The Country Ahead of Us, the Country Behind by David Guterson Read Free Book Online Page A

pleasure. It dawned on me that, by the time he graduated, Wyman would be a paid mechanic. This was something he didn’t seem to know yet. He took a completely innocent joy in his ability, viewing it as nothing special. His father, he said, was a flight mechanic in Texas; his brothers were also mechanics. His parents were divorced but when Wyman spoke of it his face did not indicate pain. He was muscular. His features were good. At the end of class each day he washed his strong hands carefully and combed his hair with water, parting it at the side. There was no graffiti scrawled on his notebook, as there was all over mine. He gave to the world the appearance of a neat, scrubbed, well-mannered boy, a budding Mr. Goodwrench, healthy and attractive but not in love with himself or fashion-conscious—the kind of boy who might be a marine someday, or a police officer, if he wanted to be. But he didn’t. He’dcut himself off, I noticed, in a manner that precluded that kind of future. There was a distance between Wyman and everybody in that room, a studied distance, that he had placed there. He was always very quiet, very busy.
    Once, while we were cleaning up our workbench and getting ready to leave, Wyman asked me a question.
    “What’s with the overcoat?”
    “It was cheap,” I said.
    “They didn’t have any that fit?” said Wyman.
    “No, they didn’t.”
    He was silent for a while. I could see that his brain was working on this problem. His face stayed even, but the movements with which he worked, putting tools away, sped up.
    “You mostly get As?” he said.
    “In some things. Yeah.”
    “Then why can’t you spend a few bucks on a coat? One that fits?”
    In his mind this made good sense. And in a way he was right. If I could get As I should be able to find a decent coat. Wyman wore a neat and trim Eddie Bauer jacket and, in courses like History and Algebra-Trig, received mostly low Bs and Cs.
    “I don’t know,” I said. “I haven’t gotten around to it, I guess.”
    “Oh,” said Wyman.
    “I hate going into stores.”
    “Same here,” said Wyman.
    “Besides, I don’t mind this thing,” I said, holding it by the lapels. “It’s good enough. It does the job.”
    Wyman looked at me like he’d never seen my face before. “You look like a fucking bum,” he said.
    It was true. I knew it was true, but I just kept telling myself I was smarter than he was. “Hey, Wyman,” I said. “I don’t care.”
    We put the tools away.
    Wyman had a car, a blue Mustang. He was sixteen, mobile, good-looking. I got friendly with him, not exactly because of those things, but more because he didn’t stop me. It was a strange sensation at first. We were friends , I realized. We began driving around a lot on weekend nights, looking—like most teenagers—for some ineffable great thing we assumed must be out there, some worthy thing to look for which remained unnamed but sought ceaselessly in the nighttime anyway. After a while it occurred to me we were looking for girls. Obviously . At that point I became self-conscious about it. We were looking for girls. It helped lend direction to the proceedings.
    We drove around Seattle eating hamburgers from Herfy’s. Wyman wrapped his in paper napkins and ate with exaggerated scrupulosity, occasionally stopping to wash up and collect himself. I wiped my hands on my overcoat while I waited, an all-purpose dress item, easy to care for. “You’ve got some hairs out of place,” I would tell Wyman, or something like that, when he came back from the gas station rest room. Then he would go for his pocket comb and, nervously, lean into the rearview mirror.
    “How is it now?”
    “You fucking narcissist.”
    “Does it look okay?”
    “They’re all going to want you to come on their faces.”
    “Don’t be gross , man.”
    “What’s so fucking gross about that? Huh? What’s gross about it, Wyman?”
    “Shut up, okay?” said Wyman. “Stop playing with yourself.”
    “Eat