The Wrong Side of the Tracks
Book 1
by
Mike Wells
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2011 Mike Wells
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblances to persons living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form whatsoever without written permission from the author.
Praise for Mike Wells’ The Wrong Side of the Tracks
5 STARS! “Ben McClean is a modern-day Huck Finn, what an awesome character! I loved him! The Wrong Side of the Tracks was a fabulous page-turner, kept me glued to my Kindle for hours.”
5 STARS! I bought this book for my 14 year old son but read it first out of curiosity; this was a heartfelt story, very moving, and reminded me of what it was like to be a teenager, all the problems, angst, bullying, argh!—what tough years those were, wouldn’t want to repeat them for anything! Well done, Mike Wells! I just downloaded Wild Child and the sequel book, can’t wait to read those, too. Super!
5 STARS! “An arrow straight to the heart! Fantastic book!”
5 STARS! “My heart was in my throat at several places in this story—the pace was great, read the whole book in 2 sittings. I was sad about the ending but it had a good lesson in it, I think. I’m going to give this to my twin boys to read.”
5 STARS! “I cannot imagine any reader with a heart and soul not enjoying this story. I have read four other Mike Wells books and, in my humble opinion, this is his best work, the one with the deepest feelings and the story that is most poignant. I would call this book LITERATURE in the purest sense of the word (I am a high school English teacher)”
5 STARS! “The stunts the kids were doing with the freight trains scared the hell out of me. We live near railroad tracks and now I wonder what goes on over there—I sure hope nothing like what was in this book The Wrong Side of the Tracks. Anyhow this story was really gripping and really funny, too, I like Mike Wells and now I have 3 of his books on my iPad. He has a really good blog, too, you should check that out.
5 STARS! “I am 15 (boy) and I do not read many books but I liked this book. It was interesting and I was liking Ben from the start he’s a cool character I know a guy kind of like him at school. I love how this ending is I want to read more books by Mike Wells, he is a really good writer.”
5 STARS! “First love, adventure, spills and thrills—a colorful cast of characters and a darn good tale, very realistic—I wonder how autobiographical this is? Apparently very much so from what was written on the author’s blog. Excellent book! My advice is to write more like this one.”
5 STARS! “I noticed a lot of young people reading this book (in reviews) but I am 72 and I really loved it, brought back so many memories, like one other person said, it really made me remember being that age and also the crushes I had and how I was helpless to do anything about them. I was a very shy kid, so much like Stephen in this story. A spectacular book! I hope Mr. Wells can make The Wrong Side of the Tracks into a movie!
For James
Chapter 1
Stephen climbed up onto the railroad line and looked down at the bend. The seven o’clock freight train wasn’t in sight. The tracks were desolate, the trees lining both sides still visible in the dusk light.
Stephen was glad. He had been trying to wrench himself away from Ben and Tommy for the past half hour—he didn’t want them to witness what he was about to do.
He knelt down beside one rail and, using a roll of masking tape, attached three new, shiny pennies to the track. Pennies smashed by the train made nice necklaces. At least Stephen thought so. Hopefully one of the pennies would be flattened smoothly enough to make a good one for Kristine Elliot.
“Hey, Stephen,” a voice called.
Stephen quickly stood up.
It was Ben. And behind Ben, Ben’s little brother, Tommy.
The two sauntered up to Stephen, looking down at the pennies taped to the rail.
Ben touched one with the toe of his bare foot. “What are you doing that for?” Ben thought smashing pennies on the train tracks was kid stuff.
“Makin’ a necklace,” Stephen said defensively.
“Necklaces are for pussies.”
“It’s not for me.”
“Who’s it for, then?”
“Kristine Elliot.”
Ben stared at Stephen. “You’re makin’ a necklace for Kristine Elliot?”
“Stephen has a giiiiirl-friend,” Tommy sang. “Stephen has a giiiirl-friend!”
“Shut up,” Ben said, lightly swatting Tommy on the head. He was only ten.
“Tomorrow is Kristine’s birthday,” Stephen said. “I just thought I’d give her a birthday present, that’s all. It’s no big deal.”
Ben lit up a cigarette and blew out the smoke, studying Stephen’s face. He seemed to see Stephen in a new light. They had often talked about girls, but as Stephen was only 14 and Ben 17, for Stephen it was only in theory. Now Ben saw that he was actually interested in a real, live female.
“Ray Hatcher won't like it. You know Kristine is his girlfriend, don’t you?”
Ray Hatcher was in the 11th grade. A big oaf who could crush Stephen like a bug. “Of course I know that. But he doesn’t own her. Anyway, Kristine and I are just friends.”
“I get the feeling you and Kristine are more than friends.”
Stephen felt himself blushing. “I don’t know….maybe.”
“You better watch your ass, Stephen.”
Stephen didn’t say anything. Ben watched him another moment, finishing his cigarette. He threw the butt down on the railroad ties and ground it out with the heel of his bare foot.
“Awesome,” Tommy said.
This always impressed Tommy. In warm weather, Ben never wore shoes except when he had to, like to go to school. He loved the outdoors. He had calluses on the bottoms of his feet that were so thick they were almost like sandals, so he said.
“Well,” Ben said, “if you’re going to make a necklace, at least do it right.” He stepped over to the rail and peered down at the pennies in the semi-dark. “You put on too much tape on that one...”
Ben made some adjustments, pulling up some of the tape. If you put on too much, the penny would get run over too many times and be pulverized into a thin slice of copper foil, no good for anything.
Tommy screamed so loudly and unexpectedly that Stephen started. “Train! It’s coming, it’s coming!”
Stephen and Ben turned and looked down the tracks. It was only an automobile that had stopped on the Tomlinson Pike crossing. It continued on its way.
“That’s not the train, you little fart.” Ben pushed his little brother over with a shove of his foot. Tommy fell on his side. He lay there for a few seconds, until he realized the iron rail was bisecting his midsection, then leaped up and scrambled into the ditch that ran alongside the tracks.
