Yard War (10 page)

“It was the Bethunes,” I said, since neither one of
them would say it. “Tim and Tom and some other guys saw us playing football with Dee yesterday.” I almost said they came up in the yard and called Dee names and broke up our game. But then I would have had to say that I didn't fight back.

—

When I woke up, everything felt different. We had our usual Sunday breakfast, orange juice with banana slices in it and cinnamon rolls, but Mama was real quiet and it was hard to sit at the table.

I was still getting dressed when Daddy called me into their bedroom.

“Trip, your mama and I have been talking it over, and after what happened last night, we are going to have to say Dee can't play football with y'all after all.”

“But you said—”

“He can still come over here, and y'all can play in the backyard all you want. Just not the front. Not till things calm down.”

I didn't say anything.

“Okay, pal?”

I couldn't make myself say “okay.”

“Okay?” Daddy said, like I better say something quick.

“Yessir.”

I stood there some more. Mama came out of the bathroom in her robe.

“I know you're disappointed,” Daddy said.

“Is everything going to be all right with the neighbors now?” I asked him.

“Of course it is.”

“Everything is going to be just fine.” Mama's eyes flashed like she would see to it.

“The Bethunes are bad people, aren't they?” I said.

“You don't want to talk about people being
bad,
Trip,” Mama said.

“Mr. Bethune may have some bad
attitudes,
” Daddy said to me, but he was looking at Mama.

“He provides for his family,” Mama said. “They keep their yard nice. Remember when he helped us fix that flat tire? They go to our church, for heaven's sake.”

“So they're good people?”

“Well, yes.”

“Then why did they throw that bomb in our yard?”

“Trip, we don't know who—”

“But you said—”

“I think we were all a little overexcited last night.”

So people can throw bombs in other peoples' yards and still be good. As long as they keep their yards nice and go to church.

—

I told Mama what Papaw told me about doing our Christian duty for colored people and that she ought to buy Dee some T-shirts because he had only two
and one of them is all torn up. She didn't act like she was paying much attention when I told her that, but that night she came into my room and told me she wanted to go through my closet.

She pulled out a bunch of shirts and pants hanging in the back and took out a whole shelf full of sweaters and sweatshirts. She piled everything on the bed and went through it all, asking which ones I never wore anymore. I don't care about clothes that much in the first place, and I told her she could take it all if she'd let me go watch TV. She said she was giving my old clothes to Dee and he would grow into them. So then I wanted to stay.

After we'd gone through everything, Mama asked me if there was a coat I didn't wear anymore. My good old navy-blue coat—Mama calls it a pea coat—was so tight it was hard to move my arms. I said Dee could have that, too.

Next morning, Mama showed me two packages of T-shirts, six each, and said she was giving those to Willie Jane, too. I said I wanted to hand them to Dee myself, but she said it would be better if his mama did it. Then she said that just for my information, she was giving Willie Jane a raise, so I could quit worrying about that, too. I asked her how much of a raise, and she said that was none of my beeswax and to help her carry everything out to the playroom.

When Mama told Willie Jane all those clothes were for Dee, she set down her iron and hugged her.

“And look, Willie Jane.” I held up the T-shirts. “Now he's got church T-shirts and school T-shirts, and plenty left over for football.”

Then she hugged me.

She went through the pile, holding up each sweater and shirt and pair of pants. “So nice, so nice,” she kept saying.

“He'll have to grow into these, but some of it might fit him now,” Mama said.

“They'll fit him, they'll fit him,” Willie Jane said.

She kept holding up the coat and looking at it.

—

I was hoping the Bethunes would forget about me and bother somebody else. It wasn't hard to stay away from them at school; the halls are crowded between classes, and ninth-grade lockers are nowhere near seventh-grade lockers. But it's different after lunch, when everybody goes outside and the teachers aren't watching. I can't get used to how much they aren't watching.

