Chapter Five

Dad and I shared some awkward dinner conversation, both of us ignoring the previous night’s bombshell event. I suppose he felt what needed to be said had been said, and didn’t see any need to go backpacking again through the rugged wilderness of discomfort. I couldn’t have been more thankful, as I mentally waved at the large elephant in the kitchen.

I kept quiet about the Bellman event, so as not to upset Dad. I needed to man up and adhere to the strict code of confidentiality I swore to Olivia. Should it come out, I’d address it then. But I felt confident my plan would work, and he’d never need to know the truth.

After dinner, I excused myself and told Dad I’m going to visit Mickey Goldfarb.

“Okay, son,” he said. “Be careful. And if there’s anything you need to ask me about your mother, don’t be afraid to do so.” He looked relieved after saying it.

“Thanks, Dad. Don’t know when I’ll be home, but I’ve got my key.” I bolted toward the door.

“Hold on a sec… Technically, you’re not supposed to be driving this time of night, unless for school or my work.”

“I’d say this was homework, wouldn’t you?” He nodded and said goodnight. I stepped outside and nearly tripped on a trio of cats on the stoop, staring expectantly at me. Their tails swooshed madly from side to side.

“Oh, great. The cat brigade’s out in full force again.” I glimpsed over to Mr. Cavanaugh’s front porch, and like magic, he appeared. As I made my way to the Bucket, he sprang from his wicker chair, watching me carefully over his wooden railing.

“Richard?” he called out softly. Well, at least soft enough for me to pretend I hadn’t heard him. I hopped in the Bucket and sped off. No time for nosies.

****

Mickey Goldfarb lived twenty minutes away, just a few blocks from where Josh lived. Nestled in the poorer part of Clearwell, her little blue two-story house appeared well kept. Given the time of year, her full and green manicured yard looked astonishingly vital. The most beautiful garden I’d ever seen surrounded the screened-in front porch. A full visual onslaught of exploding colors and flowers brimmed with life. I imagined their gaping, reaching flower buds crying out, Feed me, Mickey! Late October, we’d already had our first killing frost, so here lay proof Mickey Goldfarb had achieved miraculous gardener extraordinaire status.

I walked up the little broken sidewalk in the center of the yard to her porch door. The only sign of yard misbehavior was the tall green grass strands stretching through the sidewalk cracks, yearning for sunlight and rain.

I knocked, never having really understood proper screen door etiquette. Does one bypass the preliminary door and go straight to the front door? Like a stubborn woodpecker, I pounded at the screen. I finally relented, pulled open the porch door, and proceeded to the oddly-colored yellow front door.

Another five minutes passed, I finally saw a tuft of blue hair through the small window atop the door.

“Who is it?” rang out a craggy voice. This is starting out soooo great.

“Um, hi, Mrs. Goldfarb. I’m Tex.” I suddenly felt very stupid and wanted out of there. “Tex McKenna… My dad said I should talk to you…I guess.” I spoke too loudly, over-enunciating, because, hey, old people have a hard time hearing, right?

The door opened a crack, pulled taut by a chain. “You’re Elizabeth’s boy?” I snatched a peek at a brown eye peering over glasses, riding low on her nose. “Well…what do you want?” I kinda’ thought my dad would’ve taken care of the preliminary meeting courtesies. Otherwise, it looked like I was in for yet another interrogation.

“I don’t know, ma’am. My dad said I should see you and ask you about…well, certain powers…that my mom and I… Can we talk about this inside?” Embarrassed about the whole witch thing, really, I preferred not to have the entire neighborhood hear about it.

The door banged close. More rattling ensued with one chain than I thought possible. “Goddammit.” I sincerely hoped she had aimed her curse at the pesky chain rather than me. Finally, the door swung open. There stood Mickey Goldfarb, all five feet two inches of her, her curly, blue hair contributing at least four inches of her height. I always wondered how blue hair happens. Is it natural? Or do certain old ladies buy blue hair dye, believing this to be the hip new fad?

“Well, come in.” She frowned, none too happy to be interrupted. Whatever she’d been doing. Placing love spells on the retired guy next door, no doubt. Her glasses balanced at the very tip of her long, slender nose. How did she keep them afloat? She wore a long, blue robe. Pink fuzzy slippers peeked out underneath, the kind one would find on an infant. Hardly my idea of what a witch should look like.

