The Obstacle Course (20 page)

“Somebody might see us.”

We started walking towards the door. We were still holding hands but I let go—I didn’t want Admiral Wells or Mrs. Wells to see us holding hands. They’d wanted me to be nice to her, but that would’ve been too much.

“Hey, Melanie,” I said just before we went back in.

“Yes?”

“I’m glad you asked me to your recital.”

That made her happy. It didn’t make up for my not kissing her, but it helped.

As soon as we went inside she ran to her grandparents and started talking to them, her face all flushed and excited. From the way they looked in my direction it must’ve been about me. I felt pretty self-conscious, standing there with all those rich old people in the room and this girl talking about me to her people, one who was a famous war hero on top of everything else, so I headed for the can to take a leak. I really had to piss, I’d been holding it the whole time we were outside.

I pissed against the sides of the commode, so no one outside the room would hear me. That would’ve embarrassed the shit out of me, opening the bathroom door and finding some old biddy waiting to go, knowing she’d been listening to me. I’ll bet I went for three minutes, pissing a rope as thick as a horse’s.

On the way back I passed by what Mrs. Wells calls her drawing room. It’s the room with the paintings of people from the Revolutionary War and times like that. The room was dark, but there was enough light filtering in that I could see a woman standing there. The woman had her back to me, so she didn’t know I was watching. Then she turned, and I saw enough of her face to recognize her. It was Mrs. Prescott, Melanie’s grandmother.

She was holding something in her hand. It looked like a silver statue, a little one. Mrs. Wells had a lot of real expensive stuff in the house, silver and gold cups and picture frames and little statues.

Old Mrs. Prescott kind of glanced around, like she was checking to see if anyone was watching her. I know that look—it’s the same look I have when I’m in the dime store about to steal an ID bracelet or something. She didn’t see me, though, because it was dark and I wasn’t in the room, I was in the hall outside, and the curtains on the glass doors to the room blocked me out.

She looked at the statue for a minute more, then she put it down on the table and picked up another one. I don’t know why, but I felt weird, like I was watching something I shouldn’t be seeing, so as quietly as I could I turned away and walked back into the living room, where all the other guests were standing around, talking and socializing.

The party broke up pretty soon after. Melanie stood in the foyer with her grandparents, who were talking to the Wellses. Her grandmother was laughing and talking in that singing voice of hers like she didn’t have a care in the world.

I felt weird looking at Mrs. Prescott, because I’d been spying on her in the drawing room. Melanie caught me looking and thought I was looking at her, because she blushed again. It was kind of cute, the way she blushed so much. As she followed her grandparents out the door she turned and blew me a secret kiss.

I was going to have to figure out a way to let her know I wasn’t going to be her boyfriend—she was a nice girl, but we came from different worlds, if she ever found out about the real me … I didn’t want to think about that. She was a nice girl who was lonely. And she had the best goddamn tits I’d ever seen, even though I’d been stupid enough to be a gentleman for one time in my life and not touch them.

Admiral Wells and I sat in his study, drinking hot chocolate. We were alone—all the guests had left and Mrs. Wells had gone up to bed. He was wearing pajamas and a silk dressing gown over them, like you see in the movies. I was in my jeans and T-shirt.

I was staying overnight in their guest room, because it was too late to go home. The admiral had insisted, so I’d called my mom and told her the usual lie, I lie more to my folks than I tell them the truth. What they don’t know won’t hurt them, that’s my motto.

“Did you have fun tonight?” Admiral Wells asked me.

“Yes, sir, it was neat.”

He nodded, looking at me over the rim of his mug.

“Melanie Prescott and you got along?”

“Sure. She’s nice.”

“Yes. She is.” He paused a moment. “It would be a good thing if you and she became friends. She lives too much the cloistered life, she needs a teenager’s excitement.”

“I think we’ll be friends,” I told him. I knew he wanted to hear that, and anyway it was the truth.

“I’d like that.”

We sipped our hot chocolates without talking. One thing I like about Admiral Wells, you don’t have to talk to him all the time. It’s okay not to say anything, to just be there.

