Jim Shepard - Project X

The sixth-graders hanging around the baseball backstop see us coming and keep an eye on us. Hermie’s not around and we don’t feel like asking anybody where he is. Flake heads off to the front of the building and sure enough, we find him there in a tree.

“What’s up, Screw the System?” Flake calls up to him.

“Nothing,” Hermie says. He’s trying for nonchalant but he’s happy and worried that we came looking for him.

This was a bad move, I realize, standing there. Now whenever he wants our attention he’ll go back to the gun thing. I put my hands in my pockets and there’s a hole I never noticed. Two fingers go through to my leg.

Most of the leaves are still on the tree so when he moves his expression’s hard to see. He’s trying to climb but you can hear his sneakers slipping on the bark. Little twigs and dead leaves float down like snowflakes.

“Are those lights on your sneakers?” Flake goes.

Hermie doesn’t answer him.

“Hear you’re still having trouble with that kid,” Flake goes.

“What kid?” Hermie says.

“You want our help or not?” Flake asks him.

“What’re you going to do?” Hermie asks him back.

I look at Flake. I’m a little curious myself.

“We’ll deal with it,” Flake goes.

There’s a big slipping sound and Hermie falls a few feet. A couple heavy branches swing a little. “Ow,” he goes. I can see him rubbing something. “Why’re you guys helping me ?” he asks.

“That’s what we do,” Flake goes. He holds up both his bandaged fingers to the school. “We help people.”

Hermie laughs.

“I say something funny?” Flake goes.

“Yeah,” Hermie says.

“So point him out to us,” Flake goes.

“What’re you going to do, poke him in the eye with your bandage?” I ask. He gives me a look.

“I hurt my butt,” Hermie complains.

“That’s the bell,” Flake goes, though I didn’t hear it. “Show us who this kid is after school.”

“I think I broke my butt,” Hermie says.

Flake jogs to the front doors and I follow him. “I know how that feels,” I call back to Hermie.

“Hey, help me get down,” Hermie shouts, right before the doors shut behind us.

Flake and I get a chance to talk between second and third periods.

“We gotta only talk about the kid,” Flake goes. “If we talk about the gun, it’ll make it a big deal.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” I tell him. He nods. “But we can’t go beating up sixth-graders,” I tell him. He nods again, like he thought of that, too.

He’s kind of a hero for the rest of the day because word gets out that when they took the class picture for the eighth grade, homeroom by homeroom on the bleachers in the gym, at the last minute he held up both his bandaged fingers. Everybody’s figuring it’ll come out in the photos. Everybody’s coming up to him in the halls and congratulating him, even ninth-graders and assholes like Dickhead and Weensie. After school he’s in a really good mood.

“Hear you gave them the finger in the photos,” Hermie says when he finds us outside. The buses are starting to fill up.

“Yeah, whatever,” Flake goes. “So where is this kid?”

“Over here,” Hermie says, and leads us two buses over. He points to a kid sitting in the back window. He doesn’t try to hide that he’s pointing him out to us.

“Him?” Flake goes. The kid looks smaller than Hermie, if that’s possible. “I can barely see his head in the window.”

“I didn’t say he was a giant,” Hermie says, insulted. “I said he beats me up.”

Flake looks at me like somebody’s asking us to gang up on Gus. “We’re on the job,” he goes to Hermie. “Mr. Hermie’s sleeping well from tomorrow night on.”

“Herman,” Hermie tells him.

“Herman,” Flake tells him back.

“So listen,” Flake says to Budzinski once we get him alone. After we found his house we watched him shoot baskets with some of his tiny friends. They hacked around for an hour and a half and I think they made three baskets. They saw us watching. When the other kids finally left we walked over. Budzinski took one more sad hook shot and then put the basketball away and came out of the garage with a hammer.

“Feel like driving some nails?” Flake goes.

“What do you want?” Budzinski says.

“Can I see that?” I ask him, like I’ve never seen a hammer before. Budzinki hands it over.

So the three of us are standing in his driveway with me holding his hammer. Somebody looks out the window screen near the back door.

I hold up the hammer like that’s the reason we came over. “This is a beaut,” I tell him.

“So listen,” Flake goes.

“I’m listening,” Budzinski tells him.

They look at each other.

Flake makes this grin like he wants to pound the kid’s head in. “You know that kid Herman?” he asks.

Budzinski just looks at him.

“About your size?” Flake asks.

“Yeah,” Budzinski finally goes.

“He’s a friend of ours,” Flake tells him.

“Yeah?” Budzinski says. He sounds interested.

“Well, we watch out for him sometimes,” Flake goes. “He’s such a doofy little shit.”

“You got that right,” Budzinski says. He looks like he’s trying to decide whether or not to laugh at us. If he does Flake’ll take the hammer out of my hand and kill him right in his own driveway.

“He can be a pain in the ass sometimes,” Flake goes.

“You got that right, too,” Budzinski tells him.

“We were hoping you’d cut him some slack for the next few weeks,” Flake says.

“Why should I?” Budzinski goes.

“Because if you don’t we’ll kick your ass,” Flake tells him.

“I’ll kick your ass,” Budzinski tells him back.

The top of the kid’s head comes up to like Flake’s armpit. “Is the whole sixth grade fucking nuts?” Flake asks me.

“Get out of my yard,” Budzinski goes. “Mom!” he calls.

“What’s the matter?” his mother says from behind the screen in the window.

“Get outta my yard,” Budzinski goes again.

“We tried to ask you nice,” Flake tells him.

“I’m calling the police,” Budzinski’s mother says through the screen.

“Call the police,” Flake tells her. “Call the fucking National Guard.”

“Don’t you talk to me like that,” his mother says. She leaves the window and shows up at the back door. “What’s your name?”

“Ed Gein,” Flake tells her. “Tell the police Ed Gein was here and that he wants your son.”

“And what’s your name?” she says to me.

“Richard Speck,” I tell her.

“Gimme my hammer back,” Budzinski tells me.

I throw it into the yard.

“Asshole,” he goes.

“I’m dialing,” his mother says from inside the house.

The garbage cans at the end of the driveway are empty but Flake kicks them over anyway.

“That didn’t work out too well,” I tell him on the way home.

“Now he’s really gonna go after Hermie,” Flake says to himself.

I just keep walking. The hole in my pocket is bigger.

“Fucking cocksucking motherfucking dickbag dildo cuntsuckers,” Flake goes.

I don’t have much to say to that so I let it go. He makes the same point a few more times on the way home.

“We gotta move our thing up,” he finally says, right before I head off for my house.

“I know,” I go.

“We gotta pick a time,” he tells me.

“I know,” I go. My insides are screwed up thinking about it.

“Come over tomorrow night,” he goes.

“Yeah,” I go. And it feels like summer vacation was over just because somebody said so.