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SUMMER, PART 15 Things out there were definitely new for Ricky. Everything, everyone, every place a mix of new colors, sounds, smells. The first afternoon’s performances would be at a state fair in Virginia. All on stage and everything. There were tons of microphones and gigantic speakers which made him a little uncomfortable, but Julie’s advice worked. Just pick one face out there, one person, and pretend you’re playing and singing just for him or her. Smile and think you’re back home, or at Riley’s Field playing for Tom, or it’s some Saturday at the park with Jenny, one person. Was very, very cool when Mike introduced him by name to the crowd. I love this, they all clap and yell, I could do this all day and all night. Though damn, it’s hot and there’s no shade on this stage. I’m drinking like a quart of water in between each set, but still, I’m wicked thirsty. Just forget about it, pick and sing, let Mike and Julie lead you where you need to go. There was about one free hour in the afternoon between performances. Ricky wandered around, seeing all the rides, hearing the piped carnival music over the loudspeakers, eating stuff at the food booths, letting the excitement of the fair spin around and around him. This is way more exciting than Asheville, just get into it, 14 more days of this, damn. He sat on a bench and was wolfing down a cheese dog when some kid about Tom’s size sat down next to him and started talking. Ricky hadn’t expected to be approached and talked to like this by people he didn’t know, but maybe that was a part of being a professional. The kid seemed a little hyper like Tom, talking fast and moving his body a lot. “Hey, man. You’re Ricky, right? I heard you guys play, you’re all right! Wish I could play music. My name’s Jay, I work in Mom and Dad’s fried dough concession left of your stage. Never seen you here before, you gonna work the circuit or just local?” “Uhhh, hi Jay. This is my first day, what do you mean work the circuit?” The kid was friendly and sure did like to talk. “Well, me and my family, we’re carney people from way back. Like we travel around to the different fairs, set up, and basically do what we do. When I was smaller, I even did some clown performing with a couple of the small circuses. Not so much these days, you gotta either be really good or be some sort of cute little tiny kid that no one gives a damn if he’s good. Anyway, we’re gonna be around the northeast all summer, last place we’re gonna hit is the biggest one, the Big E in West Springfield, Mass. Right around the end of September I think. Then we pack up, head west, when it’s cold we do southern California and make our way back towards Florida by Christmas. Home, but we’re not there much, it’s Bradenton, Florida. Don’t wanna be down there in the fall, hurricane season, wipe everything out. What’s your schedule, how long you gonna be around?” The kid smiled nicely and finally stopped to breathe. “Wow, Jay, like I don’t know. I know our band will be playing for about two more weeks but I don’t know where, don’t know anything. I didn’t even know I was coming on this trip til a few days ago. So you just do this stuff all year? Where do you live? Don’t you go to school?” “Guess it’s strange, but I’m used to it, something new all the time, new people, different towns, just I guess I’m used to it. Sometimes gets boring, lot of travelling. We go by trailer everywhere, Mom home-schools me some, I gotta take certain tests the state sends for me, they’re pretty easy. They said you guys were from Asheville, NC? Our fried dough stand closes at 9. Wanna hang out after that? Sometimes sucks, there’s not that many other kids around to really meet.” “Yeah, we’re from Asheville, but I go to school in Georgia. I dunno, it’s like I got no idea if or when or where we’re playing tonight, I know we got one more session on stage in about 15 minutes. I’ll look for you if I get a chance, but I’m still getting used to all this, my head’s like spinning. But it’s bigtime fun, god damn! OK, Jay, I’m gonna meet up with my people now, take it easy.” Ricky walked away and looked back after a few yards. The kid was still looking at him, smiling and waving. Ricky waved back and shouted, “See ya!” Carney people? Don’t they miss having home, friends and stuff? Everything this trip is so different. Hope I get to see Jay tonight, he’s cool. After the next performance, the band went to the house of some friends where they’d stay for the night, crashing on couches and the floor. Evidently they were going to play in a folk tavern that night, start at 8:30, finish sometime around midnight. Mike and Julie went out somewhere, and Ricky was alone with Matt. Ricky was dead tired in his muscles, but plenty alert in his mind. He just lay on the couch while Matt turned on the stove to boil water for macaroni and cheese. The northern guy then came over and sat down on the edge of the couch, Ricky bending his knees so the man could fit. “Well, what do you think, Ricky? How do you like everything so far? Talk to me, kid!” “It’s fun, it’s different, I dunno, sir, it’s just everything’s…” “Sir?? I think if we’re gonna be on the road for a couple weeks together, we don’t have to be quite so formal there, this isn’t prep school, my name’s Matt, remember?” Ricky couldn’t help it, couldn’t hold it back anymore, it was just too much of a day. It was all involuntary, he couldn’t stop himself. His mouth opened wide, he started shaking a bit, and all of a sudden, tears and snot just flowed out of him, all over, gushing. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, it’s not you, I just can’t, I just can’t, please, no, no.” The man had no idea what was going on with this kid, but it was very scary. What was up with this kid? He stood up and walked to where the boy’s head was, petted his hair for a second. “Ricky, are you all right? What happened, what’s wrong?” All right, all right, you’ve come this far, shit, you’re a professional, stop crying like a girl without balls, tell him, gotta face it sometime. Ricky’s crying stopped, and he spoke with only a little sniffling. “All right, I’m sorry, I’m gonna tell you everything. I had an older brother named Matt, he was 11 and he died, he had leukemia, I was only 3. I can’t really remember anything about him, I don’t know, but every time I hear his name, like if it’s on TV or someone calls a kid by that name in school, I just, I can’t help it, I get all scared and weird and everything, I don’t mean to. I mean most of the time I don’t think of him, but when I hear his name, it just hurts, it hurts, I want to see him so bad, I want to get to know him, I never knew what he was like. It sucks, please, it’s not your fault, Matt, it’s just me.” The living Matt said nothing for a few moments, just stroked Ricky’s shoulder and neck. Ricky’s eyes closed and his breathing returned to normal, though slower. Not sleeping slow, but just relaxed, spent, exhausted. “OK, OK, Ricky, all right now, I understand. Take it easy there, I know it must hurt. I’m making some dinner, but if you just want to sleep, I’ll keep some for you. Rest, kid, you don’t have to wake up for more than an hour. You’ve had a long day, and we’ll be playing tonight, too. And Ricky, if you don’t feel like calling me by my name, don’t worry, call me whatever the hell you feel like. Whatever it is, I guarantee you I’ve been called worse.” Ricky opened his eyes and smiled weakly, then decided to let go, rest, have dinner later. Let it be. He had his energy back by the time the group had to play in the club. Would have been nice to hang with Jay, but work was work, professional now, get into it. One thing that Ricky noticed the minute he walked into the place was that gross sickening cigarette smell. He’d always HATED that stink, wanted to be far away from it, but figured he’d just have to get over it, that’s how things are at bars. And there were a couple ceiling fans right over the area they’d be playing, they helped. It was a calmer place than the carnival, everyone mellow and right up close. Didn’t look like microphones would be necessary, that was nice. They arrived a few minutes before they had to set up, and Ricky used the free moments to call someone. “Hi there, you know who this is?” “I don’t know, some world-famous rock star on tour?” “Jenny, I don’t play rock or metal, you know that.” “All I know is that I love you, Ricky. How’s the trip?” “Well, it’s the road, all right. Lots of miles in that truck, new people, great food at this carnival we’re playing at, casual sex with all these bluegrass music groupie chicks, you know how it is.” “Actually, I don’t know how it is, but if I hear anything more about any casual sex, I’ll just put my casual fist upside your casual head, boy!” “Oh, and I’m supposed to be scared or something, scared of a girl?” “You BETTER be scared of THIS girl, you don’t want to mess with me if I get in a mood, you know what they say, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” “I got no clue what they say, Jenny, and I don’t care because I love you so much. I love you. Look, we’re just about on now. Bye now! Talk to you soon.” Hmmm, that felt nice, hearing her. I wonder what that word she used means. She’s smart, sometimes I don’t get all the words she says. Scorned? Don’t worry about it, OK. Stretch your legs, your back, come on, get some energy up now. Showtime! The evening concert felt nice, more intimate. There were only about 100 people in the place, and after a few ripping bluegrass numbers to get the crowd’s attention, they played mostly slower music, some ballads, instrumentals, some Celtic stuff. A couple times, Ricky had to combine with Matt on fiddle, which he hadn’t practiced much recently, but everything worked out. Around 11:00, for the end of their next-to-last set, Ricky was going to be the solo singer for his favorite tune, one he’d played for everyone back in the studio. Julie was right, it was easy when he just focused on one person out there, made the singing all personal. There was one girl out there, not a girl really, more like a lady, she looked college-age, maybe 20? She was at a table with some friends, and she was really into it. They were excited, pushing her, and after a moment, she walked up to the small stage and stood next to Ricky, putting her arm around him and singing along. She knew the words perfectly. She rocked back and forth gently with him, their voices combining in perfect harmony with the top of her head tilted into Ricky’s neck. “She took to me to her Mammy’s house, and she treated me right well The hair upon her shoulders, in jet-black ringlets fell To try and paint her beauty would surely be in vain And I fell in love with that Creole girl, by the lakes of Ponchartrain” The singing paused for several bars as Matt filled in with a bridge on the fiddle, backed up by Julie’s soft guitar. Ricky looked at the pretty person next to him and smiled as they both swayed to the instrumental part. Just like the song, never gonna see her again after this. But still, if Jenny saw this, she’d definitely cut my balls off, then probably mush them into hamburger meat or something. Owww, that could hurt. Well, Jenny’s not here now, this is the road, she doesn’t have to know everything. Been a hell of a day, that’s for sure. Next verse, sweet now, here we go. SUMMER, PART 16 The National High School Championship Tournament would be held in Atlanta in late August, and when Tom found out, he really got into his practicing more, especially with Victor. In a way, it wasn’t really an official championship—any player between 13-18 years old could enter, and basically it was the championship of anyone whose parents could afford and decided to send their kid there, though most of the top players would compete. By now, Tom knew that he was nowhere near the level of superstar master players, but also knew that there would be plenty of other kids like him there--good players, trying to get better. Very often, his practice times with Victor turned into sessions where the old man pleasurably vented his anger built up over the years. “This Petrosian, he is a weasel, he just sits and waits, and you don’t know whether to jump on top of him or not, maybe he has a counterattack somewhere, what happened last time someone threw everything into an attack against this guy, you start doubting your own mind, until you see ghost variations, you see what isn’t there, and you wonder does HE see? WHY didn’t I sacrifice on g7, WHY WHY??? I couldn’t do it before, his rook defended the rank, but now? I was afraid of the air, of the space, afraid of NOTHING! Stupid!” Victor then quickly moved various pieces around, grunting like an animal, trying various unsuccessful defenses for Petrosian, defenses that wouldn’t have worked if only, if only Victor had previously…. His legs moved slowly at his age, but his fingers were still lightning quick. “Yeah, but don’t be mad, Victor, it’s hard to figure all that out without getting to touch the pieces and move them around. And you said you beat guys like him once in awhile, that’s something. And Petrosian, Tal, and that tall guy you told me about, they’re not just some clowns, idiots, they were the best in the world, you were just about as good.” “Ahhhh, as good. You asked me something about that once before. How can I tell you, you’re only a little boy? As good, what does that mean? I knew the same openings, could handle the same endings, could recognize and create the same combinations, sometimes even better. But I always seemed to lose the battle not at the board, but in that space between my ears, that space where the pieces….” Victor stopped for a second and Tom could see that the old man was upset. The gigantic round head drooped and slowly shook from side to side, the shocks of white hair nearly touching Tom’s face. Tom was trying to think of something comforting to tell him, but Victor continued. “That space in your head where you can make yourself crazy, the space that can even keep you from sleeping at night. I could dominate the 64 little squares, but I could never get complete control over that battlefield inside my brain. And the other guys could. And that’s why, young Tom, their names are famous forever, and I’m just another forgotten old Soviet, waiting to die.” Oh shit, the poor guy’s gonna cry or something, I didn’t mean to get him all freaked out like this. Say something, come up with something. “I still think you were a great player. Think how many millions of guys never get anywhere near playing with World Champions.” “Maybe those guys are happier.” Tess showed up then, said that Victor had a physical therapy session, and Tom decided to ride back to the pool for awhile, it was still early. Tess said he could come back in an hour if he wanted. He’d kind of given up on the idea of becoming closer friends with Rafe, Jimmy, and Kyle, though they were still fun to play with, definitely made him laugh. If they weren’t there, Tom figured that he’d just swim some laps and daydream about going camping with Ricky and Foxfire. Gotta be able to take him, he’d be seriously into it. When swimming laps or running, Tom had the ability to zone out, pretty much put himself into a trance, fantasize about sex or something else, and not really be aware of his legs or arms moving. Unlimited time could go by, and it was all the same. Tom arrived at the park, and the kids were still there, but dry and dressed. They were getting their bikes unchained from the fence that surrounded the pool. “Hey, Tom, man,” said