Нед Виззини - It's Kind of a Funny Story

I stand up and Bobby hugs me, his big bony hands wrapping around my back, and I feel the smooth old skin of his cheek and the well-knit fabric of my shirt doing a better job on him than it ever did on me. I think about how much this means to this guy, about how much more important it is than going to any high school or getting with any girl or being friends with anybody. This guy just got a place to live. Me? I have one. I’ll always have one. I don’t have any reason to worry about it. My stupid fantasies about ending up homeless are just that—the fact is that my parents will take me in anytime, anywhere. But some people have to get lucky just to live. And I never knew I could make anybody lucky.

If Bobby can get a place to live, I think, then I can get a life worth living.

“Thank you, kid,” Bobby says.

“It’s nothing,” I mumble. “Thanks for the tour.”

“All right, guys, we gonna play cards or what?” Armelio asks, but Bobby stops him.

“One more thing: I’m really sorry, Craig, but I accidentally fell in something on my way back from the interview.” He turns around. There’s a . . . wait a minute . . .

There’s a giant piece of dog shit ground into the back of my shirt, right above his belt.

“Ah . . .” I can’t believe I didn’t smell it. Did I touch it when I hugged him? “Ah, Bobby . . . it’s okay . . . my mom can wash it out—”

“It ain’t real!” Bobby reaches back and pulls it off, throws it at me. It bounces off my shirt (a tie-dye T-shirt that everyone on Six North likes) and lands on the table in the buttons.

“It’s plastic! I’ve had it since the eighties! Ha! I love it!”

Armelio cracks up. “Holy crap! Look at that! It looks like something my mom would leave in my bedroom!”

Everyone stops, turns.

“President Armelio, we did not need to know that,” says Humble.

“Your mother would defecate in your bedroom?” the Professor asks.

“Who said that?” Armelio asks. “I was talking about plastic—what’sthematter with you?”

“Everybody just cool it a little,” says Joanie, standing up with her book at her side. “Let’s have fun, but keep calm.”

“All right, who gets the doodie button?” Humble holds up the poop. “I think it counts for two.”

Bobby sits down and we ante up. The game is poker, seven-card stud. I’m no good at it. The hands start and people begin betting crazy, throwing in three or four buttons right at the beginning. I can’t match them. I have a limited number. And I don’t seem to be getting any good hands. So I fold. I fold three times in a row. The third time, Johnny says, “You might as well bet. It’s just buttons.”

“Yeah,” Humble says. “Let me show you a secret.” He reaches into the button container and takes out a handful. “See?”

“I see,” Armelio says, looking over his cards. “Don’t think that’s not cheating, Humble. Any more and you’re out.”

I laugh and bet six buttons.

“What am I out of, exactly?” Humble asks Armelio. “The button jackpot?”

“Be nice,” the Professor says.

“Oh, listen to her,” Humble jerks his thumb. “Trying to be the mediator.” He leans in to me. “Don’t let her grandma look fool you. She’s a real hustler.”

“Excuse me?” The Professor puts down her cards. “What do you mean, ‘grandma?’”

“Nothing, you just have that little old granny look about you, to lull people into your trap of playing good cards!” Humble gestures at himself disbelievingly.

“You’re saying I’m old.”

“I’m not! I’m saying you’re a grandma!”

“Humble, apologize,” Joanie says from the back.

“Why? Grandmas are wonderful things.”

“For your information I’ll have you know,” the Professor says, “that unlike certain people around here I act my age.”

“Oh, so now I’m a liar?” Humble asks, standing up.

“We all know that’s what you are,” says the Professor.

“Peo-ple . . .” Joanie warns.

“If I’m a liar, you know what you are?”

“What? You better not call me old because I’ll take this cane and whack you in the head right in front of everybody.”

“You ain’t taking nothing of mine!” Ebony holds her cane close. Quietly, she has far and away the most buttons.

“You’re a yuppie!” Humble yells, and he picks up the dog doo and throws it at her head. “A stupid yuppie with no respect for anybody!”

“Aaaagh!” The Professor holds her face. “He broke it! He broke my nose!” The dog doo has bounced all the way across the room and Joanie jumps over it lightly as she beats a hasty retreat.

“Uh-oh,” Armelio says. “Now you guys did it. We were having such a good card game.”

Harold comes into the room with two big guys in light blue jumpsuits, Joanie behind them. Humble raises his hands. “What? I didn’t do it!”

“C’mon, Mr. Koper,” Harold says.

“I can’t believe it!” Humble says. “She insulted me! It wasn’t even my dog poop! I didn’t have the weapon!” He starts pointing at Bobby. “He’s an accomplice. If I’m going, he’s going.”

“Humble, you have three seconds to get over here.”

“All right, all right.” Humble throws down his cards. “You guys have fun with your buttons.” He’s escorted out by Harold and the security guards, getting a resounding slap on the butt from the Professor. She still has one hand on her face, claiming that she’s bleeding, but when she removes her hand there isn’t any kind of mark. Joanie sits back down at her table.

“You all saw what happened. He attacked me,” the Professor says.

“Yeah yeah, we saw, Doomba,” says Armelio.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re the Doomba; we all know you are.”

“What’s a Doomba?” I ask.

“If you asking, maybe you’re a Doomba, too!” Armelio looks mad. This is the first time I’ve seen it.

“Huh,” Johnny breathes.

“Craig ain’t no Doomba,” Bobby says. “He’s on the level.”

“Aren’t I the winner yet?” asks Ebony.

“How can you have so many buttons?” asks Armelio. “You’re not winning any hands!”

“It’s cuz I don’t over-bet,” Ebony says, leaning over, and a stream of buttons comes roaring out of her top.

“Whoops!”

They keep coming—a mountain spilling over the ante pile. She starts laughing and laughing, showing us her very neat and clean gums while she howls: “Ooooooh, I got you! I got alla you!”

“That’s it,” Armelio says, throwing down his cards. “Every Monday the card tournament always gets messed up! I quit!”

“Do you resign your position as President?” Bobby asks him.

“Forget you, buddy!”

My tongue hurts from so much biting. It might not have been a regulation game, but it definitely had as many emotional ups-and-downs as the poker on TV. I clean up with Bobby and Joanie. Tonight, when I get in bed, I’m too busy wondering about what a Doomba is, and when Ebony stuck the buttons in her breasts, and what that even feels like, and Noelle and the fact that I get to see her tomorrow, to do anything but sleep.

The next day Humble isn’t around for breakfast. I sit with Bobby and Johnny, collect my shirt, perfectly folded, and put it on the back of my chair. I drink the day’s first “Swee-Touch-Nee” tea and ask what they did with Humble.

“Oh, he’s happy. They went and gave him some serious drugs, probably.”