Last of the Dixie Heroes Read Free Page B

kid?” Roy said.
    “We sent him home.”
    “Who started it?”
    Ms. Steinwasser’s tone changed slightly, but enough to bring back memories of his own schooling. “We haven’t really found it productive to dwell on issues of that sort,” she said. “The rule is that fighting for any reason is forbidden.”
    “Cody started it,” Rhett said, raising his head; a tiny drop of blood appeared at the opening of one nostril. Roy’s mind made a weird connection to Gordo’s and P.J.’s shaving cuts. “He hit me for no reason.”
    “Better lay back down now,” said the nurse.
    Rhett lay back down.
    “In this case,” said Ms. Steinwasser, “both boys claim the other was the instigator. That’s not uncommon. The policy mandates a minimum level-two sanction of three after-school detentions. Given that it’s a first offense in each case, I’m going to forgo anything more severe, such as suspensions, on this occasion.”
    It all sounded sensible and crazy at the same time. Roy felt like objecting, but he didn’t know where to start. He was back in school, all right. Roy went over to the table. “Let’s go, son.” He fought an urge to just lift the boy up and carry him away, instead watched Rhett struggle up to a sitting position, swing his legs out, stand up.
    “Bleeding’s pretty much stopped is one good thing,” the nurse said. “Not dizzy, are you, Reed?”
    “I’m fine,” said Rhett, but the color drained from his face.
    “It’s Rhett,” Roy said. He took the boy’s arm and walked him out.

    They waited in front of the school for a taxi. Buckhead-type cars went by—Benzes, Audis, Lexuses, big SUVs—but no taxis. Rhett withdrew his arm.
    A little farther up the street, a Jaguar convertible pulled over to the curb, top down. A boy jumped off a swing in the play area and trotted to the car; a broad-faced boy about Rhett’s age, but a lot bigger. As he was getting into the Jag, the boy noticed Rhett and gave him a big, smirking smile. Rhett recoiled.
    “That the one?” Roy said.
    Rhett didn’t answer. The boy turned to them as the car passed by. Roy got a good look at his face: not a mark on it. The boy made a hitchhiking gesture with his thumb. Then he said something to the driver, who looked like a grown-up version of himself. The driver tousled the boy’s hair as they disappeared around the corner. Roy thought he saw a cigar stub spinning through the air.
    “I want to punch his fucking face in,” Rhett said.
    “Shouldn’t say fucking,” Roy said, and felt like an idiot.
    Rhett said no more. He had both hands squeezed into tight fists, little cubes incapable of doing much damage. Roy saw a taxi, good thing, because by now he’d proved even to himself that he had no idea how to make this better with words. He raised his hand.

    They sat in the back of the cab, Rhett with his fists on his knees. Roy had to make an effort to keep his own hands relaxed. After five or ten minutes, Rhett’s hands relaxed a little too.
    Roy tried again. “What was it all about?”
    “I already told you. He hit me for no reason.”
    “Just out of the blue.”
    “I said I scored a touchdown in Pop Warner last season.”
    “And then?”
    Rhett’s voice rose. “I told you—then he punched me in the eye. Are you retarded or something?”
    The driver’s eyes shifted in the mirror.
    Roy tried silence again. They went over a hill. The houses got bigger, brick mansions set farther and farther back from the street. It turned out that living in Buckhead had always been one of Marcia’s dreams: the word itself was magic to her. The house she and Roy had bought in Virginia-Highland, a fixer-upper but a house she’d wanted very badly, had been, in her mind, it also turned out, the first step in a series of moves that would end on a street like this; like landing on Boardwalk at last. The street Marcia now lived on wasn’t quite as nice as this—the houses not so old, not so big, not set so far back—but it was