Like a Box of Chocolate

I was given no choice when you stop to think about it.

The person who sold the most chocolate in the state of Idaho would receive a trip to Busch Gardens in Tampa, and once I heard what was on the line, things like “friendship” and “camaraderie” became antiquated notions of the Before Times, when you could afford kindness because chocolate was free and handed out to you by strangers on Halloween.

Matty, I’m sure, disagrees, and that’s why he’s destined to be the employee and not the employer one day. He’ll most likely be my employee, since, even at the age of ten, it’s clear I have a big heart and a predilection to feel bad for those I once knew in my youth. My friendship with Matty goes back to the very first day of fourth grade when I transferred to Picabo Street Elementary from Manhattan after my father had a run-in with the EFCC.

I have no idea what that stands for, but I know those four letters in that order strike fear in the heart of my Papa the same way small dogs make me wet my pants as soon as I see one of their foolhardy owners take them off the leash.

People are too trusting. Matty is proof of that.

When our teacher, Mr. Fastidio, handed out the boxes of chocolate and explained to us that, were we to sell the most boxes, we would be on our way to the Sunshine State and roller coasters and corn dogs, Matty turned to me and suggested we partner up and try to sell the most boxes together.

“Matthew,” I said, “There’s only one trip to Busch Gardens. If we partner up and sell the most together, one of us will have to decide who goes on the trip and the other will have to stay here and feel like an ignoramus.”

Matty shrugged his shoulders that way he does whenever he’s listening to something but only enough to get the gist of it, like when I demystified Santa to him or Area 51. The only books he reads are ones you can color in, and even then I find him eating some of the pages.

I should have set off on my own and pummeled Matty quietly, discreetly, and there was no question I could have done it. Neither he nor anybody else in the fourth grade could compete with me and my retail acumen. Why, just by selling candy bars outside the local dispensary, I’d have that trip locked up in no time.

But I didn’t want to take any chances, and that is where I made a choice that was no choice at all. The decision to turn something certain into something sure. Something akin to cement. Something harder than the pasta my mother attempts to make me before she retires to her bedroom so she can cry in front of her vanity mirror and repeat her daily affirmations.

I told Matty I’d love to partner up with him.

My reason for pivoting was that I didn’t want to go to Busch Gardens anyway, which was partly true. Though I did want to see the third greatest theme park chain in all the land, what I really wanted was a trip to Tampa to see my Gamza and Papoose, who live an hour’s drive from there. They had disowned my father after he appeared on 60 Minutes without a tie, but I was sure that if they saw me on a surprise visit, they’d change their minds, and put him (and by extension, me,) back into the will.

When the stakes are that high, sacrifices must be made, and so I put my friendship with Matty on the line, and two of us began the greatest chocolate enterprise since Willy Wonka pitted children against each other in a death factory run by gnomes.

We sold to everyone and anyone. The cashier at the gas station. The piranha dealer who hangs out at the gas station. The woman who lives across the street from Matty and swears that the mailman is stealing her social security checks.

If they had a gullet and the means to fill it, we were selling to them.

Therefore it was no surprise when Mr. Fastidio announced that Matty and I had managed to move the most sugary product, not just in the school, but in the entire state. One of us would be headed to Tampa, and the other would be spending February break the way all students in Boise do--by building snowmen in their backyards and putting the carrot in places that will offend their mothers and get them punished for the duration of the week.

Matty started talking about how excited he was to go see Florida for the first time, and it nearly broke my heart to put my hand on that little place where his shoulder should be, and tell him that it was I who would be taking the prize.

He was confused, at first. But then I explained to him that he only sold as much as he did, because I was captaining for him. 

That wasn’t entirely true. 

In fact, it wasn’t even a little bit true.

Matty’s putty-like face was what had endeared us to most of our customers, and without it, I’m not sure I could have sold more than half a box of that Hershey’s knock-off the school gets in bulk from Indonesia.

But my best friend being my best friend, he believed me. They took my photo next to Mr. Fastidio in the gym-ateria later that day, and in a few days time, the tickets to Busch Gardens were in my mailbox.

But alas, I was mistaken.

We were headed to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, not in Tampa.

I was crestfallen.

How could this happen?

Once I dried the tears of my father, who was looking forward to being guaranteed an inheritance again, I took solace in knowing that at least I could now gift this worthless vacation to Matty. Who else but someone that dim could enjoy the idea of going to Virginia?

But the next day, Matty wasn’t seated in his normal spot.

He had moved to the back of the room, and when I tried to strike up a conversation with him at recess, he rebuffed me. I saw him walk over to Markie Ferguson and engage in a truly insipid game of freeze tag, which Markie would surely lose, since his ADHD makes it impossible for him to keep still.

As the days and weeks went by, Matty continued his silent streak, and I had no choice but to travel to the lesser Busch Gardens after all.

Before the plane touched down in Virginia, I looked out the window and saw the ravaged land coming up to greet me--and I thought of my former friend, and how he would have so enjoyed seeing any place that was new and foreign.

Perhaps if I had presented my present to him alongside an apology, things would have been different, but as my father always says--

If you apologize for doing what anybody else would have done, then you’re not anybody--you’re nobody.

I would have explained that to Matty, but some things you never truly grasp until you reach the fifth grade.