Here's the latest chapter of this story. My thanks, again, to those who've offered comments (positive and negative) on it, and I hope anyone out there who does read it will feel free to tell me what they think. This is fictional, so if anyone thinks they recognize anyone they know in the story - well, they're wrong. If reading a story like this is illegal where you live for any reason, by all means don't read it. All rights aside from those given to Nifty in submitting it to them remain mine - who knows, maybe someday I'll come up with something someone will want to publish (I dream a lot). If you do like this story, you should take a look at my other Nifty story, "Seal Rocks," which is also here in the HS section with the last chapter posted about a year ago. Read and (I hope) enjoy!
When the World Changed, Part 8
Brady's chest developed a nasty diffuse bruise overnight where he'd been kicked. It throbbed dully as he showered, groggy in the grey predawn in the floor's bathroom, the morning grumbling and bitching of his hallmates echoing around him. They were all losing their initial inhibitions about being seen in the communal room at that hour, even when erect from the need to piss. Brady himself had managed to avoid that particular embarrassment so far, but he was amazed at how many other boys seemed not to care. The others would of course make all sorts of obscene comments whenever someone showed up hard - usually about being a faggot who was hard over the prospect of seeing other naked boys - but the teasing had an understanding tone to it that belied its apparent nastiness. Since the concept of morning wood had never been explained to Brady, this knowledge - that everyone got it from time to time (for some it seemed a daily occurrence) - was a great relief. Maybe I'm not such a freak after all, he thought. It was, to some extent, comforting.
At those moments he keenly wished he lived on the same floor as Doug. He wondered if Doug awoke hard in the morning, and if the guys on his floor ever saw him like that in their bathroom. The possibility of such a thing was thrilling, and of course only made it more difficult for Brady to keep himself reasonably flaccid as he cleaned up.
Breakfast was a quiet affair. Mr. Freeman wasn't there, so the table Prefect, a pimply junior named Owen Delaney, assumed the role. "You New Boys better all be going to the game today," he counseled. "We gotta support the team." Most of the freshman nodded desultorily - it was too early to think that far ahead - but Brady was eager. He had no work program that morning, and only one class at 9:30, so he could go back to sleep for a bit after eating. The whole day stretched out before him as a treat.
He and Wolfsen got pulled from their table by some seniors toward the end of the meal to skip about the dining hall singing the school fight song. They laughed as they did so, and soon a large group of New Boys were ordered to join them. As he moved clumsily about the tables, laughing, Brady saw and recognized face after face. They were his friends, his colleagues. David was leaning back on his chair, one elbow over the back, laughing quietly and whispering to Jerry Goldman, who was seated next to him. Stud Douggie, in another part of the hall, glowered at the whole scene.
Then Brady caught sight of Ian McShane, and he faltered. His left eye was blackened, his lower lip swollen. He was sitting in a clearly uncomfortable position, as if he couldn't find an arrangement that wasn't painful. Jesus, what happened to him, Brady thought. Their eyes met for an instant. Ian flashed just an instant of deep sadness, then sneered and turned away. Brady stumbled, having slowed down at this sight, and Wolfsen ran into him. The entire line of boys threatened to tumble over like dominoes. The rest of the hall roared with laughter at this development. As people were dismissed a moment later, Brady tried to catch sight of Ian again, to no avail.
He caught up to him in the walkway, by the trophy cases. "Jesus, Ian, are you OK?"
Ian refused to look at him. "I'm fine, farm boy. Fuck off."
Brady persisted. "I mean it, what happened to you?"
Ian swung round. "This is what I got for covering your stupid ass yesterday" He hesitated, his eyes darting about. "The - the Summerton guy slugged me, while we were tangled up, OK? It's all your fucking fault anyway. Maybe you didn't hear me the first time, so I'll try it again: Fuck off." He stormed off, head down.
Brady stood there for several seconds, being jostled by boys trying to get by. "Hey Bray, what's going on?" Doug was behind him, along with Evan Creed, who was sinking his teeth into a large apple.
Brady hardly even registered their appearance. "McShane - d-did you see him? His face, and all?"
Evan shrugged. "He's ugly, I don't wanna see his face." He grinned at what he regarded as a clever remark (it was still very early in the morning, after all).
