by James Howe
DuShawn:
She’s Chinese.
Addie:
And adopted. Two minorities in one.
Bobby:
I can’t believe Ms. Wyman agreed to let the Freedom Party run on the basis of representing minorities.
Addie:
That was my whole point when I said look around the room. DuShawn was the only member of a minority group there.
JoDan:
Excuse me. He was the only visible member of a minority group. There are all kinds of minorities.
Skeezie:
Yeah, you said it yourself a minute ago. Heather’s adopted. You wouldn’t know that from looking at her.
DuShawn:
Uh, did you ever meet the rest of her family? She’s got a mother and father, two sisters, and one brother and they all got freckles and curly red hair. And there she is with her straight black hair and slanty eyes and they name her Heather! Man, the least they coulda done was name her Ming-Li or Kim or somethin’. Sometimes, people got no sense.
Addie:
Why should they give her a Chinese name? Why does that make a difference?
DuShawn:
Give her a sense of pride, man! The girl’s Chinese. Callin’ her Heather and stickin’ her in the middle of a family of micks, man, just makes her look the fool.
Skeezie:
Whoa. What’d you just say?
DuShawn:
What part?
Skeezie:
The part about micks. My mom’s half-Irish, man.
DuShawn:
Oh, man, I didn’t mean nothin’ by it. It’s just a name.
Skeezie:
Yeah, so are other words I could think of. They’re just names, too. I don’t know what you think about them, but I know what your friend Tonni would say.
DuShawn:
Man, don’t be quotin’ Tonni at me, okay? She’s always ready for a fight, acting like we’re some kind of oppressed people just because we’re black. But, hey, as far’s I can tell, you people got it worse than us.
Addie:
Who are “you people”?
DuShawn:
You guys. The Gang of Five or whatever you call yourselves. You’re more oppressed than Tonni and Royal and me. I mean, we’re cool. You guys are the ones who have to watch your butts all the time.
Addie:
Thanks a lot.
DuShawn:
I’m just tellin’ it like I see it. No offense meant.
Skeezie:
So does being cool mean you get to go around calling other people names?
Bobby:
Skeezie . . .
DuShawn:
It’s all right. I shouldn’t have said micks, okay?
Addie:
Or talked about Heather having slanty eyes.
DuShawn:
Now what’s up with that? You afraid of saying slanty eyes if the girl’s got slanty eyes? What color skin I got?
Addie:
Black.
DuShawn:
That is right. I got skin the color of night, and I’m proud of it. There’s no reason to look away, act like it’s somethin’ other than it is. Girl’s got slanty eyes, she’s got slanty eyes. Tonni’s got black skin, too, and kinkiest hair you ever did see.
JoDan:
Her hair is fabulous.
DuShawn:
And Royal’s got skin the color of mocha latte, man. And you . . .
Addie:
Me?
DuShawn:
Yeah, you. You got skin the color of I don’t know what, the inside of almonds. How come you stop writin’?
Addie:
No reason.
DuShawn:
Well, you get my point. The color of your skin or the shape of your eyes doesn’t matter.
Addie:
It shouldn’t matter, but it does. And that’s my point. I was reading in The New York Times about this study—
Skeezie:
Our ice cream’s probably sitting over there on the counter, melting. Who’s working today? Oh, it’s that new one. HellomynameisSteffi. I’ll cut her some slack. She’s a babe.
Addie:
As in the pig of book and movie fame?
Skeezie:
As in hot. Ow!
Addie:
You’re the pig. Anyway, this study in the Times showed that state police are more likely to pull drivers over to the side of the road if they have dark skin. I mean, that is so wrong.
Bobby:
There you go again, Addie, quoting from The New York Times. You can’t go throwing that stuff around when you’re running for office here. What exactly is the Freedom Party going to do for minority students here?
Addie:
We’re going to make sure that their voices are heard and that the school administration is sensitive to their needs. Anyway, I don’t have all the answers. That’s why DuShawn is on the ticket—and hopefully Heather, too. That way we can hear from them what they need.
