Carter's Big Break

by Brent Crawford

  I’m standing in about the same spot where C. B. Down read to us from his book. I totally remember the haunted look in his eyes that sent a chill down my spine and shut five hundred kids up instantly. It didn’t hurt that he was a total bad-ass, like a UFC fighter blended with a rock star. He had full-sleeve tattoos and more ink on his neck and hands. His dreadlocks were pulled back into a ponytail, and a thick beard covered his chiseled face. His voice was soft and sounded like he’d been smoking a pack a day since birth.

  I totally remember him reading to us from the first chapter. “The first time my parents left me alone, I was fifteen years old.”

  At the time, I chuckled, but then realized I’d never been left alone either. My older sister, Lynn, is always there to bitch at me when my parents are unavailable. Then he got into the point of his story, how he (Chris in the book) hadn’t really been “left alone.” His parents drove off of a bridge on their way home from a party. He’s not sure if they did it on purpose, until the end of the book. Chris has to go live in a foster home, but he’s a spoiled little bitch at this point in the story and can’t handle it. He gets into a fight with his foster father and is told that he has to go live in a group home. His guidance counselor had warned him that he’d have to go to this tough-ass boys’ home if he couldn’t get along with the foster family and that he was too big of a pussy to live there. So, Chris takes off and comes to Merrian and squats in the basement of the scary old Saur mansion. This chick Maggie (Ms. McDougle, we assume) helps him out all the time, and he enrolls at Merrian High, gets a job at the Hy-Vee, makes friends, falls in love, starts writing for fun, and eventually wins a writing contest but gets busted as a result. I can’t remember all of the details, but it’s really good (way better than I just made it sound). It’s funny because the kid on the cover of the book kind of looks like me, and when I was reading it, I always saw myself as Chris.

  Abby told me that it’s very common to cast yourself as the lead character in the book you’re reading, and because she’s a smart-ass, she added, “If you’d read more, you’d know that.” I wonder how common it is to actually get to audition for the film version of your favorite book, smarty-pants? Abby also used to say that the story was “very Dickens.” So that’s how I would describe it to people who didn’t know that I had no idea what or who “Dickens” was. Abby got me three of Charles Dickens’s novels as punishment. I started to read all of them, but they weren’t as good as Down Gets Out, so I didn’t finish. I did find out that “what the dickens?” and “you little dickens” have nothing to do with that writer.

  I’m rudely sprung from my daydream when my boys rush into the auditorium. Bag says, “I told you he’d be in here . . . drama fag!”

  I snottily tell them about the benefits of being a “drama fag.” “Have any of you jackasses been asked to star in a movie today?”

  They may not love theater the way I do, but we all dig movies, so proper jealously flows my way.

  3. HOW MANY FINGERS?

  On the ride out to Grey Goose, I’m spacing off, polishing up that acceptance speech when EJ crashes into my rear wheel, and I almost wreck. He keeps riding like nothing happened, so I ask, “S’up, dude?!”

  He looks at me, still lost in thought, and asks, “Yo, does Bitchy Nicky have a boyfriend?”

  In unison, everybody yells, “NO, and there’s a reason!”

  We approach the ditch-jump behind Pizza Barn, and my friend Bag’s about to turn into it so he can bust a cool trick like he always does, but I accelerate ahead and cut him off.

  “What the hell, Carter?” he asks, as I angle into the yard and zip down into the ditch before anyone can say anything else or I chicken out. I’m known for being a bit of a wuss. Typically, I would go last off of a jump and only get a few inches of air, but I’m feeling like a million bucks today . . . and perhaps a bit overconfident. I pump the pedals hard as I make the approach. I hit the lip going ten times faster than usual, rock my weight back, and rip the handlebars toward my chest.

  EJ and Hormone cheer, “YEEEAAAAHHHH!” as I launch into the air. So high. Way higher than Bag has ever soared. Way, way, WAY too damn high! This is the spot where a guy in the X Games would bust a tail whip, or go for the backflip, but I decide not to. I’ve got other things to worry about. Flying through the air is probably more enjoyable when you have some idea how you’re going to land, but I don’t. I simply start screaming, “HUUUAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!”

