CHAPTER 19
Kelly drove us home. I sat in the back, of course. It doesn’t matter who’s in a car with me. If there are more than two people, I always end up in the back. And I was so little as a kid that I had to sit on a booster seat in the back until I was in the third grade. And people must assume that little guys prefer the backseat — and in the middle of it if there are five people. Far from true, of course. I dream about sitting shotgun with the window open and the wind blowing through my short hair.
I can’t wait for driver’s education in the summer. It may be the only way I will ever get to sit in the front seat.
As we approached the funeral home, I suddenly remembered that I had told Todd Dixon that I would push off the snow out back. “Let me out in front of the funeral home,” I said to Kelly. “I need to clear the snow off their basketball court.”
“They have a basketball court?” Kelly asked in an unbelieving way.
“Yeah, the spirits from inside there like to play at night,” I replied. “Ask Wheat. She watches them through our bedroom window.”
“Spank!” she yelled yet another time. And then I remembered. I said “our” bedroom window. That’s something that both of us don’t want anyone to know about, especially somebody like Kelly. He didn’t seem to notice, though. He seemed too interested in the fact that a funeral home had a basketball court.
“I want to see this basketball court,” he said.
“OK by me,” I said. “Pull into the driveway on the left there and it will take you around.”
He did and I was happy to see that most of the snow had melted off because of the warmer weather. I would be able to push the snow off rather than lift it. Easy money.
“This is pretty neat back here,” Kelly said. “I’ll help you clear the snow and then I’ll take you on in a game of Horse.”
A game of Horse didn’t appeal to me much since a basketball might as well be a bowling ball the way I shoot. But I would let Kelly man a snow shovel if he wanted to show Wheat what a good guy he was.
“I’ll get the shovels,” I said.
I put in the combination to the garage where the Dixon brothers keep the coach and limousine. It’s also where the snow shovels are kept and where a few basketballs are usually rolling around.
I’ve washed the two vehicles on occasion, too. The limousine is for the dead person’s family and the coach is for dearly departed. The coach used to be called a hearse but that must have become too creepy of a name for some people. So you don’t hardly hear it called that anymore. I’m getting this funeral home stuff down pat. Nope, no interest in being a funeral director when I grow up, though. Being in the prep room pretty much convinced me of that.
A few times, I have backed both out of the garage so I could wash them. One time, the radio came on when I started the coach and the singer James Brown yelled out, “I feel good!” I doubt anybody whoever rode in the back would have agreed. Then again, maybe they would have.
When I was putting in the combination, I suddenly realized that Kelly was right behind me. “I’ve never been in a funeral home at night,” he said. “I bet it would be spookier than a haunted house.”
I’m not going to lie to you. I once took Bobby Taylor inside on a dare. He said I was too chicken to take him inside. I was shocked myself when I saw a body in the viewing room, apparently still there after an earlier visitation. When Bobby saw the body illuminated by the one light left on, he looked a little like a corpse himself.
He went skedaddling out of there and never mentioned the funeral home again. I felt a little guilty about sneaking in there that time but I didn’t feel so bad that Bobby had the pants scared off him that night.
I didn’t even think about taking Kelly in, though. I still wasn’t overwhelmed with him. “You want a tour?” I said, sort of sarcastically.
“What’s all in there?” he asked.
“A couple of viewing rooms, some offices, a roomful of caskets and a kitchen upstairs along with a prep room.”
“Are there any bodies?”
“Don’t know. Maybe in the prep room upstairs. Sometimes, there is a body in one of the viewing rooms if they have him or her ready for a funeral the next day.”
“What about us going in?” Kelly asked.
I looked at Wheat who was still hovering around the car about 30 feet away. She didn’t want any part of this. In fact, I was a little surprised that she even let Kelly drive her around to the back of the funeral home. I knew she was having the woolies. Served her right for getting involved with Kelly.
So I said to him: “I’ll tell you what. If you can persuade Wheat to come in with us, I’ll let you lay in one of the caskets. How about that? Maybe I’ll even close it on you for a second. You can pretend you’re Dracula.”
He grinned and walked back over to Wheat. I was smirking because no way was he going to talk my sister into going in there at night. No way. She might be half African-American and half of a lot of Pacific Islands but she would be whiter than me after venturing inside a funeral home. No way.
While they talked, I put up the garage door and got the funeral home’s big shovels. I also kicked a basketball outside. Wheat was shaking her head and then, all of a sudden, I heard her say, “Oh, OK.”
“OK what?” I said.
“OK, she said she would go in with us if we don’t get near any dead bodies and she can close you in a casket, too,” Kelly answered.
Hmmmm. “What’s the turnaround here, Sis?” I said. “You would never even think about going in there before.”
Of course, I knew what it was no matter what she said. Kelly had the charm, even on an apparent boy-buster like Wheat.
