The Crazy Horse Electric Game (8 page)

Willie relaxes and the next two shots are good ones. Encouraged, Big Will keeps them coming right down the middle. Willie gets a good third shot, then a fourth. But the next one shoots straight up off the handle and the sixth he drives into the floor. Big Will slows them up a little to let him get his bearings back, but Willie's lost it. He stumbles, or gets to the ball too late, or too soon. Pretty soon he can't see the ball through the tears of frustration.

Big Will says not a word, just keeps hitting the ball off the front wall, at first easy, then harder and harder
as he sees it doesn't matter, that Willie can't hit anything anyway. Big Will is silently furious. Finally, as Willie reaches for a backhand that careens off the side wall and dies in the middle of the floor, Big Will slips his hand out of the safety string and fires his racquet sidearm at the front wall. It pops like a gunshot, then lies twisted on the floor. “Just get out of here,” he says. “Let's just get out of here. If you're not going to try, there's no point to it.”

“I'm…trying,” Willie says.

“You're
not
trying. You were hitting the ball fine; then you gave up. You want to be a cripple all your life, just keep it up. When it gets a little tough, slack off.”

Tears stream down Willie's face as he slips his hand out of the safety string and limps toward the door.

“You just going to leave the ball there?” his dad asks, and Willie slowly retraces his steps to retrieve the ball lying by the front wall. As he leans over to pick it up, he catches movement out of the corner of his eye and glances up to see someone watching from the walkway between courts. He's overwhelmed by the sight of all this through someone else's eyes and he falls back against the side wall and sinks to the floor, dropping his head between his knees, sobbing.

Big Will is in control of himself again and guilt
washes over him in a wave. “Come on, son,” he says. “Get up. That's me, not you. I'm really sorry. I should have let you quit when you were doing well. We'll do it differently next time.”

But Willie knows it is him. His dad isn't the cripple. His dad isn't some stupid jerk lurching and lunging around the racquetball court in a body that doesn't even belong to him. His dad isn't the one who's going to lose his girl, who has to see a shrink every week because he's too big a baby to handle what life passes out. It is Willie. It's
his
life. And he's stuck in it.

Big Will slides his hand gently under Willie's armpit and helps him to his feet and, with his other hand in the middle of Willie's back, guides him toward the locker room.

Cyril encouraged the Weavers' family doctor to prescribe some pills for nights like this, but Willie resists taking them as long as he possibly can because of the way he feels when he wakes up in the morning. “Yeah, they can zone ya,” was Cyril's response to Willie's complaint. “Most drugs have a down side, whether you get them on the street or from a doctor.”

So tonight Willie lies in bed holding off a few minutes more, a few minutes more, hoping he'll drop off on his own and not have to face negotiating the icy streets in a borderless haze on his morning run. He and his dad came directly home from the racquetball courts in a miserable silence and Willie went directly to bed. His dad tried to apologize once again, and Willie openly accepted it, but the gap would not be closed tonight.
The echo of the hard rubber ball whapping into the wood, the sound of the racquet careening off the side wall, the ghastly uneven cadence of it all ring in Willie's ears, making sleep impossible. At three he slides out of bed, wraps himself in his bathrobe and carefully feels his way down the stairs to the kitchen for something to eat.

Warm milk helps sometimes, and he searches through the food cupboard for some instant chocolate to go in it; something to keep it from tasting like it just came out of the cow. As he pours the milk into the pan, he hears voices from his parents' room and quietly moves to the kitchen door to see if he can hear them better. Unable to make out any specific words, he pads back through the kitchen and turns on the hotplate. Now the voices are louder and he thinks he hears his name, so he creeps back through the kitchen, across the living room to their bedroom door, thinking how strange it is for them to be awake this late. Sandy has been known to get up occasionally through the night, but Will Sr. sleeps like a log from the moment his head hits the pillow until his alarm blasts him loose around five-thirty.

Willie puts his ear to the door and listens.

“…to excel at that sport or any other. No right at
all. Leave him alone. God, do you know what he must feel like? Let
him
decide what he wants to play.”

Big Will sounds low; even embarrassed. “I know, I know. I shouldn't push him, but sometimes I think if I don't he won't do anything. He'll just hide out.”

“Then let him hide out,” she says. “He'll come out of it eventually.”

“Do you
know
that?”

“I know if you keep pushing, when he does come out there won't be anyone to come
to
.”

“Jesus, Sandy. He took
drugs
. He took
acid
. Kids start playing around with that stuff and they don't come out of
anything
.”

“He
told
us what that was about, Will. He's not going to take drugs again.”

Willie is uncomfortable listening in; respecting privacy is a family rule. But he needs to know…

“A lot of parents say that, Sandy,” Will says. “Willie's got every reason in the world to want to escape.”

