Read Joe College: A Novel Online
Authors: Tom Perrotta
Joe College: A Novel (24 page)
Cindy didn’t flinch when she saw him or make any attempt to conceal the fact that she’d been crying, but she did tighten her grip on my hand as we descended the steps and made our way down the front walk. I lagged a half step behind her to signal my reluctance to everyone involved.
“You didn’t have to wait out here,” she told him. “You could have rung the bell.”
He gave a sullen shrug, sucking long and hard on his cigarette before flicking it onto her front lawn, staring at me the whole time. I made a complicated face in response, trying to convey discomfort, friendliness, and a desire to be elsewhere in a single expression. Probably I just looked like a moron.
“Kevin, Danny,” Cindy said, liberating my hand for the ceremonial shake. “Danny, Kevin.”
Kevin’s grip was as limp and unenthused as my own, and I felt a strange kinship with him when our eyes met. He seemed no more suited for marriage and fatherhood than I did.
“Man,” I said, hoping he understood that I meant it as a compliment, “you don’t look like the manager of a Medi-Mart.”
“Assistant manager in training,” he corrected me, smiling sadly. “It just means I have to work nights, weekends, and holidays.”
“You’ll be a manager soon,” Cindy told him.
Kevin didn’t dispute this assertion. Reaching into the pocket of his nicely faded jean jacket—I’d never been able to get my jackets to fade like that and would have liked to know his secret—he pulled out a soft pack of Winstons and extracted another cigarette. I tried not to stare as he struck the match and brought the tiny quivering flame to his face, but I couldn’t help myself. He blew a cloud of smoke at the sky and watched it dissipate.
“Won’t that be something,” he said, so softly that it seemed to be addressed more to himself than to me or Cindy.
It was a
little after nine when I pulled up in front of my house, late enough that I could light the coffee stoves on the Roach Coach and save myself a trip later on. I’d gotten into the habit of watching my back in the past couple of days, in case the Lunch Monsters decided to pay me the same sort of surprise visit they’d paid to Tito, but that night my mind was elsewhere. The whole way home I’d been thinking about Kevin and Cindy and the baby and myself, wondering if everything hadn’t worked out in the best possible way for all of us. Kevin loved Cindy, so he couldn’t complain. Instead of being a single mother, Cindy would have a husband and a father for her child, a good-looking young guy with a decent job and not some portly middle-aged lech like I’d imagined. I’d be going back to school, picking up right where I left off. The baby would have a normal childhood, just like the one I’d had, maybe even going to the same schools and learning from some of the same teachers. I felt a small pang of sadness imagining all the milestones I’d miss out on—the first steps, the first words, the birthday parties and school plays and Little League games, the lost teeth and Christmases and trips to the beach and points of historical interest—but the thought that Kevin would be there in my stead seemed right somehow, as if the baby were as much his as my own. I even toyed with a fantasy in which I became rich and famous and returned to Darwin years later as a kind of fairy godfather, showering my wealth not only on the child whose life I hadn’t been able to share, but on Cindy and Kevin too, rewarding them for their years of sacrifice, buying them a fancy car and sending them on an all-expenses-paid trip to Paris while Polly and I stayed behind and looked after the kid. I tried not to think about Kevin’s broken family or the sadness and fatigue that had come over him when he talked about his job. He’d reminded me of my own father then, and I’d found this association more upsetting than comforting.
little after nine when I pulled up in front of my house, late enough that I could light the coffee stoves on the Roach Coach and save myself a trip later on. I’d gotten into the habit of watching my back in the past couple of days, in case the Lunch Monsters decided to pay me the same sort of surprise visit they’d paid to Tito, but that night my mind was elsewhere. The whole way home I’d been thinking about Kevin and Cindy and the baby and myself, wondering if everything hadn’t worked out in the best possible way for all of us. Kevin loved Cindy, so he couldn’t complain. Instead of being a single mother, Cindy would have a husband and a father for her child, a good-looking young guy with a decent job and not some portly middle-aged lech like I’d imagined. I’d be going back to school, picking up right where I left off. The baby would have a normal childhood, just like the one I’d had, maybe even going to the same schools and learning from some of the same teachers. I felt a small pang of sadness imagining all the milestones I’d miss out on—the first steps, the first words, the birthday parties and school plays and Little League games, the lost teeth and Christmases and trips to the beach and points of historical interest—but the thought that Kevin would be there in my stead seemed right somehow, as if the baby were as much his as my own. I even toyed with a fantasy in which I became rich and famous and returned to Darwin years later as a kind of fairy godfather, showering my wealth not only on the child whose life I hadn’t been able to share, but on Cindy and Kevin too, rewarding them for their years of sacrifice, buying them a fancy car and sending them on an all-expenses-paid trip to Paris while Polly and I stayed behind and looked after the kid. I tried not to think about Kevin’s broken family or the sadness and fatigue that had come over him when he talked about his job. He’d reminded me of my own father then, and I’d found this association more upsetting than comforting.
