate? Might be better that way.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t have a problem with the guy. It’ll be fine.”

  Piper saluted me as I turned and skated through the park. It wasn’t too busy, with it being Tuesday. I ignored Angie and Will as I walked toward them, looking at Indy. “We’ve got to talk.”

  Indy studied my face for a moment. “Not in the mood, bro.”

  I glowered at him. “Get in the mood, then. You can’t leave me hanging.”

  He craned his neck back, staring at the underside of the freeway for a few seconds, then focused back on me, smiling. “Still not in the mood.”

  “Come on, Indy.”

  Will looked at me. “He said he didn’t want to talk.”

  I turned to Will. “I don’t even know you. Back off.”

  He smiled, his eyes dark and sharp. “Or what?”

  I tensed. “Listen, Will, I’ve got no problem with you. Leave it alone.”

  He stepped closer to me. “We’ve got business that’s none of your business, so turn your ass around and walk away.”

  I looked at Indy. “So, you’re dealing now? Is that it? Is that how you got the money for the board?”

  Will moved between Indy and me, cocking his head at me. “I said leave.”

  I shoved him hard, sick of his mouth and his attitude. He flew back, almost falling as he grabbed the walkway handrail. I braced him, ready for what I knew would be a hell of a fight. It didn’t come, though. He stood there studying me, no expression on his face except that wicked smirk and those eyes dead steady on me. His voice came soft and menacing. “You just made a big mistake.”

  For the first time in a long, long time, I realized I was facing a guy I didn’t want to fight. There was something in those eyes that sent a chill down my spine, but I knew one thing. I wasn’t leaving my brother because Will told me to. I had no choice. “Bring it, asshole.”

  Indy stepped forward, grabbing my arm. “Come on. I’ll talk, Tate. Will, just leave it alone.”

  My eyes were locked on Will’s, and after a moment, Indy pulled me away. He stared at the ground as we walked away. “Dude, what’s the deal with you?”

  I grabbed his shoulder and spun him around. “What’s my deal? What’s your deal? Why are you hanging with him? He’s trouble, man. Not even fun trouble. Just scum.”

  He swallowed hard, shaking his head and looking away. “What do you want, Tate?”

  “Why are you doing this? You’re burning some major bridges here.”

  His face fell, and he shrugged. “Things change, and besides, I didn’t do it. Dad did.”

  “Dad said you could come home.”

  “Well, I’m not.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m fine.”

  “You’re fine high all the time and staying with a guy named Porkchop in a shitty trailer? That’s fine?”

  “I said I’m fine.”

  I shook my head, piecing things together. Will was hedging in on becoming a major player, and that meant trouble. “Is Porkchop dealing for him now?” I eyed him. “Sid told me Mike Thorburne is.”

  “I’m not staying with Chop anymore.”

  “Why?”

  “He and Will don’t get along, and when I told Chop we were buddies …” He paused, looking away. “Listen, Tate, I don’t want to go home. Dad is just too much.”

  “Where are you going to stay?”

  “Will said I could hang with him for a while.”

  “You are dealing, aren’t you?”

  Silence.

  “You are, aren’t you?”

  He grunted. “Will asked me to mule some stuff for him, and I did. So what?”

  I clenched my teeth. “Why?”

  Indy dug in his pocket and fished out a hundred-dollar bill. He held it up, sneering at me. “That’s why,” he said.

  “So you’re going to be a drug dealer.”

  “Call it whatever you want, but I’m making money.”

  “Come on, Indy,” I said, trying to reason with him. “So you don’t like school. Big deal. What about your writing? What about skating? You know you could be pro one day, and the Invitational coming up could do it for you. They’re offering sponsors if you win.”

  He looked at me for a moment, then smiled. “First of all, nobody gives a crap about my writing, and second”—he eyed me—“I can tell you’ve been jonesing to do the Invitational ever since we heard about it, and you could be the one to win. Not me.”

  “Don’t do this.”

  He smiled, and something in his eyes, some kind of painful spite, swirled around like water going down a drain. “It’s already done.”

  “What about Cutter? He’s dead, Indy. And he’s dead because of the crap you’re muling now. That doesn’t matter to you? We all had a deal. No more.”

  He looked at me. “You know what, Tate? I don’t blame him for shooting up. This world sucks, and as far as I’m concerned, anything that makes it better is good.” Then he left. I watched him walk back toward Angie and Will. There was nothing I could do, but I felt like I had to do something. I just didn’t know what.

  I went back to Sid and Piper, hopping up on the wall.

  Piper looked over his shoulder, toward the park. “Bad news?”

  “He’s staying with Will.”

  Sid shrugged. “Looks like a parting of the ways.”

  “Shut up, Sid. This is serious.”

  Sid smirked. “Dude, Tate, calm down for once. Take a toke or something.”

  I clenched my teeth. “Sometimes you say just about the worst possible thing you could ever say.”

  Sid shrugged again. “Just saying. And by the way, I’m not smoking, but you’re like a firecracker ready to explode. That’s all. And it’s not your fault that Indy is flaking off.”

