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The Hero Experience - Chapter 4

 
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 19, 2015 2:06 pm    Post subject: The Hero Experience - Chapter 4 Reply with quote


____________________________________________

Chapter 4

There was, of course, trouble about the car. This was the third time in two days I had asked to have it, and my father’s reply seemed firm and nonnegotiable.

“Look here, son,” Dad said to me across the dinner table. “If you want a car, you should get yourself a job and buy one.”

Fortunately his reply was also predicable, so I was ready for it.

“Right, Dad. I feel bad about asking for the family car so much. And that’s why I swept the basement this afternoon after I cut the grass.”

Dad was caught by surprise. After a short pause, he said, “You did?”

“You bet. And I called the guys to tell them they’d have to kick in some gas money.” I tried to look very serious and responsible as I held his gaze and nodded slowly. “Seems only fair, right?”

Mom was listening silently from her end of the table, but she was smiling for reasons only mothers truly know. Either she was proud of the respectful way I was acting toward my father, or she was proud of the firm way my father was handling his son, or she was delighted by the fact that everybody was shoveling down the meatloaf she’d cooked like it was filet mignon.

Maybe she was just psychic and knew how it would all come out.

Meanwhile, Dad studied my face carefully to see if I was showing any of the usual signs of outrageous lying. He knew if he stared at me long enough I’d start looking like a bad poker player facing Brett Maverick with the deed to my ranch lying among the chips.

Finally he decided I wasn’t bluffing, so he said, “Good move, son.”

“Thanks, Dad.” I started breathing again, but I tried to do it casually so as not to tip my hand.

Dad paused again, then he upped the ante'. “You can leave it on my chest of drawers if I’m asleep when you get home.”

I blinked, I stared, and then I said, “Ummm . . . leave what, sir?”

“The gas money. The money your friends will give you.”

“Oh. Right. Uh . . . okay. But in the meantime . . . I could use a few bucks because the tank is sorta empty at the moment.”

Dad struggled valiantly between his personal honor and his love for his only child. Somebody seemed to be lying here, and he hoped it wasn’t me. Fortunately it wasn’t — but that didn’t change the fact that the gas tank was empty and I needed a few bucks to finance my upcoming outing with Stan and Doug.

After an silent debate between what he hoped was true and what he suspected was really going on, Dad sided with his hopes and forked over a few bucks to finance my adventures in the family car. I finished the last of my delicious, home-cooked meatloaf mignon and then pushed the baked potato skin over to cover up the neglected asparagus. It was time for my clever getaway.

“Well, I’d better run along,” I said cheerfully.

“Where are you boys going tonight?” my mother asked.

I couldn’t admit that we were just going to cruise around and waste gas, so I said, “Actually, we’re sort of undecided.”

“Really? How very surprising,” she said with a knowing look.

Just as I thought. Mothers are psychic.
_______________________________________________________

Minutes later I was rolling toward Stan’s house, singing along with the radio and making up the words when I didn’t know the right ones, which was most of the time. When Stan came out of his house, I got my first clue as to what the evening would be like. He was wearing a battered old cowboy hat, soft and faded with age

______________

It was a pale brownish gray, and it was pulled low over his eyes. His stride was peppy, cocky, and full of mischief. But when he got into the car and closed the door, there wasn’t a trace of a smile on his face when he turned to me and said, “Howdy!”

“How do, partner?”

“Tonight, we rodeo!” he announced.

“We what?” I was confused. “We rodeo?”

“Yep. We ride the range. We knock about. We run the circuit.”

“Oh,” I said. “Gee, I didn’t know the word rodeo could be a verb.”

Stan slumped down in the seat, folded his arms across his chest, and pulled the hat down over his eyes. “Well, tinhorn, you learn something new every day, huh?”

He still hadn’t cracked a smile, but there was one lurking behind that freckled face somewhere, and it was dying to get out.

“I sure hope Doug’s mood is as good as yours.”

“Maybe we should get him some beer,” said Stan.

“Naw. We’re loony enough without it. Besides, it affects my driving.”

“Good point. Forget the beer.” Stan proclaimed quickly.

