Chapter 4.
I awaken upside-down dangling from my feet, high between two palm trees. I try to reach up, but I'm so tired from yesterday, I dangle back down. How did I end up here? If you want a recap, forget it. You ain't getting one. You go back and muddle through chapter three and read how George and I plodded along the grassy savannah. I'll just dangle here and reminisce about how I really got here. Not just here, swinging from a tree, twisting around clockwise and counterclockwise as George snores away above me. No. How this whole process began. If you don't care for history (in other words, if you're like me) you can skip this entire chapter. It does nothing for the story at hand. It hardly even adds credibility to my narrative. For all you know, I could be making the whole thing up. Which, I am. It's my first person account of things. Take it or leave it. Skip past the whole ‘Zombie Spike Grindstone vs. Sander Stonyfield’ rematch. Again, it adds nothing to the story. (Worse, I’m substituting the names of the actual people with made up names like they did in the Flintstones. Liability reasons, but I trust you can figure it out!)
I met Spike Grindstone in the Phoenix airport. He lives in Phoenix, or did anyway. I hate tense. Past tense, present tense. The whole thing. Hate it almost as much as I hate history. I had a poor attitude in school. I blame it on my last name, which I don't care to divulge, and which will not get the Flintstone treatment. My last name always had me seated across from the pencil sharpener. Any class where the teacher found it necessary to alphabetize their students, I was directly across from it. The whole alphabetizing thing...I never understood this, did you? It did nothing for those poor schleps like me whose last name started with the same letter as the two biggest bullies throughout the triborough area. That's in New York, that's where I'm from. Well, I say I'm from Vegas because that is where I migrated to after getting fed up with New York. Too many bullies. Vegas was by choice, New York was by birthright. Sure, they have bullies in Vegas, but I could always weasel my way out of any precarious situation by betting them I couldn't. Those stories are for another book.
Anyhow, in school I always wanted to get up to sharpen my pencil, no sexual innuendo intended. Maybe some. The girl I pined after throughout my grade school career sat at the other end of the alphabet. Right next to the pencil sharpener, without fail. I won't divulge her name, on account of respecting her privacy.
Eyes like a China Doll (not Chinese eyes, mind you, just doll like. I wasn't into dolls much as a kid, so I guess I should use language that I'm used to). She had eyes like a movie star. A pouty lower lip, rosy cheeks, unblemished skin. A real looker. A real Betty Boop. Big face. Not a big head, but her face was like a news anchor, or like Vanna White. You could see the expression she had on her face (always smiling) from across the room. Like I had a choice. I had to admire her from afar. A tad overweight...maybe...when she was younger. As we moved from grade to grade her baby fat got properly distributed.
Fortunately for me, we both were very, very uncoordinated. I'll get to Spike Grindstone in a minute. Bear with me. Fortunately for me, we were both very short, very uncoordinated. Unfortunately for me, as we got older, she got taller. Much taller. (And no, I didn’t get shorter. I’m not like the old carpenter’s joke, “I cut this board three times and it’s still too short!”) The braces came off, the attention from other guys started coming in. The days of us both standing together in that gym, awkwardly shuffling our feet, waiting to get picked came to an end. I, of course, retained last place throughout my grade school career, straight up through high school.
Right around puberty, the tormenting from the bullies started. Subtle, at first. I'd go over to sharpen my pencil, wave hello to Riley (I'll divulge her first name). I'd start out with a brand new pencil; she'd be talking to someone else. I'd end up with a sharpened nub. The teacher would yell at me. I'd go back to my desk. My books would be missing. The two bullies would be laughing.
The next day, same thing. Books missing, lunch bag gone. I'd spend my allowance on pencils and notebooks while other kids spent theirs on cloths. Cloths never mattered to me growing up, anyhow. I reached my adult height of 5'2" in the fifth grade. In the tenth grade, I was still wearing shirts that had Miss Piggy on them.
Tenth grade. Biology class. The biology teacher, Mrs. Brithe, she says we can pick to sit where ever the hell we want.
"Pick wisely," she says. "Who you choose to sit next to will be your lab partner for the rest of the year."
Naturally, I run over to Riley. So does one of the two bullies, Bobby White. ‘Bobby White, ain't so bright, yellow teeth and likes to fight.’
My size gives me some advantages. For example, as half the boys raced over to Andrea White - no relation to Bobby White...far from it. She's smart and pretty. Popular too. I once offered to sharpen her pencil, she instead grabbed mine and said, "No, please allow me"...totally took away Riley time from me on that day. I kept my distance ever since.
So as half the boys raced towards Andrea, I ducked and jived and made my way to Riley. As did Bobby. Jimmy Watson, his brother in arms...he was an Andrea fan.
Anyhow, Bobby waltzes up to where Riley is sitting, pulls out the chair and says, "Is this seat taken?"
I jump in it and say, "It is now, Sucker!"
It gets a laugh from Riley. It gets me beaten up after class. Totally worth it. That first week of biology class was great. Sitting next to Riley every day. Finding out we were both dumb as bricks. It was a match made in heaven. And Bobby? I was getting beaten up by Bobby in the bathroom, on the bus to school, from school. As far as I knew, everyone was happy.
