Cartoonist

by Betsy Byars

  “What do you know about it? You’ve never locked yourself up in the attic. You and Bubba had too much sense for that.”

  “No, I’ve never locked myself in the attic, but there have been other things that I’ve had to accept and work out for myself, and that’s what Alfie’s going to have to do.”

  There had been a pause. Alfie sagged a little in his chair. He knew there was no way he could work this out, alone or with the firemen’s help. He could never come down the ladder into the harsh light of the living room, no matter what happened. It was impossible. He had gone into the woods like Hansel, turned, and the breadcrumbs were missing. There was no way back.

  Maybe when he was very old, he thought, eighty or ninety, when there was nothing left of the boy he had been, maybe then he could come down. He would be an old man, straggly beard, long gray hair, as thin as a skeleton, bent with arthritis and malnutrition. He would lift the trap door at last, trembling with effort, shaking in every limb, and slowly climb down the ladder.

  There, in the faded living room, he would discover that his family—Mom, Alma, and Pap—had moved away years ago. A new family lived in the house now, a family who hadn’t even known he was up there. He would stand bewildered and lost, blinking in the light, as frightened and confused at seeing the strangers as they were at seeing him.

  Below, his mother said to Alma, “Yes, but he could be dead up there, Alma, or unconscious. That’s why I wanted to call the firemen.”

  “He’s not dead.”

  “Well, sulking then. That’s just as bad.”

  “Look, I’ve got to go to work—I’m late as it is, but you are not to call the fire department. I mean that, Mom.”

  “The only reason I’m not calling them,” she said, “if you want the truth, is because I do not want Junior Madison, who I went with in high school, to know I have a son who goes around locking himself in attics!” She slammed something down on the television. “The last time I saw Junior Madison was at the Morgantown-Fairmont football game which Bubba won, and Junior Madison told me he knew how proud I must be of Bubba because his son had bad ankles and couldn’t even run across the family room.”

  Alfie could hear the music of the international cartoon. His mother called, “Alfie, this cartoon from Yugoslavia is real interesting. It’s about cities that keep building until they turn into atomic explosions.”

  “I don’t know why they make cartoons like that,” Pap complained. “Atom bombs ain’t funny.”

  “It’s not supposed to be funny. If you’d listened to what the woman said—”

  “Well, cartoons is supposed to be funny.” He got up from his chair. It creaked as he rose. “I’m going out back and see what the Governor’s up to.”

  “He’s gone to Pittsburgh, Pap. Don’t you remember?”

  “Oh, yeah.” He sat again, heavily.

  “You’ve started over there four times. I thought old elephants never forgot.”

  “Well, old brains ain’t like new ones.”

  Alfie heard the music swell. He thought the city must be exploding in the cartoon now, spreading crayon radiation over the land.

  “Hey, Miss-es Ma-son!”

  Alfie lifted his head. It was one of the Finley twins calling his mother from the sidewalk. He recognized the high nasal twang.

  “Hey, Miss-es Ma-son! We hear Alfie’s in the attic!”

  Alfie stretched his arms out on the table as if he were trying to reach the eaves.

  “Is Al-fie in the at-tic?”

  Somehow they made it rhyme. Alfie closed his eyes. He imagined himself as part of a jump-rope rhyme. Years from now thin-legged girls would be reciting his saga as they jumped.

  “Al-fie’s in the at-tic

  Doing his car-toons.”

  “Miss-es Ma-son! Is Alfie being pun-ished?” Both twins were calling now in perfect unison. “Is Al-fie being pun-ished?”

  The Finley twins had always had a special sense for trouble in the neighborhood. They never missed an ambulance or a police car. They sensed when and where a fight was going to break out, and they knew when a child was going to be punished. They would be leaping up at the window, like dogs after a bone, in time to see the first blow.

  “What’d he do, Miss-es Ma-son? What’d Al-fie do?”

  Alfie heard the front door thrust open. It banged against the porch wall. “Get away from here!” his mother shouted. “Get away from here before I turn the hose on you.”

  “But, Miss-es Ma-son,” they persisted. They inched closer to the steps. They wanted to be gossip columnists when they grew up. “But, Miss-es Mason, why is Al-fie in the at-tic?”

  “Scat!”

  “What’d he—”

  “Scat! Shoo! Get away from here!”

  There was a clanging noise. His mother must have thrown something at them, possibly the framed picture of himself that sat on the TV.

