Love Puppies and Corner Kicks

by Bob Krech

  I guess she’s forgetting about Jasmine, Molly, and Gordon already. Me and Lynne and Becky give each other TGFC knuckle raps as they head out to their bus line. We tell each other good luck, stay cool, and all that stuff. We’re getting along pretty well again. We’re not best friends, not even really good friends, but we were teammates and that’s enough.

  I go out the front door and onto the stone steps for the last time. Margaret is on the porch waiting for me. She sees me and sinks to her knees. She grabs my legs. “No! Don’t go! Please—not back to New Joisey! Ye canna’! Ye mustn’t!”

  What’s cool is, she’s goofing around, but I know she means it, too. “It’s okay, Margaret. It’s okay. New Jersey’s not as bad as you think. We have Cheetos.”

  “Yeah, sure. but you’ve nawt fish and chips,” she says.

  She gets up slowly. We hug. I give her my address and my e-mail. I say, “Maybe we’ll see each other again, you know?”

  She shrugs and puts her hands out with her palms up. “No reason why not, ay?”

  It makes me smile. The way she says it, I think she really believes we will. Margaret just operates with the belief that everything is going to work out. That’s her attitude. Margaret has what Word Power calls aplomb! I sure wouldn’t mind getting some myself.

  We hug again. “Ta for everything,” I say, and she breaks out in a huge grin. Then she finally goes over to her bus line—where Stewart is.

  I am going to walk over there, across the parking lot, and tell him. I take two steps and stop. Tell him what? What am I going to tell him?

  Then, while I’m still thinking about it, here he comes. He doesn’t say “Hi” or “How are you?” or anything. Just walks right over and says, “Now, don’t forget to write me.” He’s got a small smile, but it’s not his real smile where his freckles move everywhere.

  “Okay,” I say.

  “Here’s my e-mail address and all that stuff,” he says. He hands me a folded-up piece of paper that I put deep in my pocket. I already wrote mine out for him and I hand it over. He says some other stuff about going on vacation to Mallorca, wherever that is, and won’t I have fun in the States this summer and all that. I say, “Yeah, well—”

  There’s a loud engine roar and brakes squealing. Stewart’s bus pulls up. The doors swing open. Happy, yelling kids go banging up the steps.

  He looks over at the bus, then back at me. This is it. The last time we’ll ever see each other. I hitch up my backpack straps and clear my throat. “I have to tell you s-s-something.”

  He smiles. “Okay.”

  “You . . .”

  The bus horn blares.

  I look at his sneakers. Black Converse All-Stars. “I . . . well, you . . .” Oh! I am looking at shoes again!

  His eyebrows go up.

  “I, uh . . .” Oh my God. This is my last chance. Word Power, where are you when I need you?

  He leans in. “Yes?”

  I look him right in his blue eyes. Slowly. Breathe. “Have—a g-g-g-ood summer.”

  30

  NONPLUSED

  To be at a loss as to what to say, think, or do.

  HONNNNK! Honnnnk! The bus driver is leaning on the horn. He yells out the window, “C’mon, you lot!”

  “Bye, Andrea. Gotta go.” Stewart takes a quick step toward me.

  “I . . .” I try to start again.

  And then I can’t talk because—HE KISSES ME!

  It happens so fast, I’m not sure it did happen, except that my lips are tingling and my breathing has stopped.

  “Sorry. Had to do that,” he says. Then he grins and backpedals to his bus. He jumps up the stairs and in. The bus doors close right behind him. It pulls away from the curb. He’s going! He kissed me! I am completely nonplused. Which means I have no idea what to do now. But I’ve got to get “un-nonplused” and quick.

  I tear down the driveway. Why don’t people warn you when they’re going to do something like this? I catch up to the bus. I run alongside, waving and yelling, “Stop!”

  It doesn’t.

  I reach the front door and bang on it with my fist. I am banging on the door of a moving school bus! Kids and parents are stopped on the sidewalk staring at me.

  Finally the bus jerks to a halt. The doors swing open. The driver leans over from his seat, his cap pulled low on his eyes, yelling over the engine noise, “Hurry up! Git onna boos!” He’s a little old Scottish guy who’s usually pretty friendly, but he’s obviously not in the mood for this.

  I gasp for the words. I am out of breath from running, but my speech is clear because I’m yelling and have no mind. “This isn’t my bus.”

  “What?!”

  I have to yell louder because the engine is really loud. “I don’t ride this bus!”

  “What are ye on about then?!”

  “I have to tell somebody something.”

  He wrinkles his forehead. “What?! Spake up!”

  I yell again, “I have to tell somebody something! It’s important!”

  “Who?”

  “Stewart M-M-McCombie!”

  “What is it?!”

  “It’s . . . it’s private.”

  “Go on! Send him a flippin’ FedEx then, missy!”

