Simon B. Rhymin'

by Dwayne Reed

  BOBBY SANCHEZ, YOU’RE THE MEANEST–I MEAN IT!

  YOUR BREATH’S KINDA FUNKY, AND YOUR SHIRT’S NOT THE CLEANEST.

  YOU ALWAYS PICKIN’ ON ME CUZ I’M SMALL… BUT YOU SMELL.

  WE DON’T SAY NOTHING ’BOUT IT, WE JUST KEEP IT TO OURSELVES.

  YOU’RE THE TYPE OF KID WHO DOESN’T KNOW WHEN TO QUIT…

  DOESN’T KNOW WHEN TO STOP, DOESN’T KNOW WHEN TO SIT.

  SO IF YOU GET BULLIED, IT’LL ALL MAKE SENSE

  AND WE’LL ALL BE HAPPY CUZ… THAT’S WHAT YOU GET!

  “You… uhh… you so…”

  “Uhhh, uuuuh, what, shorty? Oh man, definitely time for you to go back to kindergarten with all the other little babies!” Bobby says as he walks away from our table just before any teachers can see what he’s done.

  “Here’s some napkins, Simon.” Maria pushes a pile over to me, trying to help me dry up. “You want some of my plátanos? I’m not that hungry and that pizza looked like plastic anyway.” I’m not even hungry anymore, but I take a plátano and hold it in my hand while C.J. goes to dump my milky tray.

  “Sorry, Simon. Those guys are the worst,” C.J. grumbles as he sits back down. He breaks off a piece of what’s left of his pizza and slides it over to me on a napkin. I still can’t open my mouth. How am I going to eat anything?

  “Yeah, don’t worry about them, Simon.” Maria pats my back the way Ms. Estelle does sometimes when she wants us to feel better but doesn’t know what to say. “Bobby’s just mad because you always look cooler than him. Can’t let him mess with you like that. Remember: Think positive. Be positive.”

  “You got that off a poster in your uncle’s office?”

  “Hey, how’d you know that?” Maria says as we pack up for recess. I just shiver, hoping by the end of recess my new T-shirt will be dry.

  After school Markus is laid out on the couch again with his feet dangling off the edge when the lock turns on the front door. Neither of us is expecting anybody for a few more hours, so we know whoever is on the other side is about to catch us red-handed—Markus scrolling the internet on his new phone that Dad got him for emergencies and me with my arm elbow-deep in the box of Fruity-O’s. Dad smiles and shakes his head at us as he walks in. I can’t lie with rainbow crumbs all over my face, and Markus’s backpack is too far away to pretend he was working on his math.

  “Party time’s over, y’all.” Markus swings his feet off the couch edge and grumbles under his breath, walking over to the kitchen, where I’m already washing my hands and putting the box back on top of the refrigerator. “I’m not gon’ take your little phone away from you, but I’ma be calling in an hour and you better pick up. I’ll expect an update on today’s assignment over the phone, too. I got the email from your math teacher so I know what you supposed to be doin’,” Dad warns Markus as he pulls his hundred-pound textbooks out onto the counter. Sheesh! These teachers are doing way too much!

  “Simon, let’s go.” Dad says this like I know what he’s talking about. Up until a few minutes ago, I didn’t even know he’d be home this early.

  “Y-y-you don’t want me to do my homework like Markus?”

  “This is your homework.”

  What?

  “I was thinking about your project and I got a little surprise for you. A special place for us to visit—just you and me.” Now I’m really nervous. I hear Markus laugh in his seat. I know math couldn’t be that funny, so he’s definitely laughing at the Notorious D.O.G. “I think your idea is great.” Oh boy. “Figured you should talk to some of the people you want to do your project on. People like Sunny.”

  “We’re going to the park?”

  “Even better. To the shelter. We’re going to serve food.” I thought knowing about Sunny would be enough. Suddenly I feel extra nervous. All this time all I was thinking about was having to talk in front of my class. But I never thought about who I’d have to talk to before I got to that part. “But first, put on a clean shirt, my boy. Looks like you missed your whole mouth at lunch.”

