Seven Deadly Pleasures (28 page)

I sidestepped down the embankment. My breath was a tired horse. Sweat ran through older sweat and dried blood, making sticky trails down my jaw and forehead. There were rocks in my sneakers.

I found the bottom, scrambled across the sewer pipe and snuck up a glance to mark my progress. Kyle was waiting for me at the top of the rise, elbows bending in and out with each heaving breath, his eyes pinned to me with dark regard.

I slowed. Each intake of air felt like the cross of a sharp scissors, and the more I clawed an advance up the slope, the more my resolve weakened.

He waited.

The strategy was so cool, so unexpected and obvious that it stole any of my remaining fumes of courage. I had gotten nowhere with this. First, from his position above, all Kyle had to do was give one push and I would tumble back down the embankment. More practically, however, Kyle had quickly and effectively gotten us both right where he originally intended. Seventy yards or so from my back door. The victory for him was cold and absolute. I hauled myself up over the lip and there was no helping hand to pull me across. Those days were done.

I fell to my knees on all fours in front of him so he could not sneak a push to my chest just to teach me a final lesson or something. I looked down and took in sharp draughts of air, hating myself, hating the world and its cruel little realities, the twists and slants on fairness, the imbalances. If another kid was stronger, I was supposed to inherit the smarts. Those were the rules, weren't they?

Kyle spoke first, but just before, he snapped out his arm and gripped the back of my neck with clammy fingers. He pushed down a bit so my face went about four inches from the ground.

"Just come with me and take a peek," he said. "Chasing me down to fight is only going to get you beat up and the both of us nailed. See if you see it my way first, that's all I ask, all right?"

An absolute insult. He was quite capable of charging in on Lucy and grabbing her for himself. I was no factor. The only possible difference was that my dog trusted me enough not to make a ruckus on the approach. But why would that matter to Kyle? As long as Mom was in a room away from a back window Lucy's barking wouldn't mean diddly to her.

I suppose he wanted to get off scot-free, take from me what I loved the most, and do it with my approval. Maybe so he could sleep better. The fucker.

I had not responded.

"All right?" he repeated. He shoved my head down farther. Now the ground was a pencil's width away my nose.

"Let go first."

"Promise to help me scope out what's waiting for us in the back yard and I will. Nice and slow through the weeds. We'll spy it together. Make the promise."

"All right," I said.

He squeezed harder and I gave a short yelp.

"Say it like you mean it, Jimmy. And don't even think about pulling a run and tattle. You're the one wearing the blood, dig?"

"OK, I get it, Kyle!"

He gave one more hard press, then removed his hand. Then he helped me up, but made sure it didn't really feel like help. He hooked into my underarm and dug right up in there as if it was the bottom of a window frame that was stuck. I came up and looked him in the face, but my eyes wavered first. His grip had been like iron. The message was clear.

"Let's go," he said.

He crawled his way through the high grass and I followed behind as I was supposed to. A swirl of gnats followed above us in a cloud. We pushed through a long stretch of high reeds, pussywillows, and long ferns that bent quietly before us, and when we passed over a damp patch we detoured off to the left. My mind thought of everything and nothing at once, circling back to an image of Lucy curled up at the foot of my bed every night, little paws under her maw, a little sigh of satisfaction when my feet, the covers, the sweet semi-darkness, and the warm air made a perfect little pocket of physical comfort. I tried to jump that sentimental track and get real. I tried to scratch out alternatives, but came up with nothing.

Mutiny was not my game and the familiarity of the surroundings was distracting. We were on the outskirts of the world of Mom, the place in which I was nothing but a squatter. Here, uprisings were not tolerated and loud protests never given. I had never been a path blazer or a rebel, a fighter or even an underdog. I followed here. I followed and hoped one day to grow magically into my right to drum up alternatives.

Kyle was going to kill Lucy and I could not stop him.