“Kelly said he would give me a driving lesson in his Mustang,” she said. “And you act so brave around here, Spank. I want to see you get in a casket. But no way do we get around any dead bodies. If we do, Spank, there will be one more body in there and Benny Goodchild and his bad toe will be wrestling at 119 in the conference meet.”
I just shook my head in disbelief, deciding not to mention that the Mustang was really Kelly’s sister’s car. “Then if we’re going to do this, Kelly, you need to move your car out from back here and somewhere down the block. Then again, why don’t you let Wheat drive it over to our house for her first lesson and maybe Dad will be looking out the window. That would work out swell for both of you.”
“Stuff it, Spank,” was her reply.
While they were moving the car, I quickly started pushing the snow off the basketball court. By the time the two love birds came back, I was about done. Kelly did help finish up, though.
The garage is attached to the rest of the home by a door that leads into a hallway. On the right of the hallway and on the street’s side is a room with a display of urns and memorial plaques and all the different kinds of caskets.
And on the other side of the hallway are a supply room and then a small flower room — mainly just a bunch of shelves — where delivery people from the various floral shops can drop off arrangements and wreaths through an outside door off the back parking lot. The flower room’s inside door off the hallway is kept locked so nobody can gain entrance from the back lot even when the outside door is unlocked during office hours.
If you go farther down the hallway, you come to the front entrance, a main office and the two viewing rooms — one big and one small. And like I said earlier, the prep room — or embalming room if that sounds better — a kitchen and a few more offices are upstairs.
I guess it’s your typical funeral home — even though the only other one I was in was when my dad died. And I wasn’t exactly doing a lot of observing of my surroundings that day.
I reminded Kelly again that I wasn’t doing any guided tours. I was sort of ashamed of myself that we were inside anyway. The Dixon brothers have been pretty good to me but I’ve heard a few of their stories about how they would take their friends into the funeral home when their dad owned it.
They told how one of their friends peed his pants when they took him into the casket room in the dark and pretended that there were bodies in all of them. Then another buddy jumped out of one to scare the poor guy. They thought that was great fun. I’m not sure they would laugh if I was caught doing the same thing, though.
I left the lights off but there was enough to see in the casket room because of the nearest street light shining through the windows. It was pretty eerie, though, even for me. Kelly and Wheat were still out in the hallway. Wheat was looking a little like a dog that didn’t want to go any further on its walk with Kelly trying to coax her on.
“There aren’t any bodies in here,” I said.
“You better be right, buster,” she said.
“Maybe some ashes in urns from the dearly departed but ashes don’t make very good ghosts.”
“Come on, Spank. She’s scared enough as it is,” Kelly said.
“I’m just kidding,” I said. “There are urns but they’re all empty, just like the coffins. Come on, Wheat. Face your fears. You’re always saying that to me about wrestling stuff.”
She moved forward. It was going to be hard for me not to mention to her that I knew there was a container over in the storage room of a woman’s ashes. Her husband wanted them to be saved until he died, too, so his ashes could be mixed with hers. Maybe that’s romantic to some people, but I’m not seeing it right now.
I also had peeked down the hallway and into the larger visitation room and saw there was indeed a body — it looked like an elderly woman — in a casket. So they must have had a viewing earlier in the day and that she was all ready for her funeral tomorrow morning. I stayed still about that.
Wheat and Kelly, kind of locked together, came through the door to the casket room. Kelly suddenly looked as uncomfortable as Wheat
“Just empty caskets,” I said, not daring to mention the elderly woman down the way. “No corpses, no vampires, no mummies.”
Caskets are actually kind of cool, especially the ones made out of fine wood. I know this sounds a little weird for a 15-year-old kid to be saying but to me, they would look like fancy soap box derby racers if they had wheels. I can here it now: “Drivers, start your coffins.” I think a famous sports writer once said that about the Indianapolis 500. Yeah, I know. Creepy.
“You still want to get in one?” I asked Kelly.
He didn’t answer. “Come on, man,” I said. “I’m taking a big chance bringing you in here. You wanted to come. Am I going to have to double-dog dare you now?”
“OK, OK,” he said. “I can do this. But you’re doing it, too, remember?”
I did. I opened the top of the oaken one that was sitting on a stand. Kelly, without saying a word, hopped right in. It was a pretty amazing athletic move. “Hey, I high jumped 5-foot-11 in junior high,” he said when both Wheat sort of went “Woooo!” together.
I closed the bottom half and there Kelly was, lying like Snow White before the big kiss. I didn’t mention that. I was afraid that Wheat would want to play the role of Princess Charming and kiss this froggy.
“This is pretty comfortable,” Kelly said, doing a pretend yawn like he was going to fall asleep.
“Now your turn, Spank,” Wheat said.
I wasn’t going to be able to flop in there like Kelly so I walked across the hall to the storage room to get a little two-step ladder. As I grabbed it, I thought I heard something near the outside door to the flower room.
