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Nicholas Mortelli closed his eyes and reminded himself: Be wary, be strong, be safe. But his gut argued: Wake up, quit hiding, you're leaving tomorrow. This in response to Rose, his mother, entering the kitchen that mild summer evening in 1979. As she moved behind him, he flinched. But why? She had never hit him. For the first time, he noticed the reaction and recognized it as a life-long habit. Some kind of perverse nostalgia, he supposed, had awakened him.
Nicholas didn't turn to look at Rose, but stirred his special tomato sauce as the spaghetti drained in the sink. Pulling garlic bread from the oven, he imagined her, breathing the basil aroma, smiling, feeling thankful and proud of him.
It was a fantasy.
This was her favorite meal, he thought, so he had made it for her. She hated to cook. Maybe he had inherited his cooking ability from some unknown relative. He filled a plate, turned, and offered it to her.
"That's too much." Rose stepped around him, clearing him by a yard, and took a plate from the cabinet. She helped herself to a smaller portion, then lit on a barstool.
They sat at the island counter and ate in silence for a few eternal moments.
"Who's going to cook for you when I'm gone?" Nicholas said, wondering if she would miss him at all. It had always been just the two of them, though it felt more like one plus one than two. Two seemed a friendly number, a number that implied union, togetherness. It meant no such thing in this "family."
"At least I won't have to clean up your messes," Rose said.
After finishing his supper, Nicholas washed his own dishes, the pots and pans, and wiped the counter, as he always did.
Rose put her plate and fork in the sink. "I saw your boxes. When are you leaving?"
"In the morning," he said. How gray her hair had grown. Once lustrous brown with a tendency to curl, like his own, hinting at softness, she now kept it tortured in a painful knot. She had shrunk, at least it seemed so to Nicholas, who had sprouted to five feet, ten inches. How did she cram so much oppression into such a small package?
"Send me your address," she said.
"Are you going to write to me?"
She frowned. "I'll have to forward your mail."
"Oh." You fool, he thought, you had to go and ask such a stupid question.
"I'm moving to Chicago," she said.
"Chicago! Why?"
"It's where I lived, before - before you were born." The words were a curse on her lips.
Nicholas left the kitchen, took the stairs two at a time, dropped to his bedroom floor and did 100 push-ups, then 200 sit-ups.
It didn't work. The anger clung to him like black tar. Rose unwittingly had done her son one favor: added bulk and strength to his wiry frame. Now, if only he could make himself stronger inside. Pacing furiously, he dodged boxes, his feet bare against the hot, splintered floorboards. The room smelled of old sweat, dusty dry wood, and cardboard. Drab walls wore shadows of discarded posters. Drawers and shelves stood empty, their contents packed in boxes, ready for Nicholas to leave this barren place and head for college.
This was what he had looked forward to for years. At least, he thought he had. The dream of escape had kept him going, motivated him to excel in school and win scholarships. Now every detail was in place, freedom waited for him to run out and grab it, but he felt surprisingly unenthusiastic and anything but free. Maybe because he would take himself with him.
Nicholas went to the closet. Nothing remained except a few hangers, dust balls, and one thing on the top shelf. He reached for it, an old shoe box, size ten, the sneakers long since discarded. Merely a disguise for its contents, the box was a shrine bearing a mortifying reminder. He longed to escape the memory, to undo it somehow, or leave it behind forever; to stop fearing it. But until that happened, Nicholas could not destroy the shrine. Folding under the weight of it, he dropped to the floor.
August pressed in on him. The stifling room looked smaller than ever, more confining and dreary, begging to be vacated. Nicholas glanced at the window in the east wall, covered by a heavy blind. It would help if he opened the window, let the fresh air flow. But he had not allowed himself that privilege for more than two years.
