Tales of the Madman Underground by John Barnes

Author:John Barnes
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin USA, Inc.

The ride meant I was twenty minutes early, plenty of time to collect my No Ticket This Year letter from Gratz.

Paul was leaning up against my locker, looking at me but not talking. For some weird reason, for just an instant, I thought he might be about to beat me up and take my lunch money, the way old Al used to before I hit him with the bat.

After a long, long second, I said, “Hi.”

He looked off to the side. “We ought to talk or something.”

“Yeah, we ought to. Are you mad at me?”

“No, not exactly.” He paused. “Well, yeah, but it’s not exactly your fault. Not exactly. I mean like you couldn’t know.”

“This isn’t making a lot of sense.”

He shrugged, meaning it didn’t matter whether it made sense or not, I guess. “Look, you’re still my friend but I can’t really hang out with you for a while, ’cause it just won’t work with what I’m trying to do. Okay?” He was looking at the floor like he was ashamed.

I felt like he’d just punched me in the stomach. “What’s wrong with me?” I asked. I thought I might cry.

“Nothing. Nothing wrong with you. Or with me. I just need to kind of get away from the therapy group for a while. You know how we talked about that off and on for years, being tired of it, you know? We talked a lot about that this summer.”

Come to admit it, we had. “Yeah, so?”

He raised his chin a little and looked at me like I might hit him. “So I don’t want to get the ticket this year.”

It clicked. “You don’t want to be in the Madman Underground anymore, either!”

I was about to confess that that was the reason I’d been trying to avoid him, until his avoiding me had hurt my feelings, but he grabbed my lapels. “Jesus fucking Christ fuck me up the butt, Karl, you’re such a baby. Grow up. It’s a therapy group, okay? A therapy group. Where they put weird loser kids. We don’t have some kind of mystical magical Madman mystique. It’s not the club where all the geeks get to be special. What it is, is where fucked-up kids go.” His twisted, awkward hands pushed hard on my sternum.

Like my body took over on its own, I punched low and got him in the stomach. “Great,” I said. “I’m gonna be fucking normal too. So don’t fuck around with me, faggot. I’m tired of you crying on my shoulder and if you’re trying to queer me it ain’t gonna work.”

He was doubled over and breathing hard; I was pretty strong, he was small, and he hadn’t expected it. “How normal do you want me to be?” I whispered. “Can’t get more normal than beating up a queer, can I?” I couldn’t believe what was coming out of my mouth.

He looked up like he’d been poisoned, and I knew he was about to cry and I was about to scream at him.

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