"It's OK," William said, embarrassed.
"No! It's not OK. I don't know why I did it. I guess I was tired of being bullied by my dad."
"Your dad?" William said, surprised.
"When the school called and told him what I had done to you, my dad got real mad. He said I was no good. It hurt so bad when he hit me that I knew I must have hurt you bad too. So I wanted to say I was sorry. Do you forgive me?"
"Ummm."
"No one made me come here and do it. I just feel bad is all."
"OK. I forgive you," William said, smiling.
"Yeah?!" Randy said, delighted.
"Yeah."
"The Secret Crestridge Handshake?" Randy said, extending his hand out to William. He was happy to finally be offered the opportunity to perform the secret ritual (which he knew by heart) with another student. I would tell you the choreographed steps to The Secret Crestridge Handshake but then it wouldn't be a secret anymore. The two friends completed the shake flawlessly and laughed. "We did it!"
"Yeah."
"What is that?" Randy said, pointing at Brave Raideen.
"That's Brave Raideen. He's a Shogun Warrior."
"Oh. Why is Han Solo standing next to Spider-Man?" Randy said, pointing at the window sill.
"I don't know. I like to make up new stories with all my toys," William said, sulking, waiting for a disapproving sneer from Randy.
"Oh! That's neat. Let's make up a new story together!"
Surprised, William smiled and handed Han Solo to Randy. They rearranged the toys together, setting the stage for a new story.
***
William's mother pulled the meat loaf from the oven, set it on the stove to cool, and then wiped her manicured hands on her apron. Her husband Steve, William's step-dad, would be home from work soon and he was almost always on-time--something William's natural father never was. They divorced when William was a baby and William spent some time in the summers with his natural father; the rest of the year he lived with his mother, Pam, and Steve (whom he called Steve, not Dad). Steve liked to eat as soon as he got home from work so he would have time to watch the evening news and deflate from his stressful day by drinking a cold Pearl Beer. Looking out the window, Pam realized it was getting dark and that William (or Billy, as she liked to call him) was still out back, playing in the treehouse. She hadn't heard him come back inside and decided to fetch her son. She turned off the oven and went outside.
On the patio, she could see William's head bobbing around in the treehouse. She was about to call his name when she noticed another head in there, leaving her bewildered.
'Does Billy have a friend up there?' she thought. He didn't mention to her about having anyone over. How could she have not noticed? She called to William and he appeared, standing in the doorway of the treehouse.
"Yes, mommy?" he said, calling back to her.
"Do you have someone up there with you?"
"Yes, mommy. My friend Randy from school."
"Randy?" she said, sorting through the list of names of kids she knew from the neighborhood or from the school. The name seemed very familiar to her but she couldn't place his face. "Does Randy need to go home? Or does he want to eat with us?" she said.
"I don't know. Let me ask him," he said, disappearing back into the treehouse.
She scratched her head and pondered some more. 'Randy? That name sounds so familiar,' she thought.
A moment later, William appeared in the doorway, this time with his friend Randy, whom his mother had never seen in person before although she had heard William describe the bullying he received from Randy many, many times before. Not putting two and two together at that very moment, she was pleased to see her son playing with another child.
"Randy wants to eat with us!" William said.
"OK, come inside then," she said, raising an approving thumb.
The two boys quickly huddled and discussed something that Pam couldn't hear. When they were done, they separated, gave each other a high five, put about a foot of space between each other, and then braced themselves to jump. Before Pam could scream for them to stop, immediately worried that they would hurt themselves, the two boys were airborne. They dropped to the ground, quick and heavy like two sacks of potatoes, and when they touched the Earth, a loud bang rang out--the discharge from the 25-caliber American Derringer pistol in his pocket--startling the slumbering birds in the woods behind their house, setting them in flight. Both boys crumpled to the ground. Randy quickly got up. William did not.
