Saturday Boy (14 page)

“What does your dad say?”

“He's never around.”

“Where is he?”

“I mean, he's around. He's just—he gets up and goes to work and he comes home and he goes to his office. I'm stuck with Phoebe.”

“What's so bad about her?”

“She writes poems and won't stop reading them to me.”

“So?”

“They're
poems
.”

He flopped into my chair and put his face in his hands. I had a feeling it wasn't really about Phoebe—not about her poems anyway. I wanted to make him feel better but didn't know how. People had given us food when they knew we were sad. I wondered if I should make him a sandwich or something.

“I wish my dad was more like your dad,” said Budgie.

“Dead?”

It was the first time I'd said it out loud. I hated the way it sounded and how it felt in my mouth.

“No, not—not like that. I mean,
around
. Like your dad was.”

“But he wasn't.”

“Not all the time, I know, but when he was here he was
here
.”

“Your dad's here.”

“It's not the same,” Budgie said. I could tell he was getting frustrated. His fists were clenching up and he was having trouble getting his words out. “My dad's here, yeah, but it's
like
he's not. With your dad, even when he was away it was almost like he was still here.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Do you still have that lunch box with all your dad's letters?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I see it?”

I got the lunch box out from under the bed and opened it. A few envelopes slid out onto the quilt. It was packed pretty tight after all. Budgie frowned.

“How many?”

“Ninety-one,” I said. Then I told him that my dad tried to write every week but he couldn't sometimes because sometimes he was just too busy. I don't know why I'd added that part though. It seemed a little bit like rubbing it in.

Budgie sat down on the bed and pulled the lunch box into his lap. He took a deep breath and for a second I was worried he might lose his temper and take the letters and rip them up. I'd seen him do stuff like that when he got upset.

“And you wrote to him, too?”

“Yeah. All the time.”

“Do you think he had a lunch box?”

“I'm not sure. I know he had a footlocker. Maybe he kept them in there.”

“That's what I'm talking about.”

“Footlockers?”

“Not footlockers, dorkus, the letters. Your dad was like a million miles away and you still knew what he was doing and he still knew what you were doing. My dad's just down the hall and I don't think he even knows my middle name.”

“It's Cornelius, right?”

Budgie must not have heard me because he didn't do anything. Normally he would have given me a dead arm for saying his middle name out loud. He said something else then but I missed it.

“What did you say?”

“I said, Mom even thought we were still best friends until she saw the video clip.”

“Wait,” I said, “we're not best friends anymore?”

Budgie stopped. He picked up the letters that had fallen out of the lunch box and put them back in and closed the lid.

“I think maybe we're still friends,” he said finally, “just not
best
friends.”

It hurt to hear him say it even though I'd sorta known it was true for a while now. I still had a fuzzy memory of the first time we met—Budgie peeking from under his mom's skirt, afraid to come out and play. It wasn't fair how so much could change so fast.

“Why not?” I asked before realizing I might not like the answer.

Budgie shrugged. He was fiddling with his fingers in his lap again and when he finally picked his head up he didn't look me in the eye. He looked somewhere over my shoulder instead. Then he kinda glanced at my face before looking down into his lap again.

“I don't know.”

“Did
I
do something?”

“No.”

“So you're mean to me for no reason?”

“No!”

“Then why?”

Budgie lifted his head and looked me in the eye. He took a deep breath and let it out through his nose.

“Because you're . . . people say you're, y'know . . . weird.”

“What? No way! I'm not—why? Why would they say that?”

There was plenty more I
could've
said—like just because somebody says something doesn't make it true or that thing about opinions being like buttholes because everyone had one and most of them stunk. I couldn't get the words to line up right in my head though. I just stared at Budgie with my mouth open for a second before I started to feel like a fish and closed it.
Me
?
Weird
?

“I don't know, I—look around you. Model airplanes? All your superhero dolls?”

“They're
action
figures!”

“Dinoboy, then. I mean, how old
are
you?”

“
You
like Dinoboy!”

“I
liked
Dinoboy,” said Budgie. “In
third
grade! We're gonna be in middle school next year.
Middle
school. That's huge!”

“So?”

“So you can't keep playing with that stuff.”

“Why not?”

“Because we're not
freakin'
kids anymore!”

Budgie's words were a slap in the face. Whoever made up that line about “sticks and stones” must have been lying. Or deaf. This time it was my turn to look away.

