‘Done on the docks?’
‘All done, and glad of it. Physical labor may be good for the body, but I don’t feel that it ennobles the soul.’
Holly still has trouble meeting the eyes of even her close friends, but she makes an effort and meets Jerome’s. ‘Pete’s all right, Tina’s all right, and their mother is back on her feet. That’s all good, but is Bill all right? Tell me the truth.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ Now it’s Jerome who finds it difficult to maintain eye contact.
‘He’s too thin, for one thing. He’s taken the exercise-and-salads regimen too far. But that’s not what I’m really worried about.’
‘What is?’ But Jerome knows, and isn’t surprised she knows, although Bill thinks he’s kept it from her. Holly has her ways.
She lowers her voice as if afraid of being overheard, although there’s no one within a hundred yards in any direction. ‘How often does he visit him?’
Jerome doesn’t have to ask who she’s talking about. ‘I don’t really know.’
‘More than once a month?’
‘I think so, yes.’
‘Once a week?’
‘Probably not that often.’ Although who can say?
‘Why? He’s …’ Holly’s lips are trembling. ‘Brady Hartsfield is next door to a vegetable!’
‘You can’t blame yourself for that, Holly. You absolutely can’t. You hit him because he was going to blow up a couple of thousand kids.’
He tries to touch her hand, but she snatches it away.
‘I don’t! I’d do it again! Again again again! But I hate to think of Bill obsessing about him. I know from obsession, and it’s not nice!’
She crosses her arms over her bosom, an old self-comforting gesture that she has largely given up.
‘I don’t think it’s obsession, exactly.’ Jerome speaks cautiously, feeling his way. ‘I don’t think it’s about the past.’
‘What else can it be? Because that monster has no future!’
Bill’s not so sure, Jerome thinks, but would never say. Holly is better, but she’s still fragile. And, as she herself said, she knows from obsession. Besides, he has no idea what Bill’s continuing interest in Brady means. All he has is a feeling. A hunch.
‘Let it rest,’ he says. This time when he puts his hand over hers she allows it to stay, and they talk of other things for awhile. Then he looks at his watch. ‘I have to go. I promised to pick up Barbara and Tina at the roller rink.’
‘Tina’s in love with you,’ Holly says matter-of-factly as they walk up the slope to their cars.
‘If she is, it’ll pass,’ he says. ‘I’m heading east, and pretty soon some cute boy will appear in her life. She’ll write his name on her book covers.’
‘I suppose,’ Holly says. ‘That’s usually how it works, isn’t it? I just don’t want you to make fun of her. She’d think you were being mean, and feel sad.’
‘I won’t,’ Jerome says.
They have reached the cars, and once more Holly forces herself to look him full in the face. ‘I’m not in love with you, not the way she is, but I love you quite a lot, just the same. So take care of yourself, Jerome. Some college boys do foolish things. Don’t be one of them.’
This time it’s she who embraces him.
‘Oh, hey, I almost forgot,’ Jerome says. ‘I brought you a little present. It’s a shirt, although I don’t think you’ll want to wear it when you visit your mom.’
He hands her his bag. She takes out the bright red tee and unfolds it. Printed on the front, in black, it shouts:
SHIT DON’T MEAN SHIT
Jimmy Gold
‘They sell them at the City College bookstore. I got it in an XL, in case you want to wear it as a nightshirt.’ He studies her face as she considers the words on the front of the tee. ‘Of course, you can also return it for something else, if you don’t like it.’
‘I like it very much,’ she says, and breaks into a smile. It’s the one Hodges loves, the one that makes her beautiful. ‘And I will wear it when I visit my mother. Just to piss her off.’
Jerome looks so surprised that she laughs.
‘Don’t you ever want to piss your mother off?’
‘From time to time. And Holly … I love you, too. You know that, right?’
‘I do,’ she says, holding the shirt to her chest. ‘And I’m glad. That shit means a lot.’
TRUNK
Hodges walks the path through the undeveloped land from the Birch Street end, and finds Pete sitting on the bank of the stream with his knees hugged to his chest. Nearby, a scrubby tree juts over the water, which is down to a trickle after a long, hot summer. Below the tree, the hole where the trunk was buried has been re-excavated. The trunk itself is sitting aslant on the bank nearby. It looks old and tired and rather ominous, a time traveler from a year when disco was still in bloom. A photographer’s tripod stands nearby. There are also a couple of bags that look like the kind pros carry when they travel.