Blackbird

by Larry Duplechan

  “Goddamn you, Brock!” I yelled in a voice I hardly recognized.

  Brock was seated at his desk at the front of the room, shuffling some papers. He looked up quickly, understandably startled.

  “Rouss –”

  “God-damn you, Brock!” It was all I could seem to come up with for a while there. As always seems to happen when I am truly furious, the tears came, coursing down my face, dripping down my neck and onto the front of my sweatshirt. I wiped at my eyes with the heels of my hands.

  “Now, wait just a minute, Rouss.” Brock made as if to get up out of his chair, but ended up in a funny-looking half-squat over it. “You know I could have you suspended for that sort of language.”

  “Is that so?” I was slipping into Bette Davis, really biting off my words. I crossed my arms over my chest and tapped my right foot feverishly against the floor. I snorted a quick breath. “Well, why don’t you just do that, Mister Brock.” This took him somewhat by surprise. I was not known for talking back to teachers, let alone swearing at them.

  “You know I deserved a part in your goddamn play more than Carter Murphree did. You know it!”

  “No, Rouss, I’m afraid I don’t know that at all –”

  “Shut up! You know it and I know it and everybody at the audition knows it. My audition was better than Carter’s, and better than Skipper’s. Better than anybody’s!” I took in a couple of big, trembly breaths.

  “This is a very subjective thing we’re talking about here, Rouss. Besides, the audition isn’t the whole story. There are other factors to be considered when casting a production.”

  “There’s one reason and only one reason why I wasn’t cast, and you know what it is as well as I do. Why couldn’t you go against this goddamn town just once? Just once? ’Cause you’re a goddamn racist, just like most of this town, that’s why, you old – Why the hell couldn’t you just –” And I was so angry and hurt and frustrated I thought I might throw a chair through a window or something, so I turned to leave. Then I whipped back around.

  “And furthermore, you can take your goddamn student directorship and just sit on it and rotate! I wouldn’t student direct if you paid me!” And I started down the stairs again. Stopped. Turned around and walked back to the door.

  “And furthermore,” I screamed, “I hated Dead End. It was the most stupid-assed-est movie I ever saw!”

  And I was out of there. Bat-out-of-hell material. My vision was blurred with tears, and I nearly knocked some kid down coming off the steps – maybe half a dozen kids had gathered while I was yelling.

  I heard Efrem’s voice call, “Hey, Johnnie Ray, wait up.”

  “Leave me alone,” I yelled over my shoulder. And I hot-footed it across the football field, right through campus and out, and just kept on walking. I didn’t even slow down till I got home.

  “It’s just me, Mom,” I called. I could hear the television from the family room. Mom was ironing Dad’s shirts and watching a Big Valley rerun. Mom’s a big Stanwyck fan from way back.

  “Boy, what in the world are you doing home?” Mom called from the other room. I could picture the iron poised over the board in mid-stroke.

  “I wasn’t feeling well, so I came home.”

  She must have broken the sound barrier getting to me. She was right in front of me in nothing flat, the back of her hand pressed against my forehead.

  “What’s the matter, baby?” she said in the soft voice she uses less and less as I get older. “Your eyes are red, but you don’t have a temp.”

  “Just a little sick to my stomach, Mom.”

  “Did you puke?”

  “Uh-huh.” I thought, why not go all the way.

  “Well, you just take you some Pepto-Bismol and get right back in that bed, and in a little while I’ll heat you up some soup.”

  And I said, “Okay, Mom,” and went to my room. I turned the radio on and tuned it to this station way over to the left of the FM dial, where all they play, all day and all night, is a woman’s voice reading numbers in French. Sometimes, when I’m really upset, I find it soothing.

  After a while, I had to laugh a little at the spectacle I must have made of myself – talk about your Drama. I’d never said goddamn out loud before in my life. For a minute, I wondered if Brock might make good on his threat to have me suspended. He really could, after all: I had sworn at a teacher, even if it wasn’t in class, exactly. But I was pretty sure he wouldn’t. He’s a pretty wormy old guy, and besides, I think deep down he knew he was wrong, both morally and artistically. Carter Murphree was bound to be incurably lame on stage.

