"Is it cancer or something?" I asked shakily. We didn't watch much TV, but it seemed like every day at school all the girls would be talking about some show where somebody, some kid or football player or hippie person, was dying of cancer. "It was so sad," they'd say. "I just cried."
Anyway, I knew sometimes people went into hospitals and never came out. What if Mason was dying!
"Tex," he laughed, "it's not cancer. At least I'm pretty sure it's not I just thought I'd better check it out."
I just looked at him. Maybe he was putting up a front. He never could stand anybody feeling sorry for him. "Yeah?" I said. "How sure?"
"Well, Charlie didn't think it was serious. He set up my appointments for me."
And when I didn't look convinced he said, "I don't lie to you, remember?"
I licked the back of my hand where the coffee had made a big red blotch. Maybe it wasn't serious. He looked healthy enough, a little on the lean side, but I was, too, and there sure wasn't anything wrong with me. "If you ain't sick why ain't you eatin' anything? It ain't bad cooking, for me."
Mason shook his head. "I'm not supposed to eat anything until the tests are done. Come on, get your teeth brushed, it's time to go."
It looked like everybody in the county decided they had to be in the city by nine o'clock. Pretty soon Mason was gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turned white. Then he was either muttering to himself or hollering out the window. Being a jock he knew some good things to holler.
"I don't know why the hell people don't obey the law!" he snapped, as a big silver Chevy roared past us. I didn't point out the fact that we were doing ten miles over the speed limit ourselves. I just didn't have the heart to laugh at Mace like I usually did. Maybe he really was sick. After all, people didn't go to the hospital to get tested for measles. If Pop knew Mason was sick, he'd come home. He'd do anything for Mason. But if Mace had to stay in the hospital, how could I get hold of Pop to let him know? What was I going to do if something happened to Mason?
I stared out at the oncoming cars.
"Mace," I said, struck by a thought, "did you ever think that all those people in those cars have a whole separate story to them, that it's just as important to them as our stuff is to us, and we don't know anything about it. Maybe sometime we'll run across somebody and two years ago they were driving past us on the highway and we never knew it. Like sometimes we meet people and bump off of them and never see them again and we never know why paths cross."
"Yeah, sure I spend a lot of time worrying about that," Mason said sarcastically.
"I'm not worrying, I'm thinking."
"Well, don't pass out from the shock. I'm thinking it's damned dumb to have a two-lane highway in this day and age." He leaned out the window and yelled some more.
The traffic was a little better when we got to the expressway. It's better on Saturdays. The hospital was almost clear downtown. Mason was in a real sweat by the time we got there. He pulled down a side street and parked.
"Why don't you go on to the shopping center and meet me back here in a couple of hours?" he asked.
"Don't you want me to go with you?"
"No," he said bluntly.
"How come?" My voice was rising. "You don't want me to know you got something serious, right? That's it, ain't it?"
Mace reached over and patted my shoulder. "Calm down. It's just that I'll have to be doing a lot of waiting around and it'd get on my nerves to have you fidgeting around with me. You don't sit still easy, you know."
He got out, and I slid over to the driver's seat.
"Mace..."
"Come on, kid, I'll be okay. Look, be careful, and don't drag race."
"Okay."
"And don't lose the car."
Once we had lost the car at Westmall because the parking lots were so big. We'd thought for an hour it'd been stolen, when it was just parked on the other side of the mall. I'd have to make sure of which door I went in.
"Okay," I said. "You want me to get you anything while I'm there?"
"Oh, sure," Mace said, "here's my American Express card, get anything that catches your fancy." Then he turned around and walked toward the hospital. I watched him for a minute, then started up the truck and drove off.
I got to the mall without any trouble, except I sort of ran a stoplight, but I didn't get caught. Most of the stores weren't open yet, so I walked up and down looking in the windows. After an hour or so, it started filling up with people, but I still felt kind of lonesome. It was weird being lonesome in a place full of people. I never get lonesome out hunting or fishing by myself. I tried not to worry about Mason.
