Authors: Alex Tully
CHAPTER 8
Today was Saturday and that meant Trevor could spend the whole day in the Box. He got a shower and then headed downstairs. Uncle Gary was sitting at the kitchen table drinking his coffee, probably nursing another hangover. “Hey, you pick up anything good lately?” he asked.
Trevor took a can of pop out of the fridge. “Uh, not really…but Frank told me about this house where this rich lady lived. She had to move into a nursing home and I guess they’re cleaning out her house. Getting rid of good stuff every week. It’s in Lowell and I think trash day is Tuesday.”
“Shit, Frank doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground. You better get on it. It’s been a while since you brought me anything worth a damn.”
Uncle Gary didn’t like Frank, probably because Frank was a nice guy with a wife and a family. Trevor met Frank two years ago when he was out scouting the streets. He drove past a kid’s bike that looked salvageable, but by the time he turned around and parked the pickup, the garbage truck was there. One of the garbage men was getting ready to throw it in the truck when Trevor yelled from across the street, “Hey! Wait!”
Holding the bike up in a mid-throw stance, the garbage man halted and waited for him to cross. The man looked at him curiously, “Can I help you kid?”
Trevor knew he sounded pathetic but he didn’t care. He wanted that bike. “Don’t throw it away. Can I have it?”
The man looked at the bike’s cracked frame, “You sure you want it?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.” The bike did look like a piece of crap, but Trevor was convinced he could fix it.
The garbage man shrugged his shoulders and tossed the bike to him, “Suit yourself.”
As Trevor turned to leave, a thought came to him. “Hey! Is this your route every Wednesday, at the same time?”
“Yeah pretty much. Why?”
Feeling like he had to prove something, Trevor said loudly, “Okay. I’ll be here next week with this bike, and it will look brand new!”
“Yeah, whatever kid.” The garbage man was shaking his head as he jumped on the back of the truck. “Got to go!”
Another idea immediately popped into Trevor’s head. It might be beneficial to have a friend in the garbage business. Maybe he could get an inside track to the good stuff. Maybe, they could even make some kind of deal. “Hey! What’s your name?” he yelled after the man.
“Frank!” the man yelled back as the truck drove away.
Trevor waved, “See you next week Frank!”
And it was right there, standing among a slew of empty garbage cans, where Trevor first had the idea about the Box. He could turn that old garage into a workshop. He could fix more than just appliances, and motors, and all the other junk Uncle Gary wanted. He could fix things like toys and furniture. He had a broken bike, a deadline, and most important, he had a purpose.
“Piss-ant, did you hear me?” Uncle Gary broke up his thoughts. “I said you need to do some laundry today. Don’t go hiding in that garage all day.”
The only thing Trevor hated more than cleaning up after that pig—which was disgusting enough—was doing his laundry. He would not wish that job on his worst enemy. In order to survive it, he had learned the art of breathing through the mouth perfectly.
“Yeah okay, I’ll get to it today,” and Trevor was out the back door.
When he got in the Box he immediately felt better.
Home.
He walked over to his work station and started setting up the table saw. Before he knew it, his thoughts turned to Bea. It had only been one day, but he really wanted to see her again. He couldn’t decide if he should call her now or wait until tonight. Would he seem too desperate? He decided to text her instead; it was easier.
Hey, what’s up Barbara?
It was only a few seconds and then he heard the ‘ding-dong’ alerting him of a new text message
. Not much, u?
Just working in the Box,
he typed.
Sounds fun. I’d luv 2 c it
Trevor panicked. Bea wanted to come to his house. She already knew he lived in Westwood with his white-trash uncle. He had told her the truth about that. Sooner or later, if things went the way he hoped, she would have to see where he lived.
Screw it.
Do you want to come over?
He hit ‘send’ and held his breath.
His phone lit up immediately.
What’s your address? B there in 20
After giving her the address, he ran back into the house. Thankfully, Uncle Gary left in his truck, which probably meant he would be at the bar all day. Trevor brushed his teeth again and checked out his face in the mirror.
No zits. He only got zits occasionally, and luckily none today. He had shaved this morning and no razor burn either—double bonus. His hair was probably a little long, but there was nothing he could do about that now. He reapplied his deodorant and checked his grey sweatshirt for stains—this was one of the few decent shirts he owned.
