Hit the Road, Manny

by Christian Burch

  “YOU WANTED A POD,” said Belly in her foghorn voice. She was sitting on Dad’s lap, and he had to turn his head away from her to protect his hearing.

  “Open mine next,” said India, grabbing a present from the center of the table.

  India’s present was wrapped in newspaper. She had painted bright red flowers with yellow middles on it with acrylic paint. Dad admired the paper. He even put on his glasses to see it better. They’re bifocals because he’s reached that age. He’s also reached the age where he has to take Metamucil in the morning to help him poop. I’m not supposed to tell people that anymore. One time I introduced him to Sarah’s mom by saying, “This is my dad. He takes Metamucil to help him poop.” Then I turned to my dad and said, “This is Sarah’s mom. She gets menstrual cramps.” Sarah had told me about her mom’s cramps. The manny always says to introduce people with a little fact that they have in common, and stomach issues was all I could think of that they had in common.

  Inside India’s flower-wrapped present was a T-shirt that she had sewn my name across in red velvet letters. I put it on over my collared shirt and put my collar up. India says the preppy look works for me. I always feel like a J.Crew model when I wear my collar up. Like I should be sailing on Martha’s Vineyard or playing lacrosse at Princeton.

  I opened Lulu’s present next. It was wrapped in cutout pictures from old People and Us magazines. Lulu likes to cut out pictures of celebrities. She and her friend Margo cut out pictures of boys that they think are cute and tape them all over a wall in her bedroom. Lulu calls it the Hot Guy Wall. There’s a picture of a tennis player without his shirt on. There’s a picture of the boys from High School Musical. There’s even a picture of a CNN news correspondent. He’s a little older than the rest of the “hot guys,” and his hair is completely white. Lulu says she likes him because of his “intellect.” When Lulu’s not in her room, the manny always adds pictures of himself to her Hot Guy Wall. She usually notices after a few days and takes them down and puts them on another wall in her room. She calls that wall her Freaks and Geeks Wall. There aren’t pictures of anybody else on the Freaks and Geeks Wall. Just the manny.

  I ripped open Lulu’s homemade wrapping paper, and Belly grabbed it and cuddled with a picture of a kitten. Inside, the present was a framed picture of Lulu riding a horse. I thanked her but immediately thought I would replace the picture of Lulu with a picture of my friends Sarah and Scotty and me in the frame. The one where we posed for the manny in front of a SLOW CHILDREN sign and pretended to be running really slowly.

  Uncle Max handed me a small box wrapped in squiggly silver wrapping paper. There was a card with it that had a picture of a red-haired boy with a mouthful of french fries. I opened the card and read, “Keats, we thought you could use this to tune out. Love, Uncle Max and the manny.”

  I ripped it open as fast as I could because I already had an idea of what it might be. And it was! A metallic blue iPod of my very own. I jumped up and down and hugged Uncle Max and the manny. I screeched, “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you—”

  Until Uncle Max interrupted me. “That’s what uncles are supposed to do…spoil you and make your parents look bad.”

  The manny said, “I’ve already programmed it with a lot of songs that I know you like and some that I like so I can borrow it.” Then he smiled.

  I scanned the playlist: Green Day. The Muppets. Elton John.

  The manny loves Elton John. Mom had a karaoke party for Dad’s last birthday, and the manny wore a white suit, with his hairy chest showing, and big white-framed glasses. He sang, “‘Oh, Lawdy Mama, those Friday nights, when Suzie wore her dresses tight, and the Crocodile Rocking was out of sight.’” Then he sang in a really high voice, “Laaaaaaa. La-La-La-La-La.” I thought the champagne glasses from Mom’s toast to Dad were going to shatter. But they didn’t. Well, one did, but that’s because Belly was trying to carry it on her head like the little girl who’s fetching water at the end of The Jungle Book.

  After my iPod frenzy died down, I remembered that Mom and Dad had a surprise for me. I scanned the table, but there weren’t any more presents left, just empty boxes and ripped-up wrapping paper. I thought that maybe my present was too big to fit on the kitchen table.

