Green Grass on the Sunny Side of the Street (and other tales of a childhood gone bad)

By Chris Plante

Green Grass on the Sunny Side of the Street is written through the eyes of an eight year old boy. It covers a few years of his life, and poignantly captures the innocence of how the boy sees and feels about the confusing things said to him and the contradictions surrounding him. Each chapter is a snapshot in a moment of a childhood that for our main character is not all he would dream it to be. He deals with loneliness, the mental attacks of his parents, his attempts to understand the world, and the inability to feel accepted by good people around him. His thoughts spill out onto the pages and leave a trail of colorful entries that give us all an insight to a childhood experience none of us hope to see repeated. The book is for adults. My hope is that readers will be more easily able to recognize a mentally abusive situation going on within a family of a friend or relative, and then have the courage to take positive corrective action.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Chris Plante
• Release date: Nov 20, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465777621

Chris Plante

Chris Plante lives in Riverside, California with his wife of 20 years and their to teenage boys. The family owns a music lessons business, The Musik Planet, where 11 teachers give instruction in various instruments. In his free time he spends time at the computer keyboard with his thoughts.

Book preview

Green Grass on the Sunny Side of the Street

and other tales of a childhood gone bad

By

Chris Plante

Copyright 2011 Chris Plante. All rights reserved.

All rights reserved under the International and Pan American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recorded, photocopied, or otherwise, without prior permission of the copyright owner, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Smashwords Edition

Young minds, open to learn,

Young hearts, open to love,

Young souls needing attention,

Young faces needing to smile.

You can’t be that,

Said the man.

I can’t be that,

Thought the boy,

Wondering why, but too afraid to ask.

This isn’t a story. It’s a series of mostly nightmarish events that happened to a little boy who grew up in spite of it all.

Part

ONE

DIALING FOR DOLLARS

I have never seen my parents together; at least I don’t remember seeing them together. They are divorced. I don’t see my mom much. She works all day to pay the rent. Sometimes she works on the weekends. Sometimes she is here with me, and sometimes she is out on a date. I hardly see her. I spend my time around people I don’t know. I sit in someone’s house who I don’t know and watch Dialing for Dollars. They have pretty girls on the show who call people. If your phone rings and it’s one of them, they give you a bunch of money. I sit next to the phone, waiting, waiting. They will call me. I know they will, soon. Then I’m going to take the money I win and put it in the bank so my mom can stay home.

57’ T BIRD

We have to move again. I didn’t have time to make friends here, anyway. The new place is in another town. It’s smaller, and there’s a mean old lady who lives in the house in front. We’re moving into the house in the back. My mom’s boyfriend is going to live with us. He got her to buy a new car. Well, it’s an old car, but it’s really expensive. It cost too much for her to have it and pay for the house we are living in now. They take the top off and go away whenever my mom doesn’t have to go to work, and I stay home. The mean old lady in front watches me from a window in her house. She can see right into our house from her kitchen.

I watch television and listen to my favorite record, Puff the Magic Dragon. I don’t know what it means, I just like the music. I eat at the mean lady’s house. The food is runny and the water has stuff swimming in it. Her dog begs at my feet.

Can I have a dog? I ask my mom.

No, we can’t have a dog here, the lady who owns the house says so.

She just doesn’t want us to bring in a bigger dog then she has, I say to myself out loud, one that could eat her dog. We would never be able to bring a dog home, anyway. There is only room for two people in our car. It’s too nice a car to have a dog slobbering in. It’s a stupid car. I want a friend. The stupid car can’t be my friend.

HOT WHEELS & G.I. Joes

Hot Wheels. G.I. Joes. I play with my toys. My toys keep me company. My toys keep me quiet. My toys keep me inside. My mom is gone. I talk to my toys. They talk back in my mind. They have friends. I imagine people in little cars racing down yellow tracks. They go upside down in a loop, and then they bank hard left, then hard right. They crash. One is the winner. Next time the other is the winner. I try to make it fair so they both feel good and stay friends. I make it fair so they both look good to all the imaginary people watching the race. Then they both get the imaginary girls. They drive off down their yellow tracks to the end. I put them in a box and close the lid.

