Beau, Lee, The Bomb Read online

  “Dude, are you okay?”

  He takes a deep and shaky breath. Shakes his head.

  “Not keen on cops.” He tries to laugh to underplay his wobbles. He looks at his trembling hands. He squeezes them between his knees.

  “Why, Beau? What happened?” Leo puts her hand gently on his shoulder.

  “When I lived with my dad . . .” He trails off. He looks over at us like his response explains what happened instead of when it happened. We wait.

  When he speaks again, his voice is stronger and calmer.

  “Um, I was walking from school last year when I still lived in Kansas and I got jumped by three guys from my school, right on the sidewalk, in midday.” He looks at us wearily, though that still explains nothing about cops. We wait.

  “So, it was in front of a bunch of houses and someone called the police . . .”

  “Good!”

  “Yeah, well . . . they came. They broke up the ass kicking I was getting, but then instead of taking those guys in they took me.”

  “To jail?” I’m scandalized.

  “No. They drove me around in the backseat through town and basically yelled at me for about two hours while I puked and felt horrible from getting my ass kicked, before bringing me back to my dad and telling him what happened, or at least what they said happened.”

  “Wait. They yelled at you?”

  “Told me to be a man and man up and act like a man. It was very helpful and instructive.” Beau’s voice is ancient. I follow his eyes and see the ferry chugging in the distance.

  “So . . . what’d your dad do?” I ask tentatively. I’m cold. I’m suddenly sure I can guess.

  Beau looks over at me then, with his one good black-and-blue blue eye, suddenly bested and exhausted.

  “Well, he listened to the cops and then when they left he beat the hell out of me.”

  We don’t say much on the ride over. Actually, we don’t say anything the entire ride. We’re each disappeared in our thoughts. Like taken hostage by them.

  When the ferry docks I take the directions that say Port Angeles, Forks and La Push and we’re on the road again.

  Driving at night is an extra trip. From Kingston you head northwest and sort of follow the water for a long time. You cross Hood Canal. It’s huge. Eventually you get to the Olympic National Park and start driving in the deep woods. I pass a sign that mentions an apple maggot quarantine area, about which I have no clue, so I’m guessing that the apple maggots are all free range. It’s super dark. Even the trees somehow look menacing, hungry and dark, coniferous and carnivorous, lining the sides of the road like an unending army. I look in the rearview. Leonie has dozed off. I glance over. Beau is still awake beside me.

  “How are you doing?”

  “Okay.” He stops looking out the passenger side window and instead looks out the windshield, straight ahead.

  “I don’t think you sound okay.” Though I don’t know what to do for him.

  He looks right at me then.

  “Yeah . . . no. I’m not. I’m not okay. I’m freaking sick of telling old and new stories about getting my ass handed to me. I’m sick of having to think which way to get to school or home if I’m by myself. I’m sick of using the self-defense I was forced to learn. I’m sick of people and their stupid opinions. I hate school. I freaking hate homophobic jocks and bullies. I want to be at peace, y’know? I just want to feel at home somewhere.”

  I do know. Though I don’t get beat up, I am constantly verbally abused. Which isn’t as bad but is relentless and it saps my will to live. Seriously.

  I say what I hope rather than what I believe.

  “Dude, like they say: It gets better. We just have to hang on till college. I know it will be different in college.” This I do believe. It will be different there.

  “Why is that going to be so different? A lot of kids who killed themselves are in college! Some of them were in universities. Good ones too.”

  “I know.” I got nothing to say to that. They were—and are. The suicides keep happening.

  So then, when will it get better?

  Beau continues. “Well, why didn’t the losers who ‘outed’ them get in more trouble—like socially for the way they acted? Why isn’t a storm of outrage and mockery following those guys? That was a horrible thing to do! Why haven’t people turned on the haters and like . . . I don’t know—kicked them off the Internet and shunned them?! I don’t know! Why doesn’t someone hate on them for a while? Why do I always deserve this mess?”

  He sounds like he might break down, so he stares out the side window, then takes a deep breath and settles.

