The Shore Excursion from Hell.

It’s been a long time since I last owned a bathing suit. When I signed up online for the power snorkeling excursion in Cozumel, I knew I’d have to get one. The only problem is, it was now October, a time when the stores are putting out sweaters and jackets, not bathing suits. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to find one.

I’d worried for nothing. The clearance rack not only had bathing suits, they had them marked down from $30 to $2.99. Most of them were Smalls and Mediums, but I finally found one that was XL. My last pair of trunks had a drawstring that acted as a belt, but this one used Velcro.

I told my friend Fred, an avid snorkler, about the scheduled shore excursion. He said, "Bob, are you going to be able to see anything?" That's when I realized that I would be completely blind under water. My vision is so poor that I literally can’t see the big E at the top of the eye chart. The next day Fred brought in one of his masks and snorkels for me to borrow and after much experimenting we determined there was no way to put the mask on over my glasses.

However, I have an older pair of glasses at home. I removed the arms, leaving just the lenses and frames. I was able to insert them into the mask and voila! Prescription scuba mask! I was all set for power snorkeling.

I knew that I wouldn’t want to shop while I was still sopping wet from snorkeling. Neither did I want to lug the mask and snorkel around while I was walking from shop to shop. My plan was to finish the snorkeling and then return to the ship where I would shower and change, then return to the city to spend all my money. Since the snorkeling excursion was already paid for, there was no need to bring my wallet, which suited me, as I didn’t want it to get wet, but I also didn’t want to leave it unattended while I was underwater. All I needed was my boarding pass and picture I.D., both of which fit in the plastic underwater wallet that I wore around my neck.

We arrived at the snorkeling site and were given inflatable life jackets. We put them on, and were told how to inflate them should the need arise (find the nozzle and blow in it). Next we were given our swim fins. They asked me what size shoe I wore and I told them 10 ½. The guide rummaged through his box and found a pair of size nines. I tried to put them on but I just couldn’t force my feet in them. He looked through the remaining fins but couldn’t find a size ten. He did find a pair of size twelves, which were ridiculously large on me. Every time I took a step, I left the flipper behind me on the sand. It took some very careful goose-stepping to get from point A to point B with the fins still on my feet. I looked like a Nazi Duck.

I waddled to the water, then waded in where the rest of the group had already received their power packs. While power snorkeling, instead of swimming under your own power, you hold on to a large jetpack looking device that contains a propeller. There are two speeds on this thing. Hold down just the left lever for slow, hold down both levers for fast. Simple enough.

Everyone took off after the guide, who led us to the coral reef. I followed along, but five seconds later my fins fell off. I stopped to retrieve them and put them back on and took off after my comrades.

It was then that I discovered a problem with the mask that I never considered. You can’t get an airtight seal with facial hair. If I had shaved that morning the mask would’ve worked fine. As it was, water slowly, but steadily trickled into the mask. Every few minutes I had to poke my head out of the water, lift the mask away from my face, and let the water drain out.

I was in twenty feet of water when the fins fell off again. I tilted my head down to watch them sink to the bottom of the Gulf, which was pretty stupid since that placed my snorkel under the water. Soon I was coughing and sputtering, convinced I was going to drown. I reached for the nozzle on my life jacket, but since my water filled snorkel had been my only source of oxygen, instead of blowing air into the life jacket, I only spit water into it, which didn’t make it much of a flotation device.

I finally got the mask, snorkel and lungs cleared of sea water but my now my comrades were far ahead of me, their faces under water. I had to catch up to them quickly. Time to squeeze both levers for that “fast” speed.

I shot off like a bullet. Sadly, my swim suit stayed where it was. There were no flippers to trap it at my feet. The power units are great for going straight ahead, but they aren’t so hot when it comes to turning, so by the time I got back to where I’d lost the swim suit, it had already sunk to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

My first instinct was to cover my self with whatever I had in my hand.

My second instinct was to keep a fast moving propeller away from Mister Happy.

I abandoned my fellow snorkelers and headed back to shore. When I was in waist deep water I shouted up to the guide who stayed behind that I needed my towel. Whether it was due to the wind or the boom box blasting Salsa music next to him, he didn’t hear me. I shouted myself hoarse before giving up and marching my naked ass out of the water.

Once he saw me he couldn’t get the towel to me fast enough. I expected sympathy, compassion, maybe a bottle of Corona to settle my nerves. Instead he looked at me and demanded, “Where’s your feet?”

“They’re at the bottom of the damned ocean with my trunks!”

“Twenty dollars for the feet!”

I explained that I didn’t have my wallet with me and begged him to fetch the (pre-paid) cab to take me back to the ship.

“Twenty dollars for the feet! Twenty dollars!”

“Cab!”

“Twenty dollars!”

“Ship!”

“Twenty dollars!”

“No tengo dinero!”

“Policía! Policía!”

Uh oh.

The cop must have been waiting around the corner. That’s the only way I can explain how he showed up as quickly as he did. He and the guide conversed in Spanish while I tried my best to pick up a word here and there, but they were speaking too fast. Finally the cop turned to me and said, “Señor, please remove the towel.” Oh Lord, I’m going to be thrown into a Mexican jail. Naked.

“I’d rather not.”

