Socko overheard a phone exchange between the General and his old army buddy. “It’s all squared away. You get the booth,” the General wheezed into the phone. “And did I tell you about our eighteen-hole golf course and clubhouse loaded with activities?”
“What golf course?” Socko asked when his great-grandfather hung up. “What activities?”
“So I told a few stretchers.” The General stabbed a finger at the house across the street. “I don’t want to see that fella over there lose his business; he’s got family.”
“Right. And it isn’t because you want your friend to move here. Admit it, you miss him!”
“Miss him!” The General slapped his skinny thighs with his palms. “For better than sixty years Eddie Corrigan was an irritation, a rock in my shoe! Like a bad penny, he just kept turning up. The best I can say is I was used to him.”
“I have a friend I was used to—”
“I know,” the old man said, cutting him off. “Delia Marie and I have been talking about this Damien Rivera kid.”
“You have?” Socko saw a glimmer of hope.
“If what Delia Marie says is true, he’s happy where he is.” The General lifted his bony shoulders and let them drop. “Sometimes friends move on—personally I’ve never been that lucky—”
“He’s not happy! He’s just doing what he has to do to stay alive!”
“Maybe so, maybe not. Either way, I think you deserve an answer to that question.”
The glimmer was back. “And how would I get an answer?”
“Ask Damien.”
“Ask him how?”
“Therein lies the conundrum. Delia Marie has made up her mind. She won’t take you back to the old neighborhood. I lack wheels.” He gave the arm of his wheelchair a quick slap. “At least not the kind we need. Maybe when Eddie gets here, we can steal his car.”
Was he serious? With the General, Socko could never tell, but it sure sounded as if his great-grandfather had given him permission to find a way to get back to the old neighborhood to talk to Damien.
Socko couldn’t get the conversation with the General off his mind. He thought about it every morning, standing in the hot sun with Luke and Livvy planting flower beds. He thought about it in the evening as he was playing cards with the General. He thought about it at night as he stared into the darkness, his great-grandfather snoring and coughing downstairs.
He was still thinking about it one morning when he knocked on Luke’s door, ready for the day’s gardening assignment. The Holmes Homes truck that was always parked in the driveway was gone, but Socko figured Ceelie could point him to the part of the project where Luke was working; they’d been starting earlier and earlier to beat the worst of the heat.
Ceelie opened the door, Emily on her hip. “Oh, hi, Socko. Luke’s in the city today, running errands for Mr. Holmes.”
Errands in the city … The words chimed in Socko’s head.
It was like he could hear the powerful angel voices that used to come out the open doors of the AME church down the street from the Kludge. He rushed back home.
“I think I have a way to get back to the old neighborhood!” he said, barging through the front door.
“Hold your horses, kid.” The General crossed his arms over his skinny chest. “Explain.”
While Socko explained, the General chewed on the insides of his cheeks and frowned.
Socko waited for a sign of approval, but the frown didn’t go away. It was looking like it had been a big mistake telling the old guy. The General must have been joking with him that day, not authorizing a sneak trip to see Damien. What if his great-grandfather put his foot down now, insisted they run his idea by Delia?
The General cleared his throat. “There’s an old military saying that goes like this: ‘Sometimes it is better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission.’”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that I know nothing about your little plan, and Delia Marie won’t hear it from me.” The fingers he put on Socko’s arm felt as dry and cool as notebook paper. “But Socko, if you should happen to carry out this plan you never told me about, I expect you to exercise the utmost caution, do nothing stupid, and get your patoot back here as soon as you have your answer. No heroics. It would simply be a recon mission. Compree?”
“Compree.”
When he saw Luke that afternoon, Socko asked if he could ride along on his next trip into town. “I have to check on my best friend.”
“That okay with your folks?”
“The General authorized it.” Socko hoped Luke wouldn’t go back to the General to make sure, or worse yet, ask Delia. And that wasn’t his only problem. Somehow Socko was going to have to convince Luke to let Damien ride back with them to Moon Ridge.
