Agitation in the classroom. The end-of-day excitement had turned to something else, nervousness and fear. No one wanted their arms or hands licked. No one wanted a blue star pressed to their skin.
Miss Ramirez said that they’d all seen the police car and ambulance at the school. She said that she wasn’t trying to scare them, but Rey Lugo had gotten very sick because of one of the blue stars. Someone had pressed a star to his arm before he got to school that day. Rey was still in the hospital, recovering. He would be okay, but it was a very serious situation. She repeated her earlier warning, that if anyone approached them with a blue star they were to run away and find an adult.
The agitation in the classroom grew. No one wanted to be like Rey Lugo, walking down the hallway in a scary daze, throwing up into their hands.
Miss Ramirez passed copies of the paper down the rows. It was a letter to parents, with the stencil reproduction of the star in the middle of the page. The kids read the letter to themselves, mouths working, trying to find any information Miss Ramirez had withheld for their parents’ eyes only, anything they weren’t supposed to see.
The Kid looked at the star, touched its points with his fingertips. He imagined being zombie-fied by the star like Rey Lugo, emptied out by the illegal drug it held. The thought was scary, but he couldn’t stop thinking it. He imagined staring off down to the end of the hallway in disbelief, seeing things that weren’t there. What had Rey seen? What would The Kid see? He wondered this as the bell rang, as the classroom emptied. He touched a point of the star. What would he see that he couldn’t believe?
They ate dinner in the parking lot of a burger place on Temple Street, listening to a Country station on the radio, Darby trying to forget his conversation with Molina, the thought of Bob alone at the job site, Bob screaming in a closet.
“What do you want to go as?” Darby said.
The Kid chewed the last of their fries. Go as what?
“To your Halloween party. If you could go as anything. If you could dress up as anything.”
We could just go to the drug store and see what they have.
“We can’t buy a costume,” Darby said. “We’ve never bought a costume.”
It’s easier just to buy one.
Lucy had always made The Kid’s Halloween costumes. She couldn’t sew, but she cobbled things together, old clothes and accessories, props made from household items. The Kid as a pirate one year; the President of the U.S. the next. A bag of groceries in fourth grade, her best work in Darby’s opinion, The Kid wrapped in a giant brown paper bag she’d made out of a month’s worth of supermarket bags, empty cereal boxes and milk cartons and soup cans poking out of the top, an itemized receipt taped to his front. The Kid won second place in the school’s costume contest that year, brought home a gift certificate for a children’s bookstore that he was so proud of he refused to redeem, keeping it displayed on a shelf in his bedroom instead.
Darby turned in his seat, looked at The Kid. “You’re going to go to school with those cards, those great cards we made, and you’re going to show up in a cheapo costume?”
The Kid shrugged, took a pull on his root beer.
“No way,” Darby said. “We need a costume worthy of those cards.”
They went to the thrift store on Vermont Avenue, looked through the overburdened racks of second- and third-hand clothes, shirts and pants and three-piece suits. The Kid started to brighten a little, started to warm to the idea. He decided that he’d dress as a character from his comic: Smooshie Smith, Talk Show Host of the Future. They couldn’t find anything in the boys’ section, but over on the mens’ rack Darby found the perfect Smooshie Smith blazer, yellow and green checked, loud as a police siren, small enough that it would only look slightly absurd hanging off The Kid’s slim shoulders. The Kid came over with a clip-on tie he’d pulled from a display, stripes that clashed beautifully with the blazer’s checks, a knot as big as Darby’s fist. Darby navigated The Kid into the blazer, clipped the tie to the front of The Kid’s school shirt. The Kid looked ridiculous. The Kid looked great. They could roll the blazer’s sleeves under, pin the extra fabric at the back. He steered The Kid to a full-length mirror by the restrooms. The Kid grinned at his reflection. They bought the blazer and tie, a mustard yellow dress shirt, a pair of lime green golf slacks. The whole outfit came to five bucks. The Kid insisted on paying with money he’d saved from his allowance. He still felt bad about the ruined clothes from his gym locker. Darby let him pay, hoped it would put the issue to rest.
