Bingo Brown's Guide to Romance

by Betsy Byars

  “Send it off again.”

  “Well, I will. I need to read it over—maybe I can make it better.”

  “You want me to read it?”

  “Oh, no, no, I think I’ve got to make my own decisions on this. I know you wouldn’t want me fiddling with your Richter-scale monster. By the way, what is that thing that’s coming up after four thousand years of sleep?”

  “I don’t know. When I figure it out, I’ll let you know.”

  “You got anything else in the works?” his father asked.

  “Well, I have two other science-fiction stories started, but lately I’ve been working on—”

  He broke off as he thought of his Guide to Romance. He was, he thought, like a child who had briefly waded in the ocean attempting a book about swimming the Pacific.

  “I’ve been working on something sort of personal.”

  “Anything you’d care to talk about?”

  “Not really. But Dad, you know how they’re always saying write about what you know?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I was writing about what I thought I knew, only I didn’t know as much as I thought I did. Some of my answers seem, well, less than perfect.”

  “That’s hard to believe.”

  “It happens. Are you working on anything else, Dad?”

  His father smiled. “Not anything I’d care to comment on.”

  “But you do have another idea?”

  His smile remained. “I might as well admit it. I do have another idea.”

  The literary discussion was interrupted by a wail from down the hall.

  “Well, I better go. That’s Jamie. I told Mom I’d listen out for him.”

  Bingo’s dad threw his long legs off the side of his bed.

  “I’ll get him. I’ve been sort of ignoring Jamie lately. You go on out and take the afternoon off.”

  Bingo Brown’s Day Off

  BINGO LAY ON THE grass, listening to Billy Wentworth read The Red Badge of Courage aloud.

  Bingo’s eyes were closed.

  Wentworth was not a good reader. “ ‘Hear th’ news, boys? Corkright’s crushed th’ hull rebel right an’ captured two hull divisions.’ ”

  Wentworth stopped. “I wonder what a hull division is.”

  “How is it spelled?” Bingo asked without opening his eyes.

  “H-u-l-l.”

  “I think he means whole—whole division,” Bingo explained.

  “Hull is whole?”

  “The character has an accent.”

  “I get it, but I don’t like it. You get a lot of accents in Gifted and Talented?” he asked curiously.

  “Enough.”

  “Then I’m glad I ain’t gifted and talented. Where was I? Oh, here. ‘I tell yeh’—yeh is you, right? I’m catching on to this. ‘I tell yeh I’ve been all over that there ken-try.’ Ken-try.” He kept trying the word. “Ken-try.”

  “Country,” Bingo said.

  Bingo didn’t understand how he had come to be lying on the grass, allowing Billy Wentworth to read aloud to him.

  He had come into the backyard with The Red Badge of Courage under his arm. He had thought that a change of scene might help him concentrate. Certainly he was unable to concentrate on his Ninja Turtle sheets.

  There was a tree in the backyard where Bingo, in his carefree younger days, had sat and read. He remembered pleasantly the rustling of the leaves around him, the comfort of the sturdy old tree limbs that seemed to envelop him, Disney-movie-like, as he sat high above the neighborhood.

  That was the place to read.

  It had not taken Bingo long to climb up to the favorite limb of his youth. He could almost have stepped up onto it. For a moment he could not believe he was on the correct limb. His feet had actually touched the ground.

  How long ago had he sat here? Four years? Five? The tree could not have shrunk. He must have grown!

  He had sat for a moment, enjoying the awkwardness. It was like being in a booster chair when—

  “Hey, Worm Brain!”

  Bingo had looked across the yard. It was Wentworth, of course.

  “What you doing—playing Tarzan?”

  “I’ve got to read this book.” Bingo had given a helpless shrug, gesturing with the closed book as he stepped down from the tree limb.

  “What’s it about?”

  “War.”

  “War?”

  “Yes.”

  Wentworth had looked interested. “Nam or Gulf?”

  “Civil.”

