Paperboy (2 page)

I had told my father earlier that I thought I might take on the route and he said it was good that I was going to help out a friend.

Mam and I went up the back stairs and down the hall past my mother who was putting white stuff on her face and things in her hair like she always did at night at the dresser in her bedroom.

Good night, sweetie.

I started to say good night back but I got stuck on the hard
G
and I knew if I ever got the
G
out the
N
would also give me trouble. So I just kept on walking down the hall to my room with my breath stuck in me and not feeling like fooling with a bunch of s-s-s-s tricks seeing as how it was at the end of the day and I was tired.

Mam put my dirty clothes and towels down the laundry chute when I had finished in the bathroom and then came to my room. She patted my foot when I got in bed and turned out the light on her way out.

Mam had stopped giving me goodnight kisses on the top of my head a long time ago without me asking. You never had to tell Mam what you were thinking like you did with regular grown-ups. She always knew on her own.

On the first Monday of the route the regular carriers started getting to the newspaper drop a little before three o’clock.

I already had the two
Press-Scimitar
canvas bags hanging on a wooden fence in the alley like Rat had showed me.

Most of the carriers were about my age but a few grown-ups had routes which kept the kids from horsing around too much. I knew some of the guys from school but most were from parts of town I didn’t know.

An older boy in cutoff jeans and a black T-shirt spread out his bags on the fence next to me.

Where’s Art?

s-s-s-s-Gone … for s-s-s-s-July.

He looked at me funny. I was saying in my head that Rat was taking off the month of July so he could spend it on his granddaddy’s farm. That’s what I was thinking but I had to choose words that felt like they had some kind of a chance of coming out of my mouth. I always picked my way around words and sounds in sentences like I walked around broken bottles and dog turds in alleys.

Where’s he gone to?

Saying
grandparents
’ wasn’t going to work. I could feel the
G
sound balling up in my throat when I just thought about saying the word.

Farm.

The word came out of my mouth without much of a pause or a hiss because I could slip up on the
F
sound if I went at it just right.

What farm?

Just then the white
Press-Scimitar
truck rolled into the alley and the back door opened. I moved to the truck to get the first bundles so I wouldn’t have to keep talking to the kid.

With all my bundles in one spot I pulled out my yellow-handle knife to try to cut the heavy cords around the papers. The knife had a long single blade that was so dull I could close it on my finger and it wouldn’t cut me. I had been meaning to have it sharpened because I didn’t want to spend extra time sawing through the bundle cords and I didn’t want anything slowing me down. Soon I had all my papers folded extra tight.

I had gone with Rat so many times that I was sure I knew all the houses but just to be safe I had his route book in the back pocket of my shorts.

In the part of Memphis where I live all the street names are sunk in the concrete on every corner in nice blue tile. I know all the streets but I like to read the name in my head each time I come to one. Vinton. Harbert. Carr. Melrose. Goodbar. Peabody.

The streets are like friends that I don’t have to talk to.

The teacher my parents hired to help me talk had given me some drills to work on during summer recess. She explained that I had extra trouble with words that started with a
B
sound or a
P
sound because those words meant I had to put my lips together and let the air build up a little inside my mouth.

She said the problem was that my lips tightened like a clenched fist and the air couldn’t get through. The more I tried to say words that started with
B
and
P
the tighter my lips would close up on me.

My plan for practicing the drills was to try to say a hard word just before I threw a paper on a porch. It was a kind of a game choosing the words and then hearing them come out of my mouth as I chunked a
Press-Scimitar
.

I had picked out a good word to say at the next house on Harbert. The two-story was white brick with thick hedges growing up over the porch railing. I didn’t want to take a chance on throwing the paper in the tall bushes so I walked up close to toss it underhanded and in a normal voice I said

Pitch.

A chain on a porch swing clanked and soon a lady in a green housecoat was standing at the top of the porch steps with one hand on her hip and looking straight at me. Her other hand held a glass with ice in it. She had long red hair that was piled up on her head every which way. Her legs were spread out wide on the porch like she was taking a lead off first base. The way she was standing didn’t let the flaps of her housecoat cover her up like they should have been doing. She wasn’t wearing shoes.

What did you call me, young man?

I felt like turning and running but my legs wouldn’t move. Much less my mouth. The lady walked down the porch steps.

I heard you call me a bitch.

I stood in the yard shaking my head side to side.

Don’t shake your head at me, young man, and tell me you didn’t.

She moved toward me with the glass in her hand. She swirled the glass around and around which made the ice cubes clink. I had never seen her before even though she only lived a few streets over
from me. I couldn’t remember the customer’s name from Rat’s route book.

What’s the matter with you? Can’t you talk?

