Conundrum

NOUN conundrum (noun); conundrums (plural noun) a confusing and difficult problem or question: “one of the most difficult conundrums for the experts”

   My mom was really good at crossword puzzles, and she didn’t even have a high school education until she went to prison.  I was there when she received her diploma and was proud of her accomplishment.

    This proved to me that she could have done more with her life if she hadn’t eloped at the age of 14 and started popping out kids faster than a hummingbird’s wings. And if drink hadn’t claimed her from the start.

    However, that happened later in my story.  My name is O’Henry and I am the firstborn. Born to watch over her children and swing an axe.  Wipe snotty noses, braid hair, stop fights, and cook something outta nothin’.

Although I was born into a life of poverty, despair and disappointment, I vowed it wouldn’t be permanent.  Not for me and hopefully not for my siblings.
  Funny how destiny can interfere with a young man’s plans.

When you’re named after a candy bar you learn early on that life can’t always be sweet. Hope was like a golden thread dangling just beyond my reach.  I had learned early on that a man without a plan wasn’t worth the gleam in his papa’s eye and I had a plan.  Putting it into action was the problem. For every plan seemed to depend on one thing.  Money.

   I swept my hand through my hair and rubbed the back of my neck. A habit I couldn’t seem to let go of, whether for luck or worry, was beyond me.

Money!   Where could a young man get his hands on a bunch of money, quick? Besides robbing a bank and believe you me, the thought had crossed my mind a time or three.

   The only place I could think of was going to work for ol’ lady Hutchins, the richest woman in our town. She lived on Haunted Hollow Hill, which was a conundrum in itself for how can a hollow be on a hill?

   Conundrum was my word for the day and to remember it I had to use it in three sentences. Words were mighty important, especially to me, for I was determined to be a famous writer someday.  Come to think of it, I was a bit of a conundrum myself, half Mexican, one quarter Irish and one quarter Apache.  This was what got me into trouble at school, at home and come to think of it, all my life.  I was born with a temper and taming it seemed to be an all time job in itself.

I set out on foot to ol’ lady Hutchins’ house.  It was a beautiful sunny day with only a few lazy clouds racing across the sky like horses in an open field.  Just the kind of day that I liked to go fishing.  I passed by the lazy river and looked wistfully towards my favorite fishing hole, but I was a man on a mission. 

Setting my shoulders, I strode right up the hill to her house.  I marched up the porch steps, hardly looking around at all.  Taking a deep breath, I knocked on her door with the brass knocker before I could change my mind and run to the river.

   On account of her age and all, I gave her some time to answer, stepping back so she could get a look at me through the peephole above the knocker.  I didn’t want her to feel intimidated about me, so I tried to smile instead of my usual serious look.  I know I waited at least five minutes and raised my hand to knock again, when the door swung open. I stood facing a double-barrel shotgun!  I knew that was what it was because it was all I could see with it pointed directly in the middle of my forehead.

   I dropped the smile, and started sweating, but otherwise I didn’t move a muscle for I was frozen in place.

   “You got 30 seconds to explain what the hell you doing on my front porch,” she said.

   Her voice was cracked with age and my voice came out in a squeak, choked with fear, “Uh… ma’am, I’d appreciate you not pointing that gun in my face.  I intend you no harm.  I only thought you might be needing a young man to help out around the place.”

   “Ha!  You think I was born yesterday?  Hiring some wetback to be around to spy on my belongings and maybe murder me in the night?”

I had dealt with a lot of racism in my time. The only thing to do was to stand up to it and the hatred behind the actions of ignorant folks.  

   “Last I checked, ma’am, my back was pretty dry,” I said calmly, my voice back to normal.  “However, I see you aren’t used to people like me asking for help from people like you.”  I turned around to leave, sincerely hoping I didn’t become a lead-back on my way.

