If Jack's in Love (10 page)

As I passed I made a purely subliminal attempt to signal Myra to meet me in the woods behind Dickie Pudding's house. This dire message I endeavored to communicate with facial tics and eye movements, and Myra, sensing what I was up to, turned to speak with exaggerated directness to the Coghill on her left. Perhaps my intensity had made me brazen. I kept repeating Gladstein's syllable in my mind, fixing my sights on her.

There was a flurry on the porch. The Coghill girls had been disturbed, and now they disdainfully took notice. Johnny Pendleton glanced over his shoulder. His chest expanded righteously and he strolled to the edge of the Coghill yard, snarling and ogling me.

“What are you looking at, Witcher?”

The alligator grinned sardonically from his pumped-up pectoral, well informed of my social inferiority.

Pendleton was on the high school wrestling team and could easily have manhandled me. Nevertheless, legends about my brother's eye-gouging and nut-squeezing tended to keep the older kids at bay. It was well known that Stan would spend his might and his vengeance upon anyone over fourteen who dared to molest me (and indeed, I had once or twice protected the identities of malevolents who'd crossed me, without their even knowing I'd spared their lives). There was, at any rate, little reason to worry about the Pendleton menace with Stan behind me.

I kept leaning to the side, trying to locate Myra.

She had her head averted, rigid with embarrassment. Pendleton saw what I was doing and turned, bewildered, to look at her. Then he looked back at me.

“Get out of here before I kick your ass, Witcher.”

“Try it,” I said. I kept walking while Pendleton stalked at the edge of the yard, riled by his bloodlust.

“We know who Witcher likes!” one of the girls taunted, and everyone laughed, except Myra.

I stooped behind the bush in the Pudding woods and presently she came along, bobbing thoughtfully. She was gloomy and upset and acting as if she were unaware of my presence. Of course, she knew damn well who was lurking in the verdure.

I popped up and called her name. She peered nearsightedly, pretending not to place who I was. And then she said, “Oh, it's you,” determined to finish the charade.

“What do you want?” she said.

“I have to ask you something.”

To my surprise she stepped into the woods, albeit gingerly, looking for crawling insects and slithering snakes. She came a few yards in and I took an encouraging step in her direction. Immediately she held up a forbidding hand. For a girl of twelve her haughtiness was pretty damn authentic.

“Why did you look at me when you passed the Coghills'?”

“I want to talk to you.”

“Don't ever look at me like that in front of everyone.”

“It's a free country, I can look at you if I want. But if it bothers you I won't, maybe.”

“I don't want you looking at me like that in front of Kitten and Karla,” she said, referring to two of the three Coghills. Why Kathy didn't count was a puzzle to me, but these complexities of caste seemed to exceed my comprehension.

Myra kept watching me with her hands on her hips. And yet, as my angel of self-love whispered, she was here, right? She had followed me, hadn't she?

“Okay, so what did you want?”

“I have a new ring for you. This one's a lot nicer.”

“Oh, Jack.” She clucked her teeth. “Don't you ever get the message? There's no way you and I can...” She decided to leave unuttered what might follow the predicating term.

“Just take a look at it,” I said.

She snuck a quick peek.

“Come closer,” I said.

She did. And then she thumped her hand against her chest.

“That's a diamond!”

I smiled.

“Where did you get it, from Mr. Gladstein?”

I didn't say anything, choosing to be enigmatic. She gazed at the stone, all hypnotized by its luster and its luxury, and I said, “Listen, the new people that moved in have invited me to a pool party at their house on Saturday. Do you wanna come as my guest?”

“What new people?”

“That moved into Clark Lane.”

“You mean you actually know them?”

“The girl's name is Anya, they just moved here from Dallas.”

Myra bit her lip. An intricate display of emotion passed over her face. Her eyes peered into mine...she began to say something...stopped...opened her mouth.... Her lip trembled—and she burst into tears.

“Why are you crying?” I said, thunderstruck.

“Because I want to go to the party,” she sobbed, “and I can't.”

“Why not?”

“Because of your brother. He threatened to beat up my father.”

“When?”

Then I remembered—the evening at the drainage ditch . . . Stan punching his palm, grinning at Mr. Joyner. At the time I had indeed assured myself it would come back to haunt me, but so much had happened since then that I'd nearly forgotten about it.

“Well look,” I said, “we can't let what other people think hold us back.”

“Hold us back from what?”

She drew up her shoulders. How dare I refer to us as
us
.

She proudly stared away and I allowed myself the opportunity to examine her profile. That she was still lingering made me think I might have an advantage, and silently I began to chant my magic syllable. I believe my lips moved . . . she bit her lower lip, watching me...I locked my eyes on hers...didn't let her look away. I must have chanted ten times before I eased up.

She blinked.

“Here.” I stretched out my hand. “Take the ring.”

She reached—snatched back her hand—reached once more.

“It won't bite.”

She took it. “It's too big, this is a grown lady's ring.”

Nevertheless, the ring was now on her finger. Had any Witcher in the history of our race realized the glory that was mine?

“Keep it in your pocket.”

I took her bare brown shoulders in my hands.

“Don't you dare kiss me. Don't you even try it.”

“If you're going to take my ring you have to kiss me.”

In some corner of my mind I saw Gladstein perched on his three-legged stool, watching and applauding.

“Why were you staring at me just now? That was so weird.”

“Because you're beautiful,” I said.

I moved in and got my kiss.

Gladstein nearly fell off his stool.

When I drew back, her eyes remained pensively shut, evaluating, as opposed to savoring, my kiss.

She blinked her eyes open.... And then she began to dictate the terms.

One, she would accept the ring, but only for a few days. Two, she would come to the party, but I was not allowed to pick her up at her house. Three, I was never to tell anyone, ever, that she had gone to the party with me.