“So?”

“So if I hang around you I'm afraid people will think I'm weird, too.”

“That's stupid!” I blurted out. “Who cares what people think?”

“I do.”

When the conversation started I'd felt bad for me but now I kinda felt bad for Budgie. I hadn't thought about it before but maybe he was the way he was because otherwise
he'd
be one of the ones to get picked on. After all, he was what my dad once jokingly called a “target-rich environment.”

We sat on the bed. I didn't look at Budgie. Budgie didn't look at me. If I had a tick-tock clock in here you totally could have heard it. I didn't though. My clock was digital. I looked at my hands. Fiddled with my Zeroman watch. Made it beep.

“What's that?”

“It's a Zeroman watch,” I said. “Santa brought it.”

“Cool. Can I see it?”

Me and Budgie played in my room until we heard his mom calling from the bottom of the stairs. Budgie took off the Zeroman watch and handed it to me, rolling his eyes back so far I bet he could see his brain. Then he put on his coat, went and got his phone and stuck it in his pocket.

“Are you doing anything for vacation?” I asked.

“I don't think so.”

“Me neither. Maybe if it snows some more we could go sledding. Y'know, if nobody else is around.”

Budgie's mom called out again and I couldn't help picturing a cartoon hippo on the landing, bellowing up the stairs. I closed my mouth tight so I wouldn't laugh. It was hard though. The hippo had a polka dotted bow and lipstick and everything.

“I gotta go,” Budgie said, zipping up his coat. “She sounds real mad.”

He went to the door then stopped and turned around and put out his hand. It took three tries but we finally remembered all the parts to our complicated secret handshake. When we were done, me and Budgie stood there just kinda looking at each other.

“I'm sorry,” he said.

“Yeah. Me too.”

THE SUN SHONE BRIGHTLY
and in the cemetery snow was melting. Mom wore sunglasses but I don't think it was because of the glare. At the church she'd gotten up in front of everyone and told stories about Dad until she started to cry and had to stop. She hadn't said anything since. Instead she held on to Dad's wallet with both hands in her lap, sitting up as straight as I'd ever seen her sit. She appeared to be looking at the minister but I couldn't tell if her eyes were open or closed. I wished I could close mine or look away or something but no matter how hard I tried I couldn't seem to take them off the hole in the ground.

Mom, Aunt Josie, and I sat in folding chairs near the edge of the grave along with Nanny, Pappy, and Gammy Jess. Everyone else kinda stood behind us. Budgie and his mom and dad were among them as well as some of Dad's cousins we hadn't seen for a long time. I also recognized some of Mom's friends and a couple of people she worked with at the hospital. Six of my dad's army friends in their dress uniforms carried the casket, taking careful steps in the snow so they wouldn't slip as they brought it over from the hearse.

Once the casket was in place the minister raised a hand above his head and whatever talking there had been came to a stop. Sunlight flashed off his glasses. Mom took my hand and held it tight. In her other hand she still held my dad's wallet.

“In the midst of life we are in death . . . ” the minister began.

Mom's hand twitched. Her grip on my hand tightened. I wondered what she was thinking about—was she remembering Dad and the good times they'd had together or was she thinking about the new life she was now forced to begin without him? I didn't want to think about either of them, personally. If I did I'd probably start to cry and I got the feeling Mom needed me to be strong right now—which would've been a lot easier if I couldn't see my Dad's coffin being lowered into the ground.

“. . . suffer us not, at our last hour, for any pains of death, to fall from thee.”

The minister picked up a handful of dirt and as he tossed it in the hole I finally found the strength to close my eyes.

“In sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life . . .”

Darkness. The scrape of shovels.

“. . . we commend to Almighty God our brother Jason and we commit his body to the ground . . .”

Sobbing behind me. Mom's grip tightening on my hand.

“. . . lift up his countenance upon him and give him peace . . .”

The minister paused. For some reason I held my breath. I don't know why.

“. . .
Amen
.”

* * *

Me, Mom and Aunt Josie were the last ones to leave the cemetery because just about everyone stopped and said how sorry they were again and what a great guy they thought my dad was. Even though I liked hearing it I'd really had enough for one day. So had Mom. I could tell.

