by CJ Clayton-Dippolito
I was purely obsessed with gum as a child. Black Jack Fever my mother called it. Bribe, bawl, flatter, fight, lie, thieve—I’d do any of it. Nothing was beneath me when it came to the pursuit of gum. But that first stick? That was altogether different. That first stick has burned forever bright as one of my fondest memories. All of my adult life, whenever I see or smell chewing gum, I think of my brother Cooper and that half pack of Black Jack he won.
I was in the first grade, he was in the sixth, and the occasion fell somewhere in the first half of November, 1952. A bitter wind forewarned of the coming winter and the last remaining leaves fell like paper rubies from an oak that stood in front of the school that we had the fine fortune to attend or rather, to walk to and from, five pestilent days a week.
Going into it I assumed that the day would be like any other. The eager bug of knowledge had yet to sink its pincers, so to put it mildly, I was less than an enthusiastic pupil. It would not be until much later, high school perhaps, that I would realize the equalizing effect that knowledge can have on a classroom divided by wealth, perceived or otherwise, and the lack thereof. At that point, a typical school day for me was one spent brimming with tedium, sprinkled with snaps of jealousy and wrapped in an overall bitterness for life. It was all I could do to make the tiring slog to the front steps, sit at my desk for seven hours straight and behave. A good day meant I’d made it to the last bell without being sent to the corner for some sort of nonsense that I was always, and mysteriously, smack dab in the middle of. Any education that may have seeped in at that point was purely accidental.
I did know enough to note the differences between myself and the other kids which made the notion of schooling all the more agonizing. I knew that I hated the two threadbare dresses I wore on alternating days, hand-me-downs to be sure, given to me by a cousin. They hung funny, too short around the knees, and I was always walking sort of hunched over, trying to veil the perpetual crust of knee scabs and connect-the-dot constellation of mosquito bites mapped out on my knobby legs. I knew that the town girls rode buses or were driven to school and smelled nice and were clean when they got there and that no matter how hard I tried, I ended up stringy haired and covered in some sort of muck—sweat, sap, rain, mud, whatever—by the time I slid into my assigned seat. And I knew as well that most of my classmates had lunch buckets filled with savories that varied from one day to the next while a cornmeal biscuit wrapped in cloth was as sure to show up for lunch as my nose was to show up on my face. And I had a smoldering resentment about all of this.
That November morning, with books and lunch bucket in hand, I straggled along behind my brother, over hill and dale, grousing and sighing, bemoaning the long day ahead of me. As we approached our destination, without thinking and all on their own, my feet slowed to a snail like pace until finally, unable to prolong the inevitable, the school rose up in front of us. My brother and I waited for the bell to ring, milling about, kicking up dirt and leaves under the oak with the other mountain kids.
What a turn of the wheel when my brother up and decided to enter the penny pitch around back of the school’s tool shed. My brother had found the meager cent earlier that week just laying in the school yard looking up at him through an oxidized coating of green rust. Over the days that followed I would see him playing with it, rolling it around in his pocket, worrying it between his fingers, waiting for the powers that be to speak. Finally, under that tree of paper rubies, on that windy November morning, Lady Luck whispered into my brother’s ear: Today…is the day.
As much as I wanted to experience, however vicariously, the thrill of the penny pitch, it was only a moment before my usual contrary and self-preserving demeanor piped up and I attempted—a little weakly I’ll admit—to put the kibosh on it. I wanted him to pitch but didn’t want to lose that penny in the process. I disguised my disapproval in Puritanism so that I could declare complete and total innocence when our mother, who had spies everywhere, found out.
Maybe you shouldn’t. It’s gambling y’know.
Being older and a boy, my brother brushed my halfhearted protests off and went about his business following the gang behind the tool shed where the slab foundation had been over poured for some reason and formed a smooth playing surface hidden from view of the school. Nice girls shied away from such seamy places and from such foolishness in general, but my curiosity and proclivity for the wicked had me hot on his heels. We had never been participant to penny pitch or any of the other strictly prohibited school yard betting sport that seemed to carry on without incident or repercussion behind the tool shed. He told me to beat it but I followed along, threatening him with a pinched up face.
You let me watch Cooper Grant Adams or I’ll tell on you! You bet I’ll tell. I’ll tell our mother that her only son is a gambling heathen to be sure!
Stand back and don’t you say nuthin’ he said.
Arms crossed, I stood and watched as the game got underway.
