Anything You Want (12 page)

Turns out Mr. Frederick wasn't there to be a pal. He had come on official duty. After the nurse cleaned up Darius, Mr. Frederick told him to get dressed. Darius did what he was told. Then Mr. Frederick cuffed him and took him downtown to the police station for processing. (It doesn't have anything to do with food processing by the way. I know because I asked when I was arrested.)

I couldn't go with Darius. Mr. Frederick said that they'd give me a call when I could pick him up and that it might be a good idea to get a hold of my dad.
Fantastic.

You know who's nice? Emily Cook. She finished her shift a little before Darius got hauled down to the cop shop, but she waited for me. “I figured you might need a ride home. It's very cold out there.”

“Thank you,” I said. “You're incredibly nice.”

She smiled that crazy big smile. Then she drove me home.

Maggie called early in the morning.

“Holy crap, Taco. Carrie Cramer just texted me. She heard about Darius on Snapchat. Everybody's posting crazy pictures. He crashed into Taco Bell? Is he okay? People think he hit Taco Bell because he was mad at you. Is he at home? Are you safe?”

“He didn't just hit the Taco Bell,” I told her. “Also KFC.”

“I don't think you should be splitting hairs. I'm scared. I love you!”

“Shh. Don't say that. What if your parents hear?” I said.

“Everybody is out getting a Christmas tree at Piggly Wiggly.”

“Listen, I don't think Darius was trying to kill me. I think he fell asleep because his blood is bad…or because he was so super drunk. Emily Cook said his blood problem is fake.”

“Emily Cook?” Maggie asked.

“She was at the hospital. She's super nice,” I said. “She drove me home.”

“Emily Cook?” Maggie asked again.

“Yeah. Emily Cook.”

“I'm going to try to come see you today,” Maggie said. “I need to see that you're okay.”

“See me? Okay,” I said.

But Maggie had already hung up.

Since I was awake, I called Dad. My heart pounded. The call went to voice mail. I left a message. “You maybe heard. Darius got in some trouble overnight.”

I sort of expected Dad to call right back, but he didn't.

Then I lay down in my bed and tried to read an essay for English. It was something about the proper way to choose a persuasive paper topic, but I think I read three words before my head crashed back into my pillow. I must've slept for hours because it was midafternoon by the time my eyes opened again. I probably would've slept until dark, but a noise woke me up. There was someone in the house. The floors creaked with footsteps. The cupboards in the kitchen opened and shut. Water ran in the sink.

“Maggie?” I asked.

“No, dumb ass.”

“Darius?” I called. “The cops were supposed to call me. They set you free?”

“Yeah. But not for long!” Darius shouted. I heard him shuffle down the hallway to the suite. He pushed open my door and stared at me. He was so pale, pal. He had dark circles under his eyes. He seemed like he'd dropped about twenty pounds because his shirt looked too big and his pants were all dirty and baggy. “I'm going to jail. Prison. Like for real. Probably for all of January.”

Oh man, I don't like anyone to feel bad, right? Much less my bro. It wasn't easy, but I tried to be positive. “Hey. No problem! You'll get your shiz straightened out there. Have a little time to think and reflect. I could probably use a little jail time myself. Really couldn't come at a better time in your life, you know? Figure out a path forward. Get your insides unstuck! This is perfect!”

“No, dude. Nothing about this is perfect,” Darius said.

“Aw, come on. Everything's looking up.”

“I've got fines. Big ones. I don't have car insurance either, so what about all that damage I did at Taco Bell?”

“Not just Taco Bell. KFC too,” I reminded him.

“Yeah, Taco. I know, okay?”

I squinted at Darius. Something didn't compute. “Wait. You don't have car insurance? Doesn't Dad pay for that?”

“Yeah, but…” Darius looked down at the floor.

“Yeah, but?” I prompted.

Darius started talking fast. “Yeah, but I don't really have a driver's license because I didn't do the shit I needed to do to get it back after my last DUI, and I didn't think I really needed insurance since I didn't really have a license.”

“But you drive. You've been driving for like six months.”

“Yeah, because I can't take riding my shitty bike like a little kid. So I told everyone I got my license back.”

“Where did the car insurance money go?” I asked.

