Petrogypsies

by Rory Harper

  I leaned out of the doorway to check it out and slipped and hit my chin on the floor. Set the stars to whirling around.

  A few seconds later, strong hands pulled me back up to a sitting position.

  “Thank you very much,” I said. “Very, very, very, very—”

  “Poor fella. Looks likes he’s really messed up.”

  “Yeah. Too drunk to even sit. Sad. Very sad.”

  I tried to focus on the speakers and finally succeeded.

  It was Billy Bob and two other guys, each of them almost too big to fit through the doorway. All of them were in Kaydet uniforms, crew-cutted and ugly enough to make their mothers ashamed.

  One of them marched over and picked up Stevie under one arm, neatly grabbing the bottle out of the air when Stevie lost his grip on it.

  “Looks like the Herring is kinda out of control, too,” Ugly Number One said.

  Billy Bob bent over, put the heel of his hand on Stevie’s forehead and pushed up until they were eyeball to eyeball.

  “Hello. Anyone home?” Billy Bob asked pleasantly. He rapped on the side of Stevie’s head.

  “What you want?” Stevie returned.

  “That C you gave me last semester looked bad. I want an A in your stupid course, little fart.”

  “Nope. Not ‘less you earn it.”

  Billy Bob bounced Stevie’s head up and down a couple of times. “I wasn’t asking, little fart. I was telling. You give me an A, or you’ll wish you were never born.”

  Stevie chuckled weakly. “Too late. I already wish I was never born.” He kept chuckling until Billy Bob started bouncing him some more.

  I tried to stand up and Ugly Number Two absent-mindedly put a foot in my chest and shoved me onto my back. I grabbed the foot and tried to bite his ankle, but I didn’t have the strength or coordination to pull it up to my mouth. He ignored me.

  “I’m serious,” Billy Bob was saying. “This is your extremely last chance to save your ass, Herring.”

  “Bite it, Billy Bob,” Stevie said.

  Billy Bob lifted Stevie’s head once more and slapped his face, hard enough to send his glasses flying into the corner. Stevie yelped. His expression looked like he had been shocked sober instantly.

  “I’m getting tired of asking you nice,” Billy Bob said. He slapped Stevie on the other side of his face, snapping his head practically into his shoulder. I yelled and tried to sit up again, but Ugly Number Two shoved me back. “I can hit you all night,” Billy Bob went on. “That what you want, Herring?”

  Stevie’s face crumpled, and he wiggled frantically when Billy Bob raised his open hand again. Billy Bob watched while Stevie kept trying to squirm out of Ugly Number One’s grip. Then he grabbed Stevie by the beard and brought his face close.

  “You like this? You want me to keep it up? Or will you give me an A?”

  Fresh tears dripped onto Billy Bob’s hand. He raised his other hand.

  “Don’t,” Stevie whispered. “Don’t any more. I’ll do it.”

  “You’ll give me an A?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know what happens if you change your mind or say anything about our fun tonight, don’t you?” He slapped Stevie again, harder than the first two times. “That’s what happens. Don’t fuck me up, Herring.”

  Stevie upchucked on himself and Ugly Number One. Billy Bob back-pedalled barely in time to keep from getting spewed on.

  Cursing, Ugly Number One dropped Stevie on the floor.

  Billy Bob’s handsome face went ugly for the first time.

  He kicked over the nearest table, sending glassware and other lab equipment crashing to the floor. Ugly Number One tossed Stevie on top of me, where he continued to heave spastically. The smell and the sounds of him made me feel awful nauseated, so I spent the next few minutes concentrating on not puking, myself. I hardly noticed the destruction that was going on around us.

  Finally, Stevie and me both got ourselves back under control. We managed to stand up, supporting each other as we inched higher off the floor. God, he smelled awful.

  Billy Bob had found a crowbar and was prying off the lock on the door of the refrigerator beside Stevie’s desk.

  “No! Don’t do that!” Stevie shouted. Billy Bob looked at him and grinned. The lock popped loose and Billy Bob yanked the refrigerator open.

