Beyond Dreams

by Marilyn Reynolds

  That’s how it is with my friend, Scott, too. His dad’s about as screwed up as mine is. Scott and I used to go to the park all the time in the afternoons. He’d let me practice pitching as long as I wanted. He’s got a face drawn inside his catcher’s mitt. Says it’s his dad. But we don’t go to the park much anymore. What’s the use? It hurts too much to practice when I know I can’t play. Anyway, Scott and I both got stuck with our dads, and our sisters got to stay with our moms. That sucks.

  I’ll go stay with my mom and Katie this summer, but it’s not the same as having them living here—teasing them, joking around with them, always having stuff in the refrigerator, having my mom come talk with me at night when I’m in my room, avoiding old Gilbert. Summer’s not enough.

  I grab the leftover pizza from last night and zap it in the microwave, then pour myself a big glass of milk from the carton I bought on my way home from work last night. I thought parents were supposed to at least feed you ’til you turn eighteen. I guess Gilbert doesn’t know that. Or if he does, he doesn’t care.

  I’m starving about now, but before I even get any food in my belly, my dad starts. “I talked to Mr. Grant from Loser High School today,” he says.

  “So?” Maybe that Merton teacher complained about what I wrote.

  “So anytime you ain’t there, he’s callin’ me. And when that happens, that’s the time I report your car stolen, so don’t even think about cutting school,” he says, sounding all tough.

  I take a gigantic bite of pizza and start chewing, with my mouth wide open between munches, looking straight at him. He hates when I chew with my mouth open. I only do it in front of him.

  I used to think he was such a tough guy, in his black uniform with his loaded gun. Not anymore though. I’m even bigger than he is now. He looks away. I can tell he’s pissed, but I don’t care. So am I. Just looking at him in front of the TV with his belly hanging out pisses me off. I’m glad I have to work tonight. As much as I don’t love McDonald’s, it’s better than this place.

  When I get to school in the morning, the principal, Mr. Dailey, and some of the other teachers are standing around the front gate, laughing and talking.

  “Hey, Jason, how’s it going?” he says.

  “Okay,” I say. I’ve never had a principal call me by name before, unless he had my records sitting in front of him and I was in trouble. This Dailey guy’s just standing in the sun, shooting the shit. He doesn’t even have a walkie-talkie. They must not put real principals at Sojourner High.

  “Hey, Jason,” Mr. Fowler says, walking over to me. “You used to play Little League?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I thought you looked familiar when you came into class yesterday, but I couldn’t place you,” he says. “Pitcher, right? On Gary’s Hardware?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I coached the Flagg team the year you guys took the state championship. You still playing ball?”

  “Nope. They wouldn’t let me.”

  “Who wouldn’t let you?”

  “You know. The school. They said my grades weren’t good enough.”

  “Oh. Too bad,” he says. “Ever see Johnny, the kid who played third base on that team?”

  “He moved to Bakersfield.”

  “He was a good ballplayer, too,” Mr. Fowler says. “What about Scott, the catcher?”

  “Yeah, he’s on the team at Hamilton.”

  “You guys had an amazing team that year.”

  We did have an amazing team that year. It was the best year of my whole life. I was in seventh grade, doin’ okay in school, had a girlfriend, Marci, who was totally in love with me. My family was still all together. But, best of all, Johnny and Scott and I were like the heroes of our team. I get this empty feeling in the pit of my stomach when I think of how things were then, and how they are now. If I could take a trip to anywhere in the universe, I would go back to seventh grade.

  First period I sign in, get my folder, and sit down next to Mark in a beanbag chair. He opens his journal, which is in his folder, and starts writing. My journal is not in my folder. I take a magazine from the shelf behind me and start flipping through it.

  Ms. Merton writes some stuff on the board. Thursday evening is a parent meeting, the Friday Nite Live group is going to Santa Monica for a clean-up-the-bay project—that kind of stuff.

  Some girls are sitting at a table with nachos and Big Gulps, showing pictures like girls always do.

  “He’s sooooo fine,” one of the girls says, practically drooling over a picture.

  Ms. Merton walks over and stands by their table. “Time to get to work,” she says.

  “C’mon, Claudia,” the almost drooler says.

  “Nope. Put the pictures away. No credit for looking at pic­tures.”

  She stands there, and finally they all put their pictures into their backpacks and start writing in their journals. Ms. Merton walks back to her desk and calls me over. She motions for me to sit down. I see that she has my journal in her hand. Well, I don’t care. I wrote from the heart, like she told me to do. It’s a stupid school, anyway. Let her kick me out. What do I care?

  “Nice job,” she says. “This is well organized and to the point. You’ve expressed yourself well.”

  Is she being sarcastic, I wonder?

  “Correct punctuation, correct spelling, very legible handwrit­ing. Did you know you’re a pretty good writer?”

  I just stare at her dumbly.

  “I’m not saying you’re William Shakespeare, but you obvi­ously can communicate clearly in writing.”

  I keep waiting for her to be mad about some of the words I used, but it doesn’t happen. She hands me my notebook, tells me to do another journal writing for today, and she’ll come over and talk to me about the reading part of the class.

