Monday, March 2

DAVID

Last Monday, while she was frying onions and watching Judge Judy, I handed Inez my field trip permission slip and asked her to sign it. Mom and Pop usually aren’t around for those kinds of things, so Inez has been signing school forms for years, and she never asks what they’re for. I turned the papers in the next day, and got up early this morning, before Pop came downstairs, to pack myself a lunch. So basically no one, except Arnold, Sean, and Mrs. Olivar, even knows I’m going on this field trip.

Ten minutes into Spanish class, Mrs. Merola comes on the PA system and announces that art club students should report to the main office. I close my binder and shove it into my backpack, then stand to leave. I glance at Luke, and he’s smirking at me like I’m doing something funny. I ignore him and head toward the door, which is when I notice that Andrew and Max are also grinning like I’m making a joke. They all think I’m pulling a prank, that I’m pretending. I give a little wave and walk out of the room, wondering how long it will take before they realize that it’s not a joke, and I really am going on the art club field trip. As I walk toward the main office, I realize that the only person who wouldn’t be surprised is Sammie.

On the bus, Arnold and I get a seat in the very back row. The seat across from us is empty, but Sean sits in front of us. “I don’t like the last row,” he explains.

When we get to the library, there are already four other school buses there, and I have to admit that I’m surprised because I didn’t think there were so many kids who were interested in comics, or at least in the kind of comic strips that Melvin Marbury draws. I sort of thought I was one of the only ones.

We get off the bus and file into the library.

A black man with a shaved head is standing just inside the doorway. He’s wearing gray pants and a black cardigan sweater over a T-shirt that has a picture of a black cat holding a white bone and saying, “I found this humerus.”

I laugh at his shirt. “That’s funny.”

“Thank you,” he says, smiling. “Librarian humor.” Then, speaking to the group, he says, “Up the stairs and to the right.”

Upstairs, in the conference room, there are probably fifty kids already sitting in folding chairs. The E. C. Adams crew gets the second to last row back, which I feel pretty bad about until the Ardsley kids show up and get the last row.

A moment later, the humerus guy steps to the front of the room and claps his hands together. “Boys and girls,” he says. “I’m Tobey Simmons, one of the librarians in the children’s room. We have a very special treat today.” He pulls a piece of paper out of the pocket of his cardigan, exactly the way my grandma Gert pulls crumpled-up tissues out of her sweater sleeve to mop up the drop of clear liquid snot that’s always hanging from the end of her nose. “Our guest today is the creator of the Pulitzer Prize–winning comic strip, The Northern Province. He is also the author of two wonderful children’s picture books. Please welcome Mr. Melvin Marbury.”

Everyone starts clapping as a white guy wearing jeans and a rumpled pullover ambles to the front of the room. He’s not very tall, his hair is gray, and he looks more average than I expected. But when he starts talking, I know it’s Melvin Marbury.

“How many of you follow anime?” he asks. About half of the kids in the room raise their hands.

“I don’t know anything about anime. I can’t talk about that. I’m here to talk about dreamy moose and ice-hockey-loving dogs and pugilistic beavers. Hope that sounds good to you.”

Then he talks for half an hour about how he started doing a comic strip when he was in college. He tells us he can’t draw, which is ridiculous because he’s a great artist. He tells us that the comic strip is dead, but that shouldn’t stop us from drawing ours anyway.

Then he announces the first-place winner, who gets a Percy the Penguin doll, and it isn’t me; it’s some girl from Ardsley. The librarian puts an image of the winning comic strip up on a giant screen, and it isn’t even funny because it’s about Malala Yousafzai, but Mr. Marbury talks about how great the storytelling is. I honestly don’t pay much attention because I’m bummed about not winning Percy the Penguin. I bet the Ardsley girl doesn’t even care about Percy. I wonder whether I can find her afterward and offer to buy it from her.

The girl goes up and gets to shake hands with Mr. Marbury, and everyone claps. I’m trying to figure out how much money I have and whether Pop would drive me to Ardsley, if the girl is interested in selling Percy, when Melvin Marbury says my name.

