Fast Sam, Cool Clyde, and Stuff

by Walter Dean Myers

  “Do you think that Gloria’s going to…you know?” I asked.

  “With who? With who? You mean that guy Chalky? You got to be kidding. What are you—stupid or something?” Sam was really upset. You could tell because his voice was so high. Whenever he got excited his voice would get real high. “In the first place Gloria ain’t that kind of girl.”

  “You want to give her a call?” Clyde asked.

  “No. I don’t care what she do,” Sam responded.

  “You want to play some three-handed hearts?”

  “No.”

  We just sat around for a while, watched some television, and then we split up and went home. The next day was Sunday and right after church Sam went over to Gloria’s house. She wasn’t home yet because she was Catholic and went to a late Mass. So he hung around in front of the house and waited until she did come home. When she came home he talked to her for a little while and then she had to leave to go someplace with her mother. Clyde and I were standing on the stoop as usual, and when Sam joined us I figured he was going to tell me and Clyde what had happened between Chalky and Gloria. But then my father came down and told me that I had to take Sharon and her girl friend over to the Apollo and find out what time the show was over so I could pick them up later. I was going to give him a little lip, but then I found that Sharon was going to the show with Kitty, Clyde’s sister. I didn’t even know they were friends. Anyway, so I didn’t get to find out what happened on Sunday because when I came back I couldn’t find either Clyde or Sam, which really ticked me off because after all I was taking Clyde’s sister to the show, too. I went up to Clyde’s house and nobody was home, and I went up to Sam’s house and his mother told me she hadn’t seen him since early morning. I wondered if they could be at Gloria’s house but I decided not to go there.

  When we got home the next day from school it was really cold. I mean really cold. And there were some new people moving into the building next to mine so we all had to stand around and see what they had. You know you can tell a lot about somebody if you watch them move in. Anyway, they had two kids. One was about my age and the other was about four or five years older. In fact I don’t even know if you would call her a kid. But then we went up to my place, which was about the first time we ever had gone there. Usually we went up to Sam’s place or Clyde’s or Gloria’s and sometimes even Cap’s or Angel’s. Angel’s place was especially cool because his mother always fed you. You would say you weren’t hungry but it didn’t mean anything to her. You went to her house and you ate.

  So we go to my house and guess what Sharon does? She goes out with her own money and buys some sodas and some cookies. Can you imagine that? She’s only ten. And then she knocks on my door and I give out this little look and say come in and she comes in with the cookies on a plate and says that there are more cookies and sodas in the kitchen and that she was going to the library. I really felt good about that.

  Anyway, we talk around a little bit and then I asked Clyde and Sam where they were yesterday. They said that they had went over to the park and shot around. Then they started talking about whether Sam should go out for the school basketball team or whether he should switch this year to an academic course. I waited a little while and then asked, trying to act casual, about what happened with Chalky and Gloria.

  “What do you think happened? Nothing!” Sam looked at Clyde and I could see that Clyde didn’t know anything more than I did. “Chalky went up to talk his stuff and Gloria told him to cop a walk. I told her what he had said when we were over at Clyde’s house.”

  “You told her?” Clyde asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Everything?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I said that he said he was going to come over to see if he could get some.” Fast Sam was eating twice as many cookies as me and Clyde put together. “She said, ‘Get some what?’ and I said, ‘Some you-know,’ and she said that she didn’t know, and I said some sex. Then she got mad and wanted to go over to Chalky’s house and tell him off. She really got mad. She said he came over and she was helping her mother snap some beans, you know, getting dinner ready, and he says could he see her alone. So she takes him on into the living room and asks him what he wanted, and he started talking about let’s sit on the couch and she told him that she had to help her mother. You know, she and her moms is real close now.

  “Anyway, he keeps talking about let’s sit on the couch because he wanted to tell her something important. So she finally sits down on the couch and he starts telling her about how fine she looks and tries to put his arm around her. Then she just told him to split ’cause she was busy, and he left and said he’d give her a call.”