  I’m not sure how long I sat there listening to the French numbers and thinking, but after a while, Mom knocked on the door and peeked in.

  “I thought you might be asleep,” she said, half-whispering as if she had indeed awakened me. “You have a phone call,” she said. “It’s Cherie.”

  The way Mom smiled whenever she mentioned Cherie, or talked to her, I knew she took it for granted that Cherie was my girlfriend, and she liked it. From my freshman year on, Mom seemed worried that I wasn’t dating. She’d been a real dater herself in high school.

  “I heard what happened. I’m so sorry,” Cherie said. Her powdery little voice was just barely audible against the surrounding noises – she was calling from a pay phone on campus.

  “Thanks,” I said, real sarcastic. So, of course I immediately felt like a raving shitheel. I really hate myself when I’m mean to Cherie – I mean, how could anybody be mean to someone like Cherie? But sometimes I just can’t help it. It may come as a surprise to you, but relentless devotion can be absolutely annoying sometimes.

  Cherie didn’t say anything for a while. All I could hear was the background noise, a soft, steady whoosh almost like putting a seashell to your ear.

  “Look,” I finally said, “I really appreciate your calling, and I realize I’m being a real anus, and I’m sorry. I’m just in a really lousy mood right now, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “So I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

  She sighed an okay.

  “Oh, yeah,” she said. “I wanted to tell you something. Brock just posted this announcement about auditions over at the J.C. for some directing-students’ projects. Some of them need high-school age people for their one-acts. It’s tomorrow night. Maybe you should go.”

  In my present bitchy condition, I felt like Cherie was throwing me a bone (which she wasn’t, of course) instead of being genuinely helpful (which she was).

  “Thanks a lot, Cherie,” I said, just oozing sarcasm. “I’ll make sure to do that.” And of course I instantly felt rotten for taking that tone with her again. “Look, I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Bye.”

  And just as the receiver was about to hit the cradle, I just barely heard Cherie say “I love you.” Which made me feel about as shitty as a guy should ever have to feel.

  I just lay back on my bed with my arm across my eyes, clenching my fists until my forearms ached, and listened to French numbers until Mom knocked on the door again and said, “Soup’s ready.”

  Chapter Six

  I looked for Crystal on the bus the next morning, but she wasn’t on it. In the midst of my emotional fireworks display of the morning before, I had forgotten my date to meet Crystal in the library third period; I owed her an apology. I had a note from Mom crackling softly in my pocket; I’d been severely depressed the whole day and I’d obviously looked so convincingly sick that Mom almost wouldn’t let me go back to school. I’d given the matter some consideration, and decided that if nothing else, I could really use a workout. I had hardly sat down before Jim Frye called over.

  “Hey, Johnnie Ray – heard you really cussed out old Brock yesterday.” I shrugged a rather noncommittal shrug. It honestly hadn’t occurred to me that my scene with Brock would make the papers. But lo and behold, as I got off the bus, another kid I hardly knew called out to me, “Heard you punched out Brock – way to go!” He walked on before I could tell him I’d nev
er laid a hand on the old guy.

  On my way into the choir room, I spotted Todd coming out. I called out his name, but he didn’t seem to hear me; I quickened my pace to catch up with him.

  “Hey, Todd, wait up.” He stopped and turned.

  “Johnnie Ray.” He tilted his head in greeting. It was easy to see how down the guy was. His face, though drop-dead handsome as usual, looked different, like his features had fallen a bit. His shoulders looked rounded and stooped, and he stood like a tired, beat-up old man instead of the healthy eighteen-year-old stud he was. He even looked shorter. What a difference a day made. Twenty-four little hours. And so on.

  “How are you?” I asked, hoping he could somehow deduce that I didn’t mean how’s it goin’. That I meant the big How Are You.

  He just shrugged and said, “I’m all right.”

