Chapter X: Eternal Flame

Chapter Ten: Eternal Flame

The King of The Timewraiths had not always been such a creature. When I first met him at the Youthfires at Fort Ordione he had seemed as full of joy as Huggy or Erin, content to listen to the Youthsongs of our Tribe's Past, content to sing the chorus and sometimes with the verse or at least lip-sync the words. His name was Bonigan, The Secretive. Some called him Bullwhip of Langdonville. He appeared to accept that the fire, our Youthfire, could not be fed forever and that the Long Shadow would soon mark the way of previous Tribes into the land of Nostalgia. But a darkness lay hidden in Toddy's heart, waiting patiently, like Jaws, for a chance to strike.

Many songsters entertained our Tribe during the course of our sentence at BHHS. There was the hilarious team of Buddy and Dowd. Napper, Son of Brody, and Byner Beetlejuice drew raucous cheers from the tribe with his romantic tales. Cristo the Long Tongued also coveted his place at the fire and performed the Jock-talk for the benefit of our athletes. He would replay past football games and congratulate past basketball heroes, but he was ready to let the fire fade, if only to spare him the humiliation.

The first time you suspected me was when you started the Tale Of The Toilet Paper. It was a Tribe favorite from the previous Halloween when you ran amok when the Red Sox lost. You needed me most then. You needed the fire. Laughter echoed in the forest, bouncing off the concrete walls, as you described how Huggy shoplifted twenty rolls of toilet paper from Store 24. You were so proud to have been there. So proud to be associated with risk takers but I knew how you wanted to take chances too. The tribe linked arms at the part where you picked Kodiak off the ground and ran through the woods as the police chased you up a dark trail. I was there, Oggy. I was watching. So I stopped your song before you could get to the part where Noodles ran into a clothes line, flipped in the air and fell on his back with a welt across his throat.

“We have heard this song before, Oggy of Many Smells. Let us hear a new one,” I said.

You could have refused but I knew you had been working on a new song about your adventure with Sticky down the Coast to Whaleswood Beach. The song had speed and drama and theft and despair but was not yet complete. I knew. Ray Knight knew. We played baseball together. Remember? We had fought and toiled for the same elusive honor on the same green fields, celebrated the same victories and tasted the same dirty defeat. I knew you.”

“Did you sense my weakness?”

“No, Oggy. I sensed your strength.”

Slowly approaching the fire, you brought quiet to the tribe before you began. It was as I predicted. You sang with confidence. You sang with tears. You owned the past. You owned the future. The tribe swayed like the ocean you had run naked into after streaking down the crowded boardwalk. You swelled like Sticky's belly during his epic onion ring and fried dough feast.

But in the moment of the new song you came upon a blank space in the lyrics. Naturally, a fight, a crash, a theft, a kiss would be inserted but you were momentarily lost. You knew the words and could move your lips but could not sing a note. So you did what I expected. You invented a bridge to connect truth to truth. This bridge, a meaningless encounter with two fat Whaleswood Beach girls and Sticky's subsequent abuse of them, would be our contract. I smiled and nodded as you sang. We craved the same eternal flame. I knew you.”

“But I was weak, Bullwhip. The Sox had lost. My anchor was dragging. I needed your help.”

“I gave you my help. I gave you everything.”

“But I still need one more strike.”

“You aren't ready to make the sacrifice. I'll know when you're ready.”

Soon The King was pressing me for more and more songs and my reputation spread. I was elected Chief songster. The Tribe depended on me for new songs to keep the fire high and soon the old songs sounded dull on our tongues and even Cristo was asking for a new song. No one, not Piper or Cristo or Kurt, knew that Bullwhip and I were feeding precious fuel into the fires. Bone Harbor, a Bone Harbor that never existed, grew alive with echoes of my synthetic songs and the stench of Night Train wine. I was driven to collect all the memories in my Sox hat, the one constant in my life, and keep them for my songs. But once in my hat I felt a need to embellish to song to protect the memories integrity.

“You chose well, Oggy. The fire was dying. Remember the cold creeping nostalgia when your whiffle ball games began to face?”

“But all fires die. We never should have burned those songs. They were innocent. I was the one who should have burned. Me. My hat.”

“Be careful what you wish for, Oggy. History doesn't teach itself. Ray Knight knows the price of fame.”

No longer was I playing for the song. Now I was playing for the performance. I wasn't singing as I had in 1984; I was lip-synching like a street monkey.

My rubber raft trip down the Quatoc creek with Cristo, for example, became an instant hit though the details were hazy. Had I worn shorts so tattered that my genitals flapped in the breeze? Had Cristo tipped the boat when we were attacked by a crazed goose? I couldn't remember the truth anymore. I was only concerned with the performance of the song since I learned lies burned hotter than truth in the fire. Ever present were the ghosts of my own songs whispering their hunger in my ear, one more strike, pushing me to gather more memories to feed the flames. They became stronger as the fire grew but I grew convinced of my own power over the Past. If my sings could change the historuy of my Tribe then maybe I could strike out Ray Knight. What did I have to lose?

“You only had the great burden to lose, Oggy. That great burden you carried with you since October 25^th 1986.”

“But I should have been stronger. I should have carried the burden like my grandfather and my father. I'm not the only one to watch the Sox lose.”

“But you only need one strike. You're so close. Some time to grow strong, and you might beat Ray Knight. What means an hour before the fire? You earned it.”

“But it was wrong. I shouldn't have been greedy.”

