High School Freak

screeched to a halt.

  "Take it easy, kid."

  "Why did you say that about my mother."

  "I'm sorry. But I'm sure she wouldn't want you hurting me, would she?"

  John let go of the man. "No."

  "Good," the man said.

  "Who are you?"

  There was only the smell of rubber as the man peeled out and turned out of sight.

  As soon as John got back home, he went into his mother's dresser. He wasn't allowed in there, but he didn't care. He pulled out her clothes and looked through them. Nothing. Then he saw a brown wooden box. Locked. He stared at it. He remembered, from the Internet, how to pick a lock.

  After rummaging through his study desk for some paper clips, he found one and hammered the end of it flat. Then he started to jiggle the keyhole to the lock. Tumblers. It all came down to jiggling the tumblers out of place and opening the lock like a key would. After twenty minutes, he felt the click and opened the box. This was forbidden, and if his mother knew about it, she would be furious. But that man had known too much, and if his father was alive—that man had used the word 'are'—then John would find him.

  When he opened it he found a pile of letters, opened. He stared at the postmarks. All of them were addressed to his mother. He wondered if he should read them. He didn't feel right about doing that, so he set them aside. He saw four passports, and rifled through them. They were his mother's. From Poland, Sweden, Brazil, Switzerland. Some of them had different names, but they all had her picture in them. Why would she have this? Were they different pronunciations of her name? He wasn't entirely certain.

  Then he saw a stack of photos. He looked at them. His mother when she was young. One was of a baby that must have been him. He stared at the baby. All babies looked alike to him. Then he saw an old bent photo of his mother and what must have been his father. He was holding a baby and smiling. John's heart jumped. The smile—John knew it immediately. It was exactly the same smile as the man he met today had. The men didn't look exactly the same, but there were some obvious similarities: the size for one, the jaw for another. And then there were the similarities to John. The eyes, the way his father was holding the baby, smiling, but with a certain apprehension. His eyes weren't looking at the camera, but above it. And they weren't looking more so than examining details. His pants were jeans, straight-legged. He had a yellow sweater wrapped around his shoulders and was wearing a green long-sleeve shirt. There was no sign of a watch. For some reason that seemed odd.

  John's mother, meanwhile, was looking right at the camera, smiling, so joyful, her eyes completely glazed over, as if she was trying to tell the world that this day was the best, and the ones after would be better. Her arms tried to reach around the man, who John assumed was his father, but they didn't go all the way around. Instead her hands gripped the man's shirt and pulled down. She must have been certain that no matter how much weight she placed on the man, he would never go down. Her dress, a white one with yellow flowers, was pushed against the curves of her body by the wind. The man's hand, the one not holding the baby, appeared on one side of his mother's dress.

  The background of the photo was hard to ascertain. There were rolling green hills and white-capped mountains. It could have been anywhere.

  John flipped the photo and saw that there wasn't any writing. He sighed and looked at the front again. This had to be his father. So what was the man, a possible relative, doing here?

  "Hi honey," his mother said as she entered the apartment. She had a pizza box in one hand and her purse in another. "I brought us some pizza."

  John glared at her. She'd told him once that his father was no longer with them. Of course that could mean anything, but this meant that she had misled him.

  "Honey, what's wrong?" his mother said as she put down the pizza on the table.

  John wasn't certain what to say. He'd placed everything back where it belonged, everything except for the photo. That was on the table, underneath the pizza now.

  "John, say something. Was it school? Was that boy bothering you again?"

  "It wasn't school," John said.

  "What was it then?" his mother asked as she hugged him.

  John didn't return the hug.

  "You lied."

  "What? Honey, please don't say that."

  "You lied," John said, this time louder.

  "About what?" his mother asked and looked around the place as if she was expecting a surprise.

  "About dad."

  It was as if the word held a power over her. It took a split second for the recognition, and another before the color was sapped from her face. "Why do you want to mention him?"

  "He is my father, right? And you said he was dead."

  "He... I... What happened, John?"