Back at the house, Darby pulled a kitchen chair out onto the front porch, plugged the electric clippers into an outlet in the living room, ran the cord out through the window, between the security bars. Turned on the living room lights, the porch light, so he could see what he was doing. The Kid sat in the chair with a bath towel draped over his shoulders, while Darby cut his hair. The buzz of the clippers in the quiet of the evening, the sound of the radio through the open windows of the pickup, the same Country station, a Merle Travis song, Sixteen Tons. Darby turned The Kid’s head gently, careful to get the cut symmetrical, not to go too short, not to nick The Kid’s scalp. The Kid used to sing while Darby did this, that overloud voice belting TV commercial jingles and sitcom theme songs, Lucy back at her desk in the darkening house, grading papers, singing right along, Darby trying to keep The Kid’s head still while he sang, while he kicked his feet to the rhythm and turned to warble a line back to his mother. Darby kidding The Kid every couple of minutes, a little strangled noise to imply that he’d screwed the cut up horribly, an old joke, The Kid rolling his eyes, not too concerned. The idea that his father could make a mistake was so ridiculous that it didn’t warrant a serious response.
The Kid sat still now, looking out across the front yard at a skinny stray cat crossing under the streetlight. Darby held The Kid’s head in his hands, hummed along with Merle Travis, trying not to think of Bob in a small closet, screaming.
When he was done, he patted The Kid on the shoulder, the all-clear sign. The Kid hopped down from the chair and shook out his towel, went inside to get the broom and dustpan.
Darby didn’t want the night to begin yet, didn’t want The Kid to go up to bed. The looming silence of the house pressed behind him, a ferocious thing, something Darby had to push back against, something he had to keep at bay. He didn’t want to be alone in the house, in the pickup, waiting for a call on the pager.
He pulled an empty cardboard box from the garage, some glue, some tape, a halfway-sharp scoring razor. He found a nearly fuzzless tennis ball in a back corner near the drawer where the ring slept, where the snow globe slept. He opened another drawer where he kept odds and ends he’d collected over the years, things he thought might be useful someday in the house, knobs from the original kitchen cabinet doors, snips of multicolored electrical wire, an unused light switch. He carried everything back onto the porch. He cut the box into flat slabs, drew an outline on the cardboard, erased when he screwed up, drew again. The Kid came out with the broom but never started sweeping, more interested in watching what Darby was doing. Darby finally got the outline right, cut out the shape with the razor. Rolled the cardboard into a tube and glued the ends together. Held the ends, waiting for the glue to take. The Kid stood over Darby’s shoulder, trying to figure out what he was making. Darby didn’t say anything. He liked watching The Kid trying to guess, the look of serious concentration on his face. He cut a hole in the bottom of the tennis ball, the same diameter as the cardboard tube, fixed the tube into the hole. Screwed a couple of cabinet knobs into the sides, looped some of the colored wire around the tube’s base, cut another small opening in the side and fixed the light switch into place. He held up the finished creation, tapped the tennis ball a couple of times with his finger, blew into the tennis ball, spoke into the microphone.
“Check, check, one-two.”
The Kid’s face split into a full-toothed smile, a look of genuine, delighted amazement, something Darby hadn’t seen in a over a
year.
Darby swept the porch while The Kid tried on the full costume up in his room. After a few minutes he came down the stairs, attempting to hold the microphone and write in his notebook at the same time.
How do I look? He stood on the bottom step, lifted the microphone up to Darby for an answer.
“You look great, Kid. You look like a million bucks.”
