Island Boyz (3 page)

They took Keiffer out into the pasture. He could see Mr. Noonan’s house. The light was on, but no one was in sight. Keiffer turned away quickly, not wanting Nitt or Johnson to even have a clue about the window. Oh God, what they would do if they knew about Mrs. Noonan.

Nitt stopped out in the middle of the pasture. “This should do, huh, Keiffie?”

Keiffer glanced around to see if there were any cows, or worse, bulls. But he could see only dark shadows of trees and bushes and the few lights on campus.

“We’re going to be watching,” Nitt said. “And we’re going to be real disappointed if you don’t have a good time out here, you know? So just go on and play with yourself, fairybabes, flit around like Tarzan or Peter Pan or whoever it is you want to be.”

He tapped Keiffer’s shoulder as if they were good old buds from way back.

They left, their laughter slicing the stillness.

Keiffer noticed for the first time that he was cold. He crossed his arms. What do I do? What?

He looked back toward the school, the faculty bungalows.

Oh, no, now she was there.

In the window.

Keiffer felt a crybaby-burn rise in his throat again. Tears spilled from his eyes. He wiped them away quickly.

Crouching low, he made his way back, slipping around the mess hall the opposite way. It meant he would have to sprint across the quad to get to the dorm, out in the open. But he’d have to take that chance. Nitt might be waiting if he went back the way he’d come.

Keiffer stood at the edge of the building, half in the bushes. No one was in sight. He stepped out, started creeping into the quad.

“What the hell are you doing out here, Mr. Keiffer?”

Keiffer’s heart nearly flew out of his throat. He staggered back. Mr. Bentley was sitting on the mess hall steps.

“I . . . I . . .”

Mr. Bentley stood. “Jesus, you’re stark naked.”

“But—”

At that moment Nitt and Johnson came out of the shadows behind Mr. Bentley. They stopped short and ditched their cigarettes the second they saw him.

Mr. Bentley turned.

Nitt shot Keiffer a glare that said, If you breathe one word about anything, you’ll be dead in an hour.

“What the hell is going on here?” Mr. Bentley said. “Have you all gone mad? No one’s supposed to be out of the dorm after ten. You know that.”

Nitt, in his most agreeable voice, said, “We’ve just got senioritis, Mr. Bentley. You know how that is, don’t you?”

Mr. Bentley shook his head.

Keiffer wondered if Nitt thought Mr. Bentley might have seen the cigarettes. Nitt said, “We were just playing a joke on Keiffer, sir.”

Mr. Bentley looked at Keiffer. “Taking him outside buck naked, you mean?”

“Yeah, just a little joke.”

Mr. Bentley eyed Nitt. “Mr. Nitt, you’re so full of it you’re actually funny. Get back to the dorm, all of you. Jesus.”

Keiffer ran ahead. If stupid Nitt thought his butt was saved, he could think again. All Keiffer needed was time and a killer idea. Oh yeah. Time and a killer idea.

The following Saturday
night everyone was in the common room watching some old movie. Keiffer, Nitt, and Johnson sat in the library with their books spread out around them. Mr. Bentley had written them up for two hours of study hall as punishment. Thankfully, Mr. Bentley had kept the nakedness part to himself.

Keiffer sat alone at one of the computer tables, the lit screen blank in front of him. He had to write a report on Pearl Harbor for history. Nitt and Johnson were studying at tables of their own, farther away. But Keiffer could see them from where he sat. Two seventh graders were at another table. Mr. Paine, this week’s study hall monitor, was at a desk up toward the door, keeping an eye on things.

Keiffer typed:
On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

He stopped and thought.

And thought.

Of Mrs. Noonan.

It was hopeless.
He
was hopeless.

He peeked up at Mr. Paine, then over at Nitt, whose head was resting on his arms, folded over the top of the desk. Johnson was slouched down reading some book.

Keiffer opened a new page on the screen.

Dear Julie,

He peeked up again. He could feel a tingling inside him just at the thought of writing her a letter. He’d never
give
it to her, of course. But just to write it . . .

