13

by Jason Robert Brown

  So I walked all the way home—twenty blocks, a whole mile. I pushed open the door a half an hour or so later.

  “Hey, Dad!” I called. “I’m home early!”

  He had said that he would be waiting, but the apartment was strangely quiet. I flopped down on the living room sofa and turned on the television. I had never felt more alone in my life.

  I heard the bedroom door creak open. Out came Dad wearing a white robe—one that Mom had gotten him for Hanukkah three years earlier.

  “Hey, buddy,” he said.

  I didn’t have to wonder why he was in a bathrobe. Angelina called from the bedroom.

  “Hey, sweetie? Is it Evan?”

  Dad looked at me with the same sheepish expression that had been on his face the day he told me that he and Mom were divorcing. Angelina came strutting into the room, wearing nothing but one of Dad’s long dress shirts.

  I stared at the TV and counted the seconds until I could get back on the plane to Indiana.

  13

  “BE A MAN,” Rabbi Weiner had said.

  I sat on the plane home from New York and tried to figure out what that meant. If there was some kind of test, I figured I was scoring in the negative numbers.

  All right, I thought, to be a man must mean that I’m supposed to take responsibility for who I am and what I do. An image flashed through my mind, and once it did, it remained imprinted there like the light from a camera flash: Patrice.

  Archie’s mom opened the door with her phone tucked under her ear.

  “Oh, you must be Evan.”

  I had never met the lady before, so it was strange that she knew my name. What had Archie told her about me? That I was the selfish loser from New York who moved in across the street?

  “Archie will be so happy to see you,” she went on. “Come on in.”

  I wondered if I was the only person other than Patrice to visit.

  “Sure,” I said. “Thanks.”

  Inside, Archie’s mom pointed down the hall to his room. She then returned to the kitchen, leaving me to take in the living room by myself, which, I have to admit, seriously weirded me out. That’s because everything in Archie’s house was designed so that he could reach it. The bookcases were only five feet tall, and the walls were lined with handrails. Even stranger was the staircase. It had this little electric cart attached to a metal track—presumably so Archie could get up and down.

  I’m not proud to admit it, but for a second I felt like cutting my losses and getting out of there. But like it or not, I needed Archie’s help.

  I heard the sounds of a fierce video game—some sort of gun battle—coming from the direction Archie’s mom had pointed. So I moved cautiously down the hall. Pretty soon I was outside Archie’s room. The gunfire was too loud for Archie to hear me knocking, so I just popped my head in.

  I guess I hadn’t ever really pictured what Archie’s bedroom would look like. But once I saw it, it made perfect sense. For starters, it was absolutely trashed. The floor was littered with dirty clothes, books, CDs, DVDs, at least four different remotes, pens, crayons, comic books, candy wrappers, a box of syringes, a bottle of Pepsi, Cheetos, raisins, and what looked like a half-folded poster of Captain Picard. How he ever maneuvered through all that mess on crutches was a mystery. In the middle of the chaos was a hospital bed, this bulky, adjustable thing with railings on either side that went up and down. Next to it was an oxygen tank, standing there like a giant metal gallows.

  Then there was Archie. Hunched at a desk, eyes riveted to his computer monitor, he was watching two guys battle it out with .22s. The gunfire came fast and furious.

  “Hey,” I said, walking tentatively into the room.

  Without turning around, Archie muttered, “And so he returns.”

  I sighed. “Look, I need to talk to you.”

  To that, Archie snorted and clicked his mouse. The room was instantly filled with insanely loud music. I think Archie intended it to be threatening, but unfortunately he had clicked Anne Murray’s Christmas album.

  “Archie, please!” I shouted. I think the song was “Away in a Manger.” “We’ve got to talk!”

  He just sat there, staring furiously at his computer screen, banging on the arrow keys and shooting.

  “Archie!”

  Nothing.

  I looked around and saw the plug for the computer, snaking under the desk to the outlet in the wall. I picked it up and gave it a sharp yank.

  Silence.

  Archie still didn’t move. I perched myself on one of the few trash-free spots on his bed.

