Dead Ends (4 page)

“I'll give that tool a pass for now,” I said to Billy. “I already got a detention for fighting today.”

We stepped out of the gardens and into the first streaks of sun breaking through the clouds. It was that strange sunlight that shows up only after a hard rain and washes everything in gold, so even our shit neighborhood shined.

“You got a detention?” Billy's eyes widened until they were nearly popping out of his head.

“It's no big deal.”

“I almost got a detention once, at my last school. It was a
really
big deal. Mom got in a big fight with the teacher because he said I deserved it—”

“Let me guess. For talking too much?”

“No, for going berserk.”

“What?” I stopped and looked at him.

“I have a really bad temper,” Billy said in a cheerful voice. “I
used to have fits—that's what my doctor called them. Mom calls them tantrums, but I don't really think—”

“Get to the point.”

“The point
is
—I used to go all crazy when I got upset, and I got upset at the teacher.”

“About what?”

Billy thought for a moment. “Don't remember. But I didn't get detention. Mom still calls me her little berserker, even though I don't go berserk anymore.”

As we walked down the sidewalk in silence, I thought about the first time
I
went “berserk” on somebody.

I couldn't remember the kid's name now, but he used to ride bikes down our street with Mark. I remembered how he shoved the kickstand of his crappy bike down into the icy sidewalk in front of my house. I was building a snow fort, and he started bragging about how his dad taught him to make an entire igloo out of snow. I ignored him at first, like I ignored all the loser kids on my block, but he kept talking. He went on and on about how his dad taught him to change the chain on his bike and was going to show him how to fix up a car when he got older.

I felt the itch for the first time there, kneeling in the snow. It was like the icy clumps I was piling onto my fort were stabbing me right through my gloves. I kept making fists with my hands, trying to scratch my palms with my fingertips. Open. Close. Open. Close. The itch didn't go away.

And I still didn't say anything, which seemed to irritate the kid. He went right on with his one-sided conversation, shuffling through the snow to lean over my fort and make sure I
heard every word. He told me all about how his dad took him camping and mini-golfing and swimming, and how I wouldn't know anything about any of it, because I didn't have a dad.

I should have pummeled him right then, but all I could think to do was lie.

I told him my dad was an astronaut and that he was never home because he was in outer space studying aliens. It was one of many stories I kept in my back pocket as a kid to pull out whenever anybody asked me about my dad. But this boy wasn't buying it. I would never forget his response.

“My mom says your mom doesn't even know who your dad is!”

It happened so fast I wasn't even aware that I had caused it, but all of a sudden the snow fort was flattened, and that punk was splayed out in the middle of it, with blood flowing from his nose. It spilled into the rubble of white below him, making it look like a giant cherry snow cone. The itch in my palms was gone.

It wasn't what he said about my dad that provoked the punch. It was more that—even as a kid—I had a good idea of what he was saying about my
mom
.

I remembered running inside and crying in my room after that first fight. I was sure the kid would tell and that I'd be in big trouble. But the trouble never came. In fact, the kid never said a cruel word to me again. After that, I used my fists on a few other big mouths. Success, every time.

I cocked my head at Billy as we turned down our street. “What did you mean, ‘would have said'?”

“What?”

“You said your dad
would
have said ‘all bark and no bite.' Is your dad … is he, like, dead or something?”

“No.” There was a flicker of an expression on Billy's face, but I couldn't make it out.

“So where is he?”

“He's—” He shifted that heavy backpack higher on his shoulders, causing him to hunch forward farther than normal. “Not here,” he finished.

He glued his eyes to the pavement and walked faster, right down the middle of the road. I didn't press him any further. I knew as well as anyone how annoying it was to be asked questions you couldn't answer—especially about an absent parent.

Instead, I reached up to unzip Billy's backpack.

“What's in here that's so heavy, anyway?”

“Hey!” Billy spun on instinct, causing something big and flat to tumble out of his pack and onto the wet street. I snatched it up faster than he could and brushed off the muddy gravel clinging to the front.

“What's this?”

“Duh. Can't you read?” He pointed to a huge word on the book's glossy cover and sounded it out. “At-las.”

“Nobody says ‘duh,'” I told him, flipping the atlas open. “You have a geography class or something?”

The pages settled on a map of West Virginia. Just below and to the left of Charleston, in squiggly handwriting, were the words “Big Ugly.” They were circled with red marker. I leaned in to take a closer look, but Billy snatched the book out of my hands.

“I don't need a geography class,” he said. His voice sounded calmer than his movements. He was fumbling with the zipper on his backpack, trying to stuff the atlas back inside.

“Okay,” I said.

“I'm awesome at geography.” He tugged the zipper hard over the corner of the book.

“Fine.”

“I could
teach
geography.”

“All right. Relax.”

He slung the now zippered pack onto his shoulder and looked me dead in the eye. He spoke in a deliberately reassuring voice. “Don't worry, Dane. I'm not going to go berserk on you.”

“Um. Thanks … I guess.”

We continued the trek down the center of the street until our houses rose up on either side and we silently moved to opposite curbs.

I stopped on my sidewalk and looked back.

“Hey, Billy D.”

“What?” He turned.

“My dad … he's not here either.”

Billy watched me for a few seconds, expression unreadable. Then, in a flash, his face lit up with a smile.

“Okay, then.”

“Okay, then.”

It's the calm
after
the storm, and it's typical of Mom and me. We'd had a tornado of a fight, when I'd handed her the detention slip and offered my excuse. Now it was the silent breakfast that always followed one of those storms. And by breakfast, I mean coffee for Mom and a soda for me. I took advantage of the silent treatment to finish up an algebra assignment at the kitchen table. Mom sat across from me, pressing a lotto ticket into a new frame.