"No, I mean it, he's all fucked up - he's got a black eye and his lip's all swole up, . . . "
"Damn, how'd that happen?" Doug's eyes met Brady's as their minds worked in the same direction.
Brady blinked. "He - he said the Summerton guy slugged him yesterday."
"That's bullshit, he didn't have any of that after the game."
"Maybe it took a while to show," Evan suggested. "That happens, right?"
Brady and Doug glanced at each other. "Could be," Brady said uncertainly. "I dunno."
"New Boys!!" Stud Douggie was striding down the walkway toward them, a thin blond haired kid next to him.
"Man, you're a junior, will you get off it?" Evan snapped. Brady found that interesting: Douggie's not just been going after me.
"But I'm a senior," the blond kid snapped back. He gestured to the name card on his lapel, with a school deal on it as seniors wore to denote their authority during New Boy Rules. "So shut up. Let's go, I have some shoes that need shining, and maybe more after that." Douggie smiled wickedly. "Whaddya think, Douggie, we got anything else lined up for these pussies?"
"Hell yeah," Douggie said with a nasty smile. Brady felt a vague stab of fear.
"Hey, Conover!" Brendan McCracken was ambling down the walkway, a full head taller than any of the boys around him. He wore a lopsided smile on his craggy face. "You better be there today, you need to watch the offense. What're you doing with him, Talbot?"
The blond senior (Talbot, Brady noted - he hadn't met this kid before) shrugged. "Me and McShane were gonns have a little fun with the New Boys."
McCracken frowned. "Can it, Talbot. I know what your version of 'fun' is, and you're not fucking with any of these guys."
Talbot straightened up angrily (not that it appreciably closed the size gap between him and McCracken; Brendan was still enormous). "You got no right to tell me what I can and can't tell a New Boy to do."
"Maybe, but I know Fieldstone already rusticated you for five days for the little stunt with DeFillipis last weekend," McCracken replied coolly. "He's on you tight, Andy, and I'll be too, with these guys. " He glanced at McShane. "You got any business here, McShane?"
Stud Douggie looked a bit intimidated. "I - I'm just, you know, hanging out with Andy and stuff."
"OK, well this is senior business. Take a hike." Stud Douggie swallowed and turned away, striding off with an angry slouch to his shoulders.
Without McShane beside him, Talbot seemed to deflate. "I - I was just gonna have them shine some shoes, Brendan. For the floor, you know? I - I wasn't gonna - "
"You're on really thin ice, Talbot. Take a breather, OK?" He shooed Talbot away with a dismissive wave of the back of his hand.
"Thanks," Brady breathed as Talbot left, vanishing into the swirl of boys passing by.
"No sweat. Gotta go to bat for the team, right?" Brady smiled, feeling vaguely embarrassed. Something else that almost happened, but didn't.
"Hey Brendan," Doug piped up, "what happened with DeFillipis? He's on my hall, and he was gone for a couple of days earlier this week."
McCracken hesitated. "Talbot had him do some physical stuff, and he got hurt. Not bad, from what I understand, but you're not supposed to get people hurt, you know?"
"What'd he do?" Evan asked.
McCracken shrugged, though he seemed a bit stiff all of a sudden. "Don't really know. They just told the seniors on Wednesday to not go overboard. Fieldstone was on a tear, even Leeds got into it."
"What's the deal with Fieldstone, anyway?" Evan asked. Brady and Doug exchanged another glance as the group trotted down the stairs. "Somebody told me he was a faggot." Brady found himself inhaling sharply.
McCracken laughed. "Fieldstone's all right. He's - - different, OK? Great cross country runner - don't ever go out with him on a run unless you're ready to die like a dog. He did that to me our freshman year and I thought I was a goner." The discussion moved to the prospects for the cross country team, and the track team next spring. Brady noted how McCracken had subtly changed the subject.
They emerged from Geiger into a dazzling bright, cool morning, with bright leaves scattering before a breeze. The air felt thinly cold, brittle. McCracken looked about and smiled slightly. "OK, New Boys, I think a long skip down center campus holding hands and singing - really loud singing - is in order here. " He clapped Brady on the back. "Move it, I got class at 8."
Brady laughed and took Doug's hand. It felt warm and soft. They looked at each other and smiled. Evan grabbed Doug's other hand, laughing, and they took off, raucously out of tune.