That gave me the heebie-jeebies but I sneaked over to the window and peeked through the blinds. I felt my heartbeat in my throat — Hummingbird Heart paying me a visit again. Uh-oh. I spied the rusty old car out in the parking lot that Wheat and I saw when we were shoveling the snow a few days earlier. And then I saw a couple of guys — one little and one big — trying to break in.
I froze, but only for a moment because somebody put a hand on my back. I could have jumped high enough to completely clear a casket. “What’s that noise?” Wheat whispered.
“Shhhh. A couple of guys are trying to break in and I think it might be the One-Booted Man and his sidekick,” I whispered back. “Look at that car.”
“What do we do?” Wheat said as she grabbed my arm really, really hard.
“Hide,” I said.
“This would be one time I wish we would always carry our cell phone around,” Wheat said. “I left it back on my desk.”
“Just great,” I thought.
We hustled back into the casket room and quickly told Kelly what was going on. “Should we confront them?” he asked.
“If it’s who I think it is, I figure one has some kind of weapon,” I said. “Let’s keep out of their sight. If it looks like they’re going to do something really bad, we’ll surprise them. I’m going to try to sneak down to the office and call 911 and then Dad while you guys hide in the caskets.”
“Not me,’’ she gasped.
“Yes, you,” I hissed. “Best place to hide. I’ll stick something under the lid so you’re not completely closed in. It’s hard to see in here anyway.”
“Great,” she said. And then she climbed up the little two-step ladder and got in the mahogany one. I don’t think she wanted to look too scared in front of Kelly but I could tell she was really agitated. I stuck a photo album between the lid and the top half of the casket so there was a two-inch gap. I then went over and closed the lid over Kelly.
As I headed down the hallway, I heard the inside door to the flower room being jimmied. Maybe this wasn’t such a great plan. I dove into the office just as I heard the flower room door give way. I hid under the desk.
“You go into the room over there with the caskets and see if there’s anything worth taking,” I heard the guy with the raspy voice say. “I’m going to check out the old lady they got in here. Her step-nephew said she would probably be buried in some of her expensive jewelry. He said she was a scrooge.”
”That’s sick,” said his little accomplice. I agreed with him. I didn’t think I could let that happen. I reached up for the phone and dialed 911.
But at that very moment, I heard a bang from the casket room and Wheat gasp, “I can’t breathe!” I dropped the phone and headed that way. Right behind me, I heard the One-Booted Man coming, apparently with a complete set of boots on. For some reason, I wondered if he had to go out and buy a whole other pair.
As I raced through the door, I scanned the room quickly and saw that Wheat had managed to climb out of her casket and Kelly had thrown open the top of his and was trying to get out when the little guy slammed it down on his head. That didn’t sound so good.
“There are people in these caskets!” the little guy almost shrieked as I raced over and picked up an urn and threw it at him. It missed but while he was ducking, Wheat took him down just like he was Thirsty Thurston.
And then I saw stars as the One-Booted Man hit me with something that careened off my shoulder and into the side of my head. Because I was a moving target, I don’t think he got off the perfect blow he was intending.
But I went down anyway and was pretty stunned. I’m not sure what happened next but I heard a shriek that could have just about awakened the elderly lady out in the viewing room.
For a moment, I thought it was Wheat although I never had heard her scream in my life. Then I heard the little guy cry out, “I think she broke my shoulder.”
I pulled myself into a sitting position and saw the little guy slinking toward the door, his right arm hanging at his side. I could see through the light in the window that Wheat was now up and facing the One-Booted Man.
“Well, I guess you picked on somebody your own side but now you got me,” he said to Wheat. He was patting something in his hand just like he had after I tried to tackle him last week in the neighborhood. I recognized now that it was a lug wrench.
I charged him from behind and when I hit him, I realized that he was almost as huge as Big Jim. He didn’t go all the way down but he stumbled forward and Wheat was able to knee him in the face, knocking something out of his mouth. He sounded like a wounded grizzly bear and we all know they can be dangerous.
He was, too. He swung the lug wrench at Wheat — who had let herself get too close to him — and caught her on the side of her face. She went down like a rock in water. I started to go to her but the One-Booted Man, blood dripping out of his mouth, swung the lug wrench at me. I was able to jump out of the way, but barely.
I wanted to help Wheat but I figured that ending up beside her in the same situation wasn’t going to be good for either of us. There was only one way to save the day: Run. As I did, I scooped up what had fallen out of One-Booted’s mouth and saw that it was dentures.
He was on my heels again. I headed for the stairs to the second floor and he lunged at me and caught me by my foot. Wouldn’t you know it, my tennis shoe came off.
“Now, we’re even,” I yelled back as I pulled away.
“You think so, you little …” he said. Yeah, well, again I’m not going to tell you what he called me. “I know you now. You’re the little punk who stole my boot. I thought I recognized you when I saw you shoveling snow the other day. Where’s your cop friend when you need him? And give me back my teeth.”
