Don't Care High (24 page)

Sheldon and Wayne-o looked over at Mr. Gamble, but he was still standing.

“No, not that villain — my analyst — my
ex
-analyst! I hath smote him a blow. And that is when I sought out a pot of bonny ale to slake my thirst. So I am now King Arthur, which I can confirm, as I performed the coronation personally in the Cathedral — just before they threw me out in a minor
coup d'état
. But I assure you my throne is secure.”

“Oh, Mr. Morrison!” groaned Wayne-o.

“That's ‘Your Majesty,'” corrected the king. He leaned over to them and said in a whisper, “But confidentially, I think I may have drunk too much, because, while the throne is steady, this room seems to be wobbling quite a lot.”

Sheldon signalled Paul and, with Wayne-o's help, the three of them tried to manoeuvre Mr. Morrison away from his fellow staff members. Meanwhile, the party had lost none of its momentum. The students were showing signs of the ability to carry on until noon when, at midnight, Mr. Gamble cut the power on the whole business and announced to the shocked crowd that the party was officially over.

He held up his hands to quell the cries of protest. “School rules. Twelve o'clock curfew.”

There was much grumbling and, luckily, the vice-principal did not hear Mr. Morrison sending him to the dungeon. Reluctantly, the students began to file out of the gymnasium building.

Leaving the hot gym, they found a comfortable night with a welcome cool breeze. The sky was clear, and the towering lights of Manhattan surrounded them on all sides, looking somehow more imposing than usual. But most wonderful of all was the sight that met each student's eyes as he or she stepped out the door. The streets were filled with garbage trucks, heading busily in all directions, back at work and on their way to rid the city of its mountains of refuse. The garbage strike was over.

A good-natured cheer broke from the mass of students and, having no immediate plans, all twenty-six hundred settled themselves in and around the front of the school, all sitting quite comfortably on the hard pavement. They sat in quiet contentment watching the miracle unfold before them.

Suddenly, Daphne Sylvester's voice rose above the night. “Hey, where's Mike?” Several other voices took up the cry, and the students began to look around them.

Phil Gonzalez darted over to the parking lot, and when he returned, his face was a study in sadness. “He's gone! His car isn't there anymore! Mike's gone!”

“Gone?” Mr. Morrison snapped out of a light doze. “Mike's gone? But wait a minute! He can't do this! I still need him! Oh, no!” Before anyone could stop him, he galloped off into the night, howling, “Mike! Mike!” heedless of the hour and his kingly dignity.

Wayne-o was about to run after him but froze as a mournful sound wafted up in the school's courtyard. At the top of the front stairs stood Slim Kroy, blowing an emotional rendering of Taps into his tuba. All eyes were fixed on him, and when he took his mouth from the instrument, absolute silence fell. Not a single sound could be heard except the inspirational roar of the city's garbage trucks on their appointed rounds.

The entire population of Don't Care High, a force more than twenty-six hundred strong, sat in wordless contemplation of the loss of its president. There were some sighs, some tears, and perhaps a few muffled sobs, but no one spoke. It was a time of bittersweet perfection. It lasted five minutes, then ten, and fifteen. The tension was almost tangible, but no one would be the one to violate this silence — Mike's silence.

Then suddenly the brass-plated tuba was out of Slim's arms and bouncing noisily down the cement stairs, not missing a step. It seemed to cry out against the silence, saying
clang, bang, p-toom, boing, rattle, bam, fettuh-fettuh, futtuh-futtuh, clunk
. This last part came when the instrument hit bottom, coming to rest on its massive horn.

The tension disintegrated, and the students dissolved into mirth. Waves of laughter rose up among the lofty towers of the New York skyline.

A
t that point, the mass of students broke up, and precisely what transpired after that is unclear. It is unlikely that the Calvin Klein people ever figured out who spray-painted
MIKE IS DONE, BUT HIS SPIRIT LIVES ON
over their Times Square billboard. It is known, however, that a group of some forty Don't Care students was apprehended trying to storm Flash Flood's studio at Stereo 99 to tell Mike's story to the world. An even larger group of an estimated one hundred-plus was found trying to build a commemorative bonfire in Washington Square Park. They were stopped, however, before they could break more than four municipal bylaws. And many groups, too numerous to mention, were detained as possible street gangs, and ultimately taken home.

The night would go down in Don't Care history as the night Slim Kroy officially retired his tuba by borrowing earth from a park flower bed and planting geraniums in it — also borrowed. It was the night Daphne Sylvester received her first and last jilting, and the night in which Wayne-o ran up the largest single outfit dry-cleaning bill in his family's recollection. (It would later become his most successful photography project, a not-for-the-squeamish composition entitled “Wayne-o's Suit.”)

It was the night Peter Eversleigh gave up stick for the second — and not at all final — time, a resolution that would last a scant seventy-two hours. Also that night, Phil Gonzalez broke his own record, putting a scratch on his father's Coupe de Ville measured at eleven feet, ten and three-eighths inches. Perhaps most significantly, it was the night Feldstein retired from the locker business in a touching ceremony in which his chair was dismantled, placed in a large box which had once held takeout Japanese food, and set adrift on the Hudson on an old raft someone had found by the shore.

Finally, it was the night Arthur Morrison slept under the stars on the roof of 106 Gordon Street, where he had gone to seek the man who could kindle school spirit in the hearts of his students.

* * *

Paul woke up around noon, aware of a headache, a stiffness in his legs, and a great queasiness in his stomach that could only have been caused by the tomato sauce patented under the name
Rocco
acting in combination with a massive licorice overdose. Last night had been a long one. With effort, he sat up in bed, cradling his chin in his hands, and reoriented himself.

