Finding Tom Read online

  One of the boys, with short black hair, stood up slowly and spoke. “Well now, tell us your name and what you’ve heard before I have the boys rough you up. Nobody will hear you down here if you yell. Get on with it.”

  I looked around nervously and began to speak as rapidly as possible. “My name is Tom, and I’m a freshman. I’m sorry for listening in on your conversation. I work in the library, so it’s my job to walk the floors. I heard someone mention Secret Sevens, and that perked my interest. I didn’t know who you were. I swear.” At this, the group began to murmur.

  The boy standing spoke up again. “Well it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that we are indeed the Secret Sevens. The problem is, what are we going to do with you now? Obviously, we can’t just let you go. If you told on us, Groves would have our heads.”

  Suddenly, I realized this was my chance. I summoned up all my courage. “Dean Groves is a pathetic old buzzard, pardon my French, and he would be the last person on earth I would tell.” I had their attention now. “I have an idea for your secret ball, but before I tell you, I have one stipulation.”

  “Well, will you listen at this. Now you are making stipulations. How about I promise not to beat the living snot out of you and we consider that a deal? You don’t make requests. Now tell me your idea, or I’ll give you a bloody nose.”

  “No. I want to join the Secret Sevens. That’s my stipulation.”

  They all laughed at me. “If you haven’t done the math yet, there are already seven of us, which means no room for you. You can’t just demand to be in the Secret Sevens. It is an honor that you have to earn.”

  “Then there is no promising that I will keep your identities a secret, I’m afraid. Either you let me join you and help out in making Grove’s life miserable, or I’ll be a constant liability to you.”

  “You little toad.” The standing boy stepped forward and made as if he was going to punch me. I stared at him silently, though my flight instinct screamed for me to make a break for it. Yet I stood my ground. This was my only chance.

  “Go ahead, hit me, you girl.”

  Oh, and did he ever. I thought he broke my nose. I felt my whole head snap back, and blood began to flow like water from a tap, but I continued to stand my ground.

  “Come on. You’ll have to do better than that,” I crooned.

  I could tell he was livid now, and he cocked his arm back to hit me again, but one of the other members grabbed his fist and then turned toward me. “That’s enough. Look, you hockey puck. If you tell anybody about us, I will personally break both of your arms and your legs. Consider this a warning. Now get your carcass out of here.”

  I lurched away holding my nose. Somehow in my mind, I had envisioned things going very differently. I’d imagined them welcoming me into the team with open arms, but everything had gone horribly wrong. I’d blown my shot.

  The next morning I woke up, and my nose was swollen like an over-ripe tomato and hurt like the dickens. Charles took one look at me when I got up and whistled. “Wow, boy, that is a dandy. What happened to you?”

  “Nothing,” I mumbled.

  “Ha, I know nothing, and that ain’t nothing.” Now he was sitting up in his bed looking excited—like a dog expecting to be fed a treat.

  “No, seriously, it’s nothing.” I ducked into the bathroom and stared at myself in the mirror. I looked a wreck. My whole nose was twice its normal size and bruised with deep purples and blues. There would be no avoiding Charles on this one.

  I stepped back out of the bathroom. “Okay, I can see by the look on your face that you are not going to stop bugging me until you get an answer.” He nodded his head vigorously, the persistent devil. “So here you have it. Some guy clocked me in the nose. He was an upperclassman. I guess he didn’t like the way I looked at him or something. You happy?”

  “You must have done more than look at him wrong for him to hit you like that. Yowza! He must have really unloaded. I’m surprised the darn thing isn’t broken. You should go to the infirmary to get checked out. They might have some pain killers or something, because that has to hurt like the dickens.”

  “I don’t need any pain medicine, you pansy. The swelling will go down in a couple of days, and I’ll be fine.” I was glad to have avoided the issue of why exactly I’d been punched. Charles was quickly off at full speed, talking about one time when he clocked some poor fellow. Thankfully, he had the attention span of a child.