  “Your big-time government research, Herring.”

  Stevie started to heave again and fell down.

  “I got an idea, Herring,” Billy Bob said. “You aren’t sure I really deserve an A, are you? Well, hell, fella, I can mix up formulas with the best of ’em when I set my mind to it. Watch!”

  Billy Bob grabbed a half-gallon jug off the top of the refrigerator, one of the few pieces of glass still unbroken in the lab, and set it down on the desk. He started grabbing test tubes out of the refrigerator and emptying them into the bottle.

  “Aha! Aha! Ze fiendish mad doctor in his lab, going beyond ze boundaries of science!” he cackled. “Ve vill create ze ultimate chemical and rule ze vorld! Ha, ha, ha, ha!” His retardo buddies laughed along with him.

  He threw away about every fourth or fifth test tube unopened, shattering it against the wall.

  Stevie retched and moaned beside me.

  When he had emptied the refrigerator of test tubes, Billy Bob stoppered the jug and shook it vigorously.

  He marched over and squatted beside Stevie. He emptied the sludge in the bottle on top of him. “Here you go, ol’buddy. Did I mix it up right?”

  He straightened up. “I get an A in your course, or we’ll do this again, you understand?” He grabbed Stevie by the hair and nodded his head up and down for him. “Ah, you understand. Good. Sorry about the mess. Shouldn’t take you too long to clean up.”

  Ugly Number One kicked me in the belly before he stepped over me on the way out.

  Stevie didn’t start to weep until we heard the elevator doors close.

  I didn’t pay too much attention, because I’d finally lost my personal fight to keep my stomach full, when I got kicked.

  We were still lying there all miserable when the campus cops arrived and arrested the hell out of us.

  * * *

  Doc bailed us out the next morning.

  “Looks like you boys have about completely fucked up your lives,” he told us on the front steps of the police station.

  Bent over and feeble, we squinted up at him in the unbelievably bright morning light.

  “Drunk and disorderly, disturbing the peace, creating a public nuisance, destruction of University property, assaulting a couple of police officers—”

  “We didn’t assault no police officers,” I said softly, since I didn’t yet seem able to speak louder than a whisper. “They assaulted us. ‘Bout a half a dozen of ’em.”

  “Who’s the judge gonna believe? The cops or a couple of drunk assholes? They threw the whole library at you two clowns.”

  “You mad at me or somethin’, just say so, Doc.”

  He sighed. “Aw, crap. I was young and stupid once upon a time, too. C’mon, let’s go have us a nice big breakfast. Some eggs and hash browns and pancakes, and maybe a juicy ol’ steak.”

  He laughed when we both turned pale, stuck our hands over our mouths and started hiccupping.

  “Well, maybe only some black coffee for you two big-time criminals.” He took a couple of brand-new pairs of sunglasses out of a shirt-pocket. “Here, I figured you’d need these. A good hangover’ll make you blind as a hoot-owl. Soon as you recuperate, we’ll try to figure how we’re gonna deal with this little setback.”

  * * *

  It was after normal breakfast hours, so Doc volunteered to treat us our meals at the House of Pancakes near the campus.

  What had happened, Doc said while we were walking, was that a couple of campus policemen had been making t
heir rounds when they saw three Kaydets crossing the campus. One of them had vomit smeared all over his blouse, so they pulled over and asked a few questions. The Kaydets said that one of them had gone with his buddies to talk to his professor about a term paper he was thinking of getting an early start on, and they’d found the prof and a friend of his drunk and destroying the professor’s laboratory. They tried to talk them into stopping, but the two drunks attacked them. The professor got sick on one of them, so they left.

  “So, these Kaydets tried not to get you boys in trouble,” Doc finished. “I talked to one of the cops, and he says they practically had to drag the story out.”

  “Yeah,” I said bitterly. “That was because they was making it up as they went along.” Then me and Stevie took turns explaining what really happened the night before.

  * * *

  When we got to the House of Pancakes, the place was almost full, with students visiting each other freely between the booths. We were still waiting near the cash register before being shown to our booth, when the crowd shifted and gave me a clear sight of a face in the booth in the far corner.

