Gentlemen (7 page)

So I was walking down the front hallway of the main building after school, and god knows I hate the Tits, but the hallways after school aren't so bad. They're empty and open and cleaned and polished. At home, I've got to kick my way through all the stuff on the floor half the time, at least in my room, but after school you can just motor through all this clean open space. You can sort of skate on the tiles, depending on what kind of shoes you're wearing.

It's not like it's a huge thrill; it's just much better than it is during the day. You can pretty much go where you want, and you don't need a pass. That's because the people who stay after school are mostly the jocks, who are outside or in the gym, or the geeks, who are holed up with their clubs. There's detention, too, but then you're shut in the Tank, which is
what we call the detention room. So if you're just hanging out after school, it's like you've got the hallways to yourself. You're like 99 percent less likely to run into someone you don't want to. That goes for some senior looking to stomp you or some girl you're avoiding. (And, yeah, it's pretty much always the girl who's avoiding me, but whatever, it could happen.) More to the point, it goes double for some teacher who's been acting like a psychopath.

Before sixth period, I turned the corner heading out of the east wing. I was going fast, trying to get to the library before the sign-in sheet filled up, which I didn't, and I nearly ran head-on into Haberman. He was coming out of the teachers' lounge with Grayson. Now, Mr. G I can deal with, but I'd heard plenty from Haberman for one day. Lucky for me, I was going fast and was past him before he could say anything that'd piss me off. I'm not even sure he saw me. He was already talking and coughing at the same time, and how many things can a man be expected to do at once? Anyway, that's the exact kind of thing you don't have to worry about after school. Most of the time, you turn the corner and there's no one there, just an empty hallway, like in
The Shining.

The catch is that it's not like you can just leave whenever you want. You've got to wait for the late buses and ride home with the jocks and geeks. Sometimes the late buses are at five, sometimes they're at five forty-five, and sometimes they're even later. It depends on if anyone has an away game or if a
field trip's getting back. There's a schedule printed up and you want to check it so you don't get stuck waiting forever. This was Wednesday and the buses left at five, which was fine, because we were staying after to talk things out face-to-face, and it seemed like it'd probably take a while.

I'd just been over at the little roadside place on Route 7, which had the nearest pay phone and was a ten-minute walk from the Tits. They didn't have a pay phone at the school, because if it was official business, they'd let you use the phone in the office, and if it wasn't, they didn't want you calling. A lot of the kids had cell phones. You weren't supposed to bring them to school, but that was like the most ignored rule in the history of rule-making. I would have brought mine in, if I had one. My mom said she wasn't paying for me to have a cell. I'm pretty sure she thought that getting one would magically turn me into a drug dealer. She was half right, though, because it probably would've turned me into a more hooked-up drug taker.

She's clever, too, because if I got a cell myself, I wouldn't have any money for anything like drugs. Those things are seriously expensive when you're not on someone else's plan. It's like fifty bucks a month, minimum. Last winter, Tommy said we should all go in together on a plan. At first we were like, “Jesus, Tommy, how gay are you?” Then it didn't seem like such a bad idea and we looked into it, but it turned out none of us was old enough. Then Tommy talked his way onto his mom's plan anyway. So good for him. As for me, it just
wasn't important enough to spend that kind of money on. And what did I really need one for? It's not like I'm a chick.

Except in this case, it would've saved me twenty minutes of walking, round-trip. I'd been deputized, lucky me, to give Tommy's place a call and see if he'd turned up. It sucks when the only one of us with a cell phone is the one who goes missing. I figured his mom would be home, and she was. Just the way she answered the phone—first ring and totally desperate—saying hello twice in like one second, I knew he hadn't turned up. So I hung up. Because what the hell, I was calling from a pay phone.

So I was in the front hallway, main building, like I said, making time. And that's the other thing I wanted to say about the hallways, they have that smell, like, patented. It was sort of like that hospital smell, but without the piss mixed in. I guess it was whatever they used to clean the floors. You really didn't notice it when the halls were crowded, but you couldn't miss it after school. So I got to the courtyard and pushed open the door, and Bones and Mixer were at the table all the way at the far end. There was no one else out there, but I guess they figured this was top secret and the far corner worked best for that.

