Slow crunching steps drew nearer to Aaron, and he held his breath to keep from flinching when the eyes reached him, succeeded, breathed again when they passed, and watched, without moving, the huge bulk of khaki crunch out of the corner of his eye in its search for the one boy who couldn’t look back.
The crunching stopped.
Aaron turned slightly and saw enough khaki to guess where: Barneyway!
“Out of line, you.”
A tiny half-step put Barneyway into view beyond Dominic’s chest, where he stood under Big Stoop’s stare for such long silent seconds, Aaron began to hope that Big Stoop would realize his mistake.
“How did he get away?”
Thin fingers tried to shape an answer out of a mumble.
“Speak out!” Big Stoop demanded, and everyone snapped to attention again.
“I … I don’t know,” Barneyway said, the fingers moving, shaping again, then spreading and stiffening with the shock of a slap that sent him staggering down the line as far as Aaron, whose heart shriveled with shared humiliation and their lost last chances for respect.
Big Stoop stalked Barneyway, but every feature on the wide, bovine face: the slitted mouth, the broad-bridged nose, the tiny red and blue veins that mapped the dry skin—was as clear to Aaron as to Barneyway, and he felt as threatened as Barneyway by the crooked finger and the command:
“Ca-mirrrrr!”
Trembling spread from Barneyway’s hands up his arms and over his body, but he didn’t move; and Big Stoop grabbed him, so that he stumbled and almost fell as an ankle twisted and a knee bent close to the ground.
“Gonna tell how he got away?”
“I don’t knoooooow,” Barneyway moaned, and a sob caught in his throat as he coughed out: “Don’t know—don’t know.”
“Mr. Dixon?” Big Stoop then asked and wobbled Barneyway’s head with a backhand.
“I don’t know,” Barneyway said and started crying; and the huge cupped palm clapped in Aaron’s ears with the next slap, and clashed like cymbals in them with the next one, which spun Barneyway’s head around with its force, blood spurting from his nose, streaking across his cheek; and anticipating still another slap, unable to control himself any longer, Aaron yelled:
“He don’t know! He couldn’t know! He don’t know—He don’t know—He don’t know—He don’t know—He—”
He kept yelling as Big Stoop flung Barneyway aside and charged into him, but he was too mad to be scared, too mad to fear the red face, the cruel eyes, the blow that rang gongs in his ears, numbed his face, and knocked him to the ground, too numb then to care that he was jerked to his feet, knocked down again, jerked to his feet, and knocked down again, and too deafened by his own anger and the numbing slaps to care or understand what the shouting voice was saying.
Then, suddenly, no slaps, no gongs, no shouting, only the woozy comfort of the ground.
A long blue smear with many heads fenced one side of him and the other was a blend of blue and khaki posts, moving, connected by a stretcher of khaki.
Skinned elbows propped him up.
Big Stoop’s bark cleared his mind a little, and he saw the Buzzer and Mr. Handy carry the limp body of Mr. Dixon, bald head covered with blood, past him and put it into the back seat of the station wagon.
Big Stoop’s voice again.
The shift of gears.
A rasp of tires.
The sun shimmering like a silver bar on the station wagon bumper.
A smell of exhaust fumes.
And the slow settling of dust about him.
IV
Phosphorous burns of wooden kitchen matches striped the warm steam pipe Aaron sat on in the brushy hide-out behind the compound, and the headless stubs of the matches lay scattered and barely visible in a litter of cigarette butts, wadded candy wrappers, and empty cigarette packs, cellophane, and open-flapped matchbooks on the gully floor, for it was darkening rapidly with twilight under the leafy tent of the manzanita tree.
Willow and scrub branches thickened the tent wall and prevented anyone from seeing Aaron, from seeing the hideout, a hide-out which only a search for total seclusion had led him to discover, a hide-out so filled with worthless trash that only his desire to avoid the disgusting sight of Barneyway, whose friendship seemed as worthless, allowed him to tolerate it.
A sigh of long grass disturbed the hush. Someone was forcing his way through the field between the compounds, and Aaron sat up and listened, unwilling to let anyone see his reddened eyes, eyes whose impressions of people, of best friends, especially, he no longer trusted.