Until one day. We’re sitting in biology class, I’m happy as a clam (or a bivalve mollusk of the invertebrate family…wow, I did learn something!) this little voice in my head started egging me on to sharpen pencils. I tried fighting it. The sharpener wasn't even that far away anymore. The first few times I got up and sharpened it, I swore to myself it was out of habit, not anything OCD at all going on. But when Mrs. Brithe started to take notice, and I couldn't sit in my seat, I knew I was in trouble.
On the last day of the week, I get up in the middle of class. At this point, I capitulate to my disorder. The whole grinding away of a pencil to a tiny nub has been in my blood for so many years, it's impossible to shake free. I even tried not bringing in any pencils for two days, but Riley gave me one of hers. Mine! It had her little teeth marks indented in it, and I think she even used the eraser to scratch behind her ear once or twice. I cherished it. I could even smell her breath on it, cinnamon mixed with Bubble Yum. Pure heaven.
So there I was, betwixt and between keeping my heirloom in pristine condition, or scratching a vile, silly itch deep within my compulsive soul. Five minutes before the bell rings, I can't take it anymore. I bolt up; my chair goes flying, smacks into the desk behind me. Wakes up this big black guy named Jones. Jonesy to his friends. To me, he's 'Sir.' He's nineteen.
"Watch it, Sucker," he kicks the chair back at me.
I race over to the sharpener, grind away, and Mrs. Brithe gives me the business. I'm a disruption. A slacker. From this point forward, I am to turn in all work...in ink. Ink! I shudder at the thought and slink back to my seat.
“I don’t even want to hear a peep. A peep! Do you understand?” she threatens me with a raccoon skull she keeps on her desk.
Riley, princess that she is, slides over a plastic red Bic. The retractable kind. This one got little teeth marks in it too, also smells like cinnamon. She rolls her eyes as I go about smelling her pen like a fine Cuban cigar. If only she would nibble on me. I let out a loud sigh, and get immediately banished to the front office.
I'm waiting in the front office, enjoying my pen, when in walk the two goons Jimmy and Bobby. I hide my pen.
To me, the front office is a foreign place. I've only been in here to bum lunch money on occasion. I fly low on the radar. I may be a slacker, but I know how to lay low. (Laying low comes in handy when avoiding zombies later in life.) But not these two. They're on a first name basis with th
e lady behind the counter.
“How’s it hanging, Rose?” Bobby says.
She grunts.
They sit on either side of me, and begin the same tired joke I've heard a million times since third grade. I repeat it here only for posterity's sake.
Jimmy says, "Hi, Left Ball."
Then Bobby answers, "Hi, Right Ball."
Then they both say, "Who's the Dick in the middle?"
This is worse than having to use ink.
“Ink”, I think.
I look around. I carefully take out my pen again, begin smelling it, and Jimmy rips it from my hands. I don't scream. I pretend it means nothing. They see right through my ruse.
"Hey, ain't this the pen Riley gave him?" Bobby asks.
I will skip over the vulgar things they say about the pen, suffice it to say it made my blood boil. I see red. Right there in the safety of the principal's office, I make my ‘Custard’s Last Stand.’ Custard made a stand, didn't he? I'm not too good in History. But I do know that clams are invertebrates.
Anyhow, I punch Bobby in the face, hard as I can.
He just blinks up at me.
The old lady behind the counter, she's on the phone with someone, looking through some paper work. Oblivious.
Jimmy grabs me, spins me around, sits me back down. He does it like my mother used to do when we'd go out to eat at a diner when I was little. Bobby rubs his face. They both commence elbowing me until I nearly pass out. Every five seconds, elbow to the ribs. They break four of my ribs, Bobby did at least. Jimmy just separated a few of them. I couldn't breathe for a month.
Those two gave me the business in wood shop a few times. But they moved onto occupying their spare time with drugs. Then, that was it. I didn't see either of those bozos after high school. Didn't see the pen either.
Riley moved. She grew to be a head taller than me. The last time I saw her, I came eye level to her boobs. We passed each other in the hall way. It was awkward. I stared straight ahead. In my periphery, I eyed her boobs. It was between classes, all alone. One of us was bound to say something to the other. I had zero guts back then. Still do. Any masculinity I possessed, I held onto dearly. Just like her pencil. To this day, I keep it tucked away behind me ear. Even hanging upside down, it stays. It made a groove in my skull where it fits nicely.
She breaks the ice. She says, "Hey, it's Paul Williams!"
I blush; she's close with my name. I say, "Hi!"
We stop in the hallway. Well, I stopped, she kept walking past me. What a rear end she had. Back in the eighties, the pants were practically painted on.
I said after her, "I still have your pencil, Riley!"
She turned around. "My what?"
I pulled it from behind my ear. Back then, I kept it in such good condition, hardly any of the yellow paint flecked off.
She looked at it, and smiled at me, and said...I'll never forget this.
She said, "Oh."
She turned, and walked out of my life forever. I learned later from my little sister who Paul Williams was. She pulled out one of my parent's albums. He looks like a troll, staring off into space, tinted over-sized glasses. We both even had the same long blonde hair.
Oh yeah, the zombies. I almost forgot, you want to hear about them, not some stupid pencil. Next chapter, that's a promise. Spike Grindstone, too. Real interesting guy.