Rafe, “where were you before?” Tom’s head jerked around when he heard those three letters of his name. First time any of the guys had said it? Maybe, or at least the first time he’d realized it. “Had some stuff to do,” he said nonchalantly. He certainly wasn’t about to tell them that he spent much of the early afternoon at an old people’s home, talking with an 82 year-old Russian guy about some chess game that was played in 1958, and hearing about strange visions inside the guy’s brain. Oh yeah, that would go over good, better all that be left a secret. “Feel like taking a ride to my house with us? My grandmother’s always home, she’s got ice cream and pie, spoils us fucking rotten.” “Cool, I’m down, thanks.” Tom’s voice stayed calm, but his heart was pounding viciously. It has to be good, kids like me enough to invite me over, but what am I supposed to do? He rode the few blocks just behind the other three kids, hearing them laugh and yell stuff easily. Just go with it, do the best you can, you CAN DO THIS! Gotta at least try, better than being ignored. Please, God, make me do stuff right, come ON. Rafe was right, his grandmother had nothing better to do in her late middle-age years than spoil her grandson and his friends. Food equals love, after all, and the ice cream, pie, and mushy cookies earned her plenty of it. Shameless bribery, but very nice. “Rafe, if you can manage to lift your piggy face out of the bowl for a couple seconds, maybe you’d be nice enough to introduce me to this handsome young man here who I’ve never had the pleasure of seeing before?” “Mmph, he’s Tom. He’s new in town.” “Well, isn’t that nice. Tom, where were you from before?” “It’s kind of hard to say, ma’am.” Yeah, old southern ladies like to be called ma’am, good thinking. “My father used to work for the government, so we’ve been all over. We lived for a few years in Argentina, but before here I lived with my grandparents in North Carolina. I’m pretty sure my family’s here to stay now, though.” “And will you be going to Parker Middle School with Rafe and everyone else?” “Actually I started at St. Brendan’s School over in Ripton last year, and I’ll be going into 9th grade there.” “Prep school faggot!” giggled Kyle, slurping up liquid remains of fudge ripple ice cream. “Yeah, I’ll faggot you upside the head, loser!” answered Tom, pushing the kid’s blond head down into the bowl. This caused the bowl to tip over and ice cream goo to fly into Kyle’s face. He wiped a glob of it onto Tom’s hair and glasses, and in the midst of this, a glass of milk fell over. “FOOD FIGHT!” shouted Rafe, and there were instantly four seriously giggling, misbehaving children, making that nice neat kitchen into a war zone. Wrestling and punching each other with slimy, tasty stuff as props. Grandmother was about to yell something, but figured that she was too old to yell, that’s what their mothers are for, I’ve paid my dues. Wait til they calm down for a minute, no rush. “Let’s go upstairs and play Playstation!” said Rafe. Grandmother moved quicker than one would have expected to block the stairway. “AFTER all four of you boys have cleaned up this kitchen to within an inch of its life! What kind of wild animals do you think you are, in MY day children knew how to respect!” “Awww, gramma, you gonna give us that same weak old speech about the old days? Give it a rest, I bet you were worse than us!” “Hard for me to remember back then, you know, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, but no one could be worse than you. I mean it, Rafe and all of y’all, dishes, counters, table, right now! That’s right, Jimmy, now you’re moving. Good job, boys, I guess I won’t whup you this time.” After the kids did what they had to, Grandmother let them go upstairs, after each one had given her a kiss. Playstation would be weird. How to deal with it? Tom had never really played video or computer games. Thought they were stupid, and didn’t have any in the house. This one was about some kickboxing competition. Rafe kicked Kyle’s head off and then ripped the still-beating heart out of his headless and helpless body. There was music and crowd noise in the background. Tom watched Rafe do the same thing to Jimmy, though it took longer, and Rafe did lose a lot of blood. “Your turn, Tom! NO ONE SURVIVES AGAINST THE RAFINATOR!!” “This is cool, Rafe, but I don’t exactly know how to play. My mom, she’s all weird, doesn’t let us have this stuff in the house, what do you do with the console?” Was a good quick excuse, the best he could come up with. “Jimmy’ll show you, come on.” Cool, they didn’t make a big deal of it, all right. Tom did suffer the same fate as the others, and quickly, but it was OK. He also tried a car racing game, though he crashed into the wall and died a lot. The good thing was that you could die several times before you REALLY died. Probably doesn’t work that way with real cars. Tom was happy, but still far from 100% comfortable with the kids. It was just new, really too much too soon, though all had been cool. It was kind of like the night at the dance when they were outside and Ricky met that girl. It’s good, but enough is enough, I gotta release the pressure. “Hey, guys, I gotta do something for Mom before I head home for dinner. Hey, Rafe, thanks for the pie and stuff. See you guys tomorrow?” The other kids grunted goodbyes, friendly enough, though they were fully concentrating on the game. Tom went downstairs and would have said goodbye to Grandmother, but she wasn’t around. Having a nice peaceful nap after dealing with the four monsters. As soon as he got outside and felt the afternoon heat pound him, Tom realized that his heart was going as fast and angrily as ever. He biked slowly to the end of their street, then got off and squatted down, trying to breathe as slowly as possibly and let his heartbeat slow. I did it. I did it. Wasn’t perfect, but it’s done, I was OK. They do it easily, they don’t get nervous, but still, that was a big day. Can I call them my friends now? Are they friends, or do they still count just as guys I see around sometimes? Still have over an hour left, go see Victor for a little while more. He and Victor picked up where they left off, Victor mostly explaining how once again, he had an opponent crushed, had him just where he wanted him, until…WHY, WHY? Tom could follow and understand the variations if Victor went much slower, and stopped after each move to let the boy’s mind process what was happening. “Yeah, that’s cool, Victor, but why couldn’t he just break the pin with check, bishop c6? If you take, he can get the piece back and I see you still have the same problem with…” “You see? You say you SEE?” Victor was getting loud now, animated, gesturing with his arms, his face turning a little red, as he shuffled pieces with blazing speed to show Tom how the idea would have blundered a rook way over on the Kingside. “You say you SEE? What you see? You see NOTHING! You see BOOLSHIT!! YOU PLAY BOOOLLSHIT!!! YOU ARE BOOOOLLLSHIT!!!!!!!!” And then, while Tom was staring at the man, a little angry but more thinking the guy was crazy, Victor did something that Tom had never seen him do. The old man threw back his oversized head and laughed, laughed to shake his whole body, to shake the whole planet even. Laughed and roared until Tom did, also. Both of them acting like howling idiots in the hot courtyard. Tom had even learned a couple words of Russian, and decided to try them out. “Strazdvoytye, tovarisch. Cock dye la?” This got boy and man all silly again, shrieking in the afternoon heat, pretending to shove pawns and bishops up each other’s noses. Victor calmed down first, breathed slower and slower, and Tom could see the old guy’s eyes crying just a little bit. Maybe was sweat, maybe was just a few tears. Victor gripped the kid’s forearm really, really hard, and then Tom could see that the tears were by now flowing freely. Victor’s voice was little more than a whisper now. “Haroshi malchik. Haroshi malchik.” SUMMER, PART 17 It was the fourth morning of Ricky’s road trip, and just like on the third, the grownups made him get up at 5:15, as they had 200 more miles to cover before they’d perform again. He wasn’t so enthusiastic about the schedule this time, and instead of standing in the back of the truck yelling with teenage joy, he crawled into the back seat with Matt and tried to sleep, but once awake for the first time, couldn’t really. How many more hours til we get there? Can’t I sleep til I feel like waking up? This is earlier than school, even. While Ricky was grumbling to himself on the highway, Tom had already finished his 4:30 AM run and was back into full sleep mode, the curtains of his room drawn tightly to block out the fresh light of the summer’s dawning. His dream was something about doing a speed workout, quarter-mile sprints, but each time he got under 70 seconds, Coach would let him rest more before the next one, and if he got under 67, he’d be allowed to sexually explore a semi-conscious Kyle, who was wearing just an orange speedo, lying in the shade near the pole-vault pit. Very perverted, but an enjoyable and harmless enough way for Tom to spend the time between 6:00 and 8:00. Normal wakeup time hadn’t yet arrived, not even close, but Tom felt something kind of leaning against his right leg. Something that wasn’t usual, as Foxfire usually slept on his left. It was enough to interrupt his dream, and after a moment, enough to pull his eyes open. His father was sitting there, staring down at him. “Dad?” “Tom, sit up now. There’s something I have to tell you. Come on, now.” Dad shook him a little bit, but didn’t tickle him like he sometimes did. Tom squirmed his butt toward the end of the bed so his back could be up straighter, and shook his head a couple times, shook the sleep out of those eyes. He reached for his glasses and put them on his face, showing Dad’s unshaved face in full focus. But even now that Tom was fully awake, his father just stared at him some more, just stared without expression. Too much time passed. “Dad, what’s up? It’s still early, isn’t it?” Dad spoke without moving his head so much as a centimeter, without changing his voice pitch or his face at all. “Tom, we just heard something a few minutes ago. Your grandfather died overnight. Abuela just found out a little while ago.” Dad kept talking about a few things, but Tom didn’t really hear. He tried to have a reaction, but couldn’t. He even tried to picture his old abuelo in his head, but the image wouldn’t come. He knew so little about his grandfather, really didn’t know him much, not like most kids knew their grandparents. Just the cool old guy he stayed with over vacations, who played games with him. He had spent so little time with his grandfather over the years that it didn’t immediately feel like it was a loved relative who was gone. More like just a someone, really. Couldn’t really be, and anyway, Abuelo was never feeble or dying or anything. There was a space of time when Dad was quiet, and Tom felt that he had to say something, he just didn’t know what. Finally his mouth opened. “Dad, but, uhhh, are you sure? I mean Abuelo was never sick or anything, he was always fine.” “That’s right, Tom, he was never sick, never had any symptoms of anything, it was totally unexpected, totally sudden. Maybe it’s the best way to go for the person who dies, but the worst way for the ones he leaves behind. Tom, listen. We’re going to have a lot to do right now and in the next few days. A lot to do that won’t be easy or fun. As you can imagine, your mother and Abuela are in awful shape right now. We’re going to need a lot from you these days. Right now, just get up, get dressed in your blue blazer and tie. We’ll be leaving for Greensboro in about an hour. The Donnellys next door, they’ll help us out, they’ll take care of the dog. I’ll do what I can to handle your mother for now, just get moving and get ready.” Dad got up and walked slowly out of his room, and Tom took a very quick shower and began to get dressed. The sun outside was getting higher and warmer, and there was the usual birdsong from the forest behind the house. Certainly it was no day to be wearing a choking necktie and hot sweaty blazer. No one Tom had ever known had died before, and he didn’t know how he was supposed to feel or react. And heading to Greensboro, everything would be turned upside down, what was gonna happen next? Dad came in and told Tom that he could have some toast and cereal when he was ready. There was still no special expression in the man’s face. Tom was by now dressed in black pants and a short-sleeve button-down shirt, with the tie still untied, its two ends dangling down separately. “Uh, Dad? Like what are we gonna do? We’re going to Greensboro, will we be staying there for the summer, or how long? What’s gonna happen? I don’t…When can we come back home, I mean get back to normal, like training and getting ready for the tournament and stuff? It’s just that…” Dad instantly grabbed both his son’s shoulders, lifted the kid up and hurled him against the wooden wall of the room, hurled him literally through the air. Tom’s head snapped back and smashed into the wall, causing him to cry out in pain. He crumpled to the floor, shocked and badly hurt. He wailed in pain like a baby, and moved his hand to the back of his head, then withdrew it and noticed a small spot of blood on two of his fingertips. Dad was over him, inches from his face, and now was shouting. So out of control that bits of his saliva were hitting Tom in the face. He’d lost his temper before with Tom, very rarely, but had never, not once, touched or struck his son in anger. Never before, but this was now. “HOW DARE YOU? How goddamn DARE you? THIS IS YOUR FAMILY! THIS IS YOUR MOTHER! THIS IS YOUR GRANDMOTHER! HOW ON THIS DAY WHEN WE NEED YOU CAN YOU EVEN BEGIN TO THINK ABOUT YOURSELF AND YOUR OWN STUPID HOBBIES? YOU’RE DISGUSTING! SELFISH PIECE OF SHIT! JUST GET DRESSED, BE OUT AT THE CAR IN TEN MINUTES! I WISH I DIDN’T HAVE TO SEE YOUR FACE TODAY!!” Dad grabbed his son by his shoulders again and picked him up partway off the floor. Then he just dropped him again, like a sack of potatoes, and the boy fell back down on the floor where he was. Dad pointed his finger in Tom’s face for an instant more and was considering saying something else, but just shook his head and walked out. Tom’s head was aching, throbbing rhythmically, and the part that had hit the wall seemed a little bit swollen. But nothing really bad or damaged. He kept touching back there, but there was no more bleeding. He got to his feet, took two aspirin, and finished getting dressed. He didn’t feel like eating anything, just felt like wishing this day could somehow end. Please, God, fast-forward all this. He pissed and walked tentatively toward the kitchen, hoping that nothing worse would happen. Mom was in the kitchen and she looked much older and more delicate than Tom had ever seen her. She had on a black dress and a ladies’ hat for shade. Her face was like a stone, whiter than white. Tom didn’t know what to do, but thought it would be best to simply shut up and offer her his arm to lean on while walking. They said nothing, but Mom did manage to tightly smile for a moment and was willing to lean on him as they made their way out the door and into the car. It was two and a half hours to Greensboro. Should have been more, but Dad drove faster than he should have, silently eating up miles as they drove north and east on the faceless interstate highway. When they finally arrived at the house, there