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AND WE’LL BE JOLLY FRIENDS FOR EVERMORE |
“. . . was real dark so the boys couldn’t see that the wooden boards covering the top of the well were rotten . . . it had been a real hard winter and wet spring and one of the boards had cracked all the way through. But the boys didn’t know that. They lived in different towns and only got to see each other in the summers when they came to stay with their grandparents, so they didn’t think about looking at the boards because that’s where they played ‘King of the Hill’ every year. They’d raced to the well and the first one to reach it jumped up on top. They always did that, every summer . . . and it looked okay, y’know?” Bennie went quiet then and peeled a few more lines of bark from the willow twig in his hand while he studied his audience, just like his grandpa did whenever he told a story. Dean, sitting well within the warm yellow circle of light from the campfire, nodded solemnly and hugged his knees in closer to his chin. His family had only just gotten television, so he was still more used to hearing stories then watching them. Bennie envied him a little . . . but only just a little. There was a smudge of charcoal on his cheek and a speck of white in the corner of his mouth – the remnants of the last marshmallow he’d roasted – that twitched every time his buck teeth chewed a little more dried skin off his bottom lip. Which was every few minutes or so. Dean was hooked good and proper, caught in the story like a lightning bug in a bottle. And with just as much chance of escaping. Bennie pulled off another sliver of bark and fed it to the fire before looking over with a secret smile at his bestest friend in the whole world. Spit and blood brothers forever. And ever Stevie was sitting with his back against the stones of the abandoned well, so far away from the campfire that only a tiny glimmer of the light reflected off the whites of his eyes. He’d heard the story before and Bennie could tell he was bored hearing it again. ‘Two boys with one shadow’ was what their parents said each summer when either his or Stevie’s family drove the five-miles over washboard roads to the other’s farm. Inseparable was another term their folks used, which Bennie had looked up in his grandfather’s big dictionary and knew meant ‘incapable of being separate.’ And it was true. Had been true every since the first summer they met, three years ago this summer. Three summers and no winters, with Bennie forgetting all about his friend once the cold started creeping down from the hills and his parents started packing up their summer things into the Rambler’s trunk. He never thought about Stevie in the autumn or winter or spring, never once cleared a space in his brain already overburdened with football scores and Saturday morning westerns and evil mysteries of long division to think about his friend during their nine months of forced isolation. But once the air got warm enough to fill with the sound of mosquitos, Stevie was all he could think about. It was funny how that worked. Bennie fed another strip of bark into the flames. It really was funny. “So what happened?” Dean asked in kind of that whiny way he had. “Come on, finish the story.” “Yeah,” Stevie said, “finish it.” Bennie nodded and tossed the twig into the flames. It sizzled for a second then curled into the shape of a lazy capital C. “The wooden top was solid enough,” Bennie repeated, to keep them on track, “so when the boy jumped up on it, it held him, just like it always did every summer. It even held him when he started pounding on his chest like Tarzan of the Apes, y’know . . . .” Bennie was going to try and imitate Johnny Weissmuller’s famous yell, but thought better of it when a gust of barbecue-scented wind swept through the clearing. Although the well was almost dead center of his grandfather’s apple orchard, it wasn’t that far away from the farmhouse. If he yelled now, even though he knew it would raise a full flock of goose-bumps along Dean’s backbone, at least one, if not all the adults still sitting around the picnic tables would saunter out into the orchard to see what the ruckus was all about. Bennie knew from experience that adults didn’t like any sort of ruckus, and that would have ruined everything. He wouldn’t be able to finish the story and Stevie would be even madder at him. It seemed like Stevie was mad at just about everything lately. “Come on, Bennie-beans,” Stevie