   I had just stepped off the porch and reached the driveway, when I heard a strange sound.  She was laughing, but it came out like a cackle, kinda like the sound you would expect old crows to make.  I turned around and she was standing there with her double-barrel shotgun, using it as a cane while her cackling went on and on.  CACKLE, CACKLE, CACKLE.

   The sound was grating against my nerves, so I strode right up those steps and stopped in front of her.  “Ma’am, I can appreciate good humor but if it’s at my expense, I have a right to know just what you find so doggone funny!”

   Unfortunately, this set her off on another cackling frenzy, which ended abruptly when she looked at me and started gesticulating for a chair.  She was pale and gasping for breath and her shotgun fell at her feet.  Thankfully it didn’t go off, maiming me for life, and I caught her just as she teetered on the way down.  I was strong for my age and when I picked her up, I realized she was just a bag of bones, dressed in a fancy housecoat.  Her eyes were coal black and steady on me as I gently set her on the porch swing.  I propped up the pillows behind her back and pulled the throw over her legs before taking a step back.

   “Are you okay?  Can I get you some water or do you want me to call someone for you?”

   “No, no…” she rasped out, “your name, what’s your name?”

   “O’ Henry, I mean Henry, ma’am.” I acted like I had a hat to pick up and put back on my head as I said it, a habit I had acquired when addressing elderly women and sometimes the young ones too.  They all seemed to like it, so it stuck with me. 

“Well, Henry, I don’t normally hire wetbacks or dry-backs neither, but for some reason, I like you.  What are your terms?”

   I ran my hand through my hair and rubbed the back of my neck.  I hadn’t thought my plan of action through very well, never expecting to be hired.

         “Well, first off, you need to lose the racist term ‘wetback’ and then we can move on to the pay.”

& & &

Walking back down the hill, I noticed my footsteps felt lighter.  Was it because the huge weight on my back was gone?  Putting my hand in my pocket, I felt the crisp $10 bill that Mrs. Hutchins had paid me for only an hour’s work.  My mouth was twitching, wanting to smile, but afraid I’d jinx my own good luck, so I held it in.  Thinking back on our conversation, I suddenly realized that she had set the terms instead of me.  

She weren’t so bad, though, and told me she could use me after school three days a week as long as I kept in school and kept my grades up.  I even had to show her my report cards.  That was going to take some getting used to because even Ma didn’t care about that.  I was the one who looked at everyone’s report cards and forged her signature.  I was the one who lectured my brother and two sisters and told them how important it was to get educated so folks wouldn’t think we were idgits. Hmmm… idgits… I would have to make sure that word was in the dictionary next time I used it.

I opened the screen door that led into the kitchen and the scene that greeted me was utter chaos.  Pots and pans were scattered all over the floor and table and my two sisters were in the middle of a screaming match.  Hershey sat at the table, his face in his hands and his long blond hair falling around him like a curtain trying to block out the sound.  As usual, Ma was nowhere in sight.

In 1994 when Ma was pregnant with Hershey, she watched the show with Forrest Gump saying: “Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re going to get.”  And since I was already named O’Henry, which was a joke on my birth certificate. With the dysfunctional relationship between my pa and ma he lit out.  No more Pa.  The joke being on ME!  

Anyway, she decided to name all of us after chocolate bars.  Chocolate forever being banned in the house by us kids.

Babe Ruth, whose actual name was Baby Ruth, but once she heard about the famous baseball player, she took to carrying a big stick around (since we couldn’t afford an actual bat). She said she would become the first female Babe Ruth.  

“Yawl stop that cater-wauling!  Tell me what is going on.”

My sisters stopped dead in their tracks, not having noticed my arrival.  “She started it!” said Kit-Kat. Her big, black eyes bored into me, and her teeth flashed with a smile that showed off her dimples. 

Babe Ruth stomped her foot and turned her back on me.  Her red hair bouncing in a defiant ponytail that was fast losing traction in the green band I had put in that morning.  “Did not,” she muttered under her breath.

