Gabe Johnson Takes Over

by Geoff Herbach

  Jerri was acting a little freaky. This might have been a sign to me, but I didn’t really pay attention because she was standard issue weird forever (big hippy sandals, organic turnip soup, drumming circles, making us call her Jerri). But freaky? Not really. Well, maybe a little. Sometimes. Off and on.

  • • •

  Jerri wasn’t the only one acting weird. Coach Knautz pulled me out of biology the next day. He knocked on Mr. Willard’s door, pointed at me while the whole class stared, and then said he had to have a word in private. Private? That’s a gross word. It reminds me of bathrooms and people’s privates all hanging out. Gross.

  I was scared. I hadn’t gotten in trouble since eighth grade, when I took a bathroom stall apart with a screwdriver (totally grounded from TV and suspended for three days, which ended my life of crime and vandalism), and I couldn’t imagine why a coach would pull me out of class. He walked me down the hall without saying a word. He took me into the gym offices in total silence. He sat me down across the desk from him and then stared at me and shook his head and breathed through his big nose.

  “Yes…uh…sir?” I asked.

  “Listen, Reinstein, I have never seen anything like it.” (Nose breath.)

  “Like what?” I said meekly. I was completely shaking in my shoes because I thought I must’ve done something horribly terrible.

  “I have never seen a kid run so damn fast in the fitness test,” he said.

  “Ohhhhh,” I breathed easier. “Yeah. Jerri is pretty excited.”

  “Who?”

  “My mom.”

  “Right. Jerri. And she’s right to be excited, Reinstein. I’ve been doing this for twelve years, and I have never seen anything like it. Ken Johnson wasn’t even close to as fast as you, and he took two firsts at State last year.”

  “I know,” I said, without any enthusiasm, I might add. Why? Ken Johnson has always been a jerk. The summer after eighth grade, Ken Johnson shoved me off my Schwinn Varsity, which he called a stupid bike because he said my brake lever scratched his car, which maybe it did, but only because he parked like a jerk so I couldn’t get my bike past him. Ken Johnson.

  “I’m guessing you’re a sprinter,” Coach Knautz nodded, “just by the way you run. I’m guessing you’re really built for 100 meters or maybe 200.”

  “Maybe,” I said, still not knowing what he was getting at.

  Mr. Knautz’s eyes were watery. He nodded more. He was sweaty.

  “You have to do something with your God-given speed. You have to go out for track,” he said.

  “Oh,” I said. I squinted and thought, those locker room lights beating down on my head, Hmm. Am I going to say yes to this silliness? Hmmmm. I wouldn’t have said yes, but I had Jerri’s voice echoing in my head from the macaroni dinner (the Universe…the Universe…the Universe), and I thought about Andrew all arrogant and superior, even though he’s just a punk kid, and there was this poster hanging on the wall behind Coach Knautz (I was squinting at it) with this dude running in the desert with the word ACHIEVE underneath him, and I was emotionally moved by it, which is ridiculous, I know, but whatever. And, yes, I wanted Jerri to be proud of me. Andrew has his thing, his piano, which everyone loves him for. Jerri’s so proud of Andrew. Jerri has never seemed proud of me. I mean, man, what young son doesn’t want his mom to be proud of him even if he has to call her Jerri? (The Universe, Felton…the Universe…)

  So I said, “Uh, okay, sounds good,” which caused Coach Knautz to punch his fist in the air, shout yes, and then try to high-five me.

  • • •

  So even though track season was half done by that time, and even though I had no intention before to do anything but eat and sleep and grow hair on my body and practice my completely lame and humorless standup routine (I’ll get to this later), and even though I’ve always thought that track is dumb because you just run like you’re a scared buffalo getting chased by hyenas on Animal Planet, I joined the team.

  It was right to do so.

  I was totally nervous about it. The juniors and seniors have always been jerks.

  But seriously, I did pretty well.

