Ben Fountain - Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

What to call it — the spark of God? Survival instinct? The souped-up computer of an apex brain evolved from eons in the R&D of natural selection? You could practically see the neurons firing in the kid’s skull. His body was all spring and torque, a bundle of fast-twitch muscles that exuded faint floral whiffs of ripe pear. So much perfection in such a compact little person — Billy had to tackle him from time to time, wrestle him squealing to the ground just to get that little rascal in his hands, just your basic adorable thirty-month-old with big blue eyes clear as chlorine pools and Huggies poking out of his stretchy-waist jeans. So is this what they meant by the sanctity of life ? A soft groan escaped Billy when he thought about that, the war revealed in this fresh and gruesome light. Oh. Ugh. Divine spark, image of God, suffer the little children and all that — there’s real power when words attach to actual things. Made him want to sit right down and weep, as powerful as that. He got it, yes he did, and when he came home for good he’d have to meditate on this, but for now it was best to compartmentalize, as they said, or even better not to mentalize at all.

Patty emerged from the house, shading her eyes against the sun. She took a seat on a lawn chair at the edge of the patio.

“You guys having fun?”

“You bet.” Billy was rolling Brian around as if breading a fish filet, coating his sweater with crunchy brown leaves. “He’s an amazing little guy.”

Patty snuffled a laugh around the cigarette she was lighting. Former hell-raiser, high school dropout, teenage bride; in her midtwenties she seemed to have slowed down enough to start thinking about it all.

“He sure doesn’t lack for energy,” Billy called.

“Briny’s got two speeds, fast and shut off.” Her lips produced a tight funnel of smoke.

“How’s Pete?”

“Fine,” she said, a bit wearily it seemed. Her husband, Pete, worked the oil rigs around Amarillo. “Still crazy.”

“Is that good?”

She just smiled and looked away. In Billy’s memory she was always so lithe and bold; now she was packing saddlebags on her hips and thighs, spare tubes on her upper arms. With the extra weight had come an almost palpable air of apology.

“When do you go back?”

“Saturday.”

“You ready?”

“Well.” Billy gave Brian a last roll, and stood. “I guess I’d just as soon stay here.”

Patty laughed. “That sounds like an honest answer.” Billy walked over and sat on the low patio wall near her chair. Brian remained where Billy left him, lying flat on his back, staring up at the sky. Patty cut her brother a shy look. “How does it feel to be famous?”

Billy shrugged. “I wouldn’t know.”

“All right then, sort of famous. A lot more famous than the rest of us’ll ever be.” She had a taste of her cigarette, tapped off the ash. “You know, you sort of surprised a lot of people around here. I don’t think this was what they were expecting when they put you up in front of that judge.”

“I know I didn’t have the best reputation around here. But I wasn’t the worst fuckup in my grade.”

She laughed.

“Or maybe it’s just…”

“What.”

“I just hated school so much, hated everything about it. I’m starting to think that was what was fucked up, a lot more than me? Keeping us locked up all day, treating us like children, making us learn a lot of shit about nothing. I think it made me sort of crazy.”

Patty chuckled, a low gunning of the sinuses. “Well, I guess you showed them. What you did over there—”

Billy hooked his thumbs in his belt loops and looked away.

“—that was something. And we’re all really proud of you, your family. But I guess you already know that.”

Billy tipped his head toward the house. Out here the roar of the TV was an underwater growl. “Not him.”

“No, him too. He just doesn’t know how to show it.”

“He’s an asshole,” Billy said, lowering his voice for Brian’s sake.

“That too,” Patty acknowledged pleasantly. “You notice I was never much interested in hanging around the house? Mainly I just feel sorry for him now. But then I don’t have to live with him, do I.” She shrugged, examined her cigarette. “You heard the latest? About the house?”

“I don’t think so.”

“It’s kind of fucked.” She did that gunning chuckle again, a nervous habit. Billy wished she’d stop. Out in the yard Brian was sweeping his arms and legs back and forth, making leaf angels.

