Cape Cod Noir - By David L Ulin Page 0,15

was still throwing pieces of wood in the air at the gulls. Da Cunha came busting out the back door and beelined straight for Tiny, throwing him down in a hammerlock.

“It’s you, Freddie,” Cunningham said. “The birds are just birds. You’re the one choosing to see it as an attack. Life is full of people and things, situations that are going to dump shit on you. You can’t control that. You can only control your reaction to it. You have to learn your Pukwudgies.”

“Feck you and your fekwudgees!” Freddie shouted. “I’m sick of getting it in the ass from you pricks.” The gulls shrieked and laughed as they followed Freddie, who stormed off toward the water with that axe.

Da Cunha still had a grip on Tiny, who turned limp as he watched Freddie disappear. “It’s not fair!” Tiny sobbed. “It’s not fair. It wasn’t my idea to steal the boat. I didn’t want to take it. It’s all Freddie’s fault.”

It was true. It had been Freddie’s idea, but Bobby had tried to paint it like it was Tiny’s doing. Cunningham said it didn’t matter whose idea it was. They had stolen Second Chance together.

Da Cunha released Tiny, who rolled on the ground. Stubby appeared. He and Da Cunha went out toward the water, after Freddie.

“What’s a Pukwudgie?” DeShawn asked.

“Come on,” Cunningham said. “Time for a little island history lesson.” Cunningham gave Tiny a hand, helping him up. He wrapped his arm around Tiny, and led the rest of us up the hill. As we rounded the graveyard we could hear Freddie’s shouts of “Feck you, you feckin’ narc, Tiny!” go by on the wind.

The stone ruins of the leper colony looked like the bones of a giant that had been buried there and gradually unearthed. As soon as we passed them for the windward side of the island, the seagulls that had been trailing us dropped off. The wind started to howl and whine.

Ryan and Kevin went back cause they were on the evening’s cook shift. DeShawn gave me a look like he didn’t want to walk back with Ryan, who was nothing but a snot-nosed pain in the ass, or Kevin, who was bound to do something stupid like walk us off a cliff. Maybe he was also scared that Freddie was still running around with that axe. No matter. I could tell by the way Cunningham had his arm around Tiny that he wasn’t going to let him go anywhere. This walk was for Tiny. Maybe I knew it was also for me.

I put up my hands as we crashed into that girl’s car, but I could still see her face. Her body jackknifing. Her head and chest flying over the steering wheel, toward the windshield.

They call it safety glass because when your head hits the windshield it shatters but stays in place so that it catches you, like a net. If that fails, and you’re airborne, it crumbles like a cookie so you don’t get cut. But chunks of metal went flying. That girl didn’t stand a chance.

Sometimes I feel as if I’m made of safety glass, as if everything inside me has shattered yet somehow stays intact. But Chad was all cut up inside, like that broken beer bottle, which sliced up his face.

Everything would’ve been okay if I hadn’t handed Chad that beer.

Cunningham took us to a crumbling stone courtyard that gave us a little protection from the wind. Me, Tiny, and DeShawn sat down on some old stone benches where we could see the water and some lights from New Bedford, on the other side of the bay. Cunningham cleared his throat, like he had been practicing some speech he’d prepared.

“After the leper colony closed, a caretaker lived out here with his wife and two sons. They were the only people on the island. Then one of the kids killed the other. They said it was a freak accident, but anyone who knew this place and that family knew the truth. It was because of the Pukwudgies.

“The Pukwudgies were these little demons, no bigger than your hand, that made the Wampanoags’ lives miserable. They broke their arrows, bored holes in their canoes, and ruined their crops. It would not be inaccurate to say they were the Wampanoag equivalent to having a seagull defecate on your head, but as tiny as they were, they had great power over the Wampanoag giant Moshup and his sons.” When he said “giant,” Cunningham shot Tiny a meaningful look.

“One