Grape!

by Gabriel Arquilevich

  She didn’t say anything about the policeman.

  “But, Mom, me and Lou do it all the time.”

  “She said you were stuck.”

  “No. It was the Goodbye Yellow Brick Road belt buckle. It was too big. I just took it off. Me and Lou do it all the time, Mom. I swear!”

  She closed the kitchen door and left me alone with a policeman.

  I had never been alone with a policeman. I mean, I had never even talked to a policeman. He was so close, and in my chair. He wasn’t like a policeman in Movie of the Week. He was kind of old and big and he had gray hair and red lines on his cheeks.

  “Sit down, son,” he said.

  I sat down across from the policeman.

  “Do you realize that what you did was very, very dangerous?”

  Mrs. C, his voice was kind of nice, but I couldn’t say anything. It was like being at the chalkboard in Mrs. Gordon’s math class when you don’t know the answer.

  “Son, I asked you a question.”

  “You did?”

  “Do you realize how dangerous it is to drop into those storm drains?”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No, sir!”

  “You don’t need to call me sir.”

  “Okay, officer!”

  “You don’t need to call me that, either.”

  “Okay.”

  “What you need to do is understand that what you did was dangerous and stupid. Now, look at me, son, and listen….”

  Then, Mrs. C, it was like everything was in slow motion. I could hear him saying something about last winter and how a nine-year-old boy drowned in a storm drain not far from here, but the thing is, the cupboard was open and the box of Nilla Wafers was there on a shelf, and I tried and tried to look at him instead of the Nilla Wafers, but I couldn’t.

  “Hey! Are you hearing this?”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m really sorry.”

  “Well, that’s good!”

  “The thing is, my best friend Lou might have to move away for good, and I saw this super orange golf ball, and that’s why—”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “There was this orange—”

  He pounded the table. “I don’t want to hear a goddamned thing about an orange golf ball, you got me?” Now he was yelling, and his face was turning red. “It’s like you didn’t understand a goddamned word I just said.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said again.

  He took a deep breath.

  And then, Mrs. C, he did something.

  His hand reached down to his waist. I heard a click, and then he set his gun on the kitchen table.

  “What’s your name, son?”

  “Grape, sir.”

  “What the—”

  “It’s my adopted name.”

  “Um…okay, then. Well, you could be dead, Grape. Do you understand? We could have had high humidity and a freak thunderstorm or one of your neighbors could have decided to drain the pool today, or you could have broken your ankle dropping in, and no one would have known you were in there.”

  I wanted to tell him that my backpack was on the sidewalk, and also there’s this cool echo in there, and someone would have heard me, but I don’t think he would have cared, and I didn’t really care either, because there was a gun on the kitchen table.

  A real gun.

  It was steel, and the handle was shiny brown.

  I wanted to touch it.

  “Are you listening? Do you see how scared your mom was?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Could you imagine how sad she would be if you died in that storm drain?”

  All of a sudden I imagined Family Feud, and the British host guy saying, “We conducted a survey of 100 people and got their answers to the following question. Here it is: ‘Name the top reason your mom would be sad.’”

  “If her son died in a storm drain!” I said.

  “Huh? That’s what I just said, son. Could you imagine that?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Yes?”

  “I mean, no sir.”

  He shook his head, then pulled a little pad and a pen from his shirt pocket and started scribbling.

  “I’m going to keep your information on file. If I catch you doing something like this again, you’ll go to juvenile hall. You got me?”

  He stood up and put his pad and pen back in his shirt pocket.

  “You’ll never do something this stupid again, right?”

  “No, sir,” I said, “I won’t.”

  “Okay, then.”

  He got up and started walking away.

  “Officer!”

  “What is it, son?”

  I pointed to his gun.

  He kind of chuckled. “Well, don’t want to be forgetting that. Gotta go after the bad guys, right?”

  “Right! Yes, sir!”

  He picked it up and then, Mrs. C, he did the coolest thing in the world.

  He poked me in the shoulder with the barrel!

  He actually poked me with his gun!

  My mom made me call Betsy and tell her I was all right.

  Betsy was nice. She even gave me Lou’s phone number in New York.

  When I called, his dad answered.

  “Hi, um…is Lou there?”

  “Who is this?”

  “Grape.”

  “Who?”

  “Grape, you know, from down the street?”

  “Oh, you mean that Gaby kid?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Hold on a minute.”

  Lou and I talked for a super long time, and he told me everything. He said he was sorry, and I said I was sorry, too, and then I told him about the super orange golf ball and the policeman, and he thought it was super cool.

  THE TROUBLE WITH ABE

  June 12, 1976

  Mrs. C, after Lou went to New York, Betsy came over all the time. She and my mom would talk in the kitchen and then watch TV, and sometimes I heard Betsy crying, and then one night they had their fancy Academy Awards dresses and makeup and high heels on, but the thing is, the Academy Awards weren’t on until spring.

  “We know, Grape,” my mom said, “but Channel 8 is showing all the Best Pictures.”

  “Huh?”

  “Every Friday night,” Betsy said, “so every Friday night we’re dressing up.”

