I have an eight-year-old cousin whom I absolutely adore named Brenton. Brenton has a five-year-old sister named Emily. Emily and my sister have always been close. Andrea has taught her dance, had girl days with Em, and gone shopping with her. I took it upon myself to do these things with Brenton.
Summer of 2007, unemployed, I took Brenton out of day camp to introduce him to Transformers.
Brenton loved it
There are certain movies that I will forego sleep to see. Transformers, Harry Potter, Twilight, and when Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief comes out I will be one of the first in line.
Brenton found out I was seeing the midnight movie. He asked his mom if he can go. She said no.
“But I’ve stayed up until midnight lots of times,” Brenton told his mother.
He didn’t get to go.
Tuesday night, I was in line with the sibs and Miss Jada waiting for the movie to begin. Wednesday, I got up after two hours of sleep, went to camp and then stayed there for the overnight. It was sadistic and masochistic, I know, but I felt I owed it to Optimus to be there to see the movie at the earliest opportunity possible
Anyway, the overnight…camp is on the Westside of town. Melody, my aunt (Brenton’s mom) picked me up food and dropped it off on her way home from work. It was nice that she passed the campsite on her way to and from work because the food grilled was not food I would order in a four-star restaurant because of my pickiness.
She drops the food off and Em climbs into the front seat to ask if she can sleep in a tent with me. I don’t see Brenton.
Mel says Brenton is in the car.
That’s when I see a head peak up from the back and then a hand strikes the window. Mel says something to him, but he ignores her as he rolls down the window and makes sure I know that he hasn’t seen Transformers yet. I tell him I haven’t forgotten, that Mel and I will something out.
I talk with Mel on Monday, June 29 (the movie has been out for almost a week) to ask her about the coming week – we both have Friday off due to Fourth of July – and to see when I might be able to take Brenton to the movies.
“He said you were taking him Sunday,” Mel says.
“What?” I ask. “I didn’t think I told him a date.”
“You didn’t,” Mel says. “But he was hell bent on you taking him. I told him he had baseball practice, and he had to go because it was his first practice. He told me that he would have lots of practices.”
Anyway, Mel isn’t sure what their plans for the weekend are. I call on Wednesday night after my yoga class and Brenton answers the phone.
“I thought we were going to see Transformers on Sunday,” is the greeting I receive.
“Well, Buddy,” I say going for diplomatic, “You had that baseball practice. I didn’t think you’d really want to miss it. Mom and I are working on something though.
He’s somewhat pacified and hands the phone off to his mother.
Mel thinks they might go to a water park on Friday if Chris, my uncle, is off work.
Friday comes around, and I call Mel to see if they did indeed go to the pool. It’s a hot day and I like hanging with my cousins. Plus I can work on my tan. Mel tells me Chris had to work. I ask her about their afternoon plans and I learn that they will have some free time around two. A perfect opportunity for me to take the Little Man to the movies. Since we’re both driving to the gym (she on the Westside, me on the North), she says she’ll call back after Zumba to discuss times. Before I hang up, I ask her if Brenton knows what we’re planning. She says no because he is listening to his Ipod.
She calls back and we settle on 2:40. I ask to talk to Brenton.
“When are we going to see Transformers,” he asked me in rather unhappy voice.
“Mom and I working on things,” I tell him and then we have a very sarcastic conversation centered around their lunch at Red Lobster and him declaring very loudly that he will eat the lobster and yes, he’ll video tape it for me if that will make me happy.
His sarcasm makes me so happy. To be so young and so cynical…the boy has great potential. In fact, I call every ten days or so to get my fill of sarcasm. I’ve been told that he’s going to tase me, that if I bring a boyfriend over like Andrea, he’ll tase my boyfriend, that he’ll beat an ass…it’s pretty great. My heart soars when I hear the potential in his voice.
Anyway, I meet Mel at the movie theatres and I have some old t-shirts that I am gifting the kids with. Emily is ecstatic to get new clothes and has a big grin as she sorts through what is hers and what is Brenton’s.
