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Message-ID: <49932asstr$1103055004@assm.asstr-mirror.org>
From: "Gina Marie Wylie" <gmwylie98260@hotmail.com>
Subject: {ASSM} Spitfire and Messerschmitt Ch 23 {Gina Marie Wylie} (teen, mf, cons)
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Date: Tue, 14 Dec 2004 15:10:04 -0500
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<1st attachment, "Davey Ch 23.doc" begin>



++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	The following is fiction of an adult nature.  If I believed in
setting age limits for things, you'd have to be eighteen to read
this and I'd never have bothered to write it.  IMHO, if you can
read and enjoy, then you're old enough to read and enjoy.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	All persons here depicted are figments of my imagination and any
resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly a blunder on my
part.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	Official stuff:  Story codes: teen, mf, cons.

	If stories like this offend you, you will offend ME if you read
further and complain. Copyright 2004, by Gina Marie Wylie.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

	I can be reached at gmwylie98260@hothothotmail.com, at least if
you remove some of the hots.  All comments and reasoned
discussion welcome.

Below is my site on ASSTR:
http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/Gina_Marie_Wylie/www/

My stories are also posted on StoriesOnline:
http://Storiesonline.net/

And on Electronic Wilderness Publishing:
http://www.ewpub.org/

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Spitfire and Messerschmitt

Chapter 23 :: Fissionhof

I sat up in bed, my heart thudding in my chest, breathing in
desperate gasps.  It was dark; I was in an unfamiliar bed in an
unfamiliar bedroom.  I have no idea what woke me up; I remember
my sleep being restful and dreamless, but it felt like I fell off
a cliff an instant before I woke.

I took a deep breath and held it.  Yesterday came back, bit by
bit.  I decided that my subconscious had woken me up.  About damn
time you were scared, boy!

I'd sat at the poker table with bullets hitting around me.  Some
of them had come more than a little close to me.  And I'd been
stupefied, not terrified.  I'd gotten to the floor when told I
should, but unlike all the others except Hammer, I'd stood up
from my chair.  I'd gotten on the floor, blissfully unaware that
I was bleeding.  I remembered one of the doctors telling me that
the bullet had been hot enough to partially cauterize my ear,
which was why my nerve endings hadn't been screaming in pain.

I'd watched coins fly, I'd heard the "chunk" of the bullet
hitting Chief Ortega's walkie-talkie.  I'd been more curious
about how everyone knew what sort of person was outside, shooting
at us.  But I hadn't been scared then.  I hadn't been scared when
I looked and saw the blood down my side.  I'd been curious, but
not scared.  I'd gone to the hospital emergency room and had been
treated last.  I was curious there, too.  But not scared.

Later, I'd looked in the family room at the activity there,
including the mess that the bullets had made of the stacks of
coins.  How, I'd wondered, were we ever going to straighten out
the mess?  But I hadn't been scared.

I was scared now.  Deep down to the bone scared.

I took another deep breath.

I was calmer; my heart had slowed, as had my breathing.  Had that
been what they call a panic attack?  I didn't think so, but it
hadn't been a picnic, either.  Anxiety attack?

I looked at my watch.  4:27 am.  I had slept for three hours and
I felt like I'd slept a dozen hours.  I decided what I'd really
like was a shower.  Except a shower at this time of the night was
certainly going to bring curiosity seekers.

I got up and put on the jeans and shirt my mother had brought to
the hospital, used or not, and went through the living room and
to the door of the family room.  It was open, but there was a
waist-high band of yellow police tape that read "Crime Scene --
Do Not Enter."

The lights were out; there was no one around.  I contemplated
life without being able to get to my room for clean clothes,
without being able to get to my bathroom.  I laughed, then.  What
could they do if I went in anyway?  Shoot me?

I ducked under the tape, walked directly to my room, opened the
door and got some clean clothes.  I went into the bathroom and
took my shower and dressed there before I returned to my room and
dropped the dirty clothes in my laundry basket.  I considered my
bookshelf for a few seconds.  What should I read?  There was an
old, battered, read-more-than-a-few-times copy of Anne
McCaffrey's Dragonsinger.  I took that and turned to go.

Sitting on my desk was Shellie's backup jewel case.  What had
Mercedes said?  I should look in a folder called "Life" on the
third disk.  I looked at the jewel box; it looked like a regular
CD holder.  I popped it open and got two, maybe three surprises.
First off, there were two sides, each with two disks.  And the
disks all had "DVD-R" logos on them.  Each one of Shellie's disks
had nine CD's worth of data.  Shellie had 36 CD's worth of files?
 I couldn't fill a single CD with what I had on my PC.

I shrugged and headed back to Wanda's bedroom, where her PC could
read DVD's.  I turned on the computer, waited for it to wake up
and then slid in the third disk.

There were two folders on it, one called "Life" and the other "2B
Dub."

	I opened up the Life folder, and there were JPG's labeled "Panel
001" through "Panel 129."  I clicked on the first one.