was finally time to cry, time to hug Abuela, who outwardly seemed to be taking things somewhat more calmly than Mom or Dad. But mostly there were too many hours of doing just nothing. Too many hours simply sitting while Mom and Dad talked privately to Abuela in her bedroom. Tom just sat blankly on the couch, looking at the wall clock and occasionally nibbling on snack foods. Was he allowed to play with Tonto? Tom didn’t want to do anything even more wrong, but he had to do something, just sitting here forever was impossible. He finally did invite him onto his lap on the couch. Tonto didn’t understand much English, so Tom just told him comforting things in Spanish, told him that things would be different now, and imagining that the black and brown cat was saying things back to him. Tonto, for his part, just purred, lovingly clawed the boy’s jacket, and rubbed his face into Tom’s. There was ham in the fridge, and Tom broke some into tiny pieces for him and fed him out of his hand. After Tonto finished, he was happy for a long time just licking the boy’s fingers with his scratchy tongue. In the midafternoon, Dad emerged from the bedroom and stood a few feet away from his son. Tom was afraid that he was about to yell about what are you doing with that stupid cat, but not this time. The man was calm, though still with no trace of softness. “You OK, son? Anything you need?” “I’m all right, Dad. There’s stuff to eat out here. Is…is there anything I can do for anyone right now?” Tom stared at his father, hoping for some sign of forgiveness, for it all to be better, but there was nothing there, no hint of anything in his eyes. “Look, Mom and I have much, much more to talk about with Abuela. Tonight, Mom will stay here, and you and I will check into a motel nearby. The funeral will be in the morning.” The man’s voice was soft, but the face was blank. “OK, Dad.” Tom and his father looked hard at each other but neither one moved. Tonto seemed to sense the tension, jumped off the kid’s lap, and disappeared. Dad walked slowly into the kitchen, got himself something to eat from the fridge, something that appeared to Tom to be bread and cold cuts. Tom knew he wasn’t supposed to be thinking about anything but his family, but couldn’t help thinking of an old movie, an old movie about a chess kid from New York, a kid who was a really good player. There was a scene, really nothing like this, it was after a game and it was raining, and no one had died, but the kid was outside in the pouring rain, sitting on the sidewalk and looking up at his father. In the movie the little kid then said only one line. “Why are you standing so far away from me?” SUMMER, PART 18 It was a long, slow evening. Minutes and hours dragged, clocks stubbornly resisting their march forward. After a couple more hours at the house, Dad took Tom out to eat, then to the motel. Tom had pretty much nothing to say, and Dad talked about specific things that would happen, small details about tomorrow’s funeral and receiving condolence calls from the grandparents’ friends. Tom definitely wanted to say things, like ask whether things could be back the way they were before, apologize for talking like a selfish piece of shit, ask how Mom was going to deal with everything, ask and say so much. But nothing came out of his mouth, and the worst part was that Dad really said nothing about what Tom wanted to know. Dad was still calm, which was in a way the worst part, because his son didn’t know how things were, didn’t have any resolution to anything. At the motel, Dad stretched his legs out on one bed and tried to read a newspaper, though the words didn’t seem that important to him. Words about people far away that he’d probably never have to deal with anymore, words about people killing and bombing and raping each other. People who, at this point in his life, Dad figured should simply do their thing and stay far away from me. Tom lay down on the other bed, looking blankly at the ceiling. Usually, whenever he went somewhere with his parents, he’d bring along his hand-held chess computer or at least his magnetic set to keep him occupied, but this time he’d left them at home, for obvious reasons. He usually didn’t like TV very much, but on this night just wished he could turn it on, just have some sort of noise to fill the space, something to concentrate on. The remote control was right on the table, just a couple feet away, but Tom didn’t reach for it. He didn’t want to do anything to make anything worse than it already was. Another hour passed, and Dad was finally equally bored. “All right, Tom, we’ve made some decisions today. Tomorrow, you and I will be heading home, but Mom will be staying here with Abuela for at least a week, probably longer. Abuela will be coming to live with us permanently. Mom will help her deal with all the details of selling their house, getting rid of as many possessions as possible, all the legal aspects, you have no idea how much she has to do. She’s called her superiors at work, she can get this time off, but you have to realize what she’s going through, it’s brutal. Now Abuela is going to live in that storage room next to your room, she’ll share the other bathroom with you. In a few days, when Mom says she’s ready, I’m going to rent a U-Haul and both of us are going to bring a lot of Abuela’s stuff back to our house. Some furniture, lots of personal stuff, some kitchen things, whatever she wants. Before then, I’ll need you to help me prepare that room for her. We’ll have to get rid of the junk, completely clean it up, put in carpet, maybe wallpaper, we’re going to make our house your grandmother’s home. You’ll have a lot to do.” “Of course, Dad, anything you need, no problem. But Dad,” Tom didn’t know if he should continue, but he was curious. “Isn’t that room kind of small? I mean are you sure she’ll be comfortable enough there? And what about Loco and Tonto, are you going to give them away?” “Well, Abuela doesn’t need a whole lot of space, and anyway, we really don’t have another choice, another way to do this. She’s just decided that it would be too difficult for her to stay here in Greensboro alone, too difficult physically and emotionally. I thought we should get rid of the cats, but Abuela says she wants to keep them, they’ll live at our house too. Abuela says they’re something to remind her of the good times, and something to keep her busy a bit. They’ll probably be outside most of the time, anyway. Something new for Foxfire to deal with, and we’ll find out if all the critters get along, that’ll be quite the scene.” Something a little softer out of Dad’s mouth, something almost slightly funny. Tom couldn’t hold back his curiosity any longer, he had to know. “Dad?” he said very softly. “Dad, I just want to say, this morning, please, I didn’t mean…” “NO, Tom. Not NOW!” Dad replied sharply, instantly, but not angrily. “Just….” Tom watched Dad’s hands, fingers rigid, gesturing downwards toward his knees. It was obvious that Dad was upset again, and Tom started breathing faster. “Tom, not now,” the man repeated. “Just don’t make me think back to this morning right now. Don’t make me think of the worst thing I’ve ever done in my life, just….I have much too much to think about, much too much to deal with these days, it’s a lot to get through. Compared to the rest of us, what we’re asking of you isn’t all that much. But anyway, not now, I can’t get into thinking about this morning, I don’t have the strength.” Tom now opened up just a bit, felt slightly less nervous. “It’s all weird, I never really knew much about Abuelo. He was cool, we had fun together on my vacations, but I don’t know anything about, you know, what his life was like.” “Tomorrow, at the synagogue, evidently the rabbi will give a eulogy, and I think some of their friends will say some words, maybe you’ll get better acquainted with him, in a way, though of course too late. He was an amazing man, had quite a life. A simple man, but amazing too. I guess it was because of my job and travels that you never really got to know your grandparents as most kids should. Look, Tom, I can’t talk anymore tonight, just be quiet, leave me alone now.” Tom instantly shut up, shut up for the rest of the night. He still wasn’t tired, but was bored out of his mind, and still very afraid of his father. Fortunately Dad was the one who reached for the TV remote, made the thing spring to life. He put it on CNN, where people were indeed bombing and killing and raping, and people in ties and jackets were explaining why, if indeed there was a why. Tom just figured they felt like it, that was just how some guys are. But at least the hum of the voices combined with the hum of the air conditioning covered up the silence in the room, gave both him and his father something to focus on. Tom undressed, kicked off the blanket, and crawled under one sheet. He rolled onto his side, looking at his silent father and hearing the TV news. Were things OK now? Maybe a little, but no way to know. The scene at the synagogue was new and surprising for Tom. He’d never actually been to a service of any kind. Mom and Dad really didn’t practice Judaism at all, it was something they were, but not something they did. So Tom didn’t know much. He knew that serious Jewish kids got Bar Mitzvah’ed at age 13, was some kind of ceremony where the kid was supposed to conduct the service speaking Hebrew. He thought that all serious Jews knew Hebrew perfectly, just like he knew Spanish. He had no idea how much, if anything, his grandparents were into the Jewish stuff. When he went in with his parents, someone gave him a little black cap, he wondered how it stayed on his head without falling off, but it remained perfectly in place without him having to touch it. Abuela was already down in the front area, and the other Kleins joined her. Tom tried to concentrate on the different prayers and things, though more of the service was in English than in Hebrew. There was one main prayer, and he was able to catch and remember the beginning line, as it was chanted in some sort of rhythm. Something like v’yis’ga dah, v’yis’ga dah, shamay rabo. None of the other peope there looked Mexican at all, maybe Abuelo’s friends were all Americans. The rabbi gave a speech about Abuelo’s life, calling the man “our brother Alvaro”, said stuff that Tom had no idea about. He knew his grandparents came from Mexico, but didn’t know that they had come to this city without a penny, didn’t know that they had owned a store for almost 30 years, didn’t know that Abuelo had once been a member of the City Council, didn’t know about all the charity stuff that they had been into. Until the rabbi pointed them out, Tom didn’t even know that Mom had a sister and a brother, who he guessed qualified as his aunt and uncle, and were sitting at the end of the row. Mom and Abuela were seemingly calm and in control, just crying a little bit, nodding or rocking back and forth a little as the rabbi or some friends spoke. At the graveyard, it was even more weird, and more sad. The day was so hot, and there wasn’t enough wind to dry off the sweat. Tom noticed a huge statue right down the path from where his grandfather would be buried. It had four stone lions, each one looking in a different direction. Underneath the lion facing him, there was an inscription that read “To Live in the Hearts of Those We Loved Is Not to Die”. Really? Maybe that’s something, maybe that’s a tiny bit of good news. Abuela and Mom finally lost control of themselves at the moment it was time to lay Abuelo’s casket in the hole. Tom and his father just stayed numb, and the boy’s unknown uncle grabbed him around the shoulders, holding him tightly. After all that, everyone made their way back to the house and Abuela seemed better. She and Mom had prepared buffet food for everyone, and talking with people seemed to lift up their spirits a little. Abuela introduced Tom to some of their friends, old folks and middle-aged ones. None of them spoke Spanish at all. Guess my grandparents really were 100% Americans, gave up the old language when they were with other people. People seemed more interesting in hearing Tom talk about himself than to talk about his grandfather, which was just as well, because Tom didn’t know what he’d say about Abuelo, he knew so little. The ride home with Dad was slower, and Tom was able to sleep in the back seat for most of it. Dad made some spaghetti for dinner, and Tom went for a little run in the evening. He wondered if he should invite Dad, but thought it was better if he didn’t talk unless Dad talked to him first. Just do what he says, and let him be. That same evening around 6:00, Ricky was lying in a Motel 6 in Massachusetts, bone-weary and not that happy. At least it was a real bed, not a couch in someone’s house where his legs didn’t always fit. The music was cool, but every day was almost 18 hours long, either driving or damn near non-stop playing, often the same tunes over and over, and all the places were beginning to look the same. It was really tough to get up energy anymore for this, yeah, the crowds were cool, but it was nothing like the first day, nothing exciting anymore. He was still OK, really, still was doing what he had to, though sometimes he growled attitude things at Mike or Julie when he was sick and tired of something. Tomorrow morning, they’d be heading west to someplace called Schenectady, New York, a place that Ricky had no idea how to spell but did know was Matt’s hometown. Matt was sharing the room with him, while Mike and Julie had the neighboring one. Matt could see that the boy wasn’t anywhere near in the same shape as he was at the beginning of the tour. The young teenage fire had definitely burned out of him. The guy with the terrible name sat down next to him on the bed nearer the TV, spoke quietly. “What are you thinking, Ricky? How do you feel about all this?” SUMMER, PART 19 “I just never knew the days would be so long, I’m just wiped out now, day after day. I like the music, you guys are cool, but all the driving, performing all day, every day, it’s kinda too much, I can’t get up the energy I used to.” “Something you gotta build into, get accustomed to, Ricky. Sleep when you can, try to get into it as the days go on, I know it’s tough. Sometimes is for me, too. Other years, I did this tour with my wife, having her around helped.” “Where is she now?” Ricky never knew Matt had a wife, really knew nothing about him except that this place called ske neck ta dee or something was where he was originally from. He wasn’t afraid of the guy anymore, and was OK as long as he didn’t have to call him by his name, as long as that 4-letter name didn’t have to come out of his mouth. Ricky was stretched out on his side, and didn’t really notice that Matt had one arm around him, was holding on to his other shoulder. “Ah, that’s a long story, no need to get into all that. Long story.” “Hmmm,” Ricky said softly. “I’m not like tired wanting to sleep, but my arms and legs, I can hardly move, and I just don’t wanna hear any more music for awhile, it’s all running together in my head. But we’re on again tonight, right?” “Yup, we’re playing at the Iron Horse, bigger nighttime crowd than you’re used to, Ricky, Iron Horse is the biggest folk music bar in New England, serious world-class bands play there all the time. But it’s an easy crowd to play for, they just want to enjoy, they’ll help you out. We have almost two hours til we head out there. You want anything more to eat? I can get you some Burger King junk food from down the