  “I know you say you hate reading, but maybe you just haven’t found the right book yet.”

  “I hate reading,” I tell her. Then I go back to my place beside Mark and try to figure out what to write about. A little later the teacher brings a book, The Shining, to Mark and hands it to him.

  “Thanks,” he says.

  “The new one will be out in paperback next month,” she says. “I’ll pick it up then.”

  “Cool,” he says, handing her his journal and opening the book. She hands me a couple of paperbacks.

  “Thin ones to start with,” she smiles. “Just read the first page. If you don’t like them, give them back.”

  One of them is The Outsiders. I’ve seen the movie and I remember the story. I could just pretend to read the book. I wonder if it’s the same, or if it’s one of those things where the movie is totally different, except for the title. I put both of the books on Merton’s desk when I leave.

  “Boring,” I say.

  Second period. I dread going into the Snake Pit. I’d leave now, but I sort of want to go to my third period computer class. Also I don’t want old Gilbert calling his buddies at the police department and having them pick me up for auto theft. I doubt that Mr. Grant would call, though. They always say stuff like that and then they never follow through. At Hamilton High I once missed four weeks in a row before anyone called home.

  I sit as far away from the snake, and the snake girl, as I can, writing in my physical science packet. Mr. Fowler brings a clipboard to the table where I’m sitting.

  “Anyone here want to sign up for Saturday Work Day?” he says, putting the clipboard on the table. “Extra credit, make up days missed, plus you get the inner glow of knowing you’re doing something nice for your school.”

  “More planters?” the guy sitting next to me says.

  “Not this time. Tomorrow we’re going to break up asphalt and plant three new trees.”

  The guy signs his name, then passes the clipboard over to me. I hand it back to the teacher. Then he turns to the whole class and asks, “Why did the turtle cross the road?”

  Students groan. Mr. Fowler grins.

  “To get to the other side,” the sn
ake girl says, sounding bored.

  “No. That was the chicken,” Fowler says. “I don’t think you can pass life science if you can’t tell the difference between a chicken and a turtle.” Some of the kids laugh. Most don’t seem to notice the conversation. He asks the question again, “Why did the turtle cross the road?”

  “Just tell us and get it over with,” the kid next to me says.

  “Nobody knows? Jason?”

  My face grows warm. I know it’s turning red. I hate when teachers call on me.

  “Nobody?” he says, pausing a moment, then telling us, “To get to the Shell station, of course.”

  Everybody groans.

  “C’mon. You know my jokes are better than Pritchard’s.”

  “Who’s Pritchard?” I ask the guy next to me.

  “He teaches history. They’re always raggin’ on each other about who tells the best jokes.”

  “Who does?” I ask.

  “Neither one,” he says, but he says it with a smile. “Teachers around here rag on each other all the time. Fowler and Pritchard are always saying stuff about how old Ms. Merton is—last week Pritchard went around to all the classes and invited them to a special assembly where Ms. Merton would be giving an eyewitness account of some Civil War battle.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Nothing. She laughed—they’re a trip, man. One day they came to school all dressed alike, teachers, custodians, office ladies, everybody —white shirts, blue pants, blue headbands.”

  “Why?”

  “They said they just wanted to see if anyone would notice.”

  This school is like a different planet compared to Hamilton. Teachers there take themselves very seriously. Come to think of it, except for Coach Hernandez, I don’t think I ever saw a Hamilton teacher laugh.

  At break time, Mark and I sit on a bench in the sun, eating nachos from the snack bar. I guess if I hang around long enough I’ll get used to it here. But, as my grandma used to say, that’s a big if.

  In the computer class Miss Keyes comes over and shows me what I can do for a special certificate. It looks like a lot of work.

  “If you complete this, it can help you get a job working with computers,” she tells me.

  I’d rather just fool around with the computer than do a bunch of stuff for a certificate. She leaves a beginning worksheet for me and tells me to consider it.

  “How’re things going at Slowburner High School?” my dad asks one afternoon. What a wit.

  “You heard from Mr. Grant?” I ask him.

  “Nope.”

  “Well then, I guess they’re going okay,” I say.

  “Hangin’ out with the burn-outs and gang-bangers?”

  “Yeah, Dad, whatever you say.”

  He’s never happy. At least I’m going to school. I haven’t missed a day in three weeks. That’s a high school record for me.

  “So what’s this parent meeting I got a letter about?”

  “What about it?”

  “I ain’t goin’.”

  “So?”

  “So . . . I ain’t goin’.”

  I don’t know why he needs to tell me that. He’s never been to a parent meeting in my whole life. My mom used to go, but he didn’t. The only thing he ever went to was my baseball games, and that wasn’t for me, it was for him. Big man in the bleachers could swell his chest and say that’s my kid just made that play. I don’t want him going there anyway. Wherever he goes now he talks about his bad luck, and how hard things are, trying to raise a family on disability. What a load of shit.

  ***

  One day Merton brings a book over to me. It’s about the twentieth book she’s brought to me so far.

  “Try this one,” she says.

