Not As Crazy As I Seem (15 page)

"...and we've learned that he has been suspended. The administration is not saying what his motive was for the vandalism, and his identity is also being withheld from the media. But I think you can assume, Kelly, that students here will know who he is. Back to you."

Forty-five, forty-six ... my stomach is throbbing. It feels like it's going to burst on me, but I won't stop because Dad's watching. Forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty.

I fall back on the floor and take a big breath.

"Pretty good, huh Dad? Bet you didn't think I could do it."

"You're right, I didn't think you could do it."

What's he mean—the crunches or the graffiti? This is terrible, because no matter what I do now, he's going to be thinking about the spray painting. I can't let things go on like this. I take the clicker and shut off the television.

"I was watching that, Devon."

"I know, but listen for a second. I really didn't do the spraying."

He shakes his head and rolls his eyes and turns up his hands. Is there anything else he could do to show he doesn't believe me?

"We've just been through this at your school. I don't have the energy to go over it again."

"But it's the truth. You always want me to tell you the truth."

"How could you have been in the school and not know that this other person you say was there was doing all of this spraying?"

"I was in another room."

"The boys' room?"

"No, I just said that because I didn't want to tell them where I really was."

"Which was?"

"In the advanced biology room, straightening a poster."

"You were straightening a poster?"

"Yeah, the amphibians poster was crooked."

"And while you were straightening this crooked amphibians poster, your friend had enough time to spray 'Nazi' all over the school?"

"No, I mean, I fixed the clock, too, 'cause it's always three minutes slow. And I lined up the desks."

"This was important for you to do?"

I don't know how to answer that. Sure, it was important to me, but Dad hates it when I
have
to do things. "Kind of important. I mean, the other kid had something he wanted to do at the school and asked me to go with him. I thought I was just hanging out with him, like a friend, you know. And then I thought I might as well fix a few things in advanced biology, so that's where I was the whole time."

Dad nods, but I don't think that means he accepts what I'm saying. "So, Devon, none of this would have happened if you didn't feel compelled to go in the school when you shouldn't be there to straighten posters and fix clocks and line up desks."

He's right. My tendencies have gotten me in more of a
mess than I ever dreamed of. I shouldn't have gone with Ben. I knew he was trouble to be around. But when the chance came to make things right in advanced biology, I couldn't resist.

It's time for me to change. It really is. I have to control myself. I'm not kidding this time. Goodbye, Devon the Obsessed, glad to see you go.

"Resist much, obey little."

Walt Whitman said that. Ms. Hite read us some of his poetry in English. She called him one of America's greatest poets.

I don't understand schools. They teach you that Whitman said to resist and Thoreau practiced disobedience and Holden Caulfield broke all the rules in
The Catcher in the Rye,
but then the teachers expect you to obey much and resist little. That doesn't make sense. How come they don't teach us about all of the people who followed the rules, if that's what we're supposed to do?

EnglishAlgebraEarthScienceLunchFreePeriodGym ClassicsDone.

Why am I thinking that? I'm suspended. I don't have to worry about classes.

EnglishAlgebraEarth...

Stop it, brain!

I've spent most of my life obeying. That's almost sixteen years of doing what my parents and teachers say. I've been too scared to get in trouble. I'd do my "things," but mostly I could hide them so nobody even knew. You get good at hiding after a while.

Lately, though, I've gotten in big trouble, like Dad said, and all because I couldn't stop myself from going in the school to straighten a stupid amphibians poster. Now I'm kicked out for two weeks.

Dad locked the two televisions in the storage room and took the keyboard to my computer with him to the funeral home. I told him he didn't have to go to all that effort. If he told me not to use something, I wouldn't. He doesn't trust me anymore.

He also told me not to set one foot outside unless the house was burning down. I'm like one of those criminals sentenced to house arrest. I wonder whether I'd be technically guilty if I set both of my feet outside at the same moment.