	It looked a little like a Sunday comic strip, not just one line
of cartoons, but several lines.  They were in color, not black
and white.

	The frame on the top left was just plain black.  "In the
beginning, the void was without form..."  The second frame was
the black split by a lightning bolt.  "For five days, things were
going okay... then God fucked it all up."

	The third panel had two shapes, one just human-shaped, the other
wore an obvious dress.  "On the sixth day, God created parents
and things have been going to hell ever since."

	The next panel had a man and a woman shouting at each other. 
The woman's blurb said, "Apple-polisher!" and the man's
"Serpent-tongue!"  Behind them was evidently the Garden of Eden;
there were corn stalks, tomato plants, trees with apples and
oranges.  Cows stood in a field, some sheep, a couple horses.

	Underneath the panel was the legend, "On the seventh day God
rested, because he knew that he had a long battle on his hands."

	The next row had a stork carrying a baby in its beak, flying
over suburbia.   "And just when it looked like things couldn't
get worse... along came a surprise."

	The next picture showed a man facing the wall of what was
obviously a bedroom, a woman on the bed, her knees spread apart.
There was another balloon with a "Wah!" with the tail heading
down between the woman's invisible legs.  Another balloon ran to
the man and read, "Don't you have any modesty?" and another to
the woman with the word: "Moron!"  Underneath the caption read:
"The Stork, a common-sensical animal, dropped the baby and split
for calmer climes."

	The next picture contained a man with "!$$*!" in the blurb,
obviously yelling at the woman.  She had "!*$$!" over her head. 
In the background, a baby sat in a high chair, regarding the
scene with a "?" over its head.  The caption was, "Learning at
the feet of my elders."

	The next row were all the same, the man and the woman with
deleted expletives.  The backgrounds varied.  A small girl about
five wearing a Sunday dress, with no balloon.  The caption made
me want to cry.  "I'm reliably told the first words I said were:
'Fuck you, too!'"

	In the next picture, the girl was about ten, wearing another
Sunday dress, walking towards a church with a balloon that had
dots connecting to her head, with "Fuck you both!  And twice on
Sunday!"

	The last panel was from behind the girl, again grown older. 
Once more there was no balloon over her head, but both hands were
behind her back and she was clearly flipping birds, out of sight
of her parents.

	The characters weren't done like regular cartoon characters. 
They were angular, with big-eyes, skinny, pipe-stem arms and
legs.

	I studied the cartoon, shaking my head.  And I'd felt sorry for
myself?  I might not have liked my parents or my sister, but even
when we disagreed, there were no raised voices or cussing.  And,
now that I was getting older, I realized that my parents had
listened to what I said; and even though they had tried to get me
to do what they wanted, when it didn't go their way, they didn't
forbid me to do what I wanted, they said, "Okay, on your head,
then!"

	I trailed my fingers down the monitor screen.

Dear, sweet Shellie!  No one deserves to grow up like you had! 
All those years I felt sorry for myself and I had no idea what
hell really was!

Two hours later I finished looking at Panel 129.  I'd long since
forgotten where I was supposed to stop.  It was Shellie's
autobiography I'd been reading.  Done as a cartoon.

I sat trying to put it all together.  Some of it I didn't
understand, although her father's conversion at a Promise
Keeper's meeting had been clear enough.  And that he'd taken his
wife to church where she too became a born-again Christian. 
Shellie had been immune, pretty much, because her parents had
been sending her to Sunday School since she had been a toddler.

A little after eight, there was a knock on the door.  I got up,
making sure there was nothing showing on the computer screen and
opened the door.

"Get a shower, get some clean clothes," Dad told me.  "Chief
Ortega and Willy Coy will be here at nine."

"I went past the police tape and did all that a while ago."

He grinned at me.  "Good!  You probably should have a proper
breakfast; you did lose a fair amount of blood.  How about steak
and eggs?"

For breakfast?  "Okay," I said, a little unsure about whether or
not he was serious.

"Good, twenty minutes, then."

"Can I make myself useful?" I asked.

"Stay out of the kitchen.  Rest.  How's the ear and arm?"

I worked my arm around.  It was better.  I knew better than to
reach up and touch my ear; I'd already done that once and learned
that it didn't hurt nearly as much if you left it alone. 
"Okay."

"Plan on spending the day resting.  Homework if you must."

"And assassins in the night?"

"There was smug satisfaction in Vic's voice when he called.  At a
guess, he got his man.  But he didn't want to talk about it on
the phone."

"He's afraid our phone is tapped?" I was stunned.

Dad laughed.  "He knows we have a cordless phone."

Oh.

He left and I turned back to the computer.  I'd looked at Life,
what was 2B Dub?

There was a file named, "DarksideBlues.avi."  There was another
named "Script.jap," another named "Script.doc" and another named
"Dub.wav" and a last file named "Notes.doc."  I'm not a PC geek,
I knew what avi, doc and wav files were.  What was .jap?

That, it turned out to be self-explanatory.  I opened it, and
faced pages and pages of oriental characters.  Japanese, I
assumed.  It seemed to make sense, anyway.  So I opened
Script.doc.  That was... interesting.

