Chapter 4

ROMAN

Roman Dixon stood out on the lawn in front of the white frame bungalow with green shutters where he lived with his parents. At six-feet-one, Roman was four inches taller than Howard, his father, who stood next to him. The family resemblance was there in the strong jaw, but Roman's hair was thick and blond where Howard's was black as coal dust. Roman had the lithe body of an athlete; Howard was still solid but had too much belly. The father's eyes were squinted and faintly bloodshot; the son's were a clear gray that gave him the look of being more intelligent than he really was.

Roman shifted nervously from foot to foot while he tried to hold on to the attentive expression he assumed when his father launched into a lecture. Roman was anxious to knock off the chatter, get into his candy-apple Chevy, and get downtown where things were happening. He wanted to pop in an 8-track cartridge, roll down the windows, and give everybody an earful of his new sound system. It had cost almost a thousand dollars, even putting it in himself, but it would be the best and loudest in town, and that made it easily worth the money. He was fairly itching to get started, but he knew the old man had to get in his say, so he held his impatience in check.

"You're not going to be doing any drinkin', are you Romey?"

"Hey, no way, Pop."

"Look, I know you put away a few beers last summer while you were working down in Madison."

"Just a couple of times," Roman said. "After work with the guys."

"Sure, I know that. And I'm nobody to be saying you should be a temperance freak or anything like that, but that was different. It's football season now. You're supposed to be in training, and the scouts are watching you. I mean, I know for a fact that both Illinois and Ohio State and at least one from the west coast are in town right now. Those guys watch both how you play on the field and what you do off it."

"Don't worry, Pop. I don't mess with anything during the season."

"I'm just thinking about you, Romey, you know that. You got a chance to do something with your life. Play some football, go to college, get an education. If I'd gone to college when I got out of the Navy I'd be something besides a friggin' factory hand now."

"Pop, you're a foreman. You got factory hands working for you."

"I still carry a lunch pail, son. I don't want to see you do that. Not ever."

"Don't worry, Pop." Roman stole a glance at his watch. Everybody would be cruising Main Street by now. Lindy Grant would be waiting for him. He remembered that he'd also promised to pick up Alec McDowell. Sometimes Alec could be a pain in the ass, the way he was always sucking up, but he was smart, and he came up with some fun ideas.

Roman would have liked to tell the old man to bag the lecture, but he knew better. Howard Dixon could still deliver a powerful punch if you got him pissed. Especially when he was drunk.

Happily, today the old man was sober, but when he got in one of his buddy-buddy moods he was almost as hard to take. Roman was relieved to see his mother come out of the house and walk toward them.

Fran Dixon was a plump woman with tired eyes who still carried traces of the pretty girl she had been. She said, "Howard are you going to keep the boy standing here all day? He wants to be off with his friends."

Roman grinned gratefully at her over his father's shoulder.

"Just havin' a little man talk," Howard said. He clapped his son on the shoulder. "Go ahead, Romey. Have a good time. Give the girls something to talk about."

"I guess I don't have to expect you home for dinner," his mother said.

"I'll get something downtown."

Howard frowned as though he wanted to say something more. He finally settled for, "Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

"That gives me plenty of room," Roman said in the ritual answer.

His father gave him a playful shove toward the car while his mother looked properly vexed.

Roman climbed gratefully into the Chevy, revved the sweet-running engine, and eased up on the gas, loving the baritone burble of the twin pipes. He took off, careful this time not to burn rubber, and waved back at his parents, who stood in the front yard watching him.

As soon as he was around the corner Roman popped in a Beach Boys cartridge and turned the volume up. He rolled down the window and let the mellow harmonies escape, even though the sounds were wasted in Grover's Meadows, the small tract where the Dixon family lived.

The Meadow, as it was now commonly called, had been named for himself by the developer who had built the tract homes there in the early 1950s. Fifteen years later some of the houses were beginning to show signs of age, but most, like the Dixons', were neatly kept up.

The Meadow was home to many of Wolf River's smaller merchants and the higher-salaried workers at Allis Chalmers and the glove factory. Although it was several cuts below Elm Street and the Hill, it was a respectable place to live, and Howard Dixon had worked hard to make a home there for his wife and son.

