J. James Keels

I got hair on my chest,

I look good without a shirt . . .

And I’m goin’ out west

Where they’ll appreciate me.

—Tom Waits, “Goin’ out West”

I was nicknamed Ape the first day of ninth grade, in the locker room.

The showers were lined up in a row, shooting out scalding water. I wore a white T-shirt, and hairs poked out like tiny black quills. I passed stall after stall, each shower with a boy, herded in like cattle, under its gallows nozzle. I walked for an eternity, until I reached the end of the row, turned the faucet, and stepped into the spray. Praying no one would notice. Please God, I pleaded, don’t let them see me. I gazed at the empty lockers through the dense steam; everything seemed so far away.

Closing my eyes, I stood with my back to the others. I curled into myself, a sort of standing fetal position. My wet T-shirt clung to me; the white cotton revealed a dark pelt underneath. I felt the wet hair on my back, like a thin hump. I sensed their eyes on me, each set adding weight until I wanted to crumple to the ground from the pressure. I turned around and found only one set of eyes, staring right into mine.

Jason Keller, all-star quarterback, pointed and uttered his historic words—words that would follow me into my sophomore year.

Look at the Ape!

I am fully dressed, yet I stretch out on my back, on top of the already-made covers. Rolling onto my side, I look at the mirror on the bureau. My bushy hair hides sleep-deprived eyes. I look like a sideshow carny: Ford, the Ape-Faced Boy—fifty cents for a gander!

“It’s time, Ford,” I mutter into my pillow.

Ford Gordon. It sounds terrible—even I hate saying it. All the hard “o’s” and everything. I was named after the car manufacturer. I wish my mom had been fooling, but my name is for real. Long story short, my grandfather strong-armed her in the delivery room.

“At least give your son a fighting chance. Don’t give him a Greek name.” So Ford it was—as American as apple pie. Ford Gordon. My name is based on a myth. American cars aren’t even made in America anymore. Nothing is.

Nannu had already renounced his last name in favor of melting-pot anonymity. He told me once, slouching in the doorway to the kitchen, that Ellis Island had that effect on a lot of people back then.

I’ve called my grandfather Nannu ever since I was a kid. It doesn’t do justice to how fierce he was. He came to Boston from the old country, before the war. Some people hated Greeks back then. Nannu struggled to feed his family, since no one wanted to hire him. Grandma’s family wouldn’t help either. Being Irish, they were in a better position—they had been here longer. But they never approved of Nannu, who would take any work he could find—construction and carpentry, mostly. Sometimes cleaning toilets. He never made much of himself, at least compared to Henry Ford, but those of us who loved him felt differently.

“Breakfast, Ford!”

“Down in a sec!” I yell back.

I hear Boston in my voice. People notice my accent when I’m caught off guard, irritated, or half asleep, like I am now. I carefully trained myself to be rid of it. Now I speak a perfect California tongue, flavorless as tap water. Here in Sacramento, people converse with perfectly blended uniformity, as similar as the pastel tract homes we live in.

I lumber down the stairs to see Mom sipping a latte.

“Morning, honey,” she says, holding a cell phone away from her ear. She stuffs papers into her briefcase with lightning speed. A mass of hair, recently bleached, frames her olive features.

I nod and grab breakfast. The toast is a little burnt, and all the windows are open to prevent the smoke alarm from screaming bloody murder. I smear apricot jam over the blackened square. It’s pretty much inedible, so I throw a banana in my backpack for later.

Mom says “uh-huh” into her phone several times and pulls it away to say, “You look tired. Sleep OK?”

I nod.

She gets back to her call. “No, I’m listening,” she says. “See you then.” She hangs up. “Well”—she kisses my cheek—“I’m off.” She gives me the once-over. “Is that what you’re wearing to school?” She takes the last swig of her latte and blots her lipstick with a tissue.

“Yeah.” I look down at my T-shirt and track pants. Everyone at school wears “ghetto.” It’s the “in” thing. “Why not?”

“Nothing.” She checks her watch. “Would you get my dry cleaning on the way home? I have a client tomorrow.”

I nod. I don’t know Mom anymore. As soon as we moved west after the divorce, she landed her job at the ad agency and bought all new clothes. “For a new me,” she had declared after a trip to Talbots. She’s become like those women I used to make fun of at the mall. Gone is the Boston Mom who’d shop at thrift stores and make roast lamb. Now it’s all about gourmet coffee, and she even wears blazers on the weekend. Linen, she assured me, is casual.

