Trash Can Days

by Teddy Steinkellner

  “We could go to Arlington.”

  Danny nodded. “Awesome,” he said.

  Awesome!

  We walked down my driveway, past the gate, and down the road about a mile to the Arlington playground. It reminded me of a day from a couple of years ago, the first day of fifth grade. I remember Danny and I were eating Corn Pops before school, and my mom came into the kitchen and told us that, as a special surprise, starting that morning, we were allowed to walk to school every day without parental supervision. We high-fived so hard at that. I think we might have even jumped up and down, hugging. Those walks to school became the absolute highlights of our day, each and every day for the rest of elementary school. Obviously, now we go to SP, and it’s too far to go by foot, and Danny takes the bus now anyway, so we haven’t gotten to take one of our walks in a while. That’s what made today neat. We didn’t even have to talk much as we walked—we just enjoyed the old routine. I grabbed a lemon from this one tree right near the school. Danny and I used to take the lemons and put them in our mouths and have sour-face contests. We didn’t do one of those today, but I put the lemon in my pocket for later, as sort of a souvenir, I guess. Now that I think about it, fifth grade really wasn’t that long ago.

  After we hopped the Arlington fence, Danny noticed that there was a single basketball sitting in the middle of the court, and fully inflated too, a clear sign from the gods that we should play one-on-one.

  Man, he’s good. Danny blocked three of my threes, jumped over me for every rebound, and even grabbed the rim at one point as he went in for a lay-up. I remember a year ago, he’d talk all the time about what it would be like to touch the rim. I thought the day would never come, at least not until college. Now it’s his signature move. I wonder if he could dunk a tennis ball now. Probably. He was balling like a madman today.

  Yet I didn’t play too bad myself. Despite my tendency to dribble the ball off my shoe, and my characteristically Jewish lack of vertical leap, I kept things close. I shot the lights out. I moved my feet. I hustled. In an intense game to thirty by ones and twos, one of those wars that lasts forever and takes a ton out of each guy, I only lost by three points. After the game, Danny suggested that I sign up for after-school basketball with him. It starts next week, apparently.

  “Are you serious?” I said.

  “Yeah,” Danny said. “It’ll be fun.”

  I know he didn’t compliment me exactly, but all the same, I felt like saying thanks.

  I got another idea. “Hey,” I said to Danny as he took his last jumper. “You wanna go on the swings?”

  “No,” Danny said, making a face. “What do I look like, a baby?”

  “Oh,” I said. I felt dumb. I put my head down. “Well, um, what about the Big Toy?”

  Danny nodded at that. He smiled, too. “Yeah. The Big Toy is tight.”

  If walking to Arlington made me feel like a fifth grader, running onto the playground made me feel like a second grader. In that moment, Danny was arguably even a kindergartener.

  “Beat you there!” he shouted, the second after agreeing to play. He ran off the court, across the lawn, and up to the play structure, flailing his arms, running like a loon. I followed him. When I got there, a good five seconds after him and out of breath, he surprise-tackled me into the wood chips.

  “Sucks for you, dude!” he said as he splashed a handful of chips into my face.

  Being a little kid is so fun. We ran up the slides, then slid down them, then ran up again. One of the slides gave me a static shock. I told this to Danny, who rubbed his hand on it, then ran up to me and touched my head with his electrified hand. It hurt really bad.

  We played an impromptu game of hot-lava tag on top of the half-dome jungle gym, crawling around like little spiders. It’s so tiring with only two people.

  We climbed on top of the monkey bars, standing all dangerously on top of the upper bar that connects them, the way the yard duties always tell you not to. “But there are no yard duties during winter break, are there?” Danny said. It was the best—we just stood on top of the playground, surveying the stuff below. Danny tried to give me a purple nurple while we were up there and I almost fell off. So funny.

  I don’t know what it is about Danny. He’s just always loved that Big Toy.

  “Thanks,” I said to Danny. I was still a bit out of breath from the basketball game plus the race to the play structure plus the slides plus the tag game plus the monkey bars plus the avoidance of the purple nurple.

