Book of Mercy Page 6

  Ryder stood on the brakes, and the car fishtailed to a stop just short of the trees. The quiet was immediate and loud. For a moment, they just stared out the windshield in shock. Then Ryder closed his eyes and dropped his forehead against the steering wheel. Antigone let out a shaky breath and instinctively wrapped her arm around her belly, “Shit.”

  “Fuck,” Ryder whispered. Suddenly, his skin felt cold and sweaty. He turned toward her. “You all right?”

  “Yeah. You?”

  His heart had pitched down to his toes. He didn’t have enough strength to swat a fly. He watched Antigone pass a hand across her face and noticed her hand was trembling. “You shouldn’t be driving with me in your condition.”

  “No one’s hurt.”

  Grasping the wheel ’til his knuckles turned white, teeth clenched, Ryder said, “Who the fuck was that?”

  “Art Junior. Irene Crump’s boy.”

  “He nearly killed us.”

  There was an edge of anger in Antigone’s voice. “He’s a menace, all right. I don’t know what Arthur was thinking. It’s insane to give a sixteen-year-old kid a vehicle with wheels big enough to crawl up walls like Spiderman. Especially that kid.”

  “He’s an asshole,” said Ryder, as a butterfly lighted on the windshield wiper.

  RYDER FLAGGED DOWN A farmer heading into town. The man knew Sam and was happy to pull the Mustang back onto the road with the winch on his pickup. Ryder had feared that he’d wrecked the car, but Antigone didn’t seem upset by what she termed “a few scratches.”

  “Easy paint job,” she said. “Sam can fix it.”

  “Yeah, but who’s going to fix me when Sam gets through with me?”

  Ryder knew Sam was going to give him grief—and he didn’t blame him.

  He and Antigone argued over who would drive home. She pulled some crap about getting back on some horse, and he ended up reluctantly starting the engine. Back at the O. Henry Café, Star was waiting for them. She grinned at Ryder as he climbed out of the car, moving as if he were an old man. Before he could tell her what had happened, she rose from the front step of the café, dusted off the seat of her shorts, and said, “Don’t worry. Art Junior’s an asshole.”

  Chapter 8

  Invisible Man Goes to School

  IT WAS THE NIGHT before the first day of school. Muggy August air slipped into the bedroom from the window. Sam rolled over in bed and rested his forehead against his wife’s. He and Antigone were arguing—in whispers—so the boy down the hall wouldn’t hear. She was intent upon enrolling Ryder in Mercy High School. Sam was determined to keep their irritating houseguest from flipping their family sideways.

  “He should be living with his own family and going to his own school,” Sam said.

  “He ran away from them.”

  “That should be a clue right there. What’s he running from? For all we know, he could be wanted for murder somewhere. After four months, we still don’t know anything about him. Every time I ask him a question he accuses me of being a mechanic for the Gestapo.”

  “He’s here. With us. Part of our family now.”

  “He’s nothing like us. He’s more man than child. He’s been places and seen things we can’t imagine.”

  Antigone shook her head. “He’s working hard with the deer, and he’s started helping William in the café. I think he likes it here.”

  “How can you be so naïve?” Sam muttered. “It’s a tactic to get on your good side.”

  “He doesn’t like being indebted.”

  “It’s easy to be proud when you’re eating another man’s Froot Loops.”

  “Again with the cereal, Sam?” Antigone said.

  “We had some ground rules when he first came. He and I had the man to man. And he breaks the rules all the time.” The rules, laid down in a testosterone-charged conversation in Sam’s Garage while Antigone was taking a nap, boiled down to three edicts: Keep your hands out of the Froot Loops. Don’t sit in Sam’s favorite TV chair. And most importantly, don’t ever hurt Antigone.

  Antigone rubbed her forehead. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Believe me, he knows.”

  “Would you listen to yourself? You’re supposed to be the adult.”

  “I don’t know how in the hell I got to be the villain here. I’m a nice guy. I don’t kill small animals for the fun of it; I open doors for women; I pay my taxes. I think the kid’s a racist.”

  Antigone laughed.

