Bereavement Policy
-
Four-in-Hand
Great Room, The Squat, Early October, 1995
Kid was retying their tie for the third time, adjusting the ends to be even.
“I thought I’d wear this tie to a drag night or something. Not a funeral.”
Kid glanced at the mirror and caught Jerk’s reflection. He was lounging behind them on the old burgundy chaise.
“Technically, it’s a memorial,” Jerk said, reclining with his dog-eared copy of Second Foundation. “A funeral requires a body.” The radiator pinged and banged. A hard freeze had come early.
“Aaugh! I feel like I’m strangling myself!” Kid loosened the tie and pulled it off, throwing it on the floor.
“I want to get this right!”
“Want help, fashion victim?”
Jerk laid his paperback on the seat of the chaise. The Mule could wait.
“I taught Late when he started at Academy,” he said.
Jerk picked up the tie and smoothed it out.
“I’m not telling Carmen you treated a silk tie like that.”
Kid snatched the tie from Jerk’s hand, frowning.
“Late needed help too?”
They turned around and began threading the tie back through their collar.
“I swear, he tried to do bunny ears,” Jerk said with a smirk. Late still tied his shoelaces that way.
“I’ll teach you four-in-hand. It’s the staple of Academy boys.”
Jerk reached around Kid and helped adjust the ends of the tie.
“Wide end is on right, good. You want it to be about a foot longer than the narrow end.”
Kid smelled like sandalwood. They’d dabbed it on their wrists and neck with the same precision they measured out ground mustard seed for their egg salad.
“Bring the wide end over the narrow end, then under,” he guided their hands.
“Over one more time and you make a loop on the front.”
“That’s the part I screwed up. Only went around once,” Kid said.
“Now wide end through loop from underneath and then down?”
Kid’s hands moved confidently as they finished the tie.
Jerk looked over their shoulder, at their work in the mirror, and nodded. “Looks good. I think you were making a square knot before.”
“It’s a little crooked,” Kid said. They loosened and tightened the knot.
“It’s supposed to be a little off-center,” Jerk said, tapping his own knot.
He reached out to tighten Kid’s tie. His fingers brushed Kid’s wrist.
Neither of them said anything for a moment. The radiator pinged.
Kid leaned back against him.
“So just us representing The News?” Kid said, straightening and adjusting the sleeve of their shirt, turning to Jerk.
Jerk missed the sandalwood already.
“Tiny’s in Providence with Norma. Late’s with Sarah in Syracuse.”
Jerk bent to pick up Second Foundation from the chaise.
“You want to take Clark with you? Or should I bring Star?”
They were both downstairs tending the store.
“He’s so polite.” It was an accusation. “Chopping eggs, flashing that pearly-white smile, going on about his house painting business.”
Jerk blinked.
“He’s been fine to you. He enjoys working in the deli and kitchen.” Norma had loved that about Clark.
“He looks at you like–”
Kid’s eyes flicked back to their cuff, and they adjusted it again.
“Like what?”
Jerk gripped the copy of Second Foundation, holding it upside down.
“Like he jerked me around like a loser? Like a chump?” He grimaced.
Kid studied him. They didn’t say it out loud at first.
“Like he’s sorry.”
Jerk looked past Kid at his own reflection.
“It would be nice to hear the words.”
His reflection seemed unconvinced he ever would.
He looked back at Kid.
“Wouldn’t change anything, forget I mentioned the asshole.”
“No? Nothing?”
Kid took the book gently from Jerk’s hands and turned it upright before placing it back.
“Even if he is sorry?”
Jerk looked at Kid. The corner of his mouth curled a little. He could feel it–cheek muscles pulling in a way that usually got misread.
“I’m too comfortable now.”
Kid’s eyes were soft.
Jerk glanced at his watch.
“We need to go. I told Paulie we were supposed to be at his parents’ restaurant already.”
Jerk let Kid lead down the stairs so he could follow in the trace of their sandalwood.
