Brett McCarthy

by Maria Padian

  “Yup.”

  Nonna wiped her hands on a dish towel. She went over to the cupboard and took out two small plates and glasses. From the pan of newly frosted, high-test brownies she carved two hunks and put them on the plates. She poured milk into the glasses and pointed to the kitchen table. We sat.

  “Speak,” she said.

  “He got pissed off,” I sighed. “I called the Fifth Period kids geeks. I didn’t mean anything by it. He just took it the wrong way.”

  “It is rather unkind,” Nonna said. “And undeserved. I find the Fifth Period group to be very friendly.” Nonna had joined Fifth Period on Wednesdays, her next-to-best day of the week. She didn’t really do much, just moved from group to group remarking in amazement at what the class had accomplished.

  Rather than strange and full of themselves—which they had every right to be—most of them were pretty nice. They dove into their projects with gusto, indifferent to whether their enthusiasm made them look cool or not. Out in the regular pool of classes a lot of them were usually quiet. During Fifth Period they were unleashed.

  “I know. I like them too,” I told her. “I didn’t mean anything by it. I call Michael ‘Einstein’ all the time, and he knows I’m not saying it to be mean.”

  “Does he?” Nonna asked. “Sounds to me like his feelings were hurt. You of all people know that words are powerful things. We have to choose them carefully, especially with friends.”

  We chewed in silence for a while.

  “Nonna, do you think I’m a lousy friend?” I finally asked. A big knot had formed in my throat, and it wasn’t brownie. Nonna put her hand over mine.

  “I think most junior high girls are lousy friends.” She smiled. “Actually, I’d call you a friend-in-training. You’re just learning how to be a friend, and you’re making lots and lots of mistakes along the way.”

  “I used to be a good friend!” The tears came for real now. “First Diane. Now Michael hates me. Kit’s probably next. I’m hosed.”

  “What happened with Diane?” Nonna asked gently. “I wondered why she never comes around anymore.”

  “It’s complicated.” I sniffed, wiping my nose on a scratchy paper napkin. “She’s really into this cheerleading thing, and a whole other group of girls. And she has this boyfriend now. I don’t really fit into her new scene, you know?”

  “I’d imagine her new scene isn’t all a bed of roses,” Nonna commented. “I hear her parents’ divorce has gotten quite ugly.”

  “I know,” I sighed. “Kit says she’s wrecked. But I was so mad that she blew me off that…I never even asked her. We’ve never spoken about it.”

  “Well.” Nonna let out her own sigh and leaned back in her chair. “You’ve had some upheaval in your life too, don’t forget. All of this…” She rubbed her nearly hairless scalp. “None of you complain, but I know it’s not easy.”

  “Everything has changed, and I hate it!” I burst out, tears returning. “I hate hate hate it! I want it to stop!”

  Nonna burst out laughing.

  “Don’t we all! But change happens. Redefinition happens. Darling, we are works in progress. Every one of us.”

  “Well…it sucks!” I shouted.

  I’m not supposed to say “sucks.” My parents get on my case big-time about it and Nonna says it makes me sound crass. At the moment, however, it felt like the perfect word to describe my life.

  I waited for the inevitable reprimand. Then Nonna surprised me.

  “Yes, it sucks,” she replied calmly. “Sometimes. Other times it’s wonderful. We can’t always control it. But we can control how we react to it. I mean, look at me. Did I think I’d celebrate my seventy-third birthday looking like Tweety Bird? Some mornings I wake up and wonder, ‘Who made me a member of the Cancer Club? I’m not one of those sick people!’” Nonna shook her head and laughed in quiet amusement. “It’s like when your grandfather died. I remember sitting in church at his funeral, wearing a black dress I had borrowed because I never owned anything black, thinking, ‘There’s been a mistake. I’m not a widow. I’m not all alone with this little boy.’”

  “But you were,” I whispered. “Were you scared?”

  “Terrified. Furious. Just so mad at life you wouldn’t have recognized me. But Brett, somewhere along the way you have to stop being mad and get back to business. Think of what I would have missed if I’d crawled into a hole after your grandfather died! And cancer? That’s something that’s going on in my body, but it’s not who I am. It doesn’t define me.”

  Nonna took a big bite of brownie. She closed her eyes and chewed slowly, savoring it.

