Peter Abrahams - Bullet Point

Wyatt, his voice very low, said, “You don’t think he did it?”

“Who cares what I think? The fact is he’s stuck in Sweetwater for five years, minimum.”

“Sweetwater?”

“The prison across the river,” Greer said. “Number one employer in the county. Haven’t you seen it?”

Wyatt wasn’t prepared for things happening fast, but somehow when Saturday rolled around he had a date with Greer. The plan was to pick her up at her place, go to lunch, and then drive around while she showed him the sights of Silver City. Aunt Hildy always did her shopping on Saturday morning, and Dub had practice. Wyatt slept in, woke to a quiet house. He found himself looking forward to the day ahead for the first time in a long time; and he wasn’t thinking about baseball at all.

Greer lived in an old apartment building a few blocks north of the main street, meaning away from the river. He sat in the car, waiting outside. It was a four-story building, kind of grimy outside but with fancy little details under the grime, like two Greek temple-type columns framing the front door, and the stone head of some aggressive-looking creature sticking out of the wall above it, fangs bared.

The door opened and Greer came out. She wore the short leather jacket and jeans, wasn’t carrying a purse, not even a little one. In his experience, girls always carried a purse when they went out. But no time to think about that. She opened the passenger door and slid inside.

“Hey, cowboy,” she said.

“Hi,” said Wyatt. Her smell reached him, a really nice smell, flowers and something else. He glanced over, caught the gleam of her eyebrow ring and a quick smile.

“Cut yourself shaving?” she said, touching the tip of her chin.

Wyatt touched his chin, checked his fingertip. Yes, a little red smear; he wiped it off on his jeans.

“If I was a vampire you’d be in trouble,” Greer said.

“I’m not worried,” Wyatt said. “I had garlic for breakfast.”

Greer laughed. “Vroom vroom,” she said. “Let’s see what this baby can do.”

For some reason, Wyatt had a mature thought at that moment: She’s already seen what this baby can do, on that icy patch in the Torrance Bowl parking lot. He stepped lightly on the gas and drove sedately down the street. Greer’s eyes were on him: he could feel them.

“Is that your own place?” Wyatt said, nodding back toward the apartment building.

“Yeah. I’ve got a one-bedroom.”

“Cool,” Wyatt said. Having your own place: what would that be like? “So you don’t, uh, live with your mother, or anything?”

“Correctamundo,” Greer said. “Hang a right at the top of the hill.”

Wyatt hung a right, followed a tree-lined street overlooking the river. The houses, big, old, nice-looking, but a little run-down, were spaced far apart.

“Pretty much the oldest surviving part of town,” Greer said. “Dates from back when there was still silver in the mine. The mining directors lived here, plus doctors, lawyers, that kind of thing.” She pointed. “My mother grew up in that one.”

Wyatt pulled over. The house was tall, with balconies, a screened-in porch, and a conical tower at one end.

“I think it was white back then,” Greer said.

Now it was yellow with brown trim, the paint peeling here and there; and a blue tarp covered one section of the roof. “Who lives in it now?” Wyatt said.

“No idea.”

Curtains parted on an upper floor and someone looked out. Wyatt eased off the brake, let the car roll forward. “So, uh, where’s your mom living now?”

“An even sweller place,” Greer said. “Sweller than this was in its heyday.”

“Yeah? Are we going to see it?”

“Depends on whether you’re planning a trip to Seattle.”

“Your mom lives in Seattle?”

“Check.”

“Your parents are divorced?”

“You do a dynamite Q and A, you know that?”

“Sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry for.” She patted his knee, sending a small electric charge up his leg. “What would happen to human conversation if we didn’t have Q and A? Long silences, baby, end of story.”

Way over his head. Wyatt realized that he was out of his league. Greer was smarter and older, and had more of something else he couldn’t even label. But the next moment, right after all that was hitting home, some part of him, possibly the competitive part, rose up, refusing to simply fold. Driving down this fading street where local silver barons had once lived, he forced his mind to wrestle with what Greer had just said, to really understand.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“You don’t know what?” said Greer. “Hang another right.”

“Well,” said Wyatt, turning onto a long street that slanted down, away from the river, “there’s communication in silences, too.”

“Hey,” she said. And then more quietly. “Point taken.”

And not just good communication, either. Entering his silent home-home back up in East Canton-and sensing Rusty’s mood: that was communication, too. “Good and bad,” he said.

“Communication?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re so right,” Greer said. “Take my stepfather.”

“So your parents are divorced.” For some reason, he wanted to nail that down.

“Hard to come by a stepfather otherwise, unless you know something I don’t.”

That stung a bit. Greer’s words often seemed to do that, Wyatt thought, but he didn’t mind. In fact, he found himself laughing.

“Gonna let me in on the joke?” she said.

“No joke.”

“Then what’s funny?”

He glanced at her. She was gazing at him; no eye makeup today-she looked younger, closer to his own age. You was the answer, you’re funny, and lots more than that, but he kept the answer inside, instead saying, “What about your stepfather?”

“He’s the biggest asshole in the world,” Greer said, “but the worst-”

A gray squirrel darted into the road, just a few yards in front of them, moving right to left. Wyatt swerved to the right, away from oncoming traffic, if there’d been any, and hit the brakes, steering behind the squirrel. But at the last instant, the squirrel paused and then did the dumbest thing possible, darting back the way it had come. Next came a feeling like passing over the tiniest speed bump, a soft one.

“Christ,” Wyatt said, looking back in the rearview mirror. The squirrel-what was left of it-wasn’t quite lying still. He stopped the car and got out. “Christ.” The squirrel’s head was motionless and so was its body and three legs. But the fourth leg was twitching-more than that, really, the tiny paw making little scrabbling movements on the pavement, as though trying to get the rest of the animal up and on its way. Wyatt walked over, looked down. The squirrel’s eyes were open, at least the one facing up, but was the squirrel seeing him, taking him in? Wyatt couldn’t tell. All he could tell for sure was that the squirrel’s guts were all over the place and that one leg-rear, left side-was trying to get the animal up and on its way.

Which wasn’t going to happen. The squirrel was beyond hope, finished, the only question being when. Misery: the word for describing the squirrel’s condition at that moment, and what did you do for creatures in misery? You put them out of it. Wyatt’s first thought was to get back in the car, turn around, run over the squirrel again. But he couldn’t do that: overkill, right? He now completely understood the meaning of that word; and not just overkill, but detached and cold-blooded-their meanings were clear, too. That left what? Stomping on the squirrel? To stomp on a living thing, and not in anger: he couldn’t do that, either.

Wyatt went back to the car, hearing the scritch-scratch of that one paw on the pavement the whole way. Greer sat in the passenger seat, her head turning to follow his movements. Wyatt opened the trunk, found an old, soiled towel used for wiping off his bat during drizzly games, and also took out the bat itself.