I open the back door just to breathe some real air, and it's sunny and pretty warm for the beginning of March. The snow is almost all melted, just small patches left on the ground. I stick one leg outside and half expect an alarm to go off. I wouldn't put it past Dad to rig up some system to catch me. He might even have installed one of those hidden video cameras to watch me.

I close the door and look around the kitchen. I already organized everything in the lazy Susan, putting the soups and other cans on the bottom, then the rices and pastas
on the top. The jar of pickles didn't seem like it went on either shelf, so I stuck it in the pantry.

I organized the spice cabinet, alphabetizing all the bottles and little tins so Mom can find what she wants fast. Most of the spices begin with the letter C—chervil, chili powder, chives, cilantro, cinnamon, cloves, coriander, cumin, curry powder. That's strange. Maybe Mom has a thing for spices starting with C.

I also arranged her collection of little wooden animals on the mantel in the living room so that they go from the smallest on the left to the largest on the right. The elephants, lions, giraffes, and the rest used to be all mixed up, like nobody had spent any time thinking about them. I wiped them clean with a wet cloth, too. I think Mom will like that.

Now what? I could read some more Whitman or do my worksheet on plate tectonics to keep up with my courses. That would be doing what the teachers said. But I'm not in the mood to obey. I'm going back to sleep.

I hear a car pull into the driveway and hop out of bed. It's Mom. I was never happier to see her come home. I'd be happy even to see Dad.

I run downstairs and open the door for her. "Hey, how was your day, Momster?"

She used to think it funny when I called her that. She's not laughing now.

"My day?" She sets her briefcase on the hall chair. "My day was ... exasperating, that's how my day was."

She slips out of her jacket and I grab it to hang up in the closet. "It's other people getting divorced, Mom. You shouldn't take it so hard."

When I turn around she's staring at me. I stay where I am, about six feet from her. "You look like you need a rest. Maybe we should order takeout tonight. I could go in town to get it."

"No, you won't be going anywhere."

That doesn't sound good, but I figure she's just following Dad's rule that I'm grounded except for my shrink appointment on Wednesdays. "Okay, the Japanese place delivers. You love sushi, some of those California rolls. I could order them for you, and Dad could pick them up on his way home."

Her eyes are narrowing. Her lips are squeezed shut, but her jaw's moving—she's grinding her teeth. She takes a step closer to me, and I take a step backwards. "You okay?"

She takes a deep breath. "I believed you."

"Yeah, I know. That was great of you."

"I believed you, and I said I would be devastated if you lied to me."

"Sure, I remember that."

"And you still lied to me?"

Why is she asking this? I'm already being punished, so why do we have to go over everything again? "No, Mom, I didn't lie."

She leans against the stair post. "The headmaster called me at work today. They found the spray can that was used in the vandalism. It was in the trash. The police took the fingerprints off it." She pauses here, as if I'm supposed to know what she means. I don't. "One of the prints matched yours, Devon."

"Mine? That can't be."

"Well, it is."

"How would they know what my fingerprints look like?"

"They got them off a drawing of yours in art class."

I can't believe this. The police can go searching through my things like I'm on the Ten Most Wanted List? What kind of country is this, anyway? Besides, I didn't do the spray painting, so they have to be making it up about finding my fingerprint.

"That's wrong. They're lying. They have to be, because I saw who did it, and it wasn't me."

She looks at me for the longest time, like she's searching for my soul inside. What if I don't have any soul to see? Then what will she think of me? "Say something, will you, Mom?"

"Your prints were on the can, that's all I know."

"That's impossible, it can't..." But then a picture flashes in my memory, and I realize that it is very possible. I remember Ben taking the can from his jacket and tossing it to me. I remember holding the can for a few seconds, seeing that it was Rust-Oleum, then giving it back. He was wearing gloves, black ones. "Okay, I remember now, I did hold the can, but I was just looking at it for a few seconds. I didn't use it, I swear I didn't."

She shakes her head. "I thought you always told me the truth. Through everything, I thought I could count on that."

"You can, Mom. Really."

"Devon..."

