Bystander (7 page)

“I wasn't smiling—”

Griffin dismissed him with a wave of his hand. “Shut up, Eric. Or maybe next time it will be you.”

OVER THE REST OF THE WEEK
,
ERIC WITNESSED A NUMBER
of incidents that involved David Hallenback. Mostly stupid stuff, nothing that seemed all that bad, like somebody reaching out to flick David's ears as they passed in the hallway, or another guy stepping on the back of his sneaker, giving David a flat tire. Maybe it had been going on since the beginning of September—or maybe even for years—and Eric hadn't really noticed. But now when he walked down the hall, Eric's eyes were open. He saw that David Hallenback—that weird,
awkward, mush-faced kid—was having a pretty rough time.

I Dare You! seemed to be the hot new game that October. The rules were simple: You dared someone to do something really stupid and you laughed when they did it. Laughed at them, or with them, it didn't matter, just so long as there was laughter.

For that, Hallenback was the perfect pawn, seemingly willing to do anything for approval—no matter how humiliating, or cruel, or pathetic. That was the carrot Griffin so expertly dangled: acceptance.

The dares were anything that would provide momentary entertainment for the bored boys of Bellport Central Middle School:

Go into the nurse's office, barking like a seal.

Wear your pants backwards all day.

Put a tack on Betsy Hurley's chair.

Steal a milk carton when Mr. Hennessey wasn't looking.

I dare you, I double-dare you.

The Flinch was another schooltime classic. It always got a laugh, and it worked like this. Hallenback or any other likely suspect—it didn't absolutely have to
be Hallenback; he was just the Flavor of the Month—might be at his locker, whiffing on his asthma inhaler. Drew P. would stride up to him, make a fist, and rear back like he was about to deliver a punch. Seeing this, Hallenback would shrink back in fear at the impending blow. Many found it
hysterical.
Cody would laugh and laugh at the look on Hallenback's face, his blubbering gob of a mouth.
What a loser.

Sometimes he squealed, “Ow!”—without even getting punched.

“Gotcha!” Drew would chortle.

Good times, good times.

Through it all, Eric didn't say a word. He was innocent, Eric reminded himself, he never participated in the pranks. He never lifted a finger to harm David Hallenback. He didn't think it was funny, so he usually walked away, pretending not to see. But Eric did see. Just like all the other kids in the halls. And he slowly began to recognize it for what it was.

Terrorism in jeans. It comes with a laugh and a loose-leaf binder.

One day, while walking down a near-empty hallway, Eric turned a corner and there he was, David
Hallenback. Eric instinctively lifted his hand in greeting, a private hello that nobody else had to see.

And Hallenback
flinched.

He pulled back when he saw Eric's hand come up.

Eric saw a glint in Hallenback's eye, a flash of fear. Eric sidestepped quickly, palms out—
hey, easy
—showing he intended no harm.

Hallenback stared at the tops of his shoes and scurried down the hall, like a rat looking for a hole.

I'm just as bad as the rest of them,
Eric realized.

A picture replayed in Eric's mind. A memory. He sat at a round table, spooning vanilla ice cream into his mouth. His father tossed dishes into the sink, exploding like grenades. His mother cried, frantic, desperate. And Eric remembered the taste in his mouth, so cold and so sweet.

He found a fountain and took a long, deep drink. Things would have to change.

“
ERIC
!”
HIS MOTHER CALLED UP THE STAIRS
. “
YOU HAVE
a visitor.”

He found Griffin Connelly waiting at the front door.

“Oh, hi.”

“Is it okay?” Griffin asked. “I was just wondering if, maybe, we could hang out a little?”

“No, no—I mean, sure—no problem,” Eric sputtered. “Come on in. I was just, um—”

“I know I shouldn't just invite myself over.”

Eric didn't answer at first. It was a surprise to see Griffin standing in the living room. His black eye was
barely noticeable anymore. The boys hadn't talked much since that trouble at recess. “It's good to see you,” he said, and almost meant it.

Griffin nodded, head bobbing and weaving, like a boxer ducking punches. “You haven't been around much.”

“Yeah, like, sooo busy. Tons of homework and, like, I've been doing some dog walking for the neighbors and—”

“Dog walking, huh?”

