Brendan Buckley's Universe and Everything in It (3 page)

CHAPTER 4

I pedaled through our neighborhood, past Olympic View Park, where Khalfani and I go to race, or practice wheelies and do jumps on our bikes. Khal and I met at Tae Kwon Do, two years ago. Now he’s like my brother.

I laid my bike in the rocks alongside the Joneses’ driveway and rang the doorbell. Khalfani opened the door in less than three seconds. “What took you so long, man? We got stuff to do!”

“I got something for us to do, too.” I reached for the folded green flyer in my back pocket.

He stopped me. “Not as good as what I got. Come on.” He dashed upstairs.

I stood under the chandelier in the tall entryway and pulled off my shoes without untying them. No one wears shoes in this house. The carpet is white—or champagne, as Khalfani’s stepmom calls it.

“Hi, Brendan,” Mrs. Jones called from the family room.

“Hi, Brendan!” Dori yelled in her high-pitched voice. “Take off your shoes!” Dori’s only four, but she thinks she rules the place. She once told a policeman who came to investigate a neighborhood break-in that even he had to take off his shoes before he could come in. Being around Khalfani’s little sister makes me think it’s not so bad being an only child.

“Hi!” I yelled back. I took the stairs two at a time and hurried to Khalfani’s room at the end of the hall.

“Close the door,” he said. He held some kind of contraption that he had clearly made himself. “Check it out.” He smiled so big, his ears rose up on his perfectly round head. Connected to his skinny neck, Khalfani’s shaved skull looks like a brown lightbulb.

“What is it?” He’d taken a three-pronged garden tool and duct-taped rubber hosing to the outside prongs. The opposite corners of a handkerchief were tied through holes he’d made in the ends of each hose. It looked kind of like a slingshot.

“A launcher!” He kneeled and jammed the tool’s handle into a hole in a board lying on his floor. Then he sat behind the board, put one foot on either side to keep the device steady and pulled back on the handkerchief. I kept waiting for the hoses to slip off the prongs, but they held steady. He released. The tubes snapped and the handkerchief went limp.

“Do you think it’ll work?” I asked.

“That’s what we’re about to find out. I waited for you, since you like to test things so much.” He grinned. “Come on.”

“Where are we going?”

“Just follow me.” He put his finger over his puckered lips and tiptoed down the hall like the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. I walked behind him, hoping he wasn’t about to get us in trouble, but knowing that he probably was.

He slipped into Dori’s room and headed for the pile of dolls on her bed. “Grab a few,” he whispered. I had a bad feeling about this.

With our hands full, we rushed back to his room. He dumped his load near the catapult. “Open the window,” he whispered. He turned to shut the door.

I set the dolls on the floor, then looked outside. Mr. Jones had set up their pool for the summer. The super-blue water reminded me of Ed DeBose’s round, stunned eyes as Gladys had snatched me away. I needed to tell Khalfani what had happened. Hopefully I wouldn’t get sent home first.

I pushed up the window, then unlatched the screen and shoved it up, too. I knew what Khalfani planned to do, and when Khalfani planned to do something, it was no use trying to stop him. We would sink or swim together.

He already had the first doll loaded—a small, rubbery, brown-skinned baby. It was a good thing she didn’t know where she was headed.

Khal pulled back on the catapult until it was stretched as far as it would go. “In five, four—”

I joined him. “Three, two, one. Blastoff!”

He released the launcher. The doll shot straight out the window and disappeared. Khalfani whooped.

I couldn’t help myself. I smiled and then laughed, even though I knew this was going to mean trouble. Dori would have a fit, and when that happened, Mrs. Jones always went straight to Khalfani.

We slapped each other high five and ran to the window. The doll lay facedown on the cement patio, at least four feet short of the pool.

“Ooh, that had to hurt.” Khalfani turned back to the pile of dolls. “Your turn.” He handed me a floppy, skinny cloth doll with a huge head of curly hair. She wore a bright pink shirt and a short, fluorescent orange skirt. Her feet had been sewn to look like she was wearing purple leopard-skin boots.

Oh boy. With my luck, this was Dori’s favorite doll.

I put the doll in the handkerchief and slowly pulled it back. I kept hearing Master Rickman’s words from the night before about tenet number two of Tae Kwon Do:
yom chi.
“Integrity means knowing the difference between right and wrong and choosing to do what’s right.” Integrity was our
dojang
’s focus for the month.

My hands shook. My arms were getting tired from holding the slingshot tight.

And I really wanted to see if I could make the doll hit the water. I released.

The doll snapped into the air and hit the glass, right above the opening. I held my breath as she tumbled toward the gaping hole, bounced off the sill and landed on the bedroom floor.

“You aimed too high. Try again.” Khalfani grabbed the doll and shoved her at me.

I was having fun, but I didn’t really want to get busted, and I had come here with a mission. Physics and the laws of trajectory had given me an out. “Wait. I need to tell you about something.” I unfolded the green paper and showed it to him.

