I borrowed the phone from the number fourteen winger, the boy I outran to score my try, and he was real nice about it too, but he did promise they’d even it up against us when we played them during the regular season.
And yes, cell phones apparently can be used to dial directly into hell, because my call went something like this:
MOM: Hello?
RYAN DEAN WEST: Hi, Mom. It’s me, Ryan Dean.
I always said that on the phone, like there was someone else who might call her “Mom,” even though I don’t have any brothers or sisters.
MOM: Oh my God, baby. Are you hurt again? How’s your head?
I was never allowed to call during the week. PM rules.
RYAN DEAN WEST: I’m fine, Mom.
I wasn’t about to say anything about the Band-Aid-on-the-balls thing. God! Who would ever have the guts to talk about something like that with their mom?
RYAN DEAN WEST (cont.): I’m calling from our game. We won. I scored a try.
MOM: Your dad’s going to be so happy to hear about that.
RYAN DEAN WEST: Is Dad there?
MOM: No, sweetie. He’s in New York.
Then she sounded really serious.
MOM (cont.): Ryan Dean, how did you get a phone?
RYAN DEAN WEST: Well, I just wanted to tell you, Mom, ’cause Coach is letting us use the other boys’ phones today since we’re not at school. But I wanted to let you know, and to say thanks to you and Dad for letting me go stay with Annie this weekend.
MOM: Oh. Ryan Dean?
RYAN DEAN WEST: What?
MOM: Is that why you wanted to talk to Dad?
Awkward silence.
MOM (cont.): Do you need to ask him . . . about . . . girl things? Because I spoke with your father in New York, and so yesterday I FedExed you a box of condoms and a pamphlet about, you know, how to have sex the first time. You should be getting it this afternoon, sweetie.
You know . . . I have lived my entire life and never once, not one time, have I ever talked to my mother about “condoms” and “how to have sex the first time.” I felt my ears turning red. I am such a fucking loser. My life is hell. No—worse than that. My life is a Band-Aid on my ballsack.
RYAN DEAN WEST: No! Please, God . . . . Tell me you did not do that . . . . Mom? FUCK!!!
Okay. I’ll be honest. I do not say “fuck” to my mom. During the ensuing and second awkward silence, I spend a moment seriously thinking about killing myself.
MOM: Well, you should ask your friend if she would like to visit Boston sometime.
“Your friend.” Ugh. Oh, yeah, Mom, just stock up on the rubbers and porn.
RYAN DEAN WEST: Okay, Mom.
I realized how deeply I hated talking to my mom ever since I became a teenager. And if there’s a more potent deterrent to perversion than the Niagara Falls of razor-sharp ice shards poured down your pants, it has got to be talking to my mom about “condoms” and “how to have sex the first time.”
RYAN DEAN WEST (cont.): Well, tell Dad I said hi. I should probably go now, Mom.
MOM: I love you, Ryan Dean.
RYAN DEAN WEST: (Garbled, so hopefully the boy next to him doesn’t understand) Iloveyatoomom. Bye.
Click.
I suddenly felt so dirty.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
THE SOCIAL BEGAN WINDING DOWN a little after four o’clock, and we moved through the cafeteria shaking hands and migrating out toward the bus for our long ride back to Pine Mountain.
Seanie and I were among the first to leave. I don’t think either of us really paid much attention to the group of four boys who were waiting around for us by the bus. If we had, we surely would have noticed that they were not Sacred Heart kids, because they weren’t dressed in ties and slacks.
They were just scrub kids from Salem, out to watch a rugby game, I guessed.
As Seanie stepped ahead of me onto the bus, one of the boys said, “Congratulations. Good game.”
“Thanks,” I said. I put my foot up on the first step into the bus.
“I’m waiting to say hi to my cousin,” the boy said. “He’s on your team. Joey Cosentino. Is he coming out?”
I turned around and saw Joey and Kevin leaving the cafeteria.
“He’s right back there.” I hitchhiked a thumb over my shoulder.