The first two boys overshot and their pennies ricocheted off the shed and bounced clean off into the grass. Then Del Winston, the resident thug, decided to pitch which was a surprise to everyone. Del usually didn’t pitch penny. He had more money that most boys his age so preferred a higher stakes game of dice with the well-heeled high school crowd. We would find out later that Del was hard up for cash and was taking it where he could. He had his eye on a rifle that his father refused to buy him because the last time he was handed a firearm, he shot every gobbler and hen in Blackfoot Bottom, out of season, in one fell swoop, for mere sport, leaving every last one dead. Two weeks before Thanksgiving, dumbbell Del Winston left rafter upon rafter of wild turkeys dead and rotting because he was too bone lazy to haul a single one home to clean. The killing was all that interested him. The Winston’s caught the devil from everyone and Del’s rifle was confiscated and held in the sheriff’s personal gun locker, without bail, until Del turned sixteen.
Del’s pitch was a passable effort but nothing that couldn’t be bested eventually. Boar season was full under way and it had been a year since Del had shot the life out of something so he was fairly prickly to win, by tyranny if necessary. He turned and shot a malignant glower over the crowd. He zoned in on Roger and Randall Lewis who were known for their good aim but who also favored the puny side of slim. The Lewis brothers and most other boys shriveled under Del’s daggered look and his penny sat uncontested, a clear two inches from the wall, pitch after pitch after pitiful pitch. Most of the boys were throwing the game altogether, fearing for life and limb should they win or God forbid welsh out. Del began parading around as if the game were all but won. I looked over at my brother, the smug swagger on Del’s face was making Cooper’s jaw tighten and his knuckles twitch. Del had convinced himself beyond doubt of his superior acumen while Cooper and everyone else standing around knew full well and good that it was fear alone keeping that sorry little pitch unchallenged. Cooper, who had chosen to go last, readied his weapon.
I scarcely believed my eyes as I stood back in the crowd and watched that corroded likeness of The Great Emancipator leap from my brother’s fingertips and sing through the air. Slack-jawed, I gaped and lamented at how that penny, if added to the others we had scavenged, could buy a multitude of goodies. Treasures untold. A penny equaled a million dollars in my childish mind and as far as I was concerned, it was a million dollars down the crack. My idiot brother was throwing out all of my untold treasures on a stupid penny pitch that—having never played before—he had exactly zero to no chance of winning. I wanted at that moment to grow a long arm, catch that penny in mid-air and run with it. But at the same time, I wanted him to beat Del Winston. Lord, did I want him to win. I prayed he would knock Del Winston’s pitch to kingdom come.
Cooper’s penny landed with a plink, rolled in an arc, spun like a top and fell silently flat, resting its copper rim a hair’s width from flush against the side of the shed. Hands down and by God, he won. And the crowd. Went. Nuts.
Twenty four boys pitched their pennies that morning but destiny smiled on only one: Cooper Grant Adams of Buck Fork Hollow. Destiny multiplied that rusted singular pittance into twenty one whole cents and three magnificent pieces of Black Jack chewing gum. We would pay dearly later in the month, Coop with a black eye and me with a busted lip, courtesy of a still unarmed Del Winston. But that is another story altogether.
The second that penny fell, Cooper’s head snapped around and his face searched the crowd for me. Our eyes landed and locked, a grin escaping the both of us. No words needed spoken, we’d hit the mother lode and both knew it. I elbowed my way through the throng to grab up the pennies, throwing poisoned dart glares at anyone who looked itchy to try and seize their ante back. Yes, even at six, I was a greedy little thing. I took care of the snatching and grabbing and let my brother bask in the glow, everyone slapping his back over and over. Del Winston skulked off, one penny further from his dream.
Cooper determined we would chew it during the long walk home after school. As I sat in class, my mouth watered thinking about it. Non-stop, I fidgeted in my seat as I could think of nothing but getting that gum onto my tongue and between my teeth. There were three pieces in our plunder, one for him, one for me, and one to split between the twins when we got home that evening. I admired and likewise detested my brother for being able to wait the whole day with it in his pocket. Seven hours and he never busted into it. I seriously doubt that the thought ever crossed his mind.
Around ten o’clock, the weak-kneed hunger set in. Breakfast did little to sustain me as it was burned off completely during the grueling walk to school. I was rarely able to wait until the lunch hour to open my bucket. The hunger would become so intolerable by ten, that daily during free time, when the teacher stepped out of the room to fill her coffee cup, I and a few other scrawny waifs from the hollows would abscond to the coat racks to feverishly choke down our paltry rations of corn meal biscuits. I often suspected that the teacher stepped out of the room deliberately whenever she heard the tell-tale grumbling of some undernourished child’s body. She was a kind woman by nature but also addicted to caffeine so it is hard to say what her intent was in leaving the class unattended for five to ten minutes at a time. In either case, come actual lunch, we hollow kids would sit empty handed, waiting for recess to begin so we could go outside to skip rope or play ball.
But the day of the gum, I could not concentrate even on playing and kept missing the rope and losing the rhythm and words to the songs. The gum hovered in my field of vision like a mirage taunting me and finally when the last bell rang, I bolted out the door as though the building were on fire, running to meet Coop underneath the tree out front.