  “No, man, thank you,” Danny said. “I forgot about this stuff. This was fun.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “This stuff is fun.”

  Danny looked down at the playground below, then up at me. “I’m sorry for not hanging out with you,” he said. “On my birthday, at the movie set. That was messed up. My bad, man.”

  “Oh,” I said. “No, don’t worry about it. It’s fine. I’m sorry for freaking out that day. And…yeah.”

  Danny sort of nodded to himself. He didn’t say anything.

  “I guess I just don’t like being left alone, you know?” I said.

  Some more silence went by. Danny didn’t look at me. I probably hit too much of a nerve with what I told him. He knows that he hasn’t necessarily been the best of friends this year. I shouldn’t have said that last thing. I decided to change the subject.

  “How’s Hannah holding up?” I said. “You’ve been a good friend to her, huh.”

  “Hannah’s good,” Danny said. “Thanks for asking.”

  We let some more silence go by. It was an okay amount of silence for two best friends. It would have been awkward if we were strangers. I wondered what Danny was thinking, what exactly prompted his apology about the birthday, whether he felt sorry about anything else he’s done this year.

  “You wanna head back?” I said. “If we leave now, we might have time for some video games before dinner. Or, you know, we could always take a nighttime dip in the pool.”

  Danny flashed another smile at that.

  “So we boyfriends now or what?” he said.

  We jumped off of the monkey bars and started home.

  It was a pretty great time, now that I think about it. An epic day. Dorothy, Danny, Dorothy, Danny. My new buddy, my best friend. One is silver and the other’s gold and, you know, all that stuff.

  18 • Danny Uribe

  Friday, January 1

  I almost said I love you. The moment felt right. Lying on my bed, making out, her next to me, my hand running through her hair, my other hand on her lower back. There was this moment where she lifted her face from mine and just looked at me with those big sexy blue eyes of hers. We didn’t say anything, but I know we were both thinking, I love you.

  That’s when the window started banging all hard behind us. Crap. I’d totally forgotten. I promised Jake we could hang out today. In our chat I told him New Year’s Day and then later I told him 1 p.m. I checked my phone and there it was, 1 p.m. Damn. Hannah snuck into my room like, so early this morning, and we never even noticed the hours go by. Time flies when you’re getting some.

  I told Jake one minute and I got up and grabbed my shoes.

  “I’ll wait until you guys leave, then I’ll sneak back into the house,” Hannah whispered to me. “How’s my hair?” she said.

  It was all messed up from the bed. I helped her straighten it with my hand.

  “Where are you guys going?” she said.

  “No idea,” I said.

  “When will you be back?”

  “I don’t know. Soon, probably.”

  “Awesome. I’ll be waiting for you.”

  She smiled with her tongue between her teeth. She always gets me with that.

  “I’ll miss you,” I whispered.

  “You’re cute,” she said.

  I kissed her one more time, then a second later I was outside. Jake didn’t notice a thing. I don’t know when me and Hannah are planning on telling people about us, or who we’re gonna tell. I’ll have to check wit
h her about that.

  Jake had all these gay ideas of what we should do. Like seriously, man, you think I wanna take a bath with you? Really, you wanna help me learn math during Christmas break? I know my grades aren’t the best, but come on. You have to come up with some better stuff than that.

  But then he suggested rolling down to Arlington, and, I don’t know, for some reason that sounded real fun to me. Gotta give Jake credit on that one.

  The walk down was kinda awkward. We haven’t really kicked it in a while, so there wasn’t much to talk about. I can’t exactly tell him about the main things in my life these days. He wouldn’t want to know about Eastside stuff and he definitely shouldn’t know about me and his older sister. So we just walked to Arlington, same as when we were little kids.

  There was this weird part when Jake got a lemon from one of the trees and put it in his pocket. What’s he trying to do, make lemonade?