He ran back to the Box and tried to stay busy, but it was pretty much impossible. Ten minutes later he heard a car pull up into the gravel driveway. He was nervous as
hell. His heart was racing and he had to keep wiping his sweaty hands on his jeans.
He could only imagine what Bea was thinking. Westwood must be like a foreign country to her. She was probably afraid to get out of the car.
Peeking out the side window, he could see Bea walking into the backyard. She was wearing jeans and a short white sweater. Unlike the bulky school uniform, this outfit showed off all of her curves. His heart lurched in his chest—what was happening to him?
He swallowed hard, opened the door and walked out. “Hey, did you find it okay?” He tried to sound casual.
She was about to answer him when Jip ran to her at full speed and began jumping up.
“Jip! Get down! Jip…down!” he yelled at the dog.
Bea didn’t seem to mind. She bent down and started petting Jip on the head. “Oh he’s so cute…he’s adorable. I always wanted a dog, but my parents would never allow it.” Jip immediately rolled over onto his back hoping for a belly-scratch. Thank God for Jip; he totally broke the ice.
“That name
’s kind of different. Where’d you get the name Jip?” she asked.
He could feel his face flushing, “Well, it’s kind of dumb…”
She looked up at him smiling, “So, I want to hear it.”
“Okay.” He noticed big dimples in her cheeks. “You sure?”
She nodded again showing her perfect white smile.
“Okay. Here goes. Well, Abraham Lincoln had a dog named Jip. The story is that soldiers found him in
confederate territory and he was almost frozen to death. The soldiers gave the dog to the president.” Trevor kneeled down and started scratching Jip behind the ears. “And Mr.T found this guy in his backyard almost frozen to death, so I thought the name fit.”
God, he sounded lame.
“I
think it definitely fits. Who’s Mr.T?” she asked.
Trevor must not have mentioned his seventy year old best friend, “Oh, that’s
Mr.Tyminski. He lives next door. We hang out a lot. He’s a real good guy.” Then he added, “And he’s like seventy.”
“Really?” He could hear the surprise in her voice.
He avoided her eyes, “I know it seems weird, but he’s really cool. Kind of like a grandpa I never had. You’d like him.”
When he finally had the courage to look at her, she seemed to be studying him. “How do you know this stuff? I mean, like about Abraham Lincoln’s dog?”
Trevor shrugged his shoulders, “I don’t know. I read a lot?”
“Well, do I get to see inside the Box?” she asked, looking over his shoulder at the garage. No one other than
Mr.T had ever set foot inside the Box.
“Yeah come on in,” he said as he got up. Holding out his hand, he helped her to her feet. He led her to the Box, not letting go of her hand.
When Trevor opened the door, he could hear Bea suck in her breath. He caught a sideways glance at her face. She was holding her hand up over her mouth and her eyes were wide, “Holy crap!”
She was definitely surprised.
CHAPTER
9
Tom didn’t recognize the car in the driveway or the girl that wandered into the Box with Trevor. So the kid had finally met a friend his own age, and a pretty girl at that. He hoped this was a sign of more good things to come. The kid needed to start opening up to people, preferably people not on social security. Maybe the sessions with Dr. Fisher were making a difference.
When Trevor first gave Tom a tour of the Box and showed him all of the projects he was working on, Tom was truly impressed. Here was a kid who had been to hell and back, and he still wanted to do something productive with his time.
One day Trevor had asked him for help with an air-conditioning unit. After researching on the internet, the kid still couldn’t figure out which fuse to replace. Spending over forty years as an electrician, Tom knew everything
there was to know about fuses, and they fixed it together. Things were going so well, Tom thought it was a good time to bring up an idea he had been tossing around in his mind for a while. He asked Trevor if he had ever thought about going to a doctor.
“What do you mean? I’m perfectly healthy. I think you should worry about your own old ass.” The kid didn’t understand that Tom was suggesting a therapist.
“No, I mean a doctor that can help with your problems.”
When the realization hit, Trevor got ticked off. “What, you think I need a shrink? You think I’m crazy?”