  “All right,” I said. “I know you’re mad at me about the movie. I’m sorry I didn’t have your back. I’m sorry I let you down.”

  Silence.

  I went on: “But you weren’t fair to me either, you know? Showing up at the movie like that, blaming me when I had done exactly what you asked me to do. We both were jerks. Now I’m saying I’m sorry. And I mean it.”

  More silence.

  Should I have expected anything different?

  “God, Archie! Don’t you have anything to say?”

  Suddenly he swiveled around in his chair.

  “Okay, I agree,” he said quietly. “We were both jerks. But I will continue to maintain that you were a bigger jerk than I was. If you can acknowledge that, I’ll apologize.”

  I couldn’t believe it. Me? A bigger jerk than him? It was insanity! But this was no time to get into a fight over something that idiotic.

  “Fine,” I said. “I was a bigger jerk than you.”

  Archie became so animated, I thought he was going to launch out of his seat. “Aha!” he cried. “So you agree! You were a bigger jerk, but I am a bigger man, and I can admit when I was wrong! So I’m SORRY, Evan Goldman, I’m SORRY I was a jerk, even if I was less of a jerk than you!”

  With that, Archie thrust his hand forward and smiled. I half wanted to punch him. But who could stay mad at that goofy frog face? So I laughed and shook his hand. It seemed stupid not to.

  “Okay, I’m sorry, too,” I said.

  To my surprise, it seemed like we both actually meant it. To tell the truth, I never really expected to make it that far. So I pushed forward before the whole thing blew up in my face.

  “Now I need something from you,” I said.

  “I know already,” he proclaimed. “You’re moving back to New York and you want me to look in on your mom.”

  I shook my head. “Nope. Not moving back to New York.”

  Archie raised his eyebrows. “What?”

  I sighed. “I don’t seem to belong there anymore.”

  He seemed genuinely surprised. “But why not?”

  “It’s a long story,” I said quickly. “Listen, you said you could get Patrice to be my friend again. Remember?”

  Archie nodded. “True. But that was before the movie. I’m a genius, but not a miracle worker.”

  “Can’t you try?” I asked. “It’s important.”

  A pause. An impish grin. “I assume that this has to do with your bar mitzvah?” he said. “With becoming a man. Owning up to all the vile and rotten things you’ve done wrong.”

  Suddenly Archie sounded surprisingly like Rabbi Weiner.

  I sighed. “Sort of….”

  Archie slapped his desk with an open palm. “I knew it! Well, if it’s that important to you, I think I can make this happen!”

  Shivers ran up my leg.

  “You can?”

  Archie rolled his chair right up to the bed and then, with great effort, hoisted himself out of the chair to sit next to me. “There has been a great disturbance in the Force.”

  My head was spinning. “Archie, please speak English.”

  “Something happened while you were gone that was not supposed to happen.” Archie smiled. “Something that you need to fix.”

  By that point I was desperate. “Listen. I just got off a long flight from a miserable weekend and I’m not into the head games right now! Please just tell me what you�
�re talking about!”

  Archie’s smile broadened into a colossal grin. “Listen closely! The love guru will speak!”

  I never found out exactly how Archie knew everything he told me. But by that point I had learned not to ask. Archie had this way of lurking around and soaking up information. In any case, what follows is a semisummary of what he said that afternoon. See, while I was in New York, an event even bigger than Aaron Siegel’s bar mitzvah was taking place in Appleton. The Quayle Quails were playing their archrivals, the Edgewood Thunderhawks. It was a football battle royal, featuring Brett as our knight in shining armor.

  But what everyone in Appleton knew, before the game even started, was that the knight in shining armor was a little tarnished.

  It all went back to The Bloodmaster. Turned out that little horror movie spawned a series of disasters with some far-ranging effects. Once everyone’s parents found out about the R rating (not to mention all the individual lies it had taken to get out of the house), the punishments were pretty severe. Kendra’s parents took away her cell phone, her computer, and her television for a whole week. Fudge and Eddie were forced to spend every day for a month going to church after football practice to clean out the sacristy. And Brett’s parents took away his weight room privileges and his iPod, and signed him up for after-dinner tutoring.