Soup and milk for Friday’s late lunch and again for dinner, chocolate and cold toast for Saturday’s breakfast, and soup and milk for lunch and dinner again had been the only food he could make himself swallow; and his belly was as tight as a fist from it and he felt as mean.
He hated everybody and everything with the exception of Judith, whose image had been as fleeting but as sparkling as the sunlight which had skimmed off the shiny leaves and penetrated the gloom in the hide-out; an image of a sweet, true cherry, which had appeared to him with Dominic’s prophetic words:
“When it gets so bad, when you feel so miserable, beaten down, and lonely you wantta commit suicide, she’s gonna be the reason you won’t,” and which the intruding sound prevented from reappearing.
Tall grass fenced the back wall of the compound, told him where the now darkened trail was and where he could expect to see the noisemaker. But the figure which appeared by the corner of the compound was too dark for its features to be distinguishable and was, also, partially blocked from view by an old comic book, stiff and browned by exposure, which was jammed into the crutch of a limb.
He peered through a leaf-free spot below the book, recognized the thin shape and short height of the figure as Barneyway, spit a bitter taste out of his mouth, and regretted it. For Barneyway heard the sound, edged closer on the narrow trail to the hide-out, waited, listening, then jumped from the path into the gully, stumbled upon the rocks, and while trying to see through the thick branches, began to feel about for the entrance with the clumsiness of a blind man. Aaron couldn’t repress a snort of humor.
“Duck down, you’ll see it,” he said, evenly, coldly, and snorted again as Barneyway flinched.
“That figures,” he said to himself, but aloud, unable to keep himself from striking at a guy who couldn’t tell the truth without getting done in, a guy who couldn’t get done in in a gutty way, who had to go down like pussy, and who had to get them both, and their chances, slapped down by that giant bastard.
“Stand up. You been inside for three feet now,” Aaron said, forgetting in his bad mood that Barneyway, who was still crawling, had not yet adjusted his eyes to the hide-out’s darkness.
For all of the men were bastards. Even Mr. Handy, who was as afraid of Big Stoop as an inmate, was a bastard; and Mr. Dixon was a bastard with a fractured skull. And Jenson was a mighty avenger who did more than slap, who busted Mr. Dixon’s bald head with one blow of a pick handle at five-thirty in the morning, who stole Mr. Dixon’s pickup truck, who drove it to the blind end of a back road and over the open fields like a tank, who smashed it against a tree stump twenty miles away, who escaped, and who was as bad as Dillinger for his age, and bound to be one, all the guys said.
Barneyway hit his head on a branch with a knock and a shiver of leaves as he stood and instinctively touched the sore spot.
“Don’t cry now,” Aaron said.
Big eyes had the dull shine of the leaves around them.
“What’s on your mind?”
“We can’t go into the dorm, Aaron,” Barneyway said in a voice so mournful that a pulse of fear quickened in Aaron; and he drummed on the pipe to show he was not concerned and mocked:
“And why can’t we go into the dorm?”
“The Buzzer and Rattler are bragging how they’re gonna finish the job for Big Stoop on both of us.”
Hollow beats dribbled to a stop.
�
��Did they say tonight?”
“They didn’t say.”
“What the hell yuh scared about then?” Aaron said, beating on the pipe again, harder, faster, stopped, and dropped to the ground, shocking his sleeping feet with the impact.
“Let’s go in right away,” he said and grabbed Barneyway’s shirt sleeve.
“Let’s go in and get our ass kicked. We’re used to it. Come on. Let’s go. Can the Buzzer hit harder than Big Stoop?”
“I thought you’d be glad I told you,” Barneyway said, trying to pull free; and Aaron sighed and released the sleeve, feeling sorry for both of them.
“I am glad,” he said. “But I’m sick of the whole thing, sick of getting bullied, sick of being scared, of getting whacked, sick of crying … of …” he almost said you, “… of praying even, sick of the whole goddamned place. I hate that goddamn chapel. I hate those ugly angels in it. They look like bull dikes.”