  It was Billy Bob. I nudged Stevie with my elbow.

  “Look who we found,” I said happily. “You want first crack at him?”

  He glanced at Billy Bob, then looked at his feet. I nudged him again, but he wouldn’t look up.

  “No,” he muttered. “I just want to forget about last night.” It hadn’t occurred to me that Stevie might actually be afraid of Billy Bob. I realized suddenly that life might be a lot harder in ways I’d never thought of, for a short, puny guy like him. After awhile somebody like him might just decide to quit fighting back, boxing lessons or no, because all it brought was more torment.

  I had my problems, but that wasn’t one of them. I knew just how to convince Billy Bob that the way him and his friends treated us last night was bad manners.

  “Forget, hell!” I took a couple of steps toward Billy Bob’s booth before Doc snagged my elbow.

  “That’s him, Doc! You remember. You saw him talking with Star at Jon-Tim’s. He’s one of the ones that done us dirty.”

  “Henry Lee, we’re in the middle of the goddam House of Pancakes. You ain’t been out of jail for a half hour yet.”

  I reconsidered my plans for a second. “You’re right. Okay, I won’t bust up the place. How about if I merely set up an appointment with Mr. Dartmouth so we can talk later on? Someplace private. Like the parking lot out back of here, in two minutes.” I took another step, and then the crowd opened up a bit more. Billy Bob wasn’t alone in the booth. She was sitting with her back to the room and us, but I recognized her from seeing no more than her long dark hair.

  Billy Bob looked up from saying something to her and winked at me.

  I turned and ran out of the House of Pancakes. I jostled a couple of people who had been waiting in line behind us, but I hardly noticed. All I could think of was I had to get out of there before she turned around and saw me. If she saw me it would be more than I could handle.

  Doc found me a minute or so later. I was sitting on the curb down the street, staring at the dust in the gutter. I felt like I had a golf ball stuck in my throat right beneath my Adam’s apple. It wouldn’t go down, no matter how hard I swallowed.

  “I’m sorry as hell, Henry Lee,” he said. “If I’d known they was in there—”

  “Hey, it’s all right. No problem. No problem.” I swallowed again.

  Stevie came up behind Doc. I couldn’t stand the look of sympathy on his face, so I stared into the gutter some more. “We all went to Jon-Tim’s for a while last night,” Doc went on. “After the Grand Prix performances. Him and a friend of his come sniffing around. Must have been after their run-in with y’all. I guess he already knew you were in jail by then. Invited Star out dancin’ to another club. I didn’t know she spent the night.”

  “You saw them?” I said. “And you let him take her off like that? You didn’t stop it?”

  “Stop it? What was I supposed to do? Hog-tie her?”

  I stood up. “You could have done something!”

  “Dammit, she’s a grown woman. I ain’t her keeper.”

  “Fine. You’re right.” I started to cross the street, looking both ways for cars. “Thanks a bunch, buddy.”

  He called out behind me. “Hey, Henry Lee, where—”

  “Just leave me alone for a while, okay? I’ll see y’all later on.” I stumbled on the street divider, but recovered and kept walking.

  I walked for hours. I kept wishing it would rain, but it didn’t.

  * * *

  I fished a nickel out of my pocket and closed the door of the phone booth behind me. I’d written a letter home every couple of weeks and called every couple of months since Papa got the phone lines extended out to the farm.

  I had to go through a lot of stuff with the operators, but he picked up at his end on the third ring.

  “Papa?”

  “Henry Lee? Damn, it’s good to hear your voice. How you doing? When you coming to visit? You know we got a room set aside just for you in the new house.”

  “That’s good. I was thinking of coming home for a while, if I could.”

  “Are you all right, son? Is something the matter?”

  “I’m not feelin’ too well, Papa.”

  “Well, come on home. Your family’ll take care of you. Let me send you some money. I can telegraph it this afternoon.”

