How High the Wall: A Novel

How High The Wall

A Novel

David A. Ross

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2010 David A. Ross

For more information about David A. Ross, please visit

www.davidaross.com/

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard word of this author.

Author’s Note

The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Special thanks given to researchers, trade journals, medical professionals and periodicals for information they provided for this book.

Alien Nation

On an August night when the planet Mars was closer to Earth than it had been in sixty thousand years, fifteen-year-old Hermes Hawthorne rose from his bed after two o’clock in the morning and pulled back the curtains to gaze upon the larger-than-usual red orb.

Listening for any sound to indicate that someone else in the house might be awake, he heard only the rhythmic ticking of his father’s Oakland Raiders Commemorative Super Bowl Clock as it counted down the seconds until the team’s next appearance in the championship game. On the roof an insistent woodpecker banged its beak into the chimney’s metal smokestack in measured, machine gun-like bursts. Outside his window, the leafy branches of the Honeycutt’s oak tree rustled in the warm breeze.

Directly across the hallway, in their bedroom, his parents lay sleeping. On weeknights, they were always in bed by eleven, on weekends no later than midnight. From his room, even behind his closed door, he always heard their TV go off. He heard his mother’s muted cough, and minutes later his father’s snoring. Once they were asleep, he was free to do as he wished without fear of interruption.

He might listen to music in headphones (his taste tended toward ‘alternative’ or ‘underground’ songs with aggressive lyrics and mechanical beats). Had his mother or father taken time to listen carefully to the lyrical content of these songs, they would surely have disapproved—or maybe even confiscated the discs. But they never listened—not to his music, and not to him. To Hermes, it seemed as if life in the Hawthorne household moved forward in an unwavering sequence―one that epitomized a subtle yet specific rhythm, yet one that precluded any sort of real communication.

During summer, his father watched baseball night after night, as well as all afternoon on weekends. Harry followed the Royals and the Yankees. When autumn came, he switched to football, which was his real passion, but he also watched basketball and hockey. In fact, it seemed to Hermes that his dad would watch anything that even pertained to sports. For Harry, ESPN was apparently the only TV channel that really mattered.

After dinner each night, his mom retreated to the den. There, with a cup of coffee and a pastry at arm’s length, she switched on the computer and logged onto the Internet. Dawn often surfed for hours at a time. She said it relaxed her. Hermes did not know precisely which sites she visited, but he did know (by checking the address bar scroll) that she sometimes logged onto a religious chat room using the screen name Aurora.

Since his parents had claimed both leisure rooms downstairs for themselves, he spent most evenings in his bedroom. If he did not occupy himself by listening to music, he might watch TV―not sports, like his dad, but rather shows like MTV’s Jackass or Room Raiders. And if there wasn’t anything worth watching on any of the sixty-odd channels received over cable TV, he might take one of more than three dozen DVD’s from his personal collection and put it on the machine―movies such as The Matrix, or X-men―movies he’d watched again and again until he knew every scene and every word of dialog by heart. But even more than listening to music, or watching movies late at night, he liked to draw. Time and again he retreated into a world he’d created in black and white sketches: intricate images of mythical creatures, lizards savagely devouring one another, or a scorpion lying in wait upon the neck of humanity. These drawings he hid in a satchel placed in the farthest corner of his bedroom closet.

The drawings were not the only contraband that he kept hidden away in his closet. Also concealed beneath a floorboard was a .38 Special knock-off made in China. His friend Zak had persuaded him to buy the handgun with his allowance from a seventeen-year-old kid named Justin, who had sold Zak an illicit .22 caliber pistol for thirty-five bucks. Why do I need a gun? Hermes had asked Zak. His friend replied: Don’t be stupid, Hermes. These days everybody needs one. Besides, it’s cool!

Obviously needing to hide the gun from his parents, he’d peeled back the corner of the carpet in his closet (it came loose quite easily as it was attached to the tack strip by only a few staples), and then he pried open one of the floorboards with a screwdriver. There he deposited the .38 Special, and there it had remained since the day he’d bought it.