“I’m afraid I must insist.”

I opened the towel just enough to give him a peek. He subtly reached behind him to the handcuffs tucked into his waistband. “Señor, this beach is not clothing optional!”

“Look at me! Do you see a bathing suit in my hand? Do I look like being naked is optional?” I told him how I’d lost my suit in his godless, communist waters.

“Very well, Señor, and what of the money you owe this man?”

“I no have-oh, my wallet-oh, dammit-oh!”

Just then, an old woman who had been watching the whole exchange from her Carnival Holiday Beach Towel spoke up. “I can lend you twenty bucks, sweetie. Just promise me that you won't take that towel off again. These old eyes have seen a lot, but I don’t think they could take another glimpse of that.”

I was too grateful to be offended. I gave the guide twenty dollars for the missing feet and he took me to the cab that took me back to the ship. As I boarded the ship one of the cabin stewards stood sentry in front of a large wheeled cart half full of damp and sandy towels. “I’ll take your towel, sir,” he said.

“Like hell you will,” I replied and beat a hasty retreat to my room.

Lies at lunch, trouble at dinner

I went on a cruise to Cozumel last week. It was my first cruise. I'd been looking forward to seeing the sunset from the Lido Deck but it rained every day we were at sea. So much for those stars at night, too. Still I managed to have fun.
Lunch and breakfast in the dining room was Open Seating. Since I had different dining companions I saw no reason to be boring ol’ Bob Byrd who works at AT&T. At breakfast the first day I introduced myself to my fellow diners as Dr. Byrd. I told one woman she really needed to “get that mole checked out right away. I don’t like the look of it.” Some doctor chasing bimbo asked me if there was a Mrs. Byrd. I said there was indeed, but she was ill and confined to the stateroom. Two days later this same woman was behind me in line at one of the many buffets. She asked me how my wife was feeling and I looked at her bewildered and said, “Wife? I’m traveling alone. I have no wife.” Then I commented to the person carving my meat that what with the rain and wind the night before, if anyone had slipped and fallen overboard she probably wouldn’t have been seen.
I may have been too convincing. I noticed some whispers and pointing from a few people after that, but since there had never been a Mrs. Byrd on board, there was never a formal homicide investigation.
By lunch the first day I'd already grown bored with medical degree so I introduced myself as Pastor Bobby. Naturally someone asked what church I was with. I should have had an answer prepared. Instead I answered without really thinking, "The Backwater Holy Word of God One True Church." Of course I insisted that we all say grace before eating. When the woman across from got the hiccups I pointed at her and shouted, "Out vile demon!" No one liked me, but all of them were too polite to let it show.
Dinner seating is assigned. Since I'd be sharing dinner with the same people every night I decided to behave and just be me. Behaving is in the eye of the beholder, though.

The duty free liquor shop had a free tasting just before dinner. There were a dozen kinds of rum, a couple of brands of tequila, some vodka, scotch, bourbon, and a few bottles, I wasn’t sure WHAT they were. The bartender beckoned me to a table where several little plastic shot glasses were lined up. He insisted I try one of each, and he was just too damn cute to refuse. The longer I stood there drinking free booze the longer I got to look at those brown eyes. Shameless. When it was time for dinner I was loaded.

I managed to find my way to the dining room and one of the waiters led me to table 139 where I met my dining mates: Tammy and Abigail, two friends from Georgia; Larry, traveling alone; Greg, also alone. Gerald, another solo cruiser; and Joe and Daphne, a couple, though not married.

Daphne sat directly across from me. Her boyfriend was forty-five or fifty but Daphne was maybe twenty-three. She wore a very low cut dress that she was falling out of. Her boobs were as fake as her blond hair, though better done. Her black roots were showing on her head. She wore blue eye shadow, false eyelashes, and ruby red lipstick. Every time I looked up from my soup I was confronted with those rigid boobs and that Tammy Faye makeup job.

Joe was on her left, and to her right was Larry, an older black gentleman. After the appetizers arrived Larry started telling some VERY raunchy jokes. They weren’t funny but they sure were vulgar. Every time he used another taboo word Daphne grimaced and put her hands over her ears. By then the booze had really kicked in. I wasn’t certain if she had three fake boobs or only two. After Larry’s third crude joke, and several more grimaces from Daphne I said, “Larry, turn it back a notch, dude. You’re offending the hooker!”

Dead silence.  A silence broken by our waiter who said, "In vino veritas est."

For some reason, Daphne didn’t make it to any more meals in the dining room, though Joe still showed up, and never showed any rancor towards me. I'm still not sure why he didn't beat me up.

The Ferris Wheel

Growing up, I was afraid of only two things: heights and John Mauro. I'm still afraid of heights, but I can't say if I'd still be afraid of John. He died the year we started high school. John and I were in the same class at Dwight Eisenhower Middle School. We even had the same birthday, except John was born in 1961 and I was born in '63. He was held back in the second grade and again in the fifth. John was the only student at Dwight Eisenhower who shaved, even if it was only once a month.

It was easy to tease John about failing two grades, but few people ever made fun of him more than once. Mark Creever made the mistake one time of calling John a retard. He still has the scar where his split lip failed to heal properly.