Skeezie:
So, DuShawn, my man, what do you need?
DuShawn:
I need my hot-fudge sundae, man, and I need it now!
Skeezie:
Right on!
Addie:
Skeezie, if you do not stop snapping your fingers . . .
DuShawn:
I’m thinkin’. Maybe it’s more the color of peach ice cream.
Addie:
Huh?
DuShawn:
Your skin, girl. I’m talkin’ about your skin.
11
SO HERE I am at the Candy Kitchen, in the back booth with the torn red leatherette upholstery, squeezed in a little tighter than usual on account of DuShawn being added into the picture, and while the others are exercising their jaws, with me throwing in my own two cents from time to time, I am blissfully unaware that the events that will unfold in the days to follow will change the course of my life. I mean, how could I know that? How could anybody?
When you’re living through them, events are nothing more than stuff that happens. You’re not thinking about significance. Significance only comes when you look back at your life. At the moment, what you’re thinking is whether you’ve got enough money in your pocket for hot fudge or you should just order a single scoop. And when one of your best friends is all hopped up about an election you don’t care a Fig Newton about, what’s agitating your brain is whether you should ask this cute, artistic, and terminally shy girl who kind of smiled at you one time for a nanosecond (you think) (maybe) if she wants to come over to your friend Joe’s house on Sunday night to help make posters. And before you can work up the nerve to ask her, you will catch yourself sniffing your armpits, slapping yourself on the forehead like your head and your hand are two of the Three Stooges, and calling yourself an incurable geek.
I take no pride in mentioning these things. Would that I could say I am caught up in Addie’s passion for social justice and the electoral process. Would that I could tell you, “Sniff my own armpits? Never!” But if I am going to all the bother of writing stuff down, it may as well be the truth. And the truth is that I am not a particularly high-minded character in my formative years. I hardly ever speak up in class and I never question what the teacher says. I am just a get-along kind of guy. Like my dad. I am certain I will be the face in the yearbook everybody will look at and say, “Bobby Goodspeed? I don’t remember anybody named Bobby Goodspeed.”
But of course it will not turn out this way. The future is a trickster rabbit, full of surprises. Only the past is predictable.
Somehow, I do work up the nerve on Friday to ask Kelsey if she wants to help out with the posters. This of course is after the aforementioned armpit-sniffing episode, which fortunately goes unwitnessed. Kelsey says yes—or, at least, I think she does. She talks so softly I can’t be entirely sure, but she does take the piece of paper I give her with joe’s address on it and gives back one of those blink-and-you’ll-miss-it smiles of hers.
We decide to make the posters
at Joe’s house because Pam, being a painter and all, has offered to help out and has lots of art supplies she is willing to donate to the cause. From my personal point of view, this is more than copacetic, although I try not to dwell on the prospect of being with Pam and Kelsey in the same room at the same time for fear of becoming light-headed and making a large noise when my oxygen-deprived body hits the ground.
On Friday at Awkworth & Ames, my mind is occupied with these thoughts, having nothing better to do, when Mr. Kellerman spooks me by coming up out of nowhere and saying, “Mr. Goodspeed, do you know the first thing about selling ties?”
I own as I do not, although I stake a claim on a pretty decent fashion sense, on account of my longstanding friendship with a certain party by the name of Joe Bunch.
Mr. Kellerman does not get this, but he does not question it. All he goes is, “Let’s put that fashion sense to the test, shall we?” He is holding a stack of dress shirts, some with stripes, some with checks, and some that are solid colors. I get the sense that he has finally figured out a way to keep himself entertained and I am it.
For the next twenty minutes, he dares me to pick out ties to go with these shirts and I take up the challenge. To tell you the truth, I am having a good time of it, except for those occasions when the Killer Man clicks his tongue and informs me, with a kind of pleasure I can only describe as oily, that I have committed a fashion faux pas, which is French for “screw-up.” Even when I make what is obviously a cool match, the highest praise he will give is, “Not bad.” Or, “For one so young, you have a decent intuitive sense.” Do not count on getting an “awesome” or a high five out of Mr. Kellerman.