I pushed open the back door of the Roach Coach and turned on the burners. Just as the flames ignited, a voice spoke in my head, as loud and clear as if another person were standing next to me.
He died for my sins, it
said. I wasn’t religious, so this message caught me completely by surprise. Incongruous as it was, the phrase repeated itself with such urgency that I must have spoken it out loud, even as my attacker came charging across the driveway.
He died for my sins, it
said. I wasn’t religious, so this message caught me completely by surprise. Incongruous as it was, the phrase repeated itself with such urgency that I must have spoken it out loud, even as my attacker came charging across the driveway.
“He died for my sins.”
Our driveway was narrow, and I was standing right by the edge, which was a good thing, since I was tackled with such force that my feet left the ground. I landed on my back on the dewy front lawn, the wind knocked out of me by the impact, my arms and legs spread as if I’d been crucified. Stars swam on the inside of my closed eyelids, and a strange calm settled over me as I awaited the first blow. I had already decided not to fight back, but instead to accept the punishment I had so deliberately called down upon my own head.
A few seconds passed, though, and still nothing happened. Cautiously I opened my eyes. Instead of a ferocious goon, I saw Matt crouching over me, looking down with an expression of sarcastic glee.
“What the hell—” I sputtered, too short of breath to complete the question.
“Who died for your sins?” he demanded with a smirk.
I sat up slowly, drawing my knees to my chest and shaking my head to clear away the cobwebs. I saw his paper dining hall cap lying in the driveway, not far from the Roach Coach, and wondered why I felt irritated rather than relieved.
“Kevin,” I told him. “Who died for yours?”
Matt was thrilled
by the sight of the Roach Coach in the driveway, as excited as a little kid at the firehouse. “Is this really your truck?” he kept asking me, once I’d picked myself up from the lawn and begun breathing more or less normally. “I can’t believe this is really your truck.” He begged me to take him for a spin and wouldn’t stop until I promised to let him ride shotgun with me in the morning.
by the sight of the Roach Coach in the driveway, as excited as a little kid at the firehouse. “Is this really your truck?” he kept asking me, once I’d picked myself up from the lawn and begun breathing more or less normally. “I can’t believe this is really your truck.” He begged me to take him for a spin and wouldn’t stop until I promised to let him ride shotgun with me in the morning.
His gung-ho spirit faded overnight, however, and he was still fast asleep on my bedroom floor when I tiptoed outside in a chilly dawn drizzle and climbed into the truck. I’d tried waking him at four and then again an hour later, but both times he’d flopped onto his stomach and pulled the sleeping bag over his head. I could have kept shaking and prodding him until he surrendered, but as much as I would have enjoyed his company, I sympathized even more with his desire to remain where he was.
It had been awkward introducing him to my parents so close to bedtime—they were both in their pajamas and less than thrilled to learn that a visitor had arrived, let alone a crazy-eyed stranger in bowling shoes and a paper cap who blithely announced that he’d just been kicked out of his girlfriend’s apartment for insulting Emily Dickinson—but once we cleared that hurdle I was surprised at how happy I was to see him. The events of the previous week had left me feeling troubled and isolated, and I was glad to finally be able to talk about them with a friend, a more or less kindred spirit I could count on for unswerving empathy and moral support, if not for good judgment.
On a normal day, my arrival at the warehouse generated about as much fanfare as the appearance of the next garbage truck at the dump. That Monday morning, though, people were waiting for me. I could feel it as soon as I pulled into the lot. The other drivers stopped what they were doing and stared at the Roach Coach as if the Pope himself were perched on top, dispensing his blessings from inside a bulletproof glass bubble. By the time I shut off the engine and climbed down from the cab, a small receiving committee had gathered in my honor in the middle of the lot. Chuckie was there, and Anthony, and Ted McGee, and even Pete the Polack, as well as a couple of guys I wasn’t even on nodding terms with.