“What a pussy,” Ben said, laughing. Tommy was deathly afraid of the train. He had to work up his nerve to put his head down against the tracks to listen for it, even when the train was nowhere in sight.
“I’m not a pussy,” Tommy said, though Stephen doubted that the boy even knew what the word meant. Thrusting out his lower lip in defiance, Tommy climbed back up onto the tracks and stood next to Stephen and Ben.
“Go home,” Ben ordered.
Tommy stubbornly shook his head.
“Go home. This is no place for little kids.”
“I’m not a little kid. Anyway, you’re s’posed to be watching me.”
Ben gave Stephen a frustrated look. Ben’s mother and father both worked, and he was supposed to look after Tommy until one of them came home, which could be at any hour. Ben’s father was a construction worker and usually came home drunk, if at all. His mother supposedly had a job “at a store,” but Stephen half-wondered if she was a prostitute. She sometimes came home and cooked supper, then was off again if her husband wasn’t home, wearing gaudy makeup and tight-fitting clothes.
“If you’re not a kid,” Ben said to Tommy, “then you don’t need nobody to look after you. So just go home.”
“No.” He stuck out his chest. “I’m staying here with you guys.”
Ben took a menacing step towards Tommy, and the boy backed away. “Mama said you better not hit me again!”
Ben gritted his teeth, but then seemed to regain control of himself. He lowered his voice to almost a whisper. “You want to end up like Eddie Bumpus, Tommy?”
Tommy’s skin turned so pale his freckles seemed to be penciled onto his face. Eddie Bumpus was an eight year old boy who had been run over by the train. The grisly event had happened about five years ago, long before Stephen had moved into the neighborhood, but he had heard the story so many times he felt like he had been there himself. Eddie Bumpus had been trying to find Sparky, his cocker spaniel. Instead, Eddie had gotten run over himself. All the local kids had rushed to the scene, and most of them had shared what they had witnessed with Stephen in graphic detail. One particularly troubling image was that Eddie’s legs had been sliced so cleanly in two that, from the side, they looked like “one of those diagrams in a medical book, where you can see layers of bone, muscle, skin...” This particular description, in fact, had come from Ben.
“You’re just trying to scare me,” Tommy said.
“Just go home!” Ben shouted, unable to fight his anger any longer.
Tommy stuck out his lower lip again. “Why don’t you try and make me?”
Ben’s right hand shot out and slapped Tommy hard this time. The blow was so crisp and unexpected it nearly knocked the boy down. When Tommy regained his balance, he held his hand to his cheek, a look of utter surprise on his reddening face. He started to take a kick at Ben, but then seemed to think the better of it and instead kicked the gravel between the railroad ties. Rocks flew. A few pebbles struck Ben in the chest. Stephen ducked as a rather large stone whizzed past his head.
Before Ben could grab him, Tommy leaped into the ditch and started running through the bushes towards home. Ben tore out in pursuit, cursing under his breath. Ben never wore shoes or a shirt if the weather was warm, as it had been all week, even though it was late September. His lean, tanned, muscular form raced through the brush, the thorns ripping at his faded jeans. He reminded Stephen of a wild American Indian, like in the old westerns on TV.
Stephen looked back down the tracks and noticed that another car had stopped at the crossing. He thought it might be the same car as before, headed the other way on the street. Whoever it was had stopped right on the tracks. Stephen thought he saw a flashlight beam pointed in their direction, but he wasn’t sure.
“Ben!” Stephen yelled. “Come here, quick!”
Ben climbed back up on the tracks, breathing hard. Tommy was behind him, covered with dirt.
“What?” Ben said.
“Look!”
Ben turned his head just in time to see the car move on.
“I thought I saw a flashlight or something,” Stephen said.
“Ah, that don’t mean nothin’,” Ben said. “Lots of people stop and look down the tracks.” But Ben looked uneasy. Stephen had never seen the infamous “train detective” who kept an eye on the tracks, but Ben had. In fact, Ben had been caught by him. It happened two years ago, when Ben was 15. The detective had written his name down in a big black book and told him that if he was ever caught on the tracks again, he would have to go to juvenile court.
“Hey, look,” Ben said, pointing in the direction of the bend again.
Stephen’s heartbeat quickened. “What?”
“Train!” Tommy screamed. “It’s really comin’, it’s really comin’!”
Now Stephen could clearly see the locomotive’s rotating beacon, far beyond the Tomlinson Pike intersection, sweeping out circles through the treetops.
Tommy immediately jumped down into the ditch and started running towards home. When the engines passed, he never came any closer than the edge of the woods that separated their neighborhood from the tracks.
Stephen climbed down into the ditch and squatted in the bushes, a position from which he hoped he could watch the wheels crush his pennies. Stephen was a little bit afraid of the train, too, but only if he was close to the tracks, as he planned to be today. But after what Ben had said about Kristine Elliot and Ray Hatcher, he felt little concern about the train. The only sensation he felt was that queasiness in his stomach.
He knew very well that Kristine was Hatcher’s girlfriend, but he had somehow managed to ignore this fact, or at least push it to the back of his mind, as he had gotten to know her. Now, Stephen was angry at himself for thinking that he might have a chance with Kristine Elliot. She was probably the prettiest girl in the entire ninth grade class, and Ray Hatcher was two years older than Stephen, in the eleventh grade. To make matters worse, Hatcher was a jock. He was on the football team and seemed to be the center of attention everywhere he went. Stephen loathed school sports, and Ben did, too. The one time they had gone to a football game, they had spent the entire time hiding under the bleachers and annoying girls by grabbing their ankles and pinching their behinds.
At their school, team sports seemed only for the rich kids, probably because the rich kids were the only ones who had parents that would fork over the money to buy equipment. It wasn't like the school gave you the stuff. And rides to practice and all that. Ray Hatcher even had his own car, a brand new Porsche, that his parents had bought him. Stephen couldn’t imagine having a car. Ben only dreamed of it, someday, after he would graduate and get some kind of job.