“See you tonight, then.” She kisses my forehead.

“Yeah, see ya,” I reply.

Going with Mom after the divorce was like my own Ellis Island. It was hard to leave Dad; the look on his face when we drove away made my gut sink. I felt like a traitor. Now our regular summer visits—his part of the custody agreement—are pretty strained. He dates now, women with names like Amber and Kim. He slugs my arm and asks if I’m trying out for any sports teams. We eat burgers and fries and channel-surf. I love him and all, but jeez—Mom was headed to California!

I stand in the quad between fifth and sixth periods. She passes by me on the way to her locker, and I purr her name, a nearly audible whisper. Helena. She is my dream woman, though she doesn’t know that I exist.

Helena’s a junior, a year ahead of me. She’s not a popular cheerleader, nor is she in Math Club—she’s without categorization. She doesn’t stand out; she’s neither popular nor unpopular, and she isn’t noticed for being either perfect or flawed. I guess you’d call her “average.” She’s as American as apple pie; she could be named after a car manufacturer.

Helena gets a book from her locker and continues down the hall, her black curls trailing behind her wickedly. Like snakes that keep watching me. Tempting me.

Ford, she beckons dreamily, soft and distant. I want you.

I head to the bathroom before sixth period and catch myself in the mirror.

Not again.

I try to avoid my reflection—I want not to look—but a corner, a fragment of my image, sucks me in. I step back and examine the picture. I look like an olive blob. I move closer, my nose near the glass, and focus. I stretch out my face with my palms and search for zits. I examine every pore before moving on to the hair check. Not the hair on my head—I mean a real hair check. My eyebrow—that is to say, my unibrow —looks particularly bushy. Almost Neanderthal. I could be a caveman for Halloween. I wouldn’t even need a costume.

I need to pluck or shave in between my eyebrows; that much the mirror tells me. The mirror tells me many things, like an honest friend who ought to shut up once in a while. Chest hair is creeping from under my T-shirt like a fungus—I need to trim that, too. Maybe I should start wearing button-down oxfords, buttoned all the way to my Adam’s apple. I could push my tuft down and conceal it.

A toilet flushes and I freeze. I am not alone. I try to act cool, checking my hair—the ones on my head. Nothing weird about that, all the guys do it between classes. I grab the comb from my back pocket and get started. A stall door opens and Jason Keller walks out.

“Checking for ticks, Ape?”

I ignore him, pretending to be preoccupied.

He stands behind me and makes monkey sounds. “Eee-ee!! Ooo-oo!!” Then he screeches.

“Shut up,” I say. “Leave me alone.” I wipe my bangs from my eyes and see hair on my knuckles. On my knuckles! I am a caveman. I should drag my hands on the ground as I walk.

Jason keeps making monkey noises. “Eee-ee!! Ooo-oo!!” He scratches under his armpits, like a primate.

I fling open the bathroom door and scramble outside. I feel stupid and vain, like I’m some pretty boy, which I’m not. Pretty boys care about this stuff, not real guys with depth and character. Or do they? Can you have depth while still caring about the surface?

I sit in the quad after sixth period, eating my banana, when the symbolism suddenly hits me. I dash to the garbage can and throw it away before anyone sees. That would be a real winner for the yearbook—part of the geeks-and-losers pictorial. I sit again and wait, ignoring my growling stomach. I know she will come.

Almost on cue, Helena cuts through the crowd. I sit back and watch, like a voyeur. I wish that I could participate in my own life—that I could speak to her. Maybe write her a letter. Instead, I feel like I’m watching a dumb movie.

Helena walks to her locker. She’s alone, another sign we’d be perfect together. Neither of us would have to be alone anymore. I wonder if she spends all her time in her room, like I do. I wonder if she also has no one to talk to. She dials her combo, flips the latch, and rummages through her locker. She radiates light. I want to touch her. I imagine her dark curls caressing my face like tiny fingers as she kisses me. I catch her scent on the wind—she hints of pear. Or maybe apple. My facial muscles stretch into smiling . . .

Look over here! my smile says from across the quad. I send her a psychic transmission. A mental S.O.S. Notice me. Over here. I may be hairy, but I think I love you.

She grabs her algebra book and gently slams her locker. “Gently” and “slams” is a weird way to think about it, but she even slams her locker with grace and dignity. She’s just amazing.

She never even looks in my direction.

She never sees the Ape.