mumbled, “finish the story.” He took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay, okay. The boy didn’t hear the board crack because he was really good at doing Tarzan . . . but all of a sudden, there was this other sound, louder, y’know, and his friend jumped. But the boy on the well didn’t, he didn’t hear it because he was still yelling. His friend tried to tell him, tried to get him to jump down but the boy just kept pounding his chest and yelling and laughing . . . he was laughing at his friend, I guess, because he looked scared . . . and then the board split in half.” Bennie clasped his hands together just like he did during school assembly and looked into the fire as hard as he could. He could still see Dean – hunched forward, chin resting on his knees, eyes wide – on the other side of the flames. Stevie was so far back he was nearly invisible. Nearly. “Golly,” Dean said. His voice was soft and hushed like he was in the library or church or something, and that made Bennie feel good. Unlike Stevie who was his best-ever friend, Bennie had only met Dean a week ago when his family had pulled into his grandfather’s driveway asking directions to the new KOA Campground two miles down the road, but only a quarter-mile through the orchard. Bennie’s grandfather mentioned that to Dean’s parents– how close the campground was – if he got bored with camping and wanted some company. His grandfather had even made Bennie offer Dean his hand and say how he’d be pleased to show him around the farm. And such. Since then, Dean’s father had walked him over to the farm each morning and come back for him each afternoon. And Stevie had gotten angrier and angrier over being replaced even though Bennie promised he hadn’t been. But he did calm down a bit when Bennie told him this was Dean’s last night. His family would be leaving the campground in the morning, bright and early, crack of dawn, which was why Bennie’s grandparents had decided to throw a barbeque for his new best friend’s family. That was the part that made Bennie mad. He didn’t want a new friend, and especially not a new best friend. He had Stevie and Stevie had him and that’s all either of them needed. Two boys with one shadow. At least for the summer. “Come on, Bennie,” Stevie’s voice whispered through the growing dark, “his folks’ll want get going soon. Finish the story.” “So what happened, Bennie?” Dean added. “Come on.” Bennie shrugged one shoulder. “The boy’s hands were still up against his chest when he fell. Maybe if they hadn’t been, he might have be able to grab a root or something on the way down . . . there were a lot of roots down there, from the apple trees and that’s what made it so hard to get his body out. There’s not too many now . . . they had to cut most of them away, y’know.” “Wow.” Dean’s eyes shifted toward the well, reflecting the dying light. Stevie leaned to one side, his white cotton tee-shirt scraping softly against the stones. “And . . . he was dead, right?” Bennie waited until Dean looked back to nod. “Uh-huh,” he said. “The well’s deep . . . my grandfather’s father dug it out and it goes down a long way. There’s still supposed to be some water in the bottom, but it’s too murky to drink. Only the boy never made it to the water . . . one of the roots . . . . Doctor said his chin mustta caught one of the roots on the way down and snapped his neck.” “Ouch,” Stevie said. Bennie shrugged the other shoulder. “Better’n drowning, I guess.” Dean’s head went up and down slowly. Stevie yawned. When a barn owl suddenly hooted somewhere beyond the trees, Bennie and Dean jumped like scalded cats. Stevie rolled his eyes. “And his ghost is still there,” he prompted when his eyes made the full circuit, then let Bennie continue playing story-teller. “And his ghost is still there,” Bennie said, pointing to the well’s worn rim just above Stevie’s head, “haunting the well.” Dean’s eyes made their own slow slide to the well and back again. “Really?” “Yeah.” “Nah-uh.” “UH-huh.” “Wow.” “You want to see him?” Another gust of wind blew through the clearing, stirring the leaves on the lower boughs. The lightning bugs had come late and gone early, because of the drought his grandfather said, and Bennie missed them. Telling the story, even with Stevie there, always gave him a case of spook-cooties and being able to look up and watch lightning bugs blink like Christmas tree lights helped. A little. Unless Stevie saw what he was doing and laughed. Like now. “Hahhahhah!” Stevie