Stephen was so lost in his school thoughts that he was barely aware of the approaching train. He was sure that to Kristine, he was nothing but a boy who hung around the railroad tracks with a bunch of scummy kids. Why in the world would a girl like her be interested in him?
He looked at the rail, at his taped-down pennies, now thinking that Ben was probably right—giving Kristine a necklace might not be such a good idea. Ray Hatcher was a big, mean son-of-a-bitch. He would probably kick Stephen’s little 9th grade butt if he knew she had ever spoken to Stephen, let alone that Stephen was giving her presents.
“Benny, hurry, the train’s coming!” Tommy shouted, pulling Stephen out of his thoughts. Stephen was surprised to see that Ben was casually walking down the tracks, as if the train was nowhere in sight.
“Benny! The train’s coming!” Tommy yelled again, his voice increasing in pitch.
“Here Sparky, here Sparky,” Ben called, looking to his left, then to the right. “Come on, boy. Where are you?”
Stephen laughed out loud, but it was cut off by Tommy’s yelling. “The train’s really coming, Benny! Watch out! Benny, watch out!”
Ben seemed oblivious to his brother’s screams and continued to walk down the tracks, looking this way and that, his back to the approaching train. “Heeeeere Sparky, heeeere Sparky...come on, boy. Where are you, you little mutt?”
“Benny!” Tommy shouted, his voice even higher and panicky. “Benny, please, get away, the train’s coming!” He was standing at the sagging fence at the edge of the woods, one hand clutching the rusty wire, the other curled into a tight, nervous fist which bobbed up and down as he yelled.
The train was close enough now that Stephen could hear its thundering double engines. But Ben continued wandering down the tracks, to the left and right, occasionally standing up on one rail with one foot, calling for Sparky.
The act was so convincing that Stephen himself started to feel anxious. Stephen took two steps up the embankment, so that his waist was at track-level. “You better be careful!” he called out to Ben, but the rumble of the engines had become so forceful that his voice was lost in it. The train was less than a quarter mile away, and closing fast.
There were three long blasts from the train’s air horn. Stephen jumped back down into the ditch. The engineer had spotted Ben, and possibly Stephen as well. But Ben didn’t seem to notice or care.
Now, Tommy had started wailing. “Please don’t die, Benny! Please don’t die!”
Ben finally stopped walking at a point where he was directly adjacent to Tommy, and only a few feet from Stephen. He looked to the left of the tracks, then to the right, shaking his head. “That damn Sparky! Where is he?” Ben had to shout above the rumbling of the approaching engines to make sure Tommy could hear him.
Stephen thought the game was over, and that Ben would jump down into the bushes. But to Stephen’s astonishment, Ben sat down smack in the middle of the tracks.
“Well, I guess I’ll just have me a little nap until Sparky comes back,” Ben said. He lay down on his back, his head towards the oncoming train, his arms and legs spread out so that his fingers and toes touched the insides of the rails.
“Benny!” Tommy screamed. The terrified boy took a step towards the tracks, then looked at the massive engines and stepped back to the fence again, clinging to it. “Get up, Benny, get up!”
Ben just smiled, staring up at the sky, spread-eagled between the rails. This was a trick that Stephen had seen before, but he thought Ben was crazy for doing it. Ben claimed he could tell exactly how far away the train was by the vibration in the rails, and that if he wanted, he could sit on the rails blindfolded and know exactly when to jump out of the way.
The train’s horn blasted three more times. Stephen could clearly see the engineer’s head protruding from the window of the first engine. He felt a flicker of hope that the engineer might put on the brakes, but then remembered that it takes at least a mile to bring a freight train to a stop. This was what Ben had told him, and Ben seemed to know everything there was to know about trains. And now, this particular train was less than 100 yards away.
“Benny, please don’t die, Benny,” Tommy was still screaming. “Please don’t die!”
Ben laughed out loud, but continued to stare up at the sky.
The train bore down on them. 70 yards, 60 yards, 50 yards...
Stephen felt his body growing tense. “Ben, you better get up now!” he called, though the rumbling of the engines was so intense that he knew Ben couldn’t hear him. Then a strange buzzing sound caught Stephen’s attention. It made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end and seemed to come from everywhere. Stephen quickly pinpointed the source. One of his pennies, the first one with the tape only on the back, was vibrating crazily against the iron rail.
Everything was out control.
The horn blasted again. Now, the train was so close it would reach Ben in a matter of seconds.
Ben seemed frozen, still staring up at the heavens. Stephen felt an impulse to run up onto the tracks and try to pull Ben down into the ditch, but then changed his mind when he looked up at the monstrous engine. Ben was too far away—the train would reach him long before Stephen could.
In that moment, Stephen was certain that Ben was going to die.
In a span of one second, he saw all the ensuing events. He imagined himself in homeroom the next day, listening to the morbid news as John Prescott, president of the senior class and captain of the football team, gave the morning announcements over the loudspeaker. Then he was at Ben’s funeral. He could vividly see Ben’s weeping mother standing bedside a gaping hole in the ground; Ben’s father, clean shaven for the first time in his adult life, standing beside his wife, his face pale and drawn; Tommy, clinging to his mother with tears streaming down his face, wailing “No, Benny, please don’t die—”
All at once, Ben came to life.
He yanked his arms and legs in, away from the rails, streamlining his body. Then, in one quick and calculated movement, he rolled over the rail on Stephen’s side of the tracks. Before Stephen could take another breath, the engines roared past them. The engineer was yelling something at Ben, then at Stephen. The furious man was leaning out the window, screaming with such ferocity his face was purple, but Stephen could only see his mouth moving-the deafening roar of the engines completely obliterated the sound of his voice.
After the engines passed, Stephen made his way over to Ben. He was curled into a ball in the ditch, laughing his head off.
“Don’t die, Benny, don’t die,” he howled, mimicking Tommy. “Did you hear him, Stephen?”
