The Hurt Patrol

by Mary McKinley

  Summer by a lake is a beautiful, if sweltering, thing in the Midwest. Triple digits are pretty normal, it’s flat and inland, and even though no one around Beau agreed when he mentioned it, it seemed like it was getting hotter. Once when Beau remarked on it at school, his teacher immediately corrected him. Like she was angry—she told him that he just wasn’t used to it here. But that was not true. And he couldn’t understand the anger in her denial. She said it was exactly as hot as it had always been and it was just the way they liked it here. Beau felt she seemed pretty defensive about the number of days in the triple digits, which were undeniably increasing—and that was a fact, whether she got pissy about it or not. But he dropped it. He didn’t mean to upset her.

  As they approached the lake, they noticed the same thing had happened again that they had noticed all week . . . the lake’s tiny fish were floating. There were a lot of them. The smallest fish of the lake were dying in droves. They had floated up into the shallows and rocked there, many eventually making it onto the shore. It looked like there were hundreds.

  The Scouts had been alarmed at first. “What’s up with the fish?” “Is that poison or something?” “Is it even safe to swim?”

  The scoutmasters were reassuring. It had happened before. “It’s the heat, guys. The smallest fish can’t take it. It happens every time it gets too hot. It’s okay for us to swim, though; there’s nothing that’ll poison you. It’s okay, it happened last year too.”

  So, encouraged to throw off their misgivings, the troops again waded past the fishy corpses and out to swim in cooler, cadaver-free, deeper water, and it was true; there was no poison for them. They swam and played and frisked around in relief from the heat all afternoon, having a good old time.

  That night was the Awards. The guys were ready. They were up for it.

  “Are we good Scouts?!” Pete asked, grinning evilly, getting them pumped. “Are we prepared?!”

  “Yup-per!” “Good to go.” “Can’t wait!” “Let’s roll!”

  So they strolled to the giant amphitheater where the ceremonies were held. They found their places and got in position. The other troops saw them arrive and made room. Then they waited.

  Timing would be everything.

  It was a huge amphitheater, and there was very little wiggle room once you were packed on the stage with the swarm of other troops. The stultifying part began, which seemed like it would last for several millennia because everyone in the entire state apparently had an announcement, and droned on and on and on and on.... The Hurts shook themselves off and got ready as more Scout troops packed into the amphitheater.

  The Hurt Patrol assumed their position, up toward the back of the risers, exactly as had officially been rehearsed. It was almost go-time. Time for the song. The herd of Scouts were on stage for the big finale. Pete and Beau were standing with Rob as the music started. The rounds of the song were introduced. A chorus of rawrs and whooshes resounded with all the others. The different rounds began to roll in, rhythmically. The song grew loud. It was actually awesome, to be able to make so much noise collectively.

  Beau was equipped. He had preset everything and was ready. Since he was shorter than Pete and Rob, they slowly expanded in front of him with no sudden movement, like Pillsbury dough, until there was no real telling where he was. Then, as the song grew louder and LOUDER, Beau smoothly and quietly popped out behind the other Scouts on the risers so he wasn’t viewable, but so he could pop back in quickly if there was an outcry. He was hiding in plain sight, behind the rest, on the bleachers. He waited . . . no outcry. So Beau disappeared under the bleachers, per plan, under cover of the darkness. And then it was up to the others. Mostly it was up to Hunter.

  The other Hurts sang out, ever more ardently, to cover his absence. All except Hunter. He had another psyops role to play, unsuspected by everyone in camp. Hunter was their trump card.

  Hunter was a young man of abundant and convincing sound effects. He’d had time to practice in his years of solitude, and now he had some skills. One of the greatest gifts in his arsenal was the astonishingly convincing and accurate audio recreation of bodily functions. When the Hurts had discovered this talent, their rejoicing had been beyond measure.

  And, as luck would have it, the Hurts had been assigned the Swiss-kissing sound in the round. And, since all the other noises were yells, when the Hurts all went ‘mwah,’ it got much quieter. So as Beau stealthily slipped down behind the bleachers, the Hurts amped it up. They sang lustily.

  Hunter, shorter than everyone, was camouflaged by bigger Scouts. Even just standing, he was hard to see, so crouching in the shadow of taller guys worked very well. He was totally invisible. As the rounds of the song went on, untraceable Hunter was set.