It was still a few months till summer vacation but it was a nice enough day. I had a denim jacket on but I probably didn't even need it. I could see from here that Mixer had left his jacket in his locker and was out there in just that Nosferatu T-shirt of his that has the hole in the front. I always thought
that was kind of gay, having a big hole in your shirt like that. It was just like a little too close to his nipple, which no one needed to see.

So I sat down and gave them the report: “He's not there. His mom's like waiting by the phone.”

We started talking, not whispering exactly but not talking full volume, either. We were all talking at once for a little while, because I guess we all had something to say. I'll spare you the play-by-play on that, because there were a lot of lines like: “Is that bleeping bleep-head bleeping bleeping with us?” It's not like I mind the swearing, but there's not much sentence to sentences like that, and we were kind of beating around the bush.

Finally, Mixer laid it out, just to get it out into the open. “I mean, he wants us to think he killed him, right? ‘A student is missing'…‘it's murder.' Am I reading that right? He's saying Tommy was wrapped up in that barrel, we carted it to the car for him, and now we're guilty, too?”

“He didn't say he killed him,” said Bones. “Just that someone did.”

“Who the hell do you think he was talking about, dumbass?” said Mixer. “He said it happened in
his
classroom.”

Bones shrugged. “Yeah, I was just saying.”

There was a red notebook on the table in front of Mixer, the kind with the thin plastic cover and the metal spiral binding. He picked it up, opened it, and started reading. He was doing a pretty good imitation of Haberman's voice.

“'Say someone, or some ones, help this murderer get rid of the body, aren't they also, in some sense, guilty?' ”

“That could've been the barrel,” he said and sort of tossed the notebook down on the table.

I still wasn't sold on all this, so I said, “Since when do you take notes?”

I thought that was pretty funny, but the others didn't laugh at all, so I could see they were taking this more seriously.

Bones goes, “That is so screwed up. I mean, first of all, Tommy would kick his ass. I mean, it's ridiculous, right?”

But he wasn't telling, he was asking. The question just kind of hung there for a bit. I guess we were all thinking about it. The evidence we had at this point basically boiled down to this:

Tommy, who was missing: It wasn't the first time, but it was still unusual.

Haberman, who was weird: Always had been but was reaching new heights lately.

The barrel: It was the first time Haberman had done anything like that in class.

Whatever was in the barrel: Could've been a deer, could've been a dude, but it seemed like some sort of a dead body to me.

What Haberman said about disposing of a dead body: See above.

What Haberman said about crime being “a matter of opinion”: Sounded like something a killer would say.

What Haberman said about a murder in the classroom: Sounded like something a killer would say.

Haberman talking about “the victim's friends” and sort of singling us out: Sounded like something a killer would say if he was also an ass.

So anyway, that's what we were turning over in our heads, all filtered through standard-issue high school paranoia and our natural belief that everything was basically about us anyway.

“Knickerbocker, please,” I said finally. It was like this joke expression we had, and the three of us laughed a little, just at how out there this whole thing was. I mean, it wasn't exactly funny, because Tommy really was missing, and even if he'd just run off, that was still pretty dangerous. But the easiest thing to do with something that was bothering you was always to make fun of it.

“Yeah, I mean, it's dumb, but that's what he was getting at, right?” said Mixer. “I mean, he knows we're Tommy's friends, and he's sort of been picking on us. Making us haul that barrel yesterday, and whatever the hell was in there, and today in class, I mean, Mike said he was looking at him.”

He reached for his notebook, and I knew he was going to read the line about the victim's friends, and I looked at him like, Don't bother.

“Listen,” I said, “I think it's all in the book. I think the Russian dude kills his mother with an ax and maybe like she had some friends. Who saw something or carried something
or whatever. I don't know, I'm just going by what he said, but it's a lot more likely that he's talking about the book than about some real-life killing spree. I mean, it's English class, frickin' Homoman. What's he going to do, kill Tommy with that fish club?”