Beyond was the Peters' huge, ornate mansion, their neatly kept yard and garden. They were the right kind of family to live in a house like that, "With Six You Get Egg Roll," "Yours Mine and Ours," and "Eight Is Enough" all rolled into one. It seemed incongruent for the two houses to exist side-by-side. Rose's rental was newer, smaller; an artless house, stunting the growth of those who dwelt within. Rose had brought Nicholas here, to Kokomo, Indiana from nearby Ft. Wayne in 1975, his freshman year. Nicholas had peered through the window at that other world, but not for long. The Peters had quickly welcomed him into their home, along with many other strays.
Nicholas could have hung himself for forfeiting that honor.
Only one person knew the real reason he stopped going over there, and she had since moved on, leaving him alone with this shrine. Opening the lid, Nicholas uncovered a pathetic plastic doll in a soiled dress. She just fit inside, her unkempt hair smashed against one end. When he tilted the box, raising the head, the doll's eyes opened. She had a voice, but Nicholas had silenced it long ago by removing the batteries. He stared at the doll for a moment, as if waiting for her mouth to spew forth eternal secrets, but she remained obediently silent.
After replacing the lid, Nicholas buried the shrine deep within the biggest packing box, beneath a stack of winter clothes. Who knew when Rose might go nosing around in his stuff?
Stifling an urge to scream, Nicholas clenched his fists and squeezed his eyes shut. How could he free himself from Rose's power over him? Tonight - now - he needed to do something to break her spell before he moved away.
When he heard Rose enter the bathroom down the hall, Nicholas went to the kitchen, picked up the phone, and dialed his best pal's number.
"Hi, it's Nick. Wanna see a movie?"
"You're kidding, right?" Sandy Altremann said in his booming voice.
"No. Serious."
"What about the witch?" Sandy asked. "Won't she freak if she catches you?"
"Yeah, well, who cares?" Nicholas twisted the phone cord.
"That's the spirit," Sandy said, but his dull voice belied his enthusiastic words. He didn't sound like himself. Maybe he was just surprised by the unprecedented invitation.
"It's my little way of saying 'goodbye'," Nicholas said. "So, can you go?"
"Sure. You know me: got nowhere to go, nothing to do."
No, it wasn't his imagination, Sandy definitely sounded melancholy. Well, you never knew what to expect with a guy like Sandy. Do him good to get out, too. "What's playing?" Nicholas asked.
"Hold on," Sandy said, then silence, then the rustling of a newspaper as he came back on the line. How 'bout the Deer Hunter? I heard it's good, real intense, full of violence. Sounds perfect for the mood I'm in."
"What time does it start?"
"Eight o'clock, Markland Mall," Sandy said. "I'll drive. Pick you up at seven-thirty."
"Great."
"It's a really long movie, Nick. Are you sure you'll make Mommy's curfew?"
"Shut up!"
After the movie, Sandy popped Queen into the car's tape player and cranked up the volume as he pulled out of the mall parking lot. Nicholas's mind, unaccustomed to the effect of the big screen, pulsated with the images of the film. "That was some intense movie," he shouted above the music.
Sandy scowled, examining the road, as if hypnotizing himself with the white lines disappearing beneath the wheels.
Maybe they should have gone for a comedy, Nicholas thought. Struggling to blot the violence from his thoughts and focus on his surroundings, he realized Sandy was driving south on 31 instead of downtown, toward Nicholas's house. "Where are you going?"
"Relax, Mr. Rebel. We can't just stop with a movie."
Nicholas checked the dashboard clock. Eleven-fifteen. His well-trained conscience told him he should be home in forty-five minutes, but who cared? Sitting back, he took a deep breath, telling himself to lighten up.
Sandy turned right on 26. Lightning bugs played in the heat rising from the pavement. "Bohemian Rhapsody" drowned the chorus of crickets. They turned left on a gravel road, and passed through dusty corridors of corn to an abandoned barn beside three huge, ancient oak trees. Sandy hid the car behind the disintegrating building and got out.
Curious, Nicholas followed him around the side of the barn. Bending down beside a shaggy bush, Sandy pulled out a paper bag, removed a bottle, opened it and took a long drink. He offered the bottle to Nicholas, but he shook his head. No way Rose would fail to detect the smell of alcohol on his breath. Shrugging, Sandy took another swallow, then lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply, holding it for a long moment, then exhaled, relinquishing himself to the dark earth.