I went into the bookstore to see if they had a copy of Smokey the Cowhorse in paperback, but they didn't. I spent a while looking at the books anyway. I like to read okay, but I just never seemed to have time for it.
Then I went into a jeans shop. I can't believe people buy jeans already faded, when just a month out riding in them will do a plenty good job.
"If you can help me I'll let you know," a voice said.
"Okay," I said absently, then realized that wasn't how the sentence was supposed to go. I looked at the salesgirl.
"Sorry," she smiled, "I just get tired of saying the same thing all the time. Anyway, I wanted to see if you were paying attention."
I was now. She was really cute, with gold hair and big light-green eyes and the neatest gold freckles all over her face. She was maybe a year older than me.
"Would you like to try on some jeans?"
"Uh, no, I'm just looking," I said. Somehow the thought of picking out jeans with a girl salesclerk was kind of embarrassing. Then I felt dumb. I must look really dumb. Maybe this was why Mason hated going into stores, they made you feel dumb. I turned around and nearly knocked over a rack of shirts. I set them up and hurried out. I heard her say to another salesgirl, "I knew that kid wasn't going to buy anything."
"Yeah, but he was a foxy little devil, wasn't he?" the other one said.
I was so confused I couldn't see straight and almost knocked down an older lady carrying a bunch of sacks. I hate getting embarrassed. The more you think about it the worse it gets.
I stopped at the snack bar to get a Coke to cool off. That salesgirl was kind of cute, too. I couldn't figure out why girls were getting so cute lately. Last year they hadn't been so great.
I sat down on the edge of the indoor fountain and tried to calm down a little. I couldn't go charging around knocking things and people over. That would really look dumb.
Every once in a while somebody would come along and toss a penny in the fountain. The bottom was covered with pennies. That always made Mason so mad he couldn't see straight. Shoot, if it'd get me a wish, I'd try it myself. Anyway, it wasn't my pennies they were throwing. Try and tell Mason that.
Then I felt mean, thinking about Mace like that, and him at the hospital that very minute.
I was tired of walking up and down, so I went outside. Across a stretch of parking lot was a big sporting goods store, a movie house, a record shop, and an ice cream parlor. If you didn't know better, you'd think stores multiplied like rabbits.
I walked over to the sporting goods store. I meant to look at the guns, but got sidetracked by the fishing stuff. It had been a long time since Mason and me had gone fishing. Maybe if I got us a new lure, he'd want to go again. I like hunting better, myself, but fishing was the only thing Mason really relaxed at.
I looked the lures over, trying to remember what ones he already had, and trying to find one that didn't cost too much. I couldn't believe the way they had gone up in price. Finally I decided on one; it would take what was left of my money, but I hadn't planned on buying anything anyway. Mason could pay for lunch.
Then I went to look at the shotguns. There was no way I could get one, but I liked looking at them. I found a 20-gauge I really liked. I put the fishing lure in my shirt pocket and picked up the gun to see how it balanced. It seemed a little stock-heavy to me, but maybe that was ju
st sour grapes since I couldn't get it. Good sights on it, though. I sighed and put it down. Duck season was coming up ... well, Christmas was coming up, too.
I walked around a little more, looking at tennis stuff and skiing stuff and wondering if there were enough people to buy all the stuff in stores. I guess there are, though, or there wouldn't be so many stores. I looked at the water skis. I went water skiing once, and man, I loved it.
Someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around and faced a salesman.
"Kid," he said, "can you read that sign?"
I looked where he was pointing. "Shoplifters will be prosecuted."
"Sure I can read it."
"Do you know what it means?"
"Yeah. You catch somebody stealing you'll do your best to send 'em, to jail."
"Good. Now come with me."
I did, not even thinking about asking why. When you're in a strange place you don't think about having control of anything.
I followed him into a back office.
"I got another one, Ed," he said to a man behind a desk. Ed looked up at me wearily.
"What was it?"
The salesman reached over and pulled the fishing lure out of my pocket. For a second I didn't know what was going on. Then I broke out in a cold, sick sweat. They thought I was stealing it!