Darius looked at the ceiling. He exhaled hard. “Your food, your clothes, your stupid shampoo and toothpaste. Dad doesn't give us enough! You needed that money to live, okay?”

I started to get really sweaty. My head started spinning from the inside out, like I was swirling down a drain, except I was just sitting there in my bed. “Darius?” I whispered. “What does this mean?”

“It means I'm in deep shit…like a canyon filled with shit, Taco.”

“How deep? Like a thousand dollars deep?” I asked.

“I don't know,” he said. “Probably deeper. A lot deeper.”

Then he turned and disappeared into his basement.

Maggie did come over later. Mary stayed parked out front. Maggie hugged me and told me she loved me, and she called Darius an idiot before she left. Instead of making me feel better, she just reminded me how everything in the whole world was spinning out of control.

Best day ever?

Best day ever.

You have to keep trying.

Twelve days later after a lot of trouble, which included Darius getting really drunk again and falling down in the yard and puking on the stairs (which I cleaned up) and him missing work due to a massive hangover, Darius got fired from Captain Stabby's.

During that same time, Maggie Corrigan began to show a little more in the baby-belly department. If you didn't know the what-what, you might not be able to tell, but I could. Maggie definitely could tell. Throughout the school day, she'd just burst into tears at the drop of a hat. (Really, if someone dropped their hat on the floor, she would get so sad that she'd cry.) Maggie wouldn't let me hug her or anything. Not even when we were alone in the hallway. When I asked her if she still thought we were in love, she said, “Yes, we're in love. I just hate you right now, but not forever.” So I had to guess our plan was still in place.

Here's some more bad news: I had to go to musical practice three times during those couple of weeks, and that meant my nights at Nussbaum's went very late. The musical practices themselves were great though. The other munchkins and I sang our nuts off, and we got our first taste of walking around on our knees to look super tiny, which was hilarious.

The really good news was that I loved being at Nussbaum's. Chatting up the clients? Making coffee and running down to Pancho's for sandwiches? Boom. Good times. I even figured out how Mallory intended to organize the majesty of the law folders and papers, although it was pretty clear that she hadn't been filing squatch since long before she got the babe in her maker.

Dingus, I found unfiled case documents going back like eighteen months. Eighteen months! No lady carries her baby goods for that amount of time. The doctors would come after her with a knife because the baby would have been the size of a full-grown pit bull. Mallory seemed like maybe she was just a sucky worker.

When I figured out that the files were ordered by client's last name and then by month and year—bing bang boom. I filed like a kingpin. It was pretty easy work, but Mr. Nussbaum kept saying what an astonishingly good job I was doing.

After I fulfilled my no-money civic duty, I'd walk home in the cold, feeling like all the world made sense—that is, if you just paid attention, put the right paper in the right folder, and slid it in the right drawer. But then I'd get home and find sad, broken Darius or super drunk Darius like I did one time.

I yelled at him that he was an asshole for drinking again, but he didn't care. He slurred, “I've got no reason for nothing.”

Drunk, drunk, drunk.

On the eleventh day, two days after I asked Mr. Nussbaum if Darius needed to hire a lawyer and Mr. Nussbaum laughed and said, “Your brother is so obviously guilty in every facet of his situation. Witnesses and blood tests verify all counts against him. All you'd be doing is adding to the total of this great financial disaster,” Darius got the letter from the county clerk telling him what he had to look forward to in the coming year.

Here's the what-what:

1. A $1,100 fine.

2. A twenty-four-month driver's license suspension, minimum. (He'd have to do a bunch of alcohol assessments and driving courses or it would be longer.)

3. A five-week stint (FIVE WEEKS) in the county jail, which would begin on January 2.

4. And then there was the real kick in the salami. He had to pay $22,549.30 in restitution to the local company that franchised the KFC/Taco Bell. That's how much damage my brother did to their drive-through window when he fell asleep and drove his stupid car into the side of the building.

Darius, who was already tender in his man parts, both physical and emotional, fell on the floor, sobbing. I tried to comfort him. He told me to shut up with my sunny crap and go the f-bomb away. So I went back to the master suite. I could still hear him wailing.

