Ryley's Child

A Friendly Weekend 2/2

"Is she pretty?" Isaiah asked as we sat out on the steps to my front porch. We were having the Evan's over for a Saturday night barbecue and their oldest daughter (my friend), Jamie was going to be there, as well as their two other kids. Mr. Bledsoe (Isaiah's dad and our principal), his wife Bay, and their twin girls were also joining us.
"Yes." I said truthfully. Then I playfully punched his arm. "She might have a boyfriend though..."
Isaiah stared at me weird. "You think I'm going to like her or something?"
I shrugged, "I like her."
Isaiah laughed a little. "That's different. She's your friend."
"True. Very true." was all I said in response.
Ten minutes later a tall man with sleek blonde hair and a shorter African-American woman wearing hoop earrings (so large that I could see them from the porch) came around the corner and onto our block. Behind them came Michael, swinging a bag of hamburger buns in his hands. Then Whitney, who carefully held a bowl of something. Right behind her came my only hearey friend. She had dyed her hair black since I saw her last and it was neatly French braided across her left shoulder. She carried what looked to be plates and cups. Jamie flashed her toothy grin when she saw me.
Isaiah nudged me. "Is that her?" he asked, motioning to our friends.
I shifted his arm so that he was pointing correctly. "That's her. Don't point at Whitney she's thirteen and a bit self absorbed."
Isaiah slowly moved his head up and down. "Oh, okay."
Sam and Mercedes made their way up the steps. They hugged me, (well Mercedes did) Sam just grabbed one of my hands and then pulled me to him with the other arm (he has a knack for the 'man hug'). I winced slightly as he patted me firmly between the shoulder blades.
"Good to see you, Andrew!" Mercedes said.
"We never see you during the school year." Sam said. "You're always gone during the week and we're almost always gone on the weekends."
Mercedes turned to Isaiah. "And who might you be?" she asked him.
"I'm Isaiah." he introduced. "Andrew's first school friend."
She looked to Sam and they talked without signing for a few seconds. Then she turned back and asked, "Are you Isaiah Bledsoe?"
Isaiah raised his eyebrows. "Yes, do I know you?"
"Sorry, we met you when you were maybe six or seven. You were over at Andrew's when we came to jam with his parents. You two did your own thing the whole time so you probably don't remember us."
Isaiah and I looked to each other and shrugged. I didn't remember this, but okay, I guess they've met!
Mercedes and Sam shook their heads and smiled. "You've grown so much!" she said to Isaiah. "When we first met you you were so small and your hair was longer."
Isaiah blushed and fingered his auburn waves.
Then I found myself engulfed in Jamie's arms. She squeezed hard, as usual. I gasped for breath until she released me. "Sorry."she apologized, rubbing her fist across her chest. Then her smile ignited again as she enthusiastically signed, "I just haven't seen you since summer even though we live just a block away and I miss you and need to get you caught up on the latest and greatest and congratulate you on being able to join your mom on her tour this fall and-"
I held up a hand to stop her. "Okay, okay! We have all night to get caught up!"
She apologized again and then lifted her head up and she locked eyes with Isaiah for the first time. "This is your friend?" she signed to me at an angle so that only I could see her hands.
I nodded. "Yeah. That's my friend, Isaiah."
She hesitated before asking, "Do you?... Do you think he would talk to me?"
I laughed. "You do know that Isaiah can speak for himself, right? Go talk to him. I'm not a telephone line."
She rolled her eyes at me. "Okay, fine."
The door opened and Mom came out. She sees Mercedes almost daily so they just nodded to each other. Then we made our way through the house and to the backyard where Dad had been grilling for the past hour or so.
The smell of supper lured me like a fish on a hook. My stomach felt a little tug and slowly increased until I felt it rumble in my torso. My mouth watered at the sight of Dad's homemade burgers made from the meat of local Tennessee cattle. Mom had prepared my favorite corn and spaghetti casserole that we called Sketti Corn and an apple and Snickers salad that was one of Grandma Rose's best recipes.
A few minutes later the lights flashed inside. "I'll get it!" I announced. I knew who was at the door. Isaiah and Jamie followed close behind.
I flung open the door and smiled when I saw my principal standing there, his usual smile on his face. Mr. Bledsoe was a fairly tall and thin man with bright blue eyes and auburn hair. Isaiah definitely got his height and hair color from his father. His wife, Bay was an artist and was often traveling to her many art shows across the country. She was a few inches shorter than her husband and had tied her thick, dark waves back with a thin strip of leather. Their identical twin daughters, Julie and Jenny stood bashfully behind their parents. Both girls went to a private school in Knoxville. Julie was eligible to go to the Tennessee School for the Deaf, but she's just hard of hearing and gets by just fine wearing hearing aids. The girls were eleven, going on twelve pretty soon. Both had their mother's dark hair and brown eyes.