Also hidden in the closet was a collection of spray-paint cans (illegal for minors to buy). On late night graffiti raids, he always worked alone. Whenever the subject of graffiti came up among his friends, he never boasted of his artistic exploits: rebellion, he understood, was best accomplished in anonymity.

The images he drew upon retaining walls or garage doors were always ad hoc. He worked quickly, almost madly. With his index finger, he pressed the button that dispensed the paint. The can hissed its malice in black or crimson, and once the container was empty, he ran like hell. He climbed over backyard fences and scrambled underneath hedges. He hid behind lampposts or bushes to avoid the headlights of passing cars. The cops patrolled the subdivision of Green Meadows regularly, because the residents there were rich—at least they were richer than those who lived in the subdivision where he and his parents lived, Grassy Knoll.

Green Meadows was newer than Grassy Knoll. The houses were bigger, too. Presidents of companies lived in Green Meadows; schoolteachers and post office employees and nurses lived in Grassy Knoll. When he was younger, in kindergarten and in grade school, the kids from Green Meadows had mixed easily with the kids from Grassy Knoll, but once they reached Junior High School, everything changed. An invisible line was drawn—one seldom crossed. It was like that with the adults, too. Of course, everybody was civil to one another—at least most of the time. On occasion, remarks were overheard—or exchanged. To him, and to other kids as well, it seemed like the teachers at school favored those from Green Meadows over those from Grassy Knoll. If you happen to live in Grassy Knoll, he’d once told his friend Zak, they consider you to be some sort of Troglodyte!

Slipping on a pair of baggy jeans and an over-size T-shirt, and lacing tight his red Converse All-Stars, he listened one last time to make certain his parents were asleep, then moved to the window above his bed. Quietly, he raised the window sash wide enough so his hundred-and-thirty-five-pound body could move easily through the open window. He’d done it countless times before. He’d been a night stalker since age twelve, and he’d never been caught—not by the cops, and not by his parents. Nobody knew about his nocturnal campaign. Only the results of his mayhem attested to the fact that there was a vandal at large in Green Meadows.

As he went through the window onto a narrow space of rooftop, he snagged his shirt on a protruding nail. Shit! he cursed under his breath, and liberated the torn material from the rusted metal. Carefully, he worked his way, on hands and knees, across the shingles to the place where the rose trellis ascended from the ground all the way to the rain gutter: his route of escape. Over the edge he went, climbing down upon the shaky lattice, careful not to grab onto a thorny branch, careful not to stumble, or place too much weight upon a flimsy cross-brace.

Touching ground, he paused a moment. The late summer air was thick with moisture; cicadas hissed in the treetops, and crickets chirped in the undergrowth. Tonight there was no moonlight to define his path, but the route through the backyards of Grassy Knoll was one he knew well, one he navigated easily in the light of day, or in darkness. Through a hole in the hedge he passed, into the Honeycutt’s backyard—he had to take care not to disturb Buster, their dog—then between the darkened houses to the cul-de-sac, all the while staying close to walls or fences so the streetlamps would not define his presence, either in form or in shadow.

The way to Green Meadows followed a gentle ascent, but the climb was no effort at all for him. Through the backyards of Grassy Knoll he moved, like a commando on a midnight raid, a can of spray-paint stuffed inside each of his front pockets. Once he’d crossed the invisible border between Grassy Knoll and Green Meadows, he paused a moment, not to catch his breath from the climb, but to survey his own neighborhood from the heights. An aggregate of single-family houses in redundant designs and colors spread over a depression in the landscape. The streets were laid out in concentric circles leading to some unspecific nexus. Power lines and co-axial cables formed a grid that connected one soul to another. There was a minivan or an SUV in every driveway.