Nicholas sat silently beside him, leaning against the splintered barn, searching the star-littered sky for some sign of the absent moon. He wondered, not for the first time, why he hung out with Sandy, who was his opposite in nearly every way. Baby-face, blond, blue-eyed, bulky Sandy towered over dark-featured Nicholas. Being oddballs was about the only thing they had in common. Even so, Sandy was of a completely different breed, a poor student, often in trouble. Nicholas had tried to keep his distance from Sandy the first year of high school, watching his antics with a mixture of contempt and fascination, fearing guilt by association. But Sandy had doggedly insisted on friendship despite Nicholas's aloofness.
"If you had a chance, Nick," Sandy said after awhile, "would you shoot your enemies?"
Glancing at Sandy, Nicholas could not distinguish his midnight-shadowed features. If this thought process continued, it would lead Sandy off on a trail which Nicholas didn't have the fortitude to follow. Besides, talk solved nothing. "I don't have enemies."
Sandy ignored him. "Yeah, if I had the guts, I'd hold a gun to my old lady's head, pull the trigger, and watch her ugly brain explode all over her spotless kitchen. What a mess she'd make! Wouldn't she just croak?" Lighting another cigarette with shaking hands, his pale face jumped out in the brief flicker of match-light. "Heh, heh, of course she'd croak, Nick, get it? She'd be dead. You can't get more croaked than that, can you?" Sandy sank with hollow laughter.
"Guess not," Nicholas said, envisioning Sandy's uptight mom running around the kitchen, frantically trying to clean up her own blood.
Facing the vast sky, Nicholas sat silently while Sandy soothed himself with one cigarette after another, finishing off the vodka in-between. When he tossed the empty bottle aside, it clinked against a pile of previously discarded glass. He must come here a lot, Nicholas thought, but knew he would never return, himself; the place gave him the creeps. Standing, he said, "Come on, it's late. Let's go."
"Man," Sandy said, "Forget Mommy's rules. There ain't no way you can please her. Why don't you think of someone else for a change?" Sandy flicked the glowing end of his last cigarette into the cornfield, sending a tiny arc of light through the darkness.
"Great, start a fire while you're at it," Nicholas said.
Sandy rose and walked away in the wrong direction.
"Where are you going?"
No answer. He waited for Sandy to return. Probably just taking a leak. But he stayed away longer than necessary. Growing irritated, Nicholas finally went after him, around to the front of the barn, and felt his presence like a thick, damp cloud as he passed the sagging double-doors.
Squinting into the doorway, he said, "What are you doing?"
No voice answered, and Nicholas turned toward the car, wanting very much to go home.
"I've got a gun, you know," Sandy finally spoke out from the black barn mouth.
"You do not. Cut it out. Let's go." Nicholas said, then slipped quietly just inside the doorway and flattened himself against the wall.
Sandy didn't answer, and wishing desperately that he could find him in the dark, Nicholas stepped sideways a few feet until he caught his shadow, moving like a mouse in a maze, lit by of a small window of stars. Then Nicholas could hear Sandy's breathing - fast and shallow - as he silently watched, allowing his eyes to grow accustomed to the deeper darkness until he could see a pile of rotting straw in the far corner, a coil of rope and pieces of discarded tools hanging from the walls. Gradually, Sandy stopped moving and plopped down on the dirt floor, hunched over like a scarecrow liberated from its post. Nicholas studied the window of stars. Still no moon. He warily approached his friend, wishing he could think of something to say, and longed for his cool bed. "This is no good," he finally managed. "Let's just get out of here."
Sandy sniffed. "No one listens to me. No one wants to hear me."
"You're drunk. You're talking garbage."
"Yeah, well, I'm seeing stuff clear enough," Sandy said. "Way too clear. You should see how chicken-shit you look from where I sit."
"Uh, huh," Nicholas said. "Maybe so, but vodka turns friends into ugly monsters. And flapping your jaw leads to trouble."
