and turned to me. “Tip?”
“Yes,” I replied. “You have to tip the hairstylist.”
“Oh. What about the tip?” Rae said to David.
That is when David shot me an annoyed look and shifted from instructive older brother to ruthless corporate lawyer. “Forty dollars total. Take it now or the offer is off the table.”
Rae turned to me again and I knew David’s patience had come to an end. “Take it, Rae. He’s ready to walk.”
Rae held out her hand and they shook on the deal. She turned out her palm and waited for the money. As David paid Rae her forty-dollar bribe, he appeared pleased that he was able to teach his little sister something about his line of work.
The lesson in negotiation stuck with Rae. It stuck hard. She discovered that even simple acts of grooming could be negotiated to her end. In the first half of her tenth year, the only time she would brush her teeth, wash her hair, or take a shower was when money changed hands—more precisely, leaving ours and entering hers. After a brief family meeting my parents and I agreed that we had to cut her off cold turkey and deal with the consequences. It was three weeks before Rae realized that hair washing was not a career.
Rae, Age 12
Sometime in the winter of Rae’s seventh-grade year, she made an enemy. His name was Brandon Wheeler. The genesis of their conflict has always remained somewhat fuzzy. Rae likes her privacy as much as I do. What I do know is that Brandon transferred to Rae’s school in the fall of that same year. Within weeks he was one of most popular boys in her class. He excelled in sports, possessed a firm grasp of all academic subject matter, and had clear skin.
Rae had no problem with him until one day in class, when Jeremy Shoeman was reading aloud from a passage in Huckleberry Finn, Brandon offered a dead-on imitation of Jeremy’s stutter. The class laughed uproariously, which only encouraged Brandon, who added the Shoeman imitation to his regular playlist. Rae never had a problem with Brandon’s previous impersonations, which included a red-headed boy with a lisp, a girl with horn-rimmed glasses and a limp, and a teacher with a wandering eye. Rae wasn’t even friends with Shoeman. But for whatever reason, this rubbed her the wrong way and she was determined to put an end to it.
Rae’s first line of attack was an anonymous typed note that read, Leave Jeremy alone or you will be very, very sorry . The next day when Rae caught sight of Wheeler cornering Shoeman during the lunch hour, apparently thinking the note was from the victim himself, Rae decided to come clean. Wheeler then spread the word around school that Rae and Jeremy Shoeman were a couple. While this infuriated Rae, she kept her cool as she plotted her revenge. I cannot say how my sister acquired this information, but she discovered that Brandon was not twelve, but fourteen, and was repeating seventh grade for the second time. The next time Brandon was flattered for his excellence in academics, Rae made sure her classmates understood that it was a matter of practice and not talent.
Some minor verbal sparring between my sister and the fourteen-year-old seventh grader ensued. But Brandon soon learned that talk was Rae’s weapon of choice and he resorted to the only weapon he knew. While I have never met a girl as mentally tough as Rae, she favors my mother and, at the age of twelve, was still under four foot ten and barely eighty pounds. She can run fast, but there were times she didn’t have the chance. When I saw the unmistakable rash of an Indian burn on her wrist, I asked her if she wanted me to take care of it. Rae said no. When she came home with a black eye from a “dodgeball accident,” I asked again. Rae insisted everything was under control. But I got the feeling that the constant bullying was starting to break her.
I had just picked up Petra from her apartment and we were on our way to a movie when my cell phone rang. Petra answered it.
“Hello. No,
“Yes,” I replied. “You have to tip the hairstylist.”
“Oh. What about the tip?” Rae said to David.
That is when David shot me an annoyed look and shifted from instructive older brother to ruthless corporate lawyer. “Forty dollars total. Take it now or the offer is off the table.”
Rae turned to me again and I knew David’s patience had come to an end. “Take it, Rae. He’s ready to walk.”
Rae held out her hand and they shook on the deal. She turned out her palm and waited for the money. As David paid Rae her forty-dollar bribe, he appeared pleased that he was able to teach his little sister something about his line of work.
The lesson in negotiation stuck with Rae. It stuck hard. She discovered that even simple acts of grooming could be negotiated to her end. In the first half of her tenth year, the only time she would brush her teeth, wash her hair, or take a shower was when money changed hands—more precisely, leaving ours and entering hers. After a brief family meeting my parents and I agreed that we had to cut her off cold turkey and deal with the consequences. It was three weeks before Rae realized that hair washing was not a career.
Rae, Age 12
Sometime in the winter of Rae’s seventh-grade year, she made an enemy. His name was Brandon Wheeler. The genesis of their conflict has always remained somewhat fuzzy. Rae likes her privacy as much as I do. What I do know is that Brandon transferred to Rae’s school in the fall of that same year. Within weeks he was one of most popular boys in her class. He excelled in sports, possessed a firm grasp of all academic subject matter, and had clear skin.
Rae had no problem with him until one day in class, when Jeremy Shoeman was reading aloud from a passage in Huckleberry Finn, Brandon offered a dead-on imitation of Jeremy’s stutter. The class laughed uproariously, which only encouraged Brandon, who added the Shoeman imitation to his regular playlist. Rae never had a problem with Brandon’s previous impersonations, which included a red-headed boy with a lisp, a girl with horn-rimmed glasses and a limp, and a teacher with a wandering eye. Rae wasn’t even friends with Shoeman. But for whatever reason, this rubbed her the wrong way and she was determined to put an end to it.
Rae’s first line of attack was an anonymous typed note that read, Leave Jeremy alone or you will be very, very sorry . The next day when Rae caught sight of Wheeler cornering Shoeman during the lunch hour, apparently thinking the note was from the victim himself, Rae decided to come clean. Wheeler then spread the word around school that Rae and Jeremy Shoeman were a couple. While this infuriated Rae, she kept her cool as she plotted her revenge. I cannot say how my sister acquired this information, but she discovered that Brandon was not twelve, but fourteen, and was repeating seventh grade for the second time. The next time Brandon was flattered for his excellence in academics, Rae made sure her classmates understood that it was a matter of practice and not talent.
Some minor verbal sparring between my sister and the fourteen-year-old seventh grader ensued. But Brandon soon learned that talk was Rae’s weapon of choice and he resorted to the only weapon he knew. While I have never met a girl as mentally tough as Rae, she favors my mother and, at the age of twelve, was still under four foot ten and barely eighty pounds. She can run fast, but there were times she didn’t have the chance. When I saw the unmistakable rash of an Indian burn on her wrist, I asked her if she wanted me to take care of it. Rae said no. When she came home with a black eye from a “dodgeball accident,” I asked again. Rae insisted everything was under control. But I got the feeling that the constant bullying was starting to break her.
I had just picked up Petra from her apartment and we were on our way to a movie when my cell phone rang. Petra answered it.
“Hello. No,
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