Extreme Elvin

by Chris Lynch

  Anyhoo. I just wanted to chill out, which I could do in my still-sweaty fine duds, with a quick quart of Haagen-Dazs in my lap, and she had to bring up my old affliction, which seems to jump out magically when anybody mentions it, like a lion through a flaming hoop.

  A flaming, flaming, vicious red crackling flaming hoop.

  “And what’s with the gloves?” she pressed.

  See, she drinks herbal tea, while I eat ice cream. That’s why she’s the way she is. How can you reason with such a person?

  “I’m cold, okay.”

  She sipped. “I see. You’re cold. That’s why you’re sitting on one cheek, in wet clothes, with a carton of ice cream in your lap, with my white gloves on.”

  There aren’t a million and a half responses to a question like that.

  “You got it, sister,” I said.

  The sister reference made me flinch. Whole new dimension to that now. Can’t call the mother sister anymore. Tough enough to get used to dancing with the sisters.

  “I think it’s a great idea that you have a sister school,” she said.

  Just can’t let it go, can ya lady.

  She waited. I wasn’t giving.

  “Oh please. Come on, Elvin. Don’t make me beg. I can tell by the way you’ve been slithering around that something happened. It’s a girl, right? Isn’t it a girl? Oh Lester, he’s gotten himself a girl. I can come join you now. I can let go....”

  You remember Lester, my dead father?

  “Ya, wiseguy?” I said, standing to tower over her ominously. “You think this is funny? You want to go join Lester? I’ll give you something to join Lester about.”

  Ya? So? I hate it when I do this. I can’t shock this woman. And even if I do, she’d probably just top me, send me scurrying to my room red-faced, covering my ears and humming “If I Could Talk to the Animals” real loud.

  No more. I was a man now. Time for a wake-up call for the old lady.

  I pointed a white-gloved finger at her. “She gave me a sexually transmitted venereal disease, how do you like that?”

  Where the hell...? I was already humming and covering my ears when I realized the words had come out of me.

  Right off the chair. I’m not kidding. She fell right off the chair.

  “Get back up in the chair, Ma. I want to do that again.”

  It wasn’t a real fall or anything, just something she does when she wants to express big-time dramatic surprise. When I grew my mustache, she fell on the floor. She couldn’t actually see the mustache, but she took my word for it and bang she went.

  I liked the way that felt. Manly.

  The second thing she does, when it really is serious, is she goes to the phone and calls Mikie’s mother to see if I’m lying.

  See, there she goes now.

  “What?” I said, just like I always say. “You don’t believe your own son? You have to ask some strangers about me?”

  She went on dialing as if I wasn’t there. Mikie, the rat, is incapable of lying, and the whole world counts on that.

  “What’s the big deal, anyway?” I asked, kicking back again with my ice cream, with my dogs right up on the table now.

  Sex makes a guy this way. It’s all true.

  “I thought you’d be proud of me,” I said, sounding very disappointed in her.

  “... And please, call me as soon as you get in, okay? I’m getting nowhere over here.”

  “Try Frankie’s house now, why don’tcha,” I said. Boldness like you read about. Fear, virility, satisfaction, achievement, stabbing rectal pain, all combining to cause wild personality disorder. I was losing it more by the minute. Thrilling, actually.

  It was Ma’s turn to do some sharp finger-pointing. “Ya, Frankie. Don’t think this whole situation doesn’t reek of that walking gland.”

  What I wouldn’t give, to be known as the walking gland...

  The phone rang.

  “Now you’ll see,” I said. “And I want it known that Frankie had nothing to do with this. I contracted my VD all on my own, no help from anybody.”

  She picked up. “Ya ya. Ya ya ya ya. No! Yes? Oh my god. Disgusting. No, he’s proud. Well what else can I do? I’m going to boil him, of course.”

  She glared at me.

  Gulp.

  She hung up and marched toward me. “That is not a venereal disease, Bishop.”

  “Hey, now, calling me by my last name, now that’s depersonalizing.”

