Stu Truly Read online

  I removed the sandwich from the bag and slid the baloney into the garbage. Mayonnaise left a trail of what looked like slug slime down the side of the garbage bag as the baloney slipped from view. Having no idea what one puts in a vegetarian sandwich, I slipped the first vegetables I found between the slices of bread and put it back in the bag. A wave of relief swept over me. I would be able to eat my lunch tomorrow seated at a table with everyone else and not alone on a toilet.

  My mother tucked me in that night, though I had been asking her not to for over a year, and left me with a good-night kiss on the forehead. I fell asleep dreaming of zombies, a cabin in the woods, and another heroic rescue.

  At lunch Monday I found myself once again near Becca. Not because I meant to sit near her, but because Ben seemed completely unaware of who or where he was. Only days before, he had been a well-adjusted kid who knew lunch was to be had with his buddies. In the span of a few days he had turned into some sort of lunchroom psycho interested only in discussing lizards and other trivial gossip with Kirsten. Being the true friend that I was, I felt obligated to support him despite his mental state. That is how I found myself sitting across from Becca. Being a best friend is filled with sacrifices.

  Spread before her was a colorful mixture of vegetarian delights. There were green peas, cheese wedges, fresh fruit salad, and a bar of chocolate large enough to keep her afloat in the event of a flash flood.

  “I’ve been thinking about the cafeteria food,” Becca said as I sat down. “They really should have a vegetarian entrée option every day.”

  “You’re right,” I agreed.

  I pulled out my sandwich and laid it on the table with pride. Today, we were equals. Today, we were two people with a shared passion for vegetables. Today we—my inner dialogue stopped short as I followed Becca’s eyes. My sandwich appeared to be with child. Several children. I lifted the bread to take a better look. Whatever possessed me last evening had been of the devil. Between the two slices of bread I found three brussel sprouts, a whole carrot, and several uncooked lima beans.

  “What is that?” Becca asked.

  “Um—I’m not exactly sure,” I said, closing the slice of bread before anything crawled away. “My mom likes things real natural,” I sputtered.

  “Is she into raw foods?” Becca asked, pulling her lunch closer, as if fearing the contents of my sandwich might be planning an attack.

  “Uh yeah, I guess so.” I had no idea what she was talking about, but if it explained what was hiding between my two slices of bread, I was more than willing to run with it.

  “My mom is into raw foods, too. I like being vegetarian, but I can’t go that far.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “But what can I do? She’s so proud of me for trying.”

  Becca smiled. “That’s sweet. You must really like your mom.”

  I was starting to blush. The important thing about lying is to own it no matter how much your stomach is turning. “Yeah,” I said.

  “That’s so sweet,” Ben added. “Not only does he love his mother, he also enjoys cooking and tending to his flower garden. Oh, and he just adores those quizzes in the back of Seventeen magazine.”

  I gave Ben a playful punch in the arm, the kind of playful punch that knocked him off his seat. He got up, giggling.

  “Ben’s real funny,” I explained. “And he giggles like a girl.”

  “My brother giggles like a girl,” Kirsten added, “and he’s in high school.”

  “I don’t giggle like a girl,” Ben said with a giggle.

  “Yes, you do,” we all agreed.

  This set off both of the girls—and Ben—giggling uncontrollably. As the only one who does not giggle, I confined myself to a brief snort followed by a guffaw.

  “He’s giggling,” Kirsten said, pointing at me.

  I could only hope the rest of the lunchroom had gone deaf or died.

  When the bell sounded, the four of us trooped out of the lunchroom together. We reached class far too soon, still giggling for no reason known to mankind.

  Becca and I parted at the door. “See you later,” she said.

  I floated to the back of the room like a balloon half full of helium.

  “Mr. Truly, would you care to give your oral report?” Ms. Hunzinger asked as she brought the class to order.

  I immediately rose. “Yes. Yes, I would.” I boldly strode to the front of the room and positioned myself almost but not quite in front of Becca. “The Incas were an amazing people known for many things,” I began. “They were excellent farmers who loved growing vegetables. They terraced the hillsides and grew tomatoes, avocados, peppers, strawberries, peanuts, squash, sweet potatoes, beans, pineapple, and bananas.” From the corner of my eye, I could see Becca smiling.

  When I finished, I returned to my seat with a self-satisfied smile. In my life, there have been three moments in which time seemed to stand still. Two of them had occurred in the last ten minutes.

  The word vegetarian began cropping up everywhere I turned. The nightly news did a story about the health benefits of a vegetarian lifestyle. My mom brought home a bag of corn chips that proclaimed Vegetarian Approved. And my father continued to receive requests at work for vegetarian meat loaf, veggie burger patties, and even meatless weiners. It was almost more than he could take.

  “All this vegetarian talk,” he blurted out one night at dinner. “How is a guy to make a living these days? Our country is going to the dogs.”

  My mother looked up from her green beans. “Is business down?”

  My father avoided eye contact. “Maybe a bit,” he mumbled. “Can you believe there are people who think meat is bad for you?” He shoved a piece of sirloin the size of a footstool into his mouth.