  It was two weeks until midterms, so I was glad to hide my disfigured face behind a book in the library and study. When I’d dreamed of college, I’d never envisioned myself sitting alone in the library for hours on end, but I guess all of my other idealized daydreaming refused to face the reality of my naturally solitary character. Since my mother had died, I’d learned to be alone, and though I often envied those who were always out having fun, I was never able to join them. People exhausted me with all of their complexities.

  It was Wednesday, and I was tired of studying—tired of reading long paragraphs for Introduction to British Literature and tired of memorizing body parts for Human Anatomy and equations for Trigonometry. My brain was bursting at the seams, making it impossible for me to cram in any more information. I needed a break from studying, so I moseyed on down to my mailbox. There was always the hope that Father might write, but thus far, he had completely failed me.

  CHAPTER 11

  Changes

  THERE WAS A SMALL, FOLDED note in my box. It read:

  Meet us at the place tonight at 10:30. You know where. Come alone.

  Secret Sevens

  My heart jumped. What did they want with me? I checked my watch. It was only 7:00 p.m. Those next three and a half hours dragged on slower than a church service in the middle of July with a long-winded preacher. I could not study because of my nerves, so I paced around the grounds, wondering if I was going to get good news or have my arms and legs snapped off like frozen icicles.

  At 10:25, I descended the steel stairs into the dark cool of the basement. Making my way between the rows, I wound around to the distant back corner where I had come across the Secret Sevens before. All was still and eerily silent as I stepped into the last row of books. There they sat cross-legged, silently staring at me. “Have a seat,” said a boy with short black hair. As I did, I noticed the blood stains on the carpet from my last encounter with this group. I lowered myself onto the floor and waited for someone to speak. A minute or two of silence ticked by. They must be messing with me.

  “Hello, Tom,” said another unfamiliar boy. “So glad that you could make it this evening.” I could feel the sweat running down my back as I waited for his next words, which I knew would define my fate. “Since our last unfortunate meeting, we have met as a group to decide exactly what to do with you, and after much discussion, we have come to a conclusion. Seeing that Dr. Groves has yet to approach any of us, it seems that you are not one of his spies, which bodes well for you. Because we find ourselves in a very unique situation, we have decided to do something that has only ever been done in desperate occasions by the Secret Sevens. Tom, we would like to invite you to join the Secret Sevens as an honorary member until a legitimate spot opens up for you in the future. Now you will be held to all the same expectations as the rest of us, should you choose to accept. What do you say?”

  I took a deep breath and wanted to pinch myself to see if this was really happening. “I would be honored to accept your invitation.”

  “In that case … congratulations!” There were a few moments of chaos as they all stood up and thumped me on the back while they introduced themselves. I felt like I was in a dream. Here I was, tucked away in the far corner of a giant library in the heart of one of the oldest and most lavish universities in the world, being inducted into a legendary secret society. It was difficult to believe.

  Patrick, the boy with the short black hair, took charge. “Now, Tom, you must know that there will be other necessary rituals for you to go through before you can become a full-
fledged member, but traditionally those are done together by the incoming recruits to build a sense of camaraderie among the next group of Secret Sevens. We have decided to hold off on your full initiation until recruitment begins. For now, let’s celebrate with a drink. Oh, and welcome to the family.” He grinned.

  A large bottle of whiskey appeared and was passed around the group in ceremonious fashion. I took my swig and felt it burn all the way down the back of my throat. This was a beautiful moment. Patrick quickly restored order, and business began. It was clear he was the leader. “Gentlemen,” he called out, “we still seem to be stumped on how we can pull off the secret dance. Any new ideas?” There was a round of mumbling and few sporadic thoughts, but it was clear they were grasping at straws. I decided to toss my hat into the ring.

  I spoke up and said, “I have an idea. I think we should have the party right here in the basement. Nobody ever comes down here, and after 9:00 p.m., the library is run by students who close up at 11:00 p.m. I have a key and could let people in. I know first hand that I am the only person who actually walks all three floors while on duty. The only people we’d have to watch out for while moving things around would be couples coming down here to neck, but they don’t tend to come this far back. I guess they can’t wait that long to start their business.”

