XGeneration 1: You Don't Know Me (18 page)

Janis’s fingers felt for her crucifix.

“I’m not telling you this to frighten you. I’m…” He took a breath and then a long look at her face. “You’re extremely intelligent, Janis. Extremely capable. You and your sister, both. And if this standoff continues to escalate, why, you may be called on one day to help your country. That’s why I’m telling you.”

Her father looked at her for another moment, then started the car and put it in reverse. By the time they rejoined the traffic on Sixteenth Avenue, her father seemed himself again, but everything around them—the entire world—felt different to Janis, as if it had fallen under a dark pall.

He snapped his fingers. “I almost forgot about movie night. Should we swing by Video World and pick up a rental?” He glanced down at the clock display. “There’s still time before dinner.”

“Oh, I’m going to the homecoming game tonight, remember?” Janis’s voice felt far away, as though someone else was saying the words. “And then sleeping over at Samantha’s.”

“Right, right…”

She peeked over to find her father facing straight ahead. Yes, he looked himself again, but knowing what he
could
look like made him look different, too. Though she tried, Janis could not forget how he’d appeared only a minute before. She could not forget what she’d seen on his face as he stared at the cinderblock wall. Fear. She had seen her father’s fear.

And that upset her more than anything he could have told her.

* * *

“You all right?”

“Hmm?” Janis looked over at her best friend. She and Samantha were sitting at the top of the football stands in their softball-league jackets from the year before, the shouting of the student body surging and crashing beneath them like a restless surf. A cool gust of wind blew Janis’s hair across her face while Samantha’s boyish brown hair only fluttered. Janis pushed her hair back.

“You’ve barely said two words tonight. Everything cool?”

“Yeah. Just tired.”

On the field, the Ocala team kicked off the ball. It was late in the fourth quarter, and Thirteenth Street High was way ahead. Shrill screams rose around them again as Thirteenth Street’s return man fielded the ball at the fifteen-yard line, wriggled away from two would-be tacklers, and galloped up the sideline. He was finally knocked out of bounds at the fifty. Cheerleaders high kicked and showed their shining teeth. A hyper group of freshmen boys turned around and demanded high fives.

Janis held her hands up, numb to the ensuing smacks.

“You’re not holding something back on me, are you?” Samantha asked.

There would be no retaliation No mutually assured destruction.

Janis thought for a second before shaking her head. Her friendship with Samantha had been founded on their passion for sports, not strange dreams or dark musings on the Cold War.

“Hey, isn’t that your man?”

For the first time that night, Blake was putting on his helmet and attaching the chin strap. Coach Coffer shouted something in his ear and shoved him onto the field. Blake jogged toward the huddle.

“Cute butt.” Samantha nudged Janis.

Janis could only nod vaguely. She had finally broken down that week and told Samantha about Blake. She’d seen him several times since he rescued her Alpha letter earlier that month—chance encounters in the hallway, mostly, where they would stop for a minute or two to chat. Just that morning, he’d wished her luck with the varsity soccer tryouts. She’d bitten back a smile, flattered that he’d even known about the tryouts, and responded by wishing him well in that evening’s game.

Blake chuckled. “Well, if we get far enough ahead, maybe Coach will stick me in for the final minutes. You know, just enough time to get me the reps but not enough to mess anything up.”

“You’ll do fine,” she said, placing her hand on his upper arm. The gesture startled Janice, but it had seemed so natural, as if her hand was drawn to the purple mesh jersey, to the swell of his triceps.

She gave his arm a tentative squeeze, then drew her hand away.

“Thanks.” His voice had sounded as soft as his dimples. “I’ll remember you said that.”

From the bleachers, Janis watched Blake run the second-team offense in the game’s waning minutes. Coach “Two F’s” Coffer mostly had him hand the ball off to the backs, but on the final play, Blake faked a handoff and sprinted around the end. With the goal line in reach, he took a knee. Screams collapsed to groans, but Janis understood. The game was won, and Blake was showing class.

The cheers picked up again as the final seconds ticked away. Players clapped one another’s helmets. Cheerleaders rustled their pom-poms. But from Janis’s numb distance, the action seemed to be taking place among stage actors and collapsible set pieces.

This can all end. This can all be blown away.

