According to the best-laid boys, even the best-laid plans sometimes go awry. My plan didn’t even get far enough to make awry wary. Sunday didn’t come out of English class because she wasn’t in school the next day.

My fight or flight impulse must have been severely biased toward flight. No matter how much I courted disappointment, I found myself in the firm embrace of relief. I had the rest of Friday and an entire weekend before facing my fears again. Only three more days until Monday. By then I would certainly be ready. By then I would have finished reading Lady Chatterley’s Lover.

As I stood there in the hallway after first period, I considered how putting D. H. Lawrence into my hands may well have been the last noble deed that Riley Mann ever did. That is assuming, of course, that one doesn’t have to be alive to do something noble because Riley had already been shot up, cut up, burned up and long since buried—sans heart of course—by the time the book came to me. He was a college boy. I had the reputation of being smart. After he was killed, his parents gave me a box of his books.

White people may have put Riley under, but black people were the first to put him down. That was the irony in his death. It didn’t matter that he was with a white girl in the back seat of a car because he was a sissy. Everybody who knew him knew that about him. I was very happy to get a box of his books. I wondered what a sissy read.

Mostly they were textbooks. I was thrilled to find out I could make sense of college-level history and sociology books. There was also a collection of short stories and a couple of novels. One of the novels was Lost Illusions by some Balzac guy. The other was Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence. Balzac sounded kind of like ballsy, so I began with Lost Illusions. Unfortunately “Ballsy” Balzac started off kind of dry for me. I dropped him and picked up the Lawrence instead.

At first I was confused as to why a homosexual would read a book about a passionate love affair between a woman and some guy beneath her social station. Once I got beyond the explicit language and the sex—well actually, I never got beyond the sex—I could see that the book was about having the courage to love honestly. There was a noble message running throughout Lady Chatterley’s Lover. Still, my favorite part was when she ran naked in the rain. After repeatedly reading those prurient, but noble, paragraphs, I needed no longer close my eyes to see...Constance Chatterley so inflamed with passion that her loins steamed in the cold rain; Lady Chatterley with wild flowers ringing her head and woven into her pubic hair, a forget-me-not blossom poked into her belly button; She on her hands and knees; He behind her gently stroking her steaming... Uh… steaming...

Why were people staring at me? Oh my God! Fortunately I had my notebook, which I discretely used as a fig leaf while I hurried to my next class. Now I understood why Lawrence’s last novel had been banned all over the English-speaking world. I couldn’t help but be steamed up for the rest of the day. At least I was alert to the danger now.

To make matters worse, Eric Finkelstein sat with me during lunch. In a way that was a blessing because the Finkelstein brothers usually traveled as a pair. They may have been twins because they were both juniors and enrolled in the same classes. But the Finkelstein brothers didn’t look like twins. In Eric, the Jew shouldered its way to the front, while Derek looked like a regular old Hoosie.

They sort of reminded me of me and Oz. Eric was the skinny, harmless looking one and Derek was the stout, dangerous looking one. What really made the Finkelstein brothers stand out were their severe acne and their flower-child clothing. They had moved here soon after the beginning of the school year. I could only assume that they bought their school clothes before they learned that conservative rural farming communities are no place for hippie zit farmers with names like Finkelstein.

I didn’t mind that the Finkelsteins were Finkelsteins. I didn’t mind that they were hippies but the pimples were a bit much even for me. Calling the Finkelsteins zit farmers was being generous. They were more like zit slave ships. Only instead of black Africans; their faces were packed with red Zitfricans. I knew acne was not contagious, but it seemed impossible that any face could transport that many zits without some of them leaping to safety.

The Finkelstein brothers were prime targets for teasing. Fortunately there is strength in numbers and Derek didn’t look like somebody you wanted to tangle with. Unlike Oz though, Derek was something of a pacifist. Or maybe he was just a coward. Now that the low brows were figuring him out, the brothers were getting picked on more. They fortified behind whatever strength there was in two and kept to themselves. I didn’t tease them, but I didn’t befriend them either, even when I regularly saw them in the library. Those inflamed faces made me nervous.

