Read Online After Sylvia by Alan Cumyn - Free Book Online Page B

school.
    His mind felt frozen. He turned to look at everyone. At the back, Dan Ruck sat with his face buried on the desk under his arms. Michael Baylor was beaming and confident, the picture of a future president.
    Owen took out his cards and looked at them. The words seemed even more welded together.
    He cleared his throat finally and began to speak without knowing what words might come out.
    â€œMichael Baylor,” Owen said, “wants us all to go to Japan.” He paused, then opened his mouth again. “Japan!” he said, and looked out at everyone — at Martha Henbrock and Joanne Blexton and Miss Glendon, who was standing at the back.
“Japan!” he
said again, and some people began to chuckle. Owen took a step and found that he felt more comfortable, so he started pacing back and forth at the front of the room. “Why not Gibraltar?” he asked, and some more people laughed. “Why not Brussels or Boston or Kalamazoo? Why shouldn’t we go to Peru or Mesopotamia or the lost city of Adantis? If we can go to Japan, we can go to — “ And he paused, trying to think of some other place.
    Someone called out from the back, “Italy!”
    Someone else said, “Ethiopia!” and there were calls for Ireland and Brooklyn and Labrador before Miss Glendon shushed them down.
    â€œThis is Owen’s speech,” she said, glaring at Owen, who at once felt awful.
    â€œMaybe we can go to Japan,” he said. “It might be a good idea. But maybe we should start with something easier. It would take a lot of money to go to Japan, and we don’t even have pen-pals yet. We don’t even know if they would like us. But we could go... to Elgin,” he said.
    â€œWhat would we do in
Elgin?”
Michael Baylor called out, and some people laughed. He looked upset, and Miss Glendon didn’t tell him to be quiet.
    What would they do in Elgin? Owen looked at the world map on the wall, as if it might tell him. He looked at the clock and the door to the cloak room and at Miss Glendon, who still seemed angry with him. Then he glanced at Miss Glendon’s desk, where her papers were laid out, and her pens were standing up in a large metal cup, and her pencils were in another wooden one. People began to get restless in their seats.
    â€œIn Elgin,” he said, his mind racing. And then he said it again, “In Elgin!” and reached across to the wooden cup and took out the pencils.
    He showed the empty cup to everyone. Then he took a penny from his pocket and flipped it high in the air and caught it in the cup.
    â€œWe could organize a tiddlywinks tournament... to wipe out world hunger!”
    Everybody was laughing now, as if it were all a big joke. Owen tried hard to think of what else he could say to salvage the situation, but nothing occurred to him. He sat down to a roar of laughter and applause. He could feel the blood pulsing in both his temples. What had possessed him to go on like that about tiddlywinks and world hunger?
    Miss Glendon handed out ballots and Owen wrote his own name under the president slot in pencil, then erased it and inked in Michael Baylor. Michael looked more like a president and made better speeches and who knew? Maybe his father could buy them all tickets to Japan. What better idea had Owen come up with?
    Tiddlywinks.
    Miss Glendon collected the ballots, and dur­ing recess Michael Baylor shoved Owen in the dirt and said what a rotten jerk he was for making everyone laugh at his ideas. Then when he was on the ground Martha Henbrock told him he shouldn’t make fun of world hunger.
    Owen didn’t fight back. He just felt terrible.
    They returned to class to face the results. Beside Martha Henbrock’s name was written 7, and Dan Ruck had 0. Michael Baylor had 10. His name was circled and he had become president.
    President Michael Baylor.
    Owen’s name had 9 beside it.
    Owen had a hard time believing the result. He would