And I wasn't serious about that last part, but as soon as I said it, I got a sick feeling. I remembered that club, hard and balanced in my hand. I remembered how Haberman tugged whatever was wrapped in that blanket out of the barrel, stronger than I thought he'd be. And I remembered the way the blanket moved, all joints and knobs, and come to think of it, the idea of bringing roadkill into class wasn't a big step down in the craziness department from stuffing a body in there.

So now I was finished saying my piece, and it was like the other two were more or less convinced, because they were like, Yeah, that's crazy, dude's in Manchester again, and now I was the one who wasn't so sure. I had the book in my locker, and I had half a mind to go and get it, just to start reading it and trying to match what was in it to what Haberman had been saying. But it wasn't like I was going to sit around with Bones and Mixer reading, so I just sat back and looked over at the glass hallway that runs along the courtyard. I must've caught the movement out of the corner of my eye, because there were three girls walking by.

They were freshmen, I think. There should really be a word for freshman girls, like one without “men” in it, but I
don't think there is. Anyway, one of them was kind of cute, once I got a better look. Then I heard Mixer laughing, so I knew Bones was up to something. I turned around and he had two fingers V'd out in front of his mouth and he was darting his tongue in between them. The girls giggled and hurried past us like typical freshmen chicks. Mixer and Bones were feeling better about things now. They were sort of leaning back on the benches like they owned the courtyard, but I was still sitting up and thinking.

When I started talking, they could tell by my voice that I had something serious to say. “I'm not saying it is crazy or it isn't.” That's how I started it out, and they sort of looked at each other, because I guess they thought we'd settled this. “But if Haberman did do it, here's how it could've happened.”

Then I laid it all out for them: Tommy was in the hallway in the middle of the period. He's in no hurry to get to the office. And there's Haberman. He's got a free period, and he's like, Come in here and help me with something for a second.

I started off slow, just throwing it out there, but as I went on, it kind of fell into place, and I really could see how it could've happened.

I'll sort it out with Trever, Haberman would've told him. I just need help hanging something on the wall, or whatever. Then Tommy's in Haberman's room, just the two of them. Tommy's got his back to him, hoisting a picture frame. He'd be saying, Is this OK? Higher? He'd hang a picture or two if he thought Haberman could really square him with Trever. Then,
bam,
Haberman clocks him on the back of the head with that frickin' club:
Bam! Bam bam bam!
Out comes the plastic sheet and the blankets, like a spider going to work on a fly.

Yeah, I could see that. And by the time I'd finished talking, the others could, too.

I didn't do much on Wednesday night. Welcome to my world. It was almost six by the time the late bus dumped me out on the side of the road. The bus just crawls sometimes. I swear, it goes like two miles an hour on the hills. And this area is all hills. On the plus side, Mom'd finally been food shopping. I could smell the Shake ‘n Bake as soon as I opened the door. The first dinner after she went shopping was almost always something good: Shake ‘n Bake chicken, Hamburger Helper, something like that. It would take a few days until we got to the frozen stuff, but hey, that's why it's frozen, right?

After dinner, I took a bag of potato chips and went into the front room to start reading the book. Mom was probably confused not to hear the television click on right away. That took an hour or so to happen. I put the book down once I
figured out who was going to get killed first. I figured maybe I'd pick it up again later.

And I know that an hour of reading might not sound like much, especially with what I was saying before, how I had half a mind to take it out right at school and start reading it there. But there's something you've got to understand: That book is seriously frickin' dense. Thing's like a brick.

There are probably other versions, with bigger type and more pages, but the one we had just crammed the words in there, with tiny type and words out to the edges. The pages were just like all ink. And the writing was the same way: really complicated and hard to figure out. Some of the paragraphs went on for two pages!

