Sorta Like a Rock Star (8 page)

“Let’s do this,” Donna says, and I follow her out of the bedroom.

When we get to the living room, the boys stop talking and take in Donna’s hotness. It mutes them instantly. Donna lets them take in her presence. I study Donna, and this is one of her tricks. She waits for people to take in her hotness before she speaks—always. She is the greatest person I know, and if she weren’t an atheist, I’d say she was perfect, or maybe even God incarnate.

On the way to the school board meeting, I can tell my boys are tense. I’m in the back with Ty, Jared, and Chad—and their collective nervous quietness is freaking me out a little. Also, Donna is not rocking any music, nor is she saying anything, which is strange, because she always seems to be talking or listening to music when we drive, which is how I know she is now testing my leadership abilities. Ricky is quietly counting the streetlights we pass—oblivious.

I start to wonder if my boys need a pep talk, so I say, “How does everyone feel?”

“Cool,” Ty says.

Jared and Chad nod. Chad is sitting on his brother’s lap.

“Did you memorize the speeches?” I ask.

“Yeah,” Chad says.

“Can we nail them tonight?” I ask.

“No worries,” Jared says.

“This is Franks’ livelihood we’re talking about. If Franks gets canned, no Halo 3 next year,” I say.

“Yeah,” Ty says, “we get that.”

“And Franks’ six kids,” I add. “Think of them tonight. We don’t want them living on the streets, right? Use them as motivation. Picture them in your mind.”

“We got it,” Jared says.

“Have we ever let you down before?” Chad asks.

They aren’t nervous at all, maybe because they are teenage boys and therefore do not know how much is at stake. None of them has ever been homeless either. None of them has ever missed a meal. Their lawyer and banker fathers are around to provide houses and clothes and food and all the other good stuff. These boys don’t understand what I understand.

Following my own advice, I think about Franks’ redheaded kids as we park, and my chest starts to burn—my eyes start to water.

“Leave your coats in the car, boys,” Donna says. “I want everyone to see your shirts.”

We take off our coats, get Chad into the babypack on Jared’s back, and then Donna says, “We bust in. I make a brief introduction, and then you boys follow Amber’s lead. Understood?”

My boys nod. They understand.

“Ready to start filming?” Donna says.

“Wait,” I say. “We should pray first. Before we go in.”

“If you must,” Donna says, and then walks toward the door, Ricky following his mother, because Ricky is also an atheist, just like his mom.

We are all shivering in our T-shirts, because it is cold out, but we are also geared up for the mission.

Chad, Ty, and Jared don’t really dig on JC as much as I do, but they all believe in God, so they bow their heads and close their eyes as I grab Ty’s and Jared’s hands, and say, “Dear God, we are gathered here tonight for a good cause. Franks’ job is on the line. We believe that CPHS needs Franks, that he does much more good than harm in that building, which is cool and important. If our cause be just, give us the strength to use the talents with which you have already blessed us. Help us rock the worlds of those board members. Peace out, God. And peace be with you.”

We all drop hands and open eyes.

“Ready?” I ask.

“Hell, yeah!” Chad says from behind his brother’s head.

We walk toward Donna, who has the video camera out and recording now, which makes me realize that she videoed my prayer. I’m not sure I like her videoing my prayer, but I don’t say anything about that.

Donna says, “Introduce yourself, boys.”

“Chad Fox, aka the Desert Fox, ready and willin’ and chillin’.”

“Ty Hendrix. Tower of Power even if I am only five-ten.”

“Jared Fox. Just Jared.”

“My name is Ricky Roberts. The macking mathematician,” Ricky says, which makes me smile because I made up that name for Ricky.

“Amber Appleton. Just a girl with God on her side.”

Donna holds the video camera at arms length and films herself saying, “Donna Roberts, attorney at law. We’re at the Childress Public High School board meeting. The time is 7:46
PM
Tuesday, January 27, 2009. The rest will be self-explanatory.”

Keeping the camera on herself, Donna walks into the converted-into-offices house next to the elementary school, and into the boardroom where the school board meets.

