Next: A Novel (35 page)

Of course the monitor, Mr. Snotty NoseDrip, does nothing, whining, “Break it up, boys. Break it up, boys.” They put Monkeyboy in detention, and called his mother to come and pick him up, but his mother obviously didn’t take him home, which was too bad for him. Because there they were now, walking along at the bottom of the hill, starting to cross the baseball field.

Jamie and Monkeyboy.

And this is on !

Billy hits them side on, moving fast, and the two go flying like bowling pins, right next to the dugout by the side of the field. Jamie skids on his chin on the dirt, raising a cloud of brown dust, and Monkeyboy bangs into the chain-link backstop behind home plate. Off to one side, Billy’s buddies are yelling:Blood! We want blood!

The little kid, Jamie, is moaning in the dust, so Billy goes right for Monkeyboy. He charges him with his deck, trucks out, swinging the skateboard hard, and catches the little black fucker back of the ear, thinking that’ll teach him a lesson. Monkeyboy’s legs go out, he flops on the ground like a rag doll, and Billy kicks him a good one, right under the chin, lifts his ass off the dirt a little, that one does. But Billy doesn’t want to get that monkey blood on his Vans, so he comes back swinging the deck again, figuring to whack the monkey square in the face, maybe break his nose and jaw, make him even uglier than he is.

But Monkeyboy springs to one side, the deck clangs the fence,kawang-kawang-kwang , and Monkeyboy sinks his teeth into Billy’s wrist and bitesfucking hard! Billy screams and drops his deck, and Monkeyboy hangs on. Billy is feeling his hand get numb, there’s blood pouring down from the arm, down Monkeyboy’s chin, and he’s snarling like a dog, and his eyes are popping out, staring at Billy. And it’s like his hair is raised or something, and Billy thinks in an instant of pure panic:Shit, this black fuck’s gonna eat me .

By then his skateneck buddies run up, all swinging their boards at the monkey, four boards whacking him downside the head, while Billy is yelling and the monkey is growling—it takes forever until Monkeyboy drops the hand, springs at Markie Lester, and hits him full in the chest, and the Pester goes down, and the others all chase after them as they roll in the dust, while Billy nurses his bleeding arm.

A few seconds later, when the pain is bearable and Billy looks up, he sees the monkey has scrambled up the chain-link backstop and is maybe fifteen feet in the air above them. Staring down at them. While his buds all stand below and yell and shake their decks at him. But nothing is happening. Billy staggers to his feet and says, “You look like a bunch of monkeys.”

“We want him to come down!”

“Well, he won’t,” Billy said. “He’s not stupid. He knows we’ll kick the shit out of him if he comes down. Least, I will.”

“So how we get him down?”

Billy is feeling mean now, blind mean, he wants to hurt something, so he goes right over to Jamie and starts kicking the kid, trying to hit him in his little nuts, but the kid is rolling and yelling for help, fucking baby that he is. Some of the buds don’t like it, “Hey, leave ’im alone, hey, he’s a little kid,” but Billy is thinking,Fuck it. I want that monkey down here. And this will do it, nimrod kid rolling in dust. Kick and kick…kick…the kid yelling for help…

And suddenly the buddies are screaming, “Aw,shit! ”

“Shit! Shit!”

“Shit!”

And they’re running away, and then something hot and soft smacks Billy on the back of the neck, he gets the weird smell and he can’t believe it, he reaches back and…Jesus. He can’t believe it.

“Shit! He’s throwing shit!”

The Monkeyboy’s up there with his pants down, heaving crap down at them. And never missing.

Deadly, the kids are all covered in it, and then another one hits Billy right in the face. His mouth is half open.

“Ooo-uk!” He spits and spits, wipes his face, and spits again, trying to get that taste out of his mouth. Monkey shit! Fuck! Shit! Billy raises his fist. “You fucking animal!”

And gets another one right on the forehead. Splaat!

He grabs his deck and runs away. Joins his buds. They’re spitting, too. It’s disgusting. It sticks to their clothes, faces. Shit. They all look to Billy, it’s on their faces:Look what you got us into. It’s the moment to step up. And Billy knows how.

“Guy’s an animal,” Billy said. “Only one thing to do with animals. My dad’s got a gun. I know where it is.”

“Big talk,” Markie says.

“You’re full of shit,” Hurley says.

“Yeah? Wait and see. Monkeyboy won’t make school tomorrow. Wait and see.”