Brady dozed briefly after that, still in his jacket and tie, and barely made it to Earth Science. Coach Drake had little interest in discussing albedo. He paced the front of the class for a while, lecturing absently, then started drawing plays on the blackboard, intensely explaining the blocking patterns and anticipated defensive reactions. Brady and Spencer paid close attention; many of their non-football classmates took the opportunity to nap discreetly. Coach Drake was out the door before any of his students when the bell rang.
Since buses were leaving before the usual lunch hour, an informal sandwich buffet was set up in the dining hall. Brady took an extra sandwich for later in the day and slipped back to his room to change for the bus ride. David and Doug did likewise. "Take some cash, too - sometimes they stop the buses at some hoagie place on Route 1 in like Pennsauken or someplace," David advised. Brady was trying to save his money, so he decided to ignore that idea.
Getting out of campus was a thrilling, liberating experience. Except for the trip to Summerton High for the game, Brady hadn't left the place in three weeks. The bus was raucous. The driver - one of the grounds crew Brady had noticed driving a tractor mower on center campus a couple of times - had little ability to control the boys, and less inclination as long as he could see to drive. The result was a hilarious anarchy.
The school, to Brady's surprise, was not in Germantown itself (he vaguely knew that the city was right by Philadelphia, and had been a ghetto for "foreign" German immigrants in the eighteenth century). As Brady's bus unloaded, he saw the Guppy already parked by a small freestanding locker room. The varsity was already here. It took twelve buses to bring all the Wilson students, and they made a small sea of purple and gold as they loudly took over the visiting stands. Doug strolled next to Brady, wearing a thin jacket and a purple and gold school six-footer scarf. Their shoulders casually bumped from time to time, each touch secretly thrilling Brady.
The stands were crowded and, again, raucous. Brady was at times frustrated because so few of the boys around him seemed to be watching the game with much interest, preferring instead to talk, make up nonsensical cheers, and generally blow off steam. The school cheerleaders (led, of course, by Bill Fieldstone) periodically made the New Boys recite one of a number of 1920s vintage school cheers that were set out in the School manual each still had tied to a belt loop. They were preposterous, dated, and unintentionally funny - lots of "Sis! Boom!! Bah!!!" and similar stuff that made them all both amused and vaguely embarrassed to be shouting at the top of their lungs. Brady was surprised to see david shouting them with particular vigor - school spirit didn't seem to fit in with his understanding of David's makeup.
The game itself was plodding. Wilson had clearly not practiced enough to gell as a unit on either side of the ball, and the Germantown team (which had already played two games) was just as clearly better prepared. Brady found himself losing interest after a while, except for two things: watching McCracken and observing Stud Douggie. The former was a sight to behold. McCracken was like a man among boys, moving catlike but with immense power. Brady involuntarily winced more than once at some of the hits he laid on defenders - how can anyone get up from that, he wondered. He realized that in some ways he was supposed to be the heir apparent to McCracken, and the weight of that responsibility fell heavily on him.
The other interesting sidelight was Stud Douggie. He didn't start, but went in at times to play on the defensive line. The stands were too low to afford a very good view of what was going on in the interior line, but Brady noticed that the run defense seemed weak up the middle whenever Douggie was in. He also seemed to get into shoving matches frequently after the whistle with opposing players, until in the late second quarter he was called for a personal foul penalty that negated a Wilson quarterback sack. Coach Drake pulled him from the field at that point, grabbing him by his face mask and pretty obviously dressing him down loudly before pushing him to the bench. He sat for a moment before kicking over a large water bucket. Brady saw Mr. Glendon then yell at Douggie in his turn, pointing at the bucket angrily. The half ended with Wilson down 13 - 0, and Douggie sitting very alone on the bench.
Brady and Doug wandered about behind the stands during halftime, comparing notes about what they'd seen. David was gleeful over what looked like Stud Douggie's humiliation. "Even if we lose, it'd be worth it to see him get what he deserves for a change," he exulted.
Brady noticed a couple of New Boys nearby, who he'd seen hanging out with ian McShane, frown at this. He realized he needed to change the subject. "So have you been here before - last year or something? I mean this looks like a nice campus."