  Intellectually, I know I should kick the bike away and try to land on my feet, but the signals are not getting below my neck, so I simply death grip the handlebars and watch the blacktop get closer and closer to my fragile, helmetless skull, and listen to the front tire violently POP and the metal frame CRUNCH beneath my weight. Then all sounds are drowned out by the WHAAAAM of my head hitting the pavement, and the chorus of ringing bells.

  I’m fairly certain that I slid on my face for a few feet . . . but not a hundred percent. The rest of the bike wreck is pure conjecture, because my lights went out when the first bells started to chime, and I don’t remember a damn thing.

  A foghorn blasting inside of my head rudely wakes me a moment later. My body is twitching as my central nervous system tries to reboot itself. My eyes are fluttering inside their lids and I can barely hear Doc yelling, “Call 911!!!”

  I’m trying to tell them that I’m fine, but I’m just moaning “Muggggeddiiii” instead.

  “He’s awake!” EJ gasps, and starts slapping me.

  I try to block his shots and figure out what possible good could come from beating me as I roll around the dirty street. The ringing does get quieter as his slaps get stronger. He cries, “Stay with us, Carter!”

  Finally my mouth works, and I yell, “Quit it!”

  “He’s fine,” Nutt says, holding up his hand and demanding, “How many fingers am I holdin’ up, Carter?”

  I’m slightly annoyed because he’s moving them all around, so I snap, “Four, dumbass!”

  They all look at each other with concern before EJ adds, “That doesn’t mean anything. Carter’s always sucked at math.”

  After a half hour of playing, “How many fingers?!” and getting most of the answers right, we start walking our bikes toward Hormone’s house.

  Bag still wants me to go to the hospital, but nobody else wants to sit in a smelly waiting room on the last day of school, and Hormone thinks he can use me to get his car back.

  They show his dad my mangled bike and face as exhibits A and B in the case of why we shouldn’t have to ride our bikes anymore. He looks at me suspiciously because I’m leaning on EJ, and my left eye is blinking like I’m flirting with him. He asks, “Are you sure we shouldn’t take him to the ER?”

  “No, no, he’s fine,” Hormone assures him. “Show ’em, Carter . . . how many fingers?!”

  “Three!” I declare.

  I must have gotten it right because Doc adds, “See?”

  Hormone’s dad accepts the diagnosis as if the surgeon general had made it. He hands over the keys and tells us, “Stay out of trouble.” Either that or he said, “Learn how to juggle.”

  We abandon our bikes, and Nutt calls “Shotgun” as we pile into the little car.

  We’re barreling down the street when I ask EJ, “Hmmm?” as if he asked me a question.

  He looks over at me with concern. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  For the hundredth time I say, “Yes.”

  Nutt turns around suspiciously and asks, “How many fingers?!”

  “Shut up,” I reply. “Where are we going?”

  Hormone yells back, “Grey Goose Lake!”

  “Why?”

  Nutt answers, “There’s a party.”

  “How come?”

  EJ snidely replies, “We just wanted to do something nice for you.”

  I flip them off before taking a quick nap.

  Twice more I wake and ask where we’re going. EJ reminds them how forgetful I am even when I haven’t hit my head. We pull off of
the main road and park beside the Grey Goose Golf Course so that we can sneak into the lake area undetected by the security guard.

  The next thing I know, it’s dark outside and the CRX’s dome light flickers on. My face isn’t working right, and I’ve got a terrible HEADACHE. I hear EJ whispering to someone, “No, baby, it’s cool. Carter’s passed out . . . he won’t mind.” My left eye won’t open, but my right one cracks just wide enough to observe Bitchy Nicky climbing on top of EJ in the passenger seat. I’m trying to shake away the cobwebs and figure out why I would be imagining such a horrific thing, as he shuts the door and starts sucking her face.

  “Duuude!” I protest.

  Nicky yells, “Get the hell out of here, Carter!”

  I try to tell EJ he’s making a big mistake, but nothing comes out when I open my mouth, so I just pop the hatchback and stumble across the golf course toward my party.