  We drive in silence for quite a while. We pass Port Angeles without comment or incident and leave the water for deeper woods.

  It’s very dark in the forest with only our high beams to guide us.

  We can hear Leonie shifting and talking in her sleep. I try to hear what she’s muttering. Beau turns around and watches her for a minute. She’s thrashing around. She laughs in her sleep.

  “They’re so cute at that age.” He untangles the comforter from around her head.

  I snort. Beau cracks me up. He pulls her hair out of her mouth.

  “I wonder what she’s dreaming of.”

  I stink-eye him. Who else? She dreams of Ratskin.

  “Hmmm . . . let me hazard a guess.”

  “Yeah. Probably.” Beau nods, bummed.

  “That guy is a criminal.”

  “You gonna turn him in?” He is making a point.

  I’m silent. He’s right. I know I should, but somehow I have this idea that it’s not my place to turn him in, it’s hers. After all, I never got hit on. All I know is what she said and that’s called hearsay.

  But here is one thing I saw. I saw him standing really close, talking to this hot little freshman, all up in her face one day when I went back into the classroom. I’d forgotten to get my graded reading journal so he wasn’t expecting anyone and thought he was alone with her. When I came in, he jumped like twenty feet, which to me is a sign o’ guilty intentions, at the very least.

  I never told Leonie for several reasons. One: She is the gold medalist of selective hearing; if she doesn’t like it, it’s not true. Two: Everyone is so quick to tell me every crappy thing they can think up it makes me hesitant to ruin someone else’s day (though what if that someone else might be ruining her life?). Three: Once again, I don’t really have anything more than suspicions. I could see me telling her and her jumping around and telling him and him denying it and her telling him I said so and all kinds of trouble for all of us just radiating out like rays from my own big mouth.

  I suddenly realize I can tell Beau though, and I do. While Leonie sleeps the sleep of the innocent, I confess in a whisper her stupid teacher-boyfriend’s criminal indiscretions, since he never will. Beau already knew most of it, but now I tell him everything.

  Beau listens and has no absolution for Ratskin. The unbruised side of his face registers disgust. It feels so good to rat that loser out! I can feel my shoulders and neck starting to unfreeze. I roll them and sit up straighter. We sit in silence when I finish.

  Beau stares at me, and his laugh is quiet and bitter.

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow . . . this is so messed up.”

  “Yeah.”

  He shakes his head and looks out the window.

  “It’s like a new installment of the Hurt Patrol.” He says this almost under his breath.

  “Of the what?”

  “The Hurt Patrol.”

  “What’s that?” I stare at him quizzically.

  “It was the name of my scout patrol, when I lived with my dad.”

  “Wait—you were a Boy Scout? How could you be? I didn’t think they used to let gay guys be Boy Scouts. How did you get in?”

  “I know, right? For starters: That’s so idiotic! I didn’t even know I was gay when I started scouting. I was in first grade. But besides that, there were so many g
ay scouts it’s not even funny!”

  “Wow. So, did you like it?”

  “Not really.”

  “Because why?”

  “The attitude, I guess. The ‘us against them’ thing. Somebody always had to lose and then be the loser. It was stressful. And I was the new kid. It was like they were all against me.”

  “How long were you a scout?”

  “First to eighth grade. It seemed like for hundreds of years, till I was fourteen. Then I quit.”

  “Was anything awesome? Or was it all just bad?”

  “Yeah, there was some stuff. There was this giant camping thing they did called Camporee, which was like a series of competitions. I was still all keen to sign up, to please my dad, so I went, and since we’d just moved again, I was late joining, so they put me in this one patrol.”

  “Like what kind of competitions?”

  “Oh, knots, swimming, first aid, keeping a clean campsite.”

  “What was it called, again?”

  “Camporee.”

  “Yeah, Camporee.”

  “It was kind of like a competition for who were the best scouts. The scout leaders got all agitated, because it showed who the best leaders were too. Tons of different Boy Scout troops, from the entire US. All these different patrols. We were the Hurt Patrol.”