“Calvin Schiraldi shouldn't have given up an 0-2 base hit. Bob Stanley shouldn't have thrown a wild pitch. I don't make the rules, Oggy. I'm just here to help.”

“But I'm so weak. I need help. Everyone says I've lost my mind.”

“They don't know you. They don't know Ray Knight. They don't know your struggle. They don't know the burden you carry. You need to get that strike so they will understand. You need to keep the fire burning. It isn't time yet. Not yet.”

When the day drew near for us to follow the tribes before us through the Gates of Time and into the Land of Nostalgia, I saved you by pushing you into the Wilderness beyond The Cliff of Death. Our tribe was in danger. You had to return with stories to tell, fuel for the Youthfire. I knew that your old friend Longing waited patiently in the land beyond the WHEB radio tower. Our Youthsongs had grown old. Everyone knew all the words and the melody was as familiar as Billie Jean or Like A Virgin. Our voices lacked joy and approached the dreaded pitch of Nostalgia, of pure lip-sync, of death. We needed new songs to sing and I gave you the honor of learning them. You could save us from extinction.

“But what about those who passed through the gates? Strout the Long-Legged. Brody “Stoney” Stone the rough-chined. These and others passed on and the Youthtribe of 1989 dwindled like the Fenway crowd after Cleveland blew the Sox out 13-1 on a rainy afternoon.”

“What about them? Do you talk of Wynn The Eagle-eyed, who was eaten by disease or Scoobie the Sad who shot himself in the head with a shotgun? They had no courage. Despair filled our songs. You had to save us. Remember “Buggy” Kindle, Brother of “Catch”, who came to rest at the tree on Middle Street after that motorcycle crash? Remember? Our heroes were lost. We buried these fallen heroes like our first gloriously used condoms in the sand. You were our last hope.”

“But what of the many brave and noble folk who did not tempt Fate by extending their time at the Youthfires? It was time to move on, Bullwhip. The days had been memorable and deserved their place in the pages of our high school yearbooks but they should have been forgotten beneath the dust. They should have been buried. You craved the warmth of the fire and convinced me that our time there could continue. You dangled that strike in front of me and I fell for it. I believed the Youthtribe of 1989 didn't have to fade from fame. I believed you.”

“You saved us. You only needed to travel beyond our close borders and return with new songs for the fire. This was a great honor and soon you understood. You craved the warmth of burning memories and the smell of spent dreams. I gave you what you want.”

“But when I returned from Alaska, asphalt weary, I limped to the dying Youthfire and sang my new songs. I had sacrificed myself, yet still Gedman missed Stanley's pitch. Why?”

“You know nothing about sacrifice. The fire blazed only because of your songs. Gedman is another matter.”

“I didn't believe the songs would help the Youthfire. They were my songs. Moonrise was my first love.”

“But you sang them and the diminished crowd returned the new chorus. You gave us new life. You were our savior.”

“But they didn't know if it was true that I had built a cabin in the northern forest and lived on rabbit meat. They didn't know it was a lie.”

“And they didn't care. The fire was strengthened once more as I had predicted. Your songs fed the Youthfire and kept it alive and you slept in the warmth of our companions. Sticky was there. Flash was there. They loved you.. You were a legend. We had defeated Time and the Youthtribe of 1989 survived.”

“But I lost something. I lost something along the way and the emptiness keeps me up. I lost something my hat can't fill.”

“Think of what you gained.”

As soon as one song was over a cry went up for another and another. Soon, my songbook was empty again but the crowd wasn't satisfied. I had to dig deeper than was safe into my hat, into my memory. I returned to songs long forgotten and in my desperation I betrayed my past. Soon, I was changing names and lowering the temperature and increasing the car speed. By twisting the details I had brought more lies to the Youthfire and the flames soared with my reputation. Nostalgia went into cold retreat.

“We'd beaten it like I'd predicted, Oggy. That was what you wanted. We can't grow old. Our history is safe.”

“What history? What lies? What emptiness?”

“Lies? You know better than me. Ray Knight knows you can't get the last strike if you walk through that door. There is no turning back, Oggy. Your name, your honor will never return to the fire.”

My lies had kept the timbers of our youth aflame but it was not without consequences. By altering the Youthsongs I had changed our history and without a history there could be no Land of Nostalgia, not for me or for you or for any who remained near the flame.”

“This was your gift.”

“It's become my curse, Bullwhip. I'm suspended between fact and fiction.”

A terrible figure had risen from the glowing embers of the Youthfire, misshapen by lies and scaled over. The high cost of banishing Nostalgia was the creation of a monster who fed on my songs, my neglect of the present, my love for a false past, my belief in fantasy, my hunger for a synthetic Youthfire and the forced admiration of my Tribe. This creature, a Timewraith, controlled my sense of time by preying on the Octobers of my past and could not be satisfied. It was formed in the image of my once devoted teammate. Bonigan the Secretive had transformed into Bullwhip the Timewraith, a minion of vanity, a slave to the past.

“You tried to escape, but I knew what you wanted. Ray Knight knew what you wanted. We are the only ones who can give it to you if you only give us what we demand from your precious hat.”

“You demanded so many stories, Bullwhip. I had to reach into my past for the materials to create new songs. You tricked me. Soon only a new song was allowed at the Youthfire. You banished the old songs, the graceful melodies of our Youth. Why would you do that?”

“The fire. The fire must grow or it will die.”