street.” “Uhhh, thanks, I dunno, I’m not that hungry, I pigged on hotdogs and pizza at the festival all day long in between sets. Maybe I will try to sleep a bit, at least close my eyes.” “Yeah, we’ll just take it easy for awhile.” Ricky did close his eyes, didn’t sleep, but tried to think of anything besides music and audiences and the road. He thought of Bobby and the basketball team. Bobby’s definitely going to play varsity, I wonder if I can make it? Varsity pretty much sucked last year, and a few of the guys on it are shorter than me. But shit, I was on the bench most of last year on the 8th grade team, I usually sucked. Maybe it would be more fun to get to play more minutes with the 9th grade or JV team? Matt hadn’t budged from where he was, and Ricky wasn’t really thinking about him. Until those fingers of his, those fingers that had been holding his opposite shoulder, began to move. Barely move, really, it was more like they were probing, alternately pressing harder and then softer into the material of his T-shirt. Thumb on the collarbone, pinky down towards the boy’s skinny bicep muscle. Feeling and exploring. Ricky stopped thinking about school and basketball, and tensed up his body, but didn’t move at all himself, and didn’t open his eyes. Matt’s fingers drifted a little south, down around his elbow, very softly petting the tiny yellow hairs on his forearm. Oh shit, oh my God, this guy, oh man, just like Father Ray but he really is, he’s really doing this, oh shit. But it’s not like he’s gonna rape me or anything, still… Ricky didn’t think or plan to say anything, but his voice just began talking. “I have a girlfriend in Georgia, she’s really nice, her name’s Jenny.” Instantly the guy’s hand leaped off his arm and touched the wall behind them instead. Cold wall instead of warm 14 year-old skin, and Matt knew exactly what the deal was. His voice was calm, but his blood ran cold. “Jenny, great, what’s she look like?” Maybe the guy’s OK. He’s always helped me out, give him a break. He doesn’t want to hurt me, come on, Jesus would be nice to him. “She’s really sexy, she has long brown hair and she always I guess shampoos with stuff that smells like apples. And she has this really, really thick southern accent, way more redneck than me, I guess, oh, it’s so sweet, man. She’s rich, I went to their house last Thanksgiving, and her house is huge, giant yard, really fancy. Her parents and grandparents are nice, her grandfather can fiddle.” “She sounds nice. Well, Ricky, I’ll let you rest for awhile, I’ll just read something over on my side of the room.” Oh no, Matt thought, you’ve done it again, shit, that’s why Lisa left you, she didn’t say it out loud but she knows what’s up. How the hell did she find out, was it about that kid Gerald? But we never actually did anything. Or did she get into your stuff in the computer? Doesn’t matter, she’s gone, it’s over. This Ricky, he’s such a good kid, but damn, why did you make him uncomfortable, he’s never done anything wrong to you. WHY are you a fucking child molester? Can’t you see that no kid will ever want you for that kind of stuff, Ricky’s so polite, it’s not like he’ll tell anyone, but he knows. Prep school kid, he must know. Your life is worth squat, you’re on your own. Matt closed his eyes and tried to sleep himself, but no luck. His mind formed images of things he’d never seen and probably never should, images of teenage boys’ growing legs and stiffening penises and firm stomach muscles. Images of things that he really wished he didn’t desire. And I hurt Lisa, she never deserved this. But a little later, the man’s depressing thoughts were interrupted, and he at first thought he was dreaming, but no, this was all real. Ricky had come over with him, and was lying sideways, just like on the other bed. Yellow hair right on his neck, beautiful shoulders against his body in the same position as before. “Hi, Matt,” the boy said, showing his teeth in a smile, the same one he did on stage. Matt? What the hell did he say? He said the word? The kid playfully punched his jaw and giggled for a second. “It’s cool, yeah, we’ll just hang out for a little while, rest before we’re on again.” Ricky then picked up the man’s hand, replaced it onto his own elbow and forearm, just like before, and closed his eyes again. What the hell, oh my God, yes, yes, NO!!!!! Don’t even, don’t even, the kid does NOT want more than this, he’s just happy being friends, he’s lonely on the road kind of like you. Don’t even, don’t go there, just his arm, that’s all. But damn, that warm arm and shoulder feel good, it’s more than you’ve had in so long. And sniff his hair, whatever that chick Jenny’s hair smells like, not like this. Not as nice as this in a million years. What an amazing kid you’ve run into. Damn. The road trip continued. Ricky tried as best he could to bring his energy and intensity into every song, every set, but he was running on empty, and it was obvious. Three mornings later, in the shade on a bench in Pennsylvania, Julie and Mike sat down next to him, and Julie gave him a little hug and harmless enough kiss. “Ricky? You seem pretty worn out these last couple days, both on stage and off. Is this still fun for you? You’re such an easygoing, polite kid, you’d never complain, but I see something in you. Talk to us, don’t be shy or afraid. What do you think?” Tell them, may as well. “This trip has been fun, I mean it’s so cool being professional, but I’ve never, not even close, played this much, played every day, so many hours, and so much driving places. This is way, way harder than school, really. I’m trying the best I can, but my throat hurts, and it’s like I never get the same sleep I’m used to. But I’m OK, I’m not gonna let you down, I’ll get myself cranked up, I promise. Part of being a musician, I guess.” Julie petted his neck some more. “Ricky, all three of us have talked this over. Do you feel you’re ready to go home? Would be no problem at all for us, we could just call your parents, put you on a bus, you’ve done great, and you’re such a special boy. If you’ve had enough, that would be perfectly OK, we understand.” “How many more days do we have to go?” “Today and four more performing, then Monday we’ll be home by 10 AM.” “Can I walk around for a couple minutes and think about it? Can I meet you right here in ten minutes and we’ll like talk some more?” “Sure, Ricky. Mike has to do a few things but I’ll see you right back here soon.” Ricky wandered around the carnival, barely hearing the sounds of the piped music and of kids screaming on the rides. If you’re ready to go home, maybe it really is time. But you’re not a little kid, you should be tough enough, for God’s sake, man up. Ricky heard one sound that snapped his head around, got his attention back, made him forget his big decision for a minute. “Calzones, calzones, get your delicious cheese calzones, best in the state, calZOOONNNES!” “JAY! What the hell, is that you? Calzones, what happened to fried dough?” “RICKY!!! Man, haven’t seen you since Virginia, what you been up to? Ah, we do different stuff in different places, wo, I didn’t know where your band was, didn’t know if you were gonna be around again.” “Well, we’re here now. Look, I gotta talk to my people for a minute, be right back, talk to ya soon!” Julie was sitting where she had been before, slurping on an ice-cream cone. “Julie, I’ve been thinking, and if it’s OK with you guys, I really, really want to finish the tour. Sometimes, a guy’s gotta finish what he starts. But if you think I’m not good enough anymore, and you want to go the rest of the way without me, of course I understand, no problem. But if it’s up to me, please, I want to finish.” “We still want you around, Ricky, you bet, if you’re absolutely sure this is your decision.” “Yeah, let’s do it.” “But we have one thing we want you to do differently today, Ricky. You take this day off, no picking or singing for you, we’ll do everything today.” “But I’m OK, I’ll be all right, I can perform.” “No, Ricky, that is an ORDER!” Julie turned her voice into one of a nagging but playful mother. “You’re going to CHILL, you’re going to wander around the FAIR, you’re going to get some SLEEP, and don’t you even think about touching a string today. Now at the motel, there’s a few things in the fridge, you can boil up some spaghetti on the stove, we want you to just be a kid, nothing professional til tomorrow. We mean it.” Ricky didn’t wait to be told twice. “COOL!!! Thanks, Julie, I’m outa here!!!” Ricky jumped off the bench and ran away, ran back to the calzone booth. Yee haw. “Jay, guess what? I got the whole day off, I don’t have to do a damn thing til tomorrow, this is seriously decent, how ‘bout you?” “Gonna be here til 2, then I’m gonna be a kid clown in the circus show at 3, then that’s all, you wanna just hang out after that, we’ll get all stupid, bother people, I’ll show you the rest of the circus stuff, we got all night I guess! Hey, have a calzone, on the house, Mom’s not here now.” “Sure, thanks. Hey, I’m gonna sleep for awhile, I never sleep in the day but I need it now, so you’re really gonna be in the circus?” “Yeah, I’ll get you backstage for this, some freaky stuff going on in this thing, this is so great that you’re around, hey, well, get some sleep, lazy-ass, see you here at 2!” Ricky’s three-hour nap was delicious, the first time in a long time that he’d really been able to relax completely, let everything go. Let everything go, think of Jenny and her lips, they’re strong, they hold onto me like claws, this sleep is so nice. Jay was a great performer, too, made Ricky go crazy screaming and laughing. He’d done this stuff for years, knew just how and when and where to chuck the hidden pies at people, could juggle, could act, Ricky really was into his new friend. Later he showed Ricky how they practiced the fire acts, showed him how they did some of the magic tricks, amazing, how did they think of that? This was a new world, and Ricky was back to being a little kid again, though a 6-foot-tall one. And the boys did follow through on their agreement to get stupid and bother people. For the night performance, which Jay wasn’t in, Jay led Ricky under the wooden bleachers, where they both had mad fun staring up the shorts of the girls, or trying to climb up so their faces were inches from the girls’ or young women’s reproductive parts. Sometimes they took a wooden stick and gently poked some girl in that general region, then raced away laughing like idiots, hiding while the girl screamed and bent her head to try to look under the seats. This Jay, he was only about Tom’s size, maybe even a little smaller, but he knew everything. Both kids were eventually exhausted from six hours of nonstop evil. They both sat down in the empty circus tent, still giggling but calming down, breathing slower. “Jay, we’re moving on tomorrow, I think we’re playing next in some town called Donegal, but…we gotta get together somewhere, sometime again. We gotta do something together again, I don’t know, gotta do it.” “Yeah, I don’t know how, but we’re gonna be back in Florida in early December, we don’t do much for about three months around then. Look, I get online once in awhile, hey, let’s write down e-mails, numbers and stuff. You know, there aren’t that many kids our age doing carney work.” A couple hours earlier, while the two boys were running around causing trouble, a phone rang down in Georgia. “Hello?” “Hi, Marty?” “Uh, yes, who’s this?” “This is me, Cameron Spann, Ricky’s father! Remember? How’s Tom this summer, and how’s your old-man life of leisure retirement going? Hey, but it’s really you I want to talk to. Want to ask you something, you ready?” SUMMER, PART 20 “Oh yeah, Cameron, it’s been awhile, I didn’t remember your voice there for a minute. Hey, this old man might be coming out of retirement soon, might be doing some teaching and advising in International Studies over at UGA in Athens. At this stage, I’ll sure prefer Athens, Georgia, to Athens, Greece! Tom’s all right, we’ve been through some bad things recently, my father-in-law died, it was sudden, lots of issues still for us to deal with now, but things go on, they have to, Tom’s a good boy. How ‘bout Ricky, wow, your son is huge now, you must be scared of that kid!” “Well, not these days, Marty, to tell you the truth he’s not home. Something strange happened, he was invited to go touring with a folk music band for a couple weeks, playing carnivals, festivals, things like that. He’s been travelling with them all over the northeast, I have no idea what town they’re in this minute. You know, where we’re from, western North Carolina, that’s kind of the world center for bluegrass music, and it seemed strange, but I guess he’s good enough to be with a real band. He’ll be home in a few days. But here’s what I was thinking. When Ricky gets home, I’ll be getting some time off work, and Ricky and I are going to do a little hiking, backpacking. Get out of town, yeah, commune with the nature, the whole deal. I was thinking of Pisgah National Forest. Nowhere near as crowded as the Smokies or the Appalachian Trail, mix some rugged and easy hiking, there are wooden lean-to shelters in various parts, lots of streams and rivers for water or for the kids to play in, and we’d love it if Tom could come with us, and even better if you can, too. Hey, it’ll be a four-guy thing, we’ll have some fun. We have some camping equipment here, we can borrow more from friends, all we need is you guys. Ricky doesn’t really say much to us, but I think he misses Tom a lot.” “You know, Ricky called us maybe three weeks ago about this, I know Tom’ll be into it, yeah, great. And, me, I didn’t know before, but what the hell, some father-son time, I think that might be exactly what both of us need. His grandmother will be coming down to our house to live permanently, she’ll be here in a few more days, maybe the adjustment will be easier for her without Tom and me around, yeah. Done, Cameron. Thanks for inviting us, we accept. Yeah, a four-guy thing, I don’t think I’ve ever done anything like this before.” “Well, might actually be even more than four, but not sure yet, we’ll work stuff out. You ever done any camping, hiking, outside stuff?” “Not since I was a kid, maybe no older than Tom. So many years, I’ve been off in some godforsaken part of the world, something for the government, but hey, time to call somewhere home, enjoy something good and peaceful. Tom’s gonna have the best time of his life, I’m sure of that.” “Well, anyway, Marty, we’ll keep in touch over the next few days, figure out all the plans, this whole thing’ll be a lot of fun. Yeah, we’ll all do the primal male bonding stuff, forget the rest of the world for awhile.” “Thanks for thinking of the idea, Cameron, I can’t wait! Now you got me all excited. Take care of yourself. Goodnight.” Mr. Klein hung up the phone, leaned back in the large soft couch, and closed his eyes. I told pretty much a complete stranger that Tom’s a good boy, and it’s the truth, usually. I told a guy that I’ve really met once in my life, and I haven’t yet been able to tell my own kid. If only he could learn that the world doesn’t involve only around him, but he’s 13, he really is sorry about the other morning. What did I do, how could I have possibly thrown my child into a wall, I don’t care how much he deserved it, don’t care how bad that day was. Can’t use the “busy” excuse anymore, plenty of time now. Let’s do it. Knock, knock. “Come on in, Dad.” “Whatcha doing there, Tom?” “I’m on ICC. This guy’s tough, I have an