Sons of the 613 (8 page)

He's big, as big as Josh, a fierce-looking punk with a red Mohawk and a motorcycle jacket and spikes and studs and big black boots, marching with purpose directly toward me, his fists clenched, looking like violent death personified.

I feel a rush of terror and adrenaline and turn toward Josh for help, but it's too late—the guy is just a step away, and now he's on top of me, but then he's brushing past me and I realize it's Josh he's heading for and something horrible is about to happen.

 

M
ERIT
B
ADGE
: A
TTACK BY
P
UNK
R
OCKER

There's no time to warn Josh, no time to even shout something, before the punk jabs out a stiff arm and gives Josh a brutal, jarring shove on the shoulder.

The impact jolts Josh sideways a step or two, beer erupting from the bottle he's holding. Josh pivots in surprise, his face registering bewilderment and then instantaneous fury, and I feel my knees nearly buckle from the fear of what's about to happen. And then Josh's expression changes again, shifting from angry incomprehension to recognition, then a huge smile, and then he and the punk guy are embracing and pounding each other on the back and laughing.

I watch them as they have a shouted conversation, a conversation punctuated with enthusiastic fist bumps and high-fives, the two of them leaning close to scream in each other's ears over the music. Josh points to me and says something, and the punker nods, then leans over and shouts, “What's up, little dude?” and offers me a hand. I'm not sure whether to slap it or shake it or bump it, and there's an awkward moment where I try to do all of those things at once, and finally the guy just grabs my hand, makes it into a fist, and does the fist bump for me, he and my brother laughing at me. Humiliating.

They talk a bit longer, do more bumps and high-fives, and then the punk walks away, patting me on the head as he passes. His rings hurt my skull.

As I watch him go the band finishes, and suddenly I can hear again. I turn back to Josh.

“Who was that guy?”

“Him? That's just Patrick.”

I watch Patrick vanishing into the crowd, pausing to greet someone else.

“He looks like that guy you told me about, the one you got in the fight with. The one who bit your ear off.”

“He is.”

“What?!”

“Yeah, that's him. Not a bad dude, really.”

He's distracted again, looking around at the crowd, looking toward the bar, like it's no big deal that he just ran into the guy who bit off half of his ear and whose jaw he shattered.

“You're friends now?”

“Yup.”

I shake my head, adding another item to the Mystery List. Now that the band has stopped, the house lights have come up and I can see the rest of the crowd. Everyone looks like college students or older, and they all look like they could be drunk or high or I don't know what, and the atmosphere feels charged and unstable, like an orgy or a riot could break out at any second. I have to pee, but I'm afraid to go to the bathroom, envisioning someone grabbing me and making me smoke pot or something.

“Josh, can we go now?”

“Not yet.”

“I have to pee.”

“So go pee.”

I twist around, looking for the bathroom, then spot it. Someone pulls the door open, and I briefly get a clear view inside, where a guy is standing at a urinal, peeing. I decide holding it is a better choice.

I look at Josh again. He's checking his watch.

“Why are we here?” I ask.

“Part of the Quest. So you know what it's like. So you know how to behave in a place like this.”

Right. Of course. Just the skill I need for my bar mitzvah.

Josh is examining me.

“What?”

“Clothes,” he says, like he's added something to a list.

“What? What about them?”

He's not looking at me or listening—back to scanning the crowd.

“Is this a dive bar?”

He chuckles. “A dive bar? Clearly you've never been to a real dive bar.”

“Um, I've never been to
any
bar. I'm
thirteen.
”

“Stop looking around like everyone is going to murder you. These are not meth dealers. They're all normal people. They go to school or have jobs.”

“Like the guy who bit your ear off.”

“Hmm.” He thinks about it for a moment. “No, I think he's a meth dealer.”

“Jesus.”

“Look, relax. Act like you belong here. You act confident, like everything is cool, like you're supposed to be here, and no one will bother you. Remember that. That's a good general rule.”

You hear that, everyone? When you're thirteen and you're in a bar and it's near midnight and there's drug dealers with Mohawks who bite people's ears off, just act like you're supposed to be there, and everything will be fine.

“Josh, I'm not sure that—” I begin, but he's walking off abruptly, heading back toward the bar. I can see him as he steps up to it and addresses the bartender.

A she. An attractive she, wearing a tight tank top, her dark hair drawn back in a ponytail. I didn't notice her before, and realize she must have just started her shift. And then I realize that she's why we're really here.

They're talking. They know each other. They more than know each other. He's holding her hand across the bar, and she's laughing, shaking her head. Even from where I am I can see her say
no,
and then
no
a few more times, still laughing, and then
no
again, growing more serious. Josh says something. I can see her saying
Josh
. . .

She breaks off and takes someone's drink order. She's still talking with Josh as she pours a drink and gets someone a beer, shaking her head and frowning as Josh says something back to her. Another guy tries to get her attention, and Josh holds out his hand to him without looking at him, gesturing for him to wait. The guy says something back to Josh, and now Josh turns, and I'm getting nervous again. Josh says something. The other guy takes a step back, holding up his hands, mollifying Josh. Josh is still trying to talk to the bartender. She's trying not to talk to him. The guy Josh threatened is rolling his eyes, sharing a laugh with his friends, like,
Can you believe this guy?
I don't blame him.

Josh,
I can see the bartender say, pointing at him, and then she launches into what looks to be a lecture, cutting him off with an open hand or a finger in the air each time he tries to interrupt her. Then she finishes and turns from him to a customer, all smiles again, and it's like she's slammed a door in Josh's face. The conversation is over.

