Did I say Adam did not see Otis as a sympathetic character?
He couldn't figure out if Mrs. Spofford is aware of the hair-cutting incident--when Otis cut the hair of a girl who'd ripped buttons off his shirt, exposing his accidentally-dyed-pink-in-the-wash undershirt. He concedes it was wrong for Otis to do this, but the button ripping, that was not OK.
Last we read, Otis was on his way to Saturday skating and when he gets there he begins to realize, as did Adam as we read, that this time the kids are simply not happy with him. They avoid him, point and talk secretively, laugh at his misfortunes on the ice and generally seem pleased when Ellen and Austine make off with his boots, leaving him no choice but to chase after them in his ice skates. Even the other boys, Otis is dismayed to learn, conspire with the girls to keep Otis bootless. When he finally catches up he is breathless and achy, his feet in absolute agony.
It was the second trick Ellen had played on Otis. In class, the day he had cut a thick lock of her hair off, she had reminded Otis and their peers of his pink undershirt disgrace by calling him "Big Chief Pink Underwear." He'd demanded she retract it, she did, and then revealed she had "kings"--she had been crossing her fingers behind her back, the signal that means the person is not speaking the truth or will not keep a promise.
And now here she was at it again. He admits to himself it was a good joke, and she'd gotten even, but still...
Adam looked back over the pictures of a dejected Otis watching with resignation as the girls scramble away with his footwear; being left behind by the boys as they went for hot dogs without him; as he walks from the bus stop to his home, blades digging simultaneously into his feet as well as the cement. He pointed to the picture of Otis walking in ice skates and drew to my attention that there appeared to be sparks coming up from the ground each time his foot struck.
While I am no artist, I suppose it is fair to say these are rather simple pictures, yet they convey quite a lot and Adam wasn't missing much. He commented on Otis's puffed out, annoyed cheeks, his slumped back, that he looked...hurt.
"Perhaps," I commented, "this is the 'come-uppance' Mrs. Gitler referred to earlier."
As is often the case, things often don't work out exactly as one thinks they might, and Adam's pity for the wayward Otis soon turned to a sort of delight when Ellen and Austine approach him. Otis, whose apology Ellen had rejected, sat on the steps of his apartment building, aching but now relieved that he may get his boots back.
The girls force Otis to promise he will stop teasing Ellen. "And cross your heart and hope to die and stew and fry," repeated Austone firmly. Adam was almost bursting with excitement, partly because he knew something was going to happen, as the book was over in one page, partly because he didn't know what it was. But he seemed to be aware the book would end wth a bit of a bang. "It had to," as he said later, when we discussed the ending.
I'd tried to hide the last illustration as it gave away what happened, but when he saw it, he gave out a whoop as if he'd scored a precious victory. And I suppose he did.
No comments:
Post a Comment