Anyway, add it together and you could be reading for a while and not be halfway down the page. And I'm not exaggerating, either. This is one paragraph from the first page, talking about this dude Raskolnikov:

This was not because he was cowardly and abject, quite the contrary; but for some time past, he had been in an overstrained, irritable condition, verging on hypochondria. He had been so completely absorbed in himself, and isolated from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, not only his landlady, but anyone at all. He was crushed by poverty, but the anxieties of his position had of late ceased to weigh upon him. He had given up attending to matters of practical importance; he had lost all desire to do so. Nothing that any
landlady could do had a real terror for him. But to be stopped on the stairs, to be forced to listen to her trivial, irrelevant gossip, to pestering demands for payments, threats and complaints, and to rack his brain for excuses, to prevaricate, to lie—no, rather than that, he would creep down the stairs like a cat and slip out unseen.

So there you go, and that was just one paragraph. First of all, was there a sale on commas? Second, that's a long way to go to say that the dude was broke and decided to duck his landlady. After an hour of that I needed a break and maybe an aspirin. Anyway, I watched
Without a Trace
on cable, and it sort of felt like part of the same assignment.

I don't know if you've ever seen that show, but it's all about missing persons. It's not something I watched a lot, but I'd seen it a few times before, and this one went pretty much like the others. It starts off, someone disappears, like walks out the front door and just fades out on the screen. Then this group of FBI agents, who all seem like they've had way too much coffee and way too little sleep, go to work trying to find them. They start by putting a picture of the missing person up on a board.

I tried to remember if I had a picture of Tommy anywhere, like a school photo or something. I didn't think so, but what the hell would I need one for? It's not like I was going to forget what he looked like.

Anyway, the thing I liked about the show was that it seemed sort of realistic to me. I mean, what did I know,
except that it was a little less cute and clever than a lot of other mystery-type shows, and I was pretty sure at this point that real life wasn't cute and clever very often. It's like on other shows, some old lady or flighty dude will string together all of these random clues, like a church bell going off early, some spilled flour, and a cracked picture frame. They'll take all this in, mull it over, and then with two minutes left in the show, they'll be like, Reggie did it! For the inheritance!

And sometimes it was fun to follow along with that stuff, if there was nothing else on, but it just sort of seemed like bull to me. You know how they got things done on
Without a Trace?
They shouted, and if they were really at a loss, they shouted louder. You might think I'm joking, but it'd happened in every show I'd seen so far. Their big thing wasn't collecting weird clues, it was getting people in this little room and questioning them as loudly as possible.

The clues that mattered to them were the ones that mattered in the real world: Who knows who? Who knew the victim, who did the suspect know, who had a grudge or a crush or whatever. They drove all over the place in these sleek black cars, flashed their badges, busted down doors, and hauled anyone like that back to the little room.

Jack was the main guy, Jack Malone, and he was kind of a big, burly guy, and he always seemed about one nervous twitch away from totally losing it. I think sometimes it was an act, you know, to scare the person, but it was hard to tell. I mean, the whole thing was acting, but you know what I mean.
Anyway, he'd get angry and red in the face. He was supposed to be Irish, so that part was believable. He'd yell at the guy, pick up a chair and slam it down, slam his hands on the table, say he was going to arrest him or worse. Or he'd go the other way and lean in real close, still just as angry, like he was barely in control, and whisper in the guy's ear. He'd get totally in his space and go like, Did you kill her?

Sooner or later, the poor dude would crack and tell him something. It wasn't even necessarily something about the missing person. It could just be something that'd lead the agents to someone else who might know a little more. Then they'd haul
that
person in and repeat the whole process. And Jack would be even angrier the second time, so what chance would that person have?

They'd just work their way through everyone who might've had anything to do with the person going missing. And by the end of the show, they'd find them. And yeah, they'd break through the door and rescue the lady or kid or whoever with two minutes to go, just like the other shows, so it was still sort of a fairy tale. It was still TV, when you came right down to it. It just seemed a little more like how things were, that's all.

I mean, cute and clever or angry and loud, how do you think the world works? I think you could pretty much turn on the news right now—or hell, just go through grade school again—and that would give you your answer. And sure enough, I picked up the book again and, right away, this dude killed an old lady with an ax.