  Alfie’s head sagged. He knew his mother must be very ashamed of him, and yet he didn’t understand it exactly. She had not been embarrassed at all when Bubba had been arrested after the football game riot. She had told that over and over, to anyone who would listen. And the time Bubba stole a car to drive the cheerleaders to a game in Clarksburg—she had told that next morning in the grocery store. And Bubba’s running into the police car and losing his job—she would make a good story out of that one day too, Alfie thought.

  “Miss-es Ma-son!” voices called from the porch.

  “Ignore them,” Pap said.

  “I knew Wanda Wilkins would spread it all over town about Alfie. I should never have …”

  Alfie could hear his mother’s voice fade as she went into the kitchen. She drew a pot of water. She crossed the living room, opened the door, and flung the water outside.

  Alfie heard the splat, the two screams. The Finley twins must have taken a direct hit.

  “We’re telling our mom,” one of the twins threatened as they retreated. “Miss-es Ma-son, we’re telling Mom.”

  “And also tell Mom you were up on my porch trying to look in my door. Tell her Miss-es Ma-son’s going to call the cops the next time you come poking around here!”

  She sat down on the sofa. Immediately she got up. The springs creaked. She turned off the television. “Oh, I’m going to bed. I’ve had all I can stand for one day.”

  Alfie laid his head on his arms. The house was quiet now and he missed the noise. The sound of the television was a natural sound of the house, like the heater in winter or the wind from the north blowing through the eaves.

  He lifted his head. Suddenly he actually felt like a statue. Maybe, he thought, he had turned to stone, even though he hadn’t looked up at his cartoons. He felt like stone.

  He imagined himself in a park, high on a pedestal, far above the world. No matter what happened around him he would remain unmoving at his table, hands folded. Pigeons would flap around his head, light on his shoulders. Children would throw stones at them, hitting him. The statue would remain perfect. Muggings would take place in his shadow. Babies would teeter, fall, and cry. Girls would play games of tag around him. Only at night, like this, when the world got quiet, would the statue begin to soften. He closed his eyes. He became stone again.

  Chapter Eleven

  “HEY, ALFIE!”

  Alfie’s eyes snapped open. He blinked. He lifted his head, turtlelike, and looked around the dusky attic. It was morning and there was no sunlight. The attic was as empty and cheerless as a stage waiting for props.

  “Alfie, you ready for school?” Tree called. Alfie knew he was outside, standing at the edge of the steps. “Hey, Alfie!” he called again, louder.

  Alfie waited with his hands folded on the table as if he were holding a small bunch of invisible flowers.

  “Tree, would you come in the house a minute, please,” Alfie’s mother said at the front door. She had just gotten out of bed, and Alfie knew she would be standing in the doorway, clutching her peacock-blue bathrobe around her.

  “Isn’t Alfie
ready for school?” Tree asked anxiously. “I can’t be late again, Mrs. Mason, because I’ve already been late nine times, and if you’re late ten times you have to write a composition.”

  “Just step inside for a second, Tree.”

  “Compositions aren’t my thing.” He entered, feet dragging. He looked around the living room. “Where is Alfie? He’s not still in bed, is he? Look, Mrs. Mason, if he’s still in bed—”

  “Tree, Alfie’s up in the attic,” his mother said in a serious voice, “and I want you to help me get him down.”

  “Where is he?”

  “In the attic.”

  Alfie could imagine his mother pointing up to the trap door, holding her bathrobe closed with one hand. He could see Tree’s face lifted, puzzled, looking at the square door.

  “He went up yesterday,” his mother explained, “and he won’t come down.”

  There was a pause. Then Tree said in an awed voice, “That’s weird, Mrs. Mason.”

  Alfie recognized that as one of Tree’s greatest insults. “He’s weird, Alfie, sang a solo in the Christmas pageant. Oh, holeeeeeee night!” Or, “She’s really weird, Alfie, toe-dances.” Or, ‘Yeah, but somebody told me he plays the fife. He’s weird, Alfie.”

  And now he, Alfie, had joined the group. Drawing cartoons was bad enough, he thought, but locking himself in the attic really clinched it. “He’s weird,” Tree would tell everyone, “locked himself in the attic.”

  “Well, you know how he is, Tree,” his mother said. “He just does things without thinking. Anyway, I thought maybe if you called to him, he’d come down and you could walk to school together.”