Then the four boys walked back to where Joey was, and I watched them, but it didn’t look like Joey was expecting them at all. In fact, Joey looked startled when he saw them. And the next thing I knew, all hell broke loose and someone yelled to look out because the kid had a knife in his hand.
I’ve seen people do some pretty stupid things in my life, but trying to jump a rugby player in front of his whole team has to be about the stupidest. One of the boys ran off right away. I saw Chas going after him, but the punk had too much of a lead on Chas, so I thought I’d help him out, which was also pretty stupid considering my stitches and that other injury I’d been trying to forget, but couldn’t, because I felt the sting of pain every time I moved my right leg.
I caught the kid and took him down right on the wet black asphalt of the Sacred Heart driveway. I didn’t get hurt, because he was wearing a down jacket and I landed on top of him, but he scraped up his face pretty good when he hit the pavement. I just pinned him down and tried to not get his blood all over my dwindling supply of school shirts, and Chas caught up to us and kicked the kid twice in the ribs. I know he broke something when he did it, too, because Chas was never one to go soft on anyone if he decided to actually go that far.
“What the fuck are you thinking?” Chas said, but the kid didn’t answer, he just gasped and bled. A lot. And Chas continued, “You’re hardly bigger than Winger. I should just piss on you, you stupid dumb fucker.”
Well, that really didn’t do much for my self-esteem, but I said, “Let me get off him first if you do, Chas.”
When I stood up, I heard sirens. Someone had called the police.
I looked back to the crowd where Joey and Kevin had been standing, and I saw that Coach M and some other adults were holding on to the other three boys.
“Let’s take him back to the others,” I said.
And Chas grabbed the bleeding kid in a wristlock and forced him back toward the cafeteria. As we got closer, we both saw that several people were kneeling. Kevin was down on the ground, lying on his back. A nun had her hand on his forehead. Joey was saying something to him. He was holding Kevin’s hand. The front of Kevin’s shirt was covered in blood, and he was coughing and staring straight up into the sky.
Kevin Cantrell had been stabbed.
A knife lay on the ground beside his shoulder.
The sirens grew painfully loud, and the first cop car screeched up right alongside where Kevin was lying.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
COACH MCAULIFFE RODE WITH KEVIN to the hospital in an ambulance.
The boy who pulled the knife was taken, handcuffed, in another.
Kevin had been stabbed in the shoulder when he tried to take down the guy with the knife. He wasn’t badly cut, and Coach assured us he was going to be okay. Not so good for the guy who stabbed him, though, because Joey broke that boy’s arm and jaw when he slammed him into the pavement. I honestly think that kid might have died if there haven’t been so many grown-ups around.
By the time the cops had arrested the four boys and gotten us all to write out our statements, it was almost seven o’clock and a cold rain was falling. Coach called from the hospital and told the bus driver to take us back to Pine Mountain.
It was a quiet and dark ride home.
No singing.
I don’t think any of us could stop thinking about Kevin and why something like this happened to someone as easygoing as him. It hurt us all because Kevin could accept anyone and anything, which is why, we all knew, he didn’t mind rooming with Joey—something that would be social death to most guys.
But Kevin was just Kevin.
I hoped it didn’t ruin him.
JP w
as still upset about the penalty he’d given up. Every fullback I’d ever known was like that; they had the toughest job on the team, and when they made mistakes, it was usually costly, so they tended not to let go of things very easily. That was probably the biggest reason why I believed our fight was far from over—the fullback psychology. But I knew I’d have my opportunity over the weekend to ruin his chances with Annie once and for all.
Seanie sat beside JP, but JP wasn’t talking. He just stared out the window, brooding, until he fell to sleep.
I sat stretched out in a bench seat by myself. I looked back the length of the bus and saw that Joey was alone too. So I got up and stumbled down the aisle to sit with him. Joey put his arm across the back of the seat in front of him and lay his head down on it. He had to be hurting about Kevin, but who wasn’t? It wasn’t Joey’s fault.
“Hey,” I said.
Joey didn’t answer.
