Probation by Tom Mendicino Read Free Book Online Page A

Late that night, I was awakened by the doorbell. I stood at the top of the stairs, behind my mother. My father told Mr. Sax to settle down and speak slowly so he could understand him. Then, barefoot and wearing only pajama bottoms, he left with Mr. Sax, closing the door behind them. My mother sent me back to bed and went to the kitchen to wait for him to return. An hour later I heard the front door open. I crept down the stairs and listened, safely hidden behind the kitchen wall.
    Mr. Sax wouldn’t let him call the police, my father told my mother. Mr. Wright had trashed his mother’s bedroom, breaking furniture, shattering mirrors, ripping her clothes to shreds, tearing the curtains from the windows. The fat old bastard was curled up on her bare mattress, naked as a jaybird, sucking on the nozzle of a pistol. It only took a few sharp words from my father for Mr. Wright to hand over the gun. The goddamn thing wasn’t even loaded. Mr. Sax got him into a bathrobe and my father forced shot after shot of bourbon into him until he finally passed out. Disgusting, the old man told my mother, just disgusting. I should have put the bullets in the gun for him. It’s not like anyone would have missed him if he had shot himself. Well, I suppose Mr. Sax would have missed him, my mother countered. Jesus Christ, Ruth, my father said, the incredulous tone of his voice implying she was crazy.
    After that night, Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax withdrew back into their solitude. I knew they were not real men like my father. The old man said Mr. Wright clipped coupons for a living. (I wondered how anyone could make any money snipping the newspaper to get ten cents off a carton of orange juice or a roll of paper towels.) And a good thing too, since he was a little “this way” (my father pursing his lips and waving his hand airily) and then there’s all the goddamn booze…but then again, they mind their own business. When I asked if Mr. Sax had a job, the old man muttered under his breath and told me to go in the house and get him a can of beer.
    Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax’s lives didn’t extend beyond the veranda. From the first warm spring evening to the last damp chilly night of autumn, Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax observed the world from the safety of their porch, Mr. Wright in an Adirondack chair, Mr. Sax in a rocker, a small table between them. Mr. Wright sipped a drink from a tall tumbler that Mr. Sax jumped up to refill each time Mr. Wright emptied it.
    From the distance of our yard, you could see Mr. Wright’s mouth moving, talking, talking, talking, as he jabbed Mr. Sax with the index finger of his free hand, making sure he didn’t miss his point. Mr. Sax sat rocking, smiling and nodding his head, never saying a word. My sister and I, lying on our backs and counting the stars, heard Mr. Wright’s harsh voice, slurring his words as he lacerated Mr. Sax for some imagined betrayal. The ending never varied: Mr. Wright stumbling out of his chair, Mr. Sax sweetly advising him to be careful, Mr. Wright slamming the door and locking it behind him. Mr. Sax would sit for an another half hour, rocking away, fingering the house key in his pocket and staring at the constellations in the sky, searching for his lucky star to thank for getting him through another day. Regina and I would mock him, mimicking his high, singsong voice—“Be careful!” “No, you be careful”—as we wrestled in the grass.
    At age fourteen, my father put me behind a power mower and pointed me toward our lawn. Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax sat on their veranda, sipping away in the shade, amused by the struggle between a wiry kid and a six horsepower engine. I felt their eyes assessing me, lingering on my developing chest, Mr. Sax looking over the reading glasses resting on the bridge of his nose, Mr. Wright staring through the blue haze of cigarette smoke. One Saturday morning, Mr. Sax approached my father and asked if I would like to earn some extra spending money. The old man,