6

MY LIFE AS A THUG

I went back to the barn the next day. And the day after that. And the day after. I stopped running. I stopped training for track. I biked up the hill to the barn and hung out with Jeff and Harry Mac and Ed P. instead.

They taught me how to break into different kinds of cars and how to start them all without a key. They taught me how to disable a steering-wheel lock so I could drive the cars once I started them. They even let me drive the Audi a couple of times—just around the driveway and a few hundred yards along the empty dirt road. Still, it was cool. It was a lot of fun.

They showed me other stuff too. How to pick different dead bolts and padlocks and knob locks. They even showed me a way to disable a computerized keypad if it was the right kind. All of this using that little Buster device with the various tools inside it.

How did it feel to be doing stuff like this? It was exciting. It made me feel like I wasn’t such an innocent and goody-goody preacher’s kid anymore. When I went to school during the day and Jeff said hi to me in the hall or Harry Mac nodded at me or Ed P. slapped hands with me as he went by, I thought I saw the other kids look at me differently. I felt I was into something they couldn’t get into, that I knew something now they didn’t know. Something secret. Something dangerous. Something forbidden.

And I told myself: Hey, it’s just fooling around. It’s not like I’m really breaking into anybody’s car. It’s not like I’m really stealing anything. I’m not really doing anything wrong at all.

But yeah, I knew that wasn’t true. I knew the cars in that barn didn’t belong to Jeff. I knew the stuff that Jeff and his friends were doing was wrong—not to mention illegal. I knew I shouldn’t be hanging out with a thug like him. And I knew that every day I did hang out with him made it harder for me to tell him I was going to stop.

But I knew I had to stop. Jeff kept telling me that I was almost ready to go on a “job.” And I had a pretty good idea what a job was. And I knew once I went out with Jeff and his crew, once I really did steal something, it was going to be even harder for me to make things right.

Now during this time, I didn’t talk to my parents very much. In fact, I kind of avoided them. Which was easier than you might think. See, my family lived in the East Valley Church rectory, which was sort of diagonally behind the church, on Maple Street. It was a big, rambling house with a lot of different doors—so many doors that I could always come in and get to my room without anyone seeing me. Plus my parents—and my older brother—were always kind of busy—usually too busy to notice whether I was around or not.

My brother, John, for instance, was usually busy working out which college he was going to go to. I knew this because whenever I knocked on his door, he would shout out, “Leave me alone. I’m working out which college I’m going to go to.” This was a hard choice because practically every college in America wanted him. John was always hardworking, always had his face in books or was practicing his soccer skills or whatever. But now I barely ever saw the guy anymore.

My mom was busy with—well, like, a million different mom-type things. If being a preacher’s kid was tough, I guess being a preacher’s wife was no picnic either. She called herself the church’s unpaid music director, plus she ran a bunch of committees and charities and was always going off somewhere in dirty jeans and a sweatshirt to rebuild a house or paint a children’s center or serve meals to the homeless or something. Plus she served meals to the homed too—meaning us—and kept the house nice and did the laundry and stuff like that. So yeah, she was busy.

And my dad, of course, was busy with all the stuff he did, like meeting with church people and visiting sick people and burying dead people and marrying people in love and writing sermons and studying to write sermons and giving sermons and other stuff like that.

And listen, my dad and mom and brother were all nice people—they really were. Just busy, that’s all. Which, as I’ve said, made it easy for me to come home at the end of the day and go to my room and do my homework and whatnot without talking to anyone at all.

Finally one evening, the last evening before all the trouble started, I was hanging out in the barn with Jeff and the guys. Jeff was sitting in his swivel-chair throne, kind of kicked back with a beer in his hand. Ed P. was lying across the front seat of one of the cars, with his legs hanging out the door. He was doing something with the dashboard radio, I’m not sure what. Anyway, it wasn’t the same car as before. It was a big blue BMW. The Audi was gone, I don’t know where.

Harry Mac was lying stretched out on the sofa, reading Sports Illustrated.

And I was sitting in one of the swivel chairs, examining one of these Buster things, pulling the different blades and tools out, looking them over, pushing them back in.

All of a sudden Jeff said, “You can keep that one if you want.”

Startled, I looked up at him. “What?”

“Sure. The Buster. Keep it. It’s yours.”

“Oh no, I don’t wanna . . .”

“Keep it. I’m telling you,” said Jeff. “It’s a present. You can’t insult me by turning it down.”

I opened my mouth again, but nothing came out. I didn’t want to insult him, after all.

“Anyway,” Jeff said. “You’re gonna need it. For a job. Soon.”

I felt my mouth go dry. I felt my throat get tight. I licked my lips, trying to think of something to say. But I couldn’t think of anything.

Slowly—almost as if my hand were working on its own—I slipped the Buster into my pocket.

That night, after dinner, I went upstairs to my room. I was feeling bad—really bad. Scared about what was going to happen. I wanted to get out of this. It had gone too far. I wanted to tell Jeff that I wasn’t going to come to the barn anymore. But I knew in my heart that I wasn’t going to tell him. I was afraid to tell him. I was afraid he would beat me up. I was afraid he wouldn’t like me anymore. I was afraid I wouldn’t feel cool anymore when I went to school and would go back to just being a PK.