  “Civil? Hey, let me see that book. Are there any pictures?”

  “No.”

  “Give it here anyway.”

  And before Bingo knew what was happening, Wentworth was reading aloud and he, Bingo, was lying there on the grass, listening to him.

  “That’s the end of the dialogue for a while,” Wentworth was saying. “I’m glad about that, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t see how actors stand it. I could never be an actor.”

  “No.”

  Wentworth picked up the narrative. “ ‘A shell, screaming like a—’ ” Wentworth paused to sound out a word. “Ban-shee. Who ever heard of a ban-shee? I swear that’s what it says. You can look if you don’t believe me.”

  “I believe you.”

  “What will they come up with next. ‘—screaming like a banshee went over the huddled heads of the reserves. It landed in the—’ ”

  Suddenly Wentworth stopped reading. Bingo waited, thinking he was getting ready to sound out a word, but he heard the sound of the book being slammed shut.

  “Hey, I almost forgot what I came over for,” Wentworth said. “Am I getting stupid or what?” He slapped the side of his head as if to activate his brain.

  Bingo didn’t answer. He had pushed his new glasses up on his forehead, but now he pulled them down and looked at Wentworth. Wentworth didn’t look much better, but Bingo liked to have an excuse—however feeble—to push his glasses up and down.

  “I came in the house,” Wentworth began, “and my sister said, ‘A girl called and wants you to call her back. Her number’s by the phone.’

  “I look at the number and I recognize it as the Weez’s. See, I been dialing Weezie’s number lately—I don’t know why—every time I pass the phone, I dial the Weez. I hang up as soon as anybody answers, so nobody knows it’s me, but I’m beginning to wonder why I do it. I don’t want to talk to her. I just want to dial her number. I’m getting so I don’t like to pass the phone anymore.

  “Anyway, I recognize the number and I dial it. And, Bingo, it takes all my strength not to hang up when someone answers. I was proud of myself.”

  Bingo continued to watch Wentworth, though his eyes closed from time to time, as if he were watching bad television.

  “So I don’t get Weez. I get Shirl—that’s Melissa’s sister. Shirl wants to talk. She says, ‘You were over here the other day, weren’t you?’

  “I said, ‘Maybe.’ I don’t give anything away for free.

  “She said, ‘Were you the big one in camouflage or the one with freckles?’

  “I said, ‘Do I sound like the one with freckles?’

  “She said, ‘No.’

  “I said, ‘Well, I didn’t dial this number to be insulted.’

  “She said, ‘Why did you dial it?’

  “I said, ‘The Weez wanted me to.’ That ends the conversation. She yells, ‘Weeee-zie!’ Weezie comes to the phone.

  “Weezie is naturally jealous that I’ve been talking to Shirl, but finally she comes out with the reason for the call.”

  “What was the reason for the call?”

  “Melissa’s coming over.”

  Bingo’s eyes unglazed.

  “Over here?” Bingo went up on one elbow.

  “Yeah.”

  “What did she tell you—exactly?”

  “She said, ‘Do you think Bingo’s home?’

  “I said, ‘Who wants to know?’ I don’t give anything away for
free.

  “She said, ‘Melissa.’

  “I said, ‘Melissa?’—like I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “She said, ‘Yes, Melissa.’

  “I said, ‘Well, excuse me, but last time we saw Melissa she ran past Bingo without speaking. Time before that, she didn’t give him but seven or eight words. She don’t act like somebody who wants to know whether he’s home or not. What’s she got in mind, Weez—ringing his doorbell and hiding in the bushes?’ ”

  Bingo interrupted. “Wentworth, let me get this straight. Melissa is coming over to my house?”

  “You got it.”

  “This afternoon?” Bingo sat up.

  “Yeah.” Wentworth checked his watch. “She ought to be here any minute now. I mean, this conversation took place a half-hour ago—maybe more. I lose track of time when I’m reading.”

  Bingo got to his feet.

  “Good-bye, Wentworth.”

