The Fourth Stall Part III (3 page)

T
he next day three more kids came to me for help with their problems. Well, two came asking for help. The third came bearing an offer. But I'll get to that in a little bit.

The first kid approached Vince and me as we were walking to our homeroom. We were passing the hallway that we normally would have taken to my old office each morning. Both of our heads turned as we passed, thinking about the past six years spent in the East Wing boys' bathroom. Since the school year had begun, we'd pretty much avoided our old office in the East Wing. In fact, now that I was in seventh grade and in a different part of the school, I pretty much avoided the East Wing altogether, like most kids usually did unless they were coming to see me for help. It was a good place for an office because there wasn't much of anything in that part of the school at all.

“Do you think the school has done anything with it?” Vince nodded toward our old offices.

“I don't know. Maybe. But what would they do, make it a museum? I mean, it's still just a nonfunctioning bathroom; there are not a lot of options.”

“Well, my grandma always says, ‘Your options are only as limited as the chocolate ice cream that you store inside of your skull. Give me some of that ice cream!' She shouts and then tries to twist the top of my head open like it was some kind of jar.”

I laughed. She'd actually tried to do this to me once, too. At first it had been terrifying—a crazy old lady trying to pop off the top of your head so she can eat the chocolate ice cream she thinks is inside of it—but she was so weak that after a few seconds it just kind of started to tickle, which made me laugh, and then his grandma laughed, too, and then she forgot what she'd even been trying to do in the first place.

Just then I noticed another kid had started walking next to Vince and me.

“Hey, Nick,” I said, nodding to the newcomer.

“Mac, Vince. I got to talk to you guys,” Nick said.

“What's up?” I asked, even though I knew what was coming.

He shrugged and made one of his faces. “Well, first, I lost my iPhone. And my bike frame got scratched. Plus, I heard from this one kid that the Dolphins might trade away their star linebacker for a measly fourth-round pick, but they'll probably be terrible anyway, so I guess it doesn't matter. Then I broke Brandon Decker's new glasses by accident when I tripped in the lunchroom and spilled my food all over the kids at his table. Oh, and my pet turtle died yesterday.”

Now, you might hear this and feel bad for Nick. Like, how much tragedy could befall a kid in a week, right? But that's the thing about Nick: this was pretty normal for him. He hadn't earned the nickname Eeyore for nothing. In fact, he seemed to be more positive than usual today. Whenever you asked him how he was doing, he'd launch into an answer so depressing, a black cloud would form around your head and you'd feel like you were drowning in bad news. Plus, he always talked really slowly and sadly, just like Eeyore, the donkey from those old
Winnie the Pooh
cartoons. I kind of always imagined Nick to have a trombone player following him around playing depressing and dubious baritones. Eeyore used to be a pretty frequent customer of mine, but in recent years he'd stopped coming because, no matter what I did to fix his problems, he always came up with new ones caused by my solutions. I'd have been offended by anybody else complaining so much about my solutions, but everybody knew that's just how he was.

“Rough week,” I said.

Eeyore shrugged slowly. Cue a few blats from a trombone.

“It's been better than last week,” he said. “Last week I had a splinter in my finger all week that got infected. Then I had a toothache and my mom's car had a flat tire on the way home from the dentist and we had to walk like three miles, which gave me blisters on both feet. I went outside the next day and got some gravel stuck in my shoe, and I hate taking off my shoes because one time I took them off for like two minutes and someone stole one of them. So then the gravel got stuck in my blister and it hurt all day. The blisters just now are starting to go away, but I ruined my favorite socks the day they popped. Plus, my favorite TV show got canceled. Then at dinner on Friday my sister sneezed on my food, and I'm pretty sure she got me sick. And I lost my favorite lucky penny.”
Blaaaah-Ruuump.

Vince stifled a laugh. That was really the only way to react to Eeyore: humor. If you let him get to you, you ran the risk of slipping into a depression-induced coma from which you'd probably awaken thirty years later to find a strange world where the Cubs have moved to Wyoming (yuck!) and a racist house cat named Neil has been elected president.

