The Battle for Jericho (10 page)

About fifteen minutes later, Hutch said wearily, “Any time this year, Jerry.”

“You said whenever I was ready,” I snapped back.

“Yeah, but I meant before we graduate from high school.” He stood up in front of me, took off his jacket, and stuffed it onto one of the metal shelves beside him. That left him in jeans and a thick, blue, oversized jersey that draped on his body very nicely. “Damn, man. Just do something,” he said.

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Grab my butt.”

One Saturday afternoon during middle school, Mac and I were watching a World Wrestling Federation championship match online. Caught up in the moment, Mac announced that he could pin me in ten seconds flat. We both knew he could, given our size difference, but I had to talk smack, of course, telling him that he couldn’t pin his own hairy mama, let alone pin me. Mac threw an arm around my neck, flipped me to the floor, and sure enough, I was pinned flat on my back within ten seconds. He wasn’t done, however. To avenge the insult to his family honor, Mac sat on my face and fired off a fart with such force I was surprised that he didn’t achieve liftoff. Maybe I’m weird, but the incident did not really encourage me to get any more intimate with male backsides.

“Hutch,” I said flatly, “I don’t want to grab your butt.” Look at it, yes. Admire the muscular shape of it, sure. Touch it… nah, not ready for that.

“Then I’ll grab yours.”

“Not in this lifetime.”

“Jerry, you asked me to do this, remember? If you’re not comfortable with me, I’ll take you home and you can find another guy to date, or you can just stay with Lissandra.” He yanked his jacket off the shelf and started to leave.

Damn it. I’d obligated myself to get busy with another guy. This would be even more awkward with a stranger. I grabbed Hutch’s arm. “Wait,” I said quickly. “I’ll… kiss you, okay? But give me a minute. I gotta work myself up to it.”

We faced each other again. Hutch really did have very pretty eyes. His cheeks and lips were still rosy from the cold. His lips were nice. For the first time, I noticed that he had a line of faint, fuzzy brown hair over his mouth, and I realized that I liked it. It was (I can’t believe I’m saying this) kind of a turn-on. He pulled a pack of Big Red gum from his pocket, unwrapped a stick, and started chewing like a grazing beast working a cud. It was the way a guy chews, all manly and careless, and that was nice too. Anticipation suddenly lit me up, making me feel as excited as I did at my birthday parties when I was a little kid who could hardly wait for the fun to get started. Where was all this dang enthusiasm coming from? I pulled a peppermint from my pocket and popped it into my mouth. With Lissandra, I was careful to hide the preparations that led up to our kissing. But that was about romance. This
moment between Hutch and me was about something else, but I wasn’t sure what that was just yet.

Damn it, I told myself, just get it over with.

To that end, I shut my eyes tightly and thrust my head forward, aiming for Hutch’s lips. And our lips did meet—right after my chin collided with his. There was a loud
clop,
exactly like the sound a horse’s hoof makes against a hard surface. The forward momentum caused my mouth to smash into Hutch’s. I could feel his teeth cut into my upper lip. I could taste blood.

Together, we each snarled, “Shit!”

I shoved away from him. I realized that I’d swallowed my peppermint. Hutch must have also swallowed his gum. The way his mouth was hanging open now, anything not tied down in there would have been sliding down his chin by now. He stuck his tongue out, eyes crossing as he tried to assess the damage. “I think I bit my tongue off!” he cried. He was lisping, but the message was clear enough.

I saw blood, but his tongue was intact. “No, you didn’t.”

Hutch grabbed a roll of paper towels and ripped it open. “Damn, Jerry! What the hell was that? Were you trying to bite my face off?” He pressed a wadded paper towel to his mouth.

“Sorry, man.”

He pulled his hand back, staring with dismay at the blood that brightened the towel. “Look at this,” he wailed, his voice shaking with indignation.

I was already drowning in embarrassment, and now anger shot up my spine. “Damn it, Hutch,” I replied, rolling my eyes. I paused for a second to suck down my own blood. “Quit being such a little sissy. You whine worse than a girl.” I pushed him aside, unlocked the door, and started out of the janitor’s closet.

