Thirty-five
David awoke close to noon Saturday morning to the
sound of Tony Doran and Steven Farley calling to him from outside. He lay
in bed listening to their shrill, angered cries. A rock thunked against
the side of the house.
"Dad!" he cried stridently to the empty house.
"Where are you?"
"Your father is moving the mirror,"
his mother's
disembodied voice sounded from nearby. "He'll be back soon."
David sat up in bed. "Tony and Steve are going to
break a window!"
His mother sat at his side without denting the bed.
"How would you get rid of them, if you could?"
David relaxed a bit and thought about it. "Do you
mean just make believe?"
"Just make believe."
"I'd beat them up!"
"Is that what your father would want?"
"It's what he does!"
"Your father believes violence is wrong."
David had to give that a moment's thought. "But
other people always start it, just like Tony and Steve are doing!"
"Are there no alternatives to violence except more
violence?"
David couldn't think of any. "They push me down.
Tony wants to beat me up, except that Steve got in trouble the last time.
His dad's mayor of Eagle Junction."
"I see."
"Are you going to scare them away?" David said
hopefully. "It isn't my fault they pick on me. I never did anything to
them."
His mother smiled. "I know it's not your fault."
"You already know all about this stuff, don't you?"
David said worriedly, hoping the apparition wasn't relying entirely upon
his own limited understanding of how the world worked to protect him.
For the first time, she did look
a bit worried. "I
understand it all too well."
David thought that she'd have to understand to be
able to trick people as well as she did.
She held her transparent hands up to view and wiggled
her fingers. "I know more about make-believe than even a ten-year-old
boy."
David said nothing, knowing it was a sensitive
subject for her.
"You and your father think of me as nothing but
make-believe."
"But you are!"
She gazed at him unhappily and said nothing.
Tears came to his eyes. "But it is just pretend,
isn't it? How can you really be my mother?"
She just sighed.
"Are you angry with me? You won't go away, will
you?"
"I won't leave you, David. I'm not angry with you or
your father. I understand that I must cope with your convictions and
misunderstandings."
He wiped away the flowing tears. His father was gone
and Tony and Farley and the mirror was more than he could handle all by
myself. "You look like you're angry,” he accused.
"To be honest, it is your father who is very angry,
and he is angry with me."
"Did you do something wrong?"
"I have frightened him very badly. There is so much
to do to avert tragedy."
"I tried to tell you. You just keep reminding him
that my real mom is gone."
"It's important that I be your mother."
David looked away, but knotted with so much fear and
tension that it hurt it breath. She wanted something she could never
have.
"It's not just a matter of make-believe," she said.
"It is something that must be done in most absolute terms."
Death was nothing she could do anything about. She
wasn't nearly that powerful.
Tony Doran and Steven Farley were calling him names
from outside, growing louder and more boisterous by the moment.
"Show me some make-believe, David," his mother said.
"I won't let your friends hurt you."
David's eyes widened with enthusiasm. "You can trick
them! I forgot about that!" He jumped up out of bed, threw on his
clothes and went out the front way wondering what might scare the two
bullies away. Jackie Kahl's three black cats, maybe, or the big hawk
swooping down out of the sky.
The day was sunny and warm. David felt good despite
the approach of his two worst enemies in life.
"Hey, pip-squeak!" Steve Farley called out. "Heard
your old man is in big trouble! Big trouble, squirt!"
"Yeah, but at least I don't have a wimp like your old
man, you skinny Dork!" David called out gleefully.
Steve's mouth dropped open in astonishment. "Damn!
Cocky little shit, isn't he?"
Tony came rushing down the sidewalk, shoving up his
shirtsleeves. "Yeah, and I'm about to knock it right out of him!"
David held his ground out of sheer anger. He decided
that for once he'd not be tiny, frail, and weak. Instead, he'd be like
his father, fast and courageous and not afraid of a fight. Maybe his
mother could make Steve and Tony see him bigger and stronger than he
really was.
When Tony saw that he wasn't going to turn and make a
run for the house, he faltered momentarily. Impatient for the first
victory in his life, even if was just a trick, David took the initiative.
He ran up to the sixth grader and swung his fist with a fury born of two
long school years of being mistreated.
His fist connected with the side of Tony's face with
an audible crack of lower jaw meeting upper jaw. The impact of cheekbones
against David’s knuckles hurt. Tony spun halfway around and dropped to
his knees, bellowing in both shock and pain as blood gushed from a split
lip.
Steve hurried forward to help his smaller friend.
Despite his size, he wasn't as aggressive as Tony. David satisfied
himself with a brutal kick to the shin followed by a head butt to the
chest. And then he pushed hard, knocking the wind from the larger boy and
sending him toppling over backward. Steve's backside slid off the curb.
He fell into the street with both feet sticking into the air.
By that time, Tony needed attending to again. David
shoved him back down to the ground with a foot planted against the boy's
chest, just as he had been treated so disdainfully in the past.
"David!"
David spun around in shock at the sound of his
father's angered roar. Tony and Steve reacted with arms and legs flailing
like cartoon characters. In two heartbeats, both boys had thrashed their
way to their feet and were in headlong flight down the street.
David grinned sheepishly and cradled his injured
hand. "Oh, hi, Dad."
John Hartman had stopped twenty feet away. He looked
stunned.
David pointed an accusing finger at the side of the
house. "They threw rocks at Mom's house!"
"And you beat them up?"
David blushed. "Mom said she'd help me."
His father turned ashen with ill-concealed rage.
"She put you up to this?"
"I did no such thing, John Hartman."
They both looked around in surprise. David's mother
stood on the small concrete front porch with her arms folded across her
breasts in displeasure. "David took care of the problem entirely on his
own."
"I did?" David was confused. "But you said you were
going to help me!"
"What am I best at, David?"
David had to give it a moment’s thought. He then
cried out in outraged joy. "You tricked me again!" The depth of his
insight startled him. "You made me trick myself!"
His mother was watching his father for a reaction.
His father pretended to ignore her. "Let's have a look at that hand,
son."
David held out his injured hand. The knuckles were
skinned and swollen, but his fingers still worked. His father gave him a
worried look. "Where did you learn to hit like that?"
David opened his mouth, more than eager to divulge
his trade secrets. He had, of course, watched his father fight.
"Never mind. But I'm going to hear about this from
Gene Packerson. That was the mayor's son you decked."
"I would not have allowed him to be injured, John."
His father looked around at her again. David could
see how angry he was. "It's as dangerous to let him get overly excited."
"He is far more upset with your constant worry and
displeasure. He knows there is no wrong in defending his home and
family."
His father looked at his son in alarm. "David, she’s
right about that, at least. I've always been proud of you. It takes guts
to be as sick as you are and handle it like a man."
David grinned and rubbed his throbbing hand. "Mom
tricked me. She's smart, isn't she?"
John didn't see the point David was trying to make.
"Don't you understand?” David cried out. “Sometimes
what we pretend can be for real!"
John dropped a nervous hand on his shoulder. "Go
play. Don't go far. Don't beat anyone up. I need to talk to your
mother. Alone."
David watched his parents go into the house and close
the door behind them. He remembered how they had sent him out to play in
the past. He had seen them kissing through the windows.
Most of his smile went away knowing it could never
happen again. Holding on to what happiness remained beneath the stark
reality of the hot sun, he started down the street in search of a summer
morning's entertainment.