  “You don’t mind if I finish this book, do you? It’s getting good.”

  “Be my guest.”

  “I might even read the hull thing. Get it? Hull thing!”

  “Got it,” Bingo said as he ran for the house.

  The Brown Crisis

  BINGO WENT IN THE back door just as his mother was attempting to come out of it.

  “Bingo, watch what you’re doing!”

  “Sorry.”

  He passed her and headed at once for the bathroom. He knew there wouldn’t be any mousse, but a quick shave would give him the manly feeling that he needed to meet this new crisis.

  “Bingo, wait!”

  “I can’t! I’m in a hurry.”

  “I have wonderful news.”

  “Later.”

  He rushed into the bathroom and closed the door. He turned on the water so that the drone of his father’s electric razor would be muted.

  He slid his glasses up on top of his head. He paused. He liked himself almost as much with his glasses on his head as with them on his face. Actually, he would have liked to have two pairs—one for his head and one—

  He broke off his thoughts and reached for the razor.

  His mother’s voice came from just outside the door. She had followed him. Couldn’t she leave him alone for one moment without trying to disturb him with wonderful news? Wonderful news was the last thing he wanted to hear when he had to get ready for a mixed-sex conversation.

  “The wonderful news is that your father is back to normal!”

  “That’s nice.”

  Bingo’s hands were trembling with excitement. He fumbled the razor and dropped it. He picked it up by the cord, clicked it on, and took immediate comfort in the normalcy of the buzz. He hadn’t broken it.

  “I don’t know how it happened. I left and he was lying on the bed with his eyes closed to the world, and I come back and he’s playing with Jamie. A miracle!”

  Bingo began to go over his left cheek.

  “And your dad and I are going out!”

  “That’s nice.”

  “You look after Jamie.”

  Bingo was so astonished that he flung open the door without concealing his father’s razor. His glasses flopped down onto his face.

  “Mom, I can’t baby-sit.”

  “I know. I know.” She held up her hands as if in defense. “I said you could have the afternoon to read your book, but Bingo, that was before your father got back to normal!”

  “I can’t baby-sit.”

  “Bingo, we want to celebrate. We want to go out and do something fun—have a picnic or bowl or do something we haven’t done in years. Go out to the lake and walk barefoot through the sands of time.”

  “I cannot baby-sit.”

  “Bingo, you aren’t hearing me. Your father is back to normal.”

  “I hear you fine. You are the one who is not hearing me. I cannot baby-sit.”

  “Why?”

  “I have plans.”

  “What plans?”

  “I might—I have reason to believe that I definitely will—have company.”

  “Company?”

  “Yes. Company.”

  “You can have company. Who, Wentworth? Wentworth won’t mind Jamie. Anyway, Wentworth’s not company. He’s over here all the time.”

  “This is someone who is not over here ‘all the time.’ ”

  “Who?”

  “Melissa.”

  At that moment Bingo’s father came from the bedroom. He gave Bingo a smile even when he heard the drone of his razor in Bingo’s clenched fist.

  His mother backed away from Bingo and turned with a gesture of helplessness to her husband. “He says he’s having company.”

  Bingo shrugged. “Melissa.”

  “I’m sick of Melissa. I’m fed up with Melissa,” his mother hissed. Melissa was a good name to hiss, and his mother gave the name more s’s than necessary.

  “Now, now,” his father said soothingly.

  “I can’t help it. That girl is just ruining my life. You probably don’t remember this, but I almost had a terrible wreck going down Monroe the wrong way. All because of Melissa! And there’s another thing I didn’t tell you. Remember all those long-distance calls Bingo made to her in Bixby, Oklahoma? He’s never completely paid that back. And—”

  “Now, now,” his father said. “We can work this out.”

  “How?” his mother asked.

  “Let’s bend our rules.”

  “How?”

  “Bingo can have company this once without our being home. Melissa can come over and Jamie can be the chaperone.”