  I’m headed for the lake to go for a swim, but my sister spots me fighting to peel off my T-shirt. I hear her laughing at my painful struggle. “Carter, are you drunk?!”

  The neckline of the shirt scrapes my mangled face and causes me to gasp. Her eyes fly open as she barks, “Oh my God! Who did this to you?”

  I point to myself, because I am, as usual, my own worst enemy.

  I think that she dragged me through the party and showed her friends how jacked up I was. I bet she hunted down my boys and yelled at them for bringing me out here in this condition, but I’m not sure. I know that her boyfriend, Nick, gave me a ride home, because he carried me into my house and I was drooling/bleeding on his shoulder when my mom’s screaming woke me up. He’s, like, six-five, two-hundred-and-fifty pounds. He’s going to play college football next year and he’s really cool, so when my eye snapped open and I found myself in his massive arms like a little papoose, I had no idea how to handle the situation, so I just pretended to go back to sleep.

  4. THE KIDZ CHANNEL

  I took it easy on my first few days of vacation. I think it’s called a “semi-coma” in medical circles, but my dad didn’t make me work on the deck, and I had a chance to read the Down Gets Out script. I’m disappointed to find that it’s really different from the book, so I call Abby to make sure I’m reading it correctly.

  She’s pissed off at me for not calling her for three days, but after listening to me mumble the excuse, she feels bad for me. She’s also not happy about the script changes, but I guess Ms. McDougle explained all of the reasons on the last day of school. The story is less about the homeless kid and more about the girl who helps him.

  Abby says, “It’s because stories about empowered young women are very hot this year.”

  I mutter, “But that’s not what the book is about.”

  “Well, you can tell C. B. Down and the producers at the audition.”

  “Maybe I will,” I joke.

  Sometimes she thinks I’m a complete dumbass, so she begs, “Please don’t!”

  She asks if she can bring me anything for my pain, so I inquire if there is any way she could get a hold of a slutty nurse’s uniform and hook me up with a nice sponge bath.

  She isn’t really on board with dirty talk yet, so she just starts yapping about how busy she is with drama camp and drill team practice. We make plans to see a movie tomorrow so that she can see for herself how jacked up I am and give me some proper sympathy. She fills me in on more gossip about the movie: “The Kidz Channel is producing it,” she says with dread.

  “Cool! We might get to be on Kidz?”

  “Not cool,” she replies. “They have their own talent pool, but that’s not what’s got Ms. McDougle freaked out. She thinks they’re going to cheese up C. B.’s story even more. It’s supposed to be a Sundance type of film, not a Kidz movie, and just because it stars young people, they think—”

  I cut her off, “What do you mean, ‘their own talent pool’? Like, we won’t get to audition?”

  “No, McDougle says that C. B. really wants the producers to see what we can do, but because of all the money they are throwing at him . . . they’re trying to force him to cast those Kidz Channel actors who’ve grown up in front of the camera. McDougle says they’ll ruin the film with their bad acting.”

  “It’s his story, right? He can do whatever he wants with it. That guy didn’t seem like a sellout to me.”

  “It’s the first film he’s done with a decent budget. She says he’s always been really poor, so he might not be able to handle it very well.”

  I start to freak out, but Abby tells me that there’s nothing we can do except be great at the audition. We talk through the scene a few times, and she explains all of the weird script terminology. One of the drama camp guys has done some film work, and he was nice enough to teach it to her. The dialogue we’re reading from is almost at the end of the movie. It’s really short, and it seems to be an argument between her character, Maggie, and my character, Chris. The lines are really sad, too, because we’re coming to the realization that we shouldn’t be together anymore. The script says that I’m supposed to cry, but it doesn’t say how I’m supposed to make that happen. Abby says I shouldn’t even try, but it says it right there on the page: “Chris sobs.” She also explains that her character is forcing my character to break up with her so that Chris can move on and accept the scholarship and not feel tied down. We go through all of the lines a few times and Abby sounds really good already. I, on the other hand, need to work on it. She tells me not to worry about getting too emotional or anything and to just keep it simple and see what happens. The lazy side of me wants to agree with her and just wing it, but there’s this new side of me that’s learned about the power of hard work and how effective it can be. My head is really starting to pound from all of the thinking I’m doing . . . that and the blunt trauma I suffered a few days ago.