Almost inaudibly, Sandy says, “You mean
you
do.”

Big Will is instantly angry. “What do you mean by that?”

There's a pause. “I mean sometimes I think this has been harder on you than on Willie. I hate to say this,
Will, but there are times you act ashamed of Willie. And he feels it, too; I can sense it. How do you think he felt at the racquetball courts tonight?”

“I'm
not
ashamed of him! What the hell's the matter with you, Sandy?”

Now their voices are filling the house and Willie backs away from the door, moves over toward the stairs; sits.

“What's the matter with me? I'll tell you what's the matter with me. I'm so angry at you I could scream. I could leave. When Missy died, you were
so
righteous. You were so goddam righteous. You sat around telling us all how we shouldn't blame ourselves; you even got irritated with me when I couldn't stop saying how guilty I felt. ‘Stick together,' you said. ‘Look at the good things,' you said. You were
so
strong. You were so goddam
good
. You didn't have to feel bad. Hell, you weren't even around. Couldn't be Will Weaver's fault. He was at work.”

Sandy takes a shaky breath, and Willie realizes she's almost out of control. But she's not slowing down a second. “So now something happens that puts a crick in your world.
Your
kid; the one who was supposed to grow up and go to the goddam Rose Bowl;
your
kid gets put out of commission. I want to know where your
strength is now, Will Weaver. How come you're not so
good
now?”

There's silence, and Willie can't imagine what's on his father's face this minute.

Sandy continues. “Will, this family is coming apart at the seams. Since the day Willie got hurt, it's just been coming apart at the seams. And you're the reason. You don't talk to anybody, you don't help out; you don't give anyone any reason to believe that things will ever be any better. And I'm about full up.”

“That your solution?” Big Will says, his low voice vibrating with tension. “Things get a little tough and you hit the road.”

Sandy explodes. “A little tough! A little tough! Don't you put this back on me, Will Weaver.
I
don't bury my head in the newspaper night after night and pretend my family doesn't exist! I don't treat our son like a leper; or worse yet, like he's invisible. He's not some possession, you know. He's not a car you can take back to the dealer because it doesn't run right. He's our son. And you're the one he's closest to and you better learn to be decent.
You
drove the boat, Will. Just like I chattered away across the street when Missy died.”

“Yeah, well, you're off the hook!” Big Will yells, his restraint crumbled. “You don't have to sit around and
look at your screw-up every day. Missy's six feet under. She's a memory. Willie's stumbling around in front of me from before sunrise to long after sunset, just reminding me. You know why he was without air so long? Because I panicked. Because I almost smothered him trying to get that damn jacket off. If it hadn't been for Jenny, I'd have drowned him. And I'm not so sure that wouldn't have been better. Let the little shit off the hook!”

“Let
you
off the hook, you mean! Grow up, Will. Just grow the hell up. Get real. Life isn't just the Rose Bowl.”

Willie's eyes are glued to the closed bedroom door. Smoke from the scalded milk drifts off the stove, bringing him back. He slips into the kitchen to switch off the hot plate, pour the milk into the sink; then slinks back upstairs to the strains of his parents' relentless accusations. He's never heard them fight before, much less aim every shot below the belt. Devastated, he crawls back into bed and pulls the covers over his head.

He just wants out.

 

Willie limps down the center of the hall, staring at a spot above the archway leading to the stairwell, letting the other students dodge him for a change. He's taking
stock, like Cyril taught him. Counting the positives, over and over. There aren't many, after last night. There's Jenny; in a session with Cyril, she promised she'd hang in there with him; promised she'd stay. And there's Johnny; he's a good friend sometimes, though he can be a pain in the butt trying to help. His speech is getting better and lately he's been feeling like maybe he's going to get it under control. That's it, though. His parents…no, not supposed to think about that. Just the positives. His mind moves back to Jenny, then Johnny, his speech…

“Got a new sport for you.” Johnny's voice breaks his concentration as Johnny rushes to catch him, then slows to match Willie's pace. “It's perfect. Racquetball,” he says, pulling a shiny new racquet from behind his back. “You only need one hand. Small court. Perfect for you. My dad took me over to play the other night. We can give it a try any time you're ready.”

Willie looks at him and can only smile. “Don't…think so,” he says. “Don't…think I…could…get…into it.”

 

Just before noon, Willie follows the enclosed walkway connecting the main building to the gymnasium. He's on his way to tell Coach Williams he doesn't think
it's working out too well for him managing the girls' basketball team. He's spent the whole morning concentrating, and the positive aspects of his life are worn thin. His parents' fight rings in his ears and he can't force the feelings out any longer. He just feels too awful to pretend he can be around athletes of any kind when he can't be one, too.
Let the little shit off the hook. Let you off the hook, you mean
. The voices are real.
He's not some car you can take back to the dealer because it doesn't run right…doesn't run right…doesn't run right
.

