My Name Is River Blue

by Noah James Adams

  We hadn't said much on our jog to the park. Finally, Ant asked the question that had bugged him since we left Tolley House. "Yo, how come you changed your mind about me coming with you to the park?"

  I leaned forward with both elbows propped on my bare knees and watched a red ant crawl over the toe of my shoe. On most days, I would have knocked the ant off me and used my shoe to crush it, but after working with Ant and Papa that morning, I was in a different mood. For one of the few times in years, I felt none of the usual anger, simmering inside me, waiting to boil over on anyone who gave me an excuse. For the moment, I didn't have any desire to hurt an ant, whether it was the one on my shoe or the one sitting beside me. I wiped sweat from my forehead and answered my roommate without looking at him.

  "What difference does it make?"

  "None, I guess. I just want to know why."

  I kept my eyes on the red ant. "I was an asshole, but you didn't rat me out when you coulda ruined me with Papa and taken all his time for yourself. I was ashamed of what I did to you, so I wanted to make things right. Give you a chance with Papa and maybe a chance for you and me to be...whatever."

  I looked up at Ant Jefferson. He was grinning with big teeth that were brilliantly white. "And a chance for us to be friends?"

  "Yeah or at least partners. Papa said it would be hard to get anywhere by myself, and he's a smart man." I watched the ant circle my ankle. "If nothing changes, you and me are gonna live together, go to school together, and play ball together. We'll be together most of the time. Most of twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week for five years is gonna suck a big one, if we can't get along."

  "Yo, you got that right," agreed Ant. He switched subjects and tossed me a question that caught me off guard. "Were you scared when you left Stockwell?"

  "No." I said it automatically. "Well, maybe a little."

  "I didn't sleep the night before I left," Ant admitted. "It's crazy, but I knew how Stockwell worked. I hated it, but it was home where nobody was any better than I was. I didn't believe I could ever have a white friend, but Gerry and I were family, and I already miss hell out of him. Another thing was I kept thinking how it's gonna be at school. It ain't gonna be easy to be a black kid from Tolley House, but if they find out I was in Stockwell, I'll have to outrun a gang of rednecks every day."

  "No, you won't," I said. "I went to school here for the last two months of seventh grade. If they think you're tight with me, you'll be okay."

  Ant look surprised. "You mean you're popular at school?"

  I rolled my eyes and shook my head at the notion that I could be one of the popular kids. "No, it means no one will mess with you because of my rep."

  Ant caught on quickly. "Yo, gotcha. Just like Stockwell. They're scared of you."

  "But you really don't need my help that way. If you're on the football team, the guys will take care of you. I've played ball with them here, and most of them are white, but they don't care that I'm mixed or that I'm a foster kid. Just show 'em you're gonna play hard for the team, and you're be one of the guys."

  "Yo, can't ask for no better than that. Thanks." Ant visibly relaxed and smiled.

  "No problem." I hesitated but decided I had to say it. "Dude, do yourself a favor."

  "Yo, what is it?"

  "Stop saying 'Yo' so much. It sounds stupid because anybody can tell you're smart. That whole act you do might be cool in Stockwell or back in your hood with your bros, but Papa won't like it. He's already punishing me with pushups and laps for bad grammar and cursing. Just a heads up, okay?"

  "Thanks, River. I don't need Papa thinking I'm silly. I want him to help me."

  I had to stop the ant that was crawling on my thigh and coming dangerously close to running inside the leg of my shorts. I let it crawl onto my hand before I slowly brought it close to the ground, and let it run off my finger.

  I saw Ant's outstretched hand come into my view as I heard his voice. "Friends?"

  I took only a second before I looked up to meet his eyes and clasp his hand.

  That day marked the beginning of a rare friendship. The kind of friendship that most people are never lucky enough to find. Amazingly, for someone with no friends, I found Papa and Ant in the same month. I will always be grateful to them that they didn't walk away from a screwed-up kid who needed them more than he was willing to admit.

  I saw my ant running towards the deeper grass in front of me. It stopped and turned as if taking one last look before it disappeared in a forest of green blades. The ant was lucky that day but not as lucky as I was.

  ***

  After spending almost twenty-four hours a day together for two weeks, Ant and I were so tight that a stranger watching us would have thought that we had been best friends for years. It was common for Ant, who was usually grinning and often laughing, to burst into spontaneous displays of singing, rapping, and dancing. I think I smiled more those first two weeks than I had in all my life prior to meeting him. It was nearly impossible to stay in a bad mood around Ant.

  One of the days when Papa was working with us at the park, he again received a call from an employee and told us to take a break while he conducted his business. When Papa rejoined us, he watched Ant and me laughing as we teased and insulted each other before we progressed to shoving and then wrestling in the grass. As guys our age often did, we found it fun to think of new insults for each other and the more outrageous our remarks, the funnier it was to us.

  That day, when we jumped into Papa's truck for him to drive us back to Tolley House, he went over the training instructions that Coach Riddle and he had written down for us. They wanted us to use weights to work specific body parts and warned us that we were not to use heavier weights than they directed. Since they would not always be available to work with us, they gave us football drills to practice on our own in the park or in the backyard of Tolley House.