“Get the hell outta’ the way, Sampson!” She kicked at a fat, black cat. Ah! She is a witch! The cat dutifully obeyed her, and I could’ve sworn, almost nodded in her direction. Four more cats crawled out from seemingly nowhere to stare at me, tails whisking back and forth rapidly. Okay, crazy cat lady, we better make this short as my allergies are going to get the better of me soon.

“So you’re Elizabeth’s boy,” she reiterated, scrutinizing me from head to toe. After her initial inspection, she concluded, “You need a haircut.”

“Yeah, I get that a lot.” I sighed. The cats brushed against my legs, purring for approval.

“You’ve grown some since Elizabeth’s funeral.” I didn’t remember seeing her—or meeting her—at my mom’s funeral. But that didn’t mean anything. I’d gone through the entire proceedings as if in a dream-state, barely acknowledging anyone else.

“Yes, ma’am.” How else does one respond to your growth notice?

“Oh, cut the ‘ma’am’ crap, kid.” She guffawed. “That’s for little old ladies!” Huh. “Call me Mickey.” Even standing just inside her door, the cat hair began to take its toll on my watering eyes. “Your name’s ‘Tex’?”

“Yes, ma…Mickey.”

“What kind of name is Tex, anyway?” She eyed me with suspicion.

“What kind of name is Mickey?” Okay, internal self-censor, you really need some fine-tuning. She stared at me, somewhat taken by surprise at my teenage insolence. Finally, she chuckled, her mirth ending abruptly in a coughing fit.

“Okay, okay,” she said between spasms. “You’ve got your mom’s attitude, kid, and I like it.” She reached into her robe pocket and pulled out a package of cigarettes. “My doctor says I should quit.” She jabbed one into her mouth. “So I try and smoke outside as much as possible. Let’s go.”

“Um…okay.” I didn’t understand her logic, but any chance to get away from the cat hair, I jumped at. Besides, I didn’t want to risk getting her pissed off at me. She shoved me in front of her, making a sort of “shoo-shoo” sound. I could tell she was more used to dealing with cats than people.

“Get back, Sampson.” She aimed her pink-covered foot again in the black cat’s direction. “Make way, Delilah,” she directed toward a calico cat. She pulled the door shut behind us and ushered me to a floral-patterned swing on the porch. “Sit, sit.” She pushed me down onto the damp plastic seat covering.

“It came from my dad, actually.”

“What did? The attitude?” She looked puzzled, and I couldn’t blame her. Overwhelmed, my mind raced in too many directions at once.

“No…my name, Tex. When I was younger, my dad loved old western movies. He tried to get me into them, but I never really liked ’em. But he loved to play cowboys with me, and pretty soon he was calling me ‘Tex’ more than my real name. It was always, ‘Which way did they go, Tex?’ or ‘What coach did you ride in on, Tex?’ So, it just stuck over time. And my attitude did come from my mom, I guess, and I can see that I’m talking way too much.” I ran out of gas and slumped back onto the swing.

“Heh.” Mickey snorted, alternately laughing and coughing. “I never much had no use for them westerns, but I wouldn’t kick that Clint Eastwood outta’ bed.”

Okay, gross, I thought as I watched Mickey gaze dreamingly through her screened porch, momentarily lost in a lustful scenario.

She fired up her cigarette. “You want one, kid?”

“Um…no thanks. I…uh…gave it up last year.” Real cool, Tex, trying to impress a little old blue-haired lady by lying about smoking. What’s next? Taking her “cruising” in the Bucket?

“Whatever, kid.” She exhaled a huge cloud of smoke. “So, what do you know about your mother?”

“Well…turns out I don’t know as much as I thought I did.” Having said this out loud brought home the painful truth of the statement. “I just found out yesterday she was…I guess, a practicing witch.”

“Kid, she wasn’t just a practicing witch. She was one of the best, most goddamn talented witches I’d seen in a long time. She pulled off some spells I thought were just myths in The Book of Witchcraft. Years ago, she came to me to learn. But let me tell you something, sonny-boy, she ended up teaching me quite a few things!” She blew a perfect smoke ring into the air, punctuating it with her index finger.

“Were you her…coven leader?” I didn’t know anything about witchcraft, really. Just what I’d seen in horror films.

She burst out laughing. “Why put a title on everything? There’s not really a ‘coven’ as you call it in Clearwell. Some of us are witches, some of us are Wiccans, some of us just practice the craft and some, like your mother, are born into it with strong supernatural leanings. Elizabeth said you had the gift, and I can tell just by being around you, kid.” Her short stubby legs kicked back and forth, like a little kid on a playground swing, unable to reach the porch floor.

