Sprout

spectacle of him buying a dilapidated 10-speed and riding it fifteen miles to and from the liquor store (the hilarious part was more the riding than the buying). “Son,” he said at the end of the first month, “I am the healthiest goddamn drunk in Reno County.” The day he got his license back he drove the car over the bicycle, but that’s another story. No, wait. That is the story.
    So. Kansas being Kansas, the school found out about his arrest the day after it happened (it might’ve had something to do with the announcement that ran in the “Crime Blotter” section of the newspaper). In the middle of last period there was the familiar squeak of intercom feedback followed by a distracted-sounding man’s voice, as if the speaker weren’t facing the microphone but talking to someone in the administrative office.
    “Is it on? It is? Oh.” Suddenly shouting: “ATTENTION, STUDENTS AND TEACH—what?” The voice turning away again. “I don’t have to shout? Sorry.” In an almost whispery voice: “Attention, students and teachers. Would David, pardon me, Daniel—what?” Turning away once more. “He goes by Sprout? Oh, is he the boy with the green—oh, right. Sorry.” Back to the microphone. “Would Daniel”—dramatic pause—“‘Sprout’”—audible quotation marks—“Bradford”—confused pause, as the speaker tried to remember what he’d been going to say after all those pauses—“would, um, Mr. Bradford please report to my office? Thank you.” There was a click and then, a moment later, another feedbacky squeal as the intercom came back on. “Oh, sorry, this is Mr. Philpot. The counselor.” Click .
    There were ooh s and aah s as I made my way out of Señor Gutierrez’s class, and just before I reached the door Ian Abernathy said, “Well, either he’s pregnant, or this is about his dad’s glug glug glug glug glug.”
    “ ¡Señor Abernathy! ¡Preséntese a la oficina del director para la detención! ¡Immediatamente! ”
    “ ¡Mi placer! ” Ian said, following hard on my heels. “ ¿Esta cerca de la oficina del consejero, si? ”
    Did I mention that Ian’s mom was from Chile? Ian’s mom
    Did I mention that Ian’s mom was from Chile? Ian’s mom was from Chile.
    “ ¡Muy bueno, Señor Abernathy! ” Señor Gutierrez’s voice followed us into the hall, “ ¡Muy bueno! ”
    The Phil-bot didn’t ask why it took me twenty minutes to get to his office, or why my hair was sticking out in seventy-nine different directions like maybe someone had been giving me an Indian burn, or why my T-shirt had long stretchy marks on it like maybe I’d tried to run away from someone who’d been holding on to it with one clenched fist. All he did was sit down beneath a poster that showed a big sunny glass of OJ with the caption “Orange juice glad you came to see me!” (the “Mental Health Is Mental Wealth” poster was on the wall behind me).
    “May I call you Sprout?”
    I blinked. Let me rephrase that. I felt myself blink. Have you ever noticed how once you feel yourself blink you can’t stop feeling yourself blink and everything gets all strobed out like a light is going on and off in front of your face? I think I counted about a hundred blinks before the Phil-bot finally said:
    “Ahem, Sprout?”
    I shook my head, smiled brightly.
    “That’s me!”
    This made him gasp, which I thought was a bit of an extreme reaction. “Excuse me a moment,” he said, but instead of walking away like you usually do when you say “Excuse me,” all he did was open a drawer, pull out a pad with the word FLOMAX® written on it, and pick up a VAGISIL® ballpoint pen. He clicked the pen, which was already open (thus closing it), started to write something on the pad, stopped to actually click the VAGISIL® pen open, then wrote “Daniel Bradford ( Sprout )” on the top of the pad and clicked the pen closed. When he looked up at me, he seemed surprised I was still in the room. Tell you the truth, so was I.
    “I’m sorry, where were we?”
    I blinked.
    The Phil-bot spent about forty-five minutes asking me if my dad’s “recent apprehension” (which made it sound as if he’d been frightened, not arrested) made me feel
    confused?
    scared?
    sad?
    ashamed?
    angry?
    suicidal?
    homicidal?
    like having a drink?
    isolated and alone? (about which: redundant)
    exposed and vulnerable? (about which: ditto)
    etc., etc. These questions had to be answered on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is “reaction not