-
Little Man
Paulie had a roommate. The roommate’s name was Doyle. Doyle was keeping lookout.
“Oh. My. God! Jerk, your HAIR!” Doyle’s playful catcall echoed down Fourth Street from a half block away. Jerk lowered his head and ran a hand through his hair. Kid had recently touched it up.
“Yeah! Nice hair, brother!” A guy passing them boomed in agreement, giving a thumb-up. He had an oversized Macho Man t-shirt and jean shorts so low they may have qualified as lederhosen, despite the kiss of ice in the air.
“I’m the barber!” Kid said, turning to smile and wave as the guy continued on.
“Right on, little man!” The man yelled back. Kid beamed.
Doyle flounced down the block to meet them, black velvet Cuban heels tapping like a dance revue. He was wearing a black-on-black silk herringbone suit, with a lace cravat like he was hosting a séance after. Paulie walked behind.
“Oh my god, that hair! So you! And you must be Kid. You’re Kid, right?”
Doyle’s powdered face looked back and forth between them.
“Paulie did not tell me what an absolutely adorable couple you two make!”
“I said they were roommates.” Paulie huffed, catching up.
“Adorable couple!” Doyle was emphatic. He offered his hand to Kid. “I’m so rude, I’m Doyle.” He teased out the “Doy-” so it sounded like “toy.”
Kid shook Doyle’s hand, smiling. “I’m Kid. Doyle? From Carmen’s? She mentioned you.”
“Guilty as charged!” Doyle flourished his hands and fanned himself for a moment, turning to show his profile.
Doyle looked at Jerk again and smirked. “Brothers would have knocked you senseless for that haircut.”
“They would have knocked you senseless for that penciled-on mustache, Doyle.” Jerk gave him a mocking half salute. “How have you been, Cadet?”
Doyle rolled his eyes. The subtle eyeliner and blush made him look like a chalk drawing. “Oh you know, just working on my drag act and trying to get Paulie to join me.”
Paulie sighed and rubbed his temples. “Can we talk about this in the car? We’ve got a memorial to go to.”
Doyle pointed at Paulie in theatrical exasperation. “And, he keeps saying things like THAT when I bring it up.”
-
Arrow Parkway
Paulie had a black Dodge Diplomat. It reminded Jerk of the old Ilium PD cruisers, but with only a six-cylinder it didn’t have the throaty growl of those extinct beasts. He guided it up Prospect Street before taking a right onto the tree-lined Arrow Parkway, heading toward Sacred Heart.
“Doyle, you’re fogging up the windows,” Paulie said, adjusting the vents and defroster.
“The Three Musketeers, Kid! Think about it. You as Porthos, Carmen as Athos, and, of course, myself as Aramis.” Doyle continued, oblivious in the back seat with Kid.
“I can’t,” Kid said, laughing.
“But why? I already have the rapiers!” Doyle flourished his right hand, miming the draw of a sword.
“Can I at least see a show there first?”
Paulie turned up the vent fan on high, drowning out Doyle’s next plea.
“It feels weird, representing the Society for our parents,” Paulie said. “Especially a memorial for Mayor Hayden.”
“I’m already a member,” Jerk said. He peered up through the windshield. “I think it’s snowing.”
“Oh yeah, they made you the Scribe or something, right?” Paulie cracked the window.
“Definitely snowing.” Fat snowflakes were falling on the windshield now. “‘The Page.’ Errand boy. I keep the Ledger too.”
Doyle’s head emerged between them. “Ohhh! Are you two talking about Skull and Crossbows?”
“The Vanderkill Society isn’t like that, Doyle.” Jerk crossed his arms and looked out the passenger window.
“The suicide hotline people?” Kid said, recovering from Doyle abandoning his pleas mid-breath. “‘Don’t Drown. Call,’” Kid said, quoting the posters. “I thought the city ran that.”
“Hayden became our face when he became Mayor.” Jerk turned over his right shoulder to talk to Kid, away from Doyle. “We couldn’t have set up the hotline without him.”
