The Boys of McKinley House
Chapter Three—Iodine
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The night was getting colder, and Jack was having a little trouble getting into the school.
The locks appeared to be frozen, but that couldn't be right. It was September. Things didn't get so cold out here this early; temperatures were arctic back home, but that was to be expected. Even in the middle of summer, the door to West 81st street sometimes froze solid overnight. Here, though, things had never been that bad.
Jack was, he admitted to himself now, a little inebriated. Maybe more than a little, to be perfectly honest. It was one o'clock in the morning on the first day of classes and Jack was slumped against the door to McKinley house. He had his rooming assignment, he had his key, he had his suitcase. He just couldn't get inside. And he could have sworn that, just a minute ago, it had started snowing.
He was on his knees, pounding at the door and howling at the gates, when she showed up like a vision. She was just as he remembered: calm, composed, and flawlessly, icily, immaculately pretty. It was past midnight and she was just returning to the school, had probably had just as much to drink as he had, but she wasn't even flushed. Her face never betrayed a thing.
"Jack Kelly," she said, by way of greeting. In the years he had known her she had never called him by anything but his whole name, as if she was reading it from the gossip pages of the Post.
"Now what's a badly behaved boy like you doing in a place like this?" she asked. "Haven't they kicked you out yet?"
"Hello, Benny," he sighed.
She smiled at him in that smooth, metallic way of hers. Her hair was white gold, tied back with a green velvet ribbon.
"I can't get in," he explained lamely. "The door won't open, so I can't get in." He paused, thinking a moment. "Hey, how the hell are you planning on getting into your room, anyway? It's not like you have a key to the fucking house door, or something."
"Actually, it's exactly like I have a key to the fucking house door."
"Oh."
"Ms. Larsen gave me one. Since I spend so many late nights studying in the library."
"Jesus, Benny, when was the last time you were in the library?"
"Exactly." She leaned against the side of McKinley house, playing with the open parts of the trellis that ran up the wall, and glanced down at Jack. Jack turned his attention again to trying to open the door, mainly so he wouldn't have to look at her.
"You know," she said, as if it had just occurred to her, "you can always stay with me tonight. My roommate Colleen's parents aren't leaving town until tomorrow and she's staying in Portland with them tonight—you'll have a bed, if you need it. Or at least we'll have some privacy."
Jack looked up at her for a long moment. When he was first introduced to her, he had thought she was the most spoiled, self-absorbed, cruel, contemptible, manipulative, loathsome girl he had ever met. Two years as her acquaintance had only served to strengthen that conviction. The last thing he wanted to do, on this miserable first evening back, was spend the night with someone like Benny Kittridge.
But at the same time, he was struck, suddenly, with a memory of a long ago April morning: he and Benny in bed, her arms around his shoulders, her head against his neck. It was a Sunday, and they were both skipping Easter chapel to stay in his room, the sun pouring in through the window, the sound of the church bells as they rang echoing across the misty school grounds.
At that moment, sitting on the front steps, drunk and miserable, he hated Benny Kittridge more than he could even describe. But on such a bitter, freezing night, how could he afford to reject whatever chill comfort she might give him?
She reached out a hand to help him up; he took it, and found that her fingers were frozen as well as the locks on the doors. He kissed her on her forehead, her cheeks, her temple, her neck, until finally, impatient, she pulled him down and kissed him, hard, on the mouth. After a moment, he pulled away, bewildered, wondering if he should ask her if he felt to her as cold as she did to him, and whether it would be impolite to ask this girl if she really was made of ice. He settled for the next best thing.
"You are beautiful," he said.
She smiled, silent, wound her fingers through his own, and began to lead him down the path to the secret world in which she lived. As they stumbled through the darkness, she whispered something he couldn't hear over the hiss of the stars.
"What did you say?" he asked.
She laughed, her voice cool and soft. "I said, 'You've got a minute left to fall in love.'"
Jack closed his eyes, and let her lead him through the dark.