The lines in the file were paired.  I have no idea how you could
do that in Word and I counted myself an expert.  The top line was
something in transliterated Japanese, and then second line was in
English.  It was a big file; I did a word count on it, and it was
over a hundred thousand words.  More than your average term paper
by a hundred times!

I started scrolling through the file.  The Japanese I didn't
understand, I understood the English to be a translation.  I'd
seen that often enough in Spanish class!  About two thirds of the
way through the file, there was only the top line, the English
part was blank.  I backed up a bit, and found chunks of English
to go with the Japanese, but other places where there were
question marks instead of English.

It was like a large light bulb going off in my head.  It was
Shellie.  Shellie was translating the Japanese to English!  Where
had she learned Japanese?  It sure wasn't in San Angelo, Texas!

I was called for breakfast, but unlike usual, I just grabbed my
plate and went back to Wanda's room.

I played the .avi file.  Darkside Blues was a good name for it. 
The whole tone was dark.  The animation was a lot like what
Shellie drew, but the theme and tone of the piece was dark.  I'd
listened to it for about a half hour when I picked up that one of
the voices was Shellie's, speaking in English.

My mouth dropped open, my eyes bugged out and I nearly choked.

Then my dad was banging on the door, saying we had company.

I swallowed, told him I'd be a minute, and ejected the disk.  I
put the jewel case into my jeans pocket and went out to see what
they'd learned.

Chief Ortega looked at me.  "None of the people you named were
home last night.  Alan Guttierez' mother told us where we might
find him.  We found him where she told us he'd be.  With him we
found Terry Toohey and Sean Forth.  It was clear we were
unexpected; there were a number of weapons that we confiscated.

"Still, because of the unexpected nature of the raid, we believe
they weren't expecting us.  If any of them had been up a
telephone pole, shooting at people, they wouldn't have been as
surprised.

"On the other hand, Nicholas Fesselhof, Jr. wasn't at home,
either.  His father admitted that he'd expected his son before
midnight, and at one in the morning, he was becoming concerned. 
To put it mildly, when he opened the door and saw a uniformed
officer and a detective, he nearly had a heart attack.  Nicholas'
father told us his son had gone to 'visit friends' earlier on his
motorcycle.

"Early this morning, a citizen, once again a little late, called
us when he heard the news that we were looking for a gunman
riding a motorcycle.  He'd seen, he told us, a young man walking
a motorcycle up a neighbor's driveway and into her garage.  That
had been the night before, around ten or ten thirty.

"We went to the address in question.  The property belongs to
Mrs. Fesselhof, the grandmother of the suspect.  She had no idea
that her grandson or his motorcycle were in her lawn equipment
storage shed, which is where my detectives found Fesselhof Junior
hiding a little more than an hour ago.  He says he was 'drinking
beer with some friends' and didn't want to go home drunk, and
that he snuck into his grandmother's shed to sleep it off."

Chief Ortega grinned.  "Mr. Fesselhof, not privy to his son's
logic, had voluntarily let my officers search his house.  They
found a well-concealed, locked gun case.  In spite of that, Mr.
Fesselhof Senior told the detectives his scope-mounted Remington
30-06 deer rifle, the one his own father had given him on his
sixteenth birthday, was missing."

He looked at my father.  "I know going one for two in this isn't
good... but last night I have contained."

"Contained?" my father asked.

"The shooter is in custody.  He's being interrogated as we speak.
 I'm certain we have the right person."

"I have a question," I told him.

He looked at me, intent, but wary.

"Our family room is marked as a crime scene; my bedroom and
bathroom are on the other side of the yellow tape.  Did I screw
anything up when I ignored the tape this morning?"

"You didn't break the tape did you?" Willy Coy asked, his voice
sounding earnest and concerned.

I shook my head, now wary.

"Good.  Think about what I just said the next time you spend the
entire evening trying to figure out a way to bluff the rest of
us."

I started to blush, and then it was like a ray of sunshine.  I
looked him in the eye.  This man was my father's equal.  He
bossed Blade and Hammer, two men I definitely wanted on my side
in a fight.  He had been jerking my chain... and he'd never said
I couldn't break the tape.  He just made it sound like it was
bad.

"Mr. Coy, were you afraid last night?" I asked, curious.

He grimaced.  "The only reason I didn't pee my pants was that I'd
just emptied my bladder.  All of us have our strengths and
weaknesses, Davey.  The thing you have to do is learn what yours
are and learn to deal with them.  Then, when you see someone else
who has a weakness, you want to be very careful despising him or
feeling sorry for him.  Contemplate what he thinks of your
weaknesses."

"I wasn't afraid last night," I told him.  "I woke this morning
and..."  I swallowed.  For a moment I saw something terrible,
something I must have sensed before I woke up.  I swallowed
again.  For several seconds I was afraid I was going to barf.