The Kid smiled again, hopped off the bottom stair and did his old trademark move, the soft shoe ta-da! sidestep Lucy had taught him, landing with his legs stretched to their limits, his arms extended, hands shaking for emphasis. It was the way he’d once ended every episode of It’s That Kid!, the exclamation point of the show, his final goodbye to the audience before leaving the stage. The Showbiz Shuffle, Lucy had called it. Darby clapped for the Shuffle. He and Lucy had always clapped for the Shuffle. The Kid smiled and nodded at the applause, lifted the microphone to his mouth. Darby realized that he was holding his breath, hoping that The Kid would be overcome by the moment and say what he’d always said in response to applause, Thank you, Thank you very much. That The Kid would speak into the microphone. But The Kid just smiled and nodded, bowing once, twice, acknowledging the applause, backing up the stairs to his bedroom, making his silent exit.
The Kid woke before his alarm with a different feeling in his stomach. A fluttering in his belly, not entirely bad. Nervous butterflies. He got washed up in the bathroom, rolled deodorant under his arms, brushed his teeth, gargled, zipped up his costume pants, buttoned his costume shirt, wrestled into his blazer, clipped on his tie. Stood in front of the bathroom mirror, practicing his Smooshie Smith smile.
His dad came in from the pickup. They sat at the kitchen table and his dad drank coffee while The Kid picked at his cereal, too nervous to eat. His dad drove him to school so nothing would happen to his costume along the way. The Kid checked his new backpack for the millionth time, making sure the cards were still there, all twenty-three, that none had gotten bent or ripped, that they were lying safe and flat between his math and reading anthology books.
They pulled up outside the front gate. The Kid tapped the tennis ball on his microphone with his finger, moved the mic from one hand to the other, practicing his technique, the smooth exchange from left to right.
Where’s Mom? He wanted to ask that question and hold the microphone out to his dad. He wanted his dad to know that he knew the truth, that it was okay, he understood, but he just wanted to know where she was, if she was safe. He just wanted to know if maybe she was coming back. The Kid wanted this moment to be an exception from the Covenant so he could ask that one question. That would be it, two words: Where’s Mom? It wouldn’t even be him asking, it would be Smooshie Smith. But he knew he couldn’t risk it. He’d kept to the Covenant for this long, he couldn’t go back on it now. He nodded to his dad and got down out of the pickup.
Vampires, cowboys, cops, race car drivers, Lakers players, rock and roll stars. The schoolyard was filled with costumes. The Kid felt dizzy. Norma Valenzuela dressed as a firefighter. Razz wearing a t-shirt that said, This is My Costume. Rhonda Sizemore in a puffy blue dress, carrying a plastic scepter, wearing a golden crown on her head. Some of the kids thought she was dressed as a princess, but whenever they said that she corrected them. She was not a princess, she was the queen.
The Kid found Matthew standing by the dodgeball wall, glowering at the other kids in their getups. Whenever someone asked where his costume was, Matthew told them that it was a super-powered costume, that the costume was invisible. The other kids didn’t seem to be buying it.
“Is it true about your dad?” Matthew said.
What?
“That he tried to fight Rhonda’s mom at the mall? That she almost had to call the police?”
Not exactly.
“They said that maybe he’s making the blue stars.”
Who’s making them?
“Your dad. Because of all his tattoos. They said he’s making the blue stars and giving them to older kids to stick onto littler kids.”
That’s not true.
“I didn’t say it was true,” Matthew said. “I’m just telling you what I heard.”
Brian was talking to Arizona on the far side of the yard. He wore yellow running shorts, a yellow tank top with a white number 1 on the back, wristbands, a headband. The Kid didn’t know if he was dressed up as some famous runner that The Kid didn’t know about, or if he was just dressed as himself, if that was famous enough. Arizona was dressed as a forest ranger. She wore a wide-brimmed brown hat and a green shirt and slacks, carried what looked like a fishing net on the end of a short stick, something to catch bears, maybe, coyotes in the woods.
