The Trouble Begins

by Linda Himelblau

  When I wash up and go in the kitchen I hear him yell at me again. “Du, you come here.” I slouch into the dining room to hear what I've done wrong now. “Lin told me how you helped her with her science project. She said you found some… hairy plants or something when nobody else knew what the teacher wanted. She said you were helping her more just now in the alley. Why don't you say so?” He laughs and points at the paper towel. “Dead bees,” he adds, shaking his head. I can't tell him that I'm afraid to talk to him when he's angry because I don't know for sure why he's angry. I don't even want to say to him that he looks angry. Lin has told him everything, though, about the plants and he's happy now. She told him no one else found mutants, just us, and that makes him happiest of all, to be better than everybody. “See, you're doing the best work for high school. How come you don't do good work for your school?” There it is again. I'm good right now but still there's something that should be better. I shrug and go watch TV.

  The Dragon

  School is always boring but today it's so boring I think I'm going to die. “I have some very discouraging news,” announces Mrs. Dorfman in the morning. “We have fallen three units behind in social studies.” She stops to let us think how terrible this is. I don't think it's terrible because I don't ever listen to social studies. The book doesn't even have good pictures. “We can't let this happen!” She stops again. Kids in the back are rolling their eyes and dragging out their books. “Today will be Social Studies Day!” There are groans. One of the groans is from me.

  She calls the kids from the high reading group up to the front. They read out of the social studies book while she works at her desk. Sometimes she looks up. She pulls a card from her deck of cards with our names on them. “Read the next sentence, please,” she asks the kid whose name is on the card. She puts a star next to the kid's name if they know where we are in the book. Once she pulls out a card and just puts it on the bottom of the deck. Kids sneak looks at me. She knows I'll just shrug. I don't care about stars.

  I think I'll blow up into pieces, I'm so bored. I even decide to beg for the bathroom pass. But I'm saved. “I think we're all getting a little antsy, aren't we?” Mrs. Dorfman stands up. I don't know antsy but I see kids lift their heads and look hopeful. “You've been such wonderful listeners. We'll all go out for a game of Perimeter before practice for the… winter holiday program,” she says.

  Perimeter sounds like a dumb math kind of game but it has to be a lot better than social studies. We stuff our social studies books in our desks while she talks over the noise. She starts with “As you know” like she does all the time and I don't know but neither do a lot of other kids.

  “As you know, the edge of the blacktop is the perimeter …”

  Good, it's not math; we're going outside.

  “One student will be the Perimeter Master. The rest of you will try very hard not to let the Perimeter Master tag you.”

  We'll be running around. Great. The Perimeter Master will never catch me.

  “The first two students caught are the perimeter assistants. They'll help the Perimeter Master until everyone is caught. Anyone else who is caught sits on the perimeter until the game is over. Last one caught is the new Perimeter Master.”

  Everyone is waving their hands to be the Perimeter Master. Except me. If she chooses me I'll just walk around with my hands in my pockets and not catch anyone and we'll be able to stay out all day. But she won't choose me. She smiles at the waving hands. “I'll use the cards,” she says, holding up the deck. It's suddenly quiet while she pulls out a card. “Veronica.” She calls out the name. Everyone else groans or laughs because Veronica'll never catch anyone except maybe Rosaria, who's as slow as she is. I'm happy. It's just like choosing me. The game'll last forever. Mrs. Dorfman's taking her work and her chair out today so she wants it to last long too.

  Veronica's chugging around all sweaty already but she can't catch anyone. Anthony and Jorge sneak up really close to her. She lunges at them. They run away backward and she still can't catch them. The teacher's head is down looking at her papers.

  “Hey, Beefaroni, Beefaroni, catch me,” Anthony yells, darting past her. She doesn't even try. Beefaroni is like Du Du. I lean down with my back to her and untie and tie my shoe. I take my time. She comes up and whops me on the back. “I got you,” she pants. Kids laugh. They think she caught me because I'm dumb.

  “Showtime,” I say softly to myself. Anthony yells “showtime” when he thinks he'll get me out in four-square. I go after him. He's fast but he's not as fast as me. I get him cornered near the wall-ball backstop. I almost whack him when I remember. I don't want him to be the second assistant. He might like that.