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Daniel Slocombe, Jack's roommate on the third floor of McKinley house, had tousled hair, a wide, white smile, and the kind of elegant, languid charm that was reserved exclusively for Southern boys. He came from a prominent Savannah family--his mother, Dutton Sutherland Slocombe, had been Miss Soybean Festival in 1959 and Miss Liberty in 1960, and his father, Alexander Slocombe, was a UGA football star turned defense lawyer who was now one of the most sought-after litigators in all of Georgia. Daniel himself was a third-generation Caldwell boy who, in addition to taking a full course load, played defense on the school lacrosse team, volunteered at the local crisis hotline center, was editor of the Bysting, Caldwell's literary magazine, and played the piano beautifully with the school jazz band. He was applying early to Duke that fall, and everyone who knew him was certain he would get in.
Daniel was the perfect student, the perfect son, and the perfect gentleman, and he handled everything he went through with such an easy grace that, when he finally began to crack up, later than year, no one would realize it until it was almost too late. His teachers called him Mr. Slocombe, his parents called him Danny, and his brother called him Babe. But among the boys of McKinley house, he was known, always, as Skittery.
He could handle anything from looming deadlines to final exams, but there was one person around whom his resolve collapsed, and his spine turned to pineapple Jell-O. Bryce Dawson, his girlfriend for the last two years, was tall, slender, and delicate, with fine dark hair, green eyes, and one of most difficult dispositions in the state of Georgia. Behind her back, Skittery's friends called her the Vamp of Savannah. At her best, she was warm, kind, clever, and unstintingly devoted to those she loved; at her worst, she was short-tempered, jealous, and almost impossible to please.
Being in love with Bryce, Skittery liked to say, was like living in a country that was going through a period of political turmoil; Nicaragua was one of the most beautiful places in the world, but to stay in the middle all that beauty, you had to live with all the violence and danger as well, and say goodbye to a life of safety. Skittery loved the beauty enough to stay. Some of the most concussively perfect moments in life, he said, could be found sitting on one of the white-sand beaches of the Nicaraguan coast, drinking a mai tai, and enjoying the sound of the waves crashing down on the shore in the momentary silences between blasts of machine gun fire.
Jack could tell, though, the moment he walked into their room that morning, that is was not a good day for Central American politics. Skittery was sitting on the edge of his bed, a cigarette one hand, the telephone in the other, whispering uneasily into the receiver. From this evidence alone, Jack knew there was only person his roommate could be talking to: for one thing, there was only one person in the world who could make him this on-edge. For another thing, Skittery had the luxury of turning his Southern accent on and off, his voice generic Midwestern inflection when he was at school, but whenever he talked to someone back home, it came straight back. Right now, he sounded like Ashley Wilkes.
"Yes, honey, I know this is your entrance into womanhood…yes…I know the timing can't be changed. That's the thing. The date for my final exams can't be changed either. And if I don't take them because I'm down at the Judge's house drinking champagne and wearing out my dancing shoes with you, then I can't graduate…do you see my point?" He paused, sighing, and leaned back.
Stepping forward, Jack rapped lightly on the doorjamb. Skittery looked up, and smiled tiredly. "The Vamp of Savannah," he whispered, holding the receiver away from his mouth. Jack dropped his suitcase by the door, and collapsed on his narrow bed, kicking off his shoes as he listened in on his roommate's conversation.
"No, honey, I didn't say a word…yes…I know a girl's coming out party is the most important time in her life. Uh huh. Uh huh. I'm sure any other boy in Savannah society would be happy to dance with you on your first night as a woman…I—…oh, honey, don't say that."
It was early morning, just a little after five o' clock, and still dark as night. Jack had woken up early in Benny's bed and slipped out while she was still asleep, making his way back to McKinley house, sure that he could sneak in while his roommate was still asleep. If Skittery had been talking to anyone else this early in the morning, Jack would have been surprised; but since it was Bryce, it somehow seemed like the most natural thing in the world.