  Maybe it was a brand-new car and it was parked in the driveway with a big red bow wrapped around it like people do when their kids graduate from high school or college. I’m too young to drive, but a giant red bow would be really fun.

  I was still daydreaming about the giant red bow when Dad asked, “Are you ready for your birthday surprise from us, Keats?” He had his arm around Mom like they were going to spring something very exciting and overwhelming on me. I hoped Mom wasn’t pregnant. This was how they stood when they told me Belly was coming. Maybe they would announce that we’d won the lottery and they were going to let me pick out a new house for us. I’d pick something in Nantucket. I like the accent they have in Massachusetts. It sounds wicked cool.

  Mom and Dad didn’t announce that we had won the lottery. Instead, Mom did a pretend drum-roll while Dad announced that we were going to rent an RV and go on a road trip across America this summer.

  “Surprise!” Mom yelled as she raised her arms up in the air and shook her hands. “You’ve always wanted to take a road trip!”

  I had told Mom and Dad that I wanted to go on a road trip on our last vacation, when we were on an airplane and I sat next to a baby who cried the whole time and then threw up milk on my favorite black pants. The baby’s mother didn’t even notice. She also didn’t notice when I stuck my tongue out at her baby. My mother noticed and pinched my leg.

  Being stuck in an RV with everybody is way different than a lock for my door. I pretended to be really excited so I wouldn’t hurt Mom and Dad’s feelings. I did a dance that the manny taught me called the cabbage patch, where you march in place and move your arms around in circles in front of you like you’re churning butter. The manny did the cabbage patch too. India did the worm. Mom said the manny was coming for moral support. I couldn’t tell if he was going to be moral support for her or for me.

  I excitedly hugged everyone and ran with India and Lulu to catch the bus. It was the last day of school, and the bus driver was going to let us chew gum.

  I Love the Smell of Windex4

  Mrs. House decided not to give us any more schoolwork since this was the last week of school. She said she was “burned out” on grading papers and giving tests. I can tell that she’s burned out. Last week she wore two different shoes, one blue and one black. They didn’t even have the same size heel, so she walked lopsided all day, like a pirate. When she asked Craig to stand up and hand out our graded science worksheets, he answered by saying, “Aye, aye, Captain.”

  I don’t think Mrs. House understood Craig’s joke because she said, “Oh! I like being called Captain,” and wobbled back to her desk.

  Instead of schoolwork Mrs. House let us play heads-up seven-up and watch educational videos. We watched a documentary about kids in New York City learning how to ballroom dance. They were really good, but I was disappointed that there weren’t more cartwheels and splits in their choreography. Cartwheels and splits would have added some flair. Flair is when you have a talent for something or you make something fancy. I learned the word “flair” last January when Mrs. House said I had a “flair for the dramatic” when she handed back my math quiz. It was really hard, but I only missed one. Before I realized that it was out loud, I shouted, “Hallelujah!” and threw my arms up in the air. I said it so loud that it scared Sarah, and she accidentally knocked over her pencil organizer that she keeps on her desk.

  Lulu’s class watched educational videos this week too. The manny had to pick her up early from school yesterday because they showed a movie about where babies come from. Lulu said that it made her feel faint and short of breath. Lulu has a flair for the dramatic too. It runs in our family, like freckled shoulders. Lulu was white as a sheet and refused to eat the lasagna that M
om had made for dinner. She kept saying she was having “flashbacks.” I thought a flashback was a football player, but India told me that a flashback is when something from your past comes back to haunt you. Like Mexican food does to Dad.

  No schoolwork is the best birthday present Mrs. House could have given me. She isn’t the only one who’s burned out. Last week I fell asleep during a school assembly when the high school band came to our school to play. I woke up and the gym was almost empty and the brass section was emptying their spit valves and putting away their horns. I had to run across the gym to catch up with my class.

