Making Faces(28)

But that was where the similarities in their appearances ended. Becker was wiry and on the small side, his muscles defined and lean, like a jockey or a runner. He was about 5”8 and big enough that the girls still flocked around him, but Ambrose was much taller, even as a freshman.

Maybe because Becker was smaller than the freshman, or maybe because he was jealous, he liked to poke at Ambrose. Just jabs, innuendos, side comments that made his group of friends snicker and look away. Ambrose ignored it for the most part. He had very little to prove and wasn't bothered too much. His size and strength made him less intimidated and less vulnerable to bullying than the other boys his age. And he comforted himself by imagining Becker in the wrestling room trying to hang with him or any of his friends. But Ambrose wasn't the only one Becker liked to torment.

It was fourth period, right before lunch, and Ambrose asked to be excused from English on the pretext of needing to use the bathroom. Really, he needed to check his weight. He had weigh-ins at 3:00 for the duel against Loch Haven. He was wrestling 160 but that morning he'd been at 162. He could sweat two pounds off, but just getting to 162 had been work. He had started the season at 172, and there wasn't much wiggle room or fat on his big frame to allow for weight loss. And he was still growing. He had a month until district championships and two weeks after that, state. The next six weeks would be brutal, and he would be hungry most of the time. Hungry equated to ornery, and Ambrose was very ornery. When he walked into the locker room and was greeted by darkness, he swore, hoping something wasn't wrong. He needed to see the scale. He felt along the wall, trying to find the switches. A voice rang out in the dark, making him jump.

“Becker?” the voice said nervously.

He found the lights and flipped them, flooding the lockers and benches with light. What he saw made him curse again. In the middle of the tile floor, Bailey Sheen's wheel chair had been tipped over onto its back, and Bailey was hanging helplessly with his thin legs in the air, unable to right himself or do anything but beg for help in the darkness.

“What the hell?” Ambrose said. “Sheen, are you okay?”

Ambrose ran to Bailey, eased the chair back onto its wheels, and sat Bailey up straight in his seat. Bailey's face was flushed and his shoulders shook, and Ambrose wanted to hurt someone. Badly.

“What happened, Sheen?”

“Don't tell anyone, okay, Ambrose?” Bailey begged.

“Why?!” Ambrose was so angry he could feel his pulse pounding behind his eyes.

“Just . . . just don't tell, okay? It's freakin' embarrassing.” Bailey gulped and Ambrose could tell he was mortified.

“Who did this?” Ambrose demanded.

Bailey shook his head and wouldn't say. Then Ambrose remembered how Bailey had startled him by calling out a name while Ambrose had been searching for the light.

“Becker?” Ambrose asked, his voice rising in outrage.

“He just pretended he was going to help me out and then he tipped me over. I'm not hurt!” Bailey added, as if being hurt would make him weaker. “Then he turned off the lights and left. I would have been okay. Someone would have come. You came, right?” Bailey tried to smile, but the smile wobbled and he looked down at his hands. “I'm glad it was you and not an entire gym class. It would have been really humiliating.”

Ambrose was beyond speech. He just shook his head, the scale forgotten.

“I don't come in here if someone's not with me because I can't open the doors by myself,” Bailey offered by way of explanation. “But Becker let me in, and I thought my dad was in here. And I can get out by myself because the door swings out and I can just push it open with my wheelchair.”

“Except when someone tips you over and leaves you hanging upside down,” Ambrose said, anger dripping from his comment.

“Yeah. Except then,” Bailey said softly. “Why do you think he did that?” Bailey looked at Ambrose, his face troubled.

“I don't know, Sheen. Because he's an * with a little pecker,” Ambrose grumbled. “He thinks picking on people who can't or won't fight back will make his pecker bigger. But it just gets smaller and smaller and he just gets meaner and meaner.”

Bailey howled with laughter, and Ambrose smiled, glad that Bailey wasn’t shaking anymore.

“You promise you won't tell anyone?” Bailey insisted again.

Ambrose nodded. But he didn't promise not to make Becker pay.

When Ambrose entered the lunchroom, he found Becker seated at a corner table, surrounded by a group of other seniors and several pretty girls that Ambrose wouldn't mind talking to under different circumstances. Ambrose gritted his teeth and walked to the table. He hadn't told his friends what was up. His friends were wrestlers, and Ambrose was probably going to get suspended for what he was about to do. He didn't want them getting in trouble with him and hurting the team’s chances against Loch Haven. He probably wouldn't be wrestling tonight. Guess it was okay that he was a couple of pounds over his weight.

Ambrose brought his fists down on the table as hard as he could, spilling people's drinks and making an empty tray clatter to the floor. Becker looked up in surprise, his curse ringing out above the din in the lunchroom as milk splashed in his lap.

“Stand up,” Ambrose demanded quietly.

“Get lost, Gorilla boy.” Becker sneered, wiping at the milk. “Unless you want to get the shit beat out of you.”