Eddie's Choice: True-to-Life Series from Hamilton High, #11

Praise for Eddie’s Choice

The latest volume in Reynolds’ popular True-to-Life Series from Hamilton High is the ripped-from-the-headlines story of Eddie Barajas from Reynolds’ novel Shut Up. Now seventeen, he is a senior at Hamilton High. When he impulsively paints over incendiary graffiti on one of the school’s walls, he finds himself the target of a gang of white supremacists, who begin posting racist comments about him on social media (Eddie’s mom is Mexican; his almost stepdad is black.) One example: Enemy of free speech. Impure race. Defective. And then, after he stops one of their number from fleeing after a racially motivated incident, he is actually assaulted by a group of them, leaving him with a concussion and other serious injuries. Although he doesn’t see his assailants, he recognizes the voice of one of them as being that of a boy in his yoga class at school. What will he choose to do: tell the police or take matters into his own hands? Reynolds does an excellent job of capturing the climate of bigotry and hatred that increasingly affects the lives of contemporary Americans in the wake of the 2016 election. Never didactic, her story is dramatic and compelling while her characters are fully realized and highly empathetic, especially Eddie and Rosie, the girl he meets and falls in love with. The combination of gentle love story and novel of gritty realism makes for a compelling read. The pull-no-punches novel is sure to excite discussion and—excellent for both classroom use and independent reading—it is a valuable addition to Reynold’s excellent Hamilton High series.

—Michael Cart, Booklist columnist and reviewer

Reynolds’ novel crackles with electric dialogue and vivid day-to-day details today’s high school students will absolutely recognize as their own. The teens in Eddie’s Choice anguish about not only life-choices but the expectations and pressures of family and friends. Eddie’s Choice is a worthy successor to Reynolds’ other prize-winning True-to-Life from Hamilton High novels.

—Daniel Acosta, author of Iron River

Another intense, true-to-life teen novel from Ms. Reynolds has Eddie Barajas, grown-up and in high school. Eddie is thrust in to doing the right thing when he encounters members of the white supremacist group and has to face a life-threatening situation. Reynolds once again does not hold back and the intense and real life of teenager life and difficult choices is brought to reality. The reader is rooting for Eddie as he deals with his past and sorts his way through his journey to his future. My students love these books and for many students it is the first set of novels they truly enjoyed and comprehended."

—Robert Huynh, English teacher, San Gabriel High School, Alhambra CA

After surviving a traumatic event when he was much younger, Hamilton High teen Eddie, is facing a new problem.  Racial bulling and a group of white supremacists have affected the diverse students at school.  Should Eddie leave it alone or stand up to the bullies and put a target on his back?  Marilyn Reynolds writes what teens can relate to. She brings what is happening now in young people’s lives and creates a page turning novel.

—Ramona Cheek, Teacher-librarian, Central High School, Fresno

In this stand-alone sequel to Shut Up where Eddie was a victim of sexual abuse as a young boy, Reynolds expertly shows Eddie’s life as a teen experiencing his first love and learning what it means to be a true American.

— Dr. Joan F. Kaywell, Founder of the Ted Hipple Special Collection of Autographed YA & Tween Books

Right on target for Marilyn Reynolds: the continuation of Eddie’s story from Shut Up delves into the thinking and reasoning progress of the teen mind.

—Andrea Catania-Stephenson, Teacher-librarian, El Camino Fundamental High School, Sacramento

It’s often a challenge to find narratives that reflect the diversity of my young clients. Because I work in rural Eastern Washington, I have Hispanic clients, both teens and adults, who are especially concerned about some of the issues discussed in this book, including immigration policy and the white nationalist movement. Thank God for the Hamilton High Series! I’m grateful to have a book that explores issues of immigration policy and provides an opportunity for them to see people like themselves in a contemporary YA novel.

—Leesa Phaneuf, social worker, Walla Walla WA

The Complete True-to-Life Series

from Hamilton High

Telling

Detour for Emmy

Too Soon for Jeff

Beyond Dreams

But What About Me?

Baby Help

If You Loved Me

Love Rules

No More Sad Goodbyes

Shut Up

Eddie's Choice

EDDIE'S CHOICE

Marilyn Reynolds

New Wind Publishing

SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA

New Wind Publishing

Copyright © 2019 by Marilyn Reynolds

No part of this publication may be adapted, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without permission from the publisher. Like Marilyn Reynolds’ other novels, Eddie’s Choice is part of the True-to-Life Series from Hamilton High, a fictional, urban, ethnically mixed, high school somewhere in Southern California. Characters in the stories are imaginary and do not represent actual people or places.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, without prior written permission.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Reynolds, Marilyn, 1935-

Eddie's Choice / Marilyn Reynolds

Summary: Senior Eddie Barajas stands up against white supremacists at his high school and becomes their target, triggering his old fears and new choices.

