Be Nice Read online

“It’s the sun, the planets, and outer space. It’s the only thing that matters,” Janey said.

  “Yes, Janey, that’s right.”

  Wallis whispered, “Ms. G, you think one day we’ll get out there?”

  “I hear the scientists would like to, Wallis, so I’m sure we will.”

  Janey smirked. “Hey, Ms. G., you start the meds next year, don’t you?”

  “Yes, Janey, that’s right.”

  “And if you’re really good at stuff, like artsy, they let you keep doin’ it, right?”

  “Yes, Janey, that’s right.”

  “So you think you’re gonna get to keep doin’ artsy?”

  Ms. Garner didn’t answer. Her face twitched a second time.

  Wallis noticed it and remarked, “If not, it’s straight to the W Line...right?”

  “Yes, Wallis, that’s right. I’ll go straight to the W Line.” Ms. Garner regained her composure. “So, Janey, can you tell me what your drawing represents?”

  “It’s just the sun and the planets and other stuff,” Janey said.

  “Yes, I see that, but…why is the sun, the giver of all life, destroying all the other planets?”

  Janey stood there. She didn’t know. She didn’t care.

  Ms. Garner took time to process. “You and Wallis, you both met here in my art class?”

  Janey held Wallis’s hand. “Yeah, Ms. G. And we’re both gonna be artsies. We’re gonna draw the music disc covers, the comic superhero books, and paint the really famous paintings.”

  “That’s nice. I’m so very proud of you. But, like Mr. Beams teaches us, sometimes what we want in life isn’t always what’s best for—”

  Wallis went face to face with Ms. Garner. “Then we’ll go on the meds and get on the W Line like my mom and pop did, and like Janey’s mom did. We’re Be Nice, Ms. G.,we know what’s up.”

  Ms. Garner acquiesced. “Good, Wallis. That’s very, very good.” She eyed Janey’s drawing a second time and moved to another student.

  Abe placed his trumpet to his lips. He closed his eyes and played. The music rolled out smoothly, but with a somewhat melancholy feel.

  The rest of the students in class looked on.

  Abe played for another three minutes then stopped and opened his eyes.

  Impressed, John Tom gave a fist bump to Pete and Becky.

  The class applauded.

  Mr. Baylor, the music teacher, strolled from behind his desk. “Incredible, Abe. That was just incredible.”

  Abe locked his trumpet in its carrying case. “Thanks, Mr. Baylor.”

  “Music, music, music. Don’t we all just love music?”

  “Abe’s gonna be supah famous! You watch!” John Tom declared.

  “He’s gonna be right up there with Killer Frank and Josh Klown,” Pete added.

  Becky gave a thumbs up. “I bet, when he takes his meds, they’re just gonna let him keep on playin’ his tunes.”

  John Tom pounded his desk in approval. A pair of cymbals fell off the desk and crashed to the floor.

  The class applauded.

  “Hey, I ain’t into the music thing,” John Tom boasted. “Me, I’m gonna be big time pro foot-soc.”

  “Oh, yeah, right,” Pete said. “You gonna be on the W Line just like your daddy and your mama.”

  With a serious look, Mr. Baylor turned to Pete. “And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, is there, Peter?”

  Silence in the classroom.

  Pete bowed his head. “No, Mr. Baylor, sir. There ain’t—ain’t nothin’ wrong.”

  John Tom caught the foot-soc ball in one hand and raced toward the distant goalpost. His body pads undulated around his muscular frame, a bead of sweat rolled out from beneath his helmet. The opposing players moved in on him from either side. He dropped the foot-soc ball to his right foot and kicked it to a nearby teammate. The teammate caught the ball, advanced down the field, and kicked the ball back to John Tom. John Tom caught the ball, leveling two players in his way, and kept running. A burly boy charged him head on. John Tom kicked the ball over the boy’s head, ran forward, and caught the ball before it hit the ground. He stopped, threw the ball in the air, and, spinning in a one-eighty, whip kicked the ball through the goal post.

  A group of students cheered from the sidelines.

  The foot-soc coach patted John Tom on the helmet.

