Jim Shepard - Kiss of the Wolf

“Where’re you going?” she asked Todd. Her voice was a little high.

Todd said he was going to show Brendan his stuff.

“In the car?” his mother said. Did Brendan have to see it now? She started to get up.

But Brendan was already in the garage. He went right to the backseat and opened the door and pulled out the lacrosse helmet. On the floor next to it, he found the Viking helmet.

Todd kept trying to lead him out of the garage. Brendan kept pulling free and going, I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about the Viking helmet. He put the lacrosse helmet on the hood and tried to pull the Viking helmet onto his head. Todd could see the dent on the bumper right below the lacrosse helmet.

His mother put her hand on his shoulder. She asked if they didn’t want to get out into the sun instead of hanging around the damp, smelly garage. She gave his shoulder a squeeze.

“Let’s get out and look at it in the sun,” he said.

Brendan was having trouble getting the helmet over his ears, even though it was a large and it was the real thing. He sat up on the hood of the car and held the helmet in front of him by the earholes.

Todd squeezed around to the front and stood by the dented bumper. He wasn’t sure what to do with his hands. His mother headed back outside.

“Todd, are you coming out?” she asked.

He reached for Brendan, who pulled his arm away. “Let’s sit in the grass,” Todd said.

“In a minute ,” Brendan said. The helmet was halfway on and was squeezing his head like a grape.

“Todd,” Joanie said.

“ Ma —” Todd said. She left the doorway.

“So can you give me a ride Wednesday night?” Brendan wanted to know. He pulled the helmet all the way on and snapped the chin strap. It made his face skinny. He looked around, enjoying the view through the facemask.

“A ride to what?” Todd asked, distracted.

“ Ad Altare Dei, ” Brendan said. He was playing with his wristbands. He and Todd always wore wristbands. They thought it was cool. Todd wasn’t wearing his. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Oh, God,” Joanie said, outside the garage. She was out of sight around the corner.

Ad Altare Dei was the religious medal Todd had signed up to go for. All the old altar boys had. You were eligible right after confirmation. It meant “to the altar of God.” It was like six weeks of classroom work at night about the Scriptures and catechism, and then interviews with your priest and the bishop, and if you passed you got a medal. They gave it out at a ceremony in front of the whole diocese.

“What’d you, forget?” Brendan said. “Wednesday night’s the first night.” He was whapping himself on the side of the helmet with his open palm.

“You look sick,” Brendan said. “You gonna yack?”

“I gotta get outside,” Todd said. “You can stay in here.”

He left the garage and sat in the grass. The grass was warm, but the damp came through his pants immediately. He imagined Brendan in there alone, in his Minnesota Viking helmet, noticing something, looking closer at the front bumper.

Nina’s car cruised up the driveway, popping gravel on the blacktop. Audrey stood up in the garden and trotted over, barking.

Todd’s mother put her hand to the back of her neck. “Just what I need right now,” she said.

Brendan came out of the garage.

Nina rolled her window down. She drove with the windows up, even if it was 104 out. She worried about getting colds in places like her ears.

“J’ou hear what happened?” she called to Joanie. She was leaning her head out the window and squinting. Audrey came over to the car and put her front paws up on the door, licking the air near Nina’s face.

Todd’s mother returned her hand to her side. Her eyes reacted.

“No, what happened?” she said. She turned back to the garden, like she expected to hear Nina say they called off the sale at Stop and Shop.

Nina said it was terrible. Tommy Monteleone: they killed him out on Route 110. Somebody, hit-and-run.

Todd stood there. His armpits sweated.

Brendan sat in the grass next to him. He was trying to eat a KitKat bar through the facemask instead of under it.

Todd’s mother turned around. When he saw her face, he thought it was all going to come apart right then.

“Tommy Monteleone?” she said. “It wasn’t Tommy Monteleone.” Then she put a hand up to her mouth, as if realizing what she’d done. He looked away. It was like even their mistakes seemed fake, now.

“How do you know? Were you there?” Nina said. She sounded irritated. Todd recognized her tone: nobody ever listens to me.

“Tommy Monteleone?” Joanie asked.

“Not Tommy Tommy the father,” Nina said. “Tommy the son.”

“Little Tommy?” Joanie said.

“Little Tommy,” Nina said. “Tommy Monteleone. Lucia’s son.”

Todd’s mother stood there, her mouth open a little bit. She braced herself with one leg.

“I know. It’s a sin,” Nina said. “Terrible. Just terrible. Let’s go.”

Tommy Monteleone: Todd was trying to picture him. He’d met him twice, maybe, at a wedding and a wake.

She was leaving the car running. What’s the rush? Todd thought. Is he still on the road?

It was another one of those times he imagined God peering down into his soul the way he might peer into an old garbage can.

“I’m going over there now,” Nina said. She revved the car, like she was demonstrating. “Let’s go.”

“Where?” Joanie asked. She shook her head like there was a fly around it. She was still holding the little three-pronged rake.

“Lucia’s,” Nina said. “Are you all right? C’mon. Let’s go.”

“I don’t think I should go,” Joanie said. “Maybe she doesn’t want to be bothered—”

“Get in the car, you don’t think you should go,” Nina said. “The woman’s boy is run over on the street, you don’t want to pay your respects? What do I tell her, you’re working in the garden?”

Joanie looked at the garden and then at Todd. “Isn’t it a little early? They just got the news.”

“They heard last night. We’re not gonna stay long,” Nina said. “Just stop over. I got some soup and some lasagna. They can heat it up.”

“I better change,” Joanie said.

“Go like that,” Nina said.

“I got dirt all over me,” Joanie said. She hurried for the back door. “I’ll be one minute.”

Inside the house, she called, “Todd, get the dog off Nina’s car.”

Todd took Audrey by the collar and pulled her down from the driver’s-side door.

Nina settled back to wait. She put her head against the headrest.

“Is he going to be able to get that helmet off?” she asked, nodding her head at Brendan. “Wait’ll Bruno sees everybody else wearing it but you.”

“How did you hear about Tommy Monteleone?” Todd asked.

“I called Lucia, I was trying to organize a bus trip,” Nina said. “You imagine? I’m calling about that, her son’s dead.”

Todd let go of Audrey’s collar. She shook herself and stretched and drifted back to the grass. “They know who did it?” Todd asked.

“They don’t know. What do they know? I didn’t hear a thing about it on the news,” Nina said. “Put the dog in the house. You gonna go like that?”

“Me?” Todd said. “I’m going?”

“Sure you should go,” Nina said. “It’s not gonna kill you. It’s a nice gesture. She’ll remember. We’re only gonna drop the food off.”

“Brendan’s here, and stuff. Maybe I should stay with him,” Todd said. He felt a rush of air that seemed to start at the top of his head.

Nina peered at him. “Did he just lose a son?” she asked. “What is it with you people today? Don’t start with me. We’re talking five minutes here.”