The Instructions by Adam Levin

  Benji and the Flunky turned the machine onto its side while I dragged the table a couple feet closer.

  “Isadore Momo. Remember? In gym? You were there. Hermaphrodite? Nippo? Big Ending’s Momo’s gang.” “Oh! Fair enough! Didn’t know he had a gang. But then I got Co-Captain Baxter then.” “You gotta be kidding me. Baxter’s Eliyahu’s. Don’t get in his way.” “Vincie’s right. Baxter messed up dude’s hat.” “So then how about this: BryGuy Maholtz.” “Maholtz is mine!” “Get over it, Throop,” Jenny Mangey said, “cause Ronrico just called dibs on Maholtz for both of us.” “And I called dibs on Maholtz two minutes ago.” “No one heard you, Fulton. Plus I called Maholtz three minutes ago.” “No one heard you either, Stevie.” “That’s what I’m saying. If your quiet dibs count, you don’t got dibs because I got dibs.” “Painalize!” “Best of luck to all of you on BryGuy Maholtz.” “Why you being sarcastic?” “Cause half the country’s after Maholtz.” “That’s why I called dibs!” “Half the country’s not here, man. They can’t hear your dibs.” “So dibs then on Slokum.” “You’re kidding me, Ronrico.” “I call dibs on Boyst—” “Really? Really? You think Gurion gives a fuck about your dibs on that guy? You think I give a fuck about your dibs on that guy? Not to mention Benji?” “But Benji’s got Slokum dibs.” “I don’t think he’ll feel the need to limit his dibs.” “Beatassalize!” “Maimalize!” “Maim works fine, I think.”

  Benji jammed the claw in the coinbox doorgap, wiggled and angled it until it caught stiff. “Flunky,” Benji said. The Flunky got on the table. He jumped up high, came down heavy on Botha’s claw’s arm-part.

  Something groaned but it wasn’t quite enough.

  “Shlomo Cohen dibs!” “Shlomo Cohen’s the Five’s.” “And what is the Five?” “Those kids from the field.” “They’re on our side?” “I think so—yeah.” “I want a piece of basketball.” “Try to think bigger.” “‘Bigger,’ she says. Think bigger like how?” “Like how we got the whole Arrangement in one single place.” “I should call dibs on teachers? Is that what you’re telling me? We’re gonna get teachers?” “Teachers, whoever. Whoever whoever. We just beat Botha’s ass and tied him to a radiator.” “Right! You’re right.” “I know I’m right. So like how about, say then, Jerry, for instance?” “Jerry’s a wang, but I’d rather get Floyd.” “Too late to get Floyd. I’m getting Floyd.” “I just called dibs, though.” “Put your dibs in your hat and then shit in that hat. Floyd’s for me.” “Jesus, Vincie!” “Jesus Vincie fucken what? I said Floyd’s mine. I’ll show him my pass. I’ll show him his pass. His pass to the hospital! Like, ‘Here’s your fucken pass, Floyd! Come get your fucken pass, Floyd.’” “Whatever, Floyd’s yours then. I’m saying Desormie.” “Desormie. Sure. Desormie. Go ahead.” “Scare-ize!” “Really? Desormie? Desormie’s all mine?” “Scare-ize?” “Scare-alize! I mean.” “How about scare, dog?” “Sure, Desormie’s yours. And why the fuck not? Gurion probably isn’t interested at all in fucking up Desormie, himself. Great pick. Deep cut. One from the vault. You’re the only one here who ever hated the guy. The only one in all the school—” “You shoot down everything! What the fuck? I mean what’s the point of even calling dibs if you shoot down everything?” “No one said there was a point. You just kept calling dibs.” “Well that’s not—” “Don’t be a baby. You’ll get to get someone. We’ll all get at least someone.” “Yeah, don’t be a baby. The quiet middle’s over. We’re in the fucken end, man.” “So who, then, who? Who’ll we get?” “We’ll get whoever Gurion tells us to get.”

  The Flunky and I climbed onto the table. He bent his knees and scooped me up. He counted to three. On three he jumped. We came down hard.

  “Horror-alize!” “Crushalate!” “But who else is there to get? Like specifically, I mean.”