ALEC

At the very edge of the tract, in a house a little smaller and not quite as neat as the Dixons', lived Phelan McDowell, editor of the Wolf River Chronicle, his wife, Trudy, and their son, Alec.

The Chronicle did not publish on Saturday, but Alec's father was down at the office as usual, putting together the features for the Sunday edition. His mother clattered away in the living room at the old Underwood, finishing up the fashion column she did weekly for the women's page.

Trudy McDowell did much of the feature writing for the paper, mostly without a byline and without pay. Her regular work included the cooking column, social announcements, the Laff-A-Day feature, and the club news. Usually on a Saturday Alec would be helping out - proofreading, checking facts, and running copy down to the office on his bicycle, which he especially hated. However, since this was the first big Saturday of the school year, he had been given the day off.

Alec sat outside on the front stoop waiting for Roman Dixon. He was wearing the new red-and-white satin jacket he had bought with the money he was paid for his summer job at the Chronicle. He didn't much like working with his father, but the alternative would have been to hire out as a farm hand, which meant getting all dirty and physically tired.

The jacket was a size too large, but Alec had bought it that way on purpose. It was his hope that it would give the appearance of bulk to his narrow shoulders.

As he waited, Alec ran over in his mind a set of stock responses to Roman's descriptions of how great he was going to be this year on the football field. The hell of it was, the guy was good. He was the star of the team, and nobody knew it better than Roman. Still, he enjoyed having Alec around to agree with him.

Worse than listening to the jock heroics, Alex would have to hear about Roman's mostly imaginary sexual exploits. Roman Dixon was a dumb, conceited asshole, but he was popular. And he drove that fabulous candy-apple Chevy. When you didn't have a car of your own, and lacked the looks or the money or the athletic ability to be a part of the in-crowd, you did what you could to get close. What Alec McDowell did was kiss Roman Dixon's ass.

Alec's mother came out of the house carrying a sheaf of copy paper. Alec hoped she was not going to ask him to take it down to his father on the detested bicycle. How many high school seniors rode bicycles, anyway?

Trudy McDowell smiled fondly at her son. "Don't worry. Your father left the car for me so I can take the copy down myself."

She was a slim, intelligent woman who served as an anchor for his often erratic father. It was scary to Alec the way she sometimes seemed to read his mind.

"Is Roman picking you up?" she said.

"Yeah."

"That's nice."

She never commented one way or the other on Alec's choice of friends, or anything else having to do with his private life. It was one of the reasons Alec loved his mother so very much. She bent down and kissed him lightly on the ear.

"Have a good time, darling."

Her breast brushed against his arm as she straightened up, and Alec shivered. His mother was starting to turn gray, but she had, retained a young, sexy body, which he found most disturbing.

Roman Dixon rumbled up with the windows rolled down, naturally, and the 8-track blasting at brain-damage level. Alec smiled, tried to close his ear passages, and got into the Chevy next to Roman.

With "Good Vibrations" booming from the four custom flush-mounted front and rear speakers, threatening to shatter the car's windshield, Roman tooled happily out of the Meadow and on down to Main Street. There everybody who counted at Wolf River High was either cruising the street or strolling the sidewalk. Roman seemed oblivious to the danger of imminent deafness. The admiring looks he got from the kids and the sour expressions from the adults made the pain worthwhile.

Main Street intersected with Elm at the bottom of the long gradual slope known locally as the Hill. The higher you went on the Hill, the higher was your position on the Wolf River social scale. At the very top stood the stone mansions of the Gotschke and Speith families, whose members had seldom been seen in Wolf River since the end of World War II. They preferred to live in places like Brown Deer or Evanston, but their names still brought respect in Wolf River.

Just below the fabled Gotschkes and Speiths lived people like Ralph Hartman, the banker, and his family. In descending order were found the houses of the town's top professionals, the landowners, and the leading merchants. Near the bottom were the police chief, management people from Allis Chalmers, and professors from the college.

As Roman and Alec rolled up to the corner of Elm and Main, a cluster of girls idled outside Weisfield's jewelry store, pretending to admire the window display of wristwatches. At the approach of the gleaming Chevy they giggled and waved.

Roman nudged Alec McDowell and said something.

Alec shook his head and cupped a hand to his ear.

Reluctantly Roman turned down the Beach Boys a few decibels. He pointed at the girls and said, "See anything you like?"

