Throwback, p.12
Throwback, page 12
Quinn’s negotiating skills were impressive. But now Corey was on said horse. And he was fast becoming the afternoon comedy entertainment for New York’s Finest.
“Ride high in the saddle!” Quinn shouted, looking at Corey as if he were a space alien. “High in the saddle!”
“I d-d-don’t even kn-kn-know what that m-m-means—ow!” Corey bit his tongue so hard he nearly fell off. For a moment the rafters of the stable seemed to go rubbery.
Riding was nothing like he expected. It looked so easy. Even Zenobia knew how to do it. But to Corey, it was like sitting on a jackhammer. He was already aching in places he’d never felt pain before. Through the door of the police stable, he heard the whistle of a freight train running up the far West Side. Just beyond it was the silver-blue expanse of the Hudson. He had a great urge to hop onto one or jump into the other.
Officer Blunt had promised this horse was gentle. But its name, Chaos, should have been a clue. All Corey was supposed to do was ride him in a wide circle. But Chaos was zigzagging around as if he were at a dance audition.
The police had all gathered off to the side of the stable. Some of them were doubled over with laughter. Tears rolled down Officer Blunt’s sideburns.
“Take control!” Quinn shouted. “Show him who’s boss!”
Corey pulled back on the reins. “Come on, Chaos!” he said desperately. “You’re embarrassing me. Go right!”
Chaos snorted and went left, his eyes on a salt lick near the exit. Next to the salt lick were a few bales of hay. Corey noticed one of them twitch. A moment later, a giant rat emerged.
As the rodent scurried toward the open door, one of the cops began racing after it with a baseball bat. Chaos reared up and whinnied. And Corey fell over backward onto the dirt floor, landing on his behind.
“Well, that was successful,” he said through a grimace.
Quinn raced over, grabbing Chaos’s reins. “Whoa, easy, feller! Easy. That’s my buddy you just threw. Go on. Apologize. Say you’re sorry.”
“He’s . . . a horse!” Corey said, nearly choking on the blood of his bitten lip.
“Sometimes you gotta talk to them like babies,” Quinn said, pulling a handkerchief from his jeans pocket. “Take this. Clean yourself up. You did great.”
“I did?” Corey said.
“Well, you have potential.” Quinn led Chaos to a hitching post by the door, tied him up, and then returned to Corey. “Tell me again, how is it you are alive and thirteen years old and you don’t know how to ride a horse?”
“I prefer camels?” Corey said.
Before Quinn could answer, Officer Blunt announced, “Gentlemen, on your feet! We have us an extinguished visitor!”
The two boys stood. Officer Blunt stepped aside to reveal the skinniest man Corey had ever seen. His face looked like it had been chiseled in chalk and his body was bent like a parenthesis. A top hat was perched on his head, and he stared at Quinn through a set of smudged glasses perched at the end of a twiglike nose. When he spoke, his voice was like the creak of an old hinge. “How fortunate you boys happened to be here on my daily visit to the precinct.” He walked toward Quinn with a sharp, appraising glance. “I am impressed by your ease with horses. Officer Blunt tells me you are a cowboy seeking employment.”
“Two cowboys,” Quinn corrected him. “Quinn Roper and Corey Fletcher at your service! I came all the way from Wyoming to answer your flyer. Corey here is from . . . Egypt. Once he gets the hang of horses, he’ll be an expert!”
“Wait,” Corey said. “No!”
“Pleased to meet you,” the man said. “Randall Lyme.”
He stuck out his hand. Shaking it was like squeezing eels and Corey quickly let go.
But Quinn pumped the old man’s hands with great enthusiasm. “You’re the guy on the flyer—R. Lyme! In the flesh! Pleased to meet you, sir!”
“Very well,” Lyme croaked, “I will expect to see you tomorrow morning at seven for evaluation.”
“We’ll both be there!” Quinn said.
“Yes, well . . . ,” Lyme said, casting a disapproving glance at Corey. “I trust things will work out. Otherwise I am sure Officer Blunt will have further duties commensurate with your skill level. Are we in agreement?”
“Oh, yes!” Quinn said.
“Baller,” Corey drawled.
Mr. Lyme narrowed his eyes. “Excuse me?”
