Dirty Faces - Book 2

Chapter 19: Carve the Demon

Chapter 19: Carve the Demon

 

            “But I don’t understand. Why couldn’t you just talk him out of it? He listens to you.” Leslie’s words kept meandering in and out of Kody’s head. The minute he’d dropped Jack off at his house that day, he’d gone straight back to town to tell Leslie. Sworn secrecy had been implied, at least until Jack could break the news to his parents, but for whatever reason, Kody just had to tell somebody, and Leslie was his somebody.

            He wished he could have “just talked him out of it”, but he hadn’t really even been given the chance to do so. He was still mad at Jack for that, and as Leslie had correctly observed but he had vehemently denied, it hurt his feelings. But in truth, he knew that even if he had been able to try to talk him out of it, it would have been a waste of his breath. Jack’s mind was made, and he and he was very much aware of that.

Now he sat on Jack’s bed mindlessly tossing a baseball in the air and catching it while his cousin packed his things and chattered about the adventure upon which he was to embark the following day.

            “Ya know what they say. You gotta carve the demon,” said Jack, digging through one of the drawers in his chest.

            Kody’s face wrinkled in confusion. “What?”

            “Carve the demon. It means ‘seize the day’. That’s how they say it in Latin America.”

            Kody resisted the temptation to bury his face in his hands and instead replied, “Oh, right. Carve the demon. I thought you said something else.”

            “Yeah,” Jack went on, “you gotta seize the day. The way I see it, I got this one life and I don’t mean to spend it walking behind a plough. This world’s got more to see than that mule’s ass and I ought to do more with my time in it than cut tobacco.”

            Kody nodded. “What do your folks think about all this?” The subject had only been mentioned briefly during Sunday dinner, and neither Aunt Betty nor Uncle Bill had said anything about it since, so far as he knew.

            The enthusiasm on Jack’s face faded. “Mama took it about as well as you imagine she did.”

            “And Uncle Bill?”

            “Hard to say. You know how he is. You never can tell with him.”

            Jack dug down to the bottom of the drawer he had open and pulled out a photo of a pin-up girl, which he promptly slipped underneath the clothes he had packed in Mama’s old beat-up suitcase. Kody raised a brow.

            “I probably won’t have much use for her, ‘cause you know what else they say?” said Jack.

            “No, Jack. What do they say?”

            “Women love a man in uniform. Heck, women love me anyway. But me in a uniform…dang, son.”

            “And just how many women do you reckon are gonna be at boot camp?”

            Jack shut the suitcase and thought a minute. “Well, on second thought, I might get some use outta Miss Grable after all,” he said with a wink. “But after boot camp…” He grinned and stared off into space.

            Kody shook his head. He glanced at the baseball glove laying atop the chest of drawers, and at the mason jar sitting next to it. The mason jar contained, among other things, loose change, a few toy soldiers, and several marbles- in particular, a green aggie that had once been his. His lucky aggie, to be more precise. And to that very day Jack claimed he’d won it when he knew good and well he’d stolen it. Even if he had won it, it would have been by cheating. He was a real piece of work.

            Jack shut the latch on the suitcase and lifted it off the bed. “Well, reckon that about does it,” he said, placing the suitcase next to his bedroom door.

            “Reckon so,” Kody muttered. He stood and walked over to the chest of drawers, placing the baseball he’d been tossing in the air back in the glove where he’d found it. Jack was quiet for once; he was either thinking of what other baloney he could yak about next or listening to his voices. Kody wondered how much the other boys in the barracks would appreciate being awoken by Jack’s night terrors. He shoved his hands in his pockets and began jingling the truck keys. Uncle Bill would be borrowing them the next day so he and Aunt Betty could take Jack to the bus station.

            “Well, I guess Mama’ll bring the keys up here in the morning,” Kody said, breaking the silence. No need to prolong this business.

            Jack cocked his head to one side. “You’re not gonna come up before I leave?”

            Kody shook his head. He looked Jack in the eye, because he was tall enough now to do that, and shook his hand. “Take care, now,” he said. Jack nodded, and then Kody turned and  walked out of the bedroom.. He could only hope his best friend really knew what he was getting into as he set out to carve the demon.