Chapter 34

Monday was a blustery day and I didn’t want to run, but it wasn’t raining, so out I went. I still couldn’t do my five miles faster than thirty minutes, but I wasn’t really winded at the end. I had also increased my sit-ups and pushups to one hundred each. I felt like I was in pretty good shape, but that I should be looking for other exercises.

Breakfast was quiet except for a little bickering between Denny and Eddie. They did that so much that no one even noticed. Mary was still asleep. Dad was deep in thought as he drank his coffee.

Mum asked me, “Rick what are your plans for this week?”

“Golf practice every day, but I have to ask Coach if I can skip Tuesday for Drama Club tryouts. I have to call Mr. Robinson to see if he would review the electrical circuit for the Hairdryer.”

“So long as you keep dinner open on Saturday.”

I knew exactly what that was all about but said, “Our golf tournament is in Columbus; we leave early but finish late so we will have to stay overnight.”

“Richard Edward Jackson you will be home for your birthday party on Saturday!” Mum exploded.

I just grinned.

She realized I had got her and started laughing, “You little so and so, you will pay for that.”

Birthdays at our house had always been small private parties. Not even cousins were invited; just our very immediate family. We had always given each other gifts, even if Mum and Dad had to take us shopping and pay for them.

“We play Marysville on Saturday here, so I should be home by three o’clock at the latest.”

“I’m still considering Tam Tattlers Tart for your dessert,” threatened Mum.

“Oh not that,” I replied!

There is no such thing as Tam Tattlers Tart. Mum always threatened us with it; she swore that she and her sister Mary had been acting up at dinner once so my Grand Mum had told them they deserved Tam Tattlers Tart. After dinner, they sat at the table expectantly waiting for their dessert.

After a while, they went to the kitchen and asked where the Tam Tattlers Tart was. At that point, Grand Mum told them there was no such thing, and they were getting what they deserved. Mum never did that to us, but we knew we were on thin ice when it was offered.

“Pax, I surrender.”

I learned Pax in Latin, Mum learned it in school, Pax Britannia.

As usual, I watched for Tom and Bill coming down the walk before I went out the door. Tom and I had been going places together but we hadn’t seen that much of Bill lately. As we walked along, Bill nonchalantly pulled out a pack of Lucky Strikes and a lighter.

“Bill, what are you doing,” a shocked Tom asked?

Every kid I knew had tried a cigarette at one time or the other, but to light one up on the way to school put you in another social class and it wasn’t a move up.

Bill belligerently told Tom, “I’m tired of being seen as a little kid.”

“Now you will be seen as a stupid kid,” I replied. “Have you read in the paper how it has been proven that cigarettes can cause lung cancer?”

“That just happens to old people, I will have stopped by then. If you guys don’t like it walk with someone else, I’m heading down to Wilcox’s anyway.”

Wilcox’s is a corner grocery store that is just far enough from the school that teachers ignored kids hanging out down there. It is a rougher crowd, not bad as in delinquent but as the guys taking shop class and their girls. Most of them smoked and it was well known that girls who smoked were wilder than those who didn’t. How this was established I have no idea but it was regarded as gospel.

“Bill do you think that is such a good idea,” I tried to reason.

“You guys can still get dates, I can’t, that skag Nancy Sparks has told everyone I have a big mouth, so none of the girls I ask out will date me.”

“How many did you ask?” inquired Tom.

“I asked about twenty girls in our class if they would like to go to the movies with me, they all said no, and the last couple just laughed at me.”

Tom and I looked at each other; we had no idea what else to say but knew Bill was going down a bad path. It wasn’t just the smoking, it was the whole attitude he was developing.

Tom and I walked to school while Bill headed to Wilcox’s. Talking while we walked, Tom and I admitted to each other we had tried a cigarette when we were thirteen and it was terrible.

Tom also wondered what his first taste of beer would be like. I kept my mouth shut, to me the beer was also terrible, I had one with Tab Hunter and Elvis Presley down in Mexico and didn’t care for it at all.