Usually the little cliques clumped together during lunch, but for some reason, this last day of the school week we had spread out. All the tables in the cafeteria were taken when Eric came in. I wanted to be alone. In order to discourage company, I sat in the middle, rather than near the open end, of a table that butted up against a wall. Eric got his food and then slowly surveyed the room. He started in my direction. I willed him to go somewhere else, but the people at those other tables must have been more strong-willed than I.

He stopped at the end of the table that was open to the aisle. He could have just sat there, and I would have ignored him. Instead he walked to the middle, where he could sit facing me. “This seat taken?”

The uncertainty in his voice gave him away. He sounded so vulnerable. I didn’t have the heart to be a jerk. “Nah, Man, sit down.”

I figured that if I just kept my eyes on my tray, I wouldn’t even know those zits were there.

Except he wasn’t through being civil. “I see you in the library all the time.”

“Yeah, I read a lot.”

“Me too. I’m not Gay though.”

“What?”

“I know what people say behind my back. If you read a lot they say you’re Gay.” He must have thought he saw a blank look on my face. “You don’t know what Gay means?”

Now he had my attention because he had pissed me off. Of course I knew what gay meant. “It means you’re in a good mood, having fun.”

He was hard to gauge through the zits, but Eric Finkelstein was definitely laughing at me. His amusement came through in his voice. “Hey, I’m sorry, Man. Back in the world, Gay means homosexual. Down here, you guys say sissy.”

“Nobody calls me a sissy.”

“Yeah, cause you got friends. If somebody says something about you behind your back, then somebody else says ’No, Rail Henry is OK.’ ”

“Who’s talking about me behind my back?”

“Everybody gets talked about. I know they call me Funky-stein and dart-board face behind my back.”

“Naw, Man. They call you that to your face. That’s not the same as talking behind somebody’s back. Who’s talking about me behind my back?”

Maybe it was because I put him down so meanly, but he surprised me by not hemming and hawing. “Last week in citizenship, we were talking about respecting people who are different from you. Like Gays. And Galinda Wilson said that you were a sissy because you’re a senior and you’ve never had a girlfriend, you’re always reading and you try to talk all proper like you’re British or something.”

“How does she know I’ve never had a girlfriend?”

“Hey, Man, I’m just saying.” He waited. I didn’t go over the top on him, and he must have felt safe. “Then Sunday Tice—“

“Sunday Tice!” My heart sank. E tu, Sunday.

“Yeah, Sunday Tice. So Sunday Tice says, ’Uh uh, Rail Henry, he’s OK.’ Just like that. ’Rail Henry, he’s OK’”

“Sunday took up for me?”

“Yes. And then Shareece Grasfeld jumps in and says, ’You want some of that, don’t you, Gray Meat? I see you looking at him in the hall.’ And then Galinda jumps back in and says ’Yeah, you can look until you go blind, but he ain’t gonna do nothing cause he’s a sissy.’ Then Mr. Meltzger jumped in and made Galinda and Shareece stop.”

Courtesy of one zit beset Jew, my rotten Friday had turned into a zip pah dee doo dah Friday. Sunday Tice had waded in for me. “So, what else did Sunday say?”

“She didn’t say anything. Mr. Meltzger made them stop because of the language Shareece and Galinda were using. But see, that’s why I sat here. Even the white chicks say you’re OK.”

He said I was OK, but I knew what he really meant was harmless. He thought I was somebody who wouldn’t make fun of him even though he still didn’t know me. It had taken courage to strike up a conversation the way he had. I couldn’t have done it. I was already embarrassed with the direction our little chat had taken and I decided on finishing my meal in silence. Unfortunately, as I was about to find out, Eric Finkelstein was a keen observer of human nature.

When I didn’t say anything, he picked up where he had left off. “I’m a keen observer of human nature. Jews have to be cause we never know when you’re going to turn on us.”

“I’m not going to turn on anybody. I don’t care about you being a Jew.”

“Nah, you’re OK, but some of the people around here make me nervous. I hate this place. It’s like the people are inbred are something. Sometimes when I’m in class, I’m thinking—” He realized he was talking about my home and my people.

I suspected that even though I was OK, he had almost said something that would warrant a beating. He needn’t have worried. While many people teased the Finkelsteins, nobody ever fought them. They were safer than brightly colored frogs. No way was I putting my fist into all that acne.  “How come you don’t just say what you have to say? I already said I’m not going to get mad. At least as long as you don’t talk about my momma. Then, of course, I’ll have to kill you.”