Still, I can tell that he is surprised I am so good at this and is wishing he could come up with a harder test for me, something I would be sure to fail, because that is what he really wants: for me to fail so he can lord it over me. That is the entertainment part of the program. But even when he is being nice to me, he’s nasty about it, and I am beginning to feel fed up and wishing I were more like Skeezie or Addie so I could tell him what he can do with his ties.
“Not that!” he snaps impatiently at one point, just because I have the nerve to select a tie with a cartoon character on it. He slaps my hand and makes a face like I have drawn nose hairs on the Mona Lisa or something.
“Ouch,” I say, even though the slap hurts my ego more than my wrist.
“Well, I’m sorry, but ties like that go with nothing. Do you hear me, Mr. Goodspeed, nothing.”
I nod, knowing there is no point in trying to convince him of my own personal belief that Daffy Duck goes with everything. Do you hear me, Mr. Kellerman, everything.
Just then, a customer shows. Before we both faint dead away, Mr. K says to me, “Now watch and perhaps you can learn a thing or two.”
The woman he approaches is young and unsure of herself. She looks like she took a wrong turn and is wondering how she ended up in this mausoleum and if she will ever see her loved ones again.
“May I help you?” Mr. Kellerman oozes. He pulls his lips back into a virtual smile. The effect is creepy.
“Um, I guess,” goes the woman. She is maybe twice my age. “I need a gift.”
“Of course.” Without asking who the gift is for, Mr. Kellerman starts showing her ties that make the woman’s eyes glaze over.
When she holds up a yellow tie with bright red zigzags running through it and asks, “What about this one?” Mr. Kellerman looks like she has just thrust a plate of leeches at him and said, “Care for an appetizer?”
“Ah, wellll...” he goes, when he is called away to the phone.
I don’t know which of them is more relieved, but I can see the woman is eyeing the exit and I figure it’s now or never, so I step in and say, “That tie definitely makes a statement. If you like it, perhaps I can show you some others along the same lines.”
Five minutes later, I am ringing up a sale for four ties and the woman is thanking me for all my help. I cannot wait for Mr. Kellerman to get off the phone so I can brag shamelessly, but when he does get off the phone I do not brag shamelessly or in any other adverbial manner, because he doesn’t look in my direction or ask what happened with the customer or even notice that Daffy is missing.
His face is getting that melting cheese look again, and I am wondering what gives when he says, “I must . . .” and leaves the words lying there, flat and useless as a couple of pieces of fallen baloney with no dog around to lap them up.
He goes off and I’m left standing there, feeling good about the sale I’ve just made but with nobody to brag to, while at the same time trying to figure what’s up with Mr. K, all to the accompaniment of Mickey and the Accordionaires doing their nursing-home rendition of “Y.M.C.A.” (I do not believe there is such a group as Mickey and the Accordionaires. Out of sheer boredom I have come up with names for the musicians I imagine performing each of the Muzak melodies I am forced to listen to every time I work at Awkworth & Ames. I call the oo-ah chorus that performs “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” the Vowelettes.)
The Killer Man does not return. When Junior Fernell shows up to fill in for him, he tells me only that Mr. K was called away on personal business. I do not press Junior Fernell, because I do not really like him. Besides, I can tell right away that he needs to feel important and that divulging too much information to an underling would seriously threaten his status as Son of the Store Manager and Heir Apparent to the Realm.