ISBN 978-1-929777-11-2

LCCN 2019905416

Teenagers—Fiction. 2.White supremacy movements—Fiction. 3.Bullying—Fiction. 4. High schools—Fiction. I. Title. II. Series: Reynolds, Marilyn. 1935- True-to-life series from Hamilton High

Cover design: Tannehill Designs

New Wind Publishing

Sacramento, California 95819

www.newwindpublishing.com

Together, all things are possible.

—Cesar Chavez

To the young organizers and participants of

the Global Climate Strike, the Parkland youth

of #NeverAgain, the Gay Straight Alliance

Networks, and to young people everywhere

who work to heal our broken world.

Thank you to:

Katie McCleary and the Tuesday writers, Ed Cole, Susan Frazier, Kathy Les, Jasmine Shahbandi, and Julie Woodside

Jan Haag and her loft writers

Elizabeth Rosner and the Mendocino and Sea Ranch workshop participants

Deborah Meltvedt and her students at Health Professions High School in her Medical Science class and Creative Writing Club, especially Lizeth, Alaiya, Angelica, Desyre, Blair, Lilliana, Sami, Gracie, and Diana. 

Ramona Cheek, Teacher/Librarian, Central High School West, Fresno; Andrea Catania-Stephenson, Teacher/Librarian, El Camino Fundamental High School, Sacramento; Dr. Joan F. Kaywell, Founder of the Ted Hipple Special Collection of Autographed YA & Tween Books; for early readings, and for all they do on behalf of young readers of all levels and interests.

The 916 Ink writers at Walnutwood, especially Nick.

San Gabriel High School teachers, Cady Burkhart and Robert Huynh, and to their students for sharing their takes on life as they know it.

Maryam Jabari, Keith Atwater and Subei Reynolds Kyle for enlightening me in more ways than one.

Halima Smati of the Salam Islamic Center, and the participants in the center’s leadership program, for their openness and willingness to share experiences and perceptions with me.

Dale Dodson, Kathy Harvey, Karen Kasaba, Beth Silverstein and Jeannie Ward, for invaluable help as readers, and for so much more.

CONTENTS

Treading Water

What Eddie Knows

Smart Enough

The Handshake Test

Surprise Package

You Betcha

Irritable Teacher Day

A Different Wednesday

And You Eat Health Food?

WWCCD?

I Can See Your House from Here

True Patriot

Close Calls

Challenges

Watch Out

Solidarity

Not Just Criminals

A Reverse Mohawk

The Lie

A Late Christmas

Too Soon

Strength

Revelation

A Lie Revealed

In Custody

Celebration

Transitions

CHAPTER ONE

Treading Water

Iturn into Brent’s driveway and give a quick beep of the horn. Labor Day Sunday. Last beach day before we start our senior year at Hamilton High. Brent comes out with his rolled-up beach towel, his mom close behind. She comes to my side of the car.

Hey, Mama B.

Hi, Eddie, she says, handing sunscreen and a straw hat through the window. Make sure that clown uses these, will you?

I take the hat and sunscreen from her and put them on Brent’s lap. He won’t listen to me. Maybe you should come with us?

Hmmm. Maybe, she says. We laugh.

Brent punches me in the arm. Let’s go!

I’ve known Brent since kindergarten. We used to be at each other’s houses a lot, back when we were still climbing trees and building Lego cities. I always had dinner at his house on pizza night, and when it was pizza night at our house, he had dinner with us.

Back then, we always sat next to each other in class, too—Brent Bruno, Eduardo Barajas, with no B names in between—so we knew each other pretty well.

Cameron’s waiting in front of his house, so busy with his phone he doesn’t even look up until I give him a loud blast of the horn.

Brent and I are kind of average looking. We probably weigh about the same, somewhere in the low 150s. We were the same height in the fourth grade, and we’re the same height now, except then we were 4’3 and now we’re 5’9. I’m a little darker. His hair’s curlier. But, you know, pretty average. My mom, Max, says I can’t possibly be average looking because of my sparkling eyes and my manly physique. She goes overboard with that manly physique stuff though. I mean, yeah, I work out some and do the strength building kind of yoga, so I’m a little bit buff. Nothing special, though, except to a mom.

Cameron’s tall, probably six feet, and skinny, light hair with a face full of freckles and zits. And he dresses funny, always a long-sleeved white shirt with a tie, like he’s a 1950s TV dad, except his tie is always loose, and his sleeves are rolled up. And he wears Tough Skin Jeans. Tough Skins! The kind nobody over the age of eight would be caught dead wearing!  But the thing is, Cameron’s always got a bunch of girls hanging around him. Popular girls, too, like the whole Hamilton High cheer team. I don’t get it. Brent thinks it’s because Cameron plays drums. He says girls like drummers. Maybe so.  Brent’s got those four sisters, so he knows about girls.