“I hear they do cult rituals above The News,” Doyle whispered to Kid behind his hand, conspiratorially.
“You mean The Van Renwyck Room? I’ve been in there.” Kid scratched their cheek.
Doyle gaped.
“Doyle, it’s their family smoking lounge. I’ve told you that before.” Paulie’d been in it, too.
They came to a stop. A long line of cars had formed in the right lane of Arrow Parkway waiting to turn into the grassy field that served as the overflow lot for Sacred Heart. It was always needed for memorials when the Witch took someone. This was the eleventh since Stephen, by Jerk’s count.
The fat flakes were collecting on the windshield. Doyle leaned back and looked out his window.
Kid wiped away some fog with a fingertip. “They saved Monroe when she called. How do I join?”
The car got quiet.
“It’s open to families who’ve lost someone to the Witch,” Jerk explained. “Ancestor in my case. Uncle in Paulie’s.”
“What about Late?” Kid asked.
“Christ. Poor Late,” Paulie said. He shook his head. “No. He refuses.”
“The line of cars isn’t moving.” Jerk rolled down the window and craned his neck. He couldn’t see anything. “Late doesn’t want to witness readings of The Black Ledger.”
Doyle leaned forward and hissed. “See! Skull and Crossbows!”
The line moved one car up.
Jerk sniffed. “Paulie, you’ve got a pinhole in your heater core.”
Doyle huffed.
“Shit,” Paulie swore. “Sorry, Doyle. How bad?”
Jerk sniffed again. “Not bad, but turn the heat off on the defroster. We have to dry out the inside.” He held his hand out the window, catching snowflakes. “If we can.”
Doyle leaned forward and kissed Paulie on the cheek. “It’s OK, Papa.”
Paulie blushed as he adjusted the windows. He peered ahead. “I think they’re waving cars past the lot.”
The line began crawling forward.
-
Mercywood
“The lot’s mud, we’re asking folks to park on side streets, and please respect driveways, but we’re relaxing enforcement tonight.” Snow collected on the shoulders of the clear disposable poncho and transparent cap cover of the Ilium PD officer assigned to direct cars.
Paulie thanked her and drove on.
“Jerk, can we park at Mercywood?”
Jerk groaned. “I was hoping you wouldn’t ask.” He pointed ahead. “Turn on Willard, use the staff gate.”
Paulie turned on the blinker.
“What’s Mercywood?” Kid asked, looking out the window as they turned onto Willard.
“The sign says this is the Pinewood School?”
They looked out the window at the seemingly endless wall of hedge behind wrought iron fencing. “That’s for the rich girls, right?”
Doyle snorted. “You’ve been in the Van Renwyck Room, but not Mercywood?”
“Doyle, Jerk hates the place.” Paulie said as he turned right into the staff gate.
“It’s my parents’ house.” Jerk told Kid over the right shoulder. He began to chew the side of his thumb and stopped himself. “They moved us in when I was 8.”
He wagged his finger back and forth past the gate. “School grew around a few private homes over the years, Tiny bought Mercywood and had it remodeled. Private sale.”
“Sir, do you have your staff badge?” The security guard had come out and was talking to Paulie.
Jerk leaned over toward Paulie’s window and began digging for his wallet. “We’re going to Mercywood. Name’s Theodore Van Renwyck. I’m on the list.”
He found his non-driver’s ID and handed it past Paulie to the guard.
“Just a minute.” The guard went back into the booth.
Jerk turned to Doyle. “No Chipmunks joke this time?”
Doyle rolled his eyes and ignored him.
Snow was melting on the inside of the doors, but the windshield was clear of fog.
The security guard came out. “Here you go, Mr. Van Renwyck. Sorry about your mom.”
Jerk stopped and stared at the guard as he returned the ID. “What about Norma?”
“I…” The guard blinked. “I mean, just that she’s been so sick, that’s all.” He smiled. “She brings me sandwiches sometimes.”
“Yeah,” Jerk said, voice low. “She does that.”