"Yeah, like that," Willy Coy told me.  "Hammer thinks of
inventive ways to cuss.  Blade...  a few years ago, he was taken
by some very bad guys.  They should have killed him.  Instead, he
talked and talked; he was still talking when Hammer and I broke
in.  Blade joked and quipped, right until we crossed the
threshold of the house he'd been held in.  Then he started being
sick.  We had to put him on an IV, he was that sick.   There's
not a person in this room, Davey, who doesn't have dreams that,
when they wake up, leave them sweating, wanting to throw up."

"So, you could tell what I was planning?"

He grinned.  "Yep.  Maybe the judge missed it.  He's a little
distracted lately.  But the rest of us... I speak just for myself
because it isn't something you talk about.  But yeah, I knew what
you were after."

I looked him in the eye.  "I guess it's back to the drawing
board."

He laughed.  "Davey, one day you will figure out how to take all
our money.  I wished I'd been as single-minded when I was your
age.  I'd discovered girls; I had a surplus of testosterone.  I
was all over the place.  Keep it up!"

My phone rang and I stood up and walked towards the family room.
This time I had a clear conscience walking under the tape.	"Are
you okay, Davey?"  It was Shellie.

"I have a sore ear.  They think they caught the shooter. 
Fesselhof."

"We're on the speaker phone in our kitchen," Mercedes said.  "My
mom and dad are listening.  I guess we have to nickname him
'Fissionhof.'"

"Something like that.  The police are talking to him.  They
stopped in this morning to tell us what was going on."

"But you're okay?" Mercedes insisted.

"I'm fine.  My dad thinks it's hilarious that I'm not going to
get my right earlobe pierced."

"Why not?" Shellie asked.

I was still thinking about what to say when Mercedes spoke again.
 "He doesn't have one anymore."

"Yeah," I said, wanting to minimize it.

"Oh," Shellie said.  "You never said anything about wanting
piercings."

Mercedes laughed.  "Shellie!  That was a joke!  I didn't know you
did jokes!"

I contemplated Life.  "There are a lot of things we don't know
about each other, Spitfire."

"Can we come over in a while and study?" Mercedes asked.

My father had told me I was to rest.  Or study.  I laughed. 
"Yes.  Whenever you want.  I'm supposed to take it easy.  My dad
fixed me steak and eggs for breakfast."

Ruy d'Silva spoke up.  "Could I come over in a bit and talk to
your father, Davey?"

I sighed.  "Yes, sir."

He laughed, "No, not like that.  Something other than current
events."

"Yes, sir."

"Around one.  If there's a problem, please call."

"I could check now, if you like, sir."

"No, we're off to church.  Late, actually.  Later, Davey."

I asked my dad and he nodded.  "I was going to be watching the
49ers.  I hope your girlfriend's father likes football."

Once again, it was like the sun shone on me.  "Dad, you'd know
more about that than me."

He grinned.  "See, you're learning!"

"Is everything a game?  Bluff and counter-bluff?"

He shook his head.  "Sometimes, like last night, you play for all
the marbles.  Some people would count that as a failure of
diplomacy."

I lifted my head and met his eyes.  Chief Ortega and Willy Coy
were within earshot.  I looked at the chief of police.  "The
other day I gave a statement.  I'm ready to do another."

The chief shook his head.  "Last time you gave a statement. 
Among friends, so to speak.  This time you will be deposed.  And
that is not nearly as much fun."

I frowned.  I'd hated what had happened when I had to give my
statement.  Then I put two and two together.  "It's worse?"

"Way worse," Dad offered.  "On the other hand, the defense has to
get its act together.  Almost certainly not today.  Wednesday
would be my guess."

"Certainly not today," Chief Ortega confirmed.  "The City
Attorney was quite clear.  Three, four, five days to prepare."

"Does Fissionhof have a lawyer?"

"Yes, but like as not, his lawyer will change.  One of the Legal
Aid Lawyers will take the case.  Too many juicy opportunities. 
Lawyers salivate for cases like his: the least chance of
publicity draws them like moths to a bonfire.  A judge, the
chief, a couple of Feds, your father..."

"The last time, I wasn't supposed to talk about it."

Willy Coy sighed.   "From our point of view, that was cut and
dried.  This time, we're not supposed to have a point of view.  I
would go slowly, anyway."

"What should I tell my friends?"

"You got zinged," Willy said.  "That will take care of most
comments.  If they keep asking questions, tell them about what
the hospital did to treat it."

"And this stops questions?" I asked, surprised.

"Oh, yeah!" Willy said.

"You bet!" the chief added.

"All they did was look at it, put a band-aid on it and then give
me two shots."

"The shot thing is the important point.  That makes it all seem
real," Chief Ortega said.  He wiggled his fingers in his cast. 
"Broken bones?  Hey, it's just a cast!  No big deal, right?"

I could see in his eyes that he was serious.  "I'm sorry you got
hurt," I told him, apologizing.

Willy Coy reached out and tapped me on my chest.  "Davey, one
piece of advice, perhaps the one you most want to take away from
all of this: someone fired bullets into your house.  You don't
have to apologize to anyone because someone else was in a
homicidal state, firing randomly into a lighted room.