  The coinbox popped and change gushed forth.

  “Quarters and nickels like mad here,” said Benji.

  Baruch Hashem.

  “Horror-alize? No. Horror-orize…? No.” “‘Who else specifically?’ How about the basketballers who no one knows the names of?” “And how about a million jerkstore Shovers?” “Horrorize! Yes! Horrorize! Horrorize!” “All the teachers who sent us to the Cage in the first place!” “Smackalate!” “Jackilize” “Ripalate!” “Tear-… Tear-o—no. Tear-alate? Tearalate? Tearalate!” “How about the whole motherfucking Arrangement!”

  I was splayed on the floor, next to the Flunky. The claw had come down right next to my head. Its shape had held—a well-made claw. Maybe stainless. Maybe even titanium. I stood up and banged it like a gavel on the table.

  I said, Everyone get in line for coins. Ten apiece. Forsake the dimes.

  It was twenty after ten = thirty minutes til the end of the pep rally. While the Side got their coins, I called 911 on Botha’s celly to report an explowsion et Deh Franteah Maytelle. The operator asked if I was safe, and I told her I was; I was in my car at Kilroy and Rand. She asked my name and I told her it was Victor Bo—then pretended to lose the signal and turned the phone off.

  “They’ll call your friend at the motel before they go there,” Benji told me.

  That’s fine, I said.

  “You think they’ll send people anyway?”

  Maybe, I said. It doesn’t matter.

  “Oh,” said Benji. “Oh!” he said. “We’re crying wolf?”

  For now, I said. Is your mom at work?

  “Yeah.”

  Call from Jelly’s phone and tell them there’s a fire in the basement—your mom locked you in there and went to work and now there’s a fire in the basement.

  “We don’t have a basement.”

  Even better, I said.

  COACH RONALD DESORMIE

  (AT HALF-COURT MICROPHONE, USING OWN MEGAPHONE)

  Thank you. I’m glad to have your guys’ ears because we need to talk, you and I, cautch to student-body. We need to talk about the elephant in the room. Can anyone tell me what that elephant is?

  10:10 AM: C3 (C1; C4; C6; C9)

  BLEACHERS

  (STUDENTS FIDGETING, TEACHERS SHUSHING STUDENTS)

  10:11 AM: C1 (C4; C3; C6; C9)

  COACH RONALD DESORMIE

  (AT HALF-COURT MICROPHONE, USING OWN MEGAPHONE)