The gate opened. Paulie rolled the car forward, slowly. A hand-stenciled sign said ‘15 mph’.
“Right, then left, then right,” Jerk said.
“Thanks, it’s been a minute.”
“I feel claustrophobic again,” Kid said to Jerk. They tried to roll their window down farther, despite it being as low as it could go.
“Me too. Just a little farther,” Jerk said as they made the second right. He wished he could hold Kid’s hand, just then.
“This is Mercywood,” Jerk said, gesturing as they drove up the driveway.
The main building was a squat, anonymous Federalist brick box. Beside it loomed a smaller Brutalist addition, narrow vertical windows spaced every six feet, like cat’s eyes watching the approach. Both were dark in the diffuse twilight of the snow.
“Still ugly.” Jerk couldn’t think of anything else to say about it. He then added, “I’ll open the garage, you can park in there.”
Paulie followed the driveway as it curved around the hill the house sat on, descending slightly toward the back, where the two-car garage sat beneath the Brutalist addition.
Jerk got out of the car and punched in the code for the door. 1-7-2-3. They had let him pick it when they moved in. It was his favorite four-digit prime. The lights came on as the door rumbled open.
Both his parent’s cars were inside. Tiny’s Seville and Norma’s ancient Toyota Corona she hardly ever drove.
“Huh,” Jerk scratched the side of his head.
He turned and pointed “No room at the inn, park over there.”
“On it,” Paulie’s voice came back from beyond the smeared starbursts of the Diplomat’s headlights. He pulled his car over to the side of the driveway and parked it while Jerk punched in the code and the door closed.
“It’s so quiet, you’d think you were out in the country,” Kid said as they all got out of the car.
“Wait until Pinewood’s hosting a girl’s soccer tournament.” Doyle said. He stretched. “Oooh, it’s getting a bit nippy.”
Jerk looked back at the garage door. “If they didn’t drive to Providence, how did they get there?”
“Did Tiny drive down a car for your uncle Leo?” Paulie asked. Tiny had transported cars Norma’s brother had bought before.
“Maybe,” Jerk shrugged. He pointed to a spot hidden by the darkness. “Service gate to the side street is over there, 2-minute walk to Sacred Heart.”
Kid looked up at the back of the house as it loomed over them. “You said your parent’s house was a dump.”
“I think it is,” Jerk said, walking over. He slipped his hand into Kid’s. “Roof on the addition leaks more than The Broadside’s.” Kid squeezed.
Jerk tugged on Kid’s hand. “Com’on, we’ve got a memorial to get to.”
-
The Black Ledger
“And now, a representative of the Vanderkill Society will read the Black Ledger of those taken by the Witch.” The liturgical minister introduced him before they returned to their pew. This took longer than the Solemn Intercessions on Good Friday.
Jerk stood, unclenching the fist around his thumb. He didn’t want to chew it bloody and bleed on the Black Ledger. Again.
He smoothed out the front of his jacket as he walked towards the lectern where the Ledger waited.
Father Bellafiore was seated in the chancel, just in front of the tabernacle. At Sacred Heart, the layout always made officiants seem more like bodyguards to Christ than men of the cloth.
“I’m, uh–” He hated this part. “Theodore Rousseau Van Renwyck.”
He looked out at the crowd. Full house. Overflow crowds packed the back and lined the outside walls. The doors to the narthex were open, revealing more of the crowd obscured in its dim light.
Most had seen him do this before.
He adjusted the microphone. Fixed his eyes on the ledger. It was easier when he didn’t look at the crowd.
“These are those the Witch has stolen from us.”
Had she?
Jerk didn’t know. He just knew they were gone.
The Black Ledger was nearly square. The leather wrapped cover was more brown than black, edges wearing smooth.
He opened it. He could smell mildew spores that were probably older than anyone in the church.
It had been custom-made for Maerten van Renwyck. Jerk’s ancestor, and the sibling of–
“Barent Van Renwyck. The last Patroon of Renwyck. Brother. Thirty-one. Seventeen eighty-nine.”