I was, of course, just bluffing. “Really, just say what you were thinking. I’m cool.”

Finkelstein leaned forward. The unexpected movement made me flinch but I maintained eye contact. He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper and glanced from side to side. “Sometimes I think just a bunch of niggers and peckerwoods.”

He remained still, a look of great sadness and embarrassment on his face. At least that’s how I interpreted the deeper red moving about beneath the surface layer.

The thing that shocked me was that he expected me to be shocked. Racial slurs were like baby talk. Everybody used them. We just didn’t hurl them in mixed company. Only bullies did that because when someone not of your own race called you a racial slur, honor demanded that you fight.

This was just too good. Still the guy was square. I decided on letting him off the hook. “Man, everybody thinks like that. And when we’re not in mixed company, we talk like that. That’s nothing.”

“Oh, that’s nothing?” Again there was that undulation of red beneath the surface layer. Was this guy laughing at me again?

Eric kind of cocked his head mischievously. “How about this then... niggers, peckerwoods and witches.”

“Witches!” My heart spiked. My vision from the previous afternoon flashed before my eyes. I hadn’t considered witches. Hearing him say the ‘w’ word threw me for a second. No way was I going down that snake hole. More than likely, my vision had been some kind of self-induced hallucination. There was no such thing as witches. Only fools who believed in such nonsense.

“Yeah, witches.” Eric sounded pleased at my astonished reaction. “You wouldn’t think it to look at me, but my Grandmother is up to her eyebrows in that shit.”

It was a shame really. I hadn’t realized that Jews went crazy. Might as well humor him. “Man! That stinks.”

“Tell me something I don’t already know. No matter what you’re going through in your life, it is not as bad as what I’m going through.”

“Who said I was going through anything?”

“Well, you will be. You like Sunday Tice even though her old man’s a grand giant or something in the Klan. What makes you think you even know the half of it?”

The half of it? I had no idea what he meant by that, but now I was on the defensive. “What makes you think I like her?”

“I told you. I’m a keen ob—”

“Yeah, yeah. All right already.”

“I’ve seen you look at her in the halls. You like her. Don’t you know the Klan hates blacks and Jews?”

I completely forgot about witches. Now I was more worried about Jews. Why had he included Jews? “You like her too?” Oh, shit! Did I say ‘too’?

I couldn’t make out the corners of his mouth, but there was a little twitch mid lower lip. Mr. Keen Observer had me right where he wanted me. “Nah, Man, she’s too inbred for me. I’m gonna wait until I get back home to get a girl.”

Eric Finkelstein knew from my own lips something I didn’t want known. Crazy or not, until I could ditch him, he was my new friend. “So where is home?”

“Chicago, North Side.”

“So how come you’re here?”

“My old man was in the import/export business… if you know what I mean. He ran into some trouble and he had to come down here until the heats off. My mom is from here.”

“Wait, your mom’s from here. Then you’re only half Jewish.”

“Yeah. What kind of a place is this when you can know that without even knowing who my mom is?”

Now I was embarrassed. I considered myself a tolerant person. Finkelstein had sort of turned the tables on me. “Well, maybe I couldn’t have known that you’re only half Jewish. We have a Jew store. It was just a guess.”

 For a second Finkelstein looked like a deer in the headlights. Finally, he just shook his head a little bit. “Anyway, we’re living with my grandmother. She doesn’t like my dad. I wish he had just done the time. Then he would have been the only one in prison. This place is like the whole family is in prison. The good thing about Chicago is that you can buy your way out of anything. But it cost us everything: our house, our car, and now we have to live in this shit hole.”

“Hey, this is the most beautiful part of the state. We got rivers, meadows, forests—”

“Yeah. And you can’t even see the trees for the churches. I’ve never seen so many holier-than-thou hypocrites. What they should do is give some of those churches realistic names, like The Church of the Racist Bastards.”

“The people around here aren’t so bad, once you get to know them.”

“I’m a Jew—”

“Half Jew.”

“Jew enough! You try talking to Sunday Tice and you’re gonna really get to know these rednecks around here, and maybe some of your own black people too. Maybe even better than you want to know them.”

“Oy veh.”

“Oh, you know that and you don’t know Gay. You know what I think. You’re like that guy who tries to come home again. You know the book. The same guy who wrote The Mayor of Casterbridge wrote it.”