“What do you mean? How can you tell?”

“I can see your aura, kid.” She studied the perimeter of my head like a police detective would a chalked murder victim outline. “And it’s a mighty strong one. That’s one of my special abilities.”

“Well, what do I do with this…witchcraft?”

“It’s gonna take some time, kid.” She stubbed out her cigarette in an overflowing bucket beside the swing. “That’s enough for tonight…I’ve got to watch my stories.” She rocked back and forth a couple of times to build up momentum and popped out of the swing like a geriatric gymnast.

“That’s it?” I asked.

“Look, kid, what do you want from me?” She turned back toward me, faster than I thought possible. “You want some Karate Kid crap? Fine…go wax my car.” She held out what I took to be an imaginary sponge.

“I just thought…I could learn more about my mother.” I sank lower into the cushion, deeper into my funk. “And more about my so-called powers.”

She sat back down and in that moment, appeared twenty years younger. “I told you, this is gonna take time. I’ll tell you about your mom, and I’ll teach you things and show you how to use your powers properly and responsibly. But, whatever you do, do not try anything on your own until you fully understand what you’re dealing with.” This was not the same cranky little old lady I’d been dealing with five minutes ago. I could see why Mom sought her out.

“But, Mickey…” I started and then stopped. I didn’t want to whine, nor involve anyone else in my problems.

“But, what?” She pursed her lips, challenging me with her glare. The piston-like pumping of her short legs fired up again.

“I’m in trouble…I need help. I need to be able to protect my friends…” I trailed off, the overwhelming last call of the locusts drowning me out.

“Okay, okay. Now we’re getting somewhere.” She wore a self-satisfied smile across her face. “I could tell you were in some form of worry when you first showed up. Your beautiful aura was a little ragged around the edges, like you lately took a beatin’ or something.”

“I think my friends and I could be in danger. There’re these crazy kids at school who want to kill us.” I couldn’t believe I shared this with a blue-haired witch I just met.

Once Mickey saw—or felt, maybe, in her case—the sheer terror that had locked me down, her smile melted away into a concerned frown. “Why, you’re serious, aren’t you, kid?”

I just nodded, a stupid bobblehead.

“All right.” She folded her yellowed fingers into her lap and stared sternly at me. “Everything I said still holds true. I will help you, but it will take time, knowledge, and practice. We’ll just step up the urgency.”

I continued nodding, silently, afraid if I let loose more verbal diarrhea, she’d change her mind about helping me.

“But you just remember what I told you, kid!” She poked me in the chest with her smoke-ring popping finger. “Do not do anything on your own until you’re ready.” Her eyes narrowed into slits, far above her gravity-defying glasses. “If you think you’re in trouble now, you should see the crap-load you’ll get in if you screwed up with the craft! There’s some dark and damned dangerous things out there, kid, that you don’t go messin’ with.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I mean it! You understand me, kid?” I’d seen many faces of Mickey Goldfarb tonight, but her scary ‘you kids get outta’ my yard or else’ face seemed the worst. “And don’t call me ma’am!”

“Yes, Mickey,” I said, trying to slink even further down into the comforting protection of purple and brown-covered patio furniture. Apparently, it was “National Scary Confrontation Week,” and everyone forgot to tell me.

Mickey must’ve sensed my intimidation and put her friendly grandma visage back on. “Tex…does your life feel like it’s out of your hands sometimes? Do you ever feel like you’ve got no control over whichever way your life turns? Like there’s something else controlling you, and you ain’t got no say in the matter even though it’s your own goddamned life?”

“Yes.” Leave it to a little blue-haired old lady to perfectly sum up the awful and angsty teenage experience in very few words.

“Hee, looks like I struck a nerve.” She slapped the back of my head. Damn, if the old lady didn’t pack some muscle. That one’s going to bruise.

“Here’s lesson number one in witchcraft, kid. Witchcraft ain’t about the cauldrons and alla’ that crap. Sure, they may be tools of the trade in some form or other, but witchcraft is about dealing with your relationship with nature, more than anything else. It’s about finding the perfect balance between outside forces—what I call nature, but there’s lotsa’ other names for it—and your life. You need to bring them together into a nice symbiotic relationship. You understand me, kid?” Pokity-poke went the finger. Noddity-nod went my head.

“If you learn the ropes right, you’re gonna find your life becoming less…hectic…and making more sense. The spells and potions and fun stuff come as a sort of bonus, but you’ve got to understand what I’m tellin’ you first.”