David shrugged. "Nah, they came to Summerton last year. Kicked our asses, too. This looks OK - I mean it's a campus, right? Now if they got good food, that's another thing entirely." That launched a long verbal assault on the quality of the food in the Wilson dining hall, in which everyone participated. Brady kept an eye on the kids who'd eavesdropped, just in case.
Some cheering arose from the stands above them. "What's that? Brady asked.
David shrugged. "Probably the cross country meet. They race during halftime."
Brady slipped around the edge of the bleachers to watch. A pack of runners, with some other straggling behind, was descending a hill towards the field. He soon picked out Bill Fieldstone among the lead group, his dark eyes very focused and a deep blush high on his cheeks. He was startlingly pale, given his dark hair. As the pack swept past the Wilson stands, the boys cheered on their Cavaliers. Fieldstone was being jostled by a couple of taller Germantown runners, and Brady saw the ferocity with which he repelled them with sharp elbows. The look on Fieldstone's face was shocking. Brady had only seen him in his schoolday face, a placid appearance of self confidence and control. His glare now was predatory. Brady realized that he would kill - himself, the Germantown runners, anybody - to win the race he was in. The intensity was withering. The pack rolled around the track one time, then back up into the trees behind the field. "How long is the course?" Brady asked.
"No idea," David said. "They run for fucking ever, as far as I'm concerned. Wouldn't catch me dead doing shit like
About five minutes later, the runners appeared again. The pack had thinned dramatically. Fieldstone sprinted back to the track between two Germantown runners. The two were huffing, their arms flailing mightily in their extremity. Fieldstone, by contrast, was a model of precise, purposeful movement - arms driving straight ahead and back in a short economical swing, head slightly cocked to the left, mouth almost lazily open. The color was deeper across his face, his brow was knotted. Brady could see how much the pace hurt him, how deliberately he kept himself relaxed to avoid tightening up and losing the fluidity of his stride. . Only his eyes showed the ferocity of his desire, as he again fought off elbows from the Germantown runners and accelerated further past the Wilson stands toward the finish line on the other side of the track. The Germantown runners broke down on the last turn, their arm motions tightening and their strides faltering as Fieldstone drove relentlessly forward. He crossed the line a good ten yards ahead of his closest pursuit, slowed for a few strides, then seemed to fall apart in stages as he skiddingly collapsed to the cinder track. Coach Goodwin ran to him, and spent a good five minutes hunched over his runner as others crossed the line behind them. Fieldstone eventually rose to his feet, shook off Goodwin's hand, and started a slow jog back around the track, a towel around his neck. As he approached the Wilson stands, the ovation was deafening. He raised his right hand slightly to acknowledge it, his face streaked with sweat and dirt, his knees and palms bloodied from his fall. He didn't look at anyone in particular; his gaze seemed directed to some inner place of deep pain and exhaustion. His face was drawn, mottled red, and still intense from the effort he'd just put forth. It was the most feral thing Brady had ever seen. He realized how right McCracken was to warn them not to cross Bill Fieldstone - that ferocity, turned against anyone, would be devastating. Brady was caught between admiration, pride, and fear.
Doug was next to him. "Jesus," he said.
David nodded. "He's a piece of work when he runs. He doesn't like to lose."
"I guess not," Doug laughed. "At anything."
The varsity team began to click in the second half. They engineered a long drive that included a couple of short look-in passes to McCracken - the same route that Brady had been working on with Evan - that led to punishing runs after the catch, and brought Wilson to the seven yard line. On second down, McCracken caught another look-in pas and barreled over the middle linebacker into the end zone. The Wilson stands erupted, New Boy beanies flying in the air, fists pumping. Brady, inspired, hefted David up and started passing him down the line of boys, with Doug joining in almost immediately. In no time David was aloft, laughing harder than Brady had ever seen him laugh, bobbing atop a small sea of arms and hands as he was conveyed to the side of the stands and dropped off onto his feet. Wolfsen became the next victim, and soon every little kid in the Wilson student body seemed to be flying through the air, being passed up or down or across the stands. Several of the Masters in attendance began shouting for the boys to stop, on safety grounds, but no one paid any attention. It was far too much fun to worry that someone might break their neck. The fact that the extra point went awry did little to dampen the rejoicing. Bill Fieldstone, by this time showered and dressed again as a cheerleader, applauded the foolish scene. His eyes met Brady's for a moment, and Brady nodded, acknowledging his run. Fieldstone smiled quietly back at him before turning again to lead another cheer.