  Another boring book, I think, but I start the first page anyway. By the time school is out for the summer I bet I will have read the first page of about a hundred books. Now even Mark is trying to find something for me to read—he keeps saying, try Firestarter, or Carrie, but I’d rather just see the movies. Anyway, this book starts out with a guy saying he’s seventeen and he’s already a loser. I can relate to that, so I go on to page two. I don’t notice when kids get up to leave class until Mark calls to me from the door.

  Merton takes the book from me. She smiles and says she’ll hold it for tomorrow.

  Halfway through third period, Fowler comes to the door and calls me out of class. I don’t think I’ve done anything to get called out of class for.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask as I follow him outside.

  “Nothing. I just want to talk to you about a way to earn extra

  credit and help some kids out at the same time.”

  I don’t say anything. Everybody’s always talking about extra credit around here—opportunities for extra credit. My idea of opportunities has to do with winning the lottery, not doing some stupid school assignment.

  “Interested?” Fowler asks.

  I shrug.

  “You’d be good at it. The Lions Little League team lost their coach—he had a heart attack, so he’s out of things for a while. They’re in third place, a good little team, but they’ll be knocked out if they can’t find a coach to take over. You could get credit in Community Service and also maybe in Communications. How about it?”

  “I don’t know. I’m not sure how it would fit with my work schedule.”

  “McDonald’s?”

  “Yeah.”

  “The one over on Seventh Street?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I can help you arrange that. I know your boss—he’ll go out of his way for a good cause.”

  That’s not what I think about my boss. From where I stand, it looks like he goes out of his way to give people a hard time.

  “Think it over,” Fowler asks.

  “Okay,” I say. But really, the only thing I want to do with baseball is play, not coach.

  “Hey! Jason! Come out here!”

  Even though I’m in my bedroom changing clothes, old Gilbert thinks nothing of yelling at me from the living room where he’s sitting on his fat butt, like always.

  “Just a sec,” I say.

  “I want to talk to you,” he yells.

  “Okay, okay,” I say, walking out to the living room, still buttoning my Levis.

  “That Grant guy called from your school today.”

  “I been going to school,” I say, ready to be mad as hell if he’s going to start in on me.

  “I know,” he says.

  “So?”

  “So he said he just called to say you’re doin’ good—told me parents are used to hearing bad news. He wanted to spread some good news.”

  “Yeah?”

  I hadn’t thought much about it, but I guess I have been doing okay. I’ve been there for six weeks now, no cuts, and I’m turning in work in all of my classes.

  “He says your teachers are pleased with your progress.” Then he starts laughing.

  “What’s funny?”

  “You. It sounds like you’re gettin’ to be some kind of bigshot at Loser Tech.”

  Something snaps in me. I make a quick move so I’m standing over my dad and I look straight down at him.

  “You know what?” I say, not waiting for an answer. “You’re not such a winner. At least people at my school are trying to get their shit together. Looks to me like Loser Tech is right here in this living room . . .”

  He’s out of his chair faster than I’ve seen him move since he stopped wearing his uniform.

  “Don’t you call me a loser, you ungrateful bastard. Who do you think puts food on your table and a roof over your head?” he yells.

  “The state of California!” I yell back at him. We’re eye to eye. His fists are clenched. So are mine.

  “I earned this leave,” he says, practically in a whisper. “Nobody needs to think I’m a loser, all I went through to maintain law and order—don’t you ever, ever accuse me of bein’ a loser.”

  “Yeah, well I don’t like being called a l
oser, either,” I say, backing away a little.

  “I didn’t say you, I said that school,” he says, sitting back down in his La-Z-Boy recliner.

  “My school, either,” I say. “I’ve learned more there in six weeks than in the whole time I was at Hamilton.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like how to use a computer, and that there are some books that aren’t phony, and that snakes don’t feel slimy, and that there are teachers who care.”

  He just looks at me, like he’s looking at a stranger.

  “I’ll tell you something else,” I say. “I’ve learned that school isn’t so bad if there’s not someone ridin’ you all the time. I’ve got a say over what I do there. It’s not: everybody do the same thing at the same time just because teacher says. I won’t say I like school, but I don’t hate it now, and the people I go to school with aren’t losers anymore than anywhere else.”

  I stand watching him, waiting for his next remark. He picks up the remote and starts channel surfing. I go back to my room to read until it’s time to go to work. I’m reading the life story of Jim Morrison. It makes me laugh—he was so totally outrageous. But it also makes me want to cry. As outrageous as he was, and as stupid as he was to die so young, at least he was following his dreams. My dream of being a Dodger keeps getting farther and farther away.

  The next morning the old hippie calls me into his office. He’s got my school records spread out in front of him.

  “I talked to your dad yesterday,” he says.

  “So I heard. He said he got a call from Loser High School.”

  Mr. Grant is quiet for a while. “Do you think you’re a loser, Jason?”

  “Like father, like son,” I say.

  “What’s that mean?” he asks.

  I shrug my shoulders.

  “Listen, Jason. Lots of kids come here with the idea that they’ve already failed in life—that they’re losers. The truth is, you’re only a loser of you think you’re a loser.”