  I know it’s hard to talk about, so I’ll just say it. That elephant is the scoreboard in this very gymnasium. The scoreboard and what’s been done to it. The world-class Aptakisic Indians scoreboard which was just Monday in perfect working order only to have the H and the V knocked out of it on Tuesday and how that was disrespectful enough to everything we stand for and was going to be embarrassing already this afternoon, when the Twin Groves Eagles are coming for the opening game versus our Indians, without how on Wednesday it got totally destroyed so it’s not in any kind of working order and there’s unsightly dings in the floor that came from some of the pointier rocks as an outcome of those rocks making contact with the floor after they got thrown at the scoreboard, too. I’m here to tell you disrespect and embarrassment will not stop the Indians, who have worked hard for me, ladies and gentlemen. Hard for us, our fighting Indians, hard for this school, people. In practice is what I’m talking about, hours and hours of practice over the last nine weeks to really come together as a team who will dominate so as to bring this school and all of us that kind of glory known as opening-game-of-the-season glory, which is a kind of glory you only get a chance at once per academic year because there’s only one opening game per year isn’t there? Yes there is just one, and how often does that opening game take place at home? And I’ll tell you how often because how often is every other year, meaning last year it was away, and though last year, yes, we dominated that opening game, it was not as effective a brand of domination in terms of the glory I spoke of as it was gonna be this year in terms of the glory I spoke of. And then next year it’ll be away again, and though I have to believe we will dominate next year, it will, again, be that same kind of less-effective domination that we had last year that I just described. And since t
his year our world-class scoreboard’s been destroyed for the opening game, which is the kind of thing that diminishes the kind of domination I’m talking about here, can we go three years in a row without that kind of domination and still hold our heads up? is what I was asking myself yesterday. The way in which I was answering was: no, I don’t think we can, I really don’t think we can because I think we’ll be lucky to survive after three years without that kind of domination, let alone survive with our heads up. That kind of domination at an opening game at home is unmatched in its potential to boost spirits and bolster our feelings of general confidence, not just at school I’m talking, but also at home and in our personal relationships to people who we spend time with and so on. And maybe some of you are thinking that when I was asking that question and answering how I was answering it, I was being too, how should I put it? Overdramatical. Maybe some of you are thinking: “Jeez, Cautch, a couple years ago we didn’t even have a world-class scoreboard, and a couple years ago we survived just fine with our heads up.” But you see this isn’t like a couple years ago, people, because now we not only don’t have a world-class scoreboard, but we do have a world-class scoreboard that has been vandalized and doesn’t even work, which is worse than no world-class scoreboard at all is what I’m telling you. In fact it’s worse than having no any-class scoreboard at all because of how a gym with no scoreboard at all could at least possibly indicate that that gym is part of a school with so little funding it can’t afford even a low-class or no-class scoreboard, and that would set the stage for the kind of underdog story where the poor kids from the poor school and their poor cautch who should be coaching pros but can’t because he’s too passionate a man to coach pros who do it for money that isn’t pure instead of the glory that these poor kids do it for, and who was booted permanently from the NCAA for losing his cool on a player who wasn’t toeing the line and maybe even got a little violent with that player, and publicly, and that player whined and sued like the spoiled-rotten player for money who doesn’t care about glory that he was, much less teamwork, and the public knew it and stood behind the coach who was, of course, a foot shorter and about a buck lighter than the player who whined and sued, but rules were rules said the bigshots who ran the NCAA and that coach got banned and did he suffer? No. He didn’t suffer because he had long arms that coach, like my father used to say, meaning he could pull himself up by the bootstraps, which is what he did, with a fire in his eyes and also in his belly and with a ticker that wouldn’t quit either, and he came to that junior high school and coached those poor kids who didn’t even have a scoreboard but cared about glory and teamwork and the other values, and then they won against the kids who did have a scoreboard, but we the Indians do have a scoreboard. A world-class one. And it’s broken. And even though I would’ve, if I ever coached in the NCAA and had a money player who didn’t toe the line or care about glory, I never slapped a player in the NCAA, which I never coached in, it’s true, and so the Indians are suffering for no reason that has to do with me. They’re suffering for a reason that has to do with vandalism and ill will and no intestinal fortitude or honor of any kind on the part of others so now we have to find volunteers to keep score with flipcards, and I’m not trying to be negative. I see the long faces, but you gotta let me finish first. I was only just telling you about the way I was answering that question about surviving with our heads up, which was: No. Today I answer it different. Looking at my players, our players, I got hope and my answer now is: Yes. Maybe we’re not too poor to afford a scoreboard, but two of our starters and one of our benchmen got injured in assaults yesterday, and unless lightning strikes twice in similar locales, which we all know it can’t, Twin Groves’ players have not been assaulted by schoolmates this week, meaning we’ve got a need to show some heart. To climb out from under what’s trying to keep us under it. We got difficulties to overcome, and since the scoreboard’s been destroyed, those difficulties are blessings, and once we overcome them, do you know what it is, because I’m tellin you it’s glory freakin road. FLIPPIN! GLORY! FREAKIN! ROAD!

  We had one knife and ten of Benji’s stolen crack-lighters. He handed them out once the coins were rationed, and I showed the Side of Damage where to sever their bottles. The jetflames were as precise as Benji’d told Pinge—they left all the rims at the severances smooth.

  As the lighters went around, Benji called in the fire in his basement on Jelly’s celly, I called in a gunman at a mall on Jerry Throop’s, and Vincie on his own phone reported a beardo who left a fat suitcase on the Metra tracks. When he hung up, he shook his ammo-packed fist. It jingled and he said, “I don’t get this coin-op bullshit.”

  I’ll explain soon, I said. Why you whispering?

  “It seems like you’re trying to keep everyone in suspense, so I don’t want to blow the suspense.”

  How would you blow the suspense? I said.

