Billy Badass 1

They would play frisbee on the hot days, their t-shirts tucked in their belts they would soar the disc down the street sometimes in teams of two. I once watched Demon Duck run across the front bumper of a ’71 Chevelle and leap off the other side to catch a frisbee. It was an art form to the Benders.

They could skip the disc off the ground, tossing it right to the ground in front of them, and get it to fly up and over the heads of their opponent. They would throw the frisbee wide left, higher than possible to catch, just to watch it bank and fly to the right and dip low. It was a sport to them. They laughed and cursed and tossed it back and forth, and while they did, Billy watched.

They would get together and drink, bold out on their porch. They danced when music played and they grabbed willing girls up off the sidewalk to make out with them or grab their ass. And Billy watched.

When the guy next door to us threw a BBQ and invited the Benders, Joshua took the guy’s wife into the house and sexed her. When he was done, he sent the rest of the gang in, and while this was happening, Billy watched.

He was the quiet one. Solid muscle and stocky, he wore his hair a bit past his shoulders, brown with a blonde streak in the back. He wore a heavy green fatigues jacket every day. Sun, hot summer, fatigues jacket. Ice cold everyone in parkas and scarves, bundled up with gloves and hats, Billy wore his fatigues jacket. Billy was the constant for me. The steady rock I looked upon for inspiration.

He was far and away my favorite Bender from day one. He carried with him a kind of quiet menace. Billy was a Badass. That is why they called him Billy Badass.

Four short blocks past Joshua’s house was a grocery store and I was sent after something. I can’t for the life of me remember what it was. I had on a baggy jacket that did not fit me and I walked down the sidewalk with my walk.

As long as I could remember I had walked this way. I learned it from watching my father. I learned it from watching a biker who came to my old neighborhood. It was my “dare me” walk. A kind of insult to the world around me.

I saw Billy coming up the block headed the opposite direction. I positioned my face just how I wanted him to see it. I looked as casual as I could and dropped on him my most badass dare me walk. When we passed, I gave him the slightest nod of acknowledgement and kept walking. I let him get a few feet behind me then turned around to see if it worked.

He turned at the same time to look at me. We locked eyes then he turned around, throwing his head back and howling in laughter.

I laughed, too. The part of my brain that obsessed about Billy and being like him told  me to run to him and try to talk to him, and I turned to do just that. But within me was a quiet river that knew I had done enough. I let him walk away and played the moment back in my head all the way to the store and all the way home.

“Hey, kid!” Billy yelled from Joshua’s porch on my return trip. “What’s your name?”

Less had always said that when they asked me a question I was supposed to give them lip. Don’t let them think you think they are cool or they will never like you. But when Billy talked to me for the first time, all that went out the window.

As I passed the porch, I said. “Jesse, I’m Jesse Teller.”

“Well, Jesse, I’m Billy.”

I pointed at him and smiled. “Billy Badass, I know you.” And I was past him. I was crossing the street to my house, my mind railing, my vision trembling as he laughed. The rest of the porch laughed, too, and I heard Billy say to them.

“See, what did I tell you?”

I didn’t know what that meant so I walked into the house. I went straight to my sister. She had commanded me from the first to come to her with all stories about the Benders. They were her greatest obsession. I ran to her room and pounded on the door. She opened it enough to stick her head out and look at me. She looked me up and down and smiled.

“What happened?” she said.

“I talked to-” Before I could finish, she grabbed me by the wrist and jerked me in the room.

“Don’t sit down on anything,” she said. She dropped on her bed and crossed her legs. “Stand right there.” She pointed to a spot on her floor. “Don’t say a word yet. Let me put on some music.” Twisted Sister the anthem of our age. ‘We’re not gonna take it’ blared and she waved me on. “Okay, tell me all of it.”

When I told what had happened, she stared at me with her mouth hanging open and a skeptical look on her face.

“What did he say about me?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“Did you tell him you were my little brother?”

“No.”

“Why not?” She stood up and looked at the door. “Are you ashamed of me now?”

“No, there wasn’t time,” I said.

“No time to talk about your sister. I guess you don’t want them to know about me, do you?”

“They know about you. Listen, I will tell them about you next time—”

“Next time? Listen, they wont talk to you again. You’re just my little brother. They won’t waste their time on you. Billy is not that much of a badass anyway. He is not the best one. Demon Duck is the best Bender for sure. He would kick Billy’s ass. Get out of my room.”

She shoved me out the door, and before she slammed it shut, she looked at me with a snarl and snapped, “Billy is the ugliest of all the Benders.”