I looked through the back window of the car as Aunt Josie drove slowly through the gates to the main road and could see a mini loader chugging up the small hill toward my dad's gravesite. There was only one reason for it to be heading that way and I didn't want to think about it. I turned back around and faced the front. Neither Mom nor Aunt Josie were saying anything and I wasn't saying anything either. It had been silent in the car for so long that when Aunt Josie finally cleared her throat it was like a gunshot.

“That was a nice service, wasn't it?” she said.

“As nice as a funeral service can be, I suppose,” Mom answered. Then she chuckled a little. “Jason would have said all the sad people really brought the place down.”

“Like a trip to Dragsville, Ohio,” I added.

“Or breakfast at the International House of Bummer.”

“God, he could be
such
a dork sometimes,” said Aunt Josie. “I mean, seriously? IHOB?”

Then it dawned on me—we were driving home after burying my father and we were all
laughing
. It didn't feel inappropriate. It wasn't disrespectful. It was exactly the opposite. And in a weird way I'd never felt better. We got some strange looks at a stop light and it wasn't until we'd driven away that I realized we hadn't yet taken the
FUNERAL
sign out of the window, which, for some reason, made us laugh harder. We were still giggling when we got home but it tapered off as we turned in from the street to find a car in our driveway.

Aunt Josie pulled in next to it and turned off the engine. I could see somebody in the driver's seat—a big somebody who didn't so much step from the car as
shrug
himself out of it like he was taking off an overcoat. Sunlight winked off the brass buttons and badges pinned to his jacket.

“Can I help you?”

“Annie Lamb?”

“Yes,” Mom said. “And you are?”

“Sergeant Jahri Glover, ma'am,” said the soldier. “I served with your husband and came to offer my condolences.”

“Thank you, Sergeant. Can I interest you in a cup of coffee?”

Mom unlocked the front door while Sergeant Glover leaned back into his car and got a big manila envelope from the passenger seat. He saw me when he straightened up and seemed to be studying me as he pushed the car door closed.

“You're Derek,” he said.

I nodded.

“It's so good to finally meet you. My name's Jahri.”

He put his hand out and when I took it mine disappeared completely. Seriously. It looked like my arm ended at the wrist.

“It's good to meet you, too,” I said. “You knew my dad?”

“Sure did. Hey, your mom said something about a cup of coffee—mind if we go inside and see about it?”

Jahri took his hat off and was careful to wipe his shoes on the mat when we came in. I kicked mine off and went into the kitchen. I hadn't been hungry lately but now that the funeral was over and everybody had said what they'd come to say my appetite had returned. And not a moment too soon—Mom had just put a plate of cookies out on the table. Her voice stopped me as I reached for one.

“Derek, don't be rude,” Mom said. Her back was turned and she was getting coffee mugs down from the cabinet. “Offer the cookies to Sergeant Glover first.”

“His name's Jahri, Mom.”

“Oh, is it?”

“It's all right,” he said. “I prefer it, actually.”

“The coffee will be another minute but please have a seat and help yourself to some cookies.”

Jahri pulled out a chair and sat down, putting the manila envelope on the table. It bulged. Full of something. I sat down across from him and waited for him to take a cookie. He was looking at me—studying me again the way he had in the driveway.

“You should have a cookie,” I said. “They're awesome. Really.”

He smiled and reached for the plate. Then he seemed to have second thoughts and sat back again.

“What?” I said. There was something in the way he was looking at me that made me want to tell him everything I'd ever done. Mom came around and put coffee mugs, a little thing of milk, and the sugar bowl on the table. Jahri turned around in his chair.

“Can I help with something?” he asked.

“No. Please sit. The coffee's nearly—see? There we are.”

Mom grabbed the coffeepot before the machine had even stopped beeping. She filled Jahri's mug first, then Aunt Josie's, and then her own. Jahri thanked my mom and blew on his coffee before taking a sip.

“Derek,” he said as he put the mug down, “would it be okay with you if I talked with your mom for a little while? Why don't you go to your room and I'll come find you when we're done, cool?”

“Yeah. Cool. Totally.”

“Let me put you out your misery first, though,” he said, smiling again and taking a cookie from the plate. He put his fist out as I went by and I bumped it with one of mine. Of course I had to shift a few cookies in order to do so. “See you in a little while, partner.”