There are community members and one or two local reporters seated in folding chairs; Prince Tony is in the front row with a few other administrators, and the school board is seated behind this long table front and center. Pretty standard adult stuff abounds.

We’re all in camo, hunter orange letters proclaiming who we are quite loudly. But wearing a three-piece suit that actually has a pocket watch chain draped like an evil gold smile across the man’s belly, as if he is stepping out of some old corny movie about waiting for trains to show up, Mr. Pinkston stands, removes his pocket watch from his vest, and—while reading the time—he says, “Who are you and what the hell do you think you are doing?”

Donna just stands there in front of Mr. Pinkston, front and center, wearing camo, filming herself, confidently letting all present take in her hotness.

“Sit,” Donna says, as if she were talking to Bobby Big Boy.

Amazingly, Mr. Pinkston looks up, surprised, and then sits.

The room is dead quiet.

“Ms. Roberts,” Prince Tony says in a calm, soothing voice. “What’s going on here? We don’t allow these meetings to be videotaped. Surely you can understand why.”

Donna completely ignores Prince Tony and addresses the room. “Boys and ladies. I’m with Roberts, Bradley, and Wong. If you haven’t heard of our law firm, I guarantee your lawyers have, and those boys will want to know what has been said tonight, so take notes. It’s come to our attention that you are considering cutting funding for Mr. Jonathan Franks’ marketing classes. I’ll be representing Mr. Franks and all five of the students who will be speaking tonight. All pro bono, for as long as it takes. You need to know two things before we begin. One. Roberts, Bradley, and Wong. That’s not alphabetical order. Two. Name one. The one in charge. Roberts. That’s me. Amber?”

Donna starts filming me.

I’m in total frickin’ awe.

“Amber?” Donna says.

Ty elbows me in the back.

“You’re up,” Donna says.

I look at all of the school board members. With such freaks as us in front of them—represented by one of the most feared lawyers in the tri-state area—they are in total panic mode. I can see it plainly all over their faces. All of them are impressed with Donna, except Mr. Pinkston who looks sorta like Dick Cheney and is glaring at me like he might want to roast my carcass alive and eat me for dinner. Like father, like son. Suddenly, I find my swagger.

“As my colleague clearly stated.”
I called Donna my colleague. Was that a mistake? Too much?
“We are here on behalf of Mr. Jonathan Franks. You may—”

“Okay. Enough foolishness. This school board is within its legal rights here tonight,” Mr. Pinkston says, completely interrupting me. “It’s perfectly legal to consider—”

“Don’t you ever interrupt my client again, Mr. Pinkston.” Donna locks eyes with Mr. Pinkston. She is unflinching. “And I think my client knows a little bit more about the law than you or anyone else in this room, because I’ve informed Ms. Appleton of her rights. As a taxpayer and a concerned citizen, I’m trying to help you avoid making yet another classic and extremely costly blunder.”

Donna turns the video camera on Mr. Pinkston.

“Don’t you dare film me!” he yells.

Donna smiles, keeps the camera on Mr. Pinkston until he turns red, and then she turns it back on me.

I clear my throat and then say, “You may think Mr. Jonathan Franks is expendable, but he serves at least two great purposes, one of which is to protect you from lawsuits. Lawsuits? I can hear you asking. Lawsuits. I’m the poorest girl in the high school. I haven’t been to the doctor or dentist for a decade because my mother cannot afford health insurance. For all I know, I may have cancer or may be in need of a lung transplant. But I’d never know it, because we cannot afford to go to the doctor. Maybe if she worked for a good employer, I’d have health insurance. But she works for your school district—for fifteen years now—driving buses, which doesn’t pay so hot. No benefits either. So I don’t have money for the sorta fitting-in clothes your sons and daughters wear, nor do I have money to fix my messed-up teeth, and this has led to some serious self-esteem problems. But can I see one of the quality therapists some of my classmates get to see? No. Because I don’t have health insurance. Word. This high school is a daily hell for me, let me tell you, but there is one place where I am always welcome—where I don’t feel like going on a freaking rampage—and that is Mr. Franks’ room. I am the Marketing Club team leader, and I oversee the Childress MC chapter. I personally won second place in the marketing fast food competition last year at the regionals. Mr. Franks runs this club for little to no pay when you break down the hours and the costs of the trophies, ribbons, and pizza parties he throws to boost MC morale. And it is the only thing in this school that gives me any sense of self-esteem. So don’t take away the one good thing in my school day—or I might just snap, and start needing all that therapy you don’t provide the children of your employees. Ty?”

