car-actually, it was Noah's old ' Chevy-but she hated to drive; that Uncle Alfred and Aunt Martha had given her a hand-me-down might have had something to do with it. In Owen's view, the ' Chevy was in better shape than his tomato-red pickup; but Hester knew it had been secondhand when the Eastmans gave it to Noah, who had passed it to Simon, who'd had a minor accident with it before he'd handed it down to Hester. But by picking up Hester after work, Owen Meany rarely got back to Hester's apartment before one o'clock in the morning; Hester was so keyed up after waitressing that she wasn't ready to go to bed before two-first, she had to wash her hair, which further woke her up; and then she needed to complain. Often someone had insulted her; sometimes it had been a customer who'd tried to pick her up-and failing that, had left her a rotten tip. And the other waitresses were 'woefully unaware,' Hester said; what they were unaware of, she wouldn't say-but they often insulted Hester, too. And if Owen Meany didn't
spend the night in her apartment-if he drove home to Gravesend-he sometimes didn't get to bed before three. Hester slept all morning; but Owen had morning classes- or, in the summer, he was at work very early in the quarries. Sometimes he looked like a tired, old man to me-a tired, old, married man. I tried to nag him into taking more of an interest in his studies; but, increasingly, he spoke of school as something to get out of.
'WHEN I GET OUT OF HERE,' he said, 'I'VE GOT MY ACTIVE DUTY TO SERVE, AND I DON'T WANT TO SERVE IT AT A DESK-WHO WANTS TO BE IN THE ARMY FOR THE PAPERWORK!'
'Who wants to be in the Army at all!' I asked him. 'You ought to sit at a desk a little more often than you do-the way you're going to college, you might as well be in the Army already. I don't understand you-with your natural ability, you ought to be sailing through this place with the highest honors.'
'IT DID ME A LOT OF GOOD TO SAIL THROUGH GRAVESEND ACADEMY WITH THE HIGHEST HONORS, DIDN'T IT?' he said.
'Maybe if you weren't a stupid Geology major, you could be a little more enthusiastic about your courses,' I told him.
'GEOLOGY IS EASY FOR ME,' Owen said. 'AT LEAST, I ALREADY KNOW~ SOMETHING ABOUT ROCKS.'
'You didn't used to do things just because they were easy,'' I said. He shrugged. Remember when people 'dropped out'- remember that? Owen Meany was the first person I ever saw 'drop out.' Hester, of course, was born 'dropped out'; maybe Owen got the idea from Hester, but I think he was more original than that. He was original, and stubborn. I was stubborn, too; twenty-two-year-olds are stubborn. Owen tried to keep me working in the monument shop the whole summer of '. I said that one whole summer in the monument shop was enough-either he would let me work in the quarries or I would quit.
'IT'S FOR YOUR OWN GOOD,' he said. 'IT'S THE BEST WORK IN THE BUSINESS-AND THE EASIEST.'
'So maybe I don't want what's 'easiest,' ' I said. 'So maybe you should let me decide what's 'best.' '
'GO AHEAD AND QUIT,' he said.
'Fine,' I said. 'I guess I should speak to your father.'
'MY FATHER DIDN'T HIRE YOU,' said Owen Meany. Naturally, I didn't quit; but I matched his stubbornness sufficiently-I hinted that I was losing my interest in practicing the shot. In the summer of ', Owen Meany resembled a dropout-in many ways-but his fervor for practicing the shot had reappeared. We compromised: I apprenticed myself to the diamond wheel until August; and that August-when the USS Maddox and the USS Turner Joy were attacked in the Tonkin Gulf-Owen set me to work as a signalman in the quarries. When it rained, he let me work with the sawyers, and by the end of die summer he apprenticed me to the channel-bar drillers.
'NEXT SUMMER, I'LL LET YOU TRY THE DERRICK,' he said. 'NEXT AUGUST, I'LL GIVE YOU A LITTLE DYNAMITE LESSON-WHEN I GET BACK FROM BASIC TRAINING.'
Just before we began our junior year at the University of New Hampshire-just before the students returned to Graves-end Academy, and to all the nation's other schools and universities-Owen Meany slam-dunked the basketball in the Gravesend Academy gym in under three seconds. I suggested that the retarded janitor might have started the official scorer's clock a little late; but Owen insisted that we had sunk the shot in record time-he said that the clock had been accurate, that our success was official.
'I COULD FEEL THE DIFFERENCE-IN THE AIR,' he said excitedly. 'EVERYTHING WAS JUST A LITTLE QUICKER, A LITTLE MORE SPONTANEOUS.'
'Now I suppose you'll tell me that under two seconds is possible,' I said. He was dribbling the ball-crazily, in a frenzy, like a speeded-up film of one of the Harlem Globetrotters. I didn't think he'd heard me.
'I suppose you think that under two seconds is possible!' I shouted. He stopped dribbling. 'DON'T BE RIDICULOUS,' he said. 'THREE SECONDS IS FAST ENOUGH.'
I was surprised. 'I thought the idea was to see how fast we can get. We can always get faster,' I said.