  “This is no joke, Elvin. I want you to take this seriously.”

  “I am taking it seriously. This is a high-prestige disease I got here. I’m the first one in my class to catch something from a girl. Come on, Ma. Let’s go out to dinner.”

  “No. Take off those gloves and show me your hands.”

  I leaned back in my chair, tossed the ice cream carton onto the table, and tucked my gloved hands up under my armpits. “I see,” I said coolly. “Jealous?”

  She gritted her teeth, and started counting to ten out loud. But it was all for show. My ma has no temper at all.

  “Come on, lady, you can’t go on living your life through me. You are going to have to get on with your own existence. You can keep all the framed pictures of me, keep my swing set up in the yard if you need to, play the tapes I made you... but really, it’s empty-nest time for you, babe. You can’t compete with other girls for me anymore...”

  “That’s it,” she said, miming the act of washing her hands, then shaking them to dry. “It’s therapy for you, little boy. And I’m not changing my mind this time.”

  My cool flew right out the window. Even the VD didn’t make me braver. It’s not that I don’t think, maybe, there might be some stuff in my head that should be looked at. I just don’t want to look at it, thanks. I bolted from the chair, ran up the stairs, and barricaded myself into my room.

  Just like every time she mentions the T word. When she finally does decide to get me repaired, they’re going to have to send a SWAT team of shrinks to come in and get me out.

  “Is she really going to do it?” Mikie asked, very concerned. “’Cause I’d pay to sit in on that.” Okay, maybe not very concerned.

  But I should explain the mystery of Mikie. You may think, What does Mikie get out of this relationship, in exchange for wisdom, understanding, support and all that other ultracool stuff he does for me?

  Well, I provide laughs. You have to admit that.

  But there’s something more. It’s like the old “What do you give the person who has everything?”

  Needy. I provide needy. Honest, it’s like the thing I can do better than anyone, and that Mike can’t do at all. So he gets that from me. I can feel it, that when I am in need there is something almost happy that happens to him. And when I’m not... well that situation is rare enough that I suspect neither of us knows quite how to act.

  So really he doesn’t worry when Ma starts talking about shrinking my head. He knows that’s where he comes in.

  “Every time I start getting manly,” I said, “she threatens to call in the mental health authorities.”

  We were headed for CVS. I had a note in my pocket for some kind of scabies ointment the doctor turned her on to over the phone.

  “Does it itch?” Mike asked.

  I thought about it. The way you do when you figure you’re supposed to be feeling some kind of sensation but you’re not, so you try to drum it up. I even scratched the back of my hand a couple of times.

  “No, actually. But I’m hoping to soon enough. By the time Monday comes, everybody’ll have forgotten my triumph if I don’t have the evidence.”

  “Triumph,” he repeated, shaking his head in disbelief. “El, maybe you don’t want to keep fighting the therapy idea... most people would see scabies as a kind of negative experience.”

  “Scoff if you will.”

  “I will.”

  We walked a couple blocks silently before he picked it up again.

  “Do you know what scabies even are?”

  “Of course I d
o. You’re not the only guy in the world who knows anything, Mike. Sheesh.”

  He waited. The rat always knows when I’m bluffing.

  “Ya?” he prompted.

  “It’s... like an allergy. Makes your hands itch. Hives, like.”

  “Bugs, like,” he said.

  “Get outta town, ya ghoul.”

  “I’m serious, Elvin. Scabies are disgusting creepy little insects that burrow under your skin and lay eggs there. Then their babies are born—inside you—and the babies dig all kinds of tunnels under there for like weeks and weeks.”

  I was stopped right there on the sidewalk. My hands were straight out from my sides to keep them away from the healthier parts of me. “Oh my god,” I gasped. “It sounded so cute. Scabies. Scabies. Come here, little scabies. Hey wanna pet my scabie?”

  “Ya, really cute. And it’s the most infectious thing in the world, and it can go on forever spreading from one part of your body to another if you don’t get it wiped out properly. Now for the big question.”