“I could really, really use something like that in my life.”

“Okay, that’s your first lesson,” said Mickey. “Consider that one on the house. The next lesson won’t be.” She began her bounding allez-oop exercise to get out of the swing again. Up she went.

“Um…I don’t have any money.” It disappointed me to find out she had intentions of charging me for her knowledge. What happened to the pride in being a mentor and all that junk?

“It don’t have to be nothin’ big, kid. Look at it as bringing me an offering for my witch smarts…just bring me a pack of smokes.”

“Mickey…I’m not old enough to buy cigarettes.”

“Humph.” She rubbed her small chin. “I guess that must’ve been hell on you when you used to smoke, huh?” Mickey went through her routine of laughing then hacking. “You’re so fulla’ crap, kid. Okay, I guess you can’t bring me any whiskey either, huh?”

“No.” This was going to be a real roller-coaster ride with her.

“All right, then.” She sighed resignedly. “Bring me some of the extra crispy… I love me some fried chicken.” She had the same lustful gleam in her eyes as when she had conjured up Clint Eastwood earlier.

“Okay.” For the first time that night, I laughed. “That I can do.”

She opened the front door, shooing her cats out of the way. “Oh, and, kid, let’s meet in another couple of nights. And you’ve heard of using the telephone, right?”

“Um, yeah…” Even though phoning people seemed like an outdated form of communication, I thought it best not to let Mickey know this.

“Well, use the damn thing!” She slammed the door in my face. “I’m in the phone book,” she bellowed from within the house.

And that ended my first meeting with a witch. At least that I knew about.

****

No shocker, the next day of school proved intense. I arrived minutes before my first class started, no need to be in the war-zone longer than necessary. I pulled into the parking lot, turned off the Bucket, and flipped my phone out.

—R U all right?— I texted Olivia.

Seconds later, she replied:

—YUP. In class. No sign of Bellman.—

—Good. Check in a lot.—

I ran through the parking lot, muttered “Good morning” to principal What’s-His-Face standing on the steps, and bolted to sociology. My eyes never strayed from looking straight ahead. If I passed Bellman, I never knew it.

I threw open the door, and saw by the clock, I had a few more minutes. I motioned for Ian to come out into the hallway. Ian took his feet off the chair in front of him and shuffled out.

“What’s up?” he asked. “You look freaked out.”

I quickly filled him in on what happened after school yesterday. Best to forewarn our allies, I thought, and I knew Olivia would tell Josh since he shared her first hour.

Ian giggled uncontrollably. “Damn, I wish I could’ve seen it. Olivia’s bad-ass!”

“Yeah, she really is. Be cool, be cool.” Ian’s laughter drew unwanted attention. “Just be on the lookout. I don’t know if Bellman’s gonna go after you or not. He might not even know we hang, but I can guarantee O’ and I are on his hit list.” Having said it aloud brought home the urgency and sheer terror again.

“Okay…” Ian finally settled down. “Here comes Jensen. Let’s get in before we get another detention.”

My phone beeped.

—Uh-oh— read the text from Olivia. —I’m being summoned.—

The lords and masters of Clearwell High were working fast today. The long hour of sociology crawled by at a snail’s pace.

****

The bell rang, and I ran toward Olivia’s class. Didn’t spot her anywhere. I hoped she didn’t lose her cool and mouth off.

—How did it go?— I texted her.

Blindly making my way toward algebra class, I stared at the phone, practically willing it to respond.

—Awesome!— she finally texted back. —Wait till U hear about it!—

—Cool. Come have lunch downstairs 2day?—

—Ugh!— she wrote. —OK. Gotta go.—

It was a long haul until lunch, and I half expected the intercom to summon me for another round of interrogation with Hastings. While sweating it out, the hours dragged by. I thought no news seemed even scarier than bad news. It meant Bellman would indeed take matters into his own ham hock hands. Suspension or even expulsion sounded like better options.

****

“Bellman’s such a punk-ass,” said Red, alternately amused and horrified. “You shoulda’ come got me, Tex.”

“You weren’t around, Red. Even if you were, I really didn’t have time to do anything. From the moment that bastard saw me, he started choking me.”

“Let’s see him pick on somebody his own size for a change.” Red shook out his floppy head of hair. “Sorry I wasn’t here. There was a leak in the girl’s toilet upstairs. Duty calls.”

“It’s cool. It all happened so fast. I just gotta lay low for a while and hope it blows over.” False optimism, my old fickle friend.

