by Tommy Hays
After recess, his class went back inside, and as Grover sat down at his desk, the new girl tapped him on the back.
“Are you named after the Grover in Look Homeward, Angel?”
How’d she know? Most kids thought he was named after a Muppet.
“Mama told me your daddy runs the Wolfe house,” she said.
Instead of looking through a baby name book, Grover’s parents had flipped through Wolfe’s novel for both Sudie’s and Grover’s names. Grover was named after a character who died early. Why couldn’t they have named him one of the normal brother names in the book, like Ben or Steve?
Later that afternoon, when Mrs. Caswell was writing extra credit challenge words on the blackboard, the new girl tapped him on the back again.
“You’re a good artist,” she whispered.
Grover stared at her blankly.
“My brother took me over to your mama’s grave.”
“Who said you could go over there?” Grover whispered.
“It’s a free country,” she said.
He turned back around, but she tapped his shoulder.
“I like your tapestries,” she said.
In a little while, he felt the girl tap him again.
“Now what?” he asked.
“You can’t keep her to yourself,” she said.
“What are you talking about?”
“The dead belong to everybody,” she said. “Take it from me.”
Grover looked at her a minute. “It’s none of your business!”
“Grover, do you have something you’d like to share with the rest of the class?” asked Mrs. Caswell.
“No, ma’am,” he said.
Grover sat there, looking straight ahead, but his mind was on this new girl sitting right behind him. He waited for her to tap his back again and when she did he was going to let her have it.
It was only about half an hour later, when Mrs. Caswell was in the middle of a lesson on the Cherokee Indians, that Grover had calmed down enough to hear what the girl had called his weavings. Tapestries.
Every day at recess the new girl read underneath the sycamore tree, and every day Grover stole glimpses of her while Sam beat him at HORSE or while he worked his Rubik’s cube. Who knew what else she’d figured out about him? He needed to keep an eye on her, which was hard to do with her sitting behind him. In class, she was smart. Right up there with Mira. More and more Mrs. Caswell called on Emma Lee instead of Ashley or one of her friends. Grover overheard those girls whisper things about the way she dressed, the way she talked.
The new girl had been at Claxton about a week when one day at recess while Grover played Sam in HORSE, Mrs. Caswell sat down and started talking to Emma Lee. After a while, Mrs. Caswell hugged her and got up. Mrs. Caswell stopped by where Ashley and her friends played four square, said something to them and then walked on up to the top of the hill where Miss Shook, the other sixth-grade teacher, sat on the teacher’s bench.
Miss Shook had been Grover’s fourth-grade teacher. Tall, fat and jowl-faced, she yelled a lot, wasn’t too bright and didn’t like boys, especially quiet boys like Grover. Often when he had been sitting quietly doing his work, she’d call on him, saying, “What are you up to, Grover?” One time she’d accused him of cheating on a math test. It was only after his mother proposed that Miss Shook give him another, harder test and Grover still made a 100 that Miss Shook left him alone. Lucky for Sudie, Miss Shook had been moved from fourth to sixth grade last year.
Ashley and her friends had stopped playing four square and were talking something over. They didn’t look so eager now. He saw them draw straws. Ashley must’ve lost, because she was the one who, slowly and looking back at her friends, walked over to Emma Lee. Emma Lee looked up from her book. Ashley flipped her blonde hair back over her shoulder, tilted her head and, looking everywhere but at Emma Lee, said something Grover couldn’t hear.
Emma Lee closed her book and followed Ashley to where they’d been playing four square. She began playing with them. She was taller than all of them and quicker too. Even in that long coat of hers. Sam had finished skunking Grover when Ashley and her friends, looking irritated, came down to their end of the basketball court. Emma Lee followed behind, grinning.
Grover noticed Matthew standing out on the sidewalk in his old Army coat, looking through the fence in their direction, his fingers curled around the chain-link fence.
“Who won?” Sam asked the girls.
Ashley smiled, and putting on a fake mountain accent, said, “Emuh Leeeee diyud.”
Emma Lee’s smile faded, her brown eyes darkened and she went still.