“Anyway,” Eeyore continued, “can you help me?”

I took a deep breath in preparation for my usual speech about being retired, but he must have been able to tell what I was going to say because he interrupted before I could even get started.

“Please, Mac? I'll pay you in advance for everything. I mean, thinking about all these problems is giving me a headache. Plus, my eyes already hurt from this lighting,” Eeyore said while trying to shield his eyes with his hand. “Where do they get such bright lights? Don't they know we'll all get cancer from standing under these things? Not to mention the eyestrain, I mean, my uncle lost vision in one eye from staring at his computer screen too long every day at work. Now he just sits at home all day in the dark and drinks gross tea, which is tea that is too cold to be hot tea and too warm to be iced tea. And his car rolled into the river behind his house last week, too.”
Blaaaah-Ruuump.

He knew my weak spot: payment up front. But before I could open my mouth, Vince jabbed me with his elbow as we walked—a painful reminder of how these things had spiraled out of control in the first place: not knowing when to say no.

“Look, I'm sorry, Eeyore, but I can't help. It's just too dangerous for me now. If I help one kid out, then I'll have to help others and then, well . . .”

He nodded in defeat. “Yeah, I figured you'd say no. Would this change your mind?” He took out a crumpled wad of cash and held it out to me. “Like I said: payment up front.”

I looked at the cash in his outstretched hand. There must have been at least fifty bucks there. That was a lot of dough. Then I glanced at Vince. He was also staring at the money, his eyes glistening like glazed hams.

“I've been saving all summer. I need your help,” Eeyore said. “Please.”

I looked at Vince again; this time he was looking back. He shook his head slightly. I knew he was right.

“What time is it? We have to get to homeroom,” I said, picking up the pace, hoping Eeyore would get the hint.

“I don't know,” Eeyore said. “I try not to look at clocks much; you know they say that staring at clocks too often can cause cancer, right? Plus, I read this article online that said keeping track of time too frequently can lead to stroke, heart disease, and early onset diabetes and can also accelerate the development of Alzheimer's disease. Not only that, but I had this kitty clock once that fell off the wall and smashed my Xbox into seven pieces. And that was on my birthday, which is also the same day John Lennon died.”
Blaaaah-Ruuump.

“Yeah, well, what doesn't cause cancer these days?” I joked. I know it's not cool to joke about something as horrible as cancer. My grandma had died of cancer a few years ago, so I really do know how crappy it can be. But it was all I could do to keep from slipping into a depression coma

“I know, exactly. Life is a war zone, Mac,” Eeyore said somberly.

But he'd gotten the hint because then he just nodded in defeat and veered off away from us toward his own homeroom classroom. I looked at Vince, and we both sighed and shook our heads as we headed into our homeroom. Homeroom was the only class we had together that year.

The second kid to ask me for help that day did so almost as soon as we took our seats in homeroom. I hoped eventually kids would start giving up because there's only so much a guy can take.

Vince and I sat down next to each other, and then the kid in front of us turned around so violently, his desk almost tipped over.

“Mac, Vince, I need your guys' help!” he practically shouted.

It was JJ Molina. He was known to overreact to stuff. Melodramatic, I thought, is what I heard an eighth grader call him once. I didn't know exactly what that meant, though; whenever I heard that word, for some reason all I could think about was snooty actors wearing skinny jeans and drinking Mello Yellow. But just the same the word did seem pretty fitting for JJ just from the sound of it. He was always worked up about something.

“Calm down, JJ,” I said, “you're going to hurt somebody.”

“Right,” he said, taking a deep breath. “I need your help.”

“I'm retired; you know that by now, right?”

“I know, Mac, but you gotta help me!”

His eyes were wide and panicked and had a crazy look to them like the kind I imagined mine would have if, say, Vince ever went missing. I thought for sure I might see JJ grind his teeth down to the gums right in front of me.

“Okay, I probably can't help you, but at least tell me what's wrong,” I said, knowing I should have stayed stronger. I just couldn't help it: after years of always being there, it just wasn't that easy to walk away cold turkey.

“It's Justin Johnson. He ripped me off!”