“Rock club. That’s cool. But how’s it more important than this?” He pointed to his contraption. “Catapults are all about science, man! You should know that.”

I jabbed at Ed’s name. “That’s my grandpa.”

“I thought your grandpa died.”

“My other grandpa. The
white
one.”

“Oh.” He held the doll by her boots and swung her around. “So?”

“So, I never met him before. Until yesterday. At this rock show in the mall.”

“How’d you know it was him?” He slumped on his bed and threw the doll on the floor.

“My grandma Gladys freaked out when she saw me talking to him. And his name. That’s my grandpa’s name.”

“Why haven’t you ever met him? Does he live around here?”

I sat at the end of the bed and put the flyer between us. “That’s what I need to find out.” He stared at me. “But I can’t do it at my house. Too risky.”

“Risky?” He crossed his arms and looked at me like I was being a chicken.

“I don’t want my mom to catch me.”

“Doesn’t it seem kind of funny to you that you never met your grandpa? I mean, my grandpa lives all the way in New Jersey, but I’ve still met him.”

“Yeah. It’s strange. But my mom won’t tell me what happened.”

He picked up the paper. “You’ve got his number. Why don’t you ask
him
?”

My chest tightened at the thought of talking to Ed DeBose. Before, he’d just been a guy at a rock show. Now he was the grandpa I’d never met. But Mom said he knew about me. How could he not want to see his own grandson? What did he think about me?
Did
he think about me?

I couldn’t let Khalfani know I was too scared to call. Tae Kwon Do warriors never showed their fear. “I want to see where he lives first, do some investigative work, like my dad does when he’s trying to solve a case.”

“Okay, but only if I get to be the lieutenant.” He sat up straight. “Lieutenant Khalfani Jones. I like the sound of that.” Khalfani’s name means “destined to lead”—and he knows it.

“Fine with me.”

Khal sat in front of his computer. He went to a people search site and typed in “Ed DeBose.”

I grabbed his arm. “Wait. I want to do it.”

“You said I could be lieutenant.”

“Lieutenants don’t do unimportant tasks like this.”

“Oh yeah.” He saluted as I sat in the chair. “It’s all yours—Detective.”

I rolled my eyes, then hit Return.

In no more than two seconds, one result popped up.

“‘Edwin DeBose,’” I read. “‘Milton.’ I see signs for Milton on the freeway all the time. How far is it?”

“I know how to find out.” He scooted me out of the chair.

Mrs. Jones yelled from outside. “Khalfani Omar, what’s Dori’s baby doll doing on the ground directly below your room?”

I reached for the computer mouse. “Hurry up! We’re about to get it!” Mrs. Jones didn’t mess around when it came to punishment.

Khalfani whipped out his arm and blocked my body with a
sang dan mahk kee.
I backed away. He found a map site while yelling back that he didn’t know anything about the doll.

“Then why is your window open?”

I shook Khal’s arm to make him hurry.

He swatted at my hand. “You’re messing me up.” He typed in his and Ed DeBose’s addresses and clicked on Send.

I swallowed. A map came up.

The grandpa I’d never met lived only eight miles away.

CHAPTER 5

I ran through the parking lot, ahead of Mom and Gladys. Khalfani stood inside the door, looking through the steamy glass. We always wait for each other to go into the
dojang
. (That’s Korean for “studio.”)

“Where you been? We’re going to be late,” he said. Usually he was the one coming in at the last second. I didn’t have time to explain Gladys’s denture malfunction, which had burned up about ten minutes at her apartment.

“Tomorrow,” I said, huffing. “We’re going to Milton.”

“On our bikes?” His jaws worked a huge piece of blue gum.

“The bus.” I pulled off my shoes and threw them in one of the cubbyholes against the wall. “I looked up the route.”

Mom and Gladys came in.

“Got it?” I whispered.

“Can’t wait,” he said, too loud.

Mom came up behind us. “What can’t you wait for this time?” Mom asked.

“Hi, Mrs. Buckley,” he said.

Khalfani looked at me with big eyes.

I pushed him toward the entrance to the
dojang.
“Our next promotion test. Bye, Mom.”

She looked at me out of the side of one eye, which she does when she’s not sure if she should believe me, then lifted her hand in a small wave.

I stepped into the studio, sucked in my breath and bowed toward Master Rickman, once again becoming Brendan Buckley, Tae Kwon Do Warrior. I moved to my place on the mat and got in
choon bee ja seh
—the ready position.

Khalfani smacked his gum and Master Rickman gave him the eagle eye. Khal ran to the garbage can and spit it out. Gum’s not allowed in the
dojang
, but Khal isn’t the best at remembering rules.

“Cha rut,”
Master Rickman called out. Everyone stood at attention.
“Kuk ki ba ray.”
We all bowed to the Korean flag hanging at the front of the room.
“Choon bee.”
Ready. “Warming-up exercises.
Shi jak!
” Begin.

