Adventures of Homer Fink

by Sidney Offit

  I didn’t exactly follow that, but Homer did. He dropped his head and folded his hands in his lap. The applesauce was dripping on his jacket and I wished he would mop it up.

  “Richard is right, Mrs. Sanders,” Homer continued. “And that’s why I’m more determined than ever to become emperor of the school. An emperor can do great good.”

  “There you go again,” I said. “Look, you’re not Pericles or Caesar and if you start that stuff it’s just the disconnected microphone all over again.”

  “Pericles was never crowned,” said Homer.

  “Who cares?” Pete was rushing across the room. I caught him under the arms.

  “If you boys are going to take Pete out, you’d best leave now,” said my mother. “He gets colds so easily when he’s overheated.”

  Homer Fink stood and my mother handed him a napkin. He wiped the applesauce from his face. “I wanted to tell them about life, Mrs. Sanders—that shiny, elusive element. I wanted to say we are wasting our education because we are not feeling and seeing and experiencing the rush of youth, because our hearts do not leap up.”

  “Of course, Homer,” said my mother. To me she added, “Peter’s stroller is under the front steps.”

  “That’s why I want to run for the presidency of the school,” Homer told my mother. “It’s essential that we speak now. We have to let people know that we care, that we feel, that we stand triumphantly for life.”

  “Of course.” The twins were beginning to cry for more applesauce and my mother began to feed them. “You are perfectly right, Homer.”

  I had Pete on my shoulder and he was calling, “Omni—.”

  “History teaches the lessons, provides the rules and standards for achieving power,” Homer went on. “And it is time the philosophers of the world were heard.”

  “Homer, would you mind handing me that napkin by the sink?” asked my mother.

  “I call on Zeus, Jupiter—all the gods of Greece and Rome. The world has desperate need of them and they will help me,” declared Homer Fink.

  “I always regretted that I didn’t study Greek and Latin,” said my mother. “Did Richard tell you I was an English major at Goucher?”

  I started to the door with Pete. I called over my shoulder, “Say, Ma, did you know Homer never went to Sunday School?”

  My mother was on her way to get a washcloth to clean up the twins. “Don’t keep Pete out too long,” she called to me. “That’s very interesting, Homer. Good luck in the election.”

  Pete settled down the second he saw the stroller. He smiled and said, “Me go. Me go.”

  “You sure do, Pete,” I said and I tilted the stroller back on its rear wheels, and that made my brother scream with joy.

  We cut across Lake Drive and waited for the traffic to slow down before crossing to the reservoir.

  Homer Fink was by my side as we raced against the next flow of traffic.

  “Ah, Autumn,” said Homer. “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness.”

  “Open your eyes before you get a bumper wrapped around you,” I told him.

  “That’s Keats,” said Homer Fink.

  We started around the gravel roadway of the reservoir and headed for the tennis courts beyond which were the open fields and the rolling hills of Druid Hill Park.

  “You sure snow my mother, Homer,” I said. “It’s too bad the parents don’t vote in our school elections.”

  “Will you be my campaign manager, Richard?” he asked again. “I need you.”

  Pete’s face was flushed a rosy pink and he was bouncing up and down in the stroller. His voice was softer and less confident, but he was saying, “Omni—Omni—Omni—.”

  “If you teach my brother Latin,” I told Homer Fink. “I don’t think I could take this for the rest of my life.”

  Homer jumped with joy. He really jumped and tried to click his heels together. It attracted my attention to his shoelaces.

  “The Latin alphabet has no j or w,” he said to Pete. And I said, “Hold the stroller, Homer. I’ll tie your shoes.”

  8

  We raced the stroller down the hill across the lawn and started past the tennis courts. The only people on the courts were an older man in long white ducks and white sweater instructing a blond-haired girl who looked our age. I pushed Pete’s carriage near and heard the man say, “Eye on the ball. Bring the racket back. Follow through.” Homer Fink pressed his face against the metal screen enclosing the court.

  “Let’s listen,” he urged me. “It’s a lesson.”

  “You’ll never learn tennis that way, Homer,” I said. “You have to play.”

