“What a comedown.” Jamie hung over the back of our seat and mocked us. “Having to ride the bus like other mere mortals.”
“A whole week, too,” Johnny grumbled. “No cycle for a whole week.”
“At least Cole didn’t haul it off to the junk yard like he threatened to at first. Bob’s lucky, Mason can give him a ride.”
“Yeah,” I said, “if he wants to get there an hour early and stay two hours late. Mace is getting to be a fanatic about basketball.”
Johnny sighed. Having a cycle at our school, where not too many people had them, really had done a lot for his ego. “You bring any snakes or frogs today, Tex?” he asked.
“Nope. Everything is hibernating.”
“There’s nothing to do. We already liberated the ant colony and it’s too cold for a water-gun war.”
“Aren’t you in enough trouble?” Jamie asked. Johnny shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m just so sick of Cole bossing me around. I feel like really giving him something to worry about.”
Jamie settled back in her seat. “You can always go out and get drunk again. That worked real well.”
Johnny didn’t look too inclined to take that suggestion. I didn’t tell him my idea for finishing my art project. I could tell it would just make him glum for not being able to do it himself.
I usually like art class. Most of the time I draw horses, which I happen to be real good at, or paint landscapes, which I can do well enough. Mostly I get C’s in art, though, because Mrs. Germanie counts off for behavior.
The last three weeks had been driving me crazy. We were supposed to be making a free-form sculpture by gluing toothpicks together. Some of the kids really got off on that. I’m not much on free-form sculpture. As a matter of fact the whole project bored me out of my mind, until the last few days, when I thought of how I was going to finish it. I went nuts gluing toothpicks. Used lots of glue. Now I had a huge sticky mess about three feet high.
“Today is the final day of this project,” Mrs. Germanie announced.
“Thank the Lord,” I whispered, and the girl sitting at the next table giggled.
“I’ll be passing by each desk during the hour to give you your final grade on it. So have it ready.”
I was ready. When she got to the table just before mine, I set a match to my pile of toothpicks and jumped back as the flames shot up. “Grade it! Quick, grade it!” I hollered. I thought I’d crack up at the look on her face. Then she just stood there, watched it, wrote a grade down in her little book, and said, “Texas, make sure it’s out before you go see Mrs. Johnson.”
Mrs. Johnson was the vice-principal, and guidance counselor, and she was also the person to see when you got into trouble.
Mrs. Johnson wasn’t real surprised to see me. I’d been to her office before.
I got the usual lecture and a swat with the board of education (that’s what Mrs. Johnson called it), and finally she said, “Let’s not see you in here again, Texas.”
“Not this year, anyway,” I said. “Maybe not anymore this month.”
“Try to stay away until next week, anyway.”
I nodded and waved as I left. Mrs. Johnson was real nice. I know that sounds funny coming from me, since I was the next-to-the-most swatted kid in the school. Roger Genet was the most, but he was mean. I always knew when I was doing something I could get swatted for. It was never any big surprise. See, Mrs. Johnson might swat me once in a while, but she always asked me how we were getting along, if we’d heard from Pop, and once she told me about some trouble Mason had been in when he was my age that I had never heard anything about from anyone else. She’d always say hi to me in the halls, and when I came to school after that fight me and Mason had, she spent five minutes trying to find out what happened (I wouldn’t tell) and then another five telling me the best thing to do for a black eye. If you get the feeling somebody cares about what happens to you, then you don’t mind it if they swat you once in a while.
It just wasn’t my day. Miss Carlson asked me to stay after English class.
“Tex, you can’t do two book reports on Smokey the Cowhorse.”
“But I read it two times.” I didn’t tell her I’d read it two times last year, too. Smokey the Cowhorse was my favorite book. It had some real good pictures in it, too.
“Why don’t you read another book by the same author?”
“You mean the same person might have wrote something else?” I don’t know why I never thought of that. I guess I figured writing one book ought to last somebody a lifetime. I don’t know how they sat still that long. A two-page book report wore me out.
“Written.” Miss Carlson was always correcting our grammar. She was pretty young for a teacher. I don’t know, once they get past twenty it’s hard to tell how old they are, unless they’re really old.
“Yes, Will James wrote several books. He did his own illustrations, too. I think you’d enjoy Lone Cowboy. Tex, have you ever thought about writing poetry?”