Tom held up his hands, “No, no…nothing like that. It’s just sometimes it’s good to talk to someone about things. Someone objective, someone that doesn’t judge you. You just get some things off your chest you know. I’ve been to one before. It helps.”
“Well no thanks
Mr.T,” he said. “Not interested.”
“Okay,” Tom didn’t want to give up. “But you like making deals right? You have a pretty good deal with that garbage man, what’s his name, Frank?”
“Yeah, what about it?”
Tom chose his words carefully. “Well I was thinking. You could really use some new tools and stuff to fix up the place. And I would be willing to help you buy that stuff if you do something for me.”
“What? Like go to a shrink? What does that do for you Mr.T? Deals go both ways. Frank gives me tips—I give him something I fixed up. That’s how it works.”
Trevor started looking through his screwdriver drawer. “Did you see the tiny Phillips head screwdriver?” He wouldn’t look Tom in the eye. “Besides, I’m sure you just have tons of money to be throwing around. Tools aren’t cheap.”
“Here.” The screwdriver was sitting on the work table, right under the kid’s nose. “I have enough money kid. What do I spend it on anyway—heating bills and TV dinners? I have some extra.”
Tom thought of Trevor like his own grandson. The kid was family to him, and Tom worried about him. After everything he had been through, what the kid needed most was professional help. There was too much he was hiding under the surface, and if he didn’t talk to someone about it, who knows what would happen.
Trevor began twisting the screwdriver faster, still avoiding Tom’s eyes. “Can there be some conditions?”
Tom laughed under a sigh of relief, “Absolutely. Name them.”
The kid insisted on picking his own doctor. Tom thought he could probably arrange that without a problem. He also insisted everything that happened behind closed doors stayed there—he didn’t want a million questions. Of course Tom respected that.
Then Tom laid out his one and only condition. Trevor had to go to the Beaumont Center because that was the best. “When you get done with a session, you get a Home Depot gift card,” he told the kid.
“How much?” Trevor asked immediately.
“Now you sound like a teenager!” Tom laughed. “Don’t worry kid. You won’t be disappointed.”
And the kid hadn’t been. Trevor worked his butt off with every penny he got, and turned the Box into a workshop any man would envy.
Tom grabbed his spring jacket and headed out the door. The kid wasn’t the only one with a hot date today. He had called Sorak’s diner to ask Carol if she would be working this afternoon. She sounded happy to hear from him. He was actually a little excited to see her—and to get those noodles.
***
Trevor had to admit, from the outside the Box looked like nothing more than a run-down garage. He wanted it that way; he didn’t need his uncle snooping around. But thanks to
Mr.T, the inside had been completely gutted and renovated. And it was spotless.
Steel-topped cabinets lined one wall. On top of the cabinets were shelves that held clear plastic containers. They were filled with every type of hardware imaginable and everything was neatly labeled. Paint cans were packed under the cabinets in color-coordinated
sections.
Along a second wall was a large workstation with overhead pendant lights.
Mr.T had to help him with the wiring on those. The station had saws, drills, and various other tools, all hung in orderly rows on the pegboard behind it.
The third wall, directly across from them, was what Trevor was most proud of. The Wall of Garbage. The entire wall was covered in photographs from floor to ceiling. It looked like a giant piece of abstract art. It was filled with hundreds of before-and-after shots of everything Trevor had ever garbage-picked and fixed up. A stove, a wheelbarrow, a clock, a stroller…something filled every conceivable space on the wall. All of the items looked like junk in the ‘before’ and brand new in the ‘after’.
“You did all this?” Bea’s eyes were riveted to the wall, her voice quiet.
Trevor felt his face flushing, again. “Yeah, this is what I was telling you about. It all came out of the garbage-picking.”
She hurried over to the wall. “This is incredible! So do you sell all this stuff?”
He joined her at the wall and caught a glimpse of the bike he had given Frank. “Actually, I don’t sell it. I have to give a lot of it to my uncle. He was the one who kind of made me go
garbage-picking in the first place. He has a mechanics shop in town—don’t ask.”
He paused, feeling a little embarrassed, although he wasn’t sure why, “And the rest I usually give away to people.”
Bea looked at him like he was crazy, “What? You give it away? Like donate it?”
He laughed, “Yeah. I’m on a first name basis with the volunteers at the Goodwill and Salvation Army stores.”
