John Belushi Is Dead by Kathy Charles Read Free Book Online

and whether someone was tapping on the side of a can with a spoon, calling its name. I remembered that Dumpster collection happened only once a week, and that the next collection was days away. I still had time.
    The next day, under a blistering hot sun, I related my plan to Benji. We stood in the middle of the playing field watching our classmates play baseball. Mr. Barrett always sent the worst players as far away from the diamond as possible, where there was nothingto do but run after balls hit so far out that it didn’t matter how slowly we threw them back. I was more than happy with this arrangement.
    I sat on the grass, patted the ground next to me, and Benji reluctantly moseyed over, squatting beside me among the dandelions. We didn’t say anything, just picked at the flowers and watched the players run in circles. Then Benji started to scratch at his face. Under the sun his pale skin was turning lobster red.
    Someone hit a ball out of the field and everyone cheered. The boys ran to the fence and started climbing it. Mr. Barrett chased them from behind and yelled at them to get down.
    â€œThat was horrible yesterday,” I said to Benji. “You know, what happened to that cat.”
    He waited, and for a while I thought he wasn’t going to say anything. Then he spoke.
    â€œI have a cat,” he said. “Freddie Prinze.”
    â€œFreddie Prinze? You mean after the actor? The one who killed himself?”
    Benji nodded. A loud
chock
sound echoed across the field and another ball sailed over our heads. Neither of us made any attempt to get up. Mr. Barrett yelled in our direction. I gave him a wave, and, defeated, he went to get another ball from his gym bag. Benji laughed. He tore at the dandelions in the ground and crushed them between his fingers.
    â€œI hate Mr. Barrett,” he said, his voice cold. “He deserves a bullet in the head.”
    â€œTeachers like him make you understand why Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris did what they did,” I replied, not even thinking before the words tumbled out. “Columbine wasn’t a very nice placeto begin with, from what I’ve heard. I mean, killers aren’t made in a vacuum, you know? I’m not saying what they did was right. It wasn’t. I just hate how people call them evil and don’t think about why they did it.”
    I didn’t know whether he was going to call me crazy for sympathizing with the Columbine killers.
    â€œColumbine had a history of bullying and repression,” he said, as if reciting from a textbook. “The teachers had established a hierarchy that kept the jocks at the top and everyone else on the bottom. What they did—Dylan and Eric—was a political act, like in the French revolution.”
    I was stunned, and kind of relieved. I had never heard anyone say something like that about Columbine. My aunt Lynette always said the world was a better place now that “those sociopathic monsters” had blown their own heads off.
    â€œThis place is just as bad,” Benji continued. “Nothing but a bunch of jocks and cheerleaders.”
    I thought again of the cat baking in its metal coffin. “Would you be interested in coming on an expedition?” I asked.
    Benji looked suspicious. “What kind of expedition?”
    â€œI’m going to help the cat that got hit by the car,” I said. “I’m going to save it.”
    â€œHow can you save it? It’s dead.”
    This was true. Still, I believed that dead things were not beyond dignity. And
I
was still alive and could do something about the way the cat had been literally thrown away. The whole incident had made me feel indescribably dirty, like a rubbernecker at the site of a car crash. I wanted nothing more than to get clean.
    â€œAre you in or are you out?” I asked. Benji looked at his classmates,all the jocks and princesses and people we would never be like.
    â€œI guess I’ll help