Stotan! (7 page)

“Well, the sweat ran down my chest and the insides of my arms and my thighs burned and every once in a while I'd feel myself slip a little and I'd push back up. Once I felt the tip of the blade, but Sarge didn't come back. My knees started to shake, but I held on—still acting tough—and guys were whispering to hang in there.

“I heard the door and saw the sarge coming slowly down the hall. He walked up in front of me and said, ‘You're a
little
tougher than I thought,' and walked out again.”

Even Lion was up on his elbows listening, though I'm sure he'd heard it before.

Jeff started to get up to take a leak, but I yelled, “Finish the story, you jerk!” and he smiled and sat back down on his bag. Jeff has to know he's appreciated.

“Well, then I started to break. Parts of my legs were going numb and I was afraid I couldn't keep control. My butt and lower back were on fire. Tears ran down my face and I started to whimper. Guys were still encouraging me, whispering it would only be a few more seconds, but I broke. I started screaming for Sarge, bawling and wailing and begging. I didn't have the strength left in my legs to push myself up, and the guys were too scared of Sarge to kick the knife out. The door opened and he walked back at his same slow pace. I could feel the point of the blade right there, and I cried and blubbered as he walked toward me. He stood in front of me and kicked the bayonet over, then turned to the troops and said, ‘See, I told you he was a sister,' and started to walk out.

“But just as he kicked it out, I checked out. I mean, I checked
out.
He was walking away and I screamed at him: ‘Put it back! Get back here, you worthless scumbag! Put it back!' He whirled around and just stood there, looking at me—and he looked surprised. I screamed, ‘Screw you, Sergeant! Put the stinking thing back! What's the matter,
sister?'
I was still in position
and I felt like I could hold it forever.”

Jeff laughed. “Boy, Sarge didn't know whether to crap his drawers or go blind—he just wasn't programmed for it. So he walked out. I looked at the rest of the guys watching me from their bunks, sort of frozen there, and I held the position maybe thirty more seconds. Then I pushed hard against the wall and stood up.”

He looked at Nortie. “Don't worry about your body. It can take a
lot.
Max hasn't tapped anything yet.”

Nortie just stared, his mind back somewhere on the pain in Jeff's legs, then snapped to. “That's
your
body,” he said. “He's tapped mine.” He was quiet a second, then his eyes lit up. “Stotan stories!” he said. “That's what we can do. We can tell Stotan stories. It'll keep us from getting bored. Got any more, Jeff?”

Jeff looked at him, shook his head and turned away.

“It's a good idea,” Nortie said, and turned to me. I'd finished my sandwich and was lying on my stomach in my bag, relaxed. “Nortie,” I said, “you probably have more Stotan stories than all of us combined.
You
tell a Stotan story.”

A thousand hard times must have whipped through his mind, and his face showed a little piece of each one,
but he just raised his eyebrows and put his chin in his hands.

 

“I
do
have a Stotan story, as a matter of fact,” Nortie said. It was several hours later and Elaine had sent a friend over to tell us something had come up and she'd have to come tomorrow night. We were getting a little tired of each other's company, so it was disappointing, but we whipped over to Dick's Drive-In and got a six-pack of burgers each to appease ourselves. We were back and about ready to call it a night.

I said, “Let's hear it.”

“You've already heard part of it,” Nortie said. “Nobody else knows this, so you guys have to promise it doesn't go out of this room, okay?”

“All Stotan stories stay within the brotherhood,” Lion said. “New rule.”

“It might not be a
real
Stotan story…”

“Just tell it, for Chrissakes!” Jeff yelled. “We can give it a title later.”

“I used to have a brother,” Nortie said, and I knew this was a real Stotan story.

“Really?” Lion said. “I never knew…” I raised my hand and shook my head at him. He let it trail off.

“Yeah,” Nortie said. “No one around here knows
about him. His name was Jeremy. I was six when he died. Exactly six. He died on my birthday.”

I said, “Nortie, you don't have to tell this. When I said you must have stories, I meant…”

“I need to tell this,” he said. “I've had it with me a long time. Is it okay to tell it?”