It was eight o' clock in the morning in Savannah, and Jack could just picture Bryce sitting in her ruffled pink bedroom, half in and out of the uniform she wore to the Mercer School, holding the receiver against her bare shoulder and trying to cut Skittery's heart out across national long-distance phone line 22017. She was probably telling him now about the blue velvet dress she was going to wear, the same one her grandmother had worn to her own coming out party when she was a debutante in Charlottesville in 1928; about how her father had used his last favor with Big Tony Wojciechowsky to hire the best caterers in the state of Georgia, who would be serving, for example, two hundred puff pastry triangles stuffed with curried walnut chicken, and a Lady Baltimore cake with boiled icing and candied violets, seven layers high, with lemon and raspberry filling; about how she had been taking dance classes in the box step and fox trot and waltz ever since she was a little girl in preparation for this very event; and about how, most importantly, if he didn't show up, she would be snatched up in a space of five minutes by more deserving boy, and Skittery would never see her again.
Dropping the receiver into its cradle, Skittery groaned and collapsed on his bed. After a few moments he raised his head, and looked at Jack with one eye.
"Do you think I could get a good rate down to Savannah if I was flying during the Christmas season?" he asked, his speech already coming out in clipped Yankee consonants. "Bryce's party is on the ninth of December."
"You can probably find a decent price if you book soon," Jack said. "TWA isn't usually too expensive."
"Thank you," Skittery sighed. "So how was Benny?"
Jack stared at him, startled. "How did you know?"
"Jack," Skittery said wearily, heaving himself off the bed, "you look like you've just come back from watching an execution. I've only ever met two girls who can do that to a man. One of them is Bryce, who, despite what she claims, would never make anyone but me miserable, and who I have just talked to on the phone and know for a fact is in a different time zone and therefore could not have spent the night with you.The other one is Benny Kittridge."
"Oh," said Jack.
"Also," Skittery said over his shoulder, turning from the mirror where he was knotting his tie, "you have her lipstick all over your collar. Apricot Dream, I believe. She wore the same kind when she pounced me last January, and she doesn't strike me as the kind of girl who would change the color of her lipstick without a good reason."
"That lipstick tube has probably lasted longer than any relationship she's ever had," Jack muttered.
"Or any relationship you've had, for that matter," Skittery said, coming to sit next to Jack on his bed. "I often wonder why you don't get together. You have so much in common."
"You know, Skitts, despite my entire—what's the word?—personality, I like to think that I at least have some kind of heart, no matter how ruined it might be by now."
"You're a swell guy," said Skittery. "Honest."
"Thanks," he said. "So, did your Nicaraguan sweetheart wake up everyone else on the third floor? I'd like to maybe talk to someone who doesn't have me completely figured out."
"They're all at the Ironside," said Skittery, slipping into his blazer.
"God, this early?"
"Don't we usually go down this early? It opens at five, classes start a little before eight…there's a certain window you have to shoot for if you want one of those twelve-egg omelets."
The Ironside Café was a restaurant on the outskirts of St. Helens, situated on highway thirty between Pacific Pride commercial fueling and Portland Windustrial. It had absolutely no redeeming features, but on any morning, just after daylight, a Caldwell boy could probably be found there, sitting at the counter eating a slice of rhubarb pie and trying to get a date from Audrey Kaplan, the good waitress, or buried in a booth by the window, a plate of scrambled eggs at his elbow, working on a long-overdue paper for Kloppman's history class while Rexanne Krakowski, the bad waitress, leaned over his shoulder and whispered to him about the battle of Bull Run and the burning of Atlanta while she refilled his coffee. (Rexanne was a bad waitress mainly because she always seemed to know more about what Caldwell students were learning than the Caldwell students themselves.) Racetrack, who lived with his family in a house on Pittsburg road, went there almost every morning before school, and had done the unspeakable in striking up a friendship with Rexanne, the bad waitress, and her townie boyfriend, Spot. Jack would bet anything that it had been Racetrack's idea to go there this morning.
"I can't remember the last time anybody went on the first day of classes," Jack said. "Nobody usually gets that desperate to leave the school until at least two weeks in."
"Well, there's a new junior Race wants to show around. Marshall Taylor scholarship, from New York I think."
"God, another scholarship." Jack lay back onto his bed. "Did you meet him?"
"Yesterday. I didn't really talk to him at all."
"And?"
"I could tell you things about his socks."
"Another scholarship," Jack concluded.
"Another scholarship. Anyway, a Race came up right after Bryce called, and a bunch of them went to the Ironside for breakfast—Blink, Mush, Specs, Snitch, and the new kid, uh…Davey. That was it." He paused. "I'm going down there. You want to come with?"