  “I’ll master the principles,” said Homer.

  Pete was popping up and down in the stroller and I had to hold fast to keep it balanced. I decided to unhook him and let him roam.

  Homer watched the man in white and his student. He bit his lower lip and screwed up his face. Then he took a step back from the screen and tried to imitate the teacher’s movements. I play tennis sometimes with my father and I could see right off Homer was standing wrong. He looked more as if he were playing Ping-pong.

  “Stand sideways to the net,” I told Homer, “and keep your feet apart.”

  “Shhhh,” said Homer Fink. “I’m studying.”

  Watching a tennis lesson wasn’t my idea of how to spend an afternoon, but the blonde girl was interesting. She had good form. She pulled her racket back and kept her wrist firm, but when she hit the ball it often went beyond the backcourt line.

  “Good. Fine. Racket back. Eye on the ball. Follow through,” the instructor repeated.

  The bag of tennis balls was finally empty and the instructor and the blonde girl started to collect them. They had help. Pete managed to find the entrance to the court and he was chasing tennis balls before I could stop him. He picked one up and threw it in the direction of Homer calling, “Omni—Omni—.”

  I dashed after Pete to carry him from the court. Homer was delighted. He kept urging Pete on in Latin.

  When I caught Pete I made him give the ball back. “I’m sorry,” I told the girl. “I mean we wouldn’t want to take time from your lesson which you are probably paying for.”

  “That’s all right,” she answered. “Milt is my cousin. He only gives me lessons in the fall when he’s not too busy.” She put her racket down and found an old tennis ball for Pete. By this time Homer Fink had joined us on the court. I saw him on the other side of the net introducing himself to the tennis pro.

  I stood there with the blonde girl and thought of how pretty she was, but I couldn’t think of anything to say.

  “If you’d like to hit a few, you can borrow my racket,” the girl called to Homer.

  Homer asked the pro if that was all right with him. The pro checked his watch and agreed and Homer Fink dashed to our side of the net. It was all he could do to keep from tripping over his overcoat.

  The girl handed Homer her racket and Homer bowed and said, “Homer Fink, your servant, ma’am.”

  “I’m Katrinka Nonningham,” she answered. “How do you do, Homer Fink.”

  “I do as the gods command and as the spirit moves me,” was Homer’s reply and he bowed again.

  It seemed to me Homer was overdoing it. But Katrinka Nonningham smiled and she didn’t look like the kind of girl who smiled often. Her skin was tan as though she had been playing tennis or riding around on sailboats. She didn’t wear make-up or lipstick and her long blond hair was tied in the back with a polka-dot ribbon. I was sure she would take the ribbon off the minute she stopped playing tennis. It was Katrinka Nonningham’s eyes that made me think she didn’t smile a lot. They were blue but very serious. She looked directly at you as if she were waiting to hear you say something important and sincere and that if it was even the smallest lie she would know. I didn’t think a girl with eyes like Katrinka Nonningham’s would smile for Homer Fink.

  I held Homer’s coat while he tried to hit the ball back to the pro. Homer rarely came close but that didn�
��t discourage him. Homer approached each rally as if he were an Australian Davis Cup star ready to put away the final point that would clinch the match.

  Katrinka Nonningham stood quietly and watched. Pete threw the tennis ball and chased after it. He screamed, “Me. Ball. Me. Ball.”

  I was thinking that I really didn’t have much experience with girls. I took Cindy Walsh to a dance once and a couple of times we had dates for movies. Some of the fellows like Brian Spitzer went out with girls all the time. Brian liked to talk about it. He had been dating since he was thirteen and he let us all know he had kissed three girls already and necked with one. I’d thought a lot about kissing girls, but the girls I could talk to I never wanted to kiss and when I was with the girls I wanted to kiss I couldn’t think of anything to say. Homer Fink wasn’t much on the subject. When I mentioned to him that Elaine Steigmar was really mature for her age, Homer said there was no visual description of Helen of Troy in the Iliad, but when Helen left the gates of Troy, the poet told us the old men wished they were young again.