  Only Lucy got off scot-free. Either her parents never found out or they just didn’t care. But whatever the reason, she took advantage of her relative freedom to make sure that Brett and Kendra never made up. All week long she came to cheerleading practice full of reports to Kendra about the great conversations she and Brett were having on the phone and the fabulous chats they were having online. At the same time, she made sure to remind Brett that Kendra was over him and had called him a dumb jock. Every time she said it, Brett got madder and sadder.

  That’s where things stood on the morning of the big game. Brett was angry at Kendra, and she was mad right back. And Lucy? She was just biding her time, ready to grab Brett for herself.

  As Archie put it: “Two tongues were destined to meet. But whose?”

  At the start of the game, Brett was in great form, channeling all his anger and rage into crushing the Thunderhawks. At the half the Quails were ahead 28–0. The crowd was going wild.

  Throughout, Kendra was dying a slow and miserable death. But being head cheerleader wasn’t just a job to her, it was a sacred duty. So she jumped, yelled, and cheered like always. She even wowed the crowd with a standing backflip. Only as the clock ticked down on the second quarter did she and Brett meet eyes. Hearts broken, they stared across the field until Kendra broke down and ran under the stands.

  Then the whistle blew. Halftime.

  “Okay, dude, listen,” Fudge said to Brett in the locker room. “Just go talk to her. I bet she’ll just give you a big ol’ kiss and be so glad you’re back.”

  Brett shook his head. “No, man, she thinks I’m just a dumb jock. She’s over me.”

  “She’s not!” Eddie said. “Have you seen her out there? Every time you turn in her direction, she bounces twice as high and screams twice as loud. She’s nuts for you.”

  Brett blinked. “You think she still wants to be my girlfriend?”

  Eddie gave Brett a playful punch on the shoulder. “Every girl in this stadium wants to be your girlfriend. Even Fudge’s mother. If you want Kendra, go get her!”

  With that, Brett strode out of the locker room to find his beloved.

  (Again, since Archie is the one who told me this, some of the dialogue may sound a little weird. For all I know, Archie made the whole thing up. But since the end result is the same, I’m just going to pass it on and hope for the best.)

  Meanwhile, Lucy was under the stands, consoling Kendra.

  “I could see it his eyes,” Kendra said. “He still wants me, I know he does. Why won’t he talk to me?”

  Lucy was all over that. “Why should he talk to you? You yelled at him about the movie, and you haven’t called him all week to apologize!”

  “How could I?” Kendra said. “My parents haven’t let me near the phone!”

  Lucy shrugged. “Sucky timing. But Brett told me yesterday that he’s going to find a girl who doesn’t treat him like he’s stupid.”

  With that, Kendra started to really cry.

  “It’s okay,” Lucy said consolingly. “Fudge is still available!”

  Just then the crowd cheered. When Lucy popped her head out from the stands, she saw Brett walking right toward her—toward Kendra! Acting quickly, Lucy ran out to meet Brett on the field.

  “Don’t go under there!” she called.

  Brett stopped abruptly. “Why? What is it?”

  “Kendra,” Lucy stammered. “You don’t want to see it. She just ripped up a jersey with your number on it!”

  Brett blinked. “She ripped up number 48?”

  Lucy nodded. “And she keeps repeating that she can’t understand how she ever liked such a dumb jock.”

  Brett turned red. “I’m not dumb!”

  “Of course you’re not, Brett! But hey, she’s only trying to show off for her new boyfriend.”

  Brett’s head virtually spun around in a full circle. His bottom lip quivered. “New boyfriend? What?”

  “Him!” Lucy said and pointed to the defensive tackle on the Thunderhawks, a huge kid who was, at that moment, in the middle of doing five hundred push-ups.

  “A Thunderhawk?”

  “I’m sorry, Brett.”

  Brett was too full of emotion to speak. He wandered back to the locker room in a daze. Crisis averted, Lucy went back to Kendra to get her ready for the second half.