“That’s Ancient Egyptian,” Corey said, “for yee-hah.”
Quinn was practically bouncing down Morton Street. Which was dangerous when there were people sleeping in shadows between the sidewalk’s gas lamps. Saloons lined both sides of the block, and at 7:00 on a fall night, the bars were full. “What are you so excited about?” Corey asked.
“Our job!” Quinn shouted, nearly stomping on the head of an unconscious guy sprawled in the gutter. “Yee-hah! Watch out, New York!”
“We don’t have the job yet,” Corey said. “We have to try out. Well, you do. They wouldn’t hire me in a million years, unless they need a comic act.”
“Maybe we’ll get lucky tonight and find what was stolen from you,” Quinn said. “Then, poof, you’ll be gone. Back to . . . ?”
“Egypt,” Corey said. “According to you.”
“Ha! Sorry, first thing that popped into my head,” Quinn replied. “Now look here, in case it takes a while to find your stolen goods, you’ll need a job. Just give me one, maybe two hours to train you. They’ll be begging you to be a West Side cowboy. You’ve got talent, Corey.”
“How can you tell?” Corey said.
“I can tell things about people, things even they don’t know. I’ve had practice.” Quinn turned and started walking up the street again. “Come on, let’s do this.”
They went three steps before a man with a bloody forehead came running out of a brick building, followed by a woman brandishing a cast-iron skillet. A group of men barreled out of a bar, eyes on the chase like it was some kind of sports event, whooping and cheering at the top of their lungs. Corey pulled Quinn back, and they watched the couple disappear down the block.
Corey knew this street from the twenty-first century. He had taken music lessons from a teacher in this neighborhood. But the Village he knew had sleek glass condos, bright streets, traffic, and lots of people strolling to and from the river.
Now, it creeped him out.
They stayed to the middle of the street. There weren’t many cars or horses at this hour, and as many people seemed to be walking in the street as on the sidewalk. In the upper windows of some buildings, children stared out listlessly. The tinkling sound of piano music spilled out from bar after bar, even from some apartment windows. At least five or six people were belting songs loudly and off key. A bored-looking old man gazed down from an apartment window and spilled foul-looking liquid onto the sidewalk. It splashed on the face of a sleeping drunk, who just smiled and turned to the other side.
“Guess we’re not in Wyoming anymore, huh?” Corey said.
“The nightlife isn’t so different out west,” Quinn said, “just not so squashed together. Are you looking at the faces? Should we be peeking into the bars to find those two guys who robbed you?”
“I don’t know,” Corey said. “That’s a lot of people, and I don’t think they’ll let me in at my age. Can we go back to the place where I woke up—you know, the Gash? There were two guys there who tried to help. I’m pretty sure I can recognize their faces. They gave me the thieves’ names. Maybe they can help us find them.”
“And if they give you any trouble . . .” Quinn pulled aside his leather vest, to reveal a holstered bowie knife.
Corey swallowed hard. “You don’t really use that, do you?”
“Not unless I have to,” Quinn said.
“That’s reassuring,” Corey replied, heading up the street.
In a couple of blocks, they reached the subway construction. At night the Gash was a thick strip of black stretching all the way up to Seventh Avenue and down to Varick Street. Pinpoints of candlelight flickered inside as people moved around like giant glowworms. Corey heard the strains of a banjo below and caught sight of a fire pit where an unidentified animal was being roasted on a stick. At each block, the dim reflection of the gas lamps from the cross streets cast a dull glow on the makeshift bridges.
Standing close to the edge and looking uptown, Corey had a sudden realization of where he was. “This is Seventh Avenue South . . . ,” he murmured.
“They have a name for this disaster area?” Quinn said.
“Not yet, but they will,” Corey said. “See that big street up north? That’s Seventh Avenue. It used to end at Fourteenth Street, I guess. Couldn’t extend any farther south because buildings were in the way—but those buildings were torn down to make the Gash and are gone forever. So once they put in the train, they’ll cover the tunnel with a new street, and they’ll need a name for it. But the address numbers on Seventh Avenue start at single digits and increase as you go uptown. You can’t use negative numbers as addresses—minus-ten Seventh Avenue or whatever. So that’s why they’ll give the street a different name—Seventh Avenue South! Huh. Interesting. I always wondered about that.”