“I’m so sick of him,” said Josh quietly, fear filling his eyes. I’m sure it brought back memories from his shower incident. “Can’t you tell Hastings—or even, Jensen—what happened, Tex? Maybe we can get him suspended?”

“Not without me and O’ both facing suspension. Besides, Hastings always protects his pet football players.”

Olivia’s black flats flapped down the stairs into view. Ranting again, but this time out of empowerment, not rage. “Oh, yeah,” she called out, half-mockingly. “Here comes O’, don’t jack with me!”

Red, smiling, leaped up from his rusty folding chair and offered it to Olivia. “Well, if it ain’t the junior flyweight champion of Clearwell High. Have a seat…you earned it.”

Olivia surveyed the peeling, brown chair and the garbage surrounding it. “Uck…I’ll stand.” Okay, now she acted like the daintiest Welter Weight champion of Clearwell High. Red laughed, plopped back down, and rested his lanky legs on top of a cleaning solvent drum.

“Okay,” I said, “what happened? I’m dying here.”

“Omigod, you won’t believe it!” Her visible eye widened with excitement. “Before class even started, Hastings called me in.” Olivia looked vindicated now that someone thought her capable of performing acts of vandalism or mischief. “Hastings wanted to know if I saw or heard anything about Bellman when I left detention.”

“What’d you tell him?” asked Ian, nearly as excited as Olivia.

She covered her eyes with her black-finger-nailed hands and then repeated the gesture over her ears and mouth. “I see nothing, hear nothing, speak nothing. Just like we talked about, Tex, I said I left detention, and there was nothing going on in the hallway. Told Commandant Hastings that I think I left before Bellman, but couldn’t be sure. Hastings stared me down, trying to break me, and finally said ‘Miss Swanson is pretty positive you left just a few minutes after Bob did.’” Olivia enjoyed her spotlight of notoriety. She even offered a hilarious, yet not very accurate impression of Hastings, embellishing him with a German accent.

“Uh-oh.” Why in the world would Miss Swanson be so alert as to notice when her detention students left? She needed to get a life.

“I matched old Hastings’ stare and lied like a champion,” Olivia continued. “I said ‘Well, hell, I really don’t know, but I didn’t see anything.’ I finally asked Hastings what had happened, anyway. He didn’t want to tell me at first, but finally—finally!—told me. Get this! Bellman told Hastings that three—or however many—guys from South High jumped him, stabbed him, and beat him up with a fire extinguisher!” Olivia laughed uproariously. She took pride in Bellman’s blaming her actions on three rival school male students. “It was pretty much as you said it would be, Tex…although I never thought Bellman would come up with a story like that!”

“Ha!” Red shook his head. “Bellman got his ass whipped by a girl and had to blame it on three guys they’ll never find.”

Olivia whipped her head toward Red. “Yeah…that’s right! A girl! Don’t screw with me, you sexist pig!” We all laughed, this time Olivia joining us. With her mood so victorious, even Red’s little dig at ‘the inferior sex’ didn’t derail her.

“Well, Bellman found a story that’ll keep him out of trouble.” I did my best to rein in the celebratory party as I found it premature, and just wanted to keep everyone on their toes. “And if it’s further investigated, it’ll go nowhere. So…that puts us in a holding pattern. Bellman’s not the kind of guy who’ll forgive and forget. He’s not wired that way. Let’s not forget he’s crazy.”

Josh nodded vigorously, his chin covered by his turtleneck.

“Do any of you have him in any of your classes?” I asked, looking solemnly at them in turn. No, was the consensus. We were lucky to be all sophomores, while Bellman ruled in terror as a junior (maybe several times over). “Have any of you seen him today?”

“I saw him before lunch,” crowed Olivia. “His eyes were still red from the bath I gave him!”

“O’, you didn’t say anything to him, did you?” I dreaded the answer. It’s impossible for Olivia to withstand rubbing salt in the wound.

“I didn’t say anything. Just laughed at him! And walked right by him doing it, too!”

“Olivia…please don’t antagonize him. Don’t make it worse than it already is.” And I knew telling Olivia not to do something was as good as sending her a gilt-edged invitation to a party. Usually, I love her for it, but not in this case.

“Okay, okay,” she said, smirking like a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar, who planned on going back for seconds nonetheless. “It’s just too easy.”