“Way to go,” said Fat Teddy, almost knocking me to the pavement with a friendly swat between the shoulder blades. “Show the bastards what you’re made of.”
“Kid’s got balls,” said one of the strangers, a gangly six-footer with a receding hairline and a prominent adam’s apple.
“Fock dare modduhs!” exclaimed Pete the Polack, ejecting a gob of spit from the corner of his mouth with startling conviction and velocity. It exploded against the blacktop with a clearly audible splat.
Another stranger, a taciturn guy known as Corduroy on account of the ratty beige sport coat he wore on all but the hottest or coldest days of the year, stepped up and pressed my hand between both of his. His eyes were watery and his breath smelled like last night’s beer.
“Your father must be proud,” he told me.
“Fock dare sistus!” Pete added for good measure, launching an equally impressive projectile from the other side of his mouth.
“Stand up to the bullies,” Anthony added quietly, raising a clenched fist and nodding his approval.
Chuckie placed his right hand gently on my shoulder. His expression was so solemn I thought I was being knighted.
“We’re with you,” he said. “We’re all pulling for you.”
“Fock dare dogs!” Pete continued, getting a bit carried away. I
thought he was going to spit again to complete the outburst, but this time he just cleared his throat and smiled.
thought he was going to spit again to complete the outburst, but this time he just cleared his throat and smiled.
“You goot boy,” he told me.
My hero’s welcome continued inside the warehouse, where I received numerous pats on the back and muttered words of encouragement that made me feel like the star quarterback must feel in the locker room on the morning of the big game. Even Sheila joined the chorus. She tallied up my order with a few quick scribbles in her pad, then pressed her icy palm against my cheek in an incongruously maternal gesture.
“You be careful now,” she told me. “Come back in one piece, you hear?”
I wasn’t displeased
by all this attention—I wouldn’t have objected to being treated like that on a daily basis, in fact—but I couldn’t help wondering what I’d done to deserve it. It was true that I’d managed to elude the Lunch Monsters for several days running, but as far as I knew nothing had happened over the weekend to account for the apparent jump in my status between last Friday and today. I loaded up the Roach Coach and headed around back. There was a long line for propane, as usual, but Chuckie was alone at the ice house, so I pulled up behind the Chuck Wagon and jumped out, hoping for some enlightenment.
by all this attention—I wouldn’t have objected to being treated like that on a daily basis, in fact—but I couldn’t help wondering what I’d done to deserve it. It was true that I’d managed to elude the Lunch Monsters for several days running, but as far as I knew nothing had happened over the weekend to account for the apparent jump in my status between last Friday and today. I loaded up the Roach Coach and headed around back. There was a long line for propane, as usual, but Chuckie was alone at the ice house, so I pulled up behind the Chuck Wagon and jumped out, hoping for some enlightenment.
“Here he is,” Chuckie said, announcing my arrival to an invisible audience. “The man himself.”
“That’s right,” I said. “
Ecce homo.”
Ecce homo.”
I figured the homo thing would get a rise out of him, but he let it pass without comment. He dumped three shovelfuls of ice into his ice bed before pausing to look at me.
“You sure you know what you’re doing?”
“It depends,” I said. “What am I doing?”
His eyes narrowed; he studied me for a few more seconds, trying to decide if I was pulling his chain.
“You’re too much,” he said, shaking his head and chuckling
indulgently. Almost immediately, though, his expression darkened. “You want to borrow my piece?”
indulgently. Almost immediately, though, his expression darkened. “You want to borrow my piece?”
“Do I need it?”
“I dunno,” he shrugged. “Maybe. After what you said to Vito Scalzone …”
“Vito Scalzone?” The name rang no bells. “You mean the kid?”
“What kid?” He looked at me like I was being purposely dense. “Vito Meatballs.”
“The old guy?”
“Vito Meatballs,” he said again, as if this were a household name. “The one and only.”
“
Vito Meatballs?”
My heart sank. “Is that really what they call him?”
Vito Meatballs?”
My heart sank. “Is that really what they call him?”
“Either that or Mr. Scalzone, I guess.” Chuckie gave a soft laugh, as if sharing a private joke with himself. “I can’t believe you told Vito Meatballs to suck your dick.”