“Yeah,” Stephen muttered.
Tommy was slowly making his way through the brush towards them. He wasn’t afraid to be close to the train after the engines passed, as long as Ben was there, too. Now, a series of boxcars were passing and the rumbling of the engines was fading.
“Did you hear him?” Ben said again, as he stood up and brushed himself off.
“I heard him,” Stephen said. But he did not laugh, or even smile.
Tommy soon reached the tracks, glancing up every now and then at the passing cars. He stood farther away from Ben than usual.
Ben looked at Tommy, then at Stephen. “What did you think, I was really gonna let the train run over me?” He laughed again. “I’m not that stupid.”
Stephen wanted to say that he didn’t think it was funny, but he kept his mouth shut—he was afraid Ben would just call him a pussy.
There was an awkward moment between them, the only sounds being the clicking and clacking of the boxcars that were rolling by. The train always slowed down after the engines passed. There was a bridge about a mile down the tracks, and the locomotive always decelerated before crossing it.
“You see your pennies anywhere?” Ben said, as if to change the subject.
“No,” Stephen said. “I think they all bounced off before the wheels hit them.”
The three boys stood in silence and watched the box cars pass by, then the flat cars. Soon, the big-bellied tank cars began to pass by. The train had slowed to no more than 10 or 12 miles per hour.
Ben glanced at Stephen. “Look how slow it’s going.”
“I see,” Stephen said uneasily. He knew what Ben was going to say.
“There’s a long, long time between the wheels, Stephen.”
Stephen did not respond.
“At this speed, I could roll under and back if I wanted to.”
“I’m sure you could.”
Ben glanced at Stephen. “You could, too.”
“No I can’t.”
“Yes you can.”
“Well, maybe I don’t want to.”
“Why not? You want to stay a pussy all your life?”
“No. I just don’t see the point to it, that’s all.”
Ben’s famous “tank car roll” was something that Ben had been pressuring Stephen to do ever since they had met. Actually, it didn’t look that difficult. The tank cars were the longest cars on the train, with the most distance between their two sets of wheels. And there was also plenty of clearance under their cylindrical tanks—you could almost crouch and pass underneath one to the other side of the rails, though Ben said he always rolled under them just in case there was a loose piece of metal or something else unexpected that might snag him.
But Stephen really didn’t see any point to it. To him, it was just a reckless, daredevil stunt.
“The point is,” Ben continued, as if he had overheard Stephen’s thoughts, “if you do it, you’ll be a real bad-ass, like me. Nobody will mess with you.”
Stephen considered this, almost wishing it were true. There was no doubt in his mind that Ben McClean had a reputation for being a bad-ass and that nobody would “mess with him,” as he put it. But Stephen doubted it was because of his tank car roll stunt. It was because Ben had the fastest fists around. He had a reputation for being able to put you out of commission before you even knew what had happened.
But Ben’s talent with his fists weren’t the only reason people were wary of him. Ben had an older brother who was serving a life sentence in a Texas prison for beating some traffic cop to death over a parking ticket. Everybody at school knew about the scandal and steered clear of Ben, probably thinking that if his big brother was capable of killing somebody, he was too.
“Last car’s comin!” Tommy yelled.
Stephen and Ben both looked down the tracks—the last train car was indeed approaching, only five or six cars away.
Suddenly, Ben started running alongside the train. Within a few seconds, he leaped up onto a ladder on the back of the second-to-last car. He hung onto a handrail and leaned out over the tracks, swinging from one hand like a monkey at the zoo, grinning at Tommy.
Tommy laughed, but there was an uneasy strain in his voice.
Ben only rode the train a few seconds—he jumped off and down into the bushes, rolling over a couple of times. He stood up, brushed himself off, and watched the last car roll by. Ben had told Stephen that he had ridden the train many miles in both directions, just to see where it went. He had tried to talk Stephen into riding it, too, but Stephen refused. It looked hard enough to jump onto one of the cars. Jumping off looked even more difficult. It was amazing to him that Ben could do it without being hurt.
When the last car passed, Tommy skittered up to the place where Stephen had left the pennies. Ben and Stephen joined him for the search.
Stephen immediately spotted one of his pennies, or what was left of it. Its remains were still stuck to the rail, ground so thin it looked like copper foil.
“Awesome!” Tommy said, squatting beside the rail. He rubbed his finger across the traces of smashed metal and started peeling them off.
“Too much tape,” Ben said.
They searched a little more, moving up and down the rails.
“I found another one!” Tommy said.
Stephen took it from Tommy’s small, dirty hand and inspected it. There was a thick slice down one side of it.
“You don’t know how to smash a good penny,” Ben told Stephen.
Stephen tossed it over his shoulder.
“Hey!” Tommy shouted, “I want it!” The boy half-slid, half-fell down the gravel embankment to look for it.
Stephen and Ben searched for the third penny a few more minutes, but it was in vain. It seemed to have vanished. Stephen walked slowly along the rail, scanning in between the ties one last time, thinking that maybe this was a bad sign. Maybe Ben was right and this not being able to find the third penny was an omen—giving Kristine Elliot a birthday present might be a big mistake.
Just when Stephen was about to give up his search, Ben said, “Hey, I found it!”
Stephen turned around. Ben was grinning at him, holding an oval-shaped piece of copper between his long, tanned fingers.
Ben tossed the coin to him. “Looks like a good one to me.”
Stephen inspected it—it was hard to see in the semidark. Stephen ran his thumb across the smooth metal—it felt warm. The penny had been flattened smoothly and precisely, with no irregularities. Ben flicked on his lighter so they could see it better. Lincoln’s head was still barely visible on the front, as well as the Lincoln Memorial building on the back.
“It's almost as good as yours,” Stephen said. Ben carried around a train-smashed penny which he called his “good luck penny.”
“Mine's better,” Ben said. “But this one's pretty good. Good enough to give a girl as a present.”