“Are you boys finished?” Ashley asked. “We want to play HORSE. You want to play with us?”
“That’s okay.” Sam backed up a little.
Ashley turned to the other girls. “Should we play HORSE? Or should we play another game?”
“Like what?” asked Stacey.
“Yeah,” said Marcie, “like what?”
“Hmmm,” Ashley said, tapping her chin and frowning. She snapped her fingers. “I know!” She turned to Emma Lee. “Let’s play H-I-L-L-B-I-L-L-Y.”
Grover wasn’t positive what happened. All he knew was that one minute Ashley was standing and the next she wasn’t.
“What happened here?” Mrs. Caswell asked. Grover didn’t see how his teacher had covered so much ground so quickly.
“She … she slapped me,” Ashley said in a surprised, trembling voice. She gingerly touched her cheek where a hand mark slowly bloomed. The other girls helped her up and dusted leaves off the back of her sweater.
“Emma Lee?” asked Mrs. Caswell. “Why did you slap Ashley?”
“She knows good and well why,” Emma Lee said calmly.
“We were trying to include her, like you asked,” Ashley said.
By now most of the kids on the playground had gathered around.
“Did anyone else see what happened?” Mrs. Caswell looked around the circle of kids.
Grover looked at his feet.
Mrs. Caswell took Emma Lee’s arm. “We’ll have to pay a visit to Mrs. Dillingham.”
As Grover watched Mrs. Caswell lead Emma Lee away, he and all the other kids knew what going to Mrs. Dillingham meant. That’s when he remembered seeing Matthew, but when Grover looked to where he’d been standing along the fence, he saw Matthew was gone.
The bell sounded that recess was over. As Grover and Sam walked toward the building, Mira came over and asked, “What happened?”
“They called her a hillbilly,” Sam said.
Mira shook her head and sighed. “Those girls …”
“It wouldn’t matter if Mrs. Dillingham knew,” Sam said.
Grover was sure his friend was right. Mrs. Dillingham always said she didn’t care why somebody hit somebody. It was an automatic suspension. Still, he couldn’t help admitting that he wouldn’t have minded if Emma Lee never came back to school.
When Mrs. Caswell finally returned with Emma Lee, Emma Lee disappeared into the cloakroom, probably getting her backpack. When she came back out, she’d taken off her coat. She walked to her desk, pulled out her science book and started reading. Grover glanced across the room at Sam, who gave a shrug. Everyone in the class was looking at Emma Lee. Never had anyone who’d hit anyone escaped suspension. Grover wondered if Mrs. Caswell had somehow convinced their principal to give the girl another chance. He went back to reading his science book, but he kept thinking about his mother and how she would’ve taken him aside and asked him to look out for the new girl. He went back to his science book one more time but he couldn’t absorb the words on the page.
Unable to stand it any longer, Grover set down his book and with an exasperated sigh said, “Hillbilly!”
Mrs. Caswell looked up from a paper she was grading. “Pardon me, Grover?”
Grover felt his classmates look up from their books. “Ashley called Emma Lee a hillbilly. That’s why she hit her.”
“I see,” said Mrs
. Caswell, looking at Ashley, who was looking at Grover like Do I know that kid? It was probably the first time since they’d made that hygrometer together back in third grade that Ashley had noticed him.
Mrs. Caswell slid her chair back, got up and walked slowly to Ashley’s desk.
“I didn’t call her anything,” Ashley said.
“No?” asked Mrs. Caswell.
“I said I wanted to play a game called … that word he just said.”
Mrs. Caswell cocked her head. “What word was that?”
“The one he just said,” she said again, her face getting redder.
“I didn’t hear Grover very well,” she said. “Can you tell me what the word is?”
Ashley lowered her head. “Hillbilly,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry, Ashley,” Mrs. Caswell said, “I didn’t hear you.”
“Hillbilly,” Ashley said a little louder, her voice trembling.
“What is the definition of hillbilly?” Mrs. Caswell asked.
Ashley didn’t look up.
“I asked you a question, Ashley,” Mrs. Caswell said.
