“Hey, Fezkul,” I said as I headed across the gravel to the old, glassed-in former donut shop where Mr. Natch worked his barbecue magic on squashed balls of ground beef and pepper. “Fezkul Fezkul Fezkul,” I whispered. “Fezkul.”
Now I remember some fairy tales where if you say the guy’s name five times, he shows up like magic. Rumplestiltskin comes to mind. Or the dude in that old Clive Barker movie, Candyman.
That is not exactly what happened when I said ‘Fezkul’ five times.
I was just about to step up to the door and worm my way inside, when I felt the hot, sweaty hand of authority on my shoulder.
“Where’s your parents, kid?”
I turned around and found myself looking into the glaring, stubble-covered face of — I glanced down at his nametag — Tom Wilkinson. His nametag was pinned on the left pocket of his blue security guard uniform. He did not look friendly, and he looked even less friendly when I answered: “I don’t have any.”
I know that’s not entirely true. I have two perfectly good parents and I love them to bits. But you have to understand: my parents weren’t here and I was with my sister and her boyfriend on the way back from the cottage to start school, and it was a lot easier to say I didn’t have any parents because that was partway true right at the moment and… and…
I panicked, all right? And it was a bad time to panic. I admit it.
Tom Wilkinson struck me as that kind of security guard who’d gotten into the business after giving a really good try at being a policeman and somehow not measuring up. Maybe he didn’t make the academy because he was too fat (which he was) or because he wasn’t bright enough (which from the look in his tiny squinty eyes suggested he might not have been) or because he was just too evil for police work and had flunked the evil detector test.
As he turned me around and held up the weird little wand that they all carried close to my face, I was pretty sure that the evil detector test was what had got him.
“You,” he said slowly, “are coming with me. Punk.”
I had to walk fast to keep up with Officer Tom as we made our way through the line and around the back of the grill house. There was an old, broken dumpster out back — the lid didn’t close properly, and the sides were kind of bent out. Beside it was a big metal door that said OFFICE on it, and I guessed correctly that that was where we were going. “Inside,” he said as he swung the door open.
“Look,” I said, “I was kidding about not having parents.”
We were not in an office, but a little hallway. Ahead was a pair of swinging doors that led to the grill — I could smell the seared meat and deep fryer from here. But there was another door, also marked OFFICE. This one was actually the top of a metal stairway that went down two flights. “Down,” said Officer Tom. I did as I was told, feeling terrible. At the bottom was another door, with OFFICE written on it. I was beginning to feel like the whole OFFICE thing was an elaborate joke. But this time, when we went through, there was an office. The room was walled in painted cinderblock, like a school hallway but without any lockers. In the middle was a lime green desk with a laptop computer plugged into a power bar big as a two-by-four. Seated behind it was a skinny man, who was sipping from a big bottle of water. He peered over it, first at me, then at Officer Tom.
“Yes?” he said.
“Mister Natch,” said Officer Tom, “this kid knows Fezkul.”
So this was Mister Oliver Natch. I thought back to when I was a kid — a real kid — to see if I remembered him. With his high forehead, curly blond hair and wide, expressionless eyes, you’d think I would have. But he didn’t register. Mr. Natch nodded quickly and set his water down by the computer. And he knew about Fezkul.
“Does he?” he said, then turned his gaze on me. “You’re one of Fezkul’s? You seem old.”
“I’m fourteen,” I said.
“Hmm. That is old.” He looked back at Officer Tom. “That is old, Wilkinson. Why are you wasting my time?”
Officer Tom’s mouth opened and closed, and he blinked. I thought that Natch might be doing something to Officer Tom’s airway, like Darth Vader did in that old Star Wars movie. He looked like the sort of guy who would do that.
“He-he was saying his name,” said Officer Tom. “A bunch of times. I thought—”
“Yes.” Mr. Natch looked at him like he was stupid, which was a good way to look at Officer Tom. “You should be back on patrol,” said Natch. “You know what day it is.”
Officer Tom nodded. “You want me to find this kid’s parents?”
“Back,” said Natch, “on patrol. I’ll talk with the boy a moment.”
Officer Tom left, muttering under his breath: “Patrol. Like I ever see anything on patrol.” Although I never would have thought it, I was sad to see him go. Mr. Natch tapped quickly on his computer keyboard, squinted at the screen, and looked at me, hard.
“Fezkul,” he said finally, then said it again, more slowly. “What’s a boy like you, doing saying Fezkul on a fine Labour Day Monday like today?”
It was time to start telling the truth. “I heard a little girl say it,” I said. “And then I saw another kid.”
Natch nodded.
“Another kid. With sharp short teeth in his mouth and in his eye a mischievous glint? A glint that sometimes glows with inner hellfire?”
Something in Mr. Natch’s own eye told me that my telling-the-truth idea was not a good one to stick to.
“I dunno,” I said.
Mr. Natch looked very serious and he leaned forward. “I don’t think that’s true, now,” he said. “Do you? What did you say your name was?”
I don’t know why, but I thought then about movies and books where you told someone your name and it turned out they were a wizard and they had power over you. So I said “Stan,” not Sam.
“Well, Stan,” said Mr. Natch. “Are you enjoying your day here? At the fun park?”
“We’re just stopped here for a bite,” I said.
“Hungry work,” agreed Mr. Natch, “driving south.”
I shrugged—
“And you saw Fezkul.”
—and shrugged.
Mr. Natch’s eyes narrowed. He wasn’t buying it, I could tell. But I wasn’t ready to ’fess to anything either.
“Come around here, erm, Stan. I have something I want you to see.”
I went around the desk and looked at the computer screen. There were pictures on it — pictures that looked like they were from security cameras, maybe during a big riot. Except the rioters weren’t guys in bandannas; they were little kids. There was one where it looked like a dozen kids were crawling all over an SUV. One of them was bending its antenna at almost a right angle, and another one was standing on top of the cab, holding what looked like a torn-off side view mirror over her head like it was a bowling tournament trophy. There was another one where three kids were hefting one of the RAIL MUSEUM’s signal posts between them while a bunch of others watched on. Another showed five kids at a dumpster behind the grill house, lifting what looked like a barbecue propane tank into it. One of the kids had a long barbecue lighter and was flicking it.
“Well?” said Mr. Natch. “Recognize anybody?”