Nuclear Family

Sometime in the late 60's, Moscow, Idaho

Laurie Crump dropped the phone receiver onto the hard wood floor of her petite, neat bedroom. Dark brown, curly wet hair clung to her neck and ears. Joplin screamed for someone to take another piece of her heart, and nothing mattered to her anymore except her anger. She fancied herself a fourteen year old, liberated women, going to college and perhaps making it to Woodstock. Her recent ex-boyfriend babbled on the other end of the phone. As small as Moscow, Idaho was, he may as well have been only downstairs in her house. She picked up the receiver and listened breathlessly for him to finally figure out that she couldn't go on living out a life of dreams. She needed reality. She needed sex and reality, and Kelley wasn't ready for either of those.

"Laurie, please,"Kelley said. The world had crashed around him only a few minutes ago and the shock was just beginning to wear off. "Is it someone else, is that it?""Hell if it is, Kell, you just don't do anything for me,"Laurie retorted. Although she loved Kelley with all her fourteen year old heart, she could only think of hurting him now for no other reason than not knowing another way to handle it.

Kelley winced somewhere in Moscow, holding back tears. "You .."he choked, "we've been going steady now for five weeks.""Four,"Laurie corrected with a hiss in her voice.

Kelley waited and several minutes passed. He didn't know what to say and Laurie wasn't helping by even cussing at him. Eventually he asked, "why now? School is out for summer, we could work it out."Laurie looked out her window, through the apple tree branch dangling outside her window, the same Kelley had stolen up several nights before. Her parents had been away and she had made the decision already that night would be the night she would have sex with Kelley. He was alright looking and ripe with hormones. However, Kelley hadn't brought the condoms, but one of his new comic books. "You are still a boy, Kelley, just a little boy." She hung up the phone, satisfied that Kelley wouldn't ever talk with her again.

Kelley listened to the disconnected buzz. He needed her voice. He didn't care what she said, he only needed to hear the sound of her song so his heart would stop its angry howling. Looking through the pane of glass revealing the entrance to the Palouse Empire shopping plaza, he inhaled deeply and took a bold step backwards into the hot, dry wind.

"Kelley!" A squeaky voice wailed.

Kelley emerged from his doldrums in time to see Jessie, his best friend, running straight at him. "Thank you, God,"Kelley said. He didn't question how Jessie knew he was feeling rotten, just that he needed a friend. "Jessie, you wouldn't believe what Laurie .."but Jessie broke him off, running straight past him.

"Get 'em off me,"Jessie cried with the whine of a baby.

Kelley could see large welts around Jessie's face beginning to form. Four teammates of Moscow High's varsity pig skin team screamed for Jessie's blood. Kelley immediately recognized Pete, his older brother's friend. "Hey, Pete, what's .."again he was cut off.

"Shut up, wimp,"Pete said coldly. He pushed Kelley out of the way, concentrating on Jessie, his prey.

Kelley watched pitifully, with hidden remorse and sympathy, as Pete and the other three pig skinners caught up with Jessie and gave him three lessons why he shouldn't run from them. A black eye, a bloody nose and a fat lip. Kelley felt powerless to intervene.

Jessie sat in the middle of the parking lot. Pain shot through his entire head and chest. Through his good eye he could see Kelley looking at him. His very best friend hadn't stopped them. He couldn't remember that Kelley was just as much of a coward as he was, and that he was significantly weaker than himself. But friends were supposed to stand up to one another. Protect each other.

Later that Friday evening, Jessie nursed his wounds, Kelley reading him the latest adventures from Marvel. Jessie managed to bravely hold back his tears for four hours, but could no longer resist.

Kelley looked up into his friend's sobs. "Hey, Jess, you know, next year they'll graduate."Jessie grimaced, "And go to UI right down the street, or WSU, only eight miles from here. It ain't going to change, Kell, and I'm sick and tired of it, you know?"Kelley did his best to offer a consoling smile, "we could always ask Otis for some help.""What would that fat lard ass know about fighting?" Jessie reached for the Marvel, a new Spiderman double with a secret DC guest star. He knew it would either be Batman or Superman, DC's only decent comic stars, but felt a bit strange when he saw it was the new one, Iron Man. Marvel had broken the mold with Tony Stark. Bruce Wayne was good to go since radiation didn't exist in the thirties. But since Einstein and Oppenheimer invented radiation in the forties, every decent superstar was radioactive.