  The manny is going to bring my birthday snacks this afternoon (caramel apples). But first a guy named Newly is bringing animals that he owns into our classroom to teach us about them. A big snake. Lizards. A baby crocodile. Newly is famous at our school. Most of the students have been to an assembly or a birthday party where Newly was the main attraction. There was even a rumor that he lived with his animals in the basement of the school. There’s a big lock on the basement door, but everybody claims to know someone who has seen Newly going in there at night after all the kids have gone home. Craig told me that for after-school detention one time he had to clean out the cages in the basement. I think Craig sometimes makes up stories to get attention. Once he wore a red bandanna around his head for a week and told me that Willie Nelson was his grandpa. Willie Nelson is a singer that has long braids and sings songs about baby cowboys and mamas.

  Mrs. House sat down in a chair in front of the class and told us that before Newly came, we needed to come up with questions to ask him. She handed out little pieces of paper to each of us and had us write a question on it. When we were done, she collected them and read them out loud to decide which ones should be asked.

  “‘Why is your name Newly?’

  “‘Is Newly short for Newlton?’

  “‘Is Newly your first name or last name?’”

  Mrs. House rolled her eyes and glanced at the next question. She said, “Oh, here’s Sarah’s question. I bet it will be a little bit different.” And she read, “‘Is it true you live in the basement of our school?’”

  Mrs. House looked frustrated and asked us if we had questions about the animals and not about Newly. The room went silent, and we looked around at one another and shrugged. She gave up. She knew that we had all grown up seeing Newly’s shows and that, by now, it was Newly we were excited to see, not the six-foot python.

  When Newly knocked on the door, we all cheered. His cheeks were bright red, like a sunburn, and his white teeth smiled through his thick beard and mustache. Newly brought cages full of reptiles, a few birds, and even a skunk that had had its stink removed. When Newly was telling us about the skunk, Craig passed gas and said really loudly, “Whew! I just had my stink removed too!” We all laughed, even Newly, but Mrs. House made Craig go out into the hallway anyway. We could see his face through the skinny glass window on the door. He kept pressing his lips against it and crossing his eyes. Mrs. House didn’t notice. She stayed in the back of the room, away from the snake cages, during Newly’s whole presentation. She even clipped and filed her fingernails, which I pointed out to Sarah and said was rude. Sarah reminded me about falling asleep during the band performance last week and told me not to throw stones from my glass house. That’s one of Sarah’s mom’s sayings, “You shouldn’t throw stones when you live in a glass house.” It means that you shouldn’t judge people, because none of us are perfect. When I grow up, I really do want to live in a glass house. I love the smell of Windex.

  Newly finished his presentation with an albino cobra. Albino means it doesn’t have any pigment or color. Newly kept the colorless snake in its glass cage, but it gave me the shivers, and I stood in the back of the room behind everybody else. We never got to ask Newly our questions. I guess he will stay a mystery for a little longer.

  As Newly was packing up his animals and leaving the room, the manny showed up with the caramel apples for my birthday party.

  The manny saw the albino cobra and said, “I love Whitesnake.” Then he made hand gestures like people make at rock concerts, except he was making the sign for “I love you” in sign language. He started to sing, “‘An’ here I go again on my own. Goin’ down the only road I’ve ever known.’” He told me that Whitesnake was a heavy metal band from the eighties who used to have music videos with girls rolling around on the hoods of cars.

  “What kind of cars?” I asked.

  He didn’t know.

  Mrs. House knew what he was talking about. She said that she had gone to a Whitesnake concert in Tulsa when she was in high school. She said she still had the T-shirt.

  “I’ll give you a dollar if you wear it to the next parent-teacher conferences,” said the manny. Mrs. House laughed and covered her mouth with her hand. I think she was trying to seem delicate and ladylike, but it didn’t work because she snorted and spit on the desk when she laughed.

  I can’t imagine Mrs. House at a rock concert. She won’t even let us walk down the hallway without being in a single-file line. The chaos of a mosh pit would probably “harsh on her mellow.” India always says, “Stop harshing on my mellow,” when she wants me to stop jumping on her bed when she’s trying to paint her toenails.

