remember if anyone had ever seen us climbing into the clubhouse. I could not sleep through the night, and would wake up often. The rhythm of my life had been completely upset.
My relationship with Johnny turned even sourer. We never walked to school together, even if we left our houses at the exact same time. In fact, Johnny never walked with anyone. He seemed to turn inward and he spent all his time alone. He never showed up at the cemetery or Boger Field when we played baseball. He did not even come out of his house when we were playing right outside his window.
To me it seemed that somehow he no longer viewed himself as a kid. It was as though playing was now too juvenile for him. I do not know if he thought he was too mature to play with us anymore, or if it was something else.
Each time I passed the building where our clubhouse was, I had to cross the street and walk on the other side, so I would not get too close to it. I would walk two blocks out of my way at times just to avoid seeing it. The sight of the building was enough to make my mouth dry and my knees weak.
The surprising thing was that it had now been two weeks and I did not hear anything about the body. I read the newspaper every day, from the front to back, expecting to see something. Each day there was no word, nothing in the paper and nothing said out on the streets. I do not know if I felt a sense of relief or if I was hoping that it would finally come to a head and not hang over me for the rest of my life.
Om December 14th, a week and a half before Christmas 1923, I noticed some activity around the building where our old clubhouse had been. There were men with some large pieces of equipment outside on the street right in front of the building. It appeared that they were finally getting around to tearing the old building down. Surely, they would find the body before the building was demolished. I wondered how fast a body decomposes, and if they would even still be able to tell, it was Billy Brannigan.
In the prior weeks, I had just started to relax a bit, thinking that maybe nobody would ever find the body. Now it seemed inevitable that they would find it and show up at my door. I would calm myself down by remembering that I had nothing to do with killing Billy, and that Johnny said he was not involved.
On the Saturday morning of Christmas Eve, a large snowstorm hit Philadelphia. It was the first snow that stuck on the ground that winter. Every kid in the neighborhood knew that we would meet at the junkyard on Aramingo Avenue whenever there was a sizeable snowfall. We would have giant snowball fights, using the junkyard as our battlefield. We hid and climbed among the junk using the old discarded pieces of metal and wood as our bunkers and shields.
By the time I got to the junkyard, half the kids in the neighborhood were already there. Of course, Johnny was not among them. However, Michael O’Brien was there and throwing snowballs with the best of them. I stayed for almost an hour at the battle, before we started to walk home. Michael and I paired off and left the junkyard together.
My feet and face were numb from the cold, even though I was sweating from running around. We took the quickest, most direct route home, since it was so cold. That route took us right past the old clubhouse building.
“Maybe we should cut over and walk down the back alleys,” I said.
“What are you crazy,” Michael said. “That’s the long way and it’s too cold to be walking out of our way.”
“I think it’s actually quicker than walking down the main street.”
It was hard to come up with any logical reason for changing our course without telling Michael that I just did not have the stomach to walk past our old clubhouse building.
As we turned the corner, I expected to see the building being worked on. I was surprised to see that the entire building was gone. There was a ton of debris on the ground, but the structure was completely demolished. There were no construction people working when we passed by. There were no police on the site, absolutely no activity of any kind.
“I can’t believe that the old building is gone,” I said. “It seems like they tore it down overnight.”
“I didn’t even notice that they were tearing that old building down and I walk past it almost every day,” Michael said.
Surely if they had found the body there would be some sign of police activity. They certainly would have stopped the demolition if they came across a dead body. It was unbelievable that they could have torn down the building without finding the corpse, but somehow I was sure that was what had happened. Maybe this would put and end to this entire episode, and we could put this all behind us. Just maybe this would help bring Johnny back from the dark place where he seemed to be.
39
Christmas morning was always a special time. As much as I looked forward to opening gifts and spending time with our extended family, I always felt so rushed that I never got to savor the moments that made up the day. Instead of taking time to appreciate each part of the day, we always seemed like we were headed off to the next scheduled event. If it had been up to me, I would have stayed home all day and skipped all the mandatory visits with our family and friends.
I always got up at the crack of dawn on Christmas morning, and this year was no exception. After we exchanged gifts, I excused myself, went over to Johnny’s house, and knocked on his door. Mrs. Garrity answered and greeted me with a very friendly hug.
“Merry Christmas,” she said.
I smelled a bit of alcohol on her breath, in spite of the prohibition and the earliness of the hour.
“Merry Christmas to you, Mrs. Garrity.”
“Would you like to come in and have some eggnog with us?” she asked.
“That would be very nice Mrs. Garrity.”
As I walked in to the front parlor of their house, I was struck by the serenity of the scene. All the kids looked happy, and both Mr. and Mrs. Garrity were smiling. Nobody was yelling at each other, and I could not remember a time when I ever saw all the kids happy together in one place. Annie looked especially pretty.
Johnny came out into the entrance hallway as soon as he saw me. I whispered to him so that the rest of the family could not hear us as we spoke.
“We had a snowball fight at the junkyard yesterday,” I said. “On the way home Michael O’Brien and I walked past the building where our clubhouse was.”
“So,” Johnny said shrugging his shoulders.
“It’s gone, there’s nothing left of it,” I said.
“The whole building’s gone?” Johnny asked.
“The whole damn thing is torn down; all that’s left is a big pile of debris.”
“Were the police there?” Johnny asked.
“I didn’t see anybody there,” I answered. “I am sure that they didn’t find the body or there would have been some sign of a police investigation.”
I could see a visible sense of relief come to Johnny. He didn’t say anything more, but he looked off into the distance and a relieved smile came to his face.
“Well, I gotta go; we have a very busy schedule today.”
“Well, Merry Christmas everyone,” I said as I poked my head back in to the parlor.
“See you later, Johnny,” I said as I left.
“Yea, see you later.”
I had hoped that putting the episode behind us would help bring us back together, but that never happened. Over the next few months, Johnny and I had very little interaction. He was still very withdrawn, and it wasn’t just with me. He did not seem to have any friends at school, and every time that I saw him, he was alone. It was as if he made no effort to make friends or spend time with anybody.
One morning I saw Johnny sitting by himself on the stoop outside his house and I sat down next to him.
“How are things going at school?” I asked.
“Not so great, but I really don’t care.”
“You know, we never talk anymore,” I said. “We used to know everything about each other and now we seem like strangers. It’s like you put up a wall between us and I can’t do anything to break it down.
You were the best friend I ever had an
d now you’re just like one of the empty souls lying in the alley that we walk past every day. We used to be able to tell each other everything and now it’s hard to say anything. Why can’t it just go back to the way it was before?”
“I’m sorry, but it seems like you can never go back. I wish I could go back, but I can’t. I’m sorry.”
By the end of the school year, I had all but given up trying to break down whatever wall there was between us. When we would see each other at school or on the street, there would be a ritualistic head nod, but usually not a word would be spoken. Johnny had become part of the mass of humanity that you would pass by on the streets of Kensington, someone who presence you would acknowledge but would walk right past just the same.
Then came the terrible morning of June 8th, 1924, a morning I will never forget. The school year was about to end for the summer recess and things seemed to be looking up in the neighborhood. I had been in my room reading, when I thought I heard a woman crying from just outside my bedroom window. I raised the blinds a little and saw my parents standing on the front steps of the Garrity house with Mr. and Mrs. Garrity.
I could see that they all had concerned looks on their faces, but could not hear what they were saying. Just then, I saw Mrs. Garrity put her head into her hands and fall to her knees. I watched as my mom knelt down beside her and reached her arm around her back, obviously trying to comfort her. The two men stood by helplessly, as the two women hugged