  “This kind of sounds like work, Dad,” I say, walking beside him toward the corner. But I feel bad about my words as soon as they come out of my mouth. Because Dad is right. I have to meet more people who don’t have homes if I’m going to learn what their life is like. He laughs and slows down a little. For every step Dad takes, I have to take like five.

  “I mean, that sounds cool,” I say, touching Dad’s hand for a second before letting it go. We are out in public and all. The Notorious D.O.G. doesn’t hold hands with his dad!

  When me and Dad get to the corner of Loving Street and Linden Boulevard, I notice we’re still on the side of Creighton where the park is. On the other side of Booker T. Except we’re across the street. We make a left on Linden and stand in front of a building that looks just like all the other buildings on the block, dark brown and made of brick with bars on the windows. Water drips from an air conditioner above the front door, and for a minute I think we’re going to somebody’s house.

  “All right, we’re here,” Dad announces.

  The only thing that makes me believe we’re actually at a homeless shelter is the sign right outside the door that says CREIGHTON PARK COMMUNITY OUTREACH: OPEN HEARTS, OPEN DOORS. Dad and I walk in, stopping at the front desk, where an older lady with a funny wig on says “Welcome back” to my dad and “Hello” to me. This is one of the places that keeps Dad busy and I never knew it was right down the street, right behind my school. The lady comes around the desk to shake my hand.

  “This must be Simon. My name is Wanda. I’m glad you’re here.” It feels strange that she already knows my name, but Dad smiles at her and gives me the look. The don’t you embarrass me in here look.

  “Hi, Miss Wanda,” I say back, shaking her hand. Miss Wanda smells like fancy oils and peppermints just like Grandma Lucille so I guess she’s all right. She grabs a visitor pass sticker off the counter, writes my name on it, and sticks it to my chest.

  “Everybody is gon’ be so excited to meet you, Simon. And y’all are just in time for dinner service. You can go on and head to the kitchen and wash up. There’s somebody there who will give you your apron and get you all set up. Your dad knows most of how things go around here,” she tells me, giving me a wink. Aprons. Rules. Dinner. My mouth gets all watery until I remember the dinner isn’t for me.

  In the kitchen upstairs, I learn that volunteers are in charge of handing out food to the people who come to the shelter for a free meal and that we need to wear plastic gloves for germs. Dad’s going to stand behind a big bowl of mashed potatoes and serve spoonfuls out to people in the cafeteria line. I’m in charge of bringing rolls and little foil-wrapped packs of butter to everyone at their tables.

  When I think about people being homeless, I think of Sunny. And since Sunny’s old, I’m surprised to see so many different kinds of people who show up needing food. There are old people like Grandma Lucille, moms who look sorta like my mom, and a lot of them have kids with them who don’t look much older or younger than me. I even see teenagers who look like they could have been my big brother Aaron’s friends. It makes me feel sad that all these people don’t have money to buy their own food or a kitchen to cook at home in.

  I’m so busy on bread roll patrol that I almost don’t see Sunny sitting at a table near the back of the dining hall. I walk up to him and he smiles at me, hard, through all his missing teeth.

  “Rhymin’ Simon, I thought that might be you!” Sunny says, still cheesin’ hard. “Are you and your dad helping with all the dinner stuff they got goin’ on in here? That’s mighty kind of you.” I wonder how Sunny could bite down into the stale roll so hard when it looks like he only has five good teeth. I watch him roll the wet piece of bread around in his mouth with his tongue a few seconds before remembering to say something back. Why didn’t Sunny get dentures like Grandma Lucille? It looks like he’s needed them for a long time now.

  “Wassup, Sunny,” I say, suddenly feeling awkward to be standing there
talking to him by myself. “Yeah, Dad brought me here to volunteer. And I’m actually doing an assignment for school.” I want to tell him it’s about him being homeless, but I suddenly feel strange about telling him that to his face. I don’t know if he’d still want to talk to me. Sunny’s basically been watching me grow up since I was like seven years old, but I’ve barely ever talked to him before this. It feels rude to tell him that, all of a sudden, I want to know why he doesn’t really live anywhere the way I do.