  “He plays the race card all the time,” Sam said. “If I yell at him for sitting in my chair, he says it’s because he’s black. If I tell him to clean up his room, it’s because he’s black.”

  Antigone snuggled closer. “What’s really on your mind?”

  “I just never thought he’d stay this long. I thought we’d have this time to ourselves, you know. Planning for the baby together.” Sam massaged her shoulder. “It’s just weird, Tigg. People are asking about him and us, what we plan to do with him.”

  Antigone lifted her head and frowned at him. “What?”

  “I can’t change the way the world is, Antigone.”

  “You could tell them to mind their own business,” Antigone said.

  He tried to pull her back into his arms, but she resisted. “My job is to protect you and the baby,” Sam said. “You can’t help every underdog you meet.”

  But his wife believed she could. She took in strays: deer being chased by hunting dogs; Earthly Sims rebounding from a divorce with a baby in her arms; William, a sixty-year-old merchant marine with an oversized cobra tattoo slithering up his arm, a talent for vegetarian cooking, and nowhere to go; and now Ryder. Hell, Sam thought, even he was one of those strays—a logical engineer lucky enough to wander into Antigone’s crazy world.

  “I’m sorry you don’t like it, Sam, but this is who I am. Antigone. Like in the story.”

  He knew his Greek mythology but listened anyway.

  “Antigone was a Greek woman who lost both brothers to war. The king, Creon, honored one brother with a proper burial, but decreed that the other be left to the dogs and vultures because he fought on the opposing side. Antigone defied the king and buried the second brother. Furious, the king sentenced her to be buried alive. She hanged herself before he got the chance.”

  He knew it was all about family for her. He just never thought their family would look like this.

  Antigone slipped an arm across his chest and pressed herself against him. “If our child were alone in the world, wouldn’t you hope that someone would give her a chance?” Antigone was four months pregnant. Some days Sam caught his wife standing before the mirror, sideways, looking at the small swell of her stomach. He touched that gently rounded tummy now. Soon life would twitch beneath his fingers, and, as usual, the thought made something melt inside him.

  He kissed her hair and pulled her closer. “Just don’t get too attached to him.”

  “Are you jealous?”

  Sam was, a little bit, but he refused to admit it. “He’s a wild thing, Antigone. You, better than anyone, know that the wild always calls.”

  ANTIGONE AND RYDER WAITED in the main office of Mercy High School, shifting in a row of uncomfortable, old, creaky chairs. With each swish of the heavy door, the sounds of students chattering and lockers slamming flowed into the quiet room. Boys and girls bounced in and out of the office, delivering notes, getting papers signed, asking questions.

  In a new green T-shirt that said, “Born to Be Wild,” Ryder pretended boredom, when really his heart was banging like some crazy-ass drum. Last night sitting on the front porch step with Star, long after Antigone and Sam had gone to bed, he’d still been in a state of denial. He wasn’t going to school. He was leaving. He didn’t need this crap.

  “You don’t have to worry, you know,” Star said.

  Ryder frowned at her. “I ain’t scared.”

  “Sure, you are,” Star said breezily.

  “I told Antigone she’s just wastin’ paper b
uying that new gear. I ain’t even decided if I’m going for sure.”

  “You’re going.”

  “Don’t give me that psychic shit.”

  And yet here he was. He called himself all kinds of stupid. The last time he’d been in school was the ninth grade. When he began missing days to look after Angela, his mother hadn’t even noticed—or cared. “I can’t control the boy,” she told the truant officer.

  The Professor, who’d been his friend for years, took a different view. The Professor had been disappointed when, after Angela died, Ryder dropped out for good and took to the streets. “Education,” the Professor used to say in his goofy hoity-toity accent, “is something they can never take away from you.”

  The problem was getting an education was a pain in the ass. Ryder had nothing against learning stuff; he liked books and reading, but the rest of it—the nagging teachers, the rules, the crap from other kids—that was something else.

  His old school had been nothing like this one. At Mercy High, there were no walls decorated by tag artists who would paint anything that stood still, and no wire mesh over the windows to prevent students from throwing desks—or other students—out the window. Antigone told him Mercy High School was more than one hundred years old. He believed it. With big old white pillars in the front, it looked like some kind of plantation house, some place black folk should be wary of.

