Saints of Augustine (4 page)

“I mean it. You're really just…great.”

“Um, thanks. You sound kind of out of it. You're not high, are you?”

“No,”
he lied. She knew he'd smoked pot in the past, and she didn't like it. In fact, they'd argued about it just a few weeks ago. She had this whole philosophy about how a person who took mind-altering drugs was basically just an escape artist who was dodging the real issues in his life. In a way, Charlie agreed with her. But didn't people need to dodge stuff now and then? In the end, he'd decided it was easier to lie to her than to argue; she was much
more articulate than he was, and he could never keep up. “I'm just beat. I worked on the Danforth house all day. They don't even have the power turned on, so I can't use the AC. It wipes me out.”

“Charlie Horse is tired,” she said.

He felt relieved. She only called him Charlie Horse when she was feeling affectionate. “Not too tired to pick up where we left off last Saturday,” he said, grinning.

“I'll bet.”

“You were pretty amazing.”

“You weren't so bad yourself. Hey, do you want to go to the beach this week? During the daytime, like regular people?”

“You got it. I'm flexible with my work hours. The Danforths haven't even moved into the place yet. When do you want to go?”

“How about Thursday?”

“I'm aallll yours.”

“Good. You really sound out of it. You should go to sleep.”

“I'm going to,” he said. “I'm giving you a big, long good-night kiss.”

“Yeah, yeah,
smooch
,” she said. “Go to sleep, and call me tomorrow. If I can't use my mom's car, I may need you to drive me to the mall after dinner.”

“I am your chariot,” he said.

“You're my Charlie Horse.”

“I'm your stud.”

“Go to
bed
.”

After they hung up, he rolled over onto his hand again. But instead of feeling charged up about his conversation with Kate, he only felt tired, and before long he dozed off.

Teddy was standing on
the sofa with his shoes on, hefting a power drill. “Chowderhead!” he said loudly when he saw Sam emerge from the back of the house. “Where've you been?”

“Trying to sleep. Until a laundry basket crashed into my door.”

“You should have seen Big'un here fly!”

Chowderhead. Big'un. Teddy had a knack for getting on Sam's nerves. He was slightly pear shaped, and his weight was stabbing his shoes down into the sofa cushions. Sam's mom would have had a fit if she
saw Sam or Hannah doing that. But chunky, clunky, loudmouthed Teddy walked on water.

“You and Crabcake going to help me hang some wall sconces?”

Hannah giggled, which only irritated Sam more. “Her name's Hannah,” he said. “And I've got stuff to do.”

“Sam,”
his mother called out sharply. She was in the kitchen, leaning back from the sink to put Sam in her sight line. “What have I told you about being rude?”

“Sorry,” Sam said, looking away from both his mom and Teddy, glancing at Hannah, who was perched on the arm of the sofa.

“I'm going to give you stuff to do if you don't straighten up, young man.”

“I said sorry.”

Teddy either didn't notice or didn't care when Sam got smart with him. He raised the drill and squeezed the trigger, tearing into the wall.

Sam poured himself a glass of juice. He took the scrambled egg his mom had cooked him and made a sandwich with toast and a few pieces of bacon.
Jasbo watched him. Sam tossed out a sliver of egg, and the dachshund caught it in midair. His mother was loading the dishwasher. Her blond hair, the exact same shade as Sam's and Hannah's, was pulled back into a ponytail. She'd started wearing it that way when Teddy came into the picture. That was also about the time she'd decided that the entire look of the house had to change, as if leaving it the way it was when his father had lived here was unthinkable. What did they need with wall sconces? She glanced at him, then folded her arms over her stomach and nodded toward his plate. “Put that in the dishwasher when you're through eating.”

“Affirmative, captain.”

“Tell me something, because I really want to know. I'm going to mark it on my calendar. When are you going to snap out of this attitude?” she asked.

Sam shrugged and said through a mouthful, “What are you talking about? I'm just standing here eating an egg.”

“The boy needs his protein!” Teddy called from the living room, over the shriek of the drill. “Got to put some meat on those bones. He's going to need
'em to wax that new shed to keep it from rusting.”

Sam rolled his eyes.

“
That's
what I'm talking about,” his mother said softly, so that only Sam could hear. “I don't want to see you roll your eyes or hear that sarcastic tone in your voice. We've talked about this.”

Sam swallowed, then reached for the juice glass. “Affirmative. No more eye rolling.”

“Darn it!” Teddy announced to the wall. “Brenda, do you have any screw anchors?”

“I don't think so. What are they?”

