Gone (Michael Bennett 6)

“I knew it!” Brian yelled as he came running from behind the trees off to the right.

Guillermo froze in place as the six-foot-one former Fordham Prep nose tackle grabbed him by his shirt and shoved him, sprawling, onto the ground.

The trailer-park kids scattered immediately into the woods as the kid and his bat went flying. Jane stood there, wide-eyed. She didn’t know what she wanted to do more: wrap her arms around her big brother’s neck or do a cartwheel.

Brian picked up the bat.

“Hey, it’s OK, man. I was just playing around,” Guillermo said, dusting himself off as he finally stood. “Now give me the bat back, OK? I was only kidding.”

Brian hefted the bat.

“This bat?” Brian said. “You want this bat back?”

Brian turned and hurled it as hard as he could. It made a whistling sound as it spun through the air like a thrown airplane propeller. After a while, it landed out of sight, in

the vegetation on the other side of the barbedwire fence.

“There’s your bat back, punk,” Brian said. “Go fetch.”

“Hey, why’d you do that?” Guillermo said in honest shock.

“I wonder,” Brian said, squinting at him. “You think you can mess with my little brother and sister? You’re lucky I didn’t return the bat upside your head.”

The kid looked at Brian, then at the fence, and suddenly started crying.

“I need the bat back. It belongs to my brother, man. Now he’s going to kill me.”

Brian eyed the kid.

“Then go get it, you little baby.”

“I can’t. Look where you threw it, man. Right into the middle of Cristiano’s patch.”

“So what? It’s a fence and some bushes. Start climbing.”

“Just some bushes? You crazy? Open your eyes. That’s weed, yo! That whole thing is a cash crop of premium weed. Cristiano don’t play. He’s got dogs, man. Rotties in there. Booby traps, too, people say. What goes in there, stays in there.”

“Did you say weed?” Jane asked. “As in marijuana? You can’t grow weed. That’s illegal.”

“Hello? Where the hell are you from? That’s all they grow around here,” Guillermo insisted, wiping tears from his eyes.

“And that makes you what? Cool or something?” Brian said, shaking with anger. This place is America? he thought. He really felt like punching the kid right in his face.

“Eddie, Jane, come on. We’re getting the hell out of here now,” Brian said.

“But what about my bat?” the kid screeched. “My brother, man. He’s going to go crazy!”

Brian turned to the kid and pointed a finger in his face.

“To hell with your bat, and to hell with you, too, you evil little runt. I hope your brother does kill you. He’ll be doing the world a favor.”

As they ran back to the food bank, Brian knew what he’d said wasn’t very Christian, but he was sick of this. These weird hippie families and messed-up poor people. All the drugs everywhere. I mean, they’d come here to help this morning, and Eddie had almost gotten beaten by some juvenile delinquent? How’d that make sense?

Seamus was closing the back door of the station wagon when they got back to the food bank.

“Did you win?” he asked as the kids quickly piled into the car.

“Oh, we won, Gramps,” Eddie said with an innocent smile. “Could we go now?”