The end of Ezzy's escape (cont) (Ezzy's Education: Part 8) By Garrett Murch
[Ezzy] stared at the sun-singed hills as they rolled south over the bumpy road. Her phone made a sound. A notification popped up on its screen: “InstaTok Alert: Trunk Langston Speaking NOW on Ebbing High School Page.”
I don’t want to watch this. She clicked on the notification. “Trunk Langston is speaking on InstaTok. Want to listen to his nonsense?”
Her father did not reply.
“He’ll probably tell people how great he is and how we are lousy,” Ezzy mused. “But we will be great like him again if only we show him how great we think he is.” Ezzy saw amusement in her father’s eyes his sunglasses could not hide from the side. “So do you want to listen?”
“If you want me to I will.”
“I’m taking that as a yes.” Ezzy set her phone to play on the truck’s speakers. “Get ready, Dad. This guy’s a piece of work. He’s wearing his football jersey. He’s number one.” She turned up the volume and looked at her phone screen.
The growl of Trunk Langston broke the brief silence as half the sun remained above the hills. “Fellow Ebbing Sentinels,” Trunk said, his face down as if he was reading. He looked up and continued:
“Well, you used to be Marauders, but whatever. Sentinels, Marauders, who really cares. I prefer Marauders, but that’s just me. We can be Marauders again. We’ll get there; we’ll get there.”
Trunk’s mouth straightened for half a second then returned to a frown. He looked back down.“Much is at stake in our upcoming election. We must make a choice.” Trunk looked up again:
“Of course we have to make a choice: it’s either me or Evil Lucinda Barron! Make a choice… No shit, what the...”
He looked down again:
“Are we grown up enough to make responsible decisions for ourselves?”
He looked up:
“Of course we are. What is this bullsh—”
Ezzy and her father were now both laughing and trying to keep their laughs silent so they could continue to hear Trunk. Ezzy felt a muscle in her abdomen sort of convulse. It didn’t hurt. She hadn’t laughed this hard in a while.
Trunk looked down again with his mouth open:
“Or do we need our hands held, our every action dict—dict—”
Trunk seemed not to breathe for a moment:
“Dictated by an ambitious, oo-topian doo—do-gooder.”
“Ha!” Mateo laughed. “He has a point, but that delivery. It could use some work.” “Shush, Dad.” Ezzy was still laughing inside, not caring if she pulled a stomach muscle.
The sound of paper being crumpled took over the cab of the truck. Trunk threw the ball of paper and Ezzy thought it was going to fly through the screen of her phone. She playfully ducked to avoid it.
Trunk continued.
“Enough of this. I’m just going to speak regular. I know you love that. That’s how I connect with you guys. If you vote for Lucinda Barron, you are voting for a witch. No, no, I didn’t say ‘bitch;’ it would be wrong to call Loser Lucinda a ‘bitch,’ but ‘witch’ is okay, am I right? You know, you can call her a bitch if you want; I’ll just say ‘witch.’”
Trunk paused as if waiting for a reaction.
“You’ll see what you get with Trunk at Friday night’s homecoming game. Trunk will be throwing big, beautiful passes. Yes, they will be beautiful. And if you cheer for me, you will be beautiful too.”
Trunk slapped his own neck and hollered, “I hate flies!”
“What was that?” Ezzy’s father asked.
“I think a bug bit him. Shh.”
Trunk stuck his nose up high and continued.
“And yes, I know I need to give a shout out to Kelile. Sometimes I don’t give him enough credit, you know. He’s an okay blocker, am I right? That’s right, a little juice for Kelile and his people. Trunk will be very good for the Blacks.”
Trunk’s eyes grew angry.
“Oh, and one final thing. This speech. I know it started out a little different. It wasn’t the Trunk talk I know you love. That’s because it was written by Little Link Conary. Little Link, that’s what I call him. Little Link with the little... You know. Well, Little Link can’t write, and he is a fake Patriot. Watch out for that guy. I think he’s working for Lucinda. Can’t be trusted. So sad.”
Trunk shook his head.
“And another final thing. Ezzy Bello, I know you’re watching. Ezzy, Little Link has a huge crush on you. He thinks you’re wicked smart. That’s right, everyone. Little Link with the little you-know-what has a crush on Ezzy Bello. Give it up, Little Link. You don’t stand a chance.”
Ezzy and her father were no longer laughing. “Did you know about this, Ezzy?”
“News to me.”
“Did Lucinda pay Trunk to talk like this?”
Ezzy shrugged and said, “The speech would make more sense if she had.”
Trunk cleared his throat.
“Ezzy Bello, you know I love the Latins: the good ones, like you could be if you support me. The bad ones, not so much.”
“Enough!” Ezzy yelled, straining blood vessels in her head. She did not yell often. “Can we turn around and go back to camp?” She closed InstaTok.
“He’s going to be a sociopath,” her father said.
“He already is.”
The sky off to their right had become faint peach.
“Some of the kids love him. I don’t get it. And I mean they love him. It’s like they think he’s their savior.”
“Makes sense,” her father said. “He’s not Lucinda, and he fights Lucinda.”
“Yeah, and she’s a narcissistic control freak.”