“Seriously?” She was quiet for a minute, studying the wall. “You do realize you could get some serious money for this stuff. You know, sell it on EBay or something.”
Trevor shrugged his shoulders. He had
really never considered selling any of it. “Yeah, probably.” He walked over to the workstation and fiddled with some drill bits. “I guess giving it away just…feels right, you know?”
He knew that probably sounded lame but it was the truth. He would never forget the look on Frank’s face when he brought that bike back to him. Trevor worked his ass off on that thing. It looked brand new—painted fire engine red with yellow flame decals on the frame.
As it turns out, Frank had an eleven-year old son with an upcoming birthday. From then on, Frank was all too happy to show his appreciation. He became Trevor’s inside guy to the best stuff on the garbage routes.
“Come over here,” Trevor reached out and grabbed her hand again. He led her over to the workbench. Sitting under the lights was one of his current projects, an old wooden rocking horse. “I actually found this at a garage sale on my way home from school—they only wanted a dollar for it.”
“Awe, it’s adorable,” she ran her hand over the unfinished wood.
“I’ve been sanding it. Then I just need to paint it and get a new rope for the reigns. I’m taking it to the
Haven House. They call it a crisis nursery. It’s one of those places where kids go before they’re placed in foster care.”
She looked up at him. They were so close, he could smell her citrusy perfume again. “Wow. Isn’t it sad seeing all those kids?”
“You’d be surprised. The kids there are amazing. Most of them have experienced some pretty awful things, but you wouldn’t know it. I’ve only been there twice so far, but I definitely plan on going again.”
The
Haven House was affiliated with the same hospital as the Crazy Kids Center. After Trevor’s first session with Dr. Fisher, he noticed bright green flyers hanging all over the walls in the lobby. They were announcing a fundraiser to benefit the Haven House, which it turns out, was located on the outskirts of Westwood. It was only a few minutes from his house by bike. That’s when he had the idea of fixing up the toys.
“This is really amazing Trevor.”
Hearing the admiration in her voice made him excited, but nervous at the same time. He was letting her into a part of his world that only Mr.T had seen. Still, he couldn’t stop talking, “The best was when I delivered the toys. The kids came running up to me like I was Santa Claus. It was awesome, really.”
God, he hoped he didn’t sound like an egomaniac. He wasn’t trying to come off as some kind of saint. It was just so nice to share
it all with her.
“How did you learn to fix all this stuff? I mean, I could never learn to do all this.”
“Yes you could. You would be surprised how much you can learn from the internet. Another one of my favorite places is the library because they have free internet access. I spend a lot of time there.”
Then he added, “And of course
Mr.T helps me a lot. He used to be an electrician so he’s taught me a ton.”
“Is he the one who bought you all the tools and stuff?” she asked. “I mean you said your uncle was pretty much a jerk, so I was just curious.”
“Yeah, Mr.T’s a pretty cool guy.”
“Wow, he just gives it to you?”
Trevor had no intention of telling Bea about his deal with Mr.T yet. He just wasn’t ready to go into the whole Crazy Kids Center and his sessions with Dr. Fisher. Hell no. “Well I help him around his house a lot.” He stopped there and looked her in the eyes. “What is this? Twenty questions?”
She looked embarrassed and Trevor immediately followed with, “Kidding… I like the questions, really.” He had no clue how to act around girls.
“I’m sorry. I think it’s awesome—all of it. You know, I would really like to go with you next time you go to Haven House.”
Trevor turned to her, but she immediately looked down at the floor. He put his arms around her waist and pulled her closer to him. He felt her arms wrap around his back. Good sign. He was being pretty forward, but they were alone, and he really wanted to kiss her. This was the perfect opportunity.
Trevor had been thinking about kissing Bea since they first met. Sadly, although he was seventeen, he had never come close to kissing a girl. Mr.T was always asking if he had met any girls or gone out on any dates. Honestly, he just never had any interest in girls, until now. God, he hoped he didn’t screw it up.
He started to lean down, closer, closer…
“You know what—” she abruptly pulled away from him and looked away. “I better get going.” And just like that, she turned around and dashed out the door.
Trevor stood there dumbfounded. What in the hell just happened?