Bullet Point (3 page)

“SUPPER’S ON,”
his mom called from the kitchen.

Wyatt heard her but stayed where he was, standing in his room. He’d laid the photo on his desk and was now examining it under the light of the lamp. He noticed little things he’d missed before, like how big his father’s hands were—bigger than Wyatt’s, just about the same size as the coach’s—and a light-colored metal chain, maybe gold, that his father wore around his neck. He bent closer, gazing into the photo image of his father’s eyes. They began to look not like eyes at all, but simply ovals of light and shade, mostly shade.

“Wyatt? I’ve been calling and calling.”

He turned. His mom was in the room, a red-tipped wooden spoon in her hand; he hadn’t heard her enter.

“Sorry, I—”

Her glance went right to the photo. “What are you looking at?”

“Nothing, Mom.”

“I hope it’s not something you shouldn’t be—” By now she’d moved in closer; his mom was kind of unstoppable
when she got curious about something. “Who are—Oh, my God.” She grabbed the photo, stared at it, then whipped around toward Wyatt. “Where did you get this?”

“I, uh, the coach gave it to me.”

“The coach? Why would he do a thing like that?”

“On account of the economy, Mom. He was packing up. All the extracurriculars are gone.”

His mother’s eyes opened wide, and her face seemed to soften. “Baseball, too?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, dear.”

“Yeah.” Was there any point in going into the whole Bridger idea? None that Wyatt could see: The Bridger idea was gone, too. “So the coach had this and he gave it to me.” He pointed to the photo, still in her hand. They were standing close together now, their eyes on the photo. “Did you know him back then, Mom, in high school?”

“Hey,” Rusty called from the kitchen, “what’s the holdup with dinner?”

Wyatt’s mom didn’t seem to hear. “Not really,” she said, her face still soft, and now her voice as well. “He was two years ahead of me. I knew who he was, of course. All the girls—” She stopped herself.

“All the girls what?” said Wyatt.

Cammy came in. “Dad says what’s the holdup with dinner.”

“Can’t he serve himself?” Wyatt said.

“Wyatt, hush,” said his mom. “Tell him we’ll be right there.”

“Roger,” said Cammy, and left the room.

“All the girls what?” Wyatt repeated.

Linda’s lips turned up the slightest bit, as though she were about to smile, but she did not. “He was popular with the girls, let’s put it like that.”

“So when did you get married?” Wyatt said. “After you graduated from high school?”

His mom turned to him. “We actually never did get married,” she said. “We were going to, what with you coming along, but then—”

“You never got married? I’m finding this out now?”

“There wasn’t time—he did that terrible thing and got arrested and then—”

“Hey!” Rusty was in the room. “What’s going on?” His face had pink patches here and there, a sign that he’d had a few drinks.

“Sorry,” Linda said. “We’re coming.”

“What’s so interesting?” Rusty pointed with his chin at the photo.

Linda lowered the photo to her side, the back of it facing out.

“Let me see,” Rusty said.

“It’s nothing, not important.”

“I like not-important things,” Rusty said, and then he moved with surprising quickness—Rusty was one of those people capable of surprising you from time to time, never in a good way—striding across the room and snatching the photo out of Linda’s hand.

“Don’t,” Linda said.

Rusty turned his back on Wyatt and Linda, hunching over the photo. A moment or two passed and then his back stiffened. “What the fuck?” He whirled around, said to Linda, “Where have you been hiding this?”

“I haven’t—” Linda began.

“It’s mine,” Wyatt said.

“Yours? Where’d you get it?”

“Coach Bouchard. It’s mine.” Wyatt reached out. “Give.”

Rusty held the photo out of Wyatt’s reach. “Have to think about that,” he said. “Might not be good parenting, letting it into your possession.”

“Huh?” Wyatt said.

“Not exactly what you’d call a role model, this pretty boy,” said Rusty, tapping the photo. “Gotta look out for your moral development.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Wyatt said.

“Rusty, please,” Linda said.

“‘Rusty, please’?” said Rusty. “Now you’re gonna defend him? Defend the convicted murderer?”