  Which I knew he wasn’t. I wasn’t sure just where to go from there, conversation-wise, so we stood for an uncomfortable couple of beats before I said, “Has she gone yet?” Meaning Leslie, of course.

  “Yeah.” He looked up at the sky for a second, and then down at the tops of his boots. “They packed her off so fast I didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to her.” Suddenly he looked me dead in the face, his eyes broadcasting pain like a fifty-thousand-watt radio station broadcasts the hits. “I don’t fuckin’ know where she is. I don’t know how long she’ll be gone. I’m never even gonna see my baby. And they didn’t even let me say g’bye to her.” He blinked rapidly several times, and I could tell his eyes were gearing up to cry. He was wiping at his eyes with the long sleeve of the striped pullover shirt he was wearing.

  So what did I expect the guy to do? Turn to me, not exactly his best friend on earth, and spill the whole plate of spaghetti? Fall into my arms and sob so I could have the opportunity to comfort him, I guess. Anyway, he obviously wasn’t the kind of guy to look you right between the eyes and say, “Hey man, I’m hurting.” Still, I had the strongest desire to touch him. And I don’t mean the sort of crotch-level desire I usually had where Todd was concerned. I just wanted to touch his hand, maybe hug him; tell him I was sorry, that I cared. I’d hugged Todd before, in church youth-group meetings, during Sharing of Love when we all go around the room and hug each other and say, “I love you in Jesus.” But this was not quite the time and place for that, and besides, I didn’t see where this had a whole lot to do with Jesus. I was at a serious loss for what to do.

  Finally, I reached up and put my hand on Todd’s shoulder, squeezed it just a little and said, “I’m really sorry, Todd.” Ever notice how the words I’m sorry always seem the lamest when you want them to mean the most? Todd just shrugged again and said, “Thanks.”

  “You know,” I said, “I called you Monday night.”

  “You did?” I’d never called Todd on the telephone before in my life.

  “Yeah. Just to say I was sorry about what happened.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. There was no answer, though.”

  Todd finally looked halfway over his shoulder.

  “Thanks. I appreciate that. I really do.”

  “Look,” I said, trying to lighten an unlightenable situation, “why don’t you come back into the choir room, we’ll sing something. ‘Love Me Like a Rock’ or something.”

  “Nah,” he said, his back still turned to me, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

  “Look, Todd” – I probably should have just let the man go about his business, but somehow I couldn’t seem to do it – “I just, if you ever like want to talk, you know, I just want you to know – I just want you to know I’m there, that’s all.” I immediately felt a little foolish. I mean, who was I all of a sudden, to start playing Sisters of Mercy with Todd Waterson, one of the sexiest guys in school? I wondered if he might laugh at me, but he didn’t. He turned around, finally. Put his hand on my shoulder. Sniffed a big wet sniff.

  “You know,” he said, “you’re the first person who’s even talked to me since Monday. A couple of assholes have yelled things at me, like ‘Way to go, Todd.’ But mostly – shit, I just feel like I’ve got leprosy or something. All these good little Christians we go to church with are suddenly treating me like Mr. Sin. Like most of them weren’t doing the same thing me and Leslie were doing. Or trying to do it. Assholes.” He squeezed my shoulder again. “You’re all right, Johnnie Ray.”

  And he turned and started off.

  “Todd,” I called after him, “you sure you don’t want to come in the choir room?”

  “Nah,” he said without turning around. “Maybe tomorrow.” He walked a few more steps, then he turned around.

  “Hey, did you really slug Brock in the jaw?”

  “Of course not,” I said.

  “Oh, well.” He shrugged and headed off toward the library.

  Cherie and Efrem were already sitting in the choir room; as I walked in, I could hear Efrem’s voice over the Foleys’ four-handed version of “Classical Gas.” Whatever he was pontificating about, he dropped it as I approached.

  “I trust you’ve heard about your friend Todd,” Efrem said in lieu of greeting. Cherie wordlessly attached herself to my arm.

  “Monday night,” I said. “Did you see him? He looks like shit.”

  “He was just here,” Efrem said. “He didn’t stay long.”

  “Did you say anything to him?”