  “Well, I don’t know. I could try.” Tree cleared his throat. “Alfie, you want to walk to school with me?” He waited, then said in a lower voice, “I don’t think he wants to, Mrs. Mason.”

  “Call again … please.”

  “Alfie, you going to school?” He paused, and then his voice began to pick up speed with his enthusiasm. “Listen, the reason I came by this morning is because Lizabeth and me are having a kind of war—it’s not going to be anything violent, Mrs. Mason,” he added quickly, “it’s just going to be one of those boys against the girls things—like Challenge of the Sexes on television. Anyway, Alfie, we worked it out last night. It’s going to be five different contests. And it’s you against Zeenie in—get this!—bowling! And Zeenie’s lousy too, Alfie. Half the time her ball never even gets to the pins. I mean, if it goes all the way down there, she’s proud. Gutter balls are her specialty.”

  Tree swallowed, almost choking on his enthusiasm. “And, Alfie, here’s the really good news. It’s me against Lizabeth in basketball. I still can’t believe she agreed. I mean, free throws are my specialty, Alfie. Everybody knows that. I can do them blindfolded, but she said, ‘All right, fine with me,’ and so we each get ten shots from the free-throw line—she takes one and I take one—or rather she tries to take one, right, Alfie?

  “And then—more good news—it’s Willie against Beth Ann in a race. He looks slow because he’s fat, right, but you and me know he is fast. Remember when he stole my adenoids? Remember the doctor put them in a little jar for me and we chased him for seven blocks? Anyway, you got to come down. We need to make plans. And, Alfie, if I’m late to school one more time I have to write a composition!”

  There was silence. In the attic Alfie could imagine Tree and his mother with their faces turned up to the trap door. There were sounds as Tree climbed up the ladder. He slapped his hand against the trap door. “Alfie, hey, come on down. This sex challenge is going to be one of the biggest things Morgantown’s ever seen. We may get on TV!”

  Alfie’s mother let her breath out in one long sigh. “He’s not coming, Tree.”

  “But he’s got to. He’s got to be in the challenge, Mrs. Mason. I already promised Zeenie he’d bowl her.” He raised his voice. “Alfie, I promised Zeenie. She won’t bowl anybody but you!” He went up another rung on the ladder and lowered his voice. “Look, if you’re mad about what I said yesterday, forget it. That’s over with. I didn’t mean it. This is too important for us to stay mad. This is war!”

  There was another long silence while Tree realized slowly that Alfie was not going to come down. “Mrs. Mason, are you sure he can hear me up there?” he asked.

  “He can hear you.”

  “But then why doesn’t he come down? This is important.”

  “I know, Tree.”

  “We’ve got to make plans.”

  “I know.” Her voice had a cold, ringing sound. “Alfie has upset a lot of plans.”

  In the attic Alfie shivered.

  “Well, when he comes down, Mrs. Mason,” Tree went on, “tell him about the war—he may not have heard all the details through the ceiling. And tell him to come on to school. We can’t put this war off. We’re up for it, you know, Mrs. Mason? We don’t want to lose our momentum. Tell him I’m going against Lizabeth after school today—three o’clock in the gym. I know he’ll want to be there for that. Did you hear me, Alfie? It’s me against Lizabeth at three o’clock. And tomorrow, Alfie, it’s you against Zeenie. Now she’s lousy, Alfie, but she’s also the niece of the man who runs the bowling alley—Red Cassini is her uncle, Alfie, and he’ll probably get some pro to coach her. Alfie, are you listening?” Tree stepped down from the ladder and started for the door. “Is that clock right, Mrs. Mason?”

  “I think so, Tree.”

  “Then I’m late.” His voice sank.

  The door slammed, and Tree ran down the sidewalk toward school. Alfie heard his footsteps fade in the distance.

  Alfie’s mother went into the kitchen, plugged in the coffee pot, and sank down into one of the chairs. In a few minutes the scent of coffee reached Alfie in the attic. He glanced over at his own supply of food. He looked away. He wasn’t hungry. Hunger seemed now to be one of those things he would never feel again. Like thirst. Or sorrow. Or happiness. He just didn’t think he would feel anything again ever.

  A raindrop fell on the roof. It made a loud sound as if the roof material were stretched, drum-tight, over the rafters. Alfie had never been in the attic when it rained. He put his head down on his arms.

