and pries Dorothy’s mouth wide. Robin watches in horror as one of Clark’s fingers disappears inside.
“You’re hurting her,” he protests, as his mother gags, the tendons in her neck tightening.
“I’ve done this before,” Clark whispers solemnly. He wiggles his finger and then pulls it out just in time to release a funnel of clear vomit.
Jackson is suddenly there in the doorway, wide-eyed. “Holy barf bag!” he exclaims. Robin spins around and glares at him.
Clark speaks without looking at him, “Why don’t you go back to sleep, kiddo?”
Dorothy heaves again and sends out another splash. “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Puke-o-rama,” Jackson announces.
“Dad, could you tell Howard Cosell his services are not needed?” Robin says.
“Where’d Larry go?” Jackson asks.
Robin says, “We put him out with the trash.”
Clark slaps his hand on his thigh. “Can you guys just put the sibling rivalry on hold? Jackson, go to your room. Robin, wipe Mom’s face again.”
“Oh sure, Robin gets to have all the fun,” Jackson says before splitting.
“We’re gonna lift you now, Mom, OK?” Robin says softly into her ear, but she does not respond.
“She’s out again,” Clark says. Robin can hear the disgust in his father’s voice. He feels it, too, but not for her. His mother this far out of control—this just can’t be her fault. Someone else is to blame.
“I saw Mom do the Technicolor yawn.” Jackson’s voice is an excited whisper in the dark. Robin stares up from his bed to a crack in the ceiling.
“Don’t talk about your own mother that way,” Robin says.
“Oh, give me a break. That was a pisser.”
“I’m sick and tired of your attitude.”
Jackson breaks out into laughter. “Why do you do that?”
“What?”
“Talk like Mom. I’m sick and tired of your attitude.”
The words sting. Robin rolls on his side, faces the wall. “You don’t understand anything the way I do.”
“All I know is nobody wants some kid their own age talking like their dumb mother. Why do you think Larry’s always bothering you? You ask for it, Robin.”
Robin feels his eyes watering. Maybe Jackson’s right. Maybe he does provoke the trouble that finds him. But how could he explain to Jackson the look that Larry gave him when he wagged his dick at Robin, the way he knew Robin was staring at his dick, the way he turned it against him? How can he explain himself to Jackson when they don’t even seem to speak the same language?
He finally speaks of the only thing he understands: his idea of the far-off future. “I’m going to move to the city one day and live in a penthouse, and all of this will be some funny thing in the past if I even remember that much of it.”
“Yeah, right. You and Mom can move off together and talk to each other like a couple of old ladies and drink until you puke.” Suddenly he throws back the covers. “I gotta take Petey for a pee.”
“You have a name for your dick?”
“Yeah, me and Larry. His is Freddy.”
“That’s disgusting.”
“No, it’s not. It’s funny. What’s your problem?”
He shuts his eyes so tight that neon bleeds into the blackness. He doesn’t understand how this works. Larry and Jackson get naked and name their dicks, but when Larry sees him staring at “Freddy,” it’s a bad thing. He says a little prayer. God, give me a new life. This one isn’t working for me. He waits for a merciful bolt of lightning to strike his brain, to offer him some clue as to how it all works, this whole world of normal boys.
Chapter Three
The next day, after school, he goes to a place that he has been warned against. At the east end of the reservoir, where he regularly rides his bike on Sunday afternoons, is an unpaved road. You’d hardly notice it driving a car; its entrance is a sharp right turn past some high trees just where the main road loops left. At school Robin has overheard kids mention a hidden pond at the end of that road—they call it the Ice Pond and talk about it as a place where every illicit thing happens, a place where adults don’t venture. Robin mentioned it once to his mother, who dismissed it as local lore: “Oh, just another one of those fabled lovers’ lanes.”
“You should hear the stories about what goes on there,” Robin told her, immediately regretting the wondrous tone of his voice.
“What’s the big interest?” she asked, staring suspiciously.
“No biggie.”
“I suggest you stay away. I’m sure it’s positively seedy. Soused-up, hormonal bullies trying to impress their girlfriends.”
The story that Robin cannot forget, that compels him this early October afternoon to steer his ten-speed impulsively down the road toward the Ice Pond, was whispered just a few days before, in the locker room after his phys. ed. class. Donny Meier and Seth Carter were talking about a contest: the two of them and a couple others drinking beer and then trying to knock the cans off a stump with the force of their piss. Donny saying, “That was really fucked up,” and Seth saying, “We should do it again, for a goof,” and Donny agreeing, “Yeah, we gotta get Danniman to come along again. He’ll probably put a hole through the can.” And then they both laughed, and Seth said, “Long Dong Danniman,” and Donny said, “Aw, man, that’s fucked up.”
Robin usually ignores locker room conversations. He can rarely find a way into the back-and-forth of them, the language and rhythm that boys his age all seem to understand instinctively. He does not give himself a reason that this one is different, but simply lets the picture form: the boys, their pants around their ankles, the elastic bands of their underwear tugged beneath their dicks. He hears the air split by the hissing streams, the ruffle of piss on dry leaves, the ping as cans are struck and topple. Donny Meier’s laughing mouth, and Seth Carter’s brown bangs feathered across his excited eyes, and Billy “Long Dong” Danniman with it in his hand. He lets this picture form and then, when he gets to what he most wants to see, snaps it off guiltily.
He speeds toward the pond as if outrunning a pursuing authority. The dirt road is just wide enough for a car to get through, with crisscrossing tire treads layered deep. In the stillness of the woods, his bike’s chain is loud as a motor. The wheels kick up pebbles and stiff clumps of dirt that smack him in the back—each nick almost pleasurable, a small hardship to reinforce the adventure of this unplanned ride.
He reaches a clearing strewn with litter: empty beer containers, mangled newspapers, cast off, soiled clothing. No cars—he is relieved, and vaguely disappointed. He dismounts, sets his bike on its kickstand in the soft, trodden earth and follows the edge of the pond toward a place where granite boulders are piled as high as his shoulders. In the charred remnants of a campfire, a piece of ripped, colored foil gleams among the cigarette butts, the word “Trojan” embossed upon it. He’s only ever heard of Trojans; he scans the ground for what was once inside this wrapper, not sure exactly what a rubber even looks like. Seeing nothing that fits the description, he pockets the wrapper, a souvenir of his visit.
Water laps at the silty shore; crows squawk from treetops. All else is silence. Robin removes his shoes and socks, lets his feet dangle from a rock into the pond. The water isn’t icy at all—it’s warm, soothing. He hikes up his pants and glides in to his ankles, the pond’s bottom soft as mashed potatoes. Do the kids who hang out here ever go swimming? He conjures up late-night skinny-dipping parties, the sexual laughter of older teenagers, a bonfire glowing upon wet bodies and aluminum beer cans and foil Trojan wrappers. Todd Spicer might