  “Hey, Dude,” yells Todd. “You can't get me.” Dude, he says. He doesn't call me Du Du even though we're far away from the teacher. Dude is a good name. I go after him. He's big but he's not slow. He laughs when I catch him. Together we herd six kids including Anthony along the perimeter near the swing set. We tag them all. Veronica plods over too and gets somebody. They all have to sit down. Todd and I race for the others on the far side with Veronica puffing along behind. We clear the whole blacktop in a few minutes. The teacher looks up from her papers. “Last one out is the new Perimeter Master,” she calls. We start running around all over again. It's fun.

  The winter holiday program practice is boring. I wish it was over so I could go home and see Cat and her kittens. Everybody who didn't get a special part like me is in the angel chorus. We sit in our regular seats. We get stapled papers with the words to the music. We're supposed to share but I just give mine to Jorge. I don't want to sing about stupid reindeer that fly. When the Tet part comes, the dragon comes out like it's afraid. It walks like a cow. I kind of wish I was back in the last dragon box so I could kick around a little.

  The wall clock shows five minutes until time to go home. Beep! Beep! Beep! blares from the wall speaker. We jump in our seats. Kids laugh and look around. Beep! Beep! Beep! It won't stop. It's the duck and cover signal we practice in class. Veronica and Rosaria scrunch down but there's no room under the seats. Kids are laughing because no one knows what to do. Anthony does a handstand with his head in the row and his feet waving around. Everybody laughs. The teachers hurry around whispering to each other. The dragon onstage sinks down to the floor.

  The principal hurries in. “Stay calm, everybody. Stay in your seats!” he shouts. Right in the middle the beeper stops and he's still shouting. We laugh. He looks nervous. “This is not a practice.” He's still shouting but not as loud. “There is a SWAT-team action in the neighborhood. We will stay at school until the all clear sounds.”

  “I gotta get my little brother.”

  “I got basketball practice.”

  “My mom's waiting for me.” Kids all yell at once. The principal raises his hand for the quiet sign. He yells above the voices. “I'm counting on you fifth graders to set an example for the school.” I don't know how we can set an example. There's nobody in here but fifth graders. I wonder what's going on outside. I wish there was a window so I could see.

  “You may sit quietly in your seats,” he continues. “Ms. Plinsky will lead you in singing some songs.” That's hard too, sing and be quiet. Ms. Plinsky starts singing “Sweet Betsy from Pike.” It's a social studies song but it's not bad. It's about people who roll around on the ground because they're hungry and thirsty. But nobody sings with Ms. Plinsky because no one knows the words. The songbooks are all in the classrooms. Now kids are getting really antsy, as Mrs. Dorfman says. I feel very antsy. One kid starts to cry because he's supposed to be home by three-fifteen, no matter what. I wonder what happens to him if he's late. Ms. Plinsky goes away to look for music.

  Mr. Unger, the teacher of the smart kids' fifth grade, leaves his smart kids and vaults onto the stage. “Mental math,” he shouts with his fist in the air. “My class challenges the rest of you to a mental math competition.” He explains it while the other teachers tear the Christmas song sheets into strips and pa
ss one out to everybody. Someone goes over to the media room to get library pencils. The pencils are short and don't have any erasers so no one will steal them. We each get one. We put our names on our papers. Mr. Unger will shout out math problems and we just put the answer on our paper. If we try to work the problem on the paper we're out of the contest. Usually I don't do this stuff but today I think I will. In the Philippines I helped my grandma sell food she cooked. We didn't have paper or pencil or anything but our heads there when we made change. No cash register. No calculator. Just a blanket or a table under a tree. Lots of people came. Her spring rolls and her soup with vegetables and noodles were so good people pushed around us to get some before we ran out. I had to do the money fast and right.