I stared wide eyed at the mystical contents wrapped in the blue and black packaging that lay in Coop’s outstretched hand. It read simply:
BLACK JACK CHEWING GUM 5 STICKS ADAMS TM.
It even had our name on it. What a wonder.
I’d seen others chewing gum at recess and after church but had never gotten within three feet of an actual piece myself. Coop had been afforded the opportunity to sample gum a few times over the years, during school holiday parties when it was passed out by a benevolent teacher or a well-off member of the business community. I myself had not yet attended a free gum party and so the gum lay in Coop’s hand like an enigma, hypnotizing me with its store bought packaging and licorice scented vapors. As I stared at the gum it suddenly occurred to me that I might be dreaming, so I snapped out of my stupor and nabbed the piece up before it disappeared altogether. I unwrapped it and popped it straight into my mouth, savoring its anise sweetness for only a second before swallowing it all whole.
You ain’t supposed to swallow it! Coop yelled. Now look what you done! I havta share mine now!
Disgusted, Coop ripped off the packaging and tore his own piece in half, handing it to me with his brow thoroughly furrowed. As my eyes began to fill, Coop sighed and gentled his tone.
Now don’t swallow it, okay? Chew it. Like tobacco.
I nodded and took the gum. I lasted maybe thirty seconds on my second go. I bit into the little wad of gum and tried to keep one half between my teeth while swallowing the rest. It all went down the old garbage chute anyway. It was just that the chasm in my stomach stretched and howled as we started that taxing walk home and I reasoned that if I could bite the piece in two and swallow half of the half then maybe my gut would feel a smidge fuller then settle down and stop plaguing me with its relentless garbling. I would be able to make it home then without getting woozy, forced as always to climb on Coop’s back, punch-drunk from glassy-eyed hunger.
Not wanting to further disappoint, I fake chewed, smiled and waved whenever Cooper would look back at me, his mangy sick cat of sister, dragging behind, ever anemic and low of constitution. I hung in longer than usual with the walking however. Made it all the way to the creek bed on nothing but willpower and silent prayer. Eventually my pathetic lower appendages gave out and I became enveloped in the familiar fog. I began floating through the malaise, drifting inside that perpetual hungry state of being that would forever haunt my memory. Coop bent down and I climbed on board and was so relieved to be getting a ride that I forgot to keep up the fake chewing charade and Coop caught me.
Danggit he muttered.
With all of our belongings dangling around his neck, Coop carried me, like always, the rest of the way home. Whenever I would nod off and sag down his back, he would shrug upward a little, locking his elbows tighter around the backs of my bony knees.
I’m sorry I swallowed it Coop. I offered. It was good though.
S’alright he said. I should have waited ‘til we got home. We’ll have it after supper next time.
The words ‘next time’ hung in the air a moment before I fell asleep completely.
I awoke when we arrived home and Cooper set me down carefully in my usual spot, in the rocking chair by the stove. He backed into it, releasing me down to stretch his stinging back. I settled into that chair, bleary-eyed, disoriented, but when I looked at my brother, when I rubbed at my eyes and saw him handing our baby sisters their half sticks of gum to peals of delight, it occurred to me for the first time what the word sacrifice meant. In all the sermons I’d been forced to sit through, I’d heard the word a hundred times. Sacrifice, sacrifice. It meant nothing until that day. It had tossed about aimlessly, littering my mind like excelsior with no reward, no message to be received. I was a child and so it only lasted a moment but I can see that moment, that still-shot in time, that inkling toward a better awareness. In my mind’s eye, I can see me seeing him. I can see little Brody seeing the boy who tolerated all of her shortcomings to no conceivable end, the boy who bore the brunt of a fatherless, brotherless childhood. Cooper, walking around that little house, stopping here and there to work out the crick that I’d given him with my weight, those pennies jingling in his trouser pocket. Him, smiling at the babies chasing around his feet, him, watching their pale little lips smack with pleasure. I can see my brother, his hands on his waist, walking, walking, his back arching, his shoulder blades protruding through the back of his shirt like an angel stretching its wings.
Originally from Cleveland, CJ Clayton-Dippolito moved to Youngstown about 17 years ago. Her family roots, however, are grounded deep into the hollows of West Virginia. She has a deep affinity for stories set in Appalachian coal country and also ones that depict the struggles of everyday people living in the rust belt of the Great Lakes region. She has work published in Scifaikuest, Gloom Cupboard, No Fresh Cut Flowers: An Afterlife Anthology, Rubbertop Review and many other literary journals. She earned honorable mention in the 2010 AWP Intro-Journals Competition for her non-fiction piece Buck Fork Holler. She is currently working on a young adult novel set in Lakewood, Ohio.