I deserved a treat.
After winning the Kiwanis Club “Hope of America” award and an Honors Reader certificate plus two more for Perfect Attendance and Traffic Patrol, sixth grade had been a raging success. I was Student Body Secretary, and in charge of the decorations for all bulletin boards. I was also the best boy in the class at hopscotch.
Yes, it was a banner year. To me, anyway.
I waited for the bus in front of Qualls’ Market, seeking shade under the awning over their front window. I was sunburned to a crispy crunch from the day before and what little shade I could find was bliss. Red hair, freckles and a day full of Fourth of July festivities are a lethal combination.
As I waited, I greeted the customers as they walked in the door. I knew almost everyone in the neighborhood, whether from school, church, or the gossip my mom would spread. They all seemed to know me, too—either from school, church, or the neighborhood gossip about our own family. I stood there for about fifteen minutes, I guess, as I always did. Punctuality was crucial with bus schedules. Miss one, and you had to wait another fifty minutes. To a twelve year old, that’s a lifetime.
The bus arrived and I stepped aboard, greeting the driver as though we were old pals. I dropped the coins into the slot and watched the little conveyor belt drop them into their cache below. I liked to sit as close to the front as possible, but not the front seats. They were reserved for the elderly or blind. But I liked to sit in the next one back, just in case the driver wanted to strike up a conversation with me as he did the older passengers. He never did, but Hope springs eternal.
The bus snaked its way through the streets of Poplar Grove. The Fourth of July Weekend seemed to drag on forever. As I rocked back and forth in my seat, I thought of what a long, drawn-out holiday this always was. Most families had left town for the long weekend—the Larsens, the Quinns, the Chatwins. It seemed as though everyone I knew (save for the few at Qualls’ Market) had fallen off the planet. Every year, they’d go waterskiing at Echo Reservoir, camping at Teapot. The Chatwins always went to Tabiona, wherever that was—calling it “Tabby” for short. I was jealous. Not for the waterskiing (I was petrified of water) but that their families all got along.
Our family would stay home and wait until it was time to go to Uncle Gene’s, where the grownups would drink and the kids would fight or get yelled at for leaving char marks on the sidewalk from our fireworks, snakes and caps. That was the case every year. Cheap beer, fighting relatives and all I had to show for it was a blistering, peeling sunburn.
I pulled the buzzer cable to signal a stop at Main and Fourth South. The bus hissed to a stop and opened its doors. I bounced down the steps to the curb, telling the driver goodbye. He said nothing. I didn’t let it bother me this time. Better things lied ahead. Nothing was going to rain on my parade this year.
I walked a block to JB’s Big Boy, where the red and white checkered boy himself stood sentry at the door. My relatives always teased me that I looked like him—pudgy cheeks, round belly and an ever-present hamburger shoved in my mouth.
I walked in and took a seat at the counter. The air-conditioning felt good. My feet dangled a mile above the chrome foot rail, as I reached for a menu. I didn’t really need it, because I had known for two weeks what I would be ordering.
No one seemed to notice me as I sat cooling my burned arms on the formica counter. This was different than the attention I got at Woolworth’s, my normal downtown hangout. I pivoted on my stool for what seemed ages until the waitress came by. “What would you like,” she apathetically asked, sensing the “zero-tip” headed her way.
“A JB’s Big Burger, please, with a Coke and a Hot Fudge Sundae,” I responded in the most mature voice my chirpy, unchanged one would muster.
“Just a sec,” she said and vanished for another eternity.
I swiveled some more on my stool and thought of my friends waterskiing. I thought of yesterday’s family brawl and how Junior High was waiting in the wings. I was scared to death to go to Jordan Junior next fall. The older kids seemed like giants compared to my measly, but pot-bellied, frame. Not only were they bigger than me, but there were more of them—all vying for the attention I used to get in spades at Edison. No more accolades, just wedgies and getting stuffed into garbage cans and lockers.
The waitress bought me my Coke. I thanked her and unwrapped my straw. I was tempted to do the “wet worm” trick with the wrapper, but decided that type of behavior was unbecoming to a Junior High student.
I swiveled some more, and had nearly swigged the entire drink away by the time my burger was delivered. “Here you go,” she said and slid it to me like scraps to a stray.
I loved hamburgers. I still do. Uncle Danny always called me “Wimpy,” since I could eat a whole A&W Burger before I could walk. Ketchup, mustard, lettuce and tomato—I never cared for pickles and pick them off to this day. On that quiet July day, the burger seemed twice as good.
As I dabbed the last drops of ketchup from my mouth and front of my t-shirt, the hot fudge sundae was placed before me. It was smaller than I had imagined it would be. Nothing more than a teeny scoop of vanilla, with a drizzle of fudge. A small squirt of whipped cream and a maraschino cherry. I don’t know what I was expecting, but as I said—Hope springs eternal.
I was finished with it before the waitress tallied my check and slipped it to me.
“Here you go,” I said, “It’s free—for my birthday.” The waitress furrowed her brow as I gave her the crumpled card I had received in the mail, saying “Happy Birthday! The Party’s On Us!” It was redeemable for a JB’s Big Burger, a small drink and a sundae.
I left the restaurant, back to the blinding sun and wind like a blast furnace, and dawdled back to the bus stop. I thought of my Big Holiday Weekend, of turning twelve— and of my life ahead filled with sunburns, wedgies, and those giants in Junior High.
