Adam Canfield of the Slash Read Online Free PDF Page A

only ten kids, and she felt that wasn’t enough to be a scientific sampling.
    “What else?” asked Adam, who was trying to wedge a Cheez Doodle between his nose and upper lip so it looked like a Cheez Doodle mustache.
    “I want you to read this,” said Jennifer, handing him a piece of paper with writing that covered every line on both sides. It was Phoebe’s story on Eddie the janitor. At the top, she had given it a headline: “A Lot More than a Man with a Wide Broom.”
    “Is it horrible?” asked Adam.
    “Just read it,” said Jennifer.
    This was Phoebe’s story:
    The first time I ever talked to Eddie the janitor was at recess, by the small playground, two years ago, when I was in Mrs. Parada’s first grade. I saw two baby birds on the blacktop and thought they were dead; they already had bugs on them. But when I got close, they moved their heads and chirped. I told Mrs. Parada and she said, “We’ll call Eddie. He always knows how to handle these things.”
    Eddie came with a shoebox and soupspoon from the cafeteria. He spooned up the birds and put them in the box. He brushed the bugs off with a toothbrush, kept the babies in his office in the boiler room, fed them with a medicine dropper, and pretty soon they both turned into grown-up mourning doves and are now at the district conservation center.
    Eddie told me, “Phoebe, that’s a perfect sample of what a good janitor does. Whatever needs doing.” When a microphone is squealing at an assembly, they call Eddie. When a student gets stomach flu, they call Eddie. Long ago, in the 1980s, before handicapped ramps were discovered, there was a boy in a wheelchair at Harris, and every day Eddie the janitor carried him piggyback up and down the stairs.
    Eddie told me, “Phoebe, janitor’s a funny job. You’re pretty much invisible until something goes bad.” His newest project is building Mrs. Marris a set of cabinets for an electronic system she’s having installed in the principal’s office. He’s also remodeling her bathroom.
    Eddie Roosevelt James was born in Mississippi in the 1940s; he is not sure of the exact year. He was one of twelve children, and they grew up poor on a small farm they did not own. As a teenager, he came up north by himself, because he thought the laws would be better for black people. He got a job chauffeuring Mrs. Frederick Lewis of 125 Dewey Street in North Tremble. When she died, he chauffeured Mrs. Alan Clark of 15 West Constable, also in North Tremble. When she died, Mrs. Clark’s daughter got him the janitor job.
    Eddie told me his prize possessions are his children. He has one son studying doctoring at Howard University in Washington, D.C.; a daughter at Tremble Community College studying to be in the business world; and another daughter who just graduated from the state university at Tremble and plans to be a teacher when she finds a job that suits her right.
    Eddie says he loves working at Harris Elementary/Middle. He told me, “Phoebe, there is nothing higher up than education. To me, who is miseducated, coming to work at a school each day and seeing children so busy learning every little fact feels as holy as church on Sunday.”
    Adam put down the paper and turned away.
    “Are you sniffling?” said Jennifer.
    “Sinus infection,” said Adam.
    “Right,” said Jennifer. “It’s really good, isn’t it?”
    “It’s all right,” said Adam.
    “I think it’s terrific,” said Jennifer. “Wait until you hear this. Turns out our little Phoebe’s a bit legendary.” After Jennifer had read the Eddie story, she asked her twin third-grade sisters if they knew this Phoebe person. They didn’t — they had different teachers — but they’d heard about her. When the twins were in first grade, an older boy saw a little girl reading a Boxcar Children book on the school bus. The older boy was reading the Boxcar books, too — in fourth grade. The older boy told his teacher, “There’s this girl on my bus, she reads