I sat at my computer and I noticed Joe Feller was online. Joe’s a big, shambling, friendly guy, kind of like a Saint Bernard dog in human form. We’ve known each other since we were little. His parents used to go to our church, and Joe and I used to hang together after Sunday school. About a year ago, Joe’s dad got a job in Albany and they moved away. But Joe and I still chat online all the time. We’ve sort of developed this code, which is partly the usual chat abbreviations like LOL and IMHO and so on, but is also partly stuff we made up ourselves over time and just got used to using. So if I wrote our chat down word for word, it would pretty much look like alphabet soup to anyone who didn’t know us. So I’ll save you the trouble of translating and translate it for you myself.

It went like this:

ME: Are you there?

JOE: Always at the keyboard.

ME: Got a problem.

JOE: You fascinate me strangely.

ME: Did something dumb.

JOE: Tell all.

ME: Been hanging out with Jeff Winger.

JOE: ?????

ME: I know. And Ed P. and Harry Mac.

JOE: That IS dumb.

ME: I know.

JOE: That is dragnet.

ME: I know, I know.

(Dragnet is an old, old police television show that Joe likes because he thinks it’s so old-fashioned and funny. The theme song goes, “Dum-de-dum-dum.” So “dragnet” is Joe’s way of saying something is really, really, really dumb.)

JOE: What do you do? With Jeff?

ME: Nothing. They show me stuff.

JOE: ?

ME: How to break into cars. Pick locks.

JOE: Cool!

ME: !!!

JOE: But dragnet.

ME: Right.

JOE: You should stop.

ME: Thank you, Yoda. Your wisdom astounds me.

JOE: But if you stop, they will kill you.

ME: Bingo.

JOE: Also, you will no longer be cool.

I knew Joe would understand. Like I said, we’ve known each other a long time.

ME: What do you think?

JOE: It’s bad.

ME: I know.

JOE: Really bad.

ME: I know.

JOE: Dragnet.

ME: I KNOW!

JOE: You don’t have to shout.

There was a long pause here. I stared at the monitor. As I’ve said, there was nothing much there but a bunch of letters: YHAP Rly? SA WDID . . . and so on. But I saw the whole conversation in my mind just as if it were all spelled out. It was not a pleasant sight.

The pause went on a long while—and then I saw something that made my heart grow heavy in my chest. In fact, it made my heart sink like a rock, bang, straight down to the bottom of my feet.

Three numbers appeared on the screen: 911.

I groaned out loud.

Nine-one-one was part of our personal code: it meant that a situation was so bad—that things had gotten so far out of hand—that there was no possible way out except to come clean and tell your parents about it.

And my heart sank when I saw that because I knew Joe was right. And telling my parents about hanging out with Jeff Winger was not going to be a good time.

ME: It’d have to be my dad.

JOE: Right.

ME: It will be bad.

JOE: Major bad.

ME: He will really give it to me. He will give me The Look.

Once again, there was a pause before Joe answered. Then . . .

JOE: Eat The Look. 911.

I stared at the screen for a long time, but finally I nodded. I signed off. I got up, carrying my heavy heart with me. My heavy heart and I shuffled to the door.

I stepped out into the hall—and was startled to see my dad standing right there in front of me.

My dad is tall, thin, long-faced, and bald. I remember when I was a little kid, it was always easy to draw him. I just made a very, very long stick figure with a long bald head. Oh, and round glasses. He wears round glasses too.

I stepped out into the hall and there he was towering above me—his back, anyway, because he was just passing by my room on his way to the stairs.

“Hey, Dad,” I said.

He turned around as if he was as surprised to see me as I was to see him. He blinked behind his round glasses as if I had woken him from a dream.

“Hey, Sam,” he said.

I knew right away that something was wrong. Usually my dad has a sort of serious-but-happy expression on his face. I know that sounds like it doesn’t make much sense, but it does when you see it. I mean, my dad’s not the kind of guy who always walks around with a great big grin or who’s always making loud jokes and guffawing (like Joe Feller’s dad, who’s a salesman). He’s more the type who’s always thinking about something, so he looks serious, but he seems to like thinking about it, so he looks happy too.

But right now, he did not look happy. Not at all. In fact, even through the light glinting on his round glasses, I could see there was an expression of pain in his eyes.

“You got a minute?” I asked him.

He blinked again. He looked like he had to think very hard to come up with the answer. Then he said, “I was just heading out. There’s an emergency over at the Bolings’ house. Is it something urgent or can it wait?”

I hesitated. I knew what "an emergency at the Bolings’ ” meant. Mr. Boling was a close friend of my dad’s—maybe his best friend. They had known each other since college, when Dad was a student and Mr. Boling was one of his professors. Mr. Boling had taught my dad a lot and even helped him decide that he wanted to become a preacher. Later, when Mr. Boling retired from the college, he had helped Dad get the job at East Valley Church here in Sawnee. I guess you might say Mr. Boling was Dad’s mentor. He was a lot older than my dad, obviously. And now he had gotten sick. Really sick. As in: things did not look good. I knew my dad wanted to be with his friend in case this was the last time he’d get to see him.