  Antigone told him the school was about half black and half white. He wondered if that was going to be a problem. Probably, he thought, catching a glimpse of Art Junior, swaggering down the hall, the center of a pack of loud, husky boys. Art Junior spotted Ryder, said something to his buds, and made a motion like he was driving a car. Then they all burst out laughing.

  Ryder shot a look at Antigone. She hadn’t seen Art Junior. She was leaning back in the chair with her eyes closed. He turned back and threw Art Junior the finger. The smirk dropped from Art Junior’s face, and he lunged toward the door. But just then a teacher came by, intent on clearing the halls, and Art Junior and his gang were herded off to class.

  “Smart, Ryder,” he said to himself. “Fucking brilliant.”

  He was going to hate this school, but he would give it a try. For Antigone. Because he was getting free clothes and free food and a room all to himself, something that had never happened before. Because he liked the deer and it was fun to aggravate Sam. Because, for a while, it was nice to belong somewhere.

  THE SECRETARY IN THE main office called “Next!” and Ryder and Antigone both jumped to their feet. The secretary’s name badge identified her as “Mrs. Sweetings, Volunteer.” As a former child with special needs, Antigone was no stranger to dealing with teachers, school administrators, and well-meaning volunteers. In a glance, she had Mrs. Sweetings summed up. Everything matched on Mrs. Sweetings: big chunky gold earrings and gold bracelet, silk walking shorts and silk sweater, black tights and black leather pumps. Mrs. Sweetings probably had gone through a one-week training course. From the way she kept neatening the already neat stacks of forms in front of her, Antigone knew this was Mrs. Sweetings’s first day in the main office. On the outside, she appeared calm and brave, but on the inside Antigone bet she was panicking. Antigone had heard her whisper to one of the other volunteers, “No one mentioned anything in training about boys with pierced tongues and girls with shaved heads.”

  Antigone relaxed for the first time since they entered the school; this woman she could handle.

  “Now,” Mrs. Sweetings smiled at Antigone. “What can we do for you?”

  “I’m here to register a student.”

  Mrs. Sweetings’s smile was plastered on. “No problem. Where’s the student now?”

  Antigone pointed to Ryder. Mrs. Sweetings’s glance scanned Ryder then returned to Antigone. There was a faint flicker in her white perfect smile, a barely detectable power glitch. She asked Antigone, “And you are his . . .?”

  “Aunt,” Antigone smiled.

  “Aunt?”

  “Ryder takes after his father’s side of the family.”

  “The father’s side?”

  “My sister, well, she’s my stepsister really, is a single parent, and she thought it would be better for Ryder to come and live with me for a while. She was worried about what the city does to a child, the drugs and the gangs and the drive-by shootings. She naturally wants the best for her child. And I told her there was nothing better than Mercy. Don’t you agree?”

  Mrs. Sweetings cleared her throat. “Of course,” she stammered.

  “So here we are.” Antigone pushed up her sleeves and grabbed a pen on the desk. “Now where do I sign?”

  Mrs. Sweetings’s recovery was slow. “Well, first we need a little information. If you’ll fill out this form, we can get started.” She handed Antigone a clipboard.

  Antigone guided Ryder back to the squeaky chairs and shoved the clipboard into his hands. When he gave a quizzical look, she said, “Well, you can’t expect me to do all the work.”

  Ryder grunted. He hated answering questions about himself. She watched him labor over the form. You’d think she had asked him to tap a vein. “Well?” she finally asked.

  He read his answers. Name: Irwin Cassius Butler. Answers to Ryder and nothing else. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING ELSE. Age: 15. Mother’s name: Felicia. Father’s name: William (“It’s as good as any other,” Ryder shrugged). Last school attended: Colby Middle School, New York. All inoculations up to date: Yes.

  Antigone hadn’t a clue how much was true. She didn’t ask.

  They returned the form to Mrs. Sweetings, who smiled and said, “Now if I can just make copies of your birth certificate, vaccination record, and school transcript?” Ryder looked at Mrs. Sweetings’s outstretched hand, then turned to Antigone.

