Living with the hawk (15 page)

After I got into my equipment, I sat for a long time on the bench, staring into my locker, my jeans hanging in the shadows like a haggard outlaw dangling from a gallows. What about Blake, what was going to happen there? They'd get him anyway, I thought, even though I chickened out and didn't say his name. Finally, I kicked the locker door shut and left the room.

My brother was on the practice field, working out of the shotgun because our centre needed to practice his long snaps. Blake was throwing passes to five different receivers, but they were dogging it, trotting through their routes, laughing and waving at balls they should have been catching, horsing around, I guess, while Coach Conley was down by the goal line, working with the other linemen. When I trotted onto the field, I couldn't see Blake's eyes because of the dark visor on his helmet, but I could tell from the thrust of his jaw that he was angry. If I was a receiver, I'd be running full-out every time he threw the ball. I looked around for Jordan Phelps — he never dogged it when a pass was thrown his way — but there was no sign of him. No sign of Vaughn Foster either.

I tried to keep a blank look on my face, but it wouldn't matter — he could always read me like an actor with a script.

When Blake saw me coming he was fading back to throw, but he stopped, his arm cocked, and studied me, his jaw thrust out even farther. I knew what he was thinking. Yeah, one look and he knew. He took a step toward me.

“Shit,” he said, “shit! You've gone and done it.” He hurled the ball at my head, but I got my hand up in time to knock it away. He wrenched his helmet off, glaring at me, and I prepared to duck, but he stood there for a long moment, his body rigid, motionless. In the end he fired his helmet at the goalpost. When it hit, there was a sharp crack, which must have been the visor breaking, and the helmet bounced to the ground. Before it stopped rolling, my brother had walked off the field.

On his way toward the gate, he strode past Coach Ramsey, who was usually late for practice after getting off work at the asphalt plant. Blake went by him so close, in fact, that he almost bumped him. Ramsey stopped and said something — I could see his lips move, but I couldn't hear what he said. Whatever it was, it had little effect on Blake; he spoke to Ramsey, a word or two, but he kept right on walking toward the door of the gym.

When Ramsey turned around, he looked flustered and hurried onto the field. He noticed me watching him and came directly towards me.

“What the hell's wrong with Blake?”

I shrugged.

He reached for me then, tapped me on the chest, his finger like a spike. “I saw him throw that ball at you. Then he says, ‘My stupid brother told.' What the hell's going on?”

“He's
pissed off at me, I guess.” I almost shrugged again, but caught myself in time. “He's pissed off a lot lately.”

“
He's
pissed off? You want to see pissed off, watch me if he doesn't get the hell back out here. And soon too.” He put his hand flat on my chest, pushed me back from him. Took a step away, then swung around again. “Trouble with your brother, he's got a swelled head. Just because he's throwing to the best receiver this league ever saw, he thinks he's a half-assed quarterback.”

“He's a good quarterback.”

Ramsey was so close I could feel his breath on my face. For a second I thought he was going to take a swing at me, his right hand coming up fast, but it hovered in front of me, one finger extended, pointing beyond my shoulder.

“Get the hell out there and run your laps,” he said.

I wasn't crazy enough to argue with him. I turned and jogged toward the track that circled the field.

“Where's your brother?” my father asked. We were at the supper table, chicken noodle soup and toasted cheese sandwiches laid out before us.

I shook my head. “He's not upstairs.” I took a bite of the sandwich, felt the melted cheese hot on my lower lip. The little television was on, the suppertime news coming at us from the far corner of the kitchen counter. When the weather man stepped before his map, my father picked up the remote and turned the volume down a few notches. The guy was always laughing at things that weren't funny, his laugh loud and phoney.

My mother had her spoon in her soup, was idly stirring it in little circles. “I don't know what's with him lately,” she said. For a second, I thought she meant the weather man. “He hasn't been himself all week. There's something on his mind.”

“He's been pretty slack about his homework too,” said my father. “Maybe needs some tuning up.”

The poor bugger, I thought, Jordan would've ratted on him, he's probably getting tuned up right now. I could picture him in some bare room in the basement of the police station, a couple of tin chairs, a single wooden table, somebody leaning across the table, grilling him, shaking a nightstick in his face, my brother squirming on the chair, another cop pacing behind him, nodding, yes, that's the idea, another minute and he's going to break.

“Anything at school? Blair?” My father was staring at me, a puzzled expression on his face.

“Pardon?”

“I was talking to you. Maybe Blake isn't the only one who needs some tuning up.” His voice was louder than before, but he looked frustrated rather than angry.

“I was trying to catch the forecast.”

“And I was asking if you'd noticed anything at school — about your brother.”

