Rooster (19 page)

“You think that's a good idea?”

“I'm going to make a call on that as soon as we're done here.”

“You really like that one?”

“Yes, I do. I really like that one.”

“That's good.”

“That's really good.”

“I get a small,” said Roseann. “With an ‘S' on the back. On the tag. A small. I don't need anything bigger than that.”

“I'll get a medium,” said Tim. “Big is too big. Medium is good. A medium will fit me just fine. That's my size, a medium.”

“I think I'll get you a small,” said Rooster, sizing Tim up. “You're a different shape than Roseann, but I don't think you're much bigger.”

“Okay. That's good. I'm good with that. That's okay.”

Rooster looked at Percival. “Let me guess. Extra large.”

Percival, his mouth full of ham-and-pineapple pizza, nodded.

A short time later, Rooster called for the Common House bus to come down to the bowling alley to pick them up. They were a happy group. They weren't fighting or pushing.

“Thank you for the pizza,” said Percival as he stepped onto the bus.

“You're welcome,” said Rooster.

He watched them leave, then hurried home. He had plenty of work to do before Thursday.

15

T
here was no fuss or fanfare when the Strikers were asked to join the Special Olympics Bowling League after Thursday's session. A member of the committee, Mavis Brown, the woman who had joined Mrs. Yuler the previous week, attended Thursday's session, then announced afterward that she was more than pleased to invite the Strikers to join. “You meet all the criteria for the kind of teams we associate with,” she said.

That was it. Mrs. Yuler clapped her hands and said thank you very much. The Strikers themselves, looking like a true team in their new white bowling shirts, seemed satisfied, but nothing more than that. Tim was mildly disappointed to hear that pizza in the lounge would not be repeated.

“What were you expecting?” said Jolene when Rooster phoned her later that night.

“I don't know. Hugs maybe. A cake. Some cheering.”

“For what? They're joining a league. If they win the league you'll probably see hugs and cake.”

“Probably,” he said.

“I mean, it's a very nice thing you did for them, getting them all organized and everything, but don't forget, they're still in mourning. They started out with four team members and now they only have three. I'm sure they're still upset about that.”

“Uh-huh.” He did not need to be reminded of Dorothy-Jane-Anne's passing. He was thinking of her more now than ever before.

“You sound a bit down yourself. Are you okay?”

“Me? I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?”

“I don't know.”

“I just have to finish writing this report and I'm done.”

“Good luck with it,” said Jolene.

One of the very few times he had ever taken a serious stab at writing was in grade six when his teacher told everyone in the class to pick one day out of their lives and write about it. Most of the other kids wrote about something fun —a trip to Disneyland with their grandparents, staying with their cousins at the lake, the day the new puppy came home. Rooster wrote about the day his dad was buried at the cemetery in Winston. He said that he woke up that day feeling very sad, but it wasn't until they began to lower the coffin into the ground that he started to cry. There was something about the slow, creaky sound of the crank going round and round that got him going. He cried until the sound stopped and then he opened his eyes and saw that it was over. His dad's coffin had reached the bottom of the grave. The pastor said something and closed his Bible. People started to slowly move away. Two men in a blue pickup truck with shovels sticking out the back pulled up on the drive and quietly sat and waited. Rooster discovered then that the sound of the crank wasn't the worst sound in the world. It was the dead silence that followed it.

His teacher had given him an A. She said it was very moving without being too sentimental. Rooster had not been completely sure what “too sentimental” meant, and he did not want to ask for fear of looking stupid, so he never did find out. He kept the paper in the back of one of his dresser drawers. He hadn't looked at it in years, but as he sat down to write about his involvement with the Strikers, he felt a need to read it again. When he did, he cried for the first time since his dad's funeral.

He felt better afterward. His mom always talked about feeling better after a good cry. He supposed this was what she was talking about.

He took a few stabs at beginning his report, but as much as he felt like writing, nothing seemed to be working, so he pulled out a new scribbler from his desk and wrote on the front of it
My Empty Diary
. He sat and stared at it for a moment or two. Then he opened it up and made his first entry:

Hello. This is Elma's idea, not mine. This diary will
never be shown to anyone but me. However, if anyone
else does see it, and reads it, they will die a hideous
death, with me working the controls.

Apparently, keeping this sort of thing is good for
my development as a writer, which, also apparently,
is something that I may or may not be good at. We
shall see.

I have just reread my piece on the day my dad was
buried. What a crappy day that was. A crappy year,
actually. I have never really gotten over that, I am now
realizing. I think it's time to move on. Or, as Dad used
to say, “It's time to spark it and drive.”

Wish me luck.

Good luck.

Thank you.

16

M
rs. Helmsley had no idea what he was talking about when he walked into her office for a meeting and dropped the essay on her desk.

