Let me tell you how I got the scar on my left knee.
Three o’clock Friday afternoon. I’m eleven. It’s all promise. None of it’s happened yet. I’m on parole till Monday morning from Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrows.
Up the front stoop, up to my room, swap my school uniform for shorts and a T-shirt, demolish two Hostess Sno-Balls, gulp a glass of milk, back down the stoop into the violet afternoon to clobber the other boys at handball till the streetlights come on.
To avenge what happened last time.
We swarm the playground like an army of little Caucasian ants. We start with cutthroat. My buddy Hickey serves to three guys at a time, his bony fist smacking the Spaldeen against our handball wall.
Hickey goes, “Not for pussies only, boys. Not for pussies only.” He knocks out the younger boys, the shitty players scrambling after that scuffed pink ball. You can hear their mothers calling.
Hickey is actually not all that good, but he’s a loudmouth and a ball hog and his insults will wear a person down. Which is probably what I allowed to happen to me last time.
Now that the shitty players are knocked out, we’re ready for one-on-ones. Me, Hickey, Bartlett.
I go, “Yo, Hickey, your handball nickname shall be Doctor Doom.”
Hickey goes, “No way, Bobby, I’m Galactus.”
“What’re you talking about Galactus? Galactus is the destroyer of worlds.”
“I am the destroyer of worlds! Alls Doctor Doom does is stand around making speeches.”
“Hickey, also known as Doctor Doom, alls you do is stand around making speeches.”
Hickey goes, “Bobby, what shall your handball nickname be?” He’s looking at me funny. I know what he’s thinking. He’s thinking about last time.
I go, “I’m the Silver Surfer.”
“After what happened last time?”
Bartlett goes, “Why? What happened last time?”
I go, “Nevermind what happened last time.”
Hickey goes, “The Silver Surfer is the last thing you are.”
Bartlett goes, “What happened last time?”
I go, “Nevermind what happened last time.”
Hickey goes, “Last time, I serve and it’s right on the line. You know, one of my Hickey serves? And Bobby dives for it. You know, one of his Bobby dives? But this time Bobby misses the ball by about a thousand miles—”
I go, “By about a fraction of an inch.”
“—and Bobby hits the pavement and rolls. And I mean he rolls. I mean he don’t stop rolling. He rolls into the trashcans and the trashcans tip over and then some sick orange shit from the lunchroom—”
I go, “It was Spaghettios.”
“—this sick orange shit, what I’m trying to say, spills out the trashcans on top of Bobby’s head. In his hair. And he eats it.”
I go, “I did not eat it.”
Hickey goes, “How else would you know it was Spaghettios?”
I go, “Hickey, are you ready for a rematch?”
But Hickey won’t let it go. “Did it taste good, Bobby? Was it still warm?”
I take a deep breath. I go, “It tasted better than your mother.”
Bartlett goes, “Buuuurn.”
But Hickey just stands there with this sad, stupid look on his puss.
I go, “What’s the matter with you?”
Hickey goes, “A line was crossed. You brought mothers into it.”
“I know a line was crossed.I wanted to bring mothers into it.”
“Bobby, you know what I must do now, don’t you?”
“I know what you must do, Hickey.”
Hickey goes, “Your handball nickname shall not be the Silver Surfer. Your handball nickname shall be… Garbage-Ass Shithead McGillicuddy.”
I go, “I do not accept. That’s too long for a handball nickname.”
Bartlett goes, “Too long is your number-one objection to Garbage-Ass Shithead McGillicuddy?”
I go, “It’s ten syllables!”
Hickey gets in my face. He goes, “Ten syllables is what you get for bringing mothers into it!”
We’re chest-to-chest now. I go, “I call a rematch!”
Hickey goes, “So shut up and serve!”
I serve. We volley. I’ve got Hickey jumping all over the place.
Hickey goes, “Whoa, Garbage-Ass Shithead McGillicuddy has been practicing.”
