“And also, my sister died in a car crash a few years back. Killed by a drunk driver. That’s what drove me to music. That’s why I’m so committed to becoming a guitar hero but also so detached and enigmatic. It’s why it didn’t work out with Lacy and me. It’s why I’m so edgy and volatile.”
Lacy’s not smiling anymore. She’s looking at me like she can’t believe I’m telling him this. I can’t believe it, either. But I can’t stop myself.
“Wow!” Trevor says. “Where do you come up with this material? The screen test doesn’t fly, maybe I can get you a gig as a writer.”
“Yeah,” I say. “My sister’s death hangs around my neck like an albatross. And the thing is, it’s not just because she’s gone, it’s that there’s something I should have done about it. Business I should have taken care of, but never did. Because secretly, like, way deep inside, I’m a coward. I lied to myself that my inaction was all about her, protecting her, but now I realize it’s been about me all along.”
“Wait,” Trevor says, flipping back a few pages in his pad. “You mean the drunk driver? You’ve vowed to get revenge on him? Great hook.”
Lacy’s giving me the eyeball, trying to get my attention. “Ritchie—”
“No, the drunk driver’s dead,” I say. “Worm burned up in the crash.”
Trevor frowns, confused. “Listen, if we go the bummer route, it needs to have a really solid payoff. You gotta be real careful with the tragic routine.”
“Tell me about it.”
“So let’s nail what’s really motivating your character. What’s the one thing he absolutely has to accomplish?”
“That’s easy,” I say.
“Good. Lay it on me.”
“He has to get the fuck out of here. Like, right now.”
“I don’t get it,” Trevor says, chewing a mouthful of ice.
“Me neither,” Lacy says.
El Hella finally wanders over with a big shit-eater of an El Smile pasted across his mug. “Who’s this guy?”
“Just another fool who is neither wise nor young,” I say, ripping Trevor’s card into tiny pieces and then sprinkling them all over his vintage Air Jordans. “C’mon, we got to go.”
“Now?”
“Now,” I say, already starting for the door.
“Why are you driving so fast?”
“Seriously, man.”
The trees scream by, the van taking corners hard. Equipment slams from side to side in the hold. Elliot and Chaos grab onto the backs of the seats as best as they can. I see The Paul go flying by in the rearview.
“What the hell, Ritchie?”
“Stop it. You’re scaring me.”
“Us, dude. You’re scaring us.”
A car comes the other way, hogging the road. I lay on the horn, yank the wheel, miss it by inches.
“Jesus.”
“You idiot.”
“Slow. The. Fuck. Down.”
The roads get narrower, the curves tighter.
Good old Sackville city planning.
I could slow down, but I don’t.
I could care, but I don’t.
And that’s pretty much that.
The gas is floored.
The engine screams in protest.
They all yell at me.
And then we go even faster.
I’m standing on the wet grass and the sky is some weird mixture of orange and black. It’s got to be close to dawn. I’m barefoot.
The Perfection Pools van is idling where I left it, which is on top of a huge pile of lumber and Sheetrock.
That was once a porch.
Pretty much exactly what I was aiming for. Bouncing across the lawn, digging up divots, triangulating the front door. The van is like a seesaw, on these granite steps, shrubbery torn and a yard cherub broken in half, the front of the house crushed. There’s gonna be a deductible, no doubt. Meanwhile, Elliot and Chaos are yelling at each other at the edge of the property. Chaos thinks we should haul ass. Elliot thinks I need a doctor. Lacy is off somewhere crying. I may have elbowed her when she tried to grab the wheel. My forehead is wet, and I know it’s not rain. Blood dries on my scalp, on my lips; it tastes like rust and snot. Kind of good, kind of scary.
I am covered in glass.
I am dizzy with potential.
Looper is, for sure, gonna be pissed.
In the distance, Dice is holding a flashlight. Looking at the hole in his picket fence where I chugged through. It’s a van-shaped hole, just like out of a cartoon. You wouldn’t figure it would work like that. Then he steps down onto the lawn. Speaking into his phone. Keeping an eye on me, keeping his distance. Every once in a while I feint, like I’m about to make a run at him, and he flinches.
I dig my toes into the dirt.
“Got anything to say, Dick?”
He’s in a bathrobe and slippers. Chest hair pokes from the terry cloth. He doesn’t look like a seducer or even a teacher. He looks like just another asshole who bet wrong on too many losing horses, ate too much fried food, and seriously needs a nap.
“No.”
“Nothing funny? Nothing charming? No brilliant advice?”
His sad-dude eyes are so fake they look like they were bought at a bodega.
“You’re mad, Mr. Sudden. I get it.”
“We’re not in class, doucheburger. I’m not a mister any more than you are.”
He crosses his arms. “Again, I understand you’re angry. Perhaps it is, to some small degree, warranted. That may be a conversation we can have at a later date.”
“I got an idea. Why don’t we say what we’ve got to say now instead? Huh, Dick?”
He sighs. “Well, for one thing, you’re drunk.”
“Negative. I don’t drink. Guess why not?”
He looks back at his porch. “Well, it’s just that… why else would you have driven your…”
“But you were drunk the night in question,” I say, stepping closer. “Weren’t you, Grope City?”