Maybe I should have. But I figured if he was chasing me, he was going the opposite direction of Wheat. And the longer I kept him after me, the better chance of somebody coming to our rescue. But if I just gave him his teeth back, maybe he would leave and nobody else — mainly me — would get hurt.
Oh, well. I had made my decision. And I think his talking slowed him down because I seemed to get a bit of a lead rushing up the stairs. There was only one light on up on the second floor, too, and I knew where the switch was — a little behind the refrigerator in the kitchen where nobody could find it unless they already knew about it. I had just enough of a lead for me to flip it off before he could see what I had done. Now it was pitch black.
I heard One Boot bang into the door frame to the kitchen and then apparently stop. I creeped down the two little steps to the prep room and one of them gave a little creak.
“If you want to play hide-and-seek, that’s what we’ll do,” he said and he came closer. He then stumbled down the two steps into the prep room. He said a few more bad words.
I could hear him feeling for a switch but the only lights in the prep room were the hanging ones over the work areas with chains to pull. He was coming across the room — about 10 feet away from me. But I had a plan, actually a plan I had just thought of when I realized I was right in front of the open elevator shaft.
“I may not see you but I smell you, you little pansy,” he said, obviously getting a whiff of the Midnight Breeze that apparently was still permeating off me. “A little twerp shouldn’t smell so sweet. Throw me my teeth and I’ll leave you alone.”
He came closer, now about five feet away and I could hear him breathing. I got into a wrestler’s stance and then whispered, “Bite me, Tooth Decay.”
He rushed in my direction just as I did a pancake move onto the floor. He stumbled over my body and went tripping into the elevator shaft — I figured a little like Gollum going into the fire on Mount Doom.
He yelled something I couldn’t understand and then I heard him hit the bottom. I rushed over and pulled the cord on one of the hanging lights and then looked down the shaft. The platform was all the way into the basement and he was lying there in a grotesque pose. He was also groaning. It didn’t look like he was going anywhere soon except on a gurney.
I went speeding downstairs while flipping on lights as I went and found Wheat still on the floor. She was breathing OK and moaning a little to herself. I started to head for the office to call for an ambulance but then I saw the red-and-blue lights of a squad car heading into the parking lot. I guess my 911 call had gone through and they were able to track our location.
And then I heard Kelly. “Can anybody let me out?” The little guy had apparently pulled the lock on the casket after he had slammed its top down on Kelly’s head. I opened it and Kelly had a knot on his forehead about the size of a golf ball. But he seemed OK.
He got out slowly and I told him to stay with Wheat while I opened the garage door for the police officers. A couple of them came hustling in and I took them to the basement steps and told them about One Boot.
By the time I got back to Wheat and Kelly, he was starting to give her what looked like artificial respiration. “She doesn’t need that, you dunce.”
“How do you know?” Wheat said weakly.
Kelly stopped. “You OK?” he said to her.
“My face feels like it’s broken but a few more of what you were doing might help.”
Kelly leaned down and gave her what looked more like a kiss rather than any kind of help in breathing. I stood there for a second and then figured that three was a crowd. I went out into the hall just as Ric came rushing in through the garage. In a few minutes, there were a couple more squad cars, two ambulances and a lot of neighbors out on the sidewalk.
CHAPTER 20
When the dust finally settled, it was determined that the One Booted Man — real name Dex Glass — had a broken kneecap, three broken ribs and a concussion from his fall and a swollen mouth minus his dentures. His accomplice — Jerry Simpleman, an appropriate name, I thought — had a torn ligament in his shoulder.
Wheat had a broken cheekbone and might need surgery when the swelling went down. Kelly had his knot, quickly turning black and blue like some kind of geode we studied in freshman science. And I had a little bit of the shakes that I was trying hard to hide from everyone.
Glass and Simpleman were both in custody with Glass also in the hospital. Both were being linked to several other break-ins in our part of town. Glass had a criminal record that included assault with a deadly weapon. Simpleman was more of a shop lifter type. The police had picked him up a few blocks from the funeral home and he was claiming that he had been a victim of an assault.
It was just as well that there were a half a dozen other cops at the funeral home because Ric was definitely not showing any sympathy for Glass’s injury. He might have thrown him down the elevator shaft again if his law enforcement buddies hadn’t kept him away from Glass as the EMTs carted him off.
I was considered a bit of a hero even if all I really did was drop to the floor and trip the guy — and steal his teeth, too. The Dixon brothers were very grateful we stopped a burglary and the possible tampering with a body. Because of that, they didn’t seem too upset that we were climbing into their caskets. I’m not sure the cops gave them the whole story but I figured it reminded them of their own shenanigans when they were younger.
Mom and Ric weren’t as understanding. They said if I didn’t have the conference meet coming up, I would probably be grounded immediately for taking Wheat and Kelly into the funeral home.