extra pawn on the Queenside, but he’s got his knight camped out in front of my isolated pawn in the center, I can’t even bust free, what am I gonna do? My clock’s down to under 4 minutes.” “Eat up all his pieces, why don’t you?” “Yeah, this guy won’t let me, only patzers and dumbasses let me do that.” The faceless online opponent from Italy soon offered Tom a draw that Tom accepted gratefully, even though he still was up a pawn. Tom was under a lot of pressure in this endgame from the guy’s knight and invading king, and was actually scared he was going to lose. He got out of ICC and looked at Dad, who was setting up the big plastic pieces on the floor. “Well, kid, you got a draw from him, but you know you won’t get one off me, you know I dominate you at the chessboard! Get ready to suffer some pain.” “Uhhhh, Dad, how old was I the last time you beat me, I think maybe 9?” “Well, Tom, you have to give me a handicap, make it fair, how ‘bout in the starting position you take off your queen?” “BULLSHIT!” Tom smiled and was having fun arguing with his Dad, it was better than just ignoring each other. “Or how ‘bout you don’t look at the board, I’ll tell you my moves, you play blind?” “In your dreams, maybe. All right, Dad, I got one last idea. How ‘bout the only change is that I have to play real chess, touch-move, and if you make a mistake, you can have take-backs as long as you do it before I make my move?” “I got an even better idea, Tom. Come on up here,” Dad said, sitting up on the edge of the bed. Tom never expected what happened next. Dad grabbed hold of him, threw him horizontally down, and was all over him. “Tom, Tom, son, I love you so much, I’m so sorry about that morning, never before, never again, it was just such a bad time, I love you, please know that.” He held his son tightly, really tightly, kissing the kid’s ear, squeezing the skinny kid hard, rocking back on forth on the bed. No one said anything for a few minutes, they just hugged and rubbed each other’s backs. Tom broke the silence eventually. “Dad?” “What is it, Tom?” “You’re crushing me, I can’t breathe.” “Ohhh, well, sorry, should I let you go or kill you, kind of like a boa constrictor?” “How ‘bout letting me breathe but let’s just stay and hang out for awhile? Hell with the dumb game.” They lay down next to each other, Tom resting his head into the crook between his father’s jaw and shoulder. Tom started semi-crying, not enough for tears to leave his eyes, really more like sniffling. “Dad, I never met anything bad that morning, it was like I didn’t know what to say, I was so surprised by what happened. I wasn’t trying to be selfish, I just didn’t…I guess if I don’t know what to say, I should usually just shut up. Anyway, is everything OK now? Is it all over?” “No, Tom. It’s never over. You’ll never have your grandfather again, Mom and Abuela will never have him either. It’s never over. But we have to go on, new things happen. You’ve helped me a lot in preparing her room, you did a good job that day we went up there with the truck, but you have to know that things will never be the same, you can’t expect that. Anyway, I got a call from Ricky’s father, you know what?” The last few days of Ricky’s magical mystery tour moved quickly, and on the promised Monday morning, the red pickup truck, after almost 2500 miles of wandering, pulled into the Spann’s driveway. Mom and Dad had talked to Ricky on his cell phone earlier that morning. They would both be out working when he arrived, but he had his house key and they said they’d leave a note on the front door about a couple little chores he was supposed to do when he got home. Everyone got out to stretch their legs, and the goodbyes got emotional. Julie was of course the woman, the toucher, the love creature. “Mmmm, Ricky, you were such a great kid, such a great musician, wow. We’ll miss you so much when you go back to school. What are you going to do now?” “Uhh, like maybe sleep for the next two weeks? Ah, seriously, I dunno, I think my father and me might be going camping soon, he has some time off coming up. We might even take my roommate from school. And eventually I guess I’ll get back into my hours at Wal-Mart, gotta see how things go.” Mike shook Ricky’s hand warmly, and the only one left was the quiet guy from up north, the quiet guy with the now-not-so-horrible name, the guy who had given Ricky a present of a small wooden pan-pipe flute, like they play in South America. Ricky put his arm around the shorter man and they gave each other a semi-hug. “Hey, Matt, thanks so much for the Andean flute, and for everything, I learned so much from you, I’ll never forget these couple weeks, man.” “So you can really say my name now? You’ve done it twice! That’s something!” “Yeah, I can say it. And I got something else to say to you, I’ve been practicing this for a couple days.” Ricky stopped for a minute, paused, got ready to retool his voice, to talk in a pure northern accent, just like the guy who yeah, was probably gay, but still was cool. “I bet I see you again somewhere down the line!” Got everyone laughing, ahhh, look who can pass for a damn Yankee now! Final goodbyes, waves, and Ricky watched the truck pull away down the street, taking all those memories with it. He walked up to the front door, and saw a school-size piece of paper taped there. “Hi Ricky! Welcome back, rock star! There’s something inside you might notice. Take it outside, name it, deal with it! See you in the afternoon! Love, Us.” Huh? Mom and Dad are so weird, why can’t they just tell me stuff normally, this is stupid. Ricky turned the key, and heard a deep WUFF! WUFF! Something came running at him from the den, something black and furry and really ugly. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God….Ricky dropped down on his knees and in an instant they were all over each other. Two-legged persons lips, four-legged person’s tongue, it got pretty serious. Ricky hugged the thing tighter and asked him just one thing. “WHO THE HELL ARE YOU??” SUMMER, PART 21 Ricky named the puppy Ugly. It was an appropriate name, and after a little bit of training, the creature also answered to the shortened nickname Ug. He was somewhat smarter than his teenage master in learning certain school-type tasks, like Paw and Sit and Roll Over and Fetch. He could catch a tennis ball and was very good at kissing, but had one advantage over the late, still-lamented Fluffy—Ugly could lick people’s faces without drowning his victim in disgusting globs of canine saliva. Ricky and Dad tried to guess what breed he might be, but big purebred mutt was the only correct description for him. He was so furry that the afternoon heat was tough for him, and he mostly liked to play outside in the evenings. But when he was together with Foxfire and the humans, in the cool shade of the national forest, he was fine. He and Foxfire were introduced, and mostly got to know each other through the mysterious dog ritual of sniffing up each other’s asses. Well, the dogs didn’t understand the whole human handshake idea, either. How can you get to know anyone that way? The trip was a serious treat for both animals. Endless walks, plenty of food, and except for “Come here”, very few annoying commands. Ricky’s Dad had planned out 5-6 days, with some serious hiking mixed with easy stuff, everything near rivers. In the middle, they’d reach a small town where they could restock with food, no one would have to carry so much heavy stuff in his pack. The first day was the longest hike, and usually the four youngest people went way ahead of the fathers on the trail, kind of competing to see who could make it up and down the hills fastest. No worry about anyone getting lost. The trails were very well-marked, and the boys, especially Tom, kept up pretty much non-stop yakking for hour after hour. “Damn, Tom, you’re getting taller.” “You’re not.” “Yeah, I can still kick your ass from one end of anywhere to another. Hey, Dad says that right near where we’re stopping tonight, the river has a sliding rock place, you slide down into the deep part. Not like THE Sliding Rock, you know, where everybody goes, the tourist place, but he says it’s still pretty big, says he used to come here with my brother. You gonna slide or you gonna be a girl with a cunt like usual?” Tom heard something in there that made him stop and think. “Your brother?” Oh man, I never told him before. Never, not once, even with all the stuff we used to talk about. I used to be so scared of talking about him, thinking about him, not anymore, though, the summer Matt from the band kind of cured me of all that. “Tom, I…I guess I never told you that whole story, shit, I’m sorry. I gotta tell you some stuff, let’s sit down, Dads must be way the hell behind us.” The kids and their dogs sat down peacefully and Tom listened to everything, listened to all Ricky had to say about the whole awful thing, about how he used to get all tense and sad, and even now wished so bad he knew what his older brother was like. He didn’t cry or get emotional, he was past that now, but figured that it was best that Tom knew about brother Matthew. Tom, for his part, was becoming a better listener as he was growing up, and he was quiet and respectful during Ricky’s description of everything, leaning against a tree while the bigger kid was lying down horizontally, his backpack under his head as a pillow. Tom wanted to get all over and comfort Ricky, wanted to touch him not in a gay sex way, just touch him. The closest he got was the back of his hand brushing Ricky’s shoulder. “Wo, Ricky, that must have really really sucked. I’m glad you, you know, feel a little better now, at least you can talk about it to people. My grandfather died this summer, that was weird, but I guess it’s different with old people, almost like it’s supposed to happen. And I didn’t know much about him, I wish I did but we never were together much.” “Yeah. I think I hear old guys.” Ricky did a Tarzan yell, pounding on his chest like a savage wilderness beast, scaring Foxfire. Both fathers yelled back the same way, though theirs were weaker and funnier. For the last couple miles of mostly downhill walking, all six people, all sixteen legs walked together, and the kids had to suffer through various old-man jokes their fathers told to pass the time on the trail. The one about Bill Clinton and the Virgin Mary, the one about The Mother-in-Law, the one about If You Catch Me You Can Keep Me, the one about The Traveling Salesman and the Sheep. Too many others, way too corny, pure torture for the boys, but both fathers were just about rolling on the ground laughing. Would have been, if they weren’t hiking. Tom had to admit to himself that the jokes were so stupid that after a while, they WERE actually funny. And all this green, he thought to himself. Parts of school are like this, like the cross-country course and the parts up near the ampitheatre, but not going on forever like this. And there’s not much sun, the trees pretty much block it out, like covering us. There’s almost always the sound of rushing water somewhere, coming from some stream or river I guess, and the wind’s always saying something too. Would be nice if Dad and Mr. Spann would shut up, I could just get into hearing the peace sounds and our own footprints. But they’re having fun, it’s cool I guess. This is so much better than Buenos Aires or Washington when I was little. Wish I could stay out here forever, kinda like Old Man Cropsy, except without the wife, and I don’t really want to chop people’s heads off, unless of course they mess with me. Ricky was giggling about something, giggling loud enough to snap the smaller kid out of his daydreams. Oh, Ricky was winding up one of his own jokes, that dumb one about For a Nickel I Will, But My Momma Won’t Like It. That’s the stupidest joke of the day, wins the goddamn gold medal. The group got to the shelter they’d sleep in pretty early, just a bit after 5:00. Hours and hours of daylight left, no rush to do much. The kids helped gather some wood, then disappeared to the river while their fathers organized dinner. They would have gone swimming, but both of them were pretty tired from the full-day hike, even though they wouldn’t admit it to each other. They dipped bare feet in the cool water and waded a bit, but didn’t feel like taking off clothes and actually getting soaked. The dogs drank their fill from the edge, then lay down for a nap in a pine straw part near the water’s edge. For awhile, Ricky told Tom stories of his road trip, things about the country fairs and the towns and the music and the girls, though he also told Tom he didn’t even think of really doing stuff with any of them, ‘cause Jenny’s mine, she’s special. “Maybe one day you’ll get a girl, Tom, hey, try it, maybe you’ll like it.” “Guess so, anyway you’re really into this Jenny chick, remember that first night you met her, that school dance. You’re lucky I was tired and left you two alone, otherwise she’d have been all over me, I’m such a stud, ya know.” “Uhhh, right, Tom, somehow I don’t think she ever mentioned the exact word “stud” talking about you, I wonder why not.” “Probably she’s too shy, but you know she thinks it. But anyway, she’s really nice?” “Oh, Tom, man, you got no idea.” Ricky’s face got all dreamy for a minute, then he returned back to normal. “Hey, I almost forgot, I got something to show you. One of the people in the band gave me this, it’s so cool.” Ricky brought out his Andean flute and made sounds. Sounds that were haunting, eerie, sounds that just blended in with the early-evening forest noises, just like they were a part of the nature of the forest and had always been there. Tom loved it when his friend played music for him, made the times sooo special. He closed his eyes and listened while Ricky went through the only tunes he’d learned so far. Sounds of Silence, El Condor Pasa, and a classical tune Tom recognized from Ricky’s guitar back at school, Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring. “You wanna try?” asked Ricky when the last whistle note sounded. “It’s easy, way easier than the guitar.” “No way, thanks, you know I suck at music, listening’s better for me. Hey, bet dinner’s about ready. Me and Foxfire’ll race ya back to the shelter, you’re so damn slow! Pussy lips!! See ya, wouldn’t wanna be ya!” Not only was Tom much faster, even in the short half-mile distance to their camping area, he also hadn’t brought his pack. At least he was better than Ricky at something, something besides useless classes and grades. By the time the boys got back, other hikers had stopped there for the night, two husband/wife groups, one of whom seemed to the boys to be way too old for this, all white-haired like Coach Prszeczkopowski, but maybe even in better shape—the old folks didn’t seem tired at all. Dinner was kind of a communal thing, everyone together, a lot of laughing, a bit of sharing with the dogs, and a decent-size pyro fire that burned much of the evening. Officially, you weren’t supposed to make fires unless it was an emergency—to save the woods, the national forest guidelines said people were asked to use gas stoves. But Mr. Spann figured a fire would be OK, they’d only use wood that was already down. Gas stoves used a nonrenewable fossil fuel, and anyway, every teenage boy should have the chance to grow up and be outdoors in the forest sometime, and get to stare and listen for pleasurable hours to beautiful orange night-time flames. I did it, my father did it before me, and Ricky and Tom shouldn’t be denied the pleasure now. Eight