Even though the houses were bigger in Green Meadows—multi-level architectural catastrophes in pastel colors with double doorways and three-car garages and balconies— Green Meadows was, to his eye, every bit as drab as Grassy Knoll. In Green Meadows, the cars were more expensive than those parked in the driveways in Grassy Knoll: Mercedes–Benz’s and BMW’s and Jaguars and Range Rovers. His parents owned two cars: a Chevy Suburban and an aging Toyota. He hated riding in the Suburban, and the Toyota smelled bad. (The intense summer heat had melted the glue that held the carpet and the door liners in place, and ever since, the car had given off an obnoxious if not a noxious odor.)

When I turn sixteen, he’d told his friend Zak, I’m getting a Jimmie 4x4. One with really high wheels and chrome headers!

Where are you going to get the money for a truck like that? Zak asked.

My grandpa said he’d buy me one, Hermes lied.

Cool! said Zak, nodding.

"When I get it, I’m going out to the Nevada desert where there are no cops so I can wind the mofo up to…one hundred twenty!"

"Way cool," said Zak, who thought anything Hermes said was creditable.

He was not a chronic liar, but car fantasies seemed to impress Zak. Not to mention fantasies about girls. Though interesting from a distance, girls remained a matter that he had yet to encounter―at least in any significant way. He liked looking at the bitches that danced onstage with the coolest rappers, and he also liked watching clips of the current female pop idols – girls with breast implants and slinky dresses and lots of make-up – but real girls, like the girls at his school, and the ones in his neighborhood, still resided in the realm of fantasy and mystery. Except one: he’d once made out with Nina Stevens, at her house when her parents weren’t home. As they sat together on her couch, he’d tried to feel her up, but she’d squirmed and slapped his hand away. What do you think you’re doing, Hawthorne? she’d scolded teasingly.

Sorry, Nina. I just thought—

Busy, busy hands! She clicked her tongue, smiled wickedly, and shook her head in rebuke. He did not try to kiss or touch her again. It just wasn’t worth the embarrassment of being rejected a second time.

Most of his free time, he hung out with Zak. Together they stalked the shopping mall, surfed the Internet on Zak’s PC, or rode skateboards in front of the grade school. They listened to rappers on their Discman CD players. They smoked cigarettes – joints, too, when they could get them.

Inside the mall was a piercing stall where many of the high school kids (and younger kids, too) got their ears or navels or lips pierced. A rumor was going around school that Jessica Cartwright had had her nipples pierced, but nobody that he knew had personally seen it. So far, he’d had only one of his ears pierced. On the lobe of his right ear he wore a single silver stud. But he wanted to have his tongue pierced too. His father had nixed the idea.

It’s my body! Hermes protested. What do you care?

It’s foolish. And it looks grotesque, said his father.

It’s not grotesque, he said. People in other cultures wear all kinds of body adornments.

It’ll probably destroy your taste buds, said Harry.

No, it won’t!

Look, I don’t care if you wear baggy clothes, said Harry. When I was your age, we wore tight-fitting clothes. Jeans so tight… No ballroom, if you know what I mean. Harry chuckled, but Hermes thought the joke was stupid. Baggy clothes are one thing, Harry conceded. And I don’t even care if you want to shave your head! He paused a moment to dramatize what he considered a magnanimous compromise, but Hermes knew that his dad wasn’t really serious about letting him shave his head (not that he wanted to anyway). When I was your age, Harry lectured, we all wanted to grow our hair long. But this tongue-piercing thing… I’ve got to draw the line somewhere, Hermes.

Tongue piercing is no big deal, he said.

No big deal! Do you want all the flesh on your tongue to cave in when you’re forty?

Forty seemed light years away. He gave Harry a repugnant look.

Look, I let you have a tattoo, said Harry.

A small one.

You’re only fifteen!

On my arm… Hermes sported a white rose dripping blood on his left bicep.

What’s wrong with a tattoo on the arm? Sailors have had tattoos on their arms—

I wanted it on my back.

I mean it, Hermes. No tongue piercing!

