Vignettes: Part Three
5. I’m eleven, and walking down the road with my mother, who pushes my new sister in a small carriage. Perambulating the same dusty neighborhood, we walk toward the schoolyard, the sun a sallow glow subdued by cloud cover, chiggars hopping above the grass in ambivalent clouds, cicadas clicking and whirring, moulting on house numbers. I’m dribbling a basketball, doing the "Pistol Pete", walking in continuous crossovers. As we pass the street called Jewell, I hear, “Corey! Hold up, brotherman!” Like a joyous lion, Ross bounds toward us, massive and aloof. “Hey, Miss Corey!” he greets my mother. (Later, through most of high school, he would call her Little Corey.) “Is this the baby? Let me get a look at that.” He leans over my baby sister, who burbles in awe. After a few moments, Ross smiles, charismatic, leonine. He walks half a block with us, asks for her full name, repeats it aloud, approves. Then he pulls a penny from his jeans, holds it directly in front of my sister, who cautiously fingers it. He says, “Wanna play Find The Penny?” My mother observes this closely, enamored with the gargantua and his guileless fun, and laughs out loud when he puts the penny deep in his afro. He puts his head down in the carriage, and baby Erin gropes through his hair, having totally forgotten what she is looking for. Her eyes are like cartoon moons.
6. I sit in the mid-level hallway beneath the upper seats of the gymnasium, which is called The Dungeon. I can hear gym class going on just beyond the half-flights, reading Nabokov’s “Despair”. The novel is all about false doubles, a man enlisting a hobo who he erroneously thinks resembles him to masquerade in his place, gunning the hobo down for insurance money only to find that they looked nothing alike. Having a strange immunity at the high school, I hide away like this often, skirting classes, driving home, studying bullshit. As I read, I begin to hear a rhythmic clop, and unsuspectingly I look up to see Vlad, who I have Journalism class with, arching his eyebrow. “You are not having class?” I shrug, grin. I say, “Nah, I’m not going to class-I’ll go take the test Monday and then not go again.” He laughs, full-on, boisterous, his hearty timbre filling the hallway with Russian echoes. “You are studying to be the regisseure, huh?” This is a reference from Journalism, where he and another Russian exchange student, a girl named Lily, were highly intrigued by my personal ambitions and the special treatment I received from Mrs. Patrick, who only wanted me to draw cover art for her yearbook. “Yes,” I say. Vladimir puts his finger deep in his chest, proudly, and says, “When you are very famous you must bring me to movie premiere. I will say, ‘I knew him then! He was genius even then!’” “Alright,” I say. “Okay.” Vlad pulls the collar up on his studded leather jacket, the back of which I think says “ROCK”, and continues clopping down the hallway. I read for a few more minutes, then walk down the hall and out the doors of the mezzanine. The air outside smells sweet, gooey sweet. It’s fucking cold. A voice comes from my right, saying, “I needs my fucking ganja to keep me warm! You want some of this shit, man? Your ears getting all red.” I remember the kid’s name, Hannibal, because he always makes a scene. “I’m good,” I reply. Weed makes the air smell tastey, but Hannibal and his buddy, a black Napolean kid named Arthur (who goes by some other name), are morons, and I want to escape them. I see my breath pluming from my mouth as I step across the frosted ground, going toward my car.
7. I’m twenty-four and typing a series of vignettes on my ramshackle computer. Work is in one hour and fifteen minutes. I put on my suit, dressed too warmly for the weather, and watch the dogs urinate in the grass. I return to the computer, dawdle, cogitate. I read over three pages of script I’ve written. I wonder why no one ever leaves comments for Leon Dacter, freelance professor of semiotics. The question answers itself. It is a syllogism.
6. I sit in the mid-level hallway beneath the upper seats of the gymnasium, which is called The Dungeon. I can hear gym class going on just beyond the half-flights, reading Nabokov’s “Despair”. The novel is all about false doubles, a man enlisting a hobo who he erroneously thinks resembles him to masquerade in his place, gunning the hobo down for insurance money only to find that they looked nothing alike. Having a strange immunity at the high school, I hide away like this often, skirting classes, driving home, studying bullshit. As I read, I begin to hear a rhythmic clop, and unsuspectingly I look up to see Vlad, who I have Journalism class with, arching his eyebrow. “You are not having class?” I shrug, grin. I say, “Nah, I’m not going to class-I’ll go take the test Monday and then not go again.” He laughs, full-on, boisterous, his hearty timbre filling the hallway with Russian echoes. “You are studying to be the regisseure, huh?” This is a reference from Journalism, where he and another Russian exchange student, a girl named Lily, were highly intrigued by my personal ambitions and the special treatment I received from Mrs. Patrick, who only wanted me to draw cover art for her yearbook. “Yes,” I say. Vladimir puts his finger deep in his chest, proudly, and says, “When you are very famous you must bring me to movie premiere. I will say, ‘I knew him then! He was genius even then!’” “Alright,” I say. “Okay.” Vlad pulls the collar up on his studded leather jacket, the back of which I think says “ROCK”, and continues clopping down the hallway. I read for a few more minutes, then walk down the hall and out the doors of the mezzanine. The air outside smells sweet, gooey sweet. It’s fucking cold. A voice comes from my right, saying, “I needs my fucking ganja to keep me warm! You want some of this shit, man? Your ears getting all red.” I remember the kid’s name, Hannibal, because he always makes a scene. “I’m good,” I reply. Weed makes the air smell tastey, but Hannibal and his buddy, a black Napolean kid named Arthur (who goes by some other name), are morons, and I want to escape them. I see my breath pluming from my mouth as I step across the frosted ground, going toward my car.
7. I’m twenty-four and typing a series of vignettes on my ramshackle computer. Work is in one hour and fifteen minutes. I put on my suit, dressed too warmly for the weather, and watch the dogs urinate in the grass. I return to the computer, dawdle, cogitate. I read over three pages of script I’ve written. I wonder why no one ever leaves comments for Leon Dacter, freelance professor of semiotics. The question answers itself. It is a syllogism.