Doug was making an effort to be jovial. He had perhaps decided that if he angered his two crass friends he would end up stranded for the summer, forced to spend his time with his mother, The Smiling Mute, and his father, Attila the Hun.

“Good evening, Mr. Jones,” Doug said cordially as he climbed into the backseat of the car. He leaned forward and studied Stan’s attire for a moment. “Howdy, Tex! What’s with the hat?”

I shared what little I knew about the situation. “Stan tells me that tonight we rodeo.”

Doug looked puzzled for a moment, then he said, “We what?”

“We carouse,” Stan explained from beneath the hat. “We make a little mischief over here, then we make a little mischief over there.”

After a studious pause, Doug said, “Here?”

“I speak metaphorically, of course,” said Stan, still with the hat hiding most of his face. Oh boy, was he enjoying this.

“Aha,” I said. ‘Well, please speak navigationally. Where to first, Cowboy?”

“First, we check to see who might be hanging around Shoney’s”

“Kinda early, ain’t it?” Doug said as we pulled out of his driveway.

“One never knows,” said Hopalong.
____________________________________________



And, indeed, one never does. Twenty minutes later we walked into the restaurant and glanced around just to see who might be showing his or her face at this local high school hangout. The three of us spied Julie Richards at the same instant. Though Julie didn’t know it, she was the recipient of Doug’s unrequited love and the single most prevalent cause of his acne. In spite of the fact that Doug didn't go to the same school we did, he'd met Julie at a dance that Carl and I brought him to on our side of town several month's back. Julie had apparently been smitten by Doug, and she'd danced with him most of the night. But before he'd had a chance to call her for a date, she'd started going steady, figuratively slamming the door in his face before he'd even knocked on it. And yet Doug still carried a torch for the lady.

The moment Doug saw Julie sitting at a booth with her date, he turned right around and said, “I’d rather not stay here if it’s all the same to you guys.”

Stan uttered a one-word response, the same way cowpokes spit tobacco on the sidewalk. “Coward,” said Stan. Point blank.

“What?” said Doug. He was shocked for three seconds, then he had a murderous look in his eyes.

“Why run?” Stan said, his voice low, his smile faint, and his heart set on needling Doug a bit. “Why not speak to her?”

Doug stood almost nose to nose with Stan and hissed, “I just don’t want you asking her if she wants to fool around — like you did in the McDonald’s!”

Oh God, there goes the evening. Well, blessed are the peacemakers, even if they do happen to be horribly underpaid. I decided to mediate the dispute.

“Ease up, Stan. Let Doug pick his own time and place.”

Stan shot me the same scornful look that General Patton would have given Ghandi, based on their polarized opinions, then he said, “I just think he should have the nerve to speak to her. For all he knows, Julie has been lying awake at night having lewd fantasies about him wearing black leather outfits that impede his circulation.” He turned back to Doug. “Don’t run, pal. Take a crack at it. What have you got to lose?”

“Well . . . ” Doug said, trapped by the logic of Stan’s reasoning and the peer pressure that drives all teens to run like lemmings off the nearest cliff. But his feet stayed glued to the floor, and I figured the Army Corps of Engineers would have to blast to get him off the spot.

“Come on,” Stan urged in a gentler voice. “It’ll be okay. We’ve got her date outnumbered. Just don’t let Jones start talking about space movies.”

Doug looked over at Julie for a moment, then he said quietly, “Okay.”

Stan grinned triumphantly. “That’s the spirit. Charge!”

We sauntered through the restaurant toward the seated couple. Doug walked like a condemned man taking that last fatal stroll. His shoulders were hunched up as if he expected someone to slap the back of his head. His hands were shoved so far down into his pockets that his wristwatch wasn’t visible.

When we reached the table, Julie looked up and bathed us all in a smile so bright we’d all be sunburned tomorrow.

“Oh, hi! Well, if it isn’t The Three Musketeers!” Then she studied Stan and his faded cowboy hat for moment. “No, it’s the Two Musketeers and the Cisco Kid.”

“Hello,” said Doug in a barely audible voice. He wore the same look that undertakers put on dead bodies so their families will think they’re resting peacefully. I could see Doug was going to need help.