“Mom wants to take a loan out on the house. She says there’s a hundred, hundred ten equity in it, she wants to use that to pay down the medical bills. Kathryn looked into it and she’s like, no way, you can file for bankruptcy and wipe out most of the medical bills, plus you get to keep the house. But if she does the equity loan and then can’t make the payments, she and dad lose the house. And even with the money from the equity loan, they’re still gonna owe a ton of medical bills.”

A ton. Define ton. Billy was afraid to ask. Random neighborhood sounds came their way — a dog barking, a car door slamming somewhere, a stack of two-by-fours clattering to the ground.

“What do you think she should do?”

“No-brainer, dude. File for bankruptcy and keep the house.”

“So why won’t she?”

“Because she’s worried what everybody else might think. And Kat and me are like, who gives a flyer what people think, you can’t gamble the house.” Patty crushed her cigarette against the patio wall. “You know what Idis McArthur told her after church one day?”

“No.”

“She said the reason our family’s had so many problems is because we didn’t pray hard enough.”

“Well, isn’t that special.”

“It’s a sick little town,” Patty agreed.

“Hey”—Kathryn poked her head out the door—“anybody want a beer?”

They did, though until that moment they hadn’t realized. For the rest of the morning his mother and sisters kept asking him what he wanted to do. See a movie? Drive around? Go out to eat? But this was enough, just chilling on a warm Indian-summer day, a sweet abeyance in the golden tone of the light and nothing to do but sit in lawn chairs or sprawl on blankets and let the morning lazily take its course. Two years ago Billy couldn’t have done this, the very notion of family time would have sent him running down the street tearing off his clothes. I am a changed man, Billy solemnly told himself. The person you see before you is not the person you were. Maybe it’s age, he thought, leaning back on his blanket, watching the sun do its stately pinwheel through the trees. Or maybe not so much a function of calendar days as the way Iraq aged you in dog years, and how with that kind of time under your belt you could bide here in the company of your mother and sisters and somewhat hyper little nephew and be, if not exactly calm, then still. Taking it slow and letting it be what it would be. Perhaps this was what came of being a soldier in Iraq, and the farther perspective war brought to things.

He had a beer now and then, nothing major. Ray stayed inside with the TV and that was fine with everybody, though whenever he wanted something, which was often, he’d wheel to the storm door and thump the glass until Denise or Patty or Kathryn rose to serve his needs. Worse than an infant, Kathryn observed, and when Patty pointed out no diapers were involved, Kathryn said, Don’t give him any ideas. A few of the neighbors got word of Billy’s visit and dropped by with cakes and casseroles, as if there’d been a death in the family. Mr. and Mrs. Wiggins from church. Opal George from across the street. The Kruegers. We are so proud. We always knew. So brave, so blessed, so honored. Edwin! I yelled, come quick! Billy Lynn’s on TV and he’s taking out a whole mess of al-Qaedas! Nice people but they did go on, and so fierce about the war! They were transformed at such moments, talking about war — their eyes bugged out, their necks bulged, their voices grew husky with bloodlust. Billy wondered about them then, the piratical appetites in these good Christian folk, or maybe this was just their way of being polite, of showing how much they appreciated him. So he smiled his modest hero’s smile and waited for them to leave so he and his sisters could go back to drinking beer. After her third of the morning — she was keeping pace with Billy — Kathryn pranced out of the house with his Purple Heart pinned over her left breast and the Silver Star pinned over her right, the medals flopping around like stripper’s tassels. Billy and Patty howled, but their mother was not amused. “What? Oh, these?” Kathryn answered in a ditzy coo when Denise asked just what she thought she was doing. “Why, Mother, I’m merely displaying the family jewels .” Denise pronounced the whole thing indecent and ordered Kathryn to return the medals to Billy’s room, but she was still sporting the hardware when Mr. Whaley stopped by, and it was worth virtually any amount of money to see this eminence’s eyes bug out at the sight of Kathryn, not just the medals riding high on her proud perky breasts but the whole tanned, taut, leggy length of her.