  “I knew that cat was jive,” Clyde said.

  “He’s a chump, that’s what he is!” Sam continued.

  “Did you tell her about that thing he had?” I asked.

  “Yeah, I told her. She really got mad after that. We talked for longer than we ever talked before. I asked her something, what she thought about Chalky wanting to try something like that. She said she would never do anything like that, especially with a guy she didn’t love. So I asked her if she would with somebody she loved, you know.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She said that she didn’t know. That gave me some ideas. I mean, Gloria and me are pretty tight.” Sam took a sip from my soda. “I didn’t say anything to her then, but I was thinking that maybe I would ask her for some myself.”

  “You ever do it to a girl before?” I asked.

  “Sure, man,” Sam said, finishing my soda.

  “Who?” asked Clyde.

  “I don’t want to say because it’s a secret.”

  “It’s a secret because it’s not true,” Clyde said, “because as big as your mouth is if you had done it you’d have it in the newspaper on the front page.”

  “Man, I got secrets you don’t even know about,” Sam said.

  “Like what?”

  “Did you know it was me that broke Mrs. Lucas’s window last summer?”

  “You broke that window?”

  “Right. I found that baseball and was imaginary pitching and the ball got loose. I was going to go over and say that I did it and everything, but when she started yelling about how she was going to call the cops I sneaked away. You know who saw me?”

  “Who?”

  “Angel’s sister.”

  “But you still didn’t do it to a girl,” Clyde said.

  “Well, I almost did once. I went up to this girl’s house and we fooled around a lot. I don’t want to tell you how far I got,” Sam said. “You ever do it to a girl?”

  “Nope.”

  “You?”

  Sam was looking at me and I couldn’t help but grin. No, I never “did it” to a girl and they knew it.

  “What you think, Clyde? You think I should ask Gloria for some?” Sam looked over at Clyde while he scraped the crumbs up with his fingertips. “She said that she might do it if she liked somebody enough. And I think she likes me. I might give her a little play. What do you think?”

  “Hey, look. Weren’t you mad with Chalky because Chalky said the same thing?” Clyde said. I hoped that he wouldn’t end the conversation, because I liked talking about sex. It was really something that I wanted to know about.

  “Do you put me in the same class as Chalky?” Sam asked.

  “That wasn’t the question. You got mad when Chalky said he wanted to get some from Gloria and now you’re saying the same thing, right?”

  “You figure that nobody should do it before they’re married,” Sam said, “but I know a lot of people do.”

  “I’m not saying you shouldn’t. I don’t even know, but I do know that you were mad when Chalky said it, and I don’t see the difference.”

  “The difference is that I like Gloria a lot and he just wants to get some.”

  “You doing her a favor?”

  “No, but she could do me a favor if she
gave me some. You know I like her.” Sam was looking uncomfortable.

  “All I wondered is what makes you different from Chalky?” Clyde asked. “I mean you know you and I are tight and everything, but, like, from Gloria’s point of view. What’s the difference? What are you giving her?” Clyde went on. “Say that making out with a girl is a dynamite feeling, okay? Well, remember that girl that got pregnant last year in school? She got that baby for life. And even if the baby didn’t make it, everybody knew that she was pregnant. Or remember that girl those guys from Lenox said they were going to go mess with?”

  “I didn’t go over there and I didn’t see her,” Sam said. “You see, you’re making a big thing of this and all I did was ask a question. It ain’t no big thing.”

  “But that’s how people get babies,” I said. “And that’s a big thing.”

  “Okay, so I won’t ask Gloria,” Sam said.

  “We ought to get her up here and ask her,” Clyde said.

  “You mean all of us ask her for some?” I asked.

  “No, turkey! I mean just to get her opinion on the subject.”

  “You can’t talk to girls about sex,” Sam said. “You know how they are. She’ll probably start giggling or something.”