“Where are you folks headed tonight?” I asked.

“We’re going to a movie. It starts at 8:30 and we were about to leave.” She suddenly realized that introductions were in order. “Oh, do you guys know Alex?” She turned to her date, a big beefy guy with blond hair, a slightly dangerous look on his face, and shoulders that went from here to waaaaay over there. “He’s the captain of the Headland football team,” she concluded with evident pride.

Stan leaned close to my ear and whispered, “With him on the team, what do they need the other guys for?” Alex didn’t hear him, thank God Almighty.

“Hi, Alex.” I shook hands with him and was immediately grateful that I was left handed, since the right one was now ruined. Doug mumbled hello as the two shook hands, and I saw his forearm bulge as he tried to give old Alex tit for tat.

“Hi ya, Alex!” called out Stan, waving from his safe position behind me. Stan was nobody’s fool.

Doug was making a valiant effort to appear more relaxed, but all he could manage was to pose a little better as he folded his arms, smiled at Julie, and said, “Enjoying your summer vacation?”

“Sure. The whole first day of it.”

“Oh. Yeah. Ummm . . . Are you excited about being a senior this year?”

“I sure am. Are you?

“I don’t think it’s actually hit me yet.” Doug was smiling, but his face looked like it was made of wax. He was tensing up visibly as Julie made it obvious that she wished we would run along and let her get back her date: Thor, the Norse god of thunder. Alex was looking at us like he was about to offer us a dime to go play outside with the other children. I’d have taken the money.

But not Doug. He had too much pride to turn his nervousness into a clown act — which is what I would have done. But his dwindling reserves of courage were just about to go bone dry. Into the awkward silence, Stan suddenly inserted a remark delivered without a trace of humor.

“Captain of the football team, eh? I’m captain of the rodeo team at our school. Ever heard of it, Al?”

Alex actually looked grateful as he smiled and said, “No, I don’t think so. What does the rodeo team do?”

“The usual stuff,” said Stan, reaching up and shoving his cowboy hat forward until it rested right above his eyebrows. He started slowly chewing imaginary tobacco. He spoke with his tongue pushed to one side, and I swear he sounded like he had a cheek full of Red Man. “Ropin’, ridin’, bronco bustin’ — stuff like that.” He gave Alex a look of skeptical disbelief. “Ya'll ain’t got no rodeo team at Headland? Just that wimpy football team?”

I was ready to dive under the table if this suddenly went horribly wrong. But Alex showed us all that a guy could have both a sense of humor and a pair of shoulders that blocked traffic. He gave Stan a knowing smile and said, “I’ll see about getting one started next year, Tex. Thanks for the idea.”

Stan just nodded and continued to make slow western chewing motions. Doug was wearing the thin-lipped smile that Stan Laurel had made famous, and his eyebrows were a half-inch higher than normal as he pivoted his head back and forth to follow the lunatic conversation.

“Well, we better let you two go to your movie!” I said jovially. I was afraid that Wild Bill Jenner would challenge Alex to a shootout in the street in front of the restaurant.

“Have fun, partners,” said Alex, glad to see us finally leaving. Julie’s farewell to Doug was delivered with all the veiled pity he didn’t want from the woman he adored. Stan and I trudged out after Doug, who moved with such self-consciousness that I knew he felt like everybody in the restaurant was watching his dishonored retreat. When we got outside, he climbed into the car without a word, choosing the backseat, which was symbolic. After Stan and I got in, I turned and said, “See? That wasn’t so bad, right?”

There was a pause before he spoke. “Yeah, right. Sure.” Then he spoke to Stan in a voice that was low and humble. “Hey, ummm . . . thanks. I mean it.”

Stan shoved his hat way back on his head so that he looked like Will Rogers, live and on stage. He twisted his mouth to one side to give his face that lanky, ranch-hand look when he said, “Ah hell, buddy — she wasn’t helpin' one little bit. I’m thinkin’ that gal ain’t half good enough for the likes of you.”