Mom said that bullies act the way they do to hide their own insecurities but that's not why John was a bully. I don't think he had any choice; he became a bully out of self defense. Mark wasn't the first person to call him a retard.

I could avoid heights, but John and I were not only in the same class, his family lived next door to mine. I don't want there to be any misunderstanding—I wasn't afraid of being beaten up by John. True, he was bigger than the rest of us, and stronger, too, but I had a power that left him literally struck dumb.

I discovered this talent quite by accident the summer between 7^th and 8th grades. In 1975 the housing developments and shopping malls in Fort Lauderdale hadn't crept as far west as they have today. If we wanted to see the Everglades we didn't have to drive an hour, all we had to do was walk a half mile past Dwight Eisenhower.

It was either very brave of me or very stupid of me to be at the edge of the River of Grass that humid Monday morning in July. Only two weeks before, in this very spot, Me and Jimmy and Ellen Gillespie and the Creever twins were playing Hide n' Seek with Shep, Jimmy and Ellen's German Shepherd. Shep was the smartest dog I've ever seen. He would crouch under a bush, place his paws over his eyes and one of us counted out loud to ten while all of us, even the counter, hid.

As soon as Shep heard "TEN!" he would bound out from under his bush and no matter how well, how high, or how deeply we'd hidden, he would find us in less time than it takes to tell.

That Fourth of July weekend when Ellen yelled, "TEN!" Shep didn't come galloping out. Instead we heard a horrible Yelp and a whine. We ran over to Shep's bush. I was closest and got there first, so I was the only one to see the alligator pulling him under the murky water.

And two weeks later, here I was, not 10 yards from where it happened. I had my sister's jacks with me, and a plastic canteen filled with Cap'n Crunch Peanut Butter Cereal. I was sitting on a large, square shaped flat rock playing Jacks. I'd never been able to get past "fours-ies" and was determined to do it. I failed for perhaps the tenth time and was starting over at ones-ies when I saw the snake.

God knows how long it had been there, sharing the rock with me, and He also knows how I was able to miss seeing it—it was only six inches from me, the unmistakable ugly brown-black skin of a cottonmouth. It was an adolescent, maybe two feet long. I supposed it had been following the motion of my hand going up and down, snatching at jacks. It gazed at my left fist, suspended in air, clutching a jack. The snake stared at my hand while I stared at the snake and tried not to blink, tried not to breathe, tried not to move my left arm. Without any conscious effort on my part, I found myself squeezing the jack harder and harder. The points of the jack pierced the flesh of my palm, and still I squeezed until a drop of blood escaped my clenched fist and, in slow motion (or so it seemed to me), gave up its tenuous hold on my fist and dropped onto the rock, its progress tracked by the empty eyes of the snake.

I didn't do it on purpose. I didn't mean to do it at all, it was a reflex. While the snake stared transfixed at the falling drop of blood, my right hand darted out and grabbed him behind his head.

During the next three months I caught untold number of snakes: cottonmouths, copperheads, coral snakes, water moccasins, even a rattle snake once. I made money at it, too. The new multiplex Gateway Cinema and the AMC 6 at the Lakes Mall both offered six screens. The Reef Theater, with its one screen, never had a chance. It had closed down last year and re-opened as a porno theater, which also closed down after Thanksgiving and was taken over by the Foot-washing Holiness Pentecostal Church the next Sunday. A handful of trench-coated dirty old men were unaware of the transition and showed up that Wednesday night expecting to see Nurses Night Out and instead were treated to the foot washing, and snake handling of migrant workers caught up in the spirit.

The Pentecostals paid me one dollar per snake which kept me in pocket money all through my twelfth summer. If my mother knew I was even talking to "those migrants" she'd tan my hide, never mind what she'd do if she knew I was catching venomous snakes, so I had to keep my job a secret. I'd squeezed so many jacks that summer that the sore in my palm never had a chance to heal. I kept cotton gauze wrapped around my hand which was usually sufficient to hide the evidence of my part time job. I told my family it was a fashion statement, like wearing just one glove, or mismatched socks. They believed me until one night at supper Mom noticed a red tinge on the gauze. She ordered me to remove the bandage and when she saw the wound in my palm, she realized immediately what it meant: stigmata. Clearly God was sending us a sign to convert to Catholicism. Mom held both my hands, palms upward, and her eyes darted from one to the other. Since only one hand bore the mark of Christ, God must be telling us to only be half Catholic. Thus the whole family became Episcopalians, despite the protestations of Reverend Eugene. Dad was grateful for the change; Baptists aren't allowed to cuss, but as an Episcopalian he could not only say damn and shit but he could also drink beer. Not in the garage like all the other men at 13^th Street Baptist did, but right out in the open.

One Saturday in April shortly after my thirteenth birthday, I was out in the 'glades, looking for snakes and I ran into John Mauro and Pete Driskell, who were bass fishing. Pete was in the tenth grade. He ignored me but John demanded to know what I was doing there in "his" fishing spot.

If I'd had any sense at all, I would have shrugged and went about my business, but I never seemed to have sense around John; that's one of the things about him that scared me so. I glanced quickly at Pete and then smiled shyly at John and said, "do you wanna see something?" and waded into the water. After a moment's hesitation, John followed me.