The game became a defensive struggle, with Wilson unable to replicate its success. Brady noticed Stud Douggie didn't go into the game this half. He paced, a little apart from his teammates, helmet nowhere to be seen, with hands on hips, visibly agitated. David kept pointing at him and smiling.
With about three minute left in the game. The Wilson defense forced a punt close to the Germantown goal line. Brady stiffened as he watched the defense deploy. "It's the punt block formation, look," he whispered to Doug, as if afraid he'd tip someone off if he spoke too loudly. "They're going after the punter."
David had heard. "Do the other guys know that?"
"We'll see in a second," Doug answered, his face as taut as Brady's.
They didn't know. The block formation quickly overran the left side of the offensive line, with no less than three Wilson players swarming in on the punter, who had no chance. He took one look, tried to feint to his right in some vaguely conceived idea of running his way out of his predicament, and was buried at the twelve yard line. The Wilson stands erupted again, with Doug and Brady pounding each other's backs and hugging, David hopping up and down and embracing them both. "Don't pass me around again!!" he squealed. "I wanna see this!!"
Brady ducked down and lifted David onto his shoulders. It took three hardnosed runs for Wilson to score, with Mike Raskauskas, a senior, finally bulling over. More cheers. David looked down at Brady and Doug. "Now what do we do? Go for two?"
The boys frowned at each other. As they did, Coach Drake sent the kicking team onto the field. Some of the Wilson boys groaned, and the Germantown fans began jeering. The extra point tied the game. Brady felt let down. Obviously he didn't want to lose, but settling for a tie seemed unsporting somehow. The Germantown fans were chanting "Par-SEE-ghian!! Par-SEE- ghian!!" The Germantown players were acting as if they'd won.
They were so pleased with themselves they failed to cover Wilson's onside kick. When Brent Harpring, a junior Brady had sat with for a week in the dining hall, recovered the ball at just about midfield, Brady leaped so violently he almost dropped David. He felt David's legs clamp about his neck hard in an effort to stay atop his shoulders and safe,. He felt David's hardness poking the back of his neck. Doug embraced him joyously at that point, distracting him. For a delicious moment Brady's nose buried deep into the crook of Doug's neck, amid his soft hair. The smell of his skin, the slight sheen of sweat, the tickle of the hair against his lips, made him weak. He grabbed onto Doug instinctively, groaning, "Oh, God," to himself. Doug held him fast, the power of the arms about him only making him feel shakier. David leaned down and slapped his cheek slightly. "Bray, what's up, man? You OK?"
Brady pulled back quickly, gulping in air to steady himself. "OK, I'm OK. Sorry. I, uh - I - "
"Gettin' all psyched up, huh Bray?" Doug was smiling at him. The sight made him feel so good, he had to smile back. What seemed like a long time passed.
"Hey, should I get down?" David sounded nervous. Brady looked up to see him watching with deep serious eyes.
Brady adjusted David's weight atop him. "No, it's OK. You wanted to see, right?"
"Yeah, but I don't wanna fall on my ass or anything either."
Doug laughed. "I'll catch you if Brady passes out or something."
"I'm not gonna fucking pass out, c'mon. Gimme a break here." He hoped his air of irritation would cover for him.
The game from there, sadly, proved a letdown. The offense was again unable to move the ball, and the clock ran out on a 13 - 13 tie. Neither team, nor their fans, felt much like celebrating. Fieldstone ordered all the New Boys to the sideline to sing the school fight song as a group to the team, but there was little real enthusiasm in the rendition. The Wilson students began dispersing toward the buses.
Bill Fieldstone appeared next to Brady. "Good race," Brady said sheepishly, extending a hand.
Fieldstone smiled amiably as they shook hands. The schoolday face, - the self possessed senior - was back. "It's early in the season, it hurt today. When I'm in shape it doesn't hurt like that."
"It looked like it hurt, yeah."
Fieldstone shrugged. "It's not supposed to be all fun, I guess. But it's no fun at all unless you try. Plus, those guys were assholes - they thought they could box me in and knock me around with elbows and crap." He took a deep breath. "That sort of stuff pisses me off." He smiled at Brady. "We should go for a run sometime"
Brady snorted. "No way, you'd kill me running like that."