Jack looked up at Skittery from his bed. "The thing I want most right now," he said, "is to sleep for just a couple more hours. I'm hoping that, by the time I wake up, I can feel capable of spending another year in this place."
"I'll bring you back some toast," Skittery said.
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It's hard to look sexy in mustard yellow, but she did.
Standing behind the counter at the Ironside café was the most beautiful girl Racetrack had ever seen in a waitress's uniform. Her reddish-gold hair was knotted at the nape of her neck, and she was laughing at something as she reached into a glass case to pull out a donut for a customer.
"Rexanne," said Racetrack, "you see the donut that waitress over there is holding?"
"Yeah?"
"It's my heart."
"It's a cruller, Race."
Racetrack sighed and handed her his menu. "I'll have the blue plate special."
"Of course." She turned to David. "And you?"
"Oh—I'll just have some coffee."
"He'll have the blue plate special."
"Really, just coffee would be fine—"
"What kind of toast you want with that special?" Rexanne asked, looking up from her notepad.
"Oh…wheat, I guess…"
As the rest of them—Blink, Mush, Snitch, and Specs—ordered, and began to talk amongst themselves, Racetrack turned his attention back to the most beautiful waitress in the world. She had to be new to the job; for as long as Race could remember, Rexanne and Audrey had be the only waitresses grateful or hard up enough to work here. And she must be a townie, Race thought. She looked young; she probably went to St. Helens High School with Rexanne.
And her socks—her socks were lovely, like nothing he had ever seen before. And Racetrack knew from socks. They were short, perfectly white socks that came up to her ankles (she had beautiful ankles). They were neither too short nor too long, dirty, threadbare, or worn through; they were a thing of beauty. The nametag on her uniform said RACHEL. She looked up at him, the newly risen sun shining through the window behind her making her look like she had a halo, and smiled at him as if she'd just seen the person she had been looking for her whole life.
Like everything about her, her teeth were so lovely, they almost made his heart hurt. She must have brushed and flossed after every meal. And he was just about to go over and try to talk to her—he was never good at talking to girls like this, but this was the love of his life, he would think of something—maybe he would ask her what kind of toothpaste she used, just say something—but then Sylvy Golino, the religion professor's daughter, appeared by the table, and he couldn't even think, let alone move.
"Racetrack," she said, quietly, "I have to tell you about something." She paused. "Later. Can you meet me at Spot's house today, at noon?"
Racetrack could only nod, petrified. A moment later she was out the door in a flurry of red hair and heedless beauty, and Rachel, startled by the sound of the bells as they rang at Sylvy's departure, dropped an entire tray of crullers onto the floor.
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Author's Note: The title of this chapter came from a heartbreakingly wonderful Leonard Cohen song whose lyrics I cannot print here for obvious reasons, but which you should look for anyway, because Leonard Cohen is just about the best thing to come out of Canada since instant mashed potatoes.
The establishments mentioned in this chapter--Portland Windustrial, Pacific Pride commercial fueling, and St. Helens High School--are real, as is the town of St. Helens. The Ironside Cafe is fictitious, but is based on several real cafes in the Pacific Northwest, all of which serve blue plate specials and softserve ice cream and have signs out front that say "TRY OUR CHINESE FOOD AND GREAT HQMEMADE SOUP." I had my eighth birthday party in one of them and thehqmemade soupwas great. I suppose you've all figured out by now how much I dearly love the place I live in.
Also, you may have figured out from the beginning of this chapter that this isn't a happy, we're-all-friends, secure in our sexualities and senses of self, rock n' roll high school. People are manipulative and cruel and use sex to get what they want, and the girls, especially Benny, are not as beautiful as they are kind. This is just a warning, really, that from here on out, the loyal, pelvic thrusting newsboys we know and love have more or less disappeared, and we'r entering a darker world.
But there will be great hqmemade soup.
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Shout Outs!
Man, I love you guys.
The Noble Platypus, Monarch of the Sea
You know, I was at Costco the other day, and there was a whole SECTION for Land Before Time movies. I saw sequels going as high as XI, but there must be even more than that. It really is quite terrifying. Be happy you like Littlefoot, because he may be this country's next president.