For six years we marched in single-file lines and everybody did everything at the same time. All of a sudden, nobody cares where we are as long as we make it to class. I could walk to the end of the hall in
a crowd and keep on walking right out the back door. If I did it at the beginning of morning break, I could get a fifteen-minute head start before anybody knew I was gone. I kind of don't like knowing that.

Today in history class, Miss Hooper sent the boys out of the room for five minutes so she could say something to the girls. Marcie Wofford told me Miss Hooper told them to watch the way they sit. Skirts are definitely shorter than last year. You can't help but notice. Plus, it's like all the girls got together over the summer and said, “Okay, everybody, time for boobs!” I just want to know what they feel like.

Choral music is after history and then PE, which is right before lunch, which works out well since torture makes me hungry. They've been giving us all these physical fitness tests like how high can you climb a rope and how many chin-ups can you do—my answer is “not that high” and “one on a good day,” no matter how many times they make me do it. I was getting some shorts from my locker when somebody tried to shove me in there.

“It's Dipwad Westbrook!”

Tim and Tom Bethune and a couple of ninth-grade football players were standing on top of me.

“Hey,
Dip,
” Tim said.

“Yeah,
Dip,
yeah,
Dip,
” they all said.

The bell for the next class was going to ring any minute, but I was pretty scared. I didn't let them see
it. There was nothing I could say that would have made them leave me alone except that they were right and I was wrong. I stared right back at them and kept staring.

Then I thought of something to say. I said it real loud, too, in case any teachers were around who could get me out of this.

“Hey, Tim, when did you turn into this other guy?”

“What? Shut up.”

“Remember when you used to hang around with me and Stokes and everybody? And you took me over to your house to show me your battleship models?”

“I said shut up.”

“I mean, sure, you were a jerk in those days, too, but when did you turn into this other guy?”

“When you turned into a dip.” He shoved me extra hard. “That's when.”

I was trying to think of the next thing I would say when the bell rang, and they walked off.

“Watch it, punk,” Tom said over his shoulder.

I was a little shaky in choral music. At least I hadn't chickened out.

But I was going to have to shove back next time, or get the snot beaten out of me.

—

I was still asleep when Willie Jane came banging into my room with the vacuum cleaner and roaring it all
over the carpet. My clock said 7:49. On a Saturday morning.

“I know you're not asleep, I know you're not asleep,” she kept saying. “You're the only one still in bed.”

“I bet the girls are still in bed.”

“Uh-uh. And your mama's about to be out of the house, and your daddy's playing golf. You need to get up and see Dee.”

“Let me get dressed then,” I told her.

Dee was sitting on the couch in his red shirt with his head sagging on his chest. He didn't seem real happy about being there. I hadn't seen him grumpy before. His eyes were usually wide open like they were trying to see whatever was next, but today they just wanted to be closed.

“I had to get up at six-thirty on a Saturday morning so I could get ready to come over here.” His voice was small. “I didn't even get nothin' for my breakfast.”

“I hate havin' to get up on Saturday.”

“Reckon I could lie down somewhere? My stomach don't want to stay awake if it has to be this hungry.”

“You can lie down in my room.”

He closed his eyes, and looked like he might go to sleep any second.

“Or we could get something to eat,” I said.

“Hmm,” he grunted.

“What do you like for breakfast?”

“Pancakes.”

“Yeah. Pancakes. Let's get Willie Jane, I mean your mama, to make us some.” I was starving, too.

“I can make 'em,” Dee said.

“What?”

“Mama taught me,” he said. “She says I could go into the pancake business.”

“Buckwheat pancakes?”

“Watch me.”

I got up on a chair and pulled the special box off a high shelf in the pantry. Dee said to get eggs, milk, and butter. Dee put the skillet on the stove and said he needed some Wesson oil. I didn't know what he meant till he pointed to it. He put oil on a paper towel and rubbed it all over the skillet and turned the heat on. Medium high.

