The Good Cry (1/2)
The Wiry, Little Bastard brought one of those big-ass McDonald's Cokes and a box of fried chicken. A big box. He had a large order of fries, too. I can see him, clearly, standing in line with his grandfather, it's their turn at the register. The kid is hungry, but not too hungry to think. In a moment of inspiration, he asks the old man for the big box of chicken. He'll use the deep fried chickenheads to win the allegiance of his classmates. He'll bribe them in an attempt to win amnesty for a day.
After getting into class, he stashed the food under his table. The Wiry Little Bastard knows the rules of the class. Every last one. He knows the ins and the outs of them, too. To make my job easier, for instance, I tell the kids that so long as I don't SEE anything I don't particularly CARE. This means that Little Ms. Wang can fondle her little blue Blukachu beneath the table and relieve her little body's desire to squirm around and crack jokes and push the soles of her feet up against the wall when she gets all Linda Blairey..
The class was going along as smoothly as it ever does. We were doing a couple of pages from the reading book. The reading book is composed of four parts. I won't bore you with the details, but we've just moved into the third section. It's a little tricky, because you can't copy the answers right out of the story. It's the analytical part.
The analytical part of the book looks a little bit like this:
Now I've really done it! Mom and Dad are going to be angry. They told me I shouldn't play with matches. What should I do now? Run to Mexico? No! Find a lonely old man to comfort and aid me. No! Dial 911 from a neighbors house? Hey, that sounds like a good plan!
1.)What did the boy do?
2,)What are two wrong things the boy could do?
3.)Have you ever seen a dead body?
And so on. . . tack on a crummy line drawing in Sharpie of a boy with big ears and there you have it, page 77 of our reading book. Now, admittedly, the first question was “Matches are what?” followed by “Mexico is who?” After we got those out of the way, came the big one:
“Teacher, what did the boy do?”
Actually, the second question was “Mr. Hudson, what did the boy do?” Followed by “Mistarah Huddason what did the boy do?” and “Hey, teacher, what's number one?” And it went on and on and on. . . one new question followed by three repeats. All from the boys. Each one oblivious to the others' questions. A little Dantean annex,
“Goddammit,” I wondered aloud, and then the girls chimed in with me, they knew this one by heart, “What makes Taiwanese boys so fucking stupid?”
“Teacher, I know!” and God in the Form of a Seven Year Old Girl's little hand shoots up. “When they is in their mommies tummies, their daddies punch she in the tummy!”
The girls all squealed with delight. Little Ms. Wang raised her hand.
“Teacher! When I are in K2, I see The Little Smart Ass That Could with he mommy and he mommy have she nay-nay in The Little Smart Ass That Could's mouth!”
“Give he milk!” Miss KaohSiung piped in without raising her hand. “He are five! She give he milk! I see, too!”
And then what Little Ms. Wang said, from the other girls, mutatis mutandis, applied to The Fat Kid, The Little Wiry Bastard, and Captain Liao. If I prohibited the girls from talking shit about the boys, they'd never say anything. . . Some of them actually go outside the classroom in pursuit of ammunition to use against the little shits. I'll never forget the day “Brokeback Mountain Climbing Man” made it's debut in the class lexicon.
We finish with 77 and move on to 78 and that's when the Wiry Little Bastard breaks out into tears. For the longest time, I'd hoped I'd see the day. I always imagined him snapping in a violent way, and though I saw many different scenarios with many different people getting taken to the hospital and others being taken into custody, I could never really linger over what might precipitate such an outburst. Of course, the watched pot never boils. . . and I'd hoped for so long and had been disappointed for so long that I had given up.
I got in closer for a good look and, sure enough, he was crying real tears. He didn't seem to be suffering from inflamed conjunctiva. He wasn't bleeding. Didn't smell like pot. Just crying.
Real crying. We see a lot of its opposite where I work. There's this one little, stylish seven year old girl. She's got cowboy boots. An open-backed dress. A new haircut every week. Mother and father are getting divorced. She was letting them roll, for awhile. She'd throw herself face-down in the courtyard, pounding her fists on the black rubber matting. Kicking, too. And just howling away. Long, ragged sobs that left her gasping for air. Fucking wails that went up into the seventh story apartments and shattered looted vases. She was milking the news for all it was worth. She''s not alone. With all of them, it starts out genuine enough, but once the kid figures out there's something to be gained from your pity, the shameless little monster will sick your own heart on you.
Real crying, though. I was curious. I told him to step outside. . . as I'd done countless times before. He knew the drill. He could make the walk with his eyes gouged out by The Fat Kid's green pen. I closed the door and asked him why he was crying, bending my knees to get eye-level with him. I told him I wanted to know why he was crying.
This is what he told me: “Sometimes, I come here, and my brain tell me to do crazy things. Just. . . things.”
(Ting3!)