I nodded, overwhelmed by her skill in romantic administration. And those were just the major terms. Now she got down to the nitty-gritty.

We had to figure out some way to sneak her into the pool. One good thing, Clark Lane was fairly secluded, but she nixed the idea of going through the woods: too many ticks. Probably I should just leave getting to the party to her. Another thing, she'd have to wear a bathing suit under her clothes so her parents wouldn't see.

I stood there slackly attentive while she arranged the details. She asked if my brother would be at the party and I explained he was the reason we were invited in the first place.

“That girl
likes
him?”

She wrestled with the enormity of that, and then she told me that Stan must not be allowed to speak to her. “Just tell him. If he speaks I won't acknowledge him. And God help him if he says anything nasty about Gaylord.”

Passionately I shook my head. That would never happen, I swore.

She then informed me that she would keep my ring until the party, at which point I'd have to take it back. It did not mean, repeat, did not, that we were going steady.

“What does it mean, then?”

“It means I'm your friend until the party. We'll take it from there.”

This girl had my head swimming. I wasn't even able to relish the kiss.

She held up the oversized ring and smiled. “I'll bet in a couple of years I could grow into this.”

“It's yours,” I avowed, “forever!”

She gave me an exasperated look. “What did we just agree on?”

“Okay, fine. I'm letting you know, that's all.”

Through the trees, from down at the Pudding house, sounds of conversation drifted up. Myra grew alarmed.

“What time should I be there Saturday?”

I told her one in the afternoon.

And she vanished.

She pogo-sticked right on out of the woods.

Dickie Pudding and his brother entered as she exited, punching their fists into their baseball gloves.

I HURRIED TO GLADSTEIN'S to tell him the news. As I dashed past the Ben Franklin, hoping and praying Mom wouldn't spot me, out through the door strolled Pop, bestowing the favor of his crooked grin upon the world. He must have stopped in to hit up Mom for money.

“Whoa hoss, where you off to in such a hurry?” he said, collaring me.

“Up there.” I pointed up the hill.

I didn't want him to know about my friendship with Gladstein. Or about the ring. Or about Myra. In Pop's presence my most ardent schemes seemed preposterous and I no longer wanted to admit to them. Maybe it was because I was small and he was big and I was years away from attaining that easy masculinity he had brought down from the mountains with him. Frankly, I didn't think I'd ever have it. I was full of the nervousness that creates neurotic ambition, whereas Pop was impervious to ambition. Even Stan's masculinity was hard rather than easy. Stan hated being who he was, and his virility was manifest in his inclination to tear off noses and swallow ears and spit out eyeballs. Seducing girls was his social vengeance. Stan never forgot he was a Witcher, and shame had made him proud. But Pop, he took life as it came. He was a democrat, a man among men, and without bigotry. There was a socialist streak in Pop; he didn't think of the things he owned as possessions. If you wanted what he had, you could have it. But he expected the same of you. Probably that was his problem in life: the world is not a socialist place, fundamentally. Fundamentally the world is competitive and ruthless and striving, and he found the ambitions of others heartless and cold. His easy attitude made everything you dreamed about seem vain, grasping.

“What do you mean, ‘up there'? You keeping secrets from your old pop?” His eyes were teasing me, having fun.

“I'm heading up the hill, that's all.”

“To Gladstein's?”

It surprised me that he knew. I glanced through the plate window of the Ben Franklin and saw Mom at her cash register, waving enthusiastically and blowing kisses. She almost looked pretty.

Pop said, “She tells me you and him are becoming best friends.”

“He's all right.”

“You going to see him? I'll come along with you.”

“No!”

Pop's company was the last thing I wanted. For the first time ever, I was putting another grown man before my father. I guess in some remote way I felt guilty about it. But it was a fact: I would happily divulge to Gladstein what I would never confide to Pop. I didn't even want to be in the same room with them both.

“I'm just stopping in for a minute,” I explained. “I have something to tell him.”

“Why?”

It was a good question. Why would I be calling on a merchant Jew who dealt in costly diamonds and kept fluffy dogs and retailed unintelligible Yankee jokes?

“I have something to tell him real quick. You wait here,” I said.

“I wanna see the man's shop, I've never been inside the place.”

He steered me onward, and my heart fell accordingly. The only reason I wanted to see Gladstein was to tell him what had just happened with Myra. And if Pop was around I'd be loath even to bring up her name. Then again, I was worried Gladstein might bring it up. Discretion was hardly a trait the megaphone-throated jeweler could claim.

Pop walked up the steps beside me and we turned in.

“Little Witcher!” Mr. Gladstein called.

The prissy bell tinkled over our heads. Pop turned to look.

“And who do we have here, the famous Mr. Witcher?” Gladstein said.

Pop ducked his head, being humble. He came forth with an outstretched hand.

“Yes sir, very pleased to meet you.”

“The annihilator of El Dorado Hills,” Gladstein boomed.

“I wouldn't know about that,” Pop said. “Sure is a nice place you have here.”

He'd barely glanced at it.

“I understand you're the annihilator of Kellners,” Gladstein boomed, unwilling to give anything up.

Pop gave me a shove and laughed. “What have you been telling this man?”

I stared hard at Gladstein. I begged him with my eyes to shut up.

Pop gazed all about, rubbing his hands. “My, you got some gorgeous jewelry here, you sure do.” He stared through the glass-top counter at the riches and splendor of the House of Gladstein. “Look at that gold necklace there.” Pop whistled. Then he wandered over to gaze at the stuff in the window.

As soon as he turned his back, I glared furiously at Gladstein. I put my finger against my lips. I cut my arms through the air like an umpire calling out a base runner. I popped my eyes at him. Gladstein was startled. But then his Buddha smile returned. I think he got the message.