Page 100 - What They Did to the Kid

P. 100

88 Jack Fritscher

“I’ll never forgive you, Ry-baby!” Hank the Tank jumped down from
a ladder, his hands wringing a wet rag he threw at me. “I’ll never
forget.”
He had me cornered on the third floor alone.
“Don’t say anything, baby. You talked enough already. Ski and
me came near to getting shipped out of here. Twice, because of
you. And we would have, yeah, you would have succeeded, but my
father’s name saved us. Rector Karg didn’t name you as choir boy,
baby, but we all know, don’t we, what you are and what you sang to
Gunn. Don’t flinch up. I’m not even going to threaten you, O’Hara
baby. You’d only run and sing again. You’re so effing pure. No man,
I don’t need to threaten you. You’re so busy playing white knight to
that pansy Dempsey, because I ride his tail. You wait till I ride yours.
You like your new teeth? You ain’t seen nothing yet. Fub your fub
duck. I’m gonna fuck you up.”
“Try it,” I said. “You expect me to knuckle under? To you? I
mean, how do you want me to play it? Get down on my hands and
knees and worship you by burning incense in your big belly?” I
threw the wet rag back at his face. “You found your vocation: wash-
ing light fixtures. Like father, like son. Your father washed out of
Misery. What do you expect?”
“Not what I expect, O’Hara. But what you don’t. This time you
got me big.”
“Confession,” I said, “is good for the soul.”
“You’re supposed to confess your own sins.”
“Oh,” I said, “I always get that mixed up.”
“You’re gonna get it from me in the ass when you least expect it.”
“I think my Confessions always are about my own sins.”
“Remember that, baby—when and where you least expect it.
And never mention my father again.”

June 1, 1957

Baiting Hank the Tank was a thrilling contest. Hank and his crowd
of glee club and choir boys and opera fans had those kind of eccle-
siastical ambitions that made me wonder what was God’s point in
such a calling of such a lewd boy with such social-climber friends

95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105