I looked over at Hershey, and saw he was peeking out from under his curtain of hair, one blue eye staring at me to see what would happen next.  

Hershey was 12, Kit-Kat was 10, and Babe Ruth was 8, small but the fieriest, most orneriest one of us all.  I figured it was on account of that no good dad of hers.  All of us had different dads, but we were family through and through.

“We were just trying to help Hershey,” said Kit-Kat.

“Why does Hershey need help and what does it have to do with these pots and pans all over the kitchen?” I asked.

“Ask HIM!” replied both girls and pointed at Hershey.

Hershey sighed, jumped up from the table and sprang up the stairs towards his bedroom.

“Clean up this mess,” I said to the girls and headed up the stairs after Hershey.  I had a feeling in my gut that I already knew what I would hear but Hershey, more than the rest of us, needed help. I was afraid someday that I wouldn’t be enough.

I stood in the doorway staring at Hershey’s back.  He had slid into his safety zone.  This being a drawing desk he had managed to fashion out of cardboard boxes and a piece of plywood.  It was below the window and had the best light.  Although technically this room was both of ours, I only slept here.  My mattress was on the floor on the left, his on the right.  He had decorated the room by tacking up his drawings and the room never looked better.

   I had a vague memory of Hershey’s dad.  He was different too.  He was soft-spoken and kind.  I think Ma’s temper drove him away and even though I was young, I missed him when he left.  

I shook my head to clear the memory.  It seemed like it was only yesterday.

“Hershey,” I said softly, “what happened today.”

“Nothing I want to talk about,” he replied.

He had a pencil in his hand and was busy sketching, so I tiptoed over to look at what he was drawing.  Instead of his usual flowers, herbs, and plants, he had drawn three hangman nooses and was busy sketching in the faces.

“Is this about those bullies that have been picking on you?” I asked after tiptoeing back to the doorway.  He didn’t like anyone watching him draw.

Finally, he swung around and looked at me.  The eye that I hadn’t seen in the kitchen was swelling up, a black ring around a dirty rainbow of colors.  There was also a cut on his lip.  “It’s always about them Henry, and I can’t do what you asked.  I can’t fight like you showed me how.”

I could feel the blood begin to boil under my skin as I looked at his face, “I’ll kill them for this!” I said, slamming my fist into my hand.

“No, O’Henry!  That only makes it worse.  What if they’re right about what they call me?  How can I fight it, if even I wonder?”

I knew that Hershey was constantly bullied at school.  They called him a He-She, a faggot and worse.  I had fought so many fights over him, but they just kept coming.  I had even tried to teach him to fight, but it was true.  He couldn’t do it.  He was smart, sensitive, and artistic and the boys in our school didn’t understand that in another boy.

I walked over and pulled him into my arms.  He started crying, but not the gut wrenching sobs he needed to let it all out.  Instead, he was trembling all over, silent tears wetting my shirt.  When he stopped, I held him away from me and said, “Hershey, you are a conundrum!”

This caused him to laugh because he knew my word of the day routine.

“I got money,” I smiled, “let’s go buy some ice cream!”

We may have banned chocolate, but ice cream!  Ice cream seemed to melt away all types of pain.

Disreputable

adjective: not considered to be respectable 

in character or appearance.

“he was heavy, grubby, and vaguely disreputable”

When choosing my word of the day the next morning, I had a lot to consider, like: defaultant, (we heard that one a lot because Ma was always late on the rent) delinquent, because neighbors called us that and also, the rent!  Instead, I chose one that my school counselor had used when she called me in for one of her sessions.  

Ms. Sessions was actually what I called her in my head and our conversation had sent me to the dictionary.

Ms. Sessions: O’Henry, I’ve noticed you’ve been tardy on multiple occasions and have missed numerous days since school began.  Is there something going on at home that we should be made aware of?

Me: No ma’am

Ms. Sessions:  I sincerely hope that you will let us know if there were any problems at home.