  “Ask yourself: Are things going to happen to me? Or am I going to head out and make things happen? If you want to be a good friend, then go out and be a good friend. Don’t let anything stop you. Not cancer, divorce, or even cheerleaders.” She took a swig of milk.

  “Amazing,” she said. “You know, I can’t cook. But I work miracles with chocolate.”

  per•cep•ti•ble

  Although you start learning about drugs and alcohol in elementary school, teachers don’t kick it into high gear until junior high. No more coloring books from Mothers Against Drunk Driving, or visits from McGruff the Crime Dog. In junior high they pull out the heavy artillery: namely, Officer Hotchkiss.

  Once a week we had Officer Hotchkiss for DARE class. As in Drug Awareness Resistance Education. We would file into the Health and Family Sciences room, where Hotchkiss would wait, dressed in full law-enforcement regalia, even down to the gun holstered at his hip. He had a Marine-issue crew cut, three rolls of skin on the back of his neck, and a little dirt-line mustache. The guy never smiled.

  He never cracked a joke. He never sat down. Ramrod-straight and stern, he’d spend forty minutes describing all the horrible things that would happen to us if we got caught dealing drugs, using drugs, or driving drunk. He didn’t take questions; he didn’t ask questions. He didn’t want answers because he had all the answers. He was one scary guy.

  Here’s the other thing about him: He didn’t like the smart kids. You’d have thought he would, since the smart kids generally weren’t potheads. But early in the year—with that not-so-smart-guy’s radar for high IQs—Hotchkiss had identified Michael and a couple of his Fifth Period cronies. He’d go out of his way to reprimand them, or embarrass them, for the least little thing. It made you wonder: Had gangs of Gifted and Talented students beaten him up on the playground when he was little?

  The day before the Bazooka Birthday, Officer Hotchkiss was detailing the various penalties for marijuana use and possession in Maine. It was all I could do to keep my eyes open. The previous week had been highly entertaining—he had brought in slides featuring mug shots of his favorite criminals and told us all about how they’d ruined their lives through drug use. This, however, was a big snooze.

  He had just droned out the penalties for growing marijuana plants at home (six months in jail and a $1,000 fine for five plants or less; ten years in jail and a $20,000 fine for more than five hundred plants) when Michael raised his hand.

  “Excuse me, Officer Hotchkiss, but you haven’t mentioned medical marijuana.”

  “Come again, son?” Hotchkiss asked.

  “Twelve states have laws that permit medical marijuana. Maine is one of them.”

  Hotchkiss didn’t answer right away. An unfriendly smile formed beneath the dirt line.

  “Well, I’m sorry to disagree with you, young man, but we don’t have any special laws for doctors who smoke pot.” Laughter rippled across the room. I saw red creep across Michael’s face. But he didn’t back down.

  “No, of course not,” he said firmly. “But in 1999 Maine decriminalized marijuana use for people who have their doctor’s permission. In Maine a sick person can have up to one and a quarter ounces of marijuana, and grow up to six plants.”

  “Cool,” said a voice from the back of the room, eliciting more laughter.

  “That’ll be enough!” Hotchkiss said sharply. H
e turned to Michael. “In very rare cases Maine turns a blind eye to marijuana use by some patients. But the vast majority of users are engaging in a very dangerous, illegal activity, and will be prosecuted under the law.”

  A hand went up. “Why would sick people use marijuana?”

  Michael dove right in.

  “There’s a chemical in marijuana known as THC,” Michael explained. “It helps reduce pain and nausea and even increases your appetite. It really helps people with cancer who have been doing chemotherapy treatments and losing weight.”

  “So, like, it gives you the munchies?” came the back-of-the-room voice again. Wild laughter.

  “Well, yeah. That’s right,” Michael replied.

  “Enough!” barked Hotchkiss. “There is absolutely no evidence that smoking marijuana helps. In fact, it hurts. It’s much worse than cigarette smoking and can give you cancer.” Obviously, Hotchkiss did know more about this than he had let on.

  “Well, that doesn’t make any sense, does it?” Michael said matter-of-factly. “I mean, if you’re already dying from cancer, why not smoke a little pot if it helps? Like I said, it’s perfectly legal in Maine and eleven other—”

  “I said enough!” Hotchkiss repeated loudly. You could have heard a mouse sneeze, it was that quiet. Michael looked surprised.