  “Because I know what we’re making,” he whispered. “June invented—”

  I forgot, I said.

  “Well so I don’t know what this fucken coin-op bullshit’s all about. Why don’t I get some nibs from my locker?”

  How many do you have?

  “I don’t know—forty? I lost count. My grandparents keep sending them to me. No one ever told them my eye got inked, and their hearts would fucken break if they knew I quit calligraphy.”

  Go, I said, but do it fast—the pep rally ends in twenty-five minutes.

  “What if Floyd’s out there?”

  I said, Take Ronrico to scout for you. He can run distraction if—

  “Distraction’s good,” Vincie said, “but, you know what’s a lot fucken better…”

  I handed him the sap. He wanted to bang fists.

  We banged fists.

  “Ronrico,” said Vincie, “let’s go.”

  “I want to finish making the weapon,” Ronrico said.

  Give me your tit-shaped piece, I said.

  “Tit-shaped! Ha!” Ronrico said. He traded me for the pennygun in my pocket.

  “How do I use it?” he said.

  “I’ll show you on the way,” Vincie told him.

  They grabbed some change and split.

  I called in a hit-and-run. Benji called in a dine-and-ditch.

  As soon as all the widemouths were severed, I demonstrated how to affix the balloons and told the Side of Damage what to understand.

  Understand you hold a gun, I said.

  Then I projected a nickel into a desklamp and the bulb shattered.

  The Side of Damage cheered.

  I projected another one at a coffee carafe, and the carafe shattered.

  They cheered some more.

  Understand you hold a gun, I said, but understand you’re not the only ones. Others in the gym will have them, too. I don’t know how many, and I don’t know most of their names. And since they don’t know all of us and we don’t know all of them, the only way we’ll all be able to identify each other is by our weapons, so be sure to brandish and be sure to watch for brandishers, too: we’re all on the same side. Ask your questions.

  “What makes them on our side?” “What if we don’t like them?” “What if they’re enemies?”

  I said, Even if some of them have been your enemies in the past, the past is over. They’re all loyal to me, and all of us are against the Arrangement.

  That was good enough for most of them, but a few—some of the smartest—were still concerned.

  “Please forgive my interjection, Gurion, but how is it that you know these others are loyal to you if you do not even know their names?” asked Anna Boshka.

  “Gurion knows stuff,” said the Flunky. “He’s the leader.”

  “It’s true,” said the Janitor.

  I said, I was their leader since before I even met any of you, and they’re my brothers, so they’re loyal. Faith in me is the same as faith in them.

  Anna said, “But what if we do not have faith, Gurion?”

  “Jeez, Boshka, don’t be such a downer,” Ch
unkstyle said.

  I said, No, it’s an important question. If you have doubts, then you can’t attack the pep rally with me. And I’m not challenging any of you when I say that. You’re all feeling stronger now, weapons in your hands, and that’s good, that’s why I had you build them, but back in the Cage a lot of you were dying to leave, and any of you who want to leave, any of you who have any doubts—and I don’t mean about will we have victory or won’t we—those doubts are fine, better than fine, they are smart, faithful—I mean about should we have victory or shouldn’t we, are we righteous or aren’t we— you will leave with my blessing. I want you to leave if you have those doubts. And if you leave, you will leave with all your snat, and under my protection. No one will call you a coward or a traitor. You’ll always be, as you have been, on the Side of Damage.

  “What if something happens and we want to leave later?” said Ansul Entsry. “Like after we attack?”

  I said, If you follow me to the gym, you have to follow me til I tell you not to follow me anymore.

  “What about freedom of choice?”

  Nakamook said, “If you get to leave whenever you want, no one’ll know who to rely on.”

  I said, You make your choice here. Walk away now or stay til it’s over.

  “But what if we think we want to attack with you, but then, after we start, it turns out we were wrong and we didn’t really have faith?” Ansul said.

  “You mean like you’re worried you don’t have faith in your ability to know if you have faith right now?” Benji said.

  “Yeah,” said Ansul.

  “Then you’re a fucken pussy and we’re better off without you,” said Benji.

  “But what if—”

  “If you come with, then try to run away in the middle of it, I’ll catch you,” Benji said.