Skinfolk by Matthew Pratt Guterl

Author:Matthew Pratt Guterl
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Liveright
Published: 2023-02-10T00:00:00+00:00

20

Every story has a turning point. Or two. Or three. And this is one of ours.

In the spring of 1984, as eighth grade comes to a close, we are ready to adopt again. “Ready,” in this context, means that we have caught our breath and felt reasonably in control. The first few adoptions were so reckless and so urgent. This time, we are more deliberate. There is a boy we might bring into the family, a young African American child, who would be our first domestic adoption. Bob and Sheryl organize some family meetings to discuss the process, make a trip to New York City, and reconfigure the house. We all drive out to the Bronx Zoo in Big Red, where we are introduced to our prospective brother and his attentive social service agent, and we have a wonderful day hiding in the gopher tunnels, running and laughing together on the garden pathways. It feels perfect. All that remains is the paperwork.

One afternoon, I am sitting outside, trying to impress a white girl with long brown hair while waiting for the school bus. Shannon is a well-traveled transfer student, newly arrived from California. She has long brown hair feathered back and a habit of wearing Van Halen T-shirts and tight blue jeans. She lies on her back, sunglasses covering her eyes, her face expressionless. I have a crush on her and think that our impending addition will show a unique flair and catch her eye, maybe even make me seem interesting.

“He is coming from the South Bronx,” I say casually, as if it were the most exotic place on earth. I imagine that this sounds sophisticated, or internationalist. Or that the South Bronx is Los Angeles, or London, or Nairobi, or Tokyo, or Paris. It is far away. It is cosmopolitan. Big tall buildings and bright lights. We live in a small town, far from the city.

Shannon, of course, is tragically uninterested in any of this.

“That’s cool,” she says, her eyes hidden behind the mirrored lenses. I try to add more detail, to share some of the philosophy behind the family, to explain why he matters to the idea of “us,” and what his incorporation heralds. Shannon, the love of my life at fourteen, gives me no indication she hears any of it.

His name is Eddie. He joins us in the summer of Vanessa Williams, the first Black Miss America, who appears nude in Penthouse and will soon lose her crown as a result. In the late summer, Bear and I search for that issue of Penthouse as if it were the holy grail. It is the summer, as well, of Purple Rain, of Run-DMC, and of Whodini, all competing on the local radio stations with hair-metal bands and New Wave. The summer, more seriously, in which we first hear about crack cocaine and first confront the desolate failures of the war on poverty, and in which we come to envision ourselves as a platoon engaged in a domestic rescue mission.

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