  “Oh, we don’t have any of those things,” she said, with an airy wave of her hand.

  For the first time, Mrs. Sweetings lost her smile. “No birth certificate?”

  “Stolen by gangs when they broke into his mother’s apartment looking for drug money.”

  “No school transcript?”

  “The school burned down and all the records with it. Gangs.” Antigone sighed, “Again.” She gave Ryder a sad smile and a pat on the shoulder. “He lived in a very bad neighborhood.”

  “Sounds like a war zone,” Mrs. Sweetings observed.

  “That’s about the size of it,” Antigone said. “Is it any wonder his mother was frantic to get him out of that environment?”

  “Well, what about the vaccination record?”

  “We did have that,” Antigone saw Mrs. Sweetings’s tense shoulders begin to relax, “but my deer ate it.”

  “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me,” Mrs. Sweetings said. She shuffled the forms in front of her and restacked them in even neater piles. “Ms. Brown, I really can’t admit the boy without some documentation that he even exists.”

  “Course, I exist. I’m standin’ right in front of you,” Ryder said belligerently. Mrs. Sweetings took a step back.

  Antigone quickly inserted herself between the two. “Look, would just a birth certificate do?” Mrs. Sweetings gave a curt nod. “I’ll have my sister write the county clerk’s office in New York and get them to mail us a copy. Surely, there’s one on file. In the meantime, can’t he just start school?”

  “I’m not supposed to do this, Ms. Brown.”

  “Mrs. Sweetings,” Antigone appealed, “this isn’t some impersonal place like New York. Don’t we in Mercy care what happens to our children? This town didn’t get its name for being rigid and inflexible.”

  It actually was named for a textile mill, where at the turn of the century children much younger than Ryder worked long hours beside their parents amid noisy and dangerous machinery. In its heyday, Mercy towels were known throughout the country as “the bath towel that shows no mercy to moisture.”

  “Well,” Mrs. Sweetings considered for a moment, “we wouldn’t want him to get behind in his schoolwork. But I will be watching the mail for that birth ce
rtificate, Ms. Brown.”

  “Of course.” Antigone shook her hand and thanked her.

  “Simply take this form down the hall to the guidance office, and they’ll help you with your schedule. Welcome to tenth grade, Irwin.”

  Ryder stiffened beside Antigone, who grabbed the paper and quickly ushered him out of the office. “She start spreadin’ that Irwin shit around, and we’re gonna have a problem,” he said.

  Chapter 9

  Doing Business with Hector Bob

  “YOU REALIZE WE’RE PROBABLY breaking, like, a zillion laws,” Ryder said.

  Antigone looked at him. “Yeah. Don’t tell Sam.”

  Antigone Brown, five months pregnant and enchanted with fetal kicks in the middle of the night, felt the tug of maternal instinct grow stronger with each day. Babies were like the moon, she discovered, capable of great gravitational effects on the senses and feelings of their mothers. Perhaps that’s why she found herself in a deserted back street that served as the office of a man named Hector Bob. Something she didn’t understand had pushed her here, and she couldn’t remember ever being so frightened.

  “I need to go to the bathroom,” she said.

  “You went five times on the way,” Ryder said. “And I wouldn’t trust the ‘facilities’ around here.”

  Antigone glanced around them. He was right. It was a bright September day, a day to ride with the top down and laugh and embrace the wind. Instead, they huddled in the red Mustang behind an abandoned hotel in a once bustling part of Greensboro, North Carolina. Antigone had intentionally parked in the middle of the alley, in the glaring sun, away from the shadowy buildings. Ryder complained that they were too exposed with the convertible top down, but Antigone insisted that she needed air—lots of air.

  At one time, trains rattled the railroad tracks behind the old hotel. Sleepy travelers woke to shaking beds and the early morning light in their eastern windows. Now mice and vagrants slept peacefully in the abandoned clapboard hotel and traveled the unused tracks like trails through the urban woods. It was a forgotten place, left behind by glass skyscrapers, a place for rendezvous of the questionable kind.