“What?” I say, feeling my face get hot.

“Come on up,” Mr. Marbury says. “You’re the second-place winner.”

I walk up to the front of the room, shake Melvin Marbury’s hand, and take the prize he holds out, which is a framed, autographed copy of one of his comic strips, and I recognize it.

“That’s from Oliver Shoots a Biscuit in the Basket,” I say.

Melvin Marbury looks surprised. “Yes, it is. I’m impressed.” Then he hands me back my second-place-winning comic strip. “I like your cat. And your dog looks a little like my dog, Carleton, don’t you think? You know—the one who refs for the hockey team.”

I feel my face getting hot.

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Mr. Marbury says. “I did my fair share of cribbing from the pros when I started. I’m flattered by your dog, actually.” He leans closer and says, almost in a whisper, “I think that dog might be someone very close to your heart. You’re telling something real and true with him.” He leans back and says in a regular voice, “You draw some great characters, David. Keep it up.” Then he winks and holds out his hand for me to shake.

“Thanks,” I say, shaking his hand.

Everyone starts clapping, and I turn to walk back to my seat. I look down at my Splish Splash comic strip, and along the bottom, outside the frames, I see handwriting that isn’t mine. It says, Buddha taught, “Three things cannot long be hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.” Keep drawing the truth. —M. Marbury.

In my seat, I read and reread Melvin Marbury’s message. My Splish Splash story does tell the truth. But in the rest of my life? Nope. I haven’t told Sammie the truth about my feelings, and I haven’t told anyone the truth of what happened on the bus. I’ve never told Pop my honest feelings about baseball. The guys don’t know about my artwork or my membership in the art club. I didn’t even tell Melvin Marbury the whole truth about how much his comic strip means to me.

For now, I decide I can at least be honest with Mr. Marbury, so after the third-prize winner is announced, and Mr. Simmons tells us to give Mr. Marbury one more round of applause, and he stands and thanks us, and everyone starts shuffling toward the door, I say to Albert, “Save me a seat on the bus. There’s something I’ve got to do.”

“You should hold it until we get back to school,” Sean says. “You don’t know who’s using these bathrooms. They’re public.”

“That’s not the thing I have to do,” I say, “but thanks.”

Melvin Marbury is standing with Mr. Simmons, and they’re talking. I step up next to him, take a deep breath, and say, “Excuse me.”

“David,” he says, smiling. “The Splish Splash man.”

I don’t know how to respond to that, so I say what I planned to. “I have all of your books. The older ones—Lester and the Lip Lettuce, Goose Tales, The Night of the Skating Zombie Moose—those were my pop’s from when he was a teenager, and he gave them to me.” Melvin Marbury is nodding, so I keep talking. “My pop gives me a lot of stuff that I don’t really want, mostly sports stuff, but those books . . . your books . . . I started reading them, and it was like finding a new planet. It was like learning a new language that most people didn’t know.”

Mr. Marbury smiles and his eyes get kind of shiny. I take a breath. “Then I found out there were other books, ones my pop never got. I saved up my allowance money to buy Oliver Shoots a Biscuit in the Basket. It took me like a month. I started asking for the others for my birthday and Chanukah. I usually ask for candy or Wii games, but I wanted your books that much. I even have your picture books, but I don’t think they’re nearly as good as the comics, to be honest.”

I sound like an idiot. I sound like Allie that time she ran into some America’s Got Talent girl at the fro-yo place. Starstruck. But Mr. Marbury chuckles. “Clearly you’re not trying to BS me. Or you’re doing a lousy job of it. But I appreciate your honesty, David. It’s a good quality in a cartoonist.”

But I’m not done. I have to say it all to him. “I’m glad I got to hear you speak today, and it was cool that I won second place, but if I’d never met you, it wouldn’t have mattered. Because of what you drew. Thank you.”

He smiles, puts his hands together in front of his chest like he’s praying, gives a quick nod with his head, and says, “Thank you, David.”