  "I can see that you guys are becoming a good team," said Papa. "I think you're going to cause a lot of excitement in the fall. This is a football town, and after seeing you play a year of junior high ball, everyone will be impatiently waiting to see you both on the high school team."

  "Do you think we will play for the varsity as freshmen?" Ant asked.

  "I can't guarantee it, but I think it's real possible that you guys will make varsity and see at least a little playing time. Coach Riddle will definitely make you both starters for the junior high team, so how you play this fall will help decide what happens next year on the varsity."

  "I don't see any reason we couldn't start as freshmen on the high school team," I said.

  "Well, you'll be fighting for playing time with all the older, more experienced guys. When you're a freshman, the current starting quarterback will be a senior, so it will be hard for you to take a senior's spot with all his experience running the offense."

  "Will the coach at least give me a shot to prove I'm better than the senior?" I wasn't happy with the idea of just making the high school varsity. I saw no reason why I couldn't be the starting quarterback.

  Papa could see that I was very serious about trying to take a senior's starting job. Of course, he realized that it was much harder than I thought. "The coach always looks at everyone, River, but it takes time to learn your team's plays, to understand other teams' defenses, and to become a team leader like a quarterback should be. No matter how talented you are, you need experience, and you need to mature more than you are now to be the leader of that team."

  I persisted. "But will he give me a chance? Just to see how I would do?"

  "Yes, River. I promise you that Coach Haney will let you show him what you can do."

  "Okay. All I want is a chance." When I remember my conversation with Papa, it's hard to believe how naive I was. During the next year, I would learn how much I didn't know about the role of a starting varsity quarterback.

  "Same for you, Ant," said Papa. "Work hard and I'll make sure he gives you a good look, but both of you need to trust the coach and let him bring yo
u along when he thinks you're ready."

  "Yes, sir," I said. "You know, I like the idea of playing pro football when I grow up. They make tons of money."

  Ant had another concern. "I'm not sure that I want to play pro football, but I want to go to college, and a scholarship is the only way I'll be able to go. The foster kid scholarship helps, but it's not enough. If football can give me a free ride to college, then I'm down with it."

  Papa glanced sideways at us. "You boys just need to do what I ask you to do. You need to work hard at football, even harder on your schoolwork, and just as important, you need to work at being good boys who stay out of trouble. If you give your best in all those areas, I'll make sure that you go to college, scholarship or not."

  "Thanks, Papa," said Ant. "Nobody's ever tried to help me like you have."

  "Me either, Papa," I agreed with Ant. "I promise I'll work hard, and you won't be sorry."

  "Yo, I'm glad to get a chance," said Ant. "Back in my old neighborhood, the dudes I called my friends didn't mind gettin' me in trouble. Daring me to take five-finger discounts. Offering me weed or something stronger. If my mom's lies hadn't sent me to Stockwell, I still woulda been arrested one day. Now I can do things the right way. River and me are gonna work hard to be better people and to have better lives, and nothing's gonna hold us back."

  Papa and Ant's optimism rubbed off on me, and I began to believe that I could accomplish anything with them on my side. For the first time I could remember, I was looking forward to the future.

  ***

  Max Summers, a player for the junior high team, was one of the boys who played touch football with Ant and me in Harper Park. Max was the stereotypical white boy next door, providing you lived in an expensive, gated neighborhood. He was a good-looking kid with huge blue eyes and wild, curly blond hair that was uncontrollable but suited him perfectly. His personality could be just as crazy as his hair, and he reminded me of a wild surfer kid I saw in a movie Jenny rented for us at Tolley House. Max was three inches shorter and twenty pounds lighter than I was, but the more I watched him play ball, I saw that he was athletic, fast, and remarkably agile.

  Max had already played a year of junior high football as the starting quarterback, and he was the favorite to be QB1again in the fall. Before junior high, he had played quarterback since he was eight-years old in the city recreation department youth league.

  At first, I was uncomfortable around Max because Papa had been training me for the quarterback position. He was confident that I would beat Max because I was a much better passer. Max was aware of my intentions and had seen enough of me to know that he had serious competition, but he was surprisingly friendly to me. He even complimented my play, and said that he would have to work harder to beat me for the starting job. He said that Coach Riddle would start the best player at each position, and if I beat him, he would support me for the good of the team. I was impressed with his maturity, and I thought that he was definitely better leadership material than I was.

  Ant and I quickly saw that Max didn't care about race or social status. He wanted to be friends with everyone and as far as we could tell, all of the players thought he was a great guy.

  Max began to take breaks with us, and he and Ant did most of the talking. My mind would frequently drift away to other things, but the afternoon I heard Max say that Carlee Summers was his cousin, he had my full attention. I wasn't very smooth when I plied Max for details about Carlee, so I flushed with excitement when he told me that Carlee was interested in me. After Max made me promise never to tell where I heard the information, he talked about his cousin until I thought that I knew the girl pretty well.