“Of course not,” said Wyatt’s mom. “There’s no need for any of this. Let’s all calm down.”

“That picture’s mine,” Wyatt said. “The coach gave it to me.”

“‘That pikchew’s mine,’” Rusty mimicked. “Listen to him—Cammy’s more mature, for fuck sake.”

Wyatt lunged forward, tried to grab the photo. Rusty whipped it out of reach.

“Please,” said Wyatt’s mom. “Let’s all—”

“Calm down?” Rusty said. He smiled, the kind of smile
where the eyes don’t join in. “Okay,” he said, “since he wants it so bad, he can have it.” Rusty tore the photo to shreds, real quick, zip zip zip, and flung them at Wyatt.

Wyatt and Rusty had had some nasty arguments, but things had never gotten physical, at least on Wyatt’s part: Rusty had whacked him upside the head the odd time back when Wyatt was younger. Wyatt didn’t think about any of that, didn’t think about how Rusty was still a lot bigger than him, didn’t think at all. He just charged at his stepfather, knocking him into the wall. A cheap wall—the whole house was cheap—and Rusty made a big hole, breaking through the drywall and splintering one or two of the slats underneath.

“Fucking son of a bitch,” Rusty said, looking astonished, dust raining down on his wiry red hair.

“Oh, God, stop, stop,” said Linda, coming up behind Wyatt and gripping his upper arms. At that moment, when Wyatt couldn’t quite defend himself properly—not his mom’s intention at all, he was aware of that in real time—Rusty wound up and threw a roundhouse punch, his meaty, freckled fist landing square on Wyatt’s nose. Then came a cracking sound, like a wishbone on Thanksgiving, followed by pouring blood and a sharp pain radiating from Wyatt’s nose across both sides of his face; sound coming first, pain last.

Wyatt sagged backward, knocking his mom, not a big woman, to the floor, although he didn’t fall himself. He glanced around to see if she was all right, and Rusty got him again, this time on the jaw, but not dead on. Not dead on, but Wyatt went down anyway, hot and raging inside, and the next thing he knew his vision had a reddish tinge and he welcomed
it, might even have growled like an animal. He rolled over and dove at Rusty’s legs.

Rusty toppled backward, cracked his head against the edge of the doorframe, and spun into Cammy, who’d suddenly reappeared in the doorway, holding the handle of the pot of spaghetti sauce in both hands. Cammy flew across the hall. Rusty fell and lay still, spaghetti sauce splattering everything: walls, floor, each member of the family. Then Cammy and Wyatt’s mom were both in tears, wailing, really, and Rusty was rising to his knees. “Gonna fuckin’ kill him,” he said. Wyatt thought of the small automatic Rusty kept under the bed in the master bedroom and took off. In seconds he was outside and in the Mustang, peeling away from home, rubber shrieking in the night.

Wyatt drove, fast at first, and with no plan, no idea where he was going, and then slower, out of town and down a narrow lane to a beach by the riverside, where kids went swimming in summer. No swimming tonight: in his headlights he saw that the river was frozen over, except for a narrow black channel in the center. For a moment, a pathetic moment—as he realized while it was happening but let happen anyway—he wondered how it would be to slip down into that icy dark water. Wyatt shook his head, clearing it of shit like that, at the same time setting off a sharp pain in the middle of his face.

He switched on the interior light, checked his face in the rearview mirror. Two or three smears of blood on his cheeks, but his nose had stopped bleeding. The problem with his nose was its new shape and location. Wyatt’s nose, to which he’d never paid much attention, had always been straight, not too
big, not too small. Now it was big and swollen, and worse, crooked, bent one way in the middle, then angling off in the other direction at the tip.

Wyatt leaned forward so he could see better. There were tears in his eyes. That made him angry at himself.
Suck it up
, as Coach Bouchard always said. Wyatt spoke the words aloud: “Suck it up.” Then he got a good grip on his nose, thumb on one side, fingers on the other, took a deep breath, and yanked it back into place. Another cracking sound, more blood, more pain, and he might have let out some cry—but when he checked the mirror, his nose was straight again. The thought hit him that maybe Coach Bouchard wasn’t really an authority on the subject of sucking it up.

