He slammed himself back, pinning Davey between himself and the sharp stones on the walkway up to the cave entrance, then mashed backward with his elbows, his head ringing like a gong from the stone's blow. His left elbow connected with Davey's solar plexus and the arm around his throat went slack. He climbed to his knees and looked Davey in the face. He was blue and gasping, but Alan couldn't work up a lot of sympathy for him as he reached up to the side of his head and felt the goose egg welling there. His fingertips came back with a few strands of hair blood-glued to them. He'd been in a few schoolyard scraps and this was always the moment when a teacher intervened -- one combatant pinned, the other atop him. What could you do after this? Was he going to take the rock from Davey's hand and smash him in the face with it, knocking out his teeth, breaking his nose, blacking his eyes? Could he get off of Davey without getting back into the fight? He pinned Davey's shoulders under his knees and took him by the chin with one hand. "You can't do this, Danny," he said, looking into his hazel eyes, which had gone green as they did when he was angry. "Do *what*?" "Spy on me. Try to hurt me. Try to hurt my friends. Tease me all the time. You can't do it, okay?" "I'll stab you in your sleep, Andy. I'll break your fingers with a brick. I'll poke your eyes out with a fork." He was fizzling like a baking-soda volcano, saliva slicking his cheeks and nostrils and chin, his eyes rolling. Alan felt helplessness settle on him, weighing down his limbs. How could he let him go? What else could he do? Was he going to have to sit on Davey's shoulders until they were both old men? "Please, Davey. I'm sorry about what I said. I just can't bring her home, you understand," he said. "Pervert. She's a slut and you're a pervert. I'll tear her titties off." "Don't, Danny, please. Stop, okay?" Darren bared his teeth and growled, jerking his head forward and snapping at Alan's crotch, heedless of the painful thuds his head made when it hit the ground after each lunge. Alan waited to see if he would tire himself out, but when it was clear that he would not tire, Alan waited for his head to thud to the ground and then, abruptly, he popped him in the chin, leapt off of him turned him on his belly, and wrenched him to his knees, twisting one arm behind his back and pulling his head back by the hair. He brought Davey to his feet, under his control, before he'd recovered from the punch. "I'm telling Dad," he said in Davey's ear, and began to frog-march him through to the cave mouth and down into the lake in the middle of the mountain. He didn't even slow down when they reached the smooth shore of the lake, just pushed on, sloshing in up to his chest, Davey's head barely above the water.