Ashley looked up. “Please, Mrs. Caswell,” she said, sounding like she was about to cry.
Mrs. Caswell crossed her arms, still waiting for an answer.
Ashley ducked like she was trying to curl up into a ball and disappear.
“Can anyone help Ashley come up with a definition for hillbilly?”
No one spoke.
Daniel Pevoe raised his hand. Daniel sat in the front row where Mrs. Caswell could help him catch up with his work. With Mrs. Caswell’s help, he’d been passing all his subjects.
“Yes, Daniel?”
“Hillbilly is kind of like the N-word …”
The class gasped.
“… except it’s talking about mountain people.”
Mrs. Caswell just looked at Daniel a moment as all kinds of whispering went on throughout the room. “Thank you, Daniel,” Mrs. Caswell said slowly as if needing time to think. “You raise a very good point.” She turned to Ashley. “Don’t you think Daniel raises a good point?”
“Ma’am?” Ashley said.
“We were all surprised, even shocked, by Daniel’s comment, yet I think he’s making a pretty accurate comparison.” Mrs. Caswell turned back to Ashley. “Would you ever call Mira the N-word?”
“Of course not!” Ashley said. “That’s a horrible, horrible word! I’ve never said that word before in my life!”
“I’m glad to hear it,” Mrs. Caswell said. “It is a horrible word. But according to Daniel’s comparison, hillbilly is a pretty horrible word too.”
“It was a game,” Ashley said weakly.
“Oh, I see,” said Mrs. Caswell. “You weren’t calling Emma Lee a hillbilly. You just wanted to play a game called H-I-L-L-B-I-L-L-Y.”
Ashley’s head slumped to her chest, like she was about to melt right out of her chair and collect in a miserable puddle on the floor.
“You owe Emma Lee an apology,” Mrs. Caswell said.
“I’m sorry,” Ashley whispered.
“It’s been my experience,” said Mrs. Caswell, “apologies are delivered best when one is standing and looking the offended party in the eye.”
Ashley slowly stood up, walked over to where Emma Lee sat and said, “I’m sorry.” What surprised Grover was that it sounded like she meant it.
Almost half an hour later, the class had gone back to work. Ashley was at her desk, her eyes rimmed in red. With his mother no longer bothering him, Grover had finished the assigned reading on clouds, answered the questions and even contributed to the class discussion on the difference between cumulus and nimbus. Somehow Sam had moved the discussion from clouds to storms to hurricanes, which got Mrs. Caswell off on a story about a cat she’d read about that had survived Hurricane Katrina by floating in a salad bowl for a week.
Grover felt a tap on his shoulder.
“You didn’t have to go and do that,” Emma Lee whispered.
Grover thought about it. “Yes, I did.”
They looked at each other a minute.
“Oh,” she said, looking into his eyes. “She made you do it.”
“What are you talking about?!” he said, louder than he meant.
“Grover,” said Mrs. Caswell, “do you have something you’d like to share with the class?”
“No, ma’am,” Grover said, turning back around in his seat. Who in the heck was this girl who read him like one of her books?
CHAPTER FIVE
D IS FOR DEAD MAN
He felt his report card burning a hole in his backpack. It was Tuesday, the day after the Emma Lee incident. Grover and Sudie had walked out of Isaac Claxton and headed up Montford Avenue toward downtown and the Wolfe house. Grover’d forgotten that first quarter report cards were being given out today. Unlike the other kids, he hadn’t slid his out of its little manila envelope, but had stuffed it deep into his backpack. The past couple of weeks there’d been more Cs and even a D. He’d never had a D on anything in his life. This might very well be the first D in the history of the Johnston family. Mrs. Caswell had asked that the tests and papers be signed by his father. Instead of showing them to his father, Grover had forged his father’s signature. He was amazed he hadn’t been caught. Of course it wouldn’t make any difference. His father would see his report card and it’d be all over.
