Empire Falls

he been removed to this bedroom and stripped naked and offered up as a male specimen to curious female partygoers? No doubt he’d have lost the contents of his stomach right then if he hadn’t noticed the second thing, which substituted cold fear for nausea. The dingy white sheet he’d been sleeping on was splotched wetly pink all the way up to the pillow, and when close examination revealed the sticky wetness to be exactly what he feared—blood—he vaulted quickly to his feet and backed away from the bed until he bumped into the far wall. This caused another terrific wave of pain in his head, this one so intense that he slid down the wall into a sitting position, where he remained, his knees drawn up to his chest, his hands clasped around his ankles, his forehead resting against his knees. Again he closed his eyes and considered the blessing of darkness, the marvelous way it could subtract the whole world.
    T HERE WAS A KNOCK on the side window of the cruiser, and when he looked up, Zack had materialized on the other side of the glass. Jimmy rolled down the window and grinned. Lord, the boy was getting big.
    He offered his hand. “Hell of a game, son.”
    They shook awkwardly. “Too bad we run out of time,” said the younger Minty. They’d come back in the second half, tying Fairhaven on a field goal late in the fourth quarter. “We would’ve scored again if we got the damn ball back.”
    “That’s for sure,” Jimmy agreed. “And they were all done scoring on you.”
    “That they were,” the boy said proudly.
    “Where you off to now?”
    Across the street Jimmy Minty’s own Camaro idled throatily, double-parked next to the second professor’s car, and behind the Camaro sat the pickup that had screeched around the corner earlier. There was no one riding in the back now, and only three in the cab. For show, no doubt. The other kids were probably waiting around the corner to get picked up again.
    “Thought we’d drive to Fairhaven for some pizza.”
    “We got pizza right here in Empire Falls, you know.”
    “I know,” Zack said. “But is it okay?”
    “I guess. Who you got with you?” He peered around his son to see who was in the car, but the windows were rolled up, the Camaro’s glass tinted.
    “Justin. Tick Roby. Girl named Candy Burke.”
    His father nodded, waiting. There were four people in the car. He could see that much, even through the tinted windows. “That’s three,” he said.
    His son seemed reluctant to ’fess up to the last rider. “Some kid named John.”
    “John who?”
    “Voss, I think.”
    Jimmy nodded, trying to conjure up what he knew about that name. The kid had got caught shoplifting at the supermarket back in July. Jimmy had let him off with a warning. Not worth the bother. Weird kid, he remembered. Not the sort he would’ve figured his own boy would be hanging around with. “You ever get caught shoplifting, I’ll kick your ass, you know.”
    “I won’t,” the boy promised, ambiguously.
    “I still can, you know.”
    “Maybe.” Now the boy was grinning.
    “Maybe, my ass,” Jimmy grinned back. “You might be able to knock me down, but I wouldn’t be like that kid you whacked today. I’d get back up.”
    “I know you would, Dad.”
    “You got enough money?”
    “Yeah.”
    Jimmy Minty nodded, then slipped him a twenty anyway. “Take this. You can give it back if you don’t need it.” Which would be a first. Not that he minded, though. Jimmy didn’t want a kid of his to be short, like he’d always been at that age. Getting a bent nickel out of his father had been an all-day job.
    “You stay out of trouble. This is a bad night for you to be going to Fairhaven, after that game. You get thrown in jail for fighting, I’ll let you sit there.”
    “I’ll remember.”
    “Do.”
    “I’m going now, okay?”
    “How are you and that Roby girl getting along?”
    “Oh, she’s being a cunt as usual, pretending she doesn’t like me.”
    Jimmy considered telling him to watch his language, then decided against it. He’d used that word himself, in reference to the boy’s mother, who was one and who deserved it. Like most of them did, when you came right down to it. “Well, she wouldn’t be her father’s daughter if she didn’t need to come down a peg or two. Don’t take any shit is my advice.” He was just about through taking it himself, actually.
    “I won’t be late.”
    “You wreck that Camaro, I’m not going to give a good goddamn