“Then Jimmy just walked up to Bobby and punched him in the chest. There was this big thump and Bobby’s legs gave out. He sat right down, grabbed his chest, and stared at Jimmy. Jimmy raised his fist and Bobby covered his face and start moaning like. I grabbed Jimmy and pulled him away. I was afraid he’d hurt Bobby really bad. Doug said we’d better get out of there, so we ran out of the alley.”
Steven stopped to catch his breath. Mr. Harper sat the head of the table enjoying the story. Steven could see that Mrs. Harper wasn’t as pleased, but she wasn’t saying anything. He wasn’t even certain she was listening. She seem preoccupied and unusually short tempered. “Now we’re worried that Bobby or his Inky guys are going to get us,” said Doug.
“I doubt it,” said Mr. Harper. “He won’t tell his friends that a younger kid beat him up. And he knows he can’t take all of you himself. Just avoid him for a while. Stick together and you’ll be fine.”
“General Harper,” muttered Mrs. Harper, then said, “Tell me about Bobby’s arm, Steven.”
Steven repeated the description. Mrs. Harper was certain they were needle tracks. She turned to Mr. Harper and arched her eyebrows. He looked away and opened his hands in a gesture Steven recognized as meaning “what can you do?”
Steven was sitting between Jimmy and Doug at the Harper’s table. This was such a commonplace event the boys and Jeannie just squeezed in to make room. Food was passed around and soon talk about the day and the world at large filled the room. Steven noticed that Mrs. Harper was quieter than normal. He saw Mr. Harper casting worried glances in her direction. She kept jumping up from the table to get one thing or another. Sometimes she’d jump and then forget why she was up. At the table, she kept running her eyes over the young boys to her left rubbing Eamon’s head with right hand.
During a lull in the children’s stories, she said, “I heard at the bank that Kenny Alshire, from Olney High, and Bobby Sanders, from over on Lawrence, were killed in the war. Last week it was Leo Smith. And they aren’t only ones.”
Frank Harper cleared his throat and said, “Not now, Alice. The kids.”
“It’s the kids I’m thinking about,” said Mrs. Harper sharply. “It’s these boys right here.”
“It’s a long time before they’ll be draft age,” said Mr. Harper. “The war’ll be over.”
“It is been going on since Eisenhower. The mothers of those dead boys probably expected it to be over before they were eighteen.”
“Alice,” said Frank, a little more sharply. “Not now.”
“I’m telling you, Frank, and I’ll tell Johnson or Nixon or Humphrey or anybody. If that damn war is still going on when these boys turn eighteen, I will take them to Canada or wherever I have to to keep them out of Viet Nam.”
Mr. Harper was clearly upset, but said nothing. Steven knew Mr. Harper had been in Korea, but he never heard him talk about it. The children sat motionless in the uncharacteristic silence of the kitchen, watching and waiting. Mrs. Harper stood up, lifted Eamon from his high chair, and carried him out of the room. After a few minutes of frozen inaction, Mr Harper said, “Finish up, then wash the dishes.” Dropping his napkin on the table, he rose and went to find his wife and baby.
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