I felt guilty that it was my decision that got Wheat hurt and I felt tears run down my cheeks for the second time in a day. Wheat had been taken to the hospital by ambulance, too, but came home later in the evening. She had been given some strong pain medicine and seemed a little loopy, but she understood she wasn’t going to be wrestling in the conference meet.
Mom and Ric sort of tucked us into bed that night. They hadn’t done that in a long time. They treated me almost as tenderly as they did Wheat even though I knew there would be a reckoning at some point.
I think I saw a tear in Ric’s eye as he gave me a kiss on the forehead. Mom asked Wheat to lean her head down the side of her top bunk so she could do the same. At that point, I wailed, “I’m sorry!”
Nobody said anything for a moment until I heard the weak voice of Wheat above me. “Knock it off, Spank. Kelly talked you into taking us in there and I wasn’t exactly dragged in. You took care of that big guy with your sneakiness.”
“And you took care of the little guy,” I sniffled.
“Yeah,” Wheat almost whispered. “That was kind of fun.”
Ric laughed at that and Mom even smiled a little. Then they told us to get some sleep. That was pretty hard to do. I heard Wheat groaning a little from time to time and any time I fell off to sleep, it seemed I dreamed about the One Booted Man chasing us. At one point, he had werewolf teeth and I must have let out a noise.
Then I heard Wheat say, “I’m coming down.”
I moved over against the wall and she climbed into bed beside me. She reached over and tussled my hair. I gave her a tap on the shoulder. “I’m hurting a little, Spank and I just don’t want to be up there alone after all that has happened. And I’m having some Spank-like dreams — or nightmares.”
We laid side by side and it was a comforting feeling. I had to say it again, though. “I’m so sorry, Wheat.”
“I know you are,” she said. “But it will be all right. We did good tonight even though we shouldn’t have been doing what we were doing. And don’t worry about me and the wrestling. I’m a sophomore. I’ll have other chances to win the conference — and maybe the state.”
“I don’t think I can wrestle if you don’t,” I told her.
“Don’t go there, Spank. You wrestle for both of us. You do your best. When the going gets tough …”
“Yeah, I know …the tough get going.”
“Now go to sleep.”
And so I did. I think she did, too. Before I knew it, it was morning and Wheat was snoring. The left side of her face was swollen but she still looked sort of like an angel to me.
——
Mom and Dad let Wheat sleep in. She wasn’t going to school anyway. She had an appointment with a surgeon.
“Ta-da,” Lake kept saying when she didn’t join the family for breakfast.
“She still has an ouchie,” Mom finally said.
Of course, Lake repeated “Ouchie.” We’re giving that kid quite an early vocabulary.
I wish I could have stayed home from school, too, because I was the one who was going to have to explain to everyone what happened
Big Jim and Sally already knew, though. “Kelly called me last night and told me all about it,” Sally said. “It sounds like you saved the day, Sir William. I’m impressed. Even Kelly seemed impressed.”
Her brother wasn’t as impressed, though. “How are we going to win the conference if Wheat isn’t going to be able to wrestle?”
I didn’t know what to tell him.
“I should have warned you more,” Big Jim added. “You hang around Kelly Carson and see what happens.”
“Now, now, now, big bro, you just don’t like him because we painted your face pink and purple when you fell asleep that Easter and you were supposed to be helping us with the easter eggs.”
We pulled into the parking lot and Big Jim stormed off. Sally just sat in the front seat. I got out and waited. She just kept sitting. I stood there for a while and then opened her door to see if she was OK.
“Thank you, kind sir,” she said as she climbed out. “I know you wanted to do that.”
I figured I would keep it to myself that I opened her door more out of curiosity than courtesy. She gave me a sly grin and I wondered which Sally I was going to get — and if she was going to plant one on me again. I was totally fine with it if that happened.
“Hey, Spank, Kelly told me he might take your sister to the prom if she felt up to it. She apparently can’t wrestle Saturday, right?”
I nodded, wondering where this was going.
“Well, why don’t we double with them since you’re apparently a free agent now that Laurie Middlebrook’s soldier boy is back in town?”
I gulped but thought I might give it to her a little. “Well, there is a chance I might be in the championship round of the conference meet,” I said.
“Well, I’ll come and watch you and we can go from there,” she said.
“One condition,” I said.
“What’s that?” she laughed. “A condition, little man?”
“What did I tell you about calling me little man,” I huffed.
“Oh, sorry, Sir William. And what would your worthiness’s one condition be?”
“If you wear that yellow dress that you had on at dance class on Monday.”
“You liked me in that dress?”
“Pretty much.”
“That old thing? Well, I was thinking of something else but I can see what I can do. I do like that yellow dress, too. I’ll see if I have the right accessories to go along with it.”
What did that mean, I wondered.
She gave my arm a little slug as we walked into the school. “Saturday is going to be a big day. You think my brother has a chance of winning his weight?”
The way my mind was working, I had almost forgotten she had a brother … or mother … or an orneriness when dealing with me just a few days ago. My mind was trying to take everything in that had happened to me in the last half day.
