Honor

“I want the student who is cheating on this test to stop doing so immediately,” Miss Alvarez echoed across the Spanish classroom.

I shot a glance at Carlos. He slyly crumpled the small white cheat sheet into the palm of his left hand, coughed, and pushed the ball of paper into his mouth and swallowed. Behind me Cathy began to rub away the Spanish words written in ink on her left hand. I pushed the page with this week’s vocabulary words on it back under my desk.
Miss Alvarez was no Mrs. Manzo; she actually saw what was going on in the classroom. She was Manzo’s student teacher, fresh from the university, and since her arrival a week ago, things hadn’t been the same for us in third¬-year Spanish.
Mrs. Lugarda Manzo was big and fat and mean and she had taught at our high school forever. She was from Spain and spoke Catalan Spanish, which she claimed was superior to the Mexican Spanish in Tucson. She hated Mexicans, a fact not lost on Carlos Garcia, my best friend.
Miss Delphina Alvarez was the spitting image of Manzo, only smaller. She wasn’t as mean as Manzo, yet, but she already had the eagle eye. She moved Carlos and me twice for talking, but she would never be able to squash our ability to communicate with eye and hand signals, even across Spanish classrooms. The bell rang. We handed in our tests and headed for the hallway.
“Shit,” said Carlos as we walked to our last period class. “I’m nailed. The puerco was looking right at me when she said that thing about cheating.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “She’s a student teacher. She doesn’t know anything. Remember what we did last year to Miss Malone?”
Billy had said something about Miss Malone’s hair, which was piled on top of her head like a mountain. She cracked in front of the whole World History class. She slammed her head down on the podium and started crying like she was hysterical.
“If Alvarez messes with you, Carlos,” I threatened, “we’ll send her back to Cuba. Don’t worry!” I slugged him in the arm and we headed into Clifford Haugh’s math class, where if our shirts weren’t tucked in right or if we needed a haircut, he’d give us detention.
Tuesday ended without anything happening to Carlos, and it was such a small thing that I didn’t think about the incident again. A week later, I got a pass to the principal’s office. I thought it had to do with my father being ill. He wasn’t well, and sometimes my mom would leave a message for me with the receptionist in the office if I had to come right home after school or if I had to pick up something from the store. I was surprised when the secretary told me to have a seat on the long wooden bench outside of the principal’s office. She didn’t smile but just looked over her glasses at me and pointed with her yellow pencil. I was afraid, but I didn’t know why. I thought I might be in trouble for something that happened in Spanish class yesterday.
All the guys were calling me Enamorado, the one in love. The object of my love, according to my friends, was Miss Alvarez. Anytime she called on me, the guys would say “Enamorado, Enamorado” until finally she caught on and said something back to them in Spanish that even Carmen wouldn’t translate for us. I thought I was in trouble for that. There had also been an incident with the word apenas, which is pronounced a-pain-nas and means “barely.” Carlos asked Miss Alvarez what apenas meant, but he said, “What does a penis mean?” As if Miss Alvarez would know. The class broke up and because I was laughing so hard, Carlos and I both got tossed out into the hallway for the rest of the hour.
When I finally got called in, the principal sat in his chair behind his desk. Mr. Sterrett, the honor society advisor, stood next to him. And then my heart froze. There sat Mrs. Manzo, and she looked steaming mad. I could tell she was mad--beads of sweat covered her forehead, and her small and squinty eyes moved nervously. Mr. Sterrett told me to sit in the small chair in the middle of the room. The room had no windows, just pictures and diplomas on the wall. Everybody looked at me.
The principal drilled me. “Were you cheating on last week’s Spanish test?” Knocked off balance, I didn’t know what to say. Why was Manzo in here? Where was Alvarez? She had seen me cheating. Mr. Sterrett’s presence really threw me. Why did that bald-headed jerk have to be here? He taught senior English. I didn’t even have him this year. He was the National Honor Society advisor. Did this have anything to do with tonight’s induction ceremony? I started to get really nervous. I felt like throwing up.
Mr. Sterrett bored in on me. “Answer the question, please. Miss Alvarez claims you were cheating during the vocabulary test last week. Is this true?” I went for the weasel.
“Of course not,” I told him. “I don’t need to cheat.”
“If I were you,” offered Mr. Sterrett, “I’d make sure I was telling the truth. You don’t know what we know.”
“I didn’t cheat!” I said.