humans and two dogs sat around the life-giving fire, gradually getting quieter, feeling themselves get absorbed into the Appalachian evening. The boys let themselves be hugged a little by their own fathers, then traded dads for awhile, leaning back into the soft grasp of the other man. Occasionally, beginning when he was really young, Ricky would begin singing without consciously knowing he was doing it, and he began now. His voice blended with the fire to hypnotize everyone else, and even the ones who knew the words to his old songs didn’t want to mess up the perfection by joining in. Just listen. Under his fingers, Tom’s dad could feel Ricky’s chest vibrating as the sounds came from somewhere inside him. “I got peace like a river, I got peace like a river I got peace like a river in my soul, in my soul” “If you miss the train I’m on, you will know that I am gone You can hear the whistle blowing a hundred miles” “Come by the hills, where the land is fancy and free And stand where the peaks meet the sky and the loughs meet the sea Where the rivers run clear, and the bracken is gold in the sun And the cares of tomorrow must wait til this day is done” Dogs, boys, and other backpackers eventually tired, and people found their night places, the kids in the shelter, the others outside in tents they’d brought. The two fathers for some reason still had some energy. The moon was almost full, and the men could see enough to walk a short distance away, to stay up a little bit longer while everyone else got settled for the night. “You have a special kid there, Cameron. You said you never taught him music, you don’t know how he got like that? He just busts out singing sometime? That’s an amazing voice he has. He’s just, I dunno…” “I don’t know either, Marty. Hell, maybe he ain’t even mine, maybe my wife and the mailman, nah, just kidding. He’s all mine but what he has belongs to him alone. I got no idea how or why he does this, my wife and I just watch and listen. And love him.” “Been too many years for me being too busy to listen and love like I should. Yeah, me the famous high-level diplomat, solving America’s problems. Too much on me, well, now I’m gonna take it easier, that lecturing and advising thing at U of Georgia is gonna fit me just right. Work Monday through Thursday, stay over there in faculty dorm, then Thursday night through Sunday, back home. See Tom some weekends, see him all vacations, be normal. No more stress, no more dealing with evil. Cameron, when I was in Belarus, you don’t even want to know what some people are capable of, sick, sick, sick, but no more. My wife was so right, let someone else deal with it now. How come wives are always right?” The guys talked guy talk for a few minutes more, then wandered back to the shelter. There was enough light for them to see their sleeping sons’ heads, shoulders, and arms sticking out of their sleeping bags. Tom’s head was somewhat diagonal, his black hair stretched out on Ricky’s shoulder, his nose closer to Ricky’s yellow armpit hair. Mr. Klein looked at Ricky’s father. “Yo, Cameron, what was that first song Ricky was singing a little while ago, I think ‘Peace Like a River’?” “Yeah, that was it, he loves that tune.” “Peace like a river. Been a long time, man, but I think I’ve finally found some.” PART 22 Coach Prszeczkopowski and Headmaster Carlisle lived less than half a mile from each other, but through all the years they’d known each other and worked at each other’s sides, as close friends as they were, they hardly ever saw each other during summers. Mr. Carlisle did a lot of work over the summers, Mr. P did hardly any, but both men pretty much left each other alone for the nine or ten weeks when the campus was empty. Summer was summer, time to de-stress and think about other things, other people. Coach took his wife on an Elderhostel trip to Banff National Park in Canada, then returned by way of Washington, DC to see their son, who’d finished his volunteer work and was now working as a paralegal. A lot of money for them but the relaxation was worth it. He’d returned home a few days ago, and had one thing he wanted to talk to his boss about, one little school issue. One early morning he picked up the phone to call his boss, but put it down and decided to take a walk down the summer country road to the man’s house. The house was owned by the school, and had been used by all the headmasters since Karl had begun his St. Brendan’s career just about 38 years before. He’d taken this walk hundreds of times, could really have found the place with his eyes closed. The walk was normal and quiet, nothing unusual until he turned the last small bend in the dirt road and noticed…huh? What is that other car doing in the driveway? Right behind John’s old Subaru, what was up with that Toyota Prius? Something strange. The house was dead quiet and Mr. P rang the bell. Damn, that’s different, used to be just a buzz, now the doorbell makes sounds like wind chimes, this is too weird. Got even weirder fast. The door opened, and someone who was definitely not Headmaster smiled and said “Hello?” Someone who was as tall as most guys, but who was clearly of an entirely different sex from Mr. Carlisle, someone who was wearing a loose T-shirt and sweatpants, someone who was clearly no longer young, but who must have been very, very sexy a couple decades ago. Reddish hair and a natural, sweet smile. “KARL!!” said Headmaster, walking toward the door in a St. Brendan’s T-shirt and gym shorts. Looked like he’d lost a few pounds over the summer. “I guess you’re getting acquainted with Karen here, you two are going to get to see a lot of each other as time goes by, I guess. Hey, come on in, great to see you, old man! You’re not looking so bad, you don’t look a day over 70! Karen, darling, you feel like having some coffee with us?” “John, you know I don’t drink coffee, and anyway I’m out for my walk and my exercise. You guys have fun talking man talk, nice to meet you, Karl, and I’ll be back in an hour or two.” She leaned over and Headmaster kissed her and waved goodbye. Mr. P stood there with his mouth open as his boss went into the kitchen and emerged with coffee and what smelled like homemade bread. He motioned to Karl to sit down on the comfy den couch and began to talk. “I guess you’re more than a little surprised to see this house finally having two people in it again. Been a lot of years, my friend, too many years of too many nights. Hmmm, and the wonders of internet matching, they say it never works, well, it sure did for us this time.” “Uhhh, John, I’m a little blown away, but I’m really glad for you. I’m just wondering…” “The Board of Directors? Those morally upstanding Catholic folks who really own this place? Knowing the headmaster and another person are living in sin under their very roof? Ahhh, Karl, they wouldn’t gave a damn even if they did know. Long as things are running well at school, no crisis, they leave me alone. We got 704 students enrolled this year, donations and budget are in good shape, faculty is set, the goose is hangin’ high. You know what Karen says, first marriages are just for practice. I have so much to tell you about this year, my energy is so up.” Yeah, his energy sure was up. Karl thought he looked thinner, happier, and overall better than he had in years. “Whatever makes you happy, John, and is this thing with you two for real?” “Real as it gets, yeah, we’re together. I think Rose would like her, too, the four of us’ll get together one of these nights for a barbecue, talk over old times and new ones. But hey, Karl, you’re the one visiting me out of the blue, not the other way around. Tell me your news, you first, what’s up?” “Wow. OK, here goes. I was thinking of something. What would you think about us having a cross-country training camp?” Training camp was a tradition at St. Brendan’s. It had been held for the football team since the 1960’s, and for the last twelve years soccer had held one, too. It was optional, but pretty much everyone hoping to play varsity or JV in either sport came. It consisted of the students showing up on campus a week before classes, and going through ferocious killer practices in the late summer heat. It was more than just the actual practices, though, tough as they were. More like a short summer camp where the kids got to know each other inside and out, did awful things to the freshmen (initiations that in wartime could be considered atrocities), had special campouts, picnics, really bonded as a team. All really macho, all really intense. Coaches and players could really get to know what people were about, could have time to form a cohesive team before the other students arrived and classes started. “Cross-country training camp, Karl? Huh? Karl, first of all we’ve never had one, and secondly, you only have one distance runner.” “Never done it, true, you got that part right, but this year, John, looks like we’ll have at least four real live runners. I’ve been in e-mail contact all summer long not only with little Tom, but also with Rick Lemoyne. He’s been training, doing mileage like he’s never done before, says he wants to run college track. I think he wants to get serious his senior year. And the Laird brothers from Scotland, well, you know about their father, but both kids are excellent runners, too. Alan owns a 4:06.3 in the 1500 meters, done indoors, no less! The family’s all settled in by now in America, I’ve been in contact with those kids, too, and I have a feeling that if we offered training camp, all four of the guys would be seriously into it.” “You and me both, we have some new-found enthusiasm rare in guys our age, but really, Karl, what are you planning to do with the guys all day? I mean in football and soccer, the training can go on for much of the day, but what can you do with the guys in cross-country? I mean once you go for a run, that’s pretty much it, you know. Not like there’s strategy to talk about, strength training or anything!” “You’re right, and another issue is the heat, we’d have to get our big mileage done very early in the mornings. But there’s stretching sessions we can do, instructional movies, plenty of swimming, and it might be fun to take them off-campus sometime, you know, bust their asses but also spoil them a little, do something special. Ray says we can use his fishing house once in awhile. I just think we might have ourselves an actual team this year, John, not bullshit like cross-country’s been in the recent past. You think of cross-country as an individual sport, but there’s also a real team aspect, much more than most people know. To have a good team, each person has to motivate and be motivated by the other guys, each guy has to know that the pain he’s suffering is for other guys, too, not just him. I want the guys to become close friends, to learn to rely on each other, sweat for each other. Seems strange, but it’s real. I’ve never personally met the kids from Scotland, but they’re probably decent enough guys, and Tom and Rick are easy to deal with. It’s not like the football coaches who have to keep 60 violent ‘roid-rage felons from tearing the place and each other apart.” Headmaster giggled at Coach’s description of the school’s football players. “Well, Karl, are you absolutely sure you want to give up your last week of school vacation? With the other coaches, you know, that week is built into their contracts, though like you said, they probably have a lot harder work than you would. But if you’re sure you want to do this thing, and the kids want to come, fine with me. I mean feeding four more kids, won’t make a difference, go for it if you feel like it. Keep me posted on what’s happening, I hope it works out for ya.” “Cool, John. I haven’t coached cross-country since ’91, but I’ve always loved it, in some ways even more than track & field. In the fall, with everything seeming fresh, lot of fun to coach. Strange, in my competitive career I was strictly a hurdler and jumper, didn’t really know much about the distances til I started coaching here. But I really like it, I’m up for this. All right, now your turn. You said you had news to tell me, OK, you got me curious. News besides the fact that you’ve all of a sudden turned the clock back to your days as a horny 10th grader?” “Yeah, Karl, but Karen does have something to do with some changes I’ll be making at school. She got me thinking about some things, thinking seriously. Like why am I doing this work, what do I get out of the routine here, year after year? Do I really want to be just a financial officer and an administrator? I’m 54 years old, tough guy, only 9 less than you. And partly due to my ball-busting hard work in recruiting, but partly due to the efforts of you and all the faculty, we have 704 students coming in. Last year we had 643. That’s huge, Karl. Seriously good news, and it gives me some flexibility I haven’t had in quite a few years. Anyway, I’ve hired two more full-time people, two guys to do work that I’ve pretty much done all by myself over the years. You’ll meet them, they’re friendly, down-to-earth people. One of them is going to be supervisor of everything to do with the physical plant—every foodservice issue, every maintenance issue, including personnel things regarding all non-teaching staff. The other guy is going to do the hands-on financial stuff. I’ll still have final say on every penny we spend, but this man is an accountant, a pro, and I won’t be spending hours and hours every day just pounding on Excel, just doing the mechanical work of paying the bills, keeping the accounts receivable straight, the projection of budgets, all that’ll be his job. I’ll be a little nervous, I mean I’ve never once trusted another person with anything to do with money here, but I’ve taken an online course in how to deal with all that, how to put in systems so there’s cross-checking, so I can make sure there’s no stealing.” “Anyway, anyway, anyway, here’s the reason for all this. We’ve had a lot of long talks, me and Karen, very intense stuff, she really got into my head.” “Sounds to me like that’s not the only part of you she’s gotten into!” interrupted Mr. P. “Yeah, well, that’s our business, old man. But seriously, Karl, this year, I’m going to take the time. I’m going to be much, much more involved in the lives of the students and the teachers here. I want to have my finger on the pulse of this place, want to experience the good and the bad, much more than I ever have. I won’t be teaching classes or coaching sports, I still need the flexibility in my schedule. But I’ll be around more than I ever have before, observing classes, hanging out with students, helping out teachers who are having problems, being way way more human than ever before. I’m not going to be hidden away in the admin building anymore. For better or worse, students and teachers are going to be part of my life. People, not just numbers and figures. It’s the way I want to do things. Guess I got me a new school year, a new woman, you guys get ready, ‘cause St. Brendan’s is gonna have a whole new me.” SUMMER, PART 23 Tom was blown away by how fancy the setting was for this tournament. One of the most massive hotels in Atlanta, huge hall, tables covered by white cloths, jugs of ice water everywhere, and of course the place had a very cool pool, where you could swim either indoors or out, swimming under a little divider to get from one part to the other. Certainly a much, much bigger deal than that one at that Tennessee high school. But of course, this was billed as the national high school championship, though