The Time Keepers

Chapter 64

CHAPTER 64

B UDDY SEIZES THE CAN OF WHITE SPRAY PAINT AND WALKS toward the back of the gym as the music pounds from inside. Queen’s “We Are the Champions” is playing, and everyone is loudly chanting the lyrics.

He doesn’t think about what he’s going to write, but the humiliation and rage he feels toward Katie, combined with the beer, fuels him.

He takes the paint, holds the nozzle down with his forefinger, and scrawls in large white letters, Katie Golden is a WHORE.

Clayton grins as his friend steps away from the brick facade to reveal what he’s written. He stares at the letters, watching with great titillation as their wet borders drip down the wall like the edges of an angry scar.

“We should probably get the hell out of here before we get caught,” Buddy spits as he throws the can into the shrubs and casts a frenzied glare in Clayton’s direction.

Neither of the boys saw B?o riding past the school on his way back from the clock store. Just as he rolls his bike around the rear perimeter, he eyes Buddy stepping away from his hateful graffiti.

B?o stares at the words. It takes him only seconds to recognizes Katie’s name and the last name of the one family who has shown him and his aunt Anh kindness since they arrived. And although he does not know the exact meaning of the sentence, the fury and haste in which it has so obviously been written exudes a palpable aggression. He immediately senses that the menacing white strokes of spray paint are a slur against Katie.

He stands near the bushes, still perched on his bike, and considers saying something to the boys, but the words are caught in his throat.

But even so, as the boys hoist their legs over their bicycles and start to ride off, his desire to reprimand them and punish the villains, just like his favorite superheroes would, gets the better of him.

He pushes off pavement with his foot and begins to follow them.

As B?o pedals behind them, still at a distance, the other boys don’t yet take notice of him. In his mind, he is channeling the warrior spirits of Giong, Jayna, and Zan. He is thinking how he will correct a wrong that has been done to Molly’s sister and make it right.

Clayton and Buddy continue to ride far ahead, inhaling air into their lungs enjoying the sensation of speed beneath them.

The tall lanky one rides on a dirt bike, his knees nearly up to the handlebars, the fat wheels veering S shapes as he pedals forth. He is laughing with his head thrown back, the hair on his head rising in the rush of autumn wind.

It isn’t until they approach the Ace Hardware Shopping Center and steer toward the entrance that leads to the reservoir and their fort that Buddy senses they are being followed.

They coast toward the back of the hardware store and throw their bikes down on the curb. It is only then that Buddy turns around and sees B?o staring at them with a look that transforms him from a boy wanting to be a hero to a boy now clearly afraid.

“What the fuck do you want?” Clayton is the first to break the quiet in the night. He takes a step closer to B?o. “Fucking faggot with his purple bicycle!” he bellows, spitting to the ground.

“He’s got flowers under his ass.” Buddy points a finger to the leather seat.

“You wrote …” B?o takes his hand and starts gesturing large sweeps of writing. “About Ka … tee. I will tell …”

Clayton’s laughter suddenly stops. He lunges toward B?o, throwing him to the pavement.

B?o is featherlight; his body crashes to the asphalt with little effort from Clayton.

“He’s going to rat us out,” Clayton seethes.

Buddy’s heart is pounding. He’s the one who’s going to get in trouble. He can instantly see his mother’s face in front of him, furious that he’s brought shame to their family.

He cannot have B?o tell anyone about what he did, not the police, not the school, and most of all not Katie’s family.

“You gonna be a snitch?” he mutters as he kicks B?o over and over.

B?o cries out in pain, his body buckling under the force of Buddy’s foot. “Stop,” he whimpers, and he lifts his hands up to protect his face.

The boys now don’t talk to each other. As B?o lies on the ground crying, Clayton hoists him up over his shoulder and heads toward their fort.

Anh stares at the dial of the mounted clock in the den of the motherhouse. It’s nearly 9:00 p.m., and her heart is pounding because B?o has not yet returned. The ride from the Golden Hours back to Our Lady Queen of Martyrs should not take him longer than thirty minutes. Fear seizes her heart.