Mrs. Manzo glared at me. I couldn’t shake her stare. I looked at the pictures on the wall. The flag. The black and gold pen and pencil set on the principal’s desk. Then the door opened. In walked Miss Alvarez. Her face was pale and she held her hands tightly together. She stood to the side of the principal’s desk. She avoided looking at me. “Tell us what you saw last Tuesday in sixth hour, Miss Alvarez,” demanded the principal.
“I was giving the students a vocabulary test,” she said softly, her voice shaking slightly. “I saw one of the students looking under his desk at a list of vocabulary words. He would look under his desk and copy what he saw onto his test paper.”
“What did you do?” asked Mr. Sterrett.
“I said that I knew that someone was cheating and that it should stop immediately,” she said. She spoke so softly that Mr. Sterrett bent his face toward her.
“And,” he said.
“Everyone kept their eyes on their own paper for the remainder of the test. The boy that I saw cheating stopped. I immediately told Mrs. Manzo.”
I squirmed inside but tried not to let it show. I looked at Miss Alvarez. She was scared.
“I want . . .” I butted in.
“Please remain quiet until I ask you to speak,” Mr. Sterrett snapped at me. “Who was cheating?” he asked.
“It was he,” she said, looking at me hard for the first time. I sighed loudly.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said softly, turning away her eyes.
“This is very serious,” began Mr. Sterrett, staring at me over his glasses. “Your selection to the National Honor Society is in jeopardy. Do you have anything to say for yourself?”
Shit, I thought. Shit. I didn’t think it was going to be that big of a deal or that it would ever go this far. I had gotten good at weasling my way out of trouble. Alvarez was a student teacher, for God’s sake. Everybody in the class, and half of tonight’s Honor Society inductees, had been cheating. My parents would kill me. I decided I had one chance. Once, on television, I had seen Perry Mason grill a nervous, lying witness. The witness cracked under Perry’s relentless and direct questioning. Perry’s defendant got off. I had to go for it. I went for Miss Alvarez’s jugular. “Are you sure?” I started, standing up to face her. “Are you absolutely, positively sure, Miss Alvarez, that it was me that you saw cheating? You were in the front of the room, and I was all the way at the back. If you’re wrong, your decision may not affect you, but it could have a devastating effect on me for the rest of my life.” I was on fire. “You are, after all, a student teacher. Perhaps you just thought you saw me cheating. Perhaps you wanted to see me cheating.”
“This is absurd!” shouted Mr. Sterrett. “Stop this immediately!”
“How dare you talk to Miss Alvarez in this manner?” hissed Mrs. Manzo.
Miss Alvarez was on the verge of tears. Maybe, hope against hope, I’d accomplished my mission and placed doubt in her mind. Maybe she would say she wasn’t sure that I had been cheating. The principal sent me back to the wooden bench in the front office. The secretary glared at me. School was letting out, and I had to sit. On the wall there was a Norman Rockwell painting of a happy family standing around a table set with Thanksgiving dinner. I wouldn’t have a family if Alvarez didn’t change her story. My dad was really ill. My parents had been so happy when I brought home the invitation to the induction. I began to pray as hard as I could for God to help me. I rubbed the St. Christopher medal in my pocket back and forth with the thumb of my right hand. I said “please, please, please” over and over. Then the principal’s door opened and Mrs. Manzo walked out first, ignoring me as she plodded past, followed by Miss Alvarez. I watched Alvarez’s eyes, and when I caught them and she looked at me, I thought she slowed her quick step as if she was going to stop and say something to me. Just then Mr. Sterrett came out and motioned for me to come back into the principal’s office.
I sat back down in the chair. I was alone with the principal and Mr. Sterrett.
“Cheating and honor aren’t compatible,” he said. “I especially deplore dishonesty. If you had told us the truth from the start, perhaps things would have been different.” I sunk into my chair. I was done for. “This is a black mark on your record,” he continued, “but not one that can’t be removed if you work hard and prove yourself. As a senior, you will again be eligible for Honor Society.” That was it. He was already talking about next year. I was dead.
“And as for your behavior this afternoon,” Mr. Sterrett said, “you were rude, obnoxious, and completely out of line. Honorable men admit their mistakes. You,” he intoned, “are to be pulled from the line of marching inductees. You have to go home and tell your parents.”
I thought about one last weasel, the crying I’ll-be-a-good-boy-now-and-won’t-ever-do-it -again-because-my-father-is-dying weasel. I knew he would have none of it, however. I even thought about ratting out everybody else in the class. He dismissed me before I could start.
