Walter and Wally

Written for "The Writer's Cramp"   by Sophy .
Prompt: During a walk around the neighborhood you run into a childhood friend.


Pain shot through Walter’s chest – his arm went numb, his head went fuzzy, and suddenly he was sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk listening to the birds sing and the kids laugh and the car engines roar in the street and it was the summer of 1949. He remembered that summer. He remembered the heat and the hooligans and the -- he had spent a long, long time trying to forget that summer.

Walter was 67 years old. He was retired and had a good pension funding his post-employment shenanigans. He’d built a house on the lake before retiring that was nearly paid off and Loretta had talked him into investing in a timeshare in the Keys. He was going to travel to Italy in two years and he was thinking about taking his grandson to Ireland the year after that. He and Loretta would watch their grandchildren grow up, graduate, get married. He’d grow old on the lake or near the ocean and take care of his wife and be happy. Retirement was going to be grand, spectacular, harmonious.

Except his heart was giving out.

His family had a history of heart problems. He’d lost a father and an uncle to massive heart attacks and the doctor had been saying for years that it was a strong possibility he may one day meet the same fate unless he ate better and took pills and kept fit. One out of three ain’t bad. Pills he can handle. Cheeseburgers are his favorite meal and he replaced his morning jogs with afternoon naps six years ago when he had knee surgery.

A boy was sitting across from him and it took him a while to realize he knew the child. Wally. A freckle-faced, gawky looking kid with skinned knees and band-aids on his fingers. He had a goofy look like parts of his body were growing faster than the rest. He was sitting cross-legged in front of Walter, mimicking the older man’s moves, waiting for a response.

“What do you want?” Walter snapped, putting his chin in his hands and staring at the boy.

The boy, Wally, sat quiet for a moment before answering. “Your skin is wrinkly.”

Walter snorted. “Your nose is snotty.”

“You have hair in your ears.”

“You have the grand canyon between your teeth.”

Wally perked up. “My dad took me there once! We rode on donkeys.”

“I know.”

“I caught a toad and I dared Billy Gus to lick it and now he has warts on his mouth.”

Walter chuckled. “That’s acne, kid. Billy Gus’s balls dropped early. He got his first gray hair when he was seventeen.”

“You said balls.”

“Yes I did.”

Walter looked across the street. A penny-candy store with gold lettering on its windows was bustling with customers. Mostly kids, teenagers. The candy man liked to put chocolate flakes on his root beer floats, so it was a favorite treat and even attracted kids from two towns over. The store had gone out of business when Walter left for college. He’d come back the summer before his senior year, craving root beer, but a clothing department store had bought out the building a few months prior. Kids grew up, he supposed.

“I shared half of my licorice with Betty Singleton and she let me look under her skirt.”

Walter laughed outright, running a weary hand over his face. “Betty Singleton.” He remembered her. Blonde hair, red ribbons, first girl he’d ever declared cootie free. She’d moved away before high school, and by that time, there were other girls that would do a lot more than just let him look under their skirts. “She lets you kiss her in the fourth grade.”

“Really?” Wally grinned so big his bright white teeth flashed like twinkling stars. Walter laughed at the excitement. “Wait ‘til I tell Tucker!”

Walter’s face fell. He looked away from Wally, sighing heavily. “Tucker dies this summer.”

“What?” Wally’s face was still smiling, thinking it a joke. When Walter doesn’t smile or laugh or wink, the boy’s face falls too, matching the sad, teary eyed look on the elder’s face. “Tucker can’t die.”

“Hate to break it to you kid, but he can and he does. You’re brother’s not the invincible super hero you think he is.”

“How does he die?” Wally asks, his voice cracking.

“He drowns. In the quarry. You dare him to jump off the ledge and he jumps and he cracks his head open on a rock and you’re there and you watch him thrash and bleed and float and you run to get help but you’re not fast enough and he dies.”

Wally is quiet before he wipes his runny nose on the sleeve of his shirt. “That’s awful.”

Walter nods. “Yeah.”

“So I kill him?”

Walter sighs. “You think so for a long time. But you’re just a kid. You were just doing what kids do. Nobody blames you but yourself.”

“Do you blame me?”

“Not anymore.”

The two sit quietly for a long while, lost in their thoughts, picking mud and gum and god knows what else off the bottoms of their shoes. Wally finally looks up. “Are you dying?”

“I think so.”

“Are you scared?”

“A little.”

“Do you think Tucker will be scared?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t want to die.”

“Neither do I.”

Walter looks to the road again. The candy store is gone. The building is different, changed, grown into a shopping strip. The world seems darker.

Wally is crying.

“You live a good, long life.”

He goes to sleep on the sidewalk and wakes up hours later in a semi-comfortable bed. The lights are dim and there’s an annoying beeping, but he’s breathing and thinking and he’s alive. Someone squeezes his hand.

“Dad?” Walter turns and looks at his eldest son. He smiles. “Oh thank god. You had a heart attack while you were out on your walk. You really scared us.”

“It’s alright, Tucker, I’m not done yet.”


Word Count: 996