I go, “No, Doctor Doom just sucks like he always does.”
But Hickey’s right. I have been practicing. Every afternoon, against the back of our house. My Spaldeen banging against the aluminum siding till the sun goes down, till it’s too dark to see. My serve. My returns. My Bobby dives. Because my handball nickname will never be at the mercy of a moron who comes up with ten-syllable nonsense.
While I’m busy volleying with Hickey, I can feel Bartlett staring at my face. You know how sometimes you can just feel somebody staring? After a while Bartlett goes, “Bobby, what are you anyways?”
What are you? Cause apparently we’re little trash-talking existentialists. It feels like a pile-on, to be honest, so I hit back with, “Bartlett, your handball nickname shall be Dogshit cause that one time you stepped in dogshit and tracked it up and down the hallways and it was hilarious.”
Bartlett goes, “I’m being serious, Bobby. What are you?”
Hickey goes, “Cause it would make no difference to us, Bobby.”
Bartlett goes, “Yeah. We’ll still hate you for being a Mets fan.”
But Bartlett’s waiting for something.
What am 1?
“I’m half-Irish, half-Italian.”
“You’re Italian?” Hickey smacks the ball and dances in place like all of a sudden I’m Pavarotti or something. Or maybe he’s gotta take a piss.
“Half.”
“Bobby’s Eye-talian?” Bartlett’s staring.
“Half.” Our neighborhood in Throggs Neck is full of Irish families and Italian families. We’re not exactly the Capulets and the Montagues, but Irish-Italian is still an exotic breed around here.
Hickey goes, “Bobby, I change my mind. Your handball nickname shall not be Garbage-Ass Shithead McGillicuddy.”
I go, “Because you’re in awe of the Silver Surfer’s superpowers?”
Hickey goes, “No. Because your handball nickname shall be… Spaghettio!”
I deliver one more slam. I think Hickey’s gonna blow it but he gets there. He slams it back. The ball is right on the line. I will not lose to him today. I will not lose to him today. It bounces off the line and I dive for it. I dive for it. The Bobby dive I’ve been practicing every afternoon till it’s too dark to see. I get to it, on my knees, and slap the holy hell out of it. It bashes against the wall.
And Hickey blows it. Now he’s on the asphalt on his knees next to me, gasping like he needs his inhaler.
I go, “Say ‘Uh-oh Spaghettio,’ Doctor Doom. You are out.”
I stand up, look Bartlett in the eye. “Now it’s your turn, Dogshit.”
“It’s my turn.” A voice behind me. High, chirpy.
I turn around. It’s skinny little Katie Daugherty.
I cannot possibly exaggerate how, in this time and place, skinny little Katie Daugherty’s presence on the handball court, in high-tops and a denim jumper, is as shocking as if the asphalt under our feet just cracked open and the mole people crawled up out of the ground. Katie Daugherty, hair pulled back in a ponytail, clutching a brand-new pink Spaldeen.
She goes, “It’s my turn.”
I go, “No way.” I’m not even looking at her.
Hickey goes, “Beat it.” He’s dancing in place like he’s possessed.
Bartlett goes, “Shoo.”
Katie goes, “Bobby’s a-scared of me.”
“I’m a-scared of you?”
“Cause my big Cousin Jimmy taught me everything. You should be a-scared.”
Hickey goes, “Beat it.” But he’s no longer dancing. Now he’s looking at me.
Bartlett goes, “Shoo.” He’s looking at me too.
Well.
I go, “Yo, Katie, why don’t you disappear?” I look at my boys and the corners of my mouth curl. “Or just turn sideways?”
High-fives all around. Buuuurn.
Now Katie Daugherty is not saying anything. Her nose twitches. Like on Bewitched.
I’ve known Katie Daugherty since before kindergarten. I’ve never noticed her freckles. The way her freckles dance around her nose when she’s really, really pissed.