The classroom was anxious, fidgety. They did the math lesson, social studies, language arts. They made mail pouches out of orange and black construction paper and taped them to the sides of their desks. Special delivery. The Kid made a sign, taped it next to the mail pouch. Come be Interviewed by Smooshie Smith, Talk Show Host of the Future.
He was nervous about how his cards would be received. He tried not to think about it. Instead, he watched Miss Ramirez’s hands as she wrote vocabulary words on the dry erase board. He drew Miss Ramirez’s hands in his notebook, tried to get the smooth lines right, the crooks and curves, the shading and shadows that made her fingers look like flesh and blood, like real, alive hands.
At lunch, The Kid and Matthew sat at their table, picked at their food. Michelle wasn’t around. The Kid guessed that she was in Mr. Bromwell’s office, talking about whatever she talked about. Her real dad in Minneapolis. The Kid asked Matthew if he wanted to be interviewed by Smooshie Smith, but Matthew shook his head. He was in a bad mood. He told The Kid that he didn’t care if it meant he would go to hell, he just wanted to wear a stupid Halloween costume.
Arizona sat down beside The Kid, set her fishing net on the table.
“I want to be interviewed,” she said.
The Kid looked at her.
“I want to be interviewed. I saw your sign.”
Sweat started on the back of The Kid’s neck. He tried to get it together, calm down, tried to think back over the talk-show tapes, all the things he’d learned and practiced. He took a sip from his juice box, hoped that his bad breath would go away, even if just for the length of the interview.
He flipped the switch on the microphone, adjusted the volume knob. Turned to a blank page in his notebook. Matthew looked up from his lunch, the only member of the audience.
How do you like it in California so far?
Arizona smiled, self-conscious. She leaned forward and spoke into the microphone.
“I think it’s great. I like it here a lot.”
What’s better about this place than the place you used to live?
“The people are nicer.”
Really?
“The people are much nicer.”
Have you made any friends?
“Lots.”
Name three.
“Rhonda S., you, Matthew.”
The Kid felt his ears burning. He looked across the table. Matthew was looking down at his lunch again, but his ears were red, too.
Let’s take a question from the audience.
The Kid and Arizona looked at Matthew. The Kid held the microphone across the table.
Matthew swallowed the mouthful of sandwich he’d been chewing. “Is Brian Bromwell your friend?” he said. “And if so, why?”
One question at a time.
“It’s a question and a follow up question,” Matthew said. “I know my rights.”
The Kid turned the microphone back to Arizona.
“He is my friend,” she said, “because he’s very sweet and very funny.”
Matthew rolled his eyes, looked back down at his lunch.
Just hearing the name made The Kid turn to find Brian in the yard, make sure he was a safe distance away. He was over on the other side of the pavilion, standing at the head of Rhonda’s crowded table, next to Arizona’s empty seat, watc
hing the interview at The Kid’s table. His eyes were narrowed, trying to figure out what was going on. He was too far away to hear, but The Kid still felt that flush of cold fear in his belly.
How is he funny? The Kid wrote, turning back to Arizona. Funny looking?
“No,” she said, giving The Kid a disapproving look.
Funny smelling?
“No,” she said, laughing a little. The Kid felt tingly, felt electric writing this about Brian while he was standing within sight, when he could come over at any minute. He felt brave for some reason, saying these things, brave, or stupid, or both, that little laugh from Arizona egging him on, making him braver, stupider.
Matthew read what The Kid was writing, looked across the tables at Brian, fear on his face, too, but something else as well. Excitement.
Funny how? The Kid wrote. He waited a few seconds for the anticipation of his guest to build, for the anticipation of his audience, patient, patient, waiting like he’d seen and rehearsed all those times with his mom the mornings.
Funny in the head?
And at this Arizona laughed out loud, a musical jingle, and Matthew laughed along, too, and The Kid could hear the applause from the studio audience, a delighted roar rising, cheers and clapping and guffaws.
Arizona’s hand was holding his arm. She was laughing so hard that she was holding The Kid’s arm without even knowing it.
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