Poetry! Holy cow! I glanced around to make sure nobody had heard her say that. What had I ever done to make Miss Carlson think I ought to write poetry?
“No,” I said finally.
“You might be good at it. Until you hand in another book report, I’ll have to put down an incomplete for your grade.”
“Okay. I’ll do you another one,” I said hastily. I was anxious to get out of there, not because of her, or what she was talking about—even though the poetry thing shook me. I really meant to get that book out of the library. But I was on my way to gym, and I didn’t want to be late.
I hated gym. In some classes the teacher is mean to everybody, I can take that. And in some classes the teacher likes a couple of kids and is nice to them and everybody else can go jump in the lake. That’s easy to live with, too. But sometimes a teacher has it in for just one or two people and I never liked that, even before I was one of the one or two people.
Coach McCollough had it in for me, because I wouldn’t go out for basketball. He had it in his head that I could be the next McCormick Basketball Hero, another Mace the Ace. He took a lot of credit for Mason’s playing, even though Mace didn’t really get going good until high school. I would have rather gone out for track, but not going out for anything was the thing that would bug Coach most, so that’s what I did. I love to bug people like him.
That day got off to a flying start, me coming in late. Then I had to do more push-ups than anybody else. Then during basketball practice I copied a Harlem Globetrotters routine and got everybody laughing. Then I had to go around the track two more laps than everybody else did. Then I got a lecture on getting a new gym shirt, since mine was torn up pretty bad. That wasn’t too surprising, since, like most of my clothes, it’d been worn by Mason before me.
Then Coach got down to what he really wanted to say.
“You know what your trouble is, Mac? You have no competitive spirit.”
The way he said it, not having any competitive spirit was like not having the sense God gave a goat. Well, maybe he was right. I don’t know that much about it.
“If you didn’t have the potential,” he went on, “I wouldn’t care what kind of lazy turkey you were. But you could be just as good a player as Mason if you’d cut the crap and work at it.”
I staggered back in mock amazement, almost knocking Johnny over. “Not that good!” I exclaimed.
Coach clenched his fists, like he was trying to keep from belting me. Everybody held their breath for a second, waiting for him to do it. I thought he’d do that, or tell me to touch my toes for a swat. He didn’t swat you like Mrs. Johnson did. Coach’s swats would lift you off the ground. For an endless minute we stood like that, then he said, “Showers.”
Everybody took off. I did, too, but not as fast as most people.
“Man, Tex, I thought you’d had it,” Johnny said later. I dried my hair off and flipped him with the towel. “Naw. He sounds worse than he is.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t keep pushing him like that.”
I looked up from pulling on my boots. Johnny’s freckled face looked serious. “Hey,” I said, “what’s with you?”
Johnny had been edgy ever since he got grounded, and I had put up enough with edgy people. “You’re startin’ to sound like Cole.”
“Yeah, well what’s wrong with that?”
“For Pete’s sake, you’ve been griping about him for days now. Now it sounds like you’re starting to take what he says about the evil McCormicks serious.”
“Just leave Cole out of this, okay? He’s my father, I can bitch about him if I want. Bitch about your own, if you ever see him again.”
For a second I really thought I was going to jump up and punch his lights out. It must have showed on my face, because he went charging out of the locker room. I sat there, holding one boot. Having a fight with Johnny was like seeing the sky turn orange. I couldn’t believe it had happened.
We didn’t speak to each other the rest of the week. When he got his cycle back he didn’t come by to pick me up for school. It was serious. I kept up a good front, at school—if he didn’t care if we were ever friends again, I didn’t—but at home I moped around a lot. I had plenty of people to talk to at school, but just because you know a lot of people doesn’t make them your friends. I felt like I did when I found out Negrito was gone. And I had the weirdest feeling that if Johnny hadn’t been fighting with Cole, he wouldn’t be fighting with me.
I was having lunch at school with a couple of other guys when Jamie came up to the table. “I want to talk to you.”
“Sure,” I said, ignoring the gibes and snickers from the other guys. If some cute girl walked up to them and said “Frog” they’d have jumped straight up and asked “How high?” on the way.
We moved over to another table that was almost empty.
“I want to know when you and Johnny are going to stop being so stupid.”
It was a relief to me that Jamie always said what she thought without hedging around or playing games. But sometimes it took you a little by surprise.