I walked over to the knee-like roots of a mangrove where a copperhead was sunning itself. "Hey!" John shouted in warning. I turned my head toward him and put my finger to my lips. He took two slow backward steps and then paused, waiting to see what would happen next. I reached into my left pocket and grabbed the jack, which felt cool in my hand. It would get warmer when I started squeezing it. I approached the copperhead who flicked its tongue and looked at my raised fist with suspicion. We must have made an interesting tableau, John, me, and the snake, all motionless, while I squeezed the jack. Four minutes later I held up the snake for John to see, a triumphant smile on my face.

He looked at the snake with fear and revulsion, and then transferred the look to me. "Freak," he spat and walked back to Pete.

Looking back I realize how lucky I was. I know now that the jack had nothing to do with it, and neither did the blood. But when you're a kid you're more willing to believe in magic, even magic that you make up. I wouldn't try to catch a snake now on a bet. But when you're thirteen, you not only believe in magic, you're immortal.

It's funny that John, who shamed me into giving up snake catching, would also convince me to do it one more time. But that would come later. No amount of pocket money was worth having John think I was freak. For all practical purposes, my snake catching career was over.

Snakes didn't scare me, but heights did. And John Mauro did. I wasn't afraid of what he would do to me, but of what I would do around him. I was afraid of what I felt when I saw him. I was afraid I would inadvertently say something. I was afraid he would catch me looking at him. Or that someone else would catch me looking at him. What if he realized the power he had over me and decided to use it? If John told me to empty the Atlantic Ocean with a teaspoon I would have found a way to do it.

The Creever twins were scared of John because no one else had muscles as big as his. I was scared of John because no one else had eyes as brown as his. They crinkled when he smiled, which was surprisingly often. John had a freckle on the back of his left ear lobe. I couldn't tell you if Jimmy Gillespie or Mark and Clark Creever even had ears. John Mauro had a freckle on the back of his.

And P. E. with John? What sadistic bastard ever came up with the idea of gym showers? Desperately wanting to sneak a peek, but not daring to, lest my own body give me away. The last week of school I was sitting on a locker room bench, tying my shoes when John came out of the shower. His locker was in a different row, but he'd left his key at home that day, so he was using the empty locker two down from me. I sat on the bench while he stood in front of me, the thin towel that smelled of too much bleach wrapped around his waist. Since I was sitting and he was standing, the towel and the mysteries it concealed were right in front of me. I stared at "Property of Dwight Eisenhower M.S." in faded print mere inches from my nose. He removed the towel and was running it roughly over his hair while I stared transfixed, much the way the snakes used to stare at my fist, and I forced myself to think of my ugly great aunt Ethel….and Ethel Merman….and Ethel Mertz…

Just as the snakes, hypnotized by my fist, ignored the hand that was the real threat, I was too hypnotized by what I saw to notice that John was now glaring at me.

"What are you looking at you fairy?"

"Nothing!" I finished tying my shoes and joined the queue at the exit waiting for the bell to ring. I'd been caught looking, but the various Ethels had prevented any damning bulges from giving away the lie contained in my denial. Nothing? I was looking at everything! Searing it into my mind, where it could be recalled later in the privacy of my bedroom.

I managed to get through the next week without being noticed by John, and was grateful for his indifference. Then we were free for the summer and I wouldn't have to worry about it until September. Outside of school we had little in common and if we hadn't been next door neighbors probably wouldn't have seen each other again until we started high school in the fall.

But the fact is, we were neighbors. Thus I had several opportunities during the summer to restock the shelf in my brain where I'd placed the image of John in the locker room: John playing basketball in his driveway. John, shirtless and dripping sweat, mowing the lawn. John flirting with Ellen Gillespie, and helping her teach Shep Junior to play Hide n' Seek.

I still believed in the magic jacks even though I didn't use them any more. But I was learning that there was no magic that would make me stop thinking about John Mauro when I was alone in my room. Neither the God the Baptists prayed to, nor the one the Episcopalians prayed to would allow me to have those thoughts about girls, instead.

Mark Creever called midway through the summer. "Hey! Have you been by the old Grants shopping center? There's a carnival! We saw 'em setting it up in the parking lot today!" In 1976 Disney World had only been open 5 years, and none of us had ever been there. Traveling carnivals were as close as we were likely to get to an amusement park. Mark, Clark, Jimmy and I made plans to go to the carnival Friday after supper. It had been several months since I'd made any money selling snakes to the Pentecostals, but Mom paid me ten dollars for cleaning the garage and waxing the car. I still had part of my allowance left, which gave me thirteen dollars and seventy-four cents to spend at the carnival.

Mark and Clark met me at my house just after dark and we rode our bikes to the Grants shopping center. Jimmy met us there and for an hour we walked up and down what passed for a midway. The four of us rode the tilt-a-whirl and the Scorpion, and went through the haunted house and the fun house where Clark got lost in the hall of mirrors.

My friends all went on the Jumbo Slide, a huge multi-laned slide where you sat on a burlap sack and let gravity take you over the bumps and hills on the way to the pavement. I bought a ticket and climbed up the first 20 steps before my acrophobia kicked in. I apologized to the people below me as I fought my way against the tide, salmon like, on my way back to the safety of the parking lot.