Billy trudges home, carrying his board, and the others drag on after him. And he’s thinking,Oh shit, what did I just promise to do?

CH066

Stan Milgramhad begun the long trip to see his aunt in California, but he had only been driving for an hour before Gerard started to complain.

“It stinks,” Gerard said, perched in the backseat. “It stinks to high heaven.” He looked out the window. “What hellhole is this?”

“It’s Columbus, Ohio,” Stan said.

“Disgusting,” Gerard said.

“You know what they say,” Stan said. “Columbus is Cleveland without the glitter.”

The bird said nothing.

“You know what glitter is?”

“Yes. Shut up and drive.”

Gerard sounded cranky. And he shouldn’t be, Stan felt, considering how well the parrot had been treated the last couple of days. Stan had gone online to find out what greys ate, and had gotten Gerard some delicious apples and special greens. He had left the TV on in the pet shop at night, for Gerard to watch. And after a day, Gerard had stopped nipping at his fingers. He even allowed Stan to put him on his shoulder, without biting his ear.

“Are we almost there?” Gerard said.

“No. We’ve only been gone an hour.”

“How much farther is it?”

“We have to drive three days, Gerard.”

“Three days. That is twenty-four times three, that is seventy-two hours.”

Stan frowned. He had never heard of a bird that did math. “Where’d you learn that?”

“I am a man of many talents.”

“You’re not a man at all.” He laughed. “Was that from a movie?” Sometimes the bird repeated lines from movies, he was sure of it.

“Dave,” Gerard said, in a monotone, “this conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Good-bye.”

“Oh, wait, I know that one. It’sStar Wars. ”

“Fasten your seat belts, it’s going to be a bumpy night.” It was a woman’s voice.

Stan frowned. “Some airplane movie…”

“They seek him here, they seek him there, those Frenchies seek him everywhere—”

“I know, that’s not a movie, that’s poetry.”

“Sink me!” Now he sounded British.

“I give up,” Stan said.

“So do I,” Gerard said, with an elaborate sigh. “How much farther is it?”

“Three days,” Stan said.

The parrot stared out the window at the passing city. “Well, they’re saved from the blessings of civilization,” he said, in a cowboy drawl. And he began to make the sounds of a plunking banjo.

Later in the day, the parrot began to sing French songs, or maybe they were Arab songs, Stan couldn’t be sure. Anyway, some foreign language. It seemed he had gone to a live concert, or at least heard a recording of one, because he mimicked the crowd sounds, and the instruments tuning up, and the cheering as the performers came on, before he sang the song itself. It sounded like he was singing “Didi,” or something like that.

It was interesting for a while, kind of like hearing radio from a foreign country, but Gerard tended to repeat himself. On a narrow side road, they were stuck behind a woman driver. Stan tried to pass her once or twice, but never could.

After a while Gerard started to say,“Le soleil c’est beau,” and then make a loud sound like a gunshot.

“Is that French?” Stan asked.

More gunshots.“Le soleil c’est beau.” Bang! “Le soleil c’est beau.” Bang! “Le soleil c’est beau.”

Bang!

“Gerard…”

The bird said,“Les femmes au volant c’est la lacheté personifié.” He made a rumbling sound.“Pourquoi elle ne dépasse pas?…Oh, ouì, merde, des travaux.”

The lady driver finally turned off to the right, but she was slow making the turn, and Stan had to brake slightly as he went past her.

“Il ne faut jamais freiner…Comme disait le vieux père Bugatti, les voitures sont faites pour rouler, pas pour s’arrêter.”

Stan sighed. “I don’t understand a word you are saying, Gerard.”

“Merde, les flics arrivent!”

He began to wail like a police siren.

“That’s enough,” Stan said. He turned on the radio. By now it was late afternoon. They’d passed Maryville and were heading toward St. Louis. Traffic was picking up.

“Are we almost there?” Gerard said.

Stan sighed. “Never mind.” It was going to be a long trip.

CH067

Lynn saton the edge of the tub and used the washcloth gently to clean the gash behind his ear.

“Dave,” Lynn said. “Tell me what happened.” She could see the cut was deep, but he wasn’t complaining.

“They came after us, Mom!” Jamie was excited, moving his arms. He was covered in dust and had bruises on his stomach and shoulders, but was otherwise not badly hurt. “We didn’t do anything! Sixth-graders! Evil dudes!”

“Jamie,” she said, “let Dave tell me. How did you get this cut?”

“Billy swung the board at him,” Jamie said. “We didn’t do anything!”