"He's big and can be mean when he wants,"Kelley offered. He pinched a zit on his forehead, wiping the white, juicy pellet on the side of Jessie's bed when he looked at the comic.

Jessie sighed, feeling his head swell with fiery pain. "Can you believe they put Iron Man in with Spiderman?"Kelley watched Jessie, feeling sorry for the pain the older teens had inflicted. "Who else could it be? Superman is too big league for Spiderman, and Batman only leaves Gotham when someone he knows is in trouble. DC has Iron Man all made over and just wants to show him off, that's all.""Hey, Kell, is Ray and Kathy still coming over? Ray is 'sposed to be off work and he said he was going to get a new Strange Tales, and Kathy was going to bring over the new Joplin record."Kelley bit his lip. He still remembered Joplin blaring in the background when he had called Laurie. "Hey, Jess?"

"Yeah?""Look man, I'm sorry about today. You know, about helping out."Jessie closed the comic book though still pretended to read it. "It's okay,"he said softly.

Kelley licked his lips, "No man, I mean it. Laurie dumped me, that was why I was on the phone. I didn't even know what was going on and all, then you were just sitting there." He didn't mention that it sure looked like Jessie was crying.

Jessie's heart fluttered for a moment. "Hey Kell, and I'm sorry too for calling you a no good, low down, dirty rotten fink."Kelley immediately shut his mouth, not aware it had been slack. "You never called me that.""I didn't want you to pound me too, so just said it so you couldn't hear it."The two talked for several more hours about the exactitudes of radioactive strength over honed, though still human, strength. They decided that it was still rather cornball that everyone who was exposed to radiation always lived and walked away a power stronger than a normal person. At eight, Ray showed up with his twin sister, Kathy.

Ray popped his head into Jessie's room. He set down his Bookworld bag and Exxon uniform. "Hey Jess, Kell." He looked directly at Jessie, "Jesus, Jess, you fall or something?"Jessie laughed cynically. "I guess if I fell onto Pete's fist, yeah, I fell alright. About twenty times."Kelley leaned forward and looked past Ray. "Say, Ray, where's Kathy? She get the record?" He had a secret crush on Kathy that he cherished as special fantasy. Special in the sense that no one else knew or would know. Kathy was very pretty, but a bit kooky. She had a two hundred I.Q. as sure as she had a five hundred strangeness quotient. The fact that she was quite strange and therefore without a boyfriend made Kelley's fantasy all the more vivid, considering that she was, as some would say, available. He almost fooled himself into forgetting about Laurie.

Ray's face turned slightly red though kept its usual, genuinely determined look. "She'll be along. She's been acting really kooky all day."Jess snickered, "Ray, she's always kooky."Ray shook his head, "no man, I mean if every other day she acts normal, she is acting really kooky today."Both Jessie and Kelley realized what Ray meant when Kathy poked her head through the door. Ray was telling Jessie and Kelley about how the college students got his job and Leroy, his boss, said he had to 'let you go, son,' and how sorry he was. When Kathy entered, though, she surprised Jessie and Kelley by not only acting kooky, but acting more like a girl than they had ever known her to act. She was quiet at first and smiled shyly, though her eyes somehow didn't smile when she did. They always looked out the window into the darkness, as if she was ready to cry.

"Hey, talk about having lousy days,"Ray said, trying to cheer the others up, following the axiom that misery loves company. "Brian was cut from the team."Everyone dropped their jaws into the comics they were reading, even Kathy. Jessie thought Kathy must like Brian, she always acted like a flake around him.

"Why?"Kelley finally asked when no one else said anything.

"Why do you think, stupid,"Ray said miserably.

Kathy rubbed the back of her hand, "you mean cause he ain't white?"

"Being white has nothing to do with it, sis. It's because he ain't anything else but black."Everyone was quiet, marvelling how racism could possibly strike in such a small town and especially on someone that they knew and were friends with.

"And get this,"Ray went on, even though no one else was finished marvelling.

"They ain't sending Otis."Immediately, everyone knew what Ray was talking about. Otis had turned eighteen last May and could talk about nothing else than going over to 'Nam and becoming a United States Marine.

"They're drafting everyone else,"Kathy piped in. She had always fancied Otis as someone who would go over and finally lose all the extra weight he could never lose.