“Elma said you were going to surprise me by telling me to write a report on the Strikers when it was all over. So here it is. I beat you to it. You don't have to tell me anymore.”

Never one to let her guard down, Mrs. Helmsley could not help but look very confused. She picked up his paper and leafed through its four pages.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” she said, her eyes glancing off the words he had written.

“I'm talking about the report you were going to get me to write. Here it is.”

She looked up from his paper. “I never intended to ask you for a report on your time with the Strikers. I've received a very nice report from Mrs. Yuler about how they all miss you over there. She said she had expected them to be more excited about this bowling league next year, but when she asked them why they weren't, Roseann said it was because they weren't going to see you anymore. That, right there, tells me you did what you set out to do.”

“What you set me out to do,” said Rooster.

“Of course.”

Rooster thought for a moment. “So, what? Elma told me I had to do something that I really didn't have to do?”

“I guess so.”

“Why would she do that?”

“I don't know. Ask her.”

At lunch, Jayson filled him in on what Elma's plan had been. “She just wanted to give you something to write about. See how well you did. You can't tell a person he should try writing and then just leave him hanging there. You've gotta give him something to write about.”

“Says who?”

“I don't know. Says Elma, I guess.”

“How do you know what Elma says?”

“I asked her out. We went to a movie Monday night.”

Rooster hesitated. “You what?”

“I asked her out. We went to a movie Monday night.”

“You asked Elma out on a date?”

“Uh-huh.”

“She was drunk when you went, obviously.”

“No. Stone-sober actually. We had a really nice time. She was Real Elma the whole time we were together.”

“I don't get it.”

“Neither do I.”

“She said she was looking for new ways of relaxing, not weird people to hang out with.”

“We like each other. She's never had a boyfriend before. She likes who she is right now.”

“Does Puffs know about this?”

“He was the one who helped me get my nerve up.

My track record with the ladies hasn't been so hot lately.”

“Puffs helped you ask Elma Helmsley out on a date?”

“He kept saying he owed me one. I had no idea what he was talking about, but … what the hell.”

“Do you know now?”

“I don't have a clue. I got his books back for him, though, from Nick? Gracie's boyfriend? I saw him in the parking lot yesterday, so I went over and told him to hand over Puffs' books or I'd shove his head up his exhaust pipe.”

“Did he get them?”

“After he wet his pants he got right on it.”

Rooster shook his head. “And since when did you start talking like a normal person again?”

“Elma convinced me it was time to change.”

“Really.”

“Oh yeah. It gets tiring after a while anyway.”

“So are you gonna grow your hair out and wear long-sleeved shirts all the time now too?”

“No. The bald head and the tattoos stay.”

“She said this?”

“Uh-uh. Jayson makes the call on that,” said Jayson. “Hey, you just —”

“I got tripped up.” Jayson shrugged his shoulders. “It's going to take some undoing, let me tell you.”

Rooster went home after school and lay down on his bed. He had final exams the next week. Mrs. Helmsley had assured him before he left her office that his performance with the Strikers would help his cause come graduation time, but he still had loads of studying to do. Jolene was locked away in her bedroom, poring over her notes. Puffs was anxious for school to end so he could make money running his computer business full-time. Jayson had several possibilities on the go.

What would Rooster do?

He leaned over to his desk and picked up the rough copy of his paper. There were cross-outs here and there, and notes written between the lines that he had added before dropping it off with Mrs. Helmsley.

He was pleased with the way it had gone. It wasn't perfect, but it was decent enough. Or better.

He'd enjoyed doing it, that was the main thing.

He rolled back onto his bed and started to read page one.

When I was a little kid, I used to go down to the
Winston River with my dad and throw rocks at pieces
of driftwood. My dad always turned this into a game.
“What do you want to be when you grow up?” he'd
say, just before I threw. “A truck driver,” I'd say. If I
hit the wood I was aiming at, he'd call out, “Look at
that! You're a truck driver.” If I missed, he'd say, “Nope,
you're not a truck driver. What else do you wanna be?”
Sometimes I'd say something like “A ballerina,” and I'd
throw the rock in the opposite direction of the wood.
Whenever I did this he'd say, “You hit it. I saw you.
Rooster's gonna be a ballerina now. Ha ha.”

He always made me feel that as long as I took aim
at something, I could do it. Then he died, and I never
played the game again.

Rooster stopped reading.

What he had written was true, and it wasn't until the Strikers came along that he realized he had forgotten all that.

So now the question in his mind was, what does a seventeen-year-old kid who may have a talent for writing do after he graduates? Rooster had no idea, but he was much more excited about finding out than he had been the day Mrs. Nixon called him into her office.

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