Sam Hellerman had printed up a zine with the lyrics to all the songs on the set list plus several others. It had said
“Balls Deep,” of course, but as he stood at the main exit hand-ing them out, he wrote “The Chi-Mos” at the top of each one in Sharpie, so it looked like “Balls Deep” was just the title. It proved to be a pretty popular item because of its populist anti-Teone message, and he ran out quickly, promising to go over to the Copymat to make more as soon as possible.
I was kind of in a daze standing by the stage when Deanna Schumacher came up and whispered, “Thanks for hanging up on me, ass.” (It didn’t matter what I said before I put the phone back on the hook: she always claimed she thought I had hung up on her.) But then she said, “Nice show, sexy,” in a voice that didn’t sound all the way sarcastic and handed me a note, sneakily rubbing my palm with her finger as she did it, before running off to join her friends, who were on the way out. The note said: “Thanks for rawking my world. I’m totally callable Mon/Thur from 6 to 10 if you’re 258
into it,” and it was signed with a heart and a big “D.” And next to the heart it said “slurp.” I kid you not.
Cleaning up after our set had taken longer than anticipated, so I was late for sixth period. I stopped in to the otherwise deserted boys’ bathroom, and Mr. Teone ambled in.
Now, Mr. Teone’s office is located just across the corner from the boys’ bathroom at the southwest corner of center court, so he can see its door from his desk through the mirrored plate glass, though you can’t see him looking. When he has some important matter to discuss with a student in an un-official capacity, he’ll wait for his moment and try to meet him in the bathroom for an informal chat. I don’t know who takes care of the girls’ bathroom in that corner of center court. Not Mr. Teone, surely, but, hey, you never know.
I had never been a participant in one of these secret meetings, but I had walked in on them. When someone walks in, Mr. Teone abruptly ends the meeting and growls something like “keep your nose clean!” Then he’ll zoom out, but as he leaves he’ll say to the interloper: “that goes double for you, Henderson!” Well, he only says Henderson if the interloper happens to be me or someone else with my last name.
Obviously.
But for the first time, I wasn’t the interloper. I was the main guy.
“Well, well, Henderson,” he said, standing a couple of urinals over from me, “you and your stunt you boys pulled has a great deal of folks around here pretty steamed.”
I gave him a look that said: “well, if I interpret your tortured, semiliterate syntax correctly, my only comment is that all great artists are misunderstood in their own time.”
He stepped away from his urinal, which was kind of scary, but it turned out he was fully dressed and buttoned up. Thank 259
God. I gave up trying to pee and buttoned up as well. I can’t do that with anyone else in the room, especially Mr. Teone.
He was holding his reading glasses to one eye and squinting at a copy of Sam Hellerman’s song zine.
“Chi-Mos,” he said slowly, but he pronounced it, Schtuppe fashion, “chee moss.” “Mind telling me what that’s supposed to mean?”
Now, I had been in many ironic situations before, but none of them had quite prepared me for this. I mean, here was a leading figure in the normal hierarchy, a high-ranking official representative of the Perpetrator Nation, asking me to explain the meaning of the derogatory name foisted upon me by their own sadistic test several years ago and used against me as a weapon by their lower-ranking minions ever since. I snorted. How quickly we forget.
“It’s the plural of ‘chy moe,’ ” I said, correcting his pronunciation. “It stands for ‘child molester.’ ”
He continued to squint at me. “Where are you getting this stuff ?” he said.
I stared at him with a serious look, the look that says only a (devil-head) philistine asks an artist where he gets his ideas.
Then I laughed a little, because, you know, sometimes I crack myself up.
“Now listen to me,” he said suddenly, his red face a match for that of any PE teacher, his voice a (devil-head) histrionic stage whisper. He tapped the zine with his finger. “This crap . . .” He trailed off. “I don’t know who you think you’re dealing with, but watch your step, Henderson. Keep your nose clean!” Well, I could understand why he didn’t like the lyrics to “Mr. Hitler, Mr. Stalin, Mr. Teone,” but this was a bit over-the-top. He was still whispering, but it was loud, kind of like yell-whispering. His face was throbbing red, and drops of sweat were spattering from it in all directions. Yuck.
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Enter the interloper, who happened to be Syndie Duffy’s floppy fake-hippie boyfriend.
“You remember what I said,” said Mr. Teone. “Don’t be an a-hole.” And then, as he stormed out: “And that goes double for you, Shinefield!”
“Dude,” said Shinefield, after Mr. Teone left. “Radical show!”
Pause. “Really?”
“Insane,” he said, which I took to mean “yes, really.” Then he added: “What did Teone want?”
“He was just advising me not to be an a-hole.”
“Yeah,” said Shinefield. “Me too.”
I felt a strange sense of well-being. Here was the only conversation I’d ever had in the boys’ bathroom that hadn’t consisted of introductory remarks to an eventual attempt on my life. In fact, I was trying to think of another conversation I’d had anywhere with anyone other than Sam Hellerman or Dr.
Hexstrom that hadn’t been at my expense, but I was drawing a blank. So this is what it’s like, I thought. Going to the bathroom would never be the same again. As I was soon to learn, though, suddenly becoming a quasi celebrity doesn’t necessarily mean that attempts on your life cease to occur: they just tend to move to venues other
