White Smoke by Doug Chase
“I didn’t know the word kike. It sounded like fuck and it sounded like cunt. I knew it was bad.”
Fiction by Doug Chase
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Our best secret fort. The boarded up shed behind the liquor store. Me and the Pollock boys. Inside was some old two by fours, broken up toilets, a workbench. The walls covered with faded pictures from Playboy magazines. Lots of big pink titties, Will Pollock liked to say.
Will was ten, John and Chris, twins a year younger. Chris seemed younger still. Momma's boy, his brothers called him, and Little Snitch. We left him at home the day of the fire.
John brought the lighter. Stole it from his mom's dresser. A plastic lighter colored purple she used for her Virginia Slims.
The three of us up on the workbench, legs hung down over the side. The light in the shed weird and dim. Roof made out of fiberglass so the sun hardly got through. John flicked the lighter, held the little flame near his head. Made him spooky, stuck out ears with deep black holes, little pug nose with a long shadow across his face.
"Give me that," Will said. In charge. Big brother by a year. In charge.
Will took one end of a two-by-four, leaned it against the workbench between him and me. Flicked the lighter to the end of it. The little flame, Will's hand holding the wood, his other hand with the lighter. Nothing much happened.
"Got to be patient," he said. "Like the Bible says. Patience is a virtue."
Will didn't have a crew cut like his brothers. Kind of an Elvis haircut instead. Big hunk of hair hung over his eyes when he bent down over the two-by-four. His face lit up from underneath. Bit of chin, his skinny nose all in shadow. Lips tight together in a smile. A little smoke came up from the corner of the piece of wood.
Smoke got thicker. The corner of the two-by-four got black, and the black spread out, slow at first, but then it was the whole end of it. Little bit of fire I wasn't sure was the lighter or the wood, but it was the wood, and then the top of it was a torch and Will let go to jump off the bench.
You don't think what'll happen if you actually set the thing on fire.
"Put it out, put it out," John said.
"How," I said.
"Pee on it," Will said.
I stood up on the workbench. The two-by-four had a good fire going, the whole top of it smoked and burning. My one leg on one side of it and my other leg on the other. I unzipped and pulled my dick out and tried to pee, but you know, hot air rising up and smoke getting in my nose, and Will and John yelled and swore, and the littlest bit of pee came out and dripped down my hand, and it was too late already, the fire getting too big. I jumped down. The three of us through the gap in the plywood and across the lot, Will, John, me, over to the market down the block, to the loading dock in back.
"Check my face," Will said. "Any smoke on my face? Smell me, you smell any smoke?"
I leaned down to smell Will, the top of his head, his tee shirt. Couldn't smell much, but we were by the side of the big dumpsters. Old meat is what I smelled. Rotten fish. Will held my shoulder for a second, leaned way down, sniffed at my pants. John had the lighter now, halfway down the side of a dumpster, and he threw it in.
"Shit," John said.
"Shit," Will said. "Let's go around the block, see what's going on."
We tried to walk slow like we were just boys kicking around the neighborhood. We heard sirens about when we got to Will and John's house. Down past my house, and I felt like people stared at us out their windows all the way down the street. A big fire engine in the liquor store parking lot, hoses running out to the building, the broken down shed just a mess of black smoking wood and black old toilets, and a bunch of white smoke went up from the whole mess, and Will and John and me got into the crowd of people that stood there watching it.
Later on Will came by my house. Up the back stairs that went past my bedroom window. He said John told Chris 'cause it was the kind of thing he couldn't keep to himself, and Chris, the Little Snitch, told their mom, and their mom called Mr. Pollock at his club and told him.
"He's on his way," Will said. "Probably whip our asses bloody and then come over here, talk to your dad man-to-man about it."
Mr. Pollock.
Shit.
My room. Shag carpet, red bedspread on the bed, white walls, French windows, little dresser, little bookshelf, little desk with a chair, little record player on the desk. I sat on the bed, sat on the chair, on the floor. Nowhere was safe.
The doorbell. The kind that buzzes as long as you hold the buzzer. It buzzed twice, loud and then short.
Better me to get the door and keep my dad out of it. It's what I thought. Some kind of lie, maybe tell Mr. Pollock my dad wasn't home.
Down the hallway. Fast. In a panic.
The heavy knob and the thick wood door and there was Mr. Pollock. My height, just above five and a half feet. Short for a man and tall for a boy. Rough skin on his face, nose flat from getting broken, short crew cut hair, blue eyes, dark blue, always mad, even when he joked around.
Mr. Pollock's lips, the way they pushed out. Like he tasted something bad. His eyes on me. I was the bad taste. His voice rough from the cigarettes he smoked and the yelling he did and all the time he spent in the army.
Arms crossed on his chest.
"Get your father, boy."
I didn't know what I was doing. Why I had to be at the door. I should have been somewhere else.
Dad came up, anyway, before I could move. Pushed me so I was next to him, behind him a little, his shoulder right there, the smell of his deodorant. I could see his back, his undershirt all sweaty from sitting on the couch watching the news, but I could see Mr. Pollock’s face, too.
He never even looked at Dad’s eyes but at his throat. Mr. Pollock didn’t tilt his head to look up at anyone. A loud wheezy breath before he spoke.
"Your kid started that fire down the block. Almost killed two of my boys."
His story now and I didn’t a say. Couldn’t think of anything, anyway, everything in my head wiped out. Just the unfairness of it, and Dad, his hand came up, landed on my shoulder heavy. My skinny kid shoulder, his fingers in a grip.
The look on Mr. Pollock's face, the bad taste. Tight-lipped smile. It wasn’t just me, but Dad, our whole house. The bad taste.
"You keep your goddamn kike kid away from my boys.”
He turned away. The kind of turn you don't wait for an answer. Hard footsteps. Arms down at his sides. Not swinging. just straight down. Each step the same, measured but hard.
I didn't know the word kike. It sounded like fuck and it sounded like cunt. I knew it was bad.
Dad’s hand on me. He closed the door slow. The heavy sound of the latch when the door shut all the way. He turned. Looked at me. His high forehead and thin black hair. Face slick and wet.
The way he breathed, through his nose in, out, loud. I tried to look down, couldn't do it. Had to look at his throat that was right there. Adam’s apple stuck out. Little shaving cuts. His cigarette smell. The booze he drank to watch the news. Little pieces of spit on the side of his mouth. Dark eyes. His hand shook there in the grip on my shoulder.
"Are you stupid?" he said. "Are you goddamn stupid?"
I tried to not make a sound. It would be worse if I did, but I couldn't help it but give a cry for breath.
He held tight with the one hand. Held me up. Kept me in place. His other hand he made a tight fist. The color of it blotched. White and red. Pulled his fist back. Then underhand fast hard into my stomach.
Shock. The pain of it. I fell down. Couldn't breathe. Couldn't catch any air. Couldn't pull it back in. Just lay there, thought I’d die. Everything red and black spots.
Couldn't see but I heard Dad walk away. My ear against the floor.
Dust in the carpet. Dad's steps through the floorboards, back to the living room, back to the news, the volume of it turned all the way up.
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Read another great piece of fiction by fellow Dangerous Writing workshop member Charles Dye, in his "Excerpt from Welcome to Wildhorse," here.
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Doug Chase lives in Portland, Oregon with his zen wife Tracey and his beautiful and hilarious poodle Mathilda. He is in Tom Spanbauer's Dangerous Writing Workshop and is deep in the quicksand of the first draft of his first novel.