  In the second half, Brett was such a mess that he could barely play the game at all. He threw three interceptions and fumbled twice. At one point he dropped back to pass, fell to the ground, and began weeping. Fudge and Eddie did all they could to pull him back together, but before anyone could get him under control, the Thunderhawks had pushed ahead. With a minute and a half left, the score was 31–28.

  The Quails had one final chance. But with the ball on the fifty-yard line, Brett threw a pass ten feet over Fudge’s head. Wincing in pain, he lay down on the field and yelled something.

  Everyone strained to hear what he had said. Was it: Fun? Run?

  What did he say?

  The next play, Brett was sacked. And as he lay there, immobile, he shouted it again. This time, it was clear.

  Brett had yelled “Tongue!”

  “He yelled it with a heart that was cleft in two,” Archie told me. “He yelled it as a symbol of every missed opportunity, every defeat, every failure the world had ever known.”

  “Tongue!” Brett yelled, and now the crowd understood.

  One man whose wife had just left him yelled back: “Tongue!”

  A woman whose daughter had just run off with a mechanic cried out: “Tongue!”

  The Rasmussen twins, who had both dropped their ice cream cones, screamed in unison: “TONGUE!”

  Gradually the crowd joined in, one by one, their cry of misery and relief growing in pitch and volume, until the bleachers were full of people on their feet screaming, chanting, and barking “Tongue! Tongue! Tongue!”

  Lining up for third down, the Thunderhawks watched in amazement as the crowd went collectively insane.

  Then Fudge noticed something. Something about Brett. He was reveling in the crowd’s response! Feeding off it! Every “tongue” seemed to restore some part of his lost soul. So Fudge began yelling it, too. And soon enough the rest of the Quails picked up the chant.

  Lucy’s moment had arrived. She strode onto the field, moving quickly past the ref and the Thunderhawks, right to Brett. Then before anyone could stop her, she lifted off Brett’s helmet and touched his cheek. That’s when Kendra screamed, but by that point the crowd had caught on and was chanting with the power of a million suns: “TONGUE! TONGUE! TONGUE!”

  Lucy put her hands behind Brett’s head, leaned in, and kissed him.

&
nbsp; With tongue.

  Lots of tongue.

  The crowd began cheering, stomping their feet, jumping up and down with excitement.

  Lucy withdrew her tongue and walked backward off the field, staring at Brett the whole time. And Brett stared back, hormones churning like mad.

  Then the ref blew his whistle.

  The Quails lined up at the line of scrimmage. Brett surveyed the field, looking to the Thunderhawk goal line, then narrowed his eyes.

  “Hut, hut, hike!”

  Snap.

  Handoff.

  Fake to the fullback.

  Quarterback sneak!

  Fifty yards for a touchdown!

  The game was over. Lucy was in Brett’s arms holding the game ball. Kendra was destroyed.

  By the time Archie finished telling me all this (complete with impersonations of everyone involved and a surprisingly athletic attempt to show me the plays), I was standing by the window in utter shock.

  “Don’t you see?” He was sort of winded, to tell the truth. “Now you have to get Kendra and Brett back together!”

  My eyes widened. “How can I do that?”

  “Oh, it’s not so hard. Look, everyone hates Lucy, everyone loves Kendra. Brett’s not stupid, he’s just blinded by lust. You just have to make him see that he’s picked the wrong girl.”

  Blinded by lust? “Archie, I can’t even get to Brett. After the movie, he’s pretty much sworn me off.”

  Archie twinkled. No, really, I swear he did. His whole being took on a weird glow like he was suddenly plugged into an outlet or something. “I know where you can find him. And it’ll solve both your problems at once.”

  He was going too fast for me, as always.

  “Both my problems?” I stammered.

  Archie nodded. “Remember I told you that Brett’s punishment for The Bloodmaster was getting extra tutoring?”

  “Yeah?” I said.

  Archie gave me a quick push.

  “It’s with Patrice.”

  And he pointed out his bedroom window toward her house. There in the yard was Brett’s bike.