  “I never say anything to him.” He had a point. I started to explain to Efrem that this would be the perfect time to scrape up any human kindness he might have put aside for a rainy day, but I let it slide.

  “I’m really sorry about the auditions. Needless to say, Mr. Dead End is a major horse’s ass of this or any season.”

  “Well” – I did my patented nonchalant who-gives-a-shit shrug – “Brock’s horse’s-assdom is neither here nor there at this point, is it?”

  “Perhaps not. By the way, you didn’t really bloody the old fool’s nose, did you?”

  “Of course not,” I said. “I just yelled at him. Called him everything short of Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan, cried a little, told him to take his play and sit on it, but I swear to you, no blood was shed.”

  “I thought not, but one can dream, can’t one?”

  “Then are you going to the auditions at the J.C. tonight?” Cherie uttered her very first words since my arrival, maybe even her first of the day.

  “Hark” – Efrem cupped a hand to his ear – “Garbo talks.”

  “Yes, Mommy,” I nuzzled Cherie’s sweet-smelling hair, “I think I will go the auditions at the J.C. tonight.” I hadn’t actually decided for sure I was going until Cherie asked me. I’d been toying with the concept of actually having a few weeks of evenings free for a change, and it didn’t seem such a bad idea. “I’ve got a few things to take care of before tonight, though. I’ve got to have a little talk with Brock, for one.”

  “To apologize?” Efrem asked, horror in his eyes.

  “To talk my way out of having to enter the old fart’s class for the remainder of the semester, I hope.”

  “How come?” Cherie said, speaking into my shoulder as usual.

  “Because there won’t be one helluva lot to do in there for those of us not involved in the show. Because I’ve already passed the class even if I never go back. Because if I never see Brock’s ugly shriv face again, it’ll be much, much too soon. Need I go on?”

  “Please don’t,” Efrem said through a snorting little laugh.

  The three of us sat and listened to Johnnie Foley do “Alice’s Restaurant.” He knows the whole twenty-some-odd-minute version by heart, and performs it at the drop of a hat. He had gotten to the whole “eight-by-ten color glossy photos under the pile of garbage” part, when Cherie said, even softer than usual: “Can’t wait till Saturday.” She smiled a satisfied little smile at the mention of our weekend plans. My stomach tightened in advance nervousness at the thought of it. I wondered if maybe I hadn’t made a big mistake.

  I excused myself from t
he choir room a few minutes before first period and tromped on over to the Drama bungalow. Brock looked a little bit apprehensive at the sight of me, but he didn’t mention our little difference the morning before – no talk of suspension, no nothing – and damned if I was gonna bring the subject up. It was a very easy matter to convince old Brock to let me finish out the semester with a paper, a report on some play or other.

  “That’d be fine, Rouss,” Brock said, forcing a smile that twitched a little on one side. “Do you have a particular play I mind?”

  “No,” I lied. “Not yet.” Actually, I planned to write a paper about The Boys in the Band. I’d read it eight or nine times, had in fact taken it out on indefinite loan from the library – meaning the librarians didn’t exactly know I had it. I had most of the play memorized, in fact, so it would be a cinch to rattle off a report good enough to get by Brock, who thought you were a genius if your subjects and verbs agreed. And the thought of old Brock reading a report on Boys in the Band was automatic laughs. The old guy was a homo-hating asshole if there ever was one – he once referred to Tennessee Williams as a pervert, in class.

  Anyway, I probably wouldn’t have to see Brock more than once or twice for the rest of the semester, and I also wouldn’t have to watch the cast of Hooray for Whatnot rehearsing constantly during sixth period. Both of which spelled relief as far as I was concerned.

  I went to the library third period. Mr. Katz winced a little while giving me permission to skip his class again. But there really wasn’t much he could say – I was an Honor Scholar, and besides we were covering the thirties in class, and I knew just about everything worth knowing about the thirties from the movies. Crystal was in the library, at the same table in the same chair I’d found her in on Monday. She smiled as I approached.

  “I’m sorry about yesterday,” I said.