by K. J. Reilly
And she said, “You sure?”
I looked in through the window and Rooster was sitting there by himself eating and I said, “You know what? Let’s wait until he comes outside and I’ll try to talk to him out here ’cause I don’t want to leave his stuff and for whatever reason I think he’s more comfortable out here than he is in there.”
“Well, just so you know, if we call an ambulance they will likely be here in just a few minutes and they can treat him right out here on the street. They won’t take him anywhere he doesn’t want to go or arrest him and he doesn’t have to pay anything either. They just want to help, not make things worse.”
“Are you sure?” I asked as I looked in through the window at Rooster eating, worried that in trying to help we would make things worse for him. Then Mrs. T said, “I’ve done it a thousand times, Joel, and he can refuse treatment at any point. As far as I know it is not a crime to have a cut on your face. But just so you know, the police will come as well, just in case.”
“Okay. I’ll ask him when he comes out and if he says yes, I’ll wave at you and you can make the call?”
“Sounds like a plan. But don’t push too hard and don’t get yourself hurt.” And when she said it she looked really happy.
Mrs. T went inside and in a few minutes Rooster got up and he returned his tray like he was supposed to and then he came outside and I said, “My name’s Joel,” which was a weird and awkward thing to say at this late stage in our relationship but I didn’t know how else to start a conversation.
Rooster looked at me.
“Does that cut hurt? It looks like it hurts.”
He didn’t say anything but he raised his hand to his forehead.
“Look,” I said. “Mrs. Torrington, the lady who runs this place, she’s real nice and I trust her and she said that we could call an ambulance and they could treat that wound for you right here on the sidewalk.”
Rooster didn’t nod or do anything; he was just ignoring me and moving things around in his shopping cart like everything was now in all the wrong places.
“I could stay with you until they finish. And I’d watch your stuff,” I tried.
He didn’t look at me or move.
“Should we do that? What do you think?” I asked.
Nothing.
“Hold up one finger if it’s a yes….”
Rooster turned back toward me and slowly lifted up one finger.
I saw Mrs. T standing at the window and I gave her a wave and she nodded and Rooster sat down on the curb.
Then I said, “Look, do you want some cake?”
Nothing.
“If you wait here, I can go get it.”
Still nothing. Then one finger for yes.
I said, “Hold on. Don’t go anywhere,” then ran inside and grabbed my backpack and then a piece of cake and a fork from Eli and she said, “Tell him there’s more if he wants it.”
And I said, “I will.”
in my backpack on account of the fact that Jace and I had the dentist after school and I had promised to read it to him when we were waiting but Dr. Hartman was on time and they took Jace right when we got there and me right after him, so I didn’t get to read to Jace at all.
I sat down on the curb next to Rooster and gave him the piece of double-layer Dutch chocolate cake with vanilla icing and red and yellow sprinkles and then I took the book out of my backpack and opened it to the first page and just started reading out loud from the beginning about Christopher Robin and the Hundred Aker Wood, mostly because it was easier than trying to make conversation with someone who didn’t talk back. I did it because it would pass the time and also because this book had a calming effect on Jace and me and I thought that maybe it would be distracting to Rooster while we waited. It was only just after six and people were walking and driving by being that the stores were still open and I figured that it must have looked pretty silly for me to be sitting on the curb on Hendricks Street reading a little kid’s book to a big old bear of a man with a shopping cart full of junk and too many clothes on who was eating cake, but I didn’t care.
Today, in English class, because of the parent complaints about the gay books and the new policy in the school district about violent words, Mr. Morgan listed all of the trigger words and topics in the book we were about to start that might be upsetting to some kids in the class—Iran, hanging people, restrictions on free speech, oppressive governments, revolution, exile, hijabs, the oppression of women, and books about sex. Then he said that anyone who wanted to could leave and go to a safe space next to the principal’s office to color.
Nobody left except Paulie Pullman, the same kid who left last time.
Then Mr. Morgan told us about Reading Lolita in Tehran, which is a true story about a teacher who read forbidden books with women students in Iran, a country where they have morality police who don’t let people read whatever they want to read and where they can’t dance, or drink alcohol, or listen to forbidden music except in secret, and women and men can’t interact without supervision and if you touch a girl’s hand in a park and she isn’t related to you you could both be arrested and women can’t dress the way they want to and if you are gay you could be put to death and they could display your body on a rope hanging on the back of a truck in the middle of a city to scare other people from doing anything wrong like reading a book or touching a girl’s hand in a park or being the way they were born. I was thinking a lot about what Mr. Morgan was saying about free speech being something we should protect even if that meant that sometimes we had to hear stuff that made us uncomfortable and how lucky we were to be able to read whatever we wanted to read whenever we wanted to read it even if that only meant sitting on the curb and reading a book out loud to a man who has a Purple Heart that came with delusions and a heartbreak of an illness that nobody could fix.
