Page 121 - What They Did to the Kid

What They Did to the Kid 109

I drove my VW three car-lengths behind Mike, following him to
his house. In my back seat, Rip rolled up another cigarette, and he
and Kenny kept laughing, smoking, and bragging, like two drunks,
about catching a train to Florida.
“We could buy like a case of bourbon.”
“That’s expensive. Cost you like a quarter for a 7-Up.”
“We could pack it in our luggage.”
“You know what’d happen. We’d get like halfway there and run
out.”
“We’d get off the train and like buy some more.”
“The train’d like pull off like without us.”
“We could borrow a couple bucks from your dad.”
“Hey, dad, like I wanna take a little vacation.”
“We could hitchhike down to the Keys. Take a month or so.
Send back for the skis and get towed like a hundred miles. If you fell
off, it’d be like a cool munch for a barracuda.”
“Lullaby of Birdland, do wah doh.”
I punched the radio dial as hard as I could and turned Pat Boone
up loud: “Oh, Rudy! Tutti Frutti! A Bop Bop A Loopa!”
Rip pushed my shoulder. “Turn it down, Tutti Frutti, hey,” he
yelled.
I kept the volume up.
Two blocks later, Mike’s Ford pulled ahead of me into the cement
driveway of Rip’s house. I backed in up the drive, so my window was
next to Mike’s window, the cool way of talking car-to-car, like cops
do.
Rip and Kenny climbed out.
“Bug man, you’re like crazy,” Rip shouted, starting across the
trim lawn. He dropped his plaid trunks and mooned us.
The three friends laughed so hard no one noticed I choked.
“See you,” Kenny said. He slapped his palm on the car.
Mike stared at me, car to car.
I turned off my radio. “They both...like...live there?”
“Kenny cuts through the alley.”
“Like damn, they’re crazy,” I said. “Worldly and crazy. But I like
them. They actually live in the world.”
“They’re fub duck,” Mike said.

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