  Playing ball with Jake is fun since I can dominate him so hard. I was doing all kinds of crazy moves like the fools on the And1 Mixtape Tour, like I even bounced the ball off his forehead and stuff. I let Jake keep the game close because it’s funner that way, but at the end when I decided to win, I finished him off with the sickest move. I crossed him over so bad he fell on his ass, and when I went in for the lay-up, I jumped all high and put almost my whole hand over the rim. I did it like it wasn’t no thing, too. Like, after I did it, I just acted all normal. Jake was impressed and stuff. It was tight.

  Jake kept talking about basketball tryouts the whole time we were playing, but he kept saying he wouldn’t do them because he probably wasn’t good enough to make the team. I told him it’s just after-school sports, man, they probably take everyone who signs up. I said he should do it with me. It’ll be fun.

  Then Jake had this wack idea to go have playtime on the swings, and I was like, “The swings? What are you smoking?” But then he said let’s go on the Big Toy, and I was all, “Now you’re talking.”

  The Big Toy is so nice. I remember it was the first thing I really loved when I moved to Seabrook in second grade. Jake’s house is big and cool and all, but for a little kid it’s not really that fun. You can’t touch anything in it. The grown-ups are all worried you’ll poke your eye out with one of the Emmys. Plus I still missed my cousins and all my friends over on the Eastside. But then Jake and I went to Arlington on the first day of second grade and I saw that Big Toy, and I just knew, damn, this life is legit.

  At my school that I went to for kindergarten and first grade, over on the Eastside, the jungle gym was all rusty and broken and jank. The slides were metal and they had too much friction or whatever. The monkey bars were oily and nasty. Everything made a creaking sound when you ran across it.

  The Big Toy is like a million times and like a hundred thousand dollars better. I mean, no wonder. It’s the playground for the stars’ kids. It’s got all the best slides and jungle gyms and zip lines and random steering wheels and everything.

  I forgot how much I liked the thing. Jake and I messed around on it for a few minutes today. We ran across all the bridges and climbed across all the bars like we were my little cousins at a McDonald’s PlayPlace or some crap. The best part was when I gave Jake a titty twister. He made such girl sounds, trying to get away. It was hilarious. After a while, we got pretty tired, so we were just standing up there, on the top of the Big Toy, on top of the Arlington playground.

  I told Jake sorry for not hanging out with him more when he took me to the movie set for my birthday. That was the day he got all sad. I hadn’t thought about it too much since then, but being with Jake today made me think about it. I wasn’t a good friend to Jake that day. He deserves better. He’s a good kid.

  Jake acted kinda weird after that. He made some complaint about being a loner, and then he got all quiet like he was expecting me to say more. Like I was the one in charge of making him feel better. He was kinda acting the way girls do sometimes when they’re mad. I just let the moment pass.

  Then he brought up Hannah. That was weird, too. Kid needs to not get involved in things he’s not a part of.

  The walk back home was silent and awkward, like the walk there. Jake didn’t pick any more lemons.

  Before I went into my room, I bumped fists with Jake and I told him, “Awesome day, man.” And it really was. It can be fun connecting with the stuff you used to do.

  I was so excited to get back in my room. I knew exactly what would be in there waiting for me. My girl. Her perfectly shaped legs, her cute little hands, her dark brown hair that curls just at the ends, her juicy lips, her beautiful eyes, her body, which is really nice but you can also tell that she eats, which I like, and of course how can I forget the best part: her donk. I couldn’t wait for all of it. I couldn’t wait to see my girlfriend. Happy ending to a fun-ass day.

  She was in my room, all right, sitting on my bed. But she didn’t look happy to see me like I was expecting. I said, “Baby, what’s up?”

  “You left your phone here,” she said.

  So what? I guess I’d left it in my room in my hurry to meet Jake. “What’s wrong?” I said. “Something about us?”

  “No, no one knows about us,” she said. “But something happened. On the Eastside. Carlos and Javy have been texting and calling you nonstop. Luz and Chicle, too. I didn’t want to respond for you.”