was still and always would be his best friend, but sometimes Bennie wished . . . . “You want to see him?” Bennie asked, scrapping one toe of his Keds sneaker against the dirt as Dean’s body went rigid. “You mean n-now?” Bennie nodded as Stevie stood up, brushing off the seat of his dungarees and moving around the well to the opposite side. The firelight didn’t reach that side at all and turned Stevie into just another shadow. Bennie tried to rub the spook-cooties off his arms without anyone noticing, and blushed when he heard the familiar chuckle. “Jeeze-Louise,” Stevie giggled, “next time I’m gonna tell the story.” Be my guest, Bennie wanted to say back. But didn’t. Never had, never would, because they were best friends. Two boys with one shadow, just like their parents said. “Yeah,” he said instead, getting to his feet and walking over to the fire-lite side of the well. “Come over and say hello.” Dean was even slower than Bennie had been to stand up, and even then he didn’t move. “I – Jeeze, was that my mom? It was really nice of your grandparents to invite us over but my dad wants us to get an early start in the morning so I really better get back so we can go and maybe we can come back next year and then I’ll –” He was talking so fast Bennie’s ears had a hard time catching up, but the minute Dean paused to take a breath he managed to slip in one word . . . the word that horrified ten-year-old boys more than any ghost ever could. “Chicken.” Dean was smaller than Bennie, about the same size as Stevie, but he pulled himself up as if his bones had suddenly attached themselves to wires hanging from the stars. “Am not,” he shouted and then seemed to remember they were standing next to a haunted well and got quiet again, “I just don’t want to get into trouble, you know? When my dad says he wants to leave early he means it.” “Yeah,” Bennie agreed, “I know, but it won’t take long. See, he’s . . . the ghost of the boy likes company. I guess he’s kinda lonely . . . being trapped in the well and all.” Dean’s sneakers, less worn and beat up than his or Stevie’s, left furrows in the dirt as he scuffed his way toward the well. Back to the fire, his shadow rose up and slipped over the rim to the darkness below. “You ever . . . you know, see him? The ghost, I mean.” “Yeah, every summer. And I bring him things, y’know, to play with.” That must have peaked Dean’s interest – or curiosity about what a ghost would play with – because he took another step closer. “What kind of things?” “Checkers,” Stevie said and leaned forward, letting his arms dangle into the well’s gapping mouth. Bennie’s stomach always twisted up inside him when his friend did that. “A box of checkers and a board,” Bennie clarified, just so Dean wouldn’t think he’d hadn’t given some thought to it, “and comic books . . . Archie and The Fantastic Four are his favorites.” “Mine, too,” Dean said, joining Bennie at the well. “Does he, I mean, did he like The Green Lantern or Captain America best?” “Thor,” Bennie answered before Stevie could. Dean finally worked up the nerve to look over the edge, just a quick peek and real fast, but Bennie’s stomach tightened up another notch. “What else do you throw down there?” “A baseball and playing cards and I once threw down my transistor radio but it hit the side and broke before it reached the bottom.” Bennie turned and pressed the quivering muscles of his belly against the cold stones. Stevie looked up and smiled. Winked. “It probably wouldn’t have worked anyway, the reception would have been really bad that far down, but I thought he’d like to have some music or listen to the World Series. He liked baseball a lot.” Dean’s shoulder pressed against Bennie’s as he looked down into the well. “Jeeze, can’t see nothing down there.” “Nope.” “You throw anything else down there?” Bennie licked his lips and was rewarded with the ghostly taste of oven-baked beans and charred burgers. It had been a really great barbecue, one of the best he could remember, in fact. “You gonna tell him, Bennie-beans, or am I?” Stevie asked. “Yeah . . . like I said, he gets real lonely, you know, being out here all year when I’m back home and he has no one to talk to, so I started bringing him pets . . . and stuff.” “Huh?” “First it was dead birds I found and y’know, raccoons and rabbits that got smooched on the road.” Bennie shrugged and felt Dean jerk back when their shoulders touched. “I thought, it’d be okay, since he was dead, too, but it wasn’t. They