“I stayed up till three in the morning once to watch it on AMC. Robert Duvall, Joe Don Baker, Robert Ryan… Parker was called Macklin in that movie.”
The room grew quiet. Ernest, at first proud, now embarrassed, slumped in his seat.
“What do you all like about this book so far?” said Leo, breaking the tension.
“It’s short,” said Hannibal, and a few of the boys laughed.
“Yeah, thank you,” said Mark Norman.
“We’re at the end of the school year,” said Leo. “I gave you guys a break.”
The too-loud voice on the intercom boomed suddenly and statically in the room, telling the boys it was time to go to their next class. They got up boisterously, clumsily pushing chairs against chairs, making unnecessary noise.
My pups, thought Leo.
“Read this book before the next class,” he called out, and got some groans in return. “Come on, fellas, we want to go out strong. Participation is a large part of your grade.”
As they filed out, Leo reached out and stopped Ernest with a hand on his arm.
“You need me?”
“Stick around for a second,” said Leo. He waited for the others to leave and sat on the edge of his desk. Ernest stood before him, a book bag slung over his shoulder.
“What’s up?” said Ernest.
“Just want you to know, you add a lot to this class. When you speak on things you’re passionate about, it gets everyone up, even if they don’t show it.”
“They think I’m a rain man or somethin. Soft, too.”
“No, they don’t. They respect you because you’re smart.” Leo looked him over. “You get out in the world, what you know is going to set you apart from other folks. But first thing, you got to get that higher education.”
“I know it.”
“Did you fill out the college application yet?”
“I didn’t get to it.”
“Thought your mother was going to help you.”
“She is,” said Ernest. “But she went away this week with her man. Took a vacation with him, like.”
Leo caught the distaste in Ernest’s voice. “Look, we’ve got applications in the office. Come past after school today and I’ll help you knock it out.”
“I don’t want to bother you.”
“Just come by,” said Leo.
“Thank you,” said Ernest. “And tell your brother I said thanks, too. He gave me a couple of movie books that were tight.”
“What’d he do that for?”
“I helped him out with somethin, is all.”
Leo digested that but asked nothing further.
“Okay,” said Leo. “I’ll see you after school.”
“Bet,” said Ernest.
Leo waited for a long while that afternoon, but Ernest did not return.
Bernard White and Beano Mobley were parked on 12th Street facing north, White under the wheel of the Expedition and Mobley on the other side of the console, seated in the shotgun bucket. White thinking, Mobley’s small, like Earl. But Mobley seemed bigger, because he was an endomorph. Meaning Mobley was round and muscular, and Nance had been skinny and wiry. Had the body type they called ectomorph. Those were good words. White had written them down and put them in a file he kept at home.
The Tahoe Bernard White and Earl Nance used to drive was large, but the Expedition was like a bus. No one in the city needed a vehicle this huge, but people wanted to own the biggest SUV on the block. That name, Expedition, it suggested adventure, a safari, the discovery of new worlds. Lewis and motherfucking Clark. But all Bernard ever saw behind the wheels of these beasts were fat brothers and sisters holding cell phones and white middle-aged fathers with beer guts and goatees. If they ever went off-road, it was an accident when they’d drunk too much. Highlander. Pathfinder. Expedition. To where, the Walmart? That shit liked to kill him, man.
“Kids got out,” said Mobley, looking in his side-view, seeing students coming from Cardozo in groups. “You see him?”
White glanced in his mirror. “No. He’ll be along.”
They had been sitting on the street for hours. That morning, after the Lindsay boy had gone to school, they watched as the boy’s mother and a middle-aged man who had the sour, baggy-eyed look of a mean drinker, left out the row house they stayed in and, carrying a couple of suitcases, got into a VW Cabriolet and sped off. Had to be her car, ’cause a man wouldn’t own a Cabriolet. White had laughed out loud at their good fortune. Obviously the adults of the house weren’t coming home that evening at least. Now was the time to steal the boy.
“They’re all wearin the same shit,” said Mobley with that sandpaper voice of his, observing the sea of purple and white polo shirts. “Why the school make them put on those shirts?”
“Regimentation,” said White.
“What?”
White knew he’d get Mobley on that one. He surprised Ricardo and them when he threw in a word they didn’t know. They thought he was stupid. Everyone did, going back to his mother, his uncles, his teachers, the other kids in his neighborhood. He was always way big for his age, six foot two by the time he turned twelve, and big to them meant dumb. Played football for the Marlboro Mustangs in the peewee league, then later at Largo High. The coaches yelling at him, Hit somebody, son! And he did, with fire. Broke this one boy’s neck with a helmet-to-helmet thing, got him while his head was turned toward a pass, running a sideline pattern. He could have hit him low, but hey. White had a powerful feeling when he saw the kid lying there, eyes all wide and scared, his head taped to a gurney. He apologized for the unfortunate hit: he didn’t mean to hurt no one, football was a contact sport, etc. It was called a tragic accident and largely forgotten. The boy never did walk again.
Yeah, he put some hurt on those kids, and if they looked at him wrong or called him a retard, he gave them double hurt. That is, until he dropped out. He didn’t get past the tenth grade, but that didn’t mean anything. He read bodybuilding magazines and did crossword puzzles. He could break down an engine. He was smart.
White had liked using words to fuck with Earl. Like saying Earl was compensating when he really meant over compensating. By doing this, he could get Earl to admit that he was touchy about his lack of size. He did it all the time to Earl when they were working in the service bays. Earl talking about women, and how he was small of stature but plenty big “down there,” “thick as a can of Mountain Dew,” and how he liked to use it, though White had never seen him with a girl. White saying, “You just a diminutive fellow, is all you are,” Earl saying, “Huh?”
Earl Nance was a funny little dude to hang with. Even when they murdered together, after it was done, the back and forth they had, what was called the banter, was fun. He wished Earl was still sitting next to him, instead of this bad-tempered, Have-a-Tampa-smellin old man. He’d give it to that Lucas dude fierce when he had the opportunity. It wouldn’t bring Earl back, but it would make White feel good.
“ Regimentation mean they like to keep those kids in order,” said White.
“That so,” said Beano Mobley.
Some time must have passed while he’d been, what was that word, ruminating, because when White looked in the side-view again, most of the schoolkids were gone. Except for one, a tall, thin boy with braids, coming down the block on foot. He was kind of looking around, taking his time, his mouth moving though there was no one with him. Had to be the Lindsay kid, since he was slowing down near the steps that led to the Lindsay row house. He was coming closer, damn near right beside their vehicle.
“That’s him,” said White.
“Who don’t know that,” said Mobley. He had already opened his door.
Ernest Lindsay had lingered in the library after the last bell. He’d flirted with going by the office to pick up that college application, but in the end he had decided against it. He didn’t like to leave Mr. Lucas hanging like that, but he didn’t feel like spending the time with it, and figured that he could apply to UDC some other day. This was what he told himself, but deep down he knew why he was putting the process off. He was scared.
Ernest had a comfort thing where he was at. He had lived in the same row home with his mother his whole life. He had walked to all of his schools. This was a big step for him, having to go across town to an unfamiliar
