(An excerpt from Price of Admission, by The Hayride writer Jeff LeJeune) — We finish Flowers for Algernon in reading class. I spend the last two days writing my notes as tiny as I can for no real reason at all. Ms. Jones makes a comment about it, but she doesn’t realize that I am doing that to take my attention away from my emotions. It is merely a distraction and effort to get attention off of what is going on inside me. All I can feel is terrible sadness as Charlie deteriorates in the last part of the book. It is also sad because his mom’s name is Rose like mine, and it is his mother whose abuse makes him unable to fall in love with the girl. It’s different for me because my mom’s not abusive, of course, but for some reason I understand what Charlie’s fear is, even if it is subconscious for him. Plus it seems like Maw Gladys has some of the traits the character Rose has in the book, and it is making me wonder more and more if my mom is experiencing anything similar, even though she’s married and has kids and seems to have everything figured out as a grown-up.

The flowers Charlie asks the reader to get for Algernon reminds me of the flowers I need to get for Mom. Roses for Rosalie. Could be the title of a poem one day. The ending of the book is really smart and moving. The whole book is, for that matter, so much so that I had to hide the tears at times. I am so appreciative of Ms. Jones and Hanson in general for letting us read it. I want to write deep and meaningful books like that when I get older.

Enjoying school has made December even better, which of course will make the lead-up to Christmas even better too. Christmas songs are playing everywhere, the huge Sears Wishbook has been looked through a hundred times (I won’t be asking for any sports cards this year), and the jolly ol’ robot Santa Claus is walking back and forth ringing his bells in the distance at Mr. Borel’s house. I’m getting older, but listening to the jingles and the “Ho Ho Ho” is still one of my greatest pleasures, and sometimes I just stand there looking out at the cold night and the lights thinking about when I was younger. I just listen in peace. One day I’m going to see his face up close and personal. I still haven’t done that even though I know Santa isn’t real. He may not be real, but the magic is, and I think that magical untouchableness is what keeps me away.

I watch the Rudolph and Frosty movies once again as I do every year, but I don’t cry when Frosty melts this time. I’m different. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that my social standing is different now that I’m at Hanson. I also think it’s because Christmas hasn’t been quite the same as it was before I discovered presents for me from Santa three weeks before December 25 last year. Mom said that it was probably a year or two late in letting me in on the truth about Santa Claus anyway.

Paw Joe and Pop both call all that Santa stuff “humbug.” I like that both of them feel this way. It’s been easier to let go because of them.

I can picture Mr. Stanley grumbling about it being humbug too. And maybe every other adult I know. Seems strange to create such an elaborate hoax on kids when the birth of Jesus should be the focus anyway. I don’t know. I must not be that upset about it if I’m still loving the robot Santa and the sound of the bells so much.

When I step into the morning air to catch the bus, I have only two things on my mind: seeing Holly Gale again (for the first time since yesterday!) and wondering how soon is too soon talk to her about my birthday party. I am still in a little shock that Pop actually said yes, and without his typical grouchiness. I am not wishing to be Duncan at the moment, am not wanting to look like Duncan at the moment. I am myself, all by myself. The feeling of separation I’ve been feeling, the one that hit a peak last month with 42-40, has just gotten more real. My hair even feels brushed correctly today, and if that goes well I know it’s going to be a great day. Maybe soon I’ll even start cutting my own hair instead of having Duncan do it when he comes in from Nicholls.

I want a different kind of birthday party, one where people don’t even want to leave at nine, where there’s no mushy-mushy slow dancing. No standing around and talking about couples and wanting to set up new ones. No sir. I’m picturing an all-out basketball war, a pickup game tournament complete with some type of clock and scoreboard. New details of the images continue to form in my mind. I’m even picturing the construction of a chicken fence to protect Mom’s plants and then remember that a chicken fence likely won’t keep a basketball from smashing through. I’m making every shot I take, Holly Gale is passing the ball to me every time, high fives from me to her are in abundance. Sometimes I have to remind myself that the cement slab in my head is bigger than the one in real life.

Pop was right. I do get entirely too excited about things.

Of course nothing can stay perfect with my dad in my head for very long. Once again he’s lighting up on the way to the bus stop, and this time, he smokes the whole thing.

“Got kids going to school in the dark,” he says, and I wonder again why he says this so much. Even though he is taking up for me against the way schools set up their schedules, I don’t understand what he is getting at. I calculate time-starts in the morning, time-ends in the afternoon, practice for sports—I calculate it all. And every time he says this I wonder to myself how else he thinks this whole school thing would work, especially me going to school so far away and having to ride the bus, if we didn’t do it the way it is currently done.

In the end I just assume I am wrong because I am younger and he has been around a lot longer. I figure I’ll figure it out when I grow up.

I figure.

What I don’t need any more time figuring out is that my father should apply his noble stance toward me and the school schedule to his intake of nicotine and to the smoke that brings me such agony. And that he should stop littering the ground with cigarette butts and Little Debbie wrappers.

Andre, when you are suffering like that, try to think of Jesus’ agony in the garden and offer up your suffering for those less fortunate. Remember, cover your father.

Anyway, back to feeling awesome and not Bible lessons and letting things get to me. I swear not even Peter Reinhart could ruin this feeling I have inside today. And once I’m on the bus and away from the cigarette smoke, not even that misery can. Reinhart and his stupid hair feels like a million miles away from my life right now, even though I know I’ll have to look at his stupid face again during baseball season. The idea of crushing one of his pitches over the fence and into a neighboring house window seems mildly morbid to me, but I think about it anyway.

I am purposely ignoring the fact that nothing has changed about some things in my life. One example is my ridiculously crooked teeth I sometimes catch myself rubbing with my tongue. It’s like my thoughts are the robot Santa and the jingle bells, and my reality is finding Santa’s early presents under my parents’ bed. Not real, and then real. I’ve learned ways to avoid people seeing me smile.

Today I have decided just to be happy, at least in the here and now. The bus is quiet. It often is in the mornings. I sit in the back and soak in the sun’s rays shining through the window. It is a nice peace, just sitting here bouncing to the bus’s beat, only occasionally breaking my stare to take a look at a tree or a cloud outside. It is here that I feel really close to God. I repeat some of my go-to prayers in times like this, just to hear, just to feel, the words….

(PS: Pics of the actual robot Santa used as a major symbol of Andre’s growth in this book and ‘Opening Acts’ can be found below, in addition to its return as I found out just this morning. Photo credit to Mr Lloyd Guiberteau and “Jeanerette ‘Sugar Town’–My Town” page)

#ChristmasVigil #JesusChristisLord

Jeff’s books can be found here.