Read Online Man Gone Down by Michael Thomas - Free Book Online

the rum. I drink and hand it back. ‘We gotta make this quick and messy.’ He gives me a snort, then takes it back.
‘Fuck,’
he says again, but more like a bark. He sings,
‘What’s a boy to do? What’s a boy to do?’
The back door opens again. We hear boys’ voices. Angry. Moblike. I thumb back at the boys who are approaching us. I tell him that the jig’s up. He smirks.
‘C’mon, man.’
He finishes the pint and smirks again. He throws the bottle into the hedges.
    â€œ
‘Where’d you get the drinks, Gav?’
He opens another beer. Most of the party has emptied out into the yard. We’re surrounded by angry boys. They look up at both of us, but they yell at Gavin.
‘Where’s the beer?’
He doesn’t answer. He sips at his new tall boy.
‘Asshole!’
one from behind shouts. They have us outnumbered thirty to two, but they’re tentative. Gavin finishes the beer and drops the empty in their midst.
‘Look, Gav,’
one tries to appear reasonable.
‘Just give the beer back.’
Gavin touches his chest and whimpers in mock distress. Heraises his voice an octave.
‘Gentlemen. Are you accusing me of stealing?’
He pulls out another beer. A roar goes up in the crowd. They pull him down from behind. He lands on his back. Everyone goes silent. They back off, scared of their violence. In classes we’ve taken with them, they’ve read Emerson and Thoreau. Some of their parents have told me stories about marching with King, campaigning for Bobby Kennedy, going to jail. The children of the latest enlightenment watch as Gavin comes to.”
    â€œ
’You shouldn’t have taken the beer.’
Some nod in agreement. Gavin stands slowly. He holds his hand up to me to assure me he’s okay. One kid tries to implicate me. Asking,
‘What were you doing?’
They all ponder the question, but they don’t press it. They knew better than to attack a black kid, not because of what might happen to me, but what would happen to them. And they haven’t completely reconciled the gap between black man myth and reality.
    â€œGavin fakes a punch and the whole mob flinches. He laughs. He looks at me and gestures at them with his thumb. He winks. They’re angry again. But suddenly he’s gone—pushing his way through the crowd. They grab him. Thirty boys hoist him over their heads. He’s still laughing as they take him inside. I break through the hedges and make my way to the sloping front lawn. They’re gonna kill him for stealing their beer. They’ve got him on the porch. His coat’s gone. They throw him down ten stairs and he rolls into the gutter. I run down the lawn. I see him, skinny, freckled, semiconscious on Heartbreak Hill. I see the arc that’s brought him to that moment: the boat that brought his grandfather from Cavan, the docks where he welded and riveted the hulls of the great mercantile ships. I see his father, a young man, running up the hill and Gavin, a young boy, watching him fail. Then today, his father’s fist in his freckled face. Gavin has always been my best friend. The mob descends the stairs.
    â€œI try to get him up and he pukes on himself. I turn to face the mob, ten feet above me on the mansion’s porch. The children of doctors and lawyers, liberal WASPs and Jews, well-educated teens preparing to go to Harvard and Stanford. They want to kill the poor Irishboy because he stole their beer. Gavin is my best friend. We rescue each other from our screaming harridan single moms. We steal liquor together and hide in parks, looking at the stars, sharing stories and drink. I square up and raise my fists.
‘Move!’
someone yells.
‘Don’t be a fucking loser!’
I don’t move. Sally’s on the porch, too. I look up at her—try to catch her eyes. I do. She rolls them and looks off across the street far above my head. Gavin stirs