Gabe Johnson Takes Over

by Geoff Herbach

  Without looking at us, Gore said, “So that picture of Gabe. Attempt at crushing you, huh?”

  “Oh,” Camille sat up straight. “Yeah. It’s pretty bad. What were you doing lying around on the ground like that, Chunk?” she asked.

  I popped open the lemonade and took a sip. “When? What?”

  “When Seth Sellers took that picture of you and your grandpa in your shiny underpants,” Camille said.

  “What?” I shouted.

  “Crap. Okay. I thought you were avoiding the topic. That’s why I didn’t mention it in the car,” Camille said. “Chunk, um, I’m sorry to say that you’re an MLAHS Facebook sensation.”

  “Seth Sellers is a bad person,” Gore said without any noticeable emotion. “My computer’s on the counter.” She pointed at a laptop sitting on a stone counter across the deck. “Take a look, Gabe.”

  I already wanted to throw up. I already knew what I looked like in that stupid banana hammock. Like a freaking inflatable clown. I also knew Grandpa was wearing a silver thong and I knew we were covered in mud. We also fell asleep right next to each other in full view of the world. What was I thinking, sir?

  No, I didn’t want to see the picture itself. I wanted to see who was commenting. I wanted to see what they were saying.

  Big white whale me asleep on the towel next to mostly naked grandfather. Good God, sir. Jesus.

  There were dozens of comments. Mean and nasty, man. I scanned for Justin’s name in the comments. If he said something mean, I’d be forced to hate him forever.

  All the beached gay whale and pig boy and donkey man insults came from jocks and cheerleaders (and Austin Bates, who is in the freaking band). Mostly, it was Seth, Emily Yu, and Janessa writing back and forth. Justin didn’t write anything. I had to check the “likes.” There were twenty-five. And yeah, Justin Cornell, my best friend, “liked” the humiliating picture. My stomach tightened into a walnut. I pulled out my phone and texted him, You are dead to me.

  He texted back Why? Because I won’t play in your stupid fund-raiser for our alcoholic band teacher? So sorry.

  No, I wrote, because you’re a bad person. Take care.

  Whatever, Chunk. That’s all he wrote. The walnut slid up to my throat.

  “You know what,” I said to Camille. “Screw this. Screw these people.”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  I bent over because I couldn’t breathe. Then the doorbell rang. I stood up straight. “Screw Justin,” I said.

  A few minutes later our numbers had grown to thirteen—Tess Cook and Austin Bates (the reprobate) and the Petersen girls and Omar Fulwider and others. Everybody had their instruments (except Austin and Omar, who are drummers, so their stuff is locked in the school). And everyone wanted to talk about the damn picture. Tess said, “I think it’s cute that you and your grandpa can be naked together.”

  Austin Bates said, “Jelly donut.” Then he laughed. That’s what his comment on the Facebook page said too.

  Schae Petersen said, “Seth Sellers is such a paltry excuse for a human.”

  I listened to them all talk, shook my head, bit my lip, considered ass-dancing because that’s what I’d done in the past to alleviate the stress. Then I swallowed hard and said, “I should’ve been naked. I’m so embarrassed.”

  “What, Gabe?” Gore asked.

  “Me and my grandpa are petitioning to make Wilson a nude beach because our boys need fresh air, you know? We were protesting, but we lost our nerve. Grandpa didn’t want us to get arrested.”

  They all stared at me for a second. Then Austin said, “Wilson nude? That’d be sweet, y’all. I want to enjoy my nakedness.” He pulled off his shirt, so all he was wearing was the bandanna on his head and his giant rapper-sagging shorts. Last thing I wanted to see.

  “You’d really go naked?” Gore asked. “At Wilson Beach?”

  I nodded. “Hell yeah. I’m comfortable with my body.”

  “I wouldn’t be if I was you, but that’s cool,” Austin said.

  “I wouldn’t be if I was you, man,” Omar said. “You have the body of a homeless dog. Skin and tendons. Pretty gross.”

