Best Friends

William Keckler
Sep 6, 2018 · 6 min read

Kids around here just don’t like me. Sometimes I wonder if things would be different if mother and I moved. Or would it just be the same sad state of affairs in the big city as it is out here in the sticks?

I say kids don’t like me. But if I really concentrate on just one kid, and it doesn’t matter if he’s a bit younger, or even quite a few years older than me, I can get him to be my best friend. Trust me. I can. The only problem is that I need a new best friend every year or so. If I told you where my last three best friends are right now, you probably wouldn’t believe me. Or if you did, you would look at me funny. You’d probably look at me all cross-eyed.

Three years ago, I almost lynched a white kid. Well, I should say that I almost got a white kid lynched. I wasn’t there or anything when it went down. He was one of the leaders of this gang of kids around here who are wannabee KKK sheet-heads. He was making the life of black kids around here pure hell. His favorite thing to do was have his friends hold some poor crying kid down, then carve the “N” word into his body with a pocket knife. His gang included most of the dumbest kids in town. All of them frothing like a bunch of rabid dogs.

If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s a pinhead racist. Daddy was one of those. I tell mother all the time how lucky she was to lose a man like that. That’s not losing. Black people are going to rise up in this world. I plan to help them. I’ve been studying the unique nature of their social problems. The racist bully leader was the oldest Sykes kid. My best friend at the time was a goon in suspenders named Marvin, but I renamed him Mauler. First, it was Marvin the Mauler, then it just became Mauler. He really liked that epithet. I chose him because he had a pretty good posse of friends, many of them tough bruiser types. I could pull his strings, so I could pull theirs. He had low self-esteem because his father was a mean drunk like daddy was. I thought about teaching Mauler how to get rat poison into his dad’s coffee to solve that problem for him, but then I realized he’d just end up as poor as my Mom and I. So why bother.

But I did get Mauler to use his gang to get that pinhead Sykes all alone out in the woods and string him up from a branch of an old sycamore tree. The only problem is the rope broke. He ran for his life, got away, but I think he got a taste of what it’s like to be black in America in these times. He’s changed now. Always looking over his shoulder. His neck looks ridiculous. He wears turtlenecks in summer. Funny as hell. That’s how I lost Marvin. I mean Mauler. He got sent up. He never ratted on me. His friends never even knew they were doing my bidding. Hell, most of them never even knew Marvin and I hung out. Our friendship was as secretive as any love affair. He’ll probably get out soon. I’ve been writing him letters where he is. He’s loyal. I could use him again. I have some big plans.

Two years ago I helped a girl who was struggling with suicidal thoughts. She had tried to drown herself in the river and made a real mess of that. People knew about it and mocked her. Kids would see her and throw up their arms and pretend to be drowning and then laugh at her. Her own mother derided her about this. Let’s just say her mother is a woman of “compromised virtue.” Fallen. Everyone knows that story. The old crone even tried to get me into her bed. You can guess how lovely she might have been once by looking at her daughter, whom she hates. But why choose prunes when you can have cherries?

This world is a vale of cruelty, in case you didn’t notice. I did some private Bible study with her daughter and she turned around. She became convinced that I’m a poet, after I read her Psalms and discoursed on each one. She called me “Silver Tongue.” She would do anything I asked. Anything. Sometimes I asked. What good would she have been to anyone down at the bottom of that muddy river? My nickname for her was “Swimmer.” She liked it. It reminded her that she’s strong, that she’s a survivor.

Unfortunately, when I got her pregnant, she had to have that abortion. I explained to her that I wasn’t ready to have a kid, that I have big plans, that I’m getting out of here, and she knew it was my decision, not hers. She had wanted to have my kid. Well, the options for abortion out here in the sticks aren’t exactly great. And it didn’t go well. I read everything I could about the procedure before we did it. I still don’t get it. Everything was sterile. But the bleeding started later and she just hid it too long and never got seen by a doctor in time. I sometimes visit her grave. Nobody knows it was me. She was a good girl and stayed loyal. I really considered her my best friend. We might still be together if there hadn’t been that hitch.

A year ago, my best friend George took a tire iron to the pimply head of that high school senior who was constantly convincing the members of his ratshit posse that they didn’t like me one bit and should go out of their way to remind me of that fact just about every goddamn day in school. Maybe Stan was jealous of the fact that I was going to graduate early. Maybe he hated it that I read so much, that I was able to talk about the works of Stalin, Marx, Mao, Gandhi and Hitler more intelligently than our lame high school teachers ever could.

George did a beautiful job on big boss Stanley with that tire iron. I sat in a field of wildflowers, out of sight of the beating, and listened to Stanley beg. It was hard to keep my laughter down. I’m sure old Stan never knew I was there that day. But he probably guessed who was behind it as it was going down. Because the kid who cracked his skull with the tire iron had no personal beef with him. Not that Stan would ever be able to tell anyone. He has serious trouble with even the most basic sentences now. He’s going to spend the rest of his life in some indoor vegetable patch, that’s for sure. The last time I saw him, he smiled at me like I was his best friend. That’s how far gone he is. Some of Stanley’s posse sit with me now at lunch. I do sort of miss George. When he gets out of reform school, I think I can work with him. Rehabilitate him.

Maybe I should properly introduce myself. My name is James. But you can call me Jim. Jim Jones. I’m getting out of this shithole of a town real soon. I’m going to be a part of something really big. Trust me, you’re going to remember my name someday. Helping people is what I’m best at. And, the way I see it, black people are the ones who need the most help right now. People around here are finally starting to notice I’m something special. Did I already mention I’m graduating high school a year early? I honestly think I might even be the smartest person my age in the entire state of Indiana right now. Even if I grew up without a dad. Even if I live in a goddamn shack. None of that matters. It’s not where you start out. It’s where you finish.

William Keckler

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