Rubix
Why does David have to be gay? ((ponders)) Well, my dear, I'll give that to you in seven words…
"JACK! WHY DON'T YOU STAY HERE TONIGHT!"
I rest my case.
Lutabelle
Would you expect anything less than totally shameless smutting from me, the vegan cheese substitute princess of gay porn? I think not, my love.
Ccatt
Aw, don't thank me for the "I ate babies" line. Thank my irrepressible urge to make David Jacobs's life utterly miserable. I feel like a chapter just isn't worth it if I haven't humiliated him in SOME way.
Oxymoronic Alliteration
Making Davey's life miserable is one of the things I love best to do…and if we work together, we can probably drive him utterly insane in a maximum of six chapters. (It goes without saying that one of the best things about this stupid website is the fact that you can meet people just as nuts as you are.)
Unknown-Dream
A kwee! I made someone kwee! I've never done that before! ((dances with herself)) And I am taking up your offer and having an oatmeal cookie—'cause they're cookies, but they're oatmeal, so you know they're good for you. (The really sad part is, I didn't even make that up by myself.)
Saturday
I LOVE YOU, MAN! ((goes crazy and starts dancing around.)) WHY do I love your reviews so much? Why? Why? Why? What is it about them that makes me want to immediately get back on the computer even though I updated about twenty minutes ago and write 239067843906740937694037694 more pages of beautiful fic? I don't know. But they do. And really, all I can say is, I love you man. ((tackles you))
DALTON, KNOX, SPOT, RACE, DAVEY, BUMLETS, SWIFTY, and COWBOY JACK: ((tackle you as well))
YAY MAN-TACKLING!
DALTON: I'M NOT GAY!
Lady of Tir Na Nog
DALTON: I could beat up Davey. Would that prove my masculinity?
((nods))
DALTON: ((lunges))
DAVEY: NOT THE FACE!
FrenchyGoil
«Non, merci, j'aimerais mieux ne pas passer un bon moment avec toi et ton frère.» …Charlie, you may wanna learn that one.
DALTON: I hate you.
I know.
…and there's only one REALLY evil popular girl, who turned up at the beginning of the chapter and seduced our poor sweet Jacky-Boy. Although part of me thinks you don't have to TRY too hard to seduce Jack…((smiles evilly))
Musicath
I LOVED GRENDEL! ((high-fives)) We had to read Beowulf in tenth grade, and also watch The Thirteenth Warrior. And I almost died.
DALTON: She lost all vital signs and everything.
It was great. But now, whenever I start to lose perspective, I read Highlights. It's Fun with a Purpose!
Silky Conlon
I kind of want to call you Silky Colon now—I just think of you that way—but that would be mean. So I'll just think of Spot as "The Colon" from now on, and that will enrich my life beyond belief.
NadaZimri
I AM SO A REBEL! Right, Charlie?
DALTON: Um…
Right? RIGHT?
DALTON: I have to go…reorganize the freezer now…((runs off))
What strange behavior…
Ershey
You know, for once in my fanficcing life, I'm not planning on killing anyone. But now that you've put the idea in my head…((smiles evilly))
Sodapop
DALTON: Oh yes, Jack Kelly…a VERY big man on campus…((raises an eyebrow))
…and he claims not to be gay.
Sapphy
DALTON: Kennedy…my love…I shall compose an entire SYMPHONY praising your beauty!
You know, if it weren't for Kenny, I would completely lose ANY hope of him not being gay. Do straight guys ever compose symphonies? Don't they just watch Lakers games and make you wash their shorts? …if Dalton is straight, we've found the greatest heterosexual male in the world, even if he IS fictitious.
Erin Go Bragh
Well, there are an awful lot of queers and queens in this story. I think I end up with about three classic pairings (you can guess which ones)—Lute was actually surprised that I wasn't going to do all of them, but it feels sort of unlikely that, out of a group of ten guys randomly thrown together, all of them would turn out to be gay. That happens only in our dreams.
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Review, my Spanish galleons! Or Charlie will do the Time Warp, again.