Pam ran to her son who was laying in the grass in a fetal position. She knew he wasn't dead because he was moving but a large blood stain covered the majority of his right thigh. He was bleeding profusely and, not having any foresight whatsoever that this would happen, she didn't know what to do.
"Oh my god!" she said, violently shaking. She knelt next to her son and picked him up, wrapping him in her apron. She quickly took him in the house while Randy followed her inside.
***
Pam stared at her apron while she waited for her son in the lobby of the emergency room. Randy sat quietly in a chair next to her, playing with a Rubik's Cube she had in her purse, something she kept with her in case William ever got bored. She stared at the blood on her apron and marveled at the sheer amount of it and how it changed the colors of the floors from white and yellow to a dingy, brownish maroon. After William was taken away by some nurses, Pam asked Randy how William came to have her pistol in his pocket, but Randy didn't know. She wasn't quite sure what to think of that and, mostly, she felt extreme anguish for what had happened to her son and couldn't help but think that it was all her fault. She had purchased the pistol for protection in the years between divorcing William's father and meeting Steve, when there wasn't a man around to protect them. Once she married Steve, she thought of getting rid of the pistol but never did, being swept up in the busyness of newfound love. All of this was lost on Randy who was immersed in the perplexed profundity of the Rubik's Cube. She placed her hand on his shoulder and said, "Are you thirsty?"
"No ma'am," he said, not looking at her, still twisting the colored cube diligently.
"Should I call your parents?"
"I don't remember my phone number."
"You don't know it?" she said, puzzled.
"Nope."
"Well, I'm sure they'll understand when I tell them what happened."
"I'll probably get in more trouble," he said, sniffing.
"Why? It wasn't your fault."
"I'm always in trouble."
Just then, a doctor entered the waiting room, standing in front of Pam and Randy, a couple of fingerprint-sized smears of blood on his shirt, a clipboard in his hand, and a stethoscope around his neck. His name tag said "Dr. Masala." Pam quickly stood up while Randy continued to play with the toy.
"Ma'am, your son is going to be fine. The bullet went straight through muscle and didn't hit any bone or tendons. William is very lucky," he said with a slight Indian accent.
Pam raised her hands to her mouth, sighing heavily.
"Thank god!" she said, holding back tears.
"Let me ask you a question. Why did your son have your pistol in the first place?"
Pam stood there, stricken by guilt and shame, and didn't know what to say. She didn't know how her son got a hold of the pistol so her mind was a black hole that she was looking into for answers but not finding any.
"To be very honest with you, I have no idea how he got it."
"Mmm hmm," he said incredulously. "And why didn't you keep it locked up?"
"It was locked up in my nightstand, I swear."
"Mmm hmm," he said, scribbling something on the paper on the clipboard. "Well, when these types of incidents occur, we are required to call family protective services. You will be getting a call from them in the next few days."
"Oh, OK," she said, perturbed.
"You can see your son now. Have a nice night," he said, then turned and walked back into the emergency room.
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Pam looked at Randy and said, "Do you want to go see Billy with me?"
He looked up, confused. "Who is Billy?"
"I mean, William," she said, putting her hand out. Randy gave her the Rubik's Cube then followed her into the emergency room.
***
A few days later, William sat in the cafeteria at his school, scarfing down his lunch--a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a bag of Fritos, a Little Debbie cupcake, and a Thermos of juice. He finished his lunch before all the other kids then sat at the end of the table, excited to go outside for recess. Sassy mouth Darren looked down at the brace around his leg, put there to keep his leg straight, and said, "How do you walk with that thing on?"
"I put one foot in front of the other," William said, smiling.
"Boy, you're a real genius. You know that?"
William didn't respond. He was too excited.
When the bell rang, William bolted outside as fast as he could with his gimp leg, heading straight for the playground. Waiting for him by the jungle gym was Randy who was wearing brown corduroy pants, white tennis shoes, and a red Spider-Man t-shirt. Behind Randy, a few feet away, stood his teacher Ms. Benedict. She watched William limp his way from the back of the school to Randy, who was patiently waiting for him. Concerned that Randy was going to start trouble, she decided to intervene. She stepped next to Randy and put her hand on his shoulder.