Brenton isn’t happy and he scowls in the backseat.
“Why did we have to meet you at the movies?” he asks me.
“She wanted to give us this,” Mel says and I put the pieces together and realize that Mel is still keeping the secret.
“Why the movies,” he whines.
“I’m meeting a friend to see a movie,” I say.
“Transformers?!” he shrieks and then begins to have a meltdown.
This goes on for a few seconds before Melody hands him money.
“What is this for? To make me stop?” he asks mightily pissed off. I wish my mother would’ve bribed me like that back in the day.
I look at Brenton and say “I’m going to the movies with a friend.”
A slow, sly grin breaks over his little face. “With me?” he asks.
“And me,” chimes in Emily.
Brenton gets out of the car and Emily has a meltdown when she learns she isn’t going.
But the story doesn’t end with Brenton seeing the movies.
We see a matinee and the movie costs $12.50. Then we buy popcorn for $5.50.
“$5.50!” Brenton hisses.
“The movies aren’t cheap, Brenton,” I tell him. “Do you have pockets,” I ask and hold out his money. He looks and doesn’t find any. “Want me to put it in mine?”
“No,” he says and grabs the money. We enter the movie and sit down. Ten minutes later, he passes the money off to me to put in my pocket.
He’s enjoying the movie, but halfway through, he decides he needs some candy, so we go back to the concessions. I hand him his money.
“This is all I have!” he asks of the remaining seven dollars I gave him. “I had a ten!”
“We used the ten for popcorn, Brenton, and they gave you back the five.”
He isn’t happy with this and yammers on about it some more. Seriously, I feel like I am being accused of stealing an eight-year-old’s money. Who honestly steals from a child? Alcoholics and addicts maybe. And yes, I’m all for margarita Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday…etc…but I control my urges until Friday.
We get back to the counters and I realize its not that I am being accused of stealing, it is that he has inherited my Grandma Rita’s penchant for cheapness. This proves that cheapness is genetic because Grandma passed away two years before he was born. It is quite astounding.
How cheap was Grandma?
In 1999, she was still wearing polyester clothes from the 70’s because the clothes were still in good shape. Well, that was up for debate, but I guess the clothes did manage to cover her, though they were a hideous eye sore upon all who looked at the clothes.
The woman also took the bus everywhere. She never ever had a driver’s license. My Papaw Jimmy pleaded with her to get her license, telling her he would get her any car she wanted: Mercedes, Lexus, hell, Rita, even a Ferrari and she simply told him “The bus will take me wherever I need to go.”
Note: my grandfather wasn’t poor and could have easily bought her one of the aforementioned cars. Yet she still horded money like it was 1927 and the stock market had just unemployed the entire country (You know…thinking about the state of the country today…maybe she as onto something). During my mother’s years growing up, Grandma would get groceries and pay bills and what was left over would be put into a bond. My Papaw and Uncle Danny finally convinced her in the 80’s to cash in over 30 years worth of bonds. It totaled over $100,000 and she demanded it all in cash. Once she had all of her unmarked bills, she walked outside at Fall Festival time, a big street festival with carnies and people with two teeth in their head not to mention a few who possibly make the sewers their homes, to wait for the bus. My aunt found her before the bus got there and my grandmother yelled, yelled with all of these…people (for lack of a better word) around that she had over $100,000 in her purse. My aunt drove her home.
Back to the present. Brenton approaches the concession stand with his money in hand and asks for Buncha Crunch. They tell him it’s $2.50 and Brenton has a mini-meltdown with there.
“This is all I have left!” he hisses as he holds up $4.50 in one hand and the Buncha Crunch in the other. “Mom gave me all that money and THIS is all I have!”
I just smile and lament upon the ridiculous prices that the movie charges and ask him if he was glad that I snuck those drinks in for us.
And as we sit down, I know that this child is going to do great things.
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