All Good Children - Catherine Austen [20]
I jog to my old neighborhood and greet Dr. Richmond with a shining smile. He grunts and opens the door just wide enough for my shoulders to pass.
Austin jumps off the couch and towers over me with his fist raised. His father snickers in my ear. As the fist heads toward my jaw, I duck, so Austin punches his father in the throat. Dr. Richmond explodes in coughing and profanity.
I flee to Dallas’s room, smiling all the way.
“Hi, Max. Did you do your drawings?” Dallas sits behind a massive metal desk, diagrams lit up before him, preparing for a future of leadership and advancement. He shows me his progress on the respiratory system, and I open what I have on circulation.
Austin is kicked out of the living room, so he loiters outside Dallas’s door, calling us faggots. I can’t concentrate through his idiocy.
“You should augment your memory,” Dallas says.
“No way. It wastes the adolescent brain. Kids in the trials are recalls now. Even the meds are dangerous. Remember when you tried them?”
He laughs. “Remember my dad?” He duplicates his father’s scowl and wags his finger. “‘There’s always an adjustment period. This behavior is perfectly normal.’”
“I thought you were going to die,” I say. “You were demented. You wouldn’t shut up about your hallucinations.”
He shakes his head at the memory. “Thank god Mom let me stop.”
“You don’t need meds, Dallas. Your brain is supreme.”
“Yours too, Max.”
“Parents always make you do more than you have to. I pull nineties with moderate effort, but that’s not good enough for Mom. I should exhaust myself for hundreds.”
“No kidding. Dad would do anything to make me more employable. He won’t stop pushing until I break.”
“It bleeds,” I say. “It’s not natural. We shouldn’t have to try harder.”
Austin pounds on the bedroom door. “Help, guys!” he shouts. “I’m stuck!”
Dallas opens his door to his giant brother, who’s bending over with his pants down, laughing maniacally.
“Then again,” I say, “maybe some of us are not trying hard enough.”
It’s raining as Ally and I walk to school. She hangs her head and looks for drowning worms. She’s happy, but it saddens me. She’s at the mercy of a merciless world. If she had to cross a river and a crocodile said, “Step on me. I’m a log,” she’d say, “Really? You look like a crocodile.” “No, no,” he’d say, “I’m a log. Step on me and you’ll see.” And off she’d go, never to be seen again.
I keep her company outside the school, holding her umbrella while she saves one last worm.
I don’t carry an umbrella for myself. I’ll take my hood down when I get near school because hoods are not fit, but I wear it on the road to protect my hair.
Unfortunately, it blocks my peripheral vision so I don’t see Tyler Wilkins and his goons sneak up behind me. They grab me tight, Washington on one arm and some grade nine beast on the other. I drop Ally’s umbrella. I’m so startled I barely have time to exhale before Tyler hits me in the gut.
I come up fast and furious. Instead of struggling away, like they expect, I lean into Washington to get some leeway for my arm, then I elbow him in the throat. He lets go fast, freeing my hand to grab the head of the grade nine goon and jerk it forward into the spot where Tyler’s next punch is aimed. Kapow. I’m like a movie star. Then Ally’s umbrella trips me up so I take another shot from Tyler.
That makes me mad. I kick Tyler’s kneecap as hard as I can, twice. He squeals and falls forward. I ram my knee into his jaw. His head cracks back with a sound that cuts through my frenzy.
Ally screams.
I grab Tyler’s throat, partly to be tough but mostly to make sure his head doesn’t fall off in front of my little sister. I look him in the eye and say, “There’s not going to be a next time. If you need more than two guys to take me down, it’s time to give up.” From the regurgitated crap of Xavier’s damaged movies come the words, “There’s no honor in this for you.”
Tyler’s goons stand back. Washington holds his throat, and the other boy staunches a nosebleed.
I shake the rain from my face and pull Tyler to his