Christopher Paul Curtis (19 page)

“When the male birds broke into this display thing it looked like they were throwing a fit or something. They were jerking and flapping and twitching and carrying on in a way that wouldn't make anyone or anything think
about sex. It looked like they were completely out of control, it looked like someone had just nicked them with a pellet gun.”

I drew a card and threw out the eight of clubs. I told him, “But not to the female birds, uh-uh, they thought this bumping around was hot! But, and here's where it ties in to me, Mr. X, it only looked like twitching to those who didn't understand that the dancing was giving the females all kinds of signals about the male's health and strength and how tough he was between the sheets. It was all about letting the female birds know if the male was good enough to be her baby's daddy.”

Chester X went down. I slid him another quarter and the deck.

“And,” I said, “if there was one thing wrong with the way the male bird danced, if he stuck his right wing out instead of his left, or if he scratched the dirt with three toes instead of two, or if he looked north for just a second too long, that was it. The females went deep into hate-eration on him. One little step in the wrong direction or one feather out of place and she'd be through with him. He'd be dancing solo that night.”

Chester X cleared his throat and said, “Not that there's anything wrong with dancing solo every once in a while.”

I wonder how long I'ma have to listen to comments like that.

Chester X shuffled the cards so smooth it looked like they'd turned liquid and he was pouring them from one hand to the other.

“Anyway. That's my little difficulty, Mr. X, for some
reason I can't seem to get the real 4-1-1 about Luther T. Farrell across to Shayla. It's like I'm kicking my toes up at the wrong time or bobbing my head to the right when I should be bobbing it to the left. I don't know exactly what it is but it's just one little thing, one stupid thing that has her reading me as lame.”

Chester X dealt the cards again. I picked up my hand, it totaled twenty; most times a good low go-down number. I said, “Twenty!” And spread my cards.

He said, “You got me,” and slid two quarters across the table to me.

I picked up the deck and he slid his cards over to me without showing them.

I said, “What'd you have?”

He said, “Uh, I'm not sure.” He tried to put the cards back in the deck but I checked them anyway. He had nineteen! He'd won and was letting me take the pot!

I said, “Aw, Mr. X, that's so disrespectful, how you just gonna let me win like that? What's the point in playing? I mean I know every night after you beat me you put my quarters back in the jar the next morning, but come on, at least you could front that I got a chance.”

“Luther, I wasn't intending to be disrespectful, it's just that you were looking so down that I thought losing fourteen or fifteen hands in a row would've been a little too hard on you right now, son.

“But doesn't what you're talking about with birds boil down to a lack of confidence? Aren't you approaching that young lady with the thought that you aren't going to do something right, that no matter what you say or do she's
going to look at it as you having your wings up instead of down?”

I said, “It's more complicated nowadays. It's not like when you were young.”

Chester X said, “I understand more than you think I do, Luther, and I understand things are pretty much exactly like they were when I was your age. Don't you think I said those exact words you just said to me to my father? And don't you think my father said the same thing to his father? And don't you think my father's father said the same things to his father?”

I was afraid he was going to run this all the way back to Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble.

“And I understand that it feels to you like you're the first young man who's ever had his nose opened up by a woman before, but, son, believe—”

I've learned I have to stop Mr. X when he starts busting out these sayings from the eighteenth century. I'd let “bevy” get by, but this sounded too interesting. I said, “What's that mean? What's having your nose opened up by a woman mean?”

“It means you're so far under her spell that she can easily lead you around by the nose if she wants to.”

“Oh.”

He wasn't through. He had to go and paint a clearer picture of the saying. “With the way Shayla's got you moping and carrying on and groaning, we'd say, back in the day, that she's got your nose so far open, Luther, that you could smell Fidel barbecuing steaks down in Havana.”

“Ha ha.”

“Quit interrupting me, you're throwing me off my line of thought. As I was saying, you're not the first young man to be crushed by some sweet young girl, it happens all the time, Luther. But if you would just take stock in yourself and see what it is you've got going for you maybe someone else would see it too.”

I shuffled the cards and started dealing.

I said, “I know I've got a lot going for me, I don't know anyone else in Flint who's my age who've got their own ride and their own credit cards and their own—”

Chester X slammed his hand down on the table. The pile of quarters he'd taken from me jumped up and wobbled before they settled back down. He said, “No! That's not what I'm talking about at all! That's your mother talking, that's not you!”

Ever since I'd told him we weren't going to make a break for Florida he'd been sending little torpedoes at the Sarge to let me know how bad she was for me.

He said, “What I'm talking about here is
you
, not what you have.

“Let me tell you some of the other things I understand about you, young man. I understand the fact that you're respectful, you're kind, you're considerate, you're funny; unintentionally most of the time, but I take my laughs wherever I can get them these days.”

He started ticking these things off on his fingers.

“I understand how smart you are, how ambitious you are, and I also understand that while you aren't exactly the
easiest thing on the eyes, I have seen worse.” He winked and smiled, but I knew out of this whole pep talk those words would be the ones I'd remember the clearest. This was the main part that would be branded into my mind.

He kept going. “And I also understand that the most impressive part of the whole Luther T. Farrell package is that you've accomplished all of this in spite of the fact that you've had very little positive adult influence or guidance. You've managed to turn yourself into a very decent human being even though, as far as I can see, you've used nothing but that TV in the dayroom and your own mind to do it. Your mother has been negligent in many ways.”