I put the final bracket on my last equation and slammed my textbook shut.

“How much?” I asked.

Mom cleared her throat. “Dane.”

“How much?”

She closed the clasps over the backing and turned the frame over to check that it was centered. “Five dollars.”

“Five dollars that could have bought me lunch today.”

“Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Stop acting like we don't have enough money to buy you lunch.”

“Do we have enough money to pay the rent this month?”

“Of course we do. Now that's enough. I don't want to start again this morning.” She stood and moved to the junk drawer, sifting around for a nail to fix the frame to the wall.

I swept my arm across the embarrassing display. “We probably have enough for an entire year's worth of rent. Too bad we're using cash as wallpaper.”

Mom slammed the drawer shut and flew toward the table with such speed, I actually jumped out of my seat.

“You're right, Dane! Maybe I should start framing
these
instead!” She snatched my detention slip off the table so fast it made a snapping sound in the air. “God knows we have enough of them.” She flung the paper away, and I caught it as it fluttered downward.

“I said I was sorry.” I sounded like a little kid.

Mom only pressed her lips together and went about hanging her new treasure.

I watched her for a minute, taking in her blond hair and her pale skin stretched over lean muscles, shaped by years of yoga and Pilates and whatever else she taught over at the gym. She looked strong, like me, but otherwise we were night and day. My brown hair and tan skin reflected all the dark inside, but Mom's look was a disguise, because underneath she was just as stormy as me sometimes—and just as tough. I didn't know who I matched on the outside, but inside, I was all Mom.

I had a sudden urge to hug her or make her laugh, but I knew she wasn't ready to make nice, so I packed up my bag and silently left for school.

• • • X • • •

I stuck to the sidewalks, taking the usual route. Halfway to school, I heard Billy D. huffing and puffing behind me. His feet caught up to mine at almost the exact spot where I'd put the kid with the Mustang in his place.

“Why didn't you wait for me?” he asked.

“Wait for you for what?” I picked up my pace.

“To walk to school.”

“When did I say we could walk together?”

“You didn't, but … but I thought—”

“You thought wrong.”

Billy paused, thinking, then burst out laughing. “
You
thought wrong.”

I rolled my eyes. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. I thought we were walking together; you thought we weren't. And look, we are! So
you
thought wrong.”

I opened my mouth but couldn't think of a retort. How could something that made absolutely no sense be so hard to argue with?

• • • X • • •

Billy followed me all the way to the warden's office.

“Don't you have somewhere to be?” I asked him, pulling open the office door and nodding at Mrs. Pruitt.

We crossed to her desk at the same time, me reaching in my
backpack for my signed detention slip and Billy reaching for Mrs. Pruitt's candy dish.

“Good morning, Billy D.” She smiled and patted a chair next to her desk.

“Morning.” Billy climbed into the chair and started shoving jelly beans into his mouth. The sight of him looking so at home in the disciplinary office pulled me up short. I froze with the detention slip half extended to Mrs. Pruitt.

“What are you doing?” I asked him.

“Billy delivers messages for me before school,” Mrs. Pruitt purred. “And during his lunch hour.”

I wished she wouldn't answer for him.

“You don't eat lunch?” I asked.

“He eats in here sometimes,” Mrs. Pruitt said.

“He can speak for himself. He's not retarded.”

Mrs. Pruitt held her breath in shock. When she finally let it out, a string of disconnected words rode the exhale. “Didn't say—horrible word—detention would be good for—of course not retar—disable—challenged—”

“Mrs. Pruitt,” Billy interrupted, either ignoring or totally unaware of her internal struggle. “Dane can't have detention today. He has to walk me home. He keeps the bad kids away.”

“Our own resident bodyguard, eh?” The warden leaned in the doorway to his office. “What's this about a walk home?”

“Dane walks with me so other kids won't pick on me,” Billy said.

“That true?” The warden raised an eyebrow at me.

No
, I thought.
Well, not entirely, anyway
.

Three walks sure didn't make me a bodyguard, and I'd tried to dodge every one. But it wasn't a total lie, either.

I looked from Billy to the warden. “Kind of.”

“Well,
kind of
won't get you out of detention.”

That perked my ears up. I crossed my arms, the detention slip still in my hand.

The warden looked back and forth between me and Billy. “I think Principal Davis would like this,” he said.

“Like what?”

“You helping a new student. Billy here could use a—a—” He snapped his fingers. “An ambassador, of sorts—someone to show him around.”

“So?”

“So volunteering to be that ambassador could go a long way toward cleaning up your record.” The warden nodded at the paper clutched in my fist. “Maybe it could even get one or two of those black marks expunged.”

“So … what? You'll erase my detentions if I carry his books or something?” I gestured at Billy, who was on the edge of his seat, listening.

The warden lifted his chin. He knew he had me. “I'll have to run it by the principal, but for now let's just say … Billy is in here every day. If he says you're being a good ambassador, perhaps your next detention won't be an automatic suspension.”

“Perhaps I won't
get
another detention.” I mocked his condescending tone.

The warden laughed. It was three months to the end of the
school year, and we both knew the chances of me going that long without a detention were nil.

“Fine, I'll show the shortstop around.”

Billy huffed. “I'm not a shortstop. I'm Billy D.”

“Well,
Billy D.
” I spread my arms to indicate the room. “This is the disciplinary office.” I jerked a thumb behind me. “Out there's the hallway. All those little doors? Those are classrooms.” I cocked my head at the warden. “I can show him the bathrooms, too, but I'm not going to hold his—”

The warden was in my face in a flash. “This is serious,” he hissed. “You are One. Mistake. Away.” He jabbed my detention slip with his finger on every word. “From getting suspended. After that—expulsion.”

“I know.” I was ashamed to hear a tiny squeak in my voice.