Mick (7 page)

Baba grabbed my shoulder from behind with one big powerful paw and spun me around with a jerk. He smiled mean as always and smarter than usual in my face.

“Y’know, I heard a million guys like you talk this trash before, this ‘I’m better than you’ shit.”

“No, not guys like me.”

“
Exactly
like you. And you know what else? They’re all still here. Still just like me. Just like you.”

How crazy was I? How well was Baba getting under my skin? I pushed him. Put both of my hands on his car hood of a chest, and tried to move all twelve tons of him. He didn’t move. I moved. As I pressed my hands into him and shoved, my feet skidded backward and I slipped off the curb into the gutter.

“Ouch,” he laughed in my face. “Please, no more, no more.”

It was useless, obviously. Sully snapped out of his trance long enough to shake his head no, telling me to simply let it go. So I did, sort of. I looked away again, down the block to where the bus was now in sight. That was all I wanted, just to get on the bus, let Baba go all the way to the back like we always do, and then not go with him. To be done with him. But that would have been the smart thing, so of course it was out of the question. My mouth wasn’t quite finished yet. I had to add a real snotty, “You ain’t worth my time, pal.”

“Oh, you’re so tough, Bones. I guess I’m just lucky I ain’t no four-foot-tall gook chick or you’d really be showin’ me what a man you are.”

He shrunk me. As I stood in the gutter I felt like the curb was up to my chin, like the red-faced little rat I was. The bus pulled up, the door opened right in front of me. Instead of getting on, I turned, walked up to Baba—who leered at me—and took a wild poke at him. Before I could hit him, he reached out and seized me by the throat, squeezing, lifting me up on my toes.

“So you’re feelin’ a little crazy right now for some stupid goddamn reason,” he said, almost friendly. “Don’t go riskin’ y’life over somethin’ that’s gonna pass away like a hangover.” Then he threw me at the bus, saying as I stumbled aboard with Sully’s help, “That one’s for free, Bones. Don’t be expectin’ no more of it.”

I
was
crazy. Baba hadn’t done anything to me actually, but I was focused on him, on what he was, and what I decided I
wasn’t
. We used to be the same—that was the problem, and that was bothering me more and more. So maybe I just figured if I could get Baba to murder me, that would separate us. I’d be somehow purified.

Baba did sit by himself in the back, while Sully and I shared a double near the front. I stared out the window, feeling the welts rising on my neck from Baba’s grip. I looked at Sully, who was also staring at the red marks, shaking his head. We didn’t say anything the whole way to school.

As I got off the bus, I was greeted. Sitting on the bench at the school stop were five seniors from the school, Asian guys, two down on the seat, three up on the seatback. I didn’t know any of them since, being a sophomore, there was no reason they would ever have talked to me before. But they sure wanted to talk to me now.

“Saw your show on the TV the other night,” said the one everybody knows as Mr. Quan, the leader. “You looked good.”

“Photogenic,” said one from behind.

“Athletic,” said another.

“You might have a career in the pictures,” Mr. Quan said.

I had frozen in the bus doorway when they first started talking to me. Now with people barking at me to get out of the way, Sully gave me a little shove. As I stumbled off the bottom step, Mr. Quan rose and stood on the bench, staring knives right into my eyes.

“Deep shit,” Sully whispered.

I couldn’t believe what was happening. What was this? I never had any trouble with any other kind of people before. Of course I never talked to or hung out with any either, but that was okay, that was the trade, wasn’t it? We just all leave each other alone and everybody’s cool, right? I never expected this.

“What do they want with me?” I said, playing stupid with Sully and with myself.

“Unfortunately, I think you’re famous, man.”

That didn’t sink in right away. Then it did. “Oh my god...”

Just as I was about to explain to them about the mistake, about what a fine guy full of goodness I actually was, they moved. They all stood, the lower-tier guys standing on the seat, the upper tiers standing high above. Then they came down, the front row hopping down to the sidewalk and the back row tilling their spots at exactly the same time. These boys had the sonofabitch
choreographed
. I was intimidated enough to squirt myself, but just a couple of drops.

