It
wasn’t until he was crossing the bridge to get across the river that he
wondered why the construction worker had been there. He turned and looked over
his shoulder, and saw the construction worker standing, looking. He wasn’t more
than ten feet back. Dave hadn’t heard him following.
“What the fuck are you looking at?”
The worker said.
Dave turned and ran. He heard the
worker running after him, but Dave was faster. He took the stairway into
Downtown and kept turning left and right, weaving through streets and alleys,
sometimes doubling back so that he wound up behind the worker on accident. Dave
ended up at his house; he hadn’t meant to. He ran past it and kept going. He
circled around, looked over his shoulder. The worker wasn’t behind him. Dave
jumped the fence into his backyard and laid low. He sat by the fence, looking
through the slits, to see if the worker had followed him that far.
In the morning, Dave’s father
lightly shook his shoulder to wake him. “Dave?”
“Hey dad,” Dave said, realizing he’d
fallen asleep on the grass, “I was waiting for a friend last night. Must have
fallen asleep.”
“For Neil? Why were you waiting for
him?”
“A game of hide and go seek got out
of control,” Dave said, “Seriously, I had to call Neil’s friends to get a leash
on him. Kid chased me through the whole neighborhood.”
“Neil’s dad called me, said he’s
real banged up,” Dave’s dad said, “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about
that, would you?”
“No dad,” Dave said, “Is Neil
alright?”
“Neil’s tired and quiet, but he’s
already been to a hospital twice now, and both times the doctors said that none
of the damage was permanent.”
“Thank God,” Dave said.
“I don’t know why you’d sound so
sarcastic about that,” Dave’s dad said, “I’m beginning to wonder if I’m letting
you roam too freely.”
“I’m sixteen years old,” Dave said,
“I think most parents give their kids freedom when they’re sixteen years old.”
“We’ll talk about it at dinner,”
Dave’s dad said. “For now, you gotta get showered. You smell something fierce,
son.”
“Dad you don’t know how much I love
you for what you said just now. It was completely serious, you had no idea how
ridiculous it was,” Dave said.
“Shower up,” Dave’s dad said with a
smile.
Maybe
he did know, Dave thought, Maybe that
was the joke.
Dave walked after his father, around
to the back door and stepped inside. Dave immediately smelled the bacon.
After Dave had bacon’d and showered,
Dave found his phone, and waited. He expected Neil to be sleeping. He’d assumed
that Neil had spoken with his parents when he’d gotten home, and that had been
how they’d seen the… damage? Dave hated to think of it as damage. Damage seemed
permanent. Dave hoped it wasn’t permanent. His dad had said it wasn’t.
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