Sandy sprang up and grabbed Nicholas in a head lock. "What would you say if I told you I was gay?"
"See what I mean?" Nicholas shouted, flailing against dark limbs, "You're crazy!"
"Aw, come on, give me a smooch!"
"Get off, you pervert!" Nicholas broke free and bolted for the door.
Sandy grabbed him around the waist and tackled him. "Oh no, you can't get away that easy!"
"Get off'a me!" Nicholas struggled violently, both wrists pinned to the filthy floor, but Sandy outweighed him by fifty pounds. Sandy's foul breath made the bile rise in his throat. Turning his face away, Nicholas quit struggling. "What do you want?"
Breathing hard, Sandy sat on him for a moment, then relaxed his grip and dropped heavily beside him. "Nothing. I guess you're right."
Nicholas stood up, relieved. "Take me home, you jerk, before my mom calls the police." Hoping Sandy would choose to follow him, he rushed out of the barn into the night air, which felt cooler, less stifling. Dew, reflecting the starlight, gave the weedy ground an eerie glow. By morning, there would be a thick carpet of fog.
When Sandy emerged through the dark doors, Nicholas turned away, unable to look him in the eye. What did you say after something like that? Did Sandy mean any of it, or was it really just the alcohol talking? Nicholas wondered if Sandy felt embarrassed at all, and if he would remember it the next day.
As Sandy tromped toward his car, Nicholas said, "Why don't I drive?"
Sandy glared at him, got behind the wheel, and turned the key. Afraid of being left behind, Nicholas got in without protesting. At least there wasn't much traffic so late at night.
Ejecting Queen from the tape player, Sandy replaced it with Blue Oyster Cult. Nicholas felt claustrophobic in the stifling car. The window on his side was stuck shut, and there wasn't enough air coming in Sandy's, which was only partially open. Sandy didn't seem to notice, though sweat streamed down his face as the speakers belched forth deadly romantic lies. Knowing he'd have to shout them down to ask Sandy to open his window, Nicholas didn't feel strong enough to try. Watching Sandy out of the corner of his eye, Nicholas noticed how limp and lifeless he looked, slumped behind the steering wheel.
Feeling a hollow, sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach, Nicholas had an urge to yell "STOP!" and reach over, shake Sandy. It occurred to him to turn down the music and say something, anything, to bridge the gap, but lack of practice, as well as courage, kept coherent thoughts from forming in his brain. Better to say nothing at all, he reasoned, than to say something monumentally stupid, and make matters worse. Besides, a good night's sleep would cure his moody friend.
As Sandy pulled up in front of Rose's house, Nicholas checked the clock: twelve-twenty-five. Maybe she would be asleep.
"Wait, Nick," Sandy said, turning down the music as Nicholas got out of the car.
Nicholas leaned hesitantly into the open door. "What?"
Staring at him for a moment, Sandy looked as if he struggled to choose from a world of things to say. Finally, he sighed. "Get out of here. Knock'em dead at college. You'll be somethin', I know it. Some people are just meant to make it."
Nicholas cringed. "You'll make it, too, Sandy," he said without conviction. "Hey, maybe you'll get in at Chrysler or something."
Sandy gave him a wistful smile. "You were a good friend, Nick."
"I'll see ya'round," Nicholas lied.
"Good bye," Sandy said.
Quietly closing the door, Nicholas sucked in the cool night air. As he turned toward the dark house, he felt relieved to be out of Sandy's morose presence, yet he could not shake the cloud of uneasiness and guilt that clung to him. But what could you do with a guy like Sandy?
Hoping to avoid detection, Nicholas snuck around to the back of the house from the west side. When he rounded the corner, he saw a light in the kitchen window. Asking himself what he had to worry about, he punched holes in his panic. Why was it any of her business what a grown man did on a Friday night? He stood still for a moment, feeding his courage with indignation. Screw her! He stomped up the back steps, shoved the door open, and nearly crashed into Rose.
"Where have you been?" she asked, standing her ground.
Jerking past, he headed to his room.