  Carlee Summers was everything a junior high school girl wanted to be in the summer prior to her eighth grade year. Many of the girls at school envied thirteen-year-old Carlee because her body had matured earlier than most of them who were impatiently waiting for their own transformations. She was a naturally beautiful girl on her way to becoming a stunning woman. With guidance from her mother, Carlee took good care of her skin, using cosmetics sparingly. The pair routinely drove sixty miles to the Salon of Clarice where a professional worked on Carlee's long, blond hair.

  Most of the junior high girls held no malice for Carlee; they simply wanted to be more like her. However, there were a few girls who were not only jealous, they despised her, and not simply because she could have been a model, but because of her well-to-do family who granted Carlee's every wish. Those girls hated Carlee for having a walk-in closet full of the most popular brand name clothes, for her expensive jewelry, for her ridiculously large, professionally decorated bedroom fit for a celebrity, and for her en suite bathroom, which was double the size of most bathrooms the other girls were forced to share with their siblings.

  Carlee's father, Bill Summers, first earned his nickname "Big Bill" because of his imposing size when he played football for Harper Springs High. After inheriting his share of his parents' estate and using his money wisely, he became the richest man and the biggest fish in the small tank of Bergeron County.

  Bill Summers and his three younger brothers inherited a fortune from their last surviving parent, their father. Two of the brothers, Bob and Ken, lived out of state and sold their shares of their father's businesses and the family home to Bill and Sam, both of whom lived in Harper Springs. Sam then sold his half of the home to Bill. All four men were left with plenty of money to invest and grow their wealth, but only Bill and Sam continued to run the family business while investing in new business ventures. In time, Bill did very well.

  Bill Summers' business investments were many and varied, and while he was a silent partner in most, he was directly involved in others, such as his real estate company and his restaurant chain of "Big Bill's Barbeque and Wings." Big Bill did particularly well with his restaurants, which appealed to a variety of people since one side was designed for casual family dining and the other side was a sports bar.

  The man was intuitive and had a knack for making smart investments at perfect times. He also had a reputation for being ruthless in his business dealings and never allowed personal feelings to present a barrier to his success. People were of little value to him, unless he could use them to increase his profits.

  Big Bill did care very much for his family, and he took pride in supporting his wife and children. Beth never worked except as a volunteer for local charities that created good will for her husband's businesses. Their affluent lifestyle spoiled Beth just as Carlee was hopelessly spoiled by the time little Billy arrived on her fifth birthday. Carlee's parents realized that she might resent her new baby brother, so they pampered her even more, which only inflated her sense of entitlement.

  Sam Summers, Max's father, hired experienced managers for his businesses just as Bill did, but the difference was that Sam interfered and caused negative results. For the most part, the only consistent profits Sam collected were from the businesses he own jointly with Bill. When Bill would offer financial advice for Sam's other businesses, Sam stubbornly refused his older brother's help. Since he was a boy, Sam had always been jealous of Bill, who was more successful than Sam was at anything he did, including football.

  When I told Max about the day Papa caught me staring at Carlee when her team was practicing their cheers at the park, he chuckled and told me about the same day from Carlee's perspective. He convinced me that she really was interested in me, but he again made me promise never to repeat anything he said because he didn't want Carlee angry with him.

  Carlee was the head cheerleader of the junior high squad that would be attending a two-week cheer camp with a competition at the end. The girls had been practicing almost every day because Carlee intended for her squad to win the first place trophy. As important as their practice was to her, Max said that Carlee could hardly take her eyes off me, and she knew that I was also watching her. She had purposefully moved around enough to know that my eyes followed her wherever she went, but she was careful not to let the other girls see wha
t was going on between us.

  As popular as she was, even her reputation would take a hit if people discovered that she was romantically interested in a kid like me. A blow to her popularity was not the only problem she would have if word of her desire spread through Harper Springs. From what Max told me about Big Bill, I understood that if he heard that his thirteen-year old daughter, his precious princess, had the hots for a mixed-race bastard from Tolley House, he would ground her until she was eighteen. According to Max, fear of her father was not enough to make Carlee give up her desire to be with me. She was used to having what she wanted, and she wanted me.

  Max informed me that Carlee had not only staged her tripping mishap at school in hopes that I would catch her, but she still thought of ways to get to know me better. When Carlee discovered that Max and I had become friends, she saw an opportunity and began working on a plot to use that new friendship to her advantage. After Max shared Carlee's plan with me, I was nervous but also excited that a girl like Carlee liked me that much. I imagined how jealous other boys would be if they saw Carlee hanging on to me.

  ***

  After Max told me that Carlee liked me, I couldn't get my mind off her. One night in our room, I was talking about her to Ant. He didn't say much and it bugged me.

  "Ant, how come you're so quiet? Am I going on too much about Carlee?"

  "You haven't even talked to that girl except that time she faked falling in the school hall. If you want to beat Max for QB1, focus on football instead of what he keeps whispering to you about Carlee. You aren’t as sharp in practice when you’re daydreaming.”

  I thought Ant had a good point. Maybe I was being a little silly about Carlee.

  "Yeah, you're right. I need to focus on football at practice. I'll do better but kick my butt if I'm messing up."