"Welcome to our home." I told them. I held the door open as they came in. Mr. Bledsoe has been to my house often (but not as often as Isaiah has) because he makes it a priority to visit all the students homes every other month. In fact he had just been over on one of his visits just a week prior.
They greeted their son and Bay jumped on the motherly task of making sure Isaiah had remembered everything for the weekend and that he was having fun and, "Do I need to get you a toothbrush? Of all the things you could forget, it's your toothbrush!"
We led them outside where Dad was turning the grill down, Mom was running after a cup that the wind had blown away, Sam was attempting to carry two full pitchers of water and lemonade to the table we had set up to put food on, and Mercedes was putting a spoon in the pudding she had brought. Whitney was taking selfies on her iPad thing and Michael was constantly talking to Dad as he put a plate of steaming burgers on the table.
They all stopped to greet the Bledsoe's and names were exchanged (this was the first time that the Evan's met the Bledsoe's). "I brought cookies and chips." Bay said after she set the food down on the table. "The girls and I made the cookies just before we left."
Sam grinned. "I love cookies." he said matter of factly.
Mercedes shoved him playfully. "Oh, Sam. You goofball."
When the food was laid out and served we (Isaiah, Jamie, and I) sat down at one of two picnic tables we had bought two years ago. The parents, Whitney, Michael, and the twins sat at the other table.
The sun was setting and the adults and the twins had gone inside after supper was cleaned up. Whitney followed right after. She never really talks to me. I have already sensed that she's not comfortable around me and that's fine. I have Jamie.
Which speaking of her, she was standing on our back porch just inches from Isaiah laughing her head off as Isaiah told her a funny story about his little sisters. They had talked all evening. It was okay though because they still included me in their conversations, being the good friends that they are.
I let them be by themselves because they clearly had feelings for each other and I wasn't going to intervene. Jamie and Isaiah are my best friends and I really care about them. Jamie has had a hard time with her love life, she's had five boyfriends and all of them dumped her because she either talks too much or is too occupied with her music and voice lessons. I don't mind that she talks all the time, silence insists on being filled. And even though I'll never hear her play guitar or sing a song I still have a lot of respect for that passion since music is basically my parent's life.
As for Isaiah, he has never had a girlfriend and if he's ever crushed on one, at least he's never told me. This is his first chance to start.
Michael and I sat in two canvas chairs just outside the door enjoying the cool, fall evening. The wind tugged at my hair and blew it into my eyes, Mom insisted I get a haircut, but I don't mind flipping my hair constantly, it's the look that counts. The air still smelled smoky from the grill, which was now standing alone in the yard. The trees bowed their heads politely in our direction and then the other way to acknowledge the neighbor's house too. It was a beautiful night to be outside.
Suddenly Michael whipped around and peered in the window. He furrowed his eyebrows and shrugged then sat back down, a smirk on his face.
I tapped his wrist and he looked to me. "Yes?" he nodded his fist at me.
"What are you looking at?" I asked him really slowly since I knew he couldn't read or speak sign very well.
He frowned at me until he realized what I was asking. He pointed to himself "My" then to me "You" he signed "Mom" and then "Dad" and pretended to laugh.
I sighed. Michael still had much to learn, but I got the gist of what he was trying to tell me. Our parents were laughing about something inside.
"Should we check it out?" I asked him, and then pointed to us and then to the door so he understood more.
Michael nodded and grinned much like his dad often did.
Inside we found our way to the living room. Mom and Dad sat on one half of the couch, hand in hand. Mercedes and Sam sat on the other half and Sam had his arm draped around her shoulders. Mr. Bledsoe and Bay stood behind the couch looking confused. The other four were cracking up and all of them except Mercedes were blushing out of embarrassment most likely.
I looked to the TV screen and my eyes did a double take. It looked like they were watching a video from when they were in their high school glee club. Sam was shirtless, he wore a tight, black cap, weird wing-like things on his back, and tight pants.
Their friend Artie wore black clothes and a cap similar to Sam's and the creepiest make-up I won't even begin to describe to you and he kept running his hands over his face.
Then there were my parents. Oh. My. God. This was capital E- embarrassing!
Dad was easily recognizable. He wore some make-up on his face and a white suit thing that came up to his mid-torso and then these white antler thingys served as straps, though you could still see his bare chest. White shreds flowed from his pants like a super long luau half-skirt.
The girl, I assumed to be Mom because I know that face when I see it. She wore a hot pink wig, a white dress that was super short and had hearts on it and peppermint swirls, and for some reason she held a huge rainbow lollipop.
Weirdest, and grossest of all was the last performer. He could have easily been mistaken for a girl if it wasn't for his masculine jawline. He wore a blonde/brown wig that came to his shoulders, a green sequined shirt that cut really low and tied at his chest, and pant-like things made of silver sequins that came halfway up his torso. His pants, like Dad's, had shreds in the back, but they were silver. The other thing about his pants was that they weren't really pants. The right leg cut off just below his butt and the left pant leg came all the way down his leg. He also wore ridiculously clumpy shoes. I kept staring at his face, but I couldn't quite pin a name to it. I knew those eyes and face....
