Page 78 - What They Did to the Kid

66 Jack Fritscher

wry anus so you’ll have a happy new year?” Then I added, “Asshole.”
Some words were more uncharitable than impure.
Hank banged the pipe against the railing and turned up the next
flight. “Who writes Ryanus’s script?” he said to Kowalski. “Ski, baby,
I remember, don’t you, when sweet baby Ryanus would never have
said ass much less hole.” He dry-hawked spit down on us. “Ain’t none
of your damn business what we’re doing.”
“Hey, big, strong, and stupid,” I said, “You’re a real two-ton
Teuton. You’re a real tank. You’re big Hank the Tank.”
“Says you,” Hank shouted.
Hank and Ski disappeared around the upper landing.
“Why do you antagonize him, Ryan?” Mike said.
“Ryan gives as good as he gets,” Dempsey said.
“Hank, Hank the Tank, he antagonizes me.” I held my ground.
“My dad says when I was three years old I stood on the sidewalk in
front of our house and said to anyone walking by, ‘I’m rough and
I’m tough, and I’ll beat you all up.’”
“Forget it.” Demspey pulled me around. “Let me show you what
I smuggled in from home.”
Mike went on down the stairs to spread the Roth story. I fol-
lowed Demspey off the stairs through the hall, a little mad he was
so obviously changing the subject.
After he had stopped wetting the bed, Dick Dempsey got to be
one of the most popular boys in our class, except with Hank, who
kept doing things to him like putting a pair of panties he’d bought on
vacation into Dick Dempsey’s bed. “What’s that word dick mean?”
he’d say. “Is that a name or a description?” Despite Hank the Tank,
or maybe because of him, Dempsey’s stock rose.
Some boys thought Dempsey was a saint.
Little cliques opened and closed and opened again. Gossip put
some people up and gossip knocked some people down. Down was
always easier.
Every boy had a reputation created by all the other boys. A whis-
per could cause a scandal or an ostracism. Any weakness in any boy
was picked like a scab.
All of Misery watched with only one comment: “A boy needs to
have his corners knocked off.”

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