Chapter 22

The shoemaker’s children go barefoot. And the lawn mower’s lawn grows long and thick and studded with weeds because the lawn mower is out mowing other people’s lawns.

His mother said she’d pay him for mowing their lawn, but he said nix. That would be chintzy, to take money for mowing his own lawn.

The mower wouldn’t start. He pulled at it repeatedly, and it refused to fire. He wondered if he could talk his mother into buying a ride-’em number, and grinned, thinking of his father’s face if he caught him mowing the lawn sitting down. It went against the old work ethic. Honest toil demanded honest sweat and nothing else would do.

“Benjy!” cried a new and different voice. So the monsters’ mother had found herself a sitter after all. God bless her. The sitter and the mother. They both deserved medals. He peered out from behind his phony glasses and his bangs, which had been let go, much like the lawn, and were badly in need of trimming. He saw the monsters milling around the screen door, which was still pockmarked with holes large enough to admit a whole fleet of mosquitoes. The sitter must’ve lured them there with some irresistible bait. Maybe half a steer, done rare, or a bulging bag of M&M’s. Whatever, he wished her well. The monsters, from a distance, seemed to have grown like the proverbial weeds. He wished the new sitter would be big and strong and wily. And fast on her feet.

The mower started up at last. His father would’ve been proud. Sweat poured down his face. He took off his glasses, as they only made things worse. He found an oily rag in the garage, which he tore into strips to make a proper sweatband for himself. Perfect. He caught a glimpse of himself in the garage window, bringing to mind John McEnroe at Wimbledon or, better still, Rambo returning from the wars. Either way, the sweatband lent him an air of dissolution, which he found rather sexy and hoped others might find sexy, too.

No matter how hard he worked, he made only a slight dent in the lawn’s raggle-taggle appearance. Pausing to rest, he saw a tall woman over at the monsters’ house. She wore a white hat and seemed to be telling them something. And they seemed to be listening. A first. Perhaps she was a witch. A witch in a white hat would be a switch. Maybe her rates were higher than your average, everyday baby-sitter, but she was worth every penny. More power to her. Cast that spell, baby, he told her. I salute you. If he hadn’t been so eager to finish the job, he might’ve crossed over to monster territory and introduced himself.

When at last he’d finished and the lawn resembled a greensward, he admired his work. And hoped his father might come over tonight, maybe for dinner, and see the good job he’d done. He had tried not to let his father’s approval mean so much, but it did.

He’d just stepped out of the shower when he heard the telephone. Patrick said, “Where you been, fool? I’ve been ringing and ringing. I was about to call the cops.”

“Hey, you’re back. I was mowing the lawn. How was it?”

“Mickey and Minnie sent their best. Want to come over and shoot the breeze and some pool?”

“Sure. I’ll be over as soon as I cut my hair.”

“Hey, if things are that tough,” Patrick said, “I’ll lend you barber money.”

“It’s just in the front. My bangs are overrunning my forehead. Hang in. I’ll be there in a trice.”

He rode his bike over to Patrick’s, hunched over the handlebars in a true racer’s crouch, anxious to make time. He’d missed Patrick.

“I hope you did a better job on your lawn than you did on your hair,” Patrick said when he opened the door. “Come on down. We have the joint to ourselves.”

He hadn’t improved his technique at pool, but then, neither had Patrick. They fooled around some, making like hustlers. Outside, the sun shone. Inside, all was cool depravity as they squinted out from under their green eyeshades, and pushed up their sleeves, and considered the possibilities of each shot.

“Did you run into any girls out there?” he asked Patrick.

“Only one worth talking about. Only trouble was”—Patrick went for the side pocket—“she couldn’t shake these seven little nerds who followed her everywhere. ‘Name’s Snow White,’ she said. ‘What’s yours?’ So you know what I told her?”

Patrick missed his shot.

“I said, ‘Call me Ishmael.’ What’s with you?” Patrick asked. “You had any romantic adventures since I’ve been gone?”

Tim took a long time setting up his next shot. “Nope,” he said. “I saw Sophie at a restaurant one night. She was looking at me, and when I looked back, she ducked behind her menu.” His cue slipped and he wound up behind the eight ball. A place he was not unused to.

“She’s embarrassed, that’s why she hid,” Patrick told him. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she called you up one of these days to apologize for the way she acted.”

He snorted. “If she did, I’d tell her I was out of town.”

A tall woman came halfway down the stairs and bent over, looking at them. He started to say, “Hi, Mrs. Scanlon,” but it wasn’t Mrs. Scanlon. Maybe it was her sister.

“Hello,” the woman said. Patrick never even looked at her, never acknowledged her presence. Maybe Patrick’s mother had had a face-lift. It sure looked like her. He smiled at her tentatively.

“I’m Tim Owen,” he said.

“Hello, Tim,” she said, staying put.

“Get lost,” said Patrick.

He was astonished at Patrick’s bad manners. If Patrick’s mother had been around, she would’ve let him have it.

“Why don’t you just go bury your head in the sand, Melissa,” Patrick said.

Melissa? Melissa!

Melissa came down several steps and stood there, smiling at him. “I saw you this afternoon, Tim,” she said. “When you were mowing the lawn.”

He was tongue-tied and web-footed, trying to piece things together. “That was you?” he said at last, in his usual brilliant manner. “Baby-sitting next door with the monsters?”

“They didn’t give me a speck of trouble. All I did was read them a couple of Grimm’s fairy tales. It was like waving a wand over them. They loved “Hansel and Gretel.” You know that part where the witch fattens Hansel up so she can eat him? They thought that was really cool. Next thing I knew, they were trying to fit Benjy in the oven, which they’d turned on high, to roast him. I got to them just in time. Benjy wasn’t even singed.” Melissa’s merry laugh rang out. “I’d heard those kids were a problem, but they were pussycats for me.”

“Did they lock you in the bathroom?” he asked, curious. “They almost always lock their sitters in the bathroom.”

“Well, they would’ve but I found the key under the rug and put it in my pocket for safekeeping. We got along fine,” Melissa said.

“Tim, your shot.” Patrick nudged him.

He bent over the table, brandishing his cue, pretending great interest in his next move. His head buzzed. What had happened to Melissa? He couldn’t very well ask, “Hey, Melissa, what gives? Only a couple of months ago, you were fat and ugly. What happened?” She might take offense. Still, it was a valid question.

Upstairs the telephone rang, and Melissa thundered to answer.

“All of a sudden,” Patrick said gloomily, “she’s got ’em stacked up on the runway. Everywhere you turn, these dudes who wouldn’t have looked at her crosseyed are standing in line waiting for a turn to nuzzle Melissa. It’s indecent. My mother and father are practically having a heart attack.”

“Yeah.” He took his chance. “I noticed she’s changed some. What did happen to her?”

“For one thing, she turned fourteen,” Patrick said, as if that explained the miracle. “For another, she dropped twenty-two pounds at the fat camp she went to. What with one thing and another, it’s a puzzlement. I think my parents wish they’d left her the way she was. That way, nobody would look twice at her. But now the fat’s in the fire, both literally and figuratively. Last night I heard my father tell my mother he thought sex was rearing its ugly head around here. And I don’t think he meant me. Pretty racy talk from the old man, huh?”

Well put, Mr. Scanlon, he thought. Very well put. He hung around so long, hoping Melissa would return, that Mrs. Scanlon came down to announce dinner and asked him if he’d like to stay.

“Thanks,” he said reluctantly, “but I can’t. My father’s coming over. I’ll take a rain check, if it’s all right with you.”