“It's not as glamorous as it sounds,” Eric joked.

Griffin laughed. “Good money though, right?”

“It's okay.”

There was a moment of silence, with the two boys standing in opposition.

Griffin scratched his nose with the back of his thumb. “So.”

Eric called to the kitchen, “Mom? We're going to go up in my room, okay?”

Since Mrs. Hayes first met Griffin at the supermarket, she had seen him only a couple of other times, and always in her house. Whenever Griffin had invited
Eric over, Mrs. Hayes had come up with a reason why not: too much homework, they needed to go shopping, chores to be done, whatever. She said she liked Eric home, but he suspected there was more to it than that. Mrs. Hayes didn't say it outright, but it seemed to Eric that perhaps his mother's initial enthusiasm for Griffin Connelly had cooled to something else. It was not like her to answer the door and hastily retreat to the kitchen.

Eric had a futon in his room that doubled as a spare bed. Griffin sank into it, while Eric sat on the floor, leaning back on his hands.

Griffin smiled, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. He rubbed his hands on his jeans. “Where's Rudy?”

“He's been adopted by the family down the block,” Eric quipped. “They've got twins and Rudy fits right in. He's like the triplet they never had.”

Griffin crossed his arms, looked around the room. It was like he had something to say, but no idea how to say it. For the first time since Eric had known him, Griffin seemed unsure of himself.

“So,” Eric said, stealing Griffin's line. “What's up?”

Griffin snorted, looked away. “Are you mad at me? It feels like things got weird between us after Hallenback got hurt at recess.”

“He didn't
get
hurt,” Eric insisted. “You hurt him. There's a difference.”

Griffin's eyes rounded. “We were just fooling around.”

Eric frowned, unsatisfied. “Look, I don't know what there is to talk about.”

“I don't know why I did it,” Griffin suddenly blurted.

He looked Eric in the eye. And Eric knew it was as true as anything Griffin had ever said to him. Griffin didn't know why.

“I just . . .” Griffin raised his hands in two fists, let them drop. “Everybody keeps asking me the same question. The principal, the house leader, Mrs. Ryan, or that stupid counselor, Mr. Floyd:
Why did you do it?
Why, why, why?” He said in a firm voice, “And I'm telling you, I don't know. I just did it.”

Eric's shoulders flickered, the slightest of shrugs.

“You know that tooth you once asked me about?” Griffin began.

“Tooth? Oh, the one in that wooden box in your room? Yeah, I remember.”

“Do you still want to know?”

“Sure, yeah, whatever.” Eric feigned indifference.

A whisper of a smile came to Griffin's face. Once again, he was back in control. “It was my tooth.” He opened his mouth wide, pointing. “That's a cap, see? My real tooth got knocked out in a fight.”

Eric wondered why Griffin was telling him this story. Had he come over to say exactly this? “What's the point?” Eric asked.

“The point?” Griffin shook his head. “We're the same, that's the point.”

The same?
Eric didn't speak. A storm seemed to pass inside his brain, full of clouds and rain, and it was hard to hold on to one clear thought, just those words:
the same, the same.
He seemed to feel everything at once: denial, disgust, and the fear that Griffin Connelly might be right.

Grinning, Griffin tapped a fingernail against a tooth.
Click, click.
“That's right,” he said. “Courtesy of dear old Dad. He's a mean drunk.”

Eric thought about Griffin's black eye. About
Griffin's father in a ragged bathrobe, slumped in a kitchen chair, slurping down a bowl of cereal. The breakfast of champions. Eric thought about the way Hallenback could be such an annoying pest. Maybe there were good reasons why things happened the way they did. And maybe none of it mattered anyway. Griffin Connelly was a bully. That was the stone-cold fact. In the end, did it matter why?

“All those people say they want to help me,” Griffin sneered. “You should sit in a room with them sometime, Eric. It's all smiles and politeness and concerned expressions. They tell me how they know I'm really a good kid deep down.”

The contempt in Griffin's voice was thick. “They don't know me. I can see right through them. Bunch of liars.”

Eric didn't know what to say. “I'm going to get some chips or something,” he said, rising and moving to the door.

“Just no pretzels,” Griffin joked.