Two hours later, he knocked on the door and said, “Taco, I have an alcohol problem. I want to drink right now because I don't know what else to do. I got loaded the other day because I got in a fight with Dad about money. I don't have enough money to buy shoes, and there are holes in mine where the water comes through. But he seriously won't help us anymore.”

“Because of Miz?” I asked. “He needs money for her?”

“No, because he's Dad,” Darius said. “That's why he won't help. Without Mom, Dad is a bad man.”

“Oh,” I said.

“I'm a drunk. I don't have money. And I can't make money because I'm going to jail. And that means I can't take care of you the way Mom wanted me to. Things are bad right now. We have to pay rent and utilities and…” Darius's face got all red and splotchy, and his eyes watered. “Man, I hate saying this so much, Taco. I'm such a failure.” He looked up at the ceiling. “Please, I'm sorry, Mom, but Taco has to get a job or we're going to all starve and die in the snow.” Then he looked back at me. “I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm really sorry.”

“No,” I said. “Don't be sorry. I can handle this.” I rolled out of bed. Darius had helped me so much. I could help him and me…and Maggie too. I wasn't scared at all. I was so serious. “I will be a man.”

“Oh shit,” Darius said. “You have no idea about life.”

“I'm totally great with life. I can do this, Darius.”

Darius shook his head and closed his eyes. “You're just so full of shit, dude. You kind of make me sick.”

“What?” I asked.

Darius deflated. He spoke really quietly. “Seriously. I really don't want to talk to you for a few days, okay? Just stay away from me.” He left my room.

I had to tell myself, like, ten thousand times, “Today is the best day I've ever had,” because I'll tell you, after that weird display, I had fear in my heart for sure.

When Dad went up north to the mine, it wasn't so he could marry some puffy-coat-wearing lady. It was so he could earn extra money to keep me floating until I was adult enough to float my own boat.

And the reason Darius stopped going to tech school and took a full-time job driving a Pepsi truck and then working full-time at Captain Stabby's was so he could keep me afloat until I could float my own boat.

But Dad floated into Miz's hot sack, and Darius sunk himself all the way to the bottom of the ocean. And Dad wouldn't call me back, and Darius told me to stay away from him. There was no one to float my boat but me, and I didn't even have a boat because, according to Darius, I was full of shit and also I was in high school and I had homework and musical rehearsals and I had to work for Nussbaum for free and… Holy balls, dingus. I had a baby in my girlfriend.

“Today is the best day I've ever had? So is tomorrow?”

How could I believe it?

Whatever. I kept repeating it to myself.

“Tomorrow will be even better than today.”

And it worked. That night I dreamt that my mom was watching out for me like a big, bald Tibetan baby-head sun rising over the grocery store.

The next day was my seventeenth birthday.

It was a Friday, the last day of school before winter break. My birthday!

Not that I cared. My job was to get my shiz together, not get excited about school vacation or birthdays or whatever. But dingus, nobody remembered my birthday. Not Darius (who wouldn't talk to me). Not Dad (who didn't call). Not Maggie Corrigan (who, for reasons that are completely understandable, was wrapped up in her own self). Not Ak Sharma. Not even my oldest pal, Brad Schwartz. Not one single human being.

Except Emily Cook. Sort of.

She caught me in the commons. She was wearing her shirt buttoned all the way up to her collar and her circular plastic nerd glasses. “Hey, Taco! Are you seventeen?” she asked.

I stared at her. I nodded fast. “I am! Today!”

“Oh…sooo…happy birthday?” Emily said.

“Yes! Exactly! It's my birthday,” I said. “Thanks for saying happy birthday.” I think the word
birthday
sent me into some kind of super awkward info puke because I started talking fast. “When my mom wasn't dead, she used to give me birthday cake first thing in the morning, and
then
we'd go for breakfast at Country Kitchen. Like I needed any
more
food, right?”

“Right?” Emily asked. “Uh…are you okay?”

“I don't know,” I said. I took a deep breath. Nobody had talked to me all morning, you know? “Probably not.” I shrugged and smiled at Emily. “Hey, why do you care if I'm seventeen? That's pretty weird.”

“Oh yeah,” Emily said. “One of the college kids who works the desk at the emergency room quit, so we need to hire someone. You have to be seventeen, so I figured I'd ask. I know you're a busy guy, but…”

“Yeah, I really don't have time.”