Nothing pleased me more than showing off my knowledge of literature. “Oh. The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy.”

“Yeah, that’s the one. You’re like Clem. You know… you belong here, but you don’t belong here.”

“I belong here because I was born here.”

“Cool beans, Man. Just stay alive. We work well together. See how we worked out that Clem thing. Whatcha reading now?”

“Oh, I’m just working my way through an unex… an unexpur… an uncut copy of Lady Chatterley’s Lover.”

“I read that back in middle school. Hot stuff, if you’re in the seventh grade. You wanna borrow one of my Playboys?”

“You’ve got a Playboy magazine!”

“My brother and I get them after my dad looks at them.

“Your dad lets you look at Playboy!”

“It is, after all, a literary magazine. I have one in my locker right now. I’ll bring it over to your locker after school.”

“I can’t just take it from you in public.”

“What? You think I’m crazy. It’s in a folder. Just don’t look at it until you get home.”

Just the mention of Playboy was enough to get my loins a stirring. Since it was Friday, I would have it all weekend. Zits or not, if he produced that magazine, Finkelstein’s stock would skyrocket with me. The thing was to play it cool. After all he might just be pulling my leg. “Well I always go to my locker before I catch the bus. As soon as sixth period ends... if you’ve really got one.”

“I’ve got one.”

After lunch, Finkelstein and I went our different ways, but the thought of getting my hands on a Playboy for the entire weekend rode me like a bronc buster with roweled spurs. I was excited and uncomfortable at the same time. Why would Eric just happen to have a Playboy magazine in school? Why would he share it with me? And why would he just walk up to me and start talking anyway? The whole encounter seemed weird. And yet, as soon as sixth period ended, I hurried to my locker. Finkelstein wasn’t there. Just when I was thinking the day couldn’t get any weirder, it did.

Instead of Eric Finkelstein, Shareece Grasfeld walked up to me and said in a cheerful sing-song, “Guess who’s coming to your church for the Christmas program.”

Suddenly, without any advance notice whatsoever, a prom queen and quite possibly the prettiest girl on Earth was not only speaking to me but smiling at me as well. I smiled back. That was as far as I got before my mouth froze.

Coming to my church? I didn’t even know Shareece was a Methodist. Since she had come from the old Levee City School District, I didn’t know her at all until we found ourselves in the same high school. I only knew of her because people talked about her great beauty all the time. The closest I had ever been to her great beauty was a picture of her as a small child sitting between her mother and her father. The picture was on some hand fans her father donated to our church as an advertisement for his funeral home. As a little boy, I had fallen in love with the pretty face almost buried between two big blocky adults. By the time I actually saw Shareece, that picture was over ten years old, and her mother the reputation of being the biggest woman between Memphis and Chicago, but the teenaged Shareece didn’t disappoint. Of course I would never be so presumptuous as to even think about saying two words to her. She, being a brown-skinned beauty and a cheerleader, was way out of my league.

And now she had me cornered against my locker. Her lyrical voice was like hands around my throat because I choked. Of course a simple “Who?” would have been an adequate response, but I couldn’t even stop grinning, let alone get a word out. Even a dumb-assed owl bird could have done better. There I stood in the midst of a full-blown panic attack with my heart throbbing and my guts churning.

After a few seconds of dead air, Shareece’s smile turned down at the corners. She about-faced and walked away. I didn’t even merit a backwards glance.

“Man. You should have said something.” Finkelstein was standing there. He must have walked up before Shareece had walked away. My humiliation was complete. The fact that he had seen was just the goddamned bloody cherry on top. When he spoke, the seizure that had paralyzed my facial muscles released.

Instantly my embarrassment turned to rage, which I then turned on him. “Just get away from me! And I don’t want your stupid magazine anymore either.”

Sadness fell like a Winter’s day darkness across Finkelstein’s face. He nodded, and I understood that he understood. Which infuriated me even more. But Finkelstein, that keen student of human nature, was wise. Before I could erupt again, he turned and shuffled away. His shoulders hunched as if he was carrying a great burden.

I stood by my locker silently cursing myself and at the same time silently swearing that no matter what, the next time a girl spoke to me... I was going to say something.

Next Chapter: Oz