"I was going to pay for it," I said, when I could get my breath. I went from shocked to mad to scared, so quick I couldn't tell which I was feeling. "I was going to pay for it," I repeated, trying to keep my voice level. I sounded guilty. I even felt guilty. I must look guilty, too, I thought frantically. All kinds of visions were going through my mind--what would Mason say, what would Pop think, Jamie ... being put in jail. I couldn't go back to jail!
"They all say that," Ed nodded.
Say what? I wondered, then I remembered saying, "I was going to pay for it."
"I never stole anything in my life!" I said. Borrowing that car hadn't really been stealing. Anyway, I was just twelve when that happened--
"Now that one I never heard before," Ed said.
I was so scared and sick I was close to crying. They'd never believe me. Nobody'd ever believe me. Pop would disown me. Pop was funny and talkative and loved to laugh and tell stories, but he had never ever said a word about prison or what it was like, just drilled it into us to respect the law. That probably impressed us more than if he had given us a day by day description of it. Anyway, I knew what it was like, sort of. I remembered sitting in that jail cell, listening to somebody beat on the bars down the hall, screaming "I'm drunk and I'm proud of it!" over and over again and the smell was so bad and the walls got closer and closer and I knew if I had to stay in there I'd go nuts like a caged animal, and beat my head in against the wall, and I was trying to sit real still to keep from doing that when Pop came to get me. From the look on his face I thought I'd go straight from jail to an orphanage. And when we got outside he'd belted me; the only time he'd ever hit either of us.
"I just put it in my pocket for a minute while I looked at a gun," I said, as steady as possible. The way they were looking at me made me feel like I was the worst kind of trash. Mason, even if he believed me, he'd never live this down. He had such a pride thing about never getting into trouble when he had so many chances to. He had turned very sarcastic on Johnny once, when Johnny smuggled a carton of Eskimo Pies out of the Safeway store, made him so miserable he couldn't even eat more than one or two.
"Was he out of the store?" Ed asked the salesman. "Or about to leave the store?"
It was weird, being talked about like you weren't even human.
"He was inside," the salesman said reluctantly.
"Turn him loose. This time." He went back to his papers.
The salesman opened his mouth to protest, then snapped at me, "You heard him, get out."
Everything had happened so fast I still didn't feel like I could move. "I was going to pay for it." I made one more effort to clear myself. "I got the money to pay for it." I almost took my billfold out to prove it.
"Kid," Ed said, "people come in here, kids with bigger allowances than my salary, and it's just like mountain climbing to them. They take things because they're there. Sometimes we even find merchandise in the trash bins--once they get away with it they're bored with it."
He glanced up at me, and for a second I felt like he believed me. "Still want the lure?"
I looked at it, laying there on his desk. A fishing lure was going to make me slightly sick for a long time to come. I shook my head. He escorted me out, but he didn't need to worry. I was never going into that store again.
I stood outside for a few seconds, still a little dazed.
It took me a few seconds to realize somebody was calling my name.
"Tex--are you deaf or stoned or what?"
I turned around. Jamie was standing outside the ice cream parlor with three or four other girls.
"Hey," I said, "hi."
She was wearing jeans and a shirt I knew belonged to Johnny and that he'd told her not to touch. It was a little too big for her. I couldn't tell if she was wearing a bra or not.
"What are you doing here?" she asked. The other girls were giggling and whispering together.
"Uh, nothing. Just killing time while Mason's at the hospital." Just looking at her was making me a little dizzy. The jeans salesgirl wasn't anything compared to Jamie. I wondered how I could have ever thought any other girl was cute. I must be in love, I thought, and my insides got shaky and my hands started sweating and there was a buzzing in my ears that made it hard to hear.
"...doing at the hospital?"
I realized Jamie had asked a question. Hospital. Mason. Oh, yeah, Mace was at the hospital. Huh. Maybe he wouldn't want everybody to know he was sick or something. Mason was really a fanatic about keeping things private.