Emily looked down. “I know. Lecroy makes such a big deal out of a musical. It's like he's putting on a real Broadway show, not a rinky-dink high school production.”

“That's not it. I need a real job.”

Emily shook her head slightly. “Didn't I just mention a job at the hospital?”

“I already volunteer at Nussbaum's law office, so I can't do more charity work.”

“What kind of charity work does Nussbaum do? My dad says he's a scoundrel,” Emily said.

“Really?” I asked. “Nussbaum?”

“Doesn't he spend all his time gambling at the VFW?” Emily asked.

“Really?”

Emily stared at me a second and then shook out the cobwebs. “Taco, you're kind of an airhead.”

“Me?”

“Do you think I work at the emergency room all night long for free?”

“Yeah. Volunteer work. Nerds love that crap, right?”

“I may be a nerd, but I'm not a dolt. I get paid eleven dollars an hour.”

I sort of gasped for air. Tibetan sun came flooding in from the commons area skylight. It was a total miracle. “What are you saying, Emily Cook?” I was getting tears in my eyes because I really didn't know how to get a job and here was somebody giving me a shot.

“Uh…you're seventeen, so you should apply for the job at the hospital. That's all.”

“Really? I could work at the hospital? For money?” It just seemed so far out of my league, dingus. Such a dream.

“I mentioned you to Dr. Anderson at our staff meeting last night, and he knew your mom really well because they worked together. She was a nurse, right?”

“Yeah! But in Cuba City, not in town.”

“He works there too. Anyway, he told me to talk to you because he also heard about how you calmed down that sorority girl when she arrived in the emergency room.”

“Yes!” I said. “I am totally at your service! I'll take the job!”

“Well, you have to apply for it first.”

“I am a man who can float my own boat,” I said.

“Okay. Is that a good thing?” Emily asked. “Can you come into the hospital tomorrow morning?”

“You know it, Emily Cook,” I said. “I'll be there.”

I walked around the rest of the day with my head held high as a kite floating on helium winds. When the bell rang, I grabbed Maggie Corrigan and said, “I'm going to be a doctor or nurse!”

She said, “Merry Christmas. I'm going to Ohio tonight. It's going to suck.”

“I'll miss you, my lady. Safe journeys,” I said.

She swallowed like she was about to barf. Then she nodded and left the school. We were definitely working our plan! No one could possibly tell that Maggie liked me at all, much less loved me.

After school, I told Mr. Nussbaum with a no-nonsense voice like it was exactly what had to happen, “I'm going to be late coming to the office tomorrow because I have to go procure employment at Southwest Municipal in the a.m.”

Mr. Nussbaum stood up from his desk and pulled on his shirt. He grabbed my hand and walked with me out of his office, through reception, and into the majesty of the law filing room. There, he showed me a pile of new files, which were piled on top of the old files I hadn't yet finished filing. “You still going to have time to pay your debt to society?” Nussbaum asked.

“I will. But I need money.”

“Darius?” Mr. Nussbaum asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Darius and other stuff.”

“Your pops not willing to give you a little extra?” Mr. Nussbaum asked.

“Wouldn't seem so,” I said. “He won't take my calls.”

“No other way?” he asked.

“I mean, if you paid me for this work, then I wouldn't have to get another job.”

“That's not our deal,” Mr. Nussbaum said. “I'm already doing my part.”

“Okay,” I said.

He breathed in and out through his nose and squinted down at me. “Taco. Let's talk about adult problems,” he said. He turned and walked back into his office. He waved that I should follow him, so I did. He sat down in his chair and gestured for me to sit across from him. “It has come to my attention that there are other issues too, aren't there?”

“Beyond Darius and my dad?” I asked.

“Troubles you're not broadcasting to the public,” Mr. Nussbaum said.

“What?” I knew what he was talking about, but I didn't think he could possibly know what he was talking about.

“Adult problems related to Maggie Corrigan? Related to her parents? Related to a meeting my friend Bill Bettendorf took earlier today, whereby Maggie's parents want to remove your parental rights over the child she's gestating?”

“Oh shit,” I said. “I can't lose my parental rights!”

“Taco. Be real, amigo.”