I pull into the Gato Gas station at the edge of town. Cash only. Windshield cleaner and paper towel bins are always empty. The little window on the pump with the rolling dials that show how much gas you’re getting and how much money it’s costing is so scratched up you can’t read any of the numbers. But it’s cheap.

Cameron and Brent go inside to pay for gas. That’s the deal. My car. Their gas.

While they’re paying and pumping, I pull The Autobiography of Malcolm X from under the seat and find my place. William, my sort of stepdad, loaned the book to me.  I usually like his books. It’s about a black guy who was a straight A student in junior high school. He was crazy smart, and he wanted to be a lawyer, but after some white teacher told him practicing law wasn’t a realistic goal for a nigger, he dropped out. How screwed up is that?

I was about halfway through ninth grade when William and his daughter, Imani, AKA the pest, moved in with us. She was in kindergarten then, and she always pestered me to watch Frozen with her, and to be Kristoff to her Anna. That, or I’d barely get off my bike in the driveway and she’d come running out, both arms lifted, yelling, Swing me! Swing me!

Anyways, the first thing William did after he got Imani’s room set up with her Frozen bedspread, and posters, and her giant stuffed Sven pillow, was to add another section of bookshelves under the dining room window, next to Max’s, where she had all of her books carefully arranged.

So I should tell you why me and my brother call our mom Max. It’s from a long time ago when we were both still little. I was probably about four, so Mario was around twelve. We’d been complaining, me mostly, but Mario, too, about how our mom was never around like other moms—Brent’s mom, or Mario’s friend Walker’s mom. I hated daycare and that she didn’t bring cupcakes on my birthday. Mario hated that he had to walk me home from daycare at 4:30 every day and stay with me ’til Max got home from work. On what I guess was a seriously whiny day, Max sat us in our triangle at the kitchen table and said, Let’s get this straight. Max is famous for her Let’s get this straight talks. At least she’s famous for them with me and Mario.

On that day, after one whine too many, it was "Let’s get this straight. I’m sorry I got you guys such a minimum dad. I wish he’d been the kind of dad who took care of you, who took care of us of all. He wasn’t a good dad to you, Mario. I know you still remember some of that. And he wasn’t any kind of dad to you, Eddie. Ever. He was just the sperm donor for you."

I didn’t know what she meant by sperm donor back then, but Max never talked down to us. She went over her whole schedule, Macy’s, and the National Guard to make enough money to support us, Dental Assistant school so pretty soon she could get a better job that paid more.

See, it’s because he was such a minimum dad that I’ve got to be a maximum mom.

And from then on, we called her Max. But back to the bookshelves.

William’s shelves are the same height, but they don’t exactly match. Max’s are made of oak, a light tan, and William’s are Ikea-black.

It wasn’t planned that way or anything, but it’s kind of symbolic how Max-the-Mexican has brown bookshelves that hold a lot of brown people stories—stuff by Sandra Cisneros and Gary Soto, and about Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta. And William-the-African-American has black bookshelves with a lot of black people stories, like about Martin Luther King and Booker T. Washington, and a book we read in 9th grade English, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, plus this book I’m reading right now, The Autobiography of Malcolm X.

Not long after William and Imani moved in, Brent came over to play video games. He looked at the tan shelves and read a few titles, and the black shelves and read a few titles, and said, Where’re the white shelves?

William called out from the other room, The white shelves are in your classrooms, and your library, and every other damned place in this country!

Just asking, Brent called back.

William laughed. Just sayin’.

TANK FILLED AND BACK on the 210, I switch the radio to 105.2, classic rock. Our compromise station. If Cameron had his way, it would be the jazz station. Brent? Hip-hop. Me? Probably pop-rock with a bit of Latin.

Triple digit heat and the air is heavy with L. A. basin smog so the beach is the place to be. But traffic is bumper to bumper on the 605, the freeway we’d take to the beach, so I stay on the 210.

Traffic sucks, I say. Let’s go to the lake.

That’s cool, Cameron says. There’s always a lot of fierce girls at Arrowhead.

Instead of going on to Arrowhead, I take the turn off to Lake Gregory. Closer and probably not as crowded.

Not Gregory, Cameron groans. Too many rug rats.

Driver’s choice, I say.

At the lake we strip down to our trunks, grab our towels, lock our phones in the car, run to the shore, plunge into the cold mountain water, and race to the dock. Cameron gets there first, then me, then Brent. That’s how it’s been since we were freshmen, like 99% of the time. Cameron’s always the fastest—fastest out of the car, fastest to the dock, fastest out of class, fastest to the lunch table. Maybe longer legs have something to do with it, but it’s like he’s always in a hurry, always has to be first in line, always has to be first to get wherever he’s going. He just got his license three months ago, and he’s already had two speeding tickets.