The weeds were thinning a bit. It was happening fast now. Everything itched and my mouth was bone dry. We were at the edge of my back yard. Kyle took the last bit of camouflage, a stalk in the middle of a wide growth of prairie grass, and moved it an inch aside.

It was lucky that we had averted the muddy little run back there. If we had continued in that direction it would have brought us to the middle of the property and that is exactly where my mother was looking.

She was on the back deck, hands in fists on the hips. She stared into the woods just to our right. Her blouse was a soft pastel green, an absolute irony to the steel beneath drawn into high tension you could see in the tendons of her forearms, the cords in her neck. Strands of her reddish-gray, bobby-pinned hair had come loose and they flew around her face like sharp tendrils of smoke. Her nostrils flared and I immediately thought "dragon." Her shock-blue eyes looked both ice cold and blistering hot at the same time.

It was a bad sign. I was not permitted past the weeds and into the forest, and if Mom thought I was desperate enough to try a sneak-in from this angle, it surely meant dinner was long past burnt. How long had it taken for me to rake the area and dump the shovels once I had found the watch? How long had I argued with Kyle about strategy? How many minutes were lost in the wild sprint over here? I had not taken the Mickey Mouse timepiece with me to keep a running check, and it was one more piece of poor preparation. When was I going to get with the program and be ready for shit like this? My dinner was probably into that ugly stage between cold and crusted. It would be a massive badge of failure in my mother's eyes, and God help us all if a Raybeck dinner ended up in the
trash.
Lord have mercy on children of all ages, that lecture could go on until midnight!

A gust of wind swept across the yard and my terrier stretched out her paws. She was lying on her side at the edge of the patio with her snow-white chest aimed at the sun coming in from the left. She snorted a little breath through her nose and ran her tongue along her whiskers.

Mom ignored her. The nylon lead kept the dog out of her perennials and that was all she cared about. Lucy was out of the way, chained there, and basically out of mind.

Lucy was our best hope and it killed me inside. Kyle was right. There was no fooling the blue-jean queen at the door. I was amazed at the absolute power my mother exuded when you were displaced to the side and observing her as a stranger would. I thought she was bad in the kitchen when she was up in your face, but this was actually awe-inspiring.

A sudden shrill, mechanical buzzing cut into the breeze and Kyle tensed up beside me. A sick rush went through my stomach. Mom turned toward the sound and made for the kitchen door.

The clothes were done.

This was it. The dryer in the garage had completed a cycle and Mom would be tied up for ten minutes or so, folding shirts and piling skivvies. Our window of opportunity had arrived.

The screen door swept shut behind her and Lucy barely noticed the exit. Her ear flicked. Kyle gave me a shove.

"Go," he said. "Now."

I paused. I couldn't.

"Fucking go, Jimmy! What the hell are you waiting for?"

I did nothing and he exhaled in a way to make me notice the sound. He started to stand and I grabbed his shirt sleeve.

"No," I said. "I'll do it."

I did not want Kyle Skinner touching my dog. I would take her myself. Hold her one last time.

I took one more second to look between the stalks of wild grass, and Lucy crossed her front paws. She opened her muzzle, curled her tongue, and gave a yawn.

I swallowed hard, blinked twice, and rose up out of the brush.

7.

Lucy sensed me right away and sprang to all fours. Her ears perked up. I came across the lawn hunched over as if someone was about to strike me. It was a nightmare and a blur.

The silence about the house seemed to boom a sickly pulse. I could feel the threat in my throat. At any moment, Mom's face could swim into one of those windows, her surprise quickly spreading to a look of alarm. Then fury. Lucy dragged the lead taught. It caught on her water bowl and dragged it across the concrete patio deck for a few feet. She went up on her hind legs and pawed at the air.

I kneeled and she exploded into me, a flurry of paws trying to take me in all at once. She was jumping to get up onto my back. I grabbed at her collar and unhooked the lead. I had a moment of disorientation during which I saw what I must have looked like in symbol world. I was no longer a boy, but a demon with no face, wearing black with the collar up. Lucy started in with her licking and lapping. I did have a face and it was covered with the blood of a dead blonde. I almost threw up.