She stomps home, ponytail bouncing back and forth.
***
And now Katie Daugherty’s freckles are with me at all times.
Long division.
Boy Scouts.
I’m taking out the garbage and the sun falls golden on the lid of the trashcan and I’m thinking about Katie Daugherty’s freckles.
I stay after school to take guitar lessons from Sister Augustine. We’re practicing for folk Mass. “Yahweh I Know You Are Near,” but the way I play it, it’s more like “Yahweh You Know I’m a Fuck-Up.” Sister takes the guitar, shows me how, her crooked little fingers dancing over the neck, transfiguring my cheap nylon guitar strings into a hymn. To Katie Daugherty’s freckles.
I’m watching King Kong vs. Godzilla on Channel 11 with my little sister Maggie, but for the first time in my life I want to switch to Channel 9 to watch Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.
“Since when do you all of a sudden give a shit about dancing?” Maggie cannot believe what she is witnessing.
“They are tap dancing on roller skates. You know anybody in this lousy neighborhood who can tap dance on roller skates?”
“Godzilla can spew flames.”
“When Godzilla can tap dance on roller skates then you talk to me about spewing flames.”
That night, in bed, I’m roller skating with Katie Daugherty. The constellations of her freckles circle my head.
Friday afternoon, Sister Augustine tells us to close our eyes and fold our hands and practice a silent prayer. Only don’t pray for something you want. Pray for somebody else. Because God is not Santa Claus. God is not Santa Claus.
I close my eyes, fold my hands.
Yo, Yahweh. You think you could let Katie Daugherty have such a good day that she does that funny little thing with the corners of her mouth so everyone can see the joy that’s always been inside her?
Then I’m up out of my seat, walking two rows back. Katie Daugherty sits with her eyes closed, hands folded in her lap. Her lips are moving. Her lips are moving. Katie Daugherty’s freckles do to me what Sister Augustine’s crooked little fingers do to my cheap nylon guitar strings. I lean over and plant one on her.
“Bobby, what the hell?” wiping her mouth on her plaid jumper.
The swish of religious garments. A hand on the back of my neck. Sister Augustine is going to drag me—and Katie Daugherty—to Sister Jerome’s office.
“No, Sister, please!”
Down the hall. Katie Daugherty’s got her eyes closed. Like this isn’t happening, this isn’t happening, this isn’t happening.
Then we’re bursting through the door of the office.
Sister Jerome says, “Bobby, am I going to have to call your parents?” Her voice is like a foghorn.
“I hope not, Sister Jerome.”
“Bobby?”
I’ve never been to the office before. I’m eyeing the big wooden paddle hanging on the wall, which Hickey claims Sister Jerome hasn’t used to whip ass since before we were born.
I tell Sister Jerome, “I expressed affection.”
“And how did you express affection?”
Sister Jerome’s got a mirror on the wall, where she measures the older boy’s hair when it gets too rock-n-roll. Katie Daugherty looks at me in the mirror. Katie Daugherty puckers her lips, blows me a hate kiss, then looks down at the big black-and-white checkerboard tiles on the floor of the office. I bust out laughing.
Sister Jerome says, “Bobby? What is funny about this? Robert?”
“I expressed affection. I couldn’t control myself.”
“Does Our Lord control himself when he overturns the tables in the temple?”
This is an unexpected angle. “Um, no?”
“Does Our Lord control himself when he calls out to his father in heaven, ‘Why hast thou forsaken me?’”
“Um, no?”
“Does a man know what is right?”
“Yes?”
“Does a man do what is right?”
“Was I wrong to show affection?”
“Do you talk to your parents—?”
“Are you gonna call my parents?”
“—about your urges?”
Well.
“Robert?”
“I will talk to my parents about my urges.”
To this day, I have never talked to my parents about my urges.
Sister Jerome says, “Katie?”
Silence. Katie Daugherty stares at the floor.
“Katherine?”
