“What’s this Belgian Congo deal?”
“Next stop if we embarrass him here.”
I studied Caspar’s company stationery. He used a red ink pen in a tiny flowing handwriting that got tinier as it approached the right side of the page. Caspar was tiny himself—under five-five, to my everlasting dismay—but he drove his stretch Continental like a tank. Curbs meant nothing to the man. That military academy crack put an ugly feeling in my gut.
“Did you tell him about the pass?” I asked.
“Are you kidding? My conversations with Caspar are limited to ‘Where’s the check?’ ‘Don’t be a tramp.’”
“How did he find out I caught a pass?”
Lydia laughed. She’d been laughing regularly since the night she came in late. “Someone’s on the payroll.”
“Caspar has a spy?”
“Of course Caspar has a spy.” She took my shoulders in her hands and faced me. “Sam, listen to me. Your grandfather is Santa Claus. He knows every move you make and he will always know every move you make. Nothing can be hidden. A long time ago, I realized my job is to give the spies something to report. Caspar has never done squat. He gets his jollies off by hearing the juice of my adventures.”
“Jollies? He’s threatening me with Culver again. I know what that means. It means not having my own room and playing lacrosse instead of baseball. Only squirrels play lacrosse.”
Lydia scratched Les under the chin. “I promise, Sammy, that old goat will never separate us.”
Sounded like a hollow promise to me. The old goat could do anything he pleased so long as he controlled the wallet. “What about the rabid Negroes in Belgian Congo?”
Lydia grinned, showing an intense number of teeth. “Hell, honey bunny, I can handle rabid Negroes.”
I took that about six different ways, then gave up.
I forgot to mention earlier that Florence Talbot was not ugly, she was actually semi-pretty, probably the semi-prettiest girl in the seventh grade, next to Maurey. She had a Lesley Gore look, soft reddish-brown hair and brown pencil-drawn eyebrows. Florence could have even given Maurey a run for the title if she’d learned how to smile.
It was when Florence opened her mouth that the beauty flew out the window. Had a voice like a lunch whistle and this west Alabama accent that could curdle milk.
When I showed up at school Tuesday, Florence was standing in a little gaggle of girlhood, blocking the water fountain. Chuckette Morris was there, popping her retainer in and out with her tongue. And one of the LaNell-LaDell twins.
“Excuse me,” I said.
“Why?” LaNell-LaDell asked.
“I’d like to get to the water fountain.” I wasn’t really thirsty, only in a damned-if-that-Florence-Talbot-is-going-to-intimidate-me mood.
Chuckette and a couple others shuffled aside for me. Since the junior high used to be the grade school, the fountain was about a foot and a half off the ground, so I had to bend way over. When my head came back up, Florence’s face glared at me from all of eight inches away. I could see pulses next to her eyes. Her Talbot chin jutted at me like a pointing finger.
I hadn’t swallowed so when I flashed her a What, me worry grin, water dribbled across my lower lip and down my jaw— the ultimate junior high gross-out maneuver, next to pencils up the nose.
Maurey wore all black to school that day. I asked her why in the hall after citizenship.
“I’m in mourning for the nation,” she said.
“You look like the bad guy in a cowboy movie.”
“I’m Jane Eyre, bravely going on in the face of tragedy.”
“Right.”
Dothan razzed me in PE. We were playing dodgeball and he threw at me and missed about eight times. I might not have been strong enough to win a fight, but I was quick and he was stupid. If he looked at my feet he threw at my head, and if he looked at my head he threw at my feet.
“Hey, Sam,” Dothan called, “tell us how Maurey Pierce’s hooters feel. Are they foam rubber?”
Now I’m faced with one of those universal crises of youth: to respond to a word without anyone knowing you don’t know what it means. “Hooters” was beyond me. From Lydia, I knew knockers, twat, ass, tongue, jugs, head, boobs, whanger, and several other terms such as cock and clit that I knew were body parts, I just wasn’t sure where or on what sex they were located.
I couldn’t possibly admit to sixth-period PE that I didn’t know hooters. I had to answer, yet the wrong answer would give away my ignorance. I don’t give away ignorance.
Dothan sensed he had me. “Come on, tell us about Pierce’s hooters.”
“They feel the same as your sister’s.”
Lydia breezed in late again Wednesday night. She’d been snow-mobiling with Ft. Worth and Hank Elkrunner. The closest Lydia had ever come to outdoor recreation in North Carolina was fetching the newspaper off the front veranda and she wouldn’t do that in winter. I was aghast to see my mother with ruddy cheeks.
“Which one of those two jokers are you after?” I asked.
Lydia lit a cigarette, a girl’s brand called Tarreyton. “It’s time you learned about priorities, Sammy. Which one do you think I’m after?” The gleam was in her eye. Lydia considered herself on top of the situation.
“How should I know. I haven’t met Hank yet and all I know about Ft. Worth is his hairy finger.”
“Ft. Worth has more money and a new truck and a nice dog and he’s lovably charming. Hank doesn’t smoke or drink, he’s smarter, more sensitive, and seems to have an inner demon that intrigues me. Which should I pick?”
I considered. Normally, I’d opt for the inner demon because I secretly pictured myself with one that I hoped girls would go ape over, but a new truck and a good dog might be more Lydia’s speed. She could be dangerous to sensitivity.
“They both sound like clucks to me.”
Lydia hit her cigarette hard. “Here’s your first lesson on women, Sam. I’ll choose the one with the biggest dick.”
Lydia didn’t come home at all Friday night. I fixed myself an egg sandwich and sat in the living room, watching “Gun-smoke” and reading a Life magazine featuring a photo layout of Brigitte Bardot at her villa in France. The story said she slept in the nude. The concept seemed impossible. What if the house caught on fire and you had to run outside. I’d have died of smoke inhalation before I’d run into the street naked.
At 10:30 I turned on the porch light and drank a Dr Pepper along with two aspirins and a Valium. I went in the kitchen and got out Lydia’s shot glass and Gilbey’s in case she came in after I fell asleep. I even opened the bottle and measured out her first two ounces. It felt kind of strange to be going to sleep in an empty house. I set the TV on a white-noise station and maxed the volume.
I took Life to bed with me and fantasized various Brigitte Bardot rendezvous in hopes of enticing up another wet dream—fat chance. I dreamed I was being chased by Lee Harvey Oswald.
Sam Callahan ran down a long, narrow hallway that reached forever. He passed doors on the right and left but whenever Sam tried to open one, he found it locked. Behind him, limping in bandages, came Lee Harvey Oswald with his mail-order Italian rifle. Lee Harvey’s eyes were sunk into deep hollows. He never slowed, kept coming and coming.
Panic gripped Sam by the bowels, he pulled at doors, he threw his shoulder into doors, but Lee Harvey kept coming. Sam reached the end of the corridor—another locked door. His brow poured sweat, his hands trembled, he didn’t want to die. Sam pounded on the door.