I must have dozed off waiting for Mom and Jahri to finish talking because the next thing I remembered was a knock on my bedroom door. There were cookie crumbs between the pages of the comic book that lay open on my chest. I took it to the wastebasket and shook the crumbs into it because I didn't want to attract mice. Mom once told me that she and Dad had had another son before me but that he kept eating chips and stuff in the bedroom and never cleaned and that the crumbs attracted mice and then one night the mice carried him away and they never saw him again. And as crazy and impossible as that sounded, I wasn't about to take any chances.

“Derek?” said Jahri's voice in the hall. “You good?”

“I'm good.”

“Can I come in?”

“Yeah. Yes,” I said.

Jahri came in and my room suddenly seemed a lot smaller. He didn't sit right away. Instead he walked slowly around the room looking carefully at everything, ducking occasionally to avoid running into a model airplane. Putting the big envelope on my desk, he sat in my chair and studied me again for a moment before speaking.

“Has anyone ever told you that you look just like your daddy?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Naw, I mean
just
like him. I seen pictures and everything but . . . damn. How old are you now? Ten?”

“Eleven,” I said. “My birthday's in October.”

“That's right,” he said, shaking his head. “Sorry for staring. It's just I keep expecting his voice to come out your mouth. I ain't going to lie, Derek, there's not a whole lot of truly good people out there—and Lord knows I ain't one of them—but your daddy definitely was. Something about being around him just made you
feel
good. Made you happy. A lo-ot of people going to miss him.”

I didn't say anything and for a minute Jahri didn't either. Then he reached back and got the envelope and handed it to me. Whatever was inside shifted a little. Rustling.

“He loved these but I think he would've wanted you to have them.”

“What are they?”

Jahri shrugged.

“Open it,” he said. “They're yours after all.”

I fumbled with the envelope's clasp with fingers that suddenly wouldn't stop trembling.
They're yours after all?
What did that mean? I couldn't think of anything my dad might have had that belonged to me. Finally I got the clasp undone and I folded the flap back and shook the envelope out.

Letters. My letters. Tumbling out onto the comforter. The different years bundled together with rubber bands. I recognized my mom's handwriting on the outsides of the early ones before my own was readable to anyone but her, back when I wasn't that good at writing and told her what to write instead. Back when I drew pictures. I sifted through the envelopes, seeing my penmanship get better with each one, watching myself grow up in the alphabet.

When I looked up at Jahri he was blurry.

“You okay?”

I nodded. A knot was rising in my throat and any words I might have said would have been trapped behind it. I was afraid that if I opened my mouth I'd start crying and never be able to stop.

“This is yours, too,” said Jahri.

I took the laminated strip of construction paper from him and unfolded it. It was creased and a little faded and at first I had no idea what I was looking at. Then I recognized my scribbling. It must have been from when I was in first grade or something—two stick figures drawn in peach-colored crayon with dandelion zigzags for hair and brick red smiles so big they went outside the lines. The taller figure was holding the smaller one's hand and “ILOVYUDADDREK” was scrawled underneath, the letters all squished together because I hadn't given myself enough space to write. I stared at the picture for a long time, trying to remember having drawn it but it was just too long ago and I couldn't. Not even a little.

“He told me that bookmark was the first present you ever gave him. It was for father's day,” said Jahri. “He kept it in his boot.”

“I don't remember.”

“That's okay. Now you will.”

“What if I don't? What if I forget him?”

“I don't think that'll happen.”

I swallowed hard and spoke carefully. When the words came out they were shaky and quiet.

“I'm afraid it already has.”

“Naw.”

“It has,” I said. “All day today. No matter how hard I tried I couldn't remember what he looked like or what he sounded like. Why can't I remember?”

“You going through a tough time now, Derek. A
real
tough time. Things are going to be different for a while. But they'll be normal again.”

“Everyone's been saying that.”

“That's because it's the truth,” said Jahri. “You'll remember. Soon enough. You'll see.”

He hung out in my room with me and we shot the breeze for a little while. Jahri asked me how my Christmas was and how school was going and I asked him a few questions as well—where was he from? Charlottesville, Virginia. Did he have any kids? No. When I asked him if he'd ever shot anyone he told me that sometimes his job required it. He wouldn't say any more about it and I didn't ask. A little while after that he said he had to go so I walked downstairs with him where he said good-bye to my mom and out onto the porch where he and I shook hands again. I stayed there, leaning on the rail as he walked to his car.