December Park(109)

Adrian leaned forward on the balls of his feet and peered through the doorway and down the hall. “Come on upstairs,” he said in a low voice, and I followed him down the hall and into the foyer.

“Adrian?” It was Doreen Gardiner’s voice, funneling down the stairwell. It cracked on each syllable and sounded like the noise a large bird might make when agitated. “What are you doing?”

“I have a friend over, Mom,” he called. We were at the bottom of the stairs now. I paused but he proceeded up them.

Doreen Gardiner appeared at the top of the stairs in a bathrobe. Her hair looked like a bird’s nest that had been struck by lightning, and her eyes were outlined in purplish circles. Her mouth was nearly lipless, a firm and bloodless gash bisecting the lower half of her face. “What friend is this?”

Adrian paused midway up the stairs. I was behind him but still standing in the foyer. “It’s Angelo from next door.”

“Who?”

“Angelo Mazzone,” he repeated. “From next door.”

She seemed to waver, and for one horrifying moment, I was certain she would take a header and topple down the stairs. “Shoes,” she said.

“We’re not—”

“Shoes, Adrian.”

I realized she was staring at me. I was, after all, the only one wearing shoes.

Adrian turned and brushed by me on his way to the foyer. “Come on,” he said, kicking off his bear slippers in what could only be an exercise of solidarity. “Take your shoes off.”

“Sure.” I climbed out of my sneakers and left them by the front door next to his slippers. My hackles rising, I followed him up the stairs.

His mother was still there watching us, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed over her chest like she had something to be pissed off about. Her robe was open enough at the top so that the puckered pink scar that circumnavigated her neck was all too visible. When we shrugged past her I caught a whiff of stale cigarette smoke and unwashed flesh. She eyed me distrustfully. I braced myself for one of her claws to reach out and clutch at me. Blessedly, nothing happened.

Adrian led me to his bedroom and shut the door behind us. It was the first time I’d been in his room. There was a mattress on the floor, moving boxes bursting with clothes shoved against one wall, his Incredible Hulk backpack tucked in one corner, and several stacks of comic books arranged in a hopscotch grid around the grimy carpet. There were more comic books tacked to the walls in protective Mylar sleeves, the characters on the covers completely alien to me. Some of the comics looked very old, and they were probably worth some money. Holes had been punched in the drywall, and the light switch hung from wires like an eyeball dangling from a socket. The smell—Christ, it was like a locker room.

“Is your mom okay?” I asked, marveling over the warped rationale of having to take my shoes off in order to stand on a stained carpet crusted with dried bits of food.

Adrian dropped to his knees and sifted through a mound of smelly clothing. “Yeah, why?”

“No reason.” I faced him. “Where have you been all week?”

He pulled a three-ring binder out from beneath the clothes, then sat on the mattress. “I want to show you something.”

I dropped down beside him on the mattress.

“Promise you won’t laugh.”

I touched my nose. “I promise.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Why do you touch your nose like that when you promise?”

“It’s just something stupid me and the guys used to do when we were kids. But don’t worry, I promise. I won’t laugh.”

Adrian opened the binder. The first page was a detailed drawing of five superheroes, slightly foreshortened as they flew straight out of the center of the page. They wore elaborate costumes with twirling capes and masks that tied around their eyes, like the kinds the Ninja Turtles wore. The detail was remarkable, and their expressions were not only realistic but identifiable.

“Wow. Is this us?”

“Yeah,” he said. “All five of us. It’s the cover page. I haven’t thought of a title yet.”

“A title for what?”

“The comic.” He flipped to the next page. It was divided into a series of square panels in which the superheroes posed in a variety of heroic positions. “I’m drawing a comic book about us.”

“Holy shit.” I slid the binder from Adrian’s lap and pulled it in front of me. “These are incredible. How’d you . . . ? I mean, how the heck . . . ?” I didn’t have the words. Adrian Gardiner had rendered me speechless. “This is really great, man.”

“Thanks. I can draw, but I don’t really know how to write a story for it. I was wondering . . . maybe you would want to work on it with me?”

“Really? Yeah, that would be great.” I looked at him. “Why would you think I’d make fun of you for this?”

“I don’t know.” Adrian raised one small shoulder, then took the binder back from me, shut it, and slid it beneath the heap of clothes on his mattress.

“Is that where you were all week? At art school or something?”

“No.”

“Well, then where’d you go?”

“I had to talk to some people.” He got up, went to a stack of comic books, and selected one from the top. He dropped back down on the mattress and flipped through the pages.