“Earth to Spank, earth to Spank,” Sally said.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Yeah, what?”
“Yeah, I’ll go with you.”
“I thought we already established that. My brother. What about him?”
“What about him?” I repeated. “You want him to go, too?”
“Never mind. Call me tonight.”
“Call you what? Ohhh, call you on the phone.”
“Spank, are you sure your sister and Kelly were the only ones who got conked last night?” she said as she headed the other way down the hall.
I just smiled as I watched her glide down the hallway while feeling a little awkward and a whole lot of overwhelmed. I had to wonder if maybe I could someday hook up with an average looking but sweet girl who made me feel like I didn’t have to be constantly living up to my legend — ha, ha.
CHAPTER 21
The news quickly spread in school about what had happened at the funeral home. I guess the knot on Kelly’s noggin was like a press release. A few of our teammates came up to me and commiserated about Wheat. A couple of guys kidded me about how tough I was.
Both the Brayton brothers, Billy and Bobby, said nice things to me. Bobby’s girl friend, Ellie Robistelli, even gave me a thumbs-up out in the hallway and called out, “Way to go, tiger.” She may make my Top 5 list pretty soon.
I guess the news hadn’t spread into Laurie Middlebrook’s circle of friends, though. She smiled at me when I came into English class and then asked me if I was liking the Robert Frost poems we were studying.
I said I did, especially the one about good fences making good neighbors, although I couldn’t think of the name of the poem. She couldn’t, either, and we both sat there trying to think of it, allowing any awkwardness to pass while we waited for the bell.
I was glad I didn’t have to talk to her about the One Booted Man and Wheat’s injury and Kelly Carson’s noggin. I told Bobby Taylor not to bring it up around her but that wasn’t really necessary. Other than Wheat, I don’t think Bobby has talked to a girl since grade school.
Of course, Coach Mathews already knew about Wheat. Ric had called him in the morning. When I got to the wrestling room after school, he waved me into his office. “Tough about your sister,” he said. “She would have won the conference and then been one of the top seeds for the state tournament. I’m glad she’s just a sophomore”
I agreed. Then he asked me how much I weighed.
“I was almost up to 115 this morning and that was before breakfast,” I said.
“Can you lose enough to take your sister’s spot at 112 tomorrow?” he asked.
“Maybe,” I said, holding back the gasp.
“Well, you obviously would have a better chance of advancing at the lower weight and I think Benny is back in good enough shape that he could maybe win one match tomorrow at 119. Don’t repeat this, but if I wrestled the Torso at 112 against a top-notch wrestler, they might arrest me for child abuse. The poor kid is just not a varsity wrestler.”
I agreed but didn’t say so. I was thinking more about the nice meal I was going to be missing tonight.
“I’ve lost three or four pounds before,” I said. “I can do it.”
Coach Mathews smiled. “I think that will give us a better chance of winning the meet and maybe a chance for you to take the 112 title. I hear you’re on a bit of a roll anyway. Some sort of hero last night. Just curious. Do you think your wrestling background helped?”
I said it did. I knew that would make Coach happy. And I guess I did react quickly and knew how to avoid that charging moose of a jerk. Maybe I kept my cool, too. I don’t know. I would have to think a little more on how much my wrestling might have helped me handle the situation. I do know the time I was most scared was after everything was over and I relived how it had turned out.
“You good with all this, Spank?” Coach Mathews said. “You look like you’re somewhere else. I know you’ve had a crazy day or two and it has to be upsetting about Tanda. If you want to go ahead and stay at 119, we can do that. I know you have some work ahead of you if you are going to lose the weight.”
“I’ll be good at 112,” I assured him.
“Great,” he said. “Now round up the rest of the guys for a quick meeting and then everybody can do what they need to do.”
The meeting was a bit somber because of the news about Wheat — most knew the story anyway — and then Coach went over our lineup and surprised Benny that he was going to get back his 119 spot. He looked happy.
The conference meet was going to be at Penn High School with the morning session starting at 9. I would have to win two matches in the morning to advance to the semifinals in the afternoon and then win that to get into the evening finals.
After Coach got done talking, we all got into a circle and put our hands together. Dion Borden told how we were going to whump on Penn and Mishawaka and then Big Jim, as emotional as I have seen him, said we were going win the meet for Wheat.
Then the chanting started. “Win for Wheat! Win for Wheat!”
Guys started chest bumping each other and Benny came over and gave me a big hug. “Thanks, Spank,” he said. “I’m so happy I’m getting the chance.” Then Tommy the Torso hugged me, too. He was as happy as Benny because he wasn’t going to have to fill in at 112.
While most of the guys headed home, I put on a sweat suit and started running laps around the gym. I figured I could take the weight off if I ran for an hour. Sherman Nelson, our 177-pounder, was running, too.