The moment my back was to him, Hutch—in an action that had nothing to do with gayness—got a good feel of my hinterlands. He planted the fake Timberland boot on his right foot squarely between the back pockets of my direct-from-Walmart Faded Glory blue jeans.

The blow to my backside left me stunned (but not because that’s where my brain is,
thank you
). I couldn’t believe Hutch had actually kicked me. It was just as unbelievable when my fist shot out and got acquainted with Hutch’s jaw.

From there, things went downhill pretty fast.

Chapter 9

I
WALKED
down Poplar Avenue, cursing my existence with every step.

It was rush hour, and as I passed the point where Poplar became Highway 22 again, the highway started clogging down with the loud, fuming crush of cars racing for Webster’s Glen and points beyond. My throat hurt, my nose was burning and bloodied, and a knot the size of a baby’s foot sat on the side of my head, all from blows delivered very solidly by Hutch. We’d tussled in the narrow service hallway of Madison’s Deli until something large and hairy (Hutch would later tell me it was the bakery chef, but I’d be willing to swear it was an eight-foot gorilla) emerged from the kitchen, seized us by our necks, and tossed us out the rear service door like a couple of rotten cabbages. Hutch then raced for the front of the building. I realized what he was about to do and ran hard on his heels, but he got to the car before me. He hopped in and started the engine. I made a grab for the handle on the passenger door, and he threw my backpack, hitting me in the chest and knocking me backward. In the few seconds it took me to recover my balance, that shiny yellow coupe blasted its way out of the parking lot.

I only had three dollars in my pocket, hardly enough for cab fare. And I didn’t have my cell. Not that it mattered. I wasn’t about to call Mom or Dad and ask to be picked up. They’d have a few too many questions about what I was doing in Benton. My parents had warned me repeatedly never to hitchhike under any circumstances, so thumbing a ride was out. There was no bus service from Benton to Webster’s Glen. That left me with just one way to get home.

I ran the first two miles or so, but the backpack was heavy and made my shoulders ache, so I slowed to a brisk walk. I’d called Dad from school to let him know that I was hanging out with Hutch and would be home by six. My current pace would put me there around six thirty, but that was nothing Mom or Dad would get upset over since my curfew today wasn’t until seven. At least I would come out of this without getting into trouble.

Nothing sets the heart racing like the blue-white flicker of police strobe lights. Once I crossed out of Benton, the four lanes of Poplar Avenue narrowed to the two lanes of Highway 22. The sidewalk also ended at the border, and I had been stumbling along the sloping, grassy berm with cars whizzing by barely four feet away. After my jog turned into a walk, I made perhaps half a mile under those conditions before the brief, sharp warble of a siren cut through the air and the police car started flashing its lights behind me.

I stopped and turned. A white and blue Benton city cruiser had pulled off the road. The driver’s door popped open, and a cop climbed slowly out. He was Hispanic, about the same age and height as my dad, but thicker in build. He wrapped the fingers of his right hand around his belt, close to his holstered service revolver. He wasn’t smiling.

Do cops ever smile?

“Where you going, son?” he asked in a voice that put the
grrrr
in gravelly.

I thought I might pee my pants.

“Home, sir.” I smiled in what I hoped would be a winsome and wholesome manner. But I knew even as I did it that I just looked nervous. And guilty. Of anything and everything.

“It’s dangerous for you to walk along the highway like that. You could get hurt.”

“I’ll be careful, sir.” I turned to go.

“I can’t let you walk on the side of the highway, son.”

“It’s okay. Really. I’ll watch myself.”

The cop’s voice got even lower. It rumbled with an authority so profound it could have parted seas. “Get… in… the… car.”

Would you have told him no?

C
OMING
home in a police cruiser is embarrassing. You think everyone in the world is a witness to the event, the image of you in the backseat—secured behind the mesh divider like a rabid animal—forever burned into their minds. I can’t say that the entire world saw me, but Dad sure did.