Sitting on my bed after school, I mull over the day’s events. Stupid Jason Keller and his monkey sounds. Beautiful Helena not knowing that I exist. Something has to give. I think about her every night before going to bed. I obsess over a girl who doesn’t even know my name, and it makes me feel sick inside. Need is a powerful thing—it makes your gut feel hollow like a drum and can hurt as it pounds loudly in your ears.

I look at the photo of Nannu on the bureau next to the mirror. Nannu used to tell me stories of bar fights he had been in—to let off steam—and how winning would always lead to a tattoo. They were like badges of courage, testaments to his strength, and each one had a story. His arms were covered in ink; he could never fully hide them. No matter which shirt he’d wear, waves and snakes always traveled beyond what could be concealed.

My favorite was the heart he got for Grandma. She refused to get a matching one. “Proper women don’t get tattoos,” she once told me. I suspected it was hard enough for her family that she married a Greek, without her getting inked. Still, she’d always show off Nannu’s with great pride to anyone who’d look. “See?” she’d ask, pointing. “It says Emma.”

The summer I was twelve, Nannu gave me some advice I’ve never forgotten. One day he and I were in the kitchen as Grandma made sandwiches.

“Can I have a kiss?” Nannu asked her.

She smiled, wiped her hands on her apron, and pecked him on the lips.

“Ford,” he said, smiling, “never be afraid to ask for what you need.”

Nannu knew about need. The way he fed his family through his sacrifices proved that much. His words had stayed with me years after my Nannu went to his grave. It was another legacy, in a way.

I pull a pencil from my bag. No, I think, use pen. You can’t take it back that way.

Dear Helena,

You don’t know me, but I wish you did. I think about you all the time and wish I could talk to you. There’s so much I feel—I need you to know—but it would come out wrong if I tried to tell you. Maybe someday we’ll meet and you’ll see I’m not who people say I am.

I leave it unsigned. Without my name, she can’t track me down, so there’s nothing to lose.

The next day after fifth period, I stand in the quad. I study the note in my hand, wondering if I should go through with it. I walk down the hall with forced ease, passing her locker on the right side. She is bent over, looking for her sixth-period algebra book. Her butt looks like a small candy heart; I practically lose my breath. I could gaze at her bending over this way forever, but instead I slip the note into the pack slung over her shoulder and keep walking, unseen.

Nothing changes. The next day between classes, I watch her for signs. She doesn’t look around quizzically, searching faces for clues, searching for her anonymous love. She doesn’t smile secretively; she doesn’t hum or giggle or walk with a slight bounce. Maybe the note wasn’t enough to inspire that kind of reaction?

Seeing her smile with the knowledge that someone cared for her would have filled me up. I think it would have been enough to keep me going. Perhaps the note got stuck in a folder, or maybe it was still in her pack, under a textbook? I bet she never even read it.

I wait a few days, monitoring her behavior like an anthropologist, but Helena is “business as usual.” As if nothing had happened.

In bed at night, I still see her face as I drift off to dream. She stands by her locker in a black dress, her curls cascading down her tender back. She starts to speak, but Nannu’s scratchy voice comes out of her supple mouth. Ford, she says, never be afraid to ask for what you need.

I wake in the morning with Helena’s image and Nannu’s voice both still in my head. It’s an upsetting combo, a real killjoy to be sure, and there’s only one way to make his voice stop.

I have to follow his advice precisely. I have to ask for what I need. But how can I ask for something when I don’t know what it is? At least give it a shot, Ford, I tell myself.

I shower, towel off, and put on a shirt I got for Christmas—a baby blue oxford. I approach the mirror with my eyes closed. I don’t want to do it this time. I want to look objectively. No harsh criticisms, no judgment. I run a comb through my hair and try to find the positive. My blue eyes are the first thing I notice; the shirt brings them out. In a good way. My hair is parted and looks clean. Girls like clean hair. I check my teeth and practice smiling—they are a little crooked. Not any more than anyone else’s, I assure myself.

I practice smiling a few more times: the surprised, caught-off-guard smile; the spontaneous, devil-may-care smile; the alluring, come-hither smile. I want to be prepared for anything. And I want my smile to be ready.

I look at my ears and notice two black hairs. I can’t help myself—I grab the tweezers and pluck them by the roots. It’s hard to check the ear canal for hair, but my finger doesn’t feel anything spiky. I picture myself as an old man with long gray hairs growing out of my ears. It doesn’t matter when you’re seventy, I think. No one cares then.

I check my eyebrows. Still bushy.

The unibrow has to go.

