Stupid Fast - By Geoff Herbach Page 0,5
to rename Bluffton Suckville is because of the town kids: the public school teachers’ kids and the lawyers’ kids and the doctors’ kids and the cops’ kids and the insurance salespeople’s and the bankers’ kids and the orthodontist’s daughter, Abby Sauter, who has been very mean.
“They’re all dumb and annoying!” we shouted. “They’re the retarded ones!” we said. They honestly do think they’re the special children of God. Gus calls these kids honkies. I don’t know why, but it makes me laugh. Even now. Honkies.
We aren’t honkies (maybe I am). Me, Peter, and Gus are college kids (that is, kids of college professors).
At least, I used to be.
We are a minority! We are oppressed!
At least, I used to be. I’m crazy.
Gus and I tried to write a horror movie script last year titled The Retarded Honkies of Suckville! We wrote two pages actually. Gus wrote some good jokes.
I didn’t write any jokes because I wasn’t funny.
Gus is hilarious. Gus could be a great standup comic right now, even though he doesn’t want to be. He’s really small, and he’s got this wad of black hair that’s always sort of long, and he ducks his head so his bangs cover his eyes so he can hide the fact that he thinks everybody is just dumb. I know he’s under his hair rolling his eyes and making faces. Everybody else knows too. He used to drive the junior and senior honkies crazy because they knew he was making fun of them, but they couldn’t catch him because his hair wad was in front of his eyes. He’s so dang funny, hugely hilarious, which is the greatest compliment I can give anybody.
He also left for the summer, which threatened to make Bluffton double Suckville, maybe triple Suckville, as I wasn’t exactly in love with Peter Yang, who was my remaining friend.
Not funny. Not funny. Not funny.
A comedian? I don’t think so.
***
It’s 1:20 a.m. I am not sleepy.
CHAPTER 4: THE TERRIBLE PHONE CALL OF LATE MAY!
This is how the summer began.
Imagine this:
It’s the Saturday before the last week of school. I’m lying downstairs on the couch outside my bedroom, down in the basement, lights out, resting with my thoughts and the TV, and sweating hugely because of my disqualification at Regionals. Andrew’s upstairs in the living room playing about ten annoying notes on the piano, over and over, singing along with them, totally off-key and very loud, which he does a lot, which I find excessively annoying. The phone rings. Jerri answers, her voice echoing throughout the house.
“Oh, no. I’m so sorry, Teresa.” Jerri says Teresa in her best Spanish accent, Tayraysa, even rolling the r.
Jerri thinks she knows Spanish because she took hippy drumming lessons from a dude named Tito a few years ago. Tayraysaaa. Teresa happens to be Gus’s Venezuelan mom.
I sit up, which isn’t easy as I’m weak from not eating. Is something wrong with Gus?
“Of course, Tayraysa. Felton can do Gus’s paper route. He really needs to re-engage.”
Paper route? Re-engage? Oh, no. Jerri said re-engage, which is code for torture Felton.
Gus’s ridiculous paper route? Torture!
My stomach is rumbling, churning, burning, almost ready to upchuck, except there’s no food inside of me.
What if something is wrong with Gus?
“I’ll have Felton call later this morning, Tayraysa,” Jerri says.
I leap from the couch and run upstairs just as Jerri is hanging up the phone.
“What the hell, Jerri? What’s wrong?”
“Felton, Gus is leaving.”
“What do you mean? When?”
“Next weekend. Tayraysa’s mother is gravely ill. “
“Yeah? She’s been sick since third grade. So freaking what?”
“The doctors don’t think she’ll make it through the summer, so the Alfonsos are going to Venezuela to be with her.”
“Aw, hell! What am I supposed to do all summer?”
“You can help Gus out. He needs a friend.”
“Who am I gonna chill with, Jerri?”
“Gus needs help with that route.”
“Paper route? Come on! He doesn’t give a crap.”
“Well, Tayraysa does. And I do.”
“You?”
“Yes. So you’re going to help Gus out, do you understand?”
“Aw, man! Jesus Christ! Come on!”
Meanwhile, Andrew’s plinking the piano behind me, still singing along with those ten notes.
Blah la la blah. Plink plink plink.
“Shut your freaking piano, Andrew. We’re in crisis here,” I shout.
Andrew turns. Looks at me. Says “What?” but stops, which is lucky for him because I’m about to take him down with some serious karate-chopping to the nose, throat, and mouth if he doesn’t stop.
***
MY F-BOMB SUMMER by Felton Reinstein:
Kick off with a serious sweat fest. Add the absence of best friend. Stick in a damn morning