“I don’t know,” I shrugged, trying to look like I didn’t care, either.
“Well, I certainly wouldn’t let some dumb little argument come between me and Linda Murphy.”
“I thought Marcie was your best friend,” I said. Jamie’s eyes were so dark that it always came as a surprise to realize they were blue.
“Oh, that was last month.”
“See,” I said. “If I went around switching best friends all the time, maybe it’d be different. This time it matters. To me, anyway,” I added, tired of lying about it.
“And you think it doesn’t matter to Johnny? Listen, he’s been acting so weird that Mona has started making him take vitamins. Cole let him get the cycle out early because he’s just been sitting around with gloom and doom on his face.”
Well, if Johnny didn’t want to keep this fight going, and I didn’t, you’d think it would be easy to patch things up. But I couldn’t see anything easy about it.
“He’s going to be out dirt-biking at the gravel pits after school today,” Jamie was saying. I wondered when she had started wearing a bra. “And if you two don’t quit being so … so…” she paused, looking for a strong enough word, “asinine, I’m not going to speak to either one of you.”
I grinned at her. “Well, that’s a real inspiration.”
Suddenly she blushed. Turned red clear up to her bangs. I felt my face get hot, and I knew I was turning red, too.
“You know, Tex, you are really cute,” Jamie said. But she didn’t say it sarcastic, not one bit. Then she got up and hurried off. I sat there, my face flaming like a bonfire. My heart would stop, then go racing on till I thought I’d suffocate. I had a sudden urge to jump up on my chair and let out a war whoop, but I managed to control myself. For a little while. When Eddie-Joe Cummings came by and cracked a joke, I laughed, and dumped what was left of my chocolate milk on his head.
I got out to the gravel pits with Roger Genet. Roger wasn’t real popular with a lot of people, seeing how he was given to stealing things and beating up on kids he knew he could whip. But me and him always got along okay. Anyway, I needed a ride out to the gravel pits, and he had a cycle.
There were five or six cycles out there, roaring up and down the hills, seeing how high they could jump, or who could do the longest wheelie.
Johnny was there but didn’t give any indication that he saw me. That bugged me for a second, but then, I knew it wasn’t going to be easy.
After a while everybody got together and talked over an old subject, doing an Evel Knievel jump over the creek. Last year a high school senior had tried it, missed, and broke his back. Since then, a lot of people talked about jumping the creek, but nobody really tried it. A couple of people, including Roger Genet, said they had tried it and made it, but unfortunately nobody had been around to witness it I had always wanted to try it myself, but since I didn’t have a bike, I didn’t want to take a chance on wrecking Johnny’s.
Johnny was saying something about giving it a go, except he was low on gas.
“Hell,” said Roger, “that little bitty thing couldn’t make it across the creek if it was pumped full.”
He had a big old Honda, the kind you couldn’t ride legal till you were sixteen. You’d think he wouldn’t want to keep reminding everybody he was sixteen and still in the ninth grade, but somehow I don’t think Roger ever saw it like that.
“Sure it could,” Johnny said. He looked at his fuel gauge. “Maybe I have got enough to try it.”
I swung off the back of Roger’s cycle. “I don’t know,” I said, looking at Johnny’s fuel gauge. “You look awful low on gas, to me.”
I was trying to give Johnny a way to get out of a try, but he looked at me like I was razzing him.
“It’s enough,” he said curtly, then started up the hill. I took two long strides and hopped on behind him. He didn’t say anything. On top of the hill we stopped. The trail led straight down, right to the edge of the creek, then made a sharp left. On the other side the bank was grassy—there weren’t any tire tracks there. The creek sides were steep and it was a twenty-foot drop to the creek bed, at least.
“You can get off now,” Johnny said.
“Hey, come on,” I said. “You don’t want to kill yourself.”
We looked down to where everybody was grouped, watching. Roger hollered something, we couldn’t hear what.
“Off,” Johnny said. I got off reluctantly. “Johnny…”
He revved up the engine and took off. I watched him, so antsy I couldn’t stand still. Geez, Johnny, faster! I was twisting my fists around like I could change the gears for him. He should have had it wide open by now, full throttle, unless he wanted to be able to stop, unless he thought he’d change his mind … he’s going right off the cliff, dammit! I thought He’s going to be dead and I could have stopped him, I should have stopped him … I started running.