Stephen would put it on a strap and give it to Kristine Elliot tomorrow, in history class. He really would.
Chapter 2
Just as it grew completely dark, the three boys made their way through the brush to the chain link fence that separated Stephen’s back yard from the woods. Ben stopped and lit a cigarette, then they all climbed over the fence. Ben helped Tommy to make sure he didn’t snag himself on the rusty prongs that ran across the top.
“Hey, look what I found!” Tommy said when he landed in Stephen's back yard. He held up a broken piece of a baseball bat, the narrow end. It was caked with mud.
“Wow,” Ben said sarcastically. “Why don’t you sit on it, Tommy?”
“Looks like he already did,” Stephen said.
Ben laughed. He motioned to Stephen with his cigarette. “How you gonna make a hole in that penny? If you’re gonna make a necklace, you got to make a hole in it.”
“I’ve got a drill at home,” Stephen said, though he wasn’t even sure the thing worked.
“My old man’s got a good one.” Ben always referred to his father as his ‘old man.’ “We can go over to my house and make a hole in it right now.”
“I don’t know...” Stephen said, glancing at the back windows of his own little cracker box house. The kitchen and living room lights were on, which meant his mother had gotten home from work. But the truth was, he was only checking because he wanted an excuse—any excuse-not to go over to Ben’s house. He had only been there once, but once was enough.
“My old man ain’t home, don’t worry,” Ben said.
“I know. But my mother’s probably got dinner ready.”
“Come on,” Ben said, pulling on Stephen’s shirt sleeve. “You’ll screw up that penny if you’re not careful.”
Stephen reluctantly followed, as did Tommy, who carried the muddy baseball bat handle with him. They cut through Stephen’s yard, went across the street, and walked along the new chain link fence that encircled Capers’ house. Mr. Capers was the McClean’s next door neighbor, which the poor man was clearly not happy about, even though he had lived there ever since Ben could remember. At first, Stephen thought Mr. Capers had built the fence to keep the dog in, but soon realized its main purpose was to keep the McClean clan out. Especially Ben.
As they walked along beside Capers' fence, Tommy ran the handle of the baseball bat along the chain link, making a click-click-click-click sound. Stephen glanced over at Mr. Capers’ porch. Blackie had been sleeping, but raised her head.
Ben stopped and rattled the fence with both hands. “Come get me, you old bag of bones. Come get me!” He often teased Black, hissing at her in a way that would have infuriated any animal.
The ancient beast rose, a little shakily, then bounded off the porch towards the three of them. Ben squatted and pressed his face up to the fence, sticking out his tongue and making wet, farting noises. Mr. Capers kept her on a long rope attached to the front porch, to keep her out of his precious vegetable garden around back.
When Blackie reached the end of the slack, the rope snapped her completely around, so she was facing the other direction.
“That’s the stupidest dog I’ve ever seen,” Ben said, laughing.
“She’s not stupid,” Stephen said defensively. “She thinks there’s a million and one chance the rope might give way, and she’s willing to take the risk to get a juicy piece of your obnoxious ass. And I don't blame her.”
“Oh? You want a piece of my ass, Stephen?”
“Screw you.”
“Yeah, that's what I meant.”
Before Stephen could think of a clever comeback, Ben looked at his younger brother and said, “Hey, Tommy, don’t do that!”
Tommy had stuck the bat through the chain link. Blackie immediately snapped her jaws down on it.
“You’ll never get it away from her now,” Ben said. He yanked the end of the stick from Tommy’s hand. Blackie may have been old, but she had jaws of steel. And once they clamped down on something, they did not open again until that something was free of its owner, be it a finger, or even an arm or leg.
The front porch door swung open and Mr. Capers stepped out.
“Uh-oh,” Stephen said.
“Don’t you boys have anything better to do than torment my dog?”
“I’m not tormenting her,” Ben said, twisting the mud-caked piece of wood back and forth, trying to free it from the Blackie’s mouth. “I’m just trying to get my brother’s stick back.”
“What is it, a billy club?” Mr. Capers said sarcastically. “Or part of a home-made assault rifle?”
Stephen laughed, but Ben just glared at him.
“Blackie!” Mr. Capers shouted. “Blackie, let go of the stick!”
The dog paid him no attention. In fact, the old Lab seemed to growl even louder, backing up and trying to pull the bat out of Ben’s hand.
“Blackie!” Mr. Capers shouted again, stepping down off the porch. He was still wearing his red and white striped Coca Cola coveralls. He drove a truck and had a terribly exciting job—filling up vending machines with soft drinks. “Come here, girl!”
“To hell with it,” Ben said, and let go of the piece of wood.
Blackie gave a victorious twist of her neck, then trotted obediently to her master, the bat clamped in her jaws. Mr. Capers took the severed branch from her mouth, though not without some difficulty.
“Keep your crap out of my yard,” he said, and flung the bat over the fence onto Ben’s driveway. “Bunch of juvenile delinquents.”
Ben and Stephen both laughed. Mr. Capers was always calling them “juvenile delinquents.”
“You'll all end up in jail,” Capers muttered.
“Blow me,” Ben replied under his breath, then coughed a couple of times.
Mr. Capers froze, holding Blackie by the collar. “What’d you say?”
“Nothin,” Ben said. “I’ve just got a cough.” He held his hand over his mouth and pretended to cough again, but the words “blow me” were clearly audible.
Mr. Capers just shook his head. “That’s a fine example you’re setting for your little brother.”
Ben ignored the comment and took Tommy’s arm. “Let’s go.” The three of them started walking up Ben’s driveway.
Mr. Capers sadly shook his head again and looked at Stephen. “What are you hanging around with trash like McClean for?”
Stephen shrugged. “Entertainment value?”
Mr. Capers did not laugh. “You seemed like a nice boy when you moved in, but Ben McClean is leading you astray.” He paused thoughtfully. “Why don’t you come to church with me on Wednesday night, son? We have a youth group there with a lot of nice kids I’m sure you’d like.”
