Greatest

Awright, park it a second, I got the skinny and I ain’t got all day to give it. I’m eighteen, it’s the 1940s, and I’ve got exactly enough nickels for the streetcar if I don’t stop at the fountain first, which I always do. Paper route mornings, soda fountain three afternoons, caddying Saturdays when the caddy master’s feelin’ generous, every dime’s spoken for before I even make it, and that ain’t a hardship, pal, that’s just Tuesday. Pa’s pullin’ overtime at the plant, which is the only reason this joint’s got two nickels to rub together this year, so you won’t catch me griping about the ration book. A fella who gripes about that in public is askin’ to get called high-hat, and I ain’t lookin’ to get called nothin’.

Ma runs this house whatever Pa thinks he's runnin'. She keeps the good recipe card copied twice, one in the kitchen and one in the cedar chest, on account of she's the type who plans for the fire before it starts. Monday's wash day and she hums the same tune pinnin' up the same clothes, and most days I don't even hear it, and then some days it sneaks up and socks me one right in the chest, so I skedaddle before she catches my mug lookin' soft and starts askin' questions I ain't got snappy answers for. I've got a kid sister who can't leave a thing alone once it needs countin', jacks or jump-rope turns or how many times Ma's hummed that same bar, don't matter, somebody's gotta keep the count straight and it was never gonna be me, and an uncle who won't switch the parlor over to electric on principle, grousin' at the both of us exactly the way his own pa must've groused at him.

Danny's my best pal, been that way since before either of us can properly account for it, he gets the whole skinny before my sister gets it counted, timed, and filed, and that's sayin' somethin'. There's a dame at the fountain I keep findin' excuses to walk the long way past, and I've missed my own streetcar home more than once on account of her and would do it again tomorrow, no question. Evenings, once the news is done and nobody's fixin' to talk about the mail, Pa finds some big band on the dial and the kitchen linoleum turns into a dance floor for about four minutes, curlin' edges and all, my sister doin' the countin' out loud on account of somebody in this house has to. I'll jitterbug through anything if Benny Goodman's askin'. That's cookin' with gas, pal.

I know what this year's for. I know the letter's coming, not if, when. Nobody in this house has said the actual word for it since about February, and I'm not about to be the one who starts. I want to come back. Not get written up as no hero. Just come back.

Come back to a Saturday free for caddying, and a dame at the fountain still worth the long way round. Danny thinks I'm sore about missin' the streetcar again. Let him think it, the sap. Sure, my knees go a little jumpy some mornings — nerves, dancin', too much joe, take your pick, pal, I'm not signin' any confessions. Now grab a phosphate if the counterman ain't lookin', and don't be a mug about it.