“Figures,” I said.

Justin was always up to no good. Stealing stuff from kids, fighting, vandalizing the boys' bathrooms, crop dusting the hallway, etc., etc. At one point last year he was in charge of Staples's business dealings at our school. So I'd had my fair share of run-ins with him.

“He followed me home after school yesterday, and once I was like a block from the school, he jumped me!” JJ said. “He stole my mint-condition,
autographed
, 1955 Topps Roberto Clemente rookie card!”

I shook my head. That was some card. Roberto was one of the few non-Cub players who I really loved and respected. I knew that card was pretty valuable: in mint condition (which is pretty rare for a card so old), it could be worth anywhere from $1500 to $5000 or more without his signature. But an autographed version? The sky was the limit.

JJ nodded. “It's my prized possession. He's the best baseball player ever to come from my parents' country, you know?”

“Yeah, I know . . . but the thing is—” I started, but JJ didn't let me finish.

“Please, Mac, can you help me get it back? That card was a gift from my father; it was his when he was a kid. I'll never be able to afford another one,” he said. “Plus, there aren't that many that exist that are autographed.”

He was actually fighting tears now. JJ was a pretty tough kid, so it must have hurt pretty bad to lose that card if he was this close to crying in a school classroom. I mean, any time after second grade, crying in school was social suicide.

“Look, I wish I could help. I really, really do,” I said. “But I just can't get involved. The Suits are all over me the way it is. If I try anything, I'll get expelled or suspended before I could help anyway. Have you thought about going to the Suits yourself? I mean, they could probably do something for you.”

It made me feel violently ill to suggest to somebody to go to the Suits for help with a problem. But what else was I supposed to do? I felt so bad for JJ, but there was nothing I could do to help. I was retired. And I was being watched closely. Where did that leave me? I had no choice, right? Right?

JJ nodded slowly. But his head stayed low. He avoided looking at me or Vince again, and then without saying anything else, he slowly turned around in his desk and flopped his head down onto the hard surface.

As I watched JJ Molina cry quietly at his desk, all I could think was: What have I become?

“It was the right thing to do,” Vince whispered, practically reading my mind like he sometimes seemed like he could.

“I know; it's just hard to say no. I mean, who else is going to help him? Or Eeyore, or any of them?”

Vince shrugged. “It's like my grandma says, ‘When you need help, just start screaming as loud as you can and people will come running . . . just don't let them steal your scrambled eggs. You must always guard your eggs at all costs.'”

I laughed in spite of the fact that I was serious about what I'd said. I really did wonder how the kids at our school were going to handle suddenly having no one to help them with their problems. It's like they say in cheesy movies: sometimes you don't know what you really have until it's gone.

T
he third kid who tracked us down that day, the one who had an offer for us, found us during lunchtime. Or, well, I guess he didn't find us so much as he had us found.

Vince and I were hanging out near the west goal post of the practice football field, waiting for kids to finish their lunches so we could get a short football game going before the start of fifth-hour classes.

“Remember that time we tried to pull a
Rookie of the Year
?” Vince asked as we played catch with the football.

I laughed as I remembered that incident. We had been in fourth grade; it was the beginning of the baseball season. Vince and I had watched this old movie called
Rookie of the Year
because it was about the Cubs. We watched everything we could find that mentioned the Cubs. Anyways, in this movie this kid hurts his arm and it heals weirdly and gives him a cannon for a throwing arm. So naturally he joins the Chicago Cubs baseball team to help save their season and end the curse. And because it's a movie, and not real, it works out in the end. This thirteen-year-old kid ends the Cubs curse and they win the World Series. Overall the movie was just okay, but it gave Vince and me an idea. Probably the best idea we'd ever had up to that point.

I mean, Vince was already a good pitcher, right? So really we thought our plan was pretty genius. And maybe it could have worked if he had separated his throwing shoulder in the fall instead of his other shoulder. But I guess having Vince jump off the roof of the school wasn't really that good of a plan in the first place. We had never really considered that he wouldn't be able to control entirely what body part he landed on. But it's hard to blame us; we were only fourth graders, after all. And being a Cubs fan can kind of blind you to logic sometimes. We were just that desperate to somehow break the curse.

