Rooster (11 page)

The number he had thought of was five, making the order Dorothy-Jane-Anne first, followed by Tim, Roseann and Percival.

“Yippee!” said Dorothy-Jane-Anne. “I get to go first!”

“No fair,” said Roseann.

The first few rounds of bowling went smoothly. The bumper pads were in place along the gutters. Tim announced that he would take care of the scoring. In hindsight, that was probably the first decision Rooster wished he hadn't agreed with.

“You got fourteen. Then you got eleven. Then you got six. Then you got three. Then you got eight.” Tim reviewed Roseann's scores with her.

“So? What's wrong with that?”

“Nothing. Nothing's wrong with it. Nothing's wrong with it at all. I just don't think it adds up to ninety-three.”

“Yes.”

“I don't think it does.”

“It has to.”

“Why does it have to?”

“It says so right there. Ninety-three.”

“I know that. But I don't think that's right.”

“Why would it say ninety-three if that wasn't the right answer?”

“I don't know. That's what I'm trying to figure out.”

Roseann stared at him for a moment. She did not look impressed with being accused of cheating. “Who died and made you the president?”

Tim began to rock back and forth in his chair. Confrontations were not his specialty, especially with someone as intense as Roseann. “I'm not saying I am the president.”

“Well, who are you then? The Queen of England? Princess Diana? Prince Charles?”

“I'm not saying I'm any of those people, especially Princess Diana. She's dead. I'm just saying I think you might be cheating.”

“Who are you, Perry Mason?”

“I don't even know who that is.”

“He's a lawyer on television. On the old-shows channel.”

“No, I'm not him either.”

Dorothy-Jane-Anne threw her third ball and turned to Tim to tell him her score.

“It's your turn,” she said. “I got fourteen.”

Tim stood up and handed her the scorer's pencil. He had a very flustered look on his face.

“Uh-oh,” said Dorothy-Jane-Anne, who recognized the look. “Is Roseann cheating again?”

“No. I'm not,” said Roseann, sounding hurt.

“I think she is,” said Tim. “I think she is cheating again. She says her scores add up to ninety-three, but I don't think they do.”

“Do you want me to add them?”

“Yes, I do,” said Tim. “I think that would be good. She's calling me the president, but I'm not trying to be the president. I'm just trying to count, but I can't because she keeps talking to me.”

“Do you know how to add?”

“No. Not really.”

“Do you want me to use my calculator? My sister got it for me for my birthday.”

“That would be good,” said Tim. “That would be really good.”

Dorothy-Jane-Anne went to her purse on the bench where their coats were and pulled out a small calculator with large buttons and a screen that clearly showed the numbers. She sat down in Tim's chair and began to slowly add Roseann's scores.

“I'm not cheating again,” said Roseann.

“Shut up,” said Dorothy-Jane-Anne. “I don't like it when you cheat.”

“I'm not cheating.”

“Yes you are. I can tell already you are.”

“Can you?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Because I have more points than you have and I only have fifty-seven.”

“Oh,” said Roseann, her fingers frozen in front of her mouth. “Sorry.”

“It's okay.” Dorothy-Jane-Anne turned the pencil around and began erasing the ninety-three.

“I'm sorry about that,” said Roseann. “I won't do it again.”

“Okay. I don't like it when you cheat.”

“I won't do it again.”

“I'll turn you over to the police the next time.”

“No, don't do that.”

“Okay.”

Percival returned a short time later with a six-inch stack of paper towels from the washroom. He put them on the bench next to his jacket, picked one of them up and walked over and polished the bowling ball he was planning on throwing when his turn came up.

Rooster saw him do this, then watched in horror as the bowling alley manager walked up to Percival and asked him what he thought he was doing.

“What does it look like?!” screeched Percival, who towered over the manager by at least a foot.

“It looks like you're stealing paper towels from my bathroom. That's what it looks like.”

“You're very bright!” said Percival. “That's exactly what I'm doing! But I have a perfectly good reason for doing it!”

“You're stealing for a good reason? I don't think so. Put them back. Every one of them. Except that one in your hand. You can keep that one. The rest, they go right back where you found them.”

“Over my dead body!” said Percival, taking a stand.

Rooster arrived to intervene. He introduced himself, apologized for the paper towels and asked the manager for a little extra patience. “They're very excited to be here,” he said. “They've been waiting so long for a chance to come back. They love it here.”

The manager gave Rooster a once-over, then leveled with him. “Listen, kid, I know who these characters are. I know them from the last time they were here. They're trouble. They make the little kids cry. They disrupt the other bowlers. I told that lady at Common House I'd give them one chance. Out of the goodness of my heart, I'll give them one chance. If they blow it, they're gone. Now I'll say to you what I said to him. These paper towels go back into my bathroom or you guys can pack up and leave now. Done. Just like that.”

“Fair enough,” said Rooster.

“Never!” cried Percival.

“I'll handle it,” said Rooster to the manager.

“Every one of them,” said the manager. He pointed a menacing finger at Rooster, gave Percival the evil eye, then turned and left them alone. Rooster looked up at Percival, who was joined by Tim. At the scorer's table, Dorothy-Jane-Anne and Roseann both stared at him. He took this to be the first defining moment of his time with the Strikers. It was time he held little regard for, but still, he did not want it to end this quickly. He did not want to go out without even a whimper, much less a bang.

He thought mightily for something to say.

He cleared his throat. “All right,” he said. They waited. The time for action was now.