  “And you want to ask us some questions?” Sunny’s smile gets bigger. Like he’s been waiting for this and is proud of himself for being able to read my mind.

  “Well, just you… if it’s okay. I don’t want to bother you while you eat your dinner, though,” I say, not feeling ready. I don’t even really know the first thing to say.

  “Oh yeah! Probably got too many meetings tonight, but I think my schedule will free up a little bit later this week,” he jokes. “For real, though, kiddo, it’s not a bother at all. Come back tomorrow after school and I’ll holla at ya.”

  CHAPTER 8

  “COME ON, C.J.! I DON’T WANNA MISS Sunny!” Sometimes C.J. can be the slowest kid in the world. It’s already Wednesday afternoon, so my report is due in just five days. I practically drag C.J. down to the sidewalk, where Aaron is already sucked into his phone, waiting for us.

  “Yeah, come on, both of y’all,” Aaron says, pulling his backpack higher up on his shoulder. He jets down the sidewalk, barely checking to see if we’re with him or not. He agreed to take me and C.J. to the shelter, mostly because he can shoot hoops with his friends at Locust Court afterward. “Gotta practice as much as possible,” he said last night when Dad and I asked if he could take me.

  As we get closer to the corner of Locust and Loving Streets, I smile, thinking about last night. Handing out rolls and then helping out with dessert was actually kinda fun. Sunny had a lot of friends in there who I kept overhearing talk about the good old days. I wondered, since they’re all homeless, if it was okay to be joking around with them. They were joking with each other and Sunny always has something goofy to say, but I still felt like maybe I should be more serious around him. Maybe joking with him would make it feel like I was making fun of him. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll ask him about that today.

  I’M NOT REALLY SURE HOW TO ACT AROUND SUNNY,

  DON’T WANT TO BE RUDE, THINKIN’ I’M BEING FUNNY.

  I’D HATE TO EMBARRASS HIM IN FRONT OF HIS FRIENDS

  OR BY ACCIDENT, THEN HE WON’T SPEAK TO ME AGAIN!

  SO I’LL PLAY IT COOL, TALK LESS, LISTEN MORE,

  CUZ THAT’S THE WHOLE REASON THAT I’M GOIN’ HERE FOR,

  TO LEARN WHAT THIS MAN’S GOT TO SAY ABOUT HIS LIFE.

  CHILL OUT, SIMON, EVERYTHING’S GONNA BE AIGHT!

  “Hey, Simon, think they’ll have a vending machine with some good snacks in there? I’m starving!”

  “You ain’t starving, C.J.” Aaron answers for me, overhearing C.J. from steps ahead of us. “It’s a homeless shelter. You know, for people who actually need food. Don’t think they gon’ be too worried about showing you where a vending machine is at, bruh.”

  “Chill, we’ll eat after we get out of here.”

  Miss Wanda walks me, Aaron, and C.J. over to a big room that’s full of tables with chairs, some comfy old couches, and a Ping-Pong table in the corner. A super-sad-looking rec room with not enough light. No one’s playing Ping-Pong, but there’s some kids working on a big puzzle at one table and some adults reading magazines on the couches.

  “All right, boys, holler if you need anything,” Miss Wanda says as she waves her hand toward the table where Sunny’s waiting for us. We start walking over and Aaron finds a corner to sit in and forget about us while he texts on his phone. Even though it’s only Sunny who I told I was coming back today, Miss Wanda has set things up real official for the Notorious D.O.G. For a second, it makes me feel like I might know what to say when I sit down with him. Maybe.

  “Rhymin’ Simon and your boy C.J.!” Sunny says, saying our names like it’s part of a song. “Sit down, sit down.”

  At first, I feel funny asking Sunny questions. I look down at my notebook, where I wrote five questions because Mr. James told me I should be prepared. I feel nervous about talking like that to an old man I don’t really know, besides the fact that he’s always somewhere around my block, and I don’t want to make him feel funny by getting all up in his business. But before I even get to question one, C.J. and Sunny start talking about a blues band that C.J.’s uncle Lou played in sometimes.

