Lawn Boy Returns Read online

  “You?” Sandra Santana raised her eyebrows and turned the mike to me. A blinding light atop the camera flashed on. Between Grandma’s hair and the TV lights, I’d be seeing flashing swirly dots in front of my eyes for years.

  7

  The Detrimental Influence of Fame and the Loss of Privacy as a Result of Prosperity

  “I’ll have to give serious thought to bringing a PR person on board,” Arnold said to me the next morning. “Someone to handle the media and coach you about what to say in public.”

  That was probably a sound idea, since I couldn’t imagine giving another interview, the first one having been so unexpected and terrifying. My tongue was still stuck to the roof of my mouth. Which tasted like—well, never mind. It was bad.

  I’d appeared as a feature on the ten o’clock news the night before, the little human-interest story they do between the weather and sports. Sandra Santana had asked me all kinds of questions about why I had become a prizefighter’s sponsor and how I’d made the money in the first place and who was the genius stockbroker who’d made me rich.

  The bright lights and her fast questions made me nervous and confused and I couldn’t remember what I’d said two seconds earlier. She forgot all about her interview with Joey, who didn’t seem to mind; he stood next to me, his arm around my shoulders, beaming. It was only a two-minute piece, but it felt like I stood there for an agonizingly long time, dripping sweat under lights hotter than a blowtorch.

  Grandma and I woke up the next morning to a bunch of neighbors on the front lawn taking pictures of our house. I was especially proud that they got such good shots of Zed’s camper and his laundry, mostly made up of skidmarked underwear, which he had drying on the line he’d strung between his radio antenna and the garage light. Luckily, Zed slept through the excitement, so they didn’t get a picture of him in his tightie whities and bedhead.

  And there were also a bunch of girls about my age who wanted my autograph. I like girls, but I can’t talk to them. Not a word. Turns out you don’t have to talk when you sign autographs, and they smile and are nice to you anyway. Sweet.

  By 9:47 that morning, Arnold had received numerous calls about me.

  “The local university has invited you to lecture to their econ department, the newspaper wants to do a series on you and me and our working arrangement, several Internet teen sites have expressed interest in having you blog for them, and the big cable sports channel wants to fly you and Joey to New York to be on their round-table program Sunday morning.”

  “I don’t know about any of that…. I mean, what to do …”

  “Wait, there’s more.” He studied a fistful of messages.

  Real good. I was so hoping there would be more. More was what I was lacking in my life. I needed more more around here. I started to get dizzy.

  “We’ve also gotten an offer from a national lawn fertilizer company for you to endorse their new organic mix. Who knew all poop wasn’t organic—they have plastic cows? And a swimming pool company wants to pay you to use your picture on their trucks because of the high-quality pool cleaning you’re known for. A licensing company wants to be the official supplier of Lawn Boy T-shirts, lunch boxes, thermoses, caps, water bottles, sunglasses, sunscreen, lawn bags, gardening tools and, for some reason, giant foam fingers.”

  “Um …”

  “Oh yeah, and can you run outside when we’re done talking here and sign autographs for those girls sitting on the curb waiting for you with their autograph books? They’ve been here since I woke up. I sent Kenny and Allen out to deal with them when they arrived this morning, but I think the girls are waiting for you.”

  I peeked out Arnold’s window. This latest batch of girls were cute. Maybe even cuter than the girls in my front yard. Kenny was spinning his basketball on his forefinger as he talked to three or four of them. Allen and some curly-headed girl were sitting on the curb sharing a book. Good; Kenny and Allen would make it way easier to face all those girls.

  I turned back to Arnold, who was still talking.

  “We’ve also gotten a call from an entrepreneur in Texas who wants to talk to you about the possibility of opening nationwide franchises.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Like what you set up here with Pasqual. You lend your name to the company and they start up subdivisions of lawn care, shrub trimming, pool cleaning, sidewalk edging and garage cleaning services, from which you receive royalties and other fees.”

  “Arnold. I don’t feel so well.”

  “But this is groovy. Capitalism plus publicity equals monster commerce.”

  “And that’s a good thing?”

  “That’s a far-out, trippy thing.” He waved his whole body back and forth in place, like a round little willow tree bending in a gentle breeze. “It makes the world, like, move.”

  The world wasn’t the only thing moving. My dizziness was getting worse, and not only was Arnold waving, but there were two—no, wait, three of him.

  I knew that the only thing that would settle me down was to do a few lawns. As soon as Arnold turned to answer a question from Gib, I slipped out the kitchen door to the garage, crawled through the side window and shinnied down the wall next to the overgrown lilac bush. I squatted in the branches and texted Pasqual: NEED TO WORK; GIVE ME AN ADDRESS.

  As soon as I got his reply, 4024 BROADWAY, I commando-crawled through the bushes to the corner of the garage and, waiting until the coast was clear—the autograph girls were talking to Allen and Kenny, and I couldn’t be spotted by anyone in the house—I sprinted through Arnold’s backyard and cut through the Sautters’ side yard and came out on the street a block away.