"He's got flat feet. Can you dig that? Flat feet and he can't go." Ray rolled his head and his eyes quickly followed.

Kelley shook his head in dismay. "Tough brake for Otis. Man, his old man will kill him before any Red will."Kathy sat down on the floor Indian style, pulling a record jacket from her knapsack. She looked over the glossy finish with some amusement, with Kelley peering down at it interested.

"I thought you were getting Joplin,"Kelley said without much interest. He secretly didn't want to listen to Joplin and was glad the sleeve didn't resemble anything good old Janis would do. Rather, it was a strange, odd design.

"Well, I didn't,"Kathy snapped.

"Hey, sis, take a chill pill, huh?" Ray flipped through his new Strange Tales and then became curious himself.

"What did you get, anyway? No Brit music, right? Dad would kill you."Jessie couldn't be sure what Kathy said, exactly, but the venom in her voice and his blood pouring out of his face, the prayer that his parents didn't hear her, told him that it wasn't good.

Kelley shut away the evil of Kathy's words by closing his eyes, and Ray stared slack jawed at her. It was only after Kathy said the 'F' word again - a second time! - that Ray threw his comic at her.

"Jesus, Kathy, shut up already, okay? Jessie's been beat on enough without having his folks pounding on him for cussing." Ray shook his head slightly. He understood why his sister used that kind of language sometimes, usually when she was really hurting like she was then. Since their mother had died, his father had been doing things at night to her - she would cry until morning when he did - and not even Principal Sterling would believe him when he told him. He even got a week of detention for trying to help Kathy because Sterling told him nobody liked a fink, especially since he was finking on his own old man. But he knew his sister and she wouldn't dare swear, especially not the 'F' word - ever - unless it was really bad.

"What'd you get,"Ray finally asked, knowing it was probably some Brit band she got just to spite her old man. Neither Kelley nor Jessie seemed capable of saying anything. Jessie had jumped up and was pressing his ear to the wall to check and see if his parents were coming.

"A new group,"Kathy said quietly, swallowing. She didn't think anything about her language, but the minor rebellion with the record would only antagonize her father if he saw it. "It's called Piper at the Gates of Dawn."The four teens spent the next few hours listening to Kathy's record. Ray didn't particularly care for it, neither did Jessie, but Kelley actually liked Syd Barrett's - the lead singer - voice and the songs were pretty hip, albeit strange.

"Hey,"Kathy said when Lucifer Sam, the second song, was over. Her awful cussing had been forgotten, though her silence throughout the evening had made Jessie and Kelley curious, if not a bit nervous. "If you were ever caught in a nuclear blast, what kind of hero do you think you would be?"Ray shrugged, "that's kind of a stupid question, Kathy. Everyone knows that you'd be like the Incredible Hulk."Kelley shook his head, "Spiderman was bit by a radioactive spider, though."Ray nodded, "Yeah, but he wasn't blown up in a mushroom cloud though like Banner."Jessie pointed at his Spiderman, "Sandman was, but he was made into sand."Kathy and Kelley both nodded. "Yeah, and Superman is radioactive,"Kelley said. "They said it is just a different sun, but everyone knows that because it takes millions of years for light to reach earth, then if radiation was made here, it would have shown up out in space a million years ago. It's scientificable, even"Ray thought that sounded pretty plausible so nodded. "What would you be, sis?" He was glad that Kathy wasn't acting quite as kooky anymore, and seemed to be getting over her fit of hysteria.

"And the Fantastic Four,"Jessie chimed in.

Everyone nodded.

"Maybe like Invisible girl, or she-hulk. It's not like I'd get to choose or nothing. But if I could, I guess Invisible girl."Kelley thought for a long time. "Chronos.""Who the hell is that, Kell?" Jessie readied himself to check his comic collection.

"You know, time and all, I could travel in time.""I'd be Dr. Platinum. I'd be covered in metal and be able to make all these different weapons and gadgets.""Like Batman with armor?" Kelley asked.

"Sorta, but a super strong Batman that had incredibly advanced gadgets. Heck, Chronos over there could just go into the future and get the gadgets for me, I'd only need to be covered in metal and be super strong. What about you, Jessie?"Jessie shrugged, touching his bruised forehead. "Sounds like Dr. Doom, Ray." He waited for Ray to stop shrugging. "I don't think it would take a whole lot, really. I just want to be able to make friends out of everyone who wants to beat me up. Pheromone Man!" he laughed, though nobody seemed to get it. He had just learned about pheromone in biology, and no one else would take biology until next term.

