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  Pike gave it a minute for things to resolve themselves down there, you could hear Hannamaker talking to Foxe and Cathy, and there were short bursts of laughter, so Pike figured, what the hay, I guess we can deal with this and he went back down.

  It didn’t take long before Jack, who Pike noticed now was wobbling a little, called him over and put his arm around him. He said, “Foxie, this is my boy here. He’s a good man, he’s bailed me out more than once . . . I forgot I even invited you over, but now I remember why . . . Dudes, let’s let it go.”

  They were in the little living area down there, that Pike’s dad had finished off years ago with the intent of remodeling the whole basement but he never got that far. Anthony and Andrea were still in The Box, and for all Pike knew they weren’t even aware of Cathy and Foxe being here, or Hannamaker for that matter.

  Pike tried to block it out but it was kind of bittersweet having Cathy there, since once upon a time, when he was going out with one of the original Cathy’s, they spent some nice time down here. They were close.

  It seemed like Jack wanted Pike and Foxe to embrace or shake hands and go all Kumbaya or something, but that wasn’t going to happen, the best scenario was they’d tolerate each other, and so be it. After a while Pike felt bad not at least offering them something, so he went upstairs again and rounded up more food and beverage, even though by now he noticed Foxe in his good hand was carrying a bag of Taco Bell, which seemed a little forward . . . you don’t even know if someone’s going to let you in, but you bring your own food like you own the joint? Plus it smelled good, which ticked Pike off. Whatever . . .

  When Pike came back Jack was surprisingly lively, especially given how out-of-it he looked when he showed up a half hour ago and immediately announced he was going to crash. Now he was explaining to Foxe and Cathy different climbing maneuvers you could use to get into The Box, making sure to also highlight some details of his construction work . . . and with an unexpected party deal going on and everyone apparently happy, Pike decided it was a good time to go upstairs and call Mitch.

  Chapter 17

  His parents and brother and sister were home now and Pike made a little small talk, and on second thought figured the truck would be better than his room, more private, in case he got worked up for some reason and started talking real loud.

  Mitch sounded like he might have had a couple beverages himself, and what could you do, it was a Saturday night.

  “I called you for three reasons,” Pike said. “A, an update, B, a question, C, something bugging me.”

  “Let’s go with C first,” Mitch said. You could hear some activity in the background, and Pike would bet this time Lucy was involved.

  “Must be busy, all the retirees down there,” Pike said. “Where are you?”

  “Son . . . I’m sitting poolside, and we have Mai-Tai’s with mini multi-colored umbrellas attached to the glass . . . I’m telling you, this really is the life.”

  “I’m going to start with A,” Pike said. “I went to San Francisco, I felt like I was doing my duty. Now I’m back.” He couldn’t remember if he’d given Mitch much detail, or just the general idea that some guy broke his neck, but it didn’t matter.

  “Ah . . . and this was where you were torn, in that did you need to dive further back?”

  “Don’t use that word, dive,” Pike said.

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “Too many doofuses talk that way already . . . they go, ‘okay if everyone’s ready, let’s dive in’.”

  “I wasn’t aware of that.”

  “But yeah . . . I tried to stop the immediate thing, simple as that, and I’m hoping for the best.”

  “Interesting . . . have you . . . confirmed it yet?”

  “I want to wait a while. In case I fucked up . . . why get bad news too soon.”

  “I can understand that,” Mitch said. “How’d you stop it? Or try to?”

  “I don’t know, it just kind of came to me. I got there a week early, so I was already restless . . . What I did basically, I entered a game and made a play. Hopefully it was heavy-duty enough that the guy can’t play the next game.”

  Mitch was working this around. “I think I understand . . . the next game, then, that was the key?”

  Pike said that was his understanding, yeah.

  Mitch said, “And do you know for a fact, you didn’t . . . over-injure . . . the individual?”

  Mitch wasn’t stupid, and Pike was still a little worried about this too, that maybe he paralyzed the guy himself, which meant the whole trip was a total waste of time.