She zipped her jacket slowly and pushed her hands into her pockets. “Hey, um, I think I’m going to catch a ride home with Margaret.”

“What about the sleepover?”

“Yeah, I’m sorry.” Janis tried to smile. “Tryouts whipped me pretty good.”

“Oh. That’s cool.”

In the quick movement of Samantha’s eyes, Janis felt a chasm separating them. She wondered if they hadn’t started drifting apart that summer when she began having the strange dreams—dreams she’d been too weirded out to share, even with her best friend. Janis wondered, too, if her decision to stick with Alpha hadn’t further separated them. After all, Alpha had deprived them of lunches together. And with Janis possibly earning a spot on varsity soon, they would no longer be practicing soccer together, either.

“We’ll do it another time,” Janis said. “I promise.”

“It’s cool,” Samantha repeated but without looking up. “Well, my mom’s probably waiting out front.” She turned and began picking her way down the emptying stands.

Janis stood watching her, wondering whether there would be another time, after all.

15

Friday, October 5, 1984

7:09 p.m.

“Not very many cars.” Scott’s father scrunched up his thick glasses and dipped his shaggy head to peer past Scott. “The front porch light isn’t even on. Sure you’ve got the right house, Ace?”

Scott quickly read the numbers on the mailbox, then looked down at the invitation for the Alpha-Gamma gala, covering the address with his thumb. “It’s supposed to be 2624. Let’s see…” He pretended to search around. “Yup, says it right there on the box. I’m just a little early.”

“Do you want me to wait to make sure?”

“Naw, I’m fine.” He opened the car door and stepped out into the dusky street.

“All right. Well, call me when it’s over. I’ve got
Christine
loaded in the Betamax. It’s supposed to be a horror flick, but Jagu over at Video World says it’s a riot. Har, har, har! Then I’ve got the latest Dirty Harry flick,
Sudden Impact
.”

His dad cocked his head and started to squint, but before he could get off his horrendous Clint Eastwood impersonation, Scott closed the door. When he stood up, all he could see was his father’s belly over the steering wheel. Scott half-waved, half-shooed at him, then took a couple of slow steps toward the affluent-looking house as his father’s Volkswagen droned away. When the taillights had grown small enough, Scott headed toward the actual house, which was two blocks over.

Sorry, Dad, but tonight’s too important.

And it would not be out of character for his father to shout something mortifying from the car as the front door was opening: “Don’t feed him after midnight! Har, har, har, har!”

Scott walked briskly, touching his hair. He’d spent an hour in the bathroom with a blow-dryer and a comb, trying for a feathered style like Blake’s. But no matter what Scott did, his center part wouldn’t hold up. In the end, he’d rewet his hair and combed it forward. At least the Bud Body book had arrived. In the first exercises, Bud had him skipping in circles, pulling imaginary ropes, and slathering his body with vegetable oil in order to “succor the muscle tissue.” Scott had been skeptical, but tensing now, he thought he felt the beginnings of a line separating his pectorals.

He winced when he cupped his bicep. He’d forgotten about the fading brown band on the inside of his arm. Another one marred his upper ribcage on the same side. They were from the day at the tennis courts a month earlier, when the fence he had clung to became… electric? With his cervical nerves being crushed inside Jesse’s pinch, Scott hadn’t been able to feel more than a faint burning. But by the next morning, two raw bands had appeared, their surfaces mottled with blisters like toadstools risen after a humid rain.

Scott was still trying to make sense of it all: Jesse’s strength… Creed’s speed. And what about Tyler? Before Mr. Shine appeared, he had been retracting his arm from beneath the windbreak. Had he shot current through the fence? Scott pushed up his glasses. He couldn’t exactly stroll up to Tyler and ask him. Ever since the incident on the courts, he’d been taking extra care to avoid those guys, his ears attuned to the faintest rumbling of the Chevelle.

Scott squinted ahead, penny loafers slapping the sidewalk, pink argyle socks peeking out from beneath the hems of his cream-colored slacks. Even though it was the first Friday in October and mild, his armpits were slippery with sweat. He was anxious about his first social event—there was that. But he’d also made a pledge to himself that day, a pledge to talk to Janis.

No matter what.