I felt like I was looking up at a giant waterfall that was blasting my face. “Okay. It's all true. Gestating,” I said, barely able to get the word out.

“Of course it's true. All of it.” Nussbaum nodded at me.

“But, Jesus, can the Corrigans really do that? Remove my rights without me agreeing?”

“If we don't fight them, they can,” Mr. Nussbaum said.

“I want to fight! I want to be a dad, a family guy, the husband Maggie needs. I want to kick around a soccer ball with my kid.”

Mr. Nussbaum squinted at me again. He kind of laughed. “So you want to get a job
and
work here
and
go to school
and
be a musical munchkin
and
be a dad?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Again, you want to be a dad
and
a typical teenager
and
a munchkin?”

“Yes?”

Nussbaum shook his head. He sighed. “I don't think so,” he said. “You have to simplify, prioritize, or you're in trouble. You're
already
in trouble.”

“Oh,” I said. Yeah, dingus, I got it. I just didn't want to get it.

Nussbaum laughed. He barked, “Wow!”

“Wow what?”

He laughed more. “I just can't see how a good kid like you can get into so many messes! That Maggie Corrigan must be one hot tamale. Hard for you to think clearly with her around? Plus you don't have a family to write home about. Not like there's anyone to guide you or clean up your messes. They die or get drunk or run away with floozies up at the mines, don't they?”

“I guess,” I said.

“Wow.” The smile dropped off Nussbaum's face. He exhaled and stared at me. He didn't say anything for a few seconds, like he was thinking hard. Then he nodded. “Okay, I'm it. I'm your guy, Taco. Listen to me. First things first. Get your priorities straight. You can't quit school to go to work or your future will be ugly. Got it?”

“I won't quit school,” I said.

“Good. Also, you can't quit here until Mallory gets back or you're in trouble with the law,” Nussbaum said.

“Okay.” I wouldn't quit.

He leaned back, put his hands behind his head, and kept thinking and talking. “You need money. Your dad won't support you the way you need to be supported.”

“True,” I said.

“Well, we could sue the shit out of him. You're his responsibility.”

“No!” I shouted.

“But your brother is going to jail, and you need money,” Nussbaum said. “Why not get it from your old man?”

“I don't want to be connected to him…like indebted,” I explained.

“But you need money,” Nussbaum said.

“So?”

“So you won't become homeless. So you won't starve.”

“Also, so Maggie and my baby have food to eat when they come live in the house with me.”

Nussbaum shook his head. Then he looked up and spoke to the ceiling, “But you're just a kid.”

“I'm not really a kid. I'm seventeen today,” I said.

“Yeah, yeah,” Mr. Nussbaum said. “But you don't need to have a kid.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. “I'm the father of a baby.”

Nussbaum leaned forward. “Taco. You forget that crap, amigo. Take a sizable cash settlement from the Corrigan family, give up your parental rights and all nonessential contact with Maggie, and go be a teen and a musical munchkin who lives in your own place and has enough to eat.”

“No!” I shouted. There it was! What Maggie said they were going to do! They wanted me to sell my kid! “I won't do that.”

“You haven't even heard their offer, Taco.”

“I don't sell children. I don't sell my love.”

“Oh boy,” Nussbaum said. “Will you just hear their offer?”

I clapped my hands over my ears. “No, no, no, no!”

Mr. Nussbaum shouted, “Stop it! Stop, Taco!”

I put my hands down, glared at Nussbaum, and said, “So other than sell children for money, what do you think I should do?”

“Go get a job. That's all you can do,” he said. “Then between here, school, and your job, work yourself to death.”

“Okay,” I said. “I'm on it.”

Nussbaum glared at me. “Cut the deluded shit. You quit that musical because you have no time to be a damn munchkin. Focus, kid. You have school, my office, and whatever job you get, and that's it. You agree to quit that musical and dedicate yourself, and I'll fight off the Corrigans. Do we have a deal?”

“Yes, sir,” I said quietly. I needed help. “Thank you.”

Mr. Nussbaum just shook his head.

A few minutes later, I was back filing. My stomach hurt, and my chin trembled. For my birthday I got the gift of no longer being Mayor of Munchkinland.

I got Nussbaum's help though. That meant something.