They passed Reader’s Corner, a small used-book store with a black-and-white cat named Tom after Thomas Wolfe, who always sat in the front window. Grover often stopped here with Sudie and would sit and pet Tom while Sudie picked out books. Their father kept a tab at the Reader’s Corner, which he’d pay at the end of every month. Their mother had loved Reader’s Corner. Two blocks farther up they passed Videolife, another little store, but with movie posters plastered all over the windows. Grover’s heart always sped up whenever they passed Videolife.
“Look, Grover, they have Fantastic Mr. Fox.” Sudie stopped, looking longingly at a poster. “Maybe we could rent just one movie?” She held up her finger. “Just one.”
“Come on, Sudie,” Grover said impatiently, taking her hand and pulling her along. Sudie kept looking back over her shoulder at Videolife as they walked on up Montford.
“I don’t see why we can’t rent just one,” Sudie said.
What Sudie didn’t know, and what Grover and his father agreed never to tell her, was that their mother had been walking up to Videolife to get Fantastic Mr. Fox. She’d asked Videolife to call her as soon as it arrived. She’d wanted to surprise Sudie.
They crossed the bridge that led into downtown. The bridge was the overpass of I-240, a busy four-lane expressway with cars and tractor trailer trucks rumbling beneath them. Built thirty years ago, I-240 cut through the middle of Asheville, dividing Montford and other Asheville neighborhoods from downtown. Their father hated it because in its construction they had bulldozed Thomas Wolfe’s birthplace and made a big wide wound in Beaucatcher Mountain.
They crossed into downtown and entered the Grove Arcade—a long building built in the 1920s with immense winged lions guarding the doors. They walked down the long hallway, which glistened with polished marble and granite. Sunlight slanted through the high windows, so that the bright light and deep shadow reminded Grover of a famous painting he’d seen in some art book. The painting was of a church, but that’s all he could remember.
The Grove Arcade had been renovated into a kind of mall, with shops down both sides. People lived in condos on the second floor. The original architect’s drawings, displayed in the middle of the building, showed that it was planned to have twelve stories above it, a small skyscraper, where people would live above the shops. The Depression had hit and the project ran out of money, and they never built above the first few floors.
Businessmen in coats and ties, and businesswomen in high heels and suits, using the building as a cut-through, walked fast to one important meeting or another. Tourists strolled around, lugging shopping bags and pausing in f
ront of store windows. A few street people lounged on benches beside grocery carts full of their belongings. Young street people, what their father called quasi street people, wore backpacks and camped downtown in alleys and vacant lots. A lot of them wore their hair in dreadlocks. Many carried drums, and, on Saturday nights, a huge drumming circle gathered in Pritchard Park, the drumming echoing off the buildings and carrying all the way to Grover’s house.
Grover’s family would walk downtown on Saturday nights and watch the drumming, which went on for hours. People danced in the center of the circle. Sometimes Grover’s mother would try to pull their father into the circle to dance, but he almost always refused. Their mother would go into the center of the circle and dance by herself, swaying and turning around, closing her eyes and smiling like the drumming had taken her some other place. Watching his mother dance like that, Grover sometimes felt he didn’t know her.
With the report card in his backpack, Grover was in no hurry to reach their father’s office. They stopped at Bean Streets Café, a coffee shop, on the way to the Wolfe house. Every morning their father gave them enough money to stop after school and buy hot chocolate and a doughnut. After they got their hot chocolates, Grover and Sudie sat at a table in the lower section of Bean Streets. It was like somebody’s den with old sofas and big cushioned chairs to sit in. A woman mannequin’s arm reached down from the ceiling, its nails painted bright red.
Grover liked Bean Streets because Mr. Critt, the owner, who lived upstairs and often walked around in a robe and bedroom slippers, was a painter and displayed his own paintings on the walls. They were never of any particular thing. You might make out a tree or a telephone pole or a tennis shoe or a bicycle, but whatever it was would always be caught up in crazy swirls of colors. His paintings looked like little framed nightmares.
Grover and Sudie sat at their usual table, a giant checkerboard, with the pieces in the little drawers underneath. Sudie started to get them, but Grover shook his head.
“You don’t want to play?” Sudie asked.
“Not in the mood.”
“What’s wrong?”