  “If you don’t talk to girls about sex how are you going to ask her for some?” Clyde asked.

  “How come you have to twist everything around? Huh?” Sam was getting mad and his voice was getting higher. “You know what I meant. Let’s just drop the whole subject, man.”

  We sat around awhile. I wet my finger and picked up some of the cookie crumbs with it. Then I remembered that Sharon said there was some more cookies and stuff in the kitchen and I went and got it. When I came back Sam and Clyde were still sitting around not talking. I put the cookies down and right away you could see that Sam was interested in them. The first cookies we had were vanilla wafers, and these were chocolate cookies with cream. Who ever invented chocolate cookies with cream must have been some kind of a genius.

  “What about the club?” Clyde asked. “We said we’d talk about our problems, right?”

  “Well, it ain’t no problem now because I’m not going to ask her for none. In fact, if she walked in here right now—if the Queen of England walked in here right now and said, ‘Please, Sam, take some, honey,’ I still wouldn’t do it.”

  “Look, Sam, I’m not on your case, man. But it’s a problem and you know that. How many sisters you see getting pregnant? A lot, right?” Clyde looked at Sam.

  “I didn’t get nobody pregnant. What you running your mouth on me for?” Sam scooped nearly half the plate of cookies up and looked away from Clyde. I had never noticed how big his hands were before. No wonder he could handle a basketball.

  “I told you I’m off your case. But it’s still a problem, right? Dig, would you marry a girl with a baby?”

  “I don’t know.” Sam’s voice was muffled because he had his mouth full of cookies.

  “But you sure would think about it, wouldn’t you?” Clyde asked.

  Sam shrugged.

  “Would you marry a girl with a baby?” Clyde was talking to me.

  “Yeah!” I said. I liked the idea of getting married. And I liked babies, too.

  “You’re a snap, Stuff,” Sam said. Then he put out his hand and Clyde gave him five. “Okay, look, call Gloria up and we’ll ask her opinion but don’t tell her that I was going to ask her for some. Okay?”

  “Okay.” So Clyde called Gloria and sure enough she was home. He asked her if she’d come over to his place, that we wanted to discuss something with her. She must have asked him what because he started grinning and then had to try twice before he told her. She asked him who all was over to his house, and he said me and Sam were over. Then he hung up and said Gloria said that she would be over in about fifteen minutes.

  Then Clyde said that we had to be cool when Gloria came over. You know, we couldn’t crack up or anything.

  “Excuse me, Miss Gloria.” Sam was talking in a deep voice and holding a pencil in front of Clyde like it was a microphone. “What do you think about sex?”

  Then we all cracked up. Then Sam got real serious and Clyde got real serious and we were quiet for about a minute. Then Clyde looked over at Sam like he was going to laugh any minute, and Sam looked over at me, and I wouldn’t have laughed except I had a cookie in my mouth so I cracked up, and then Clyde and Sam cracked up again, and then we couldn’t stop cracking up. Clyde was trying to be a little cool but then he’d look at Sam or look at me and we’d all start laughing again. And Sam had this real high laugh that sounded a little bit like a squeaky door that somebody was messing with. Anyway, this went on for a while with Sam asking some funny questions every so often in his radio-announcer voice until the doorbell rang. Clyde gave us a look and then went to the door. Sam and me were looking at each other, making faces and about to crack again, when they came in.

  Gloria had got Angel’s sister, Maria, and BB and they all came in together. And they were looking ready! They all sat down and were looking so serious that Sam had a hard time swallowing his cookies.

  “So what y’all want to talk about?” Gloria had her head leaning over to one side.

  Sam looked at Clyde and Clyde looked at Sam and then they both looked at me. I looked down real quick because I wasn’t going to start a conversation about sex with one girl, let alone three. Finally Clyde spoke.

  “We were talking about, you know, and since you were in the club we figured we’d ask your opinion.” Clyde wasn’t looking at Gloria when he spoke.