were just dead things, y’know, no ghosts . . . so I had to throw down . . . y’know live things so their ghosts would be trapped in the well with him.” Dean’s voice sounded real funny when he asked, “Like what?” “A couple of chicks, first off, but chicks are really kind of stupid. Then I found a kitten and then a puppy and I thought it’d be enough . . . but he’s still lonely.” “Needs someone to talk to,” Stevie prompted. “Yeah, he needs someone to talk to . . . and play ball with. Y’know?” “Wow . . . coooool.” Dean lifted himself onto the toes of his sneakers and leaned forward until his face was hidden in shadow. The knot in Bennie’s stomach tightened into a perfect sheepshank, like the one he’d finally mastered for his Boy Scout merit badge. He had to swallow real hard to keep the ghost of his dinner from joining all the others in the well. “Jeeze-beans,” Stevie grumbled and flicked a pebble off the rim. Bennie counted all the way to nine before he heard the hollow plunk when it hit the water. Dean jumped, but only a little. “Do you think that was the gho –” Dean was a lot easier than the puppy had been. The stray mongrel had been squirmy and twisty and almost too heavy for Bennie to lift . . . and once the puppy figured out what Bennie was about to do, it scratched and clawed at his belly so badly that Bennie’d had to wear a tee-shirt for the rest of the summer, even when he went swimming. The puppy howled on the way down and the sound had echoed up from the darkness so loud that Bennie thought sure his grandfather or someone over at the KOA would have heard it. But they didn’t, no one did . . . no one ever did. Dean didn’t make a sound except for sort of a gasp when Bennie grabbed the hemmed cuffs of his pants and tipped him over. Bennie forgot to count before he heard the meaty thud echo up from the dark. He and Stevie stared down into the well for what felt like a long time, listening to the soft twisting of leaves and crackle of the fire, and letting the night settle itself. “Think he’s dead?” Bennie asked, he hated the idea of anything – kitten or chick or boy – alive and suffering down there alone in the dark. “I don’t hear anything. I think he musta broke his neck before he hit bottom, don’t you?” He jerked back liked he’d been lightning struck when Stevie suddenly grunted. It wasn’t the sound Bennie hoped to hear from his friend. “What?” Stevie’s elbows were jabbed against the rim, chin firmly set into the V of his open hands. He didn’t look happy. “I bet he doesn’t even know how to play checkers,” he said, looking down into the dark pit, “or Crazy Eights. And I bet he’ll cry and get all pouty if he loses.” “He didn’t when I played with him,” Bennie said and instantly regretted having let that slip out. Stevie didn’t like him playing with anyone but him. Ever. “Grandpa got me a new Monopoly game,” he added quickly. “I could throw that in, too.” Stevie’s eyes met his across the dark pit. “I only like playing Monopoly with you,” he said and Bennie felt the cold come creeping up under his skin despite the campfire warming his back. He knew what Stevie wanted, had wanted ever since he’d fallen down the well and died. Bennie was his bestest friend and bestest friends were supposed to stick together no matter what. Two boys with one shadow, just like their parents said. But that’d been easy when Stevie was alive. Bennie shook his head as he backed up. “I’m sorry, Stevie, but Dean’s a good guy . . . you’ll like him once you get to know him. Really. You’ll have a lot of fun together, you’ll see.” Stevie sighed – or maybe it was just the wind again. “It didn’t hurt, Bennie, just a little right at the end . . . when my neck broke, but only a little. Come on, Bennie-beans, we’ll have lots of fun, just like we always did. Please?” Bennie didn’t take his eyes off his friend until the fire was between him and the well and Stevie was just another shadow . . . just like he was supposed to be. “You got Dean now, he’ll be fun. I gotta go and . . . y’know, before they come looking for us. I’ll tell ‘em it was another accident, like what happened to you.” “But we’re friends, Bennie. You and me.” Bennie shook his head and even though he couldn’t see Stevie anymore, he knew his friend was still watching . . . “It was just a little pain, Bennie-beans.” . . . still waiting for him to stop being chicken . . . “Tell Dean I’m sorry, okay?” . . . and would still be waiting for him the next summer and the next and the next . . . . The End |