He stares at me. Pale and scared. Or tired and resigned. Or beaten down and defeated. Or fairly accused.
“Yeah, that’s right. Beth told me a week before she died how you were at the Pines. Bumped into her near the keg. All talking and laughing and relating to the kids, just like always. Until, you know, you grabbed her shoulder and kissed her.”
He clears his throat.
“That did not happen.”
“She said it’s no big deal, ’cause you were hammered.”
“I wasn’t.”
“She said it’s sort of a big deal, though, ’cause she was hammered, too.”
“She was.”
“She told you to be cool. She pushed you away and asked if you could please just leave her alone.”
“That isn’t what she said.”
“So you were there? Do we at least have that confirmed?”
He looks down at his slippers. It’s just him and me, on a wet lawn, the stars and the moon and the crumpled metal. He takes a deep breath, acting out the movie of himself, the one where he’s about to give the speech that makes it all okay. That makes me realize how tough it is to be old and getting older. Conflicted. How we’re all just human. How temptation is part of our elemental selves, from Eve to the apple to the snake and back.
“I did leave her alone.”
“No, you didn’t.”
Dice claps his hands together. It’s like a rifle shot across the lawn. “I’ve got something that you need to hear, Mr. Sudden. Not for me, but for you. Your sister liked drama, okay? And if there was none, she made up her own.” He looks back at his house. “Obviously, it runs in the family.”
I laugh. “You know what? Beth insisted you groping her wasn’t the end of the world. She even had your back. She said people do dumb shit all the time, even teachers, right? So why drag Mr. Isley into anything?”
“Because it never happened.”
“I was the one wanted to go to the cops.”
“And yet, somehow you never did.�
�
“For what? A bunch of gossip and rumors? I mean, who was going to believe who?”
Dice shakes his head. He expels a bunch of rotten air, trying to regain his Zen.
I step closer. “Maybe you’re what freaked her out. Maybe she left that party because of you. Maybe she drove too fast to get away from you.”
He reties his bathrobe, opens his mouth, about to say something.
“You better not say I’m sorry. I swear to god, if you do I’m going to—”
Sirens echo off in the distance. We both watch sets of headlights come screaming around the bend.
“I am a good teacher,” Dice finally says, and then turns and goes back inside the house.
Through the huge hole where his front door used to be.
Cowardly bitch.
The van’s radio still works. It’s on softly in the background. Live 105.7 KROK rocking you all night long. And now we got a three-fer from ZZ Top. “Beer Drinkers and Hell Raisers.” Makes me want to laugh. Fred Sabbath is no doubt next, laying into a live rendition of “Call Me Paranoid, but I Think I’m Screwed.”
The flashing red lights cut across the road and onto the lawn.
It doesn’t matter. I’ve finally let go of my secret talisman, the one dangling around my neck for years, a compressed ball of righteousness I thought was going to protect me.
Nothing can protect anyone.
Elliot yells something about running. He has his arms around Lacy, who is shaking her head.
Chaos is already halfway across the field, arms full of gear, into the woods.
I turn and stare directly into the Perfection headlights. Or headlight, I should say, the one that’s not smashed, seeing pink halos and then black dots and then nothing it all, letting it burn my corneas down.
It’s my last day. They say I don’t have to, but I still pull my final shift in the library.
“You drove a van into your teacher’s house?” B’los laughs, amazed. “That’s why your dumb ass is in here?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, shit, homes. You are a bad dude.”
“Nah, I’m a pussy.”
“No way. You prove yourself. In here and out there. That singing routine? Oh my god. One inch away from crazy, one inch away from genius. Either way, pure stones.”
“Maybe. But can I ask a for-real question?”
“Of course.”
“Why didn’t you help me?”
“Help? You mean like throw a punch?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“And what kind of help is that, but bringing more punches? You rose above. The whole thing. Or you would have been taken under. Either way, nothing I can do. We all make our own life.”
“True. I guess.”
“When you passed out the chairs? I was the first to sit. That’s help. Because you have an idea. And every idea needs one other person to say, yes, this is smart. But fighting? There is no help. It happens and then it’s over.”
The guy should be writing philosophy textbooks.
B’los laughs. “But wait, you only got ninety days for El Ramo?”
I was lucky. Attempted house murder. Attempted vehicular assault, reckless driving, hauling equipment without a permit, no seat belts in cargo hold, all sorts of possibilities were on the prosecutor’s table.
“Dice refused to press charges. The big thing is that I was stone-cold sober, ’cause only a glue-head would have missed that turn. Plus, I pled guilty. People testified about how scared I am to drive. See, we have a history with cars in our family. The lawyer said I lost control. The excitement of the show. Given my past, clean record, blah blah. I told the truth, but the judge didn’t listen. He just bought it whole.”
“Who is Dice?”
“Guy whose house I ran into.”
“What kind of boo-shit name is that?”
“Dick Isley. Calls himself Dice. Like a nickname.”
“You can’t give yourself a nickname, homes! Everyone knows that. Shit, no wonder you want to run him over.”
“And then there was this other thing.”
