his hand. He held on to it like a prayer bead.
TWO
Rhett lay on the couch in the school nurse’s office, holding a bloody tissue over his nose. One eye, swollen and purpling, was closed; his open eye stared at the ceiling. The nurse was on the phone, laughing softly at whatever she was being told.
Roy stepped in front of Ms. Steinwasser and walked over to him. The nurse got off the phone.
Roy didn’t know what to say. “Hey.” That was what he said, the word coming out a little deeper than he’d intended, and a little ragged.
Rhett’s good eye moved, found him. Roy saw a lot of emotion in that eye, far more than he wanted to, far more than he could read. “I got in a fight, Dad.” Rhett’s lower lip trembled and so did his voice, but he didn’t cry.
“I can see that,” Roy said. Maybe he should have said something else.
Rhett cried then, just one sob before he got a grip.
Roy put his hand on Rhett’s shoulder, so bony. “Hey,” he said again.
“Take me home, Dad.”
That meant Marcia’s. “Now you’re talking,” he said.
The nurse was on her feet. “I’ll just check on that nosebleed one last time.”
Roy turned to Ms. Steinwasser. “I’m still not clear on what happened exactly.”
“As I mentioned, Mr. Hill, there was a fight at recess. The fields are very well supervised here at Buckhead, but unfortunately the boys got behind the big magnolia by the wall and no one saw them right away.”
“How many were in it?” Roy said.
“In it?” said Ms. Steinwasser.
“The fight.”
“Just two,” said Ms. Steinwasser. “Which was quite enough, as you can see.”
As you can see: Roy didn’t quite get that part. Was she saying that Rhett’s face was convenient proof of some theory of hers? “Where’s the other kid?” Roy said.
“We sent him home.”
“Who started it?”
Ms. Steinwasser’s tone changed slightly, but enough to bring back memories of his own schooling. “We haven’t really found it productive to dwell on issues of that sort,” she said. “The rule is that fighting for any reason is forbidden.”
“Cody started it,” Rhett said, raising his head; a tiny drop of blood appeared at the opening of one nostril. Roy’s mind made a weird connection to Gordo’s and P.J.’s shaving cuts. “He hit me for no reason.”
“Better lay back down now,” said the nurse.
Rhett lay back down.
“In this case,” said Ms. Steinwasser, “both boys claim the other was the instigator. That’s not uncommon. The policy mandates a minimum level-two sanction of three after-school detentions. Given that it’s a first offense in each case, I’m going to forgo anything more severe, such as suspensions, on this occasion.”
It all sounded sensible and crazy at the same time. Roy felt like objecting, but he didn’t know where to start. He was back in school, all right. Roy went over to the table. “Let’s go, son.” He fought an urge to just lift the boy up and carry him away, instead watched Rhett struggle up to a sitting position, swing his legs out, stand up.
“Bleeding’s pretty much stopped is one good thing,” the nurse said. “Not dizzy, are you, Reed?”
“I’m fine,” said Rhett, but the color drained from his face.
“It’s Rhett,” Roy said. He took the boy’s arm and walked him out.
They waited in front of the school for a taxi. Buckhead-type cars went by-Benzes, Audis, Lexuses, big SUVs- but no taxis. Rhett withdrew his arm.
A little farther up the street, a Jaguar convertible pulled over to the curb, top down. A boy jumped off a swing in the play area and trotted to the car; a broad-faced boy about Rhett’s age, but a lot bigger. As he was getting into the Jag, the boy noticed Rhett and gave him a big, smirking smile. Rhett recoiled.
“That the one?” Roy said.
Rhett didn’t answer. The boy turned to them as the car passed by. Roy got a good look at his face: not a mark on it. The boy made a hitchhiking gesture with his thumb. Then he said something to the driver, who looked like a grown-up version of himself. The driver tousled the boy’s hair as they disappeared around the corner. Roy thought he saw a cigar stub spinning through the air.
“I want to punch his fucking face in,” Rhett said.
“Shouldn’t say fucking,” Roy said, and felt like an idiot.
Rhett said no more. He had both hands squeezed into tight fists, little cubes incapable of doing much damage. Roy saw a taxi, good thing, because by now he’d proved even to himself that he had no idea how to make this better with words. He raised his hand.
They sat in the back of the cab, Rhett with his fists on his knees. Roy had to make an effort to keep his own hands relaxed. After five or ten minutes, Rhett’s hands relaxed a little too.
Roy tried again. “What was it all about?”
“I already told you. He hit me for no reason.”
“Just out of the blue.”
“I said I scored a touchdown in Pop Warner last season.”
“And then?”
Rhett’s voice rose. “I told you-then he punched me in the eye. Are you retarded or something?”
The driver’s eyes shifted in the mirror.
Roy tried silence again. They went over a hill. The houses got bigger, brick mansions set farther and farther back from the street. It turned out that living in Buckhead had always been one of Marcia’s dreams: the word itself was magic to her. The house she and Roy had bought in Virginia-Highland, a fixer-upper but a house she’d wanted very badly, had been, in her mind, it also turned out, the first step in a series of moves that would end on a street like this; like landing on Boardwalk at last. The street Marcia now lived on wasn’t quite as nice as this-the houses not so old, not so big, not set so far back-but it was Buckhead. The driver turned onto it.
Roy glanced at Rhett. He was sitting very still, looking straight ahead. Roy could see only one half of his face, the swollen half. The closed eye was puffier now, more purple; the long lashes hung limp and damp from the rim of the lid. Roy had one more thought.
“I was a skinny kid too,” he said.
“I don’t care.”
Bad idea. Either Rhett hadn’t got the part that was meant to be comforting-that Roy had grown up to be big and strong, at least big and strong enough to have suited up on the Bulldog special teams in his freshman, and only, year over in Athens-or it hadn’t been comforting, period. Maybe the opposite. Was it possible Rhett didn’t see him as big and strong? Roy made third team all-state as a tight end his senior year in high school, even though he hadn’t weighed what tight ends should weigh. He caught the reflection of his face in the side window, realized he was closer to tight end level now, the added pounds being of the wrong kind and years too late. The reflection of Rhett’s swollen face loomed behind his. Roy had no idea how the boy saw him. The taxi stopped in front of Marcia’s house.
Marcia’s house, with its three-story central section and two-story wings, wasn’t big by neighborhood standards, but it was a lot bigger than the house she’d left behind. Was it as nice? Not in Roy’s opinion, but he knew nothing about architecture. And why did he think of it as Marcia’s house? It was the boyfriend’s house and would be until she married him.
“Where’s your mom today?” Roy said.
“At work.”
Not true, but Roy didn’t say anything. Rhett took out his key and opened the door.
