The Misfits
Page 3
“But—”
“The candidates from the two parties will meet with me, as student council adviser, in this room after school on Thursday. Any questions?”
Addie raises her hand.
“Good,” Ms. Wyman snaps, grabbing a stack of papers from her desk. “Then we can move on. Brittney, would you pass these out, please?”
Brittney Hobson jumps up. “I’d be happy to,” she says perkily. Brittney is the kind of person for whom active verbs and modifiers were invented.
As we read about the seventh-grade dance coming up in October, the announcements come on the P.A., and soon we are standing for the Pledge.
Or not.
Which explains why Ms. Wyman now has that liver-eating look on her face and is saying to Addie, “Miss Carle, I think perhaps you had best go see Mr. Kiley.”
Some of the boys go, “Oooo.”
“That’s enough!” snaps Ms. Wyman. “Miss Carle, you may be excused.”
Addie rises to her full height, meaning she occupies all the vertical space she’s entitled to instead of slumping, which she sometimes does because of her being so tall and getting called names on account of it, and she walks to the door, clutching her books. When she gets there, she turns and cradles the books in the crook of her left arm and raises her right hand high in the air so she looks, I swear on a stack of pancakes, like the spitting image of the Statue of Liberty (which I expect is exactly what she intends) and she proclaims in a voice that sounds like she’s been listening a whole lot of times to that “I Have a Dream” speech: “Until there is LIBERTY and JUSTICE for AWWLL... let there be TRUTH in SILENCE!”
Ms. Wyman’s jaw drops. Some of the kids clap. Some laugh. Jimmy Lemon calls out, “What a loser!” Ms. Wyman says, “That will be enough, Mr. Lemon.” DuShawn Carter sends a spitball flying, but it misses Addie because she’s turned and walked out, and hits the “a” in Ms. Wyman’s name on the door instead. Ms. Wyman sees it and there’s blood in her eyes as she yells, “Kevin Hennessey!”
“Why is it always me!” Kevin protests. “I didn’t do it!”
The whole class gets laughing so hard I forget that Addie is in serious trouble.
5
SO NOW it is Tuesday after school and an emergency meeting of the Forum has been called on account of what happened to Addie today, her being sent to Mr. Kiley’s office and all, as well as some other matters I will attend to in due course. But I am not yet sitting with Addie and Skeezie and Joe in the back booth with the torn red leatherette upholstery at the Candy Kitchen; as of this very moment I am standing ten feet away from Killer Man, waiting. I listen to the sound of his fingertips drumming the wooden edge of the Calvin Klein neckwear display case, while at the same time making the observation that whenever the Muzak choral oo-ah rendition of “Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head” plays it is always followed by a sprightly accordion version of “Y.M.C.A.,” and I think I may be trapped in a time warp or an episode of The Twilight Zone. And then I begin to worry that if I keep coming here on Tuesdays and Fridays and the occasional Saturdays, I will become accustomed to standing around waiting for customers who do not appear, waiting for time to pass, waiting for who knows what, and that eventually I will turn into either Mr. Keller-man or a Zen Buddhist.
I do not know why I have this job, except that my dad does not make much money at the nursery and I do what I can to help out. So, okay, I know I have to work, but why this job, I cannot figure, other than that my dad knows the store manager. Perhaps, I think, it is not about the job. Perhaps there is a lesson I am meant to glean from the experience. Perhaps it will make me a better person. I think, I am already turning into a Zen Buddhist.
At this moment, the anti-Buddha walks in, in the person of JoDan Bunch.
“Look at you,” he greets me with, “in that tie with all the little amoebas on it. How science dweeb is that?”
“These aren’t amoebas,” I inform him. “This a style called paisley.”
“Well, I think I knew that,” says Joe, casting his eyes over the ties on the nearest display table and gingerly selecting a purple one. At least I do not have to worry that his hands are filthy. This is never a question with Joe.
I glance over my shoulder to see if Killer Man is giving me the evil oculus, but he is not so much as looking in my direction. He appears to be lost in thought and whatever has got his brain cells occupied is having a strange effect on his facial muscles. They are not locked into their usual the-world-is-beneath-me sneer, but hang on his face like melting cheese, creating the illusion that he is an actual human being and a sad one, at that. Seeing him like this makes me wonder once again about his life outside of Awkworth & Ames, and I make a mental note to try and find out a thing or two.
Joe has come to remind me of the emergency Forum at five-fifteen, which will be brief but crucial. I have no doubt that the words coming out of his mouth have been supplied by Addie. Joe does not say such things as “brief but crucial,” whereas Addie loves to make herself sound like a business executive. I worry about her sometimes.
Joe has also come to have his pinky fingernail repainted by his aunt Pam.
“Can you take a break?” he asks me.
I look at the clock. I have been working (or what passes for working at Awkworth & Ames) for only forty minutes. I am not entitled to a break until I have worked for at least an hour. It says that somewhere in the six stapled pages.