“What? Where’d you hear that?”
“Fat Teddy told me.”
“Who told him?”
“I don’t know. Lots of people are talking about it.”
My face got hot. I wasn’t an expert on these things, but I had read
The Valachi
Papers
in seventh grade and came away from it with a clear understanding that you shouldn’t say things like “Suck my dick” to people with names like Vito Meatballs.
The Valachi
Papers
in seventh grade and came away from it with a clear understanding that you shouldn’t say things like “Suck my dick” to people with names like Vito Meatballs.
“That’s bullshit,” I said.
“So modest.” Chuckie jabbed the shovel into the sparkling pile of ice. “That’s one of the things I like about you.”
“I didn’t,” I insisted. “It’s just a stupid rumor.”
Chuckie must have heard the fear in my voice. He turned around a little too quickly, accidentally tilting the shovel in the process. The ice cubes slid off, raining down on the cracked pavement and scattering like marbles.
“You didn’t?”
There was such naked disappointment on his face that I shifted my gaze back to the ground. I wanted to explain that the basic story
was right but the details were all wrong, that instead of inviting Mr. Meatballs to perform a sex act, I’d really just advised one of his flunkeys to make a dentist appointment, but the distinction hardly seemed worth making. If the Lunch Monsters felt like making an example of me, setting the record straight to Chuckie wasn’t going to change anything. And besides, I was tired of letting people down. It was nice to be the hero for once, if only for a handful of lunch-truck drivers.
was right but the details were all wrong, that instead of inviting Mr. Meatballs to perform a sex act, I’d really just advised one of his flunkeys to make a dentist appointment, but the distinction hardly seemed worth making. If the Lunch Monsters felt like making an example of me, setting the record straight to Chuckie wasn’t going to change anything. And besides, I was tired of letting people down. It was nice to be the hero for once, if only for a handful of lunch-truck drivers.
“Cock,” I explained, crunching an ice cube beneath the heel of my work boot. “Not dick. I told him to suck my cock.”
Chuckie hooted with laughter and relief.
“You’re too much,” he told me. Then he shook his head and patted me on the shoulder. “Watch your back, okay?”
The only other
time I’d felt myself in such immediate physical danger was in the spring of my senior year in high school, when I’d gotten myself on the wrong side of a maniacal wrestler named Mark “Psycho Midget” Barnhouse. Though technically not a “little person,” Barnhouse was very short, maybe five foot one, with a strikingly handsome face and an impressive weightlifter’s torso that began just north of his knees. I’m not sure if he was bitter about this lack of proportionality and as a result felt some compensatory need to prove his manhood through violence, or if he was just a vicious person with unusually stumpy legs, but it was widely accepted at Harding, even by football players who towered over him and outweighed him by fifty or a hundred pounds, that it was a good idea to steer clear of Barnhouse. Don’t talk to him, don’t look at him, don’t even think about him. Stay off his radar screen, because you just don’t know what’s going to set him off. He beat the crap out of Phil Derry, this totally harmless band nerd, for wearing an ugly sweater. Steve Mullaney, a well-liked jayvee goalie, ended up with a black eye and three stitches in his lip for taking an especially smelly shit in the locker room while Barnhouse happened to be within sniffing distance.
time I’d felt myself in such immediate physical danger was in the spring of my senior year in high school, when I’d gotten myself on the wrong side of a maniacal wrestler named Mark “Psycho Midget” Barnhouse. Though technically not a “little person,” Barnhouse was very short, maybe five foot one, with a strikingly handsome face and an impressive weightlifter’s torso that began just north of his knees. I’m not sure if he was bitter about this lack of proportionality and as a result felt some compensatory need to prove his manhood through violence, or if he was just a vicious person with unusually stumpy legs, but it was widely accepted at Harding, even by football players who towered over him and outweighed him by fifty or a hundred pounds, that it was a good idea to steer clear of Barnhouse. Don’t talk to him, don’t look at him, don’t even think about him. Stay off his radar screen, because you just don’t know what’s going to set him off. He beat the crap out of Phil Derry, this totally harmless band nerd, for wearing an ugly sweater. Steve Mullaney, a well-liked jayvee goalie, ended up with a black eye and three stitches in his lip for taking an especially smelly shit in the locker room while Barnhouse happened to be within sniffing distance.