Josh spins away from the bar and stalks toward the exit and disappears through the doors. It takes me a second to realize that he's leaving for real and he's leaving me behind. I start toward the door, and suddenly the room seems crowded again, people blocking my path and slowing me down, and I have to fight my way through. I need to catch up to Josh, and I need to pee, and it's like a nightmare where your feet are sinking into the ground and you can't move forward. I detour around a fat guy and squeeze through a tight circle of girls, mumbling apologies as I go. I hear someone say, “Check that kid out,” and I try to speed up, only to run into a herd of guys heading from the bar, one of them slopping beer on me from a pint glass when I bump into him.

“Hey, watch it!” he says, and I squeak some more sorries as I backpedal away and bump into someone else. Rough hands grab my shoulders and spin me around, and Patrick the Meth-Dealing Punk's face looms in front of my own.

“What's up, li'l dude!” he bellows, his acrid breath stinking of liquor and what I guess to be a cheeseburger and fries that are decomposing in his stomach. “Your bro's, like, friggin' awesome, dude! He's the friggin' shit! He's, like—”

“I gotta go!” I say, and I mean it in more ways than one. I go around him and get another jarring pat on the head, his rings making a knocking sound on my skull.

I swim upstream through the hordes of people coming in the front door and finally make it outside, gulping for air.

Josh is gone. For a moment I can't remember if we came from the left or the right, and I'm lost and unprotected and have to pee so bad I almost want to wet my pants.

I pick a direction, realize it's the wrong one, and double back. I make it around the corner and spot the car with relief. Josh is sitting in the driver's seat, waiting.

I open the passenger door and lean in.

“I have to pee,” I say, hopping from foot to foot.

He doesn't respond, just gestures roughly toward the wall behind me.

Cursing, I find the spot farthest away from the pool of illumination cast by the street lamp. I'm picturing being caught in the sudden blinding light from a police cruiser, like on
Cops,
and it takes me forever to start peeing and then forever to stop. A car goes by and honks. I cut off the flow and zip up and racewalk back to the car, my face flushed.

Josh puts the car in gear before I've even closed the door and accelerates away from the curb, still without saying a word.

“You were going to leave me in the club,” I say angrily as we pull onto the highway. He doesn't respond. I sit back in my seat and cross my arms, mad.

We drive in silence until we get home. When we pull into the garage I follow him wordlessly to the door to go inside.

“Where do you think you're going?” he says.

“Asshole,” I mutter, repeating it as I trudge out of the garage, walk around the side of the house, into the backyard, and climb into my tent.

“I'm gonna get expelled. I'm going to get expelled. I'm going to get—”

“Isaac, would you shut up, already? You're not going to get expelled.”

“I have perfect attendance!”

“Had.”

“I was going to get a fifty-dollar gift certificate to Jerry's!”

“Ice cream is bad for you.”

“Where are you driving us? What are we doing?”

“You'll see. C'mon, it'll be fun.”

Oh, God.

 

M
ERIT
B
ADGE
: L
OVE AT
F
IRST
S
IGHT

I had figured that after our late night I'd be getting a reprieve from my early-morning workout session. I was wrong. Josh dragged me from the tent at six A.M. for our run and calisthenics and wrestling, mostly him tossing me around while I lay there like a rag doll. This led to threats of more pushups unless I put forth some real effort. More effort was forthput.

Standard hostage-situation conversation with parents, Josh looking on to make sure I stuck to the script. More urging from my mom to contact Eric Weinberg deflected. Comments from her that I sounded tired again.

At breakfast Josh was texting with someone on his phone, and then he made a call.

“You can't do it tonight?” he said to whomever he was talking to. “What about the weekend? Seriously? All right, we'll do it today.”

As Lisa and I were walking out the door, Josh told me to wait. I waited.

“I'll drive you to school,” he said.

Um . . . okay.

Then we got in the car and he went the exact opposite direction, and I commenced freaking out.

We get on the highway, Josh responding to my panicked where are we goings with an equal number of you'll sees. Wherever it is, it's taking me out of Edina and out of school and out of the running for fifty dollars' worth of ice cream.

We're off the highway now, on Lake Street, heading toward Uptown, another no-go area for me: boutiques and bars and used bookstores and punky kids, and what I'm pretty sure are gay men who have shaved heads and handlebar mustaches. As I peer fearfully out of the window Josh pulls the car up and parks at the curb.

“Out,” commands Josh.

Out we go. I employ my standard half walk/half jog that I need to keep up with Josh on the sidewalk. I whine. He ignores.

 

As we near an old movie theater I notice a girl leaning against the wall by the doors, smoking a cigarette and watching us approach. Josh doesn't seem to see her. She's about his age, I figure, and she seems vaguely amused, her eyebrows raised just slightly, a suggestion of a smile on her face. She's wearing skinny black jeans and Chuck Taylors and a T-shirt with an illustration of a dancing girl on it and the words
THE BEAT
, and it all looks just right with her slim frame and pretty face and bright red hair, which falls in tight curls to her shoulders. I like her. I don't know why.

When we draw even with her, Josh stops dead and regards her in silence. I stop as well, waiting, not sure what's going on. She returns his gaze and takes a drag from her cigarette.

“I thought you quit,” he says finally.

“I thought you left,” she says in response, smiling, and flicks the cigarette aside. Then she turns to me and smiles warmly.

“You poor guy. Has it been terrible, being his little brother?”

I stammer something, not sure what to say.

“I thought so. Here, c'mon,” she says, offering me her elbow. “C'mon,” she says again when I hesitate, and so I link my arm with hers.

“Let's go shopping,” she says, and we walk arm in arm down the sidewalk, Josh following behind us. And that's how I fell in love with Lesley McDougal.

 

“Dude, where were you?!”

“Danny, I'm sorry.”

“You promised you were going to be there! We waited an hour!”

“I know. I'm sorry.”

“I called you, like, five times!”