There was no way I could tell them what I knew. “He doesn't talk to me all that much anymore.” I took a bite of my sandwich, the cheese cooler now. My father waited while I chewed.

“Something going on between the two of you?”

“I don't know — not really.” They'd find out soon enough, but someone else would have to tell them. Still, I had to say something. “Being quarterback, I think maybe all that responsibility is getting to him. And Coach Ramsey's a bit of a dink.”

“Blair!” My mother's interjection.

“Coach Conley's in charge, isn't he?” My father again. He said something more about the coaching, but I was watching the television, Anna Big Sky's face in black and white, a yearbook photograph was what it was, that smile frozen there, the same smile she wore whenever we passed in the halls, a photo the only way anyone would see it now or ever again, the volume still turned down low, but in the silence after my father's words, I heard the announcer say there was breaking news, the police were expecting to make arrests, of high school boys, no names would be released.

“You know anything about this?” my father asked.

I shook my head, wishing I hadn't been so busy staring at the television set that I'd missed the reaction of my parents. I wondered, did they have any suspicions?

E
IGHT

W
hen the doorbell rang, I was in my room, staring at my geometry text, a series of triangles that kept shifting beneath my gaze. I went to the window, pulled the curtain aside and looked down on a police cruiser parked at the curb. I made it to the head of the stairs in time to see my mother pass through my field of vision, an open magazine trailing in her hand as she went to answer the door.

“Oh, is something wrong?” She sounded surprised. I could imagine her taking a step backward, her hand rising to her mouth when she saw the officer standing at the door.

“Yes, I'm afraid there is, ma'am. Is the rector here?” A deep voice so low I had to strain to hear it, a voice I recognized at once. I knew she wouldn't like him calling her ‘ma'am.' More than once I'd heard her say that the only people who used the term were the ones who think you're too old and too decrepit to look after yourself.

“No, he isn't. What is it?” Her voice sharper now, the beginning of alarm.

“It's about your son — Blake.” Yes, it was definitely Mr. Hammond.

“Oh, my God.” I heard something hit the floor, decided she must've dropped her magazine. “Has he been hurt?”

“No, oh no, he's not been hurt.” There was a pause during which I swear he shuffled his feet on the front landing. “It's just that, well, I thought it best to let you know in person — he's down at the station.”

“What's going on?” There was a sob in her voice.

“It has to do with the death of that native girl. Anna Big Sky. You've probably read about it in the papers.”

“Blake wouldn't be involved — ”

“I'm sorry, Mrs. Russell, but it seems he is.” His voice was louder now, more sure of itself. “He came down himself.” It was as if he was laying out the evidence before my mother, but then he seemed to relent, his voice softening. “He claims he wasn't involved personally, but there's others say he was. That it was his idea.”

No. It would never be his idea. I started down the stairs.

“You understand,” he continued, “there's no choice here — we have to keep him in custody.”

My mother was crying by the time I got to her. Mr. Hammond, wearing his uniform, but looking more unsettled than I'd ever seen him — skinny and balding, his cap in his hands — had backed against the door. It was as if he needed the door to hold him upright. When he spoke again, I thought, as I often had before, that deep voice must be someone else's. It couldn't be coming from his scrawny frame.

“We knew you'd be worried when Blake . . .” He paused, swallowed, cleared his throat. “He didn't want to phone, asked if I'd come and break the news. Ashamed, I guess, but he thought you ought to know the circumstances right away.”

I put my arm around my mother. “No,” she said, but she was talking to him, not to me. Her shoulder quivered beneath her blouse.

Mr. Hammond stood in the doorway, looking embarrassed, his cap clasped over his crotch, as if that bit of apparel was all that kept him from being naked. His left hand suddenly abandoned the cap and began to work its way across the door, moving like something independent of the rest of him, until it finally reached the knob. “I'm sorry to have to bring you this kind of news about your son. I . . . I always liked Blake.” His hand was turning the knob. “You can see him any time you want. But what you really ought to do is get yourselves a good lawyer. That's about the best advice I can give you.” He had the door open now, and was edging toward it. He ducked his head toward my mother. “Sorry about . . . the bad news,” he said. This was weird, but then I thought, sure, it's because my father isn't here — he was expecting to talk to my father. He glanced at me, nodded, and backed out of the house, pulling the door shut as he went. Mr. Hammond, I thought, what an awful job he's got.

My mother's shoulder was suddenly like iron beneath my hand.

“Get your father,” she said. “He's over at the church.”

“You going to be okay?”

“Get him now.”

When I went to grab my bike, the cruiser was pulling away from the curb, its brake lights flashing once as it turned the corner.

Blake, I thought, he went down to the station just to tell them he wasn't involved. What was the good of doing that?