“There you go.”
“They both constantly bring up my ethnicity. Is that all I am to them? A skin color?” Her father didn’t answer, but Ezzy saw concern on his face.
“They think it benefits them to bring it up,” she said. “I’m pretty sure that’s why.” She rolled down the passenger window, which had started fogging up.
“The national Patriot and Justice politicians do the same thing,” her father said.
“But why?”
“I don’t know.”
“What’s your best guess?” Ezzy asked.
“We’re just part of a voting bloc to the politicos, not unique individuals. Something that can help them win.”
“Probably so,” Ezzy said. “I can’t stand that. They’re both wrong, the way they bring race and ethnicity into things. I’ve heard some Patriots suggest racism is virtually non-existent, which I know from experience is not true. But people pushing so-called Justice—including this person who spoke to my English class a couple weeks ago—they say racism is everywhere you look. And we’ve had to watch these videos that say things like excellence, merit, nuclear families, and even free speech are these secret tools of racism. Can you believe that?”
“Racism was far worse when I grew up in New York City thirty years ago. It’s not like that here in Maine.”
“I don’t understand why people who claim to be the world’s biggest enemies of racism always do things that make us think of ourselves as different because we’re not White.”
“You’re half White,” her father said.
They passed silently through a winding stretch along a small lake where large trees hung over the recently paved road. Ezzy got to see the small island with the little brown and cream cabins, side by side with matching rouge shutters, enclosed by birch trees. She had been fascinated by those cabins since she was a little girl. The cabins soon escaped Ezzy’s view and their drive continued along a curvy stretch through brittle birch trees that years ago had many more leaves before their branches started dying.
“Pretty much everyone thinks racism is evil, and no one wants injustices,” Ezzy said. “I don’t think we need someone like Lucinda to solve these problems. She’s trying to make people feel helpless so they think they need her, so they vote for her.”
“Possibly,” her father said.
“But Trunk seems to think the only problem on earth is Lucinda Barron. He doesn’t know a damn thing other than how to get people riled up. Elect him and school will be great again, just don’t ask him how or why.”
Her father grinned.
“And you don’t have to look any further than Trunk to know toxic masculinity exists,” Ezzy said. “But you know what? I like most of the football players. They’re masculine, and they’re some of the best guys at school. I think Lucinda’s using this whole ‘toxic masculinity’ thing for some other agenda. I’m not exactly sure what.”
Realizing her father was letting her talk, Ezzy kept talking. “And, my word, I do not feel discriminated against because of my race or my ethnicity. Maybe others feel differently, but I just don’t. My gender some, without a doubt, but some of that comes from girls and women, not just boys and men.”
“You sound like someone who should become a leader.”
“I’m going to be a biologist like you. Only better.” They both laughed.
They were silent for several minutes as the stars began revealing themselves. “So who is this poor boy Link? I feel sorry for him already.”
Ezzy smiled. She had already forgotten Trunk mentioned Link Conary. “He’s a guy at school, a senior. Came here a couple years ago. I’ve never talked with him much. He’s in my Advanced Political English class and he’s a pretty smart guy. He’s a Patriot.”
“Advanced Political English?”
“The teacher pushes Justice politics more than any other teacher.”
“So Link’s got the hots for you?”
“Who knows. I think Kayla Jennings—she’s this beautiful field hockey player, also smart—I heard she has a thing for Link.”
“The poor boy. He just got thrashed by Trunk. You shouldn’t hurt him.”
“Yeah.” Ezzy unlocked her phone. She had a new message from Verica. She opened it.
Ezzy,
Lucinda says 2:30 p.m. tomorrow works and she will see you then. We noticed you still haven’t reacted to Lucinda’s video. Please do that tonight. Did you see you got a strange shout out from Trunk in his video? He is such a train wreck. We feel good about our campaign now, thanks to Trunk for revealing how dumb and wretched he is. If you can’t hide your wretchedness, you won’t be good in politics, Trunk!
—Verica
PS: I love the pronouns in your email signature. We knew you were for Justice!
The PS threw Ezzy off. What is Verica talking about?’ She scrolled to her earlier reply to Verica. There it was. The end of her message read “Ezzy Bello (She/Hers).”
“Dad!”
“I’m right here.”
“Mom broke into my email.”
“What? How?”
“I don’t know, but she did. She must have.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I suddenly have pronouns automatically added to the end of the emails I send.”
“How do you know it was your mother?”
“I guarantee it. Friday morning before school, she was pleading with me to add them and I refused. She thinks I’m going to help her prove her Justice credentials for her school board race. She said she needs Justice credentials because we live in a college town. I left my iPad on the coffee table. I don’t lock it.”
“Oh my,” her father said. “I’ll talk with her. We’re almost home.” He sighed. “Let me handle it.”
“I’m getting rid of them right now.”
“Okay.”
“She can’t use me like this; I’m her daughter for crying out loud.”
“Your mother loves you.”
“You always say that.” Ezzy kept a tear from escaping her eye.
“Because she does. And don’t forget, you would not exist if it wasn’t for her. Literally.”
Ezzy thought about that for a moment, then said, “Now can you see why I don’t tell her anything?”