"There's not going to be any problems today, is there?"
"No, Ms. Benedict. We're the best of friends now," he said, smiling. "Really!"
"Well, that's great."
When William reached Randy, he put his hand out and they commenced giving each other The Secret Crestridge Handshake. Ms. Benedict was pleased seeing their little friendly ritual. Randy whispered something to William, and he agreed then limped to the other side of the jungle gym. He stepped on top of a short, cement wall, spread his legs into a stiff, heroic stance, raising one arm straight up, his finger pointing to the clouds. He indicated that he was ready.
"All right! Here I come!" Randy said.
"What is William doing over there?" said Ms. Benedict, shading her eyes with her hand, squinting.
"That's not William!" Randy said, scoffing. "That is the great and powerful, BRAVE RAIDEEN! Not even a bullet can keep down the Brave Raideen!"
"And who are you supposed to be?"
"I'm Spider-Man. Duh!"
Randy left Ms. Benedict behind to join his friend on the other side of the jungle gym.
Good Night, Jerk Face
My dreams were sturdy when I was young; they became more fragile as I got older. Summer of 1986. All I thought about was the car I hoped to get for my 16th birthday the following summer. That was all I thought about when I was 15, all day, all night. I thought I had a pretty good chance of getting the car I wanted too because I lived in a pretty good neighborhood and I thought my dad made pretty good money, and the majority of my friends got good cars for their 16th birthdays. The odds looked pretty good in my favor, at least. Plus, I made good grades. It seemed like a no-brainer to me. The car I wanted was a 1980 Mazda RX7. I really, really, really wanted that car, preferably a stick shift even though I didn't know how to drive stick shift, let alone drive a car.
Every summer since I could remember, I spent a couple of weeks at my grandparents' house in Moore, Oklahoma, probably to give my parents a break. During the drive from San Antonio, Texas to Moore, I read the classifieds of the San Antonio Light newspaper, scouring the used car section, looking for Mazda RX7's for sale, particularly 1980 models or ones that were close to that year like the '78 or '79, just not an '81 cause they were different. I found a few for sale with prices ranging from $4,000 - $6,000. That seemed like a pretty good deal to me even though I had no idea really what a good deal was for a car. I was only 15. I didn't know shit.
"What are you looking for?" my mom said. She was somewhat thin with auburn, short cropped hair, kind hazel eyes, and had lightly freckled pale skin. She gripped the steering wheel of her Toyota Camry confidently and sat up straight, ready to bear the heavy burden of the long, boring drive to Oklahoma.
"The car I want for my 16th birthday," I said.
"What makes you think you'll get a car for your 16th birthday?"
"Isn't that what you get when you turn 16?"
"Sure, some kids get a car for their 16th birthday. What kind of car do you want?"
"A 1980 Mazda RX7. Stick shift. Silver."
"Ha! A sports car?"
"Do you think dad will get me one?"
"I don't know. You'll have to ask him."
"What do you think he'll say?"
"Trying to guess what your dad will say at any given moment is impossible. You'll just have to call him and ask him. OK?"
"OK."
I read the few ads for used RX7's over and over, imagining what they might look like, thinking that they were probably all like new, lightly used, hardly dirty. I imagined myself in one, driving it to school, impressing the shit out of girls, making my friends jealous, and stuff like that. It was a damn, good daydream.
The drive to Moore seemed to take an eternity.
***
My mom only stayed one night in Moore. The next morning after we arrived, we sat down for breakfast with my grandparents. My mom wanted a good meal before she started the drive back to San Antonio, a drive that took seven hours or so, depending on if she stopped to pee or not. She seemed to be in a hurry to leave. I was distracted. All I could think about was the car I wanted.