  The sounds piled up—one on top of the other, and the rounds grew more complicated. It came time for the kissy sound. Hunter was ready—into the soft smooch of the kiss, he maniacally “let one,” resulting in a blast like Godzilla shat himself. It was way louder than all the kisses combined—and the audience screamed appreciation. All the Scouts looked to see who it was. The Hurts tried to see, too, as Hunter scuttled for different cover.

  The Scout leaders were not amused. As the rounds came round again, they had their eagle eyes on the place they’d heard it. But the sound came from a different area this time. The leaders twirled their infuriated gaze over to the new area as Hunter the Obscure grabbed his cheeks and proceeded to whack out a smarmy, smackity-jack rhythm that caused the other Scouts to go batshit with joy. As the rounds rolled again, the sounds varied between humongous Sasquatch belches and a loose squelchy booming, like marine biologists might record if they echolocated a pod of sharting sperm whales.

  Performance-wise, Hunter was killing. The Scouts watching the concert were bent double, screeching in wholehearted appreciation. They couldn’t get the breath needed to pee their pants. The scoutmasters looked like they would like to drop-kick every little fathead at the entire Camporee off a cliff. They were beyond furious. They couldn’t see who was doing what, but they knew they were being Owned.

  The round came again—the crowd favorite: leviathan blubber farts. The glorious roar of gassy blasts rose like the Rapture. All the scoutmasters were in the fray, now; every eye was eyeballing—and some snotty smartasses were really going to be sorry for flouting the Scouting tradition!

  Under the cover of this raucous dark, Beau jumped off the back of the stage and tiptoed to his hiding place. There he got out his huge can of shaving cream. This was what they had planned; they would shaving-cream the tent of the Head Lice, nothing too artistic, nothing too destructive or vicious, just sad faces with tears and “SUX 2 B U!!!” After all, it was just a prank. The payoff was the LOLZ, not to commit a crime or do any real harm.

  Beau had been thinking, so Beau had been thorough. He wanted to prepare a surprise that even the Hurts didn’t suspect, a special surprise. Shaving cream seemed like the Head Lice were being let off too easy. So Beau had put on his thinking cap . . . and it came to him.

  All week he had pondered the Head Lice tent as he was walking by, and he’d seen several rips in the sides where the tent windows were sewn. The thread had not been UV resistant or whatever, because wherever there was a window, underneath was a rip. The window-side walls were reinforced with a separate layer of fabric, so with the rip each made a long open “pocket” where you could stash things.

  But what? That’s what Beau pondered. Till the perfect present presented itself.

  In the dark he got his gear. A can of shave cream and a big Baggie. They had been preset and waiting, and in spite of the fact his hands were trembling with nerves and adrenaline, Beau was so enjoying himself.

  As he heard the shouting laughter of the Scouts and the leaders’ agitation growing exponentially, Beau hurried over to the Head Lice tent and started his art. He spray-creamed two folded fingers on each side of an extended middle finger in the universal flip-off sign. He drew “SUX 2 B U!!!” He penned “YO MAMAZ BUTT, O S
NAP, ASS-WIPES,” and then, growing inspired as he shook the shaving cream, he embellished. He inscribed “CIRCLE OF JERKZ!!!” in a fancy, calligraphy kind of way, but back to block for “O YA!!! I SAW U—YR OWN-D!!” He wrote and then, as the can was running low on medium, he ad-libbed butts, prolifically: large OOs and UUs, and tiny oos and uus. As the econo-sized shaving can finally gave out, hissing to its finale, he had to leave the last ass with only one tiny butt cheek, but that too looked like a dis, like half-assed—so, yeah.

  Oh, ho-ho; but Beau was so not done. He had another surprise, and this one was a surprise for the Hurts as well. Beau had cooked it up alone. But he was sure that for the Hurts, it would be a pleasant surprise.

  Hee, his soup-de-grace. All on his own. One for the Team.

  Because all that hot, humid week, unbeknownst to any of the Hurts, Beau had been reflecting on how best to up their revenge. Nothing violent, nothing dangerous, but worse than just shaving cream. And then it came to him, and he had begun to organize.

  For four days and nights, Beau had been gathering the tiny ominous fish corpses in a great big Baggie. Now it was full of putrified, slimy, gaggy fish guts—which he was now gingerly carrying. He had kept them constantly wet in the heat, and they had grown mighty.