  “Cool.”

  “I hope that’s all right,” Betsy said. “I don’t mean to be taking over your house.”

  Mrs. C, the only person in the world sadder about Lou was Betsy, and Betsy was the nicest person in the world.

  “No,” I said, “you’re not taking over our house. I mean, I go to your house all the time and use the pool and you always give me cookies, and if I counted how many cookies you’ve made for me, I bet it would be over a thousand, and I slept over a bunch of times, too, and you can sleep over here if you want, and—”

  “Grape,” my mom said, “is time for the movie. You can watch it with us if you want. Is called Oliver!”

  “What’s it about?”

  “An orphan,” Betsy said.

  She sounded kind of sad when she said it.

  “Is a musical, Grape, like The Sound of Music.”

  So I sat down with my mom and Betsy in their fancy clothes and watched.

  Mrs. C, have you ever seen Oliver!? It’s super good! There’s this one kid, the Artful Dodger. He’s an orphan and he picks pockets and it’s funny because he wears this top hat and blue coat, like he’s super fancy even though he’s poor and has dirt on his cheeks and he’s part of an outlaw orphan gang! And he sings this great song, “Consider Yourself,” and he has this super
cool British accent so it sounds like he’s saying “considor yorself.”

  Mrs. C, he was so cool, and I talked about him so much my mom bought me the record of Oliver! and then we went to a costume store and I used my allowance to buy a top hat, and on Monday, instead of my Elton John Pinball Wizard beanie, I wore my top hat and smeared dirt on my cheeks.

  At lunch Sherman asked me about it.

  “Well,” I said, “for yor information, I ’ave a likin’ ter it!”

  “Huh?”

  “For yor information, I ’ave a likin’ ter it. It’s spot-on!”

  “I can’t understand you.”

  “Well, considor yorself at ’ome!”

  “Wait a minute…why are you talking with that accent?”

  “What accent?”

  “A Cockney accent,” Sherman said, “like the Artful Dodger.”

  “You know about the Artful Dodger?”

  “As a matter of fact, Grape, yes. We’re doing Oliver! at camp this summer, and I’m going to be assistant stage manager. Rachel the Director already said so.”

  Mrs. C, it was like a miracle.

  “No way! Really? You mean they’re going to act out the movie?”

  “Yes, but it was a play first. Original production was in 1960, in the West End—”

  “Can anyone be in it?”

  “Yes. You just have to sign up for the theater program, and when you get there you audition. But everybody gets a part.”

  “It’s like Park League.”

  “I suppose it is.”

  “Cool! Considor yorself at ’ome!”

  “Just remember to get everything from the checklist. Every summer some kids run out of clothes or don’t bring extra batteries for their flashlights.”

  “Flashlights?”

  “They have them at the store and it cuts into their candy money.”

  “Can’t they just go home and have candy?”

  “Grape,” Sherman said, “it’s a sleepover camp.”

  “Oh. It is?”

  “Two weeks.”

  “Oh.”

  My mom was nervous, but my dad thought it was a good idea.

  “Sometimes is good to try different things,” he said. “Even if it scares you.”

  “It’s not scary, Dad. It’s camp. Camp is fun.”

  “Yes, Grape,” my mom said, “but is two weeks.”

  “But Sherman will be there.”

  “Sometimes is good to try scary things,” my dad said. “Let me put it this way—”

  “It’s not scary, Dad! Sherman will be there! And we’re doing Oliver!”

  My dad looked at my mom.

  “Is a musical, Javier,” my mom said. “Okay, but Grape, are you sure? Is a long time. You can still go to the day camp, and what if you get asthma?”

  “I have my pills, Mom.”

  “He’ll take the pills, Angélica.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m super sure. And Sherman will be there!”

  But Mrs. C, the thing is, Sherman wasn’t there.

  Two days before camp, he called to tell me he had the chickenpox.

  “The doctor said it’s one of the worst cases he’s ever seen.”

  “Bummer,” I said.

  “I have chickenpox on my chickenpox.”

  “Double bummer.”

  “But don’t worry, Grape. Everyone is nice. You’ll make lots of friends.”

  “Okay. I’m not worried.”

  “And if I’m better my parents will drive me up for the performance.”

  “Cool! Considor yorself—”

  “But, Grape?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Just don’t get in trouble.”

  “I won’t.”

  Mrs. C, I really wasn’t going to get in trouble. I was going to wear my top hat and follow the rules and be in the theater program and make all sorts of new friends, and when I got home I would tell Lou all about it and I could teach him all the songs and we could act out the parts, and I could be the Artful Dodger and he could be Oliver the orphan boy or he could be Fagin, the guy who teaches all the orphans how to steal, or even Bill Sykes, the bad guy who kidnaps Oliver.

  The bus picked us up from temple and on the ride over I got kind of nervous. I mean, I didn’t know anyone, and no one else was wearing a top hat. I leaned my head against the window and fell asleep.

  When I woke up, the bus was on a bumpy dirt road, and there were pine trees everywhere, and the bus stopped and I got out and found my duffel bag and checked in at a table and went to Boys Cabin B, and set my stuff down.