  Pike said, “Jeez. No, not for sure. But why do you have to rain on my parade?”

  “But what was it like otherwise? I’m dying to know . . . anything else you can tell me?”

  “You mean 1989? Well one thing, the offenses back then, they were like watching paint dry.”

  “I didn’t mean the football part.”

  “The women were more beautiful, I’d say. Not as skinny as today, with all the gyms we got now, and the yoga and whatnot . . . Other than that, nothing jumped out, particularly.”

  “That’s hard to believe, frankly,” Mitch said, “that your only real distinction is the women were more beautiful--which I can’t disagree with you on--but there must have been other specifics.”

  “I was kind of busy,” Pike said. “If I had dived-in and examined the culture more carefully, I might have more for you.”

  “Okay, I get it,” Mitch said. “No need for sarcasm.”

  “B . . . what was B?” Pike said.

  “A question, you said.”

  “Okay maybe forget that, let’s go to C . . . The guy I told you about? Who died, but donated his organs first?”

  “Yes, I remember.”

  “One of the recipients, he went wild in a mall and hurt a bunch of people . . . actually it wasn’t a mall, it was one of those airshows.”

  “Was he . . . empowered? Similarly to the donor?”

  “It sounds like it . . .”

  “But you’re not convinced.”

  “What I’m not convinced of, is this thing didn’t mutate. Like I’ve been worrying about.”

  “Understood,” Mitch said, “which is an ongoing concern. Let’s don’t jump the gun though . . . Do you know for a fact, this person wasn’t unstable to start with?”

  “No. But another one goes off the deep end, we got a problem.”

  “Then we could,” Mitch said.

  ***

  When Pike finished with Mitch and exited his pick-up truck and came back in the house, everyone was asleep upstairs and it was nice and quiet.

  Then he went downstairs, and too bad he couldn’t say the same for that situation.

  Apparently they were all in there now, squeezed into The Box, Hannamaker and Foxe and Cathy, and of course Anthony and Andrea, and it didn’t seem like a harmonious group at the moment.

  Pike listened for a minute, trying to size up what the problem was. It was hard to tell, but Hannamaker was in the middle of it, and there was some shuffling around and you could hear Jack say, “Okay now what you just said, you better be careful.”

  It seemed like a good time to break it up, so Pike climbed the rope and dangled over the wall and asked did anyone need anything from upstairs, such as more salami and cheese.

  “Hey looky who’s here,” Jack said.

  “I’ll say,” Anthony said with a sly half-smile, “nice of you to join us.”

  Foxe chimed in, “Maybe he thinks he’s too good to be hanging with us.” He hadn’t opened his mouth since he’d been here, that Pike had heard, and this was how you did it?

  Pike was tempted to throw him back Hannamaker’s what you said, you better be careful deal, but it wasn’t worth it. Foxe had obviously been putting away some beer on top of what he might have had before he got here, and he’d loosened up, as had all three of these bozos for that matter. Cathy and Andrea weren’t saying anything but looked relaxed on the bean bag chairs, no do
ubt enjoying the entertainment.

  What Pike said was, “How about some cheesecake?” He’d noticed one in the fridge, a big one all boxed up, obviously on tap for some designated use, but that didn’t matter. He was thinking some sugar along with plenty of fat might help take the edge off, and then hopefully he could get these idiots out of here and finally get to bed.

  Everyone said fine, not a lot of enthusiasm behind it, but Pike went up and got the cheesecake and found some paper plates and forks and lugged the whole shebang over the wall and against his better judgment joined them in The Box.

  Now Jack was getting into it with Anthony. “I did not,” Jack said.

  “You just did,” Anthony said.

  “Hold on,” Pike said. “Whatever it is, let’s just eat.”

  “This guy now,” Anthony said, meaning Pike. “Didn’t want to embarrass him, but now that you bring it up . . .”

  “Bring what up?” Jack said.