What he’d not told his father was that some of the kids—well, nobody he knew personally—were having their tongues surgically split. Some of them were doing it to their friends, and some were doing it to themselves, with knives or razor blades. It was cool. Well, the blood wasn’t all that cool…

I talked to Mom about it, he persisted, and she didn’t say no.

I seriously doubt that your mother would agree to tongue-piercing, said Harry.

She didn’t say no, said Hermes again.

When you’re twenty-one, you can do whatever you want to your body, said Harry. Until then, you’re mine!

"It’s my body!" he said as he walked away.

Not until you’re twenty-one! Harry called after him.

What’s so important about twenty-one? he mumbled.

Twenty-one seemed almost as distant as forty. It was Zak’s opinion that they would probably both be dead anyway before they reached age twenty-one. Which, in Zak’s limited vernacular, really sucked. Because most of the really cool stuff happened after you were twenty-one. Some stupid shit will probably happen before we’re twenty-one, he’d said. Like they’ll probably blow up the whole fucking world. Or a comet will come down from space and smash everything. Or your grandfather will croak and never buy you the Jimmie 4x4. Then we’ll both be so bummed that we’ll have to drown ourselves in Grass Lake. Or something… Know what I mean, Hermes? Know what I mean?

What Hermes did know was that there wasn’t going to be any Jimmie 4x4, because one of his grandfathers had died before he was even born, and the other one lived in Michigan and drove an Oldsmobile. He barely knew his grandfather, and he’d made up the entire story about the Jimmie 4x4, so he wasn’t worried about dying. He was far more concerned with body piercing, and with tattoos, and with not getting caught while out on one of his nocturnal beautification errands in Green Meadows.

Concerning his graffiti crusade, just how he chose his canvas, or target, never involved issues of revenge or contempt. Why this wall and not that mailbox? In the end, it all came down to momentum. Once his emotions were right, the spray can was out of his pocket and aimed at a particular backdrop almost before he knew what he was doing. On one hand, the act of vandalism was surely pre-conceived; on the other hand, it was wholly automatic.

Now, with a can of black paint in hand, he drew the image of a television screen on the outside brick wall of a particularly large, Green Meadows house. Then, with a can of red paint, he wrote the word(s): ALIEN-NATION. Tossing the empty cans onto the ground, he turned to run away, but instead of making his escape, he crashed face first into the well-muscled chest and torso of a man.

What do you think you’re doing, you little shit? the man roared. He held Hermes in a headlock.

The thick arm wrapped tightly around Hermes’s neck smelled vaguely of sweat and sawdust, and for a moment he considered biting the forearm that held him in a vice-like grip; but he never had the chance, as the overbearing weight of the man’s well developed, adult body drove him to his knees. Pinned like a trapped animal, he realized the hopelessness of his situation, and he began to shake. Then, to his mortification, he felt the warmth of his own urine spreading over his pant leg. He squirmed to break free, but it was no use. The arm that held him was strong. The hands were callused.

The entire neighborhood has been on the lookout for you, the man said as he dragged Hermes, one hand grasping his arm and the other clenching tightly to a tuft of his hair, across the front lawn and toward the street.

Once in the light of the streetlamp, Hermes could see the man’s face. Large, fleshy, and glowering, it was framed by closely cropped, light brown hair. Beneath thick converging eyebrows, his eyes seemed to dart from side to side. The irises were green, the whites of his eyes slightly jaundiced. A fistula of tiny purple capillaries tinted his bulbous nose, and two errant hairs grew out of a mole on his left cheek. A razor-stubble covered his chin and upper lip.

Okay, kid, we’re going inside now, he said.

Hermes felt a push from behind, a solid blow right between the shoulder blades. He lurched forward, stumbling on his over-size cuffs. His urine-soaked pants now felt icy against his leg.