She does not want to disturb the Sisters, but she worries if he might have run away again or even worse, hit by a car? She will give it five more minutes before she walks down the corridor to where Sister Mary Alice’s room is and then she will knock.

But before that, she decides she will go to the room of the one person she knows she can freely share her worry with. She goes to the community kitchen where, just a few minutes before, she saw him with a cup of tea and practicing the exercises in his English workbook.

“What is wrong, em ?” Dinh asks her in Vietnamese.

“It’s B?o,” she explains. His name breaks in her throat, and she quickly covers her mouth with her hand because she thinks she might cry. “He’s late. He’s always been on time for the past two weeks. He never comes home a minute late.” She taps her wrist. “I’m so worried.” She begins to cry.

To Dinh, her coming to him now in her moment of distress is a sign she thinks more of him than the others they live with at the motherhouse.

“You and I will wait for him for a few more minutes … then we’ll go find Sister Mary Alice. We won’t wait too long, I promise.” Dinh takes her hand, and the warmth penetrates his skin.

Jack has now finished his last repair for the evening and has no other chores to do, as B?o wound up all the clocks before he left for the night. He glances at the pocket watch they worked on together and smiles, buffing it one more time with a cloth before placing it in the drawer. He then glances at the time. It’s a couple hours earlier than he typically takes Hendrix for their long walk, but the dog is pacing around the room, restless to go out.

“What’s wrong, boy? You want some exercise?” Jack bends down and pats Hendrix’s black coat. The dog nuzzles his snout into the side of his hand and his eyes look up with pure adoration. The light in the store has shifted from twilight to nearly darkness and it strikes Jack that the long nights of summer have already shortened. He wonders if the stars will be particularly bright this evening as he walks Hendrix toward the reservoir.

He pulls the dog leash from the chair and snaps it onto Hendrix’s collar.

After about twenty minutes into their walk, he arrives at the entrance of the reservoir where he finds himself startled by the sight of three bikes thrown to the ground, and one small sneaker turned on its side.

But it is the sight of the purple bicycle with the flowered leather seat that sends Jack into full panic. His body rushes with adrenaline and fear, a frightening combination he hasn’t experienced since he was back in the jungles of Vietnam. His body becomes rigid, and his heart beats wildly inside his chest as he senses that something terrible has happened or is about to.

Hendrix must detect the changes rushing through him, the fear that’s changing his body chemistry. He must smell it deep in his dark, wet nostrils and hear it in his ears that are now in high alert. Hendrix barks and rushes toward the long winding path, pulling Jack into the forest.

Less than thirty minutes before, the boys pounced on B?o and began dragging him toward the fort.

Clayton’s laugh is menacing, and B?o is afraid. It suddenly hits him he has no actual superhero powers. He cannot transform himself like the Wonder Twin Zan into a powerful element of water, like a blizzard or a monsoon. He cannot vanquish these boys who threaten him and who have written bad things against Katie.

He weakens quicker than he wants to, as the tall one with the yellow hair is far too strong. His arm feels like a rope, the muscles sinewy and hard.

B?o is breathing hard as Clayton throws him inside the shelter made of sticks, twigs, pieces of broken lumber and plastic tarp.

His body feels like it has been shot with arrows. The pain is intense and overwhelming. His face is streaked with tears.

“What are we going to do with him?” asks Buddy.

“We can’t let him snitch on us.” Clayton’s eyes are fierce, and his bicep is locked beneath B?o’s chin. “I’m not getting in trouble for what you did back at the school.”

Buddy only hears “what you did” and begins to panic.

He bites down hard on his lip, and the metallic taste of his own blood on his tongue surprises him. “We need to make him shut up.”

B?o begins to wrestle underneath Clayton’s tightening grip. His face is darkening like a ripening plum.

It is then that Clayton’s eyes flash toward the circle of small pebbles around the makeshift firepit. Small and smooth as tiny moons, he reaches for one of them and brings it slowly to B?o’s lips.

B?o kicks the earth and desperately shakes his head no.

In the back of his mind, Clayton hears the words his father threatened him with earlier. “Here,” Clayton hisses. “Swallow this, you little gook.” He pushes the marble-sized rock into B?o’s mouth and orders him to swallow it.