Margaret Graystone’s blue Prelude was parked among the many cars lining the street. Scott fanned his face with the invitation as his gaze climbed a rolling lawn to the castle-like house hosting the gala. All the curtains of the ground level had been pushed open, and light shone out into the yard. Inside, young men and women in formal attire sipped drinks and palmed cocktail napkins, some of them tipping their heads back in laughter.

You’re out of your class.

Scott slowed at the foot of the walkway. It was the voice again, the one that had been haunting him since the first Gamma meeting. But he’d done fine so far, he reminded himself. The lunches, where he was beginning to feel comfortable with the other pledges, truly comfortable; the Standards; the two Saturday morning service projects he had attended; even the push-ups and sprints the older members sprung on him from time to time—he’d done fine with all of them.

But the pledge period isn’t even half over, Scott. There’s still plenty of time. Plenty of time for them to see you don’t belong.

Scott shouldered the doubting voice aside and continued up the walkway. A couple was stepping outside when he reached the front porch, and he used the opportunity to slip through the front door. He found himself on a Persian carpet, marble columns standing like sentries beside two doorways. Conversation and music poured in from his left, Chaka Khan, from what little he knew of music.

He ran his hands down the lapels of his Miami-blue blazer, adjusted his pink knit tie, muttered a prayer, and stepped around the corner. The Alpha and Gamma members were spread over the living room. Several clustered around a sleek black piano, singing a rousing song Scott didn’t recognize. Something about a piano man. Cologne and perfume intermingled in an intoxicating bouquet. Scott’s gaze flitted around for the other pledges while his damp hands alternately clasped in front of him and hid in his pockets. He recognized several of the older brothers and raised his chin when they looked his way, but their eyes showed only the dimmest recognition.

That’s what you get for hiding in the back all the time.

It was true. For the last month, Scott had been trying to have it both ways: participating without being seen—or at least without drawing attention to himself. And that’s where he was still conceding to the doubting voice, to his beleaguered past. To be seen was to risk being singled out.

Yeah, but not to be seen is to miss out altogether.

At last he spotted the back of an Ovaltine-colored bowl cut across the room. Scott smiled in relief and made his way over.

Sweet Pea was standing in front of a glass-topped table arrayed with drinks and platters of hors d’oeuvres. He glanced up. In his bowtie and too-small blue suit, he looked like a parody of Spanky from
The Little Rascals
.

“Whaddya say there, Stretch?”

“Hey, not much.”

Sweet Pea was fixing a plate of food, though
loading
it was more like it.

Scott stepped up beside him and poured himself a Pepsi. “Been here long?”

“Long enough to pick out the four chicks I’m taking home.”

Scott’s laughter came out louder than it felt. When Sweet Pea turned, his plate was heaped so high with shrimp and cocktail sauce, he might as well have just taken the whole platter.

“Gawd!” Sweet Pea exclaimed around his first wet mouthful, wide eyes sweeping the room. “There’s nothing but nines and tens in here. All right, maybe a couple of eights.” He elbowed Scott in the side and lowered his voice. “What do you figure her for? Size D?”

Scott followed Sweet Pea’s gaze, not knowing what he was talking about. They were apparently looking at a young woman whose breasts jogged inside her dress every time she laughed.

“Yeah, D sounds about right.” Scott brought his cup to his lips.

“Well, she’s not in training anymore, that’s for sure.” That got another elbow into Scott’s side, and Sweet Pea snorted on cue. He suckled his fingers, then wiped them against his round thigh. He popped two more shrimp into his mouth. “Got your eye on anyone, Stretch?”

Scott’s ears prickled. “Hmm?” He took a sip of Pepsi.

“You know—chicks, babes, broads, honeys—whatever you like to call them. Anyone in particular getting you hard?” He lowered his voice. “Better yet, any of them getting you off?”

The way Sweet Pea leered up at him, gobs of cocktail sauce ringing his lips, made Scott want to pack up his feelings for Janis and carry them someplace far away.

“I guess I’m still looking,” he said quietly.

“Playing the field, huh? I like that.” Another shot to the ribs. He brought his hand to his mouth like a megaphone. “DID YOU HEAR THAT, LADIES? MY FRIEND HERE IS A FREE AGENT—AND LOOKING! AND THEY DON’T CALL HIM STRETCH FOR NOTHING!”