Mighty Mercury

The last bell rang and Johnny Jinckler rode the tide of liberated teens through the halls of Culchack High to the parking lot, wearing all black. Johnny was new at Culchack. He needed to make a name for himself, fall in with the right gang, fit in.  He wasn't really a death-rock kid or a Goth or

especially sad or anything.  He just loved to wear black.  Even his socks were black, and he'd used a black marker to blacken all the colorful rubber and plastic bits on his black tennis shoes.

 

He started worming his way inside the daily life of that small, surly group.  who frequented the smoking section.  He tried to blend in. Most of the kids there had backpacks full of junk food like him, and some even wore lots of black, but they all seemed very cheerful by comparison. Johnny always looked very unhappy, despite his good mood, so he always stood out in a way. Everyone called him  "that dead kid"  at first.  But whenever Johnny lost his cool, his hands would move and twitch with a life of their own. In the smoking section it was him, a few girls with green hair, and a lot of skinny guys in combat boots wearing trench coats and scrappy golf caps. A kid named Artie came up to Johnny one day and said, "MAN-I bet you can't fit your whole brain in my lunchbox! Go ahead, TRY to!"

 

This kid with the funny gray hat seemed so happy. Somehow Johnny really felt like trying, even though he knew he probably couldn't. "Put my brain-in your lunchbox-"  he bubbled.  "Well, I don't think I know-"

 

"Man, I'm just FUNNIN' you, son," cheered Artie, jiving and winking at Johnny,  "Just funnin' you. Try it anyway, though.  Try it.  Just try it anyway, though, see what happens.  Go ahead.  TRY, TRY."

 

Johnny Jinckler went along with it. Ha Ha HA, he said to himself, so you think I can fit my brain in your lunchbox or something, eh?  Well, Ha Ha HA!  Now I bet you think I'm casting a spell or something, eh?  You've been laughing at me since I came here!  That dead kid.  Well, ha ha freaking ha HA! He worked his fingers at the kid's lunchbox as if casting an evil spell, at the same time trying to look very cool and off-handed while doing it (he was still in a very good mood).

 

"Hey man . . . your brain grows anywhere," said Artie, gazing up at him with reverent brown eyes and slowly opening his lunchbox. There was really a brain in there, the whole glistening cabbage of wrinkles, gross and slimy and pink and gray. Johnny Jinckler stepped back, Artie laughing behind one hand and pointing at him with the other. "Your brain grows anywhere!" he cried. Then Johnny Jinckler started laughing too and Artie was freaked out, if only for the moment, by this unexpected  response. "Where'd you get it?" asked Johnny.

 

"I'm just making a joke, son,"  said Artie.  "My old man works at the rendering plant outside town . . .  and sometimes he brings home guts and brains for us kids to fool around with.  That's a real cow brain in that lunchbox!"

 

Artie was always cracking wise like that. The next day he went up to this pretty new girl with red hair named Stacy and told her confidentially,  "This is my new friend, Johnny Jinckler.  Perhaps you've heard of him

. . . he's very creepy, people always say . . . he might even be crazy, I guess, for all we know . . . ‘"

 

"Hey there, yawl," Stacy cawed nervously.  She was already very freaked out, her knees shaking, her lips barely trembling. Johnny felt like reassuring her:  Hey there, Stacy.  I'm really in a very good mood.  It's just something about my genes that makes me look so sad and mean. Don't be scared of me, Stacy,  I just love the color black! Good afternoon, Stacy. My, what nice red hair you have.  But saying all that would be hard, and it might freak her out even more, After awhile, he just stared into space and twiddled the air with his fingers, manipulating something only he knew was there, his eyes bugging out.  He felt out of place next to this doll.

 

"People say this kid is very creepy," continued Artie, opening a packet of Crispy Sugar Terrorists and slipping one into his smile, "always wearin' all black like an alien VAM-pire or somethin'.  People say he's a REAL WEIRD GUY, in the service of ALIEN GODS from the darkside . . . haha, they say that  . . ."

 

 

He turned and gave a scornful little cough for these detractors, then turned back to face the red-haired girl,  "And he's cool in a way, Johnny Jinckler, so you know, whatever . . . but I think it's all just an act.  This whole wearing-all-black-all-the-time whole trip he's always playin' on us.  All that stuff is an act! What do you

think, Stacy?"  Artie smiled at her again.

 

"Well-you know-I don't know, I-"

 

 

Johnny Jinckler started thrashing his invisible chains and moaning silently into the air.  He didn't mean to, it just happened. He was nervous. Stacy stiffened and moved away slightly.  "You wouldn't wanna make him mad now,"  Artie told her.  "Be careful."

 

 

Artie was trying to freak Stacy out by pitting him against her.  "Well, if you're so evil . . . if you're so bad," he sang,  "then Johnny Jinckler I  dare you . . .  to put your brain in my lunchbox! Go ahead!  I dare you to!"

 

 

Out of habit Johnny acted like he was casting a spell on the lunchbox, and Artie pretended to be very scared and freaked out when he opened it up and found a cow's brain in there-put his hands up to his mouth and yelled,  "Johnny Jinckler can grow his brain anywhere!"