  She says, “Take some Advil, Carter. I can’t wait to see you tomorrow.”

  I don’t say anything for a couple seconds because I’m trying to read what’s written on my hand. She reminds me with a slight tinge of bitchiness, “We’re seeing a movie tomorrow, at one o’clock. Write it on your arm, please.”

  “Dude, I got it!”

  The next day I wake to the sound of a saw ripping through the old deck and my mom yelling at my dad, “Knock that racket off!” I can tell by the tone of her voice that she’s not angry with him for building a new deck, she just wants to make it clear that she’s not helping with it. I go back to sleep for a minute but am awoken again by the sound of the car starting. Dang it! Mom and Lynn are going shopping and leaving me to fend for myself. I remove my crusty bandages for emphasis and go down to break the news to Dad that I can’t help him today.

  “I-I-I’m still in a lot of pain,” I dramatically explain. “And Abby really wants to go to the movies.”

  He seems disappointed but doesn’t make me help. He revs the saw and says, “You’re going to miss the best part— demolition!”

  I point to my swollen face and tell him that I’m sorry, before going inside to eat cereal and look at the audition sides again. I can’t stop thinking about it. The dialogue is way better than Guys and Dolls, but it’s that same kind of rapid-fire talking, so I know that I need to have the lines down pat. Ms. McDougle has trained us to analyze dialogue in terms of the emotions as well as the words. She always asks us, “What do you want from this scene?” But I have no idea what my character wants yet. I can tell that it’s going to require a very subtle, passive-aggressive anger and various levels of hurt. I’m not sure how I’m going to play all of that, but I’ll keep working on it until I do.

  EJ skids to a stop in front of my garage as I’m inflating the new front tire my dad brought home yesterday. “You ready?” EJ asks.

  “For what?”

  He notices my pus-filled scabs and yells, “Daang, your face is gross!” then does a reenactment of the wipeout, complete with sound effects, slow-motion action, and instant replay.

  “Very nice. What am I supposed to be ready for?”

/>   He replies, “The movie!”

  “No, dude, I’m seeing a film with Abby.”

  “So am I.”

  I shake my head. “It isn’t a tricycle date; you’re not invited.”

  “Yeah, I am. We’re meeting up with her and Nicky at one o’clock.”

  “Bitchy Nicky?” I ask.

  “Yep,” he clarifies. “And don’t call her that anymore.”

  “What do I call her?”

  “Just Nicky, dude.”

  “That’s not her name.”

  “Yes, it is. Actually, it’s Nichole.” He giggles.

  I do a mean impression of his giggling, so he’s aware of it and won’t do it again. When his dumb smile has faded, I hop on my bike, and we roll out. I’m not trying to be a hater here, but EJ is making a big mistake, and I don’t want to double-date with it!

  As we ride he tells me, “Yo, you need a hat or an eye patch so Nicky doesn’t freak out about your evil eye.”

  My mouth is still sore, so I just shoot him a dirty look, as if to ask, “Why would I do anything for that hose beast?”

  EJ catches my meaning and replies, “She’s got a nice ass!”

  I cannot dispute that, but she’s still the spawn of hell, so I mutter, “She was so mean to me last year—”

  “Yeah, I think that’s what makes her such a badger in the sack!”

  Pain flies through my skull as my jaw drops. “Son of a bitch, you’ve already had sex?!”

  “Hell yeah!” he yells, and goes to high-five me. “Three times!” he adds. I stick out my hand for the slap, because he’s my boy, but I’d rather run him off the friggin’ road. This SOB hooked up with Sara “the Caboose” Ruiz a few months ago, and then he got lucky with a drunk Hooker High slut at his church. The Caboose heard about the Hooker and cut him off, and I was secretly very happy about that because I was more than a little jealous. I had been slightly ahead of him in this department until he tapped the Caboose. But now he’s pulling ahead of me like a race car from a go-cart.