"How easily the 'good son' act disappears," she sneered. "Now we see what you're really made of."
He halted. That wasn't fair, this was the first time he had ever broken curfew.
"I asked you a question. I will have an answer."
Why did he let her do this to him? He turned to face her. "I was with Sandy."
"And who is Sandy?"
It hit Nicholas how absurd it was that she didn't know, so oblivious to his meager life. "A good friend."
"Yeah, I'll just bet she's a good friend. Couldn't even leave her to get home by midnight!"
"No, she's, I mean, he-"
"And what were you doing, as if I didn't know!"
"No! We just went to a movie." Nicholas shook his head in wounded disbelief.
She glared at him, and he returned her stare, standing still, fists clenched, for as long as he could bear it. Eighteen! And yet, like a child, he longed for forgiveness, approval, any crumb from her that could allow him to believe that somewhere deep within she actually cared about him.
His heart sank, his fists relaxed, and he found himself on the verge of falling at her feet to beg forgiveness, to plead for her to soften and acknowledge his desperate need for acceptance, just once before he left home. Dropping his eyes, he said without emotion, "I'm sorry I went to the movie, and I'm sorry I'm late."
"One day you'll see what sorry is!"
Since she seemed to be finished rebuking him, Nicholas slithered off to bed, mercifully managing to remain in a state of numb exhaustion long enough to sink into a heavy, dreamless sleep.
The next morning, the insistent ring of the telephone downstairs awakened Nicholas. Before he could fully rouse himself to go answer it, he heard Rose rush down to the kitchen and the ringing stop.
Realizing he had slept much later than he had intended, Nicholas jumped out of bed and dressed somberly, dreading the cold disdain he knew Rose would wear that day and cursing himself for allowing it to bother him. Maybe she would stifle her nastiness for once and be nice to him on his last day in her house.
Fat chance.
Walking into the kitchen just as she hung up the phone, he saw a strange look on her face.
"Sleep well?" she asked.
The question caught him off-guard, for he couldn't remember having been asked that before. He dared to hope she might actually regret the previous night's confrontation and want to make up for it. He nodded.
"Not as soundly as your friend, I'll bet."
Frowning, Nicholas wondered what she could mean.
"Or maybe," she continued in a sarcastic voice, "He has nightmares. Very real nightmares. Probably wishes he could wake up."
His skin prickled.
Her scowl dissolved his vain hopes. "Now you'll see why you should listen to me, and not be rebellious."
"What are you talking about?" he said, but he really didn't want to know.
"The movie must have been a real bad one, to make your friend blow his brains out." She strutted out of the room.
He felt the blood explode in his head. You bitch! You cold, cruel bitch! How could you? How could you tell me that way? I should have been there, he tried to tell me, but I wouldn't listen. I shut him up, because that's what you taught me: not to care, to leave him alone to lick his own wounds, alone. I did it your way - your way.... You killed him! And you're killing me, ripping my heart out and stomping on it so I won't feel a thing, just like you. Well, I won't let you turn me into you.
"No!" He yelled, slamming his fist through the back door. The glass shattered, slicing his knuckles, and he jerked his hand away from the window, gashing his wrist on a piece of glass that clung to the frame. Reaching out with his other hand to break off the weapon, he stared at it, and it became Rose, became the apex of his affliction.
He heard her upstairs filling the bathtub. Eighteen years of pain, of callous neglect and scorn, propelled his arm as he flung the bloody piece of glass across the kitchen, watching with grim satisfaction as it smashed against the refrigerator.
Then he lifted his shredded limb and watched the blood flow swiftly from it, washing him red, his life-blood deserting him in pulsing gushes. Marveling at how painless the wounds were, he compared them to the pain of his heart; how dead he already felt, how much she had accomplished. The room closed in on him like the walls of a box.
Anger boiled to the surface. He swung his hand around, turning in circles, splattering scarlet across the walls, the counter top, the cabinets, until the room filled with spots of buzzing white light and his legs turned to rubber. Then his head hit the floor and the world went black, as though someone had slammed the lid down tight.
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