  Carefully, he poured the ghastly aspic into the pockets of the tent windows, and then stood back briefly to see if it could be immediately detected. Nope. In the dark, the long wet spots were unremarkable, and the stink was muted. Best part was you couldn’t see the fishy, from the outside or the inside, trapped in the long fabric funnel. Beau carefully arranged the window flaps exactly the way they had been, pre-fishy trip. He could tell from the uproar that the antics on stage were about to be banned, so he rushed. He scuttled back and stuffed the Baggie and can in the stash hole and quickly concealed it, as the scoutmasters were starting to completely lose it with the entire Camporee.

  “EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU LITTLE SMART-ASSES SHUT UP!”

  It sounded like the scoutmaster’s voice was going. He had been screaming so much it sounded like raspy bagpipes. The Scouts, however, feigned deafness and caroled on. Beau stole back to the patrol, and they elevated him up effortlessly as other leaders took over screeching. He was reassumed into the multitude and nobody knew nothin’ . . . la, la, la, let us sing....

  He looked over and smiled, warbling with the others; so innocent, if a bit breathless.

  Eyes ahead, Pete prodded him. “Mission successful?” His gaze and lips barely moved.

  Beau’s wolfy smile and glittering gaze were his only answer. Very pleased = Beau.

  Pete subtly nudged him. “Heh! Way to freaking go, Beau!”

  Pete half turned to the others and his eyes told them all they needed to know, and as the scoutmasters hollered, threatening everyone with everything, the Hurt Patrol looked around too, trying as hard as they could, as hard as the others, to help find the horrific, and—they were being informed—UN-Scout-like fart-meister who started all this dreadfulness.

  So, they got the very first After-Party Camporee Debriefing ever in the history of the Scout/time continuum. They were all in so much trouble. And even though every Scout had spotted Hunter by the end of his performance, they’d kept it to themselves. Duh. They might despise him, and even though he was a huge dork and outcast, if you told, then you became an untrustworthy suck-up yourself.

  So nobody ratted him out, and the hunt for Hunter the Hurt was thwarted. Eventually the Scout leaders ran out of time because the end of Camporee came, and they never discovered for sure who the master fart-meister had been. Thus it became urban folklore and the tale of the Face-Fart-Song was recounted at countless campfires . . . and Hunter passed into Legend.

  And the other Scouts’ not ratting him out, their weird, self-interested, semi-protection, healed something deep and broken inside Hunter. Maybe just in time. People get crazy when everyone is so unrelentingly scornful and vicious.

  However, since the guys in the Head Lice Clan didn’t realize that it was Beau and the Hurts who shaving cream-served them, they were completely the same, hating on the Hurts, and especially Hunter, just like always. As usual, they paid especial mind to wee Hunter’s proclivity.

  “Hey, Smiley!” “Hey there, Sir Smiles-a-lot!” “Hey Smiley-boy! ”

  When they did this for the first time after the Awards, the old familiar pain stabbed Hunter and made him miss a step. He’d hoped maybe things would be different.

  And that was what Beau had figured. And he was so ready to bring it!

  “Hey yerself, Stink-Pot! Hi, Stinky! Hey, Stinky Boys! Hey—maybe wash your BUTTZ up in your butt-lice factory, ya chicken-shits!! Hi, Stank-o! Hey, Swampster! Hey Swampy!!”

  The Head Lice snarled in return, but moved on because Beau’s little vishy time bomb was still simmering inside the semi-porous tent fabric and Beau’s prophecy had not yet emerged. But the tiny reeking harbingers had slithered down into and through that fabric, coating the floor seams and all along the outer rim of the tent, to continue . . . infusing, fermenting, and fetid.

  And thus, a day later, in the already broiling morning of the next to the last sweltering day of Camporee, the entire group was treated to the frantic spectacle of the entire Head Lice Clan, under the enraged and gagging leadership of the loud head louse, trying to find that gawd-damn stink!

  With delight, they watched them manically flinging everything out of the tent—all their sleeping bags and pillows, dirty clothes, their backpacks, everything—and then watched in frenzied euphoria as the Lice began dumping all the stuff they had collected to bring back: leaves and rocks, animal bones and antlers, and all the gear from their packs; heaving their sleeping bags out and kicking them open—to find nothing!