  “Oh boy, they can play, can’t they? You know I used to sing with a band sometimes, back when I was a younger man,” Sunny says, looking proud. “Used to run around here doin’ all kinds of little jobs, too.”

  “Oh yeah?” I lean in. It’s funny imagining Sunny as someone who used to look like me or my brothers a long time ago. Grandma Lucille looks like she’s been a granny forever. Sunny telling me and C.J. he was a kid in Creighton Park, Chicago, feels like something that couldn’t be real.

  “When I was y’all’s age, I used to make extra cash shoveling snow off sidewalks. Wasn’t no allowance or funny stuff like that, so I had to make my own money,” Sunny says, making me think about how my brothers do that sometimes in the winters, too. “I had to get out there, roll up my sleeves, and do real work! Didn’t have no video games and internet this and that keeping me all up in the house staring at a screen. My mama barely let me get caught up listening to the radio too much.” Sunny had a mama who wouldn’t let him chill, either. I pause for a second imagining him in the kitchen and somebody older than him telling him Rooms, homework, now.

  “Now the whole world got they faces glued to they little gadgets and machines and don’t know what it’s like to go out and earn your money for real. The internet’s taking over everything, I tell you.” C.J. and I just stare. Sunny sounds like Grandma Lucille with a deeper voice and long gray hairs that grow out of his nose like weeds. But his hands wave all over the place when he gets excited the exact same way hers do.

  “Got my first real job at eighteen straight out of high school. Gave that place fifteen good years of my life till they dumped me, man,” he says, his voice lowering and kind of slowing down. I want to ask him what the job was and what happened, but Sunny starts looking out at nothing after telling us he lost his job.

  “Hey, Sunny,” C.J. says, smiling. “Will you sing a song for us? Since you used to sing in a band and all.” C.J.’s timing is always kind of off. He’s not the biggest on manners, but this time I think he’s trying to make Sunny feel better. I’m glad because the look on Sunny’s face makes me feel like I don’t know what to do.

  “You don’t have to ask me twice.” Sunny stands up, clears his throat, and starts to sing the same song I heard him singing the other day in front of our apartment building. The one about the sunny side of the street.

  When Sunny sings, it feels like his voice takes over the whole room. And I see a whole bunch of people turn around and stare at him from their seats. He sounds like something off the radio. But from like fifty years ago, of course. I’ve never heard anything like that in real life. For a minute I forget where we are. That this guy is going off like this in a homeless shelter rec room. I snap out of it and look around when the whole room starts clapping at the end of Sunny’s song.

  I look up at the clock on the wall and realize it’s almost time for Aaron to walk us home. I haven’t asked Sunny all of my questions for my project, but I hope I have enough to not sound completely lost on Monday when I have to present. I decide to ask question number five from my list.

  “Sunny, can I ask you one more thing before we have to leave?” I say, holding my pencil in my hand, ready to write down as much as I can.

  “Shoot, Rhymin’ Simon.”

  “Okay, what’s one thing you want people to know about being homeless? Or, you know, something people might not know.” I stumble over my words a little, feeling emba
rrassed to use that word and for the fact that I’ve only ever come here for a project. Sunny just smiles and looks down at his hands.

  “That’s easy, young man. I wish people knew we’re not invisible. People walk by and pretend I don’t exist. And I know they have their reasons, but it hurts. Let me ask you something, Simon. Have you ever felt like people don’t see or hear you?”

  I nod, not knowing what to say. I thought I would be the only one asking the questions. That how Sunny feels has nothing to do with me.

  “Thanks, Sunny.” Something inside me feels happy for coming but kind of low at the same time. What Sunny said sounded a lot like how I feel sometimes, but it seemed kinda wrong to compare myself to him. I don’t have to live the way he does. I don’t have it as bad. I say thank you again while C.J. teaches Sunny how to dap him up. We walk over to Aaron to snap him back into reality, and as he walks us out of the rec room, Sunny calls my name.

  “Hey, Simon! Now that I sang for you, you owe us a little something. I’ve heard all about you, son. Time to let the rest of the hood hear your talents.”