  It took him an hour and a half to ask me the big question.

  “Elvin, in the time since you spent time with this girl... have your hands been socializing with any other parts of your body?”

  I did not dignify that question with a verbal response.

  Not for several seconds anyway.

  “Oh my god!” Nononononononononononononono-noooo! It’s so unfair. It’s never even been out anyplace. Noooooo!”

  “Oh Jesus Elvin don’t start that. Crying isn’t going to help.”

  “I am not crying,” I insisted as I started jogging, trotting, running, in the direction of CVS.

  He caught up. “No? If you’re not crying what are those running down your face?”

  “Bugs, probably,” I answered, speeding up.

  Mikie caught up quickly, grabbed me and stopped me.

  And took my hand.

  He grabbed hold of my pus-filled, insect-riddled, corroding hand and pulled me to a stop.

  “What are you, nuts? Is this going to be one of those suicide pacts where you want to decay along with me?”

  “You don’t got scabies, man,” he said sadly.

  “What? I do so. See, I knew this was going to happen. Everybody’s going to wake up and say it was all a dream. No foxy girl held fat Bishop’s hand. Well no way—”

  “She didn’t have scabies. She had psoriasis.”

  I stared at him dubiously.

  “June told Frankie. It was just a joke.”

  It was just a joke.

  It was just a joke.

  “It was a sucky joke, Mike.”

  He sighed. “It was, El.”

  I went back to walking. “What part did you like best?” I asked, steaming. “The part where I thought the girl liked me? Was that the best part, Mike? Or was it the part where I was ready to peel my own skin off when I realized what I had?”

  I did not remember ever scolding Mike before, ever. It was weird, like I was getting angry at a part of myself—like I was one of those people who injure themselves on purpose.

  “Never mind,” I said. “Forget it anyway.”

  “Well,” he said, “no, we shouldn’t probably. You might, y’know, maybe have a point.”

  No, really, I did not want this. I was so off-balance, hearing Mike stumble and apologize. I’d rather be wrong. I’d rather have him back the way he was. I needed him back the way he usually was.

  Oh. Just like he needed me?

  “She really did like you, El,” he said, reading my thoughts for the hundred millionth time. “The joke was bad, but I think really, she did like you anyway. You were doing great at the dance. Better than I ever would have thought...” His voice trailed down and away there.

  “And we don’t need to go to CVS anymore,” I said, staring at the CVS dead ahead.

  “Yes we do,” he said, looking me up and down as we walked.

  Which caused me to look myself up and down as we walked. I was now traveling with a nearly completely sideways gait. Like a football drill where the coach makes everybody follow his hand like dummies, left right back left right, cut this way, cut back.

  I was once a football player, have I mentioned that?

  “Your problem is out of control, friend,” Mike correctly said. “I think as long as we came this far, we should really get you fixed up. Can’t stand to see you like this, man.”

  I punched him hard on the arm. As long as I was facing that way. “Well, you didn’t help it any. Scaring me with all that scabies bug crap, when you knew I didn’t even have it—”

  “Cut it out already, El. I feel bad about that.”

  “Ya? Well not bad enough. So now I’m like, full, like I got a complete grapevine growing out of my ass. I am redefining Fruit of the Loom. Maybe I could get a sponsorship deal... stop laughing at me... so, no, feeling bad is not good enough.”

  “I know it’s not good enough. But CVS must have something for, er, people like you.”

  And there we were. People like me. I didn’t just have a condition now, I had joined a community. Frankie was right. These things really did happen only to certain kinds of people. And it was looking more and more like I was simply one of them.

  I was fourteen years old, and I figured by now I had experienced everything there is, except, of course, the one or two really big ones, but what was to come at CVS was a trip I’d never figured on taking.

  “So, how do we do this?” I asked as we walked tentatively into the superstore of medicine and hygiene. We at least knew enough to keep moving. Perpetual motion is the way not to look suspicious when you feel guilty for not doing anything. Once you stop and stare, the security cameras all train on you, the shoplifting beepers start screeching, the Simon and Garfunkel tape stops humming over the PA, interrupted by the manager’s voice bellowing your name over and over for everybody to hear, and the girl behind the counter starts dialing up your mother.