  I would have liked to say that to Katrinka Nonningham but I didn’t. We watched Homer rally with the pro for about fifteen minutes and neither of us said a single word.

  9

  A Bald-headed man joined the tennis pro and Homer Fink brought Katrinka Nonningham’s racket back to her. We were just standing there watching Pete chase tennis balls. I couldn’t talk or think clearly, but Homer Fink plunged right in, reciting poetry.

  A violet by a mossy stone

  Half hidden from the eye!

  Fair as a star, when only one

  Is shining in the sky.

  Katrinka Nonningham said, “Thank you, Homer Fink.” And she took her racket and put it in the case and wooden frame.

  “We’d better be starting back. I have a lot of homework to do,” I said. It was only four-thirty and at that moment I would have been happy to stay in the park for the rest of my life just looking at Katrinka Nonningham. But that was all I could think of to say.

  “Who are you? Where are you from?” asked Homer. “What gods have conspired to send you to us?”

  Katrinka Nonningham told us she lived on Eutaw Place and went to the Park School. That’s a private school and it seemed right.

  I handed Homer his overcoat and picked up Pete to carry him to the stroller.

  Katrinka Nonningham had on a pink sweater with pearl-colored buttons. It was all she wore over her tennis outfit. I was thinking she must be cold, but she didn’t look as if she were the least uncomfortable.

  “I have it,” Homer exclaimed. “You must be the golden, sweet-smelling Aphrodite who rules the hearts of men.”

  Katrinka Nonningham tightened the screws of her tennis press, and I latched the belts of Pete’s stroller.

  Pete was bouncing up and down in the stroller and calling, “Omni—Omni—.” I guess he wanted to attract Homer’s attention, which was all right with me. The truth is, I wasn’t exactly happy about the way Homer had taken over.

  Katrinka Nonningham faced Homer and looked at him with her unsmiling blue eyes. “I don’t know very much about gods and goddesses. Who is Aphrodite?”

  Homer bounded forward waving his arms and filling the air with his overcoat. “The goddess of love and beauty. The daughter of Zeus and Dione.” Homer went on telling us how Aphrodite rose from the sea. And then he told us about her love for Mars.

  Katrinka Nonningham stood absolutely still and listened. The sun ducked behind a cloud and it seemed a lot cooler to me. I wondered why she wasn’t cold and I thought of asking Homer to lend her his coat.

  “Prescient,” screamed Homer Fink. “I feel positively prescient.” He flung his overcoat into the air. Pete was greatly impressed with the flying overcoat and I had a hard time keeping him from unzipping his snowsuit.

  Katrinka Nonningham said, “What does ‘prescient’ mean? I have never heard that word before.”

  “I don’t believe it. It can’t be true,” said Homer.

  I said, “I don’t know what ‘prescient’ means, Homer. And neither does Pete.”

  Katrinka Nonningham’s voice was calm and quiet but impatient. “Tell us what it means.”

  “It comes from the Latin, praesciens,” Homer replied. “It is a feeling more than anything else—a feeling of great promise for the future.” Homer wasn’t exactly satisfied with that. He thought hard a moment and then he said, “Come, let’s all go up to the hill and look for Pan. Something wonderful is about to happen. I know. I have foresight. I feel prescient. Don’t you feel that way too, Katinka?”

  Her name was Katrinka and Homer had said it wrong, but she didn’t seem to notice. “I’m not sure how I feel. I’m rarely sure of how I feel,” said Katrinka Nonningham. She moved her tennis racket to her shoulder and started from the courts.

  “I have to be going home too,” I said. “Maybe we could look for the shepherd another day.”

  Homer picked up his overcoat and chased after Katrinka Nonningham. “At this moment, at this instant in history, we are within reach of a new era—a rebirth. Over that hill, beyond the field on a bluff overlooking the falls, you can experience a miracle.”

  Katrinka Nonningham tossed her head and the long blond hair fell over her shoulders. I wanted very much to touch her. She looked at me. “Does your friend act this way all the time?” she asked.

  “Homer Fink happens to be just about the smartest kid at P.S. 79,” I told her. “If anybody can see a miracle, it’s Homer.”

