This Boy's Life

Tobias Wolff (Toby,a.k.a. Jack): It was 1957. We were driving from Florida to Utah. After my mother was beaten up by her boyfriend, we got in the Nash and high-tailed it for the uranium fields. We were gonna get rich and change our lives, which hadn't been so hot since our family broke up five years back.

Toby: I was caught up in my mother's freedom, her delight in her freedom. She was gonna get rich on uranium and I was gonna help her.

Mom: ...it'd be just like heaven on a June day.

Toby: My mom had her own way of solving problems, she left them behind.

Toby: My mom had high hopes, especially for me. I've been giving her no end of grief since she left dad. I decided I was gonna do better. I was gonna have straight arrow friends, I was gonna get all A's in school, and I was gonna keep my nose clean. I promised it and I meant it.

Toby: It wasn't me who broke their stupid window.
Mom: Oh, please.
Toby: Oh gee thanks a lot, believe them instead of me.
Mom: If you cared anything about me at all, you'll just be quiet.
Toby: Aw yeah? If you cared anthing about me, you would've stayed married to dad. I didn't really mean that. I knew it wasn't true. My father went his own way a long time before they actually called it quits and took my older brother Gregory with him. Sometimes I need to blame somebody and she was the only one there.

Toby: Most afternoons, I'd wander around in a trance. Sometimes I go downtown and stare at the merchandise. Maybe I'd shoplift, maybe not. I used to imagine I saw my father coming toward me. I'd wait for him to recognize me. I knew it couldn't be him though, he was living back East married to a rich woman. His nickname was "Duke" and thats how I thought of him, as a duke living in a castle far away. A few minutes later, I'd pick someone else.

Toby: Hey, Terry.
Terry: Hey Jack. What'd your mom say about skipping school last night?
Toby: Who listens?
Terry: You go to Wanda's last night?
Toby: Uh-huh.
Terry: You make out?
Toby: Uh-huh.
Terry: You make out good?
Toby: Uh-huh?
Terry: How good?
Toby: Fucked her 'till her nose bled.
Terry: You are so full of shit, Jack.

Toby: Is he that guy that comes down from the boondocks? The mechanic? Dwight..what a stupid name.

Toby: Duh...wight.

Marian: I love a man who knows how to dress.
Toby: What a dope.submitted by Lisa

Toby (mocking Dwight): Oh please (fiddles with the lighter) allow me. There you go. Just a little trick I learned in the navy.

Toby (mocking Dwight): Let me try this (drinks coffee). Mmm Mmm. Who made this? Did you make this? I'd love to live in a house with a cup of java like that.

Dwight: A neighbor of mine says, "looking for nice churches, come to Concrete. Looking for sin, go to hell."

Dwight: Just shut your goddamn piehole!submitted by Lisa

Mom: What do we do?
Toby: What do you mean?
Mom: I mean, what shall we do? Because this isn't working. We barely have any money, Kathy's moving out now and on top of it all you've gone wild. You lie.
Toby: No I don't.
Mom: Yes, you do. You're smoking cigarettes, you're stealing from Marion's purse. I can't handle it anymore and it scares me. I don't know what to do, so you tell me.
Toby: I can be better. I mean, I will be. I hate the way I am. I don't know why I do it.

Toby: Oh yeah? Pull the other leg, its got bells on it. submitted by Lisa

Boy 1: Look who's comin'.
Toby: Who's that?
Boy 1: Arthur Gale.
Boy 2: What a homo.
Toby: Sure walks like a girl.
Boy 2: Yeah, runs like one, talks like one, throws like one...you know he probably pees like one too. Yeah just squats right down.
Toby: You know what he did? He mouthed off to me the other day. I was gonna fuckin' sock him one. He called me uh...bourgeois.
Boy 2: What the hecks a bourgeios.
Toby: I don't know.
Boy 1: Hey, hey call him a homo.
Toby: Why?
Boy 1: Just see what he says.
Toby: Yeah?
Arthur: My, my what do we have here? Elmer Fudd and his hunting boys. Look at all that yellow...boy, didn't your momma tell you to wash your hands after you pee?
Toby: Shut up.
Arthur: Strike one. Ooh, that was very good, very original. Did you just make that up? That was very very clever.
Toby: Why don't you just fuck off, dicklick.
Arthur: Excuse me. Wooh! Hasn't anyone ever told you, you look exactly like a pile of steaming dog turd?
Toby: Yeah? Well at least I'm not a great big homo!

