Chris Crutcher - Whale Talk

“Why can’t we just meet in my room after school, or during your study hall?”

“Because the best I could get there is that wretched fried egg sandwich your wife sends with you. Why don’t you tell her how cold and hard that thing gets?”

We meet at a little Italian place he likes, which I’m sure he thought would intimidate me because the menu is hard to read and most of the diners dress relatively well. Guess again. My father and I have a common tie, and I can turn it and a shirt and a pair of Dockers into a G.Q . thing for sure.

Simet orders a glass of wine and a Coke for me. “So why are you plaguing me? And whatever happened to pizza?”

“Pseudo-Italian,” I tell him. “It doesn’t cost enough.”

He reaches over and grips my triceps. “You getting into shape?”

“Against all odds,” I say. “Getting in five to six thousand yards.”

“Are the other guys showing up?”

I assure him they are. “I’m working some with Chris; getting him used to the idea of being on a team and getting on a schedule. I’m worried about what he’ll do the first time he hears a starter gun.”

“What about DeLong and Mott?”

“Haven’t seen Mott yet.” I don’t tell him it’s to my relief. You never know what Mott is thinking, whether he’s simply feeling ornery-a natural state for him-or if he’s plotting a mass murder. “Simon’s there like clockwork.” I shake my head in wonder. “He’s the only guy I’ve ever seen who can raise the water level in a swimming pool.” I take a long drink. “We still need to talk about letter requirements.”

“I told you not to worry, you’ll get your letter.”

“Yeah, but I’m thinking about the other guys.”

Simet says, “We can make it a particular number of points. A first place gets you five. Second is three and third is one. You can swim three individual events or two individuals and a relay. Let’s say you earn a letter if you average two points per meet.”

I consider our personnel. Most of them won’t beat anyone on the other team and will only pick up third-place points in the events I’m not swimming or in events where the other team swims only one swimmer. I say, “How about just if they don’t drown?”

Simet laughs. “Somewhere between lies a compromise. We’ve got time to think about it. We have to be careful; the athletic department has a lot of pride at this school, and a lot of clout. The letter jacket is the ultimate prize. I’m going to have to be judicious if I want respect in the coaching fraternity.” He is only half joking.

“Well,” I say, “somehow we have to put it within reach.”

There is something seriously messed up about Rich Marshall being around as much as he is. Since he’s now the head guy at Marshall Logging, he seems able to take off as much time as he wants to play school, which he’s been doing to some degree since the year after he graduated. I mean, the guy never left, was roaming the halls back when I was a freshman. I understand why the football coaches want him around; he was a real monster when he played, and he’s a good guy to introduce psychopathy to the other players. But he also volunteers in PE classes sometimes, which puts him in the halls during the regular school day way more than I’d like. He’s kind of a cross between a kid and an adult, and I mean that in the least flattering terms of either. You see him in the coaches’ room being treated like an assistant, but you also see him hanging out between classes with Barbour and the more arrogant members of the football team. A couple of times I’ve caught him staring at me with the same look he had when I wore my bloody T-shirt to school, and he makes continual references to the fact that they could sure use me out there on the football field, if I had the heart for it. He also remarked recently on the number of black guys in the swimming hall of fame. Because of the deer incident my freshman year, my parents have offered to raise hell that he’s there at all, but I don’t want that. Hey, when he’s here, at least I know where he is.

And now he’s popping up in even more corners of my life. I stop by Georgia Brown’s house after workout a few days after my conversation with Simet about the letter jackets, just to see what’s going on. She doesn’t answer the door, but I have walk-in privileges, so I snatch some Gatorade out of the fridge, turn on Sports Center, and make myself comfortable on the couch. Within seconds, big commotion spills down from upstairs, which tells me Georgia’s in the thick of a therapy session, and I sneak a few steps up to see if I can get a glimpse into the playroom. Georgia sees me through the stair railing and motions me on up.

Play therapy, as practiced by Georgia Brown, is done live and full scale, meaning she will drag in anybody available to play the roles that allow the kids to work out their life traumas. Most times I’m a bad dad they want to tie up and put in prison, so my job is to struggle and struggle and never get loose while still protecting my nuts. As I said before, I’ve been on the other end of this, so I never refuse.

Inside the playroom a girl of about four or five, with almost my exact coloring, plays with dolls. Georgia whispers, “This is Heidi. Think we’re gonna need a bad dad here.”

Heidi has dragged a plastic basket full of dolls to the middle of the room, where she sorts them by color, placing the fair-skinned ones into cradles, tucking them in tenderly, singing bits of lullabies. The darker-skinned dolls don’t fare so well; flung across the room, stuffed behind toy appliances, some beheaded or otherwise dismembered. She looks up.

“This is T. J.,” Georgia says to her. Heidi looks at me, through me, and turns her attention back to the white dolls. She sings, urges Georgia to do the same. Occasionally she glances at me but quickly turns away, gives the dolls bottles, nurtures them like a nurse.

Suddenly she stands and marches right to me, grabbing my hand. She says, “You be the bad dad.” I’ve played it frequently, know the role. Interesting that the kids all use the same term.

I say, “Okay, I’m the bad dad.”

“Find all the nigger dolls,” she says.

Georgia nods.

“You mean the dark-colored ones?”

“The nigger dolls!” she screams at me.

Georgia nods again.

I say, “The nigger dolls.” I retrieve two.

“Scream,” Heidi orders.

“What should I scream?”

“Stupid black bitch!”

“What?”

“Stupid bitch!” she yells again. “Black bitch!”

Again Georgia nods. I don’t like this particular bad dad role.

I look at a doll, raise my voice, and call it a stupid black bitch.

“Me!” Heidi screams. “Yell it at me!” She turns to Georgia. “Make him do it right!”

In a calm voice Georgia tells me I’m supposed to yell at Heidi for letting the black dolls in the house, and I finally piece together from Heidi that I’m also supposed to find them one by one, scream at Heidi for letting each one in (“Get these nigger babies out the house! They stinky!”), and throw them out, and it wouldn’t hurt if I kicked or punched them while I’m at it. It’s a lot easier to hear that word than to say it to a little kid, because I know the impact when you aren’t steeled against it. But Georgia knows what she’s doing.

As I get deeper into my role, Heidi turns back to the white babies, tucking them tighter, rocking them as she rocks herself, never engaging me unless I lose zeal for my task.

I find the last doll crammed inside an igloo dog house Georgia has turned into a cave for some other kid and jerk it out by the arm, open the door to the hallway, and fling it, only to see someone disappearing down the stairs. I am caught for one moment in mid-scream, but Heidi screams, “GET THESE GODDAMN FUCK NIGGER KIDS OUT THE HOUSE!!!” and the dead come alive and I am back in business. I hear the front door slam.