impossible at home. Filled up by my first-place showing at regionals, I demanded new privileges, shirked my chores, and argued with Mike about stories in the newspaper. Recognition and the decongestant pills had given my voice an authoritative ring I couldn’t get enough of.
“Don’t let the liberals dupe you,” Mike said one morning as we debated the headlines. “Organized labor’s a form of legal blackmail.”
“Blackmail. Black male. Have you ever noticed that?”
“Meaning what?”
I wasn’t really sure. In the swell and surge of my nonstop jabbering, I’d started seeing patterns in the language that struck me as significant and ominous but didn’t seem to interest other people. Therapist. The rapist. Coincidence? And why was “live” spelled backward “evil”? My oral gift had turned on me somehow.
At school my arm ached from raising my hand so often. The hinges of my jaw hurt. I couldn’t shut up. Insocial studies one morning, during a lesson on life in the ghetto, I sprang from my desk to state my views and sent my chair crashing backward into the wall.
At lunch hour a man’s voice on the P.A. ordered me to visit the school nurse. She tested my blood pressure twice and took my pulse, then picked up her phone and summoned the principal.
“Whatever drug you’re on,” he said, “you’d better not be bringing it to school. I’ve ordered a locker search.”
“Go ahead. Use dogs.”
“Empty your pockets.”
I turned them inside out. Nothing but lint and change, which I let spill.
“Pick that junk up.”
“I want my coach,” I said.
Mr. Geary explained my condition to the principal as a case of prestate-tournament jitters and offered to drive me home so I could rest. In the Mercedes I thanked him for his help. Sunlight bounced and flickered off his scalp, which he’d begun to wax. He wouldn’t look at me.
“What’s wrong?” I said.
“You’re a monster.”
“You used to love me.”
“Don’t be grandiose.”
“Then what was all that business about my ‘gift’?”
“Flattery. Ego building.”
“But I keep winning. There must have been something to it.”
“I made a monster.”
With the meet just two days away, I couldn’t sleep that night. At school the next morning the nurse rechecked my blood pressure and warned me that if it didn’t come down soon she’d check me into Children’s Hospital.
“The weight loss, the agitation. You’re taking something.”
I glanced involuntarily at my sock, where I’d stashed the decongestant pills. It wasn’t them, though. It was me; my mind. Maybe I really had become a monster. Maybe winning didn’t suit me, after all.
I decided to confess. “I can’t stop blabbering. It’s like I’ve turned on a switch I can’t turn off. I’m out of control.”
The nurse softened. “Close your eyes. Imagine a peaceful lake.”
Hypnosis again.
“I’m doing it,” I lied. “It’s helping.”
“Still, blue, fresh water. A sunset. Gliding gulls.”
Why were they always trying to put me under?
The finals were held on a Saturday morning at the Minneapolis Sheraton. We checked in the night before: one room, two beds. The girls had been eliminated by then.
In the soaring glass lobby coaches, judges, and students signed registration forms, consulted schedules, and filled out sticky name tags with Magic Markers. Theonly student I recognized was Mark, my opponent from divisionals. He had on black loafers, gray flannels, and a blue blazer whose sleeves fell short of his wrists.
“God, how pretentious,” I said to Mr. Geary.
“The boy has pizzazz. It takes courage. Good for him.”
A dinner buffet was held in the Red Room. I got in line in an effort to seem sociable. Men in chef’s hats wielding metal tongs heaped our plates with roast beef and mashed potatoes. Mr. Geary passed by my table, ignoring me, and sat down next to Mark. I overheard him call himself “a fan of yours” and I watched the two of them instantly
“Don’t let the liberals dupe you,” Mike said one morning as we debated the headlines. “Organized labor’s a form of legal blackmail.”
“Blackmail. Black male. Have you ever noticed that?”
“Meaning what?”
I wasn’t really sure. In the swell and surge of my nonstop jabbering, I’d started seeing patterns in the language that struck me as significant and ominous but didn’t seem to interest other people. Therapist. The rapist. Coincidence? And why was “live” spelled backward “evil”? My oral gift had turned on me somehow.
At school my arm ached from raising my hand so often. The hinges of my jaw hurt. I couldn’t shut up. Insocial studies one morning, during a lesson on life in the ghetto, I sprang from my desk to state my views and sent my chair crashing backward into the wall.
At lunch hour a man’s voice on the P.A. ordered me to visit the school nurse. She tested my blood pressure twice and took my pulse, then picked up her phone and summoned the principal.
“Whatever drug you’re on,” he said, “you’d better not be bringing it to school. I’ve ordered a locker search.”
“Go ahead. Use dogs.”
“Empty your pockets.”
I turned them inside out. Nothing but lint and change, which I let spill.
“Pick that junk up.”
“I want my coach,” I said.
Mr. Geary explained my condition to the principal as a case of prestate-tournament jitters and offered to drive me home so I could rest. In the Mercedes I thanked him for his help. Sunlight bounced and flickered off his scalp, which he’d begun to wax. He wouldn’t look at me.
“What’s wrong?” I said.
“You’re a monster.”
“You used to love me.”
“Don’t be grandiose.”
“Then what was all that business about my ‘gift’?”
“Flattery. Ego building.”
“But I keep winning. There must have been something to it.”
“I made a monster.”
With the meet just two days away, I couldn’t sleep that night. At school the next morning the nurse rechecked my blood pressure and warned me that if it didn’t come down soon she’d check me into Children’s Hospital.
“The weight loss, the agitation. You’re taking something.”
I glanced involuntarily at my sock, where I’d stashed the decongestant pills. It wasn’t them, though. It was me; my mind. Maybe I really had become a monster. Maybe winning didn’t suit me, after all.
I decided to confess. “I can’t stop blabbering. It’s like I’ve turned on a switch I can’t turn off. I’m out of control.”
The nurse softened. “Close your eyes. Imagine a peaceful lake.”
Hypnosis again.
“I’m doing it,” I lied. “It’s helping.”
“Still, blue, fresh water. A sunset. Gliding gulls.”
Why were they always trying to put me under?
The finals were held on a Saturday morning at the Minneapolis Sheraton. We checked in the night before: one room, two beds. The girls had been eliminated by then.
In the soaring glass lobby coaches, judges, and students signed registration forms, consulted schedules, and filled out sticky name tags with Magic Markers. Theonly student I recognized was Mark, my opponent from divisionals. He had on black loafers, gray flannels, and a blue blazer whose sleeves fell short of his wrists.
“God, how pretentious,” I said to Mr. Geary.
“The boy has pizzazz. It takes courage. Good for him.”
A dinner buffet was held in the Red Room. I got in line in an effort to seem sociable. Men in chef’s hats wielding metal tongs heaped our plates with roast beef and mashed potatoes. Mr. Geary passed by my table, ignoring me, and sat down next to Mark. I overheard him call himself “a fan of yours” and I watched the two of them instantly
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