Part 7 (1/2)
I thrust my fists deeper into the jacket pockets. ”Nothing.”
”You're nervous.”
”I'm not nervous. I'm tense. There's a difference. ”
All this time we were walking, weaving our way toward the bonfire. Some of the cars were parked so close together that we actually had to climb over the b.u.mpers where they touched. I could hear at least three different radio stations playing. The music was jumbled and discordant. My ankle turned in a hollow in the ground and I swore.
Kevin peered down at my foot. ”You okay?”
I shook his hand away from my elbow and said, ”You live in an ant swarm.”
”Relax, Josie.”
”How do you deal with this? All these people?”
He shrugged. ”I've known some of them since kindergarten. They're okay, most of them.” My distrust must have been written on my face, because he let go of my hand and said, ”Of course, you're probably safer back home with your psychopath brother. My friends are over there.” Before I could say anything, he was headed toward them. There was nothing for me to do but follow.
By the time I caught up, Kevin was deep in conversation with a boy wearing a Miles Davis T-s.h.i.+rt. The s.h.i.+rt was about three sizes too big. I heard the boy say, ”Hey, it's the invisible girlfriend.”
”What do you know? You do exist,” a girl said, grinning cheerfully at me. She was wearing a pair of work boots that didn't look like they'd ever seen a day's work.
I said, ”In the flesh,” and tried to smile back, wis.h.i.+ng that I really was invisible-or at least that I hadn't p.i.s.sed Kevin off. Then at least I'd have one friend in that teeming crowd. But he took my hand to help me up into the back of the red pickup truck as he told me their names, which slid through my brain like water.
Work Boots said, ”I've seen you around town with your brother. You really don't go to school?”
”I really don't.” I was still grinning like an idiot.
”Isn't the school board up your dad's a.s.s about it?” T-s.h.i.+rt said.
”We're home-schooled. It's all legal.”
”I wish my parents would do that,” Work Boots said. ”I hate school. It's so pointless. The teachers are dumber than we are.”
Kevin leaned in. ”You know Josie was studying Greek when she was six?”
”No kidding! Our school doesn't even have Greek,” Work Boots said. The three of them examined me as though I were a specimen under gla.s.s.
Finally T-s.h.i.+rt said, ”Not having to go to school would totally rock. Kevin says you guys have a h.e.l.l of a time up there with your brother.”
Kevin's smile vanished.
”Well,” I said. ”Things get a little intense sometimes.
” ”Insane, huh? Right, Kevster?”
He mumbled, ”Shut up,” and looked away from me.
”Your brother's cute,” Work Boots said.
”I guess so. He's my brother; it's hard to tell.”
Kevin forced a laugh. ”I think you're a little young for him, Amy.”
She tossed her head and said, ”You're as old as you feel.”
An image came unbidden to my mind: Amy's immaculate work boots lying among the overflowing ashtrays and crumpled clothes that always covered the floor next to Jack's bed while above them, his lean body moved over her compact round one and she moaned softly- My stomach lurched. I said, ”Well, get Kevin to bring you up sometime,” knowing that he would never do it. Just then, the marching band, which had been standing idly in a rough circle a few feet away, broke into something strident and loud, and a pack of cheerleaders tumbled and handsprung their way into the clearing, and I learned that the Tigers-or maybe it was the t.i.tans, I couldn't quite make it out-were going to go, fight, win, killing the Lions and going all the way, that's right, all the way. The cheerleaders barked out questions like drill sergeants. Kevin and his friends seemed to know all the correct responses.
”a.s.sembly-line idiot factories,” Raeburn said in my head, ”producing a.s.sembly-line idiots capable of a.s.sembly-line thought. You two are better than that.”
Someone in a tiger suit bounced into the midst of the cheerleaders, eliciting a ma.s.sive burst of enthusiasm from the crowd. Around me, a sea of entranced faces eagerly watched each sharp, martial movement. Fists punched the air. Feet stomped loudly in time with the music. Kevin put his arm around me, pulling me close. I tried to smile.
There was a commotion on the side of the clearing closest to the parking lot. The crowd parted and an old car, rusted and covered in primer, was pushed into the center of the crowd by a group of huge boys wearing football jerseys over faded jeans or sweatpants. More boys sat on top of the car, waving their arms in the air and shouting ”Yeah!” and ”Oh, yeah!” and occasionally ”f.u.c.k yeah!”
”What's going on?” I asked Kevin.
”The car smash. They do it every year.”
Work Boots-Amy-leaned over and said, ”It's mostly an excuse for the seniors to show off what big, tough men they are.”
”My dad says whoever donates the car gets a tax writeoff,” T-s.h.i.+rt said.
As if by magic, a sledgehammer appeared in the hands of each of the riding, shouting boys. Someone blew a whistle and they started to smash, blows raining down on the already dead car. Gla.s.s shattered. Metal buckled. It was like b.u.mper cars on the autobahn, like a war, like someone being killed, and still there were fenders to be hammered flat and b.u.mpers to be ripped off and held aloft like trophies. Something s.h.i.+ny flew through the air. It was one of the side mirrors, thrown clear of the carnage.
I tapped Kevin on the shoulder. ”Doesn't anyone ever get hurt doing this?”
He smirked. ”A few years ago some kid got hit in the kidneys. If they're stupid enough to do it they deserve what they get.”
The band played and the fire roared, and somewhere out of reach of its flickering red light, my brother sat in a room with my father and they drank brandy by the light of a smaller, more private flame.
The pep rally ended when the car was reduced to naked, twisted metal. The cheerleaders closed things up with a few more rounds of ”Go! Fight! Win!” but the kids were already leaving by then, trickling off in ones and twos toward the parking lot. Kevin's friends wanted to go to a coffee shop in Janesville, so we all piled into the red truck, which belonged to T-s.h.i.+rt-or, more likely, to his father. Kevin sat in the back and Amy and I squeezed together in the cab. Amy was sitting in the middle and she and T-s.h.i.+rt were laughing about something, some story about Kevin that I think was being told for my benefit.
My face ached from smiling and I couldn't quite figure out what to do with my arms. They seemed too long and I moved them restlessly from the open window, which was too high, to the armrest, which was too low, to my lap, which felt too timid. The air outside, which made my hair lash at my face as it blew in the open window, smelled of smoke and cold weather and carried with it the clear tang of water. I envied Kevin sitting by himself in the truck bed.
I moved Jack's jacket around me. His scent surrounded me like an aura.
Amy said, ”So we're all of thirteen years old, Lisa's parents are right upstairs, and Mr. Smooth Moves in the back, there, decides that it's time for his first makeout session and pulls her into the bathroom.”
T-s.h.i.+rt said, ”This is so cla.s.sic.”
”Like you're any better, Mr. Back-Seat-of-the-Bus-during a band trip with six sets of parents in the front and everyone we know watching.”
”All I'm saying is, I didn't get caught.”
Amy shook her head dismissively and turned back to me. ”Anyway, so naturally Lisa's mom comes downstairs to see if we want more chips or something like that. And she's like, 'Where's Lisa?' and we're like, 'Uh, we don't know, Mrs. Nath.' And Lisa's in the bathroom with Kevin, listening to all this, so of course she opens the door and comes out, like, 'I'm right here, Mom,' like nothing's going on. And Kevin follows her.”
The two of them burst into laughter. I wondered who was watching the road.
”What?” Kevin called through the sliding panel in the back window. ”What's going on?”
They only laughed harder. They were still laughing when T-s.h.i.+rt pulled into a parking place in front of the coffee shop and turned the engine off. ”Caught!” he said, too loudly in the sudden silence. ”So caught! ”