Mr. Okonski drove us home. He let me out first, on Furnace Street. As I was getting out he said, "Rollie. Tomorrow after Mass, come by the house. Dennis is going to go see Hutch Vukovich, and I think he'd like you there."
"I wasn't going to—"
"I didn't ask what you were going to," he said, not unkindly.
My mother was up when I came in. It was a little after five and she had a shift at eleven and should have been sleeping, but she was sitting at the kitchen table in her bathrobe with a cup of coffee and a pad of paper, and I knew before she said anything that somebody had already called her. On our street, news traveled at roughly the speed of sound.
"Mrs. Prochazka," she said, by way of explanation.
I sat down across from her. Fritzie was in the living room watching Punky Brewster with the volume up too loud, and I was grateful for the noise.
"Are you hurt?"
"No."
"Is Dennis?"
"His hand's broken."
She closed her eyes for a second. "Oh, that poor boy. Oh, Hutch Vukovich." She knew. Everybody on our street knew about Hutch Vukovich. It had been the best thing that had happened to any of us in years, a kid from Furnace Street getting a real trade. "What did the Conway boy say to you?"
I did not want to tell her. I told her anyway, all except the part about her shoes, and the part about the lot. She listened with her hands wrapped around the coffee cup.
"He knew you'd been to the lot," I said finally. "He knew about the Dart."
She looked down at the pad of paper. "I went by," she said. "I wanted to see if it really was eight-fifty or if that was just what they put on the glass. Sometimes they come down." She smiled a little, tiredly. "They didn't come down. A very nice young man in a tie explained to me that eight-fifty was a good price for the car. I'm sure it is."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because you'd have washed more cars," she said simply.
There it was. We sat there, both of us, two Haydus who thought a need said out loud got bigger.
"The car wash is done," I said. "Father Lisowski's not going to let us do it anymore. I don't blame him."