“Oh, hi, Willie.” He looks up, startled, to see Jenny and Jeff Rhodes entering the walkway through the side door, from outside.

“Hi,” he says quickly, realizing instantly something's wrong. He looks into Jenny's eyes, then Jeff's. Jeff darts a look at him, then to the wall behind his head. “Hi…Jeff.”

“Hey, Willie. How you doin'?” Jeff says. He glances quickly at Jenny, then back to the wall. “Look,” he says, “I gotta get to class. I'll see you guys later.”

Jenny's recovered. “Okay, Jeff. Take it easy. Tell Debbie I'll catch up with her in Algebra.”

Debbie is Jeff's girlfriend.

Supposedly.

Jenny turns to Willie; touches his arm. “Where're you headed?” she asks.

“Out…to see…Coach Williams.”

“How come?”

“Just gotta…talk to her…for…a minute.”

“Want some company?”

Willie shakes his head. “No. That's…okay. Got some…other stuff…to do.”

Jenny smiles and pecks his cheek. “Okay. I'll see you at lunch.”

Thoughts of his parents' fight wash out of his head like water draining out of a bathtub, replaced by the flash across Jeff's and Jenny's faces. In the months since the accident Willie has developed radar for hidden meaning; unspoken language. It's as real to him as anything he can touch or feel. But Jenny wouldn't do that. She's a friend. She was a friend before all this; a good one. She said she wouldn't do that; she'd hang in. Certainly there are times when his intuition is wrong. Cyril
said
there will be times when he's particularly paranoid. On the other hand, no one ever tells him anything. Friends are so careful, there's no way he can trust them. Petey is the only one. Words tumble out of his mouth long before he might even think of censoring them. Everyone else is on guard. Willie feels himself
physically pushing his stomach back down where it belongs. Whether he's right or wrong about Rhodes and Jenny, there's no way to find out. And Rhodes is a class guy. Pretty good athlete. Great student. Funny. Good-looking. Willie feels the black cloud of his worst fear taking shape.

With a deep breath he continues out to resign his position as flunky for girls' roundball.

He skips lunch because he knows he can't play it straight with Jenny. If she has been seeing Rhodes, she'll know he senses something and it will be awful. If she hasn't, she'll dig out of Willie what's bothering him and he'll feel like a fool. He pulls on his coat and snow boots and wanders aimlessly for the lunch period through the neighborhood surrounding the school. If he could
just stop the unraveling;
finally get to the last of the awful pain seemingly caused by his mere presence. Hell, he knew Jenny was going to go. He's been saying it all along; but holding a little back, really; holding on to a small spot deep down that said maybe Jenny was superhuman. But he knows that “uh-oh” look Rhodes gave her in the walkway.

He slips quietly into his desk minutes after the start of Algebra, purposely late to avoid a conversation with Jenny. He lays his cane on the floor parallel to the desks
beside the rest of his books, brings out his notebook and starts his hand-held tape recorder; Cyril's “equalizer” for Willie's slowness. Actually he doesn't need the cane anymore, but he carries it sometimes because some of the guys on the ball team had it made special. The head is a gold baseball inscribed:
WILLIE WEAVER—1, CRAZY HORSE ELECTRIC
—0. Petey's idea.

Petey hustles into class five minutes late, apologizing to Mr. Zimmer as he comes through the door about having run an errand for the Journalism class.

Mr. Zimmer nods patiently as Petey babbles on, then finally says, “Mr. Shropshire, do me a favor, okay? When you come in late, come in mute,” and Petey nods and keeps right on explaining, rounding the corner by Willie's desk, kicking the cane the length of the aisle, tripping in the process, turning to save himself on Willie's desk. He catches Willie's tape recorder with the side of his arm and it crashes to the ground. In an instant Petey retrieves the cane and rushes back to pick up the damaged recorder, apologizing all the while to Willie, whose hands cover his ears, and whose eyes are closed.

“God, Willie,” Petey says, “I'm really sorry. I didn't mean to mess up your stuff.” He tries to hand him the cane and, when Willie doesn't respond, leans it against
his desk, placing the recorder carefully on Willie's book. “Really, Willie. It was an accident.” He reads Willie's pulling away as anger at his clumsiness when all Willie really wants is for the attention to shift elsewhere. “Is it okay, man?” Petey says. “I don't think your tape recorder's broken…”

“Stop…it!” Willie screams. “Stop it! Get…away from me. Everybody get…away…from me! The…next…person apologizes…to me…for…anything…I'll…hit 'em in the head!” He picks up the cane in his right hand and swings it in front of him. “I'll…hit 'em. I…will. I'll…hit 'em…right…in the head!”