  No clue. He had no clue how much like a little professor he sounded. He might be getting laughs, and good questions, as a result of his informed comments. But nobody loved him for it. Basically, junior high kids hate know-it-alls. Even well-intentioned know-it-alls. And I suspected that emotionally, Officer Hotchkiss had not advanced much beyond his own junior high years.

  “This is not a joke!” Hotchkiss said severely, glaring at Michael. “Pack up your things. I’ll speak to you in Mr. Hare’s office after class.”

  For one stunned moment Michael just stared at him. Then he slowly began to stuff pencil, notebook, and loose papers into his binder. He kept his eyes fixed on the floor. I think it was the first time in his life that Michael had ever gotten into trouble at school.

  Brett McCarthy, no stranger to trouble, stood up.

  “Excuse me,” I said clearly. “Why are you sending him to the office?”

  “Have a seat, please,” Hotchkiss said icily. “This does not concern you.”

  “Yes, it does,” I said. You could have heard a pin drop in that room. This was turning out to be more entertaining than the inmate slides.

  “And how is that?” Hotchkiss asked sarcastically.

  “My grandmother has cancer. She’s lost a lot of weight because she’s nauseous from her treatments. If smoking pot could help her, I’d like to know.”

  “The medical benefits of marijuana are questionable, and the harm caused by marijuana is very well known!” Hotchkiss insisted. “Now, unless you’d like to join your friend here in a trip to the principal’s office, I’d suggest you have a seat.”

  Hotchkiss had no clue that dates with the principal were nothing new to me. I didn’t budge.

  At the back of the room a new hand shot up. Bob Levesque.

  “I think Brett makes a good point. After all, it’s legal. Right, Mike?”

  A chorus of “Right, Mike?”s filled the room. I remained standing. Michael had stopped his shuffle toward the door and looked across at me. I tried to smile at him without really smiling. Like tossing him an imaginary rope.

  Another hand up. Monique Rose.

  “If smoking the pot is a problem, what about eating it? I was watching a movie recently about the sixties, and people were baking marijuana into brownies. Might that work, without the side effects from smoking?”

  An enthusiastic round of “Right!” erupted from every corner.

  History Dude, a Fifth Period kid who was to history as Michael was to math, answered her without even bothering to raise his hand.

  “You’d have to determine whether the heat from the oven destroys the THC,” he said.

  “Right,” she said.

  “Yeah! Right!” someone exclaimed.

  “Actually, there’s a way to extract THC from the marijuana leaves,” Michael said excitedly. He’d obviously forgotten that he wasn’t floating in his safe Fifth Period pond right now but swimming with the piranhas. “It’s not as potent as smoking it, but there are some benefits. And doctors can prescribe it in capsule form.”

  “You mean pot pills?” someone asked. “Right, Mike!”

  Hotchkiss looked furious. He opened his mouth to say something dire. Instead, the bell rang.

  “You!” Officer Hotchkiss said loudly, pointing at Michael while the whole class rose and began the swarm to lunch. “You’re still headed to the office!”

  I felt my knees unlock. At the back of the room Bob was laughing and high-fiving his Demigods, “Mike” already forgotten. Diane, in the seat next to his, rose slowly. She glanced my way, and I wasn’t sure, but it seemed like she nodded. A barely perceptible tip of the head. Then she walked out.

  Perceptible: capable of being noticed.

  In the hallway I scanned the crush of faces. You could lose sight of someone within seconds when the lunchtime crowd was on the move. Then, only a few locker lengths away, I found what I was looking for. I pushed through the sea of shoulders and book bags and grabbed hold of Michael’s elbow.

  “Hey,” I said. “Going my way?”

  in•so•lence

  That night Michael and I found ourselves searching Web sites for pro and con arguments in the medical marijuana debate. This was Principal No-Hare’s solution to the DARE class disruption issue.

  Unlike Officer Hotchkiss, No-Hare had the greatest respect for high-achieving students like Michael. He’d also gotten pretty chummy with me. Once soccer season ended and winter set in, he surprised me by showing up at a few of the eighth-grade girls’ basketball games, then catching up with me in the school hallway the next day to talk hoops. Turned out that he was a huge North Carolina fan. True, his lip-smacking, finger-licking ways with fried chicken could turn the strongest stomach. But anyone who loves the Tar Heels couldn’t be all that bad. So when Hotchkiss complained about Michael’s drug-promoting insolence, No-Hare was skeptical.