I know you don’t know me, but you’ve probably seen me around. Who I am doesn’t matter. What does matter is that I think you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life. I think about you every night and every day. I can’t STOP. It’s like I’m in a dream and you and I are the only people in the world. Sometimes I think about kissing you. I’ve never kissed anyone in my life. But if I could kiss you, I would never want to kiss anyone else ever again. I love you more than anyone ever could. I don’t know how to say it any stronger than that. I love you, I love you, I love you.

From your secret admirer

Keiffer read it and smiled. He read it again and again.

He looked up. Nitt was still dozing and Johnson still reading. He hit the print command and held his breath as the printer hummed it out. He snatched it up and read it one more time, then folded it and hid it in the pages of his math book for later.

The next night
in the dorm after dinner, when everyone else was in their rooms doing homework, Keiffer leaned back in his chair and stretched.

Casey was reading a novel in Spanish, lying on his bed with headphones on. Probably listening to jazz, Keiffer thought. Casey was a little weird, but a nice guy. He kept to himself. Avoided all trouble. All he wanted in the world was to get into MIT with a perfect record.

Keiffer stood and Casey looked up.

“Just going out for a walk,” Keiffer said. “I’m falling asleep.”

Casey nodded and turned back to his book.

Keiffer went a different way this time, skirting the back of the mess hall. It was full dark out, no moon. The air was cool and it smelled like ginger.

And she was there, alone in the room.

Keiffer figured Mr. Noonan must have a different place in the house where he worked, or read, or graded papers.

Mrs. Noonan was talking on the phone again. She wore a T-shirt this time, and Keiffer wondered if she had anything on under it. In his mind she didn’t. He remembered the letter he’d written and thought of how he’d felt as he’d written it and how it was true to the last drop. He should give it to her. Secretly.

A mosquito hummed near his ear and he slapped it.
Whack!

Mrs. Noonan looked up.

She reached toward the lamp and shut it off.

Keiffer froze and stared at the darkened house.

A light appeared, a flashlight shining through the screen. Mumbling voices.

Keiffer staggered back and stumbled away. He fell and got up and raced through the weeds and grass and trees, sprinting back to the dorm and his room, where he slammed the door and leaned back against it, then fell on his bed, gasping.

Casey, still reading, looked up.

“Just . . . just ran a bit,” Keiffer said. “To wake up.”

Casey shook his head.

A moment later he said, “Your friend Nitt was here looking for you.”

Keiffer didn’t answer. Immediately he got up and checked his stash to see if Nitt had taken his cookies that his mom had sent. There had been fourteen left. Now there were only five.

“He also messed around over at your desk,” Casey added.

Keiffer checked there too. Everything was out of place, but nothing seemed to be missing. “What did he want?” he asked.

“What does he ever want? Food.”

Keiffer scowled and straightened his desk. His hands still shook from the shock of almost getting caught. He had no idea, just no idea, that sound could carry so far in the night outside Mrs. Noonan’s window.

It took him hours to fall asleep.

Moments after he finally did, he bolted awake.

He turned on his desk lamp and grabbed his math book.

The letter was gone.

On Tuesday Keiffer
took the biggest chance he’d ever taken in his life. It was so big he wondered what was happening to him. He’d never acted this way before. He’d
thought
about doing things like this, many times, but he’d never actually followed up on anything.

This time he did.

Because the killer thought had arrived.

He pretended to be sick and spent the day in bed. But while everyone was at class, he crept over to the senior dorm and went into Nitt and Johnson’s room. Nothing was ever locked. Which in this case was great. He had to find that letter and tear it up.

The room stank. It was like Nitt and Johnson had a stash of really gross laundry somewhere.

Keiffer couldn’t find the letter.

In fact, Nitt had nothing at all of interest on or in his desk or clothes drawers or closet. He didn’t even have one picture of anyone on his corkboard. He didn’t have a stereo, a clock, or even a pencil sharpener. Keiffer frowned.

But there was the one other thing he’d come to get. And that was way more than enough.

Nitt’s binoculars.

They were high up on the top shelf of Nitt’s closet in their frayed black case. Someone had scribbled
Nitt, U.S. Army Infantry
on the strap.

Keiffer grabbed the case and left.