But I wasn’t goin’ nowhere. Uh-uh, couldn’t do that no matter how wrong they were about me. Can’t run, can’t say, “Let’s be reasonable about this.” You just can’t. I don’t
know
why you can’t, so don’t ask me. It’s just that the operation doesn’t run that way. Sully understood it too, standing there beside me looking as mean as he could, which wasn’t a whole hell of a lot of mean, but it was a nice gesture anyway. We’d take our lumps together.

Then the miracle thing. Just like a movie scene run backward, all five guys hopped right back into their original positions on the bench. Were we tough or what? Without turning, I looked at Sully out of the corner of my eye and saw him looking back at me.

“We ain’t got no beef with you, O’Reilly,” Mr. Quan said, tough but nervous at the same time. Baba had just stepped off the bus, last as usual.

Baba didn’t say a word, just stood hulking, arms folded across his chest, above and behind Sully and me. Mr. Quan stared, mostly at me, with blanching glances at Baba. Baba didn’t move. The Asian guys didn’t move. Sully and I certainly didn’t move—if Baba’d had a pouch like a kangaroo, we’d have been inside it.

Mr. Quan tried once more. “We ain’t got no beef with you, O’Reilly.”

“Sure you do,” Baba said coolly.

That was it. Mr. Quan and his boys made a decent show of it by hanging around for another minute or so, but as soon as Baba spoke, they were already packing. Unless they could round up another twelve guys, they weren’t going to play with Baba.

He waited for them to be completely cleared out before Baba split from us too.

“Not such a bad thing, to have a animal around sometimes, huh, boys?” he said smugly.

I started to thank him, but he waved me off. “Another freebie. You was pretty fortunate today, Bones, but don’t even bother to thank me. I wanna wish ya luck wit’ the rest of your life, bro, ’cause you’re gonna need it.”

He walked away, and I knew I wouldn’t have Baba standing behind me ever again. That was scary. But that was good. Right?

B
ABA NEVER, AT ANY
time in his life, knew anything about anything that was worth knowing, so how was it that he knew my life was going to get so hard?

The month following the whole St. Patrick’s mess lasted about six years.

The Asian guys eventually caught up to me. I found a letter
inside my lunch bag inside my locked locker
, that said “Yum yum, this tuna sandwich is going to taste extra special good now,” and even though it seemed like nothing was done to the food, who the hell could eat it after that?

I think six people in the school made eye contact with me all month, and those six I had fights with. To see me was to punch me.

Sully got mono from, I think, fretting for my life and, by association, his own. This kept him home for three weeks, reducing my support at school by roughly one hundred percent.

My father revived his dream of buying the O’Asis. He’s never owned anything. Not the shack we live in, not a car, not a dog, not a bicycle. But every time the O’Asis comes up for sale—every six months or so—he thinks he can own a bar.

Terry got out of jail and threw himself a restraining order-burning party.

And I think I fell in love.

The month truly bit.

The place I had to go to every day was school, and the last place I wanted to go to was school. April, May, June, then out. I didn’t think I could make it. Starting with April Fool’s Day, it got harder and harder to haul myself out in the morning. Some mornings I just never did.

One morning I was sitting at the breakfast table five minutes before the start of homeroom. Dipping my toast into the yolk of my greasy, bubbly, over-easy egg, yellowing up the toast, then not eating any of it. Terry sat across from me like usual, both hands wrapped around a triple-size mug of black coffee, shaking as he tried to guide it to his mouth.

“You’re going to be late, Mick,” Ma said as she tromped down into the cellar with a mound of washing.

“I’m not going,” I said.

“Terry, drive your brother to school,” she said, “so he’s not late.”

“No, no, no,
no
,” I said. “I’m leaving, I’m out the door. No need to do that, Terry. I’m gone. Bye.”

Terry stood up, guzzled the coffee. “A-course I’ll drive ya. Don’t be a ass.”

He would have run me over with his truck if I said no, so I got in. A beautiful thing, Terry’s pickup, ’69 fat red Ford with the big rounded hood and big spaces in the floor to watch the street whiz by.

“Havin’ some trouble at school, are ya?” Terry said as he revved the tired engine.

“Ya, I guess.”

“I know how ya feel. I didn’t like school much either when I was your age.”

My age? He didn’t like it much when he was six, when he got booted out for the first time for smashing the fish tank.