  “The Hurt Patrol . . .”

  “Yep. It was particularly awesome when we were at Camporee because it drove all the scout leaders crazy . . . especially ours.”

  “Okay. So what’s a patrol do?”

  “I guess they’re like a squad of guys. They hang out and accomplish things, like make a trail or whatever. At our Camporees, it was basically a bunch of guys getting judged on tying knots and keeping their own campsite clean. That was mostly all it boiled down to.”

  “Okay. So you were in the Hurt Patrol because—”

  “Because by the time we moved there, all the other patrols were filled up. So they put me in the only patrol that still had room, like always, and when I got there, I was the youngest, and all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and started sweeping with a pine branch like I’d seen the others doing, and they took one look at me and were like, ‘Calm down, kid, ain’t never gonna happen.’ ”

  “Why?”

  “ ’Cuz they knew we would fail, no matter how perfect we were.”

  “Why?”

  “Because we were the misfit patrol. They didn’t care about us. Seriously. That’s why there was room for me. They were the guys nobody else wanted in their patrol. They were the freaks. Guys who were gay, or would be soon. There was a guy who had nightmares, like totally screamed in his sleep, and a dude who wet the bed, and two brothers who hated scouting, but their dad made them go, to build character.”

  “I don’t get it. The leaders just ignored your patrol?”

  “More or less. We were the goofballs. Everyone had grown up together, except me, and had been rejected or kicked out, so they formed their own patrol. The other patrols were like, ‘You suck,’ and these guys’re all, ‘Oh, wah, you don’t want us. We’re so hurt!’ Everyone knew the other guys hated us, and there was no way we would ever be okay. If I tried to get our campsite ready for an inspection, my patrol was all, ‘Don’t bother. It won’t help.’ And it didn’t. But at first I did.”

  “So what happened?”

  “Like you said, we were just pretty much ignored. I think they were hoping the bears would eat us if they left us alone for long enough, but no.”

  I sit and ponder this information.

  “What were the other patrols’ names?”

  “Oh, you know: Wolf Clan, Eagle’s Den, the Bear Nest. The usual randomness.”

  “And then you guys were—”

  “The Hurt Patrol!”

  “Omg.” I laugh softly. “The Hurt Patrol.”

  “Yep”—Beau smiles—“we had a flag. It was a red cross with a Band-Aid over it. We even wrote a song. Wanna hear it?”

  “You guys wrote a song?”

  “Yep.”

  “Okay,” I say, “I do.” And he sings softly:

  “They say that we are hurt,

  Because we hit the dirt.

  But that’s not really true,

  ’Cuz we’re not really hurt!”

  He beams at me proudly.

  I snuffle-laugh with my face scrinched up in delight, trying not to wake Leo.

  “Sing it again,” I whisper.

  So he does.

  I nod approvingly. “That’s awesome, Beau! Two thumbs-up.”

  “Thank you.” He nods modestly. “You’re supposed to kind of scream the last line—defiantly.” He laughs under his breath. I glance at him while I drive. Even though I’m joking I hesitate. But then I ask:

  “Can I be in the Hurt Patrol, too?”

  Beau looks over and grins at me. Joy shines right in my eyes like sunshine.

  “Absolutely! You and Lee and me, so far: We are the new Hurt Patrol, West Coast chapter. Congratulations! ’Cuz we’re not really hurt! Now sing our team song with me.”

  So I do. Both of us sing:

  “They say that we are hurt!

  Because we hit the dirt!

  But that’s not really true!

  ’Cuz WE’RE NOT REALLY HURT!”

  We try to scream it quietly, but we get loud enough that Leonie starts to wake up behind us. Beau turns.

  “Good morning, sleepyhead.” Though it’s still dark.

  Leonie stretches so her feet hang off the seat.

  “I’m hungry.”

  I laugh out loud. It’s like four in the morning. She eats like a mountain gorilla.

  “Go back to sleep and we’ll wake you up when we find a restaurant.”

  She does.