We call him Tank — Sherman Tank, get it. He’s a pretty good football lineman but just an average wrestler. This Tank is known to run out of gas. He is heavy to the metal in the first period but if an opponent can avoid getting pinned during that time, he can usually outlast the Tanker. Yeah, he tanks about halfway through the second period. Of all our nicknames, his might be the most appropriate — in more ways than one.
I didn’t think a bunch of running was going to help him the day before the conference. He didn’t usually have weight to lose. “You over, Tank?” I asked as I passed him on a lap.
“I’m pretty much right on weight,” he said. “But my little sister turned 13 today and I want to have some of her birthday cake. I figure if I lose a couple of pounds running, I can eat a couple of pieces.”
“So you want to have your cake and eat it, too,” I said as I stayed beside him for several slow strides.
“What does that mean?” he asked.
“I don’t really know,” I admitted. “My granddad has always said that. I think it means that…
“Beat it, Spank,” he said. “I don’t care what it means and I don’t need to be having any more conversations while I’m trying to work up a sweat. You little guys always tick me off with how easily you can run.”
I scooted along. I should have probably told him that I didn’t think the cake was going to be good for him right before the meet.
I ran for almost an hour. The Tank made it for about 20 minutes. I wasn’t sure that was going to allow him a second piece of cake. But he still could have one and eat one, I thought, and still wondered what that stupid expression meant.
Sweat was pouring off me when I went back to the locker room. I stripped down to my tighty whities — I gave up my Spiderman undies when I started high school — and got on the scales. I was just a little under 113 and so I felt pretty good. I could lose another pound before morning easy enough. I called Ric on our cell phone and he said he could pick me up.
Maddie Hamilton came in to pick up towels and looked embarrassed that I was sitting there without a shirt on and with my three chest hairs sticking straight out. “Oh, sorry, Spank,” she said. “I thought everyone was gone.”
“It’s just me and Bobby Magee,” I said. It’s a line from an old song that I’ve heard my Grandma Kate sometimes sing. Maddie apparently hadn’t heard it.
“Is he a new kid?” she asked.
I laughed. “No, no, that’s from a song,” I said. “It’s just me.”
She looked like she was turning red and I guess I noticed — maybe for the first time — that she was kind of cute. Long blonde hair, pretty teeth and dimples. I like dimples for some reason. She might be in the 142-pound class and a couple of inches taller than me but so what. I wasn’t planning on wrestling her. And I’m beginning to think that size doesn’t have to be such a big deal — unless you have to lose a couple of pounds for a meet.
“Well, good luck, Spank,” she said as she headed quickly for the door with a pile of dirty towels. “You’ve always been one of my favorite wrestlers.”
Geez, I am barely average, I thought. What’s with that girl? I wanted to ask her a couple of questions but Mr. Gunderson, the sports facilities’ custodian, was the only one around when I came out of the locker room. He can’t hear worth a darn so it’s hard to talk with him. So I just waved when I went by as he pushed a broom across the floor.
“You the last one?” he yelled.
“Yes, sir,” I yelled back.
“You wrestling tomorrow?”
I yelled out another, “Yes, sir.”
“Then good luck and don’t call me sir,” he yelled, upping the decimals even more. “I was a gunnery sergeant, not an officer. We didn’t have much use for them around the artillery.”
“Is that what affected your hearing, Mr. Gunderson,” I almost screeched.
“What are you hearing?” he shouted back, looking like he was expecting some gossip from me.
“I gotta go,” I replied and gave him a wave. I was going to lose my voice if I hung around any longer. To be honest, I think a conversation with Mr. Gunderson would tire me out more than a run.
Ric was waiting in his squad car outside the gym and said that Wheat got a pretty good prognosis from the doctor. She might be able to avoid any kind of plastic surgery but that she would definitely not be wrestling for a while.
He said that Simpleman sang like a stool pigeon about the various houses and cars that he and Glass — the One Booted Man — had hit. He also said that Glass sometimes carried a gun. Simpleman even mentioned the names of a couple of fences they used to get rid of the stuff. So it was a good day for the good guys.
At home, I found Wheat sitting on the couch with Lake on her lap. “Ta-da, ouchie,” Lake said as he pointed up to Wheat’s black and blue cheek.
“You hanging in there?” I asked.
“Sore, but OK,” she said. “What about you?”
“OK, but I’m going to be masquerading as you tomorrow — a 112-pound terror.”
“I’d smile if it wouldn’t hurt. You have a good chance of advancing pretty far.”
We talked a little more and I yelled out to the kitchen to mom that I was just going to have a bowl of chicken broth for dinner and maybe some jello.
She came into the dining room and looked disappointed. “I made a big dish of lasagna — mainly for you and your carbo-loading.”
“I’ll eat it for leftovers all next week,” I told her and explained my weight class change.
“OK,” she said. “I’ll warm up the soup for you.” Being the mom of a wrestler isn’t always easy, I know, and I felt a little bad for her.