  The rain began to come down hard now, splattering against the roof in waves. It was a rhythmic thing, Alfie thought, like the ocean he had never seen. He closed his eyes and drifted back to sleep.

  Chapter Twelve

  “ALFIE, DO YOU HEAR me? This is Pap speaking.” Pap’s voice sounded as clear and pronounced as a radio announcer’s.

  Alfie lifted his head. The rain had slackened and was now a steady drumming on the roof. It gave Alfie a drowsy feeling. His eyelids drooped.

  “Alfie?”

  His eyes opened.

  “Alfie, your ma’s gone over to the Wilkinses’ to use the telephone. She’s calling to tell Bubba and Maureen to come on over as soon as they can get their things together. She’s not letting on that you’ve locked yourself in the attic. She’s telling them the attic is all fixed up like something out of a picture.”

  Pap pulled his chair closer to the trap door. Alfie could hear the chair legs scraping on the floor. Pap sat down heavily. He sighed, scratched his chin. Alfie could hear his whiskers bristle.

  “There’s something I want to say before she gets back,” Pap went on. “Now, Alfie, I don’t want Bubba and Maureen staying here any more than you do. I wish I could lock myself somewheres. I’d do it if I thought it would do any good. Only it wouldn’t. There’s not much an old man can do to get noticed without them sending him to the asylum.”

  Pap cleared his throat and leaned back in his chair. Alfie knew Pap was looking up at the trap door now. He could hear the back cushion creak.

  Alfie opened his eyes wide, trying to stay awake. He didn’t know why he was so sleepy. It was mid-morning—he knew that from the television programs—and yet he felt as tired as if it were midnight. Maybe it was because of the bad dreams, he thought. All night long he had had nightmares in which cars c
rashed together and the ceiling cracked like a jigsaw puzzle and fell on him.

  “So here’s what I was thinking, Alfie,” Pap said, his voice rising with his enthusiasm. “I was thinking maybe you and me and Bubba could get the junkyard back. Harvey Sweet’s let it run down. I was out there the other day—took the bus to the end of the line and then walked five miles just to see how things was—I miss that place, Alfie—and things was bad. Sweet hadn’t got a new wreck in three months. And the crown—remember the hubcap crown your dad made? Wreck King of West Virginia? Well, it’s gone—blew down in the wind, Sweet said—and the whole place is looking run-down. I got a catch in my throat when I saw it.”

  He shifted in his chair. Then Alfie heard him get to his feet and begin lumbering around the living room like a bear just learning to walk erect. Alfie remembered that last day when the junkyard was being sold. Pap had walked among the ruined cars like a dazed, defeated general.

  “Things could be the way they used to be, Alfie, when your dad was alive. You remember them days?”

  In the attic Alfie looked down at his empty hands. Slowly he closed them into fists.

  Below, Pap had gotten to the wall. Alfie heard his footsteps stop, then begin again as he returned. Alfie imagined him touching pieces of furniture as he had long ago touched fenders and windshields. “We had someplace to go then, something to do. Remember how we used to sit out there on a summer evening? People would come shopping for parts after supper, remember? That was our busiest time. And I’d sit there on an upturned Coke carton, greeting people, and you—you was as good at tracking down car parts as your dad. And when you got tired you’d take a rest in an old blue Dodge sedan you was fond of. You got to remember the Dodge, Alfie!” He sighed.

  “Well, Alfie,” he went on, “it could be like that again. I know it could.” Pap stopped walking, and Alfie heard the ladder creak as Pap leaned against it. “I know how you feel up there, Alfie. I have give up a time or two myself. I think about the government rotting away like an apple and senators using our money for trips to China—did I tell you, Alfie, twenty-seven senators is going to London, England, to pick up a copy of the Magna Carta? Which they could mail, Alfie! And you know who is paying them twenty-seven senators’ way, don’t you? You and me!” He snorted with disgust. “I think about things like that and about us giving money to countries that hates us and arms to countries that wants to shoot at us. Well, it makes me want to go somewheres too. Stick my head in the sand. Lock myself in a closet. Get where I can’t hear no more.” His voice lowered. “Only if we had the junkyard again, Alfie, well, it would make up for everything. Come on down and we’ll talk about it. I got a little money saved up—don’t tell your ma. It’s not much, but we could use it for a down payment, get a loan for the rest. And Bubba—well, if he’s good at anything, it’s wrecking cars, and between the three of us—”