  We drive on. I’m going very slowly because I’m a little freaked out, as usual, by the density of the trees. I am always a little unhinged about the idea of getting stranded out here so I’m careful. I see shapes in the shadows that I imagine are black bears and cougars fixin’ to lunge at the van. I freak myself out.

  After a while we see a little spot that looks good called Granny’s Café and I pull off. It’s still dark, and it’s not quite six so we sit in the parking lot. We fade out after I turn off the engine.

  The next thing I’m aware of is someone new tapping on the window.

  It’s some lanky old guy who is telling us the café is open now if we are hungry. Which we are.

  We smell frying bacon and traces of gas from the recently lit pilot light when we come in. We’re the first customers of the day and the only ones here besides the old guy who runs it with his wife, our waitress. We sit down, and she comes to take our order.

  She’s a little person. And I gotta say, we act weird at first, even if we don’t stare. See, why do we behave like that? We have all seen a little person. How silly is it when people wig out over someone because they’re different? So immature!

  Anyway, she’s really old too, and both of their faces look a little like these dried apple head dolls my brother used to make for my mom. We order. She smiles at us, which makes her cheeks super wrinkly, and takes the menus. We remember our manners and say thanks.

  We look around. It’s pretty much what you’d think, from the name. Lots of blue gingham ruffles and doodads. I end up having to take the country goose salt and pepper shakers away from Leo because she won’t stop messing with them, making them kiss and dance on the table.

  Breakfast comes quickly. Killer food, tons of it, and cheap. We grub like wild jackals. The waitress is pretty funny. We ask her if there is anything we should look out for, and she pretends to think for a sec and says we’d probably do better if we stay on the road and keep the yellow stripes to our left. Then she nods, all straight-faced like that was helpful.

  We laugh, and she brings us another fountain of coffee, which I drain. It’s about eight or so in the morning, and I am in overdrive! I don’t think I’ll need to sleep before we leave for Cali!

  The sun is behind us as w
e get back on the road. It’s not raining for five seconds. Yay.

  We pass Lake Sutherland, which we can’t see, on the left and head toward Lake Crescent. It’s on our right, and we can see it sparkling as we pass. It’s off-the-hook gorgeous. As well as enormous. We get out at a turnout and admire the view. The road is empty, and the morning sun backlights the lake.

  Glittering, crystalline and pristine. I hope it stays that way.

  We pass on detouring down the road leading to the hot springs after a brief, exasperated (on my part) discussion—

  because we’re already on a side trip from our real mission, and all we don’t need is to go to some clothing-optional hot springs in b.f. Egypt with Leonie the man-eater. We’ll never get to Beau’s uncle, and we’ll never get our various acts together till we do, etc., which is what I start sputtering and whining (really only the part about Beau’s uncle, I never actually say the thing about Leonie the man-eater) and to which they finally agree.

  We drive once again into the deep dark forest. I’m steadier in the daylight. The trees just look like trees again. It starts to cloud, but it’s okay. It’s kind of cool, actually—all brooding and foggy and mysterious. Atmospheric.

  Leonie’s been texting for the last few minutes and has gotten quiet. Beau and I exchange glances. We see a sign for Forks and show her, and she starts to get all excited and stops texting to take pictures. I can see that Beau is also looking around and smiling.

  That’s good. This is so insane. We’re going to Forks.

  It’s a small town about as far over on the West Coast as you can get before you leave dry land. A sign says it’s one of the rainiest places in the world, which is easy to believe. There are gray clouds, and the wind is up a little. No sign of vampires, though.

  We drive slowly down the main street of town. We are looking for the greasy spoon that must be here somewhere. They always are. We don’t have too far to search.

  When we pull in the small parking lot, it’s almost full. It’s nearing lunchtime and the waitress is busy. The clientele is about what you’d expect: flannel-covered guts and baseball caps for the gents; jogging suits for the ladies. I’d fit right in if my sweats were made of velour and I was, like, fifty. I also spot a few matching bowling jackets, official uniform of the RV crowd.