I sighed. “Well…anyway. The longer we can stay out of his path maybe some of his anger will burn off. Right now, it’s Thursday, and I’m just trying to make it through the week.” This didn’t sound like much of a challenge, but it felt like going for the Gold Medal in Survivalism. “He’s not in my seventh-hour gym class, but he is in the upper-class gym class at the same time. I could have an encounter with him in the locker room.” It’d been on my mind all day. Like one of Dad’s westerns, an imminent showdown would be held at High Noon. The villagers would shut their doors and windows, leaving me alone to fend off the notorious Bob Bellman.

“I’m glad I’m not in gym anymore,” said Josh. “Sorry, Tex.” After last year’s shower escapade, Josh found a family doctor who wrote a letter recommending he take “remedial gym” for medical reasons. I always envied this loophole as the easy-peasy gym kids never did anything more physically challenging than walking. Yet, because of some misplaced sense of pride, I never asked Dad to find me a willing doctor. Now, I deeply regretted that decision.

“It’s cool, Josh. I totally get it.”

“What’s with those jackasses?” asked Ian. “Is gym the only class they ever take?” As students, two years of gym were required and then our tour-of-duty in Torture 101 could be put behind us. After my second and current year, I vowed to never set foot in a gym again.

“Ian, we’re not dealing with brain surgeons here,” Olivia said. “Gym is all they know and probably the only decent grades they get.” We all nodded and silently agreed with her.

“Tex, my garage is right across from the locker room,” said Red. “I’ll be sure I’m upstairs—in the garage—during your seventh hour today. If you need me, I’ll come runnin’.” This actually gave me a small sense of comfort. Red glanced at Olivia to be sure she noted his grand gesture of selfless protection.

“Thanks, Red,” I said. “I appreciate it. If you hear me screaming, run in with your fists a-blazin’.” And, I knew first hand, that’s what Red did best. Running.

****

While sweat-inducing and futile, gym class proved surprisingly quiet for the most part. Thankful that the juniors and seniors played football outside, I gladly ran my endless and pointless laps inside the relative safety of the gym. Bellman was nowhere to be seen. Now I just had to get dressed and out of there as fast as possible.

While running my umpteenth lap around the “world’s smallest indoor track” as Mr. Sowers called it, my blood ran cold as the upperclassmen came into the gym from outdoors. There stood Bellman, big and ugly, mouth wide open, glowering at me. He slowed his gait, his gaze burning into me, as he entered the locker room.

Mr. Sowers ended our torture at the fifty-minute mark and blew his whistle. “Golly, gee, fellas,” he drawled, “that was pathetic. Put me out of my misery, and go hit the showers.” He enjoyed belittling our lack of physical prowess every chance he got.

Maybe Bellman had already showered and left before me. Reluctantly, I entered the locker room, honed my tunnel vision technique, and hustled toward my locker. My shower would have to wait until I got home, no sense in putting myself at risk in the stalls. I threw my jeans on and tied one shoe while sitting on the bench. If I had to leave suddenly at least I’d be half-dressed.

Thick, hairy legs planted themselves in front of me. I looked up. Bellman stood naked, his junk inches from my face. From head to toe, hair and muscle covered him, capped off by a burgeoning beer belly. He leaned down and whispered in my ear, “You’re dead.” His calm unsettled me more than his usual out-of-control shrieking.

“I’ll get you,” he continued. “And your little slut, too.” It took all the control I had to not ask him if he tried out for the role of the Wicked Witch in the school production of Wizard of Oz.

Inches above my head, he smashed his fist into the locker. I said nothing, frozen with fear. Breath plumed from his nostrils, his mouth. The rank odor of nicotine wafted down. He hit the locker again with a loud rattling bang. He pulled his hand back and clenched it in front of my face, forming a threatening fist. His knuckles grew white, one of them bleeding. Predatorily, he licked the blood off with a grin.

“What’s going on here, fellas?” asked Mr. Sowers, poking his head into the locker alley. “Bellman, go get dressed. McKenna, hit the showers…you smell!”

“Yes, Coach,” Bellman said. His unblinking eyes never left me as he barely acknowledged Sowers’ existence. He strutted off, staring at me like a vulture surrounding an already dead carcass.

“Okay, Coach.” For once, I was glad to call Sowers “coach” for his intervention probably saved me.

No shower for me today, though, thank you very much.

I waited for Sowers to go back to his office, threw on my other tennis shoe, grabbed my shirt, and ran into the gym. In case Bellman waited for me in the hallway outside the locker room, I didn’t mind at all taking the long route to the parking lot. I opened the door onto the football field. While running for my life, I finished dressing, pulling my shirt on. Recently, I’d perfected the art of multi-tasking.