Even though I wasn't ready to leave Bone Harbor, I again volunteered to leave the tribe's territory to learn more songs. I thought I was being smart and that once gone I would be surrounded by new people and new places and I could belong to a new tribe as an Adult. But Toddy was prepared for this and I had already gone too far with my Youthsongs. My lies had spawned other Timewraiths born from the lyrics of my new songs and they were sent to guard me on my journey. Ernesto Deville was there. Moonrise was there. The Veteran was there. The truck driver. Ben. Toddy became the King of these lesser Timewraiths and urged them to never let me forget my tribe. This host of Timewraiths tormented me in forest and in desert, in mountain and by stream. They fouled my friendships with judgement. They tainted my relationships. They were a constant reminder that all my experience was for the sole pleasure of the tribe. My performance was all-important even if I only moved my lips.

A day did not pass on the road in which I was not reminded to write the new songs for our Tribe, to cache my experience in my hat for unveiling at the fireside. I lived for two years in a dizzying state of despair, neither in the present nor in the past nor in the future, but at once divided between all these times. As I walked the asphalt highway in Utah I also walked the length of Lincoln Ave. on my way to steal a kiss from Darcy's window. As I slept beneath a forest of Monterey Pine trees in California I could see the night sky over Sagamore River winking in familiar formations. As I leaned toward Nancy I could smell Rose McCorley's shampoo drift through the window. When I met a new traveler, a fellow worshipper of the rain and road, the Timewraiths questioned how the traveler would fit into my songs. They asked how the new traveler compared to the old travelers in the old songs.

“I can never forgive myself, Bullwhip. I betrayed my friends for a laugh.”

“They knew the risks. No one is as innocent as you believe. Everyone wants something and everyone gets something.”

“I tried to keep them away but you were always there, whispering, chanting, and demanding that I write more songs. I hoped to appease you but every time I began to compose a song only for the ears of my Tribe I had betrayed those around me.”

“Rather you betray us?”

“Maybe. As you know, my betrayal was enough to turn Nancy, Ernesto, and the others into Timewraiths too. Now you own them. Everyone I encountered either became a Timewraith, trapped in the Youthsong or else they were repelled.”

“You did it to save us. Nan didn't understand your work. She didn't know who Ray Knight was. Ernesto didn't care about you or your baby. He would be amused to know you think you betrayed him. He'd think it was funny.”

I convinced myself that the Wraiths had always been there and would always be there. I decided that everyone had their own Timewraiths and the best thing I could do was give up and bear my burden. Others lived in worse prisons. If I had to go through life watching Game Six of the 1986 World Series, convinced I could mentally change the course of events, then so be it. The Wraiths told me that I could do it. Maybe I could. Only they believed in me and supported me. Only they understood my burden.

When I was alone in the forest I naturally sucked up the scenery, the trees and the lakes and blackened them with betrayal. My Present life, the life the Timewraiths feared most, shrank and shrank and all but disappeared. The present could provide no fuel for the fire. I knew only false lyrics and Game Six. I had become a servant of the Timewraiths, the Tenders of Memory, and The Commanders of my Tribe's history.

Even when I returned from the West with new tales hardly anyone was left to hear them.

“They were cowards. That wasn't your fault.”

“But all the tribe except myself and Sticky and a few others had moved on to the Land of Nostalgia. Only the Timewraiths were left to entertain and, thanks to me, their numbers had grown. That wasn't part of the deal.”

“You got what you wanted. Your precious Game Six has never ended. You still have a chance because of me so don't talk to me like I'm stupid. I'll teach you a lesson about respect.”

The King of the Timewraiths lorded over us from his thrown built from the souls of all those I had robbed. There was my Roommate from Alaska, Ben. There were the souls of the innocent people who had picked me up as I hitchhiked. There were my trapped coworkers, gasping for freedom beneath the King's weight. There were my friends and lovers, trapped beneath him, encased in the Time Throne. There was Clutch and Nan and Flash. There were Ernesto and Sara and Piper and Pam. There were Erin and Cristo. There was Moonrise with her lashes so long. They all cried out from the prison I had locked them in. And there was room for more victims on the King's throne of Greed. I had caused all this misery with my hunger to hear the Tribe sing my Youthsongs.

“I brought all of your friends to one place and still you question my power? Still you doubt me?”

“But you didn't bring my friends together. I brought only a fragment of who they were, who they were to me, who I thought they were to me. I brought them and caged them and now I don't know who they were. These songs were lies, Bullwhip.”

“That they burn is all that matters. They burn and we remain. Survival is not a game.”

I was helplessly in the grip of Ray Knight, the ball he had hit on an 0-2 count hovered like the WHEB radio tower light above my head. Could I control it?

“Of course you can. Once you are ready to sacrifice. Once you are ready.”

At the Youthfires, few came to sing and the few soon grew tired of my forced Songs. They were scared off by the King and feared I would use them in my verses and they would also be trapped in the throne.

“They were cowards. They wanted to grow old. They had never been young like you. They didn't know Ray Knight.”

“But when almost all had passed into Nostalgia I realized I'd never had an identity. I'd only had a reputation and my reputation had also gone with them.”

“But what a great reputation.”

I was no longer Ogden The Chief Songster. Rumors spread that I had betrayed my tribe and sold them to the King Timewraith for eternal youth.

“Lies. Those are lies. We all feel the heat. I can't take it all. There is plenty of room at the fire. Come closer, you who are timid.”