  John walked over to the table and lifted the pizza box. The photo, stuck to the bottom of the box, floated down to the table.

  She stared at it like it was an evil talisman. "What are you doing with that picture, John?" she whispered.

  John hadn't been certain whether the man in the car had been lying, or his mother, but looking at her face told him it was her. "You said he was dead, when he's not."

  "John, did you go through my things?" his mother asked in a voice that was finding its volume again.

  "You said that..."

  "John, I told you never to go through my things," his mother said, a hint of violence in her voice.

  John could hear his mother's anger, and usually that was enough to silence him, but he didn't feel any need to keep quiet today. "I've never even seen a photo of him, and I thought it was because you didn't have one." He pointed at the photo. "Is that him?"

  His mother was staring at him.

  "Mom! Is that him?"

  "Yes."

  John picked up the photo again and stared at it. Now that he was certain, knew without a doubt that this was his father, he took in the man's face again. He tried to smell the picture, or picture what the wind whipping about his mother's dress must have felt like. "Is he alive?" he asked.

  "I don't know," she said, as she sat down at the table and stared at the back of the photo.

  "You don't know where he is?" John asked, disappointed.

  "No."

  "Why didn't you show it to me? Why don't you ever talk about him?"

  "I don't want you to know anything about him," she said.

  "So he was right."

  "Who?" his mother asked as she jerked out of her trance to shoot a sharp look at John.

  "The man, today."

  "A man asked you about your father?"

  John could hear the edge on her voice.

  "No, he mentioned him. Said I was just like him."

  "John," his mother stared at the door. "What did this man look like?"

  "A little like dad. Very big, and he laughed like he was crazy."

  She didn't seem to relax. "What did he say?"

  "He saw—"

  A knock came on the door. It wasn't any knock but a hard raspy, shake the door off the hinges knock.

  John started for the door, but his mother placed a hand on his shoulder. He turned to look at her. She was trembling, and placed a finger on her lips to tell him to be quiet.

  The knocking got louder.

  John watched as she walked into the bedroom and came out with a gun in her hand. He had to look twice. He'd never seen a gun here before. Weapons were something else that she told him not to touch. Part of him was angry that she would tell him so many things, and yet violate the same rules herself. She was starting to act like all the kids and teachers he hated in school.

  The knocking now resembled kicking. John wondered who could have been on the other end. Unfortunately they had only one exit: the door.

  "Honey, get behind me," his mother said.

  "Mom, what're you going to do?"

  "If something happens, just run, okay?"

  John felt his insides churning. He felt light-headed, and all the energy drained from his body. What did
his mother mean?

  "Who is it?" his mother finally said.

  The knocking slowed down, but there was no answer, and the door continued to shake.

  John's mother leaned over to the door and put on the chain.

  "I can hear you," a man on the other side said.

  It didn't sound like the man John had met earlier in the day. He wanted to tell his mother that, but the knocking started back up.

  "Tell him to leave us alone," John whispered. The parking lot next to their apartment building was frequently used by teens trying to get drunk, or junkies shooting up. Occasionally there were a few who would knock on the door. They usually left when John or his mother threatened to call the police.

  "We're going to call the police," his mother said.

  "Katherine, open up."

  This time it was as if his mother was hit by a wave. She stared at the door as if it was transparent. Then stepping back, the gun still pointed at the door, she cracked it open.

  "Tom?" She undid the chain and opened the door. The man from earlier in the day stepped inside. She locked the door then looked at the man.

  John nodded at the man who nodded back. John could see that his mother knew him. His mother hugged the man, then pointed the gun at him again. John stared on. Sometimes adults just didn't make sense.

  "Easy, Katherine." Tom had his hands raised.

  "You scared the hell out of me," she said, now holding the gun as if she was going to shoot him.

  John felt confused. How she could hug him, then act like she wanted to hit him? She hit the man twice, and he snatched the gun away from her.

  "No playing with this in front of me."

  "You're an asshole for knocking like that," his mother said, still acting angry, though she smiled when she finished the sentence.

  Tom let out