When the cop car pulled up I was at the part where Christopher Robin is explaining to Pooh that you don’t get honey with balloons. The cops came over and Mrs. T came out to talk to them. Then the Colonel and Spindini came outside and sat down next to us on the curb. I was reading the part where Pooh Goes Visiting and Gets Into a Tight Place when the ambulance pulled up with its lights on but no siren. The paramedics were really cool and they asked Rooster’s permission to look at the cut on his face and I kept reading as they cleaned up the wound and they kept asking Rooster if they could do this or do that without me even pausing to let them talk. I was at the part where Pooh gets stuck in Rabbit’s hole when Eli came outside and I kept reading as one of the paramedics told Rooster that the cut didn’t need stitches, so they were going to put a big butterfly bandage across it and they told him that they used antibiotic cream so it would heal better and I was at the part where all Rabbit’s friends and relations went head-over-heels backward to pull Pooh free from the entrance to Rabbit’s house and Eli was sitting on the curb next to Spindini at this point and when the paramedics were done, one of them, a big guy with a shaved head, told Rooster he did two tours of duty in the “sandbox,” which he said, for those of us who didn’t know, was Iraq. He said he was a Navy hospital corpsman, which is a medic in the Marines. Then he said he never read Winnie-the-Pooh and one of the cops said, “Are you fucking kidding me, man?” And then the cop said his favorite part was near the end when Piglet Does a Very Grand Thing and I said that my favorite part was the beginning because it’s as far as it can be from being over. And then he asked Rooster if he could do anything for him like give him a ride to a shelter and I was wondering why things like this weren’t in the police blotter. I mean, come on.
Rooster didn’t say anything, he just got up and took his cart, and all of us, me and Eli, and the cops and the paramedics, and Spindini and the Colonel, and Mrs. T just stood there watching as he walked away with the butterfly bandage and antibacterial cream and us figuring that we all did what we could even though we were all wishing like hell that we could have done more. Maybe even a Very Grand Thing, like heroically pulling someone who wa
s stuck out of a very tight place.
TEXT FROM JOEL TO PRINCIPAL REDMAN 4:09 a.m.
Here’s a sentence completion for the SAT people.
If a town in Rockland County has a large number of people who are ---------- who don’t have enough ----------, the town should just ------------.
A. veterans, food, do the bare minimum
B. criminals, places to rob, leave all the bank doors unlocked
C. religious, churches, suggest they become atheists
D. skateboarders, skateboard parks, build more
The correct answer is “D.” The skateboard one.
“A” is tricky. I mean, the SAT people would mark it wrong, but it’s pretty much what happens.
“Did you Google Burning Man?”
I said, “How is your penny project?”
He said that he ran into a stumbling block.
And I said, “Day fifteen?”
And he said, “How did you know?”
Then I said, “Burning Man sounds cool, but I still can’t go.”
And Benj said, “Did you ask Jackson?”
“No.”
“Jesus, Mary?”
“No.”
“Just wait. You’ll change your mind.” Then Benj said, “Here,” and handed me a plastic bag full of socks in a variety of colors and a pair of winter gloves.
Men’s size large.
And then he just walked away.
who looked like he was our age, and I watched as Mrs. T went over to talk to him.
I was wiping down tables with a rag and Eli was somewhere in the back and when the kid got in line to get food Mrs. T waved at me to follow her. When we reached the kitchen she waved Eli and Benj over and told us that the boy’s name was Jesse and that it might be nice if we tried to talk to him. “He just told me that he grew up in foster care moving from home to home, but when he turned eighteen he aged out of the system. The state wouldn’t give anyone money to keep him, so that’s it.” And then Mrs. T started piling dishes into the sink like she was trying to break all of them and then she added, “Jesse probably doesn’t have most of the basic life skills he needs to take care of himself. He didn’t even get to graduate from high school.”
She pretty much said that he was in a hole and didn’t have a ladder to climb out.
I said, “There has to be a way,” and Mrs. T basically told us that there wasn’t and that it sucked but at least we are here to give him a hot meal.
Me and Eli and Benj went back out front and sat down with Jesse. We were wearing T-shirts that said Hendricks Street Soup Kitchen on the front and Jesse looked at them and then down at his food and I said, “Hey, my name’s Joel and this is Benj and Eli,” and he said, “I don’t want to be your research subject or pity project.”
I said, “It’s not like that.”
And Jesse looked at the three of us again and said, “Yes, it is.”
Then Eli said, “Do you want some cake?” And Jesse said, “Yes, please,” and Eli got up to get Jesse a piece of cake and when she came back we all sat there while he ate it with his gloves on and we didn’t say anything but we all stared out the window as a girl was getting into her car with her mother and she was laughing and talking to someone on her cell phone and they had huge white bags from Bed Bath & Beyond that were full of what looked like stuff for a new apartment or to bring to college ’cause there were big pillows and velvet hangers and a coffee-pot and a Swiffer handle was sticking out of one of the bags. There were so many bags that they had trouble fitting them all in the car. I was thinking about what Mr. Morgan told us about high schools and colleges where there are safe spaces to protect students from the violence of words and I was thinking that there were no safe spaces to protect kids like Jesse from the violence of life if they don’t have a family. And then I was thinking that Jesse must feel really bad because that girl has a safe space from the violence of life with velvet hangers and big soft pillows and he doesn’t, and even if he did have velvet hangers and big soft pillows he wouldn’t have a closet to hang them in or a bed to put them on and that sure felt like a fucking hole that would be impossible to climb out of.