  “I would like to see a miracle,” she told us. “Let’s go.”

  I pushed Pete’s stroller and Katrinka Nonningham and Homer walked beside it.

  “I knew it,” Homer explained. “My fortune has changed. The gods have sent me Aphrodite.”

  I told Homer her name again. I was afraid his wild talk might scare Katrinka away. But Homer Fink said, “No. The lady is Aphrodite. One has but to look at her to see that is true. How is your father, Aphrodite? What new disguises and devices has Zeus thought up to escape Hera?”

  Katrinka Nonningham said, “My father’s name is Paul. He lives in San Francisco.”

  “Of course, San Francisco,” said Homer Fink. “Noble, playful Zeus. Did he ever tell you about the time he disguised himself as a white bull to woo Europa?”

  “My father lives in San Francisco because he’s separated from my mother,” Katrinka Nonningham said matter-of-factly.

  “Your mother would be Dione,” said Homer Fink. “Julius Caesar claimed descent from Dione. We could be relatives.” Homer was jubilant. “It could be, Richard. Julius Caesar would be a great help in winning the school election. I am a definite possibility.”

  I was afraid the mention of Caesar would send Peter into the Gallic War again, but my brother was trying to drag his hand along the ground and he wasn’t paying attention to Homer.

  “We could be cousins,” Homer Fink said to Katrinka Nonningham. “I’m eternally indebted to you—you have my everlasting gratitude. How would you like to head up the women’s committee of Julius Caesar’s campaign?”

  “I’ve never been very interested in politics,” Katrinka answered.

  I said, “Katrinka doesn’t go to 79, Homer. She told us before that she’s a student at the Park School.”

  “That is nothing to the point,” said Homer waving his overcoat. (After the tennis rally he made no effort to put it back on.) “We are advocating an idea—a concept that transcends the individual. The important thing is the idea. Your school—your Park School—is just as ripe for revolution as P.S. 79.”

  Katrinka Nonningham lifted her chin and looked off beyond the hill into the distance. “Thank you, but no.”

  I would have bet my life that there wasn’t a chance of Katrinka Nonningham changing her mind.

  But Homer said, “You don’t understand. I haven’t told you the idea yet.”

  We had come to a long stretch of flat ground and off in the distance we could hear the sounds of boys playing football. Katrinka Nonningham�
�s eyes were very clear and there was a flush about the rise of her cheekbones. I was almost ready to believe Homer Fink was right. Katrinka Nonningham could have been a goddess. I had certainly never seen a girl on earth as beautiful. “I don’t like to argue and I would be no help to a revolution,” she said. “You told me we were going to see a miracle. If we’re not, I’m going home right now.”

  I felt as if the sky over Druid Hill Park was black with clouds and the air was still. I was certain we had lost her. But Homer said, “That’s it—that’s the whole point. We are going to see a miracle. The miracle is the reason for the revolution.” Then Homer said, “Follow me.”

  On the way up to the hill Homer told us about the death of Pan. I was pushing Pete’s stroller on the rear wheels to keep his hand from scraping the ground. I heard Homer say, “At the time of the Crucifixion a great cry swept across the ocean. ‘Great Pan is dead.’ There is a poem about it.”

  Earth outgrows the mythic fancies

  Sung beside her in her youth;

  And those debonaire romances

  Sound but dull beside the truth.

  Phoebus’ chariot course is run!

  Look up, poets, to the sun!

  Pan, Pan is dead.

  “Did you write that poem?” Katrinka asked Homer.

  Hardly hearing her question, Homer went on. “It’s ridiculous. A graceful lie,” said Homer Fink. “Great Pan isn’t dead. He’s just been sleeping. Isn’t that right, Richard? Didn’t we see him?”

  “I’d rather you wouldn’t bring me into this,” I said softly.

  “Don’t you believe Homer?” Katrinka Nonningham asked me. “I thought he was your friend.”

  I could see she was very impressed. I guess she thought Homer had made up the poem just like that—one, two, three. She really went for Homer’s poetry.

  I shrugged and said, “Homer’s my friend. We walk to school together every day.”