  The manny started telling Mrs. House about our road trip, while I passed out the caramel apples. The kids sang “Happy Birthday” to me. They really screamed it, but Mrs. House was too tired from the school year to stop them. You can get away with anything on the last day of school. Craig still hadn’t come back from being sent out into the hallway, but Mrs. House didn’t seem to care. His head wasn’t in the window anymore. Sarah said that he was probably torturing squirrels on the playground or that he had stolen Principal Allen’s Oldsmobile and was fleeing to Texas. I reminded Sarah about throwing stones from her glass house.

  Mrs. House had a string of caramel hanging from her chin when she said, “Keats, be sure to stop by my classroom next year to tell me all about your trip.” I had to ask her to say it again because I was staring at the caramel on her chin and not listening.

  I finally answered, “Oh, I will. It will be so educational.”

  A comment like that could raise my final grades and maybe even convince her to nominate me for an award like Student of the Year or Best Dressed or Most Valuable Player.

  Mrs. House hugged me good-bye. The manny stood there until he got a hug too.

  5Mannytopia!

  A week after school let out for summer vacation Dad brought home an RV that had the words CRUISE AMERICA on the side and had a picture of snow-covered mountains and people on bicycles. He had rented it for my birthday surprise trip. When Dad gave us the tour of the RV, Lulu screamed, “This is my seat!” and sat in a booth that was by a table.

  The manny whispered to her, “I’m going to steal it when you get up.”

  She didn’t get up at all during Dad’s tour, not even to see the tiny kitchen or the bathroom that had a vanity mirror surrounded by lights. Lulu would like it if there were a chair that sat right in front of the mirror. She likes to practice facial expressions in the mirror. Angry. Thoughtful. Surprised to be getting an award.

  The RV had one bed in the back (probably for Mom and Dad); one above the driver, which Lulu and India claimed; and the booth folded out into another bed for the manny. The seats were really big, like thrones for kings and queens, and Mom said that they folded down and would make perfect beds for Belly and me. India sat kindergarten style in one and pretended to meditate with her hands on her knees and her fingers pointing toward the roof of the RV.

  I sat down in one and said, “This is the most comfortable chair I’ve ever been in. I could stay here forever.”

  “Good,” said Dad. “Because we’ll be driving a long way before we fly back home from Las Vegas.”

  The manny squealed when Dad said “Las Vegas.” He loves Las Vegas.

  “Where else can you travel the world in one evening without ever having to change out of your t
hongs?” he pointed out to India.

  “Nobody calls them thongs anymore,” said India. “They’re called flip-flops. Thongs are different.”

  “Oh, sorry,” the manny apologized as he pretended to adjust his thong underwear through the back of his jeans.

  Elton John has a show in Las Vegas at Caesars Palace, and the manny really wants to go. Elton John plays a concert whenever Céline Dion is on vacation or is filming car commercials. She’ll be gone when we’re in Las Vegas. Lulu tried to find out where she would be by surfing Céline’s Web site, but it didn’t say. I looked over Lulu’s shoulder while she was searching, and I saw that Céline Dion has her own perfume, only it was called a fragrance instead of perfume.

  “What do you think it smells like?” I asked the manny.

  “Probably like talent and determination, with just the right touch of attitude,” he said. “Like Lulu after gym class.”

  “Your fragrance would be a fruity mix of sarcasm and starched shirts,” Lulu said back to the manny in her snotty voice.

  “I’d call it Mannytopia, and I’d have candles made too,” said the manny, raising his hands in front of him like he was imagining his name in bright lights on a billboard.

  The manny started typing on the computer when Lulu was done. He said he wanted to look at the Elton John Web site to see if it would be appropriate to wear a feathered boa to the concert. Elton John’s Web site has pictures of him playing the piano and wearing wild glasses with sparkly diamonds around the rims. There’s a link on it where you can actually hear a message of his voice. I think it was an old message because at the end he said, “Happy Christmas,” and Christmas was more than five months ago. Elton John has a British accent, like Sarah’s mother.

  Sarah called to tell me good-bye and asked me to send her postcards from interesting places. I wrote down her address on a piece of paper and put it in my silver money clip. My silver money clip doesn’t have any money in it, just phone numbers and old movie tickets. And Sarah’s and Scotty’s school pictures.