Jimmy and Mark and Clark went on the Ferris wheel, the Flying Pirate Ship and other rides deemed too high for me. I watched them from the ground and felt jealous, but not jealous enough to buy a ticket for that swinging pirate ship!

We spent half our money on rigged carnival games. Although Jimmy did win a deformed 7-Up bottle, stretched and twisted until it was three feet tall. It served no useful purpose whatsoever, but man did I want one! I wasted four dollars trying to win one before I gave up.

We lightened our pockets at the corndog vendor, the cotton candy vendor, the funnel cake booth, and the candied apple vendor. We leaned against the fence surrounding the bumper cars, eating our cotton candy. Jimmy said to me, "Did you see who was working the Ferris wheel? Pete Driskel."

"No way!"

"Yup. If you're seventeen they'll hire you to run a ride." I looked at the guy operating the Bumper Cars and sure enough, it was Joe Hogan. I used to go to church with him when we were still Baptists. Jimmy said, "John Mauro was with him, but he can't work the ride. Too young."

John? Here?

Mark wanted to go on the Tilt-a-Whirl again, but the Creevers and Jimmy had gone on more rides than me, and their money was gone. We agreed that it had been worth it and collected our bikes. Mark, Clark and Jimmy took off for home but I told them I was going to try one more time to win me a 7-Up bottle.

When they rounded the corner at Sawgrass Road I strolled as nonchalantly as I could toward the Ferris wheel. Sure enough, Pete was working the switch while John kept him company. On my third pass John saw me. "Hey! Bobby! C'mere!" He leaned in to Pete and said something I couldn't here and they both laughed. I stayed where I was.

"What do you want?" I asked.

He jerked his head toward the wheel, covered in thousands of blinking yellow and green lights. "Want a free ride?" he asked.

"No thanks."

"C'mon. It's not that high." John was no doubt remembering the time we had to climb the ropes in gym class. I was good for six feet and then shimmied down, trembling the whole way. He was smiling at me now, the blinking yellow and green lights changing the shadows on his face. The green lights seemed to accentuate the way his eyes crinkled when he smiled. I found myself reaching for a teaspoon to start draining the ocean. "I dunno," I said.

Then he sealed my fate. "I'll go with you."

"You will?" My voice squeaked and I cringed with embarrassment.

"Sure. C'mon." Pete pulled the lever and the ride came to a halt. A boy and girl got out of the bottom-most car and John got in and slid over, making room for me.

Why did he want to go on the ride with me? I looked up at the cars dangling and swaying above us but I couldn't see the occupants. The cars are pretty private. Does he want me alone? Does he want to tell me something secret? Does he want to. . . do something secret?

John was still waiting in the car for me to join him. In a daze, I walked over to the car and got in and he lowered the safety bar. With a jerk the car took off, backwards from my perspective. I grabbed the safety bar with both hands and closed my eyes.

I could tell when we crested the top and then started the descent. Even though it was July I could feel a breeze against my face. John nudged my shoulder. "Wow did you see that? You can see the whole city from up there!"

"Yeah," I said, still keeping my eyes closed. I could handle this as long as I didn't look. The problem was, with my eyes closed I couldn't look at John. Was he looking at me when he nudged my shoulder? Was he going to nudge it again?

We started our second ascent. We rounded the top again. Suddenly, and I do mean suddenly, as in not gradually or smoothly, the Ferris wheel came to a halt, stranding us at the top. I squeezed the safety bar harder than I'd ever squeezed a jack and tried to control my breathing.

"Look," John whispered and put his hand on top of mine on the safety bar and I opened my eyes.

Lights.

So many lights. Headlights on Sawgrass Road and Broward Boulevard. Street lamps. The lights on the midway. Lights shining through windows on houses half a mile away. I had seen enough and was closing my eyes again when John grabbed my other hand. He now held both my hands in his.

He took a firmer hold of my wrists and wrenched my hands off of the safety bar. I was holding on so tightly that when he pulled them away the rusty bar felt like sandpaper against my hands. I yelled and tried to get my hands back but John was just too strong.

Still holding my hands he began rocking the car, slowly at first but then he got some momentum going. And still he wouldn't let go of my wrists. The car swayed almost to the horizontal and I was looking up at the moon. Then the car swung the other way and I was looking down through the lattice work of the Ferris wheel where Pete was just a tiny figure looking up and laughing. With each swing of the car, the lights, oh so many lights danced and whirled in front of me as if I was in a cave full of fireflies.

I no longer had any breath for screaming. I was vaguely aware of being afraid I was going to wet my pants, or else throw up all the midway food I'd eaten in the last hour. And still the car swung back and forth, back and forth, the sound of metal rubbing against metal sounded like the whole damn ride was falling apart. On the fifth forward swing I started to slide toward the front of the car. I realized with horror that there was more than enough room for me to slide under the safety rail and out of the car.

Samson had his hair. Popeye had his spinach. Terror gave me my strength. I tore my hands free of John's grasp, but reaching for the safety bar meant reaching toward the gap I was sliding toward. Instead in a panic I wrapped my arms around John's waist, holding on as hard as I could, terrified I was going to fall to my death!