  I walk-trotted back to my own street, where, hiding behind Mrs. Steck’s sheets hanging on her clothesline next door, I made sure Zed was nowhere in sight. Then I jogged to the garage and my lawn mower. While sitting on the mower, I did some deep-breathing exercises we’d learned in gym class, until the panicky dread in my gut had subsided a little.

  Then I shoved the throttle to turtle and headed off to work. I’d feel better after I’d done a yard or two.

  8

  The Model of Capricious Development

  The interview fallout picked up steam, and the next day Arnold insisted that I spend the day with him rather than working on lawns. He sent Kenny to take my place working with Pasqual and the guys. Gib and Frank went to full-time positions. Arnold made an offer on the building he thought I should buy to house our operations. And he hired a PR person named Kathy who answered and made and returned a lot of phone calls and then typed up itineraries for interviews and appearances.

  Gib, Frank and Kathy set up shop in what had once been Arnold’s living room, using the dining room table and dragging the kitchen table in too. Savannah and Lindy kept stopping by with papers to go over with Arnold and for me to give to my parents for signatures. Everyone had BlackBerrys pressed to their heads and there was a sea of cables underfoot for all the computers and printers and copiers they’d brought in.

  It was … well, groovy. If, of course, your definition of groovy is sensory overload.

  Arnold worked on the screened-in porch, sitting peacefully at his round picnic table drinking his sweet hippie tea and making money while he tap-tap-tapped on his keyboard. Allen was never far away, watching him, then tapping on his laptop. I looked over Allen’s shoulder and saw that he was creating pie charts and bar graphs and all sorts of other things that we used in math class last term and that didn’t make any sense to me but seemed to make Allen really happy.

  Kathy had started a Web site for me and asked me write “copy” for it. Apparently, Web pages are nothing without “content.”

  “Just write your story in your own words,” she said. “People want to get to know who you are.”

  What she posted was nothing I had written. She had a better sense of what made me me than I did. She made me sound smarter and not nearly as confused as I really was. Lately, I was feeling just this side of a drooling idio
t.

  Kathy took a bunch of pictures of me and sent Frank off to get shots of the work crews and Joey. She also took a couple of pictures of the girls waiting on the curb for me to sign autographs. “Content combined with visuals,” she explained, “makes for a captivating site.”

  At one point she came running to find me and asked, “How do you feel about the possibility of reality TV? Camera crews will follow you around and you’ll be a prime-time series.”

  “I’ll puke.”

  “Oh.” She didn’t ask again.

  A box arrived in the office in the afternoon: Team Lawn Boy T-shirts and uniform pants, and truck magnets for the crew to slap on their pickups. That was the best part of my day, driving around with Gib (not officially a chauffeur, but the go-to guy when I had to go to someplace) and handing the stuff out to all the guys.

  I breathed deep every time we stopped at a job site, smelling the fresh-cut grass, and thought back to how simple and pure my life had been when I mowed lawns as a summer job.

  Was it just a month or so ago?

  I was glad my parents were out of cell range. They don’t watch television, and I knew they wouldn’t bother with newspapers while they were up north. So they wouldn’t know that in the past forty-eight hours I had become what Kathy called a media sensation.

  “You’re bigger,” she told me, “than sliced bread.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It’s a good thing. Don’t worry.”

  9

  Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Management

  Arnold tried to talk to me the next morning about “establishing and implementing our official policies on hiring and firing, salary and wage structure, health and life insurance coverage, retirement, sick days, vacation, and incentive-based performance bonuses for employees.”

  It was very exciting.

  I think.

  I was having a hard time focusing because I’d just spent the better part of a mind-numbing hour in the office/dining room with some of my employees and, as I explained to Arnold a little peevishly, I didn’t feel like giving them anything.

  “Why do you feel that way?” he asked.

  “As best I understand things: Lindy has a crush on Frank, who is sweet on Savannah, who is mad at Gib for not handing in receipts promptly, and Gib resents Frank for overstepping his role as business manager. Oh, and Frank thinks Gib is a slacker, while Lindy is peeved at Savannah for her very existence, because, as Gib explained to me, if Savannah wasn’t around, Frank would appreciate all that Lindy has to offer. And Kenny doesn’t want to go out and work on lawns anymore because he’d rather sit around mooning after Savannah.”

  “That is not groovy at all.”

  “Really.”

  “Numbers are so clean and elegant; people are so messy and complicated.” Arnold sighed. “I know! We’ll get an office manager once we move into the new office space. Someone who can keep things totally cool.” He gestured to Allen, who wrote down OFFICE MANAGER in the small notebook he carried. Allen was always writing down things Arnold said.

  “You’re saying we actually need someone to manage the people who are working for us to manage the business?”

  “Crazy, isn’t it? But just think—you’re stimulating the economy by giving all these people jobs.”

  “But who’s going to manage the people we hire to manage the people who manage the business?”

  “Oh. Well … wait. You’re kidding now, right? Because we don’t really need to have people manage the people who manage the people who manage the business. That would be just silly.”

  “Good.”

  He studied me for a moment. “How do you think Kathy is doing?”

  There was a strange sound in his voice. I looked at him quickly, then away. Oops. He had that look. The same one that Lindy got when Frank walked into the room and the same one that Frank and Kenny got when they saw Savannah.