"Christ, Jessie,"Ray said astounded, "that would take a full mushroom cloud and then some for that kind of power. That isn't just mind control, that is like changing the way they think and all forever."

"You think?" Jessie asked, not quite sure.

Kathy nodded in agreement. "Yeah, maybe even like Hiroshima.""Couldn't be that, Kathy,"Kelley said "They only put all the bad radiation in those bombs. But when they test them, they have to use the pure stuff so no one gets sick. It's scientificable, even. Why else would Einstein, the world's smartest man, show them how to do it if there wasn't a safe way to test it. And if it wasn't safe, then they wouldn't have blown them up right on top of the ground.""Too bad there isn't a place we could go and get irradiated." Ray yawned.

Jessie twitched his lips. "Hanford."Everyone fell silent. Hanford wasn't just close and convenient, but made plutonium, the purest, cleanest form of radioactive material the government knew how to make. As Kelley pointed out, it was even scientificable.

In retrospect, Kathy decided, the plan to go to Hanford that night wasn't the brightest idea any of them had ever thought of. But at the time, it sure seemed like the only thing to do that would let them set things right.

Ray didn't remember how Brian and Otis were took in by the stupid idea, but Otis was the only one with a driver's license, though Brian had a permit, just nothing to drive. The Hanford reactors were about two hours away, though the travel time went quickly. The road was open, and Otis found a station that played both the Beach Boys and Hendrix back to back. Both Brian and Otis were mum about what they hoped to be when they got irradiated, but Ray figured that if they weren't game, they wouldn't have come along.

Everything was running smoothly until they reached the front gate. It hadn't occurred to anyone that a guard would be stationed, but none of them wanted to turn back. It was the common, though quiet, consensus that there was nothing to turn back to.

"You kids took a wrong turn. The Gorge is back up eight fourth to ninety, then east to the Columbia, over the bridge, and past the Wild Horses scenic view." The guard seemed pretty nice, though was stern and reminded each of them of their fathers in some way.

Otis was not all that impressed considering the guard was Army, not with the Marines.

Taking charge, Otis leaned out his window, "sir, we're here to see the reactor."The guard smirked with plain amusement. "Now what would a bunch of good kids like you want with the reactor?"Kelley and Jessie discussed their options quietly in the back seat of Otis' beat up, blue Ford.

"Tell him it's for class, Otis,"Kathy whispered.

"Sir, I'm a senior over in Moscow and I have to take these kooky freshmen to see something scientific for a report." Otis grinned stupidly.

Kelley kicked the back of Otis' seat.

"Look, kid,"the guard said, leaning closer towards Otis. "You guys, and girl,"he corrected, seeing Kathy, "are nice kids, I can tell. You ain't got a lot of money, and if you were meaning to go about with some wickedness in you, I imagine you would have gotten yourselves drunk or stoned first. Christ, you're even listening to the light station, not that acid rock garbage everyone is listening to."Everyone fell silent.

"Hey, mister,"Kelley poked his head over Otis' shoulder, though the back window would have sufficed. "We just want to see the reactors. I mean, like you said, we ain't bad kids or nothing, and so why shouldn't we be able to go see them?"The guard smiled gently. "Ok, kid, let me see what I can do."Everyone in the car smiled and felt a warm glow pass over them.

"But you kids have to listen to me, first, okay?"Otis and Brian cringed. Both knew exactly where lectures such as these would lead.

The guard chewed something in his mouth. "They've been saying that radiation isn't really good for people, not even in little doses. Now, I'm not supposed to tell you this, but I'm not supposed to know, either, so I guess it's okay."

Otis noticed then that the guard couldn't have been much older than he was.

The guard continued. "I got this job because I thought it would be pretty keen to work around the stuff, but it ain't all that cool. You know what happens if that stuff leaks? We all get fried. Everyone for hundreds of miles around here. Christ, it would probably take clear up into the nineteen nineties to clean it all up." The guard watched the kids for a long time, not sure what to make of it all.