I stood there grinning. This was the first time a Bender had talked to either one of us and it had been me. My sister would hate me for years for it. I think she still does.

I saw Billy again that weekend. He was sitting outside my neighbor’s house selling weed. He had a butterfly knife and was flipping it around, concealing the blade and exposing it. He looked up through the crowd of Benders and he said, “That muthafucker right there.” He pointed his knife at me and my heart stopped.

“That muthafucker right there.” The entire crowd of gangsters looked up at me and Billy said, “That is my guy. He reminds me of me when I was little. I bet that little fucker can kick an ass, and if he can’t, we are going to teach him. If anyone in this neighborhood fucks with him, they answer to me.”

Jad stepped off the porch and stepped in front of me.

“Let me look at the little bastard.” He bent over, looking into my eyes.

I was terrified. My heart pounding out a panic. My mind screaming at me to run, to go home, find my mommy and hide. But right at that moment, I knew I was Billy’s guy. In my eleven-year-old mind I knew exactly what that meant. I had seen mob movies before. I had heard older kids talk about the mob movies I hadn’t seen, and I knew if I messed this up, I was breaking Billy’s reputation.

I stared Jad down. He grinned and looked up at Demon Duck. “I think he is staring me down. You want to fight me, you little fucker? I don’t care what Billy says, I’ll stomp you into that curb right there.” He looked at me and laughed.

Every one of them was looking at me, every eye that meant anything staring at me, and I knew if I spoke I would cry. I knew if I tried to run the world would come to an end.

Jad was over six feet two, a Native American with a bowie knife on his belt, jet black hair folded over his shoulder. He grinned at me with his eyes black as pitch and he scoffed.

With my heart in my throat, knowing it was my death, I locked my eyes on him and took two steps forward.

They all busted out laughing. Jad stepped back, threw his arms out wide, looked up to the sky and yelled out, “Damn, this little fucker ain’t afraid of anything. Shit boy, you ready to die?”

I waited until the laughs died down before, emboldened by my stance and the sound of the laughing, I said the most insane thing I have ever said to another human being. I stepped forward and said, “You better be ready to kill me.”

They all grew deadly serious and I knew they were going to kill me. Jad was going to take me back behind the liquor store and cut my head off. He was going to slam my head in a car door until it was mash. He was going to gut me and leave me to bleed to death in the street. I was damn near in tears when Jad looked up at Demon Duck.

Duck nodded.

I was Billy’s boy. He wanted me to sit close but not too close. Had me sitting across the street from where he sold, watching for cops. He told me to whistle if I saw anything. I didn’t know how to whistle but I told him I would. From across the street I watched them do everything. Every now and then, Joshua and Demon’s mom would come out of her house and bring me a warm soda.

One day Billy waved me over. “Go to the Quicky Fill and get me a pack of cigarettes and a beer.”

“They won’t sell me the beer,” I said.

“Tell them it’s for me,” Billy said.

I held my hand out and he looked at it. “What’s this?”

“I need the money.”

He gave me a cold stare then looked me up and down. “Where is your knife?”

I patted my pocket where my tiny little folder was hid.

“You ask me for money, you better have it in your hand,” Billy said. “Don’t you ever ask me for money again.”

“Okay, sorry. I’m sorry. I promise I won’t ever again.” I turned toward the Quicky Fill then back to him. “I don’t have any money.”

“You had better figure it out.” He turned back to the street where Carny was washing Demon’s dad’s car.

I ran for my bike but Billy’s hard loud whistle brought me back.

“What are you doing, Jesse?”

“I’m getting my bike. Wanna be fast.”

Billy looked at me with all the love he was capable of and sighed. “I know you do, Jesse, but you can’t carry a beer on a bike. Just run there.”

“Okay, Billy.”

“Jesse!”

“Yeah,” I said, turning to face him as I ran.

“Walk back or you will shake up my beer.”

I laughed. “Okay, Billy.”

I knew I had to hurry but I had no ideas. I could ask for the money from my mother but I knew how that would go, and what could I say if she asked me what I needed it for? I tried to imagine how I would phrase, “I need to buy a gangster beer and a pack of smokes.” That would not go well, so I just ran to the store. No ideas. No plan.

When I walked in, I looked at the guy behind the counter, and with empty hands and emptier pockets, I said, “I need a pack of Lucky’s no filters and a beer.”

The man looked at me as if I had lost my mind before his face changed and he said, “For who?”

I went back to the Benders’ house with two packs of Lucky’s no filters and a six pack of beer. I was Billy’s guy. I could have gotten a twelve pack if I had asked for it.