I don’t know how to respond. Should I do the praying thing back to him? Try a high five? Hold out my hand to shake his? I shift from one foot to another, then clear my throat, and say, “Okay. Bye now.” I give a little wave, which is the stupidest thing I could do. But I don’t care. I turn and race for the bus, feeling for the first time ever like I could run a hundred miles.

SAMMIE

When the bell rings at the end of math on Monday, Haley leans over and says, “Will I see you at softball practice? My mom can give you a ride home.”

“Not today,” I say.

“Tomorrow?”

I shake my head, not looking at her. “Nah. I’m done with softball. The baseball meeting is tomorrow.”

“I heard your dad say he won’t let you do softball.”

I hate the way she says that, like she feels sorry for me. “No,” I say, focusing on getting my math binder into my backpack. “It’s not like that. My dad was just surprised. I lied to him about where I was. He was upset about that.”

“Why would anyone lie about a softball practice?” Haley asks, sounding almost exactly like my mother. I look over at her, startled, but she’s focused on zipping up her backpack, not even looking at me.

“I’m good at baseball,” I say, folding my arms in front of me. “It’s what I’ve always played. I mean, softball was fun and all, but . . .” I think of the way Jelly hugged me at the batting cages, the way all the girls seemed happy to see me and psyched that I was there. And then I hear Dad’s voice. You’d be wasting your time and your talent. “Honestly, softball is just a waste of my time.”

Haley snorts. “How can softball possibly be a waste of anyone’s time? You sound like you think softball is less important than baseball. That’s just stupid.” She picks up her backpack and slings it over one shoulder, then turns and walks toward the door.

“I’m not stupid,” I say to her back. “I have straight A-pluses, if you really want to know.”

Haley turns and looks at me. “You sound pretty stupid.”

“I’m a good baseball player,” I say. “I don’t want to screw that up for something that’s not real.”

“Softball is as real as it gets,” Haley says. “You’re making a mistake. You would have been a great addition to the team, even with your giant ego. But if that’s the way you want it to be . . .”

“It’s not the way I want it to be,” I say to her back. “It’s the way it is.”

The rest of the day, I feel weird and lonely. When the dismissal bell finally rings, I text the Peas and tell them I don’t need to be picked up, then head to my locker to get my stuff. Everyone else is clustered in groups, talking and laughing. On the bus, I sit down next to Mrs. Caputo, and she tsks and shakes her head. “What the heck happened to you?” she says. “You look like a balloon with half your air gone.”

I try to smile, but it won’t stick. “I’m just tired,” I say.

“No twelve-year-old should be that tired.”

At home, the kitchen is dark and cold. There’s a note from my mother on the counter: Showing two properties to a client. Home by four. Baby carrots and grapes in the fridge.

Carrots and grapes. Yuck. I crumple the note up and toss it in the trash, then turn on all the lights, pour a mug of milk, and stick it in the microwave to heat up for hot chocolate.

I stand in front of the microwave, waiting, and suddenly remember Haley’s bright pink toenails, that first day in the locker room. “Silly,” I say out loud. “Silly and girly.” But it’s like somebody else’s words are coming out of my mouth. I can’t make myself believe them.

“We barely knew each other,” I say. “We weren’t friends.” But saying it doesn’t make the lonely feeling go away.

DAVID

On the bus, I tell Sean and Arnold about my conversation with Melvin Marbury. Arnold whistles at the part where I say I saved my allowance for a month to buy a comic book, and when I get to what I said about the picture books, Sean says, “Wait. You told Melvin Marbury they weren’t good? That’s not polite.”

We make it back to school for the last fifteen minutes of lunch, but I don’t want to go to the cafeteria and talk about baseball. I want to keep talking about Melvin Marbury and drawing the truth and winning second place, so I go to the art room with Arnold and Sean.

“Your folks are going to be super proud when they hear about your second-place win,” Arnold says.

I shake my head. “They don’t even know I entered the contest.”

“But you had to have the permission slip signed by a parent,” Sean says.

“My babysitter signed it.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not legal,” Sean says.

“I do it all the time. It’s easier asking Inez.”

