fought off the urge to ask her how she knew this stuff.
“Anyway, they don’t have a football team in Brontville. They don’t even have a school. But, somehow, the coaches found out about this boy. Bluto. Franklin, I mean. He’s monster-sized, Dell. Just looking at him, I guarantee you he’s at least six six. And probably way over three hundred pounds. But he’s not fat.”
“Okay.”
“No, wait! There’s a lot more. They paid his family to move inside the town lines here, and they taught him how to play.”
“They?”
“The school. Well, not the school itself. The ‘boosters’ is what they’re called.”
“And they paid his family how? With a job or …”
“His people don’t work. None of the people in Brontville work. At least, not at regular jobs—they wouldn’t know what a W-2 looks like. It’s only forty-some miles away, but it’s another world. All of it’s on one side of a hill. None of the roads are paved, and there’s no mail delivery.
“There’s all kinds of rumors about Brontville, everything fromthe people who live there all being from the same family—like, incest for generations—to them being cannibals. One of the girls told me that, a long time ago, it used to be the thing to do on Halloween, go quad-running through those back roads. But some of the kids never came back, and nobody knows what happened.”
“Ghost stories.”
“Sure. Brontville doesn’t even have a police department. The County Sheriff is supposed to cover that area, but no one ever heard of anyone getting arrested. I mean,
from
Brontville, sure. But never
in
there.”
“Doesn’t mean much, what people
didn’t
hear.”
“I know. But it
is
true that Franklin’s family got a nice little house—one of those manufactured homes, so they could get it up and running quick, since they already had the land to put it on. And it
is
true that his father is on the city payroll. As a grounds-keeper or something like that, so there’s no set hours.”
“I thought you said MaryLou didn’t hang out with the jocks.”
“She didn’t. Neither did Franklin. I don’t think any of them would try and stop him if he wanted to, but he didn’t feel … comfortable with people like them. Actually, he didn’t feel comfortable, period. He just went to practices and played in games. But, outside of that, he didn’t do much of anything. Not in school, anyway.”
“He was in remedial classes?”
“I don’t think the high school even has those, but I can find out. The impression I got was that Franklin wasn’t going to get that kind of help, even if he needed it. Football isn’t like other sports. If you’re good enough in sports like baseball or basketball, you can turn professional right on your eighteenth birthday. Football, the best you could hope for would be a college scholarship. That wasn’t in the cards for Franklin. Not that they couldn’t find one to take him; he just wouldn’t go. And now that he’s already graduated—he was a senior, like MaryLou, but that was only so he could play football for all four years—nobody’s interested in him, not for anything.”
“His family still have the house?”
“That’s a good question. Should I find out?”
“Yeah. Please.”
She sat there, like a beautiful bird on a tree branch. Not impatient, but ready to move if she had to.
“Those friends of yours. The ones who we buy the flowers from?”
“Yes …?”
“I need a car, Dolly. It can’t be ours. And if I’m stopped driving it, it has to have real papers. Not only that, whoever actually owns it has to tell the cops I’m driving it with their permission. Borrowed it for a few days, or something like that.”
“What makes you think they’d—?”
“It feels to me like you’re real friends. And there’s two of them, so maybe we’ve got twice the chance of getting lucky. I know they’ve got some kind of panel truck, but that wouldn’t work—their store name is painted all over
“Anyway, they don’t have a football team in Brontville. They don’t even have a school. But, somehow, the coaches found out about this boy. Bluto. Franklin, I mean. He’s monster-sized, Dell. Just looking at him, I guarantee you he’s at least six six. And probably way over three hundred pounds. But he’s not fat.”
“Okay.”
“No, wait! There’s a lot more. They paid his family to move inside the town lines here, and they taught him how to play.”
“They?”
“The school. Well, not the school itself. The ‘boosters’ is what they’re called.”
“And they paid his family how? With a job or …”
“His people don’t work. None of the people in Brontville work. At least, not at regular jobs—they wouldn’t know what a W-2 looks like. It’s only forty-some miles away, but it’s another world. All of it’s on one side of a hill. None of the roads are paved, and there’s no mail delivery.
“There’s all kinds of rumors about Brontville, everything fromthe people who live there all being from the same family—like, incest for generations—to them being cannibals. One of the girls told me that, a long time ago, it used to be the thing to do on Halloween, go quad-running through those back roads. But some of the kids never came back, and nobody knows what happened.”
“Ghost stories.”
“Sure. Brontville doesn’t even have a police department. The County Sheriff is supposed to cover that area, but no one ever heard of anyone getting arrested. I mean,
from
Brontville, sure. But never
in
there.”
“Doesn’t mean much, what people
didn’t
hear.”
“I know. But it
is
true that Franklin’s family got a nice little house—one of those manufactured homes, so they could get it up and running quick, since they already had the land to put it on. And it
is
true that his father is on the city payroll. As a grounds-keeper or something like that, so there’s no set hours.”
“I thought you said MaryLou didn’t hang out with the jocks.”
“She didn’t. Neither did Franklin. I don’t think any of them would try and stop him if he wanted to, but he didn’t feel … comfortable with people like them. Actually, he didn’t feel comfortable, period. He just went to practices and played in games. But, outside of that, he didn’t do much of anything. Not in school, anyway.”
“He was in remedial classes?”
“I don’t think the high school even has those, but I can find out. The impression I got was that Franklin wasn’t going to get that kind of help, even if he needed it. Football isn’t like other sports. If you’re good enough in sports like baseball or basketball, you can turn professional right on your eighteenth birthday. Football, the best you could hope for would be a college scholarship. That wasn’t in the cards for Franklin. Not that they couldn’t find one to take him; he just wouldn’t go. And now that he’s already graduated—he was a senior, like MaryLou, but that was only so he could play football for all four years—nobody’s interested in him, not for anything.”
“His family still have the house?”
“That’s a good question. Should I find out?”
“Yeah. Please.”
She sat there, like a beautiful bird on a tree branch. Not impatient, but ready to move if she had to.
“Those friends of yours. The ones who we buy the flowers from?”
“Yes …?”
“I need a car, Dolly. It can’t be ours. And if I’m stopped driving it, it has to have real papers. Not only that, whoever actually owns it has to tell the cops I’m driving it with their permission. Borrowed it for a few days, or something like that.”
“What makes you think they’d—?”
“It feels to me like you’re real friends. And there’s two of them, so maybe we’ve got twice the chance of getting lucky. I know they’ve got some kind of panel truck, but that wouldn’t work—their store name is painted all over
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