  Mr. Unger yells, “Fire up your brains. Here we go. No talking. Just write the answers. Eight times eight hundred.” Groans from my row. I write the answer. “One third of fifteen.” I see Anthony's down my row writing the problem on his paper. He's erasing it with a pencil he had in his pocket. He's already behind. He can't do math no matter how he cheats. Mr. Unger starts going faster. The problems get harder. I see kids near me quit. We get to number thirty. “Seven times three hundred forty. Write. Okay? Stop!” Mr. Unger yells to pass the papers to the end of the row. “If they're late you're out. One, two, three.” He runs down the aisle collecting the papers. “Who didn't miss a beat?” he yells as he runs back up the aisle. Most of the kids in his smart class shoot their hands up in the air. No one else does. He smacks his fist into his hand. “Way to go,” he yells. He's proud of them. I kind of wish I was in his class. “And now…,” he yells, jumping back on the stage. He stops because the all clear bell rings. He laughs. “And now we'll all go home,” he yells over the sound of kids. “You've been great. Have a great afternoon.” Mrs. Dorfman is grabbing Alex because he's running. I go home to see Cat. Todd walks out with me.

  “See ya, Dude,” he says at the bike rack.

  “See ya,” I say.

  I see some police cars on Fortieth Street on my way home. I hear people saying that a man robbed a store but there's nothing to see now. If he robbed the store when I was coming home from school maybe I would have caught him. I'd be on television and the kids at school would see it.

  At home everything is crazy. My sister Lin is crying because she got a B on a test. She never gets anything but As. My dad slams in the front door. Is he mad because Lin got a B? “You kids are gonna do it whether you want to or not!” he yells. Do what? He's yelling at Thuy and Lin and Vuong. This is interesting. I sneak in to listen.

  “My friends'll see me,” Thuy mutters. “I have to study.”

  “It's so early. We won't be able to do anything else all day.”

  “It hardly pays anything.” I never heard them argue with him before. Their voices are soft like they almost don't dare to have him hear.

  My dad's fist slams down on the table. The heavy books jump. “When they call we say yes. And that's that!” Thuy and Lin and Vuong all look down at the table but they don't say yes. My dad stands staring at the tops of their heads. Maybe for the first time they won't do what he wants. “That's that,” he repeats. He slams out the door to go back to work.

  I ask Vuong when he comes to watch TV. “He wants us to get up at four in the morning to deliver Sunday papers,” he tells me. “It pays about nothing. Thuy told him no on the phone and he came running home.”

  “How come he wants to do it if it pays nothing?” I ask. I know my dad doesn't leave work and come running home for nothing.

  “Well, it pays a little bit but not enough to get up at four a.m.,” complains Vuong. “He'll make us save all the money anyway.”

  “For what?” I ask. My dad never buys the stuff you see on TV.

  “He wants to send us to college and buy a house,” answers Vuong like it's something he's heard from our dad over and over again.

  College is more school. “I don't want to go to college and we got a house,” I answer, and shrug.

  “He wants to own a house, not rent one, and we want to go to college.” Vuong doesn't want to talk to me about it anymore. He looks at the TV.

  “Will you do it?” I ask.

  “I don't want to,” he answers. “Maybe they'll never call.” “You could answer the phone and say we don't want the job. He'll never know,” I say. I just say it for fun but Vuong turns to look at me funny. He goes in the dining room to whisper to Thuy and Lin.

  I go to look for my grandma but she's sleeping. I climb through the shed window and sit with Cat and her kittens. I scratch her chin. She purrs. The kittens wiggle around trying to get the best place to eat. I think about a place to hide them from the old man. Maybe Cat knows best.

  My dad does look at my report card. He knows the day we get it and he asks to see it. For a minute I think I'll tell him I left it at school or lost it or something but that will just make it worse when he finds out. It's folded up into a little tiny square in my pocket. I take it out and unfold it. I hand it to him. There is a long heavy silence while he looks at each grade. He doesn't yell at me or slam anything down on the table.

  “So, your teacher says you're not even trying,” he says. “You're acting like a gang boy, a criminal. You're mean to people. You can't read. I don't know whose boy this is.” He says it sadly like he gives up. I know the report card doesn't say all that. It has Needs Improvement checks next to “Follows classroom rules” and “Treats classmates with respect.” Not respecting my classmates means I won't let Anthony call me Du Du but I don't tell my dad that. I got a U, Unsatisfactory, in “Effort,” which means Mrs. Dorfman thinks I don't try. “Reading” is a D for dumb reading group. For him there is no excuse at all, anywhere, for a report card like this. He places the report card on the table, turns his back on me and leaves the room. Later I get my mom to sign it when she is in a hurry to leave for work.