"What about like the stories say,"Jessie offered. "I mean, isn't it good."Kelley thought really hard for something scientificable. "Like x-rays."The guard nodded. "X-rays are good to see into people, but they aren't any good for people." Finally, the guard paused. "Hey, you guys read the latest Spiderman?"Ray gaped. "You read comics?"The guard smiled. "Shoot. Christ, I'm only nineteen, I like a lot now, especially because my mom can't throw them away and tell me I'll go to Hell if I read them."

"What do you think of Iron Man,"Otis asked, who was told the incredible story of Tony Stark helping Peter Parker with a new villain in the latest issue.

"Well, I'll tell you what, I expected them to send the Fantastic Four again, or Superman. But how I figure is they can't. You know, if radiation made each of them really strong, then they must be pretty radioactive. That's how I figure. And if they are, and they hang around each other all the time, they would make each other sick. Fantastic Four is ok because they were all made strong by the same comet. But you think. Every super hero made with radiation was made by a different bomb, or whatever."Kathy slumped back in the seat, glancing at Kelley and Jessie, then Otis and Brian. "I guess it wouldn't be too keen to go getting your friends sick."The guard shook his head. "Hey, you want to know something really scary?" He didn't like the sudden, miserable expression their faces had adopted.

"Now this is a genuine secret that you can't tell anyone about. But you kids are pretty cool, and are the first ones who really understand me. You know, you never meet a lot of people who really understand you. Christ, we even got,"he stopped before he said the 'n' word, seeing as the car had a colored kid in it and all, "colored folk working here, and they ain't picked on or nothing. But not one of them understands me, so it really gets me down. Anyway, this kid from the Tri-Cities comes over here about a month ago, and had this kooky idea that if he dug around in some radioactive material, he would be a super hero." The guard cocked his head, expecting the kids in the car to laugh. Not even a hint of smile crossed any of their lips.

"What happened to him?"Otis finally asked.

"He snuck under that fence over yonder, got all the way to the outside of that reactor pile over there, and found one of the barrels of waste that was supposed to be buried the next day. Well, the guards saw him, but he jimmied the lock of the lid with a crowbar and dunked his head in it." The guard twitched his lips.

Brian swallowed. "What happened to him?"The guard rocked back on his heels, "I'll put it this way. He not only just died, but all the guards got sick and couldn't work anymore, and all the dogs died. Now, you can't even get that close to nothing around here, but back then you could.""You mean a commie could have snuck up here and gotten some waste if he wanted?" Otis asked in disbelief.

"If a commie wants some waste, man, he can have it. And he would have gotten shot anyway." The guard scratched his head. "Man, that stuff in those barrels is plain poison. And the plutonium bars in the reactors makes the stuff in the barrels look like lemonade."Jessie couldn't believe his ears. "But I thought plutonium was pure and clean."The guard nodded, "It is. Essentially, it is like concentrated radiation." The guard paused, then caught on. "Hey, kid, yeah, it's clean because it doesn't leave a lot of waste, but it will still kill you, just like uranium, only a lot faster."

The kids were quiet, not being able to think of anything to contest the guard's hard facts.

"Hey,"the guard said to Otis, "you going to 'Nam? You look old enough."Otis cussed under his breath, "hell no. Flat feet and I can't go.""Hell man, you should come work here with me. They need guys to work clean up and the pay is really pretty good. More than you'd earn even with some professional jobs."Otis pondered. "What's the catch?""Honestly?" The guard looked around to see that no one else was listening. "That stuff will kill you dead where you stand if it leaks just a pinch. No lying, either. No one wants the job because it is so damn dangerous. That is why they pay so much. You have a better chance of dying right here than you would if you went over the 'Nam. No lying, man."Otis shrugged, "I'll think about it.""Hey, if you want, call me. I'm listed. My name's Ricky Jones. I'll put a word in for you." The guard smiled and then stepped back, giving them room to turn around.

Otis didn't need to think long. He planned to call Ricky the very next day.

The trip back was spent in silence, with the conversation turning to wonder if Superman, Spiderman, or any of the radioactive heroes ever gave the ones they loved radiation sickness.

Kathy secretly promised herself to give her father some radiation the next time she had the opportunity.

Though they left Hanford without their super powers, they found that the few hours they had spent questing for radiation had made their bonds of friendship even tighter. Though they didn't have the strength that Marvel and DC had promised them, they found that when they were picked on, abused, fired, cut, dumped, or given no other recourse, they always would have each other. They were a nuclear family.