Now he was the one yelling. "Get off me, you faggot!" And he shoved me away from him. At least he forgot about rocking the car. I scooted as far away from him as I could and held onto the arm rest on the right side of the car.

There is a kind of dignity in quietly weeping. People weep at sad movies and at the loss of a beloved pet. There was nothing dignified in what I did. I wasn't weeping, I was sobbing. Great howling sobs that were ripped from my soul. I wasn't crying because of the altitude, but because of John's attitude.

Mom and I were both wrong. John wasn't a bully because he was insecure. He wasn't a bully because he had no choice. He was a bully because he was cruel. He took delight in torturing others. He got a thrill in finding someone's weakness and exploiting it. He didn't exploit my fear of heights. He knew the only way to get me on that ride was to exploit my feelings for him. He took my innocent, confused, frightened crush and used it to torment me for his own amusement.

I don't know how long we were stuck up there. Long enough for my sobs to subside until they were nothing but hiccups. Someone below us yelled at Pete to start the wheel going and with a jerk we started our descent. Pete stopped the ride again when our car was at the bottom and I lifted the bar and got out without speaking. I used my sleeve to wipe the snot and tears off my face and found my bike and pedaled down Sawgrass Road toward home.

During the summer I usually didn't get up until after 9 but the next morning it was nearly noon before I stumbled downstairs. I fixed me a bowl of Cocoa Puffs and sat down at the kitchen table to eat. There was nothing left in the bowl but brown milk when the backdoor opened and Mom walked in. She held a dishtowel in her hands and was twisting and untwisting it.

She saw me at the table and stopped twisting the towel. "I was at the Mauro's," she said. "John's dead. He didn't come to breakfast so Julie went to wake him up and he was dead. And do you know what killed him?"

I didn't trust myself to speak, so I shook my head, being careful to keep my hands in my lap, under the table cloth so Mom couldn't see the white cotton gauze wrapped around my left palm.

The Sidewalk

I grew up in a little town called Refuge, Florida, so named by the New Englanders who founded it after escaping the Great Blizzard of 1956. Refuge really was a small town. It had one library, one grocery store, three policemen, one Catholic church, one Methodist church, and two Baptist churches which were across the street from each other. On one side of the street was the First Avenue Baptist Church and on the other side was The Real First Avenue Baptist Church.

Not only did we belonged to the Catholic Church, I also attended St. Aloysius Catholic School. My best friend, as well as my nemesis at St. Aloysius, was Jeff Leval. We had enjoyed a friendly rivalry since we were first paired off in first grade and it only intensified over the years.

When we were in the fourth grade our teacher was Sister Bernadette, who was one of the new, modern nuns. Instead of wearing the traditional floor length habit, hers went only as far as her knees. I doubt the Vatican approved of how snugly it fitted. Her wimple was designed so that you could actually see some of her hair. She was also a babe. She used to teach the older classes, but the students at St Aloysius attended mandatory weekly confessions and Father Daniel got tired of hearing her name come up repeatedly in relation to the sin of self abuse so she was transferred to the elementary grades.

The competition between Jeff and me was strongest in Sister Bernadette's class. She drilled us in our multiplication tables by selecting two students, then whipping out a flashcard. Whichever student gave the correct answer first received a piece of candy. Whenever she called my name I prayed that she would pair me with Jeff. Beating Mark or Maria or Jenny gave me no satisfaction. And when Jeff and I were paired together, there was no need to tempt us with candy. The thrill of shouting out the answer a millisecond before he did was all the incentive I needed. This competition was not one-sided; he felt the same way. It's hard to say who was ahead—we were pretty evenly matched and I lost as often as I won.

Our rivalry wasn't limited to academics. Nothing was too insignificant to make into a contest. If I stumbled over the broken sidewalk in front of the flagpole at school, He "accidentally" fell down the stairs on the way to recess. If he got sick all over the 8^th grader in front of us at chapel on Wednesday, I drank an entire bottle of Ipecac and vomited all over Sister Mary Margaret at Mass on Sunday.

We always walked to the bus stop together. One frosty Friday morning as we passed a car badly in need of a wash, Jeff stopped to retie his shoes. While I waited, I wrote "Bobby" in the dust on the trunk of the car. Jeff finished tying his shoe and admired my work with a gleam in his eye. Another contest began and the next move was his.

Monday morning after the bus unloaded us at school and we passed the flagpole Jeff said with feigned surprise, "Hey, they fixed the sidewalk!" I looked down and my world nearly ended. There at the base of the flagpole was a fresh square of sidewalk. Workers must have poured the cement last Friday for it was already dried. It was too late to smooth over the writing that had been gouged into the cement when it was still wet: Jay, Eee, Eff, Eff. He hadn't been satisfied with just his name; he'd also left imprints of each of his hands. Jeff had turned St. Aloysius into Graumann's Chinese Theater.

I tore my eyes from the sidewalk only when I felt something tapping my shoulder. I looked up and Jeff was smiling triumphantly, tapping me with a ten inch stick, the end of which was covered in dried cement. I couldn't even pretend another Jeff had signed the sidewalk, not when he stood there jabbing me with his "pencil." He tossed the stick onto the grass and strolled into the school, whistling a cheery tune.