  “Dude, get this,” Anthony said to Jack, like they’re good buddies all of a sudden. “The guy needs me to pick him up. He’s waiting for me in these football pants. Ancient ones.”

  “When was that?” Jack said.

  “Today,” Anthony said. “He’d just eaten too. What he might have needed those pants for is anyone’s guess.”

  Everyone laughed. Pike felt like smacking Anthony, and in a perfect world he might have . . . though these days he’d have a tough time defining a perfect world.

  “Anyways,” Anthony said, “Gillette’s problem, his real one, is he messed with my girlfriend behind my back.”

  “That’s not good,” Foxe said, “and it’s not surprising, neither.”

  “Oh yeah?” Anthony said. “You’re not surprised?” He took a long swig of beer and glared at Foxe now.

  Foxe hadn’t meant it like that, but Anthony was at that point where A, you’re looking for trouble now, seeking it out, and B, everyone starts rubbing you the wrong way, which makes it easy.

  “How’d he mess with her?” Jack said to Anthony.

  “Haven’t figured it out yet, but I’m getting there, don’t worry,” Anthony said.

  “Well,” Jack said, “maybe I can understand it. She’s an agreeable little gal.” He smiled and reached over Anthony and gave Andrea a playful squeeze on the arm.

  Anthony stood up. “See this is what I’m talking about. You just did it again.”

  Jack took his time finishing the bite of cheesecake he was working on, and then he put the plate down and brushed off his hands and stood up too.

  Anthony threw the first punch and Jack staggered back and probably would have gone down if The Box wasn’t so small and the wall wasn’t right there, but as it was he used the wall to rebound forward and swung a wild haymaker which could have done a lot of damage but luckily for Anthony it only caught him on the very top of the head.

  Then they locked up and started grappling, and Cathy and Andrea were scrambling now and pushing the drumset out of the way. Hannamaker was quicker and the better athlete but Anthony was strong at the core and hard to move, and you couldn’t tell how this might go.

  Their heads were rubbing together and they were pulling each other tight to avoid letting the other guy get leverage, but Jack was starting to figure out how to land some uppercuts and you could see Anthony was bleeding.

  Anthony was a stubborn son of a bitch though and Pike could tell this was going to get ugly, and he yelled for them to stop, but that had no effect.

  The girls were yelling too now, and even Foxe chimed in, that they made their point and that was enough.

  Pike wasn’t sure why but the expression bull in a china closet jumped out. It didn’t exactly apply here but the fact was neither one of these doofuses was going to give in, and you weren’t going to be able to break them up the conventional way.

  Pike was beyond tired now . . . the day had started a long time ago, with him arriving in the swimming pool in Berkeley, and he wasn’t in the mood.

  He asked the girls and Foxe, who were sort of huddled together away from the action, to please step out of the way, and he sized up the wall behind them, and with the heel of his hand he casually but very firmly broke through the sheetrock.

  He hated to mess up the meticulous details of Jack’s job, that included the high-density insulation in the wall to absorb the sound of the drumset, which it had been doing a darn good job of too.

  But it to be done, so he snapped off enough of the sheetrock so he could see what he was doing in there, and then he reached in, took a look at the rest of them to make sure they were still focused on Jack and Anthony going at it and not him, and grabbed one of the vertical studs, and snapped that off.

  There was a big crack noise, and for a moment Jack and Anthony hesitated and looked over, and then they went right back to their business, which continued to consist of the two of them locking heads, and arms, except when Jack could now and then pull one of his out of there and get a good lick in on Anthony’s increasingly bloody mug.

  Pike pulled out the two broken pieces of 2 x 4. Jack had correctly installed studs every 16 inches, but now with one of them out of there you had a 32 inch gap, and a chance to get everybody out of this sucker. There wasn’t anything left now except the outside sheetrock, and one solid high kick took care of that, and you were the looking at the basement and the couch over in the corner which Jack had shown up intending to crash on before things spun out of hand.