Quinn scratched his head. “That’s the kind of thing you find interesting?”
But Corey had his eyes on the flickering candles below. Three of them were moving together. Lighting up a group of faces.
They were all men, bearded and smiling, their eyes fixed on Corey and Quinn. Lit from underneath, they looked ghoulish. Corey couldn’t tell if they were young or old. “Fella, can you help a fallen pal?” one of them called out in a raspy voice. “It’s my buddy Clarence here. He was up where you are, but he was in his cups and fell in. Can you see him? He’s hurt pretty bad.”
The guy was holding his candle away from himself now, trying to illuminate something—or someone—on the ground below.
Corey and Quinn walked closer, straining to see the outline of a man who let out a pitiful moan. “Maybe we should go back to the precinct house,” Quinn suggested. “Get him some help.”
Before Corey could answer, a kid dressed in loose clothes and a cap scurried up a ladder from inside the Gash, leaped onto the street, and grinned at both of them. “Have a nice trip,” he said.
With a sudden, sharp jab, he shoved them in the chest, away from the dark trench.
Corey felt the underside of his legs hit against something hard. They gave out from under him and he tumbled backward, flying over the backs of two guys who had crouched on all fours behind them.
As Corey smacked to the ground, he took a kick to his head. He drew himself into a ball, but the kicks kept coming.
22
Corey couldn’t see a thing. His head was tucked to his chest, his arms pulled tight around his face. But the boots landed hard on his back, his arms, his torso, his legs. He couldn’t tell how many people had surrounded them but it felt like a hundred. He heard Quinn grunting, yelling.
Corey rolled away, lashing out with his arm. He fingers closed on someone’s leg. The guy jumped away, but Corey clung to the pants and pulled as hard as he could.
“Yeeeaaagghh!” The attacker fell backward, windmilling his arms, and crashed into the guy who was pummeling Quinn.
Both guys lost their balance, falling onto a pile of sharp rocks. As they cried out in pain, Corey sprang toward Quinn and lifted him to his feet. His cowboy hat had fallen off and he quickly rammed it back down on his head.
“Let’s get out of here!” Corey shouted.
The two fallen guys were crawling away, trailing blood. Quinn looked at them with disbelief. “You knock my hat off, you pay,” he grunted. “Cowards.”
The men were struggling to their feet. But Corey’s eyes were drawn to a movement beyond him, in the shadows of the buildings.
Three other men stepped out. They didn’t look much older than Quinn. Two of them had their hands behind their backs. They all wore ragged clothing and matching wool caps perched at the same slant. “Nobody does that to an ooga-ooga boy,” said one of them, flashing a grin that revealed a set of teeth like piano keys.
“And no one calls us cowards,” another said.
“The who?” Quinn howled with laughter. “That’s the name of your gang—ooga-ooga? I take it back. You ain’t cowards. You sound more like a species of monkey. And you look like it, too!”
The guy balled up his fists. As he lunged for Quinn, the two other guys stepped toward Corey. They were pulling their hands from behind their backs. One guy was an enormous seven footer holding a crowbar, the other a skinny rat-faced boy holding a broken wood plank.
Corey stepped backward, tripping over on a jagged rock. He nearly lost his balance, teetering at the edge of the trench.
“Jump!” shouted some drunk below, with a cackling laugh.
“Come home to daddy,” another one growled.
“YAHHH!” One of the ooga-ooga boys ran for Corey with the crowbar held high. He took a wild swing.
Corey felt the whoosh of air as he jumped away, keeping the trench behind him. He scooped up a fistful of gravel and rocks, tossing it into the guy’s face. The attacker flinched and turned away, hacking. Corey glanced quickly over to Quinn. He was spinning on his feet, landing a kick to the jaw of his assailant.
“Psst, kid, take this,” a croaky voice called up from the trench.
Corey glanced down. In the darkness, a guy with a floppy, ripped cap and a scraggly beard was creeping up the ladder, reaching to Corey with an empty glass bottle. Corey had to fall to his belly to grab it.
The bottle smelled foul and was sticky to the touch. But it would have to do.
“Corey, watch out!” Quinn shouted.