  High in the stadium seats, Wallis and Janey sketched in their drawing pads.

  Wallis glanced at Janey’s drawing of a fiery comet hurtling through outer space. He looked at his own drawing of John Tom scoring a touch-goal in the Pro Foot-Soc League.

  Down on the field, a crowd of young men and women recorded the foot-soc practice on their sellies.

  Janey pointed at them. “Brian Drake and his crew, like they’re really gonna go Hollywood and make the big movies.”

  “Yeah, right. They’re gonna end up filming on the W Line.”

  Janey giggled.

  “Hey, you packed yet?”

  “Nah. Not yet. Not leaving `till Monday.”

  “I didn’t tell the folks. I’ll do it tomorrow.”

  Janey smeared the comet off her drawing pad. She sighed and turned her attention first to the open roof of the stadium, then to the stars in the night sky.

  “You good?”

  “You know…sometimes I think that…” she paused.

  “What?”

  “Nah, I’m good. Forget it.”

  “You said sometimes you think that…?”

  “I’m good. Forget it.”

  “I know you. What?”

  “It’s nothing. It’s childlike.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Nah. It’s kiddie stuff.”

  Wallis stared at her.

  “Damn, okay.” Janey checked the stadium to make sure no one was close enough to hear them. “Okay, this one time…this one time I was thinkin’…I mean, I was in my room, so it was private, I can’t get in any trouble or—”

  “Will you tell me?”

  “Well…if the stars are the only thing that matters. If way up there, if outer space, if that’s the only thing that’s real…then why do we have to stomp stomp?”

  Wallis closed his drawing pad with a puzzled look.

  “What I’m sayin’ is…like, why aren’t we tryin’ to get out—go way, way out there in space? Why do we always have to beat on each other down here?”

  Wallis tapped his drawing pad with both his thumbs.

  “I know. It’s kinda silly.”

  “You wanna know somethin’?

  “What?”

  “Well, it was a few years ago, okay? But this golden oldie, he told me there used to be, like, I don’t know, these four separate times. I think they were called seasons or some shit like that. Now, though, it’s always hot. The golden oldies, they effed up everything. That’s why we have to stomp. We have to stomp so the bad stuff can’t ever happen again.”

  “But you think a train ride, a field trip across the country, it’s really gonna help to get us,” Janey motioned to the sky, “way, way out there?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Baby, there’s nobody here. Talk to me.”

  “I am talkin’.”

  “No, I know you. I know you real good. And I saw what you did earlier.” She leaned close and whispered in Wallis’s ear, “I saw you with that Sex Crimer, Janus. You held back.”

  “What? No way!”

  “You wanna know a little secret? Me…I held back on him, too.”

  Wallis checked the stadium. No one was listening.

  “If the stars and the sun are the only thing that matters…”

  “Girl, you’re crazy. You’re crazy. And if the therapist or anybody else hears you say that—”

  “I was in my own po
d, okay? And when I’m in my own pod, I can do whatever I want and I can think whatever I want.”

  Wallis placed his drawing pad under his arm. “Girl, c’mon.”

  Janey kissed him. “And I know you feel the same way.”

  Wallis guided his hog to the curb. Janey slid off the seat and bit him on his left ear.

  “See you tomorrow night.” She waved goodbye and ran up the walkway to her pod.

  John Tom’s H-mobile swerved around the corner. John Tom triple-tapped the horn. Wallis whipped the hog around and drove up beside him.

  John Tom peeked at his selli. “I left the twins and Abe over at BURGER BURGER BURGER. So you wanna go see what’s up?”

  Wallis looked at the stars. “Not tonight. I got me some artsy to do.”

  John Tom raised a shock wand and sparked the tip. “For real? I mean, you’re missin’ out. Always someone out there who needs a good stomp stomp.”

  “That’s for damn sure. Just not tonight.”

  John Tom gave Wallis a fist bump.

  Wallis revved the hog engine and raced away down the street.

  Wallis entered his pod. His father was asleep under the flatscreen in the living room. A half bottle of meds was next to him on the floor. His mother was asleep on the couch. Her meds were on the java table. A trail of saliva dripped out of the corner of her mouth.