The thing that made Barnhouse so singularly terrifying wasn’t his improbable strength, or the obvious pleasure he took in inflicting pain, or his contempt for the widely accepted concept of “fair fighting”—it was his unpredictability. You never knew when or where he might strike. He’d gotten suspended for spitting Tabasco sauce in someone’s eyes in the cafeteria during the first week of his freshman year, and after that had made it a point only to go after people off school grounds. Mike Donlevy opened his front door on Halloween night and got socked in the mouth, right in front of his mother, by a suspiciously short trick-or-treater in a Frito Bandito costume. Dave Repetto got his septum deviated in the bathroom of the Park Cinema during a Sunday matinee of
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
. It was like Barnhouse kept a list of people he needed to beat up in his pocket and selected a name off it at random whenever he was in a bad mood. You could offend his sensibilities in September and not find out about it until April, when Psycho Midget materialized out of nowhere and began smashing your head repeatedly against a car door in the parking lot outside Echo Lanes.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
. It was like Barnhouse kept a list of people he needed to beat up in his pocket and selected a name off it at random whenever he was in a bad mood. You could offend his sensibilities in September and not find out about it until April, when Psycho Midget materialized out of nowhere and began smashing your head repeatedly against a car door in the parking lot outside Echo Lanes.
Barnhouse was a year older than me, so he wasn’t even at Harding anymore when he decided to add my name to the list. The trouble started at the Battle of the Bands, held in the gym/cafeteria of St. Lucy’s school in Springville. My friends and I were pushing our way out with the rest of the crowd when I noticed that Zeke had struck up a conversation with Ronnie Barnhouse, Psycho Midget’s average-sized younger brother. This might have made me nervous under normal circumstances—Ronnie was only slightly less unpopular and belligerent than Mark—but the Squidman had turned us on to some Thai stick that night, and I was distracted by the realization that everyone around me was wearing Two Shoes, a phrase whose comic potential I had grossly underestimated until that very moment.
I am wearing Two Shoes,
I thought, giggling to myself while Zeke and Ronnie exchanged what appeared to be pleasantries. And
you are wearing Two Shoes too
.
I am wearing Two Shoes,
I thought, giggling to myself while Zeke and Ronnie exchanged what appeared to be pleasantries. And
you are wearing Two Shoes too
.
Later, when the altercation was re-enacted, I learned that the
conversation was anything but pleasant. Zeke had accidentally stepped on Ronnie’s foot during the rush to the exits, and Ronnie had taken offense.
conversation was anything but pleasant. Zeke had accidentally stepped on Ronnie’s foot during the rush to the exits, and Ronnie had taken offense.
“Hey,” he said. “You stepped on my fucking foot.”
“Sorry,” said Zeke, and because he was as stoned as I was, something about this exchange made him giggle.
Ronnie smiled in return. This was a favorite Barnhouse tactic, to act like your victim’s best friend just before you clobbered him, but Ronnie didn’t have his brother’s discipline, which was one of the reasons people found him merely hateful rather than frightening.
“You better be sorry,” he said, the surly tone of his voice cancelling out the lulling effects of the smile.
It was weird, Zeke explained later. Just like that, he wasn’t stoned anymore. His head was clear; he saw what was coming from a mile away. He and Ronnie continued walking side by side, out the doors and onto the lawn in front of the school. They had almost reached the sidewalk when Ronnie put his hand on Zeke’s shoulder.
“Hey,” he said. “No hard feelings.”
Even as he said this he was swinging his right fist at Zeke’s temple, but it was already too late. Zeke had ducked out of the way and was in the process of delivering what by all accounts was a beautiful uppercut to the tip of Ronnie’s jaw. I was looking the other way, at this sweet-faced girl I’d been talking to earlier in the night, the sister of the bass player in Sweet Home Cranwood, a country-rock band that had come in third in the Battle of the Bands, behind Spread Eagle and Total Extinction. Martha was her name, and she smiled and waved to me as she headed across the street with her friends. I was waving back, wondering why I hadn’t bothered to ask for her phone number, when I heard the fleshy smack of a landed punch. By the time I turned around Ronnie Barnhouse was flat on the ground at Zeke’s feet, looking like he’d been struck by lightning. Zeke was rubbing his hand and smiling down at Ronnie, as though the punch had been offered in the spirit of friendship.
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