“Well, you still have to tell your parents about the prize,” Arnold says.

“Yeah,” Sean agrees. “You can’t be drawing the truth, like Mr. Marbury said, if you don’t tell the truth.”

I sigh. “It would be easier to tell my pop the truth if it was a baseball truth instead of a comic strip truth.”

Sean looks confused. “What’s a baseball truth?”

“I mean it would be easier to tell my pop something exciting that happened if it involved baseball.”

“Is baseball exciting?” Sean asks.

“To Pop, it’s the most exciting thing in the world.”

“What about for you? Do you think baseball’s exciting?”

“Umm. Sometimes,” I say, remembering the time Sammie scored off my hit, and the time Kai’s mom brought homemade lemonade for the team instead of Powerade.

“You don’t sound excited,” Sean says.

“My dad thinks NPR news is exciting,” Arnold says. “Every night at dinner we have to hear all about it.”

“My dad’s an engineer,” Sean says. “He thinks buildings are exciting. When we went to Chicago last spring, the whole family had to take a boat tour just to look at buildings. But the next day my dad and me went to Montrose Point Bird Sanctuary, and I added seven birds to my life list. We even saw a Leconte’s sparrow.”

The bell rings, and we grab our backpacks. Arnold heads to English class and Sean and I start toward math together.

“Did your pop always like birds?” I ask him. “I mean, is he the reason you started birding?”

Sean laughs. “Nope. It was the other way around, actually. He tried to get me interested in buildings. And then he wanted us to bake stuff together. He’s an amazing baker. He makes the best cakes and pies you’ve ever had.”

“I like cakes,” I say. “And pies. Can he make a sour cream apple pie? That’s my favorite.”

“My dad can bake anything,” Sean says proudly. “But I hated baking. Way too messy. I don’t like messy. You have to be okay with gunk on your hands to be a good baker.”

“So how’d you end up doing the birding thing?”

“I’d sit in the kitchen while my dad baked and watch the birds landing on our bird feeder. One day, my dad was making a pecan pie, and I was watching these two yellow-and-black birds fluttering around the feeder. My dad put the pie in the oven, and took a book down from the cookbook shelf, and handed it to me. It was the Sibley Guide to Birds. He challenged me to find a picture that looked like the birds at the feeder. It only took me about five minutes. Then he asked me if I’d want to go somewhere and look for birds with him. I was so excited, I fell off my chair. My dad said that if I didn’t want to build stuff or make cakes with him, that was okay. But he wanted us to share something more than just our genetics. He said if what I loved was birds, then he wanted to love birds too.”

“Wow,” I say. “My pop would never say something like that.”

“How do you know?” Sean asks. “You haven’t even tried. Maybe you should tell him your comic strip truth, and see what happens.”

All afternoon, I think about Sean and his dad, and Pop, and baseball, and truth. I make it through my classes without any of my friends asking awkward questions about the art club, and then, when the dismissal bell rings, I grab my backpack and head outside, not to my regular bus, but to the one that will take me downtown, to the store.

When I walk through the doors of L. H. Fischer Sporting Goods, Pop’s at the register, his reading glasses perched on the very tip of his nose. He looks over the top of them at me and smiles.

“David,” he says cheerfully. “What a surprise!”

I nod, but can’t say anything.

He tips his head to one side, looking concerned. “Everything okay?”

I nod again, take a big breath, then sigh it out.

“Did something happen?” Pop asks worriedly. “Bad day?”

I take another breath and say, “Yes, and no. I mean, yes, something did happen, but it wasn’t bad, it was good. But it made me feel bad—well, it made me think, and that made me feel bad . . .” I stop because I don’t know how to say the rest.

Pop comes out from behind the register and puts his hands on my shoulders, then bends over and looks right into my eyes. “Whatever it is, good or bad, champ, you can always tell me.”

So I try again. “I’m in the art club,” I say. “And I won second place in a contest.”

“Second place? Nice,” Pop says, sounding exactly like he did when Allie came in third in her class’s geography bee.