Fieldstone smiled again, more gently, and patted Brady's arm. "I'll be gentle, New Boy. Promise." His gaze lingered a moment on Brady's face before he moved away into the crowd.
Brady heard Ian McShane behind him. "What a fucking joke! A fucking tie!! Drake didn't have the balls to go for it when he had the chance. Fucking moron."
Brady refused to turn around - he knew he'd only get angry. He glanced at Doug, whose jaw was clenched, and David, who was slouching along looking surly. "Hey, he did the onside kick, that took some guts, man. That was a real gamble, he could have lost the whole game," someone said to McShane .
"Bullshit. He lost this game the whole first half when he played chicken shit. My brother gets fucking benched and look what happens - they run all over us." Brady wanted to respond that the opposite was the case - that they'd run all over us until Stud Douggie got pulled. "And he's got Nazzarro kicking when he isn't worth shit, either. Drake is a fucking loser moron!!" Ian shouted again.
"That will be quite enough, Mr. McShane!" A clipped, oddly honking voice cut through the din, and all conversation near them stopped. Mr. Taber strode through the crowd to stand directly in front of Ian. "Mr. Drake is a Master at this School, and a fine one at that. I will not have you hurling imprecations against him - certainly not here, on another campus, and indeed not anywhere. And especially not in that tome of voice. Am I very clearly understood?"
"Yes, sir," Ian replied softly, the resentment audible. Brady's ability to refrain from turning to witness this sight was starting to crumble. Did anybody else on earth really talk like Taber, he wondered.
"You can expect detention for that outburst, Mr. McShane, and far more if I ever - EVER - hear it repeated. Any questions?"
A pause. "No, sir, I understand completely, sir."
Mr. Taber turned and walked past Brady. "Mr. Conover, I hope you enjoyed the game?" he said as if nothing whatever were the matter. The flash of his eyes was still an angry one, though.
Brady gulped. "Yes, sir, it - it was very, you know, enjoyable. I mean I wish we'd won and stuff - "
"Not to worry, Mr. Conover, I understand. No one likes to tie. Cavaliers like to win." He glanced behind Brady. "And we do so as gentlemen - win or lose. Or even tie."
Brady swallowed again. "Yes, sir."
Mr. Taber nodded. "Mr. Tanner, I'm happy to see you came. I hope it was enjoyable."
David was polite; he obviously had enjoyed hearing Ian get chewed out as much as Brady had. "Oh, yes, sir, it was a good game. We were gutsy at the end with the onside kick, I think." He grinned at that line, knowing Ian could hear it.
"I agree. Now, to the buses, all of you!" He moved away, shepherding boys toward the parking lot, his hands flapping as he walked.
When he was about twenty yards away, Ian muttered, "Look at that walk. What a faggot."
Brady had had enough. "What's your deal, McShane?" he snapped as he turned. "Will you give it a rest just once in a while?"
"Fuck you, Jethro, you're probably sucking his cock already. You and your queer buddies there," he added, waving a dismissive hand at Doug and David.
David started laughing exaggeratedly. "What's your deal, pussy?" Ian snarled.
"I was in the library this week, Ian, and I looked up 'douchebag'. It had your picture."
Ian shot a fist at David's jaw. It missed. David, for his slight stature, was quick. He ducked away to his left , while Brady and Doug stepped forward to confront McShane.
"Stop!!" Mr. Taber's voice boomed, unnaturally loud and shrill. He strode between the parties and stood directly in front of McShane. "To your bus, immediately. When we arrive back on campus, you and I are going to visit Dr. Leeds."
McShane started to object. "Sir, he -"
"Enough. I saw what happened. He was saying something to you - probably taunting, knowing Mr. Tanner - and you reacted by throwing a punch. That is unacceptable, however cutting Mr. Tanner's remark may have been."
"Christ, McShane, you at least lasted till January last year. You're not even gonna make October," David jeered.
"That is quite enough, Mr. Tanner. I know you two don't get along, but I don't need you goading anyone. You do that far too much already, and I expect it to stop. Understood? Get to your buses now, all of you! I may yet put you all in detention - if I can trust you in the same room."