Mike was gone. Regardless of the ridiculous aspects of Mike's rise to stardom, he really had touched all their lives. For Paul, Mike had dominated the majority of his thoughts in the span of his life in New York. What would it be like now without him? Paul tried to think back, but practically everything that was pre-Mike had taken place in Saskatoon. New York and Mike Otis had become inseparable in his mind. He sighed. It was hard to believe that, when school reconvened on Monday, Mike would not be there, and there was no way to find him.

He climbed out of bed and struggled to the window. Well, here was a kick. The building across the street was totally calm. It was the first time, day or night, that Paul had not been able to see one single weird thing going on over there. Even the Fifty-Thousand-Watt Family's apartment, normally illuminated twenty-four hours a day, was now dark. It proved that New York, too, could have a slow day now and then.

Leaving his room, he decided to postpone a much-needed shower in favour of drinking a few quarts of milk to soothe his digestive system. He was on glass number two when he saw the note on the kitchen table.

Paul wasn't surprised. It was almost nice to know that some things never changed.

He ate a breakfast which consisted of cold cereal and what was left of the milk, took a quick shower, dressed, and ventured out of the apartment. He and Sheldon had agreed to meet at one.

It was quite a brisk day, which appealed to Paul, especially since he didn't have to go through his mother's famous “You don't go out so soon after a shower” lecture. Just leaving the building was an enjoyable experience, as he no longer had to conduct himself through the maze of uncollected garbage that had been there only the day before.

The streets were filled with people, and in the crowd Paul felt he could lose himself. His thoughts returned to Mike. How long ago it seemed that Sheldon first picked the president at random in the infamous 200C hall of Don't Care High.

Paul reached the meeting place before Sheldon, so he seated himself on a bench to await his friend. A young man walked by, carrying a large portable stereo, blasting out the best-known voice on the FM band.

“You're listening to Flash Flood, kicking off this holiday weekend with a blast! The holiday is that the garbage strike is over, which means that we can all look out our windows, even below the seventh floor! Traffic in from the suburbs today is backed up halfway to Alaska, but sit tight, you frustrated motorists, because the sun is shining through the smog and all systems are go in the greatest city in the world!”

The song that followed was one that Daphne had danced to at the party last night. Paul could see her still, the ultimate leading lady. He had tried so hard to be Steve, but when the dust cleared, there he was, still Paul. Yet Paul wasn't such a bad thing to be, under the circumstances. After all, he'd had a fifty percent share in bringing Mike to power. Well, at least forty percent. He sighed. With Mike gone, what was Paul now?

“Hey, Ambition.” Sheldon jogged up to the bench. He took in the dejection on his friend's face and understood immediately. For a brief instant, the two could read each other perfectly. Then Sheldon perked up. “Don't look so grumpy. ‘Mike is Gone, but his Spirit Lives On.' You know the slogan — you helped make it up. Funny thing about this world, it's chock-full of grand opportunities and all sorts of neat stuff. I can't think of a better place for the offspring of a genius and a guy with ambition.” He gave Paul his most engaging smile. “But right now I could go for some food. I know a Chinese restaurant where the ribs are so delicious and so sticky —”

“— that they cement your jaw together,” supplied Paul sourly.

“Yes! And do you know what else?”

“What?”

“It's not too far from this very spot. So if you'll just be so good as to follow me…”

The two each polished off an order of ribs at Steinberg's Oriental Cuisine, then began walking downtown in companionable silence. On the street, an ancient Checker Cab, travelling seventy miles an hour, shot between two trucks with no space to spare, ran a red light where it was narrowly missed by a cement mixer, and screeched to a halt three-quarters of an inch behind a parked bus to pick up a fare. Paul, the boy from Saskatoon, would have gone home to spend the rest of the day in bed with a hot water bottle, but Paul the New Yorker simply joined in the applause from nearby pedestrians. The cab driver blinked his lights graciously and waved.

“Sometimes ordinary things can be glorious,” Sheldon commented.

Paul was amazed at how heartily he agreed. He took a deep breath and found to his astonishment that the Steinberg's spareribs had gone down rather well. Where were the headache, dizziness, queasiness, cramps, gas pains and heartburn he had come to know so well every time Sheldon recommended a restaurant? Could it be that he was developing a New York stomach? Given time and a little practice, he might even learn to digest the tomato sauce patented under the name
Rocco
. With both ambition
and
a New York stomach, he would really be in good shape!

He was about to voice these thoughts to Sheldon when he caught sight of a dapper middle-aged man in front of a street-side vegetable stand. Paul stopped short and peered at the man's face intently. He was hard to recognize dressed in ordinary clothes, but yes, there was no doubt that this was the same man Paul used to watch from his bedroom window — the one and only Rabbit Man. Paul watched as his neighbor hand-selected and weighed out twenty pounds of carrots. A strangled laugh escaped Paul's lips. Saskatoon was a nice place, but only in New York could you run into Rabbit Man right on the street.

“Hey, Ambition,” called Sheldon. “Are you all right?”

Paul smiled so wide it hurt his face. “Just fine,” he replied exuberantly. “All systems are go in the greatest city in the world.”

Other books by Gordon Korman:

Born to Rock
Jake, Reinvented
The Juvie Three
Losing Joe's Place
Pop
Schooled
A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag
Son of Interflux
Son of the Mob
Son of the Mob: Hollywood Hustle
Ungifted