I fled from the tundra of Alaska to the Granite Peaks of the Sierra Nevada. From the High Meadows I had traveled, by the coast, through the dark Valley of Death, and then to the Canyon of Zion. From there I crossed in strange vehicles across the desert and the fields and the hills to the East. But always the Timewraiths traveled with me.

“We had to make sure you didn't forget where you came from. You had to be reminded who your real family is, who was there for you when you fell, who picked you up, who held you hand, who sucked your...?”

My deeds were tainted by vanity and my rucksack grew heavy with stolen memories. Even my pain was added to the Youthsong. I could not remain in Bone Harbor for long before I lost myself in Song or else crumbled before the image of Gedman's empty glove. So I fled to South America but the disease followed me and cursed my companions there.

“I know you, web. I know your secrets. I know where you go to hide. I know who Ray Knight is.”

Tired, heavy with the baggage of new Songs, hopeful that this would finally satisfy the Wraiths of Time, I returned to Bone Harbor.

“You were holding back. You weren't keeping your promise.”

“But Nan was innocent. She never asked to for this.”

“It was her or us. Her songs fueled the fire. Remember how high the flames climbed into the pine trees? Remember the heat?”

But my new songs of the jungle, of love, of wise speech, of magic drinks were devoured in the flames and were hardly heard by anyone except the very Wraiths I had spawned. The flames were too hot for anyone but the Wraiths. The King demanded more. He demanded more songs written for his own enjoyment.

“For our enjoyment. I think of the tribe first. The tribe must prevail.”

The King Of the Timewraiths now demanded I continue to use my own life and the lives of others as material for my songs. Already my life had become little more than a Toll Bridge for the Future to cross over the Present into the Past but this last demand was too much.

“You were a coward. You fled. You betrayed the Red Sox and you knew it. How could they win without you?”

I tried to escape to the sunshine of Florida but the Wraiths pursued me and cast their cold shadow over all my adventures on the Islands. I could not swim in the warm waters without hearing a new melody in my head, composed and performed for the King's pleasure. I could not smoke from a six foot water bong without my white breath swirling above my head in rebuke. I could not learn who John Galt was without practicing how I would tell everyone back at the Youthfire about him. My present life dwindled until I acted only in the pursuit of new songs.

“You became a hero.”

I became a slave to the King and on my return to the North I went to Piper's school to hide. I thought Lacy could give me the strength to break free.

“Only your tribe can give you strength. Only the Sox.”

As I leaned close to Pam's dark hair, her doe eyes, her ripe lips I saw the face of Darcy looking back at me. I could smell the spring grass at Strawberry Banke.

“Sing it. Sing our songs.”

The river washed against cement steps near the planting boxes and wooden yacht slips. We played touch football in the spring to loosen our arms for baseball, and in fall for an excuse not to do homework. Our grass stained jeans fit us perfectly after a winter of wear. The lights across the river in Maine blinked all night for my lonely walks along the riverfront. Huggy had thrown my hat into the water from that bench over there. In the summer a musical production of Grease was performed every night to couples in lawn chairs. Kids rolled in the grass and tossed coins in the fountain.

“What did they wish for?”

“They wished for more time. Just a little more time.”

“So you came back to where you belonged. You returned to us.”

I had to. I had no life. My lips could give no life away from the fire. I lay in front of the television as Kevin Mitchell looped a base hit to Center Field. Would Henderson catch it? Would he? Please...No, he had just moved back a few steps. Why?

“Ray Knight knows.”

Or else I would crouch beneath Darcy's bedroom where the sharp needles stuck through my ninja suit or spend my nights beneath the steel bleachers at Leary Field where so many dreams had been cashed in for a tub of popcorn and a taste of my own semen. Cristo was no help since he had long ago sold his soul to the King in return for fake immortality.

“He knows the smart move. He isn't dumb.”

Vance knew my torment, but was immune. He owned the present, had no past. He was still falling toward the water of the Sagamore river. He had never struck the rocky shore and never would. He tried to help with his nightly tours but even the violence of his driving was not enough to banish the Timewraiths. They followed me on our nightly quest, hovering near my window or perching like Bill Buckner in the elm tree limbs on Middle Street. These tours only reminded me of past glories and renewed the melodies I had foolishly written and strengthened the King's hold on my present. I could not help lip-syncing the Youthsongs that had passed into legend as we drove by the landmarks. “Karma Chameleon” “Don't You Want Me?” “Take it on the Run” The Wraiths wouldn't let me forget.

“History doesn't teach itself.”

If only in my own mind, I was compelled to sing. For now I was trapped again in Bone Harbor, home of the Eternal Flame, and the King Of the Timewraiths was demanding his homage once again.

CHAPTER IX: Karma Chameleon

Chapter IX: The Karma Chameleon

Buddy “Huggy” Huggington and his two younger brothers, Roman and Burton lived on the Route 1 side of The Woodlands near the old arcade plaza that is now a supermarket. Buddy could see the Yoken's whale from his bedroom window. Erin McCorley and I used to sneak out of our houses and walk the two miles up Route 1 to Buddy's house to watch porn and drink beer and play pool in his basement. It was a house without rules and thus a holy refuge. Buddy was the benevolent Pope of Route 1.

