wasn’t for nothing that Ray and Steve were called what they were. Carolina wondered if Steve even knew how to think for himself. Ray was smart and if Brad wasn’t around he could be kind of nice. He could make other friends if he wanted. She couldn’t understand why he hung around with Brad.
Brad hawked a big one and let the lugey fly. Carolina watched the gob of snot as it sailed through the air, milky white and snotty green. A great clump of sticky, slimy nose shit, sliding upward, like a tiny comet. The wind caught it as it reached the top of its arc and headed back toward earth, changing its path, ever so slightly.
It landed on Arty’s tennis shoes. What were the odds? It was impossible to tell if Brad had done it on purpose. There was a lot of room for doubt. Nobody could be that good.
“ Good one, Brad,” Ray said.
Brad beamed, but it rang false to Carolina. Brad had just spit. It was dumb luck that it landed on Arty’s shoe.
“ Shit, Brad, why’d you have to go and do that?” Steve sounded like a jerk to Carolina. “Now, poor Arty’s nice white shoes got slimy snot all over ’em.”
“ I’m sorry, Arty, I wasn’t lookin’ where I was aimin’.” Brad’s face was covered in a rare smile.
“ It’s okay, Brad. I know you didn’t mean it.” Arty said. Carolina could tell he just wanted them to go away.
She started to speak up, but held her tongue. Her father had always told her to mind her own business and not to get involved. He believed that nice guys always finished last and that do gooders were as bad as Bible thumpers, always sticking their noses where they didn’t belong. But it was hard, because she kind of liked Arty.
“ Come on Carolina, let’s go.” Arty attempted to lead her around the three bullies.
“ Not so fast.” Brad ran his hand through his hair. He wore it long on the sides and tapered into a ducktail in the back, like the bikers in the fifties movies. “I want to talk to your girlfriend about the test.”
“ Are you mad because I flunked it?” Carolina said.
“ Yeah, I am.”
“ You’re not half as mad as my dad’s going to be. He’ll beat the shit out of me for sure. He always does when I don’t do good.” She told the lie with a little shiver for effect.
Brad’s scowl lit up. He flexed the muscles in his arms and rolled his shoulders. He was wearing a white tee shirt that fit close to his chest. There wasn’t any fat on his large frame. He was as big as any kid in junior high school.
“ Good, ’cuz you deserve a lickin’.” Brad laughed. His shadows picked up on his mood and laughed with him.
They couldn’t know she was lying. Her father wasn’t at home. She didn’t know where he was. But she had always been sharp. Her father had always said so. She was always able to say the right thing, and somehow she knew if Brad thought she was going to get a licking for failing the test, he’d let them by. He was that kind of boy, so lying to him to get themselves out of trouble didn’t seem wrong at all.
“ We gotta go.” Arty grit his teeth and took Carolina by the hand.
“ Step aside, boys,” Brad said, “Carolina’s got a date with Daddy and we wouldn’t wanna hold her up.” The three boys moved out of the way, laughing, and Carolina and Arty moved on down the sidewalk.
She glanced over at Arty as he led her away. He was turning red and she couldn’t tell if it was because of Brad or if he was embarrassed to be holding her hand. Part of her wanted to let go, but another part of her liked it. She didn’t know what to do.
They stepped off the curb to cross Fremont Avenue, when a car coming around the corner solved the problem for her. They jumped back and by the time they were up on the sidewalk, they were no longer holding hands.
“ Here’s where I turn off,” she said, when they got to the corner of Lark Lane.
“ Okay.” He turned a slight shade of pink.
“ You might think I got them all wrong, but Miss Sadler made me stay after, remember?”
“ Yeah.”
“ She said she knew I flunked on purpose, because Brad was copying. She gave me another test. An oral one.”
“ And?”
“ And I got them all right. She gave me a hundred percent. You know what that means?”
“ I gotta carry your books every day for a year.”
“ You betcha. I leave home every morning at twenty to nine. I’ll expect to see you right here at nineteen till.” She flashed him with a quick smile and she was amazed at the size of the smile he gave her back.
When she got home she made herself a cheese and tomato sandwich. She didn’t eat meat, because she loved animals and it seemed wrong to eat them. All the other kids thought she was nuts. She had some milk and cookies when she finished. She didn’t mind milk, because animals didn’t have to die to make it.
With her hunger satisfied, she strolled out into the living room and lay down on the couch. She was only going to close her eyes for a second or two, but it was dark when she woke up to the sounds of Mick and his street fighting band.
She wanted to ask her mother if she’d sold any more paintings, but she was listening to the Rolling Stones in her bedroom and she knew how happy she was when she was laying down and listening to Mick sing his rocking blues.
Sticky Fingers was her mother’s favorite CD and it was playing loud. Not loud enough to bother the neighbors, but loud enough that Carolina couldn’t turn on the TV. But it didn’t matter, Carolina was glad. Just hearing the music meant that maybe her mother was getting over the blue funk she’d been in about how poorly her last show had gone.
When the CD was over, Carolina half expected her mother to put on Sympathy for the Devil, because that’s what she usually did after she played Sticky Fingers, but instead she came out of her room wearing a shocking pink dress. It was new. “How do you like it?” she asked, spinning around so Carolina could get the full effect.
“ It’s nice,” she said, not meaning it. She hated the dress and what it represented. Then she said, “Do you have to go out tonight?” She hated it when her mom went out on dates and left her home alone. She hated all her mother’s new friends. The men and the women, but mostly the men. She wished her father would come back. She wanted it to be like it used to be, her father home right after work, with a kiss and hug for her, her mother with dinner on the table, her father playing with her after dinner, television with mom and dad, her mother tucking her in and telling her a bedtime story as she drifted off to sleep. Now all that was gone.
“ Yes, I do. I’m going to dinner with a nice man. It hasn’t been so easy on me since your father left, you know.” She pouted and fixed Carolina with a soulful stare. She looked like she might cry, and she would have fooled anyone else, but not Carolina. She was a fine actress. She should be in the movies, Carolina thought.
“ It hasn’t been easy on me either. And what if I hear things, I mean noises, in the house, like I did last night?”
“ Carolina, I told you that’s all in your imagination.” The phony sadness was gone now. “There are no things and no noises in this house at night, and I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t bring it up again.”
“ Yes, Mother.” Now it was Carolina’s turn to put on a phony pout.
“ And don’t, Yes Mother, me. You know I don’t like that.”
“ Okay, Mom.”
“ That’s better.” Her mother flounced down on the love seat and looked at her watch.
“ Will you be back early?” Carolina asked.
“ I’ll be back when I’m back. You’ll be fine. Just keep the doors locked and don’t let anyone in.”
“ Okay, Mom,” Carolina said with obvious resignation. She didn’t get time to say anything else, because she was interrupted by the sound of the doorbell.
Her mother popped off the couch and almost skipped toward Carolina, kissing her on the forehead. “You be good now. I’ll try not to be too late.” Then she went out the front door and into the night. Carolina wasn’t even curious enough to peek through the curtain to see what the man looked like.
She put her hands down on the seat and pushed herself off the couch. She had to pee. She was halfway to the bathroom when she heard the scratching noise. She stopped, smiled, reversed herself and headed toward her bedroom. This was a friendly scratching noise. Mom was gone and it was time to feed Sheila.