Once inside the house, the man turned on the lights. Overhead, a chandelier illuminated a foyer nearly as big as the entire living room of his parents’ house in Grassy Knoll. The walls of the foyer were painted egg-shell white; the floor was made of white marble; the carpet in the formal living room was white Berber; the drapery that covered the floor-to-ceiling picture window was white; the upholstered furniture, white. The pictures on the wall were also devoid of color—faces without expressions, landscapes without relief. He felt like a stain upon pristine fabric. In his urine-soaked pants, he felt vile, horribly out of place.

From somewhere above—a landing on the spiral staircase, he thought—came a voice. Frank, is everything okay?

Yeah, everything’s okay, Heidi. I caught the kid that’s been spray-painting houses. I’ve got him right here!

What are you going to do with him, Frank?

The man now had a name: Frank.

I guess I’m going to call the cops.

Do you think that’s such a good idea, Frank? The voice on the landing sounded weak and whiney.

What else am I supposed to do with him? Frank asked.

How old is he? the woman wanted to know.

Maybe I should call my dad, Hermes suggested.

Maybe you should shut your mouth, Frank said. Then he noticed that Hermes had wet his pants. Jesus Christ! he bellowed. He’s pissed his pants!

Frank, the woman’s voice called, what’s the boy’s name?

The homeowner regarded him in disgust. What’s your name, kid?

Feeling humiliated, Hermes gave his name.

He says his name is Hermes Hawthorne, the man called to his wife.

At first there was no response from the woman, but then she said, Frank, are you sure you want the police here at this time of night? The man seemed to consider his wife’s question for a moment, though he made no gesture to indicate he might relent and let Hermes off the hook. Do you want me to put on clothes and come downstairs? she called to him.

I have everything under control. Just go back to bed, Heidi, he said.

Maybe you could just call my dad, Hermes said. I’ll repaint your wall, he offered.

What about all the other walls in this neighborhood?

I didn’t spray-paint any other walls.

You’re lying, said the homeowner. His brow was knit, and he was grinding his teeth. He worked his fingers into a fist, then relaxed them, then clenched them again. You broke the law, and now you’re going to have to face the consequences, he told Hermes. Then he picked up the telephone and dialed 911. My name is Frank Brickman, he said. I live in Green Meadows, and I would like to report…

As the homeowner gave the cops all the details of the alleged vandalism, Hermes became aware of another figure now standing on the landing. Though he could not make out whom it was, he was certain that it was not Heidi. The figure was female, dressed in a long, white nightgown. He could see her delicate hands wrapped round the railing; he could see her well-formed, bare feet below the embroidered hem of her nightgown. Definitely not Heidi.

The figure on the landing disappeared as Frank hung up the phone. With a smug look on his face, he assessed Hermes, but said nothing.

Aren’t you going to call my parents? Hermes finally asked.

Don’t sit on the furniture, Frank said as he again regarded Hermes’s wet crotch and pant leg.

Graffiti is a common prank played by adolescent boys, Lieutenant Joe Claxton said to Harry and Dawn Hawthorne at the police station. But the truth is that it’s gotten way out of control—particularly in Green Meadows. We’ve been patrolling that subdivision all summer, looking for the vandal, or vandals. Originally, we thought it might be a gang of kids. But as it turns out, your son is the Lone Artist.

Harry and Dawn sat on chairs opposite the policeman. Frank Brickman was there, too, and though he was offered a chair, he declined to take a seat. Instead, he loomed in a corner of the small office, monitoring the process of juvenile justice. Hermes sat on a straight-back chair, banished to the opposite corner. It was four-thirty in the morning, and nobody wanted to be there. Except Frank Brickman: he seemed to be relishing Hermes’ parents’ anxiety, not to mention Hermes’ own misery. Hermes suddenly felt glad, whatever the consequences of his actions, that he’d defaced the side of Brickman’s house.

Looking around the police lieutenant’s office, he noticed a framed citation hanging on the wall that honored Lieutenant Claxton for his longtime service to youth. Hanging near the citation was a team