My grandparents were both well-worn and travel-weary, both reaching their 70s without experiencing too many life-threatening diseases or personal fiascos that would leave scars like most of their contemporaries had. My grandfather moved his hunched-over frame with the grace of a cowboy shuffling a two-step, his elderly chuckle filling the room with joy, his snappy demeanor always punctuating his interactions with dirty jokes or whacky riddles. My grandmother was as thin as a stalk of wheat, her left hand gripping a highball glass of scotch on the rocks, her right hand pinching a Virginia Slims 120 cigarette with an ash two inches long. They asked a million questions about everything except for what I was really thinking about. My grandfather noticed my unusual behavior.
"What cha thinking about, son?" he said.
"Cars."
"Oh yeah, which car?"
"He wants a car for his 16th birthday," my mom said.
"Which car?" he said, a smile slithering across his face, his arm around my shoulders.
"A Mazda RX7."
"Ooo! Those look fun. And with rotary engines, too."
"Yeah. Rotary," I said, uneasy like, not sure what he was talking about.
"Must be expensive," he said.
"Not if it's used."
"True. It'll be cheaper than new."
My mom was completely uninterested in this conversation but my grandfather liked cars, liked working on cars. He was curious, at least. My mom finished her breakfast, grabbed her stuff, kissed me goodbye, and was out the door as fast as she could go. I didn't get a chance to tell her to butter my dad up about getting me a car for my 16th birthday.
My grandfather placed his hand on my shoulder as I watched her drive off. He squeezed my shoulder gently.
"Are you sure you want a Japanese car? How do you feel about Fords?"
***
I had a thing for sugary cereals. I could eat almost an entire box in one sitting. Fruit Loops, Lucky Charms, Smurf Berry Crunch--practically any cereal except for the bran varieties--I could scarf down bowl after bowl. My grandparents knew this about me. When I got up for breakfast, I discovered dozens of boxes of cereal, waiting on the kitchen counter. My grandparents didn't eat cereal so I knew it was all for me. They preferred to eat eggs, bacon, toast, the eggs coated with salt and pepper, the toast covered with margarine, the bacon burnt to a blackened crisp. I grabbed two boxes of cereal--it didn't matter which ones--and sat down at the table. I commenced to scarfing them down. My grandmother cackled as she watche
d me.
"Good thing we went to the store before you got here," she said.
"Mmm hmm," I said.
"Do you want any orange juice?"
"Uhh uhh," I said, shaking my head.
My grandfather shuffled into the breakfast room from the kitchen, the morning paper in his hand. He sat down at the breakfast table, pulling the plastic wrapper off the rolled up newspaper, then unraveling the paper on the table. I watched him, with my mouth full of half-chewed cereal, spreading the sections across the table. He liked reading the newspaper during breakfast.
"Why do you have to cover the whole goddamn table?" my grandmother said.
"There's a lot of sections in here, dear," he said.
"That newspaper is dirty. We eat here."
"Well, I know we eat here. It's a breakfast table, isn't it?"
"Yes, it's a breakfast table, not a reading the newspaper table."
"Well, for Christ's sakes, I didn't know you had such an aversion to the morning paper."
"Well, I didn't either until I watched you spread the filthy thing all over the table."
They went on like this for ten minutes. I continued to scarf down my cereal. My grandfather turned through the different sections of the newspaper, looking for the editorial section, to the displeasure of my grandmother. He liked to read the editorial articles and comment about them aloud to whoever was around. It made him feel invested in the community, I guess, to speak about these civic matters, even though he didn't do much else about them. He found the classified section, lifted it up in front of him, spread it open, and ruffled the pages.
"Look here, my boy. Let's see if there are any Mazda RX7's for sale here in Moore. You know, for fun!"
I set my spoon in the bowl and chewed the remainder of what was in my mouth. He turned the pages, scanned them, turned some more. He blurted out car maker names in alphabetical order: Audi, BMW, Buick, Cadillac, blah blah blah. The suspense was getting to me. It irritated my grandmother.
"You're not buying him a car," she said.
"I know that, dear," he said.