Anthony Varallo This Day in History (pdf)

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I d grown tired of flipping the shutters of the dashboard vents,
whose center knob playfully juddered like a loose tooth. If ev-
erything is boring, I said, what s there to look forward to?
Lots of things, Nathan said.
Like?
I can t tell you, Nathan said. That d ruin it.
Downstairs, my mom had fallen asleep. It bothered me, the idea
of her sleeping. I thought of Brady s party, but there was noth-
ing to think of, so I sat beside by my mother, hoping my sitting
would wake her. Mom? I said. She opened her eyes, but just for
a moment. Sometimes I liked the way Dr. Kari looked at me when
he tightened my braces, bored but watchful, like I was a televi-
sion show whose ending he d already seen, but whose outcome
might still somehow be in doubt. Mom, I said, do you think
you could maybe drive me someplace?
At school I d always liked the idea of going to see the nurse,
Ms. Warren, whose office door held a flaky bulletin board from its
lone nail, stringed like a necklace, thumbtacked with notes, and a
dry-erase board whose message was always the same: knock: i
just might be here. Seeing her in the office doorway, sipping
coffee from a tall paper cup, whose top made a gentle crinkling
noise, gave me a kind of hope. I don t know why they say caf-
feine is supposed to be so bad for you, she said one morning
when I d stopped by to see if she d replenished the fishbowl of
scratch n sniffs she kept just inside the door. This morning I
woke up feeling like garbage, but I m only halfway through this
coffee and already I feel like fifty bucks.
Sometimes I can see this, like, thing, out of the corner of my
eye, I said, once, when the other boys were out of earshot. For
weeks I d thought I d been noticing something there, a trickster
sunspot that ducked out of view whenever I turned to glimpse it.
It s like, this speck.
Maybe you have a speck in your eye, Ms. Warren said. Then,
If it keeps happening, let me know. Nine hundred times out of
A Di ct i onary of Sai nt s 111
ten, it s nothing, though. She opened her desk drawer and handed
me a rare scratch n sniff Motor Oil and wrote me a hall pass.
I don t why you guys are so into those, she said, retracing her
name with a chewed pen.
Once, I nearly fainted while watching a film in science class.
The film was ostensibly about the ecology of the farm, live-
stock, but midway though a dull account of horse feeding, a baby
colt slipped from his mother s womb, slick and gelatinous as
a squeezed egg. A membrane covered his bulbous eyes, which
glistened when they roved within their sockets. His legs were
misheld chopsticks. I raised my hand and asked to be excused, but
my voice sounded strange to me, the classroom a place I hardly
knew. I took a long drink from a water fountain, then let myself
into Ms. Warren s office; she wasn t there. I sat back on the exam
table and waited. Above me, fluorescent lights made noises like
pinged glasses.
Sometimes, when no one was home, I liked to sit at the dining
room table and read comic books beneath the chandeliered light,
just getting into it, the formal silence, turning the pages like they
were sheaves from the Gutenberg Bible. A bowl of wax fruit sat
atop the table, and it was my habit to take the wax pear and roll
it alongside the margin of the comic book, experimentally, until
I would raise it to my lips and taste its nothing taste, like meals
consumed in dreams. It was exciting to dim the chandelier, too. I
liked to turn its knob until the little flickering flames trapped in-
side the bulbs guttered like blown candles and then whoosh
turn the knob back, a birthday wish in reverse. I mention this
only to say that something of the feeling of being in the dining
room greeted me each time I was alone in Ms. Warren s office,
and to point out how jarring it was when Brady Carson opened
Ms. Warren s door and asked me if Cathy was in.
She s not here, I said. Cathy!
Brady shook his head, ruefully. She probably had to pick up
Rexy. I keep telling her she should bring him to school sometime,
but Brother Richard thinks he might get into a fight with Cocoa,
which seems like a long shot to me since I ve never seen Cocoa do
anything besides chew his collar and sleep in the oratory. Brady
clicked his tongue. I swear, it s like he s addicted to that collar or
something.
112 A Di ct i onary of Sai nt s
I sat up and conjured a face that said, I know all about every-
thing you could possibly know. Brady sat himself at Ms. Warren s
desk and hunted around for a pen.
You shouldn t go into someone else s desk, I said, but felt the
advantage extend to Brady in saying so.
Cathy doesn t mind, he said. She s always bumming one
from me anyway. He held up a thick novelty pen with a green
kooshball at its point. My parents got me this in the Amish
country. He pressed a button on its side and the pen began to
play Amazing Grace. Isn t that the stupidest thing? Brady
said. I told them I d never use it, but they seemed to get such a
kick out of it.
So you gave it to Ms. Warren?
Uh-huh. Well, really more of a loan, I guess. Brady tore
a piece of paper from a desk pad. Is salutations with one l or
two?
Aren t you supposed to be in class? [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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