“Notyet,” I tell him.
Joe goes off to find his aunt Pam. He is doing a little dance as he goes that is a sort of polka version of “Y.M.C.A.” and I return to listening to Mr. Kellerman’s digit-drumming and I suddenly imagine I hear this deep voice intoning, “You are traveling to another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. Your next stop, the Twilight Zone!”
My dad and I have been watching way too many episodes of The Twilight Zone.
By the time my break comes and I join up with Joe, Pam has already finished painting his fingernail with a black-and-white yin-yang sign on a bright yellow background.
“Like it?” Joe asks. This is not a multiple-choice question.
“Awesome,” I say.
Pam is standing there, with her hair all frosted pink to match the pink jacket they make all the cosmetics ladies at Awkworth & Ames wear. On most of them, it looks like a rag—a shmatte, Joe calls it—but on her it’s high fashion. I get a sniff of some kind of perfume I’d bet a week’s supply of Mallomars has the word “magnolia” somewhere in its name, and I decide that the only way I can handle a conversation at the moment without embarrassing myself is to select a boring topic.
My topic of choice: Killer Man.
“Hey, Pam,” I say, trying to sound old and studly.
“Hey, Bobby,” she gives back in a magnolia sort of way, making me feel I’ve almost succeeded.
“What do you know about Mr. Kellerman?” I go on, figuring the faster we get to the boring stuff the better for all concerned.
Pam laughs. At the sound of it, I pray, Dear God, give me the strength to get through the next ten minutes without dissolving into a pool of lustful preteen sweat.
“Funny question,” Pam says.
“Bobby’s a funny guy,” Joe puts in. “Oo.”
When Joe goes, “Oo,” it usually means he has found something more interesting going on than his conversation with you, so do not expect further attention. In this case, what distracts him is an Estée Lauder gift bag that is your gift with any twenty-five-dollar purchase. Joe has to know what’s in it. He moves down the counter to check it out.
Pam leans on her elbows in my direction, a move that causes me to develop an intense, nearly scientific interest in my shoelaces.
“Mr. Kellerman,” she says. “Hm. Well, he’s kind of a sad character, isn’t he?”
I notch my head about one degree Pam’s way. “You think?” I ask. “He seems kind of that way to me today, too. But most times he just seems like the kind of person who never learned to get u
p on the right side of the bed.”
Pam laughs again and my sweat glands go into overdrive. I curse whoever invented adolescence and ask God to keep me upright and odor-free for another eight minutes.
“He’s a real grouch, for sure,” she goes on. “But one thing I’ve learned in my twenty-eight years of living, Bobby, is that if somebody’s a grouch, it’s usually because they’re not happy. And if they’re not happy, there’s a reason for it.”
“So do you know what the reason is in Kellerman’s case?” I am aware I am not calling him Killer Man in front of Pam. I do not want her to think lowly of me.
Pam says, “All I know is that he’s a middle-aged guy who still lives with his mother and gets up every day of his life to sell clothes in a department store untouched by the passage of time. That would be enough to make me a grouch. Why the interest?”
I shrug. It’s the best answer I have.
“Well, if you’re like me,” Pam goes, letting me off the hook, “you’re curious what makes people tick. I mean, we’re all so complicated, don’t you think? Sometimes, I think we’re too complicated. That’s why I came here to live for a while. Simplify things, you know?”
I nod like I know what she’s talking about. I do not have a clue.
“Mr. Goodspeed!”
“Gotta go,” I say, and make a mad dash for the men’s department.
From the sound of his voice Killer Man is back to being his old cranky self. The trouble is, now that I’ve heard what Pam has to say about him, I can’t see him as 100% cranky anymore, or 100% terrible, or 100% anything except maybe 100% human and I’m not so sure I like that. Because when you get down to it, thinking of somebody as 100% human seriously gets in the way of hating them.
6
Bobby:
Thanks for waiting for me, you guys. So what’s today’s topic?
Addie:
“Popularity versus Principles.”
Bobby:
O-ka-ay. I’m going to need serious ice cream to deal with that one. Double-double chocolate.
Addie:
Is that a good idea? You’re going to have dinner when you get home. Your dad will kill you if you fill up on ice cream.
Bobby:
Yes, Wendy.
Addie:
What?
Bobby:
Wendy and the Lost Boys.
Addie:
Oh. Well, that fits, doesn’t it?
Skeezie:
Speak for yourselves. I personally am not lost.
JoDan:
Guffaw.
Addie:
May I have your attention, children?
Bobby, Skeezie & JoDan:
Yes, Wendy.
Addie:
Very funny. Now, I called this emergency meeting because of the elections.
Skeezie:
Wait, I never heard what happened with Kiley.
JoDan:
How come you weren’t at lunch today?
Skeezie:
I had a date with Mrs. DePaolo. I was givin’ her tongue.