  In fact, right away, it became obvious, even though my last name is Reinstein and not something Jamaican like Bolt or Lightning or Nitro or Napalm, that I’m sincerely fast. Actually, it turned out that I am so fast that I made varsity in the 100 meters, which pissed off a couple of seniors, boohoo, but it wasn’t my fault. (Coach Knautz kept me off the relays for political reasons, he said.) It turned out I could already run almost as fast as that jerk Ken Johnson.

  All the rest of the spring, a growing crowd of sweaty dudes who looked like Coach Knautz—balding, wearing those elastic coach shorts pulled halfway up their fat bellies because they’re also coaches, albeit football coaches—kept coming up to me, saying, “I’ve never seen anything like it. You’re what, fifteen?”

  All the rest of the spring, Jerri kept yelling from her crossing guard position out on the corner or from the stands at other schools or from next to Andrew at big invitational meets, where I always placed a closer and closer second right behind Ken Johnson. “Run, Felton! Go!” (Even as she got freakier at home.) And all spring long, all the jocks in my grade, especially Cody Frederick, who I always thought smelled like an old urinal cake in a locker room (sorry), kept saying, “Can’t wait for football. You’re going out, right, Reinstein? We’re going to kick some ass in the fall.”

  “I guess,” I’d tell them.

  I did not enjoy the jock bus rides. I missed Gus, my first best friend, who sometimes sat on the hill watching track practice, shaking his head in disapproval. But I loved to run. Loved it.

  Fast like donkey. Very fast. Zing!

  • • •

  But then at Regionals, the qualifier for the State meet, because I was filled with donkey adrenaline that made me shake, because I knew—seriously understood—that I’d gotten as fast as that jerk Ken Johnson and I had a good shot at beating him and making him feel like the jerk he is, I false-started twice—yes, two times—and was disqualified and then—oh, I’m not proud—I cried and blew chunks right there by the track. I did. Vomited. And then…drum roll…it was all over.

  Ken Johnson whispered “Head case.”

  A couple other seniors whispered “Squirrel Nuts,” for that was my nickname with the upper classes.

  Coach Knautz said, “Another year of experience and that won’t happen to you, my boy.”

  Gus showed up outside the locker room and said, “You should quit stupid track because it’s foolish and dumb,” because track made it so I didn’t have time to drive around with him and Peter Yang. He didn’t have to say that, by the way. Track was done for me for the year.

  And Cody Frederick said, “We’ll kick ass come fall, Reinstein.”

  For the next five days, I stayed home. I didn’t go to school because I was wrecked by the false starts. I didn’t barf anymore, but I felt sick. I felt sweaty. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t rest. Moist sheets. Disgusting. Didn’t smell good. Jerri paced around the house all day while I lay there. She only stopped pacing to stare at me (or to go be a crossing guard for an hour). By day six, I was pretty hungry, so I ate a couple of bagels.

  And that was that. No more track. Sophomore year was almost over. Summer was almost here.

  While track was going, I felt I had a reason for getting out of my bed: Beat Ken Johnson. Without track, I was back to lying in bed wondering if I’m funny. (I really wanted to be a comedian…maybe I still do.)

  Chapter 3:

  Proof of why I Shouldn't Be a Comedian

  A.

  Nobody laughed at my jokes except for Gus, who is my best friend. He thinks I’m hilarious, of course, but he’s been my best friend forever, so he’s biased. My so-called second best friend, Peter Yang? He never laughed at anything. What funny man would hang out with a dude who never laughs?<
br />
  B.

  In seventh grade, I did the school talent show, and I ripped a routine right square out of my Jerry Seinfeld Live on Broadway: I’m Telling You for the Last Time DVD and nobody laughed. Jerry Seinfeld is hilarious. He’s a comic genius. Everybody laughs at him. I did his shtick, and I got nothing except for Ben Schilling shouting at me to get off the stage (yes, he got detention) and also a couple of other kids booing. That means the bearer of the jokes wasn’t funny (I was the bearer, if you didn’t get that).

  C.