  “Dad, I can’t baby-sit. I can’t be sitting here with a baby when Melissa comes over. Dad! Be reasonable!”

  Bingo’s words to his father—that last “Be reasonable!”—were a man-to-man appeal.

  After all, his father had once loved a woman. He knew what it was like. He knew that Bingo needed to stand alone, babyless. His hope died when his father gave his that’s-the-best-I-can-do shrug.

  “All right, we won’t go,” Bingo’s mom said. “We’ll all just sit in the living room together. We’ll all visit with Melissa.”

  “I’ll baby-sit,” Bingo said.

  “I don’t want to force you,” his mother said. “I respect your right not to baby-sit when it interferes with your plans.”

  “I want to baby-sit.”

  This caused his mother’s frozen features to soften into a smile. “Bingo,” she said warmly.

  Bingo turned to go back into the bathroom.

  “Oh, Bingo,” his father said.

  “Yes?”

  He had a brief moment of hope that his father would give him a wink and say, “We’ll take Jamie with us, all right?”

  “Yes, Dad?”

  “Put my razor back when you’re through with it.”

  “Yes, Dad.”

  Waiting for Melissa

  BINGO SAT ON THE sofa with Jamie on his lap. They were watching cartoons. The Saturday faces were as familiar and comforting to Bingo as his own, and yet now everything the characters did made him nervous.

  Also, he had to keep getting up, walking tensely to the window, and looking out. Bingo had been doing this for one hour, and still Melissa had not appeared.

  He lowered his new glasses and peered over them like an old man.

  “Not yet,” he commented. “I wonder where she could be. Maybe she’s not coming.”

  He returned to the sofa and began a sort of nervous commentary about the cartoons.

  “Now this is one of my favorites.”

  He barely knew what he was watching.

  “Oh!” At last there was a moment of real recognition. “It is one of my favorites. See, that’s Wile E. Coyote and he’s sending off for a flying machine because he wants to drop a bomb on Road Runner. Road Runner’s the one you like so much that goes ‘beep-beep.’ Don’t put your fingers in my mouth, please, Jamie. I’m very nervous. Thank you.”

  Bingo got up and went to the window. Again, the sidewalk was empty; the street
, deserted. It was like the street in a Western movie before the showdown, when townsfolk stayed home behind locked doors.

  “Not yet,” Bingo said. “I wonder where she can be. Wentworth said she was coming.” He paused. “He could have been lying. He could have just said she was coming so that I would run in the house like a fool, shave, put you in a clean jumpsuit, and spend the rest of the afternoon running to the window.” He sighed. “But—so far—Wentworth has been truthful—almost too truthful.”

  He went back to the sofa.

  “Now, where were we? Ah, the package has arrived from the Acme Supply Company and, look, Jamie, it turns out to be a flying machine. See, now he’s on the flying machine. He gets on the flying machine, and he’s supposed to be looking for Road Runner, but he starts enjoying the flying machine and he—”

  Ding-dong.

  Bingo gasped. His heart leapt to his throat.

  It couldn’t be Melissa. Already! He hadn’t heard her come up the steps. How had she slipped up on him? Had she been hiding in the bushes?

  It wasn’t fair. He needed time to get himself composed. His plan had been that as soon as he saw her coming down the street, he would compose himself.

  Now she was here and there wasn’t time to put the plan to work.

  Ding-dong.

  Bingo leaned forward so he could look out the window and see who was at the door. Perhaps a miracle had occurred and a delivery man …

  It was Melissa.

  Involuntarily, Bingo’s arms tightened around his brother.

  Melissa was not aware that she was being watched. She fluffed out her hair and put her hands in her pockets and took them out and straightened her collar and put them back and took them out and smoothed her hair. Then she thought better of it and refluffed it.

  Ding-dong. Ding-dong.

  Two of them! This meant that she was getting tired of the single ding-dongs and soon she would tire of the double ones. Then she would come to the window, peer in to see if anybody was home. And she would see him, frozen with fear on the sofa.