I hadn't merely been topped; I'd been trounced! All day I plotted and schemed, coming up with new ideas only to discard them immediately. Not big enough. Not unique enough. Not impressive enough. So intent was I on regaining the upper hand, I completely zoned out in Religious Studies until Brother Dominic rapped my knuckles with undisguised relish and told me there was a special level of hell reserved for little boys who didn't pay attention in class.

The next day when Jeff and I passed Miss Millicent's house on the way to the bus stop, I paused dramatically in front of her oak tree. "What do you think of that?" I asked. Jeff looked at the word "Bobby" carved into the trunk of the tree and smirked and continued walking. I trailed behind him embarrassed at my feeble attempt. We both knew it didn't come close.

I suppose in time I would have gotten over it, but every day we passed that damned sidewalk and when we did I swear Jeff's step got a little jauntier, his lips curled up just enough to suggest the hint of a smile. By the time Saturday rolled around I was desperate.

I waited until dark and then went to the garage for my bike and a can of red spray paint leftover from a long forgotten do it yourself project. It took nearly an hour to get to St. A's on my bike and when I finally arrived, I had to stop and catch my breath.

I raised the can of spray paint and was just about to press the button when headlights illuminated me from behind. I whirled around and there was Lester McAllister, the night shift cop, slowly driving up to me. Actually it was Mrs. McAllister driving up to me, on account of Lester had epilepsy and couldn't get a driver's license, so his wife had to drive the squad car. It was a pretty good arrangement as long as Mrs. McAllister didn't turn on the lights and siren. The red light, flashing on and off, reflected in the hood of the police car, inevitably caused Lester to have a seizure. When this happened, Mrs. McAllister was supposed to detour to the emergency room, but she hated to abandon the chase and more often than not, shot first and asked questions later. The only reason she was able to shoot at all, was because she carried his service revolver since Lester, being epileptic and all, couldn't qualify for a gun permit.

Anyway, Lester peered at me through the open window on the passenger side of the squad car and said, "Hey! Ain't you that Byrd Boy?" He chuckled to himself and added, "You heard of the Bird Man of Alcatraz? I reckon yer the Byrd Boy of St. Aloysius, ceptin this is a school and not a prison. Course, if any paint should happen to appear on this here edifice, well then you just might be the Byrd Boy of Alcatraz. Do we understand each other?"

He held out his hand and I gave him the can of spray paint and he told me to "git" so I got. It took twice as long to get home as it did to get to the school, but it's hard to pedal with the weight of defeat on your back.

Just when you think things can't get any worse, they do. Monday Jeff and I walked into Math class as usual and took our seats at the back of the room. It wasn't until the late bell rang that we realized Sister Bernadette wasn't there. A few seconds later the classroom door opened and Sister Mary Margaret, whom I had last seen when I threw up on her in church, strode in and announced that she would be our substitute for the day. I prayed that she wouldn't recognize me, but when she called roll and I announced that I was present she said, "Ah, Robert. I trust your stomach has settled?"

She instructed us to open our books and then marched to the blackboard. Sister Mary Margaret never walked. She always strode, or marched or tromped. She would have made an interesting ballerina.

While she drew on the board Jeff leaned over and whispered to me that Sister looked like a brick shit house. I'd seen pictures of outhouses, which is what I supposed a shit house was, and never saw any made of brick. But I was ten years old and Jeff had said a dirty word, so I laughed at his razor sharp wit. Sister Mary Margaret turned from the board and shot us a dirty look, then went back to writing fractions.

I still don't know what a brick shithouse looks like, but if it resembles Sister Mary Margaret I feel sorry for it. She was very tall for a woman, nearly six feet. She wasn't fat, really, just big. Where Sister Bernadette was shaped like an hour glass, Sister Mary Margaret was shaped like Big Ben. Except for her bust. She had the largest chest I've ever seen. She could nurse Rhode Island with those things.

Like all nuns, she had a sixth sense for when someone was misbehaving, or about to. She stood at the blackboard writing and talking. "Three fourths over two thirds multiplied by the square root of one half—" suddenly she turned toward the class. "Edward Pearson if you even think of using that spit ball I shall break eight of your fingers." She went back to the board. "Now that you've mastered simple fractions I expect you'll have no trouble with these—" another glance at the class, this time directed at Jeff and me. "If you two don't be quiet I shall send you to Father Daniel!"

Every time she turned to face us, her massive bosom rubbed against the black board, smearing the chalk. She was oblivious to the big blur in the middle of the lengthy equation she was writing, and just kept going. I felt sorry for whoever she called on to solve THAT problem.

"Robert. Front and center, please." I looked up in horror.

"Me?"

"Yes. Don't dawdle. Come up and solve this problem."

There was no way I could tell her that her boobs had erased the middle third of the equation. I decided to go to the board, stare blankly for a few seconds, and take my F like a man. As I walked to the front of the class I heard the stifled giggles of my classmates.

I squinted at the white blur and thought I recognized a four. After a minute Sister Mary Margaret said impatiently, "Well?"

I turned to her, fully intending to say "I'm sorry Sister, I can't do it" but the words never left my mouth. She stood there imposingly, all five feet eleven inches of her and I found myself staring at her chalk dust covered breasts.