"Listen, I know you don't like my tendencies, all that stupid obsessive stuff. I'm sorry I'm like that. I wish I wasn't, you know, and I'm going to work on it next time with Dr. Wasserman. But I never lied to you about anything. Maybe I've lied about little stuff sometimes—I don't remember
every single thing. But on big things, I never lied. And I didn't lie to you about spraying the school."

She reaches down and slips off her shoes. "I'm very tired. I'm going to take a nap."

"That's good. You get some sleep."

She starts up the stairs.

"Mom, you believe me, don't you?"

She stops on a middle step. She doesn't turn around. "No, Devon, I don't."

I think that's the worst thing she has ever said to me.

God, how did things get this messed up? Why did I let some weird kid pull me into a situation like this? I spend almost every minute of my day trying to keep things under my control, so how could I let this happen?

I can't believe Mom doesn't believe me. Mothers are supposed to believe their kids no matter what. Fathers, well, they naturally don't believe anything their sons say because they were sons themselves once and know how it is. But moms are different.

It's so quiet in my room that I can hear my heart. I reach under my T-shirt and feel the beating between my ribs. It's amazing that something as thin as skin is all that protects the human heart. Why don't we have armor, like an armadillo, or a shell, like a turtle? Why did they develop good protection and we're left with skin?

I could use a massive hit of self-esteem right now. I shouldn't have returned the motivational tapes to Dr. W. I sit up in my bed so I can stare at myself in the mirror. My shoulders are slumped forward. My red hair is sticking out
like I've been zapped by electricity. My face looks all pasty, like pancake dough. My ears look like little stuck-on pieces of clay. Who would believe a kid like that?

"Cancel Cancel." Looks shouldn't matter when it comes to truth or lying. What matters is whether you have a witness.

Obey little. I have to follow that motto now. Mom's napping and I'm leaving by the garage door. I figure I can run over to Ben's house and drag him back here to confess before Dad comes home and goes ballistic over them finding my fingerprints on the can.

I start out running with a burst of energy. I probably look stupid, but I don't care if anybody sees me. The wind is cold against my face, and it feels good after being inside all day.

It takes me about ten minutes to get to Ben's. He isn't outside skateboarding like I'd hoped. I'll have to knock on the door and maybe meet his mother. What if she's drunk? What would I say to her?

Hi, I'm Devon, I live just a few blocks away on Naples Street, and I go to school with Ben—we take art together and I was just wondering if he's home?

That sounds okay, so I ring the bell. Nobody answers. After a minute I ring again. The door opens in and a little kid is there, like a miniature Ben, without the purple hair. "Is your brother here?"

"Which one?"

"Ben."

The kid closes the door in my face. That's rude. And what does it mean—that Ben isn't home?

The door opens again and Ben is standing there in
shorts and a T-shirt as if it's summer. "Hey, what's up?"

"We have to talk."

"I've been trying to talk to you for the last week at school. You keep running away."

He's right. I was avoiding him, but I thought the reason would be obvious. "I just didn't think we should be seen together, you know?"

He moves back from the door and I walk in. The floor is covered with toys and clothes and papers. It smells like cat piss. It's way too hot for winter.

Ben leads me upstairs to his room and flops down on his bed. "So why do you want to talk to me now?"

"Somebody saw me go in the school with you. Now the cops and my parents and everybody think I did the tagging."

"Somebody saw you?"

"Yeah."

He sits up. "You didn't tell on me?"

Why does he sound surprised? Should I have told on him? "No, I didn't tell."

"How come?"

"It's not like you threatened to kill anybody or anything. You just wrote 'Nazi' on the walls, and they took it the wrong way. They figured somebody had to be really messed up to do it."

Ben laughs. "I am messed up. That's what my shrink says."

"You've got a shrink, too?"

"Sure."

"And he tells you you're messed up?"

"He says I never got over my father running out on the family, and I'm mad at everybody else in the world instead
of him." He leans back on his bed with his hands behind his head. "What did your parents say?"