The first claimed by the Vanderkill Witch.
“Geertruyd Jansdochter. Seamstress. Twenty-nine. Seventeen eighty-nine.”
Definitely not the woman Barent and Maerten quarreled over.
The script was large, almost childishly so. Maerten, the first to maintain the Ledger, was effectively blind and had to write the names of his brother and their shared beloved large enough that even he could read them.
Jerk turned the page. The next few pages were written in the same hand in fading iron gall ink on the rag paper. Maerten lived to eighty-three. Longer than any Patroon.
Many names were forgotten, even by the families that had lost them. Unmourned, except by the Black Ledger.
He read many mechanically. They had become facts, divorced even from the biographies he’d studied in the Society archives.
The names of the taken spanned 206 years.
“Silas Aries Whitmore. Minister. Fifty-three. Eighteen thirty-one.”
Some said Silas was pushed off a ferry. His much-younger widow married a Hayden. Their sons took the name.
“Lillian Beardsley. Daughter. Thirteen. Eighteen sixty-one.”
Jerk looked out. The Beardsleys were near the back. They still came, one hundred and thirty-four years later. Hers was the last name in iron gall blood. The Witch went quiet for a decade.
“Seymour Gunn. Drunk. Husband. Father. Fifty-nine. Eighteen Seventy-one.”
The purple of the original coal-tar ink had nearly faded, and Jerk had traced over it in ballpoint to make it more indelible a few years prior. Seymour’s biography was empty, other than those biographical details.
Seymour was probably a bastard. Jerk couldn’t be sure.
His voice was getting hoarse by the time he got to the twentieth century. One of Father Bellafiore’s altar servers brought Jerk a glass of water. He sipped from it, and looked out at the crowd. Solemn faces. Tears here and there.
McNally was towards the back, serene like a lizard on a rock.
“Christiane Pétain. Student. Parisian. Nineteen. Nineteen thirteen.”
She had come to Ilium as a student at eighteen.
Her family never acknowledged the Society’s invitation to mourn together.
They never sent for her things.
“Carmine Gaetano. Seminarian. Brother. Son. Twenty-three. Nineteen fifty-one.”
Paulie crossed himself for the uncle he never met.
Next were the names of those taken in the sixties and early seventies. The last of the seventies was the first he remembered.
“Stephen Jonathan Early. Student. Valedictorian. Son. Brother,” Jerk stifled a noise that definitely wasn’t a sob.
“Friend.”
He always added that.
“Seventeen years old. Nineteen seventy-nine.”
His eyes involuntarily went up to the empty choir loft.
Where he had his last conversation with Stephen.
Where he made his promise to him.
-
Captain Fartknocker
Mercywood. May 1979.
“This is Captain Fartknocker. Come in Earth. Do you read me?” Late’s 9-year-old voice came out of every intercom in the house. “Commander Renwyck! Do you read me?”
“If you hold the button down, no one else can reply, Kev!” Stephen called out. Late was somewhere else on the first floor.
“What do you think of Mercywood?” Stephen asked as he turned back to Jerk. They were drinking cokes in the too-bright, too-white kitchen.
“It’s OK,” Jerk said. He pointed at the microwave installed over the range. “It’s got a microwave, that’s… cool.”
The house seemed more endurable with Stephen and Late there.
“I think it’s hideous,” Stephen grimaced, then winked and flashed the grin the brothers shared. “But I guess your Mom’s happy.”
“Yeah, it’s ugly,” Jerk agreed, making a face and looking at his drink.
“It can’t even fit all my books,” Jerk said quietly. His coke fizzed and popped. “I don’t like it here.”
“This house is so cool!” Late said, running into the kitchen. His sneakers chirped on the new vinyl floor. He came to stop next to Stephen and grabbed Stephen’s soda off the table, taking a sip before putting it down.
