Side Story: Percy

1983

“Do you promise you’re coming?”

Victor moved aside a page and began reading the one beneath it. Small glasses were perched on his nose, a pen in his hand was raised, poised, ready to sign wherever he needed it. 

“Dadddd you said you’d come,” Percy whined. 

His father picked up the page he was reading and squinted. He made a noise and swiftly wrote his signature, an elegant ‘V’ that Percy liked. 

Percy stood next to his father in his office. The man had been in there all day, going through pages and folders and answering calls with words Percy didn’t understand. 

“Dad–”

“Yes Percy, I said I would be there. Now leave me alone or I won’t come at all,” Victor chided. 

Percy beamed. He ran from the room towards his. His backpack laid on the bed. He had haphazardly thrown his basketball uniform in. His shoes were at the foot of his bed, dirty, scuffed and the bottom was coming off the shoe but they worked fine. Percy had wanted to ask for new ones but his father had said that it was wasteful.

As he shoved the shoes into the bag he heard a honk. It was Mrs. Gallo, Junior’s mom who had come to pick him up for the game. She only did that when Sally didn’t have time to walk him to the school as Arthur had taken him to the city with their younger sibling for a dentist appointment after the local dentists Mr. Johnson pulled out and ate all his teeth.

When Percy had asked why he did that, Sally said that dentist’s get stressed too. Percy vowed to never be a dentist.

He zipped up his bag and ran down the stairs, nearly crashing into the butler. Mrs. Gallo was waiting in her green minivan, she smiled when she saw Percy rushing down the front steps. 

Junior threw open the door and said, “hey dude!”

Percy and Junior slapped hands. After he got in, Junior began to talk excitedly about the match against another middle school from Winchester. Percy was abuzz too.

“My dad’s coming to the game!” he told Junior.

Junior looked surprised but said, “that’s cool dude.” He exchanged a glance with his mother that Percy pretended not to see.

°°°°

Percy watched almost in slow motion as the ball flew to the net. The noise of the room died away, the mouths’ of the crowd moved but no sound came out, he could feel his heartbeat but not hear it. Junior stood a few feet away from him, looking from the ball to his friend. 

And then… the ball hit the white netting. And the sound came back. 

The first noise he heard was the scream of triumph from his own mouth. “YEAH!” Junior yelled. Percy smiled at his friend and then gasped as little hands lifted him up. Junior joined the rest of the boys to heave Percy up and down. 

Percy grinned and laughed, his eyes searching over the heads and limbs and other adults cheering from the stands. He carefully scanned the parents of his team members and his heart almost burst out of his chest when he saw a man wearing a suit and tie. 

But the man moved his face from behind the waving arms of a woman in front of him. Percy’s smile wavered as he realized it was the father of someone else. The boys under him kept screaming and whooping. But he didn’t feel it anymore. Junior’s eyes turned worried and he tried to get his friend to smile and smile he did, but it didn’t reach his chest. 

All the sound had gone again. 

The sound remained muted for Percival when he was getting his things, when he got back in Mrs. Gallo’s car and all the way home. Mrs. Gallo tried to engage Percy in conversation but the boy only responded curtly. Junior asked Percy if he wanted to get a pizza but he didn’t respond. 

When Percy threw open the door of the van, he gave a terse wave at Mrs. Gallo and Junior without turning around. He slowly walked into his house and the moment the cool air of the foyer touched his face he felt the tears spring from his eyes. 

He wiped at them furiously and threw his bag on the floor, the maid can clean it up for all he cares. He stomped up the stairs and furiously came to the door of his father’s study which was as opened as he left it. 

His father wasn’t there. That made the boy even angrier. If he was still working that would at least be an excuse. Percy imagined his father drinking with his friends at one of their houses.

Percy found himself swiping all his father’s papers off his desk. He imprinted the bottom of his dirty shoes on the pages, he tore entire folders with his hands but the thing that would get him a spanking later would be when he unplugged the antique lamp on the desk and threw it over his head onto the floor. Pieces of colored glass dispersed all over the floor. 

Percy pulled out the cabinet without a thought as to what he wanted to do with it. Its heaviness surprised him and his hands gave out. Hitting the ground, his father’s wallet slid onto the floor. Glass crunched his feet as he crouched down and picked it up. 

The face looking back at him was his older brother’s in one of his school pictures. Percy was about to chuck the wallet with everything else he saw something peeking out from a compartment within it. 

He pulled out a faded, old bill of twenty dollars. The figure on it looked him in the eyes as if telling him take me, you deserve me. He looked around the room at the mess he had made. He knew he couldn’t take it back and he wasn’t sure he wanted to. Might as well. 

He slipped the bill into his shorts and laid the wallet on the desk. 

He will go get that pizza after all.