  My mother lifted her juice glass. “There are still lots of people who eat meat.”

  My father coughed. Something that might have passed for a calf being born spewed onto his plate. “They need to be reminded that meat is American. People were eating meat long before anyone ever heard of a vegetable.”

  “Yeah,” my brother added. He took a big bite of his steak and spit it out.

  “Tom Neville Truly,” my mother snapped. “You will not spit your food onto the table, no matter what example your father sets.”

  “Listen to your mother,” my father said. “And don’t waste a perfectly good piece of steak.”

  My brother crossed his arms. “It was fat.”

  “That’s what makes you big and strong,” my father replied.

  “And fat,” I threw in. At least one of us had taken a health class.

  “People need to be reminded. There has to be a way to get their attention back on what really matters,” my father said.

  “You mean meat?” I asked.

  “Yes, meat. We’re made to eat meat,” he continued. “You know, to hunt game and roast it over an open fire—”

  “When was the last time you hunted anything?” my mother interrupted.

  “It’s not about hunting,” my father continued, staring off into space. “It’s about being who we were meant to be.”

  My mother rolled her eyes, then cleared her plate and left him sitting at the table, still staring into space, the trace of a smile curving his lips.

  I left the table, too, and went straight to work on my health journal. By straight to work, I mean after a short detour to play Death Intruders 3, followed by a few moments of Internet browsing on my mother’s computer and ending with a slow trudge up the stairs, while inspecting the banisters for defects in workmanship. About 9:00 p.m. I sat down at my desk and got out my notebook.

  I started with the protein food group, as this was the easiest for me to remember. In the last few days, I’d eaten bacon, chicken, steak, lunch meat, pork chops, and nearly a hard-boiled egg. Next, I reviewed my dairy intake. Milk and cheese jumped to mind, lots of milk and cheese. Then came grains. I wrote down breakfast cereal and bread. After that, I was left with fruits and vegetables. Things were getting trickier at this po
int. I was pretty sure I’d eaten at least two apple wedges and maybe a slice of orange or two along the way. I rounded off and wrote down apple and orange.

  That left me with just vegetables. Hmm . . . what vegetables had actually passed through my lips? I had looked at plenty enough vegetables in the last few days and placed several between two slices of bread. And been involved in more vegetable discussions than I cared to remember. But I could only list the ones I’d actually eaten. I wrote red pepper and peas. Oh, and potato. Thank God for potatoes. And thank God for the Incas for discovering how to farm them. This was almost a religious moment for me.

  I looked back over my work. Clearly, I was eating a well-balanced diet with plenty of the things that mattered most and tasted best. Why fruits and vegetables had to be included was beyond me, but to each their own.

  I packed up my notebook, congratulating myself on a job well done. After brushing my teeth, I climbed into bed and prepared for another night of zombie adventure and damsel-in-distress rescue. And not just any damsel. Becca.

  The next day in PE, Mr. Snedaker filed us into the gym. We took seats in the nearest bleachers. “Please take out your food journals,” he said.

  I was happy to see that some of my classmates seemed unprepared. I, on the other hand, slipped my journal from my backpack. The cardboard cover felt warm in my hands. The notebook was of a good weight, sturdy and filled with promise. Well, at least the first page.

  “Hopefully, you’ve been keeping careful track of what you’ve eaten the last few days. Were you surprised?”

  Not in the least. When you’ve got a diet as complete as mine, you know it. I wasn’t about to take any chances and throw in ill-advised surprises. “Stick to the basics” is a motto I live by. I had just made the motto up, but it seemed pretty mature for a guy wearing sneakers and basketball shorts.

  “Well, let’s find out,” Mr. Snedaker continued. “Becca, would you tell us what you put for protein?”

  Warmth spread up the back of my neck. When had she joined our class? That girl was everywhere. And right at the moment, that was not a good thing.

  “Okay,” she replied. “I was a little confused about the categories. Do nuts go under vegetable or protein?”

  “Excellent question,” Mr. Snedaker responded. “Nuts go under protein.”

  “Okay. In that case, I put peanuts, tofu, cheese, and yogurt under protein.”

  “Very good,” said Mr. Snedaker. “No meat?”

  “My family is vegetarian.”

  “Very good. We could all stand to eat less meat.” Mr. Snedaker turned in my direction with an all-too-

  pleasant smile on his face. “Stu, what about you? What did you put down under protein?”

  I glanced down at my journal. The warmth slowly spreading up my neck turned into a wildfire ready to burst out of my ears. My list of proteins looked exactly like what it was: all meat, all the time. “Uh, I also had a question,” I said, trying to buy time. “Are all nuts considered nuts or are some vegetables?”

  Ben tipped over. He did an admirable job of not giggling out loud, though the rhythmic pounding of his fist on the bleacher was a bit distracting.

  “Yes, all nuts are considered nuts,” Mr. Snedaker said slowly, as if speaking to a toddler.

  I stared back down at my journal. The same entries were still there. No matter how many times I blinked, the words refused to change. “Well, in that case, I had peanut butter on my nuts.” Something didn’t sound quite right about how that came out.