Master Rickman led us through our warm-ups.

“Yup cha gi!”
he commanded. I kicked my leg high and to the side, the heel of my foot hitting my imaginary opponent’s chest.

I made a fist and punched strongly to the front, pulling my other arm in tight by my hip.

In the mirror, Gladys and Mom watched me. Whenever Gladys came to my practice, she sat in a chair at the back. Every time I kicked or punched, she kicked out her foot or threw her fist, her forehead scrunched into a scowl. I tried to keep my eyes focused
shi sun ahp
—to the front—but it was hard not to notice. She lurched and jabbed as if defending herself from swooping bats. Or maybe she was imagining hitting that guy Bernard.

“Ki hap!”
Master Rickman commanded.

We stood with our fists pointed down in front of us and yelled: “Ha!”

Then we did the
hyung,
or form, for each rank, up to whatever rank we were. Khal and I are fifth rank—blue belts with a purple stripe, which stands for “blue sky helps growing.” We’re beyond the seedling and sprouting stages, but not yet to the “growing nobly toward harvest” stage. That will come with the purple belt.

When we were done with our forms, Master Rickman put a board in the mount on the wall. He stood in side stance with his arms in a blocking position. He reminded us about proper kicking technique—foot flexed with the heel out front. His leg shot out and back so fast, I barely saw it touch the wood. The board snapped with a loud crack. Gladys hollered and muttered something about a heart attack.

Khalfani raised his hand. “When do we get to do that,
Sa Bum Nim,
sir? ’Cause I think I’m ready now.”

I stifled a laugh so I wouldn’t break tenet number four:
guk gi.
Self-control. A Tae Kwon Do warrior is in control of his body and mind—his actions and reactions—at all times.

“Your confidence is admirable, Mr. Jones. Actually, you will need to do the
kyepka
to be promoted to the next level.”

“All right!” Khalfani said under his breath.

Khal and I are both
you gup ja,
which means we have colored belts, not black belts. When we get our black belts, we’ll be
you dan ja.
When we heard about an eleven-year-old girl getting her first-degree black belt this spring, Khalfani got mad. Since then, he’s been saying he’s getting his this year. Khalfani turned eleven in May.

“Speaking of promotions,” Master Rickman said to the class, “the next test is scheduled for July twenty-fifth, so make sure you’re practicing every day if you would like to be eligible to take it.”

I gave Khal a thumbs-up sign and we grinned at each other.

Together the class recited the five tenets of Tae Kwon Do—courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control and indomitable spirit—then bowed to Master Rickman. I started toward the door, but Master Rickman stopped me. “Do you want to test for your purple belt, Brendan?”

“Yes, sir. Khalfani and I want to be
you dan ja.
”

“You know, purple stands for ‘noble.’ I’ll start working with you and Khalfani on the boards next week. You’ll be ready.”

“Great!”

“Your dad will be proud.”

I beamed thinking about Dad watching me break boards with my feet and receiving my noble purple belt.

He patted my back. I met Khalfani at the door. “He says we can be ready for purple,” I said.

“Bring it on!” he said. “Black belts, here we come.”

Mom and Gladys met us in the shoe room. I said goodbye to Khalfani, who left with his dad. I grabbed my shoes. “Mom, can we have pizza for dinner?”

“Sounds good to me!” Gladys said.

A little boy stood off to the side, watching us. “Mommy,” he said. His mom was talking to another parent. He pulled on her pant leg, then pointed in my direction. “Why don’t they match?”

I looked at my feet. Had I accidentally put on two different shoes?

The boy tugged on the woman again. “Why don’t that boy and his mommy match?” He and his mom both had brown skin.

The woman stopped talking. She whispered something to the little boy about not being rude. The other lady took her daughter and left.

My muscles had tensed and my armpits were hot. Mom put her arm around me.

“What kind of fool question is that?” Gladys said loudly. “Sister, you need to teach your child that black people come in all shades.” Mom let out a small laugh.

My face felt like it was a bright reddish brown shade right about then.

The woman glared at Gladys and beckoned for her older son to hurry up. She pushed her kids out the door.

“And teach him some manners while you’re at it,” Gladys muttered after they’d gone.

“You know, Miss Gladys, I’m not black,” Mom said, laughing again.

“More Caucasian people got black in ’em than care to admit it.”

On the way home, I thought about being black. I don’t think about it all that much. Until something happens like that kid saying my mom and I don’t match. Then I remember that my skin makes me stand out in some places—like with my mom.

Truthfully, I hear more about how tall I am or how good I am at science than anything about what race I am. But I know I’m black and I’m glad to be that, because that’s what Grampa Clem was and what Dad and Gladys and Khalfani are.

If I ever wish something were different, maybe it’s that Mom was black, too, or at least had brown skin like the rest of us. Then I wouldn’t get asked about what I am all the time at school. Seems like things would be simpler.

And there’d be no question about whether we belong together.