My Sister from the Black Lagoon by Laurie Fox

Author:Laurie Fox
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 1998-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

That afternoon, I was introduced to Nathaniel on the middle lawn of El Corazon High School. He was shouldering an enormous cardboard sign in the shape of a human hand. It modestly instructed:

hand me the vote.

nathaniel berman, your better

boys’ league president.

The sign commanded the attention of all who saw it. Nate was a candidate in some race that never had crossed my mind. Formal school politics seemed square in these experimental times; the so-called counterculture surely ran counter to Boys’ League president and the like. Of course, like everybody else, I smiled at the sign. No doubt a goofy smile, because the sign itself was so goofy. But I flushed with admiration too; there was something genius and brave about concocting a cartoonish campaign. Didn’t this guy hear the world laughing behind his back?

Claire had warned me that Nathaniel expected everyone to feel superior to a guy toting a giant hand. So when I saw the hand with my own eyes, I understood Nates political strategy; the boys might very well elect a president who posed no threat to their hipness. He was too outré to be cool. For all his creativity, Nathaniel was a safe, benign choice.

“Nate, this is Lorna.” Claire made the briefest of introductions. “She’s the most real person—besides you, of course. You just have to know her.” Claire smiled smugly at her cupidic skills and hummed a suspect little tune.

I stared openly at The Nose. But Nathaniel looked me right in the eye, without a trace of fear. His equilibrium at such an historical moment was daunting.

“I admire your handiwork,” I practically whispered into my purple turtleneck sweater, grinding the rubber heels of my Mary Janes into the grass.

“Yeah?” Nathaniel grinned at my pun. “Would you like to touch it?” he asked, as if offering me the chance to hold his frog or rock or some part of his body.

I reached out to grab the sign’s long stick and lifted it high over my head. “This feels nice,” I blandly reported and pumped the sign up and down like a giddy cheerleader. “Rah rah, everybody wins.” Then I set the whole business down on the grass. With a happy adrenaline surge, I knelt over the cardboard hand and pretended to read its palm. “Ah,” I prognosticated, “this hand will have a long life and much good fortune. This is a hand with a future!”

Nathaniel bent down and peered into the palm as if he saw what I saw. “By George, you’re right! This is a winning hand!” We giggled together and noticed that Claire, our official escort, had conveniently escaped our circle and was now a few yards away, brushing sensuously against the chest of her new boyfriend, Petey, a total airhead in my book. Nathaniel then asked me the first of what would prove to be a thousand life-threatening questions: “You seem sort of sad. Would you like to walk home with me after school today? I’m pretty comfortable with sadness.”

The sheer boldness of his statement floored me.

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