  I faced him. “We’re a crew. We take care of our own.”

  He looked away. “Listen, Tate, the only one around here who doesn’t want to be part of the crew isn’t here. It’s his choice.”

  I clenched my teeth again. “Yeah, and remember those two guys in the park who gave you a hassle last summer? They had you down when I got there, Sid. Remember that? Remember who saved your ass a beating?” I stared, ice running through my veins. “Yeah. Me. That’s no sweat, though, huh? You just take what you can get, right?” I shook my head. “Stick it up your ass, Sid. You’re a dick.” I stared at him. “He’s part of the crew and he’s in trouble. Just like Cutter was, and just like you’ve been. And if you don’t get that, then maybe you should fuck off.”

  Sid was rock-steady, blunt and indifferent as usual. “He’s making the choice, Tate. And maybe I will go fuck off, because I think you’re being the dick.”

  Piper took a breath, cutting in. “You are on the edge, Tate. Like dangerous on the edge.”

  I kept my eyes on Sid. “No, I’m not.”

  Piper went on. “I know what you’re thinking right now. That’s on the edge.”

  My chest tightened. I felt like the whole world was against me. “Oh yeah? Then tell me what I’m thinking.”

  He swallowed. “You’re thinking about beating the crap out of Sid, who you’ve known since you were six years old. That’s not right, Tate. Not right at all.”

  I stared off in the direction Indy went, realizing Piper was right and I did feel like everything was out of control. I looked at Sid. “I’m sorry.”

  Sid nodded. “No sweat, Tate. You know how I feel about Indy. I’m just saying we
all have choices.”

  I sighed. “Listen, I’m heading home. And I’m sorry. I’ve just got to get my head straight about this.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  There was a silence around our house that usually wasn’t there, like everybody was thinking and wondering the same thing but not talking about it. Indy was gone, but it was more than that. Mom didn’t say three words to Dad all night, and I knew she was still mad at him. Dad just sat in front of the television staring at whatever show happened to be on. I passed through the living room and he was watching Desperate Housewives, which is so not my dad it could have been a joke. I wondered what was going on in his head, but thought better of asking.

  I burrowed in our room, doing homework, reading a skate mag, then just staring at the ceiling thinking about Indy. I had a huge urge to blurt out that Indy was dealing, but I couldn’t. Things would go from bad to worse, because I knew it came down to one thing. I didn’t trust Dad. He’d go ballistic.

  I decided not to say anything. Not now. Part of me was afraid Dad would stick to his guns, and another part of me was afraid it would mean him busting down Will’s door and dragging Indy home. I didn’t know what to do, and anger welled up in me.

  I sat up and slung my legs over my bed, staring at Indy’s side of the room. Indy. He should be here sitting at his computer and writing some story. I’d say something to him and he’d be so into the characters he wouldn’t hear me, and then a couple of minutes later, he’d turn and ask me if I’d said something.

  I thought about when we were kids. He’d always had a mouth, but it had been different then. Always joking and smiling and goofing around, having a good time. Always a million friends, too. He knew everybody because he wasn’t afraid to know everybody. He could strike up a conversation with anybody and have them smiling thirty seconds into it, and people always just wanted to be around him. Indy was always the kid in the sun, flashing his teeth and egging you on to come have a good time. And I was always the guy making sure he was all right. I also envied him.

  But it was changing, just like he’d said.

  I stood, walking over to his desk and sitting in his chair. The screen saver scrolled geometric lines across the monitor, and I touched the mouse, the lines disappearing and his browser flashing on the screen. I clicked on Word, then Open, and looked at his files.

  If Indy spent as many hours on his schoolwork as he did writing, he’d have already graduated college. But as I looked, I realized I’d had no idea just how much he’d done. Forty documents—four novels and thirty-six short stories, ranging from ten pages to eighty, that he’d written in three years. I couldn’t believe it. This was incredible, and not a single teacher had seen any of it.

  I sat, staring at the files and not knowing where to start. I’d never even peeked into his computer before. Obviously, all those nights and weekends he’d spent sitting here had added up. I clicked on the first file.

  At three-thirty in the morning, I’d been reading for over seven hours, rapt with attention as I scrolled through my brother’s words and stories until I was brain-dead with fatigue. I hadn’t even gotten to his novels. The last short story I’d read, his most recent, went deep, and I knew it was about him.

  He’d made it fictional, but I could see right through his words and straight to how he felt about the world and school and us and himself. It wasn’t sad or depressing or funny or disturbing, but all of them put together. Forty-one pages of my brother’s feelings about life.

  The story, called “Stealing Home,” was about a baseball player who was good but never quite good enough, and his coach rode him hard about it, drilling it into his head about how to do things by the book and play by the rules and think like everybody else. He had to look right and play right and talk right, and if he didn’t, well, he wouldn’t be a good player.

  He’d made the team and was popular and the world looked at him like he had it made, but he didn’t feel that way. He knew he could do better, but something in him wouldn’t let it happen. Some part of him rejected everything baseball stood for. He didn’t care about trophies or winning or batting averages or any of the other things that made baseball what it was. From the time his cleats hit the clay to the time he stepped over that white baseline and went home, the only thing he wanted was to play for the sake of playing, not for the sake of winning. He loved it, but everything surrounding it made him hate it. And hate himself.