Stacy fled screaming and Johnny was glad the old prank was so trusty, but he also felt totally sad and ashamed to see such a pretty girl running away just as fast as she could. It felt like his whole destiny was running away from him. This is all Artie's fault! Johnny thought. He's always messing around with me! Artie was making a whole lot of jokes about Johnny Jinckler's brain the last few days-" "Your brain can stick to the wall!" he'd  shout, or "Your brain is full of worms!"-and it made him mad but it scared him too. Artie was supposed to be his buddy after all, so he was glad and sad and mad and scared and guilty all at once, a jumbled feeling. He went into the bathroom one day between classes and looked at himself in the mirror-his black hat, black shirt and black shorts, the black socks and black shoes, all the black hair on his body, the black frames of his glasses, his pale skin making all the black seem blacker still-no wonder the kids laughed at him! He looked just like that suicidal kid in the after school special last week! Or a puppet on some kid's show who's only there to explain the color black! He was so tired of people saying he was creepy all the time. Sometimes even people he was cool with told him that: even they thought so, deep down.

 

 

 

A few years passed. Johnny Jinckler was a senior. It was prom night. "Now I have style!" he laughed into his mirror, lacing up his new black tennis shoes. Muggles had given him a special new pair for his birthday where even the rubber parts came black. It was touching

-"She knows me so well . . .  it's been so many years"-but he hadn't put them on until this evening.  I'm dealing with the mercenary politics of high school coolness here, and the way a guy looks on prom night is VERY important to how cool he is in the long run! The whole smoking section believed it. For Pete's sakes! Johnny thought,  I'm not trying to be a mad scientist here or anything, but Gosh darn it, the way a guy looks at the prom is VERY important to the other kids, with whether or not they consider him cool! I've already made quite a name for myself with this whole wearing-black-all-the-time thing, I guess-but now I think it's time I really started being STYLISH!  Now he had a bright new pair of green plaid slacks to really make these tennies POP!

 

 

Old Muggles came into his room just as Johnny was leaving. She'd been into the paint cans again.  Her new prosthetic leg was dappled with sloppy streaks and spots of purple, green and blue. "Yaap,"  she said, screwing it into her thigh,  "Got mah new pros-THEES-iss, Johnny!  Yaaap!"

 

 

"How are you tonight, Muggles,"  he said.

 

 

"Waal . . .  I got this new pros-THEES-iss Johnny, and I'd like to try it out ."

 

 

"You want me to dance with you again, Muggles?"

 

 

"Just a quick waltz, Johnny."

 

 

"Sure."

 

 

They circled the hardwood floor a couple of times, Muggles smiling and pegging along in her peach-colored apron. Then the clock struck six and he put on his sharkskin jacket and headed off down the dark street. Stacy was meeting him at the Kwik-Mart and so was Artie and his girlfriend, Sweet Tooth. It was a dark blue night, even the moon threw blue shadows. Johnny wanted to feel dumb and crazy and smart, but still felt himself sliding around on that hardwood floor with the ancient Muggles. His mood was good, even so.

 

Stacy was his girlfriend now. She tackled him outside the Kwik-Mart and gave him a lipsticky smack on the mouth, her red hair wrapping around his face, and he heard bells when she kissed him like always. Artie slapped him on the back and said, "You weirdo." Sweet Tooth gave him a good-natured swat on the ass.  They climbed into one of Stacy's dad's huge red semi cabs and hovered hugely down that dark blue highway, bound for Culchack High School's senior prom.  The semi cab was making a quiet grinding noise as it barreled forward.  Johnny Jinckler had offered to fix the transmission but he didn't really know how.  The whole night was dark blue, all the sudden shapes jumping up into his sight were at least as dark blue as the sky and even smaller and harder to see.  "It's a good thing I'm not drivin' this rig tonight, Stacy," he told her.

 

 

"Aw how come, you still seein' them shapes?"

 

 

"More and more."

 

 

"Well that sucks.  Muggles get her new leg yet?"

 

 

"She did."

 

 

"Well that's good.  She sure is gutsy, yore Muggles.""

 

 

"Yeah it is good."  It was.  Doing the Charleston one-legged with Muggles was hard. Not to mention the Tango, the Can-Can, the Twist-she really liked to dance. Johnny tried changing the subject,  "I'm looking forward to the show."

 

"Cool. Me an Sweet Tooth love helpin' the Brains."

 

 

The Flying Brains. That was the name of the band they'd started the summer before. Artie had drawn up a lot of promotional flyers with a big purple octopus tearing apart a drum-kit with its tentacles and pasted them up all over his neighborhood in search of a drummer, but nobody ever showed up for the tryouts, so the band was just Johnny and Artie. Johnny knew how to tap dance and Artie had a keyboard, so this became their act. A couple of bars in the neighborhood let them play for free and they were starting to get the hang of it.  It was pretty cool being in a band, but at the same time it totally sucked. Johnny Jinckler just started tap dancing as if his caretaker was there and muttered his growling grumble vocals in time to one of the prerecorded beats from Artie's keyboard while Artie stood there wearing sunglasses and a black suit, shaking his arms and occasionally leaning forward to press another button. All Johnny had to do was curl his lip and they'd see his teeth and start clapping. He felt lame as a duck onstage. Not the metaphorical lame duck either, but an actual duck that was lame. Perhaps from stepping on a landmine. That's what dancing without her felt like.