I turned away my face and gathered the awkward moving bundle. She was still trying to mash her muzzle against my lips, craning in, cold, wet nose. I turned and made for the woods. At any second I fully expected the squeal of that screen door, the sharp call of my mother, the footsteps in pursuit.

They never came.

I broke through the weeds and pushed down the hill, past Kyle, down the steep rise. I almost tripped and went headlong down the slope. I caught myself just in time and widened my steps. I heard Kyle's hoarse breath behind me. He was panting and I don't think it was just the rapid pace. I think he was excited as hell. Lucy was nervous now, nearly motionless for all but an occasional kick from a hind leg.

I reached the bottom of the gully and stopped. Lucy's nose was nuzzled into my neck and I could hear her curious sniffing. Her body felt warm with trust in the arms of her best companion.

My mind went red and I heard roaring in my ears. I could not do it, not in a million years, not ever. A hand fell on my shoulder. I shuddered so badly I almost dropped the dog. Kyle slipped in front of me wearing his fake-me-out smile. He reached for Lucy.

"Hand her to me, Jimmy. You've taken her as far as you can go. I can tell. Give her up. It's almost done."

He stretched a set of grubby fingers to the fur on her neck and I exploded.

"No, you fucker!"

I stepped to the side and tilted back my head.

I brought it down. The air whistled. Contact. A splatting sound. He was rocked back with the violent contact and my motion brought me just past his shoulder. In the corner of my eye I saw his palm race up to the middle of his face. I got my balance and took a good look. Bright blood squeezed through his fingers and dripped down his wrist. Got him square in the nose. Bull's-eye.

"Argghh," he said.

"Take that, you fucker!" I shouted back. I was fuming at a height so great and so new that the boundaries seemed endless. Kyle was hurt. I had caused it. Now
my
breath was starting to race and Lucy started to kick.

I held her tight.

Then I just dropped her. Maybe Kyle could chase me down in a dead heat, but he would never catch Lucy once she got going.

She fell between us and scratched for a footing. Kyle dove in at her and missed, landing hard on his forearms and pitching up dirt. Before he could recover I stamped on the back of his left hand.

"Run!" I hollered. "Go, Lucy, run!"

She skidded across the sewer pipe in a fast break for the far hill. Kyle clawed to his feet and spit blood to the ground. I shrank back and covered up. The rain of blows was going to be heavy and motivated.

But no punch was thrown, and by the time my eyes fluttered open Kyle was past the pipe and tearing up the side of the hill. He was going for Lucy. Thirty feet above him I caught a glimpse of her hind legs disappearing over the peak and into the trees.

And suddenly I knew.

I knew where she was going and Kyle did too. She was not running blindly. She was following our scent back to the pit.

I put down my head and pushed my aching legs as hard as they could go in chase of the boy who was stalking my dog. My heart was pounding. My lungs started to burn.

This was all far from over.

8.

By the time I crashed through the trees and down into the clearing it was almost too late. The unfolding scene was repulsive and odd, with Kyle bent over and making a slow tiptoe along the far lip of the grave. One bloody hand was pressed to his face and the other was dangling down and out, thumb rubbing against forefinger. His breath rattled. His voice was a muffled "come hither" from beneath the bloody hand and kept repeating "Here, kitty, kitty," between more muffled curses from the back of his throat.

Lucy was not buying into it. Yet. Her tail was down and her neck hair was up. Every time Kyle got close, she pranced away. Then she would slow and stop, never escaping but always keeping a cushion of a couple of feet between herself and her coaxing assassin.

I ran long to the left where they were instead of where they were going and wound up at the edge of the circle across from the rooted path I had driven a car down in what seemed another age. My hands went to my waist, then my knees. My shoulders were heaving up and down, my lungs raw.

"Lucy!" I gasped. "Come here, now!"

She stopped fast and twitched up her ears.