  “What, dude? I work for this shit,” Austin shouted. Then he flexed. “I celebrate myself!” Then he ran toward the lake and leapt off the dock into the water.

  Tess stripped off her shorts and shirt and chased him wearing her bra and underpants. Splash. She was in the water. Girl has been after Austin since kindergarten. Only the sweet Lord knows why, sir.

  Gore said, “I’m going to be really mad if anyone drowns.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m a very strong swimmer.”

  “You are?” Camille said. “When do you swim, Chunk?”

  “All the time, girlfriend,” I said.

  And then I did it, sir. I peeled off my shirt and raised my arms above my head, letting my big gut expand in all its terrible glory. Omar started chanting, “Chunk, Chunk, Chunk.” Then the Petersens chanted and I cupped my ear and stared at Camille and then at Gore. Gore chanted (more whispered), “Chunk, Chunk, Chunk.” Camille just stared back at me.

  I did my little ass-dance, which felt powerful, not stupid, and everybody laughed but in a good way. “I’m in,” I said. I pulled off my stretchies, revealing my plaid boxers. Kicked off my shoes. I walked out to the dock and dove like a sweet swan into the lake.

  Whale or not, nobody is going to take my dignity. No more.

  No, I’m fully capable of taking my own dignity. But no one else is going to take it.

  We got off to a pretty rousing start. Everybody but Camille and Gore stripped to their undies and jumped in the freaking lake and splashed around. It was great, man. It was awesome. There’s a lot of freedom in just saying “This is my giant ass. Deal with it.”

  Ten minutes after we all jumped in, Camille walked out to the dock and said, “Gore’s hamburgers are getting cold. We’d better eat them. Don’t want her getting mad at us.” She drew her finger across her neck like we might get our throats cut. Everybody climbed out fast.

  Gore gave us towels. She did her “kind of” smile. I could tell she was having a good time. Everybody treated her like it was normal that we’d be there, even though I’m guessing nobody had talked to her in years. We ate out on the deck.

  Oh, no, I’m not that great with myself. I dried off and pulled on my shirt right away. I’m not really interested in hanging at a nude beach, man. I’m psyched people think I want to though.

  The late-day sun hovered over the lake. Gore played pretty cool music from her computer. A bunch of seagulls flew around in the sky. A couple pelicans scooped fish. They don’t stay around here for long. I like them. I felt awesome

  That’s when Omar said, “Think Shaver is going to get fired?”

  Austin said, “No. Everybody around here drunk drives.”

  “No, they don’t,” Camille said. “That’s stupid.”

  Austin pursed his lips and nodded. “Oh, they do, yo. Just don’t beep their horn and shout at people outside the Kwik Trip like Shaver did the other night.”

  “That’s what he did?” I asked.

  “Yeah, dog,” Austin said.

  “That’s why the school board is meeting Friday,” Omar said. “To decide if they are going to fire him for acting so crazy.”

  Sir, apparently a lot can go down when you’re sunning yourself in a banana hammock next to a river. I had no idea about this.

  Yeah, Camille knew. So did Gore.

  Speedboats began buzzing heavy on the lake. You know, the evening is always thick with boaters. “Can we please go inside? I need to speak to you guys,” I said. “Too much noise.”

  We all went in except for Austin and Tess. Tess said she was scared of the house. (She’s a kid at heart.) They stood at the screen door. Everyone else gathered on the big couches around the fireplace. Everyone b
ut Camille. She stood up next to me, which is fair, right? She sent out the invitation.

  Before I could start talking, she said, “So we’re gathered together today for a special reason. We are just five days from the beginning of band camp.”

  Austin shouted from the door, “There is no band camp. The school canceled our asses and our teacher got lit up like monkey, girl. Wake up.”

  “From the traditional beginning of camp. Usually. When we usually begin camp, okay?” she said.

  We nodded. I wasn’t sure where she was going. But I nodded, sir.

  “We have decided to play a fund-raising concert for the band during Spunk River Days. That’s why we’re here.”

  “Wall of Sound plays on Sunday night at Spunk River Days. Can’t believe they’re coming here. Randall Andersson is freaking genius,” Omar said.