  Winter holiday practice again. We're going to practice every day until the day of the program. That means no PE. Before we begin Mr. Unger jumps up on the stage. He's waving the strips of math paper. “What a great job you guys did!” he yells. “Give yourselves a big round of applause.” Everybody claps and cheers and whistles. He doesn't get nervous like Mrs. Dorfman when it gets noisy. “Way to go!” he yells. “And now for the winners.”

  It gets quiet. Even kids who quit writing answers halfway through get quiet in case everybody else was even worse and they won. “Many of you got over ninety percent correct!” he yells. More cheers. “But those problems number fifteen and twenty-seven were doozies. Those are the ones that did us in.” Kids groan. “Only two people got everything right because of those two ugly problems.” He waits, looking all around the auditorium. Kids are squirming hopefully. “And the one hundred percent winners are …” His feet pound the stage like a drum. “In my phenomenal class, Iris Perez! Come on up, Iris.” Kids clap, especially the ones from Mr. Unger's class, and she runs up to the stage. “And in Mrs. Dorfman's equally phenomenal class, Du Nguyen!”

  There's a moment of complete silence. Nobody believes it. I don't think about winning. I feel scared. I have to run up on the stage. “Put your hands together for Du. Come on up, Du Nguyen.” Kids clap then. Pretty loud, I think. Kids near me push me out of my seat. Cheering picks up in my class. We tied the smart kids' class. Because of me. I run up to the stage. Mr. Unger gives Iris and me each a new pencil. Then he snatches them back. “You two don't need these,” he says, breaking off the end with the erasers. He gives the broken pencils back to us. Everybody laughs.

  “Seriously,” he goes on. “With the skills these two have developed I wouldn't be surprised if they end up owning the pencil factory. The rest of you out there, follow their example and next time it will be you up here… with a broken pencil to show for your work.” Kids laugh again. I laugh too. “And the winners also receive this Mental Math Champion certificate to keep so they can remember this day and what they did. Let's have another round of applause.” He hands Iris and me thick papers with gold pa
per medals and little blue ribbons stuck on them that have our names and “Mental Math Champion” and the date in fancy printing. Everybody wants to see it when I get back to my seat. They want to see the broken pencil too.

  We start the winter holiday program practice. I'm happy. I like school. I might even sing in the angel chorus just because I feel like making noise.

  The Tet part of the program starts. The girl in the front box of the dragon is absent. Mrs. Dorfman asks for volunteers. I wave my hand around without thinking. “All right, Du,” she says like she's sure it's a mistake. “You may have another chance.”

  I go up onstage again. No problem. I crawl under the front box of the dragon. It's the box with the head, a big mouth full of teeth, flames from the nose painted along the sides of the face and lots of colored streamers all around the back for the mane. I don't want the dragon to look like a cow. I grab the sides of the box. I jump into the middle of the stage. For a second the other boxes hold me back, then they jump too. I jump straight up and shake the box back and forth. Through my box I hear laughing. It's easy to act crazy when no one can see you. Bong! go the gongs. I leap and jump and shake and bow and go in circles until someone knocks on the box and says it's time to go offstage. I'm sweaty when I get out from under the box. I walk back to my seat. Kids are still laughing. Somebody pounds my back. “You were great, Dude,” they say.

  At home I show Thuy and Lin and Vuong my Mental Math Champion certificate.

  “Oh, Du, now you will get As, I think.”

  “See, Du, you just have to get over being lazy.”

  “You could get everything right in spelling too if you tried.”

  I feel embarrassed. It's such a little thing but they pretend it's big. I wish I hadn't told them. I give my Mental Math Champion certificate to my grandma. She puts it on the chest in her room where she keeps a piece of bamboo, a little vase and a necklace from Vietnam. I don't tell my dad because he will say it was just a game or say that it proves I am a lazy boy and not trying, and to him lazy and not trying are the worst things of all.