Huggy was adventurous: he drove his car onto the frozen Sagamore river and narrowly escaped when the ice broke. Huggy was an athlete: he was the one who caught a tipped pass and ran forty yards for a game winning touchdown, holding the ball up in taunting victory as he crossed the end zone. His adventures set the standard of midnight fantasy and his lies filled the vacuum of our understanding. When he said Cindy Phillips had sucked his balls, we believed him. All the girls secretly said he was so fine, and wrote “I love Buddy Huggington on their Trapper Keepers, so why wouldn't she suck his balls? When he said he had stuck three fingers in Chrissy, we asked to sniff them. When he said Amanda “Loose” Laurent had sucked the contents out of the rubber he had been wearing, we acted like we were disgusted, but Buddy knew we were jealous. His fashion (French rolled stone-washed jeans and T-shirt worn inside-out) and fast phrases (“Hey, Monkey Man.”; “Get him a body bag!”; “Nobody likes a snitch.”) were repeated until they became the standard.

“Oggy,” he'd say as we played video games in his basement, “you've got to use this Sun In. Just put some blonde streaks on the side. It'll be the best. Try it, monkey man. Just try it. I did. Chicks love it. Darcy told me that you'd look better as a blonde. Yeah. Get him a body bag, Oggy! You'll be so good lookin' that I'd fahk ya.”

So you looked even more pathetic with orange streaks in your hair as you lay in your bed masturbating at night. What else did our friend Huggy do?

Then there was Buddy's dark side: When Erin's wallet vanished after a drinking binge, we were sure Buddy was at Gillies spending the money on chili dogs. It was funny, unless you were Erin. Good old Huggy! That crazy kid! What a clown! But when a rumor was spread that positively identified me and Cristo on Pierce Island, in the bushes, with our pants down, I wasn't laughing. I was confident that Buddy had started it, but I could only grin and meekly deny it. “Shucks, Huggy, you know that isn't true.” And when “Spaz” Bunson was hit in the back with a small piece of shit while he took a shower in the High School locker room, he didn't have to look further than Buddy's stained hands and grinning lips, nor could he do anything except wash himself again. These and other incidents tested, but never broke, our allegiance to Buddy Huggington.

Huggy was always hated by at least one person but never by the whole crowd. The laws of high school conformity naturally demanded silence from the solitary victim. If “Loose” Amanda had been thoroughly humiliated by Huggy's ultimate betrayal then what could she do? She was just one girl with an ass as wide as a shopping cart. Her social credit at school was very conditional and it was better if she just kept her mouth shut and try to rebuild her shattered image. If Cristo found his shorts around his ankles in front of the whole senior class then he could only laugh at himself and shuffle off the stage. Was he going to confront Huggy and risk total social banishment? Never. If it was funny to everyone watching, and it usually was, then the victim was left with no response. Huggy understood that as long as he kept the majority of the school on his side then he could do absolutely anything to minority.

Thus, Huggy became the older brother I wanted to have, the keeper of forbidden pleasures. Unlike brooklyn, Huggy always made time to humiliate me. He made me believe I could be as tough and brave as him. Huggy taught me to shred cheese in my Ramen noodles and fry onions in butter as a garnish, and while I was cooking he was stealing change from my Red Sox baseball coin bank. He also showed me how to pack Cristo's sister's Cabbage Patch Doll with firecrackers and detonate it at the Little League field. Later, Huggy shoplifted my first bottle of Mad Dog 20/20 from the drug store and made me feel like a man as I puked in the alley behind Gillies. He had danced and laughed as I fell into the puddle of my own excreta. This awful drunkenness was not, as I had been led to believe by my-M-M-Max Headroom,” stuttered Buddy. “Huh? You want some of the Buddy Twins? Is this what you want?”

Buddy pointed to his flexed biceps and bounced like a boxer. Then he suddenly punched Mikey on the side of the head, yelling, “Get him a body bag, Johnny! No Mercy!”

Mikey fell to one knee, dazed and blubbering. His chin started to tremble.

“That…that’s what feels hurts. I hurt it,” he babbled.

I put a foot on his back and pushed him the rest of the way to the ground. I was disappointed when I realized Buddy was now watching a girl jog down the industrial park road.

“Huggy! Hey, Huggy! I pushed him with my foot and he fell down. Look! Get him a body bag!”

“Nice, Oggy,” said Buddy, but he was still distracted by the girl. Curse her! He watched her jog away until he heard Mikey cry out pitifully.

“Why? You’re my friends. Why? I was good this time. I brought my car. I did good.”

Buddy answered with pure disgust, “We aren’t your friends, you retarded fahk. We don’t care about you. We don’t care about your baby.”

This last comment had nothing to do with Mikey’s familial status, rather it was a direct quote from the Charles Manson tribute movie Helter Skelter, and was a current catch phrase of ours that could refer to anything beneath our concern. There was no worse insult then to say we didn't care about your baby, and I was deeply envious that Buddy had thought to use the quote before me. How could he be so quick-witted? Still, I repeated it with not quite the right phrasing and attitude.

“Yeah. That's right. We don’t care about you or your baby. Huggy doesn't care, and I don't care! We just don’t care! Look at us not caring about you or your baby!”

Huggy again ignored me as he faked a punch at Mikey, who flinched and then curled up in the dirt.

“It feels hurts. That’s what hurts,” he said, though the punch never connected.

I spit on him and watched with pleasure as Buddy finally smiled approvingly. I had done good.

“We still don't care about you or your baby,” I said as I picked up Mikey's toy car and threw it into the nearby woods. Huggy now beamed like a proud father.