“I’ve got something to show you,” he said in this offhanded way, like he’d just remembered whatever it was. He walked over to his desk and picked up a catalogue, then came back and sat down next to me. “Have you heard of Admiral Farrington Academy, Roy?”

“No, sir.”

“It’s a military preparatory school.” He held the catalogue on his lap so I could see it. It had a slick cover with a picture of some kind of Army or Navy cadet standing at attention. On top of the picture it said “Admiral Farrington Military Academy,” and underneath, “Turning Boys Into Men For Over One Hundred Years.”

He handed me the catalogue.

“Farrington is one of the finest military schools in the country,” he told me. “They specialize in training boys to go to the Naval Academy, and from what I understand they send more boys to Annapolis than any other school in the country, by a factor of three, maybe more.”

I hefted the catalogue in my hand. It was pretty heavy, with a lot of pages.

“It’s something you should consider, Roy,” the admiral said, turning to me.

Boy, that hit me like a ton of bricks. I didn’t know what to say, so for once I was smart and didn’t say anything.

“This is all preliminary, of course,” he continued. “I know you live with your mother and father and sister and that you’re happy at home and with your school. At the same time, I know how important going to Annapolis is to you. And I want to help you achieve that goal if I can.”

“Yes, sir.” I was numb, as if this was all a dream.

“I want you to take this catalogue home with you and look it over,” Admiral Wells said. “I’m sure you’ll find it interesting, maybe even exciting. If I were a young man considering a military career, a Navy career, I’d want to look long and hard at a school like Farrington, because it would help me reach my goal.”

He sat back then and gave me a good, hard look.

“Going to a school like this would be very different from the life you live now, Roy. It would be different from the school you go to, and from any public school you will attend in the future, be it in Ravensburg or anywhere. It would even be different from a normal private school, like St. Alban’s here in Washington. To begin with, you would live there. You would come home for holidays, of course, and in the summer, but for the most part you would be moving out of your home and making Farrington your new home. And you might have to repeat the ninth grade, because their standards are higher than a public school’s.”

I kind of squirmed around when he said that. Even though I’d been wanting to get out, for years it seemed, facing it suddenly was hard to do. What about my friends? What about Darlene? And to do ninth grade over—I was already tired of this year.

He thought I was squirming for a different reason: “I can understand your reluctance to leave home,” he told me. “It’s one of the most difficult decisions a young person has to make.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “Other guys do it, though, so I guess I could.” I wasn’t sure why I’d said that, it just popped out, but it seemed okay. I
could
leave home if it was the right thing.

“Yes, you could. You’re a mature young man. I think you could handle just about anything.”

“Thank you.” I hoped I wasn’t turning red—getting compliments like that doesn’t happen to me very much.

“I mean it. I’ve observed you long enough to know your mettle, Roy. You’re first-rate. You’ll make a terrific midshipman someday.”

“Yes, sir,” I said again, “thank you.”

“It isn’t easy, going to Farrington. The discipline is difficult. It is, after all, a military academy. You’ll pull plenty of duty your first year; all boys do. The classwork will be hard, much harder than what you’re used to. You’ll be studying three or four hours a night, just to keep up.”

Three or four hours every single night? Except for that time I’d busted my balls to get my math homework done, I hadn’t studied three or four hours a month, ever.

“That’s a lot,” I said.

“Everyone does it at Farrington,” he told me, “or they don’t make it; they wash out.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “I know you, Roy. You won’t wash out.”

“Yes, sir.” Shit—he was talking like I was already going there. And even if I wanted to, even if I got in by some miracle, there’s no way my old man would ever pay for anything like that. He’d think I was crazy, and he’d probably make me stop seeing Admiral Wells to boot, if he ever got wind of any of this stuff.

“One thing I should mention before I pursue this any further,” he said. “This is an expensive school. It costs as much as a good university.”

That was it. He’d told me what I’d already suspected.

“But you mustn’t let that concern you,” he continued. “Farrington wants the best there is. If you qualify, they’ll find a way to make it work.” He paused. “And if there’s anything outstanding, Mrs. Wells and I will help you out.”