  They think you’re looking for condoms.

  I went right to browsing the endless magazine and paperback aisle. They had about two million titles, divided into categories. Women’s magazines, men’s magazines, teen, fashion, sports... paperback best-sellers, romance, John Grisham.

  “Everything in the store falls into a category,” Mike said. “There’s a category for you too. We just have to find it.”

  I stopped flipping through Travel & Leisure. “Well sure, let’s just look for the Ass aisle.”

  “Or you could ask someone.”

  I tossed the magazine in disgust. “I will not. Gimme a break here, will you? I’m embarrassed enough that you even know. I’m not asking any stranger for help.”

  “Then do your funny walk around the store a couple of times and let them figure it out for themselves. They are professionals. They’ll get it.”

  See that? That is the problem. Mike was just playing, and in fact I wished I had said that line. But instead of laughing, I just got worse. It was stupid, really, and entirely my own fault, but I could not get past this. These people had seen it all, and probably nobody cared what my problem was any more than they cared about the lady with the wart on her finger or the guy with the tickly cough. So it shouldn’t have mattered.

  But of course it did. This was just one of life’s little jokes, a problem that for no good reason is funnier than other problems. And I like a joke as much as the next person—more than the next person, unless the next person is my mother—but there is a large difference between making a joke and being one.

  I walked up and down and up and down the aisles without picking up one item that might help relieve my distress. I couldn’t even bring myself to give it an honest effort. I grabbed a tin of Band-Aids from aisle five, which would hardly be the best solution; a box of Kleenex from six, for all the crying I’d likely do if I didn’t get real help; some cold medicine; and a shower cap.

  All the time, I must have been doing The Walk. Because as I stood reading all the ingredients in Tylenol Flu Formula, a large red-fac
ed obese man in a baseball cap and farmer jeans crept up on me with a sad smile and a familiar ridiculous sidestep.

  I was afraid. I stood frozen.

  “Aisle one, friend,” was all the kind stranger said before padding away.

  My god, there it was. My community.

  Mikie, you ask? My good and lifelong friend? Trailing behind me, keeping just enough distance to allow me to maneuver in relative privacy, but close enough to rush in and help if I got in over my head with the hemorrhoid crowd.

  But things got serious when we went to dark and mysterious aisle one. There was no fun in aisle one. Sad faces, puffy faces. I was the only shopper in the region without a hat. We all pretended we were there for something else—sure, grab some Pepto, or have yourself a plantar wart foot pad shaped like a tiny life preserver—but those things were decoys. We knew why we were there.

  I wished they wouldn’t make eye contact.

  When I finally reached my destination, there were three packages that seemed to address my problem. Two of them actually had the words “Burning” and “Itching” written in acid red there on the cover, which I thought was nice of them.

  Some time must have passed, because Mike came up and tried to hurry me through this. “Preparation H, right?” he said, snagging a tube. “Take this. This is the stuff.”

  “Duh!” I said. “Of course I know what it is, I live in America, after all.” I looked at the package and growled at it, rather irrationally, I suppose. “Even the product is too embarrassed to come out and say its own name. Like we’re going to think it’s for headaches, or heartburn, or hair loss, and those things are all okay.”

  Mike tried to bring me back. “So try it, El. It’s on TV so it must be the best one.”

  “‘Fast, temporary relief,’” I whisper-barked, imitating the guy on the commercial. “I’ll say! It was so fast and temporary I didn’t even get the cap screwed back on before—”

  “All right, all right,” he said, waving me down. “We’ll look for something else.”

  Quickly, speed-reading like a brainiac, I whipped through the product descriptions and instructions on the back of another box. I shoved another into Mikie’s hands for him to do the same. It would have gone a lot quicker if the two of us hadn’t kept looking over our shoulders as if it was the nudie magazines we were sweating and panting over.