I grab the tweezers and pluck a few hairs from the middle. My skin stings and my eyes water. The tears start my nose flowing, so I blow into a wad of toilet paper. I snatch the tweezers again and pull a few more hairs. Each pluck feels like a tiny bee sting. My eyes stream and turn bloodshot. It looks as though I’ve been crying. Plucking is a slow process. At this rate, I’ll be yanking away until second period.

I clutch my razor and hold it to the middle of my eyebrow, where I’d already started weeding. I run the razor down the middle, and a huge patch is mowed.

But it doesn’t look even.

I stand back and try to figure out which eyebrow is OK and which is too short. Or maybe one’s too long? The left one—right, I guess, in the mirror—looks like it could be shorter. I shave a tiny fraction off it and stand back. It still looks crooked, but I can’t figure out why. The shape is wrong, I think. The right one—wait, that’s left—should be rounder and not so flat. I angle the razor, the corner against the tip of the brow. I try to carve a shape, but accidentally carve more than I bargained for. I nick a bump, a zit maybe, and draw blood. It bleeds a lot. I press toilet paper on the bump and hold it until it stops. It looks like a wasp sting. I use some of Mom’s makeup to hide the redness.

I stand back to assess the damage. I look weird; having two discrete eyebrows makes my face look balanced, if perpetually surprised. And the makeup looks obvious. I grab a baseball hat and pull it down close to my eyes. I’ve seen lots of guys at school do this, so I figure I’m safe. My red eyes should clear by the time I get to school.

I head toward the back door in the kitchen. Mom is drinking her morning latte from the machine. “Honey, would you make yourself something for dinner?” she asks, staring down at some papers. “I have a date tonight.”

I avoid looking at her. “No problem.”

“Chad and I are going for sushi.”

Figures. It would be a Chad or a Steve, to rival Dad’s Kim or Amber.

“Have fun,” I say as I head out the door. I pass the picture of Nannu on the hall table. It is his wedding day, and he is dressed in a suit and tie. You can still see the tattoos, faint under his thin white shirt.

Mom always says how dapper he looks in this picture. “He looks like a real gentleman.”

I wait by Helena’s locker. I will speak my mind, until it is clear. I will make Nannu proud. She appears and our eyes meet.

“Hello,” she says.

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.

“Sorry,” she says. “I need to get into my locker.” She smiles.

I move aside, mute.

I can’t breathe. It feels like something is sitting on my chest, but somehow I manage, “Hello, Helena.” I take a breath. “You don’t know me, but I wish you did.” I’ve practiced this moment in the mirror countless times. I know the speech by heart.

Her face ignites with recognition. She interrupts me. “You wrote that note!”

I stare at her, my mouth hanging open. Then I nod.

“Ape?” she asks.

I stare at my hands. My hairy paws.

My heart races, the sound throbbing in my ears like a drum being beat over and over. “My name is Ford, not Ape,” I say. “I’m not who people say I am.”

She examines my face. “What happened to your eyes?”

I look away and pull my baseball cap down farther.

“Your note,” she says in a low voice. “It was sweet.”

I gaze at her, hopeful, waiting.

Her eyes meet mine. She smiles. “But . . . you’re not really my type.”

My face begins to sweat, stinging my shaved eyebrows. “I can change,” I say.

She shakes her head and heads down the hall.

I followed Nannu’s advice to the letter, and it failed. I asked for what I needed, yet here I am. Looking at me, all she saw was the Ape. I don’t blame her. It’s all I see looking in the mirror, too. How can I expect her to see something I don’t?

I stretch out on top of the already-made covers before breakfast. I look at the mirror on the bureau and see an ape-faced boy. Sick of my own image, I go downstairs, grab an apple, and head toward the door. Nannu’s wedding picture makes me hesitate before leaving. He does look sophisticated.

He may have cleaned toilets and gotten into bar fights. He may never have amounted to much in America. Maybe people hated him because he was Greek. But one woman—Grandma—saw past all of that. Nannu cleaned up well. Sure, you could see the tattoos through his shirt, and maybe his face was craggy—but still, he looked pretty smooth in his old fedora. I can see why Mom describes him as “a real gentleman.” Sure, we could have been carnies at a sideshow together: Ford, the Ape-Faced Boy, and Nannu, the Tattooed Man—fifty cents for a gander!

But Nannu was anything but “average.”

I look at the mirror above his picture, then back to Nannu. I alternate between staring at myself and at him until the images blur together. It never occurred to me how much I look like him. Our eyes are virtually identical.

“I miss you, Nannu,” I say, before heading out the door.