“Those little plastic jobbers that hold the screws into the drywall. I'll bet the guy who invented those is a millionaire. Probably a Japanese.”

“I don't think we have any.”

“Darn it. Who wants to go to the hardware store?”

“Me!” Hannah shouted.

What a pushover, Sam thought. You'd think the hardware store was Disney World.

Teddy blew drywall dust off the drill bit and said, “Sam?”

“I'm going running,” Sam said. “Thanks, though.”
He set his plate down, leaned forward, and kissed his mom's cheek. “See?” he whispered. “I'm a model of politeness.”

This time she was the one who rolled her eyes. Sam headed off toward his room.

 

His ancient Discman wasn't working. He put new batteries in it, but it was still dead. That's what he got for buying a cheap model he'd never heard of. He wanted to get away from the house before Teddy and Hannah came out to leave for the hardware store, so he didn't stretch for nearly as long as he normally would have. For the first ten minutes, he suffered. But eventually the muscles in his legs started to heat up and feel as if they were moving on their own. He left the neighborhood and made his way out to San Marco Avenue, where he ran against traffic. He passed the neon signs for the Fountain of Youth and the Ripley Museum. (It was hard to believe people actually paid to see that stuff. Why didn't they just throw their money into the street? He pictured the Believe It or Not headline for the story:
St. Augustine tourists throw dollars into the street for amusement—
AND LOCAL BOY RUNS AWAY WITH THEIR MONEY!
)

San Marco Avenue took him down to the Bridge of Lions. The water was choppy and dotted with bobbing fishing boats, and the wind, once he was out on the bridge, was crazy. But Sam liked the feel of it: shoving into his chest, like a giant hand, then not there at all, then smacking into his back and driving him forward. He crossed over onto Anastasia Island. From there, he left the main road and followed a path through the palmetto scrub, out to the beach at the island's northern tip. Damp sand—a few feet away from the tide line—was his favorite running surface. Just enough cushion. Just enough resistance. He was flying now, kicking chunks of sand up behind him and sending gangs of seagulls flapping out over the water. He was drenched in sweat, his mind engaged only with his speed, his form, and dodging the occasional beached jellyfish.

But soon his shins started to feel like burning sticks of wood. He turned around, finally, and headed back, but he was far from home when he had to slow down and eventually surrender to walking.

When he got back to his house, Teddy's car was gone. He opened the front door and felt the air conditioning seal onto his damp skin.

The phone rang and his mom answered it.

“Hello?…Oh, hi, Melissa! Are you ready for the new school year?…Mm-hmm…And what about colleges, have you started looking into those?…That's good…. It's never too early to start…. Okay…Yes, I think I just heard him come in. Sam, is that you?”

He stepped into the living room, still breathing heavily, and nodded.

“Here he is, Melissa. Say hi to your mother for me, all right?” She handed the phone over.

“Hey, Melissa-monster. What's up?”

“I'm so depressed!” Melissa said into his ear. “I can't even tell you.”

“Tell me,” he said, waving his mom away. She winked at him and returned to the sofa, where she'd been leafing through a book of wallpaper samples.

“Oh, you know. Why get out of bed, have they blown the world up yet, I'm a cow. The usual. What's going on with you?”

“Just got back from running.”

“You really ought to give that one up. You're a journalist, not a jock.”

“Screw you,” Sam said, and mimed a remorseful face when his mother looked up at him.

“Not in this lifetime. Do you want to go with me to the Pistol Museum tomorrow?”

“Why do you want to go
there
?”

“I talked to the curator on the phone today. He's going to let me take some pictures.”

“And what are you going to do with them? Decorate your room?”

“Very funny. I want to do a series of photos about handgun legislation for the fall art fair. The curator doesn't know that, but I don't think he'd care; he sounded about a hundred years old. Anyway, I want to do a kind of eerie gun montage, then get some shots of the jail, and maybe ride out to the Old Spanish Cemetery.”

“Sounds like an uplifting afternoon. I can't go, though. I'm working straight through Sunday.”

“Yuck,” Melissa said. “How much frozen yogurt can people eat?”

“More than you want to know. Somebody's got
to staff the counter. Shapiro—that whiny jerk who usually works weekends? I'm covering for him. Can we do it on Sunday?”

“It's got to be tomorrow afternoon, because they're closing the museum to have the carpets steamed, and the old guy said I could come in before they start.”

“Sorry.”

“Well, you're still coming over on Monday to watch
The Poseidon Adventure
, right?”

“Absolutely. It's a date,” he said—and was immediately sorry he'd chosen the word
date
. His mom raised her head again and smiled at him.

“Okay, I'd better go. I have a yoga class. I'm going to slash if I don't center myself.”