The red-haired lady stared and made sure that I knew she wasn’t going away until I gave her an answer.

s-s-s-s-Just s-s-s-s-p

I had made a mistake to try to say
practicing
. A bad
P
word for me. I started over.

s-s-s-s-Just s-s-s-s-rehearsing saying s-s-s-s-words.

My answer was so soft I wasn’t sure she heard me.

What? Rehearsing? Calling me a bitch?

My head kept shaking from side to side like one of those brown toy dogs in the back windows of cars.

s-s-s-s-Not what s-s-s-s-I said ma’am. Sorry.

She moved back from me one step and almost lost her balance. Her housecoat flopped open again.

Where’s my regular paperboy?

s-s-s-s-Rat’s on the s-s-s-s-farm.

I heard the words come out of my mouth but they sounded like I had just told the red-haired lady that somewhere in the world there were a bunch of rats running around on somebody’s farm. Even
when I managed to say words halfway decent they didn’t always have the meaning I intended.

Are you the boy who walks with his colored maid to the bus stop?

I nodded.

s-s-s-s-Just helping my s-s-s-s-friend with his s-s-s-s-route. s-s-s-s-Didn’t say what you s-s-s-s-thought.

I should hope not.

The glass in her hand looked like it held only ice water at first but when she had moved closer I smelled the whiskey.

Now you listen to me.

She stepped toward me and raised her finger. I was hoping she wouldn’t lose her balance again.

Don’t throw the newspaper AT my house. Walk up and place the paper in front of the dwo-o—or like a gentleman.

Somehow she had managed to put a
W
in
door
.

I nodded extra hard. She studied me like she wanted me to say something else but I was clean out of words. I backed away from the house onto the sidewalk and kept going down Harbert.

My T-shirt was soaked with sweat and my khaki shorts looked like I had taken a bath in them. From then on I just walked up to the porches and tossed the papers underhanded. You can bet I didn’t practice any more word drills.

By the time I had thrown my last newspaper for the day I had come up with a good plan. I ran all the way home and up the back stairs to my room. I put a clean sheet of notebook paper in the typewriter.

The big attic fan was roaring and a good breeze was blowing through my window. I checked the name on Harbert in Rat’s route book. I typed slow and careful so I didn’t have to go back and rub out any letters.

Inside my head I said each word over and over. I folded the piece of paper in half and then in half again. On the outside I printed Mrs. Worthington’s address with a sharp pencil.

I ran to the house on Harbert and checked to see that Mrs. Worthington wasn’t still on the porch swing and then clothespinned the note to the black letterbox at the side of her front door.

The rest of the week stayed hot but by Thursday I had the route down to about two hours.

At 1396 Harbert I was just getting ready to lay the paper on the porch in the perfect spot when I saw Mrs. Worthington peeking out at me through the glass of her front door. She opened the door and walked out on the porch wearing a bright green dress with a big shiny black belt.

I didn’t usually pay much attention to dresses that ladies wore but this one looked special the way the wide belt fastened tight around her middle like it was dividing her into two parts.

That first day Mrs. Worthington had looked about the same age as my mother but she looked younger this time. Almost as young as Rat’s sister who was still in college.

Mrs. Worthington had on bright red lipstick that made her smile look bigger than it really was. She had figured out a way to make her eyelashes longer and she had a green color on her eyelids that came close to matching her dress. When she talked I watched her red lips move like it was the first time I had ever seen words come out of a person’s mouth.

Young man, don’t think me rude but you startled me when you came by earlier this week.

When she said the word
Startled
her voice went higher like she wanted me to pay extra attention to the word but I was already concentrating double hard on everything she said.

With a lot of Gentle Air coming out of my mouth in front of almost every word I told her that everything was my fault and she sure didn’t owe me an apology. She said she liked the note I had written and that she thought her husband might know my father because they both worked downtown in the same building.

Doesn’t your father fly his own airplane?

s-s-s-s-Yes ma’am. s-s-s-s-But only a s-s-s-s-little one.

Have you flown in it?

s-s-s-s-Some.

I thought about saying A Gazillion Times but I didn’t want to try to make the
G
sound and saying
gazillion
to Mrs. Worthington didn’t seem right anyway.

Would you care to join me for a lemonade?

s-s-s-s-Need to keep s-s-s-s-going.

Deep down I was feeling I wanted to stay and talk to her but my talking was working out good compared to my first day with Mrs. Worthington and I didn’t want to take a chance on spoiling things.

Will you be coming by Friday evening?

I remembered from Rat’s collection book that 1396 Harbert was scheduled to pay monthly. Stepping around hard words I tried to explain to Mrs. Worthington how collecting was supposed to work.

You s-s-s-s-pay by the s-s-s-s-month. s-s-s-s-Not each week.

She smiled and then did something that surprised me. She touched me on the nose with her pointing finger and kept it there and then she pushed on it like she was ringing a doorbell.