  When I talked, I often talked way too fast, sometimes so fast I even annoyed myself (not to mention others), especially when I talked too fast in my head, which, for most of my life, I have done 24/7, which is not funny. This can still be a problem. Shut up, voice in head. Not funny! Not funny! Seriously, not funny.

  • • •

  Let us address some larger issues, shall we?

  My dad must be part of this discussion:

  I used to think about my dad a lot. I used to think he was with me wherever I went, and that made me feel good. I used to ask him for help and ask him to keep me safe, which is weird. He’s dead. I thought a ghost was keeping an eye on me.

  Aha! When I was eleven, it occurred to me that he killed himself (I found him when I was five), so he obviously didn’t want to be with me at all because he made sure he’d never see me again no matter what, so I stopped kidding myself that my dad’s ghost was hanging around taking care of me. Hanging around is a bad way to put it.

  Ha-ha.

  See? None of that’s funny.

  • • •

  Let’s address the bonfire.

  There really aren’t any pictures of Dad left because when I was seven, Jerri had this giant bonfire to help me and Andrew “let go of the past.” We listened to Celtic music and burned Dad’s books and shirts and photo albums, etc. Just about everything. (Not totally everything.)

  You can’t burn memories, Jerri. I guess you know that now.

  I have some memories.

  Here’s a memory:

  One time, when I was maybe four, Dad put me in our old Volvo station wagon (a car Jerri got rid of around the time of the bonfire, even though I screamed “Noooo!”) and drove us out to the big Mound east of town (an important Mound). I sat down at the bottom while Dad jogged up and down it, which doesn’t make a lot of sense given what I knew about Dad from Jerri (a short, fat dad). He jogged, and I played in the dirt or whatever, and he jogged, and I remember shouting at him, “Daddy! Daddy!” etc., and he jogged. When he stopped, he was all sweaty, and he walked over to me and whispered, “That’s better. That’s better.” Then he said, “What the hell are you doing, Felton?” I believe I was eating a rock. I remember the Volvo smelled funny on the drive back because he was so sweaty. Not exactly like Cody Frederick funny but sort of. When we got home, Dad said, “Thanks for accompanying me, buddy.” That was nice.

  I really loved that car—it was freaking huge—but Jerri said it had bad vibes. So it went away like all Dad’s pictures.

  I do have some memories though. Not funny ones.

  • • •

  Let’s delve into Jerri a bit!

  While I was home from school sweating and not eating after my Regionals screw-up, Jerri, between her crossing guard shifts, often stood at the landing of the stairs that lead into the basement, where my room is and where I watch TV. She would stand there and watch me sleeping. Except, I wasn’t asleep. I was watching Comedy Central. I would pretend to sleep when I’d hear her creep down the stairs so I wouldn’t have to talk to her (as she had taken to saying very weird things, very incomprehensible things that my brain did not understand). I’d squint my eyes so they looked closed, but they were open just enough to continue watching Comedy Central. Sometimes, she’d stand there looking at me for a whole episode of MADtv, and I’d get uncomfortable and want to move, but I didn’t because her freakiness was freaking me out. Sometimes, I could hear her swallowing, like she was crying or something, which was totally weird. I got disqualified from a stupid track meet, for God’s sake. I was pretty upset, but it wasn’t so tragic that my mom should’ve been crying about it.

  You know what? Of course she wasn’t crying about the track meet. I was just a dumb kid back in May.

  One day, she stood there for like an hour, swallowing and staring, and it just got to be too much. I had an itch on my leg and couldn’t hold on anymore, so I said, “Can I help you, Jerri?”

  She flinched and said, “No…just checking on you.”

  “Okay!” I said.

  “I don’t think it’s bad to be in sports, Felton.”

  Why the hell would it be? Incomprehensible!

  Then she went upstairs.

  Incomprehensible jokes aren’t funny, by the way.

  • • •

  And, finally, let’s address Bluffton.

  Disclaimer: Jerri says I shouldn’t say “retard” all the time because it’s disrespectful to people who have really low IQs, but that’s not what I’m talking about, you know? I sincerely apologize to anyone I offend by saying “retard.” Okay: There have been times when I truly feel like I’m a retard and that everybody thinks I’m retarded, and because they think I’m retarded, I get nervous and I act like a retard, which simply fulfills their expectations. It’s a big circle. The retarded circle of my life.