"It's like what happened on 9/11.  There were people, some of
them quite good-hearted, who thought it was partly our fault.  We
help people; not only needy people in this country, but around
the world.  We can be proud of our charity.  It's sad that there
are still poor and oppressed people in the world, but there
always will be; we do what we can.  Being poor and oppressed does
not excuse you from the crime of slamming an airplane full of
people into a building full of people.  Besides, most of the 9/11
terrorists weren't poor, they were from middle or upper class
families, and had the money to live anywhere they wanted to. 
They had, in fact, come to this country where they lived among us
for months and months, taking advantage of the services and
opportunities we offer.

"It is why we took on the Taliban in Afghanistan and it looks
like it will be Saddam's turn in the spring.  They are, as well
as the yammerhead that fired into your house last night, the
enemies.  We don't have to apologize to anyone because someone
sets out to hurt other people.  No hurt that you actually
delivered or that the guy fancied he was given compares to what
he did.

"If you have any regrets about last night, let it be the things
you were responsible for.  Like being a little slow to take
cover.  Or doing a lousy job trying to set us up to bluff."

"I've always admired the effortless way you can make the rest of
us eat humble pie," Dad said.  It was said with a smile and
everyone smiled as well.

"You have your job, I have mine," Willy told Dad.

"Mine pays better," Dad said with a grin.

"Phil, everyone's job pays better than mine," Willy told him.

They left and I went in and sat down in my room for a few
minutes.  Then I was up, looking for my father.  He wasn't hard
to find; it was Sunday and he was sitting on the couch in the
family room, watching a football game.

"Can I have a new PC?" I asked him.

He laughed.  "That has to mean you've found something you want to
do that the one you have doesn't do.  What is it?"

"I want a DVD player."

"Let me talk to the Man   my tech guru.  If possible, I want him
to just upgrade you and spare the expense."

All my life I'd heard things like that.  I tasted bitter bile,
turned and walked away.

Dad caught up in two steps.  "Okay, what pissed you off?"

"When Wanda wanted a new machine, you didn't ask her questions
about what she wanted -- you went out and bought the biggest one
in the store."

He stared at me for a few seconds then shook his head.  "Yeah.  I
was going to come right out and tell you that after what happened
to her, there's nothing she can ask for that I won't try to see
she gets.

"The truth is, ever since the first time I saw her, right after
she was born, she's been the apple of her father's eye.  Even
after you came along, I think I was readier to give her whatever
she wanted than give you the time of day.  When you started
pushing back..."  He sighed.

"Well, let's say sometimes we make mistakes.  Later this week you
and I will go talk to the Man.  He will wave his magic wand and
you will have a machine that hums along even faster than
Wanda's."

Around one in the afternoon, Shellie, Mercedes and her dad
arrived.  My dad and hers watched TV and talked; I didn't have a
clue about what, as we were in the dining room, sitting around
the table.  Shellie had come home with Mercedes after church. 
Karen came in about a half hour later, with Pammie.  Pammie
vanished into Wanda's room, while Karen sat down with the rest of
us.

About three, Rob came over and he and Emily sat in the living
room talking while the rest of us continued hitting the books.

Mom came in and looked at us and laughed.  "We used to do this in
college, when I was a cheerleader.  Although usually it was the
week before finals."

A few minutes later, she brought out a couple bowls of fresh
popcorn and we took a break.  I kept expecting to hear questions
about getting shot, but even the stuff with the baseball game
didn't come up.  That was all fine with me.  Then it was time for
it to end.  I hugged and kissed Mercedes, then Shellie.

"I looked at Life," I told Shellie.  "All of it.  I forgot how
far I was supposed to go."

"Pretty boring," she said, smiling a little.

I dropped my voice so that only Shellie and Mercedes could hear
me.  "I'm impressed you learned Japanese so well."

Shellie shrugged.  "I have a knack for it.  Maybe I spoke it in a
past life; I don't know."

"You speak Japanese?"  Mercedes seemed impressed.

"You speak Spanish and are learning German," Shellie told her. 
"It's no big deal."

"How well do you speak it?" Mercedes asked.

"It's hard.  It's not like English at all, even in the little
things.  In English we have plural nouns.  It's not like that in
Japanese.  One car, two cars in English is one car, two car in
Japanese."

"That makes sense," Mercedes told her.  "It's redundant in
English."

Shellie nodded again.  "There's a lot of things like that.  Even
words from English that are the same in Japanese aren't the same.
 They sound like jokes... like hotel is hoteru, and gasoline is
gasorin.  But it's how they do it.  Don't even get me started on
reading and writing it.  They have four different ways of writing
things.

"It's pretty amazing how much culture and history we rely on in
our every day speech.  The Japanese are even more so.  They can
abbreviate an entire book with just one symbol; it's weird."

"How do you mean, abbreviate a book with just one symbol?"
Mercedes asked.

"Think of the Bible and Christianity," Shellie explained.  "You
draw the little fish symbol, a simple loop lying on its side. 
Everyone knows what you're talking about."