Stephen glanced at Ben. “Yeah, maybe.” Mr. Capers was a member of a fundamentalist Christian church, which, Stephen had heard, promoted rituals such as snake handling and speaking in tongues.
“Youth group,” Ben muttered, too low for Capers to here. “Probably teach the little kids how to handle the baby snakes.”
A long, sharp whistle cut through the dusk air.
“Momma’s callin’” Tommy said.
“I’m not deaf,” Ben grumbled. He glanced over at Mr. Capers, looking a little embarrassed. Mrs. McClean rounded up Ben and Tommy by standing out on the back porch tearing off a ear-shattering whistle through her two front teeth, which had a slight gap between them. Ben had a similar gap between his front teeth, too, but it was smaller and somehow seemed to look all right on him, even attractive, somehow. He could whistle just like his mother. His father could do it, too, and Tommy was learning. It seemed to be a family trait, just like the space between the front teeth. Genetic, maybe, Stephen thought. Their natural whistles were so shrill and piercing they could be heard as far as a block away.
“Real classy family,” Mr. Capers said disgustedly. “I should have done a police check of the neighbors before I bought this house. Bunch of juvenile delinquents.” He dragged Blackie back up onto the porch and went inside.
Stephen grew more and more anxious as they approached Ben’s house. He tried to think up some good excuse for not going inside.
When they reached the top of the driveway, a pickup truck pulled in. It was Ben’s father. And the way the truck meandered as it rolled along the gravel told Stephen that Mr. McClean was in his usual condition. He gave a drunken-looking nod as he passed them, then pulled around to the back.
Ben and Stephen glanced at each other.
“Maybe it’s not such a good idea to use my dad's drill right now,” Ben said.
“Yeah. Anyway, I have one at home. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Stephen walked back down the driveway towards home, greatly relieved he wouldn’t have to come face to face with Ben’s “old man.”
* * *
Later that evening, Stephen rummaged around through a cardboard box in his bedroom closet that contained a bunch of odds and ends that his father had given him when he and his mother had moved away. There was an old leather briefcase, a dusty clock radio, an electric razor with no power cord, an old gym bag that smelled faintly of soiled socks, and a few assorted tools.
He pulled out the power drill and the little plastic box of drill bits. He wasn’t sure why these particular items were included—his father had simply said, “This might come in handy” and had tossed them into the box, too. It was as if his dad thought the contents of the box would somehow make up for his absence.
The drill felt heavy and manly in Stephen’s hands. He plugged it into the power outlet behind his bed and squeezed the trigger. It vibrated and made a whirring sound that was so unexpected Stephen almost dropped it on the floor. He waited a few seconds to see if his mother had heard it. It was after 11 o'clock, and he was supposed to be in bed. No. He could still hear the steady clicking of the keyboard from the living room. Although her “day job,” as she called it, was being a nurse, her real love was fiction writing, and it seemed like she spent every spare hour sitting in front of their computer.
He glanced around his bedroom, wondering how he could hold the penny still while he drilled the hole in it. He needed a vise, like the one in his father’s workshop at their old house. But there was no vise here, no workshop, no nothing. They didn’t even have a garage in the crummy little house they rented now. His mother had to park her old car outside under a maple tree, and the paint was already beginning to mottle. But he couldn’t blame her. She didn’t make much money. She was doing the best she could.
Stephen decided to “improvise,” as his dad often said. He picked up his algebra book (it may as well serve some useful purpose, he thought) and used it to hold the smashed penny firmly against the doorjamb of his tiny closet. The bit that was already in the drill looked about the right size, so he didn’t bother changing it. He positioned the bit just above the ghostly outline of Lincoln’s head, then pulled the trigger. The drill whirled round and round and tiny corkscrews of copper dropped away. After a few seconds, the bit broke through to the other side with a thump of finality.
“What are you doing in there?” Julia called out. Stephen only now realized that keyboard clicking had stopped a moment ago.
“Nothing, Mom.”
“Go to bed. It’s almost eleven thirty!”
“Okay.” Stephen brushed away the copper filings and blew through the hole.
Not bad.
On the way home from school, he had bought a thin leather strap to use for the necklace. It was actually one of a set of two brown leather boot laces, but it would work fine for a necklace. It would give the piece of jewelry an earthy look.
He threaded the strap through the hole he had just drilled, then held the strap between his hands, the penny swinging back and forth on it. He had chosen the brown laces because he thought the color would look good against the copper of the penny. He decided that he had made the right choice.
Now, all he needed to do was tie a knot in the strap and the necklace would be finished. Still holding the penny in the air, he moved the two ends of the strap up and down, apart and together, trying to imagine it hanging around Kristine Elliot’s neck, and how far down the penny should hang. As he moved the ends of the strap together, he watched the penny slowly descend, and he found himself imagining it sliding down between her breasts.
He swallowed.
Man, did Kristine have a beautiful body. Not only did she have a nice chest, but long, shapely legs, crystal-blue eyes, and shoulder-length chestnut hair that looked so silky and soft he could just barely stop himself from reaching out and touching it when she was sitting in front of him in history class. And her lovely smell!
But it was her face that most captivated him. She was beautiful. She had the face of an angel…
He closed his eyes and slowly inhaled through his nose, trying to imagine it, but then it was gone. He then found that he was not only unable to imagine the way she smelled, but he could no longer see her face, her body—nothing. It was as if she had been standing right there in front of him and had just vanished into thin air.
He stood there stupidly for a moment, wondering how to determine where to tie the knot, then decided to use himself as a model. Stephen closed his closet door and looked at himself in the cheap full length mirror that was attached to it. There was a crooked crack in the mirror about two-thirds of the way up, which tended to make you look like your body had been sliced in two, with the top half trying to slide off the bottom half. Squatting to avoid this annoying distortion, he tied and untied the knot several times, trying to decide whether or not she would want the penny up near her neck or down...lower. Finally, he decided against tying a knot in it at all. It would be better to let her do it herself. Maybe she would want to wear it so that the coin was completely hidden under her clothes.