Hopefully when the time came, Damien would have one of his genius ideas.
For days, Socko and Livvy helped Luke plant the gardens around the clubhouse, Socko waiting, not very patiently, to hitch a ride back to the old neighborhood. Although the need for the ride to happen right now itched him all the time, he didn’t talk to anyone about it, not even the General. He was afraid his great-grandfather might reconsider.
But his great-grandfather had other things on his mind—namely, not acting excited that his own thorn-in-the-side best friend, Eddie Corrigan, was about to move to the neighborhood.
Luke straightened up from the landscape boulder they’d just rolled into place beside one of the clubhouse paths. “Might be going into the city this afternoon,” he said. “If I am, I’ll pick you up.”
“All right!” Lucky for Socko, Livvy was off at the dentist and the General was probably too distracted to care. This was the day the Corrigans were to arrive.
Socko needed a shower, but he couldn’t risk being naked and wet when Luke came by, so he stood at the kitchen sink and let the cold water pour over his head. He vaguely heard the blast of a horn through the sound of running water.
“Unnecessary ruckus!” the General exclaimed. “Socko?”
Socko rushed out of the kitchen, furiously rubbing his head dry with a kitchen towel, but the Holmes Homes truck was nowhere to be seen. Instead, a baby blue Cadillac Coupe sat in the driveway.
“The bad penny turns up!” the General huffed. “It’s Eddie Corrigan and his lovely wife Lil. You may as well show them in.”
Socko’s first view of Eddie Corrigan through the bug-specked windshield included a straw hat with a plaid band and a pair of milky blue eyes that peered back at him from under the hat’s brim. The window powered down. “You must be Socko!”
“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Corrigan.” Socko opened the door for him.
“What the hey? Call me Uncle Eddie. And this is the wife, Lil.”
The woman seated beside Uncle Eddie was large, like Delia. She wore a dress with giant daisies printed on it. “Hello, honey,” she said.
The old man climbed out of the car but his back stayed as bent as a question mark. One hand on top of his hat, he squinted up at Socko. “Hoo-ee! How’s the air up there? I remember when I used to be tall.”
The General rapped his knuckles on the window.
Uncle Eddie lifted his hat to salute his scowling friend. “Sure have missed that friendly face!” He tucked his thumbs into his white plastic belt. “So how has Cookie been treating you, son?”
“Cookie?”
Uncle Eddie’s laugh was a sharp honk. “He didn’t tell you? That’s what we called him in the army.”
While the Corrigans settled in the living room, the General ordered Socko to rustle up some grub.
“Yes, Cookie—I mean, yes sir.” Socko beat a hasty retreat and heated half a dozen burgers while Uncle Eddie and “Cookie” caught up over lunch (Uncle Eddie did most of the talking). His wife read aloud from the Moon Ridge Estates brochure. “Lush lawns. Modern landscaping. Golf course.” After each item she stared pointedly at the General.
“You don’t even play golf, baby doll,” Uncle Eddie soothed. “And my booth sure looked spiff-a-roo. The moving van should be here by six. You’ll feel better with your stuff around you. Our daughter Jeanie and her husband packed us up,” he explained. “We diddle-dawdled our way south so we’d get here about the same time as the truck.”
They were just finishing their burgers when a second horn blasted in the driveway. Socko looked out the window and saw Luke seated at the wheel of the Holmes Homes pickup.
“Nice meeting you,” Socko called as he headed toward the door, “but I gotta go!”
“Halt!” A surprisingly strong hand gripped his wrist.
“But I have to—this is my ride!”
The General’s grip tightened. “You will exercise extreme caution at all times, private. You will do nothing to give me reason to regret this mission I know nothing about.”
“Yes, sir.” Socko dashed out the door and climbed into the truck. When he looked back at the house, his great-grandfather’s face was at the window. The old man nodded once. Socko nodded back.