While Junior busies himself refolding clothing that is more in need of dusting than refolding, and tidying up the sales desk, which Mr. Kellerman has already tidied to the point where it could pass military inspection, I alternately replay my coup as a tie salesman and imagine what sort of personal business took Mr. K away. I want to think he is involved in some type of illegal drug operation that is about to be exposed, bringing national attention to Paintbrush Falls. I picture myself watching myself on TV going, “Yeah, I worked with Mr. Kellerman. No, he never struck me as the criminal type. I was as surprised as anybody to find out he was a drug czar and that he had fourteen bodies buried in his backyard. I mean, people at work did call him Killer Man, it’s true, but who would have thought...”
This is when the Muzak stops and the voice says, “Shoppers, the store will be closing in fifteen minutes.”
“Kind of a slow day,” junior Fernell goes, like there’s any other kind at Awkworth & Ames. “Why don’t you cut out early? I can close up.”
I say thanks, knowing that Junior is doing this not out of kindness but so he can feel like a big shot, but I am truly grateful, anyway, because if I stick around much longer my sanity is in serious danger.
12
BY THE time Sunday evening rolls around, I am no longer thinking about Mr. Kellerman. Truth be told, by the time I am out the door of Awkworth & Ames on Friday, I am no longer thinking about Mr. Kellerman. I am too caught up in my own mixed-up life to worry about his. Although I do have a moment watching the news with my dad Friday night when I swear the anchor guy says to the anchor woman, “Well, Jenny, pretty shocking news from Upstate New York today. Seems a clothing salesman in the little town of Paintbrush Falls has been revealed to be a Mafia godfather.” Of course, what he actually is saying turns out to have nothing to do with Upstate New York or a small-town clothing salesman or even organized crime, which just shows what an overworked imagination combined with a pathetic need for excitement does to the brain.
Anyway, by Sunday evening what I am thinking about is Kelsey Scoggins. I go so far as to call Skeezie on Saturday and ask him what he knows about love.
“Not you, too!” he gives back, although when I prod him for an explanation, he zips his lips and goes, “All I know about love is that it’s a four-letter word.”
“Why so cynical?” I ask.
Skeezie gives his bubble gum a pop on the other end. “Oh, gee, I don’t know. Could it have something to do with my dad splittin’ two years ago and my mom still cursing him out every chance she gets and my little
sisters still cryin’ themselves to sleep at night? Hm, let me think about it. Time’s up. Yep, that’s it.”
Me: Lots of people get divorced, Skeezie.
Skeezie: And your point is?
Me: My point is it doesn’t have to turn you into a cynic.
Skeezie: Says you. Why’s it on everybody’s brain all of a sudden, anyways?
Me: We’re in seventh grade. Our hormones are kicking in.
Skeezie: So who’s kickin’ your hormones in, Bobsters? As if I didn’t know.
Me: Who told you?
Skeezie: I got eyes, man.
Me: You’re not even in my art class. You’ve never even seen me talking to Kelsey.
Skeezie: Kelsey? I thought you were talkin’ about Joe’s aunt Pam.
The sound Skeezie doesn’t hear is me blushing.
Me: I guess it’s kind of both.
Skeezie: In the words of Joe Bunch—oy.
On Sunday night, it’s Skeezie and me, DuShawn and Joe and Kelsey, and the magnolia-scented Pam, down in Joe’s basement with poster board and markers everywhere. One whiff of Pam and I’m praying for ventilation.
Joe’s parents are home, along with his brother Jeff, but they’re not in the way. Jeff is up in his room on his computer, which is pretty much where he lives, and Joe’s parents come in and out only every so often to make sure we’re taken care of in the refreshments department.
“Don’t want to have any starving artists,” Joe’s father cracks at one point, and we all laugh up a storm like it’s Dad Appreciation Month.
Joe has cool parents, there are no two ways about it. Joe says it is impossible to hate them, at a time in life when hating your parents starts feeling like a requirement. When Pam split up with her boyfriend a few years back and was feeling all messed up and sorry for herself, she called her sister, who is Joe’s mom, and was told, “Get on the next train out of New York and come stay with us for as long as you need.” It’s been two years now and Pam has said more than once that Joe’s mom and dad saved her life.