They all danced like maniacs and clapped their hands and Dad did some sort of push-up thing. Mom "licked" her "lollipop", Artie continued to claw weirdly at his face and flap white wing things. The weirdly dressed guy just thrashed about and didn't really appear to be dancing, in my opinion. Sam looked like he was trying to impress someone in the way that he was shirtless and flexed his muscles purposefully.
Awkward.
After the video was over it switched to their Nationals performance they had done in L.A. I had seen that video many times before, but never the creepy one I had just seen.
I glanced at Michael and saw that he had an expression that I guessed I probably had too. His mouth hung open and his eyebrows rose to the middle of his forehead, his eyes wide in shock. He pointed to the screen and said something to Sam.
Mom reached over and paused the video right where it had zoomed in on Blaine's face. Wait.... I looked at the screen. Those eyes, that jawline, the way that his body moved when he sang.... I waved my hand at them. When I was sure they were looking at me all I said was, "Blaine? Really?!"
Mom and Dad looked to each other and laughed. Dad turned to me, "Yeah, that was Blaine."
I shook my head and laughed. "Wow." I commented. "That was one messed up performance. Mr. Schuester let you do that?"
Sam, Mom, and Dad looked to each other as if to see who would answer first. Sam shrugged, "Well, everyone in the audience was a little confused. It was Katy Perry vs. Lady Gaga week so we decided to do Applause. We wanted to dress like Gaga for the fun of it and that's what we came up with."
"Weird. Awkward. Embarrassing." I said as I took a seat in the recliner.
"I hope we didn't scar you for life." Mom told me and Michael.
"You already did." I told her. "I will never be able to look at you the same way again, especially Blaine."
Dad shook his head at the ceiling, "Yeah, years later and I still don't understand Blaine's Gaga fashion."
We laughed and then slowly turned back to the Nationals performance, our smiles slowly fading as we watched the performance with the same respect that we always did. They had sang songs that were favorites of the late Finn Hudson, a New Directions alumni and role model who lost his life just a year after graduating high school. I never got the chance to meet him; however, I often watched videos of the songs he played drums in and have picked up a few skills from him that way. I wished I could've met him, he seems like such a great guy.
Around eleven our guests started to leave. Sam and Mercedes left with Whitney and Michael. Jamie would be staying the night with Isaiah and I.
The Bledsoe's stayed a little longer. Bay and Mom were in the kitchen putting away dishes and probably talking about their kids and their jobs and how silly their husbands were.
The twins were on the couch reading books they had brought.
Dad had taken Isaiah and Jamie outside to look at the moon (it was a full moon tonight).
Mr. Bledsoe approached me and I noticed a white envelope peeking out of his jeans pocket. "Can I talk to you?" he asked. I nodded. He smiled as he told me, "You had talked with me about learning to ride a motorcycle,"
I smiled out of excitement. What was he leading up to?
"And I talked with your parents." he continued. "And they said I could start teaching you every Wednesday after school."
My jaw dropped. "Really?!" I asked. He nodded. "When can I start?!"
Mr. Bledsoe reached into his pocket and handed me the thin envelope. "As soon as you use this."
I took the envelope. It looked to be empty until I opened the flap and looked inside. A check was in there made out to the local bike shop. "A check? For what?"
"I want to get you your first motorcycle helmet, but I want you to go with me so we can get the right size. I already wrote out a check that has enough money on it to purchase a good quality helmet plus extra left over for proper riding clothes, and most importantly your own motorcycle."
I shook my head in disbelief. "I'm really going to learn how to ride?!!"
Mr. Bledsoe's smile widened. "Yes, for free. You deserve it."
I set the envelope on the nearest table and hugged him tight. I then released him and thanked him repeatedly. This was one of my life long dreams ever since I first saw Mr. Bledsoe come riding into school. Think about it. Your principal rides a motorcycle to school every morning. That's my principal and I'm proud to say it.
Mr. Bledsoe and I talked about motorcycles for a while until Bay came out of the kitchen and told him, "Come on, Emmett. We still have the long drive back to Knoxville and I'm driving. Let's get the girls off the couch and get their noses out of their books and go home. Toby called me too and we need to talk about going to Mom's book signing and we need to see if Regina can come babysit. Also, your mom texted me about her moving closer to us."
Mr. Bledsoe's shoulders slumped in. He pulled me into a hug again and said good-bye. As they walked to the living room I saw Mr. Bledsoe sign back, "Mom wants to move and Toby called you this late at night?!" Bay just shrugged helplessly.
Soon it was just the three Lynn's and two friends sound asleep in their beds (or on the floor in Isaiah and Jamie's case).