  Mrs. C, right then I wished I had listened to my mom.

  The thing is, everyone already knew each other and everyone high-fived each other, and no one asked me what my name was, and I just stood there in my top hat with my duffel bag and watched them throw a Nerf football back and forth and then it ricocheted over to me so I handed it back to a kid.

  But the thing is, Mrs. C, they weren’t really ignoring me. They were just so happy.

  “Hey, who are our counselors?” one kid asked.

  “Randy and Ezra.”

  “Awww…Randy’s cool but Ezra’s strict!”

  “Yeah, and Randy’s a fart machine!”

  And then this one kid came in, and everyone went crazy.

  “Abe! Hey, man! Abe! What’s up?”

  “BOOYAA!” Abe screamed, and everyone said BOOYAA! and laughed and said “Abe!” again, and Abe threw his duffel bag on a top bunk, and then he flexed his muscles and kissed his biceps and said BOOYAA! and everyone else said BOOYAA!, and he high-fived everyone, even me.

  Mrs. C, Abe wasn’t mean the way Bully Jim is mean or the way Lou became mean.

  But in a way he was worse.

  Abe was king of the cabin. He carried the Nerf around and once in a while he threw it super hard, or he faked you out, and then he would do the BOOYAA! thing, and all the kids said BOOYAA!, and he had these other sayings, too, but they didn’t make any sense, and they all had food in them, like “Lickety-split, cotton candy” or “Major-ama hot sauce” or “If it’s in da belly, orange tomatoes,” and then once in a while he would walk around and punch a kid in the arm, not hard but also not soft, or a kid would walk by and he would just all of a sudden put his face right up super close to the kid’s face and scream BOOYAA! like an army guy, and then everyone said BOOYAA!

  He also loved to show off his Swiss Army pocketknife.

  “Check it out!” he would say, and all the kids would gather around him and watch as he showed us the main knife and the little knife and the corkscrew and the can opener and the bottle opener, and then he talked about how it could chop onions or peel a potato or an apple, and then he walked around the cabin and made every kid touch the pocketknife and say BOOYAA!

  Pretty soon the counselors came in.

  Randy was tall and skinny and had a ponytail. Ezra was short, like me, but a little chubby, and he wore a yamaka.

  After dinner we played get-to-know-you games, but these kids already knew each other and nobody even cared that my name was Grape or that I wore a top hat.

  Finally, right before lights out, Abe talked to me.

  “Hey, what program are you doing?”

  “Theater.”

  Mrs. C, I expected him to make fun of me, but he didn’t.

  “Me, too,” he said. “And guess what part I’m going to try out for?”

  “Um, I don’t know, Oliver?”

  “Nope. Guess again!”

  “Bill Sykes.”

  “No! I’ll give you a hint.” He jumped on a top bunk and started singing, “‘Considor yorself at ’ome! Considor yorself part o’ the family.’”

  “You mean Artful Dodger?”

  “BOOYAA!”
r />   “BOOYAA!” everyone said.

  Mrs. C, Abe was super annoying and king of the cabin and he had big muscles and said dumb food things and he made us touch his pocketknife and say BOOYAA!, but he was also a super good singer.

  And he had a perfect Cockney accent.

  “What about you?” he asked. “What part do you want?”

  I guess he didn’t notice my hat.

  The next day we had auditions. I gave the sheet music to the lady at the piano, and the director, Rachel, told me to go for it, so I went for it. I sang “Candle in the Wind” by Elton John. Mrs. C, it’s about Marilyn Monroe, this super famous and super pretty actress and how even though she was famous she was really lonely, and how she died and how sad it made Elton, but I didn’t even get to the part when she dies because Rachel asked me to stop.

  “Thank you, um…let’s see…Grape?”

  “Yes, it’s my adopted name.”

  “Great, okay. Parts will be posted tonight after dinner, where you will also pick up your scripts, and remember, rehearsal starts every day after rest hour.”

  I didn’t get to be the Artful Dodger, or Oliver, or even one of the pickpocket orphans in Fagin’s gang.

  I got a stupid workhouse boy and a stupid book delivery boy. And I got one stupid song, “Food, Glorious Food,” and one stupid line, “Books you ordered from the bookseller, Sir.”

  Abe got the Artful Dodger.

  That night I really wanted to go home. Even after lights out Abe wouldn’t shut up. He would yell one of his food sayings and the rest of the kids would answer, “BOOYAA!”

  “Tomato pretzels have ignited!”

  “BOOYAA!”

  “Macaroons to the moon!”

  “BOOYAA!”

  “When you go to Marco Polo, I get a walnut and you get a toe!”

  “BOOYAA!”

  The thing is, Randy was with us, and he was our counselor, but he didn’t act like a counselor. He walked over to one of the kids and squatted down and ripped a big long fart on his face, and everyone laughed.

  Finally Ezra got there and everyone shut up.

  In the morning I was so homesick I almost threw up.

  I ate breakfast and did morning sing-along, but I never felt so lonely in all my life. So after rest hour and a million Abe sayings, instead of going to rehearsal, I stayed in my sleeping bag and waited to die.