G.I. Joe is being attacked. Its okay, his friend will cover for him. Quick, run to the space capsule, I yell to him. Then I put him in and lift him really high, as high as I can lift my arms, and then he drops an imaginary bomb on the enemy. Kill the enemy, I yell. Kill them so people back home don’t have to be communists. Kill them so people can keep living in their houses. So people can drive nice two-seater cars. So moms can leave their little boys at home and go away when they want to.

MARTHA

A lady moved into the house behind us. It’s not really a house; it’s more like a room. She uses our kitchen. She doesn’t speak like we do. My mom trades her food for playing with me. I play and she watches television. She repeats the words she hears. She holds the T.V. Guide in one hand and walks around.

I love Lucy, Hi O’ Silver, ride em’ cowboy, oh, kiss me again Jack, she reads aloud as she moves back and forth past the T.V.

Then she moves away.

Thanks, she says to my mom. Bye, she says to me. She drives off.

My mom grabs her suitcase. Her boyfriend is in the car making a lot of noise with the engine.

Bye, she says to me.

I lay down in front of the television. A man sits in a chair, his feet up. His wife is on the couch, knitting. Two boys are playing hide-and-go-seek. They run outside, into their front yard. Their dog barks. They chase him, around and around. They bark. He barks again. I bark.

THE ALLEY

My mom is home. I can go outside now. I ride my bike down the alley. I race with some alley boys my age. We speed past trash cans and garage doors. We stop to rest. A boy leans his bike up against an old car with a nice paint job. We race down the alley. My mom’s boyfriend drags me down the alley. We take my bike. He measures my bike with the scratch on the old car. I know who did it but I’m not going to tell. The car won’t, either. It’s just a stupid car, it’s nobody’s friend. It’s not worth my friend. The guy who owns the car is there. He throws up his hands.

I help my friend clean the shiny paint off the end of his handlebar. We race down the alley. I have to go in, my mom is leaving.

Thanks, my friend says to me.

Bye, I say to him. I go inside. I sit down in front of the television. I hear the car drive off down the alley. Bye, I say to no one.

PICTURES

My mom’s boyfriend has a daughter. She is older than me. She comes to stay for a week.

Let’s play hospital, she says. You are the doctor and I’ll be the nurse.

I listen to her heart. It’s still beating, I say.

Good.

We find pictures in my mom’s room.

What are they doing? I ask.

I don’t know for sure, she says, but gosh, they’re naked!

That’s my mom, I say.

They must be playing hospital, she says. She is sitting on the floor with a pile of pictures in her lap. I’ve never played like that before, she says.

Grown-ups play it that way, I tell her.

Then I want to play it like a grown up!

You can’t! You don’t have the same things on you!

Yes I do, want to see? She lifts up her shirt.

I don’t want to be here anymore. I’m just a kid. I want to play with friends. I don’t want to play like a grown-up because they don’t act like friends. They get on each other and yell. I’ve heard them. They call each other names. They get mad and leave and never come back. I stand up. I call her a name. She cries. You wanted to play like a grown-up! I yell, So there! I leave. I go to my room and lock the door. It’s quiet. I am alone. I sit on the floor and stare at the wall and wish that I never grow up.

SUNFLOWER SEEDS

What do we do with him? It’s late, and we can’t just leave him here by himself. My mom looks at her boyfriend.

I have some friends; they work with me. I’ll have them come over. He calls someone. Two guys. My mom and her boyfriend leave. I sit on the floor in front of the television. I have my two G.I. Joes. They are invading a secret hideout for communists. They shoot and blow up a hundred bad guys. Boom! The two guys stay in the bedroom. They look at pictures and laugh.

Hey, do you want to play G.I. Joes with me?

No thanks kid. They just look at each other and laugh.

I close the door. I put my head down and walk back to the