“Here, this’ll help,” he said, and pulled a six-pack ring out from under his seat. There was one beer left clinging to it. “It’s only a Lite, but it’ll do for mornin’ time.”

I popped it right open, the fine spray misting my face. I took a long suck on the can. Terry reached across me, pulled a pint of Wild Turkey out of the glove compartment.

We didn’t talk, which I appreciated. I finished the beer, and was filled with it. I didn’t normally do this, the
A.M.
snort, because it had a bad effect that at first felt like a good one. That first cool blast of morning. The okay thing, the jingling belly, the quick bink in the head, the momentary silliness that made everything that was hard and nasty about my life or anyone else’s seem stupid. It was a blast but it was only a blast, gone just as quickly as the last swallow of backwash in the bottom of the can and I was left with the rest of the day, and the rest of the day was just a ball rolling down a steep hill and I wasn’t ever going to catch it. Not again, not after the first cool blast.

I threw the can into the bed of the truck, a hook shot out the window. I stuck the empty hand out toward Terry and he filled it with the pint.

It wasn’t a pleasant ride, Terry jerking the truck into gear when it didn’t want to go, then racing it to the next set of lights where he had to slam on the brakes again. Stop signs were not a problem, because he didn’t stop. Except once.

There was an elderly woman waiting at the intersection to cross. One of those old-timey elderlies who make a big deal out of it every time they go out. She had on a suit, dark pink jacket and long matching skirt, white gloves, a small shiny pocketbook, and a sort of cylinder-shaped white hat with a spray of baby’s breath poking out of it. I could smell her lilac perfume all the way from there. I guess it was her celebration of the arrival of spring. And, by the way, she was a black woman.

Terry muttered “What restraining order? What two hundred yards? Truck ain’t got no restraining order,” and charged toward the intersection. Ten feet short of the crosswalk, he screamed on the brakes, making the frail woman drop her bag, even though she was a prudent five feet back from the curb. She picked it up and Terry motioned her with a broad sweep of his hand to cross the street. The woman nodded thank you and started slowly across. When she was right in front of the truck—in his sights, he said—he blasted the engine, making it roar to catch her notice. The woman froze, staring at the ground, trembling like a wet dog.

“Cut the shit, Terry,” I said.

He grinned, leaned out the window, “Sorry, ma’am, the thing just races every once in a while. It’s old. You know how it is.”

She didn’t look up, instead tried to toddle a little quicker across. Terry, looking more insane than usual, said, “Three points, boy. Too bad she wasn’t younger and pregnant, that’d be ten points.” And he dropped it into gear.

“No!” I screamed, but he was already into it. He put his foot on the gas, boosting the truck ahead, right into the woman, then screeched the brakes with the bumper six inches from her hip.

The woman doubled over, covering her face with her hands, crying. Her purse fell, her hat toppled off her head.

“You asshole,” I said as Terry sat there watching her, giggling.

“Oh, be a man for chrissake, will ya, Mick?”

I looked away from him and back at the woman, who was still in front of the truck, petrified, going nowhere. I thought, she just wants to be left alone. She doesn’t do nothing to nobody. She just wants to cross the street. To get home in time for
The Price Is Right
. She just wants to go to the mall in a van with the other old folks once a month and buy tiny portions of food and put a little extra sugar in her tea and make sandwiches with only one chewy slice of ham in them and to be left in peace. And y’know, she was helpless, and why couldn’t he just leave her alone?

But that was it, wasn’t it? It was the helplessness that he loved and that he hated, the helplessness that made him horny.

I looked back at Terry, all smugness and cowardice, and for that moment, I wasn’t afraid of him.

“C’mon, lady, move along,” he said. “I got places ta go.”

“Hey, bro,” I said, and when he turned, I took the pint bottle and racked it right off his forehead.

I jumped out my door and went to the woman. I heard Terry slam his door and figured I was in for a beating, but I didn’t care. I picked up the hat and the purse and took the woman by the arm to the sidewalk. Then I turned, ready to meet Terry. But he wasn’t there. He was piling back into his truck and peeling out, pointing a menacing finger at me and scowling under a puffing pink brow. I looked down the block and saw the policeman walking our way. Which certainly explained Terry’s shyness.