it was open to any high-school player aged 13-18. As he and Dad wandered around before Thursday before the first round would start, they saw hundreds of kids, hundreds of parents and friends. Most of the kids seeming to be pounding pieces and clocks, playing 5-minute blitz games to warm up. With the hotel’s killer air-conditioning system, warming up was an absolute necessity. “What a place, Dad. I thought tournaments were in grubby kind of ordinary places, like at the Buenos Aires club or at that school in Tennessee. What are you going to do all weekend?” “I told you before, Tom. I’ll probably be spending most of my time in Athens getting final arrangements made for my job there. I might be back, stay one of the nights with you, but more likely you’re on your own. Call us if you feel like, and I’ll definitely come back for your last game Sunday morning, then we’ll head home.” Dad had booked them into a Motel 6 a few minutes walk from the tournament site. Was cheaper, and nice enough, right near plenty of junk food places for Tom to eat. The time on his own, the whole atmosphere here, this was a big treat for his son. Dad thought of one more thing before he was ready to leave. “And Tom, look, I’ve given you money for food at Pizza Hut, Burger King, all those places, but I don’t want you to eat only that. Come on, you need real food like fruit, too. Remember that market the other side of Wendy’s where we got apples? I want you to get other fruits, raisins, carrots, you like all that stuff. Junk food’s fine sometimes, I like it too, but don’t fill up so much on it that you have no room for decent stuff. Some of everything, OK?” “OK, Dad, no problem.” “All right, Tom, then I guess I’m outie like Curt Gowdy. Go get ‘em, kick some ass, have some fun, and I’ll see you either Sunday or before.” Tom hugged his father and then wandered around the tournament hall and the surrounding parts of the hotel. He had grown up in size and in maturity since the last tournament. He knew now not to throw a temper tantrum if he lost a game, knew now that just because he was Tom, everyone else wouldn’t just lay down and let him crush them. Wasn’t gonna be like that, these guys are good, or they wouldn’t be here. He saw the wallchart with everyone’s names and ratings. His own rating of 2067 was provisional, based on only the five games he’d played in Tennessee. After a couple more tournaments, he’d have a real rating. He saw there were 96 people in the open section, for players over 1800. His name was in space 51, so according to rating he was just a tiny bit below the mid-point. Then suddenly, there were tons of people moving, jostling each other, pushing and jabbering, trying to get space to look at something on the other wall. Pairings must be up!! Come on, let’s get intense here, time to do it! Tom found his name and another kid’s. He’d be Black against someone named Jacob Schalter. Tom had already decided that he wouldn’t look at any opponent’s rating or previous results before any of his games. Don’t give a damn, they’re all MEAT, and I’m a PREDATOR! CARNIVORE! KINGHUNTER! But as he found his board, he did think the name was strange. Jacob. At school there were a few guys named Jake, but never the whole 5-letter name. He remembered back in his school in Argentina, which was Catholic, that they’d studied some of the Old Testament Bible. Wasn’t there a guy in there with that name? Jacobo in Spanish, he thought. Abraham’s grandson, maybe? His unimportant thoughts were interrupted as the kid arrived, sat down, and began setting up pieces. Jacob Schalter, from New York City, was in outward appearance an absolutely ordinary boy, or almost a young man. Of course neither he nor Tom knew it, but they shared the exact same birthday in September. Jacob would soon turn 17 the same day Tom would turn 14. Yes, Jacob was very ordinary, and most people wouldn’t even notice him. He was almost 5’11” tall, neither tall nor short. He wasn’t fat and he wasn’t skinny. He wasn’t athletic or into sports, but he wasn’t a total klutz or uncoordinated geek either. He had no style or haircut or clothes that would identify him to anyone. Just short brown hair, very nondescript clothes, for today’s game a blank dark blue T-shirt, olive-colored shorts with lots of pockets, and old white sneakers. He wasn’t a loud kid, but wasn’t shy or afraid of people. Was polite to adults, but not ridiculous or fawning. There was absolutely nothing special about him, nothing to distinguish him from anyone else. Well, almost nothing. There was just one thing. Jacob was the 4th highest-ranked player aged 18 and under in the United States, and 3rd highest in this tournament. He was an International Master, an IM who wanted to take the next step, to become a Grandmaster, to have the special initials GM before his name. He only needed one more norm to get the title, and most observers thought he’d get it very soon. No doubt about it, just a matter of time. After that, no one could really know. How could anyone know how far any player could go, how close to the summit? Since he was very small, about 9 years old, and his talent was discovered in New York’s Chess In The Schools program, he’d always known he was good. In fact, so good that he really didn’t want or need to do much else in his young life. Chess was his thing, and the only thing he desired. The only thing he wanted to think about. What else could there be, everything else was stupid. He did go to high school, but pretty much just sat there, hadn’t done an assignment or a homework for years. In his New York public school, as long as you weren’t some sort of a discipline problem, you got C’s or B minuses. He’d asked his parents a few times if he could drop out, it was a waste of time, but they wouldn’t let him. He spent over half of his waking non-school hours at the Marshall Chess Club, pounding out blitz games and analyzing with some of the country’s best players. He also had a part-time job at a foodservice company warehouse, as by now Mom and Dad made him pay for some of his own expenses going to tournaments—part of the travel, entry fees, food, lodging, whatever. He did his work OK, but would sometimes zone out, let his mind wander to various chess positions. Once in April he went into this kind of trance and crashed the pallet jack into a 10-foot tall stack of bags of flour. Two of the top ones came crashing down on him and knocked him to the floor. It didn’t hurt, but the bags busted open and covered the kid from head to toe with the stuff. Spring snowstorm! His boss and a couple truck drivers saw all this, weren’t really mad but everyone laughed like freaks. Someone even had a camera, and a picture of a laughing, very white International Master was still tacked up above the shipping desk. That day was one of the very few times that Jacob had ever out-of-control laughed. Friends, girlfriends, boyfriends, other kids, none of them were really necessary for Jacob, no one was necessary at all if they didn’t play chess. A few times a week, he masturbated mechanically, without passion or special fantasies. Orgasm was just a physical thing he had to do, like brushing his teeth or eating or pissing. He had a little brother named Robbie who he barely knew, who was just a thing that lived in the same apartment with him and his parents. Parents were basically people that were around and were in charge of feeding him when he was home and not at the Marshall. Jacob’s parents grieved for him, and grieved for themselves. What was this madness in their son? Why did God pick him for this? When Jacob was younger, they saw his chess ability as a rare and beautiful gift. They loved his trophies, would look lovingly at their favorite special photo of a smiling much smaller Jacob, surrounded by other top chesskids, getting ready to fly to France to represent the United States in World Youth competition. He’d taken similar trips more recently to Ukraine, Canada, and Ecuador. But this gift had long ago become a curse, something that had taken their son far away from them, even when he was right in the same apartment. They argued a lot about him, argued about how to bring him into the real world, and Mom cried and cried, sometimes silently, sometimes out loud. Jacob wasn’t a cruel or heartless kid, and he did have a conscience. Once in awhile, when he was home and not at the club some evenings, he’d press his ear against the closed door of his room, and hear his parents talking or arguing about him, which very often got his mother’s tears flowing. Then he’d begin to get sad and emotional himself, and he’d come out of his room to hug his mother, please Mom, I’m sorry, yeah you’re right, I know what you mean. At the time he always meant it, really did feel sorry that he was upsetting his parents so much. He’d hang out with Mom and Dad a little more for the following days, try to make little jokes, maybe play around with Robbie some more or at least watch his stupid skateboard tricks on the sidewalk outside their building. But the change was always temporary, and very soon he was back to where he always was, somewhere inside the 64 squares that were really his home, if they weren’t his prison. For this particular tournament, Jacob had taken the trip down from New York with three other teenage players from the Marshall, very good players but light-years away from him in ability. One of the guys had a 20 year-old brother who did the driving and was supposed to do the chaperoning, though quite understandably, none of the kids were really into being chaperoned. The five of them would stay in one room right at the tournament hotel, as with everyone sharing the cost it wasn’t all that expensive. The Tournament Director announced to the players to start their clocks. Jacob politely shook Tom’s hand and played e4, then watched Tom respond c5. Tom Klein? Who the hell is this, never heard of the kid. From Georgia, provisional rating 2067, but based on five games, that doesn’t really mean anything. Can the kid play? Jacob looked at the White and Black pawns in the Sicilian Defense structure and figured all right, let’s see what the kid’s got. Does he know anything about the Grand Prix Attack? Knight c3, then pawn f4, see if the kid has a clue. Within a few more moves it was obvious that the Black kid didn’t. Jacob pushed pawn f5 at the right moment, and soon the Georgia boy was ripped open and laid bare. White won a pawn and was all over Tom’s Kingside. Typical Sicilian hack job, slash and burn. After 13 moves, Tom had used 54 minutes on his clock and Jacob less than 2. The game was over, but it would be a long, long time before Tom realized it. He did manage to exchange queens and stop Jacob’s mating ideas, but remained a pawn down, with two other pawns isolated and doubled, and Jacob’s knight dominated Tom’s hemmed-in bishop. Eventually they’d reach an ending, but a complete no-brainer. Jacob had played in tons of open Swiss-System tournaments, and he knew that in this format, usually the first game or two were mismatches where he’d destroy the guy without even having to think. More serious challenges wouldn’t come until middle or later rounds. Jacob was always unfailingly polite at the chessboard, and never let his body language indicate his frustration with the stupid opponent, never let on that he thought the guy should have resigned about an hour ago and let me rest before the next round. But it did stress him sometimes to have to sit there and sit there, while an obviously whipped opponent stared mindlessly at the board, hoping for some salvation that wasn’t coming. But for some reason Jacob didn’t feel impatient this morning. He was a little curious about who this Tom could be, and for some reason didn’t mind the smaller kid sweating and staring. No hurry, really, next game’s not until tonight. There was really nothing to look at on the board, so Jacob only looked at his opponent. He didn’t know why, he normally hardly ever looked at the other player when he was in a game. And he usually got no sadistic pleasure out of doing the easy mop-up work of finishing a slaughter, usually was happier if his victim just resigned, but this time, well, this time it was all right. Later, too much later, Black finally figured out that to stop White’s a-pawn from turning into a queen, he’d have to permit Jacob’s king to invade and eat up two more pawns in the center. Ballgame. Shit!! But Tom knew not to throw a fit, don’t be a baby, Victor told you to use your losses to learn from. “I resign. Congratulations, Jacob, great game. You seemed to have the advantage the whole way.” “Thanks.” Most of the time, Jacob didn’t offer to analyze games with much weaker players, not because he wanted to be rude but more like what was there for either player to get out of it? But for whatever reason, this time was different. “You feel like going over it?” SUMMER, PART 24 “Yeah, that’d be cool,” Tom answered. “Just let me mark the result on the wallchart, be right back.” He was mad all right, but knew that he had to keep himself under control, and he was actually curious as to where he’d gone wrong. He didn’t think he’d made any actual gross blunder, but this Jacob kid was all over him almost from the start. What happened? Maybe he could figure it out in the analysis afterwards. He found the place where people were to post their results, where he had to write “1-0”, meaning White won. But WHAT THE FUCK?? On this page, they had written people’s ratings, and Jacob was 2574! Shit!! And the letters IM before his name, damn, I just had to play an international master, all right, no wonder the guy blew me away. Didn’t know anything about him beforehand, oh yeah, I thought I was such a predator, sure. Yeah, and I wondered if Victor actually knew how to set up the pieces. I’m such an idiot is more like it, all right, still have six games to go in the tournament. The kids headed over to the skittles room. No one ever knew where the word “skittles” came from, and Tom thought the name sounded stupid. It was the place where players could go over games, could hang out, pound clocks in informal speed-chess, and of course could talk. When Jacob and Tom arrived, there were already maybe 50 other kids in there, playing, laughing, eating junk food. The unmistakable pressurized sound of chess clocks being punched fast and hard punctuated everything, ripped through the air. Jacob cleared away some Burger King wrappers from a table and set up a board. Tom was the curious one, and had to know some stuff about this guy who had just abused him. “Uhhh, Jacob, I just looked at the wallchart, 2574, is that really your rating, are you really an International Master and all?” “Yeah.” Jacob by this time had the pieces in the position after his third move. A few other guys wandered over to their table, hoping to learn something from the superstar, but neither boy really noticed them. “The thing about the Grand Prix Attack is that Black has to do something active in the center before…” “About the what attack?” Tom didn’t know that name, and Jacob’s original hunch was right, the little guy didn’t know the variation. “Grand Prix Attack, White plays f4, leaves his d-pawn back. You never seen it?” “I don’t think so, I was more expecting first knight f3, then pawn d4. Or sometimes people do pawn c3 first, I do that sometimes. I don’t know too many of the names of the openings.” “Mmm. Where do you play usually? Are you like with a club, or does someone train you? I noticed your rating’s provisional.” “I don’t get to play that much against good people, no way like