  They all looked at me, nodding their heads. Patrick spoke up. “A great idea, Tom! I don’t know why we didn’t think of it. We can move some of these shelves around and make our own dance hall. Brilliant! Now the only problem is that the main entrance to the library is so central and well lit. If we have half the campus coming into the building, they will be sure to raise suspicion, not to mention the fact that there will be women on campus after hours.”

  The large boy who had originally found me eavesdropping, Evan, piped up. “There’s a small back entrance in the rear of the building we could use. We can put out one or two of the lights in that area, and no one will suspect anything.” There was more nodding of heads.

  I could tell that Patrick was excited. “Well, gentlemen, we might just pull this thing off after all! We’ll need to set a date and spread the word carefully.”

  I lay in bed wide-awake that night, feeling a near kinetic energy coursing through my veins. It was more addictive than the buzz of a cigarette. Eventually, I drifted off to sleep with Patrick’s words still ringing in my ears. “Welcome to the family.”

  Time went by like a blur. I was still on my high, but I quickly realized the inevitable frustration of being a member of the Secret Sevens. It was spelled out in the name. The group was secret. Because I did not know any of the other boys outside of our group, I had to act as if nothing had changed. No one could know my affiliation, especially not Charles. While the group was not overly suspicious, they wanted to take absolute precautions because of Charles’ family history. Here I had this whole world that I had to keep completely to myself. While doing my everyday activities, life carried on as normal. I studied, worked, and generally kept to myself, but in my mind, I was constantly planning and scheming. I managed to pass all of my midterms, but I did not do nearly as well as I had anticipated. I simply did not have the stamina or the necessary focus to study. Years of poor study habits slowly overcame my prior zeal to excel academically. I felt guilty about this, but the guilt was pushed aside for the time being by my excitement of being involved with the Secret Sevens.

  The more I observed him, the more Dr. Groves become the focal point of my hatred for the snobbish elitism I faced every day at Locklear. Each time I saw his greasy figure lurking about, I could feel the hair on the back of my neck rise. I despised the man to a point that was surely unjustified. The incessant writhing and wriggling of his long, bony fingers and his yellow eerie gaze reminded me of a slippery eel. In my imagination, he morphed into a twisted villainous character. Soon I had blurred the line between what was real and what was false so much that there was no turning back. The debased mind tends toward darkness, seeking out the bad and the ugly within people, and so my mind led me down such a path in its depiction of Dr. Groves. As a result, I grew an even greater desire to make his life miserable through my allegiance with the Secret Sevens. I saw our pranks as a deliberate and deserved attack not just on Dr. Groves but also on all the persnickety pompous buzzards like him. I felt no sorrow or remorse for the man, only hatred.

  My writings became wickedly dark as I found myself to be an embittered outsider standing always on the fringe of this frivolous society of social elites. My hatred for them was only magnified by my inner conflict in which I wavered back and forth between wanting to be one of them and loathing them. I dared not share my wrestlings with Dr. Emory for fear of what he would say. Even he, who did not care for Dr. Groves or the blatant snobbery, would see that I had crossed boundaries that should not be crossed.

  I wrote other prose and the occasional poem for Dr. Emory, but they were fake and feeble: Just a shadow of the true me. Dr. Emory picked up on this and probed to see why, but I could not divulge my secret. All writers go through seasons where they lose their voice. Graciously, he must have thought that I was in such a place, and he gave me my space to emerge from my writer’s slump. Little did he realize that I had, in fact, discovered my voice, but it was not a voice that could be shared with the world. Having tapped into my own pain and darkness, I found within me a voice that I had not previously known, a voice whose words sometimes scared even me.

  During that time, I found myself in a place of immense confusion. Mixed in with my anger and bitterness was the strange feeling of acceptance and belonging as a part of the Secret Sevens. For the first time since the death of my mother, I was a part of something. The loneliness that had long been my companion began to fade ever so slightly. But these new and blessed feelings were intertwined with my growing recognition of the darkness residing within me. It was as if my soul, in its desire to maintain equilibrium, pushed outward toward both good and evil. These two worlds battled within me and were only complicated by my experiences at chapel, where I sought refuge from myself.