"Looks like the same old stuff to me," Alec said.

"Yeah, but you notice some of them are really filling out? Check the tits on Claire Hennesey."

"Yeah."

"How many of them you suppose got laid over the summer?"

Alec looked over the group and practiced his inexpert Elvis lip curl. "Them?"

"Sure. How many you think buried the old weenie?"

"None, if I know Wolf River girls."

"Don't kid yourself. They're female. The chicks want it as much as we do, and nowadays they're not afraid to ask for it."

"Nobody's asked me this week," Alec said.

"You got to let 'em know you're available. No shit. They all take the Pill now, so they don't have to worry about getting knocked up. There'll be plenty of pussy out there for a guy that knows how to get it."

Roman made the turn and headed up Elm between the rows of stately trees that gave the street its name. The houses near Main Street were well kept but modest. Up near the crest of the Hill where Lindy Grant lived, the houses were fifty years old and more - sturdy and sedate structures with gables and porches and leaded windows. The houses wore new paint, and the lush lawns were bordered by neat box hedges.

On this first Saturday of the school year social distinctions were not as important as they would soon become again. Kids from the old families on the Hill mingled freely and happily with classmates from the Meadow, and even the Poles from the South Side, Wolf River's oldest and poorest district. The cars were shined up, the sky was blue, the leaves just beginning to turn. The air was warm with a soft Indian summer breeze. Roman drove slowly, enjoying his sense of being young, healthy, and popular.

* * *

With the Beach Boys continuing to assault him from four speakers, Alec had some difficulty keeping the smile on his face. But he did. To him the California surfer sound was musical Pablum. If he was choosing the music, he'd have gone with Andre Kostelanetz, but that was a peculiarity he was not about to make public. The important thing was that if you were going to be Roman Dixon's friend and ride in Roman's car, you'd better listen to Roman's music. You either liked it or you kept your mouth shut.

As they headed up Elm Street, Alec leaned closer to the window so the other kids would be sure to see him. He knew a lot of them would kill to be riding up here in the school's sharpest car with the football hero. There were some payoffs to listening to the windbag.

Roman shifted down unnecessarily, rumbling the pipes. He stroked the floor stick lovingly, like it was his cock. He looked over, and Alec understood he was expected to comment.

"You sure got this baby running sweet," he said.

"I came home a week early to tune her up before school started."

"How come you didn't drive it down to Madison?" Much as he wanted to stay friends, Alec could not bring himself to refer to an automobile as "her."

"I was staying with my aunt and uncle, and they've only got room in their garage for one car, and I wasn't about to leave this baby out in the weather."

"I don't blame you," Alec said. "Not with a paint job like this."

"Besides, you don't need a car to score in that town. The women have their own. They want to go somewhere, they take you."

"No shit."

"Yeah. They're really hungry for it. They'd hang around the construction site and watch us. You should have seen them lick their chops whenever we took off our shirts."

Alec widened his eyes. "Wow."

"Had to fight 'em off, practically."

"Wow."

"All they got for men in Madison is radicals and hippies from the university. Bunch of long-haired faggots. Women down there get a chance to see real men, they flip out."

I will not say "wow" one more time, Alec told himself.

"Wow," he said.

"So how'd the summer go for you?" Roman asked, making little effort to sound interested.

"Dull. I worked at the Chronicle with Dad, as usual."

"That what you gonna do? Work on a newspaper like your old man?"

"I guess, after college. I haven't thought too much about it."

"I know one thing I'm not going to do," said Roman, "and that's work in a factory. For one thing, factory work is a batch of shit, and for another, my old man would kill me."

"Your dad makes a good living."

"It's still working in a factory. He comes home with grease on his clothes, and his fingernails are always black."

"I see what you mean."

Roman brightened. "Hey, maybe you'll be a sportswriter and you can write about me."

"Wouldn't that be a kick."

Not fucking likely, Alec thought. Once he was out of this shit town he would be somebody and be on his own and wouldn't need to suck around with jocks. It was to his advantage now to be tight with the class hero - it got him invited to parties and it got him dates with girls who otherwise would have brushed him off. But pretending to agree with every simpleminded statement of the Star could be a giant pain. Someday he would love to tell Roman Dixon what a stupid prick he really was.

But not today.