  Next, they frantically tried pulling the pillowcases off their pillows, several of which tore because they were too old and ratty to be used in their houses, and showered old, yellowed, nasty-ass shredded foam-rubber all over the campgrounds, clearly flouting the Scouts’ Leave No Trace creed. The Head Lice did not appear to care, though, as they continued every kind of garment rending pandemonium, just trying to find that filthy, remarkable, world-class, gut-puking Stench.

  As they continued failing, their search grew increasingly rabid. They couldn’t locate the stink. They couldn’t believe the stink. Finally, the large tent was completely empty, and it looked like a tornado had hit their campground and still they didn’t see why it smelled so repulsively. Even when a scoutmaster came in and accused them of “going to the bathroom in the tent, or something” and they lost it again, on principle this time, they couldn’t come up with a hypothesis.

  While the Hurts stood rapt, along with everyone else in camp, Pete slowly turned to Beau. He looked searchingly into his eyes. Beau continued to look all blameless, as had been their successful MO up to now, but his treacherous Ears of the Sun flamed, and he couldn’t keep up his guileless gaze, so he looked down as he began smiling involuntarily. Great, now he was random like Hunter.

  Pete’s eyes grew wide, as modestly, Beau met his gaze and shrugged. Pete mouthed one question: “What did you do?” His lips barely moved. Beau glanced around cautiously. He pretended to sneeze—“Fish!”—cough—“Walls!” Beau rubbed his nose for verisimilitude.

  “Gesundheit!” Pete commended him. “BLESS you, my son!” It took all Pete’s considerable self-control not to burst into happy horseplay, or do a little jig. He felt goofy with glee.

  The gagging Head Lice gave up toward the end of that great day, after running around pointlessly accusing everyone. They had blamed the Hurts right off the top, but nothing could be proved. But all stinky day they had been noodling on a possible theory. So the Head Lice went to find the Hurts to ask them something. The lead louse, a guy called Chris with an eternal scowl on his face, like, “I smell dookie!” stomped up first, his meticulously moussed faux-hawk oscillating with outrage.

  The Hurts had been sitting on the grass at the end of a long day, not doing anything much, when Chris Lou
se loomed, radiating rage like a heat mirage. They stared at him with interest. Beau glanced at Pete as Chris approached. Pete smiled back, dangerously, and shrugged. He’d be happy to throw down.

  Chris Louse gestured at Pete, and began threateningly. “We know you did it!” he bawled, getting right to the point, practically levitating as he gestured with pent-up nastiness. Pete and Beau watched Chris perform his hula of fury, unwilling to meet each other’s eyes for fear of excessive celebrating.

  Chris continued gnashing. “YOU and that Charlie Brown–lookin’ idiot”—Chris’s orneriness choked him—“and that . . . that FAGGY fag!”

  The Hurts all quickly looked down, trying to mask their dawning delight, but it was too late. Kyle addressed Pete.

  “Well, Pete, as the most obvious faggy fag here, I’m going to have to complain. What proof do they have?”

  Rob interrupted him. “Hardly, Kyle, I’m the faggy fag!” Rob proclaimed, “No contest! But I, too, must protest, for I, too, didn’t do it.” He scratched his cranium in his sincerity. So perplexing! Which pissed off Chris.

  “WE KNOW IT WAS YOU! Don’t LIE!” Chris Louse screamed at everyone, equally.

  Pete spoke next. “Nice try, guys! But I’m the faggiest fag, of all of us fags, though Beau does pretty well, and Hunter here, as well as being a Charlie-Brown-lookin’ idiot, is also an apprentice fag.”

  “Almost a faggy fag,” Rob added helpfully.

  “Shut up, dick-face! That one! THAT fag!” Chris sobbed, stabbing his wrathful finger at Beau.

  “Oh, I say!” exclaimed Kyle. “I contend that both my brother and I are easily as faggy!”

  “Yeah, why him?” asked Pete. “That hardly seems fair.”

  “Yeah, we’re all equally faggy here,” added Rob, and then Kyle said, “Yeah, I’m just as faggy a faggy fag as him!” Then everyone: “Me too!” “I’m the faggiest faggy fag!” “No! I am!” “Nope!” “Me!” “I AM the faggy fag—and so is my wife!” “Hey! I just remembered! I’m also the faggiest Spartacus!”