The cop turned into our driveway, put the cruiser in park, and got out. He reached down and opened the rear door for me. (There were no handles on the inside of the door.) I climbed out with my backpack on my shoulder. “Thank you, sir,” I said, with genuine gratitude.

“Stay off that highway, son, unless you’re in a car.” The cop nodded at me (but did not smile), got behind the wheel, and backed out of the driveway.

Dad came rushing out of the house, waving for the cop to stop, but the cruiser was already rolling down the street and the officer never saw him. Dad therefore shifted his attention to me. “What the hell was that about?” he snapped at me. “What the hell were you doing in a police car?”

“He was just giving me a ride home, Dad.” I tried to sound casual. As if I traveled with police escort all the time.

“Don’t give me that, boy. He’s a cop, not a taxi driver. Why were you in that police car?” Dad looked me up and down, and then a frown darkened his face. “Did you get into a fight?”

“Uh… no, sir.”

“Then why the hell are you all bruised and bloodied?” His eyes widened in horror. “Did that cop hurt you?”

“No, no. No, sir. I sort of got into a… like, pushing match with Hutch. We shoved each other around, and then he kicked me out of his mom’s car. I was walking home down Highway 22, and that cop came up behind me, told me it wasn’t safe to walk the highway, and made me get in his car. Then he brought me home.” Sometimes, you have to go with the truth.

Not that the truth set me free. “For God’s sake, Jericho, what the hell’s wrong with you? Are you out of your mind? You got into a fight with your friend, and then you stood right there and lied to my face about it. ‘Pushing match’ my eye. And you were walking on that highway? Are you
trying
to get yourself killed?” He didn’t wait for my answers, which was good because I didn’t have any for him. “Get the hell in the house. Go to your room. No television and no telephone for you tonight.”

“Can I make just one call? Can I call Lissandra? She’s been sick, and I wanna see how she’s doing.” I put on my best daddy’s-little-boy face and held my breath, ready to drop to my knees if Dad started to refuse me. I am not above abject groveling.

Dad caved. “All right, you can make
one
call. After that, I don’t want you on the phone for the rest of the night.”

“Thank you, sir!” I slipped past Dad and hurried toward the house before he changed his mind, dogged by the suspicion in his eyes.

O
NCE
I was in my room, I dialed Lissandra’s number. Her dad answered and said her mother had taken her to the doctor. I was alarmed until Mr. Ackerman explained that the visit was only a yearly checkup, and that Lissandra was actually feeling much better. I asked him to give her my best and let her know she couldn’t call me back tonight because I was on punishment (again), but that I’d talk to her tomorrow.

With nothing more entertaining to do, I lay down on the floor and waded into my homework, trying to finish another chapter of
Moby Dick.
I wasn’t aware I’d fallen asleep until a knock on my door brought me around. I looked up to see Hutch standing in the doorway.

He seemed hesitant, embarrassed, and frightened, all at the same time. I could see that I’d done a real number on him. His right eye was swollen and bruised; his bulky, oversized jersey was torn, a ragged flap hanging down from his left shoulder; and his lower lip was split down the middle, caked with dried blood. “Hey,” he said, giving me a small, almost shy wave.

I sat up, wiping at my mouth with the back of my hand. “Hey.”

“Your dad let me in. He chewed me out, said you and me should be ashamed of ourselves. You didn’t tell him that we—”

“I told him we had a fight.”

“Oh.” The tension in his face eased a bit. He took a few steps into the room, tentatively, as if he was afraid I might jump him again. “Jerry, I’m sorry, man, about the fight and leaving you behind. I came back for you. I swear. I drove all around the parking lot, then I drove up and down Poplar twice, but I didn’t see you.”

I was feeling pretty regretful myself. I hated that I had hurt Hutch, especially with all the things that had happened with his parents. “That’s okay, man. I deserved it. A cop gave me a ride home. And I’m sorry too. It was my fault.”