Lion said, “It's okay to tell it.” Lion knows a thing or two about family that used to be.

“My brother was seven years older than me,” Nortie said, and smiled. “I was a mistake. A big one, my dad says. Anyway, we lived in a small town called Beaumont in Nebraska and my dad was a truck-driver. He was
really
mean then. He used to do real damage. He drank a lot—way more than now—and he'd come home some nights in a rage. He'd drag everyone out of bed and choose one of us to pick on—usually Mom or Jeremy, because they protected me. He'd call us names and ask why the hell we were trying to ruin him and make wild accusations until either Mom or Jeremy had had enough and challenged him. Then he'd knock them around and storm out. We'd comfort each other and finally go back to bed and Dad would stay away a day or so—or go out on a haul—and then come back like nothing had happened. No one would mention it, but you could see Jeremy starting to hate him. And I didn't
understand that then, because Jeremy talked about all the things he wanted to do to Dad, and
would
do as soon as he was big enough; but then I'd see him trying to please him all the damn time. He'd go out and wash his truck—once he even
waxed
it. A whole truck he waxed. It was a monster. And I'd want to ask him why. I wanted to ask him why he did anything nice for Dad. But I didn't ask. And I understand now, because I do it all the time.

“I remember one night Dad came home drunk and decided Mom had been sleeping around, so he called her a whore and a bitch and some names a whole lot worse than those. She stood there crying, asking how he could be so mean when he just knew that wasn't true. But he wouldn't give it up, and he started describing what she did with all these other guys she was messing with. Finally, he made her stand up on this big round coffee table so her kids could get a good look at their mother, the whore. Jeremy cried and held my head against his chest so I couldn't look, and Dad came over and jerked him away and threw him against the kitchen table. Then he made me throw things at Mom. He stood there slapping me on the back of the head until I did it. I said, ‘No!' and he'd slap me, and then he started to choke me. Mom was begging me to go ahead, and
Jeremy was trying to get up to come help, but his arm was broken. Finally, I threw an ash tray at her, and I think a small vase that was on a TV tray. Neither one hit her, but somehow it satisfied him, and he called us all some more names and left.

“Jeremy was thirteen years old, and I think he thought Dad had finally gone too far; that we'd pack up and leave, because that's what Mom said. But the next morning, when she took us to the hospital to have his arm set and put in a cast, she told the doctor that he'd broken it falling off the garage roof. I remember the look on his face like it was yesterday. I think he hated her more for that than he hated my dad. He knew right then we were stuck with it forever, and he hated himself for not being able to make it better.

“The next day Mom sent me out to the garage to see the bike they got me for my birthday, and to get Jeremy to come in and watch me open the rest of my presents. Dad was on the road.

“The garage was just off the kitchen, and I walked through the door and Jeremy had hung himself from the rafters. A stepladder was kicked over and his Adidas dangled right above my eye level. There was a note tied to one of them with my name on it.

“I was a Stotan, guys. I was tough and I showed no pain, as Max says. I walked over and took the note, turned around and went back into the house and up to my room. I didn't cry or say a word; just crawled under the covers. A couple of weeks later I read the note. All it said was Jeremy was sorry; that I'd have to take care of myself. He wished me good luck.”

Nortie told the story without changing tone or expression once. Jeff and I were paralyzed; staring at him, waiting for more; waiting for the rest. Tears streamed down Lion's face and he rolled over and faced the wall.

“I don't even know what happened after that,” Nortie said. “I don't know how Mom got him down or how they notified my dad or what happened to the bike. Neither of my parents ever said another word about it—at least not to me. In a few months we moved. I think we moved about four times in the next couple of years until we showed up here. My dad's been at the hardware store ever since. He doesn't drink as much as he used to, and he doesn't beat on us as much.”

I finally said, “Nortie, is there anything we can do?”

“Nope,” he said. “I just needed to tell somebody.” He rolled over and laid his head down. “I've been needing to tell somebody for a long time.”

