A Song for Mary (11 page)

Now Bobby is sprawled across the fender of the car. He missed the catch, and so it is my game, third in a row.

We go to the cellar of 25 Sutton Place South where there is a Pepsi machine. We are pretty quiet because we know that the service elevator guy will try to give us a kick in the seat if he sees us here. The soda machine costs a nickel, and Bobby has fifteen cents of his thirty cents’ allowance with him. The Walshes have some money because his father works for the railroad and plays the Irish fiddle in the Third Avenue gin mills for extra cash.

Bobby puts a nickel in the machine, and we share the bottle of Pepsi, though he drinks most of it. He gives me about two inches in the bottom of the bottle to finish off.

And as Bobby heads up the stairs to the street, I stand there and drink the bottom of the soda, and then I shove the bottle back up into the machine.

I should have some money soon, too, because Billy got me the job. It’s not a good job, but it will help. I am getting twenty cents an hour for delivering the papers. Fat Walter who runs the candy store on 57th Street and First Avenue says that he pays for one week the week after. Billy told me that Walter does this so that the kids will come back again to deliver the papers. It takes about an hour and fifteen minutes to take the papers from building to building, up the service elevators, and through the hallways, but they only pay for an hour. “If you go fast,” Fat Walter says, “you can do it in an hour.”

Next week I’ll have my own thirty cents to spend. I told my mother that I will give the rest to her.

We quit the elevens after three more games, and we are sweating good now.

“I’ll race you to the Pepsi machine,” Bobby says, “and I’ll buy another soda.”

“Great,” I say, and we take off like Olympic sprinters to the basement of 25 Sutton.

We race as hard as we can until we get to the bottom of the stairs, and then we run quietly like we are ballet dancers. Bobby puts the nickel in and pulls down on the handle. I hear the bottle drop. Bobby sticks his hand in the machine, and he pulls out the empty bottle I had left there an hour before. His chin drops to his chest, and he looks as if someone told him he was really adopted.

I am disappointed, too, because I want some soda.

“What’s this?” Bobby says.

“Damn, Bobby,” I say, “I don’t know. What’s that?”

“It’s a friggin’ empty bottle is what it is,” he cries.

“What are you gonna do?” I ask.

I am doing everything I can to keep from laughing, especially since I am really thirsty and want some Pepsi.

Bobby sinks into his pocket and pulls out another nickel, his last one. This time the machine gives him a whole deal, and we return to the street, Bobby sucking down the bottle as we go up the stairs. When there is an inch left, he hands the bottle to me. I take my shirt out and wipe the top. This is going to taste good, and there is nothing like a cold soda after sweating it up. Even if there is just an inch.

As I raise the bottle to my lips I see out of the corner of my eye that Shalleski and his brother are coming toward us.

“Hey,” Bobby says to them.

“What are you guys doing?” Shalleski’s brother says. Harry is a tall and skinny boy, two years older than Shalleski and a little nicer.

“Off-the-point,” Bobby says.

“Give me some of that,” Shalleski says to me, reaching for the bottle.

“No,” I say.

I stare at him, but I know I am not going to stare him down.

“Give me that bottle,” Shalleski says, “or I’ll kick your ass in.”

“No,” I answer, “it’s mine.”

I can feel my body beginning to shake. I know this will lead to a fight. You just know these things, the way you know the guy in the movie will rip your ticket in half when you give it to him. One action leads to another.

I am afraid, and I know that he can see I am afraid, but I remember what Billy said, too. It is hard to talk, I am so nervous. The skin around my eyes begins to tighten, and I make the face, but I know I am not going to let Shalleski get this bottle. There is only one thing for me to do, and I know I am going to get hurt doing it, but I know, too, that I have to be quick, quick like my brother. So I hand the bottle to Bobby. As soon as Bobby takes the bottle I have a free hand, and I feel myself squeezing my fingers hard into my palm so that my fist is as tight as it can be, like a piece of hard wood, and I swing it around as hard as I can and punch Shalleski across the side of his face. I guess I could have hit him in the mouth, but I didn’t really want to hurt him or knock his teeth out. I am hoping that a punch like this, an easy one, will keep him from getting too mad at me.