Doug held Stan’s gaze for a moment and wrestled with what he should really believe about himself — and about Stan — and about Julie — and about Will Rogers, live and on stage. He looked pretty confused by the whole thing, and I didn’t blame him a bit. I realized that our evening was going to fall flat on its face if the mood didn’t do a fast about face and start marching in the opposite direction. A thought came to me, and I acted on it right away.

“Well,” I said, “turnabout is fair play, so let’s go visit my heartthrob, Jean Wilcox.”

Stan wore a knowing look, but he backed me up in true western fashion. “Good idea. But she’ll be out on a date, most likely.”

“Most likely, yes indeed. But as an act of manly defiance we’ll go by her house and spit in her mailbox!”

It was a clumsy attempt at group therapy, but I couldn’t think of anything better. Not that I would have actually spit into the fair Jean’s mailbox, but it just gave us a fixed destination and a common foe. To tell the truth, I was only slightly infatuated with Jean Wilcox, who was only slightly aware that I was alive. I just picked her because she was female and blond and gorgeous and lived close by.

We roared out onto Main Street with great energy and a good chance of being pulled over by the police. During the short trip to Jean’s house, we harmonized on "Home on the Range" with high volume and little skill. The sun had set and night had arrived. The warm evening air was a natural perfume, designed to drive young men mad. The windows were open, and our singing floated out to the world at large. We drove along through an elderly residential area, beneath huge trees that were old enough to remember General Sherman when he camped under them during his visit to Atlanta so he could roast marshmallows while the real estate burned down.

When we approached Jean Wilcox’s house I saw two guys standing by the curb with the lovely lady herself. The boys were leaning against a canary yellow Chevy Camaro (and just try saying that ten times fast). I knew that my stately four-door Dodge felt insecure in the presence of that high-powered rocket from Detroit.





And as a matter of fact, I felt pretty insecure myself. Those guys had more nerve than I did, more car than I did, and more woman than I did. The injustice of the situation suddenly hit me squarely between the eyes, and I responded with a rebel yell that split the air and scared the pee out of both my passengers.

“YEEE-HAAAW!”

I punched the gas pedal to the floor as we approached the trio at the curb. Stan was quick to match my vocal outburst with his own yell before I'd even run out breath. The car leaped forward, and we shot by the two guys, who looked distinctly ruthless as they tensed up, ready for action. As we barreled on down the road, I visualized them leaping into their bird-poop-colored muscle car and rapidly overtaking my poor pale blue Dodge Polaris.

The residential road came to an end at a cross street, and I had to do some frantic maneuvering, twisting the steering wheel to the left. We careened around the corner, tires begging their executioner for mercy. I knew that when my father noticed the missing tread, I would be shot at dawn. We raced down the street for a hundred feet and then turned left again onto another residential street. More rubber was married to the asphalt, but I was determined to confound our pursuers.

We were building up a pretty good speed when suddenly the road made an unexpected and lunatic ninety-degree turn to the right!

I had just enough time to stomp the brakes and lock up the wheels for one useless instant before we slammed over the curb and sailed off into the high grass of a big vacant lot that was adjacent to a public playground visible just ahead. The car was airborne for a half second, and then we came down in the tall grass. The Dodge rambled along for a dozen yards before it finally came to a stop.

The three of us sat there for several seconds without words and without movements. I can’t speak for the others, but I was in complete shock. I cut the ignition and leaned forward until my forehead rested against the steering wheel.

“Oh, no . . . ” I moaned as I visualized vital pieces of the car strewn along the ground all the way back to the road. I heard Stan open the car door on his side. I turned and watched him get out slowly. He stepped back from the car to survey the scene. He nodded his head studiously as he looked under the car and then back along its path.

“Um-hmm. Um-hmm,” I heard him mumble. Then he knelt down and delivered a ceremonious kiss to the ground at his feet. “Um-wah!” He stood up, came back to the car, got in, and closed the door. He looked over at me and grinned gleefully.

“That was great!” he proclaimed. “Let’s do it again!”

He delivered this pronouncement with a bright smile like a child being handed a candy cane by a loving grandmother, then he turned and stared straight ahead just like a man sitting on a bus that was about to leave. When I finally spoke, I tried to make my voice sound very calm and patient, with just a touch of quiet desperation.

