March '04

Derek Murphy Ultimate Fearless
David Gianatasio Smile
Savannah Schroll Showmanship
Dianne McKnight How To Train Mules
John Leafey The Field

Momma had a new boyfriend who would sometimes stay overnight. His name was Del and she told us not to bother him. He was kind of fat and had long hair and a tattoo of an eagle on one arm and a naked woman on the other. Ernie didn’t like him at all, but he never liked any of Momma’s boyfriends.

Del was rich. He must have been rich because he had so much stuff that he would sometimes need to keep things at our house. He would bring a bag over and put things away in a drawer in Momma’s room. Del’s drawer, Momma called it. We were never to go snooping in Del’s drawer. Del must have been pretty generous, too. Sometimes his friends would come over and Del would take and empty bag and fill it up with stuff from his drawer and just give it to them. He was also afraid of thieves. Sometimes he would yell at Momma to hide his shit better, I guess so the thieves wouldn’t find it and steal it. Then Momma would yell at him for saying “shit” in front of us, and they would yell even louder. I don’t know why Momma got upset about stuff like that. I first heard the word “shit” three years ago from Kelly Richter, who lived two buildings down from us.

There was a game we played, me and Ernie and sometimes Kelly and Michael from down the street. Some nights Del would drink a lot of beer, and then he would sleep all through the next day. The game was to see who could sneak into Momma’s room while Del was sleeping without waking him up. Ernie called it “Fearless” because whoever could get closest to Del was the most fearless. One person would sneak in at a time while the rest of us would watch from the outside window.

We were playing Fearless one day when Ernie said that we needed to take it to the next level.

“This is boring. Today I’m going for the Ultimate Fearless.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m going to snoop in Del’s drawer while he’s sleeping.”

“Ernie, you know Momma said that we’re not supposed to do that.”

“Yeah, well I don’t care. Besides, no one will know if you don’t tell. I’m doing it, so ya’ll watch me through the window.”

And we did. He snuck in while Del was sleeping and walked right up to his drawer. I held my breath when he opened it. I don’t know how long I held it but I was out of breath by the time he closed it and snuck back out. Ernie looked scared and proud.

“What was in there?”

“A gun. He probably has that for protection against thieves. I didn’t touch it because they can trace your fingerprints. Then he would know I was in there.”

“What else?”

“There was some money rolled up with a rubber band around it. I told you he was rich.”

“What else?”

“These,” said Ernie with a big grin, as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a funny looking metal thing with four holes in it.

“What is it?”

“It’s some kind of special ring. See, it fits through all my fingers. You’re probably supposed to write something on the top here.”

“It’s shiny, it looks like gold.”

“I told you he was rich.”

“I think you’re supposed to hit people with it,” Michael said.

“Well, whatever it is, put it back,” I said.

“I’ll put it back. But I want to hit something with it first.”

We walked around behind the building to where the lawn was that all the building shared. There wasn’t much back there, except for a couple of grills cemented into the ground, a picnic table, and the Fernandez’s kiddy pool.

“There ain’t nothing back here to hit,” I said.

“I bet I can bust that kiddy pool open.”

“Yeah, do it,” said Michael.

I told him not to, but once Ernie decides to do something he won’t listen to anyone. He put those rings on and pulled his fist back to crack that kiddy pool open, when the back door of our house flew open and Del came out.

“You little bastard! You went snooping in there, didn’t you?” he yelled as he came toward us.

Ernie pulled the rings off his hand and dropped them in the kiddy pool. We all took off running as fast as we could. I guess Del couldn’t run very fast because he was kind of fat, so he just stood there in the grass, yelling and cursing at us. We ran into the woods, all the way to the tree fort. We waited there until it was almost time for dinner. We tried to talk Ernie into staying out there so he wouldn’t get in trouble.

“I ain’t afraid of him,” he said. “Besides, if I go back it will prove once and for all that I am the Most Ultimate Fearless of us all.”

Ernie got a bad whipping from Momma for snooping in Del’s drawer, and Del said that if he ever caught him in there again he would give him worse than that. The next day Del came in and drilled a hole in Momma’s dresser and the drawer, which Momma was not thrilled about. Then he put a lock on it so the drawer wouldn’t open. He called us into Momma’s room.

“See that?” he said, pointing to the lock. “That means stay the fuck out. Don’t let me catch either one of you snooping in here again, or you’ll get it bad, understand?”

Then Momma started yelling at him for saying “fuck” in front of us, but I’d already heard that last year from Carlos Fernandez next door.