  “Well, I figured”—Gloria was looking dead at Clyde—”that since you had three guys up here I’d bring some girls to even things out. And I thought the conversation was going to be about sex, not ‘you know.’”

  “Right!” Sam spoke up. I guess he figured he’d already talked to Gloria about sex so he could do it again. “We were talking about whether or not guys should try to get some.”

  “Some what?” Gloria asked.

  “You know,” Sam answered.

  “What’s all this ‘you know’ stuff? What are you talking about?” That was BB.

  “Why don’t you?” Maria asked. She had a little bit of a Spanish accent.

  “Why don’t we?” Clyde looked up at her.

  “Why don’t you get some from Sam, Clyde?” When Maria said “Clyde” she said it so it rhymed with “reed.”

  “Now what’s that supposed to mean?” Clyde asked. He looked like he was going to get mad, and I got on one of my tough looks. It would have been tougher if I had my hat on.

  “What it means, Clyde Jones,” Gloria said, “is that ‘getting some’ is done with a guy and a girl. So what we should be talking about is whether a guy and a girl should get together and do something. Not if a guy should do it. So when we talk about it, let’s talk about it as a together thing. Because, according to Hygiene 103, at least the way Miss Perlman teaches it, it’s done in two’s.”

  “Okay, then the question is should guys and girls do it?” Clyde said. He started fooling around with his sneaker.

  “I don’t think people should have sex before they’re married,” Maria said. “It’s easy going around having sex but it don’t prove nothing. Then if you get a baby or something, everybody looking at you like you’re dirt. Even girls who’ve had more sex than you look at you like you’re dirt. I had a cousin who got pregnant from just one time and nobody came to her side except her mother, me, and my godfather. That’s all.”

  “Yeah, but you talk about it as if something’s always going to happen,” Sam said. “A lot of people do it and don’t get pregnant.”

  “I’m hip,” said Gloria. “Half the people who have sex don’t get pregnant. The boys.”

  “Gloria, you’ve got an attitude,” Clyde said, “that’s why you can’t discuss it.”

  “She’s supposed to have an attitude,” BB said. “If a girl gets pregnant by some guy she’s the one who has to have it and maybe get on welfare. And
then if the boy marries her he acts like he doing her a favor. She might not even want to get married to him.”

  “Then why she have sex with him if she don’t want to marry him?” Sam asked. I thought that was a pretty good question.

  “Because he might come on with—” BB started but Gloria interrupted.

  “What are you guys talking about? Married sex or unmarried sex? If you’re talking about getting married to somebody, that’s a whole nother conversation. Because what married people do is their business. Because it’s legal and ain’t nobody going to say nothing about it. What you guys are talking about is sex when you’re not married. Now that we got that straight you can go on, BB.”

  “Right,” BB said. “You talking about getting some but you’re not talking about what you’re going to do if somebody gets pregnant or if they catch V. D.”

  “Okay, now we got your opinion,” Clyde said. “You don’t think that people should do it before they’re married.”

  “That’s what I think,” said Maria.

  “I think Maria’s right,” said BB.

  “I really don’t know.” Gloria took the very last cookie just when I started to reach for it. She gave me a little smile. “Maybe it’s right and maybe it’s wrong but the way I feel, it’s too important to be just doing without thinking about. You got a reason to do it, Sam?”

  “Well, you know, I’m a man and it’s natural that I’d want to. You know?”

  “No, Sam, I don’t know. Because if it’s natural for you to do it because you’re a man and it’s not natural for me then who are you going to do it with? It’s natural for me, too, but not just to take lightly. I guess if I really dug somebody I’d think about it. But I’d think about it real hard. And I hope that if a guy wants me to be with him in sex he’ll find me important enough to think about it real hard. That’s just the way I feel.”

  “I figure that if a guy can’t make it with me because I don’t go to bed with him, then he loves that more than he loves me, anyway,” Maria said.