 

 

They pulled up in front of the high school and climbed down out of the air-cooled, cushioned semi cab.  The second Johnny's boot heels hit the asphalt, he felt like an astronaut touching back down after flying far out into space-Gosh darn it, he thought, I felt so immortal just gliding along in that semi cab, I was taller than EVERYONE ELSE on that road!  Yes! "So what songs are we gonna play tonight?" he asked Artie.

 

 

"The plan's simple," said Artie, leaning forward and grinning, "like my brother-in-law, Kenny, heh heh. But unlike Kenny, this plan just might work." (Artie's brother in law weighed more than five hundred pounds and hadn't left his studio apartment in over thirteen years. He was looked after by a network of humanitarian organizations and concerned family members).

 

 

Artie reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of goat's brains, giving Johnny, Stacy and June each a chunk and keeping the rest for himself. It was part of their act, to hurl brain matter into the crowd unexpectedly, and tonight the girls were helping.  Johnny had to control himself when Artie said that stuff about Kenny.  He was always cracking wise about the crippled like that. Well, Artie, he said to himself, maybe someday a whole army of us will show up on your doorstop to finally settle the score! I'd sure like to see that!  he thought.  Johnny Jinckler wasn't quite sure how to feel about his buddy anymore.  "What songs are we playing tonight, I said!"

 

 

"They're only giving us fifteen minutes," said Artie. "We're gonna open up with Musical Wonderland, then rip right into Dark Gods. Get ready to rock!"

 

 

"Are you gonna play that one you wrote for me?" asked Stacy, softly lifting Johnny Jinckler's hand as silver bells went off between his ears again.

 

 

"Yeah, that's why I brought it up.  I'll say something about you before we play that one,"  he promised her,  "and I won't let what happened last time . . . happen this time.  Not this time."

 

 

"Of course not, sweetheart."

 

 

"You can count on that,"  he promised. "It's a full moon tonight. Last time it was only a quarter, which ain't no good."

 

 

Stacy nodded and he smiled at her. She didn't know anything had gone wrong at the last Flying Brains show, but Johnny was always complaining. She hoped he'd forgotten his promise about the transmission by now. She knew he probably couldn't fix it. Maybe he can't really fix anything, she thought, but he can always come up with a fresh new angle on why it all went wrong last time. Like a man who stares into the sun for too long and goes blind, then tours the country warning folks not to stare at the sun for too long or they might go blind. Very careful and boring and reassuring, that was her Johnny Jinckler.

 

 

As they walked toward the gym, Artie's girlfriend Sweet Tooth said, "I'm gonna give Muggles some guts later on!"

 

 

"You what-"  said Johnny, "give her guts-"

 

 

"From the rendering plant! I mean she's so gutsy like Stacy said, going through life on one leg all the time, always smiling so sweetly and whatnot . . . why don't I just give her a whole buncha guts just to give her the point of how gutsy I think she is?  She could cook 'em or somethin'. People eat guts sometimes!"

 

 

"Guts are good!"  added Artie.  "I'll give her some too.  Your mom's so brave."

 

 

"Wait a minute." Johnny whirled and clenched his fists. "She's NOT my mom, Artie! You have no right to say that!" He seized him firmly by the throat and told him,  "Artie-she's NOT . . . Okay?  Okay?  She's just my caretaker, that's all . . . Okay? . . . OKAY? . . . for Pete's sakes, Artie!"

 

 

Johnny Jinckler's anger really rang in that dark blue parking lot. Artie shook himself free. "Okay okay . . . geez . . . holy cripes, Johnny Jinckler!" He could see right into the gym, where yellow lights were blazing on a group of kids surrounding a big punch bowl. "You better hope none of those kids saw you do that!"

 

 

Just then a long bright school bus heading west sailed down the dark blue street behind them all.  Johnny Jinckler was looking right at it, and Artie and Sweet Tooth and Stacy turned slightly to watch it float past. The bus was packed with joyous children sticking their arms out the windows, pointing at them and singing a song in a foreign language. It happened so fast time itself slowed down for a second, then everything went back to normal again so fast it was almost like nothing had happened at all. That's how it felt. Johnny Jinckler turned away from the road and made funny eyes at the high school.

 

 

"What's wrong, Johnny?" said Stacy, touching his arm. "I thought you said you were in a good mood." He heard bells whenever she spoke to him now, as if she was a cement mixer backing up and he was the sidewalk about to get covered with all that sweet gray mud.  He looked over at the truck, where Sweet Tooth was comforting Artie as he unloaded his keyboard and its stand.

 

 

"I am honey I am," said Johnny. Then he did a little dance right there, to show Stacy just how glad and sad and mad and scared and guilty he felt, deep down.