Wyatt sat in his car, parked in this place—familiar, except he’d never been here in winter; kind of like a stranger in his own hometown. At first he ran the engine to stay warm, but the needle was dipping down toward empty—a great car and he loved it, but not good on gas—and he switched it off. Then it was quiet, the sky full of stars, the only movement that black rippling out in the middle of the river. It got colder and colder in the car. Wyatt was wearing only jeans, sneakers, a short-sleeved T-shirt. He could see his breath. It fogged the windshield. He didn’t like that, wanted to see out, so he kept a little porthole-sized circle of glass clear. After a while he started shivering and couldn’t stop. He felt alone. That was new.

“What’s the goddamn point?” he said.

Wyatt started the car, backed away from the river, U-turned, and headed into town. By the time he got to his
house, he was nice and warm again. A light shone in the kitchen, and in Linda and Rusty’s bedroom, but otherwise the house was dark. Wyatt slowed down, almost turned into the driveway, but instead kept going, not from fear of Rusty’s little automatic, or fear of anything, really: he just didn’t want to go there. He drove down Main Street, all closed up for the night, gradually began to feel more like himself. His cell phone rang. He saw his mom’s number on the screen and didn’t answer.

Wyatt ended up parked outside the Mannions’ farmhouse. An upstairs window opened and Mrs. Mannion looked out. A minute or so later, Dub came outside, wearing a ski jacket and pajama bottoms. He opened the passenger-side door and slid in.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey.”

“I’m real sorry about that Bridger thing. I didn’t have a clue about them only having one spot.”

“Didn’t think you did.”

“My old man’s so fucking organized.”

“That’s good.”

“I don’t even want to go anymore.”

“That just proves you’re dumb.”

“You go. You take the position. You’re better anyway. I can’t hit the curveball for shit, and that means I’ll wash out sooner than later.”

“Shut up.”

Dub glanced over. “Hey,” he said. “What’s with your face?”

“Nothing.”

“Don’t look like nothing.”

Wyatt took a deep breath and shivered all of a sudden, even though he was no longer cold.

“C’mon inside,” Dub said. “It’s cold.”

“Nah.”

“I’m freezing my ass off.”

“Then go.”

“Nope,” said Dub, sitting back, like he was actually getting comfortable.

Dub was very stubborn, always had been. They ended up going into the Mannions’ house together.

MRS. MANNION,
wearing a quilted pink robe, her round face glistening with some sort of clear cream, made hot chocolate. They sat around the Mannions’ kitchen table—Wyatt, Dub, Mrs. Mannion. It was warm in the Mannions’ house, much warmer than home, and Wyatt felt no drafts; his place was full of drafts.

“Hot chocolate okay?” said Mrs. Mannion.

Dub grunted.

Wyatt said, “Yeah, thanks.”

“Not too hot?”

“No,” Wyatt said. “Just right.”

“So,” said Mrs. Mannion, “first thing would be a call to your mom, right?”

Wyatt shook his head.

“She’ll be worried,” said Mrs. Mannion. “You know that.”

Wyatt knew, but he didn’t admit it out loud.

“Can’t he stay here for the night?” Dub said.

“Of course. Longer if he wants. But he still needs to call his mom.”

“She’ll be asleep,” Wyatt said.

“No she won’t,” said Mrs. Mannion. “Proves you’ve got a lot to learn about mothers.” Wyatt gazed into his hot chocolate, thinking:
Rusty will answer for sure.
“Tell you what,” Mrs. Mannion said. “I’ll call.”

“Aw, Mom,” said Dub.

“Don’t ‘Aw, Mom’ me.” Mrs. Mannion reached for the phone and dialed. Rusty had the kind of voice that carried through the phone speaker, and Wyatt clearly heard: “Yeah?” Mrs. Mannion stuck her jaw out a little. “Linda, please. It’s Judy Mannion.” A second or two went by and then Mrs. Mannion said, “Linda? Wyatt’s over here. He’s fine.” She listened for a few moments and said, “Good idea.” Then she hung up and turned to Wyatt. “Your mom’s coming over.”

