The World Played Chess (76)

“Where do you think you’re going?” Eric dropped his hand. When William didn’t stop, Eric became the matador before the bull, and I think the idiot finally realized what he had sowed. Too little, too late. Eric made his next statements while retreating, presumably to shut the door, but William arrived too fast, the lightning-quick high school wrestler. He drove his shoulder into the door and knocked Eric back. No hand, and no door, was going to stop William.

Eric shouted as William stormed down the hallway. “Hey. Hey! Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

I followed William. I’m not sure exactly what I thought I could do, but I was following the man code. You didn’t leave your buddy hanging. Eric turned to me as I stepped inside the house. He had that look of uncertainty and fear etched on his face. “What is he going to do?” he said.

I can’t believe I could even speak, or what I said, but I said, “He’s going to get his money’s worth.”

The wife looked stricken, crying and shouting. “Eric! Eric, just pay him. Pay him!”

Eric kept calling William’s name, kept trying to reason with him as he rushed down the hall behind him. “Hey! Hey, I’m talking to you! Hey! Hey, where are you going?”

William knew where he was going and so did Eric. William stepped into the bathroom and raised the sledgehammer, about to take a huge chunk out of the beautiful shower design.

The wife screamed, but now her words had a bite of anger, directed at her husband. “Goddamn it, Eric, pay him!”

None of it had any impact on William, the raging bull. Just as the sledgehammer was about to fall, the husband shouted, “You swing that hammer and I will fucking kill you.”

And that was it.

Things moved in slow motion.

William spun on his boots and redirected his aim from the floor to Eric. Fight or flight. Live or die. William chose to fight. I thought of all the stories he had shared with me that summer. I thought of all the occasions he said he had lived because of luck, while others had not. I thought of him telling me that his ass only stopped shaking when he no longer cared if he lived or died. And I knew what William was capable of.

So did Eric.

The husband’s eyes widened. His wife’s hands moved to her face, covering a silent scream. I did what William had done when Whippet got shot. Something I would not have done at the start of the summer. I moved on instinct. I stepped toward William and I gripped the sledgehammer.

“William. No,” I said.

William’s eyes shifted to me, to Eric, back to me. He looked as if he had no idea who I was, who Eric was, or where he was.

“Don’t do it,” I said. “William. Don’t do it.”

The weight of the sledgehammer gradually lessened. Color returned to William’s eyes. His face slackened, like melting wax.

“He isn’t worth it,” I said. “Let it go.”

I turned to Eric, who opened his mouth, and I cringed, certain he would say something even more stupid, but to my relief, fear got the better of him. “Okay. Okay. I’ll pay!” he said. “I got my checkbook right here. I’ll write it for the amount in full.”

He held the checkbook out in front of him like he was holding out the Holy Grail, imploring William to take it. He spoke slowly, carefully, as if speaking to someone who did not speak English. “I’ll pay in full. Okay? I’ll pay in full.”

William looked frozen in time and place, but he wasn’t in Redwood City, California. I knew he’d gone back to Vietnam, to a firefight in the bush, a firefight like the ones he had described. William lowered the sledgehammer, and I felt my stomach drop and my knees weaken. I took the sledgehammer and let out a breath I didn’t realize I had been holding.

Eric stepped backward, down the hall. “Get me a pen,” Eric said to his wife, watching William as if he were a stray dog who might bite. “Get me a pen.”

At the kitchen counter, the wife handed Eric a pen. His hands shook so violently he could hardly hold it. He wrote the check, ripped it from the checkbook, and handed it to me, as if fearful he might not get back all his fingers if he handed the check to William. His handwriting was almost illegible, but he’d paid the amount in full.

I nodded to William. “Let’s go.”

I looked at Eric and his wife, both dazed and stunned and scared, not quite sure what they had just witnessed. It had not been of this world, not behavior they could relate to. It had been pure adrenaline, coming from someone who knew the true meaning of a battle for survival. The couple huddled together in the entryway, watching us go. Again, I don’t know what possessed me. Manners. Hubris. Smart-ass. Whatever it was, I just couldn’t help myself. As I stepped from the house, still carrying the sledgehammer, I said, “Nice meeting you both.”

And I closed the door.

Outside, I threw the sledgehammer in the bed of the El Camino, pulled myself into the passenger seat, and turned to look at the house. My first thought was Eric would call his bank and cancel the check, but I quickly dismissed it. Like the woman who had flipped off William, Eric wouldn’t have the guts. He knew if he did, he’d always worry William would come back and take the house apart with that sledgehammer, blow by blow. He now knew William was capable of just about anything.

I did, too.

And it scared me, the quickness with which William had gone from zero to ten, the way Barry Hickman had gone from laughing and smiling to crazed animal.