Lion saved the day. We lay for those few minutes, dreading going to sleep on Nortie's story. I couldn't imagine having that incident be part of my life, or living with what it must be like to have Mr. Wheeler as a dad. It made me wonder how Nortie got the day-to-day things done—how he got up and went to school, or took out the garbage, or shoveled the walk.

Lion said, “I have a Stotan story that will put yours to shame, Nortie. And it will diminish yours to the rank of ‘amusing anecdote,' Jeff.”

Jeff said, “So tell it, Anus Breath.”

Any story would do.

Lion reached up and switched off the flashlight above his bed, leaving us with only the glow from the streetlight outside and the reddish flash of the neon bar sign. “Close your eyes,” he said. “You'll want to visualize this.

“At fourteen—a frosh—I was not quite the fully bloomed Tom Selleck clone you see before you today. While not the King of adolescent clumsiness and buffoonery, I certainly qualified as a Duke or an Earl. And I had the hots for Melissa Lefebvre.”

“You and every guy who draws breath,” Jeff said.

“Yeah, but I had it
bad.”

I said, “This is beginning to sound like Melissa Lefebvre's Stotan story.”

“Funny man,” Lion said. “The girl was enchanted. She just didn't know it. So shut up and let me tell this.

“You guys remember Melissa. Already a varsity cheerleader, she was Sophomore Class President, Frost High School Carnival Queen and carried a 4.0 grade average, with a reputation so pristine you felt the stabbing, twisting saber of guilt the moment you tried to sneak her into one of your fantasies. More than once she turned me into a one-man Ship of Fools with a smile or a nod that wasn't even meant for me. A curious mixture of tomboy and princess, those subtle dimples, long brown hair and light blue eyes just made you ache.”

Jeff let out big air. “This isn't a Stotan story,” he said. “This is disgusting.”

Lion went on as if Jeff hadn't spoken. “I wanted her. But to have her, to really
have
her; to shroud her in the purple-and-gold letter sweater I had yet to earn; to have my class ring wrapped in adhesive tape coated with fingernail polish so it would fit her delicate finger; to meet daily at Dolly's for a chocolate Coke; well, that would have been what you call your amazing come-from-behind victory.”

“That would have been an amazing come-from-
way-
behind victory,” Jeff said.

“Whatever,” Lion said. “Anyway, a few nights before the Football Frolics dance up at the gym, during which I had promised myself to ask her to dance—maybe even a slow one—I was visited upon by the first of a forest of pimples yet to come. This wasn't an advance man, an insignificant pimple scout sent ahead to determine whether this peach-fuzz frontier could support a whole pimple nation. This was Sitting Bull. This pimple was red and sore and angry and given to harmonic tremors. Friends asked if I were growing another head. Enemies said it must be my date to the dance. This was a big zit.

“I considered flying down to some obscure Central or South American country where it's possible to have an illegal alien growing on your face surgically removed, but decided against it, because I was fortunate in those days to count among my friends one Walker Dupree, a promising young swimmer and budding sports-medicine specialist, ready with a quick remedy for my leprous condition.”

I was already laughing—I knew this story. “Really,” I said, “it worked for me.”

It was as if I hadn't spoken—or didn't exist. “After close examination,” he went on, “my friend Walker recommended Coke-bottle treatment. ‘I beat it to death with a Coke bottle?' I gasped, then considered it. ‘That
might
work.'

“But Walker revealed to me a nearly invisible scar from a boil on his right calf that he had treated with this method just three days earlier.

“That night, with my parents finally tucked away in their beds, I closed myself in the kitchen, quietly boiled a Coke bottle in water and deposited a wet washrag in the freezer. When the water came to a rolling boil and the rag was nearly stiff, I carefully removed the bottle with tongs, wrapped it in the freezing washrag and slipped the piping-hot mouth over the mountainous zit—the idea being that as the air inside cooled and contracted, it would suck the boiling core of the Vesuvian blemish
whappo!
right into the bottle, rendering it dormant and harmless.

“It didn't come off as advertised.”

I said, “You must not have done it right.”