Mercedes nodded.  "Try explaining the fish symbol to someone from
another country where Christians are rare and no one's read the
Bible," Shellie continued.

"Tough," I said, nodding my head.

"There are times when you think you know what was meant, but the
words are something from history or a book and mean something
else entirely.  It's easy to make mistakes."

"How do you learn something like that?"  I asked.

"And keep it from your parents?" Mercedes added.

Shellie smiled.  "You lie.  They know I'm studying Japanese; they
had a fit at first.  Then I told them that I want to grow up and
be a missionary.  That I want to go to Japan and convert the
heathen."  She snorted in derision.  "I went native before I ever
left!"

She looked at Mercedes.  "I found some online courses, plus IM a
lot and go to Japanese chat rooms.  They are very patient with
you when you are trying to learn their language.  I give them
help with their English, too."

Then it was time for them to go.  I went back and watched the
last of Darkside Blues, using Wanda's computer.  She and Pammie
were off on some errand or other, Karen with them.




Monday I was up early.  In spite of it being a bit chilly, I went
out and started swimming.  Wanda had come and gone, even so.  My
arm felt more or less normal, but I didn't push things.  I did
some chin-ups, but only used my left hand.

Wanda spoke to Dad at breakfast about a pool party.  "You told
Davey he could have a pool party.   You said that I could invite
some friends, too."

Dad met her eyes.  "I noticed it was a little cold this
morning."

"Yeah.  Saturday afternoon.  I don't know if we'll do much
swimming."

He examined a bite of sausage intently for a second.  "You could
always wait until it warms up.  April, maybe."  He looked right
at me.  "When do you want to have your party, Davey?"

"Now is good for me," I told him.

"Kind of short notice, don't you think?" Mom piped up.

"Yeah.  Maybe if I clean the pool a lot, I can have one for
myself in the spring," Wanda told them.

"I'm getting Davey a new computer this week," Dad told her.  "I
suppose you can have a pool party next spring.  Who knows, maybe
even two.  One to celebrate the good college you were admitted
to."

Wanda stuck out her tongue and everyone laughed.

Wanda faced me.  "Turn out your friends.  Invite the baseball
team.  I'm going to have cheerleaders and football players.  It
will be cool!"

"I'm not sure how many from the team will be speaking to me next
week."

Wanda looked at me.  "Davey, Jack's lost a football game or two.
He's screwed it up and lost a couple of games all by himself.  It
happens."

"I've done the same thing," Dad told me.  "Davey, you have to
listen to your coaches.  Listen to them... not slavishly obey. 
Coach Wells is a fine man, and I've heard from a dozen people
about how you back-talked to him and Coach Delgado.  I've also
had a couple people scratch their heads and say they can't figure
what got into Bud's head... it should never have happened, he
should have pulled the catcher at the same time."

He looked at me.  "You saw the rest of the game?"

I nodded.  "I sat and watched."

"You get points for that, Davey.  You could have hit the
showers."

"I don't want us to lose, I want us to win.  I was pissed is all.
 I did clap and cheer when there was something to clap and cheer
about."

"Yeah, well that catcher didn't do much good Saturday.  Lake
Terrace got a lot of hits, particularly in the later innings when
they realized it was all fastballs coming in belt high.  Be
patient, Davey.  Don't blow your stack."

"I didn't blow my stack.  I was polite."

"Firm but polite," Dad nodded.  "That's the way to be.  Flexible,
though, if needed.  A conundrum."

I shook my head, and a while later we were at school.

Mercedes grinned at me.  "I asked my mom if Shellie could sleep
over next Friday.  She said yes."

"Cool!"

"Now, though, there's the science fair project.  Frankly, Davey,
I don't see how we can do anything competitive without spending a
lot of money on it."

	"Yeah, I've noticed that."

	"So maybe we need to look elsewhere.  Oceans are good, I like
the ocean.  But we need something doable."

	"Maybe we can find something that we can do that uses a
computer," I told her.  "My dad's says I can have a new one."

	She looked at me and shook her head.  "And I share ours with
three other people.  Mom and Dad share one too, and sometimes let
us use it, too."

	"We'll just have to see what we can do.  Maybe Ms. Weaver will
know something."

	"We could always ask Ms. Churchwood, too," Mercedes added.

	That was a good idea!  I told her so, too.

	On the way to the Microsoft Office class I asked Shellie how she
could send me messages during the period, because if I was going
to be bored out of my skull, I was thinking I could send her a
message back.

	"Someone," she told me, "I won't say who, set up a little
listener program on the school's main server.  You send it a
message in the right format and it creates an email in the
system.  The email looks like it comes from outside, but you
can't actually tell, because all of the routing information is
missing.

	"I can send you directions tonight, if you like.  It wouldn't be
a good idea to do that through the school server."

	I nodded and we went and spent the next fifty minutes being
bored by the mindless class.

	On the way to lunch, I asked Shellie how she did the paired
lines in her scripts, which led to a general conversation on the
cool things you could do with Microsoft products that Bill Gates
had probably never imagined they could be used for.

