THE BIG ROUND TABLE was set for eight. “Now,” Sam’s partner said as they approached it, “when we get to the table, hold the chair out for me. Then as I sit down, push the chair in.”
“Okay,” Sam said. He did not ask what spag and nag was. He had a nasty feeling he already knew.
“They’re not bad kids,” she whispered, nodding to the other kids who were already sitting at the table. “I’m Nancy,” she said, more loudly.
“Sam,” he said.
“That’s a nice name,” she said.
“Yes,” said a tall pale boy in a dinner suit. Sam recognized him from the lobby, too. He had striking, shining jet-black hair down to his shoulders, and an expensive watch shining on his wrist. “Yes,” he said. “Sam Peanut Butter, am I right? You eat peanut butter sandwiches so you don’t have to pay for room service.”
“What’s your problem?” Sam said.
“No, no, Geoffrey,” said the girl next to him. She had piles of curly strawberry-blond hair and bright, bright blue eyes. “Don’t upset him. I’ve seen him on the dance floor. He’s really violent.”
“Shut up, Gloria,” said Nancy.
The boy with the long jet-black hair covered his mouth with his hand. “Judges can lip-read,” he said.
And the girl with the strawberry-blond hair smiled at Nancy as if she was her favorite friend. “Oh dear, Nancy,” she said. “I do hope your feet are feeling quite recovered.” She picked up her napkin and held it delicately over her mouth. “If he’s a clodhopper,” she said into her napkin, “he’s sure to be a sauce-splatterer. They’ve put me next to a violent splatterer for spag and nag.”
A boy’s voice hissed: “Judge incoming.”
Then Gloria changed completely. She lowered her napkin and revealed a sweet friendly face.
“I was wondering, Sam,” she said, “did we meet in New York City? Were you staying at the Royalton? I thought I met you with your folks in the lobby.”
If Sam had not already seen how creepy she was, he would have thought she was a blond-haired angel.
“Or maybe at JO JO’s,” she said. “Do you eat at JO JO’s? Do you know it? Sixty-fourth and Lex? Or the Metropolitan Club Christmas party.”
Of course she was making polite conversation for the judge who was circling the table with a clipboard. Sam knew he would be wise to do the same, but he was so angry about her two-faced act, he did not answer.
“You’re supposed to talk, Mr. Peanut Butter,” she said when the judge had walked on. “There are a whole six points for conversation. And your hair is horrible, like an old janitor’s mop.”
“I was never at the Royalton Hotel.”
“Neither was I, Monsieur Peanut,” said the boy with long black hair. “You’re supposed to pretend. And don’t glower and glare at me, that won’t help you pay for room service.”
“Talk to me, Sam,” Nancy said. “I think your hair is gorgeous.”
“Yes, talk to her,” said the girl who looked like a porcelain angel. “Not to me, I beg of you.”
“Here they come,” said the tall boy with the jet-black hair.
Sam expected more judges, but this time it was waiters who came swooping down on the table like great penguins. They left huge plates of salad in front of every Perfecto Kiddo, then retreated.
Sam smelled the salad before he even saw it: the onion, the vinegar in the dressing.
“Eat it,” Nancy said. “Pretend you like it I hate the onions.” She smiled at him and began to eat. “I hate the pickles, too,” she said. “But when I’m the Perfecto Girl, I’m taking my family to Jamaica and then I’m retiring. I’m thinking about Jamaica.”
It was like a dream, but there was no hallway to wake up in. There was no escape from the onions and the pickles. There was nothing to do but eat them. Every time Sam thought he couldn’t take another bite, there was Nancy smiling at him. He thought he’d like to take his mum and dad to Jamaica at the same time. He remembered to hold his elbows in. He remembered to use his napkin. He even made some jokes that Nancy thought were funny.
He ate everything on his plate, and the waiters, descending on the table, whisked the empty plates away, refilled the water glasses, and retreated so the judges could come in and circle the table one more time.
So far, so good. Sam knew he had not been a perfect dancer, but he was an optimist and he knew he was having a great conversation with Nancy about Jamaica. He knew it was a great conversation because he wasn’t thinking about it until Nancy stopped him.
“Uh-oh,” she said. “Here comes the dreaded spag.”
The waiters swooped in with big plates of spaghetti and meat sauce. As Sam turned to thank the waiter, he caught sight of Muriel and George up in the gallery. George was looking at him with a little brass telescope. Muriel had a tiny pair of binoculars. Wilfred was not with them. He was locked up in their room, looking at his spotted face and his Blue Jays cap in the bathroom mirror.
Sam put his fork into the spaghetti just the way he had practiced with the slimy string. He used a spoon and a fork. He held the spoon underneath and twirled with the fork on top, and it worked.
“Eureka!” he said to Nancy.
“Man’s a pro,” said Nancy.
Sam saw the spaghetti twirling onto the fork and he was, for a full ten seconds, a champion, a winner, excited, pleased. He really did have a chance of winning. The spaghetti, he thought, was just like the string he had practiced with.
But string is string and spaghetti is spaghetti and this spaghetti was long, and really slippery; and much more rubbery than string. As Sam lifted it to his mouth, it unwound like a spring.
It did more than simply unwind. It became an elastic band, a catapult. It sent a single gob of sauce flying across the table and, as chance would have it, it landed on the obnoxious tall boy with the jet-black hair. It landed smack on the front of his perfect white dress shirt.
The boy looked at him and shuddered. “You vile little peanut,” he said.
“I’m sorry” Sam said. “It was an accident.”
He looked up at the judges’ podium. He saw Mr. Lopate looking right at him with a weird kind of look in his old face.
“You’re dead, Mr. Peanut.” the boy said, mopping at his shirtfront with his table napkin. “Why don’t you leave the table now and stop ruining it for your betters.”
Sam did not like being talked to like this, but on the other hand, the last thing he wanted to do was splatter sauce on Nancy’s dress. He wanted her to have her holiday in Jamaica.
“I’m sorry,” he said to Nancy, and began to stand.
“No,” Nancy said.
But it was too late. He stood at the moment when the waiter was pouring water into his glass and now a whole jugful came spilling down, over his carefully arranged Perfecto hair, over his scrubbed Perfecto face, over Wilfred’s suit, and worst of all, it spilled right over Nancy. Her shining hair hung like rattails over her dripping face. She looked like she had fallen into a swimming pool. She had water in her eyes. She was spluttering.
Everyone in the ballroom was looking at them.
He wanted to die. He wished the ballroom floor would open up and swallow him. But when he saw the boy with the jet-black hair laughing behind his napkin, he got mad.
“Get a life,” he said, and this time he did not care who heard him.
Sam picked up his fork and dug it deep into his spaghetti. He watched the boy’s face change as he stood.
“No …” the boy said.
But Sam was already lifting the dripping mess high. And then Sam Kellow flicked.
“Oooooh,” said a woman in the gallery.
“Aghh,” said the judge with the gold jewelry.
The sauce and spaghetti flew high above the table, in a perfect arc. It was like a shooting star, a comet. One hundred pairs of eyes watched its shocking, scandalous trail. It lobbed up high, it plunged toward the earth, its tail streaming behind it.
And it landed—smack—on the top of the boy’s jet-black hair.
Red sauce leaped upward before spilling down his cheek and neck. Long strands of spaghetti flexed and flopped and lay like long white worms on top of his Perfecto hair.
Sam bowed. “Mr. Peanut Butter,” he said, “sends his compliments.”
And for a moment he felt wonderful.