  I probably shouldn’t tell Arnold that I heard Kathy on the phone with her boyfriend, Kurt. Must keep up morale.

  “She’s busy. She wants us to do a phoner. Whatever that means. With a commercially geo-marketed syndicated radio show. Whatever that means. Today. But you know, I’m feeling like I need some fresh air so I don’t get any more confused and, you know, run screaming into the lake. I rode my lawn mower over and I think I’ll go out and do a few lawns, just to clear my head.”

  “Good.” Arnold had started sorting through a thick pile of envelopes. “You do that. Then come back in the afternoon so we can touch base again.”

  Right, I thought. So we can touch base.

  Before I headed off to do some yards, I turned to Allen. “You should take the rest of the day off and drag Kenny out of the living room and away from Savannah.”

  Allen jumped up. He looked relieved. Kenny was in another room, sitting by the window like a lonely house pet, waiting for Savannah to come back to the office from an appointment.

  “I think you both need a change of scenery,” I went on. “Go to the state fair. Eat deep-fried things on sticks. See the freak show. Maybe ask a couple of the autograph girls from the front curb to go. There’s nothing like a corn dog and a bearded lady to make you forget about work.”

  I wished I could go with them, but even more than curly fries and a look at the beauty queen carved life-sized in butter, I needed to work a few lawns today.

  10

  The Juxtaposition of Financial Status and Jurisprudence

  I signed a few autographs on the way out of Arnold’s driveway, then mowed a few lawns, ate lunch with Louis and his crew, and headed back to the office.

  I walked through Arnold’s front door and a lady in a suit and too much red lipstick jumped up from the couch. She shrieked, “There he is, poor child!” and pulled me into a hug that nearly jammed the brass buttons on her jacket through my head.

  I peeked over at Arnold for an explanation as she said, “Hi, sweetie, I’m a civil rights attorney and I heard about your terrible plight on the news. Don’t you worry about a thing from now on, because I’ve already filed a lawsuit on your behalf. I’m suing your parents for violation of child labor laws and having them served with papers immediately upon their return from this inexplicable vacation they’ve taken without you. I’m thinking of reporting them for desertion of a minor child as well,” she finished in a huff.

  Arnold seemed to have shrunk with each word.

  Then she did that gross thing where she licked her thumb and was about to rub some dirt off my cheek, but I leaped away from her.

  And crashed into a fat guy with a ponytail who was holding a bulging briefcase.

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m the attorney who wants to represent you in your emancipation suit against your parents. Don’t listen to that ambulance chaser”—he gestured toward the lipstick lady—“you’re, what, twelve? Too old to be treated like a child, but plenty old enough to sue for your right to control your own money. I think the youngest plaintiff in a successful litigation of an emancipation suit was fifteen, maybe sixteen, but we have a good case.”

  Arnold had started to look like he might blow away.

  “You both want me to sue my parents?”

  “Yes.” They spoke in unison and then glared at each other.

  “The wheels are already in motion,” Lipstick Lady said. “In fact, the matter is out of your hands; it’s up to the courts to determine what’s in your best interests now.”

  “Don’t listen to her,” Ponytail Guy said. “She finished at the bottom of her online law school class and doesn’t know what she’s talking about. We’ll file an injunction against her suit when we file your suit before she can file an injunction against our suit to stop our suit and injunction to stop her suit. Now, if you’ll just sign here where I’ve indicated with an X.”

  “Please.” Miraculously, Arnold had regained his previous size and composure. “Leave the papers with our executive assistant and we’ll appraise the points you’ve raised at our soone
st convenience. Thank you.”

  He all but shoved them out the front door. He locked it and turned to me.

  “Let’s sit on the porch and have some tea. We have a lot to talk about.”

  I got the distinct feeling that when he said “a lot,” what he meant was “something brand-new.”

  Uh-oh.

  11

  The Recognition of a Diminishing Rate of Return

  When we were seated at Arnold’s picnic table, I said, “Give it to me straight.”

  “The quarterly tax payments that Savannah filed triggered an audit by the Internal Revenue Service.”

  Oh, is that all?

  “Seems the tax people are alarmed by your sudden, and dramatic, appearance on their radar. Usually, that kind of money stems from illegal activities, especially when the paper trail is so complicated and diverse.

  “Your assets are in a slight, some might say a teeny-tiny, bit of danger of being frozen until every-thing is settled.”

  I wasn’t too panicked, since I’d actually never seen the money after the first few weeks, when I had crammed wads of cash into my pockets. Now all the money existed solely as digits on a computer screen.

  “Can the crews still work? I’d hate for them to lose money.”

  “Sure. Pasqual will collect the money from the clients as always, pay the workers and then deposit your portion into the bank account. Even if it does become frozen, you can still make deposits, you just can’t make withdrawals. If necessary, I’ll cover salaries for Frank and Lindy and Gib and Savannah until we get this muddle straightened out. I’ll make sure Joey Pow is okay too.”

  “What a mess.”

  “Don’t worry, we’ve filed an emergency appeal.”

  “How long will that take?”