  Camille got a little flummoxed. “I know Wall of Sound is cool and I know the lake is pretty. And Chunk is fat and that’s funny and everything. But we need to get organized to play our concert, okay?”

  A few things occurred to me rapid-fire while Camille was speaking, Mr. Rodriguez. One, it’s not funny that I’m fat. It’s a fact, but it isn’t funny. Screw you, Camille. Two, this concert idea was totally lame. People at Spunk River Days want to see Wall of Sound, not a marching band. Plus, if Shaver was going to get fired, we’d really be raising money for nothing. There’d be no camp no matter what. Three, RC III was totally right. We should be more aggressive.

  “Right,” I said, breaking in. “Also, we need to show the school that we’re not a bunch of losers and we’re a force to be reckoned with.”

  “Hell yeah,” Austin shouted from the screen door.

  Camille broke back, “The concert will do that, so—”

  “What if we protested that dance squad?” I asked.

  “Protested?” Schae Petersen said. “Like with signs and…and marching?”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “I know,” Austin said. “We could protest it Chunk-style. Get all naked and take pictures in the girls’ locker room!”

  “No,” Camille said.

  “Or break into Kailey’s mama’s dance school, yo. We could trash it,” Austin cried.

  “That’s ridiculous. We don’t have to be criminals about this,” Camille said. “We just need to play our—”

  “Did you guys know the dance squad has this new coach and they’re up at the high school in the gym all week? Me and RC III watched them practice yesterday,” I said.

  “You and RC III?” Camille asked. She shook her head like she couldn’t comprehend the connection.

  “Yeah, the school’s replaced band camp with this stripper camp for cheerleaders. That’s what it looked like.”

  “Cool,” Austin said. Tess punched his arm.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you’d gone up there?” Camille asked.

  I didn’t talk to her. I talked to the band peeps. I leaned forward really intensely. “How many of you saw my Facebook post the other day? About the pop machine?”

  Most people raised their hands—but not everybody.

  “Listen, you guys. This is serious. This is straight-up serious, okay? The absolute, 100 percent reason we don’t have camp is that the school board took all the money from the pop machine in the cafeteria and gave it to this dance coach to pay for the cheerleaders’ stripper lessons.”

  “No!” Omar shouted.

  “Is that really true?” Schae asked.

  “Hell yeah, it is,” I said.

  “I only plug that bitch machine because we get the damn money back!” Austin shouted.

  I think Austin drank as much Code Red as me during the school year, sir. He bought three bottles during our research project. (He didn’t get fat though, lucky guy. He might be on meth, but I don’t think he is.)

  “Me too, dude,” I said.

  “That’s why we’re fund-raising,” Camille said.

  “Wow. Wow. No wonder Shaver went off the deep end,” Schae said.

  “Bet he got depressed because we get so little respect,” Omar said.

  “I want to blow some shit up!” Austin shouted.

  “Yeah. Me too,” Schae said.

  Others sort of growled and got mad, which is good because we should be mad. We shouldn’t just accept crap because we’re used to crap, right?

  “So what if we went up to the school tomorrow and did a little protesting? Let Deevers and the cheer bitches know that we’re pissed and that Shaver had better not get fired and we’re not going to take it.”

  “Don’t call them bitches,” Gore said, but nobody listened.

  “And what if we get in trouble?” Camille asked.

  “We’ll use the trouble to spread word about the benefit concert. How about that?”

  “Oh,” Camille said.

  “Sounds like a plan to me,” Omar said.

  “Yeah, we’re in,” Schae said, referring to herself and her twin sister, Caitlin, who never says a word. (She smiles really nice though.)

  “We can’t just show up at school,” Camille said. “If we’re going to protest, we have to make some signs and know what kinds of slogans we’re going to shout.”

  “Really? Slogans?” Gore asked. “Like cheers?”

  “Like cheers—but with a real message. ‘No blood for oil!’ or something.”

  “Whose blood?” Austin shouted from the door.

  “Yeah!” Tess demanded.