Wheat and I talked about the wrestling meeting and I told her how the guys had chanted her name. I could tell she was touched even if she tried not to show it. Lake waddled off to the kitchen and Wheat then told me she was at least going to try to go to the prom for a little while with Kelly — maybe for some punch and a couple of slow dances. “Unless you’re in the finals, of course,” she said.
“At 119, it was probably going to be a pretty quick meet for me,” I said. “Maybe I can win the morning matches at 112, but there are too many good guys for me to make the finals.”
Then I changed the subject. “You and Kelly? Are Mom and Dad okay with that?”
“They’re OK with it. I knew they would be fine. It’s you who I worry about.”
I wasn’t sure what to say. Wheat is the most important person in my life right now and I hoped that was how she felt about me, too. A boyfriend could complicate that closeness we have. And Kelly Carson of all people. He’s probably a better guy than I thought he was a few days ago but he still was going to be one of those pretty boys all his born days. Then again, maybe he’ll lose all his hair by the time he’s 25.
“I’m OK with it, too,” I finally said.
“I hear you may be keeping an eye on me anyway,” she said. “Kelly told me this afternoon that you and Sally may be doubling with us. That is, if you aren’t in the finals tomorrow. Wow, Spank. A cheerleader … a junior … a dancing queen … and a crazy woman. All rolled into one.”
I hadn’t forgotten about Sally. But I had tried to push her out of my mind for a while, which might be like forgetting how to breathe.
After weighing myself and then eating my meager dinner — Lake decided he wanted jello, too — I got a call on our house phone from a newspaper reporter. She was doing a story on the police catching the guys who had been breaking into homes and cars and heard that I had played a part in it.
I didn’t know what to say since we should have never been in the funeral home in the first place. I hemmed and hawed a little and then finally mumbled, “I really didn’t do much.”
But then she said, “Todd Dixon said you were a hero, that you were doing some work for them at the funeral home and apparently out-foxed the burglars.”
Well if Todd Dixon said it … “I guess I tricked a guy into falling down an elevator shaft,” I said. “Actually, he sort of tripped over me in the dark.”
“One of the police officers told me you’re a wrestler,” she continued. “Did that help in any way?”
She sounded like Coach Mathews. “I’m trying to weigh 112 pounds for tomorrow’s conference meet,” I answered. “That guy must have weighed around 240, I’m guessing. I think track would have helped me a lot more than wrestling.”
She laughed at that. Then she asked about Wheat and some other things about what I do at the funeral home and if I wanted to be a cop like Ric. She also heard that we had a confrontation with the burglars on one of our morning runs.
“Yeah, I tackled the big guy’s boot,” I said and explained. “I called him the One-Booted Man but he had two boots on last night.”
She liked my nickname for him and wished me good luck the rest of the wrestling season. She said there would be a story in the paper tomorrow.
I figured I was going to have to move to a bigger city. I was getting too well-known around our town — ha, ha.
I was about to put on a sweat suit and jog up and down our basement steps for a half hour when Wheat came into our room with our cell. “Somebody on the phone asking for Sir William,” she said, rather sarcastically.
“That would be me,” I said.
Wheat just shook her head and left.
“You were going to call me, weren’t you, Sir William,” Sally said. “Other late offers to take me to the prom are rolling in and so I wanted to make sure you and I are still going to be out in the limelight together.”
“Like I said, only if you wear that yellow dress,” I said.
“Oh, the things I do for you.”
Hard as I tried, I couldn’t think of anything that she had ever done for me but give me a life-changing kiss. Finally, Sally said, “Are you still there, Sir William?
“Yes.”
“Usually, boys want to talk to me a little longer when they call me.”
“You called me,” I pointed out.
“That I did — and maybe a first. So I’ll see you at the wrestling meet tomorrow and we can make our plans. I assume your sister and Kelly are going. If not, you’re going to have to ride me there on your bicycle’s handlebars since I flunked my first try at passing my drivers’ test.”
“What happened?” I had to ask.
“Oh, the silly instructor said I bumped another car when I was parallel parking. I don’t think I’ve ever seen my mom parallel park in her life but I’m not driving yet because I barely brushed another car while doing an otherwise perfect maneuver. The way the instructor acted, it was as if it was his car I tapped.”
“That’s too bad,” I said, sort of relieved that I wasn’t going to be alone in a car with Sally. I don’t think I have enough testosterone — is that the right word? — just yet for that kind of closeness with a girl like Sally. Maybe I wouldn’t feel that same way with Laurie Middlebrook, I don’t know. Average-looking, sweet girls I think I could handle.
“What are you doing right now, Sir William,” she continued.
“Trying to lose a couple of pounds.”
“Aren’t we all,” she said before hanging up.
I looked down at my hand that had been holding the phone and sweat was dripping off of it. Maybe if I had talked with Sally another five minutes or so, I wouldn’t have to run the basement steps.