  Am I retarded? Well…

  I am a Reinstein. I live on the outskirts of a small town in southwestern Wisconsin on ten acres from which I can see the town’s little country club and golf course—which I’ve called ugly. From my home, I can also see all the alcoholic, blithering golf dads who swear and scream.

  I blamed my dad for this situation, for abandoning us here by hanging himself in the garage. And I also blamed Jerri because she’s from here and should’ve known better. I believe Bluffton, Wisconsin, is a terrible place.

  On good days, this is what I’ve thought: I’m not retarded. Bluffton is retarded. It has a dumb little college, which is why my dad came here (to teach). Mostly all the students at the dumb little college are dumb, and they think they’re king shit or whatever because they’re drunk and walking around shouting and in college. Other than the college, Bluffton has a dumb main street, where kids my age stand around staring at each other, or, if they’re old enough and have access to a car, they drive up and down the street, staring at the dumb kids staring at each other. Sometimes, they drive to Walmart, which is really big. Bluffton also has a McDonald’s and a Subway and a Pizza Hut and a combo KFC–Taco Bell. (KenTacoFrickinBell—retarded.) And there are lots of hills and lots of farms outside the city limits and lots of farmers who drive their pickup trucks and smell like poop and lots of black and white cows standing on the hills staring at you like you’re a retard or like you’re a kid on main street.

  And listen to this: I never even minded cows. I never minded poop-smelling farmers, even though they can be mean and gross (they blow snot out of their noses onto the snow). Farmers and their poop-smelling kids are not why Bluffton has seemed retarded and why me and my friends have called it Suckville.

  Me, Peter, and Gus (my only friends forever) figured the facts out in eighth grade. The reason we wanted to rename Bluffton Suckville is because of the town kids: the public school teachers’ kids and the lawyers’ kids and the doctors’ kids and the cops’ kids and the insurance salespeople’s and the bankers’ kids and the orthodontist’s daughter, Abby Sauter, who has been very mean.

  “They’re all dumb and annoying!” we shouted. “They’re the retarded ones!” we said. They honestly do think they’re the special children of God. Gus calls these kids honkies. I don’t know why, but it makes me laugh. Even now. Honkies.

  We aren’t honkies (maybe I am). Me, Peter, and Gus are college kids (that is, kids of college professors).

  At least, I used to be.

  We are a
minority! We are oppressed!

  At least, I used to be. I’m crazy.

  Gus and I tried to write a horror movie script last year titled The Retarded Honkies of Suckville! We wrote two pages actually. Gus wrote some good jokes.

  I didn’t write any jokes because I wasn’t funny.

  Gus is hilarious. Gus could be a great standup comic right now, even though he doesn’t want to be. He’s really small, and he’s got this wad of black hair that’s always sort of long, and he ducks his head so his bangs cover his eyes so he can hide the fact that he thinks everybody is just dumb. I know he’s under his hair rolling his eyes and making faces. Everybody else knows too. He used to drive the junior and senior honkies crazy because they knew he was making fun of them, but they couldn’t catch him because his hair wad was in front of his eyes. He’s so dang funny, hugely hilarious, which is the greatest compliment I can give anybody.

  He also left for the summer, which threatened to make Bluffton double Suckville, maybe triple Suckville, as I wasn’t exactly in love with Peter Yang, who was my remaining friend.

  Not funny. Not funny. Not funny.

  A comedian? I don’t think so.

  • • •

  It’s 1:20 a.m. I am not sleepy.

  Thank you for reading!

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Growing up, Geoff Herbach was both dork and jock. Sports calmed him. People caused him anxiety. Offseason, Geoff was prone to kummerspeck, which is a German word meaning weight gain due to nervous eating. Its literal translation is grief bacon. Geoff teaches writing at Minnesota State, Mankato. Visit him at geoffherbach.com.