“Right,” Eric said, remembering Hallenback. “Maybe we should stay away from pretzels for a while.”

When Eric got back to the room, Griffin wasn't there. But he entered a minute later. “Bathroom,” he explained.

His mood seemed different. Lighter, somehow. “You know, it's not like I did anything
that
bad,” he told Eric. “Let's face it. Kids like Hallenback are always going to get beat on. It's the law of the jungle. Only the strong survive.”

“We're in middle school,” Eric countered. “Not a jungle.”

Griffin shook his head. Just like that, the old confidence was back. “No, you're wrong. It's still a jungle, the survival of the fittest. The sooner you figure that out, Eric, the better.”

“I don't believe that,” Eric said.

Griffin blinked, blew the bangs out of his eyes. They had hit an impasse. “When you think about it, Eric, we're all basically animals. I think that's why I was fed up with Hallenback that day. I mean, come on, you've seen those nature shows on television. Hallenback is like the sick gazelle in the herd, limping along. The one that gets eaten. It's not fair, but that's life. I don't make the rules.”

Eric listened, didn't answer.

“You, of all people, know I'm right,” Griffin persisted. “Don't try to con me. You know what it's like. We're all animals. That's why you called Cody a weasel.”

“It was a stupid thing to say,” Eric countered. “I didn't mean it.”

Griffin grinned. “Sure.” He stood and slowly wandered around the room, running a finger along the spines of books on the shelves, bending to read the plaques on Eric's Little League trophies. Griffin picked up a small pile of CD-Rs, the songs and artists written out by a careful hand.

Eric reached for them, a little too hastily.

Griffin pulled away, sensing their value. He read one out loud: “ ‘Eric, Rock On! Love, Dad.' Aw, isn't that sweet!” he teased.

“Give me those,” Eric demanded.

Griffin spun around, pretending to tuck them into his shirt. When Eric grabbed his arm, Griffin laughed. “Here you go—chill out, buddy. I'm just messing with you.”

“It's not funny.”

“Don't get all sensitive on me, Eric.” Griffin could see that Eric was flustered. He seemed to take pleasure in it.

Eric glanced at the digital clock, the way a drowning man might scan the water in hope of a life preserver. “Look, it's getting—”

“Yeah, yeah, I've got to go anyway.”

Eric escorted Griffin down the stairs and out the door. He watched Griffin pick up a skateboard and push off down the driveway and into the street. No helmet, naturally. Eric felt relieved—and more confused than ever.

What is he up to?
Eric wondered.

Later that night, after dinner, Rudy made a discovery. Teary-eyed, he came into the television room holding his ceramic baseball bank. “I'm missing twenty-seven dollars. All my birthday money is gone.”

Two sets of eyes—Rudy's and his mother's—settled on Eric. “Don't look at me. I never touched your money.”

Rudy's lip quivered. “Mom?”

“Are you sure, Rudy? Maybe you misplaced it.”

Rudy was positive. “But if Eric didn't take it, and Mom, if you didn't take it . . .”

Mrs. Hayes fixed her eyes on Eric. The look on her face said it all. She had a pretty good idea where the money had gone.

A sudden thought leaped into Eric's mind. A few minutes later, he went to check on his CDs.

The gifts from his father.

One of them was missing.

GINGER
,
A LONG-HAIRED GOLDEN RETRIEVER
,
WAS READY
to bound out the door when Eric arrived to take her for a Saturday-afternoon walk. The minute she heard the keys rattle outside the door—Eric always struggled with the Martins' sticky deadbolt—Ginger would leap out of her socks. If, of course, she were wearing any (she wasn't).

The dog-walking business had turned out well for Eric. Back in Ohio, he once took care of a neighbor's dog when they went away on vacation. That job led to others, and Eric considered it easy money. He just had
to be trustworthy and responsible, and those qualities came naturally enough. Now on Long Island, Eric had two steady clients, the Parkers and the Oropesas, plus some side jobs when people went away for weekend trips or vacations. He didn't have to do much to drum up business, just hung up a poster at the coffee shop in town. He'd walk the dogs in the morning and evening, play with them a little, give them food, water, and something resembling love, and that was it. Besides, Eric liked dogs. They were a lot simpler than human beings.