I didn’t know whether to shit or go blind. First he’s telling me about this great school, then he’s telling me I can get in, then he’s telling me I’ll make it through, and then he tells me he’ll pay for it.

“I … I don’t think I could do that, Admiral Wells,” I said, feeling like I was going to barf I was so nervous. “My folks … they wouldn’t go for someone else paying for me.” Shit, my old man would skin me alive if this ever came up.

“I can appreciate that, Roy. But if and when it happens, we’ll see it right. I’m sure your parents want the best for you.”

Don’t be so sure, I thought.

“As I said, it will be a completely new life-style. You will wear a uniform to school every day, and you’ll have to be spic-and-span, just like at Annapolis.” He looked at my hair. “You won’t be able to wear your hair in that style.”

I reached up to my hair. It was pretty long, the front in a pompadour, the sides and back combed in a modified DA. You can’t wear real DAs at RJH, you have to comb the back down, but still it’s a hoody hairstyle. I’d have to wear a flattop, and no sidecars, either. Roy Poole with a dorky haircut; who’d have ever thought that could happen.

“And it isn’t coed,” he went on. “No girls.”

Now that would really be a bitch, particularly the way things were starting to go for me.

“Of course, there aren’t any girls at Annapolis, either,” he reminded me.

“I know that.” That was okay, those were the rules. Rules are fine, as long as they’re the same for everybody. That’s what I hate the most about my school—they don’t make everybody play by the same rules.

“Do they have a code of conduct, sir?” I wanted to know if everybody played by the same rules.

“As a matter of fact, they do,” he said, his eyes smiling behind his eyeglasses.

“One set for everybody? No playing favorites?”

“Absolutely.” Now he was really smiling.

“Like the one they have at the Naval Academy?”

“Identical.” He waited. “Is that important to you?”

“Everybody getting treated the same is important,” I told him. To be treated by what you do, not who you are or how much brown-nosing you do.

“That’s how it is,” the admiral assured me. He looked at me over his eyeglasses, like one of those headmasters you see in those English movies. “It’s a wonderful star to mark your compass by,” he said. “I’ve been living by that standard since my first year at the Academy. If you can handle that kind of discipline, that self-discipline, you’ll do fine.”

“I hope I can, sir. I want to try.”

More than anything, that’s what I wanted. To be judged just for me, not all the other bullshit.

He patted me on the shoulder again. “Take this catalogue up to bed with you and look it over. We’ll talk about it in the morning.” He stood up. “I’m bushed. These society parties wipe me out. By the way, you handled yourself quite capably this evening. Mrs. Wells said you were an absolute gentleman.”

“Thank you.” When he’d said he was getting tired it made me realize how beat I was. It had been a real strain, getting through this whole day and night.

“Sleep tight, Roy. See you in the morning.”

“Good night, sir.”

I didn’t fall asleep for hours. I read the catalogue cover to cover. It looked pretty neat, even the uniforms. If everyone else is wearing one, you don’t feel like a jerk.

It didn’t
seem
real, though. I come from a crappy family in a crappy town, go to a crappy school, and I’m a crappy student. There’s no way I could go to a place like that. I mean I wanted to go to the Naval Academy, and I knew I could make it if somebody would give me a chance, which is more than anyone ever had done about anything up to this point in my life. So that got me to thinking: if I could go to Annapolis, why couldn’t I go to this military school, especially if Admiral Wells thought I could? If anybody knew what it took, he did.

It was a good feeling, that Admiral Wells thought I could do it.

Before I fell asleep, I thought about Melanie. She really was kind of sorry, compared to the girls I knew. On the other hand, she was fairly pretty in the face and she was nice as hell, not stuck-up or anything. She was rich. And she was stacked, that was maybe the most important thing about her, after being nice. Thinking about those titties got my pecker hard as a piston. It wouldn’t be any big deal to be nice to her. I could even make out with her, Darlene would never know. I’d be doing Melanie a favor, and making Admiral Wells and Mrs. Wells happy as well.

I shot a mighty load into a wad of Kleenex, thinking about Melanie’s tits. Then I fell asleep, dreaming about Farrington Academy, about Annapolis, about everything. About my life—about what was happening to it.