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Bookmobile II

Every day now, it’s Mama saying, Scags do this or Celia do that. She is making me mad. She is mad at Pops, too, always telling him to stop staring at her, to eat his dinner and to stop drinking and bowling. First he looks at her like what are you talking about and then he laughs, laughs so funny, like he’s laughing at something neither Mama nor I can see. He laughs. Mama gets up from the table and yells at Odessa that there are water spots on the glasses. Odessa doesn’t say anything but I know she knows Mama doesn’t mean it.

It is only two weeks before school starts again. Oh no. I got the letter in the mail telling me what teacher I’m going to have and what room number. I’m going to have Mrs. Showalter. Mrs. Showalter’s father was a friend of Boomer’s. Maybe she’ll like me best because of that.

With the teeny clouds running all over the blue sky, it feels kind of cool today. Under the tree is even a cooler place to sit and in my shorts and t-shirt I see little bumps on my skin, on my arms, which are covered with freckles and on my legs. I don’t think Mama will let me ride today on Julia’s new tandem bicycle. Mr. Arthur bought Julia this keen-o bike and she said we could take a long ride today, maybe all the way to Church Street and Crawford, the furthest away I’m allowed to go on my own. There is a lot of busy traffic there. It’s not so easy to cross. I need a grownup to go with me.

Julia says, Scags. I look up and across the yard and she is standing in her mother’s flower bed. I see her with her long blonde hair tied up on her head like a ballerina. She pretends to be smoking a cigarette but it’s a candy cane, and I say, Can I have one too? You have to come with me to the bookmobile if you want one, she says.

I stand up and wipe the dirt off the back of my shorts. I walk to my front yard and Julia walks in the same direction. Through the bushes she hands me a red and white candy cane. I stick it in my mouth and at first it makes my eyes tear but then I like the sticky sweetness of it. As I pass by the front door, there is Pops holding it open, whistling, leaning against the door and whistling nothing I’ve ever heard before and sort of like someone who doesn’t know how to whistle trying to whistle.

Hi Pops, I say, but he is looking at his shoes, not at me. He’s wearing his shiny black shoes and his green suit with a white shirt and the green and yellow tie. He reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a rock, one of my rocks, and hands it to me. It’s the one with fool’s gold in it and it glows. I say, Keep it Pops. I can get more. He tosses it in the air, pulls it to him and replaces it in his pocket. Thanks, he says.

Julia says, Come on Scags, let’s go. Pops turns his head in the direction of Julia’s voice but when he looks at her and after she says, Hi Mr. Morgenstern, he says to me, Well got to cook the bacon, and he opens the door and walks back into the house.

What’s wrong with your dad? Julia asks me in my ear as we walk down the lawn to the bookmobile. Oh, he’s just tired, I say, I say, Maybe I should get him a book to read. What will you get him? Julia asks. He doesn’t look like he’s in the mood to read.

What do you mean? I ask Julia. He’s fine. People who are tired like to get into bed with a good book.

Yes Scags, he’ll be fine soon, Julia says as we climb up the two little steps into the bookmobile where the old lady sits, reading at her table, not even looking up when we come in, I say, He’s just got a lot on his mind. Then I say, Hi bookmobile lady, we’re here.

She looks up at us and says, Edna, my name is Edna. Your names are Julia and Celia.

No, I say, she’s Julia and I’m Scags. Just plain old Scags.

Scags is it, well then Scags, what book would you like today? I don’t know, I say, not something sad like Old Yeller. Maybe I could read Heidi again.

Scags, you’ve read it a million times, Julia says, so I say, Well then I’ll read it a million more times until I have it memorized.

Would you like to live with your grandfather? Julia asks me and I say, Boomer’s okay. But not to live with.

Julia says, My mother bought me Shirley Temple glasses to drink out of. When you come over again, you can drink from them too. I love Shirley Temple. She can sing and dance and everything and she has all those curls in her hair, you could do it too Scags.

I don’t want to look like dumb old Shirley Temple, I say and wait for Edna to tell me to be quiet but I guess since we are the only ones here we can talk as loud as we want to. I say out loud, because I’m thinking it and it just comes out—Fuck Shirley Temple. Edna says, Scags none of that. You hear me? I say, Okay. I’m sorry.

I want to read a real story. I want to read about Abraham Lincoln or Beethoven or Clara Barton—Julia says, But Scags you’ve read all of those. Why are you so angry? Can’t you be nice?

Well, I say, yes…I can be nice…Let’s leave and go sing songs, I want to hear you sing your camp songs.

What is that you’re talking about? Edna asks and she stands up from behind her table and walks toward us. You know, she says, sometimes you think you want to read but what you really want to do is to run around and scream and yell. Maybe today you can’t sit quietly in here and look at books.

I look at her mouth moving, her tongue and lips all move. I see the pencil stain on her lower lip and when I look at her eyes, I see how pretty she is.

I say, We’ll leave now, come on Julia.

But Julia doesn’t want to leave right away. I say, We can come back in a little while. Edna takes the book Julia is looking at, an illustrated dictionary with big pictures of bicycles in there but no pictures of the tandem bike she got as a present. Julia stomps out of the bookmobile, stomps to her front lawn and lies down on the grass on her back and looks at the sky. She is angry at me.

Mrs. Showalter is going to be my teacher, she says.

Oh shit, I say. Well hell’s bells, I continue and put my hand over my mouth so that I don’t say anymore what is on my mind. I say to Julia with my hand over my mouth, Me too.

What? Julia says. I can’t understand you. Are you in my class?

I shake my head back and forth, up and down, from side to side.

Well what is it Scags?

I take my hand down. I take a deep breath and will only say, Me too. I don’t want to be angry at Julia. I don’t want to hate her but I do, so I say bye to her. She raises a hand to me so I can help her off the ground but I walk away. When she calls out Scags, want to go for a bike ride, I just keep walking to my house.