Late looked like a younger version of Stephen. Lake-blue eyes and sandy blonde hair framing wide friendly faces, incapable of affecting guile. Late smiled more.
“When are we going to the mall? I want to play Skee-Ball!” Late bounced away, into the living room, before Stephen answered. Jerk heard him running upstairs.
“Buddy, you have a lot of books,” Stephen said. “More than any other nine-year-old out there.” Stephen borrowed Leaves of Grass the previous week. Jerk hadn’t read it yet.
“I’m eight,” Jerk corrected him. “Nine in September.”
People always got that wrong. Some thought he was ten or eleven.
“I always forget Kevin’s a little older,” Stephen leaned his head back and yelled. “Kev, if you keep running away we can’t leave.”
Late ran back down the stairs and skidded to a stop just inside the doorway. “Buddy has his own bathroom!”
He’d stacked boxes in front of the door. Of course Late noticed.
“I’m glad you like the house, Kevin.” Jerk wasn’t.
“Skee-Ball?” Late said it like Oliver Twist pleading for more porridge.
“We better go,” Stephen said. “Or Kevin might explode.” He took their drinks and put them in the sink.
“I gotta pee!” Late suddenly exclaimed. He raced upstairs.
Jerk knew which bathroom he was going to use. He sighed.
“Kev, best aim!” Stephen called after Late.
“Stevie, you’re a good big brother,” Jerk said.
His face was serious. “If I had a big brother, I’d want him to be like you.”
Stephen titled his head and smiled. Even smiling, his eyes looked like he might cry. Jerk wondered if he said something wrong.
“You’d make a great little brother,” he said, before ruffling Jerk’s mass of cowlicks. “Great big brother, too.”
“I’m ready!” Late said, running downstairs.
“Did you wash your hands?” Stephen knew the answer.
“Forgot!” Late said, turning to run back up the stairs.
“No, Kevin, in the kitchen. I’m not letting you out of my sight again until I get you out of Mercywood.” Stephen winked at Jerk and twirled the keys to his mom’s Oldsmobile around his finger while Kevin washed his hands in the kitchen sink.
-
Time Machine
Circle Mall. May 1979.
“SKEEEEE-BALLLLL!” Late screamed like a marauding Viking as he charged all the way down the hallway that fed into the mall.
“Should we tell him he doesn’t have any quarters?” Stephen asked Jerk. Stephen seemed quiet on the way over.
Jerk let out a small snort. “He’ll figure it out.” Late bounded around the corner into the mall’s main gallery and went out of sight.
“I want to thank you, Buddy,” Stephen said. “When they held Kevin back a year, I was worried about him.”
“Miss Gilchrist didn’t like him,” Jerk said. “Tiny made sure we both ended up in Mrs. Lyons’s class.”
“How do you know that?” Stephen asked.
“I’ve heard him talk.” Tiny had lots of conversations in front of Jerk that he probably shouldn’t have had. “I was just glad Kevin didn’t want me to do his homework.”
“I have to sit him down at the kitchen table as soon as he gets home, but he does it,” Stephen said. “I tape his favorite cartoons so he can watch them after.”
“Oh, Tiny gave you a VBT200 too?”
Stephen nodded.
Jerk wasn’t sure where they had all come from, besides Japan, like the boxes said. Tiny had given away six by Jerk’s count, and he still had five more.
“I have Battle of the Planets on tapes,” he said. “You might like that.” Tiny had found them for him during one of his trips to “Providence,” where the receipts Jerk saw all had New York City sales tax listed.
“Ahhhh!” Late came around the corner, running toward them.
“Told you he’d figure it out,” Jerk said. He almost smirked.
Late skidded to a stop in front of Stephen. “Emergency! I need quarters!”
“I’ve only got a twenty, and I’m not giving it to you, Kev,” Stephen said, ruffling Late’s hair. “You can wait two minutes so I can get quarters from Davey.”
As near as little Jerk could tell, Davey and Stephen were best friends. They really liked each other. Jerk saw them holding hands one time when he slept over at the Earlys’ house. Late and he had tried to stay up to watch SNL, hoping for a Father Guido Sarducci sketch.