I never saw anyone on the team cry before, but just then I thought Joey might have been. And I felt really awkward, but I put my arm around Joey’s shoulders. And then I thought how stupid I was for feeling like that because I wouldn’t feel weird about putting an arm around Seanie or Kevin or any other guy friend of mine who was hurting.
Seanie turned around from where he was sitting up near the front of the bus, and he looked at me and mouthed “homo,” then smiled. That was just Seanie being Seanie. So I flipped him off.
“Everything’s going to be okay, Joe,” I said. “You want to talk or something?”
Then I patted his head and put my hand down so I could push myself up to stand.
“Oh, and hey, I never did say thanks for that pass, Joe. So, thanks. Oh, and I’m breaking up with Megan tomorrow. I swear. As soon as we make out one more time, that’s it. Well, maybe twice more. Okay, three more times. But that is it.”
I laughed. Joey looked at me.
He looked pissed.
“I’m just kidding, Joey.”
I stood up and looked out the window.
“How stupid was that, anyway, trying to jump a guy in front of his whole rugby team?” I said.
Joey didn’t say anything.
“Okay. I’ll go now. I guess you don’t want to talk. Sorry, I just thought this fucking ride was getting boring.”
“Since when do you cuss?” Joey said.
“I cussed when Seanie stepped on my balls yesterday.”
“That doesn’t count.”
“In that case, I take back what I just said about the bus ride, just to keep my record clean.”
“Sit down,” Joey said.
“Okay.” I sat next to Joey.
“And, yeah, it was a pretty stupid thing to do,” Joey said.
“The one guy said he was your cousin. That’s why I pointed you out. I’m really sorry, Joe.”
“He isn’t my cousin. And it wasn’t your fault.”
“At least Kevin’s going to be okay,” I said. “He might have saved your life.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you know what it was about, Joey?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Okay,” I said. “Well, you know I totally trust you, Joey. I know you can keep a secret for me. So if you want to tell me anything about it, it’s okay, and if you don’t want to talk about it, I understand too.”
Joey took a deep breath. He glanced around. The bus was dead. Nearly everyone was asleep.
He said, “The kid with the knife. His name’s Mike. His brother and I used to see each other. When his folks found out, they flipped. They sent him away to a hospital for crazy kids.”
“Oh.”
Joey said, “It fucked him up worse than anything. Mike told me he was going to come after me one day. I never believed him.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” Joey cleared his throat. “I never tell anyone this shit, Ryan Dean.”
“I won’t say anything, Joe.”
“I know.”
“Did you tell the cops?” I asked.
Joey nodded his head. “I wrote it all down, Ryan Dean.”
“Oh. Okay.” I drummed my fingers against my leg. That Band-Aid, which had become a symbol of my life, was really starting to bug me. “Hey, Joey? Can I tell you about how stupid my mom is?”
He looked at me. In the dark, I could see he looked really serious and tired, but his eyes were kind of smiling.
“Sure.”
Then I told him the whole thing about the phone call and the condoms and the “how to have sex the first time” pamphlet, and Joey actually laughed out loud.
“Oh, your mom just cares about you, Ryan Dean, and sometimes parents don’t really understand the best way to show it. But that is fucking funny.”
“I swear to God, Joe. My life is a nightmare.”
“I don’t think so. Not compared with most guys’.”
“And I haven’t even talked to you since the other night, but thanks for getting in Chas’s face too.”
“Did you actually punch him?” Joey asked.
“As hard as I could. And I am pretty sure he would have killed me if you didn’t stop him.”
“Damn.”
“Hey, Joey? What would you do if, let’s say hypothetically, you had to sleep in a bunk bed over Betch and you had a giant Gatorade bottle filled with your own, foamy, day-old piss just sitting there getting cold in your bed?”
And Joey laughed again, like he didn’t believe I was telling him the truth.
On that bus ride home, I believe Joey Cosentino and I became best friends.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
BY THE TIME WE GOT back to O-Hall, it was almost midnight.