  I began attending chapel regularly as an act of penance for my growing sense of wickedness. I was unable to detach myself from the abundance of sermons I’d heard growing up about the wrath of God against sinners. Somewhere inside, there was also the thread of hope that God would speak and reveal himself, but the thread was unraveling quickly. I would go early and slip into one of the back pews. Each week I watched as fewer and fewer students came until the cathedral was nearly barren. A small group of mostly gray-haired women sat in the first few rows every Sunday without fail. They were the faithful, the remnant, while the rest of us were just passing through.

  I loved the feeling of that place. I breathed in the rich smell of scented candles that hung in the air. The marble floors were polished and slippery beneath my feet, and the wooden pews were well worn and smooth from the touch of hands across the years. While the rest of Locklear felt like a monument to the greatness of man with its grotesque lavishness and unbridled consumption, here man found his rightful place. Here man was once again but dust of the earth. Here man was the created, not the creator. This sense of smallness resonated with my soul. I understood the feeling of powerlessness. I did not believe in God made flesh. I could not believe in a personal God who cared about the affairs of man. I knew only the vast otherness of God. I knew a God of distance who was untouchable. I had moved past the idea of God being cruel. No, God was merely guilty of divine negligence, I decided. God did not care one way or another what happened to us. But still I came to squelch the fear of hell branded forever on my soul and try to believe that God could be more than silent and angry.

  Pastor Paul officiated the service each week. He was different from my old minister in every way, and it seems that the God they served was equally different. Paul was middle-aged and balding with broad shoulders. He bore the look of a man accustomed to a hard work. His eyes were filled with compassion, and it was not unusual for him to be moved to tears while he taug
ht. It was clear that he believed with all his soul the words he preached and prayed. I found myself enraptured by his robust passion. I was captivated by him, but in spite of all that, I could not believe as he did. Even if I wanted to believe and return to the days of my early childhood when I saw God everywhere and heard him whisper across the meadow on the winds, I could not. The winds were silent, and God had disappeared like a thief into the night. Oh, there is no doubt that I wanted to believe, but I no longer knew how. I had lost my way. The God I once knew was dead—just like my mother. Silent. Cold. Gone. All that remained was ritual.

  CHAPTER 12

  Lord of the Dance

  THE EVENING OF THE SECRET dance was upon us. Of course, news had quickly spread across campus, and no doubt the vast majority of the student population knew about the event, courtesy of a few well-placed notes and the innate human instinct to gossip. With juicy news like this, everybody wanted to know what was going on. They loved the fact that the dance smacked of rebellion against the intolerable dean, but even more than that was the women. For one sweet night, the forbidden feminine fruit would be within our reach to touch and perhaps taste. The thought of soft skin and rosy lips and twinkling eyes made my head spin. We would dance with the forbidden fruit until we could take no more. Everyone knew that it was a Secret Sevens event, and rumor had it that this was going to be the event of the year. Nothing like a little hype! The previous night, we had been up into the wee hours of the morning, moving shelves and decorating. We covered the whole place with 7s of all different shapes and colors. We hooked up long ropes of power cord to encircle the room with lights looping and hanging all over the place. Finally, droopy-eyed and covered in dust, we let ourselves out of the library just as daylight was beginning to break.

  The event started at 11:00 p.m. At 10:30, I unlocked the back door, returned directly to my post, and carried on with my nightly routine as usual. I heard the clock strike eleven o’clock as I walked out the front doors. Let the fun begin. After stopping by my room to shower and change, I approached the library again. I smiled at the unusually high number of people out for this time of evening, dressed in the most fashionable attire. Lights still on in a few professors’ windows made me nervous; hopefully, they would carry on with their boring research and not notice the activity going on right outside their windows. It was nearly midnight as I slipped in the back door and down the spiraling staircase. Everything was pitch black, save for a few appointed people with flashlights to show the way. The basement was a different story. Below ground and with no windows, it was the perfect location. The room was lit up like a carnival. Big band music filled the air, originating from a large Victrola that trumpeted at full volume in the corner. But not a sound or shred of light could be detected from outside.