He pounded on the pipe with both fists but couldn’t make it echo, and a kick to its underside only produced a dispiriting thud. He turned and leaned against it but got no comfort from its mild warmth, and the strain of trying to see in the hide-out irritated him.
“What are we gonna do, Aaron?”
“How in the hell do I know?” he yelled and noticed the oblong rectangles of orange light high in the back wall of the compound, which meant they’d have to go inside for lockup soon.
“How could I know, Barney?” he said, trying to apologize, sorry, but disgusted, and with little hope. “Jenson’s gone. Dominic ain’t about to risk his go-home. I don’t know. Just don’t know. I’ll tell yuh the truth, too. I stayed away from those bouts this morning not only because I was bumkicked but because I was leery the Buzzer would choose me with the gloves, and I heard he ain’t nothin’ in the ring, stays away from the gym because of that. I figured him for getting meaner now that Jenson’s gone and after what Big Stoop did.”
“Let’s go tell Big Stoop then.”
“Go to hell. I’d rather get whipped. I ain’t that scared. Besides, what makes you think he’d believe us? He just beat us both up, remember? And the Buzzer’s a cadet captain, man, no matter what his mother did.
“I should’a gone with Jenson,” he added, pretending that he could have escaped the trap, without expecting Barneyway to believe him, and then admitting that he was trapped, but in the only way he could: by hurting both of them: “There’s nothing we can do, man, nothing. We’re gonna get whipped on again, just like before, worse than before, whether we deserve it or not. Whipped on, man. Whipped on.”
“Let’s go to the hospital, then, Aaron. Tell ’em we’re sick. They’ll let us in. They’ll have to if we—”
“Sick? … Sick?” Aaron said. “… Sick?” And he was suddenly ashamed of himself, ashamed of what Stanley would think, and Judith, too, ashamed of wanting to quit, ashamed because he knew there would have to be a showdown when he made his pledge.
“Goddamnit, Barneyway,” he said, “we’re going in that dormitory. You understand? And if we get messed with, we’re gonna fight. You understand? And if you don’t fight, I’m gonna put you down. Got me?”
He pushed Barneyway into a squat and into a duckwalk through the branches ahead of him.
“Got me?” he said for his own benefit, too, as they climbed out of the gully and started inching their way along the dirt ledge behind the compound.
“Got me?” he kept repeating, but with decreasing power on the walk through the field.
“Got me?” he said, without force, when they reached the compound gate; and he did not lift the iron latch, for his knees had the peculiar weakness in them that always gripped them when he had time to think before a fight, time to consider his reasons for fighting, the consequences, and to doubt his own courage.
“Is Dominic in there?” he asked, trying to cover up his stall.
“Yeah, but he’s not gonna—”
“I didn’t ask you that. Don’t forget what I told you,” he said, severely, and felt his own courage come back to him. “If you get picked on, fight! Don’t take it or it’ll only get worse later, maybe even.…” He paused in order to sound more cruel. “Maybe both of them will try and give it to yuh, if you act scared.”
He then shoved the gate open, strong again, strong enough to cross the courtyard with determined steps, to reach the screen door, to strike a fighting stance with his commands:
“Fight! Sunday ’um! Hit first!” and, stiff and poised as a short fuse, he threw the door open and marched into the dormitory, ready to spring on the Buzzer.
But soft light, soft talk, stale, undisturbed air, and no Buzzer unnerved him; and midway through the dorm, he began to lose his driving tension. He decided to ask for the Buzzer, which was the same as starting the fight himself, but which would, at least, guarantee that he would not be relaxed and unprepared for it and would also get the nervous strain of waiting over with; and he felt satisfied and almost relieved when the Buzzer walked out of the washroom with Rattler, both with towels and toothbrushes in their hands.
“Hah!” the Buzzer said.
“Hah!” Rattler repeated and popped his towel with a whipping snap of his thin arm; and Aaron stepped forward to meet them, but was stopped by a warning cough and Dominic’s beauty mark, which was switching back and forth in a signal of caution.
He didn’t expect Dominic to risk a go-home for him, but the concern shown for him by the only person he trusted calmed him, and he took the advice and sat on his bed rail, waiting to pick his best shot, ready to fight still, but only if he had to, more than willing to get by without a fight if he didn’t get ranked as pussy.