  The doors close. The engine roars louder as the bus pulls away again. I can see Stewart way in the back, his face up against the window. Margaret is next to him. The bus curves slowly down the drive. He waves. He’s going.

  No!

  I sprint down the driveway. I catch up as the bus sits at the stop sign waiting to turn onto North Donside Road and go away forever. I’m standing right behind it in the middle of the driveway. The blinker is blinking for the left turn. This is my very last chance! And there’s only one way to do it. Stewart has his eyes right on me. Margaret, too. This is it.

  I very deliberately point at my chest. I yell at the top of my lungs even though I don’t think they can hear it—“I!”

  Their eyes don’t move.

  I cup both hands over my heart and yell again—“LOVE!”

  Margaret’s eyebrows go up.

  I point at Stewart—“YOU! STEWART McCOMBIE!”

  He smiles so big, his freckles go everywhere. He signs me right back. Margaret pretends to faint, falling on Stewart. As they make the turn, Stewart is pushing Margaret with one hand and waving to me with the other.

  I blow him kiss after kiss till the bus is out of sight. I told him. I finally told him. Then I hear cheers and applause and hooting. I turn to see half the school standing behind me in the road. There are kids and parents and teachers clapping and yelling. There is nothing to do but smile and bow.

  Margaret was wrong about only one thing. Music class with Mrs. Brown was not totally useless.

  The night is so quiet. It seems like a million years ago I was in school, even though it’s only been five hours. Officially I’m grounded, so there’s nowhere I’m going tonight. My mom drove me to the local police station the day after the initiation thing and made me tell them everything. I was really scared, but it turned out the police weren’t that interested, except Constable Menzies, the community service officer, did warn me for a couple of minutes about the danger and all that.

  One good thing though. Constable Menzies gave me his business card. I took it home and got my father’s good pen and wrote in my best cursive on the back, “Please call at your earliest convenience regarding Jasmine/Dunnotar Castle.” Then I walked over to the Geddeses’ house and dropped it in their mailbox. That was satisfying.

  After dinner, I take a walk by myself along the old trail overlooking the valley. The long summer days are starting again. The sky is all reddish blue and purple behind me and light blue with white wisps of clouds over the hills in front. It’s so beautiful. I want to see it again.

  I want to hang out with Margaret. I want to play soccer on the TGFC with Lynne and Becky. I want to eat fish and chips from Gorty’s, and most of all—I want to see what would happen with Stewart. But none of that is going to happ
en. It’s going to be a whole something else.

  I stay out on the trail watching the sky till the moon comes up and a silvery, blue light falls on the hills. It begins to get cold.

  “Andrea.”

  I turn around. It’s my dad poking his head out from the kitchen door. “Can I get your help with some of these last boxes, please?”

  For the next hour we wrap dishes, glasses, and cups in newspapers and pack them into boxes together—the same boxes we had shipped from New Jersey. Mom is upstairs packing clothes with Faith.

  I think about Stewart and where he is now. Probably on a plane headed to London to see his mom. We paint over the Scottish address on the boxes with white paint and then write our home address in New Jersey with permanent marker on the white patches when they dry.

  We pile the boxes up by the kitchen door, where the moving company guys will pick them up tomorrow. When we’re done, we sit down right there together on the boxes. I’m beat. Dad hands me a Coke from the little fridge. He peers at me, which means to “look searchingly at something difficult to discern.”

  He says, “Should really be something going home.”

  “Yeah,” I say.

  He squeezes my shoulder. It’s quiet. We both just stare at the almost empty little kitchen. Finally he says, “Don’t worry, kiddo. You’ll do fine.”

  I remember when he said that exact same thing just before we left for Dunnotar. I think about Margaret. And Stewart. And this whole crazy year and I say, “Yeah, Dad. No reason why not.” And he laughs.

  Now I reach in my pocket and press the note hard between my fingers. I feel the rough texture of the cheap yellow school paper. I pull it out and unfold it again.

  STEWART MC COMBIE , 288 SOUTH FORK ROAD DUNNOTAR SCOTLAND UK STEWART @MAX .COM.UK

  I flip it over and read the crooked capital letters for the hundredth time.

  A

  YOU ’LL ALWAYS BE MYB LOVE PUPPY S.

  That boy. He really knows how to use his words.

  FOR INFORMATION AND RESOURCES ON STUTTERING

  The National Stuttering Association:http://www.nsastutter.org Stuttering Foundation of America:http://www.stutteringhelp.org

  International Stuttering Association:http://www.stutterisa.org

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Many thanks to all those who helped, supported, and inspired, especially Elvira Woodruff, Steve Meltzer, Paul Acampora, Rutgers One-On-One Plus, NJSCBWI, The American School in Aberdeen, and of course, Karen, Andrew, and Faith.