I just know I have to do this.

Shalleski begins to yell as he falls back.

“You fuck, you fuck,” he is screaming as he recovers, and lunges at me. He grabs me around the waist and pulls me to the ground and begins to punch wildly at me. I am on the ground, but I don’t punch him back. I don’t want to be in this fight, but I know I have to be here. I just try to cover my head and face so that his punches go off the side of my arm. He is strong, and I can feel the muscles in his body tighten as he grabs me around the neck.

I could fight back easily enough if I wanted to, but I just want him to know that he’ll have to fight me every time he gives me a bad time. I don’t care about winning or losing, but Shalleski has to know he is going to have to go after someone else the next time.

God, I am thinking as I take a good punch to my head, I have to take care of myself. So I begin to move around quickly, knowing that I don’t want to be like a statue. A statue is too good a good target. I feel myself getting out of his grip, and I know I could punch him right in his teeth if I wanted, but something is holding me back.

He has his arm around my neck, but I have one arm under his neck, and the other arm is free. I could bust him a good one now, if I wanted.

Then, suddenly, Shalleski is saying, “You give? You give?”

It is easy to stop it now, even though I have a free fist to bop him one. I just have to say “Give,” and it will be all over.

When someone says “Give,” you have to stop. That is the way it is on the east side. I could say it in a second, but I have to think what I want to do with my free fist. Should I crack him hard?

My heart is not in this fight. I know that.

I don’t like Shalleski, but I don’t want to hurt him, either.

I am here on the ground rolling around with Shalleski in my new dungarees, and I am still remembering what he did to me back there on First Avenue a few years ago. I so wanted to get even with him then, but now it doesn’t matter so much. It doesn’t matter that he sent all my candy flying across First Avenue.

And there have been plenty of other times, too, that Shalleski has acted like a pain and bullied me. Little things, like punching me hard in the middle of the back in the school yard basketball games. But, still, I don’t want to hurt him, even if I could kick the shit outta him. I don’t know why. It just doesn’t seem worth it.

Passing through my mind now, but just for a second, is Sister Maureen in the second grade talking about turning the other cheek, and giving somebody your coat, too, if he asks you for your shirt. I remember that she also said it was easy to say this, but much harder to do, and I think now that I don’t want to give Shalleski anything. I don’t want to take anything from him, either. I just want us to be equal, if that could be in the cards.

Finally, after thinking about all this, I say the famous word. “Okay,” I say as he is choking me, “I give.”

But Shalleski starts to punch at me again. It figures that he wouldn’t be fair, and I should have known better.

And now Shalleski’s brother pulls him off.

“He says he gives,” Harry says, “so break it up.”

Shalleski gets up, and he and his brother move on up the street, and they don’t look back. I turn to Bobby, and he hands me back the bottle of soda. There is still a little left in the bottle, and I take it to the curb and pour it out.

“Hey,” Bobby yells out, “what the hell are you doing?”

“The soda doesn’t matter,” I say. “This is not why I punched him.”

“You coulda gave it to me.”

“It don’t matter,” I answer.

“Maybe you coulda beat him,” Bobby says.

I am laughing now, and I can’t wait to tell my brother Billy.

“Ahh, Bobby,” I say, “maybe and ten cents gets you on the subway.”

I guess you have to make one point at a time, I think.

Walking up First Avenue to 56th Street, I am scraping a stick along the block-long fence that goes around the church and school of St. John’s. It makes a clattering sound, like a drummer in the St. Patrick’s Day parade.

Suddenly, Walsh begins to laugh out loud. He is pointing at the knee of my dungarees.

“Hey, Dennis,” he says, “you got a hole in your pants.”

“Holy shit,” I say.

“Now,” Walsh says, “you got a hole in your pants, a hole in your shoes, and a hole in your head.”

God, I am thinking, my mother will kill me.

I should have hit that Shalleski when I had the chance.

