Different Seasons(158)

“Stick with me, Gordie,” Chris said in a low, shaky voice. “Stick with me, man.”

“I’m right here.”

“Go on, now,” Chris said to Ace, and he was able, by some magic, to get the shakiness out of his voice. He sounded as if he were instructing a stupid infant.

“We’ll get you,” Ace said. “We’re not going to forget it, if that’s what you’re thinking. This is big time, baby.”

“That’s fine. You just go on and do your getting another day.”

“We’ll f**kin ambush you, Chambers. We’ll—”

“Get out!” Chris screamed, and levelled the gun. Ace stepped back.

He looked at Chris a moment longer, nodded, then turned around. “Come on,” he said to the others. He looked back over his shoulder at Chris and me once more. “Be seeing you.”

They went back into the screen of trees between the bog and the road. Chris and I stood perfectly still in spite of the hail that was welting us, reddening our skins, and piling up all around us like summer snow. We stood and listened and above the crazy calypso sound of the hail hitting the treetrunks we heard two cars start up.

“Stay right here,” Chris told me, and he started across the bog.

“Chris!” I said, panicky.

“I got to. Stay here.”

It seemed he was gone a very long time. I became convinced that either Ace or Eyeball had lurked behind and grabbed him. I stood my ground with nobody but Ray Brower for company and waited for somebody—anybody—to come back. After a while, Chris did.

“We did it,” he said. “They’re gone.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah. Both cars.” He held his hands up over his head, locked together with the gun between them, and shook the double fist in a wry championship gesture. Then he dropped them and smiled at me. I think it was the saddest scaredest smile I ever saw. “ ‘Suck my fat one’—whoever told you you had a fat one, Lachance?”

“Biggest one in four counties,” I said. I was shaking all over.

We looked at each other warmly for a second, and then, maybe embarrassed by what we were seeing, looked down together. A nasty thrill of fear shot through me, and the sudden splash/splash as Chris shifted his feet let me know that he had seen, too. Ray Brower’s eyes had gone wide and white, starey and pupilless, like the eyes that look out at you from Grecian statuary. It only took a second to understand what had happened, but understanding didn’t lessen the horror. His eyes had filled up with round white hailstones. Now they were melting and the water ran down his cheeks as if he were weeping for his own grotesque position—a tatty prize to be fought over by two bunches of stupid hick kids. His clothes were also white with hail. He seemed to be lying in his own shroud.

“Oh, Gordie, hey,” Chris said shakily. “Say-hey, man. What a creepshow for him.”

“I don’t think he knows—”

“Maybe that was his ghost we heard. Maybe he knew this was gonna happen. What a f**kin creepshow, I’m sincere.”

Branches crackled behind us. I whirled, sure they had flanked us, but Chris went back to contemplating the body after one short, almost casual glance. It was Vern and Teddy, their jeans soaked black and plastered to their legs, both of them grinning like dogs that have been sucking eggs.

“What are we gonna do, man?” Chris asked, and I felt a weird chill steal through me. Maybe he was talking to me, maybe he was ... but he was still looking down at the body.

“We’re gonna take him back, ain’t we?” Teddy asked, puzzled. “We’re gonna be heroes. Ain’t that right?” He looked from Chris to me and back to Chris again.

Chris looked up as if startled out of a dream. His lip curled. He took big steps toward Teddy, planted both hands on Teddy’s chest, and pushed him roughly backwards. Teddy stumbled, pinwheeled his arms for balance, then sat down with a soggy splash. He blinked up at Chris like a surprised muskrat. Vern was looking warily at Chris, as if he feared madness. Perhaps that wasn’t far from the mark.

“You keep your trap shut,” Chris said to Teddy. “Paratroops over the side my ass. You lousy rubber chicken.”

“It was the hail!” Teddy cried out, angry and ashamed. “It wasn’t those guys, Chris! I’m ascared of storms! I can’t help it! I would have taken all of em on at once, I swear on my mother’s name! But I’m ascared of storms! Shit! I can’t help it!” He began to cry again, sitting there in the water.

“What about you?” Chris asked, turning to Vern. “Are you scared of storms, too?”

Vern shook his head vacuously, still astounded by Chris’s rage. “Hey, man, I thought we was all runnin.”

“You must be a mind-reader then, because you ran first.”

Vern swallowed twice and said nothing.

Chris stared at him, his eyes sullen and wild. Then he turned to me. “Going to build him a litter, Gordie.”

“If you say so, Chris.”

“Sure! Like in Scouts.” His voice had begun to climb into strange, reedy levels. “Just like in the f**kin Scouts. A litter—poles and shirts. Like in the handbook. Right, Gordie?”

“Yeah. If you want. But what if those guys—”

“Fuck those guys!” he screamed. “You’re all a bunch of chickens! Fuck off, creeps!”