  “That’s just an example,” Camille said. “We need to make up cheers about how we’re mad at—”

  “Cheerleaders?” Schae said.

  “How about this!” I said. “How about this?” I repeated because I thought I’d been struck by the freaking hand of God right in my face. “We don’t talk. We don’t cheer. We keep dead silent because they took away the music. Get it? And if the school fires Shaver, the music will die forever. We go in there and just stare at them in complete silence!”

  “Really?” Camille asked. Her eyebrows were all knotted, her face pinched. “We just stare at them?”

  “Yes! That’s one spooky-ass protest, don’t you think?” I said, excited.

  “Maybe?” Gore said.

  But everyone else thought that was a good idea. They all shouted, “Yeah!” and “Spooky.” Camille totally rolled her eyes but didn’t fight it.

  So we had a plan!

  Everyone agreed to do it too, even Gore, who has no connection to the band whatsoever except she hosted the practice, which turned out not to be a practice. We decided to meet at the school at 2:15. (RC III said the doors were open from 2 to 4 p.m. daily so football players could lift weights.) We decided we wouldn’t say anything, that we’d be totally silent and spooky to show they’d taken away the music! Cool, right?

  Yeah, not very effective maybe.

  The only thing musical that was established during the meeting—because Camille wouldn’t let it go—was that we all knew how to play the song “Tequila” from memory. That’s the song we played while the cheerleaders danced during halftime at home basketball games during the year. We decided we’d play that at our Spunk River concert, but we didn’t practice because like six of us had to be home by ten and Austin and Tess were getting bitten by mosquitoes on the deck. The party broke up.

  I loved it. I had a great time. My leadership bone was getting strong, right?

  Yeah, Camille was pissed at me. She had a right to be pissed too. I wasn’t being very nice to her. I didn’t respect the concert. I butted into her speech. She was unhappy, sir. Camille was dealing with pretty complicated emotions too. She left when everyone else did. Right before she went out the door, she whispered, “Justin and Janessa.”

  “Oh, shit,” I said. “You know.”

  “You and RC III. What am I supposed to do?”

  “I don’t kn
ow,” I said.

  “Me either,” she said.

  “I’m not dating RC III,” I said.

  “This is the worst summer ever,” she said. Then she left.

  What could I do? I stayed behind and helped Gore clean up.

  Gore put some dance music on. Like drum machine synthesizer euro club crap that I wouldn’t normally like, except Gore danced around cleaning. She danced all over the place, shaking her big booty. It was awesome, man.

  Sure, I did a little ass-shaking myself. You know I’m down to do so, given the right situation.

  While we cleaned (picked up napkins and lemonade cups, loaded dishes into a dishwasher that looked more like a luxury airplane), Gore shouted, “You should be nicer to your girlfriend.”

  “Who?” I shouted back.

  “Camille.”

  “Seriously. She’s really not my girlfriend. Okay?”

  “Nicer to your friend then,” Gore said. “You shouldn’t call the cheerleaders bitches either.”

  “Why not? Look at what they’ve done to us.”

  “You don’t have to be like them. You’re a nice boy, you know? You’ve always been nice to me.”

  “Not really.”

  “Polite at least, which made me like you because polite is so much better than most people in our grade.”

  “Our school is filled with idiots,” I said. “That picture of me and Grandpa is proof.”

  “I think that picture is adorable,” Gore said. Off she danced, bouncing up and down.

  I felt a little warm. Gore has really pretty eyes and she can move really well, even though she’s giant. And so I got a little tickle in my gut. I watched her and the tickle spread.

  Then she said, “Where was RC III? Didn’t he say he’d be here?”

  That broke the spell, sir. “Oh. Yeah.”

  “Wonder why he didn’t come.”

  “Um…texted right before I got here. Fight with his dad. Couldn’t make it.”

  “Oh. That’s sad. I like him a lot.”

  My heart slowed. “Yeah?” I said.

  “Yeah. He’s really cool, don’t you think?”

  “Could you give me a ride home?” I asked.

  “Now?” Gore asked.