Sagaria by John Dahlgren Page B

be needed. Which maybe it would be. Maybe she’d stand up in divorce court and, choking back the occasional sob, tell the world how her brute of a husband had planted a plastic spider in the soap dish, under the soap.
    She had told Sagandran the other day that Dad was a wonderful father and a wonderful friend, but a complete disaster as a husband. Sagandran thought this was probably the truth. But he still wanted Dad back. He hung up his jacket and kicked off his shoes, not making too much noise but not trying to be especially quiet. Mom didn’t like what she called “sneaking around.”
    She finished her call with a harsh “goodbye!” that had a horribly terminalsound to it. Then the receiver was slammed back in its cradle.
    “Hello, darling,” she said, coming out of the kitchen and finding him in the hall. “I didn’t hear you come in.” She folded him in her arms the way she always did when he got home from school, and he hugged her back. He was glad Webster and the others couldn’t see him, but at the same time, he basked in the comfort of being held by her. He smelled the clean smell of her white blouse and the unmistakable warmth of his mother beneath it.
    She held him out at arm’s length for a better look at him, and that was when she saw the rope burns on his hands and, her eyes drifting down, the bloodstained tear at the knee of his jeans.
    “Oh, my darling,” she cried. “You’ve been in the wars.”
    “It’s nothing much,” he said, trying for a nonchalant shrug. He had the feeling it wasn’t very convincing, because her gaze did not waver.
    “Was it that ghastly bully, Webster O’Malley, again?” she demanded. “I’d like to wring his neck. He’s a little toad. I could think of a lot worse words to describe him, Sag, but I’ll spare your delicate ears.”
    “Okay,” he said lightly.
    She glanced toward the kitchen. The phone, probably still red-hot from the call she’d just finished, sat on the counter. “I’ve a good mind to speak to his mother, even though I know you never want me to.”
    “I can handle it, Mom. Honest.”
    The ethic of schoolboys. Bullying was a sin, true, but telling tales to adults was a worse one. Mom had told him many times how stupid this was, how kids had even died because of bullying going unchecked, but that didn’t make any difference. It was a matter of honor. Besides, he had the shrewd idea that Webster’s mom, Mrs. O’Malley, would probably side with her darling son. He’d met her once and reckoned that she was, if anything, even viler than Webster, however impossible that may seem.
    “Are you sure?”
    “Yes, Mom. I told you, I can handle it. In my way.”
    Mom didn’t usually take much persuading to leave things be. She was a busy woman with her career as a lawyer, and even more so now Dad wasn’t here to help out at home. But this time, Sagandran saw a harder determination in her eyes. It was a good thing that this was the last day of term. He guessed that one more day of him coming home roughed up and she’d start making good on her threats. Perhaps after the summer holidays, it would be different at school.
    Perhaps Webster will fall off a cliff and die or something , he thought, and then felt guilty about it.
    “I’m really sure I can cope with it, Mom. One of these days, I’m going to bust him on the nose real good, and he’ll never come near me again.”
    “All right, then.” There was still some doubt in her voice, but not enough to drive her to the phone.
    At her insistence, he took off his jeans. She gave a little hiss when she saw the redness of his thighs, and he told her as much as he thought she needed to know about the gym class.
    “It was just that my hands slipped on the rope, Mom. Could have happened to anyone.”
    She took him into the bathroom and bathed the wound on his knee with warm, soapy water and then hydrogen peroxide, which made him let out a yelp. Then she sat him down on the couch in front of the