	We'd been sitting for a just a few minutes when Rob appeared and
sat down next to Emily.  He gestured around.  "No Fesselhof
today?"

	I looked at Emily.  She had talked to Rob Sunday afternoon; it
didn't seem reasonable that she wouldn't have mentioned it.  That
and it had been on the news.

	Emily saw me looking at her and she stuck her tongue out at me.
A lot of that was going on, I thought.  "I don't gossip about my
friends.  Or what goes on at your house."

	"That's okay, Emily," I told her mildly.  "You can talk about
something like that."

	"Like what?" Rob asked, curious.

	"Davey's ear," Mercedes told him.

	"What about your ear?"  He looked and saw the band-aid. 
"Strange place to cut yourself shaving."

	"You didn't notice it yesterday?" I asked him.  "Or the odd
little circles on the carpet in the family room?"

	They'd drawn yellow circles around the bullet holes; it was,
they'd told Dad, something that would shampoo out.

	Rob glanced at Emily and blushed.  "No, I wasn't paying
attention to those things."

	"Well, Fissionhof won't be back anytime soon," Mercedes said
flatly.  "Not after shooting the Chief of Police."

	Rob looked at her, then at me.  "I'm obviously missing something
here."

	"Someone started shooting at us Saturday night," I told him. 
"They hit me, another of my dad's friends.  Chief Ortega wasn't
shot, just his radio.  But it broke a couple of his fingers.  The
police think it was Fesselhof."

	He looked at me, then at my ear.  "You were shot in the ear?"

	"Yeah."  I was really uncomfortable.

No one, really, had asked about the car that had almost hit us,
except the police.  I could understand Rob's curiosity; I'd have
been curious myself if someone had a story like mine.  Except the
story was about me.  I wasn't as curious as I could have been.

	"Scary!" Rob said.

	I shrugged.  "At the time, I was too surprised to be scared. 
Since then..."  Okay, there were times when I thought about the
bullet going a little to one side and drilling a neat little hole
through my skull, like the one Hammer had in his arm.  Then I
would get sick to my stomach.

	I met Rob's eyes.  "Right now, I'd like to change the subject."

	"Baseball," Rob said with confidence.  "I hear, tomorrow another
scrimmage.  I also hear, who is going to be on which team will be
a surprise."

	"Cool," Mercedes told him.  "So long as Davey and I are on the
same side."

	After a bit, Rob was talking to Emily about shutter speeds,
f-stops and other camera stuff.  I just sat still, enjoying the
brush of Mercedes on one side of me and Shellie on the other.

	The bell rang, ending lunch.  I grinned at Mercedes.  "Thanks,
you two!"

	"Mi amigo!" Mercedes told me.

	"Mi amigos!" Shellie corrected her.

	"Oh yes!  Amigos!" Mercedes laughed.  "You and me, dear Shellie.
 After school, we are going to study together at Davey's!"

	Shellie nodded and I felt just tons and tons better.

	That lasted until PE.

	The first thing was that I was called to Coach Wells' office.  I
was thinking it was about Saturday; instead the vice principal,
Mr. Two Crows, was there as well as Coach Wells.

	"Talk to me about Saturday night, Mr. Harper," Mr. Two Crows
told me.

	I explained the details.

	"And I understand that Nick Fesselhof was arrested in connection
with the shooting?" Coach Wells asked.

	"Yes, sir.  That's what Chief Ortega told me yesterday."

	"You play poker with the Chief of Police?  And Judge Warren?" 
That was Coach Wells asking.

	"Yes, sir.  They are friends of my father."

	"And you think it is proper for a fourteen-year-old to play
poker for money with those men?  And others?" Mr. Two Crows
asked.

	I laughed.  "I'll grant you, while I'm ahead, I'm not that much
ahead.  Miss Kimmel lost more than a hundred dollars to me."

	"I have been told that you and Nick Fesselhof had words Friday
night at the dance.  That there were blows," Mr. Two Crows told
me.

	I shook my head.  "We had words.  One blow, Fesselhof punched
me.  Then he turned around and walked away."

	"And you did nothing?" the vice principal asked.

	"No, I didn't do anything.  He didn't hurt me.  I didn't laugh
at him, but others did."

	"This is the second very serious attack on you," Mr. Two Crows
said.  I was looking at Coach Wells.  He didn't blink, so I
figured he had to know about the first attack.

	"The police and the Feds don't think they are related," I said
confidently.

	Something passed between the two men and then Mr. Two Crows
stood up.  "Harper, once was an accident.  I'll accept that twice
was coincidence.  Don't let there be a third time."  He walked
out of the coach's office.

	"I've given some thought about the things that were said between
us, Saturday," Coach Wells said.  "I've looked at the tapes of
the game.  I'm going to have you start working with Trace
Grundig, the other catcher.  Trace is a senior."

	"Yes, Coach."