you. I was in one tournament last year, I did OK, but that was way smaller, less intense than this one. There’s this old guy I go to see sometimes, he sometimes practices with me a little, or we look over some games. He’s named Victor.” “Cool, anyway, once White got in the pawn break on f5,…” This Jacob seemed to know everything. When he explained the way he opened Tom up, it all seemed so easy, so logical, Tom wondered why he hadn’t thought of all that, yeah, it’s all obvious now. The older kid moved the pieces around so fast, but would slow down and go step-by-step when Tom asked him, or tried to create one more hopeless defense. Jacob saw defensive possibilities that hadn’t even come into Tom’s mind, but of course none of them worked, the White player had it all figured out beforehand. Once a guy like him got a serious advantage, there was no escape, not in a million years. Jacob did most of the talking, and Tom most of the listening. They were at it for over 45 minutes, and finally they both stood up and were ready to go on their ways. “All right, Jacob, thanks a lot for going over all this with me. You know, Victor says that I gotta really look more at the games I lose, that’s how I’ll get better. He always shows me his losses, he whines and bitches so much, it’s weird, he always says he almost had the guy, again and again. But even though he’s old, he’s really good. I dunno, maybe you’ve heard of him. He’s Russian, says he used to play against the top players. His name’s Victor Taschenko.” This stopped Jacob in his tracks. Now he was the curious little kid. “VICTOR TASCHENKO??? I thought he was dead. You know him?? Damn, Tom, that’s like one of the best guys, he was knocking on the door for like 20 years!! You know Taschenko?” Without thinking, Jacob reached up and grabbed hold of Tom’s shoulder. Jacob didn’t realize it, but except for shaking hands with other players, hugging his mother, or occasionally hitting his brother, it was the first time in several years that he’d actually touched someone’s body. Not even a body, only a T-shirt, but still. He wasn’t thinking of anything but his surprise that this little kid actually knew a legend. “Yeah, he lives at a nursing home my Mom works at. He’s nice, but he’s weird like a lot of old folks. But he’s still amazing at chess, he knows stuff, man, you wouldn’t believe. What are you gonna do the rest of the day, Jacob, next round doesn’t start til 7.” “I dunno.” He was surprised to hear the next few words come out of his mouth, he wasn’t planning on saying them. “How ‘bout you?” “Maybe go back to my room at the Motel 6 and change. Go for a nice swim, the pool here looks nice, get the stress out, hey it’s not easy getting by ass kicked by you! See ya.” Jacob didn’t actually know how to swim. Had never tried it since the age of 8. He didn’t know what he intended to do for the rest of the afternoon, usually at tournaments he just either vegetated, slept, or played skittles in between games. He didn’t know why he had even asked or cared what that little 2067 player was going to do all afternoon, certainly not like it mattered. A 2067 player who doesn’t even know the Grand Prix Attack. It’s one of the main sidelines in the Sicilian, how the hell can the kid be so ignorant? His mind, as usual, had a position in it, the position just before he played pawn f5, but his mind accidentally erased the position for a moment, for the moment it took to ask himself if he’d packed shorts he could swim in. Yeah, the black ones, they’re not cotton, they’ll dry quick. First a nap, hope the other guys aren’t in the room, just let me rest a little while. The good news was that Jacob’s clubmates weren’t there, so it was nice and quiet. He lay down, stopped thinking of positions, and tried to sleep. He felt relaxed enough, and closing his eyes felt good, but for some reason he couldn’t actually go over the edge into sleep mode. Lay on his back and tried, more or less successfully, to think of nothing, let his mind go blank. One of the grandmasters at the Marshall was into this weird meditation stuff, said it helped him relax better than he could otherwise, and he’d taught some of the stuff to Jacob, who thought it was corny, but did enjoy the breathing exercises, the way the guy told him to clear his head. Was good now, but Jacob only lay there for about a half-hour. Then he changed into his black shorts, grabbed a towel and his small magnetic set, and took the elevator down to the ground-floor pool. There was background music playing, which Jacob usually hated. He didn’t like music, or really any artificial sounds and noises, all they did was try to mess up his head. The sounds of everyone splashing and playing, they were OK, as for some reason actual people voices didn’t bother him. He looked around at the people swimming, looked for the stupid 2067 player, and decided to recline in one of the poolchairs and set up a Queen and Pawn ending he’d misplayed into a draw at the New York State Championships a couple months ago. He knew where he’d gone wrong, but had to see it again, had to burn it so deeply into his subconscious that the winning idea would be automatic. He then went in and out of sleep for awhile, and wondered if he should really jump into the water, would be something different at least. One voice woke him up. “Yo, Mister International Master! Yeah, you! Why are you so tired, wasn’t like I made you work hard this morning! Gonna come in?” Jacob grinned and stood up. He didn’t really know how to swim, but the water was shallow, even in the deepest part only up to his shoulders. Is it cold? Fuck it, what’s the worst thing that could happen? “Uhhh, I’m a little better at chess than swimming, all right, here goes.” A couple running steps, a little jump, and he was in, where he hadn’t been in years. Once he was in, he didn’t care much about anything anymore, just let his mind go, and swam around the best he could with his skinny little first-round opponent. Underwater, on top of the water, letting the kid climb on his shoulders, chucking the miniature basketball into the plastic hoop at the pool’s edge, it wasn’t really so hard after all. Cold but fun, a different kind of fun. The two boys (they weren’t really an IM and a 2067 player anymore) splashed and played for a good while, Jacob gradually getting more confident in his swimming ability and getting more rowdy, which was unusual for him. Throwing Tom around so much, it was making his shoulders and arms ache, but a good ache, how come I’ve never tried this before? The smaller kid again and again climbed onto his back and made Jacob hold his ankles, balancing him on his shoulders, before diving off forwards. The chlorine also made Jacob’s eyes sting a little, but not enough to want to get out until much later. In the water, Jacob couldn’t seem to get his mind back on the chess. There would be one more round that evening and two on Friday. Hard work for both players, but they did get up from their boards several times to briefly watch each other’s games. When Tom went over to see Jacob, there were usually a few other people surrounding the IM’s board at the same time. Jacob never looked at him, never smiled, never moved his head a millimeter. Tom was amazed at how he could get in this kind of trance, almost like he was dead but with his eyes open. Even when he made a move, the only parts of his body to move were his arm and hand, move the piece, touch the clock. Shoulders, head, face, chest, legs, nothing. But it was different the other way around. When Jacob walked over to watch Tom, Tom noticed him right away and smiled. Jacob would grin back and give a little index finger point, kind of like the track and field guys used to do, meaning “Get That Thing!”. He’d never stay more than a couple minutes, but Tom was seriously into having a fan. His fourth game, the one that started Friday afternoon, was a serious test, against a GIRL no less, but a girl who was tough. Everything about even, Tom’s White pieces locked up with her Blacks in a late middlegame, a position where both players were on a sort of tightrope, Tom wondering if he should do something aggressive to knock the chick off, but knowing if he went after too much, he could easily be the one to slip and crash to his death—and against a goddamn GIRL! Tom’s heart was pounding hard and the position stayed balanced. It was close to 7:00, on the 55th move, when the young lady’s nerves failed her. She overlooked Tom’s simple pawn push to dislodge her bishop, then a knight fork to win the c-pawn. A baby could have seen it, but the mind plays terrible tricks during the 5th hour of a brutal game. Tom’s extra pawn, protected and on the 5th rank, was enough to get him the hard-fought win. After the bitch resigned and shook his hand, Tom went to a corner of the big hall and collapsed on the floor. He soon saw Jacob standing over him. The IM tilted his head diagonally, arched his eyebrows a little. The look meant “Way to go, Tom, probably should have been a draw, but you out-toughed her mentally”. The look didn’t need any actual audible words to go with it. The boys walked silently through the hotel hallway and then out into the warm evening. Finally Tom found something to say. “Man, Jacob, that was nasty, and she was a girl!! I dunno, maybe let’s walk a few minutes, near where I’m staying there’s some places to get something to eat.” Jacob was thinking of his own game, also a hard struggle but a win, and followed along. SUMMER, PART 25 The boys’ bodies were hungry, but their heads were too emotionally exhausted to want to eat at the moment. They walked slowly down the sidewalk of the big avenue, not saying much, just general observations on their games. They didn’t have much in common to talk about much else. Most people didn’t think of chess as a sport, and maybe most people were right. But it can be just as exhausting, just as draining. Tom was much more wiped out after the two long games than he would have been after a 12-mile run. “Your game, Jacob, I didn’t see that much of it, looked pretty even to me, but you did have your rook hogging the e-file, guess that helped. I’m beat, I feel like I’ve been run over by a fucking tank or something. I think I just want to head back to my room, lie down, chill, can eat later. The places are open pretty much all night. You wanna come? I’d like to see your game and stuff, if you feel like we can get pizza later, hey, I’ll treat.” Jacob grinned and kept walking next to the smaller kid. He never usually hung out this much with other players at a tournament, especially outside the actual hall or the skittles room. But everything about this competition was different. He didn’t know why, didn’t really have the concept of “friend” in his mind, he’d never needed one. Whatever it was, it felt nice, and he did want to boast to someone about how he’d squeezed out a win, bit by bit, like a constrictor, in what looked like an almost dead-drawn endgame. Show it to someone who’d really enjoy it. The room was kind of a mess, as they hadn’t cleaned it during the day. Tom didn’t care, a room with a made bed looked too formal to actually hang out in, anyway. Felt better just as it was. They could have used Tom’s small magnetic set to analyze, but that really was too small for two people to use and shove pieces around together. They tried to set up the big vinyl board on the big double bed, but there was a problem—being a regular vinyl chessboard, it had no rigidity to it, and rumpled all over the bed. Pieces wouldn’t stand up, kept tilting or falling down. One option was for the kids to climb off the bed onto the floor, but Tom’s brilliant mind found a better idea. He squirmed under the bed to find an empty pizza box from the previous night. A stiff corrugated cardboard one. One side of it fit most of the board, and when Tom ripped the top off it, they could use that part to fit under the rest. That was Tom, all right, Tom the damn-near genius. Tom thought the opening and much of the middlegame were pretty boring, though he of course wouldn’t say that to Jacob. The great player’s ideas and variations were too long and difficult for him to follow, anyway. But when they got to the part from where Tom had actually seen a bit of it, that part he liked. A Rook and Pawn ending, equal material, and with Jacob having what looked like just one insignificant advantage. Looked insignificant, and maybe it was, but Tom loved how Jacob just probed, just improved things really slowly and patiently, gave the other guy fewer and fewer options. Just waited until he could penetrate the guy, or force a rook trade that would lead to a win with Jacob’s dominating king. This is cool, this is how a master plays, and he’s my friend. More than once, partly because he liked the position and partly because he liked the way Jacob explained things, Tom asked something like, “Can you go back again to how it was after he pushed pawn a5? Yeah, that position, I wanna look at something.” Finally, there was nothing more to look at or see, and the boys just decided to lie down and rest. It was under the cover of this semi-sleep, or maybe fake sleep, that the beginnings of things started to happen. They probably couldn’t have happened if the boys had been fully awake, or if they thought each other was that way. But the illusion of unconsciousness allowed them more freedom. ************************************************************************************************** Readers, this is me, The Dreamer. I’m afraid that at this point, I had to delete a few paragraphs, where things between the two chessplayers got a little too hot and steamy to permit on a respectable site like BoyWrite. And of course we all know that boys under 18 can’t possibly be interested in other males, can they? So, people, if you want to know the next part, you’ll just have to rely on your filthy imaginations!! OK, that’s enough, back to the story now. ************************************************************************************************ Soon enough, bodies were dry, shorts and underwear back on bodies where they belonged. There was a little peaceful above-the-waist affection, until the boys realized that it really was feeding time. More take-out pizza would work just right, and they both seemed to agree that a 20-inch family size pepperoni one, along with a 3-liter bottle of soda, would be the appropriate amount. They put their shirts on and wandered outside to the pizza shop, talking and laughing about things that strangely had nothing to do with the sex. Nothing at all. When they got back, Tom showed off one of his other unique and special talents. When he ate a big mouthful of food, then washed it down with a couple gulps of soda, he was a very talented belcher. Could belch “The Star-Spangled Banner”, at least the first two lines of it. He thought it sounded best when it was done right in Jacob’s face. Bra--ap brap brap bra braaaaaappppp, etcetera. He’d have attempted the rest of the song, except Jacob gave him a not-very-hard punch in the face to shut him up. Damn, Ricky and now Jacob too, some people just don’t appreciate musical talent. They calmed down for awhile, lay down next to each other in darkness with all clothes on except shirts and shoes. “Hey, Jacob. You sure everything’s cool, the other guys aren’t looking for you or wondering where you are?” “Naah, they don’t give a damn, at least not now, it’s only 10:30. They’re probably either pounding out some speed chess or trying to find a way to get some beer. That’ll keep ‘em busy til after midnight, pr |