  The class erupted into a chorus of laughter led by Ben, who was rolling about like the demon child from a movie we watched one time during a sleepover. I swore off going near all demon children after that night. Watching Ben reminded me why.

  “Okay,” Mr. Snedaker said, holding up both hands in an effort to get the class’s attention. “Mr. Truly, that is not the behavior I expect in this class. I’ll be seeing you after school in detention.”

  Detention seemed a reasonable price to pay to keep the truth hidden from Becca. As class continued, I discovered I was not the only one who was uncomfortable discussing the contents of their journal. Ben, for instance, was called on to read his list of grains. The word Oreos slipped out before he could catch himself. Tyler included M&M’S in his list of dairy products. And Ryan listed gum as a vegetable.

  By the time everyone had taken a turn reading from their journals, Mr. Snedaker looked a bit ashen. “I can see,” he said, “you have a lot of room for improvement in your diets. I want you to continue keeping your food journal for the remainder of the semester. We’ll read again from them near the end of the term. Let’s see if your food choices change for the better between now and then.”

  Well, at least there would be no more reading from our journals for the time being. I let out a sigh of relief. Maybe things weren’t so bad after all.

  Mr. Snedaker continued. “Well, Monday is what you’ve all been waiting for.” He paused for effect.

  We stared innocently.

  “We begin the square dancing unit,” Mr. Snedaker finished, just as the bell rang.

  No one spoke as we filed out of the gym. My hands were sweating for no apparent reason.

  Once outside, Ryan turned to us. “Why do we have to do square dancing? Why can’t we just play dodgeball or something fun?”

  “It’s all part of their plan,” Ben said matter-of-factly.

  “What plan?” I asked.

  “My mom says the school does things like this to socialize us into being respectable young men and women,” he explained.

  Tyler shook his head. “What’s respectable about square dancing?”

  Ben shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “Do you think we’d get detention if we refused to participate?” I asked.

  Ben bumped my shoulder. “You can’t even read out of your journal without getting detention.”

  He had a point.

  After spending a pleasant hour in detention, I got home to find an old flatbed trailer in the driveway. My father walked around it like a king surveying the location of his future castle. Chester joined in by peeing on both wheels as if getting a head start on the moat. From my viewpoint, all I saw was trouble in the making.

  My mother confirmed my suspicion. “What in the name of heaven are you doing with that old trailer?” she asked, having just pulled into the driveway with a carload of groceries. What my mother lacked in tact, she more than made up for with righteous fervor. She approached my father like a priest exorcising Satan himself. “We are NOT buying a boat, another motorcycle, or anything else that could possibly be put on that—that thing,” she said, holding her ground despite the trickle of dog urine working its way toward her open-toed shoe.

  My father raised both hands in a placating gesture. “Molly, trust me. Just be patient and all will be revealed in due time.” His voice was so reassuring I was ready to believe him, though my mother seemed less inclined.

  “If I see motorcycle parts or any other junk coming home on that trailer, you’re going to be sleeping beneath this thing with nothing but the clothes on your back and a sign on your forehead that reads Blockhead lives here.”

  “Molly. I would never do something like that. Trust me, this is something special, you’ll see.”

  My mother let out a grunt that could’ve passed for a grizzly bear’s. She hefted the groceries out of the car, all six bags’ worth, and waddled her way into the house, still grunting.

  My father looked at me. “She’s a heck of a woman, Stu. Let me tell you—one heck of a woman.”

  I was dying to know what he intended to do with the trailer but I could see he was lost in thought. He had returned to pacing, a smile on his lips identical to the one I’d seen the night before. I left him there in the driveway, a man and his trailer. Something big was brewing. Or not. Only time would tell.

  Saturday morning began with a leisurely breakfast of pancakes and bacon.

  “Stu, you must have a wife and children liv
ing in there,” my dad said, pointing to my chest, “the way you’re eating these days.”

  “Don’t give him a hard time,” my mother scolded. “A growing boy needs the calories.”

  My father shook his head as I took another piece of bacon. “He needs to get on with it while there’s still enough livestock in the world to feed him.”

  “I want livestock, too,” my brother added, thinking only of himself as usual.

  “Don’t worry,” I said with a pat on his arm. “I may get all the bacon, but there will always be plenty of broccoli for you.”

  My brother grabbed at the remaining bacon on the plate. The plate flipped off the table and clattered to the floor, sending the last piece of bacon skittering beneath my brother’s chair. Chester moved with the reflexes of a tiger. The bacon disappeared before anyone could form the word no, let alone bad dog.

  “I want more bacon!” my brother yelled.

  “See what happens when you torment your little brother,” my mother said, handing him the remaining piece of bacon on her plate. “The two of you are enough to drive me crazy.”

  “What about the trailer in the driveway?” I asked innocently.

  My mother stopped with a bite of pancake halfway to her mouth. “Fine, the three of you. And let’s not even go there,” she said. She pointed her fork in my father’s direction. “That topic is still under review.”

  My brother chomped his bacon down in one bite like the dog. He smiled at me, bacon grease glistening his lips. “Grr,” he growled.