“Why?”

“Why? What kind of a question is that?”

“I’m going to bed,” Dub said.

Mrs. Mannion washed the mugs and stood them upside down in the drying rack. “I’ll be pushing off, too,” she said. “Invite your mom inside when she gets here.”

But when Wyatt saw the headlights coming, he went out to the driveway to meet her. His mom drove an old Cherokee—old and wrecked, rusted out and burning oil, but not yet quite paid off. Wyatt got in the passenger side and sat down. Linda’s face was puffy from crying, and she was no crier.

“I’m staying at Dub’s,” Wyatt said.

His mom nodded. “Okay, I understand. I just wanted to
make sure you were all right.”

“Yeah, I’m all right.”

“No, you’re not,” said his mom. “Look at me.”

He looked at her. He was all cleaned up now, blood washed off, hair combed, nose a bit swollen but straight.

“I’m so sorry,” she said. A tear formed in one eye, rolled down her cheek.

“You didn’t do anything.”

“Oh, I did.”

“What, Mom? I don’t get it.”

“I only wanted—” Her face started to crumple up. She got control of herself and continued. “I hate what just happened. It made me sick. And there’s no excuse, none at all. But for someone like Rusty—his whole life has been about hard work, and now getting canned like he did, sitting around all day, useless, stewing in his…” Linda went silent for a few moments. “He’s his worst self right now.”

This is how he always is.
That was Wyatt’s response, but he held back, caring too much about his mother to say it.

Linda gazed at the Mannions’ house. Dub’s big flat screen glowed in his second-floor window. “I wanted this—want this to work so bad.”

“Wanted what to work?”

“A family. This family.”

Wyatt shook his head.

“Nobody’s perfect, Wyatt.”

“And a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” A nasty thing to say, and he regretted it at once.

Too late, of course. His mom actually winced, as though
he’d thrown a punch. “This jealousy of his—it’s just so stupid,” she said.

“He’s jealous of me?”

Wyatt’s mom gave him a long look that made him even more uncomfortable than he already was but that he couldn’t interpret. “That’s not what I meant,” she said. “I meant—” She paused, as though making some effort, then licked her lips. “I meant Sonny. Rusty’s always been a bit jealous of him.”

“He knew him?”

“Not really. Rusty was a bit older, went into the service as soon as he could, got posted out to the Coast. He was jealous sort of after the fact, jealous that Sonny and I were—had once been…an item.”

“An item?”

“A couple. We…we were so young.”

Wyatt didn’t want to hear about that. Wasn’t he the young one right now? Her job was to be the older one. “Where is he?”

“At home, asleep. I don’t think he even—”

“Not Rusty. I’m talking about my real father.”

“He’s in prison. A life sentence, you know that.” The TV light went off in Dub’s bedroom.

“Everyone keeps saying I know things,” Wyatt said, “but I don’t. What prison?”

“I’m honestly not sure. They sent him to Sweetwater originally, but he might have gotten transferred since then.”

“Sweetwater? That’s the name of a prison?”

“Sweetwater State Penitentiary. From the Sweetwater River, downstate.”

“Did you ever visit?”

His mom nodded. “Once, a few weeks before you were born.”

“Only once?”

“It…it was horrible. And he didn’t want me to come back.”

“Why not?”

His mom shrugged. “Life sentence. It was pointless.” She sighed. “Plus, what he did—I could never think of him the same way again. That made it almost easy, letting go. Maybe a harsh thing to say, but true.”

“What was the crime?”

“You know all—” She stopped herself. “It was a robbery gone bad. Sonny swore he didn’t fire the shots, but even if that was true, it’s the same as if he did, under the law.”

“Who fired the shots?”

“They ended up pinning it on Sonny, all on the testimony of some lowlife.”

“What was his name?”

“I don’t remember,” his mom said. “So long ago, and besides, none of this—”

“Come on, Mom.” Wyatt raised his voice. He was tired of this fogginess, a fogginess he hadn’t even realized was there till this last few minutes, but now he wanted clarity, a simple understandable story from A to Z, all the blanks filled in.

“What do you mean, ‘Come on’?” his mom said.