As he gazed at himself in the mirror, Stephen wondered what Ray Hatcher would do if he saw Kristine wearing the necklace.
It was not something he wanted to think about.
Chapter 3
The next day, Stephen emerged onto his little front porch at the usual time, 7:20, and waited for Nick Bird to come by. Nick was half Apache Indian and half black, a friend of Ben’s. He owned a big, rattling, convertible that he drove to school every day. It was in dire need of an engine overhaul and burned a tremendous amount of oil, belching blue smoke everywhere it went. But at least it ran.
As Stephen waited, he felt his usual uneasiness—he never knew if Nick would let him ride to school with Ben and his other friends or not. They were all in the 11th or 12th grades and spanned all colors of the rainbow. Ben was the only other white boy in the neighborhood. As Ben explained when Stephen had first moved in, there was no place for racial prejudice here—on this side of the railroad tracks, you had to stick together. The real enemy were the rich kids on the other side.
It was as if the railroad tracks that ran behind Stephen’s house were a colossal, insurmountable wall that separated the “haves” from the “have nots.” Ray Hatcher was one of the haves. He had a shiny new Porsche his parents had bought for him, a fancy cellphone, and lots of expensive clothes. It was a bit ironic for Stephen—he had been one of the haves before his parents had gotten divorced. Now they had to live only on his mother’s salary, and nurses didn’t make much money. So when they had moved here from Philly, they had not only changed cities, they had dropped down quite a few rungs on the socioeconomic ladder. Now they couldn’t even afford a computer, and cellphones were out of the question.
At least Stephen usually didn’t have to ride the bus to school. With the exception of Ben, the older boys didn’t seem to like the fact that a lowly 9th grade “kid” was riding along with them in Nick’s car. Still, because Stephen was Ben’s friend, Nick and the others usually kept their mouths shut. And the fact that Stephen always pitched in his share of “gas money”—something that Nick always asked for but often did not receive—Nick didn’t seem to mind.
Nick’s convertible rolled down the street at 7:25, spewing smoke the telltale blue shade of burning motor oil as it came to a stop at the bottom of Ben’s driveway. It was a light green color, a shade Ben called “goose shit green,” which always infuriated Nick.
Nick tooted his horn, brushing his long, jet black hair back as he waited. As Stephen walked through his yard towards the street, Ben came trotting down the driveway in what Stephen thought of as Ben’s “school outfit”—jeans, ratty sneakers that he loathed wearing, a T-shirt, and a light jacket, one that had belonged to his incarcerated older brother. The temperature had been in the 80’s every day for a week, which made the ride to and from school fun, but the rest of the day miserable. For some reason, the teachers weren’t supposed to turn on the air conditioners after the last day of September, and the classrooms were like ovens, especially in the afternoons.
“How’s it goin’?” Ben said to Stephen, as he opened the car door. Nick gave Stephen a nod as they climbed inside. Stephen always sat in the back seat, directly behind Nick, and Ben in the front. Ben reached outside the door and slapped it a couple of times. “Get this boat sailin, Nick.”
“It ain’t no boat,” Nick said. To prove it, he flattened the accelerator. They tore off down the street, the tires screeching and burning rubber. Stephen glanced behind them at the trail of smoke, thankful that his mother always left in the morning before he did.
“Here’s your oil money,” Ben said, slapping some change onto the dashboard.
“Very funny,” Nick said. He glanced into his rearview mirror at Stephen and put an open palm behind his head. “Cough it up, kid.”
Stephen handed him half of his lunch money.
They stopped at the bottom of the hill and two more boys jammed themselves into the back seat with Stephen. One was an odd Korean kid nicknamed “Torch,” who was forever fascinated with cigarette lighters, butane, and anything flammable. He was as odd in appearance as he was in character. At first, Stephen thought his face was frozen in an expression of astonishment. Then, he realized that this was not so—Torch simply had no eyebrows. He had accidentally singed them off a few months before Stephen had moved in, and they were apparently very slow in growing back. His haircut only added to the overall look—it seemed to stick straight up, twisting a bit to the sides, like flames rising up from his head.
The other guy who always rode with them was Hispanic, called “Big Monk.” Upon moving into the neighborhood, Stephen had discovered that a lot of the boys had animal nicknames: there was a black kid named “Donkey,” who seemed to bounce up and down when he walked; a Philipino named “Squirrel,” who had to overly-large front teeth; and of course the family of “Monks.”
All the Monks looked more or less the same, except for their physical size—their ears were rounded and stuck out to the sides, and they all seemed to have sloping foreheads that gave them a Neanderthal appearance. In fact, they all looked so similar that it was sometimes hard to tell Big Monk from Middle Monk and Little Monk, especially at a distance. Though most of the boys didn’t seem to mind their nicknames, Big Monk was an exception. His real name was Juan, and he expected to be called that, at least to his face. Everyone pretty much complied with this except Ben, who called him Big Monk no matter what. Stephen supposed this was because Big Monk knew better than to challenge Ben McClean about anything.
Even Ben had a nickname: “Nature Boy.” Ben hated the “boy” part, but Stephen thought it fit Ben perfectly. Not only did he go shoeless and shirtless when the weather was warm, but he also stayed outdoors most of the time, even slept out under the stars in an old sleeping bag on many occasions. Though Ben truly liked being outside, Stephen had soon learned that the real reason he stayed out so much was simply to avoid being in the hellhole that served as his home.
Nick Bird didn’t seem to have a nickname, for some reason. Maybe it was he was already a “Bird.” Or maybe because he had a car and everyone wanted to be on his good side. Nick was the most conservative kid around, as far as Stephen could tell. He had a job after school, at a hardware store, and already had big plans for college and a career of some sort. But he was a cheapskate. He had a cellphone, and if you wanted to use it, he made you pay him, in cash, before you even made the call.