There it was. Night after night the conversation always got twisted around to the Sarge and how the best thing for me to do was to run on down to Florida with him. Some of the things he said I'd have to do a little musing about, but what he
didn't
understand was that Luther T. Farrell is a fighter, not a runner.

He said, “I was watching the Sea Life Network yesterday and there was a lesson in it for you, Luther. It was about this sea slug that's got a tiny, tiny brain that the slug uses only one time in its life. It uses it to move from where it was born to another area just a little bit away; then it anchors itself to a rock and it'll never use that brain again. So you know what it does? It eats its own brain. It absorbs its own brain, it uses it for enough energy until it's established in this new place.

“That's you! If you don't get out of here you're going to put down roots and dissolve your brain and turn into the Sarge, Part Two.”

I said, “Whoops! How'd I know the Sarge was going to be making a special guest appearance on this CD?”

He laughed. “See what I mean? See how smart you are? Here I've been thinking I was slick and you've known my plan all along.”

He slid the pile of quarters that he'd won back over to me and said, “Here, save me the trouble of putting them back in the jar in the morning.”

I said, “That I can do, but don't think that's gonna get you any closer to Florida.”

He laughed and said, “Don't make me go to plan B on you, Mr. Man.”

“And what's that?”

“I was only going to tell you as a last resort, but it looks like since you've figured me out I'm going to have to show my hole card.”

I said, “I can't wait to see.”

“Well,” Mr. X. said, “it would be a good way to demonstrate what we've been talking about so I'm going to go ahead and tell you.

“I've been thinking it over and I've decided I'm going to Florida. With you or without you.”

I said, “That sounds fair.”

He said, “No, what's fair is that I let you know how I'm going to get there if you don't come.”

“I'm listening.”

“You think I was joking about the confidence thing, don't you? You think I was pulling your leg when I said that a man or woman with confidence is irresistible, don't you?”

I said, “I can't say I thought you were joking, I was thinking you were straight-up wrong.”

Chester X said, “Just to show you how right I am I'm going to bring this demonstration real close to home for you. Maybe a little painfully close.”

Uh-oh.

He smiled. “That's right! I've been noticing how your momma comes in and inspects us every night before she drives back to her place. And I've been noticing that she looks at me a little bit differently than she looks at everyone else.”

I busted out laughing! “That's 'cause she thinks you're bling-bling, if she knew how broke you are you'd get the same dirty look that Mr. Foster does.”

“Spoken like a young man whose confidence tank is on empty! There's lots more to it than that, I know when a woman is giving me the eye, and the way your momma looks at me is starting to reactivate these old bones!”

That was enough for me! I was starting to get all kinds of real disturbing pictures in my mind that would interfere with my sleep. I got up from the table and got in bed.

I said, “Don't make me sick, Mr. X.”

Chester X got back in his bed and kept his little head poked out of the covers to keep shooting this nonsense at me.

“Oh,” he said, “I see, it's because your mother's such a hot young thing and I'm so old, huh? But what's that old song say? ‘Age ain't nothing but a number.’

“So don't say I didn't warn you. One of these days after you've given me a really good shave and I've splashed on
some of my Old Spice and borrowed some of those jeans you wear around your knees I just might have to start courting your momma. And after I marry her I'm taking some of her money and heading south.

“I'm giving you a choice. Either come with me to Port Saint Lucie now or the next time one of your partners asks you ‘Who's your daddy?’ you'd best start practicing saying Chester No Middle Name Stockard. One way or the other I'm getting out of here.”

I turned off the light and said, “Well, I can't say I wasn't warned, can I?”

Mr. X said, “Good night, son.”

I laughed. “Good night … Daddy.”

Chester X said, “What is it that your boy Spunky is always telling you? ‘Don't hate, congratulate.’ ”

I didn't even have to look at the clock, I knew it was
way
past my bedtime.

I can think of a lot better ways to start a day other than coming out of a good sleep and seeing Chester X standing over you. But that was the hand I'd been dealt.

“Luther? Rise and shine, you just about slept through the alarm again.”

Aww, no! Not today! Today was the day they announced the science fair results.

I went into the bathroom and looked at my chin. “Mr. X, could you come here a minute?”

Chester X popped his head into the bathroom. “What is it?”

“Should I shave my goatee or let it go?”

Chester X squinted at me. “Your what? I didn't know you had a goatee. Here, let me see.”

He tilted my chin back. “Luther, I think you're being
pretty generous to call this a goatee, I can't see more than a hair or two in there.”

“I didn't ask you to judge it, Mr. X, I just wanted your advice on whether I should shave it off.”

He said, “I think putting a razor on that isn't anything but asking for trouble. Why don't you pluck them out? It'll take you all of two seconds.”

“What, pluck it like a girl?”

“No, pluck it like someone who's got sense enough not to shave that hash you got going there. Splash a little of my Old Spice on afterwards and you'll be good to go.”

I looked at the goatee again. “You got any tweezers?”

By quarter to eight I took care of my personal business and had all of the Crew up, fed, medicated, cleaned, shaved and waiting to go to the vocational center.

When I dropped them Chester X squeezed my shoulder and said, “OK, son, best of luck with your project. Just remember, if you did the best you could, you did the best you could.”

“Thanks, Mr. X, but this baby's sewed up. Remember what you told me, confidence.”

He said, “Being confident's good, but let's not go overboard.”

“Mr. X,” I said, “you get ready to celebrate tonight.”

I wish I felt as confident as I was fronting to Mr. X. Inside I was shook. They weren't doing any previews of the projects this year but from what I'd seen and heard Shayla's was just as tough as last year.