“It wasn’t just a school-wide contest,” I explain. “Kids from all over Westchester entered.”

Pop nods.

“Melvin Marbury judged the contest.”

Pop furrows his brow, and then his eyes go big. “Isn’t that the guy who drew the Northern Province comics? I loved those comics when I was your age.”

“I know,” I say. “You gave me all your old books. I loved them too. I still do. They’re what turned me on to drawing, and then I drew a comic strip myself, and it won second place. From Melvin Marbury.”

Pop nods his head some more and smiles at me. “I knew you liked to draw. I’ve seen those kitten stories you and Allie do. But I didn’t realize how much it meant to you. I’m so glad you told me, David.” He turns to go back behind the register.

“There’s something else,” I say.

He turns around.

“Baseball.”

He nods, smiling so widely that all his teeth show. “Tryouts tomorrow! I bought the eggs already!”

“The thing is,” I say. “I’m not sure . . .” I stop and look down at my feet and then up at Pop. He looks at me, puzzled, and then he understands, and his mouth makes an O, and he nods, and sighs.

“You’re not sure you want to play?”

I nod. “I’m not sure I don’t want to play. But I’m not sure I do.”

“Well,” he says. He clears his throat, then says “well” again. I can’t look at his face because I know I’ll see disappointment there.

“I—just have to check on something in the stockroom. I’ll be right back,” he says.

It takes him almost five minutes to fake-check on the fake-something in the stockroom. He comes back carrying two metal folding chairs, opens them, and sets them out, facing each other.

“Sit down,” he says.

I sit in one and he takes the other.

“Son,” he says. I look up, startled, because Pop never calls me “son.” That’s what my bubbie and zaydie called him. His eyes are bloodshot and his nose is running a little, but he doesn’t look sad, or disappointed. He looks determined. “Did I ever tell you how your mom and I met?”

“In college, I think.”

“We met in law school,” he says.

I look at him, surprised. “I never knew you went to law school. I thought only Mom was a lawyer.”

“I didn’t finish. I quit at the end of my first year. You see, law school wasn’t my dream, it was my parents’ dream for me. It took me a long time to see that, and to see my own passion. I’d started working in this store when I was sixteen—it wasn’t called L. H. Fischer then, of course; old Mr. Blumenthal owned the place. I kept working here every vacation during college and even the summer before law school, and I loved it. But making a career in retail? Not what a nice Jewish boy was supposed to want to do. I figured I’d stay connected to the sports world by going into entertainment and sports law, maybe representing professional athletes. Then I met your mom during orientation and fell pretty hard for her. She loved the law, and she loved law school, and she could see almost right away that I didn’t. You know where I brought her on our third date?”

I shake my head no, afraid if I say anything Pop will stop talking, stop telling this surprising story that I’ve never heard.

“Right here.” Pop says, pointing at the store’s checkout counter. He laughs. “I wanted to show her New Roque, where I’d grown up. We were both living in the city, so we took the train out here and I took her to dinner down the street, at a little Italian restaurant. We walked to the high school and got ice cream at the Häagen Dazs place. Then I brought her here, introduced her to old Mr. B.”

He stops talking and looks around at the store, seeing something I can’t. Then he pats my knee and says, “We were only a couple of months into our first year. Mom saw how much this place meant to me. She convinced me I should come back to work over the Christmas break. Told me Mr. B needed me. Then she kept prodding me, asking me questions, making me see what was already in my heart. What I really wanted to do. Making me see that I already had a passion, and a path, and it was right here.” Pop pats the counter like it’s a living thing and smiles a small, crooked smile. “I didn’t know how to tell my parents. But your mom, she gave me the courage to do that too.”

He puts his hands on his knees and leans forward a little, chuckling. “It took Bubbie and Zaydie a long time to forgive me, and to forgive your mom. But following my own passion instead of the dream someone else fashioned for me? I have never once regretted it. I love what I do.” He puts his hands on either side of my face so I’m looking right at him. “I love what I do, son. And you should too. Whatever you decide about baseball will be fine with me.”