On the dock and shaking water from my hair, I see these four girls sitting near the ladder, watching. I dive back in and swim farther out to a buoy. When I look back, I see that Cameron’s already got the girls looking at him like he’s a god or something. Like I said, I don’t get it. Cameron’s so skinny you can barely see him when he stands sideways. And there’s the zits. But the girls hang around him like he’s Justin Bieber or something.

I duck underwater to cool off, and when I come up, I see this girl swimming toward the buoy, about five feet away. She takes another stroke and reaches for the buoy. I move over to make room for her. Awkward.

Hi, she says.

Hi, I say, letting go of the buoy and treading water.

You don’t remember me, do you?

I give her a closer look. I guess I’ve seen her around school, but remember? No. I’m not too good at this talking to girls shit.

I’m Rosie. Fourth grade.  Ms. Summers’ class.

I tread water.

Oh, yeah, I say. You’ve changed.

She laughs. I hope so!

I tread water.

I remember those funny cat pictures you used to draw, and your jokes. It’s like you always had a joke, and you were so funny, Ms. Summers never got mad at you.

I still tread water.

Know any jokes? she asks.

Just, you know, little kid jokes.

Tell me a little kid joke. I’ve got a little sister who loves little kid jokes.

I tread water.

The thing is, I do know a lot of little kid jokes because of Imani. We have a deal that if I tell her a joke, she has to not mention anything about Frozen for thirty minutes.

Come on.

Yeah, so, well...Why does the elephant bring toilet paper to the party?

I don’t know...why?

No, you have to guess.

"Ummmm. Because toilet paper was on sale?’

Noooo. Because he was a party pooper.

Rosie laughs like, I don’t know, like I’ve turned into that Bo Burnham comedian guy or something. Her laugh gets me laughing so hard I have to grab the buoy to stay up.

Brent dives from the dock and comes up in front of our buoy, wiping water from his eyes.

Man, I could hear you laughing all the way from the dock! What’s so funny?

Hard to say, I tell him, my laughter fading into the water.

Try me, he says. What’s so funny.

He looks from me to Rosie, whose laughter has also faded...but her smile hasn’t. I’m noticing she’s got a great smile.

You had to be here, I tell him.

"I am here."

"But you weren’t."

Okay, Rosie says, Why does the elephant bring toilet...

NOOOO! Not the old party pooper elephant joke!

Brent lunges at me, pushing my shoulders down. I sink under the buoy. Come up on the other side. Brent lunges again, and again I go under. This time when I come up, Rosie’s swimming in the direction of the dock, already halfway there. I don’t know a lot about girls, but I do know they get bored when guys start messing around.

Brent reaches for the other side of the buoy.

Why was she out here talking to you?

I don’t know. She said she remembered me from Palm Ave. Fourth grade.

I went to Palm Ave. She never talks to me.

Maybe she doesn’t remember you. She remembers me because I was funny.

I was funny at Palm Avenue in the fourth grade. I was funnier than you. Besides, you were barely even in fourth grade at Palm. You were supposed to be master of ceremony for that Harvest Festival thing, and you didn’t even show up for it. You didn’t show up again until the ninth grade, so how can she remember you and not me?

Maybe I’m just memorable.

Your hand’s memorable. Everybody remembers Captain Hook. Maybe if I had a creepy Captain Hook hand, she’d remember me.

Doubt it, I say, sinking under water and surfacing right before I get to the dock. We’re like that, Cameron and Brent and I, always raggin’ on each other. That’s what friends do. Guys, anyways. Brent’s Blockhead. He’s one of the smartest guys I know. He even did that Academic Decathlon thing last year. Except he could never take a math question.  He can count to 100, add two and two, and say his times tables up to the fives. That’s about it. And get this: Brent’s dad wants him to be an engineer, like he is.

Cameron is Zitter, for obvious reasons. I’m Captain Hook, or mostly just Hook.  On my right hand, I’ve got a thumb, two grown together stubs for my index finger and my middle finger, and just a glob of flesh where my fourth finger and pinkie would attach, if I had a fourth finger and a pinky. I came out that way. Not a problem. I can do anything anyone else can. Well, I didn’t take piano lessons, but I’m okay. My hand’s a mark of distinction. People who don’t remember my name say: that kid with the hand. Which is stupid because all the kids have hands, but everyone knows they’re talking about me when they say that kid with the hand.

I start up the ladder to the dock. Too many people. I mostly like people one or two at a time. Three’s about my limit. I slide back into the water and swim to shore.

LATER, WHEN I SEE ROSIE walk to the drink stand, I go scoot in behind her. I don’t want a drink—I just want to stand near her. I know it sounds crazy, but something happened out there