  Wallis opened the fridge unit. A case of Dawg beer was on the bottom shelf between a package of bacon and a bowl of pre-made pancake batter.

  Wallis opened a can of Dawg and took a sip. He set the can down, unlocked his work desk, and took out his art portfolio. He flipped through the pages: dozens of drawings of superheroes. But the one thing that caught his eye, as if for the very first time, was that all of his superheroes appeared to be angry; they were mad, scowling, furious about something indefinable. Wallis viewed the action figures posed on his work desk. They smiled back at him.

  Wallis activated his speakdeck, took another sip of Dawg, and began, “Yeah, so…so here we go. Today, it was insane. John Tom, he got a Be Nice call right before school started. Me and Janey, we were already on our way when he hit us on the hog. Anyway, we motored straight to this dude’s living pod. This Sex Crimer, Janus Jones. Man-oh-man, and was John Tom ready to go. He had these ultra-killer shock wands in the trunk of the H-mobile. Oh, and you shoulda heard when Janey called this guy, Janus, the punk-ass anus. We laughed so hard like we was already on the meds! So, uh…we crashed inside this dude’s pod, and John Tom, he went right at him. He shocked the guy’s nut-sack for, like, twenty minutes, and then he kicked out his two front teeth. We almost pissed ourselves laughing! Then Abe tells the dude he got off on a tech-ni-cal-i-ty, and that Be Nice don’t play no damn lawyers, we play exe-fuckin’-cutioners! So we beat on this dude, beat him up, down, and bloody! And Becky, oh, man, she took a knife out of the dude’s kitchen, like a knife for cuttin’ up meat, and why this punk had a knife like that, just gettin’ out of the lockup, I have no idea. Anyway, John Tom, Pete, and Abe held him down…” Wallis stopped, drawn to the superheroes in his portfolio. Angry superheroes, insane superheroes…but, wait, superheroes never got angry, they never went insane “…and…and as Becky’s cuttin’ him, cuttin’ him up good, she’s sayin’ men and women are equal, no one rapes…” He studied his action figures. Blazer Blane, Rock Quarryman, Super Doll, and the rest of the Heroes Unlimited squad smiled back at him. “So…so then…John Tom, the twins, and Abe, they…they took the dude in his bathroom. Me and Janey, we cracked up when we heard him scream…”

  Wallis pushed off the speakdeck. He swiveled his chair to the blue walls and the light blue spaces where his posters had been. Across the bedroom, his Be Nice posters were rolled up on the floor.

  Janey and her mother arrived at 7 PM the next evening. Irene had on an orange moo-moo, a string of pearls, and a pair of gold earrings that dangled down to her collarbone. Wallis’s mother, Mary, greeted everyone and ushered them to the kitchen table. Wallis’s father came through the front door wearing his work jumper covered in brown grease.

  “Hi, all!” he said.

  “Well, hey, there, lover love,” Mary answered.

  Janey took a seat. “What up, Brent? So how you doin’, big man?”

  “Why, I’m doing fine, Janey. Thank you so much for asking.” Brent smiled at Janey’s mother. “My, that’s a lovely dress you have on, Irene.”

  “Thank you, Brent. I’m so very glad you like it.”

  Wallis’s mother placed a bowl of pasta on the table. “And how was work today, dear?”

  Brent lit a cigarette. “It was great. We did thirty-two thousand new solar panels for the week.”

  Irene filled her plate with pasta. “On my side, I built over one hundred and forty-three brand new pedal bikes.”

  Mary put a bowl of some kind of steaming meat and meat sauce on the table.

  Janey poured herself a glass of wine. “So where’s my hot as eff man at?”

  Everyone laughed.

  Wallis entered the kitchen. He had on black overalls, a cigarette parked behind his ear. “Hey, baby girl.”

  They kissed.

  Wallis sat at the table.

  Janey hopped in his lap. “You tell `em `bout the field trip yet?”

  Brent’s face lifted from his plate. Meat sauce dribbled down his chin.

  Mary placed a dozen rolls of garlic bread on the table. “What field trip?”

