“What’s that?” he asks.
I tell him it’s Seagram’s V.O., so then he wants to know why I’m pouring it in my drink.
I look at him and he has this authentic interest in his big, round eyes. He really wants to know. What am I going to do, lie to him?
So I go, “Well, I like it. It’s smooth. It has kind of a smoky flavor. I used to drink the southern bourbons more—Jim Beam, Jack Daniel’s—but if you’re going for a nice, slow, all-day sort of buzz, those have a little too much bite. And to my way of thinking, people can smell them on your breath more. I tried Southern Comfort, but it’s too sweet. No, it’s the Canadian whiskies for me now. Although I’ve been known to mix a fine, fine martini too.”
“What’s a martinina?” he says, and I can see it’s time to head off the questions before I end up spending the whole morning putting this kid through bartender school. I mean, he’s a good kid, but my girlfriend is waiting on me and she’s not the most patient person in the world.
“Look,” I say, “I’ve got to be moving along, so where you headed?”
He finishes chewing the last of the burrito, swallows, and says, “Florida.”
Now I can’t give you mileage off the top of my head, but we’re in Oklahoma, so Florida is a good five states away, at least. I explain that to him, and he tells me to just drop him off at the edge of town and he’ll walk the rest of the way. He’s serious.
“I’m running away from home,” he says.
This kid is getting better all the time. Running away to Florida! I take a hit off my whisky and Seven and I can see it just like he does—a giant orange sun dripping down into the bluest ocean you ever saw with palm trees genuflecting at its glory.
“Look,” I say, “Walter. May I be so bold as to ask why you’re running away?”
He stares into the dashboard. “’Cause my mom made my dad move away and now he’s in Florida.”
I’m like, “Aw shit. I can sympathize, little dude. Same thing happened to me when I was a kid too.”
“What’d you do?”
“I was pissed, I guess. My mom wouldn’t tell me where my dad moved to. I didn’t run away, but I think it was around that time that I set the tree in the backyard on fire. I’m not sure why. It was quite a sight, though.”
That stokes his enthusiasm. “Really, you set a whole tree on fire?”
“Don’t get any ideas,” I tell him. “You can get into some deep dookie for that kind of thing. You don’t want the firemen mad at you, do you?”
“No, I don’t want that.”
“So, about this running away deal—I can see your point. You’d get to visit your dad and you’d have adventures and shit. You could swim in the ocean. But to tell you the truth, I can’t recommend it. Florida’s too far. You try to walk and you’re not going to find a convenience store on every corner. Where are you going to get your food then?”
“I could hunt it.”
“Yeah, you could. Do you have a gun?”
“No.”
“A knife or a rod and reel maybe?”
“I have a baseball bat, but it’s at home.”
“There you go. You’re not prepared. We probably ought to go back and get your bat.”
“But my mom’s home. She thinks I’m in school.”
“That’s all right. I’ll talk to her. I’ll explain the whole situation.”
“You will?”
“Sure.”
Chapter 2
Now, I should’ve been at my girlfriend’s five minutes ago, but this time I have a legitimate reason for running late. How can Cassidy—Ms. Activist herself—hold it against me for intervening in this kid’s situation? I’m practically doing social work here. I might even get Walter’s mom to vouch for me.
Unfortunately, Walter doesn’t remember exactly where he lives. He’s never had to walk there from the convenience store before. All he knows is there’s a scary black van with no wheels parked in the driveway of a house on the corner of his street, so up and down the residential section I go, looking for that van.
For a six-year-old, Walter’s a pretty good conversationalist. He has a theory that Wolverine from X-Men is the same guy who picks up the garbage on his street. Also, there was a big, redheaded kid at his school named Clayton who made a hobby out of going around and stepping on other kids’ feet. Then one day, he got tired of hearing the littler kids squeal, so he stomped down on the teacher’s foot for a change. The last time Walter saw Clayton, Mrs. Peckinpaugh was dragging him down the hall by the wrist while he slid along on his butt like a dog wiping itself.
“Yeah,” I say. “School’s weird, all right. But just remember this—weird’s good. Embrace the weird, dude. Enjoy it because it’s never going away.”
Just to illustrate my point, I tell the story about Jeremy Holtz and the fire extinguisher. I knew Jeremy pretty well in grade school, and he was all right, always quick with a one-liner. But in junior high, around the time his brother got killed in Iraq, he started hanging out with the “bad element.” Not that I don’t hang out with the bad element every once in a while myself, but that’s just me—I hang out with everyone.
Jeremy changed, though. He got acne and started harassing teachers. One day after he let out a loud exaggerated fake yawn in history class, Mr. Cross told him he was only showing off his bad upbringing. That was too much for Jeremy. Without saying a word, he walked out of the class. About a minute later, he sauntered back in with a fire extinguisher, just blasting one direction and then the next, casual as could be. He was a walking blizzard-maker. Everyone in the back row took a hit along with most of the whole south side of the classroom. Mr. Cross made a charge for him, but Jeremy blasted him a good one, too, as if to say, “There you go, Mr. Cross. There’s some motherfucking bad upbringing for you.”