the Jewish, but every time you turned around they were having some sort of holiday that kept them from attending meetings. And of the three boys who weren’t Jewish, one of them had a doctor-certified heart condition, poor kid, and couldn’t do much more than sit on a folding chair and highlight his Scouting manual. That left the Stelzel boy, who was promising, and Julian Ferris, who wasn’t.
Julian had poor initiative, didn’t even seem interested in earning his Tenderfoot. He also had a nervous habit Leo found irritating: he scrunched his shoulders up and rolled his head around like he was rubbing the back of his skull against his neck. It wasn’t exactly a shrug, but it looked like one, and he did it whenever he was tongue-tied or restless. Mention the Tenderfoot badge, and there went Julian, scrunch and rub.
Another hassle for Leo was dealing with Dan Messer. Dan—shaky and spindly—was the only person Leo had been able to find on Merritt Island who was interested in being assistant scoutmaster, and he was nice enough, but he was a bit of a wet-brain. As in, he came to the weekly meetings drunk. He hiccupped during the Pledge of Allegiance. “Bring your own personality and excitement to instructing the sessions,” the training manual said, but Dan didn’t bring any of those things. At the close of the meeting one night, right in the middle of the Stelzel boy’s clunky but earnest rendition of “Taps,” a flask bottle of Old Crow had fallen out of Dan’s windbreaker. When he’d dropped by to see how Leo was doing in the days following the stroke, and had been trying to buck up Leo’s spirits by saying they were robust for men their age, both of them just fifty, Leo had been astonished. He would have put Dan at sixty-five.
Mitch and Howie, as far as Leo knew, were still committed to the idea of Scouting and of one day becoming Eagle Scouts. But they took the pageantry of it all far less seriously than they had before his stroke. They used to sit like ironing boards in the backseat of the station wagon on Scout night. All the way to the meetings, they would barely say a word, but would check, over and over again, the hang of their sashes, the stitching of their badges. Now they rode like monkeys. They yanked on each other’s neckerchiefs. They tried to throw each other’s hats out the window. They tormented the Ferris boy, who did nothing to defend himself, just covered his face with his arms. When all this became intolerable, Leo would slam his foot down on the brake and throw gravel as he steered the station wagon to the side of the road. He would turn around in his seat and holler that they, Mitch and Howie, were going to get it; they were already going to get it, but if they didn’t settle down and leave Julian alone, they were going to
really get it.
But next week, it would be the same thing all over again.
They were suspiciously quiet at the moment. Leo turned off their street and into the newer section of the neighborhood and peered at them in the rearview mirror. Both of them in uniform, hats on, neckerchiefs tied. Both of them tight-lipped and red-faced and wearing false mustaches. Where the mustaches came from, Leo had no idea. And, really, for obnoxious behavior, this was small-time. One on a scale of ten. But in another way this tiny infraction—false mustaches on the way to Scout night—was worse than if they were smart-mouthing and was exactly the kind of thing he felt certain he wouldn’t have had to deal with if he hadn’t had the stroke. There was no rationality to it, but since his brush with death, the smallest of annoyances had become intolerable. Already this evening he’d had to deal with Marie’s berating him for having skipped both his last neurologist appointment and his physical therapy. Then had come the excusatory phone call from Dan Messer, saying he had some sort of flu and didn’t feel well enough to make it to the meeting (Leo had recognized the familiar
Julian had poor initiative, didn’t even seem interested in earning his Tenderfoot. He also had a nervous habit Leo found irritating: he scrunched his shoulders up and rolled his head around like he was rubbing the back of his skull against his neck. It wasn’t exactly a shrug, but it looked like one, and he did it whenever he was tongue-tied or restless. Mention the Tenderfoot badge, and there went Julian, scrunch and rub.
Another hassle for Leo was dealing with Dan Messer. Dan—shaky and spindly—was the only person Leo had been able to find on Merritt Island who was interested in being assistant scoutmaster, and he was nice enough, but he was a bit of a wet-brain. As in, he came to the weekly meetings drunk. He hiccupped during the Pledge of Allegiance. “Bring your own personality and excitement to instructing the sessions,” the training manual said, but Dan didn’t bring any of those things. At the close of the meeting one night, right in the middle of the Stelzel boy’s clunky but earnest rendition of “Taps,” a flask bottle of Old Crow had fallen out of Dan’s windbreaker. When he’d dropped by to see how Leo was doing in the days following the stroke, and had been trying to buck up Leo’s spirits by saying they were robust for men their age, both of them just fifty, Leo had been astonished. He would have put Dan at sixty-five.
Mitch and Howie, as far as Leo knew, were still committed to the idea of Scouting and of one day becoming Eagle Scouts. But they took the pageantry of it all far less seriously than they had before his stroke. They used to sit like ironing boards in the backseat of the station wagon on Scout night. All the way to the meetings, they would barely say a word, but would check, over and over again, the hang of their sashes, the stitching of their badges. Now they rode like monkeys. They yanked on each other’s neckerchiefs. They tried to throw each other’s hats out the window. They tormented the Ferris boy, who did nothing to defend himself, just covered his face with his arms. When all this became intolerable, Leo would slam his foot down on the brake and throw gravel as he steered the station wagon to the side of the road. He would turn around in his seat and holler that they, Mitch and Howie, were going to get it; they were already going to get it, but if they didn’t settle down and leave Julian alone, they were going to
really get it.
But next week, it would be the same thing all over again.
They were suspiciously quiet at the moment. Leo turned off their street and into the newer section of the neighborhood and peered at them in the rearview mirror. Both of them in uniform, hats on, neckerchiefs tied. Both of them tight-lipped and red-faced and wearing false mustaches. Where the mustaches came from, Leo had no idea. And, really, for obnoxious behavior, this was small-time. One on a scale of ten. But in another way this tiny infraction—false mustaches on the way to Scout night—was worse than if they were smart-mouthing and was exactly the kind of thing he felt certain he wouldn’t have had to deal with if he hadn’t had the stroke. There was no rationality to it, but since his brush with death, the smallest of annoyances had become intolerable. Already this evening he’d had to deal with Marie’s berating him for having skipped both his last neurologist appointment and his physical therapy. Then had come the excusatory phone call from Dan Messer, saying he had some sort of flu and didn’t feel well enough to make it to the meeting (Leo had recognized the familiar
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