"He went to see your brother Charlie. So Charlie could show him the hospital. Mason's thinking about being a doctor."
Then it occurred to me that she might talk to Charlie and find out different. Somehow when I was around Jamie I didn't exactly know what I was doing.
"Going to make money and nurses, huh?" Jamie said. I couldn't think of anything to say to that.
"Well," she said, "that's what Charlie says about being a doctor. Cole'd kill him if he heard. Of course, Charlie's only kidding. Partly."
Jamie's eyes were bluer than a twilight sky and her hair had a sheen like a summer horse, and I wanted to squeeze her till she crunched--I wanted to rescue her from something...
"...spent the night with Laura," she was pointing to one of the girls, I couldn't tell which one, they all looked alike.
"We're going to the movies, and Cole's going to pick me up later."
I looked up at the marquee. "I hear that's a good movie."
I felt like everything I was saying was coming out really dumb, but I couldn't seem to stop it.
"I've seen it before. I like the guy who plays the smuggler. He is a doll."
Anger flashed over me like a freak lightning storm. "Oh, yeah? I hear he's a real wimp."
When the covey of girls giggled, I realized how that sounded. It sounded jealous. I might as well have yelled "I love you" over a loudspeaker. That was how it sounded. I felt the red spreading up my neck till my ears got hot. I expected Jamie to be glaring at me, but she just said, "Whatever you say." Then I noticed she was a little pink, too.
All I could think of was getting out of there before I said anything dumb again. "I got to go," I said. I did, too, it wasn't just any excuse, Mason would be waiting.
"Well, I'll see you around," she said.
"Yeah," I said and hurried off. My heart was thumping in my ears so hard I thought I would be deaf, but I heard, clear as anything, one of those girls say, "Oh, Jamie, he's cute," and Jamie say, "Yeah, he's real sweet, too."
She liked me! I had a chance. I stepped out in front of a green Firebird and nearly got run over. It gave an obscene blast of its horn and an angry squeal of its tires, but I didn't
care.
I had a chance.
Mason was waiting for me at the hospital. He didn't even offer to take the wheel. I was still so wrapped up in Jamie that I'd driven three or four blocks before I remembered he had his problems, too.
"Did you find out anything?" I asked finally. He sat slumped in the corner, glowering like a cornered wildcat. I half expected him to shoot off sparks.
"Yeah, I found out something. I got a goddamn ulcer, that's what I found out. I got a goddamn ulcer. Anything else you want to know?"
That wrenched my mind off Jamie. "An ulcer? Is that bad? I mean, serious?"
"Well, it could get serious. It could get pretty goddamn serious." His voice was shaking. I kept quiet, and drove as careful as I could, and by the time we got to McDonald's he'd straightened up, took a couple of deep breaths, and unclenched his fists.
I ordered two Big Macs, two orders of fries, and a chocolate shake. Mason had a strawberry shake. That was all.
"Have some french fries," I said, holding them out. He shook his head. "I'm not supposed to eat stuff that'll bother me. Last time I had french fries they bothered me." He was quiet a second. "There goes the ol' chili."
I stared at him. No more chili? He'd starve! "Hey man," I said, "I'm sorry."
"You and me both. I got to get some pills, too ... I'm not supposed to let things get to me." His voice broke. It was awful to see Mason upset He always stayed cool. "Now just how the hell do I do that?"
I figured I was one of those things that got to him. Me and--"You can still play basketball?" I asked anxiously.
"Yeah, yeah." He nodded. "So far. It could be worse."
"Have a hamburger. You can have a hamburger, can't you?"
"Yeah, but I'm not hungry. I had to drink some barium and it really killed my appetite."
Mine was gone, too, but I finished my second Big Mac and cleaned up the fries anyway. I don't get to McDonald's very often.
"It could be worse," he repeated a couple of times, and by the time we were ready to go he sort of seemed to believe it.
"I hope these damn pain pills work."
"You been having pains?" I said, surprised. I never noticed it.
"I didn't publish it in the paper, but yeah, I had 'em. Bad, too. I was puking blood after practice last week."