“Now we need a big bowl,” he said. “And a big spoon, so we can stir up the mix with the milk and the eggs.”

He cracked open the eggs and dropped them inside the bowl, but long strings of clear stuff dripped out of the shells and got all over the counter.

“It's hard to deal with eggs sometimes,” he said.

“Sure is.” I cleaned it up.

“Mama says don't stir it too much,” he said. “Just till there aren't any big lumps.”

When he had mixed it, he stuck his hand under the faucet and flicked water in the skillet.

“The water's not dancing yet. The way you know it's hot enough is when the water dances.”

We waited a minute and Dee flicked water into the skillet again. It sizzled a little.

“Let's go,” I said.

“Not yet,” Dee said. “It's not dancing yet.”

“Aw, come on.” I never wanted pancakes so bad in my life.

“Not yet.”

We waited some more, and the next time Dee flicked it, that water danced all over the skillet.

He spooned the batter into the skillet in circles that spread out.

“Wait till the tops bubble and the edges look hard before you flip 'em. If you wait too long, they get rubbery and dry. I like mine nice and soft. You want to flip 'em? Flippin' is the best part.”

We watched until the tops of the cakes bubbled and the edges got hard.

“You gotta be careful.” He handed me the spatula.

I did all right. Then all we had to do was watch them rise and take them off.

Dee put butter on them and put a paper towel on top so they would stay warm while we made the other three. He poured and I flipped.

I got us a couple of plates and forks. Now came the part where I could be an expert.

“What you want on 'em?” I asked him.

“Butter and syrup.”

“Here's the important question—what
kind
of syrup?”

“What kind do
you
want?”

“Well, if you ask me, nothin' tastes better on a pancake than molasses. Farish puts maple syrup on hers. I call that Yankee syrup.”

“I don't want maple syrup,” said Dee.

“Heck no.”

I got down the molasses and we sat at the kitchen table and went to town. Then we made three more apiece.

“What in the world are you boys up to in here?”

Willie Jane set down the vacuum cleaner and looked around the kitchen like a miracle out of the Bible had just happened.

“We made pancakes,” said Dee.

“You want us to make you some?” I asked her. “There's plenty of batter left. Sit down and let us make you some.”

“Child, I don't have time to eat pancakes.”

“Dee said y'all didn't have breakfast this morning. Come on and sit down.”

“Eat some pancakes, Mama.”

She eased down at the table and watched us with a big, soft smile while Dee reheated the skillet and I restirred the batter and he spooned them in and I flipped.

“You want molasses, don't you?” I asked her.

“Goodness, yes, let me have some molasses.”

Dee handed her the plate full of steaming pancakes. She took a bite and looked like she was thinking about it. Then she looked at us and said, “I tell you what, these may be the butteriest, sweetest, tenderest, best pancakes I have ever tasted.”

Dee grabbed my hand and raised it with his like we had both won a boxing match.

“Winners and still champions!” he said.

“The Pancake Brothers!” I said.

Willie Jane said now that he had something in his stomach, it was time for Dee to do his chore. She took him out to the shed and showed him the mulch and the trowel and showed him what my mama wanted him to do. She said it wouldn't take nearly as long as mowing and raking. I said I would help him so we could get it over with, but she said Dee was getting paid for this job and he oughta do it himself.

I was kind of sleepy, so I went back to my room and lay down. The next thing I knew, Willie Jane was waking me up and telling me that Dee was almost finished.

Stokes was visiting his cousins in Bay St. Louis, and Andy had told me he had to do something on Saturday. I asked him what, and he said
“Something!”
like it wasn't any of my business. Calvin said he had
something to do, too. So we couldn't have had a game today anyway.

Mama reminded me to keep Dee out of the front yard, but when I asked her how I was supposed to explain it to him, she said, “You'll think of a way.” So I just didn't mention it. How do you say to a person, “My neighbors hate you so much, they told my parents not to let you play football with us anymore and even threw a bomb in our yard”?