	He smiled.  "Don't go getting a swelled head.  Tomorrow we will
have another scrimmage.  Just three innings.  One pitcher, each
inning.  You'll be up third.  Oh, the same arrangement as last
Tuesday... except for you.  You'll play with the upper classmen.
Will that be a problem for you?"

	I was going to say "No," but then I realized I'd be playing
against Mercedes.  I gulped.

	"No, sir."

	"Get out on the field.  Warm-ups, then batting practice.  You'll
be DH tomorrow as well as pitching third."

	It was nice.  I warmed up, and then went to the plate.  Josh was
catching, and someone I recognized but didn't know his name was
pitching.

	I made a mental note.  There were only two dozen people on the
team.  I knew a little more than half by name.  I was terrible
with names and faces.  I had to do better.

	The first pitch seemed to hang forever; waist-high, right over
the plate.

	I had a wood bat again and I pulped the horsehide.

	"Stay there, Harper, until I tell you to leave!" Coach Wells
called.

	The next pitch was a little lower, but a little faster.  I
mashed it too.

	Three more pitches.  The only one I didn't hit over the fence
was the last one, which, as near as I could tell, was aimed at my
head.

	That resulted in the pitcher going straight to the showers and
Josh being called to talk to Coach Wells and Coach Delgado.

	Another pitcher warmed up, and another catcher appeared.  He
held out his hand.  "Trace Grundig, oh master of Swat!"

	"Davey Harper."

	"Step aside, varlet, so I can get a few practice pitches in."

	I laughed and moved away from the plate.  Six pitches later and
I walked up to the plate.  From the bench, Coach Wells yelled,
"Bunt it, then head for first!"

	I grimaced as everyone started moving in.

	The first pitch was a knuckleball, down around my knees.  I let
it go and it was a called strike.

	The second pitch was up and out, a ball.  The next pitch was
low, another knuckler, I thought.

	I spoke, but quietly.  "If he's throwing what you're calling,
you and I are going to get along well."

	"You don't pay attention to what he's throwing, you're going to
screw up.  Don't you know you don't bunt on two strikes?"

	I smiled to myself.  A good try, I thought.  And sure enough, a
change-up, in a little, but waist high.  I pulled back a bit, hit
the bunt and headed for first.

	I remembered something from the rulebook; I couldn't touch the
ball.  I had to jump over it and I nearly stumbled.  I sensed
Trace behind me.  I had slowed down and I looked at first, where
Mercedes was ready, grinning at me.

	Dead meat.  That's what I was.  Dead meat.

	I continued running, now putting my feet down on the white line
that connected home plate and first.  I wasn't going to make it
easy for them.

	Still, I was maybe six steps away when Mercedes came off the
bag, caught the ball that had blurred past me on my left, and a
second later, she was back on the bag.

	I got my glove and headed out to right field.

	Jack came up to bat, then Chuck.  Both pulled hits to right, but
I caught them both.  I was told to hustle over to left field
while a new batter was coming up, so I did.

	Left field was more of a challenge.  The shadows made it harder
to see the ball.  I fielded the one that came my way, even if it
was a grounder.  I did what I knew I should, throwing to the
shortstop, acting as the cutoff.

	Then the period was over and we hit the showers.  Jack stood
next to me.

	"I was thinking," he told me.

	"Always a bad thing for a football player," Chuck said from a
few feet away.

	Jack ignored him.  "I never thought about telling a coach off. 
Or telling him he was wrong.  I kept looking in the mirror,
Saturday.  Yesterday.  I'm sorry about what I said the other day,
Davey.  I was wrong."

	"Perfection," Chuck added, "is getting it all right.  Even the
little things.  Jack might have been looking in the mirror, but I
was reading about Ebenezer Scrooge.  It was a practice game;
practice is about getting it right for when it counts.  I don't
want any ghosts coming after me later, telling me we let little
things slip past us because we were paying attention to the wrong
things.  You are maybe a little hard to take at times, Davey, but
the fact is, you try your damnedest.

	"You look at what's important," Jack told me.

	"Pammie!" Chuck said with feeling.

	Jack stared at him and Chuck laughed.  "Hey, Jack, we're
friends, right?  You got Wanda, now Pammie and I are getting to
know each other."

	Jack shook his head and turned back to me.  "I wish you'd come
out for football."

	Chuck laughed again.  "You have to know, that's Jack's highest
compliment."

	"I don't want to go out for football," I told them.

	Rob spoke up from a few feet away.  "Now, if only I had the
balls to tell them the same thing!"

	Jack looked at him.  "We need a backup quarterback.  You're
good."

	"And you're better," Rob told Jack.

	"The problem being," Chuck interjected, "that Jack is more of a
threat as a running and blocking back.  Suffer, young man!"

	Rob grimaced.  "I have no desire to suffer."

	"You will!"  About a dozen of the players, the guys on the
football team, chimed in with that.

	Rob rolled his eyes in mock despair.  But I had a sneaking
suspicion he wasn't all that unhappy.  I hoped he'd be careful. 
Of course, careful people don't play quarterback on Texas high
school football teams.

<1st attachment end>


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