I won’t put a prayer to God unless it’s about Auntie’s health or my hand-me-downs. I try to kneel beside my mattress sometimes, with my eyes shut, sandwiching my hands together like the saints do, but I’m stunted. God’s mood ring is always white, you know.
Mr. Bubbly’s Kindergarten class really stirred smoking coals in my gut. Tommy SideWinder, this porky snake, would pinch his nose whenever he saw me, even if I was a mile across the classroom just sharpening my No. 2s. His catty eyes crawled all over me and left this gunky feeling all over my body. That really messed me up; I mean I still can’t walk past a girl on Center Street without sniffing my shirt collar like some freak mutt. And God never changed one rotten thing; he never plagued that jackal’s nose with scabs so that I could scrap em off with a spade, and he never got me any better soaps than those sample bottles Auntie sneaked from the motels after she prostituted. Don’t say God don’t provide, sonnyboy. Auntie always calls me sonnyboy.
Sample soaps aren’t really divine provisions, I don’t think, so I could never praise God for that. But my clothes got better. Every year, the day after Christmas, Auntie took my brother Charlie to some nice shop East of town, and he’d waddle home through the front door with his arms full of folded clothes, and he’d go into his bedroom to put his new stuff in the drawer. Whatever old stuff he took out of the drawer to make space for his new stuff, that old stuff was mine. Sports jacket, jeans, maybe four or five T-shirts. He was only one year older than me so it almost always fit. I would try on my new clothes for hours, when I got them. Sometimes I’d wear three outfits in one day. I can honestly thank God for the day after Christmas because I’m, on that day, I’m a little more identical to Charlie.
The shirts and pants are Charlie’s used stuff, but I like them better that way, if Charlie used them. If I was Charlie’s twin, I bet Auntie wouldn’t have to leave every night and return every morning just to make cook our Crème of Wheat, and she wouldn’t fall asleep at the dinner table, and we could talk and laugh, like a family. Two good boys, Charlie and me, could pose often enough, well enough, to scoop in plenty of dough. Auntie wouldn’t need to work nights. Charlie was already doing everything he could anyways, being in school and all. He even quit the soccer team. But if I worked with him, we’d be eating like the fattest Kings in the Bible.
I watched Charlie’s photoshoot once. Almost got to work with him, too. We both tried out for the same spot but Charlie got it, of course, probably because his clothes were newer and he looked a bit nicer. The director offered to film us both, but Auntie stomped her foot and held my arm, and she wouldn’t let go. Absolutely not. Not her sonnyboy. So they just filmed Charlie, and it was really stupid, really, because they told him to take off all of those nice clothes that made him look so handsome and that earned him the role. His clothes didn’t even matter. Charlie was naked and posing and the cameras flashed on him and the director told him to twist this way or like this or think that. Auntie and I just watched, but the whole time I thought I could be doing that.
So I only thank God the day after Christmas because then I’m wearing what Charlie wore when he got the parts, the parts that earned money, and now maybe I’ll get parts, too, and soon Auntie won’t fall asleep at the dinner table.
