“I got a call from Sister Henry,” she began, her voice deceptively soft. He saw how her hands gripped the edge of the couch and how her skin had gone pale with red splotches underneath her makeup. “What happened with Ryan Peterman?”
From his spot in front of the closet, Andy said nothing.
“This is the second time this year,” his mom said. “One more fight and they’ll expel you.”
Andy didn’t answer. In September, Darryl Patrick had called Andy an Oreo, black on the outside, white on the inside, “except you don’t even look black.” That wasn’t exactly an insult, but he’d fought Darryl anyway, in the playground after lunch, and when his mom had asked what had happened Andy had just said, “He started it,” and had refused to tell her anything else.
“Andy?” Lori asked. “Andy, what are we going to do about this?”
Andy put his hand in his pocket and crossed his fingers, hoping that if he kept quiet she’d let it go, but Lori kept on.
“What were you fighting about?” Andy didn’t answer. His mom kept right on going. “Because you didn’t want to wear his old coat,” she said. Andy gave a tiny nod. She sighed, lifting her hair off her face, then letting it drop. “Honey, I told you. If I could buy you a brand-new coat, I would. I’d buy you a hundred coats if I had the money.”
No, you wouldn’t, he thought. The pit of his stomach felt cramped, and his face felt like it was on fire. If you had the money you’d go to Atlantic City and play roulette with your friends.
“And now,” she said, “I’ve got to call the Petermans and apologize.” She stomped into the bedroom, locking the door behind her, except the door was a cheap, sad thing, like everything in this cheap, sad place, and Andy could hear what she was saying. That shouldn’t have mattered, and A jacket is a jacket, Andy wears hand-me-downs all the time, this wasn’t any different. Then there was a pause, and then Lori said, Oh, no, I couldn’t . . . No, really, it’s not necessary . . . No, Andy can’t be rewarded for this, he needs to understand that what he did was wrong. Then a lot of uh-huhs and I sees and then, finally, a thank-you. He stood behind the kitchen table, waiting, one leg jiggling until he pressed down hard to make it stop. Finally his mother emerged.
“What happened?” he asked. He’d gotten a scraped cheek and a black eye in the fight. Lori reached across the table and touched his face.
“The Petermans understood why you were embarrassed,” she said. “Ryan wants to use some of his allowance money to get a coat for you.”
“Oh, no,” Andy said. He was horrified. The only thing worse than wearing Ryan’s old coat would be wearing a new coat that Ryan had bought especially for Andy. That was when Lori put her hands against her eyes and started to cry; not the big, showy sobs she sometimes did, but just sitting there silently while tears rolled down her face.
Andy hated when she cried. It made him want to run out of the house and onto the street and sprint, all-out, until he was as far away from her as he could get. He made himself stand up and pat her shoulder. “It’s okay,” he said. When he tried to hug her, it was like trying to put his arms around a bundle of sticks. She didn’t move to help him, didn’t do anything except sit there and cry. He leaned down, resting his cheek on her head, smelling shampoo and hair spray and Jergens lotion, the cigarette that she’d smoked on the walk from the train to the house and the Tic Tac she’d sucked to cover it up. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I promise I won’t get in any more fights.” He patted her shoulder some more, and brought her a glass of water that she didn’t touch. Outside, he heard a bus wheeze by, and voices, two ladies talking about getting their Christmas shopping done.
“Are you hungry?” he asked. Lori shook her head.
“But you get something,” she said. “There’s money in my wallet.” She moved her hands away from his face, trying to smile. “You’re a growing boy.”
He wouldn’t take her money. Not on that night. Instead, he took down the envelope on the top shelf of the closet where he kept his own savings, the two dollars he got for feeding Mrs. Green’s cats on weekends when she went to visit her mother in Virginia and the five that Mrs. Cleary had given him for teaching Dylan Cleary how to ride a bike, the quarters and fifty-cent pieces that he’d collected for shoveling neighbors’ steps and sidewalks in the winter. The money was supposed to be for a bike. He’d been saving up since Miles had gotten a mountain bike the year before. He took out ten dollars, ordered a pizza with mushrooms, his mother’s favorite, and gave the guy a dollar tip when he came.