It seemed like forever, but Thanksgiving weekend finally arrived, and like Bob Hansen promised, so did the day of the commercial shoot. My whole family arrived early, since my parents had a few more questions for Bob. As we pulled up to the field, we saw that the boys’ team was warming up, and the film crew was setting up their equipment.
Mom, who was wearing her full police uniform with all her weapons attached, pulled Mr. Hansen aside. “It says on page four of the contract that Riley will be in magazines. What magazines? I want to be able to say no if I don’t approve of the magazine.”
Mr. Hansen smiled and popped a mint into his mouth. “We totally understand. We’re talking mostly sport mags, some teen stuff, and outdoor sport publications. We’ll make sure you approve before we put the ad in.”
“What about Brady? It doesn’t say anything about him being able to come on the trips with us.”
“Who’s Brady?” Mr. Hansen shrugged.
That made me laugh.
Brady’s my little brother. He’s in third grade. He’s really smart, but he’s really weird. He doesn’t have a lot of friends. I think it’s because kids just don’t get him, and neither do I. Here’s what I’m talking about:
The day after my parents signed the shoe contract, Brady came into the living room where I was watching TV. He just stood there — staring at me, which was really annoying, so I turned off the TV and stared back.
“You don’t look famous,” he finally said.
“I’m not.”
“Mom says she’s afraid you’re going to be.”
“But I’m not.”
“So what should I call you now?” This is a typical Brady question. He has this thing about what he likes to be called, and it’s never “Brady.” It’s always some other character that he’s pretending to be, or that he actually thinks he is. So we have to call him things like “Sailor Solomon,” or “Supersonic Man,” or “Prince Picklemeister.”
See what I mean? Weird.
“Just call me Riley. Please.”
He shook his head. “Riley isn’t a famous name. I’d rather call you ‘Princess Slide-a-Lot,’ or ‘Shoe Highness.’ ”
“Those are stupid names.”
“How about ‘The Fresno Bee-loved?’ ” (Our local newspaper is called the Fresno Bee.)
“Okay, that’s what I’ll call you.” Then he walked out.
I have to pray for a lot of patience with Brady. And when I can, I ignore him. Others do too, probably for the same reason.
But now Mom was making it impossible for Bob Hansen to ignore Brady. She asked him to sign a paper that said that Brady could be included in any and all Swiftriver activities.
“Sure,” Mr. Hansen grinned and signed. “It’s no trouble. No trouble at all.”
Mr. Hansen obviously doesn’t know Brady.
Right about then a couple of crazy people came running onto the field: a woman who was maybe in her thirties and was dressed super-nice, and a man who looked like a high school kid who just woke up and put on clothes that had been wadded up in a corner for a year or so.
“Flip, Fawn — meet our girl, Riley Mae, and her parents, Lynda and Bart.” Mr. Hansen smiled through the introductions. “Oh . . . and, uh . . . Brady.” He pointed to my brother, who was playing some silly boy game over on the bleachers. No one looked over there. Instead, Flip and Fawn just swarmed all over me like a bunch of bees.
“Oh, you are just perrrrrrfect for this job. Look at that hair!” Fawn (the woman) grabbed my head and pulled her fingers through my light-brown waves. Her right hand got caught.
“Owwww!” That was me, not her.
“That’s okay, honey. I’ll teach you how to brush your hair properly so that doesn’t happen. How about a little green eye shadow to match those amazing eyes?”
“NO eye shadow. Riley doesn’t wear makeup.” Yep, that was Mom.
Fawn put her hand on her hip and sighed loudly. “I’m the makeup artist hired for this job, and I know what this girl needs.”
My mom stood up on her toes so she was eye to eye with Fawn, who was wearing six-inch heels (which I thought was a funny choice since we were at a baseball field). “And I’m the mom and I say NO EYE SHADOW.”
Fawn stepped back, and as she did, both of her heels sank into the dirt, so now Mom was looking down at her.
“Okay, then, how about a little blush and lip gloss?” Fawn stepped out of her shoes and pulled them out of the dirt to shake them off.
I don’t know what Mom said then because Flip (the guy) pointed a camera at me and started asking me to do things.
“Smile! Frown! Laugh! Grimace!”
“Grimace? How’s that different from a frown?” I was getting annoyed with that camera in my face.
“Try to look like you just drank bad milk.”
“Oh.” I grabbed my stomach and pretended to throw up. Flip laughed and pretended like he was throwing up too. He went on and on with the gagging noises.
“Flip, this is a SERIOUS job! Do you THINK you could act like a professional for ONCE?” Fawn huffed and puffed her way over to me and smacked me in the face with a powder puff. (Well, I guess it was more like a gentle smack.) I choked on the dust and looked over at Flip, who was making fun of the way Fawn was smoothing her big blonde hairdo out of her eyes. Fawn turned and caught him — then she hit him in the face with the powder puff.
“Here’s a clue, funny boy. Buy an iron.” She tried to walk off in a hurry, but her heels kept sinking in to the dirt. I couldn’t help cracking up.
“I just loooove working with her.” Flip put his hand on his heart. Fawn turned and blew him a kiss.
Flip turned back to me. “Hey, Riley — you hungry?” He started pulling weird things out of his pockets. “I didn’t have any breakfast. Luckily I always have some good stuff in here. If you see anything you want, help yourself.”
He tossed a bunch of food items out on the ground: A piece of unwrapped beef jerky, a sandwich bag filled with some kind of cereal, a half-eaten granola bar, some random mints, and a fun-sized Snickers bar that looked like it had melted a few times and reformed into a triangle shape. He held the Snickers up and smiled.
“I bet you want this, don’t you? All girls love chocolate.”
“That’s sick. How old is that candy bar?”
“Old? It’s from Halloween. I think that’s the last time I wore these pants.”
“Well, at least we know it hasn’t gone through the wash.”
“Are you saying I don’t wash my clothes? You’re not gonna make fun of me like Fawn does, are ya?”
I looked over and noticed that Fawn and my mom were having a disagreement again. Their arms were flying all over the place. Nah, I didn’t want to be like Fawn.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.” I tried to think of a way to make it up to him. “Okay, I’ll take the Snickers.” I ripped the wrapper off and popped it in my mouth. It wasn’t so bad.
“You’re a cool kid. I’m gonna like working with you.” Flip took a bite of the jerky, made a face, and then spit it out.
“Whoa, I’m not sure what that was, but I can tell you one thing . . . it wasn’t jerky!”
I grimaced. Flip took a picture of me.
“Perfect,” he said.
My favorite part of the commercial shoot was when I slid into home plate. Flip suggested that they add some extra dirt to the area so that a big puff of it would fly up, and as the dirt settled, my shoes would dramatically come into view of all the confused boys. Too bad for Fawn, though. She got a little too close to home plate at the wrong time. Her nice white skirt isn’t so white anymore.