“Don't let your karma run over your dogma.”

“See, that's how much of a jock you're not. You don't even know what yoga is, and it's the least sporty of sports.”

They said good-bye and hung up.

His mom was watching him. “So,” she said after a moment, a hesitant smile forming on her lips, “you have a date with Melissa?”

“Just to watch a movie next week at her place. She's been having a classic disaster film festival all
summer.
Earthquake
,
Hurricane
,
Virus
, a bunch of other stuff I've never even heard of.”

“Melissa's a nice girl.”

“I guess.”

“Is she dating anyone?”

Sam shrugged. “I don't think so. She's kind of on the morbid side, not exactly a romantic.”

“I just think she's a nice girl. She told me she's going to apply to the University of Florida because they have a good photography program.”

“Yeah, she's mentioned that to me about a hundred times.”

“Well, what schools are you considering?”

“Cernak High,” he said, then whistled and glanced off to the side as if the point was obvious.

“I'm talking about a year from now, smart aleck. Before you know it, all your friends will be accepted
some
where, and you'll wish you'd given it some thought.”

Of course Sam had already started thinking about college. But it irked him that his mom just assumed he didn't care, that she was butting in and trying to control the situation. “I'm not even a senior yet.”

“You'll be one in about three weeks. Believe me,
time just flies. What do you think about the University of Florida?”

“I think…it's in Gainesville.”

“What do you think of it as a
school
?” she emphasized.

“As a school, I think it's in Gainesville. As a concept—”

“Attitude,”
she reminded him. “Their journalism program is supposed to be good. You're still interested in that, aren't you? You're going to be the editor of the school paper this year; that's the kind of thing that can help you get scholarship money.”

“Huh,” Sam said, as if he'd never heard of scholarships before.

“It might be worth looking into. What about Charlie?”

Sam blinked. “Charlie
Perrin
? What about him?”

“I'm just wondering what schools he's thinking about. He plays football, right?”

“Basketball. But Charlie and I haven't hung out in over a year.”

“There used to be that little group of you that I really liked. You and Charlie and Rudy Walters, and who was that boy who moved to Oregon?”

“No idea.”

“Don't be difficult. His name was Loren something.” She shook her head. “That was such a terrible thing, when Charlie's mother passed away. Just awful. She went so quickly.”

Sam didn't say anything. He'd wanted to call Charlie when he'd heard, but hadn't been able to bring himself to do it.

“Is he doing okay, since then?”

“No idea.”

“Does he have a girlfriend? Mrs. Morrow up the street said he was dating that girl Kate Bryant, the one who got that junior spirit trophy at the awards ceremony last year.”

“Mom, I
don't know
.”

“Well, when did you two stop being friends? After his mother died?”

“No, it was before that.”

“And you
never
talk to him? I'm sure he could use a friend. I mean, really, Sam, the Perrins live just three streets over.” Sam tilted his head back and closed his eyes. “All right, never mind,” she said. “But what happened, anyway? You two were so close. For years. Friendships don't just end all of a sudden.”

“This one did.”

“Don't tell me if you don't want to, but it's a shame. He's a nice boy.”

Sam already knew this. He missed having Charlie as a friend. But he had to accept the situation for what it was. There was no way around it. “Can I…keep walking down the hall now? You know, to my room?”

She exhaled. “Go. Just don't forget about the shed.”

“What about it?” Suddenly Sam remembered. He felt his energy drain down his legs and into his shoes.

“You're going to wax it this afternoon. That's what we agreed on.”

Sam groaned. “It's my day off. I'm not supposed to do
anything
.” She tilted her head toward him. “Why can't Teddy do it? He's the one who built the stupid thing. We don't even need it. It's just killing grass.”

“Speaking of grass,” his mom said, “Teddy mowed it before he put up the shed. Remember? That was very nice of him, and it's one less thing you have to do, so I expect you to stick to what we agreed on and wax the shed. This afternoon.”

“Does Teddy live here now, or what?”

“Sam! Would you stop being so difficult?”

“Does he? I'm only asking because he's here all the time.”

“He's here as much as I want him to be, young man. And if you don't shape up, you're going to spend the rest of the summer in your room.”

Then I won't be able to wax the shed
, Sam thought. He retreated down the hall.

 

She had everything fixed a certain way in her mind. Sam was supposed to be dating Melissa. He and Charlie were supposed to still be best friends. They were all—including Charlie—supposed to dance off to U of F together and live happily ever after. Why didn't she just attach marionette strings to everybody's limbs and put on a show called
Sam's Mom Rules the World
?