Of course I can't even begin to explain why even after the first failed attempt we still thought the plan could work and tried again. The second time we had Vince jump off a Jet Ski going at full speed and try to land as awkwardly on his throwing arm as possible. After that fracture finally healed and he couldn't throw any harder than before, we finally decided to let the idea go.

“That
was
pretty awesome,” I said.

Vince faked being upset. “Yeah, for you maybe. You're not the one who had to suffer through two arm injuries!”

“It's not like you didn't love all the attention you got from girls because of that sling. They were just lining up to do your homework for you and help carry your books and stuff.”

Vince grinned and shrugged. “Whatever. It still wasn't as much fun as it would have been to pitch for the Cubs.”

“Speaking of the Cubs,” I said, “I bet I've got you.”

“You wish.”

“Who was the last Cub to be inducted into the Hall of Fame?”

Vince scoffed. “Well, sorry, but I'm not an idiot and thus know that the answer is in fact Ron Santo.”

“Yeah, I know that was an easy one. I just thought I would honor the fact that those morons finally let him in like he deserved to be.”

Vince nodded, and we shared a few seconds of silence in honor of good old Ron.

Then suddenly two hands came out of nowhere, grabbed my arms, and pinned them to my sides. I saw Vince hit the ground as someone pushed him.

“Hey!” I said.

My assailant let me go, and I turned around as Vince climbed to his feet next to me. He seemed unhurt—thankfully we were on grass and not gravel or pavement. We'd been ambushed, basically. Had we still been in practice, we might have seen it coming, but with the simple life of not having a business came less paranoia. My head wasn't always on a swivel like it used to be.

“What gives?” Vince said.

“Jimmy needs to talk to you,” one of our attackers said, pointing at me.

It was Mitch. One of Staples's former lackeys, a guy who had plenty of reason to dislike Vince and me. The other kid was this brutish eighth grader named Lloyd Ahler, a real gorilla of a kid who I didn't know much about since he had been new here last year. I had been too busy last year to get to know most of the new kids.

Mitch wasn't too big and tough, but he did have a year on us. And Lloyd looked like he could have driven Vince into the ground with a single overhanded swing of his giant mallet of a hand. I figured fighting back or running wouldn't end well, especially since they didn't seem to be here to fight.

“Jimmy who?” I asked. “Jimmy ‘the Dutch Axe' Pierson?”

“No, not Jimmy ‘the Dutch Axe,' you idiot,” Mitch scoffed.

I didn't see how me not knowing who he meant made me an idiot since there were like seven Jimmys at this school. But I didn't argue the point. I just stared at him.

“Jimmy who, then?” Vince asked.

“Jimmy Two-Tone, duh,” Mitch said.

“Look, I don't know a Jimmy Two-Tone,” I said, and started to turn away.

Lloyd “Gorilla” Ahler grabbed my arm with what I could only assume was a robot hand since it squeezed so hard.

“Yeah, well, he knows you, apparently,” Mitch said. “And he has requested a meeting with you.”

“Me? Why?” I asked, even though I knew better. Clearly it was just another kid in need of help. A kid so desperate that he'd hired two eighth-grade goons to come and make me hear his request.

“I'll ask the questions here, okay?” Mitch said.

I shrugged and nodded. Then a long silence followed. It was kind of uncomfortable.

“Well, are you going to ask me a question, then?” I said finally.

“Oh, well, I guess . . .” Mitch started. “I guess I don't have any questions, exactly. Look, stop messing around. I said Jimmy wants to talk to you!”

I looked at Vince, who merely shrugged.

“Okay,” I said.

“Okay, then,” said Mitch, clearly not quite used to this sort of thing. There was a definite difference between recreational bullying and bullying for pay, being a strongman, and he hadn't quite worked out the subtleties just yet.

Lloyd was holding my arm a little harder than was necessary considering I'd agreed to come with willingly, but I wasn't about to insult this walking lump of hair and muscle that called itself a kid named Lloyd. And so we started back toward the school in silence.