The Life and Times of Benny Alvarez (12 page)

Party Pooper

B
y two p.m. on Saturday, I've thrown up again and spent two hours at the walk-in clinic, where my father complains to the receptionist about the long wait. Then he informs twelve other hacking and shivering people that our health care system is equal to that of a number of Third World countries.

As it turns out, my tonsils are inflamed and I have an ear infection, so the doctor writes me a prescription for an antibiotic and tells me to rest for a few days.

“Will I be better by Monday?” I ask.

“Probably. Antibiotics work best when we give the body time to heal. But nowadays I can't get people to slow down.”

“Tell me about it,” my father says, happy to find a kindred soul.

When we return home, Aldo's in the sitting room with Irene.

“Wow, you look bad,” he says.

“That's the general consensus.”

Irene is searching the closet for her jacket but stops to ask how I am.

“I'll survive,” I say.

“Best to stay away from Aldo,” she says. “He has two gigs this weekend.”

“Not to worry,” Aldo says. “I have a strong immune system.”

“Next you'll be telling us you're a vegan,” my father says. He's cleaning the refrigerator, wearing yellow elbow-high rubber gloves, jeans, and an old gray T-shirt.

“Not to worry, Mr. Alvarez. Every self-respecting Cro-Magnon is a carnivore.”

“The truth will reveal itself when I get the private investigator's report.”

“Private investigator?”

“Yeah, the one I hired to follow you.”

Aldo knows my father's joking but still seems taken aback.

“You're costing me a lot of money,” my father adds, scrubbing a rack that's stained with mustard and ketchup.

“And I was hoping you'd save it for Irene's dowry,” Aldo says.

“Don't let my father scare you,” Irene jokes, finally locating her jacket.

“Yeah, like he does my friends,” I say.

“You mean Beanhead and Jerko?” my father says. “Actually, I like those guys.”

“Well, they're terrified of you, and you're my dad, so I want them to like you.”

“The day I need Beanbrain and Jacko as friends will be a sad day indeed, but tell them I think we should all go candlepin bowling next week. We can sit around, sip Dr Peppers, munch chips, and talk about Ms. D.”

“Can I come?” Aldo pleads, trying to bust my father.

“That's Benny's decision.”

Aldo looks longingly at me, so I change the subject. “Where are you going?”

“To see Grandpa,” Irene says.

Everyone becomes more serious now.

“I didn't know we could visit him.”

“That's because you can't,” my father says. “The last thing he needs is a bad cold.”

“Are Mom and Crash there?”

“No,” Irene says. “Mom took Crash clothes shopping.”

“May she rest in peace,” my father says. Everyone is laughing except me. I just want to go upstairs, grab a graphic novel, and nod off. Which is what I decide to do.

About four p.m. I wake to reddish sunlight flooding my bedroom and a cool wind rattling the windowpanes. I wonder what Beanie and Jocko bought Becky and whether they got dressed up, or if Big Joe was invited by accident, showing up wearing a dog collar and leash and tugged around Becky's backyard by Paige. I wonder what music they played and whether any of the boys danced with girls, and whether you had to eat differently at parties like these. I've seen Beanie make a slice of cake disappear in one gulp, and Jocko has a habit of constantly burping when he drinks soda and of wiping his greasy fingers on his pants.

I'm bored, so I tinker with my poem until I have it just right. Then I fall back to sleep, this time not waking until it's dark. My mother's standing over me like a ghost.

“Your friends are downstairs.”

“Jocko and Beanie?”

“They came after the party ended. They brought you some cake and a party favor.”

“But I didn't go.”

“Becky's mother knows you're sick.”

I'm hoping the party favor is an iPod, or a yo-yo, or maybe Becky burned a Bruno Mars CD. I sit up, feeling a little grungy. My fever seems to have broken with the last nap, so my clothes are damp and smell like sickness. “Will you tell them to wait a few minutes? I need to shower.”

“Okay,” she says.

After I clean up and change, I go downstairs, finding Beanie and Jocko in the sitting room, talking to Crash. They don't look much different than usual, except their shirts are tucked in.

“The walking dead,” Jocko says.

“Boy, did we miss you,” Beanie adds.

“Sorry you had to wait.”

“Not to worry,” Beanie says. “We were entertained by Crash complaining about clothes shopping.”

Crash is wearing a new pair of cargo jeans and playing with one of my yo-yos. “Three hours, Benny,” he says, “in and out of dressing rooms, arguing with Mom, all these teenage girls telling me I'm cute. What a bunch of liars!”

“Sounds good to me,” Jocko says.

“Yeah, right,” Crash says. “Even you guys couldn't find a word for that torture.”