I take a step back. I survey the school board and catch a few sympathetic eyes. One large woman even nods at me and gives me a wink, like she is my mom or something and is proud. Cool, I think. We’re moving people tonight.

Ty steps forward and says, “I have a dream. I dream that some day in the near future Childress Public High School will diversify the faculty and recognize Martin Luther King Day. I’m the only black kid in the school, and the only place I feel comfortable is in Mr. Franks’ room. If Mr. Franks lost his job, there would be no refuge left for me in this school, and I think I might have to start writing letters to the local papers about how hard it is to be black at Childress High School, a place that does absolutely nothing to celebrate my heritage. A place that inadvertently says to me every day that white is right. No black authors in the English curriculum. Coaches always asking me to join the basketball team. Mrs. Watts always trying to get me to sing Negro spirituals in her all-white choir. I’m sick of it, yo. The only thing I’ve ever done through CPHS in celebration of my heritage was to raise money for the United Negro College Fund, because a mind is a terrible thing to waste. I ran a charity Ping-Pong tournament last year and do you know who was the faculty member that helped me market and chaperone that tournament? Mr. Franks. He also made the biggest faculty donation too. Don’t fire Franks, or you’ll be sorry when MLK day rolls around and you don’t observe the holiday again! Because I’m speaking up this year if Franks gets cut.”

Ty steps back, looks over at me, and I nod at him, which makes him smile, so I give him a wink, Donna style, and say, “Jared and Chad.”

“I’m just a regular white kid—I love Franks and all, but you probably noticed that I’m carrying around my younger brother in a backpack,” Jared says. I worry that he is going to forget the
Scarface
line, but then he remembers and says, “So say hello to my little friend!”

“Hello,” Chad says over Jared’s shoulder. “Maybe I would have driven my electronic wheelchair in here if the building was wheelchair accessible. But it’s not. Nor are the gym locker rooms, really. And Das Boot—my two-wheeled ride—don’t fit through the library aisles, so I can’t browse the books or anything like that. If I want to pick out a book to read, I have to be carried through the library, which is humiliating. No one—besides the kids in this room—really talks to me at school. I’m late for every class because I have to take the elevator and all the kids push the buttons on every floor when they walk by—ha-ha—so I have to wait forever. You people suck at accommodating the special-needs people of the world. But you know who makes me feel like I am wanted, every day? Mr. Franks. Yeah, we play video games, but you know what? In the video games I have normal legs and arms. I can run around and jump and walk in a virtual world that Franks sets up for me using his own equipment that he buys with his own money because you people do nothing to fund his program. Try not walking for seventeen years, and then tell me that video games are stupid. If Franks goes, there will be no more Xbox in school and therefore no place in the high school where I can socialize or interact normally with other teens doing something age appropriate.”

“We don’t have Xbox at home,” Jared adds, and then the brothers step back.

I give them each a nod and a wink when they look at me. My boys are rocking tonight. I’m so proud. “Ricky?”

Donna hands Ricky a prepared statement, and tells him to read it, which he does. “My name is Ricky Roberts. I am the only Childress Public High School student diagnosed with autism, and I do not like the special education teachers very much. Also, school board member Mr. Pinkston’s son Alexander Pinkston torments me on a daily basis, which makes me sad and angry sometimes. But I love Mr. Franks, because he always lets me into his room and makes me feel like I am wanted and that I have many friends, and that my friends are also wanted in the school. I do not like eating in the lunchroom, because Alexander Pinkston torments me. I like eating my lunch with Mr. Franks. Mr. Franks is my favorite teacher. Please do not fire him. Please. Thank you. Yes.”