The Long Run (24 page)

The silence is broken by the sound of our feet moving on the frosty ground. Five minutes in, there are bird sounds off in the woods. I glance at Brookes. He grins that monkey grin of his. We share the same thought. We'd like to be in the woods now with a few precious stones. Brookes knows every rabbit hole and bird's nest from the Mount to Sugar Loaf.

The branches of the evergreens are spotted with powdery snow. We can feel our nostrils sticking as we run. The air is so cold it almost tastes bitter. We're glad Blackie advised us to wear extra layers.

Every face is intense, even though the race is nine months away. We've only just begun our training, but every face reads the same: This is it. The Comrades! I first learned about the Comrades from Oberstein when I heard him telling Blackie he read about it in a book he found in the library on marathon running. They were poring over a map, not an ordinary map, a geological map. They were really excited. Oberstein was telling Blackie that the marathon would make a perfect decoy. I looked the word “decoy” up in the dictionary right away. I know what it means, but I didn't know what Oberstein meant. The Annual Comrades takes place every year at the same time in South Africa. Fifty-two miles. A double marathon. Oberstein said that South Africa is the only place in the world where it happens. Blackie decided we'd do a Comrades as soon as he heard about it.

“If we train for two marathons, we'll sure be in shape for one,” he said.

We know that a special time has arrived. We feel it in our blood. A oneness. It's in our veins, our hands, our eyes, this special feeling that has come over us all. It is knowing that we are preparing for a double marathon, the awareness of the Comrades, that makes us feel this way.

As we run along Logy Bay Road, someone whispers that Blackie has scabbed a fresh loaf for when we return. Thinking of tearing into the fresh bread when we finish gives us new energy.

“Do you think he's scabbed a bit of butter?” Kavanagh asks.

Ryan shrugs his shoulders.

We're panting hard as we reach Sugar Loaf, the halfway mark. There's a thin burst of flame in the sky. We're tired and not yet in shape, but we all think the same thing:
How beautiful!

“Jesus, look at that,” Ryan shouts, as we lie on our bellies and smash the thin layer of ice with our fists, greedily drinking from the pond. As each of us finishes, we stand and run on the spot while waiting for the rest.

When he finishes gulping the water, Ryan asks Murphy about the hockey scores. Murphy has the only transistor radio in the Mount. It is a tiny thing that he stole from Burns' Music Store. It has a cord running from it with a metal clip like a small clothesline pin that he attaches to the steel frame of his bed to get a station. He's always up on the baseball and hockey scores.

“Beliveau scored again last night.”

“What about the Pocket?” Ryan asks, his breath coming in little puffs.

“An assist.”

“Boom Boom get one?” Blackie asks.

“Two,” Murphy says. “First period and the last. Missed a hat trick.”

“He'll get over fifty this season. Dickie Moore play?”

“Scored on a power play in the second.”

“Fantastic.”

“Plante getta shutout?” Brookes asks.

“Mahovlich scored in the third. Four–one was the final score. Leafs dropped to fourth place.”

Blackie hoots, pumping his fist like a champion.

“Bower musta been pissed,” Ryan says.

Shorty Richardson is the last one to finish drinking. There is more hockey chatter till he gets up. When he joins us, Blackie smiles and we start out again. I shiver as we run, letting thoughts of Shorty Richardson crossing the finish line at the St. John's Royal Regatta Marathon drift through my mind. Halfway home, Cross jerks our lifeline. A rock pile peeks through the new layer of powdery snow. Ryan and I jump the obstacle. Too late for Brookes, who stumbles and falls. Anxiously, we backtrack and help him to his feet. He's in pain, but he's okay. Only a bruised knee. He makes a joke of his fall and runs harder than ever.

It's at times like this that we are no longer running alone. Our heart's desire is one. We are brothers-in-arms, all at once together. Knowing that blood loyalty and teamwork will help us run to victory. Our shivering ceases as the great silhouette of the Mount appears in the distance. We think of getting back to the dorm and dividing up the fresh loaf and getting into our bunks under the warm covers for an hour or so before the ugly buzzer sounds for chapel.

Canteen's open for the feast of Saint Ray-field. Canteen's open . . . Canteen's open for Saint Ray-field . . . Canteen's open . . . Canteen's open . . .

Canteen criers are racing through the halls during recess, screaming with delight. There's always more criers than you can count when the canteen is open.

I look at my Mickey and head for my locker to get my canteen card. The brother in charge of your dorm hands out canteen cards at the end of each month. I close my eyes and see the first canteen card I ever received, a sky-blue index card. Along the top, typed in black, a row of four quarters. On the bottom, two rows of five dimes each. Along the left side, eight nickels. Along the right, ten pennies. In the middle of the card, typed in black, is my name, and in brackets my number: Aiden Carmichael (291).

A canteen card has a value of two dollars and fifty cents. Blue money, Oberstein calls it. You can use your card anytime the canteen is open. The brother on canteen duty will add up your bill and punch holes through the numbers on your card, totalling your purchase. The money has to last you the entire month. Needless to say, many cards are stolen, the name and number efficiently erased and replaced with another boy's. There's a rumour that Farrell, a member of the Dare Klub, counterfeits a few cards each month, but I don't believe it. For one thing, the thick blue paper is unavailable. Canteen cards are as good as gold. Boys exchange IOUs for cigarettes, chore swapping, and even clothing and food. I remember Murphy giving Father Cross his entire canteen card one month for his black cowboy hat. I thought it was a pretty good deal. Everyone argued for days about who came out on top. Blackie controls the canteen card trade, as Oberstein calls it, especially since preparations for the marathon began.

