Free Payton Hidden Away by Jonathan Korbecki

proper analogy. “Payton’s
like an Oreo cookie. An Oreo cookie is nice and good and all that, but if you
had to choose between an Oreo cookie and a whole cake, an entire cake with the
works—white frosting and chocolate chips and all that, which would you choose?”
    Ritchie sits quietly.
    “You’d pick the
cake,” I say.
    “I might not.”
    “Trust me, you’d
pick the cake.”
    Ritchie says
nothing. He just stares at the TV.
    “Payton doesn’t
have much,” I try. “It’s a population nothing, prospects zero small town out in
the middle of nowhere.”
    “Can’t you at
least stay through the summer?”
    “I can’t. I already
accepted that job at the university bookstore.”
    “But you already
got a job here.”
    “The university
pays more, Rich, and the job starts in June. If I work through the summer, my
first semester is already paid for.”
    “But school
won’t be over yet.”
    “For us seniors
it will be.”
    “The baseball
season won’t be over yet.”
    I bite my
tongue, considering my words carefully. “And I’m sorry about that. I mean it.
I’d love to be able to hang around long enough to see you finish out the
season, but I can’t. But if we make the state championship, I’ll come back and
watch you pitch. I promise.”
    “Don’t make no
promises you can’t keep,” he murmurs. “ Bro .”
    “Don’t
guilt-trip me.”
    “I ain’t doin’
nothin’ of the sort.”
    “Are we going to
play or argue like little old women?”
    “We’re playing,”
he grumbles.
    “Good, then
let’s play.”
    “Fine,” he
snaps, picking up his controller and turning his attention back to the TV. This
is such an odd conversation, and not a pleasant one either. He nods, and I feel
like I’m looking out for a little brother. Not that I have a little brother,
which just amplifies the weirdness especially when it’s usually Ritchie looking
out for me. Ritchie thinks for a moment, his eyes distant even though fixed on
the screen across the room. Finally, he swigs from his beer, burps and nods. “Are
we playin’ or what?” he snaps.
    “We’re playing.”
    “Well, you got
the thing,” he argues. “Press ‘play.’”
    I smile as I
turn back to the screen and resume action. The battlefield livens and we are
tossed back into the action, our guns blazing as we shower our opponents with
bullets. Digital blood smacks the screen and we are amazed by how far graphics
have come in only a few years.
    “Wow,” he
whispers, this glow all around him—an innocence, and for me, it’s a revelation.
Not the game or the beer or even Sharon Daniels. But Ritchie. Underneath his
tough-guy persona there’s a little boy who’s terrified of everything; school,
work, life, girls—the whole world. Even me. He’s afraid of growing up, despite
how much he hates his parents and the shackles they hold him back with. No
disrespect to God or anything, but Jesus Christ, that’s a lot to deal with at
that age.

Five
Today
    “Nothing works outthe way you want it to,” she says,
sifting through her salad while still chewing. Lifting her eyes, she holds her
fork upright, a bit of chicken perched upon the prongs. She wags the fork at me
as if to make a point. “I learned that lesson at the tender age of twenty-one.”
    “Are you being
sarcastic?”
    “No.” She snags
the bite of chicken from her fork and begins to chew. “It’s a fact.” Then she
shakes her head. “No, not a fact. It’s a fairytale.”
    “What is?”
    “All of it. All
that crap they cram down your throat when you’re a kid about growing up to be
whatever you want to be. It’s a fairytale. It’s like blowing on the white
feathers of a dandelion. They tell you to make a wish, but it’s an illusion,
and pretty soon all you’ve got is weeds.”
    “So, what
happened?” I ask. “When you were twenty-one?”
    She lifts her
eyes and studies me a moment before returning her attention to her salad. “That
was the year my dad was injured in an