“Get 'im, Oggy. Nice. Get that retarded stutter-fahk. No Mercy!”

We left Mikey in the dirt and laughed all the way to Gillies, where we bought chili cheese dogs and hamburgers and ate them in Prescott Park overlooking the Chickanoosuc River.

“Gee, this job shore is hard to figger out,” Buddy said in an imitation of Mikey. “I wunder if I could be any more stupid? What do yew think, Oggy?”

I took my Sox hat off and scratched my head.

“Well, shit, Mikey. I don't know. Oops! I just got my hand caught in the binding machine again. Durn it. That makes the fourth time today. Ain't no slacking on this job. Do you think the boss will miss the two hundred Hustlers I stole?”

“No, sir. I do believe he'll be too busy looking for next month's shipping invoices that I shredded.”

While I was laughing, Buddy took the unfinished half of my chili cheese dog and threw it into the river where it was instantly attacked by starving seagulls.

I stopped laughing. I loved chili cheese dogs from Gillies as much as I loved watching Dwight Evans toss a baseball.

“Hey! I wasn't finished with that, Buddy. Friggin' asshole! Why did...”

“Shut your pie, ya big baby,” spit Buddy. “I paid for that hot dog.”

“But...” I stammered.

“Here, take a swim, Jim Rice.”

Huggy took my Red Sox hat off and, before I could react, he whipped it over the fence into the river near the crumbs of my hot dog bun. I had no choice but to jump in after it before it sank or was swept out to sea or carried off by a seagull. As I hopped over the fence, fully dressed, I caught a blurry glimpse of Huggy laughing as double-cheese burger juice dripped down his chin.

“I'm just kidding,” he cackled.

The difference between a friend and an enemy was a line in the dirt that Huggy had rubbed out and pissed on until the roles overlapped. Whether he laughed at me or with me was impossible to tell. Maybe he was ‘just kidding’ when he urinated in my school locker. Could I blame him for wanting to have a little fun at my expense? When he threw all my camping equipment on a fire at Ogden's Point, what could I do but laugh. Everyone else was laughing. When I found a bottle of piss poured onto the seat of my VW Rabbit one morning, I had to chuckle. What goes around comes around.

Buddy laughed as though he had no conscience and I was gripped by jealousy a moment before I hit the frigid water. When I climbed out of the river ten minutes later with my dripping Red Sox cap on my head I accidentally got some water on his shoes.

“Tool!” he yelled and pointed toward Pierce Island, “Go drip dry with the other queers.”

I did not hesitate to apologize and take two steps back. I worshipped Buddy and like any good devotee I loved him most when he hurt me.

The salt water smell of the river and the remains of my unfinished chili cheese dog remained in the sweatband of my hat and was no less comforting than Darcy’s vaseline greased sock and her shiny yearbook picture.

The streets in The Woodlands were designed to minimize stop signs by routing traffic together with merges and triangles. There were no intersections, just branches off of branches, one merge after another. Vance liked this because he could speed recklessly in and out of the triangles. I liked it because the danger confused the Timewraiths and most of The Woodlands was a still a mystery to me so the Timewraiths could harness few memories. Sometimes Vance drove on lawns. Sometimes I saw a cat or the occasional raccoon dart in front of the car lights.

After ten or twenty minutes of terrifying recklessness Vance stopped at an all night gas station near the forestry plantation and went to piss behind a dumpster. I had an urge to get out and change our tires for racing slicks. Instead I thought about Mikey's toy car. Could I find it and give it back to him, return it as a gesture of kindness? But what would Huggy think if he ever found out? Soon Vance returned drinking the ex-alcoholics cocktail, black coffee and a cigarette. He squinted at me through a cloud.

“Here.”

He tossed a cellophane package through the air. I caught it.

“A Twinkie?”

“All the essential vitamins and minerals,” Vance informed me.

“Sure, if you consider corn syrup a mineral.”

“Look, I only had a buck, Ogden. When I make a million dollars I get you your organic nuts and raisins or whatever you like. For now, eat your fahking Twinkie.”

I thanked Vance with a forced smile and started to tug the cream filled sponge cake delight out of the cellophane. Vance blew on the top of his coffee and asked, “Ready to...?”

Just then, a white 1987 Ford Fiero pulled in and stopped next to me at the pump. The plastic body was impervious to rust, but I could hear the undercarriage squeak with the cries of a million memories. This was Death's carriage, driven by the King of The Timewraiths. Toddy Bonigan had found me.

“Remember our deal? History doesn't teach itself, Oggy. You scratch my back I'll scratch yours.”

Why did you do it? Why can't I be free?

“Because history doesn't teach itself.”

But it isn't our history.

“It is now.”

Youth Song Three: Hurts so Good

Youth Song Three: Hurts so good2 “You’ve been doing dope again haven’t you, Chrissy?

She says no, tears streaking her thick mascara, but she’s lying. Vance can tell.

“You know how we deal with the liars don’t you, Chrissy, you dirty, dirty girl. You filthy girl.”

The phone rings and in a professional voice Vance says, “ First class escort service beautiful girls at a reasonable price, please hold.”

He puts the phone down and puckers his ugly mouth.

“We run an escort service, not a god damn hash house for washed out whores.”

Chrissy cowers in the corner, shakes her head, instinctively tries to protect her eyes.

“We’ve got to discipline you, Chrissy. We can’t have whores at First Class.”

He unbuttons his pants.

“Strip!” He commands.