The boys slipped onto their bus. Brady felt embarrassed, along with his simmering anger at McShane. Doug was glowering. David, on the other hand, seemed giddy. "They're gonna fuck him up, I love it, not even three weeks!! Did you see his face, man?? This is so great!"
David, what's going on here? Why're you so fired up to mess with McShane?" Doug was asking what Brady had been wondering.
"He's an asshole, OK? Is this news or something? I mean he's been fucking with you guys too, you oughta be just as happy."
"We know he's an asshole, that's not the point," Brady answered. "The point is why are you so pent up over him? What happened with you guys last year or whatever that's got you so bent out of shape?" Brady slid into a window seat, and was quietly thrilled when Doug dropped down next to him.
David sat across the aisle from them. He was silent now, and avoiding eye contact. Doug started to repeat the question, but Brady nudged him, realizing the attempt would only be counterproductive at that point. Doug glanced at Brady for a moment, then smiled and shrugged. Brady's face split into a grin as well, and they started laughing and talking both at once - about the game, about what dumbasses the other cheerleaders had been, about what a jerk Ian was, about the houses and cars they passed as the bus pulled out towards the Turnpike. Their knees periodically pushed against each other in the tight quarters of the bus seats, and Doug eventually turned that into a shoving contest to see who could get the most leg room. Brady was winning until Doug upped the ante by ticking him, at which point Brady fell into a giggling fit that soon had Mr. LePage, a biology teacher who was chaperoning on the bus, shouting back at them to keep it down. Even with this admonition, it took Brady a few minutes to subside entirely - every time he looked at Doug, he felt the laughter well up in him again. He noticed David watching them from across the aisle, his head down but his eyes taking it all in with a deep sidelong stare. He looked lonely and sad. Jerry Goldman sat next to him, staring absently out the window.
The boys eventually quieted down, and Doug fell lightly asleep, his head tipped sideways toward Brady, his breath coming in slow soft snores. Brady sat ramrod straight, hands on his thighs, feeling Doug's breath against his cheek and his leg lightly pressed against his own. His body rang with the memory of Doug touching him while they tickled each other. He kept a small loopy smile on his face the whole way back to campus. He didn't notice David's frequent appraising glances.
The buses pulled up in front of Geiger just in time for dinner. They were allowed to eat without having to change into jacket and tie, which was to the boys another intoxicating taste of freedom. The fact that the team hadn't (quite) won got lost in the raucous euphoria of the dining hall. Brady kept looking over at Doug, who was about five tables away. The sight made him smile.
Dunc demanded a full recounting of the game (and all the assorted sideshows) when they got back to Linsley. He had apparently spent the afternoon working on a homemade guitar amplifier, only to have it short circuit about an hour before the buses' return. The short had caused half the campus to lose electricity, and the grounds people were on a tear, demanding to know who or what could have been responsible. "I managed to ditch the amp in the lake, I don't think they saw me," Dunc said with a depressed sigh. "It coulda been so cool . . . ." Doug shook his head slightly, with an amused glance at Brady.
"Where the hell did you get parts to make an amplifier, anyway?" David demanded.
Now it was Dunc's turn to smile slightly. "There's this old guy down on Main Street in town who runs a TV repair place," he said. This was news: none of the New Boys had really ventured off campus into Summerton at all yet, and they'd had no idea Duncan had gotten that brave either. "I just started shooting the breeze with him, and all, sucked up to him a bit about what he did in the war - he's got all this Marines shit on the wall - and he gave me a bunch of spare parts, tubes and stuff, and some circuit boards. I thought I had it figured out," he sighed. "Maybe I should find one and take it apart so I'll see how it really works instead of guessing and trying to remember this thing I read last summer in Popular Science."
Brady couldn't restrain his laughter. "Yeah Dunc, I'm sure everybody on campus with an amp is dying to have you take it apart for them. You'll wind up getting like Radio Moscow or something."
"My dad has an old radio that you can get Radio Moscow on," Evan Creed chimed in from the doorway.
Doug stared. "You're shitting me, what's it like?"
Evan laughed and bit into the apple in his hand. Where does he keep coming up with these huge fucking apples, Brady wondered. "It's really weird. The news announcers are these women with really soft quiet voices and this accent that's so perfect it's sort of impossible. And the news is stuff like, 'Vietnamese freedom fighters killed 37 American imperialists today in the continuing struggle of their people for liberation from Western oppression.'" He started laughing at his imitation. Brady felt a chill.