JoDan:
That is sooo gross.
Skeezie:
Uh-uh. It was tasty.
Addie:
Shut up!
Bobby:
You’re a sick man, Skeezie.
Addie:
Can we be serious?
JoDan:
You’re always serious, Addie. Seriously.
Addie:
I am not.
JoDan:
Are so.
Skeezie:
Yeah, yeah. So what happened, anyways?
Addie:
Okay, let’s see. Mr. Kiley told me I was within my rights not to say the Pledge, but that he personally had a hard time with my position because he fought for this country in an unpopular war.
Skeezie:
For the North or the South?
JoDan:
Not the Civil War, dummy. The Vietnam War, Right?
Addie:
Right.
Skeezie:
I think I knew that. I was making a joke.
JoDan:
Duh.
Addie:
Ahem. Anyway, he said that the Pledge means a lot to some people and that other people don’t appreciate all that this country is and how great a democratic nation we are and blah-blah-blah. But when I tried to argue the point about our not being such a democratic nation as he contends we are, well, he wasn’t very interested in hearing that. All of a sudden, he had an important meeting he just had to go to and he was, like, whisking me out the door, as if I’d let off a stink bomb in his office and he was going to have to have it fumigated. Anyway, he told me he would inform Ms. Wyman that while I did not have to say the Pledge, I should stand up out of respect for my fellow classmates.
Skeezie:
Are you going to?
Addie:
I guess. I mean, what I’m really objecting to are the words, not standing or sitting. Although I can’t say I like being told I have to stand up. I mean, I am not a robot.
JoDan:
You go, girl.
Addie:
So about the elections.
Skeezie:
If the service gets much slower in this place, I swear I’m gonna take a job here myself, just so’s I can get something to eat. Who’s workin’ today? Oh, no, it’s HellomynameisEric. He’s even worse than HellomynameisAdam.
Addie:
The student council elections are going to be in three weeks, so we have to get going on this right away.
JoDan:
We?
Bobby:
Get going with what?
Addie:
I want us to form a new party. The Freedom Party.
Bobby:
Ms. Wyman said there are two parties and only two parties, and, anyway, Brittney’s going to win.
JoDan:
Oo, Brittney “Aren’t I Fabulous?” Hobson.
Addie:
She’s not so bad.
JoDan:
Brittney “All the Boys Like Me, I’m so Popular I Could Die” Hobson.
Addie:
Joe!
Bobby:
But that’s the point. She is popular. She wins everything she runs for.
Addie:
Big deal, she was elected class president for the past three years. But this is the student council, the governing body of the whole middle school.
Skeezie:
I can’t believe you want to compete with her.
Addie:
It’s not about competing with her.
JoDan:
Brittney “Miss Future Anorexic Cheerleader Prom Queen My Life Will Be Over at Seventeen” Hobson.
Addie:
Look, that’s why today’s topic is “Popularity versus Principles.” What I want to know is: If there’s a contest between somebody who’s really popular—okay, let’s say Brittney—
Skeezie:
Just for the sake of argument.
Addie:
And somebody who isn’t popular but stands for Truth and Freedom and Liberty for All, do you think the person who stands for Truth and Freedom and Liberty for All has a chance of winning?
JoDan:
In your dreams.
Skeezie:
No way.
Bobby:
Uh-uh. Popularity wins. Period.
Addie:
What a bunch of cynics!
Skeezie:
We calls it likes we sees it, babe.
Addie:
I will overlook the sexism.
Skeezie:
I was thinking of the pig of book and movie fame actually. No, no, put the salt down! Oh, man, I’ll never get this out of my hair!
Addie:
Perhaps if you didn’t use so much mousse . . .
Bobby:
Here are our sodas.
Skeezie:
’Bout time.
Addie:
Okay, fair is fair. I did ask your op
inion and you’re probably right. So I won’t run for president. But I could run for vice president.
Skeezie:
Yeah, nobody cares who the vice president is. Nobody even knows who the vice president is.
JoDan:
So who’s going to be your candidate for president? Oh, please tell me it’s Tonni. Don’t you just love her hair? She has the most fabulous hair. And that name: Tondayala Cherise DuPré. Just saying it is like eating dessert, don’t you think? But not like a heavy dessert—and not too sweet. No, no. Light and airy. Lemon chiffon pie, with a dollop of whipped cream.
Bobby:
Stop it, Joe, you’re killing me.
JoDan:
Why she insists on being called Tonni is beyond me. I mean, I would die for a name like hers. She’d win, you know. She’s really popular and sooo beautiful. And she knows how to put herself together, which is important in a politician these days. I mean, it’s all about image. And she’s—
Skeezie:
Black.
JoDan:
Well, there is that.
Addie:
My thinking exactly.
Skeezie:
You want Tonni to run for president because she’s black?
Addie:
Of course not. Besides, she’s got way too much, attitude.