Me: Yes ma’am.  I stared at her curly black hair and the tiny gold spectacles perched on her nose.  I wondered how they could stay there without sliding off, since they were right on the tip of her perfectly straight and narrow nose.  She stared down at the paper in front of her and I waited, willing the glasses to spring off and run free.

Ms. Sessions:  I’m going to let you go with just a warning.  I can see you are keeping your grades at an acceptable level for someone in your situation.

Me: I was beginning to feel my blood boil and gripped the seat of the chair so I wouldn’t knock the spectacles off her nose or flip the desk or…

Ms. Sessions:  O’Henry, did you hear my question?

Me: No Ma’am.

Ms. Sessions: Perhaps it’s those disreputable characters you’ve been hanging out with lately.  What were their names?

I stood up.  I had enough.  I didn’t know the exact meaning of the word, but I knew what it inferred and who she was talking about.  My best friends, Coyote, and Bean.

Me: Ma’am I will do my best to not miss school and get here on time.  May I be excused, please?

She nodded and I bolted out of that room like my ass was on fire.  I was sick and tired of folks acting all high and mighty and prying into our business.  The child welfare office had been called a few times, but we had successfully avoided them by pretending we weren’t home.

I knew what they thought of Ma, but it wasn’t her fault she had to work as a cocktail waitress and leave us at home alone, often without any food in the house.  She tried to bring home food when her tips were good, although in the back of my mind, I knew that cigarettes and beer took top priorities on that grocery list.  So, the school authorities were always trying to get me to say something negative and now here they were picking on my friends.

I stopped by the library to look up the word, disreputable, and studied the definition.  If I were being honest, Coyote and Bean fit the bill.  Coyote with his hair sticking up in all directions and his clothes always a muss could scrounge up trouble faster than you could say Jack Squat and disappear even faster.  And, Bean, well Bean tried, he really did, but he was shaped a bit like a bean and not very conscious of his appearance either.  Plus, he farted all the time.  He swore he didn’t eat beans every day, but ya had to wonder.  We made a motley crew, but we stuck together through thick and thin.  After all, we had been blood brothers since 3rd grade. 

I left the library and headed down the hall for class and speak of the devil. Coyote was trying to pry someone’s locker open.  He was so intent on what he was doing that I silently came up behind him and stuck my finger in his back, “hand’s up!” I breathed in his ear.

He swung so fast; I didn’t have time to duck, and he landed a painful punch to my jaw.  “Damn, Coyote!  It’s only me!”

“Well, Henry, you know better than to sneak up on my like that.  It’s a good thing I saw you in time, or you’d be laid out on the ground!”

I doubted that but didn’t want to rob him of his pride.  “What are you doing anyway?  Why aren’t you in class?”

“They told me to go to the principal’s office because Robbie Collins was messin’ with my hair, and I decked him.”

“So, what are you doing out here?”

“I thought I’d get even with him and steal something out of his locker.  Like that picture of Lannie in her bikini or his football helmet.”

“So, are you fixin’ to go to the principal’s office?  I’m really surprised they didn’t escort you instead of lettin’ you go alone.”

“Yeah, bad on them, cuz you already know the answer to that question.  I ain’t a goin’!  Besides, the teach was all busy trying to stop Collins’ nose from bleeding.  Heh, you wanta cut out with me?  I dug up some worms this morning, so we could go fishing.”

I thought of the warm spring sunshine shining on the pond, the soft sigh of the pine trees and the birds chirping as they built their nests.  Sigh.  “Nah, I better not, I just got called into Session’s office and they’re on my back.  Besides, I got me a job now!”  As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I regretted them.

“A JOB!  You got a job!  When?  Where?” Coyote wasn’t the sort of person who would respect Mrs. Hutchins and I was thinking fast on what to tell him.  Thankfully, the bell rang, which made Coyote abandon his locker project and turn to escape among the crowd.  I gave him a salute and headed to class.