Free Birdy by William Wharton Page A

mind telling me how it happened?’
    Sure I would, but I know a direct order when I hear one.
    ‘Only in the army four days, sir. Corporal at Fort Cumberland grabbed me by the arm and I reacted instinctively, sir.’
    ‘Oh, I see.’
    He doesn’t see and he knows he doesn’t see. I smile back at him. Big smiling game. Great being Italian; all the movies make everybody afraid of you. When people think of a bad guy, they think of an Italian. I give him my dangerous look again. He’s going over the wet form; doing the hmmm, ahhhaa thing some more; we’re not getting anywhere.
    ‘Sir, should I go back to the ward this morning?’
    ‘That’s right, Sergeant. I think it’s the best chance we’ve got.’
    I wait. I can’t really get up and leave till he does something. When you’re in the army, you’re tied down all around. I can’t figure why he isn’t asking me if I’ve ever clobbered Birdy. That’s the first question I’d ask.
    He stands up at last and I stand, too; give him the salute. I have a feeling he’s pissed at me and pissed at himself for being pissed. I scare him; this makes me feel good. I keep hoping I’m finished with that crap but when somebody starts leaning, it all comes back.
    ‘OK, Sergeant, I’ll see you tomorrow about this time.’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    Bastard’s going to write to Dix for my records. Please Lord, just let me out of the goddamned army!
    I get back to Birdy and even though he’s still squatting on the floor, I know it’s different. I know he’s knowing I’m there. I know it’s Birdy and not some fake, freaky bird.
    – Had another session with your doctor, Birdy. You’re going to have a great time with him when you decide to talk. Whatever you do, don’t tell him about the pigeons and the canaries and all that bird shit. He’ll have you pinned into a case as a specimen.
    I know he heard me that time. I want to hang in there, keep it going.
    – Hey Birdy, remember when we were selling the mags? Christ, that was a scene!
    After we get back from Wildwood and I finally recover from old Vittorio’s revenge, we have to figure some way to pay back the money. We owe our parents ninety-two dollars in train fare. We get the idea to sell magazines door-to-door in apartment houses.
    We work out a smooth deal. The building superintendents try to keep us out but we push all the call buttons and somebody is always lazy enough just to push the door buzzer without calling back. Once we’re inside, one of us keeps the elevator busy while the other goes from one apartment to the other selling the mags. We’re selling Liberty, Saturday Evening Post, Collier’s and Cosmopolitan . The best time for selling is from right after school till about five-thirty, when the men start coming home. A lot of the ladies are alone because their men are off fighting the war. We get a regular route of ladies who buy from us. I’m the one who usually does the selling; Birdy does the elevator business and keeps the superintendent chasing after him. Fat chance that super has of ever catching Birdy.
    Most of those ladies are bored out of their minds and I’m always getting invited in for a cup of tea or coffee. If I were older and knew what to do, I could probably really make out.
    Birdy’s already started with all his crappy breath-holding. He’s getting to be more and more of a freak. He shows me once how he can hold his breath for five minutes. He sticks his head in a pan of water in my cellar. He tells me he turns his mind off breathing. That’s nuts!
    Then he’s always talking about flying. He tells me once, ‘People can’t fly because they don’t believe they can. If nobody ever showed people they could swim, everybody’d drown if they were dropped into the water,’ is what he says. Really weird ideas. He’s going to a Catholic high school, now, down at Forty-ninth Street in Philadelphia. The things he tells me about that school, I begin to understand why he’s turning so crazy. It’s