This morning, Big Monk was sitting in the convertible’s back seat, in the middle, his weight pressing against Stephen as they rounded the first curve towards school. He gave Stephen a dirty look. “Move over, punk.”
Stephen tried to make more room, but he was jammed tightly against the left side of the car. Big Monk seemed to be in a bad mood, for some reason.
“Why’s this kid riding with us, anyway?” he muttered. “We’re not stopping at a kindergarten, are we?”
Before Stephen could think of a comeback, Nick slammed on his brakes. The car slid sideways to a stop. At first, Stephen thought a dog or a cat had run in front of them, but the street was empty.
Nick glared at Big Monk through the rearview mirror. “The kid’s here because he pays, you cheap bastard. You haven’t given me a cent for two weeks. Pay up or get out.”
Frowning in a primate-like way, Big Monk dug one hand into his pocket and threw a few bills on the front seat. “There’s your damn money.”
Nick looked down at it, as if he were debating about whether or not to accept it in light of the less than appreciative way it was presented, but then snatched it up and stuffed it into his shirt pocket, behind his precious cellphone. He straightened the car out and slammed his foot onto the accelerator again, burning even more rubber this time, the huge vehicle fishtailing several times before it stabilized.
Ben glanced first at Nick, then at Big Monk, and finally at Stephen, a puzzled grin on his face. “What the hell’s the matter with you bitches this morning? You all get your periods at the same time, or what?”
Torch, who had been silent up to this point, started giggling like a hyena. When this fit subsided, he began flicking the lighter in his hand over and over again, a long yellow flame shooting out each time.
Nick glanced over his shoulder at Torch. “Stop it.”
Torch hesitated, then flicked his lighter again. “Why? There’s nothing flammable in here.”
Ben turned around. “My hair’s flammable, you asshole. And if you singe a single strand of it, I’m gonna toss your butt out the back of this car.”
Torch seemed to consider this threat seriously. He did not flick his lighter again, though he still kept it in his hand. It was his favorite—a heavy silver pipe lighter, the kind you have to fill from a butane canister, a process which Torch seemed to find endlessly satisfying.
As they rounded the next corner and headed towards Tomlinson Pike, the two-lane road on which the high school was situated, they spotted Karla Duncan walking to her bus stop. Karla had an incredible ass. Today, she was wearing a pair of tight-fitting slacks that didn’t leave much to the imagination.
“Will you look at that bubble-butt,” Nick said, slowing down for a better view.
“Hot damn!” Torch said, flicking his lighter several times as if to add some extra exclamation marks.
Nick slowed the car down almost to a stop as they passed her. She had her book bag hugged to her chest, as if for protection. She glanced at them and quickly looked straight ahead.
“Hey, Karla,” Ben said, “wanna ride to school?”
She looked at Ben and the others distastefully, then said, as if to try and at least be polite, “There’s not enough room.”
“No problem,” Ben said. He tilted his head straight back and peered up at the sky.
Karla glanced up to see what he was looking at, then glanced back at him, puzzled.
With his head still cocked back, he said, “You can sit right here on my face, Karla. Hop on!”
Everyone in the car cracked up.
Karla tried to spit on Ben, but Nick tore off and it landed somewhere behind them, the car burning more rubber, and more oil. Torch went into another hysterical fit of giggles, saying “You can sit on my face,” over and over again.
“Shut up,” Ben said. “It wasn’t that funny.”
They turned onto Tomlinson Pike and raced towards school. Stephen watched the speedometer climb past 70, then up to 80, as they passed a school bus loaded with kids. It was the same bus that Stephen would have been on had he not been able to ride with Nick.
Stephen settled back in his seat, enjoying the early morning sun, the wind blowing through his hair. It was a beautiful day, and a very special one. Kristine Elliot’s birthday. Stephen felt the necklace through the pocket of his jeans and started imagining what she would say when he gave it to her.
Just as they were approaching the school, Nick glanced over his shoulder and yelled, “I told you to stop that shit!”
Torch was flicking his lighter again, absentmindedly, it seemed, holding it between his knees.
“It’s not hurting anything,” Torch said.
“Stop it, or your gonna walk to school.”
Torch silently imitated Nick behind his back. Then, he fired up his lighter and directed the long flame at the back of Nick’s seat.
Ben heard the sound and glanced into the back seat. “He’s burning your car,” he said to Nick matter-of-factly.
Nick glanced over his shoulder again. “God damn it!” He swerved around a corner, onto a side street and slammed on the brakes. The huge vehicle screeched to a halt, coming to rest at a 45 degree angle across the road. Nick jumped out onto the pavement, leaving his door open, and pointed at Torch.
“Get the hell out of my car.”
Torch just sat there, the lighter in his hand.
“Get out of my car, you freak!”
Torch did not move.
Nick took a step around the side of the car, then stopped. Torch had a large, flabby frame and weighed well over 200 pounds. He was basically harmless, providing he wasn’t armed with any flame-throwing devices any bigger than his cigarette lighter. But he was stubborn and difficult to mobilize.
Nick looked at Ben, as if for help.
Ben just shrugged. “It’s your car.”
“Ah, screw all of you,” Torch said, standing up on the seat. He leaped over the fender and onto the street. “Who wants to ride in this rattletrap, anyway.” He lumbered off towards school. Big Monk immediately moved over to the empty space Torch had left, finally looking satisfied with the amount of room he had.
There was a loud honk. They were blocking the street, and a car had stopped and started beeping its horn.
“Fuck off!” Nick yelled at the driver, climbing back behind the wheel. He put the car in drive, rambling and cursing. He looked at Ben. “It takes money to drive this goddam car. Money for gas, money for oil—”
“Lots of oil,” Ben said.
Nick stopped momentarily and glared at him. “Money for oil, windshield wipers,” he continued, “and new tires. The engine needs a valve job—”
“We noticed,” Ben said. “So has most of this city.”
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