“It’s fine.” Katie’s eyes on those black-and-white tiles on the floor. “I’m fine.”
She won’t look at me. I think about how this is the same Katie Daugherty who helped me bury my dead turtle in the backyard when we were little. Who said a “Hail, Holy Queen” for my dead turtle. This person. I suppose it’s the first time I’ve had a thought like that. Or maybe I’d call it a feeling.
I don’t remember the walk back to class. I don’t remember packing my book bag. I don’t remember meeting Katie Daugherty’s eyes.
The walk home. The windows of old Mrs. Pisser’s house silently judge the condition of my school uniform. The windows of my buddy Hickey’s house, the venetian blinds always a little out of whack. The windows of my house gaze across the street, without hope, at the lace curtain windows of Katie Daugherty’s house.
***
Three o’clock Friday afternoon. I’m the first guy on the playground. I’m the only guy on the playground. Two older boys are coming.
“You’ve never touched it,” one of the older boys says. He doesn’t even notice me.
“You’ve never seen it,” the other boy says. I recognize him as the one who’s always the first one picked for stickball.
“You don’t even know what we’re talking about.” The first boy notices me.
Now the other one, the stickball one, is looking at me, looming. He goes, “Yo, what are you?”
What am I? I’m pretty sure my cheeks are burning. The older boys keep walking.
It’s drizzling. And I’m only eleven, studying the brand-new obscenity spray-painted on our handball wall.
A voice behind me goes, “It’s my turn.”
Katie Daugherty.
She holds out her brand-new pink Spaldeen.
I nod. “Serve.”
Katie Daugherty serves, her vicious little fist, her brand-new pink Spaldeen scorching our handball wall, sending me scrambling, stumbling.
I go, “Whoa.”
She goes, “Do I get a handball nickname?”
“Yeah. Your handball nickname shall be Chump.”
“Today of all days you’re gonna trash-talk me?”
“That’s how the game is played.”
“Well then, pucker up, Bobby.”
Slam.
Whoa.
I go, “I’m sorry for what happened.”
“You’re sorry?”
Slam.
Whoa.
“I mean about what happened after.”
“You think that’s the first time I’ve ever been—”
Slam.
“—to the office? Chump?”
We stand there. The smell of the pavement in the drizzling rain.
Katie Daugherty raises that pink Spakdeen. Katie Daugherty serves.
Slam.
The ball is right on the line. I will not lose to her today. I will not lose to her today. It bounces off the line and I dive for it. I dive for it. I am going to lose to her today. I am going to lose to her today. And now my knee hits the asphalt and the skin busts open.
“Bobby, are you bleeding?”
“It’s fine. I’m fine.”
“Your knee looks like shit.”
My stupid blood all over the place. “You think you could run home and get me a band-aid?”
She’s looking at me. “You think you could give me a handball nickname that isn’t Chump?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe’ is not going to get you a band-aid.”
“Your handball nickname shall be…”
I study her face. She studies mine.
I go, “Your handball nickname shall be… Freckles.”
“Freckles? I am a monster on the handball court and you’re gonna name me Freckles?”
“You’re a strange person, Katherine.”
“I’m not the one who’s gonna bleed to death, Robert.” Katie Daugherty’s nose is twitching.
“Your handball nickname shall be... Godzilla.”
She does that funny little thing with the corners of her mouth. “The band-aid will probably have a Barbie on it. You okay with that? Spaghettio?”
“I’m okay with that. Godzilla.”
“Back in a sec.”
Katie Daugherty’s ponytail bounces back and forth as she runs across the schoolyard.
Back in a sec.
***
Years later, I see that scar on my left knee and an eleven-year-old boy is back on the asphalt, blood dripping down his leg. An eleven-year-old girl is standing on a step-stool, ransacking the medicine chest. He waits under the streetlights in the rain. She comes back to him, always, bearing a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, a bag of cotton balls, and a Barbie band-aid.
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