  As I read, I finally understood. Baseball was school, and my dad and his teachers were the coach. And for Indy, lacing up those cleats was the same as sitting down at this computer and writing, except they had ruined it for him.

  When I finished, I sat staring at the screen. My eyes burned and I was done for, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The boy in the story—his name was Gregory—gave up baseball because of all the things that got in the way of playing. Just simply playing. His coach rejected him for being a quitter, and Gregory ended up jumping off the Monroe Street Bridge. Goodbye.

  I sat back, worried over Gregory’s fate and how it tied in to my brother. Indy had never said anything about suicide, and I couldn’t see him doing it, but I couldn’t keep my mind from it. Were things that bad? Was he really thinking about it?

  It finally struck me. Indy knew what was going on, and he knew what he was doing to himself. The spite that I’d seen in his eyes was ripping him apart.

  My bro wasn’t a rebellious teenager hell-bent on breaking the rules; he was breaking the rules because there was something in him that wouldn’t let him follow them. I also had a feeling that he didn’t know how to follow them. It just didn’t click. But to kill himself? No. That wasn’t my bro.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The next morning in first period, Mr. Bennett’s phone rang, and my day went from crappy to nuclear crappy. Mr. Bennett stopped lecturing, picked up his phone, spoke for a moment, then hung up. “Tate, you’re wanted at the office,” he said, writing me a pass.

  As I walked down the hall, I wondered what had happened now. I was exhausted after staying up all night reading, and didn’t have much in me for more trouble. When I reached the office, I told the receptionist my name and she nodded, then directed me to my counselor’s office.

  I’d met her twice, both times for schedule mix-ups. Her name was Ms. Potter, and she’d seemed pretty cool. I knocked on the door, and she came to open it, smiling. “Come in, Tate.”

  I did. She took a seat behind her desk, squishing her chunky butt in the chair. She had a bob haircut, wore a necklace with huge plastic beads, and looked like she could be selling cookies at some church bake sale. I sat down across the desk from her.

  “How are you today?”

  “Fine.”

  “Good. I’m afraid I don’t know you too well.”

  With every wrong thing going on right now, I knew this wasn’t a getting-to-know-you meeting. “Why am I here?”

  Her smile faltered. She took a breath. “Well, Tate, I wanted to talk to you about a couple of issues.” She said issues with a sharp s, and it sounded odd. “How are things at home?”

  Her pretty-cool status took an immediate dive. “None of your business, thanks.”

  She raised her eyebrows, then nodded. “Okay. Well, I just wanted to get in touch with you. You know, see how things were going.”

  I sighed. “Ms. Potter, you seem like a nice lady and all, but you can cut it with the bull. This is about my brother, right? Did my mom call?”

  Surprised, she sat back in her chair. “I know about your brother, yes, but that’s not what this is all about. And no, your mother didn’t call.” She looked at me for a moment. “It came to my attention that you recently beat up another student.”

  I tensed. “It was off-campus.”

  “Yes, I know. But since it was reported to me, and his injuries are … obvious, I wanted to talk to you.”

  I crossed my arms. “You can’t bust me. Didn’t happen here.”

  “I don’t want to bust you.”


  “Who told you about it?” I asked.

  She looked down at her desk. “That doesn’t matter.”

  “Yeah, it does,” I said.

  She gazed at me. “Why would it matter?”

  “Because if Corey came whining to you about it, I’ll kick his ass all over again.”

  Her face hardened. “There’s no need to threaten another student.”

  I blinked, thinking about what I’d done all night long, and how this place couldn’t care less about my brother. “You know what, Ms. Potter? I don’t really care what you think. You and everybody else here are nothing but hacks pulling a check.” I stared at her. “Are we done?”

  “Corey Norton did not report anything to me. And when I questioned him about it, he refused to talk.”

  “Good for him. Are we done?”

  “Why did you beat him?”

  I smiled. “A personal issue.”

  Silence. She was stumped. “I’m not your enemy, Tate.”

  “I don’t think you are. But my problems are mine, and I know how this works.”

  “How does it work?”

  “School policy says that I can get busted for fighting off-campus if you have a statement. You’re not getting one. And you’re not going to be able to add anything to whatever file you have on me or my brother.”

  She nodded, picking up my file and putting it in a desk drawer. “Okay, then. Let’s forget that part. I won’t ask about it, and I told you I had no intention of getting you in trouble.”

  “Then why am I here?”

  “I think you are hostile and have anger problems. And that usually stems from other things happening in your life that aren’t so good. I want to help you with those things if I can.”

  I smiled, sitting back. “Why? Because you know me so well?”

  She continued, unfazed. “Why did you feel the need to use force?”

  I shook my head. “You’re not my shrink. Don’t even start.”

  She took a breath. “Can I ask you a question, Tate?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing has stopped you yet.”

  “When you hit him, did it feel good?”