It was less than two minutes, but for Late it was an eternity.
“C’mon!” Late tugged on Stephen’s hand. The sign above the arcade entrance said Time Machine. “Skee-Ball!”
The front of the arcade was dominated by the newest arcade games. Behind those were the pinball machines and redemption counter, and in the far back were the Skee-Ball and coin-pusher games.
Stephen looked up as they reached the entrance, eyes scanning for Davey. “Hey–” He stared at Davey, standing next to the display case of redemption prizes. “Davey, what the hell?”
“Hey, Steph,” Davey said. The left side of his face was bruised and swollen. “I was hoping you wouldn’t come today.”
Davey’s swollen lip was scabbed over, and his eye was nearly shut. Jerk touched his own face reflexively.
Not even Spinks looked that bad after beating Ali. Tiny had watched that a few times on tape.
“Boys,” Davey said. He looked at Late and Jerk. “Buddy, Space Invaders is still broken.”
Jerk groaned. It was his favorite. He always got the high score when he played.
“I’ll help Kevin get tickets,” Jerk said. Late was saving up for a shortwave radio. Four thousand tickets, and he only needed a hundred and fifty more.
Jerk was saving them in a fake book he’d found at a used bookstore. It looked like a copy of Dickens’s A Tale Of Two Cities. He wanted to have secret hiding places for things the way Tiny did.
Stephen stopped and pulled out his wallet. “I need quarters for Kev and Buddy.”
Stephen handed Davey a twenty.
“Normal split?” Davey asked.
“Just a five in quarters for the boys. I don’t want to play anymore,” Stephen said. Davey handed Stephen back five in quarters and three five-dollar bills.
“Davey, can we talk?”
“Back by the Skee-Ball. I can watch the place from there.” Davey walked back.
“Buddy, can you split the quarters?” Stephen asked, dumping five dollars in quarters into Jerk’s hands, which nearly overflowed.
“Sure, Stevie,” Jerk said, looking at Stephen. Stephen’s eyes were wet.
Jerk had noticed that some people could cry but not shed tears. Stephen was one. Little Jerk knew not to cry, because once he started he didn’t know how to stop.
Jerk counted out ten quarters for Late and put them in his left pocket. When he counted the rest for himself, he had ten too, and put them in his right.
Sometimes the belt change dispensers at Time Machine slipped out extra quarters. He always returned them, and the attendants eventually stopped giving him odd looks when he did.
Stephen and Davey were standing by the door to the back room, where they kept the big-ticket prizes under lock and key. The display case boxes of those were empty.
Jerk gave Late a quarter, and they set up at their usual machines, two and four. When Jerk played alone he liked three. It was the only respectable prime number of the four, though four was two, the first prime, raised to the power of itself, which he thought was cool.
Jerk had been chewing on his thumb. He hadn’t even realized it until he could taste blood. He pulled his thumb out and looked at it. It wasn’t too bad. Skee-Ball would keep his hands busy for a few minutes.
Jerk tried not to listen, but machine four was next to where the door went to the back. He was bad at Skee-Ball, but he liked feeling like he was contributing to Late’s shortwave.
“–leaving me here, in Ilium?” Stephen asked. His eyes were more than wet.
Davey murmured something, then added “I thought my dad was going to kill me.”
“Three hundred and fifty points!” Late cheered his own skill. Jerk gave him another quarter, and went back to his game. One hundred points. , Stephen had said something. The parts of Davey’s face that weren’t bruised were white.
“Don’t talk like that. I’ll visit you on leave,” Davey said. He didn’t sound convinced.
Stephen was shaking now. “No, you won’t.” He started pushing past Davey to leave. “I won’t let you.”
“Steph, I love you!” Davey said, loud enough that even Late’s arm hesitated mid-swing as he turned his head. A boy had come in and was playing the Nugent pinball machine. He either didn’t hear or didn’t care.
