"Tech School"

Like a well-meaning cow bothered by a circling pack of dogs-- yes, in that sun-faded desolation of cracked asphalt, the roar of engines, "Cheech n' Chong" antics, and high, gated fences-- Bobby does not look at his days training to be an aircraft mechanic with fondness.

Certainly, no-- juvenile delinquents clanging on engines and sitting in class with the potent, hairy stench of pot rising up in the air like the bad seed of cheap weed, flipping switch-blades through the air so that it would stick down in the table with a "POING!".

Perhaps Bobby merely exaggerates when he says they poisoned his sandwich, or put dishwashing detergent in the drinking fountain, or that a fed-up Chinese ex-soldier tore out the heart of one of the fuckers. . . . . But he tells this one story about the helicopter, how one night he and the delinquents threw a blanket over the barbed wire and jumped the fence.

Moving stealthily like commandos, they loaded up into the military-issue Cobra left over from Vietnam and thought it was something, raising their arms in the air and hooting like young bull-moose. Then one of them had the bright idea of jiggering with the controls to see if he could turn it on "for the fuck of it". And wouldn't you know, the keys were in the ignition. . . . .

One thing lead to another as the rotary blades began to turn.

They were so high on drugs and full of bad judgment, they wanted to fly it under "The Arch" and touch down in Sauget, Illinois to buy liquor and pick up prostitutes. But what they didn't count on was the length of chain holding it to earth and the helicopter began to swing around circles like an angry hornet kicking up dust.

It seemed as if the blades would shake off, until Hayes took the controls and had the bright idea of landing it on the roof of the retarded children's school sitting next door like a dingy shoe box. They touched down, and jumped ship like rats. And then the roof collapsed. . . . . spilling the helicopter down into the cafeteria with a rain of abestos.

They got in their cars and and squealed the tires like tomb robbers, swearing each other to secrecy and coming up with air-tight alibis that they were sipping lemonade and singing church songs.

Bobby still has the newspaper clipping. . . . .