He locks the door and as he turns the lights off he picks his teeth with a yellow fingernail.

“It’s for your own good.”

Remember Christina Jenkins? You were in the same Earth Sciences class with her in 7th grade. You sat in the back of the class and watched her shift her slender body and rest her tender head on her arm. You watched her lips, her eyes, her legs develop for five long years. You knew what you could do to those legs. You wrote notes to her that began with, “You don't know me but I have always loved you...” or “I know a secret about you...” and burned them in the sink at home. You coward. We claimed the embers of these notes and read them back to you during your restless nights when even Darcy's sock couldn't bring you to sleep.

Chrissy was popular and knew it, wore the nicest spandex pants and the hottest pink leg warmers. You could never hope to associate with her no matter how big the shoulder pads were in your white blazer. Your greasy hair got in your face causing inflamed pimples. You sweated and smelled bad. You were a pussy coward. You were friends with a crippled Greek kid and a dying cancer victim! What a fool to think you would ever run your fingers through Chrissy's fragrant hair.

Your clothes were dirty and out of style before they got off the racks, even before your grandma bought them and gave them to you for your lucky thirteenth birthday. Your Don Johnson coat and pastel T-shirts were too special to wear to school so you kept them hidden in your closet in hopes of wearing them on a date or even going to the prom in them. But who would go to the prom with a loser like you? The white suspenders nicely accented your pink T-shirt but meant you couldn't wear your stylish thin gray leather tie. The only time you ever wore this gay outfit was in your room late at night while Twain slept on your bed and you listened to Pat Benatar on WHEB. When your brother and father were asleep you would turn down the volume and play “Word Up” by Cameo on your turntable and secretly try on different combinations of clothes before doing some more push-ups. Your black plastic sunglasses made every outfit look radical, didn't it? You used Christmas money to buy a white dress shirt, with pockets big enough to hold a guinea pig, to wear with the tie and the pin stripe jacket, but you could never work up the Sonny Crocketts to ask any of the girls on a date. Why? Was it because you hated getting caught in the crowd even if it meant being closer to Chrissy? Was it because you ran home from High School so you wouldn’t get caught by Stoney and Kong? The crowd of suffocated you until you had no identity, until you were just part of a crowd, assimilated and faceless. The lips in the crowd moved but they didn't say anything original. You thought you were so much better than everyone.

Remember Chrissy’s polka dot blouses and frosted hazel hair? She was wholesome and unspoiled, not like Cindy Phillips who was dirty and bad and wore torn sweatshirts off her shoulders and who, according to Huggy, had given the entire basketball team blow jobs in the forest after a game. Chrissy wore clean stone washed jeans while Cindy wore tight stretch skirts above her knees and her leatherette jackets had countless zippers. Cindy would make a good whore, wouldn't she. Chrissy would make a good wife and mother, her ripe nipples meant for a baby's mouth rather than a hungry man-child with a bobbing erection. You want to be that baby, don't you? You'd be a good baby. You would love Chrissy and coo as you kissed her. She would stroke your head and say, “Go to sleep my little baby. Go to sleep on mommy's breast.” And she would sing to you. Your dick wanted Cindy but your filthy mouth wanted Chrissy. What else do you remember?

Cristo and I usually sat in the back of the auditorium during the lip-sync concert to make fun of the acts, but when Darcy, Chrissy, and Cindy all came out to sing “Venus” dressed like the Bananarama, my heart stopped. Goddess on a mountain-top, indeed: three of them to be exact. My penis bulged in my tight white underpants and I started to rub it ,hoping a Genie might pop out and grant me three wishes (one of which would be to meet Cindy, Chrissy and Darcy in the forest. They'd be cold and hungry for my body) while my orange parachute pants did nothing to hide my erection.

“Hey, Sticky,” I whispered. “Chrissy's hotter than Mallory on Family Ties. What a skank. I'd Smurf Chrissy so good. I'd take my big Smurf and Smurf all three of 'em.”

It was not uncommon in 1985 for kids to use the word “Smurf” for a variety of verbs and nouns, preferably vulgar ones. You are free to interpret them as you choose.

Cristo leaned closer to me. Even by high school his face had no more hair on it than a used whiffle ball. He made up for this outward lack of maturity by being foul mouthed and bitter. He no longer hid in the shadows, like he had at the Jones Ave. dump; instead, he rode tides of popularity like a social surfer, working a crowd of football players like a professional salesman with attention to sell instead of life insurance.

“Word! But she isn't as good looking as the Smurf you call your mom. Psych! Did you sleep in those clothes? You look like Hobo Smurf.”

I laughed mirthlessly. “Naw, your mom took 'em off before she rode me like a Bronco.”

I held up my hand for a high-five but when Cristo tried to slap it I pulled away at the last second.

“Psych-O-Rama!”

Then Buddy “Huggy” Huggington stood up and yelled, “Why don't you three girls come down here and suck my big dong!?” This request, followed by Chrissy's boyfriend turning around and spitting at Huggy's face, formally launched the brawl portion of the evening. Everyone would march out of the auditorium and towards the school parking lot, choosing sides and making grave threats. As soon as we reached the parking lot 99% of the crowd either dispersed like Cristo, fleeing up the grassy hill in sissy fear, or decided to go to Gillies for a hot dog instead of fighting. This left only Buddy and a drunk foster kid from the Chase Home Orphanage to fight it out in between cars in a one round, thirty-second blood-sport, during which Huggy would yell, “Kumate!” Or “Get him a body bag!” as he leaped into the air like a kick boxing Jean Claude Van Damme.

