Vision Quest by Terry Davis Read Free Book Online Page B

before. I thoughtit was beautiful and sad. She was so beautiful.
    â€œYour breasts have gotten smaller since you came,” I said.
    â€œUm-hum,” she replied, buttoning her shirt.
    That was about all we said to each other for a long time. The intimacy of the talk didn’t bring us together or anything.
    I didn’t learn about Austin Tower from Carla. I first saw him at the YMCA. He’d be there in the evenings playing ball and lifting weights. I hated him right off. He was this really handsome guy, about six-three and maybe two hundred pounds. He was the color of a horse chestnut and wore a middle-sized Afro. And aside from being better-looking, he leg-pressed more than I did. Otto barely out-leg-pressed Tower. I don’t train with weights, so I really didn’t hate him as much as if he’d done more pushups than I, or more dips. I was jealous of Tower’s good looks. Not many guys are better-looking than I am from the neck down, but sometimes I think I’d trade all my muscle tone for a better-looking face. I mean I’m not ugly or anything—except maybe for my cauliflower ears. It’s just that I’ve always kind of wished I was good-looking.
    Tower and his pals made me look silly on the basketball court. But they could tell by my rubber sweat suit and my hooded sweatshirt and my high-topped wrestling shoes that basketball wasn’t my sport. They tolerated me in the pickup games.
    â€œI dig you dudes another day,” Tower would say to us in the mirror, tilting his leather hat. The word at the Y was thatthe University of Washington recruited him out of a New York City high school, then sent him to Spokane Community to get his grades up.
    Sometimes I’d see him out at Rollie’s Ribs when I’d stop there to pick up a ten-dollar bill or two after a game. Minors aren’t supposed to be in there, but the cops must not watch the place very carefully. I think the cops generally try to stay pretty unobtrusive in that part of town. Also, I’m pretty old-looking for my age. I’m the one who buys everybody’s beer. Now that I’m eighteen I can do that legally.
    The first time I saw Tower out at Rollie’s, Carla was with him. They were sitting with Elmo and some guys who played for the Spokes. Elmo saw me and flashed me the big fist, which in Rollie’s I returned somewhat self-consciously. Elmo was about to introduce me to Carla when Tower said, “They know each other, man. She lives in his daddy’s house.”
    â€œDid Dad get to see the game?” Carla asked.
    â€œHe had to work,” I replied.
    I got a bucket of ribs for Kuch and me and split, waving to everybody. I’d dropped to 168 by then, but dieting in summer was turning out to be way too tough. I rolled the DeSoto toward the Northside with the good night smells coming in the window and the good rib smells coming from the seat beside me and told myself it was best not to overtrain.
    Later, as I sat in the park with the bucket of ribs between my legs and a twelve-pack of Coors beer at my side, Kuchcame screaming through the trees on his racer sliding about thirty yards across the grass into the little cove of benches I’d built so the cops wouldn’t spot us drinking. The park was deserted. Kids are always making forts out of the benches, so our little hideout aroused no suspicion.
    â€œYou crazy bastard,” I said. “You get caught riding that thing on the street, they’ll impound it. And you can’t get to be an AMA Expert with your bike in the police garage.”
    â€œNo cop car could catch me,” Kuch replied, jamming the heel of his hand down hard on a bottle top, popping the cap against the edge of a bench. “I can climb trees on this machine,” he said through the foam. “I wouldn’t have to outrun ’em. I’d just wick it up a tree and hide.”
    I told Kuch about my first sighting of Carla’s nipples.