School was quiet by the time I left the principal’s office. I ran smack into Linda, Pam and Bonnie heading toward the parking lot. “He has the smallest ass of any junior,” Linda said, flirting, showing off, and bugging me all at the same time. I moved past them quickly as they all laughed. Real funny. I wasn’t going to have any ass left when I got home.

I had to tell my mom what had happened as soon as possible. I had only a few hours left before the 7 o’clock ceremony. My dad was asleep in the back bedroom. My mom was in the kitchen, rolling hamburger meat into patties.
“I’ve got something I have to tell you, Mom.”
“Yes,” she said, looking up from her work.
“We don’t have to go to the Honor Society induction tonight,” I said.
“Your dad is too ill to go with us,” she said. “He hopes you won’t be disappointed if he stays home.”
“They pulled me out of the ceremony,” I blurted. And then the words tumbled out in a rush. “I got caught cheating on a Spanish test. I wasn’t the only one cheating. Everyone was cheating, even Carlos. I’m sorry, Mom,” I said. “I really screwed up.”
“Cheating?” my mother asked, raising her voice. “Cheating on a Spanish test? Have you completely lost your mind? What do you think this would do to your father? It would kill him today if he knew you were kicked out of the Honor Society before you ever got in.” She threw the hamburger meat into the bowl in disgust. “This is terrible. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said, resigned. “They said if I keep my grades up and nothing bad happens again, I can get in next year. I’m sorry.”
“So am I,” she said, disgusted. She was quiet for a moment; then she said, “I don’t want you to tell your dad today. He’s had a really bad day. Telling him this, now, would just make it worse. You can tell him later. We’ll get dressed and leave the house just like we had planned.”
I ate a quick dinner, showered and put on my grey pants, long-sleeved white shirt, and red-, white-, and blue-striped tie. My father was awake. I walked back into the bedroom before we left.
“I’m sorry I can’t come with you tonight,” he said. “I know it will be a wonderful ceremony. I’m so proud of you.” He started coughing and held his hand up to me to let me know it was okay to leave. I walked down the hallway to my mom, waiting by the front door, his cough sputtering in the background. I felt sad, stupid, and angry all at the same time.
My mom and I left. She drove. I didn’t know where we were going, and then she pulled into the one place I would rather have died than gone to: Helsing’s.
Hell Sings. That’s how we said it. Hell Sings. It was a coffee shop just off Miracle Mile. A lot of old people went there, but so did most of my friends from school. We’d go there with our dates for dessert or for coffee after a Friday or Saturday night of drinking, so that we could walk in our front doors and not be falling down drunk. We knew the waitresses and sometimes they were nice to us and sometimes we acted like assholes and they threw us out.
Once, when I was on a date with Linda, an old, crazy bag lady came and sat with us and asked if we would take her home. Once, a really drunk cowboy fell against the big front window, cracked his head, and an ambulance took him away. Once, Randy ordered a whole loaf of white bread and a whole stick of butter and ate it all because he was really drunk and he thought it would sober him up. It didn’t, and he puked all over the back of Carlos’s father’s pickup. My mother didn’t know any of this. She didn’t know that I knew this place inside and out or that we claimed the second table next to the window as our table, or if someone occupied that booth, what our second or third tables were. She didn’t know the waitress with the long, brown hair named Betty--the one all the guys called Betty Big Breast or Bet-tittie--or that secretly I called her Betty the Beauty because she had the prettiest face I’d ever seen. Once when I was really drunk I asked her if she wanted to see Doctor Zhivago with me. I wanted to tell her I loved her, but Carlos got me out of there before I could say it. My mother didn’t know any of this when she walked into the coffee shop. Arlene, the hostess, sat us against the window that looked out onto the parking lot, so that the whole world could see me in a white shirt and tie on a Wednesday night sitting in Hell Sings with my mother. Arlene handed us menus and acted like she didn’t know me, which she didn’t. Arlene never recognized anyone who wasn’t old, white, and rich. I sat down on the red vinyl seat.
Betty, Beautiful Betty with her hair tied back and wearing large silver hoop earrings, walked over to our table. I felt my world collapse. There I sat, a cheater, with my mother. I waited for her to tease me, to crack jokes like she always did, but she didn’t say anything except normal waitress stuff.
“What’ll you have, ma’am?” Betty said. “And what can I get you, sir?”
Sir! Either I looked like such an idiot that she didn’t recognize me, or she was pretending not to know me. I tried not to look at her.
“Apple pie, please, and a glass of milk,” I said.
“Just a cup of coffee for me,” my mom said.