  Insolence: insultingly contemptuous speech or conduct; impudence.

  To make Hotchkiss happy, No-Hare promised to “punish” Michael with an assignment: Come up with ten pro and ten con arguments in the medical marijuana debate. And since I just happened to be standing around and Hotchkiss told him I had been involved too, he included me in the assignment.

  Michael was thrilled. He loved research. He suggested we go online at seven o’clock and IM each other as we gathered the twenty arguments.

  We were almost done when I got a shocker: A message from Diane popped up.

  2Di4: hey.

  I stared at it, stupidly, for at least thirty seconds. She knew I was online. I had assumed she’d deleted me from her Buddy List months ago. Obviously she hadn’t, which meant every time she’d been on the computer, sending messages to all her cheerleader pals, she’d have been able to see whether Sockrgurl was on. Likewise, I’d never deleted her. Just watched, as night after night she entered and exited cyberspace. It was like spying, with binoculars, from the windows of a tall building as Diane came and left from another building across the street. And we’d both been doing it.

  Sockrgurl: hey back.

  2Di4: whazzup?

  Sockrgurl: not much. u?

  Then Michael sent a message.

  MensaMan: BINGO!!

  Sockrgurl to MensaMan: what’s bingo?

  MensaMan to Sockrgurl: just found #10 con. we r done!

  Sockrgurl to MensaMan: awesome. we r done.

  2Di4: thought u & m were brave 2day. hkiss is a loser.

  MensaMan to Sockrgurl: want 2 play checkers?

  Michael is big into online games. He’s especially into chess, sometimes playing three or four games simultaneously with grand masters across the globe. He usually invites me to play something more commonplace,
like checkers or crazy eights.

  Sockrgurl to MensaMan: u always win. no fun 4 me.

  Sockrgurl to 2Di4: thx. it was mostly m.

  Carrying on two separate Instant Messenger conversations is not easy, especially when one conversation is from a long-lost-friend-turned-enemy and the other is with a recently-hurt-reconstituted-friend. My head began to ache.

  MensaMan to Sockrgurl: i’ll let u win.

  2Di4 to Sockrgurl: howz your nonna?

  Sockrgurl to MensaMan: still no fun.

  Sockrgurl to 2Di4: not great.

  MensaMan to Sockrgurl: i’ll let u win and play 4 money.

  2Di4 to Sockrgurl: sorry 2 hear that.

  Sockrgurl to 2Di4: u r 2 wierd. i’m blocking u.

  Sockrgurl to MensaMan: thx 4 asking.

  There was a long pause; nothing from either of them for a full minute. Then:

  MensaMan to Sockrgurl: u r welcome. does that mean yes or no?

  It took me several seconds to realize I’d sent each of them the other’s message. But there it was, right on the screen.

  Diane wrote back.

  2Di4 to Sockrgurl: b that way. i was trying 2b nice.

  “No!” I yelled, pounding the countertop with my fist.

  “Someone having trouble with her homework?” Dad remarked calmly from behind his newspaper.

  Sockrgurl to 2Di4: don’t go please!!! I’m on w/m 2. that message was 4 him!!

  She didn’t see it. The little lower right-hand corner message box floated up, announcing that 2Di4 had just signed off.

  MensaMan to Sockrgurl: checkers?

  “Aah!” I yelled in frustration. This was too stupidly ironic. I reached for the phone and dialed the Pelletiers’ number.

  “Hello?”

  I recognized her voice. “Diane, don’t hang up. This is Brett. Let me explain.”

  “You’ve got thirty seconds,” she said calmly.

  “Okay, just now? I was online with Michael. We had to do a project tonight about marijuana—No-Hare assigned it ’cause Hotchkiss was really mad—and we were messaging back and forth, and then you came on just as we finished and Michael wanted to play checkers. See? And I was trying to tell him no at the same time as talk to you and he was being a pain. So I told him I was blocking him, but by accident I sent that message to you. I absolutely didn’t mean to call you weird. I meant Michael.”