So I sort of put on a relaxed voice and said, “Oh no, it’s not urgent. Go on over to the Bolings’. We can talk later. I hope things turn out all right.”

My dad smiled sort of sadly. “I’ll see you later, Sam,” he said.

He turned and went down the stairs.

I stood alone in the hallway and sighed. I guess I was a little relieved I didn’t have to tell my dad about Jeff Winger, but mostly I was disappointed because I’d already worked up the courage to tell him and I knew I really needed his advice. I didn’t think my mom would be as helpful. It’s not that my mom isn’t smart or anything, it’s just that she tends to give advice that would be good if you were going to take it, but you’re just not going to. I mean, she’ll say stuff like, “Report him to your teacher,” or “Just explain to him that it’s not right for him to take your lunch money.” That sort of thing. My dad’s advice is more practical is what I’m saying.

So I stood there and I heard the front door close downstairs as my dad went out to see his friend. And then I sort of put my hands in my pockets, wondering what I should do. Then, without really deciding, I kind of wandered down the hall to my dad’s study.

I’m not sure why I did that exactly. I just felt like it. It made me feel better to be in his study somehow.

The lights were off in there except for the small reading light on his desk. He was always forgetting to turn that off when he went out. The light shone down brightly on the Kindle he’d been reading from and then sent a sort of faint glow out over the rest of the room. The rest of the room was mostly books, shelves of books on every wall except one wall that had windows overlooking the backyard. There were also a couple of chairs for people to sit in when they came to visit and talk.

The desk was big—a big old wooden thing that nearly stretched from one wall to another. I walked around it and plunked down in my dad’s chair. The chair was big too—a big leather swivel chair with a high back. My mom had gotten it for Dad for Christmas a few years back. It was soft and comfortable.

I sat in the chair and swiveled back and forth. I had my right hand in my pocket. It was wrapped around the Buster. I rubbed its cool metal in my fingers. I was thinking: What do I do, what do I do, what do I do? Over and over again like that. Not a prayer exactly—I was too ashamed to pray. It was more like a chant in my mind. But I guess it was kind of a prayer too, since I was secretly hoping God would take pity on me and send an answer—fast.

As I swiveled and thought, my eyes went over the desk, the computer, the letter opener, the penholder, the Kindle under the reading lamp. Then I sort of swiveled around and looked over the books on the shelves, which were sort of sunk back in the shadows.

There was other stuff on the shelves too. Photographs of Mom and my brother and me. There was a drawing I’d done when I was, like, I don’t know, five or something: a crayon drawing of a rocket ship. I don’t know why Dad framed that and kept it, but he did. There was a drawing by my brother, John, too. And there was other stuff: tokens and souvenirs that people had given Dad or that he’d brought back from some trip or something. An old coin mounted on a block of wood. A carved cross from a church in Africa. Some of this stuff was hard to make out in the shadows, but I’d seen it so many times, I already knew what it was.

But then I saw something I didn’t recognize, something I hadn’t seen before. Maybe it was new, or maybe I just hadn’t noticed it. It was a small statue of an angel. Even in the shadows I could tell what it was because its wings were spread. It was lifting a sword too, so I guessed it was the archangel Michael. He’s the head of God’s armies and does battle with Satan in the Bible, so they pretty much always show him with a sword.

Like I said, I’d never noticed the statue before, so I got up out of the chair and walked over for a better look. It was just a small statue, not much bigger than my hand. I picked it up and took a closer look at it. It was Michael, all right, with his angel sword raised up. And at the base of it, there were some words engraved:

RECTE AGE NIL TIME

The words gave me a strange feeling. I thought they were probably Latin, but I didn’t know how to read Latin and had no idea what they meant. All the same, I got this weird notion in my head that the words were directed especially at me. Maybe I just needed advice so badly I was ready to find it anywhere, but still, I had this powerful feeling that the angel statue was answering that chant of mine: What do I do, what do I do? It came to me that if I could find out the meaning of those words, I would know.

I set the statuette down on the shelf and left the room. Headed back down the hall to my room.

My room is not at all like my dad’s. It’s a lot messier, for one thing. And there aren’t as many books. Mostly the walls are decorated with posters, which are mostly from my favorite video games. Like one has “The Evolution of Mario,” showing how Mario went from being all pixilated in the old days to being three-dimensional now. Then there’s Batman from the Arkham Asylum game and the Prince of Persia and so on. Then there’s my bed and stuff. And then there’s my computer, which is a MacBook, on a big table that is cluttered with all my books and papers from school.

So I sat down at the computer. I called up Google and typed in the words I’d seen on the angel statue: Recte Age Nil Time.

The translation appeared on the monitor at once. I leaned back in my chair and took a deep breath.

Because now I didn’t think those words were the answer to my prayer. I knew they were. I knew they were the advice I’d been looking for.

I guess in a funny way it was those words that started all the trouble. It was those words that changed everything.

The translation on the screen was:

DO RIGHT. FEAR NOTHING.