The canteen is opened most nights, and on Saturdays between one and two o'clock in the afternoon and Sunday night before we watch
Walt Disney
or
Bonanza
. Once in a while, the canteen opens at odd times. The PA crackles, and there's an announcement that the canteen is open. Or some half-crazed criers, like the ones running around now, race through the halls yelling, “Canteen's open for the feast of Saint Ray-field!” And the canteen can open on a whim, if a special event takes place, like when John F. Kennedy won the election. “Wingding for the first Catholic President. Wingding for President Kennedy! Wingding! Wingding!”

I'll never forget King Kelly's excitement when Brother McCann said Senator Kennedy was elected president. “C'mon everyone, the canteen's open for the first Catholic President. Betcha Oberstein and Blackie'll get extras cause they're Americans.”

McCann's gone nuts over President Kennedy. We have special prayers between classes for President Kennedy. He reads every day from a book on President Kennedy's life. Bug says if he hears one more story about the PT
109,
he's gonna throw a baseball at McCann's nuts. Even when he's teaching diagramming sentences in grammar class, every sentence has Kennedy in it: “John F. Kennedy hit the ball.” “Senator Kennedy, who has a bad back from a war injury, walked spryly to the store.” “John Fitzgerald Kennedy, who is the first Catholic president, loves vanilla ice cream.” “President Kennedy, a Catholic, is the thirty-fifth president of the United States because he beat Richard Nixon, a Protestant.”

All the brothers, even McMurtry, have become really nutty since the election. Every morning, Mass is offered up for President Kennedy. Rosaries are being said. And novenas and benedictions. Bug calls it voodoo time. But it doesn't seem to have affected Rags much. He's the only one not cranked up about President Kennedy. Oberstein says that's because he's a Republican.

When the canteen is opened for a wingding, you don't have to use your canteen card. Everyone receives free ice cream and pop. We all really like canteen surprises.

There are a million stories about our canteen cards. You can just imagine the stuff that goes on. Once Rowsell paid fifty cents, blue money, to Bug to cut his hair. Rowsell's fussy about his hair. It's always slicked back in waves with a greasy ducktail. Bug put a bowl on his head and chopped away with a pair of old rusty scissors. Rowsell was a sight for sore eyes. Everyone called him the monk from Mars. He looked pretty goofy with his bowl cut. When he looked in the mirror, he was spellbound, his jaw hanging.

One of the best stories is about Ryan charging Murphy twenty-five cents for three one-cent stamps. Stamps are hard to get. You have to steal them from the post office, which is only open on Saturdays. And you need an insider to pull it off. Murphy had taken a boot in the balls playing soccer one day, and Blackie told him he'd never be able to get a hard-on again.

“You're probably ruptured,” Oberstein said.

“What does that mean?” Murphy asked.

“You don't have to worry about an heir to the throne.”

Murphy raised both his big hands and gave an exasperated look, indicating he knew he'd been successfully teased but couldn't think of a comeback.

“How do you know? How can you be so sure I'm ruptured?”

“You can't. Not 100 percent. But the pain you got means you probably are.”

“You could try the stamp test,” Ryan said. “That's one way to find out for sure if you're ruptured or not.”

“What's the stamp test?” Murphy asked.

“It's a surefire way to find out if you can still get it up.”

“How's it work?”

“Easy. You take three new stamps, joined. They gotta be new and joined. You lick 'em and put 'em on your dick when you're going to bed.” Ryan was brimming with excitement. All you could see was the gap between his teeth. “In the middle of the night, if the stamps break, you know you can still get it up. If you wake and they're still joined, well, you gotta big problem. Let's put it this way, there won't be any little redheaded Murphys running around. You might not even snap the lizard again.”

“'Course, if you don't get it up, it could all be in your mind,” Oberstein said. “A sort of hypno-suggestion 'cause Blackie said you were ruptured. It's called self-fulfilling prophecy. Like when Rowsell gets a hard-on 'cause we tell him he's gonna get one. If it's all in your mind, the only way to overcome it is through the power of positive thinking. Through thinking positively.”

Murphy agreed to pay Ryan twenty-five cents from his canteen card if he would lift the three stamps from the post office so he could try the test.

“It'll take a few days,” Ryan said. “If you get it up in the next day or so, lemme know. No sense takin' a chance on a shitkickin' for nothing.”

Murphy didn't get a hard-on for the next few days. He was really worried. We all rallied round him and told him not to worry, to think positively, that everything would be okay, that he would pass the stamp test through the power of positive thinking.

“You're gonna bust them stamps to bits,” Blackie howled, as we all placed our bets.

Saturday came, and Ryan got the stamps, and Murphy did the test Saturday night. He woke us all up early Sunday morning, running around the dorm yelling, “I passed. I passed the test. I'm not ruptured. I passed the stamp test.”

At first we didn't know what was happening. We thought it was Brookes, who not only looks like a monkey, but acts like one all the time. Some Sundays he gets us up early, jumping from bunk to bunk, whacking us with a broom handle, which he calls his
ski-o-saku
, and chanting, “Rise and shine. Come on, my lads. You know what lads I mean. Up. Up. Let go of your cocks and pull on your socks. Up. Up. Rise and shine.”

But this time, it was Murphy, running around like a lunatic, screaming that he'd passed the stamp test.

“Oh, that power of positive thinking!” Oberstein boomed out in his best opera voice from his bunk bed.

At breakfast, Blackie howled, “You passed the test all right, Murphy. You busted them stamps to pieces.”

For a while, we all called Murphy The Postman. But like the stamps, it never stuck.