Brass Monkey

I’m going to tell you about the brass monkey. But first, let me tell you about my two childhood buddies, Tommy Boyd, TB, and Clancy Smith. Dad had taken up a new position as foreman with a nearby construction company and TB and Clancy were the first guys I met in Rainbow Falls when we moved into the old brownstone house.

They had a strange kind of friendship.

Apparently it all started in Junior High; TB had done Clancy a favour by beating up an older kid caught trying to pinch Clancy’s lunch money. TB was like that; he hated unfairness. But then Clancy kind of stuck to him, like chewing gum to the sole of your best trainers.

It got so that he wouldn’t leave TB alone. To start with it must have been flattering; your own go-fer stoke alibi, excellent for when you get caught screwing around. TB did a lot of that back then from practical jokes and revenge raids on rivals to punching out guys he felt had somehow dissed him.

If that makes him sound like a bit of an arsehole, he was. Also kind and sympathetic when you least expected. When my dad died of a heart attack at work TB came around to our house to spend the next day with me. He didn’t try to say smart things; just sat and listened to me talk about Dad then put his arm around me when I began to cry. No other kid I knew would have done that.

He had a pretty dry wit too; cruel and mocking but accurate to a tee. You couldn’t help laughing, complicit in his disdain of the folk who lived in our dull little town. Poor Clancy never got the joke of course, always a few beats behind not sure whether to smile or frown and usually doing both. Only the soft blue eyes registered hurt at our casual dismissal of him.

He showed me his report card once: ‘Clancy is slow at Math, has poor concentration skills and is easily distracted.’ He didn’t seem particularly upset by it.

But the faithful dog act began to drag on TB. Although we all had part-time jobs my best friend became even more outrageous, gaining a gang of like-minded lunatics who egged him on to new mayhem. I was left on the fringes now. While mom made me study even harder after dad passed, TB started to let things slide. His parents argued a lot and didn’t seem to notice. When they started up we’d sneak out the back door. He said he hated them for what they did to each other but it seemed to bring out the devil in him. That’s when he began to scare me.

And then there was the night of the Brass Monkey. Thought I’d forgotten? I can never do that.

It was hot and sticky with not a breath of breeze. A big old blood moon hung high over Rainbow Springs, bathing the town in its crimson glow.

There were just the three of us again; it was summer holidays and the rest were away on family camping trips doing all that bonding shit. We were too poor and TB’s parents obviously couldn’t stick the thought of being with each other. I don’t think it even occurred to Clancy’s.

We hadn’t seen him much lately. He’d seemed down with a kind of heaviness to him, as if he’d finally accepted some things were never going to change.

“Come on, we’re going to do something.” I asked TB what. “You’ll see; you’re going to stand watch.” I didn’t like the sound of that and said I’d better be getting back. “There’s no homework shit tonight man. It’ll be just like old times…” He looked over at Clancy. “You too buddy.”

Clancy’s face lit up and the dourness vanished. It was both sad and strangely moving.

We biked over to the old quarry road. There was a bunch of houses strung out along it, the last half hidden by over-hanging branches and cordoned off by a crumbling picket fence. I knew who lived there; a reclusive Vietnam Vet named Jack Peters. Sergeant Jack Peters.

“What are we doing here?” I asked.

TB pulled something out of his bike saddlebag. A smooth round metal object gleamed in the red-hued moonlight; it looked like a monkey covering its eyes. “Got it in the store; plastic but I painted it up so he wouldn’t notice.” I suddenly remembered TB’s sacking from his pizza delivery job for attempted theft. Jack had been the complainant. As if to confirm my worst suspicions TB continued excitedly, “It’s exactly the same size; a little swap’s in order, don’t you think?”

“Why the hell bother?” I tried to sound reasonable but my voice betrayed my uneasiness. I didn’t want to get involved in his idiotic crap now with college coming up.

“I’ll do it TB!” Clancy chimed up.

“You’ll screw it up.” TB replied.

“I won’t, honest!” Clancy beseeched.

He took his time as if considering all the angles. “Okay then, he leaves the side door open when he goes to play cards with the oldsters in town. I checked out the time it takes. His car’s already gone so now’s our chance.” I gave TB a sidelong frown. He’d obsessed this dumb operation like some kind of military raid but had still wanted me to witness it. Now he was letting Clancy have his big moment. It was pathetic but also, I could see, a big deal for him. “You go into the front room,” TB continued, “there’s a big glass case by the TV full of medals and guns and shit from his old ‘Nam days; the three little buggers are in there too. Do the swap then get out fast. It’s easy, Clancy.”

“I’ll get out fast.” Then, as if TB had done him some humongous favour, “Thanks TB!”

I opened my mouth to speak but he’d already gone, running hunched up across the ground like a commando. The screen door whined open and slammed shut. The curtains lit up for a moment then went dark again.

TB groaned “Christ!” Minutes went by. “What the fuck’s he doing?” I shook my head although he couldn’t see me.

Suddenly the night was split with headlights. A boom of eight-track cut off as Jack’s Pontiac slithered to a halt. Angry and pissed he climbed clumsily out and ran to the side door, wrenched it open and disappeared. There came the sounds of crazy shouting and furniture being upturned then the front door burst open and Clancy tore out. He’d got no further than the porch steps when there came a loud bang from behind. His chest exploded and he slumped to the ground.

I turned to run but TB stood frozen to he spot with an expression halfway between excitement and terror. I grabbed his arm then we were both stumbling blindly through the undergrowth. When we got back I told my parents one story he, probably, another. We never met to match them up and the local sheriff never asked us. I later learnt Jack had been released when no charges were brought. He said he didn’t know of Clancy and the boy had been pointing one of his guns at him; all you needed in those days.

A month later I was leaving for college and went to say goodbye to TB. He was sitting hunched up on his bed gripping something in his right hand. He looked up and opened it; the monkey sat in his palm, long fingers covering its eyes as if it couldn’t bear to see. I picked it up; it was the real brass one, not the plastic fake. TB’s eyes were red-rimmed, like he’d been crying.

“He keeps trying to give it to me.”

“Who?” I asked.

“Clancy.” He shook his head, as if trying to shrug off something that wouldn’t let him go. “I keep throwing it away, but it keeps coming back.” He looked up at me again, looked through me. “He’s never going to leave me now, is he?”

Ten years later, on the anniversary of that terrible night, my friend Tommy Boyd was killed whilst robbing a liquor store. They told him to put the gun down but he opened fire instead. They said he wanted to die, what they called ‘death by cop’.

When the police searched his body they found a small brass monkey in his jacket pocket.