Johnny realized he didn’t have enough speed, not enough to make the jump, but too much to stop. I felt like I was running in a nightmare; I was going as fast as I could but not covering any ground. Everything was happening in slow motion. Johnny slammed on the brakes and the cycle skidded, turning, but moving right toward the creek. Johnny laid the cycle on its side and they both slid to the edge.
I didn’t stop running, even when I saw he wasn’t going over.
Johnny was looking at his leg. Most of his jeans and part of his leg was in shreds from the gravel. His jacket had protected his arm, but his knuckles were skinned up, too.
Everybody else buzzed up. Roger had the decency to pause, making sure Johnny wasn’t really hurt, before he said, “Run out of gas?”
Johnny didn’t look up from picking the rocks out of his leg. I could tell he was wishing he had gone over the bank rather than have to face everybody.
I went over and picked up Johnny’s cycle. “Shoot,” I said, catching my breath. “He just hit a bump. Anybody could hit a bump. But seeing how he can’t give it another chance, I will.”
I started up the cycle. I wasn’t worried about wrecking it. If that cycle didn’t go across that creek bed, for everybody to see, Johnny’d never ride it again anyway. I drove back up the hill, turned, and paused. Everybody was standing to one side, even Johnny had limped out of the way. I saw them for a few seconds, then I didn’t see anything but the creek.
When I used to ride in junior rodeos, before money was such a problem, I had the same thing happen to me. You think the crowd is so loud you can’t hear yourself think, then you climb in the chute and everything disappears except you and what you’re up against. I wouldn’t have cared if there were five guys down there, or five hundred, or nobody. I was going across that creek.
I started down the hill, changing gears fast. I didn’t even hear the roar of the engine. I kept my eyes on where I wanted to land. A motorcycle needs speed to jump, where it’s mostly impulsion with a horse. A horse can tell where you’re looking, and head that way, and care if he makes the jump. A horse is a partner, but on a cycle you’re all by yourself. Still I leaned and steadied that hunk of machinery like I would a horse coming to a scary jump. When I left the bank and the air whistled around me, and the rocky creek bed floated out behind me, I thought, “Good boy!” and I wasn’t talking to myself.
I came down where I’d planned to, but harder than I thought I would. The cycle bounced hard, and we parted company—the cycle going in one direction and me in another. I’ve had a lot of practice at being thrown from horses, so I know how to relax and roll. And I still got the wind knocked out of me. That sure is a sickening feeling, waiting for air and not really sure you’ll get it again.
Somebody came scrambling up the creek bank. I got a mild shock when I looked in that direction. I hadn’t cleared the creek by as much as I thought. In fact I’d barely made it.
“Tex?” Johnny crawled over the edge and sat down on his heels beside me. “You okay?”
I nodded, still needing all my air for breathing. Then I tried sitting up. Everything spun around, then settled into place. I waved at everybody watching from the other side. They all cheered and waved back.
“Well, I did it.” I felt like I’d won a war, single-handed. “Me and this little bitty thing.”
Johnny was getting some color back in his face. He’d been white as a sheet a few minutes before.
“I thought you didn’t have any competitive spirit,” he said finally.
“I just wanted to see if I could do it,” I said.
“It was really great. You looked like a stunt rider or something. I guess…” He looked away. “I shouldn’t have let Roger psych me out like that. But he thinks that Honda is so cool—”
“Shoot,” I said, “I don’t see him jumping over here.”
Sure enough the others were all driving off in different directions.
“Johnny, there are people who go places and people who stay, and I think we stayers ought to stick together.”
He grinned at me. Then he said, “Your jacket’s ripped.”
I took it off to look at it It was an old sheep-herder jacket of Mason’s, but the only coat I had. Ripped was an understatement. It looked like somebody had rubbed a giant piece of sandpaper across the back. Then I looked at the cycle. It lay like a turtle on its back, the wheels still spinning.
“I hope the cycle’s okay.” I started to get up, then caught my breath. My back was really sore. Johnny got up and gave me a hand up. I was tottering around like an old man, holding my hand on my lower back.
“Are you okay, that’s the question. I can get a new cycle,” Johnny said.
“I’m okay.”
We got the cycle upright and Johnny tried to get it started, but it’d just splutter and then die. We took turns pushing it home. Johnny limped a lot, and my back ached terrible. We both felt fine.