I looked over at Benj and was wondering what he was thinking at this point and then I looked at Eli and wanted to say, “Where’s your God now?” but ReThought and didn’t say anything at all.
I just shut up and sat there.
Jesse never came back after that night.
At least not on a Wednesday.
that we had to write an essay or do a piece of artwork or anything else creative about our experience working in the soup kitchen to hand in to Mr. Morgan as part of our community service requirement.
She said it didn’t have to be a big project but it had to be from the heart.
Benj painted a picture of Spindini eating.
In the picture Spindini had a giant head and a giant fork and giant hands and pretty much it didn’t look like Spindini or even a man eating but it was more like modern art where you had to bring your imagination, or if you didn’t have an imagination then you just had to listen to what the artist said it was a picture of and take his word for it. Eli said it reminded her of a Picasso and Mrs. T said it was more like a Basquiat and I said I didn’t know who they were but it looked exactly like a Jacey Higgins to me.
I submitted a pair of socks.
Quite possibly the last pair in the Higgins house.
And Eli made a birthday card.
On the front was a picture of me as a homeless person in ripped, dirty clothes wearing a backpack. She Photoshopped my face onto an image of a guy in crappy clothes but Benj said, “I don’t get it. That’s what Joel looks like every day.”
I said, “Is not.”
Benj said, “Is too.”
Eli said, “Cut it out.”
On the front of the card it said, Happy Birthday!
Inside it said, This is what I would give you if I could:
1. A house with doors and windows and a roof
2. A job
3. A plan
4. Enough food so you were never hungry
5. Books
6. Love
7. Shoes
8. Clothes
9. Socks
10. A wallet full of cash
11. A healthy brain
12. Toothpaste
13. A healthy body
14. Free medicine
15. A TV
16. A cell phone with unlimited data
17. A car
18. A coffeepot
19. A different world
20. A friend
21. A lot of friends
22. A safe space
23. God
24. A promise that I will try to make things better
Benj said real birthday cards usually weren’t that big and what Eli wrote would never fit on one and Eli said it was her magnum opus and Benj said what is that and she said my masterpiece and I said we would make it fit, Benj.
He said no you wouldn’t.
I said we’d have to. Those are violent words.
TEXT FROM JOEL TO ANDY 1:54 a.m.
Jackson and me played crash-car combat and annihilated a BMW 380i and a Subaru
Outback last weekend. They were pretty busted up when we got them but you should have seen it.
The Subaru won. I was driving it. Jackson was pissed.
I mean, come on, he had the Beamer.
TEXT FROM JOEL TO PRINCIPAL REDMAN 3:52 a.m.
Here are some more words that should NOT be on the SAT:
Napiform—resembling a turnip
Mundungus—malodorous tobacco or half blood wizard in Harry Potter
Ort—a scrap of food left after eating
Oxter—armpit
And here is a possible sentence completion you might suggest to the SAT people because this one actually makes sense:
The conclusion of his argument, while _______, is far from_______.
Is it:
A. stimulating - interesting
B. abstruse - incomprehensible
C. germane - relevant
D. worthwhile - valueless
E. esoteric - obscure
F. out there - total bullshit
The answer’s “F.”
The SAT people will tell you “B” works too, but basically the answer is “F.”
TEXT FROM JOEL TO ANDY 4:06 a.m.
The exploding head syndrome calmed down, so I might not have a brain tumor but now I have a nasty rash to go along with the fungus. And Jackson’s still a mess. But don’t worry.
Hendricks Street Will Smith came back and he was wearing a business suit.
He said he would like the chicken, no salad, please and he said his name was Sam Trenton and he used to be a software engineer for a tech company but he got into some financial trouble and then he couldn’t get a job when the recession hit in 2008 and he lost his house and then he got sick and didn’t have health insurance and his wife left him and divorce is really expensive and the tech bubble burst and companies don’t hire old people like him especially in tech where being over forty is like being a hundred. And then he said Margot Kidder was homeless once and and lived in a cardboard box in California and she was Lois Lane in Superman. Then he said Sugar Ray Williams, who was captain of the Knicks and played for the Boston Celtics, had to sleep in his car when he became homeless because he made some bad investments and spent too much money. Then Sam Trenton said, “Shit like that happens all the time.”
I said, “Did you see the Will Smith movie where Will Smith is homeless and has a kid played by his real son in real life and he wears a business suit and is trying to get back on his feet and they sleep in the bathroom in the subway and he ends up getting a good job?”
Hendricks Street Will Smith nodded his head yes and said, “Come on, man, that wasn’t believable because it was freakin’ Will Smith for Christ’s sake.”
I said, “I know, right?”
And then Hendricks Street Will Smith said, “I cried at that movie,” and I said, “I know. Me too.”