“Percival, put those paper towels right back where you found them or you can walk home. Roseann, when you come to this bowling alley, you keep your fingers out of your mouth or you don't bowl. Is that understood?” It was Elma. She had joined him from the table in the lounge, where she had been observing the night's activities. “Now what's the matter with the score card? Is someone cheating? If you cheat, you don't come back. That's the rule. No exceptions. Now look how much time you've just wasted. You could have been bowling instead of standing around doing nothing. You have half an hour left. Get to it.”

She turned and went back to her table. She did not even make eye contact with Rooster.

The rest of the evening went without further incident. Percival returned the paper towels. Roseann's score was revised. The Strikers finished their game, returned their shoes and boarded the Common House bus when it arrived to pick them up.

“See? That's how you do it,” said Elma, packing up her books after the bus left the parking lot. “Be tough. Be firm. Establish the ground rules early and stick with them. And if you have to, be nasty.”

Rooster nodded. “You're good at that.”

“If you let them take over, they will. Clamp down on them. They can be just like everyone else if you discipline them enough.”

“Who says they want to be like everyone else?” said Rooster.

Elma gave him a curious look. “Who doesn't?”

Rooster watched her leave, then thought about that question all the way home.

9

“Y
ou did what?” said Puffs the next day at school.

“I had to,” said Rooster. They were eating their lunch in the cafeteria. “I was in a pinch.”

“A pinch? You do this to one of your best friends because you're in a pinch? Couldn't you say you were in a vice at least?”

“Whatever. Elma was all over me about my lack of preparation for my big debut at the bowling alley.”

“Uh-huh.”

“So I had to do something to get her off my back.”

“I get all that.”

“So I figured what better way than to tell her that Jayson likes her.”

Puffs shook his head. “See, that's the part I don't understand.” He stirred his soup with his spoon. “Why would you do that to a friend?”

“It shut her up in a second, that's why. One minute she's going on and on about this stupid hero cycle. The next thing she's got little Jaysons dancing in front of her eyes and has to sit down 'cause she's feeling faint.”

“I just want to know how you're going to get out of it without hurting her,” said Jolene, dipping her spoon into her yogurt cup.

Rooster took another bite of his sandwich. “I'm going to ask Jayson if he can do me a favor.”

Jolene and Puffs exchanged a long glance, then spoke simultaneously. “Are you kidding?”

“I have no choice. I thought about it last night after I got home. I have to ask him to come down to the bowling alley and hang out for a while. Talk to her. Laugh at something she says. I didn't say he was madly in love with her. I just said he likes her.”

“And then what?” said Puffs.

“Well, then, ideally, she'll decide that she doesn't like him and dump him.”

“Jayson is God in the jock world,” said Jolene. “There's no way that's going to happen.”

“It happened three times last year.”

“Those weren't jocks. They didn't understand him.”

“Nobody understands him. That's the point. Elma won't understand him. What will she think the first time he sits down and eats an entire loaf of bread while waiting for his lunch? Or he gets that tattoo of a grizzly bear he's been talking about? There's some things about him that could turn a person like Elma off.”

“There's no way he's going to go down to the bowling alley,” said Puffs.

“I have to ask him,” said Rooster.

A few minutes later, he got his chance. Jayson walked into the cafeteria, loaded up his tray with food and joined them. The sight of Jolene and Rooster sitting together made him do a double-take. Puffs, who had forgotten that his little joke was still very much alive and flourishing, started to panic.

“Hey,” said Jayson, sounding hopeful as he placed his tray on the table. He had a plate of spaghetti, a caesar salad, two roast beef sandwiches and two apples.

“Expecting company?” said Rooster, looking at all the food.

“Jayson's a big boy,” said Jayson. He made eye contact with Puffs and motioned with his head toward Rooster and Jolene. Puffs briefly frowned and shook his head, indicating that nothing had changed and hoping Jayson wouldn't say anything about it.

“What's all that about?” said Jolene.

“Rooster has something he wants to ask you,” said Puffs, changing the subject and avoiding Jolene's glare.

Jayson twirled an enormous bite of spaghetti onto his fork, put it in his mouth and looked at Rooster.

Rooster threw a dirty look at Puffs and cleared his throat. “All right. I wasn't going to ask you this second, but … You remember the other night at Puffs' house, all that stuff we were talking about?”

Jayson, his mouth very full, nodded his head.

“Well, the situation has changed somewhat.”

Jayson's eyes widened with curiosity.

“Elma Helmsley is involved with it now.”

Jayson gagged on his food and had to work very hard to keep it all in his mouth.

“And I have to ask you to do me a huge favor.”

Rooster waited for a moment, but since Jayson was having more trouble with his food than anyone had ever seen before, he decided to carry on.

“I need you to come to the bowling alley sometime over the next couple of weeks and sit with Elma. You don't have to make out with her or anything like that. Just be nice to her. Act like you enjoy her company.”

With an enormous intake of water, Jayson washed the food down and sat back in his chair. He took a moment to collect himself.

“Jayson needs some clarification,” he said finally. “There's some things about all this he's not understanding.”

“I'm not completely sure I get it all either,” said Rooster. “I just need your help with this one thing. I know it's a lot to ask.”

“You want the Jay-dog to pretend he's got it going for Elma Helmsley?”

“In a nutshell, yes.”

“Is there another Elma Helmsley who goes to this school or is it the one we call Junior?”