“Don't be so sure,” Beanie says, and pulls out the Book. “Torture: affliction, agony, anguish, dolor, martyrdom, twinge . . .”

“Why do you guys waste your time with that junk?” He releases the yo-yo, doing the Walk the Dog trick, the yo-yo spinning on the floor away from him, then snapping back into his palm.

“Be careful what you say,” Jocko says, giving Crash a playful headlock, then letting him go.

“Why mess around when all those words mean the same thing?” Crash says. Then he performs the Rock the Baby trick.

“Very impressive,” Jocko says. “Keep practicing, so you'll be able to support yourself after you get out of high school and can't find a job.”

“Huh?” Crash says.

“What Jocko means,” I say, “is the difference between those words
is
important. If you're being tortured, you can call the cops on Mom. If shopping causes twinges of agony, then get over it. And if you think you're a martyr after trying on three pairs of pants, you're a whack job.”

“Bravo, Benny,” Beanie says.

“Very eloquent,” Jocko adds.

Meanwhile Crash can't figure out if we're educating or making fun of him. “Dad's right about you guys,” he says, then Walks the Dog again, this time following the imaginary creature into another room.

“What's that supposed to mean?” Jocko says. “I thought your father liked me.”

“He doesn't like anyone,” Beanie says.

“Not true,” I say. “He just gets ticked off by stupidity. I can relate.”

“As the Book says,” Jocko reports, “the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.”

I can't argue about that, so instead, I ask about the party. “Did they hang a Benny Alvarez piñata from a tree and pummel it with cheerleading batons?”

“Actually,” Jocko says, “you've been temporarily forgiven for being Claudine's enemy, mostly because I told them about your grandfather.”

“How's Claudine doing?”

“She didn't show.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

“So what did you all do?”

“It wasn't that bad,” Beanie says. “Some decent music, and the food was incredible. They had these things that look like hot dogs but are twice as fat and taste like steak. Amazing.”

“Did you play games?”

“Just the usual,” Jocko says. “Bobbing for apples and pin the tail on the donkey.”

“You're kidding.”

“Of course I'm kidding. It wasn't a big deal, dude. Some music, some food, then we all talked a little.”

“And Jocko danced,” Beanie says, smiling.

Jocko glares at him. “You did too.”

“Beanie?”

“Yeah, he danced with Paige.”

They might as well have told me they skydived with no parachute. “I didn't know you guys danced.”

“We didn't either,” Beanie says. “We kind of moved around, feeling the beat,” and then he slips into a very strange dance, looking like he's dodging punches while getting kicked in the shins.

“Will you do me a favor, Beanie?”

He stops dancing. “Sure.”

“Smack me in the face.”

“What?”

“I'm having a very bad nightmare, and I'm afraid if I don't come out of it fast, you'll start slow dancing with Jocko and kiss him on the cheek.”

Everyone laughs at that one. Then Beanie gives me a little red box with a yellow ribbon around it. “It's your party favor.”

“What is it?”

“We don't want to ruin the surprise,” Jocko says.

I open the box and inside, cushioned by cotton, is a gold pin in the shape of a butterfly. “This is it?”

“Yeah, it was the only weird moment of the party. Becky's father handed them out, then talked about how Becky was their butterfly, describing all the stages a butterfly undergoes before”—and Beanie finishes the sentence—“‘blossoming into a wonder of nature.'”

“He really said that?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you laugh?”

“First,” Jocko says, “I'm not sure it's something to laugh about. Second, Becky's father's a big cop, so if he told me to address her as Your Highness, I probably would. And finally, every girl at the party sighed at the same time when they saw that pin.”

“Yeah,” Beanie says. “It was very weird.”

“And considering the big showdown on Monday,” Jocko says, “I didn't want to tick off anyone, especially Becky.”

“What did the guys do?”

“Most of them probably forgot about the pin when the cake arrived.”

I hold the pin in my hand and wonder what party favor my parents would choose for me. Probably a whoopee cushion or joy buzzer.

At that thought, my mother suddenly appears with a bowl of chips. “I'll get some Cokes, but I want you to have ginger ale,” she says to me.

We sit for a while drinking our sodas and eating chips. They mostly want to talk about my poem and if I'll be well enough to recite it. “The whole world's watching,” Jocko says.

“Maybe she won't show,” Beanie says, “and you win by default. Hobo bailed you out.”

“What a jerky thing to say,” Jocko protests.

“Jocko's right, Beanie. I wouldn't want to win like that.”

“Well, I was just saying.”

“Well, don't,” I say.

When we're done talking, I play some dance music and say I'll pay them to show me their moves. “Nice try, Benny,” Jocko says, before he and Beanie hustle out the front door.

As my mother cleans up, she asks me how I'm feeling.