“Rattler, ole buddy, ole shuck, tell me what come down when I out pickin’ up Mis-tuh Dixon’s busted he-ed? Gimme some ins, ma-han.”
“Mistuh Big Stoop,” Rattler said, waving his towel and reciting to the dormitory, “he whip on some paddy boys, pale-skinned Spanish boys. Ring some bells in their heads.”
“Is that a fack?” the Buzzer said, scratching the thick fold of his neck in a dumb pretense at ignorance. “Who is they? Hip me to it, daddy.”
“Punks,” Rattler said. “Paddy boy punks. Buddy-up punks.”
Aaron was annoyed, but he kept his temper, for his initial momentum was gone, the insults were still indirect, and the odds were too great to risk a battle unless he was chosen or was really angry. Also, Barneyway was hiding behind a book again and Dominic’s lips twisted in such a pronounced leer of contempt that only the earlier signal convinced Aaron the leer wasn’t meant for himself.
“Ain’t you gonna tell me what hap-pen, ma-han?”
“Sure, man. Big Stoop scare a little punk half to death by giving him the bad eye. Then slap him around a little to help him make up a good enough story,” Rattler answered and began to snap his towel and side-step toward Barneyway, popping the towel with every phrase, singing:
“Beat on the punk,
knock him around,
bloody him up,
make him bawl like a broke-dick-dog,
like pussy,
punk-punk-punk.”
He drove Barneyway, hands half-lifted, back up the bed to the wall with the stinging snap. And a snort of contempt from Dominic brought Aaron to his feet, his throat tight with an angry, disgusted, barely contained scream at Barneyway.
“Oow!” Barneyway said, not loud, flinching from the sting on his chest.
“Ow!” Barneyway said again, standing, and trying to flatten himself, with spread arms, against the wall between his locker and his bed.
“Ow!” Barneyway said again, and Rattler’s laugh rattled like phlegm in his throat and he snapped the towel into Barneyway’s crotch, and snapped Barneyway’s hands when Barneyway tried to cover himself, and snapped Barneyway’s butt when Barneyway turned, and raised the towel to snap it again.
“Stop!” Aaron yelled. “Stop!”
Rattler aimed the towel at Aaron.
“This ain’t hurtin’ you none. You better stay out of
it.”
“Quit torturing him,” Aaron said, and disregarding the warning which pulsed in the vein at his temple, challenged:
“How would you like it, if I did it to you?”
“How did you like it when Big Stoop slapped your silly head around for butting in on somebody else’s business?” Rattler drew his arms back to snap the towel. “And how would you like me to—”
“Find out! You sonofabitch!” Aaron yelled and threw himself at Rattler’s throat, locked his fingers on the Adam’s apple, and knocked Rattler backwards, over Barneyway’s bed, and down to the floor.
“Yaaaaagh,” Rattler groaned, trying to get his breath, prying at the fingers, struggling and kicking, knocking first against Barneyway’s bed and then the adjoining bed, sending both of them skidding, and still groaning: “Yaaaaaaaaagh.”
But the ridges of the Adam’s apple helped Aaron hold his death grip, and Rattler’s weak punches to his forehead and jabbing thumb to his eye only forced him to duck his head down between his stiffened arms and helped him to squeeze tighter, and he squeezed tighter, squeezed until Rattler’s eyes popped out of their lids, squeezed until the groan became a wheeze, squeezed until a blow caught him in the ribs, knocked his breath out of him, doubled him into a ball, and sent him sprawling into the aisle, gasping for breath, fighting the faint that swept over him.
Another kick caught him in the back and knocked him farther, and he kept rolling, rolling instinctively, rolling to evade the next kick; and he rolled into a bed, rolled under it, rolled while trying to get his breath, rolled while watching for another kick, rolled while nausea knotted his belly and voices rose and fell like echoes in an empty auditorium.
Two pairs of pant legs and heavy brogans did a crazy dance by the bed, scuffled, skidded on the concrete.
A toothbrush fell to the floor and was crushed by a brogan.
Tattoo the Wicked Cross Page 18