I turned my head to the right and looked at the smeared blackboard.

I turned my head to the left and looked at Jeff.

I turned my head forward and stared once more at that massive bosom. I handed the chalk back to Sister Mary Margaret. "Is there a problem, Robert?"

I didn't answer. I raised my finger and traced a capital B in the dust on her habit. I heard her sharp intake of breath but kept my eyes on my palette. Next to the B I wrote o, b, b, and y, and then looked at Jeff who was staring at me in disbelief. When I turned my attention back to my graffiti I noticed that the chalk dust had not been evenly distributed. Thus my first lowercase b was missing the "stem" and looked like another o. Instead of writing Bobby, I had written "booby." On her booby.

When I was done I took a step back. Sister Mary Margaret tilted her head down and stared at my handiwork a good thirty seconds. Then she reached out and grabbed me by the necktie that was part of the school uniform and pulled me toward her. Her left hand kept a vise like grip on the tie, leaving me gasping for air, while her right hand, which still held the chalk, reached out. I winced as she wrote furiously on my forehead. She must have been writing very small because she wrote a lot more on me than I had written on her. Finally she released me and said, "You are to go to Father Daniel's office and you are not to return until the writing on your forehead is as accurate as the writing on my . . . booby."

"What's written on my forehead?" I managed to ask.

She leaned over until her eyes were even with mine. "Beaten to death," she quoted.

As I walked to the door at the back of the room I knew that whatever punishment Father Daniel meted out was nothing compared to what would be waiting for me at home. No matter. I caught Jeff's eye and the silent message between us was clear. We both knew he was never going to top that!

Frat Boys, Rock Stars, and Me

My job sometimes takes me to Alpharetta, Georgia. Usually I stay at the Ameri-suites Hotel, which is very close to the Alpharetta office. I have an idea how Joseph felt in Bethlehem; the last time I tried to get a room at Ameri-suites I was told there was no room at the inn. A co-worker recommended Double Tree, because they give out fresh baked chocolate chip cookies when you check in.

That night when I returned to the room after a long day of testing, I decided to treat myself to room service, something I'd never done before. I ordered a steak dinner and half an hour later there was a knock at the door. I opened it and Room Service carried in a tray and placed it on the desk. Before eating, I changed out of my work clothes. I opened my suitcase to put on my Harry Potter pajamas, only to discover I'd forgotten to pack them. No matter; there was no reason why I couldn't just lounge around in my underwear.

I ate at the desk, and then watched TV for a while. I'd decided to call it a night when I remembered the tray. In the movies, hotel patrons always leave their room service tray in the hallway. If it's good enough for Hollywood, it's good enough for me. Since I was still wearing nothing but my Fruit of the Looms, before opening the door to put the tray in the hall, I looked through the peephole to make sure the coast was clear.

It was a challenge opening the door while I was holding the tray, but I managed. Just as I set the tray down, I realized: The Key! I heard the click of the latch as the door closed behind me.

Thank goodness for potted palm trees in hotel hallways. I took refuge behind such a tree, running out every few seconds to knock on the door of room 212. When whoever was in room 212 opened the door, I didn't want them to see me in my current state, so after knocking, I ran back to the safety of the palm tree, where I planned to ask the occupant of 212 to call the front desk and send someone up with a key to 214. I heard the television in 212 but no one answered the door, no matter how many times I ran up to it and knocked. I was ready to try my luck with room 210 when the elevators opened and a tough looking fellow in a blue uniform came rushing out at me. "You!" he shouted. "I've got you now!" It seems the folks in 212 had looked thru the peephole when I knocked and saw no one there, since I had taken refuge again behind the tree. They assumed some kids were engaging in hi-jinks so they called to complain, whereupon the front desk folks took a peek at the security monitor. I hadn't noticed the little black balls in the ceiling that concealed the cameras.

I explained to Hotel Security that I was not the Alpharetta Strangler, but had merely locked myself out of my room. The tray in the hallway gave credence to my story, at least enough so that he used his pass key to open the door, though he did follow me in to take a look at my I.D., which seemed superfluous since he'd already seen much more of me of me than my drivers license picture shows.

When I checked out the next morning, I was grateful to see that the day shift was already on duty. I wouldn't have to face the person who received the complaint from room 212. While the front desk clerk entered information into her computer I noticed a piece of paper with a large red circle with a slash running through it. Behind the slash were the Greek letters Delta Sigma Pi. I asked the clerk about the sign and she explained that three years ago, a fraternity rented a room for the night. Within an hour there were eighty people and ten kegs of beer in the room. The police had to be called and now the Deltas are no longer permitted in the hotel.

I noticed a similar paper, except this time instead of the red slash covering Greek letters, it covered a photograph of the Rolling Stones. "Are they banned, too?" I asked. The clerk nodded as she continued to type. "They were worse than the frat boys. Just as drunk, but with underage girls in the room. They won't be staying here again, that's for sure."

When she handed me my receipt, I saw the third "wanted poster". Behind the familiar red circle and slash was a black and white photograph of a fat, bald man, wearing nothing but underwear, crouching behind a potted palm tree.

I'm going to miss those chocolate chip cookies.