Long Past Stopping by Oran Canfield Read Free Book Online

money now, right?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œIs that because you have been spending it on candy?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œOkay, Oran, can you put Carol on the line now?”
    I ran back to the other room and used my finger to hang up the phone and make that clicking sound. Then I released the button and very carefully put my hand over the receiver and listened in.
    â€œCarol, I thought I made it very clear that the fifteen dollars a week was for expenses only, and not to be given to the kids. That money was to go to soap, toothpaste, laundry, and maybe a movie if they were good.”She was using her stern voice, which was somewhere between talking and yelling.
    â€œOh. I must have gotten confused. Yes. Now I remember that conversation. Okay, I won’t give them any more money,” she said in the most gracious voice she could muster.
    â€œCarol, I just want you to be aware that even though I’m going through some heavy stuff right now and am unable to be with Oran and Kyle, they’re still my kids and I decide what’s best for them.” Mom was getting icy now.
    â€œOf course,” Carol said. I could picture her rolling her eyes. “I would never question that you know how best to raise your kids.”
    â€œOkay, so we understand each other then?” Mom asked.
    â€œI understand absolutely.”
    I didn’t beat Kyle up. I just shook my head and didn’t talk to him for a while. Without our allowance, it was back to stealing candy from the ampm or I should say stealing more from the ampm. I had found that stuffing my pants full of candy looked way less suspicious if I at least bought one thing. On Monday morning, as Carol ushered us out of the trailer, she handed us fifteen dollars each. Nothing in her expression hinted that she was doing anything wrong. We were astonished.
    Â 
    O THER THAN JUMPING on the trampoline, there just wasn’t a whole lot going on at the school, which eventually led to trouble. The older kids who had begrudgingly let us hang around them, for the small cost of letting them play practical jokes on us, were not a good influence. They taught us how to throw rocks at cars and steal golf carts from the course down the road and showed us where they hid their stash of porno magazines underneath a floorboard in the clubhouse they had built. Worst of all was our introduction to white music. There was an eight-track cassette player in the clubhouse and a tape collection consisting of the J. Geils Band, Journey, Foreigner, Loverboy, and Toto. It made me long for Wednesday nights, which was when we got to go to the roller-skating rink. I could not wait for my once-a-week chance to hear Michael Jackson, the Gap Band, and Miami Sound Machine.
    On the rare occasion when I found myself alone, I would sneak into the clubhouse, sit on the floor where no one could see me through the windows, and study those porn magazines with a passion and interest I had never experienced before. In the presence of anyone else, though, I would feign complete disinterest.
    â€œHey, Oran, did you check these ones out? Holy shit, those are nice tits,” John or Matt or Mike would say.
    I knew that picture better than anyone, but I would just say, “No, haven’t seen those,” and go back to reading my Conan comic book, or whatever else was lying around.
    â€œJesus Christ, are you fucking gay or something? Hey, Mike, I think Oran might be a homosexual.”
    â€œLay off, Matt. He’s seven years old. He doesn’t even know what a boner is.”
    â€œI don’t know. I think he might be a fag.”
    I tried to defend myself. “Okay, okay…those are nice tits, now shut the fuck up. I’m trying to read.”
    The older guys also taught us to swear. I didn’t understand why this always made them laugh so hard, but I guess it was funny hearing an eight-year-old whose voice hadn’t changed telling a group of teenagers to shut the