  Wallis lit his cigarette. “Be Nice field trip on Monday. We get to go across the nation. We get to see the whole of everything.”

  “Well, that sounds like fun,” Brent said.

  “It sounds like a lot of fun,” Irene said, as she chomped down a roll of garlic bread.

  Wallis motioned to the kitchen. “Yo, Mom, can you get me a beer?”

  Mary hurried to the kitchen. She took a beer out of the fridge unit, wiped off the top of the can, and ran back to the table.

  Wallis grabbed the can and took a sip. “It’s okay that I go?”

  “It’s okay with me,” Brent said. “But you know we’ll miss you.”

  “So me and Janey, we did some good art in class on Friday.”

  The parents stopped eating and clapped.

  Janey said, “I drew the sun really big, and it was, like, burnin’ up everything.”

  Her mother poured a tall glass of wine. “Brent, may I have a cigarette?”

  Brent handed her a cigarette.

  “I drew Mighty Morphon. He’s the changing man,” Wallis said.

  Mary’s eyes widened. “Oh, is he?”

  Wallis took another swig of beer. “Me and Janey, we gonna be supah famous. We gonna paint all the music disc covers, draw the superhero comic books—”

  His father cut him off, “Oh, I have no doubt about that.”

  Janey snuffed Wallis’s cigarette out on her empty plate. “We gonna do it. Me and Wallis: we gonna be supah famous.”

  “I know you are. Because you children are so wonderful,” her mother said.

  “Son, did I ever tell you I wanted to be a music man?”

  “A million times, Pop. And Mom, she wanted to be, like, an actress on the TV.”

  “Silly times,” Mary said. “Those were silly times. But now we work. Now we make good things.”

  At 10:00 p.m., Wallis and his parents walked Janey and her mother to the front door.

  “John Tom, Abe, and the twins are going to Mescoe’s at 1,” Janey said. “You wanna go out later?”

  “At 1? Yeah, that’s ice. I’ll swing by and pick you up.”

  She and Wallis kissed.

  Irene opened the front door. “Thank you very much for having Janey and me to dinner.”

  Brent and Mary replied, “We enjoyed serving you.”

  Wallis pushed his wrist implant. The LED time flashed 11:39 PM. He was on his bed
. His clothes weren’t packed and his drawings were still in their art portfolio on top of his work desk. He was surprised when the front doorbell chimed.

  He jumped downstairs and opened the front door.

  A stunning brunette, in her early thirties, stood on the walkway outside. She wore knee high black war boots, a long, black leather coat, and viddi-camera eye shades.

  Taken aback, Wallis looked her up and down.

  She flashed a gold ID badge and said, “Good evening. I’m sorry to bother you, Wallis. My name is Miss Janika Fallings.”

  She gently pushed Wallis aside, stepped into the living pod, and shut the door.

  “Yo, who the eff do you think—”

  “You may call me Ms. Fallings.”

  She put her badge in her right coat pocket and activated her eyewear.

  “Okay, look, woman—”

  “I’m the therapist at the Brennan Learning Center.”

  Wallis went numb.

  “But don’t worry, Wallis. I’m not here to speak to your parents.” She slowly circled the living pod. Her eyewear lenses brightened as they viddi-recorded. She walked through the living room and eventually settled at the kitchen table. “Why don’t you come over here and join me, Wallis? Have a seat.”

  Wallis’s stomach churned as he took a seat.

  Ms. Fallings patted him on the knee. “Well, you appear to be okay. You look good. No obvious problems, as far as I can tell.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Now, Wallis, what do you have to be sorry about? Did you do something wrong?”

  Wallis squeezed a dinner napkin on the table.

  “So I’ve been told you’re quite the artsy, Wallis. Quite the young talent. You and your girlfriend, Janey Typermass. That’s her name?”

  “Uh, yeah.”

  “Wallis?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you have any idea why I’m here very late and on a Saturday night?”

  “No.”

  “Well, Wallis...I’m here because I’m upset.”

  Wallis fumbled with a plastic dessert fork.

  “But, here’s the thing. I only get upset when one of my boys or girls gets upset.”

  “I’m…I’m not upset about anything,” Wallis said.