Chapter Sixteen

S
ister Urban is looking over the class with that funny look she has every time she wants to lash out at someone. Raymond Rabbitscabbage farted, just a little noise. But it gives me an idea, and I put my hand in my shirt, cup it under my arm, and squeeze down. I am good at this, and it makes a terrific fart noise. Petey Poscullo laughs out loud. Raymond Rabbitscabbage farts again, and this time Petey Poscullo can’t stop laughing. I know that Sister Urban is out for a farter, and Petey knows that she will settle for a laugher if she can’t find a farter. So Petey is now pointing at me, and Sister Urban is flying down the aisle. Her wide black habit knocks the books off of Gilda Galli’s desk, and she doesn’t stop to help pick them up for Gilda. She tears toward me, and I feel like running.

“It wasn’t me, Sister,” I cry out, “I swear.”

But that doesn’t stop her. She grabs me. She pulls me by the arm, and I can see her hand go way back before she swings it around and slaps me hard across the face as she pulls me from the seat. I am stunned that she does this, and I yell.

“Shit,” I say, “I didn’t do nothing that bad.”

She pushes me to the back of the room and has me standing with my nose one inch from the brown wall. She puts her mouth next to my ear and yells at me.

“If you ever curse in this room again,” she screams, “I will have you thrown out of this school as fast as you can blink.”

Raymond Rasakavitch is now as silent as a guardian angel, and Petey has stopped laughing. Ann Kovak, who is always so sweet and friendly, looks like she is going to cry. She is so shy anyway, and now her eyes look so sad, and her lips are pursed up. The rest of them, too, look scared and caring. I know that everyone in the class is feeling sorry for me, and I will let them know that I would beat the crap out of Poscullo if he wasn’t two years older than me because he was left back twice. Poscullo’s going to have a mustache when he graduates.

Here, with my nose against the wall, I listen to everyone in the class talking again about Blessed Maria Goretti. You can’t get away from the saints in my school, and Blessed Maria comes up like clockwork every term. She fought her attacker off until she died, protecting herself from sin.

I think that she must have been a frightened little girl, but my nose is against the wall, and I can’t say anything. And so I close my eyes and think of Blessed Maria Goretti, and of the fight she must have put up to keep from committing a sin.

Suddenly, I am thinking of Mr. Dempsey, and what would have happened if I didn’t get away from him that afternoon in the delicatessen. I wonder if Mr. Dempsey would become a priest if he killed me.

I guess once something like that happens to you, you can never forget it, and I still think about why people like Mr. Dempsey don’t get arrested, or why God doesn’t find some way to stop them from hurting little kids. And how come God lets a nun cream a kid like this in front of everyone?

My face is burning, and I try to rub it a little to make the burning go away. But Sister Urban sees me and calls out from the front of the room.

“You just put your hands at your side,” she says, “or I’ll tie them behind your back.”

Whenever I go to church, I always ask God to help make everything better for everyone. I know that I’m ten years old, and it’s 1950, and I have a job, and I’m supposed to act older and nor care about God or church, because everybody now is getting a television set and watching it is the big thing. But I love talking to God because I know He cares about me. Just like my mother does. But I worry that He has too many people talking to Him at the same time, and doesn’t have time to get to me.

Chapter Seventeen

M
y mother holds my face in her hands.

“Look at this,” she says. “What happened?”

There is no mirror in our bathroom. The bathroom is just a little square not much bigger than the bowl itself. There isn’t even a light, because there is just room enough for your knees if you are sitting, and you can hold the door open a little to let some of the kitchen light in. So my mother pulls me in front of the mirror above the kitchen sink.

“Just look,” she says, pointing.

I can see Sister Urban’s handprint in red across the side of my face. Now I guess I have to tell her about what happened, but she hates it if I have been bad in school. Or anywhere. She can get the strap on me to add to the punishment if I did something bad. But, I am thinking, I didn’t do anything that bad. And so I sit down in a kitchen chair and tell her about Rabbitscabbage and Petey Poscullo, and even Gilda’s books, and Ann’s sad eyes, and how Sister Urban ran down the aisle.

“You just made a crack underneath your arm?”

“That’s all I did, and Petey …”

“It is kid stuff,” she whispers, “just kid stuff. Put your jacket on.”

Now I am in the dark corridor of the second floor of St. John the Evangelist school, and we are looking for Sister Urban. I don’t want to be here because no matter what happens I know that I am going to be a problem for Sister Urban for the rest of the school year.