Corey leaped to his feet, just in time to see the skinny ooga-ooga boy stepping toward him, drawing back with the plank.
He leaped away, scooped a rock from the ground with his free hand, and threw it. As the guy swung, the plank struck the rock with a loud thock, and the rock sailed over the trench and through the window of a building across the street. “Hey, grand slam!” Corey said. “Let’s celebrate.”
The weight of the plank had turned the guy’s body around. Before he could recover, Corey jumped toward him and swung the bottle into the side of his face. It smashed to pieces, leaving Corey with a jagged stump in his hand. “I don’t believe I just did that. . . .”
“Yee-HAH!” Quinn yelled, running toward him. “Nice work, Cor—”
The word caught in his throat. He stopped at Corey’s side. The ooga-ooga boys were facing them in a line now, shoulder to shoulder—the crowbar guy, the plank guy with blood streaming down the right half of his face, and the guys who had fallen on the rocks. “Should we scrub ’em, Satch,” growled the crowbar guy, “or just take their money?”
“Money first,” said the guy who had started the attacks. “Then, boys, we have us some fun.”
Corey’s hands were shaking. He held up the broken bottle. He could see a flicker of fear across their faces. Or maybe it was just his imagination.
“You’re shaking, nelly boy,” said the plank guy. “Maybe I need to make a line drive single out of your head.”
Quinn stepped forward. Corey heard a soft shhhhink sound as he pulled the bowie knife from its holster. It glinted dully in the reflection of the gas lamp on the corner of Morton Street. “Not before I make a dugout in yours,” he said.
“Quinn, be careful!” Corey hissed.
With a bloodthirsty yell, Satch grabbed the crowbar and swung it at Quinn. It connected with a thud to Quinn’s wrist. His arm jerked backward and he cried out in pain.
“No-o-o-o!” Corey jumped at Satch, swinging the broken bottle. He felt it slice the guy’s arm. Satch jumped back.
Quinn shifted the knife to his other hand, grimacing with pain. But as he looked toward Corey, his eyes grew as wide as softballs. “Duck!”
Corey squatted fast. He was aware of one of the ooga-ooga boys swinging something. And of Quinn lunging forward. And of a sickening groan.
Then everything fell silent.
“Quinn?” Corey said, still huddled in a crouch. “What just happened?”
Corey felt a drop of warm liquid land on the back of his neck. Quinn was backing away, still holding the knife, his arms at his sides. In the distance, a low, droning siren sounded.
“It’s the police,” one of the gang boys muttered.
Satch glowered at Quinn. “We don’t forget,” he growled, as the gang began slipping away into the shadows. Corey counted four of them.
The fifth was the plank guy. He was sprawled on the rocks, facedown in a pool of blood.
Quinn was standing over him, looking down at his inert body. Even in the darkness, Corey could see Quinn’s face slowly going pale with shock over what he had just done.
23
After an entire Saturday of rehearsals, Leila was ready to scream. So she did. She walked into her room, kicked off her shoes, and let loose.
“Do you finally hate Stephen Sondheim?” her mom called from her office down the hall.
“Yee-e-es,” Leila sang back.
“Happens to everyone!” she said. “But it’s temporary.”
It really, really helped to have a mom who understood.
Into the Woods was hard. Stephen Sondheim, the composer, was famous for writing hard music. Not to mention the staging, the lines, all of it—and Leila’s part, the witch, was the toughest vocal role ever written. Right now her throat felt like it was punctured with holes. Plus Rachel had kept forgetting her lines. And even though Claudia’s latest breakup had happened three weeks ago, she talked about it all through rehearsal and during the pizza party afterward, while eating every one of Leila’s spinach and mushroom slices.
Arggh.
She fell back on her bed. At least all the work had kept her mind off Corey. Sort of.
For about the nine hundredth time that day, she checked her phone. Not a word. For about the thousandth time, she checked her actual brain memory for the status of Corey’s grandmother, and it came back dead. Nothing about that had adjusted. Okay, okay, so she hadn’t survived. But what about Corey? Her heart was doing flip-flops. There had to be a way to know what happened. Soon Corey’s parents were going to suspect he wasn’t having a sleepover. Maybe they knew already.