“Better,” I say.

“Have you finished your poem?”

“The question of the week. Yeah, I have.”

“Can I read it?”

“I'd rather you not.”

She gives me that hurt look mothers are so good at and says, “I wouldn't want to make you feel uncomfortable.”

I have two choices. I can spend an hour discussing why I'm uncomfortable (“There's nothing wrong with showing feelings,” “I want to know the inner Benny”), or I can let her read the poem, which is what I decide to do.

A few minutes later, she's sitting in the recliner, and I'm feeling a bit nervous. She positions her reading glasses on the bridge of her nose and scans the page. “So this is what's causing all the commotion?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

She nods, then reads quietly to herself. After a first pass, she goes back for a second, then something very strange happens. Her eyes well up and a few tears spot her cheeks. “This is beautiful. I wish your grandfather could read it.”

“I plan to recite it to him.”

“Will you do something for me, Benny?”

I figure it can't be any riskier than letting her read my poem. “Sure,” I say.

“Realize that Monday there are no losers. Your poem already makes you a winner.”

“But not in the real world.”

“Yes, in the real world too.”

“But not in the Alvarez world.”

She mulls that over, then hands the poem back, kissing me on the cheek and going quietly upstairs.

Later, I lie in bed thinking about her crying, and I kind of envy her. The Alvarez boys have never been big on crying, so instead, I'm stuck with a numbing kind of sadness, as if something bad is lurking, like a bullet with “Benny Alvarez” etched on its casing, and I think of what my grandpa said: “Trouble can't hit a moving target.”

Keep moving, Benny,
I think.
Keep moving.

Surprise, Surprise

B
y Sunday, I'm feeling better but decide to hang around the house, working on my poem and playing board games with Crash. Monday morning I'm strong enough for school, though still coughing up ugly green mucus. I fear, or maybe hope, that while I'm reading my poem I'll launch a huge loogie onto Big Joe's forehead. When I come down for breakfast, my mother and Irene have already gone. My father and Crash are eating cereal at the round granite table, wearing cardboard crowns from Burger King. They pretend not to see me.

“I say, old chap,” my father says to Crash, “looking so forward to the troubadour's performance today.”

“Aye, matey,” Crash replies, mixing up time periods and characters.

“Very funny,” I say.

“Ah, and herewith he comes,” my father says, jumping off his chair and bowing to me. Not bad for an old guy.

I grab a big wooden spoon on the kitchen counter and tap him lightly on the shoulder. “I knight you Sir Alvarez the Negative.”

He rises and removes his crown. “There's not a big leap from being negative to being funny, Benny. As Mark Twain said, ‘Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand.'”

“Not even Claudine?”

He laughs and gives me a hug. “Pancakes or waffles? It's your day.”

“Pancakes,” I say.

“Can I have some too?” Crash asks.

“Sure thing, Your Majesty.”

“Can I wear this crown to school?” Crash says. “I wanna prank Paulie.” Paulie is Crash's best friend.

“Why not? Halloween's not far off.”

While my father prepares pancakes, I ask about my grandfather.

“He's swallowing okay, and they said we can bring him home on Wednesday if things get better. He's taking some meds that make him very tired, though, so he slept about sixteen hours yesterday.”

“Can he walk?” One of my grandfather's worst fears is being in a wheelchair.

“Yeah, but we'll have to help him for a while, and he has that cane he refuses to use.”

Crash is finishing his cereal, not saying much of anything. That's how he's been dealing with the stroke, pretending it doesn't exist.

My father looks at him. “If he gets out on Wednesday, he wants to sit on the porch with Crash and watch the birds feed.”

“Gloria okay with that?”

“She wants him to be happy, she says, ‘in his last days.'”

“Why does she talk like that? She makes us guys look like optimists.”

“Yeah, but she's always there for your grandpa. She's a trouper.”

“It's going to be sunny and sixty degrees on Wednesday,” Crash blurts out.

“Great day for bird-watching,” I say, hoping I, too, can have one-on-one time with my grandfather that day, maybe read to him.

Crash still doesn't look up, nodding his head so vigorously, the Burger King crown nearly slides off.

My father decides to take us to school because I'm still a little weak. Fortunately, it seems all the psychotic Rhode Island drivers have their cars in for servicing today, so he doesn't have much to complain about. At school, Beanie and Jocko joke around, but I'm too uptight to join in. Instead, I give them copies of my poem, asking them not to read it until later.