Davey seemed embarrassed. Jerk and Late looked at each other and went back to playing Skee-Ball.
“Steph, I swear.” Davey grabbed Stephen’s arm.
Stephen’s voice was hollow. “I don’t care what you swear anymore.” He pulled his arm out of Davey’s hand.
“Boys, I’ll be next door at Woolworth’s,” Stephen said as he stalked out of the arcade.
“Steph, wait!” Davey said, chasing after him.
Davey came back after a minute and stood behind the redemption counter, staring out the entrance. When Jerk and Late left, he didn’t say a word.
-
Simplicity
Circle Mall. May 1979.
The Woolworth's in Circle Mall was an artifact from back when it was still a strip mall. A few years earlier, they'd added the roof and the stores that formed the outer L facing the parking lot. Its wide front opened onto the main gallery—a hundred feet of plate glass, long past its usefulness.
They found Stephen in the back corner where the bolts of fabric and clothing patterns were. He was holding a Simplicity dress pattern and staring at a sunny bolt of linen.
"Are you going to make Mom another dress?" Late asked as the boys approached.
Stephen didn't answer. He was staring through the bolt of fabric.
"Stevie?" Late reached out and took Stephen's hand like a lost child.
Stephen's head snapped back with a gasp, and he jerked his hand away reflexively. Late jumped back, too.
"Kevin, where did you come from?" Stephen's eyes focused, and his body relaxed as he registered Late. Jerk stood a couple of feet behind.
"The arcade?" Late tilted his head.
Stephen let out a small sigh. "Of course. Right."
Stephen looked at the pattern in his hands. "Sorry, I was somewhere else."
"I asked if you were going to make Mom another dress?" Late pointed at the bolt of linen. "That's a pretty fabric."
Stephen looked at the fabric. "I think so, too." He smiled and looked at the pattern in his hand, eyes sad. "It will make a pretty sundress."
Stephen fumbled for his wallet. "Why don't you boys get a model?"
He pulled a ten out and handed it to Jerk. "Buddy, get yourself a couple of comics or something too, okay?"
Jerk took the ten and stared at it, folding it before he could memorize the serial number. His mouth was bone dry.
"I need a coke," Jerk said.
Stephen was staring at the fabric again. Late glanced back at Jerk.
"C'mon, Kevin." Jerk tilted his head toward the toys and models. "I bet they've got Star Wars models."
Late was bouncing again before they got to the models. Jerk's mouth was still dry, and he went to get an orange coke from the lunch counter nearby while Late browsed.
The counter attendant was smoking a cigarette, looking bored. She recognized Jerk and shook her head as he approached. "Fizz tank is low—you'll just complain."
The stink of her cigarettes plastered itself over the smell of minestrone—the 'soup of the day' for several years running—and the smoke coated his arid mouth with tar.
Jerk made a face. "Can I have a glass of water? I'm thirsty."
By the end of the fifteen seconds it took her to pour him the glass, it was saving him from gagging.
He tilted the small glass back and drained it. "Could I have another?"
She started to say something and then stopped when she looked at his face. "Sure," she said, and refilled his glass. He sat at the counter, sipping it this time, and she went back to being bored with her cigarette at the other end of the counter.
The slap and squeak of Late's sneakers preceded him, vaulting over the stool next to Jerk to sit on it, sliding the large box of his prize onto the lunch counter. "Star Destroyer!" he said excitedly.
The box was damaged, and it was marked down: $5.49.
"It's not a good deal if it doesn't have all the parts, or if they're damaged." Jerk picked up the box. It had been crushed in one corner. He shook it and shrugged. "Sounds okay."
They bought the model, and Jerk ran back to the lunch counter, putting a quarter tip on it for the attendant. "Thank you for the water," he said. She took it and smiled weakly. "Have a better day, Buddy."
They waited in the main gallery for another twenty minutes before Stephen came out with the Simplicity pattern and a length of sunny linen. His eyes were puffy.
They headed back to Mercywood.