  Everyone was paying attention to the hole now and Jack and Anthony relaxed their grips on each other and Pike figured you bear-hug one of them, it doesn’t matter which one, this nonsense is over, so he picked Anthony, and Anthony didn’t like it but there was nothing he could do about it, and when he started giving Pike an extra-hard time, Pike picked him up like you would a belligerent kid and carried him out of The Box, and up and and out the side basement door and down to the street.

  When they got out in the fresh air Anthony’s level of aggression tapered off a notch, and soon he had nothing left in the tank and wasn’t dangerous, and Pike went in his truck and found some napkins in the glove compartment that he’d saved from a Burger King run and helped Anthony get cleaned up. By this point Cathy was standing there with Foxe, and she said she’d be the designated driver and take everyone home, which ended up just being Anthony and Foxe, no sign of Andrea at the moment, but no one argued or even seemed to notice, and the three of them got in Cathy’s car and were gone.

  Pike went back in and the first thing he heard was snoring, and there was Hannamaker flat on his back on the couch sleeping away like nothing had happened, no blanket, no pillow, nothing, and all his clothes still on including his shoes.

  There was no sign of Andrea at this point, but Pike couldn’t worry about that, she’d figure it out, and probably already had. He dragged himself up to his room, and man did that bed look inviting, and he could finally get in and hopefully stay there about 15 hours.

  He couldn’t resist checking his computer one time first, and he hunched over his desk and there were a couple emails, not important, and he gave Facebook a look, and not much there either, and as he was pulling the laptop closed he felt two hands on his shoulders, and was stunned for a split second and then he knew whose they were.

  “You really do . . . assert yourself,” he said.

  “You don’t like it then?” Andrea said, gently rubbing his back, which at this moment felt better than anything had in two different time zones.

  Pike let it happen for a while, and then turned around and looked at her and tried to make an evaluation . . . what might really be going on here . . . and he realized you couldn’t know for sure, and that she probably didn’t either, and he laid his hand on the back of her neck and eased her toward him and slowly kissed her, and he wasn’t sure if it was right but it sure didn’t feel wrong . . . and for just a little while you were in a brand new time zone and the world made sense.

  “I’ll drive you home,” Pike said finally.

  Andrea
looked a little disappointed. “What?” Pike said.

  “You know . . .” she said.

  “I do know . . . and you’re not staying over. I got enough going on with Jack downstairs. It’s going to be a crapshoot, what he’s like when he wakes up . . . after that display tonight.”

  Pike was trying to keep it light. She said, “Well I’ll look forward to hearing all about it.” Sarcastic, but she had her purse and was ready to go.

  They were quiet in the truck until they reached her block. Pike said, “You reminded me of someone at first. And now you don’t.”

  Andrea said, “Is that good then? . . . Or are you disappointed.”

  “More like relieved,” Pike said.

  Chapter 18

  Monday at school was a little awkward. For various reasons Pike tried to avoid interacting with Hannamaker, Anthony, Cathy, Foxe and Jocelyn.

  Andrea he wasn’t sure about, but he figured don’t go out of your way there either.

  Jack had slept on that couch like he was drugged. Pike went down there around 1 on Sunday and he was still snoring away like an old man, and still with his shoes on.

  At that point Pike woke him up, and directed his attention to The Box, which now needed some serious repair. Jack glanced at the big hole with no expression, cleared his throat hard like he was bringing up phlegm, and left without saying anything.

  Pike went for a light jog after that, over to the old cemetery and back, and on the way home he made his decision to go Arizona.

  Sometimes when you exercise, especially outside, your head becomes real clear and the riff-raff and clutter fall away and you can think simple and straight, and taking a little trip emerged as the right choice.

  Partly it was the lunacy of the other night with the impromptu party that told him a change of scenery would be good, but more than that it was the deteriorating dynamic he was seeing between his parents.

  And he missed Audrey, there was no denying it, and Christmas in Beacon with all the familiar sentimental stuff would only accentuate it.