Whether it's the medication or the contest, I'm feeling spaced out: not happy, not sad, just kind of dazed. Which is in contrast to everyone else, who seems wired. The high fives and Benny-hating stares begin the moment I enter school, though Becky Walters breaks free from her crew long enough to say she's sorry my grandfather's sick. Before math, I bump into Claudine once or twice, but she refuses to make eye contact. I want to tell her I'm sorry about Hobo but have trouble reading her face. She has to be sick from sadness if she missed both school and the party, but she's putting up a good front. She looks nice, nothing flashy or bright: a white, long-sleeved button-up sweater and blue dress slacks whose cuffs rest on navy leather sandals. I'm wearing jeans, a gray hoodie, and running shoes. Not a good start, I think, if the judges vote on appearance.

I make a point of facing forward in Mr. Congo's class, and on my way out the door, I'm surprised when he says, “Knock 'em dead, Benny.”

“Thanks,” I say, then peer into the hallway, happy to see Claudine isn't there. I imagined fighting my way through a mass of angry seventh-grade girls reciting sonnets and poking me with No. 2 pencils.

Ms. Butterfield and Caulfield Thomas Jones are sitting on the desk again, waiting for everyone to arrive. They're both very excited, not realizing that one contestant has lost her dog, and the other has a sick grandfather and a pound of snot packed in his nose.

“Let's settle down,” she says. “Mr. Jones and I want to say a few things. First, I can't say how proud I am of how you've taken to poetry, whether it's verse poetry”—and she looks at Claudine—“or prose poetry,” then she turns to me. “I'm hoping that by the end of class, we all agree that poetry can be found in everything: in the shell of a snail or a fallen tree, in cutting the lawn or cleaning a gutter. Poetry is not just written. It's lived. It gives us those small moments when, for even a brief second or two, we can feel immortal.” At that last word, it appears that she's about to cry, until Caulfield places his hand on hers. “I'm just very proud of you all,” she says.

When she finishes, everyone is quiet, realizing she means every word she said.

Caulfield's turn is next, and he does a very un-Caulfield kind of thing. He's usually king of one-liners, those snappy little phrases that suggest he's the wittiest guy this side of Mars. But rather than making a joke, he says he's brought doughnuts and juice, and that after the contest, we'll have a party.

“Cool,” Big Joe says.

Then Caulfield clears out a section of the room, dragging over a podium he must have borrowed from the auditorium. “Ms. Butterfield and I have decided, in the spirit of courtly love poetry, that ladies shall go first.” He bows ceremoniously for Claudine to come forward.

It seems to take her forever to get there. She rests her poem on the podium, slowly scanning the room. Then she focuses on me for a second, her chest making slight heaves.

The wait is killing me, but she's in no hurry to begin. It's clear this experience is very painful for her, and I can see her fighting back tears.

She takes another deep breath and says, “This is a poem for Hobo, my dog. He died last week.”

Something very odd happens at this point. As I'm listening to her, my mind is flooded with a sea of unrelated images: my grandfather touching my hand, Crash and me sleeping on the pool table, my father yelling at a double-parked vehicle, Hobo waiting for Claudine outside school, Jocko and Beanie dancing, and on and on to the point where I'm having trouble breathing, and I see that Benny Alvarez sadness bullet speeding toward me. I wish I could go for a run, or shoot a few baskets, anything to dodge it, so I try to focus on Claudine. I've never seen her so shaky, but she gathers herself and says very slowly, “Hobo: A Verse Poem in Three Stanzas.”

When she finishes, at first there's dead silence, and I can't decide if I'm more impressed by the poem or the courage it took to read it. I involuntarily clap. Then everyone joins in, and I almost start to cry—partly for her and partly for every time in the last year or two when I've felt sad or angry about my grandfather's strokes.

“Benny?” I hear. “Benny?” When I look up, Claudine has sat down and everyone is waiting for me. I skim-read my poem, knowing in my heart it's every bit as good as Claudine's, but I quickly decide not to recite it. Why? First, because my grandfather should be the first to hear it, and second, because I refuse to compete with Hobo's poem or Claudine's sadness.

Right before I'm about to break down in a classroom of seventh-grade girls and boys who will be talking about this collapse for the next twenty years, I excuse myself, grab my backpack, and leave the room, first stopping by Claudine's desk to say her poem is the “coolest” one I've ever heard. Granted, “coolest” is pretty lame, but it's hard to be creative when you're about to cry in front of your peers and a big chunk of snot is working its way out of your left nostril.

“Benny, you can't just leave class,” Ms. Butterfield says. She moves toward me, but Caulfield stops her.

“I'm sorry, Ms. Butterfield,” I say, “but I can. Shakespeare would understand.” I don't know where the heck that comes from, but it seems appropriate.

I'm not two steps out the entrance of school when I begin to sob, and I mean “sob,” not whimper or moan or shed tears, not wail or snivel. I mean a whole world of sadness comes down on me as I make my way slowly home.