“You didn’t do anything?” she said, raising an eyebrow. “You mean this happened for no reason at all?”

“Yes, Mom! I swear! We were just walking home! They came after us!”

“Mrs. Lester called,” Lynn said quietly. “Her son came home covered in excrement.”

“No, it was poo,” Jamie said.

“How did that—”

“Dave threw it! He was great! They were beatin’ us and he threw it and they ran away! He never missed!”

Lynn continued to clean the cut gently. “Is that true, Dave?”

“They hurted Jamie. They beated him and kicked him.”

“So you threw…poo at them?”

“They hurted Jamie,” he said again, as if it explained everything.

“No kidding,”Henry said, when he came home later. “He threw feces? That’s classic chimp behavior.”

“Maybe, but it’s a problem,” Lynn said. “They say he’s disruptive in class. He’s getting into scrapes on the playground. He’s bitten other children. Now he’s thrown feces…” She shook her head. “I don’t know how to be a parent to a chimpanzee.”

“Half-chimp.”

“Even quarter-chimp, Henry. I can’t make him understand that he can’t behave this way.”

“But they pick on him, right?” Henry said. “And these older kids, they were sixth-graders?

Skateboarders? Those kids are in and out of reform school. And what’re six-graders doing bothering with second-graders, anyway?”

“Jamie says the kids make fun of Dave. They call him Monkeyboy.”

“You think Dave picked this fight?”

“I don’t know. He’s aggressive.”

“This happened at the playground. I bet there’s a security camera there.”

“Henry,” she said, “you’re not understanding what I am telling you.”

“Yes, I am. You believe Dave started this. And I have the feeling some bullying dumb-ass kid—

”

That was when they heard the gunshot in the backyard.

CH068

Traffic crawled. The 405 Freeway was a river of red lights in the night. Alex Burnet sighed.

Sitting beside her, Jamie said, “How much farther is it?”

“It’s going to be a while, Jamie.”

“I’m tired.”

“See if you can lie back and rest.”

“I can’t. It’s boring.”

“It’s going to be a while,” she said again. She flipped open the new cell phone, found the number she had entered for her old childhood friend. She didn’t know whom else to call. Lynn was always there for her. When Alex and her husband were breaking up, she and the baby had gone down to see Lynn and Henry. The little kids, both named Jamie, played together.

Alex had stayed there a week.

But now, she was having trouble getting Lynn on the phone. At first, she worried she didn’t have the right number. Then she thought there was something wrong with her cheap cell phone. But then she got the answering machine, and now—

“Hello? Hello, who is this?”

“Lynn, it’s Alex. Listen I—”

“Oh, Alex! I’m really sorry, I can’t talk now—”

“What?”

“Not now. I’m sorry. Later.”

“But what—”

She heard the dial tone.

Lynn had already hung up.

She stared forward at the red lights of the creeping freeway.

“Who’s that?” her son asked.

“Aunt Lynn,” she said. “But she couldn’t talk. They just sounded busy.”

“So are we still going there?”

“Maybe tomorrow.”

She pulled off the freeway at San Clemente and started to look for a motel. For some reason, she was strangely disoriented by the fact that she could not see Lynn. She hadn’t realized that she’d been counting on it.

“Where’re we going, Mom?” Jamie sounded anxious.

“We’ll stay at a motel.”

“What motel?”

“I’m looking.”

He stared at her. “Do you know where it is?”

“No, Jamie. I’m looking.”

They passed one, a Holiday Inn, but it was too big, and it looked exposed. She found a Best Western, unobtrusive, on Camino Real, and pulled in. She told Jamie to stay in the car while she went into the lobby.

A pimply, gangly kid stood behind the counter. He was tapping his fingers on the polished granite surface, humming a little to himself. He seemed restless. “Hi,” Alex said. “Do you have a room for tonight?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’d like one.”

“Just for yourself?”

“No, for me and my son.”

He glanced out the door at Jamie. “He under twelve?” He was still clicking his fingernails.

“Yes, why?”

“If he goes to the pool, you gotta accompany him.”

“That’s fine.”

Still tapping the counter. She gave him a credit card and he swiped it, all the while tapping out a beat with his other hand. It was getting on her nerves. “Can I ask you why you do that?”

He began to sing in a monotone. “Trouble’s where I’m going, and trouble’s where I’ve been.”

He thumped the counter. “’Cause trouble is my middle name and trouble is my sin.” He smiled.