I felt weird. My mom didn’t say anything. I couldn’t tell if she was mad at me or worried about my dad. I just looked out the window and prayed to God that Carlos or Billy or Eric wouldn’t show up and make fun of me and embarrass my mother, tonight of all nights.
Betty returned with our order. Coffee for my mom. Milk and apple pie for me. And cheese. Betty did recognize me. I always ordered cheddar cheese with my apple pie like my dad did, and Betty knew that. I hadn’t said cheese when I squeaked out my order. On a day that had been the worst day of my life, Betty the Beauty gave me cheese with my pie! I felt okay. Even if my mom wouldn’t talk with me, I felt all right. I did, at least for a moment.
Then my mom started crying. She was crying in Hell Sings. Not bawling, just tears rolling down her cheeks. I felt even worse, now. Making her mad was one thing, but making her cry was the worst thing I could do to my mom. I’d really screwed up. I had no idea how I would get through tomorrow in school. My pie tasted like paper. I felt sick to my stomach.
“I’m really sorry, Mom,” I tried to explain. “I didn’t mean to make such a mess of things.” “I know,” she said. “It’s not just you. It’s everything. Your dad is really ill. I don’t know what we’re going to do.” She looked off into space. Sadness crowded in on her eyes. She sat quietly.
To break the tension I said, “Tell me a story about when you were little.” It usually worked to lighten things up.
Her face brightened. “You would have loved Bootsie,” she said. “He was the sweetest little dog. Once, when I was ten or eleven, he got hold of a huge box of Ivory Soap flakes and ran all over the house shaking his head and tossing soap everywhere. My mother made Winston and me clean up the mess. It took us hours to pick all of the white flakes off the carpets.”
I listened, and I think it made her feel better because she didn’t seem mad at me anymore. She looked at her watch and said that we could leave now. She paid the bill and we walked out to our car. I tried to catch Betty’s eye before I left, but I couldn’t find her anywhere.
At the car, I said, “I left my watch at the table.” Before my mom could say anything, I ran back into Hell Sings. Betty was cleaning up our dishes. I wanted to say something intelligent to her. I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to cry, but I was too afraid to do anything. I just stood there in my grey pants, long-sleeved white shirt with the red-, white-, and blue-striped tie. My hair combed. My face puffy from all of the crying I’d been doing since this afternoon.
“Hey!” Betty said. “You back already?” I just stood there like a cow. “Do you know what goes in hard, but comes out soft?” she asked, her eyes twinkling. My head was buzzing. I was too dumbfounded to speak. Did she really just ask me that?
“Don’t know?”
I knew, all right. Was she going to say it right here? A sexy joke in front of everyone? No, she wouldn’t.
“Give up?”
I nodded. I cringed.
“Chewing gum!” She laughed, taking a piece of Clove gum out of the pocket of her apron and flipping it to me. I caught it and laughed out loud for the first time since that afternoon.
“Thanks, Betty,” I called, heading for the exit. “See ya, Zhivago!” she called as I pushed through the door and ran to our car.
My mom and I drove home in silence.

My dad was up when we came into the house. “How’d it go, Einstein?” he said, smiling.
“Okay,” I said
. “Tell me about the induction,” he said. I looked around for my mom, but she was in my sister’s bedroom.
“It was okay,” I said. “It was just what you’d expect. You didn’t miss much, Dad.”
“You must be tired,” he said.
“I am. Good night,” I said.
“Good night, son,” he said. “Your mother and I are so proud of your accomplishments today.”
I headed for bed. I brushed my teeth and washed my face and crawled under the covers. I turned the radio on low. The old Wazoo was on the air, playing the best music. My mom came in.
“Good night, dear,” she said. She sat on the edge of my bed and ran her hand through my hair. “I want you to talk to the principal tomorrow and apologize to him and to your Spanish teacher. There’s no reason Dad ever has to know about this. I don’t want to have to go through another evening like tonight, especially now. This is a hard time for everyone. Try to be good, and know that I love you.” She kissed me on the cheek.
Van Morrison was churning and burning up “Gloria.” I unwrapped the stick of Clove gum and held it for a moment. I thought about the day. Manzo’s face when I entered the office. Alvarez’s face when I had her on the witness stand. My mom’s face when we were sitting in Hell Sings. My dad’s face, full of pride, when we came home from the ceremony. Betty’s face when she tossed me the gum. Betty’s beautiful eyes. I put the stick of gum slowly into my mouth, but I didn’t chew it. I just let it be there, that spicy flavor burning my tongue.