“What other thing?”
“They found some stolen equipment in the van.”
“What kinda equipment?”
“Stuff for the band. A compressor. A mixer. Some speakers.”
“You jack it?”
“Yeah.”
“Nice, dude. You a constant surprise. From who?”
“Dice.”
“What, that night?”
“No, like a month before.”
B’los howls with laughter. “Oh, shit. Oh my god. You a genius. A mad genius!”
“Yeah, well, he refused to claim the stuff at the trial. Said he didn’t recognize it. Said maybe it was mine after all.”
“Then what’s the cops’ problem?”
“Serial numbers were filed off.”
B’los nods with appreciation. “So, like, on the house? When you get out, you gotta make… whattayou call it? Reparations? Help him fix the porch?”
“Nah, Dice sold the place. Moved to some other town. Some other school. At least that’s what I hear.”
“So you won.”
“I didn’t win. I think it’s just sort of over.”
“Huh. I guess there is a difference.”
“No doubt.”
“Man, remember when we were first in here, and you tell me you killed someone?”
“Yeah,” I say. “But that was bullshit.”
“I think it’s still true.”
“Whatta you mean?”
“Man, you killed yourself. The Ritchie Sudden sitting right here, right now?”
“Yeah?”
“That dude is so not the same dude walked in day one, pissing his pants.”
“I wasn’t scared.”
“Oh, okay, you weren’t scared.”
“B’los?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you trying to tell me Progressive Progress works?”
He laughs. “Naw, man. It probably would have happened either way. You were just due to evolve.”
When it’s time for me to leave, B’los and I do the many-gripped handshake. I do it badly. I’ve never been able to figure that shit out.
“Be cool, man.”
“You, too, baby,” he says, already checking in the next book.
I get cuffed and processed. Stand in front of the bench. The judge gives me the sentence, ninety days, and the option to start in a week. I say no, let’s go right now. I’m put on a bus with a cop who escorts people for a living. In the movies it would be The Rock or some other badass. In real life the guy is so fat and bored I think he might be dead. But he wakes up at the transfer point and shuffles me down the aisle. I get off and stand there for a while, before a van with a counselor and a couple other kids picks me up. The counselor says his name is Yunior, huge dude with a ponytail and gold teeth. The kids all wear scowls. The counselors all wear scowls. The place is a few hours away. We drive through the woods to a big field that looks like an office park. In the center is this mean-looking building, squat and gray. In other words, almost exactly like Killington-Holloway. Except fewer pissing cherubs and way more razor wire. We wheel up and they take us out, cuffed, one at a time. We go through processing, get issued a jumpsuit. They bring me in, sign some forms, look in my ass. A bunch of us are issued soap and blankets, then marched down a long hallway, two to a room. The counselor swings the door closed behind me.
It’s crazy how easy it is, the transition.
I was me.
And now I am in a box.
For the next ninety days, I am home.
I get uncuffed and processed. Release forms are triple-signed. It’s crazy how easy it is. They issue back my belongings, essentially nothing but clothes, and then sign me out. Meatstick waves good-bye. Yunior waves good-bye. I pop in to see Dr. Benway, but her office is empty. On the desk, like she knew I was coming, is my notebook.
I grab it and slip it into my bag.
&nb
sp; “Hey,” The Basilisk says.
“The doc said I could have it back.”
He can see I don’t give a shit either way.
“Fine, whatever.”
We walk up to the steel doors. The whole time I’m sure someone’s about to yell, “Wait, there’s a mistake, don’t buzz him through!”
I am buzzed through.
Fence, metal detector, hallway, revolving door.
And then I am free, on the sidewalk, in the sun.
Unless you have stood there, you have never stood there.
I walk down the horseshoe.
Elliot and Looper are in the parking lot.
Leaning against the van.
But it’s not a Perfection Pools van.
It’s got a new paint job.
LOOPER’S POOL SERVICE.
“I started my own company,” she says.
“It’s pretty much just like starting a band,” Elliot says, muttonchops gone, hair all grown out and slicked back like a Wall Streeter, presumably to piss off the Wall Streeters. “All work and no reward.”
“Welcome home, sweetie,” Looper says, and hugs me.
I put my face in her shoulder. It feels really, really good.
El Hella gets me in an armlock and flicks my ear.
He smells like sweat. I could swear he smells like Lacy.
It makes me happy.
“Welcome back, brother,” he says.
And it’s hard not to cry, all lump-throat.
All cell-pale and stupid.
“Where’s Mom?”
“Resting,” Looper says. “You know how she is about this place.”
“Yeah, I know.”
I look down at my hands. The calluses on my fingertips are practically gone, weak and soft. It’s going to take a while to build them up again. Which is fine, because I owe Rude about ten grand for his van, and it’ll take a while to earn that off, too.
“So what now, kingpin?” Elliot asks. “Should we go jam? Get some real chow? Celebrate? Leave you the hell alone?”
Beyond the lot you can see the hills in the distance, nothing but trees.
“Never leave me alone,” I say, and they both stare at their feet.
“Okay, you guys do some serious hanging out,” Loop says, playing with her feather earring. “I got to get back to work.”
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