I wanted to say, That I was jumped by four of your high school football heroes, but I didn’t. Mr. Howison was a nice guy and was also a football booster. Assholes like Monger and his crew came and went. I wasn’t the sort to paint everyone with the same brush. And I understood where Mr. Howison was coming from, even if I was always in back on the loading docks and never saw any customers. He needed to count on me and my head wasn’t in the right place. Hell, it hadn’t been in the right place for years.
He gave me sixty bucks and we shook hands. No hard feelings. I took that sixty to a pawnshop. Their 35 mm cameras were out of my price range, but there were some Instamatics I could buy. Problem was, it was going to be in low light, or even no light, so I’d need a flash. Then I spied a Polaroid. The instantaneousness grabbed me. The audacity of stepping out of the bushes and taking a picture of them in the act of polluting was a powerful pull. So $30 later, I purchased a Polaroid OneStep Flash. Then, after I hunted down some batteries and film, I was ready to save the planet… or at least the place where my memories of Helen were perhaps the best.
I spent that Friday night hiding in the weeds near Patton’s Pond, waiting on a truck to show up. The spot had the usual traffic of guys with girls, steaming up the back windows of cars. Once I heard a scream come from the rear of an Impala, but it was followed by a giggle. With all the boy-girl action, it wasn’t long before my thoughts drifted into the dismal memories surrounding Helen. Part of me couldn’t help wondering what it would have been like with us had she not been attacked… had I been able to save her. There was a hole inside me a mile deep where what-ifs and what-could-have-beens fought Texas cage death matches, possibilities plowing into each other with barbed-wire fists and razor-blade feet, only to be reborn to fight again. The images were never-ending and tended to blend into reality until I believed I was seeing things that couldn’t possibly be there. For a year after the rape I’d see her, only not as she’d been before, but after, standing by a bus stop, bruised, bloody face cracked open or standing in line, her face purple, eyes accusing.
I’d tried to be with her at first, hoping I could be part of the recovery process. But it wasn’t long before I realized she wanted nothing to do with me, so I stopped trying to see her. She’d become such a recluse, all I could do was wonder if she spent her time blaming me. The attack was the very reason I’d found martial arts. I vowed that I’d never be in such a helpless position again.
Not that I hadn’t utterly failed in that plan the other day. I knew how I’d let them get the best of me. I knew it and hated myself for it. Overconfidence belonged nowhere near a fight. Neither did hesitation. I should have taken it to them the moment they’d confronted me, but instead I’d posed like a character out of a Bruce Lee movie who was reluctant to fight, but who everyone knew would eventually unload a can of kung fu whoop ass and be the hero.
Yeah, that’s me.
Stupid.
A station wagon pulled up and parked. Thing 1 sat in the front. Thing 2 sat in the back. Their dates sat beside them and looked like children. The size difference was so improbable that I almost laughed. They drank a few beers and groped the girls. Just as I was thinking they’d leave, Thing 1 spilled out of the front seat and began walking toward me, unzipping his fly. I eased myself deeper into the bushes. Yet still he came. I doubt he saw me, but I sure saw him. I watched with more than a little disgust as he relieved himself, the sickly stream landing just in front of me, splattering my knees. As if things couldn’t get any worse. I heard a car door slam and then Thing 2 was beside Thing 1, adding a new stream. I couldn’t look away. If they saw me, I needed to be ready. So here I was, kneeling in the bushes, forced to watch two gigantic offensive linemen holding their rods, inches away from me, giving me a golden shower.
I held my breath until they left, packing, zipping, turning, wiping their hands on their pants as they returned to their dates.
The rest of the evening was uneventful. I stayed until morning, but no dumping.
I made it back by nine, in time to see my father leave. We nodded to each other as we passed, our only connection. I slept for ten hours and woke at seven. My father still wasn’t back. Probably at the track.
Wheatie showed up as I was wolfing down a can of pork and beans.
“How’re you feeling?” he asked.
“Fine,” I said around a mouthful. “Where’d you get to last night?”
“Was busy.” He glanced around. “Your dad around?”
I shook my head.
“Good,” he said. Then he asked, “What do you think of your dad?”
“What kind of question is that?”
“Simple question formed from a leading interrogative, followed by a subject and a verb and an object… the object of the question being your dad, with me asking what you think of him.”
I sighed. I forgot sometimes that Wheatie was a smart-assed genius. “I try not to think of him.”
“You know he doesn’t like me, right?”
“He just doesn’t understand.”
“I think he does. And you know what else? I think he loves you.”
“You don’t know anything I don’t tell you to know.”
“That’s sort of harsh.”
“Well, I’m feeling fucking harsh.” I tossed the can in the trash and the spoon in the sink. “You ready to go, or what?”
We were in place by nine, watching the steady flow of hormone-fueled teenagers come and go.
About eleven, Wheatie asked, “You’re hoping you see them, aren’t you?”
Some questions you can answer with a nod or a word, but this wasn’t one of those. The answer ran back years to those hideous moments when Helen was on the ground and four older teens were doing to her what no man should ever do to a woman. Despite the sketch artists and police promises, they were never identified, although I swore to myself I’d know them if I ever saw them again. Was I out here looking for them? I never stopped looking for them. I looked for them in every store, on every street, and in every place I went. Instead of answering, I continued my vigil. Whether it be Monger, the polluters, or one of them, I was on the lookout, and by God, I’d find one of them.
Wheatie bugged out at three in the morning, but I stayed until dawn. No sign of Monger. No sign of anything. I was halfway back to my house when I heard the rumble of an engine. I looked over and saw a station wagon. Thing 1 and Thing 2 filled up the front. They were in sweats and it looked as if they’d just worked out as they pulled up next to me.
“What’s going on, ground stain?” Thing 1 asked, prodding Thing 2 in the rib with an elbow.
“What’s in your purse?” Thing 2 asked, all grins and steroid acne.
I had a small pack with a water bottle and my camera. It wasn’t a purse, but they didn’t need to know that. Instead of answering, I cut across a lawn, leaving them in the street. They’d either drive away or—
I was gratified to hear the sound of two doors opening, then slamming shut.
“Don’t you walk away from me when I’m talking to you,” Thing 1 growled.
I turned and watched him stomp across the grass, hands working around invisible necks. Instead of running, I took three quick steps and got into his guard. He reached out and I hip-chucked him ten feet. Before he landed, I was on Thing 2, firing two punches to his kidney, then raking my foot down his shin and into his instep. He fell to the ground, grabbing at his foot.
Thing 1 started to get up and I kicked him in the face.
Thing 2 saw it happen and stayed in place.
“What’s wrong? No one to sucker punch me?”
Just then a cop car pulled to the curb. Its lights began to flash and I could see the cop talking into the radio and eyeing me as if I were an escaped convict. Then he got out of the car, his hand on his pistol.