Joey and I followed behind Chas, up the stairwell and down the hall. I hoped he’d run into Mrs. Singer, but, when I thought about it, it seemed like I was the only boy in the whole building who’d ever had any run-ins with her.
Maybe she didn’t even really exist.
I decided that sometime before Halloween, I’d have to design a Ryan Dean West is-the-permafrost-eye-poison-known-as-the-unhot-Mrs.-Singer-actually-of-this-universe? experiment, fully controlling, of course, for all unexpected variables.
We checked in with Farrow and said good night to Joey, and I envied him for having a room to himself, even under the circumstances. Then I went to the bathroom-slash-execution-chamber to pee, and Chas headed off to our room alone.
When I got to the room, Chas was already in his bed, but the lights were on.
“What’s in the package?” Chas said.
I groaned.
A white FedEx mailer was sitting on my bunk.
I am such a loser.
“Some porn and a box of rubbers,” I said. “From my mom.”
“Whatever. You’re a fucking dick, Winger.” And Chas rolled over and covered his head, mumbling something about kicking my ass one day.
Confronting Chas Becker with the truth was the surest way to get him to think I was lying.
I turned off the lights and climbed up onto my bunk. I stuffed the package down between the wall and my mattress, right next to the Ryan Dean West Emergency Gatorade Bottle Nighttime Urinal repository full of pee.
I thought, pretty soon I’m going to run out of sleeping space.
I slipped out of my clothes and listened to the rain until I fell asleep.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
I SAW ANNIE AT BREAKFAST in the morning.
Everything seemed to click back into place and get better on the spot. The whole school was buzzing with the rumors of the “Rugby Riot,” and I heard all kinds of bullshit stories from people who weren’t even there, about Kevin Cantrell almost dying, and how “the gay kid” started a fight.
But Mr. Farrow had already told us before we left for school that Kevin was fine and would be back in O-Hall on Monday, so I just shut up when I heard the ridiculous versions circulating, except I did push one boy and call him an asswipe for saying Joey started the fight.
I sat down across from Annie. We held hands on top of the table.
Isabel, the constant, fuzzy-lipped-flying-monkey companion, sat beside her. Seanie, Joey, and JP were there too.
JP noticed we were holding hands, gave me a dirty look, and then turned his face away.
“Hey,” I said. “Are you feeling good today?”
“I was back at school yesterday,” Annie said.
“I scored a try for you, like I said I would.”
“I heard all about everything from Sean,” she said. “Are you ready for today?”
“Oh my God, Annie. I’ve been ready for a week.” I fired a look at JP. He wasn’t watching, but I knew he was listening.
“Let’s meet at the front of the office at the start of lunch,” Joey said.
Kids who flew home usually rode to the airport together, since seniors were allowed to leave their cars at PM. I didn’t even find out until after the arrangements had been made that Joey would be driving Chas Becker’s SUV and taking me, Annie, Chas, and Megan to the airport with him.
Chas Becker’s driver’s license had been suspended. Go figure.
Joey was going home to the Bay Area, Megan lived in Los Angeles, and Chas, I assumed, would be going with her, but I didn’t care and wasn’t going to ask him. I just wanted to get out of there, even though I dreaded the awkwardness of the long drive to the airport and sitting in the same car with Annie and Megan. But I did come up with a couple perverted fantasies involving getting stuck in a snowdrift and sending Chas and Joey out into the cold to search for help. Unfortunately, the first snow hadn’t fallen yet.
“Did Isabel give you my note?” I asked.
“Nice Space Needle cartoon,” Annie said. “But you are a total liar about not knowing what was going on the other night, Ryan Dean West, and you know it.”
I stared right into her eyes, giving her my most innocent look. I even leaned forward over the table, just like she did to me that night outside O-Hall when Madam-Frosty Mrs. Singer caught us as we were about to kiss.
But, God! I really wanted to kiss her so bad.
“Oh, really?” I said.
“Yeah,” she said. “Two times balls equals they do the thinking. Oh, which reminds me . . . How’s the SpongeBob Band-Aid?”