We love it when you give us what we want, Oggy. Maybe we can return the favor. 0-2 to Knight? Remember? Now go home and watch the tape again. Maybe this time Gedman will snag Stanley's wild pitch. You just need to concentrate harder. You need to believe in yourself and stop being a pussy like you were in Junior High School. Go home, Oggy. Stop wasting your time with this crook. He can't give you what you want. He can't give you one more strike. We can.

Chapter Nine: Rebel Yell"

I examined Vance as he squinted over the hood and tapped ash out a crack in the window. He was one of the cowards who marched out the auditorium planning to fight only to wind up watching Buddy kick the orphan in the chest. Vance had a chin like a cowboy in a cigarette ad, but if you looked close you could see he had no lips. It was like they had been burned off by his non-filtered cigarettes. His mouth just appeared uninvited somewhere above his chin and below his thin nose so he had to hold his cigarettes in his teeth. His Early Man face asked to be punched just to keep him in line. He had a tattoo of a wood chip on his shoulder and he sported these funky eyebrows that hung over his cheeks like shop awnings, casting a permanent shadow on his face. If he was in a lineup for a petty theft the victim would pick him out instinctively from ten others no matter who actually committed the crime. Why? He looks the part of a petty criminal, resigned to petty, mean efforts that are forgotten as soon as they are accomplished. From selling fake 50-50 tickets at football games to stealing from the Unitarian Church collection plate, the most important thing he had ever done was fall off that cliff at the dump. He hadn't been picked up by the world's radar since.

“Leave Chrissy alone,” I said weakly as I repositioned my hat on my head.

“Who? I don’t know a Chrissy. Who’re you talking about?”

“You know. I don’t approve of you peddling my classmates like slaves. It will not stand. I played Clutch in Whiffle Ball once.”

“Look, I’ll put an add in the paper. If nobody comes in for an interview then I’ll drop the whole thing. But you know what, Ogden? I’ve already had about 20 girls commit to a position. It’s easy money. Sex or no sex. They make money and I make money. The customer is satisfied. Life is good. First Class escort service. Beautiful girls...

“...at a reasonable price. I know Vance. You are a prince to give them this opportunity. A real Alex P. Keaton.”

“So you want to invest? I’ll let you in on the ground floor.”

“More like the basement,” I quipped. “No, Vance. When I die I want my conscience to be clear. You won't earn a dime anyway.”

“Awww, don't be queer. Starting a business is like teaching your girlfriend how to suck your dick. You make an initial investment but it pays off. It always pays off. Heh, Heh.”

While Vance made slurping sounds, I counted backwards from ten to calm myself. Such loose talk about sex makes me nervous. If I'm the only one who takes sex seriously, I figured, then I'd never get a girlfriend.

“You sicken me, Vance.”

“How many times you beat off today?”

Around 1985, the same time the word “Smurf” became part of our code-speak, the subject of masturbation broke the dike of respectability. In High School, Buddy and Oly had talked about how many times the masturbated in a day so loosely that the student council considered making it part of the morning announcements. It was voted down by a narrow margin.

My standard reply to this question was, “I lost count after ten.”

“And I sicken you? Please. You're young, Ogden. You could be pretty good looking if you shaved that mug of yours and trimmed that hair. You look like a starving Charlie Manson. Just carve a swastika in your forehead and...”

“Break my shine box a little more, Vance! Please! You sound like my grandmother. Just tell me to get a job and I'll put you on my Christmas list.”

“I'm just saying. I know you're still hoping for that Darcy chick to come back and give you head but, lets face it, if it didn't happen when you were in high school, and could still run a block without falling down, then it probably isn't going to happen now. Right?”

I wasn't listening. I was stroking Darcy's pink neon sock where it lay snug in my jeans pocket next to thirty five cents and a receipt for a Taco Bell burrito. The sock was so soft. So tight. Her toes were once right there at the end, moving around with candy painted nails, so precious. She would come back to me, I believed. She would realize the love I had inside me would fill her up, would complete her, and she would embrace me. She would return to me with the other sock and allow me put it on her tender foot. Then she would know who I was. She would understand. Would Vance notice if I took it out and kissed it?

He doesn't understand, Oggy. No one understands. They don't know Ray Knight. Of course she'll come back for you. The girl always comes back in the songs. She'll come back for her sock.

We entered a residential area called The Woodlands. Since I had mowed lawn here for three mornings as a landscaper, it was a place the Wraiths had well guarded. A light on in the Huggington home reminded me of Burton, the youngest Huggington brother. The evil had not settled in Burton as it had in Buddy. Nor had the charisma blossomed like it had for Roman, the good middle brother. Burton Huggington was his own man, a wild, unpredictable beast, a lord of the flesh and sadly given to the dark side. His adventures and misdeeds were legendary among his own youth tribe, which was fortunately a few years behind me. I knew him only from rumors, so when his name came up in conversation I carefully said, “Burton is a good man to have on your side,” and this could be taken many ways. It could easily have been said about Huggy.

Remember Buddy Huggington? Remember good old Huggy? Tell the story about the time you broke into Huggy's house. You wanted to show everyone you were brave, but you never really risked anything. You were always too scared to risk what was precious but Ray Knight took it anyway. Remember all of Huggy's good advice? He never let you down. Sing the song, Oggy. Sing it.