Dwight: Well...so...heh, heh. Who won?
Toby: He's the one who can't see out of one eye.
Dwight: Hot damn! you actually gave little Lord Gale a black eye? Huh?
Toby: Yeah. But its not black yet.
Dwight: But its all puffed up? Well, then its a shiner, right? Right?
Toby: Mmm hmm.
Dwight: How did it start?
Toby: Well, I called him a sissy.
Dwight: Well, he sure as hell can't sue you for slander. The boy fights for the pink team. We all know the god damn kid's queer.

Toby: A lot can happen in two years. Skipper and Norma had left Concrete and moved to Seattle. I was gonna get out too for sure. In the meantime I made some new friends.

Chuck: Hey look, there goes Carol Baumgarden. Ain't she sweet? She's out for Wolff.
Toby: Yeah, Yeah I wish.
Chuck: It wouldn't do her any good. Jack's saving himself for Ria Clark.
Driver: You know what he said about Ria?
Toby: Fuck off.
Driver: Said even the inside of her arm turns him on. Inside of her fuckin' arm. You slay me Wolff! She is pretty though.

Toby: Hey, let me copy your math homework.
Arthur: No, but I'll show you how to work the problems.
Toby: I tell you I'm thirsty and you offer me a sandwich. Thank you and fuck you!
Arthur: I take it back...you don't act like Psycho, you act like Dwight.
Toby: I know it. He's winning, isn't he? I do act like him and I feel like him sometimes. I gotta get out of this damn place or I'm a dead one.
Arthur: Sure, you've said that for over two years.
Toby: This time I mean it, I'm gonna go live with my brother Gregory in Princeton.
Arthur: Oh, the brother Gregory in Princeton who never calls you? That brother Gregory?
Toby: No, but you know I may go to a prep school like he did. Yeah like my dad did.
Arthur: What about your grades? What would you use for money?
Toby: Dwight owes me 1200 bucks. If I hadn't let him keep my paper route money, I'd be o.k.
Arthur: Yeah, if the dog hadn't stopped to pee, he would have caught the rabbit.
Toby: You know what? I think Dwight was right about you, I think you really do fight for the pink team.

Toby: My brother Gregory and I had been in touch. He said the road from Concrete to Princeton started with SATs and that I could take them at the Lakeside School in Seattle. Dwight said I had as much chance of passing the test as he had of farting his way through the star spangled banner.

Toby: When I went to fill out the application forms I ran into a wall. They wanted letters of recommendations from teachers. I figured I could write these myself. But they wanted my grades on our official high school transcript forms and this was a problem...

Arthur: I won't do it.
Toby: Why not? You work right in the office, nobody will ever know.
Arthur: I'm surprised you want help from anyone who fights for the pink team.
Toby: Look, I'm asking you for help man. I got word yesterday that I did really well on those tests but thats not enough. I've gotta cheat and I've gotta lie. If they want A's, I have to give it to them one way or another. Its such a simple thing. You're the only way I can get out...
Arthur: No. Why should you get to be the one who leaves? Why not me?

Toby: Mom, you can leave too. I'm leaving. You don't have to stay here for this shit.
Mom: I don't do I.
Toby: No, you don't.
Mom: I could leave with you right now, couldn't I?
Toby: Yes, you could.
Mom: I could walk right out that door, couldn't I?
Toby: Yes.
Dwight: What?
Mom: I'm leaving you, Dwight.

Toby: It was as easy as that. We just picked up and left. You can dream of a moment for years and still somehow miss it when it comes. You've gotta reach through the flames and take it or lose it forever. I took it. So did my mother. We never looked back.