  “Give me the phone,” I said. She gave it to me. I looked at all the missed calls, all the texts. They all said basically the same thing. All the texts repeated the same three words. I read them over and over. I couldn’t believe them.

  They got Gordo.

  Twelve Arrested in Local Gang Sweep

  By Aaron Marcuse, San Paulo Spectator

  Sunday, January 3rd

  In a surprise New Year’s Day operation, local law enforcement officials carried out search warrants and made arrests of twelve individuals, all minors, on Friday morning for participation in an Eastside gang brawl.

  The early-morning raid, which was known as “Operation Viper,” came about partly as a result of widespread community outrage. Although juvenile gang violence has soared in the past twelve months, there has not been a corresponding increase in the number of youth arrests made, leading many to think of the San Paulo Police Department as lenient.

  “After Viper, we’re not so soft now,” said Lt. Pat Ayers, a spokesman for the San Paulo PD.

  No connections were made between any of the 12 arrested and the still-unresolved murder of 13-year-old Angel Calderon, which occurred last March.

  In addition, no names have been released as of yet.

  Finals week is coming! Exam schedules are posted in all classrooms. For an individual copy of the exam schedule, see Ms. Dooling or Ms. Glass in the library. Now start studying!

  Tell your parents to come to tonight’s San Paulo Town Hall Meeting. The evening’s topic will be “Safety in Our School: How to Keep San Paulo as Well Protected as Possible.” Principal Greene will be speaking along with Officer Craig Shaw of the S.P. Police Department. The meeting is at 7 p.m. in the auditorium.

  Attention All Athletes! The winter sports season is here! This season’s sports are boys basketball, girls basketball, boys volleyball, girls volleyball, and wrestling. If you would like to join one of these teams, meet outside the gym after school next Monday for an informational meeting. Tryouts are the week after next. Go Pirates!

  Tickets for the Sweethearts Dance go on sale next week! Tickets are $7 per person, $12 per couple. The dance is Saturday, February 13. Get to it, cupids!

  Seventh graders: feeling threatened by those eighth-grade bullies?

  Eighth graders: feeling annoyed by those upstart sevvies? Starting next semester, the leadership class is beginning a new school tradition: “Unity Lunches.” Every Wednesday at lunch, try eating with someone from a different grade! Let’s end the inter-grade squabbles! Let’s get this right.

  Future Scientists and Engineers of America (FSEA) meets today at lunch in Mr. Peterson’s room
(Room 124).

  All health classes are beginning a unit on Sex Education next semester. Be sure to bring back your signed parent/guardian release form by the first day of classes.

  On a somewhat related note, congratulations to Coach Wade and his wife, Marie, for their new daughter, Bella Claire Wade! We’ll see you here in about twelve years, Bella!

  Don’t forget, next Friday, January 22, is a minimum day. Since it is the last day of the semester, students will be released from campus at 12:30 p.m. Make good choices!

  And as always, San Paulo is a no gum, no iPods, no cell phones, no skateboards, no video games, no laser pointers school! Those found with any of the aforementioned items will be given a detention. No exceptions.

  19 • Hannah Schwartz

  Monday, January 18

  I love having this little secret. Every single day feels like that night in Jake’s room. It’s amazing. We catch each other’s eyes in the hallway before school and during passing periods. At home after school, I walk past him playing basketball with Jake, and when Jake’s not looking, I shoot him a secret smile. Then, at night, when no one is paying attention, I slip into his room and we just go to town on each other’s lips. Me and my forbidden boy.

  Today was my and Danny’s one-month anniversary, not that anybody besides us knows that. We celebrated by making out in Danny’s room from seven to seven-thirty while Jake watched Jeopardy! Then we had an awesome conversation for a couple hours while Jake did homework. Then, after we were supposed to go to bed, Danny and I AIM chatted till way past midnight. And here’s the best part: at the end of our chat, right before we said good night, Danny and I both typed and sent less-than-three hearts (<3) to each other at the same exact time. Obviously I had to delete the chat file right after, just in case anybody ever snoops around on my computer, but that <3 moment <3 is one I’ll never forget.