That night, after
he heard Casey breathing deeply, Keiffer threw the binocular case over his shoulder and peeked out into the quiet hall.

One light was on down near Mr. Bentley’s apartment.

He hurried to the door and went out into the night, feeling an electric thing inside him even stronger and more driving than before. It raced through him. Charged every nerve in his body so that the trembling in his hands took hold again, and even before he’d gotten halfway to the grassy hiding place outside Mrs. Noonan’s window, he had to stop and breathe.

Breathe and think.

All right, settle down.

He gripped the binoculars.

She was reading.

She was wearing the kimono.

Keiffer couldn’t keep the eyepiece still.

Wow.

Wow, wow, wow.

She was even more beautiful up close—so close that he kissed her, tasted her lips, felt them so soft and damp and smooth, her hands now caressing his face and hair.

Keiffer watched her read for fifteen minutes, exploring every inch of her—her eyes, her smile, her hair, her body, everything—until she put her hand inside her kimono above her breast, as was her habit.

When she did that, put her hand there, in that spot, Keiffer lowered the binoculars. His ears quivered with the pain of it all. He could never have her to himself. Never. She loved Mr. Noonan. Not him. She would hate him if she knew he was out there spying. She would think he was nothing but some sick, dorky tenth grader.

“But it’s not like that,” he whispered.

He looked one more time, then lowered the binoculars and put them down in the grass, near the case.

Do it now, he thought.

He coughed, very lightly, as if trying to stifle it.

The light in the house went out.

Keiffer flattened down into the grass.

In seconds Mr. Noonan burst out the back door with the flashlight, combing the trees and pasture, the beam passing just over Keiffer’s head.

“Who’s out there?” Mr. Noonan shouted.

When the beam moved off into the pasture, Keiffer got up and ran for his life.

The next morning
Nitt got called into the headmaster’s office. At noon in the mess hall word spread like floodwater. Nitt had been peeping into Noonan’s house at night. More than once, everyone whispered. Mrs. Noonan had heard him out there. Mr. Noonan had found his binoculars.

That afternoon Keiffer was trying to concentrate in English class when a seventh grader came in with a note. Mr. Ellis read it, then strolled down the aisle to the back of the room and gave it to Keiffer.

Keiffer opened it.

He looked at it and sat for a moment without moving, then stood and gathered his books. All eyes watched him leave.

He stepped out under gray and white clouds. Rain fell like mist as he headed across the green grass toward the headmaster’s office.

Mr. Noonan was there. And Mr. Bentley. And Mr. Toms, the headmaster, a burly, red-haired man who rarely smiled.

Mr. Toms pointed to a chair and Keiffer sat. His hands started to tremble. He sat on them.

He’d been caught. It was over.

He waited for someone to say something.

To call his parents.

To tell him to go back to his room and start packing.

It was so quiet that he could hear Mr. Toms breathing.

Mr. Bentley leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. In one hand he held a folded piece of paper.

“Mr. Keiffer,” he said, then paused.

Keiffer stared at the floor.

“I assume you’ve heard what happened with Mr. Nitt.”

“Yes sir.”

Mr. Bentley nodded. “When we went through his belongings, we found something that he swore was yours. He said he took it from your room.”

Mr. Bentley handed Keiffer the folded paper. “Did you write this?”

Keiffer took the letter. He unfolded it and pretended to read it. He willed his hand to stop trembling.

The letter shook.

“Mr. Keiffer?”

“No sir, this isn’t mine. I don’t know anyone named Julie.”

Keiffer kept his eyes on the letter, afraid to look up. He felt sick.

Mr. Bentley went on. “Remember the night I caught you out buck naked?”

Keiffer winced. He wanted to crawl out of the room. He could feel the blood rush to his face.

“Yes sir,” he whispered.

“I’ve got to say, I was rather stunned to see you like that. But then Mr. Nitt and Mr. Johnson showed up and said they’d just played a practical joke on you. Was that true, what they said? Did they strip you and take you outside?”

“Yes sir, they did. They took me out into the cow pasture.”

“And . . .”

Keiffer looked up. He shrugged. “Nothing. I just walked back. That’s when . . . when I saw you.”