Nobody's Fool

not told a soul, but this present circumstance already reminded him of what had happened at the lumberyard, and Will sensed that this would be the beginning of something else that Grandpa Sully’d be instructing him not to tell anyone about. His grandfather was mad again and banging things and cursing, and the old house he was kicking looked like it would fall down for sure if he didn’t stop. Or maybe it would wait until they were all inside and then fall down on them. Or maybe they’d all go inside and he’d be told to wait someplace and Grandpa Sully and the other man would forget about him and drive off, and then it would fall down.
    Sully, who hadn’t, as far as he knew, a key, was trying to force the rear door with a crowbar. The gray wood, its paint long ago stripped away, had grown soft and porous, which meant the crowbar wasn’t working very well. So far, Sully had managed only to mutilate the door, which held fast.
    â€œWho but Don Sullivan would use a crowbar to enter his own house?” Carl wondered out loud, stamping his feet in the cold.
    â€œStand back a second,” Sully said, putting his weight against the bar. Like everything else about the house, the door hung crooked, and Sully had managed to create a space between the door and its frame, a space large enough to insert the flat end of the crowbar. When he levered himself against the bar, however, the steel simply sank deeper into the rotten wood.
    â€œWhy I should be surprised is another question,” Carl continued. “Your grandfather is a crowbar kind of guy, Will. He’d use a crowbar to remove the back of his wristwatch.”
    â€œI don’t own a wristwatch,” Sully reminded him. “And if you don’t shut up, I’m going to use this crowbar to remove you entirely.”
    Carl leaned up against the porch railing, ignoring this threat like he did all of Sully’s threats. “What worries me is that just about the time you succeed in breaking in, the cops are going to arrive, charge us with burglary and throw our asses in jail.”
    â€œMe, maybe,” Sully stood upright for a moment to catch his breath. “I’m the one breaking and entering. As usual, you haven’t done shit.”
    Carl lit a cigarette, peeked in the kitchen window. “Hey,” he said. “Ijust had a hell of an idea. You could move in here.” He inhaled deeply, then remembered he’d quit smoking and flicked the cigarette over the porch railing.
    Sully was grinning at him. “You aren’t going to make it, are you?”
    â€œYou want these?” Carl said, offering Sully the pack of cigarettes. “Take ’em.”
    Sully took them, put the pack into his pocket.
    Carl looked surprised. Clearly, he’d intended the gesture to be symbolic and wouldn’t have offered the cigarettes to Sully had he thought Sully might actually take them. It wasn’t this actual pack of smokes he’d intended to give up but some future pack. He already missed this particular pack. “Those aren’t even your brand,” he pointed out.
    â€œI’ll smoke them anyhow,” Sully said. “I’ve gotten something for nothing from you about twice in the twenty years I’ve known you.”
    â€œThat’s better than the nothing for something I always get when I hire you,” Carl said. “Why don’t you just break one of those small windowpanes and reach inside and unlock the door?”
    â€œBecause then I’d have to replace the glass,” Sully said, stepping back and eyeing the door savagely. “Here.”
    Carl caught the crowbar. “Can this be?” he said in mock astonishment. “Has Don Sullivan, Jack-Off, All Trades conceded that his trusty crowbar is not the precise tool for the task at hand?”
    Sully grinned at him, measured his distance to the door. “You’re right for once in your life,” he admitted. “And here’s the precise tool I need.”
    Planting on his bad leg, he kicked the door as hard as he could with his good, just above the knob, to gunshot effect. The door held, but all four panes of glass came free and shattered at Sully’s feet. “You prick,” he said, addressing the door.
    Carl, shaking his head, handed the crowbar back to Sully. “Allow me,” he said, reaching inside and unlocking the door. Glass crackled underfoot.
    At this point Sully remembered