“Stan? Old buddy? I’m a dead man. My father will kill me. He’ll burn my driver’s license posthumously after he rings my neck like a skinny chicken.”

Stan took a deep breath and let it out noisily, the way people do when they’re about to explain something to complete idiots. “Don’t be silly, Jones. He’ll never know about this. The car is okay. We’re okay. And the evening is looking up. Come on, crank it up and get us out of here.”

I was amazed beyond all words. It was as if he’d expected this night to produce something remarkable, and this had been it. Apparently, rodeoing was a little wilder than I’d thought.

Suddenly I heard a voice. “Hey, look!”

A report from the backseat: Doug had survived. He was pointing back along our path. Looking through the rear window, I saw for the first time that in leaving the road, we had slipped perfectly between a telephone poll and it’s diagonally stretched supporting cable. When the car had zipped through the gap, the clearance could be measured in inches. The black tire marks on the street told the story, even though nobody would believe it unless they had seen it for themselves.

Then suddenly there was another voice — this one from outside.

“Just leave the car right there, boy! The police are on the way!”

I turned to see a man lumbering into the pool of light formed by the streetlamp on the poll I had narrowly missed. Several other people were coming out of nearby houses.

“Uh-oh,” said Stan. He wasn’t looking quite so happy any more. He spoke to me in a low and urgent tone. “Jones, get us out of here. Right now!”

I cranked up the car . . . and then I froze, wondering which way to go. Our original route back up to the road was blocked by a group of irate citizens who were descending on us like those Transylvanian peasants in the old horror movies who got real mad at Dr. Frankenstein for creating monsters in their neighborhood.

“Douse the headlights, Brad!” said Doug. “Maybe they haven’t gotten the license number yet.”

I turned out the headlights . . . and then I froze all over again. I couldn’t see anything ahead of us except the dim silhouette of trees and playground equipment in the public park ahead of us.

“Go, man!” Stan shouted. The rearview mirror was filled with upset citizens stumbling through the grass toward the rear of the car. I punched the gas, and the spinning tires spat dirt at the people behind us. We went bucking along the rough ground while I peered into the gloom. An oak tree leaped out of the darkness and tried to collide with us, but I dodged around it.

“Watch out!” Doug wailed from the backseat. It was good advice.

Two more trees sprang from ambush, but I evaded their leafy clutches and came out onto the playground area.

“Turn on the headlights!” Stan cried. “We’re far enough from the crowd now.”

When the bright beams split the darkness, a huge swing set barred our way. I twisted the steering wheel and plowed up the dusty earth with a sideways skid.

“Take a right at the monkey bars!” Stan ordered. We bounced along the bare ground, its hard surface packed and flattened by the tiny feet of ten thousand kids. Behind us, a cloud of dust was rising to envelop the playground.

“There!” I shouted, spotting the shortest route to the adjoining street. The car dove into more of the knee-high grass, and we tore along like an Everglades boat through the Florida swamps. I kept a careful lookout for telephone polls with supporting cables as we neared the street. We thumped over the low curb and fishtailed out onto the asphalt. I was strangling the steering wheel in an iron grip. My palms were sweaty, and I felt moisture trickling down beneath my armpits.

When we were a half-mile from the scene of the crime, I slowed down and tried to relax. I wondered if I was actually sitting on the car seat or just holding myself two inches above it with the steering wheel. I had just begun to relax when I saw flashing blue lights up ahead.

“Slow down, Brad,” said Doug. “Try to drive like normal people do until we get past him.”

As the blue lights grew nearer, I realized that the police car was stopped by the side of the road, and another car was in front of him at the curb. I eased over into the left-hand lane to go around them both. As we rolled past the two vehicles, we saw a policeman standing beside the canary-yellow Chevy Camaro, writing a ticket. The guy in the driver’s seat glanced in our direction, but I couldn’t tell if he recognized us..

All my fears of pursuit suddenly seemed ridiculous and self-important. Those guys had better things to do than think paranoid thoughts and plow up dusty playgrounds.

And frankly . . . I envied them for it.


____________________________________________



_________________
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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