  “No, I’m fine on the money part. I got some stuff to wrap up here, but I’ll take a bus in a couple of days. Uh, you know Sprocket …”

  “Sure as hell do. He’s half of what you write home about.”

  “Well, he’s, uh, he’s hurt. It ain’t for sure yet, but he might not be able to drill any more. Could we maybe pasture him if need be?”

  “Hell, yes! Wasn’t for him, we’d all prob’ly be livin’ under a bridge someplace by now.”

  “I’m sorry, Papa.”

  “Hush. You just get here quick as you can. Bring that critter with you. Everything’ll be fine.”

  * * *

  I had a vague memory of having left my ax at Stevie’s apartment the night before. Stevie answered the door in his underwear after I banged on it for five minutes.

  Neither one of us talked much. I found my ax and the Pignose behind his couch. He made me take a shower while he fixed coffee and a real late lunch for us both. Then he took a shower while I stared out the window, sipped coffee, and thought rotten thoughts.

  When he got finished dressing and started on his third cup, he told me about his wonderful morning after we split up. He had been seriously eat on by the Stone Magnolia. She nearly exploded, he said, when he revealed that he had run off the dactyls. She let him know in her usual direct manner that as soon as she could put the paperwork through, he would no longer be employed at P&A, and after she made some phone calls, his prospects at any other school in the country would be as dim as she could possibly make them.

  * * *

  We cut past the football stadium on the way to the amphitheatre. The parking lot was completely full of cars.

  “I forgot,” Stevie said. “The big exhibition game with TU is tonight. P&A’s favored by ten points.”

  “What I needed to hear. We’re screwed, but ol’ Billy Bob’s gonna come out ahead all the way around, ain’t he?”

  “Yeah. I guess.” Stevie stopped and pointed upward and over to the left.

  “That’s the Allbright Bell Tower over there, Henry Lee.” About two hundred yards off I could see it outlined by the setting sun, a narrow stone spire with a bell enclosed in the top.

  “Wow! Great!! C’mon, we’re gonna be late.”

  Stevie just stood and stared at the tower.

  “Sometimes I feel like that guy myself.”

  “What guy?”

  “You haven
’t heard about the bell tower and Scott McCullar?”

  I sighed. “Nope. I’m just a ignorant ol’ country boy, remember?”

  “Aw, heck, sometimes I forget. Anyway, a couple of years ago, a sophomore named Scott McCullar climbed up inside the tower one October morning. He was a Kaydet, as a matter of fact, just like our friend Billy Bob.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Uh-huh. Well, Scott brought his Corps-issue M-16 carbine with him, as well as half a dozen boxes of ammo. He’d sighted in a sniperscope on the carbine.”

  I looked at the tower again. It offered a great view of practically the whole campus. I had a sick feeling I knew what was coming.

  “He didn’t—” I started.

  “Uh-huh. He opened fire. Shot at everything that moved, for almost two hours, before the cops got to him.”

  “Oh, my God!” I breathed. “That’s terrible, Stevie.”

  He nodded. “Yeah. Tragic. Could have been worse, though.”

  “Christ, how could it have been worse?”

  “Well—he was an Aggie. He missed everybody he shot at.”

  After a few seconds, I finally said, “How can you make jokes like that at a time like this? You’re a very sick person, you know?”

  I think he was still chuckling and wheezing too hard to hear me. Finally, he straightened up and looked at me soberly. “It’s either laugh or cry, Henry Lee. Laugh or cry.”

  * * *

  The Rebecca Matthews Memorial Amphitheatre had been designed to look as natural as possible. From the low wooden stage, the grass-covered ground sloped gently upward in an acoustically perfect curve for about a hundred yards. Dozens of oilfield critters circled the rim of the bowl. Most of them looked to be asleep. I spotted Sprocket and kept myself from going and stroking him for awhile.

  The ground was covered with blankets and people, and the crew was tuning up their instruments when we got there. Doc looked surprised when I marched up to the mixing board and plugged in. I got my sound levels checked out and my ax tuned and my fingers warmed up without having to look at Star more than a dozen times.