Doug glanced at Brady. "That's not funny, that's like sick,. That's our own people getting killed and they're making it like we're the bad guys."
"Man, we are the bad guys over there, I hate to break it to you," David snapped. He also had a wary eye on Brady. "I don't mean like the soldiers themselves or anything, but like the reason we're there - Johnson and McNamara and Rusk and all those assholes - Westmoreland - it's all total bullshit,. We don't belong there." He took a deep breath. "It's like we're wasting all these good people, you know?"
Brady felt everyone watching for his reaction, but he didn't know what to do, or say. He had found himself increasingly feeling that David was dead on, that his brother was being used as cannon fodder in some pointless stupid chess game that had no meaning. But wasn't admitting that denigrating what his brother was doing? He didn't so much love Trent, the way he loved Hal, his middle brother, so much as he worshipped him. He'd been gone from the house, in college and then the Army, since Brady had been seven years old, and he knew that Trent had very consciously assumed the role of father figure after their dad's death. The weight was visibly heavy on him, and it showed in his flaring temper. One reason he was sure Trent would come back from the war is that he couldn't imagine anyone hurting Trent if he got really pissed off.
He blinked, took a breath. "Yeah," he finally said, "it's all bullshit. But it's always like dumping on the soldiers, and not the politicians. That can't be fair."
"Bray, I'm not dumping on anybody but the politicians, OK?" David's voice had a real note of urgency, more than Brady had ever heard.
He looked at David for a moment and smiled quietly. "OK, I know," he said, looking back down. "But when Trent gets back you better be careful what you say. He keeps telling me, he knows how to kill people now."
The laughter was thin and forced, until Jerry Goldman piped up, "So let's introduce him to McShane!" That broke the mood, and the discussion quickly devolved into a listing of body parts they'd like to see Ian McShane lose in the most grisly possible fashion - with a second list quickly filling up for Stud Douggie as well. Brady soon was demonstrating a few of the hand- to-hand tricks Trent had showed him: blows to the trachea or a thumb jabbed hard into the armpit ("That paralyzes the main nerve to the arm for a little bit, and if they can't move their arms well it's all kind of pointless for 'em, you know?"), a palm to the nose bone to drive it up into the cerebral cortex, gross things like that. He'd never really contemplated their being used before, the damage they could cause. He found himself becoming quiet amid the burgeoning chatter.
Doug eventually pulled him into the hall. "You OK?"
Brady leaned back against the plastered wall. "Yeah." A pause. "What - what if he doesn't come back? I mean there's like 200 guys being killed every week now. It's on Walter Cronkite every Wednesday, I can't watch the news that day. My Mom - " he paused to control his breathing " - she, she couldn't handle it. I mean, she drinks too much now, at night, because of my dad." Why did he say that, he'd never told anyone such a thing. "I mean, I just dunno, I dunno what - what I'd do - or she'd do . . ." He found the urge to cry assaulting him again, and felt his defenses rise to stop it in its tracks. The internal battle made his insides hurt, but he kept control.
"He'll come back, man, you know that," Doug said, his arm around Brady's shoulders. The grip was solid, the limb against his body warm and solid. "He's like doing headquarters stuff now, briefings and shit, you said, right? So he's not out in the jungle getting shot at any more." Brady nodded. Let me bury my face in his chest, please, he thought, but he resisted. "So his tour ends at the end of January, and while the gooks do their New Year's thing - what'd they call it, Tet, or something, I heard about that last winter - he gets to fly back home and bust your chops for being a wimpy prep school boy." Doug unleashed one of his daybreak smiles. Does he know how that gets me, Brady wondered. "It's gonna be OK, man, trust me."
Brady smiled, blinking to keep his eyes clear. "I - I trust you." He smiled openly for a moment, before realizing what he might have said. He looked down, and stepped away. "I - I just don't know, um, about the Viet Cong, and all."
Doug laughed and tousled his hair. "Man, he must be something if he has you that scared of him. You're not scared of anything."
Brady laughed, shaking his head. "I'm scared of lots of things." And, looking at Doug's beaming face and sparkling eyes, he knew abruptly what one of them was.