“I want the story.”

“But—”

“Just give it to me in bullet points.”

“Bullet points?”

“The important parts.”

His mom nodded. “The most important part was how stupid it all was. Sonny had a good job, working construction for this company in Millerville, but he got involved with the wrong people and—”

“What wrong people?”

“Art Pingree was one of them—the nephew of Sonny’s boss.”

“Was he the lowlife?”

She shook her head. “The real bad one was a friend of Art’s they called Doc. It was all his idea—I’m certain of that. Sonny never said a word to me about any of it. The whole thing hit me like a bomb. For ages I kept thinking there was a mistake, like Sonny had a twin he didn’t know about, and they’d gotten the wrong guy.”

“What was the idea?” Wyatt said. “What happened?”

“The idea—if you can call it that—was to rob these drug dealers in Millerville.”

“Drug dealers? I thought it was a bank.”

“Sorry. I may have said that way back when. In order to…make it better, somehow.”

“That makes it better?”

Wyatt’s mom didn’t answer, just stared straight ahead. Chimes hanging by the Mannions’ garage door gleamed in the night.

“They were planning to steal the drugs?” Wyatt said.

“The money,” his mom replied. “They thought drug dealers would have lots of money and would never go to the
police—a kind of perfect crime. But it all went bad.”

“How?”

“They went breaking into a house on Cain Street in Millerville, the very worst part. Shots got fired. A…woman died.”

“A woman?”

“The girlfriend of one of the drug dealers. And her baby got shot in the eye. She was in a coma for a long time, but I think she lived.”

“God almighty.”

“What nobody knew was that the state police were on to the drug dealers and patrolled the street every night. They burst in and arrested everyone. I never saw Sonny again, not as a free man.”

“What if he didn’t fire the shots?”

“Same as if he had.”

“But it’s not.”

“In the eyes of the law.”

“But in real life.”

“Real life?”

“Yeah—it’s not really the same. You know, like morally.”

“I’m not so sure of that,” his mom said.

She had the engine running in the old Cherokee and the heat blowing full blast; still, Wyatt felt cold.

“Does he ever write or anything?”

“No. Life goes on, Wyatt. We—” She cut herself off, resumed more softly. “We’ve got our own problems.” They sat in silence for a while. Then she turned and touched his shoulder. “We can make this work. We’ve got to.” Her gaze
moved to his nose, and she quickly looked away.

“I’m staying with Dub.”

“For tonight, fine. But I know Rusty will feel bad about this in the morning. He’ll want to square things up.”

“You’re dreaming.”

“Don’t say things like that.”

“I’ll say what I want. He’s a pig and now he’s living off you.”

“That’s what’s killing him—don’t you understand? And he’s not a pig—he’s basically a good person.”

“Bullshit.”

“You can’t talk to me like that.”

Wyatt opened the door, got out.

“Wait,” said his mom, fumbling with her purse. “I’ve brought you some money.”

He slammed the door, went back into Dub’s house. The basically good person, even better than that, was his mom, of course, and he wished he hadn’t slammed the door. As he entered the Mannions’ house and felt the warmth inside, he realized she had had no real expectation that he’d be coming home anytime soon, maybe didn’t even want it, possibly fearing what might happen. Why else would she have brought him money?

Wyatt climbed the stairs and entered Dub’s room, a pigsty like his, except much bigger, fancier, airier, with a spare bed for overnight guests. No lights were on but Dub was awake.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“My mom called her sister, Aunt Hildy. You know, down
in Silver City. And she’s cool with you living there, at her place.”

“Huh?” Wyatt said.

“No baseball, I know, but there’s no baseball here, either. And you could kind of get away, if you want. From Rusty, I’m talking about. Plus next year you’ll be a normal resident, so you can play. You’ll only be a junior.”

Wyatt lay down, closed his eyes. They wouldn’t stay closed.

“How much does she want?”

“How much does who want?”

“How much rent. Your aunt.”

“Rent? Zip, for Christ’s sake.”

“I’ll think about it,” Wyatt said. His eyes closed. His nose hurt for a while and then he was asleep.