Flowers For A Gardner

Chapter 5

Gardner left Flower Girl to continue reading her book in the Japanese garden. He got some lunch and then continued exploring the campus, bird dogging spots he might take her to that wouldn't be too crowded. Eventually, he left for his shift at the Good Time Bar and Arcade. When he strolled up, he spotted a disheveled kid with sandy brown hair leaning up against the building with his arms crossed, looking disgruntled. He called to him to get his attention.

"Hey, Rufus, what're you doing outside? Did you get the heave ho?"

The boy looked up and, spotting Gardner, immediately tried to conceal the traces of tears and distress that accompanied his frustration and anger.

"Hmph!" was all he could manage to say.

Gardner put his hand on the boy's shoulder. He leaned down to get eye level with him. "Who was it this time giving you the blues?"

Rufus turned his head away from Gardner, as if he were refusing a spoonful of cod liver oil.

"Not gonna tell me?"

Rufus shook his head no.

"Come on, you might as well. Cuz you know I'm gonna find out anyway. One of the other kids is going to give me the whole story. Might as well tell me your side of it."

Rufus's resolve started to crumble.

Gardner rubbed his shoulder with his hand gently. "I won't narc on you to your family, Rufus. This is just between you and me. I just want to make sure nobody's getting out of hand in our clubhouse and hurting one of my guys, right?"

Rufus nodded.

"So what happened? Did someone hurt you or did you hurt someone?"

Rufus huffed "I didn't hurt anybody! It was that asshole Brett! He tried to steal my game! He's always doing that to the smaller, younger kids! Waits until you slot your money in, then pushes you out of the way and plays your turn. Well today I just got fed up with it and I pushed him back out of the way."

Gardner gave him a cool, assessing look and asked "Didja hurt him?"

Rufus said "Nah, I didn't hurt him! Just made him fall on his ass! Then I started to play my game! But you know old Hendrickson. He comes steaming over to me and starts yelling 'I'll have no fisticuffs in my arcade young man!' and kicks me out! So here I am now, waiting for my big sister to pick me up on the way home from cheerleading practice. I still got another hour and a half to wait. An hour and a half I was supposed to have to myself that that asshole Brett stole from me, having fun playing games."

Gardner knew that Rufus's home life was sub-par at best. His divorced alcoholic mother mostly farmed out her parenting duties to his older sister. Typically of her age and maturity level, his sister saw him mainly as a pain in the neck and an obstacle to becoming the most popular girl at the local high school. She was constantly rushing between activities and social outings, and most of the time Rufus had to find his own way home from school and wait for his sister to come home and make him dinner. On many nights she would come home until very late and he'd have to get his own dinner or just do without it.

The only time Rufus was ever really happy was when he was allowed to go to Good Time. His sister would bribe him from time to time not to tattle on her for shirking her "parenting" duties by giving him a roll of quarters and a couple of hours to kill at the arcade while she was busy.

Gardner straightened up and patted his shoulder. "Okay, buddy. Let me see what I can do." He went inside to have a word with Mr. Hendrickson, the owner of the bar and arcade.

"Hi, Mr. Hendrickson. I hear there was some trouble with one of the big kids bullying a smaller kid."

The owner said "Huh? That's not what I saw. I saw that little shit pushing that bigger kid down on the ground."

Gardner said "Yeah, I spoke to Rufus, the smaller kid, about it. He told me about what happened. Turns out that's not the whole story. Turns out that bigger kid Brett's running a racket where he's stealing the smaller kids' games from them. I'm sure you realize that's bad for business if the kids are all getting bullied and intimidated. We gotta cut that weed off at the root, don'tcha think? I think maybe we ought to suspend Brett's gaming privileges for a little while and invite Rufus back into the arcade to show the other kids that this is a safe space for them. We need their business a whole lot more than Brett's right?"

Mr. Hendrickson ran his hands over his five o'clock shadow thoughtfully and said "You might have something there, Gardner. I can see now I wasn't dealing with the full set of facts. And you're right to view it based on market forces. That's what it's all about after all, keeping the customers happy and making my business a success."

Gardner said "Right. I'm all about making this place a success."

"Okay, Gardner. Rufus can come back in. But you tell that little pissant I won't tolerate any fisticuffs. If he has a problem with another kid, he should come to me or you or another adult."

"Right, Sir. I'll be sure to tell him that. That's the only proper way to handle these things."

Gardner turned and walked away, trying his best not to crack up at the idea that he had actually sold his boss on the idea that his anti-bullying campaign was really a capitalist Trojan horse. He went back outside to fetch Rufus, who was pacing nervously in anticipation.

"Okay, Rufus. You can come back in. But from now on, if someone messes with you, henceforth you are not allowed to retaliate physically. You need to let an adult intervene on your behalf, you hear? Let someone else take the heat for you, look out for you. It's bad enough that you don't have that in your home life. You may as well take advantage of having that luxury while you're here, right?"

A lightbulb seemed to appear over Rufus's head and a whole new concept seemed to dawn on him. Somebody had his back for once and was willing to step up for him.

"Yeah, okay. Thanks, Gardner." He dried the remaining tears and snot off his face and fell into line behind Gardner, prepared to enjoy the rest of his precious time at Gardner's clubhouse.