When I was young I asked my mom why we go to church every Sunday. She said it was so I didn’t turn out like my dad. Eli went to church too, but he didn’t used to. My mom made him agree to it before she would marry him. I guess he mostly liked it eventually. Said it made him feel like a good person.
When a new church set up in town, I asked why we didn’t try it out. A bunch of people tried it out and ended up switching. My mom said it wouldn’t be Christian to switch between churches, and besides, it was in the Bible not to. I didn’t mind church though. I thought it was nice to have time to think about life and religion and stuff. I had a lot of time to think on the farm, but I was always sweaty and angry, so I mostly thought about how I was sweaty and angry rather than the meaning of life. I’m not really sure what I believe, but for now I think it feels alright to be Christian and go to church on Sundays.
This one Sunday, it must’ve been the week right after I went to Mrs. Glass’s house, we had a guest pastor. I guess he went to some hotshot school to learn about the Bible so our pastor wanted him to visit. He was fun to listen to, which was nice cause the pastors who go to hotshot schools usually aren’t. He talked about how the Bible tells us there’s gonna be a city in heaven with pearly gates where we can all go, and God will welcome us in. He told us that’s why we talk about Jesus. I guess he’s the one who lets us into the city. I almost never remember what they talk about in church, but I sure got excited about this city. I bet it sure beats this hot ugly town anyway.
Like he always does, Eli got home from church and right away threw his blue pinstriped Sunday shirt on a chair for my mom to handle. I always hated that. My mom’s one of the kindest, nicest, most hardworking, most patient people I know and Eli treated her worst of all. But I don’t wanna talk too much more about that. I’m already getting red in the face and I just wanna snap this pencil in half and stop writing this story. But like I said, this story needs told.
So like I was saying, Eli sat in his stained overstuffed chair and put on the news right after church. I guess just a few miles away they caught a whole bunch of Mexicans trying to get into America. I don’t know why Eli always put the news on right after church. He got in such a decent mood at church and ruined it with the stupid news. I had to leave the room, so I went to help my mom in the kitchen. It’s not that I disagreed with Eli, I didn’t know what to think about Mexicans back then. I had only met one once at a grocery store, and he just said excuse me and reached past me to get some orange juice. I had no idea why Eli was shouting about “Damn Mexicans” at the TV (or maybe at my mom and me, I could never tell).
Usually the news only bugged Eli for a couple hours, then my mom made a nice roast dinner or something and he got over it. But this Sunday he didn’t. “They’re gonna take our jobs and use up all our welfare money.” He started talking at my mom and me at the dinner table like he started up a new church and he was the pastor. “I don’t even feel safe in my own home anymore.” Awful thing is I don’t think my mom ever felt safe in her own home.
Eli finally finished his sermon. “Hey, you go talk to Mrs. Glass yet?”
“I talked to her Friday. She says she can hire you someone this week.”
I don’t remember exactly what Eli said back, but it went on for a while and I felt awful rotten after he said it. I hated wasting my mom’s cooking, but my stomach was turning so I asked her to pack it up for lunch the next day and I got the hell out of that stupid house. Eli made me so mad sometimes and I never had the guts to talk back. I still hate myself for that. I really do. Maybe if I had any guts at all I wouldn’t even have to tell you this goddamned story.
Even after the sun went down it stayed hot and dusty outside. Sometimes it does that here, stays a million degrees even after the sunset. I didn’t even care though. I was not going back in that house that night. I couldn’t. I walked a couple blocks sweating bullets and rang Jacob’s doorbell. His mom answered, and I guess I looked pretty rough. Sometimes moms can just tell something’s wrong I guess. “Ben, is everything alright?” She made that face people make when they see you’re hurt and they don’t know what to say. I hate that face.
“It’s just hot out. Is Jacob here?”
“He’s in his room, come on in.”
Boy was I glad Jacob was home. You don’t make a lot of friends going to school just a couple days a week. I guess most people just hang out with people who do the same clubs or band or choir or whatever else with them. And you especially don’t make a lot of friends if you don’t like sports. I don’t have anything against sports, I just don’t see the point if I exercise on a farm all day anyway. And if they cost any money, there’s no way I could have talked Eli into it.
I guess Jacob heard us at the door since he ran out to the living room. “Hey Ben, you alright? You look like hell.” His mom shot him a look that I think meant “don’t say hell in my living room”. I repeated that it was just hot outside and asked if I could stay the night.
Before Jacob could even answer his mom said of course and brought me a blanket from the hall closet. “If you boys need anything at all, me and your dad’ll be watching TV in our room.” My mom was probably worried sick. Probably thought I ran away or something. But if I’d had Jacob’s mom call her, Eli would have lost his shit, and I couldn’t leave my mom to deal with that by herself.
Jacob got us both a soda and we sat down in his room. His bedroom was a little bigger than mine. He had a desk that was always covered in homework. I think that’s how he got good grades. Well, that and he got to go to school every day. His bed was pushed right up against the corner, and he had a little wood stool with a Mickey Mouse alarm clock on it. He was a spaz growing up so his mom thought he needed a nice calm paint color. The whole room was navy blue and always kind of dark, even in the middle of the day with the curtains open.
As soon as we sat on his bed I noticed the lump that must have been growing in my throat. I didn’t want to cry though. That’d make me a wuss or something. It’s always so goddamn awkward when men cry. I couldn’t do that to Jacob.
But then he asked why I was spending the night. I freaking lost it. I’ve heard girls talk about ugly crying, and I think that’s what I did. I scared Jacob too. I started bawling and telling him all about how Eli gets mad and yells, and how my mom was too good for him and we should’ve just run away, and how sometimes he got all violent and how I could handle it but my mom didn’t deserve that. I stopped to catch my breath and Jacob’s eyes were the size of baseballs, I swear. I guess I let all this crap build up and poor Jacob had to be there when I let it all out.
I expected him to call me a wuss or something, but he just gave me a big hug and said “Damn, I had no idea.” I always thought it was gay or something to hug another guy, but I guess I really needed a hug. It didn’t even feel gay. It just made me feel a little bit more like a person I guess.
We talked for a couple of hours after that. For a few minutes we kept talking about how Eli was a bastard and my mom deserved better. But then we mostly just talked like we usually did. About what teachers were the strictest and what jocks were dating what cheerleaders and how I still didn’t have a girlfriend. I think he was trying to make me laugh or something cause he kept making up that he had a girlfriend but she lived in Canada and they just talked on the phone. He said he had mad moves on the phone, which I still don’t really understand. There’s no way Jacob had a girlfriend in Canada. Let’s face it, we were both too much of a wuss to ask anyone out, especially from that far away.