| That Guy Page 2 Soon the other board members began to arrive. Each of them went right up the stairs to the boardroom. I saw their cars pull into the lot or caught the back of their dark suits as they marched up the steps. It was a typical night at the youth center. There were some games indoors and outdoors. I easily beat a couple of teenagers who thought they could get the better of me on the ping-pong table. I wasn�t much of a pool player, and only played if a child could find no other opponent. Later, I was closing up for the night, ushering out the last few kids when the board members filed down the stairs and drove off into the night. David had again come to find me and suggested we go for a beer. �Sure,� I said, but Timmy and Dena, eight- and ten-year-old siblings, were standing alone in the parking lot when I locked the building. �You guys have a ride coming?� I asked. �My mother is supposed to be here,� Dena said. �Does she know we close at nine?� �Yup,� the girl replied. It was ten past and no sign of the woman. David insisted on waiting, but when I suggested to the kids that we go back in the building and try calling home, David pointed to his watch and said he had to get going. �It�s OK,� I said. �Next time.� I led the kids back into the building, where our phone call roused their mother from sleep. David did join the board of directors and he did a good job, eventually serving for a year as president. However, by the end of that term his wife was pregnant and they were looking for a bigger place in the suburbs, and he had become comptroller and was working even more hours at his job. When he resigned from the board I was grateful that he had put in as much time as he had. Not long after that, it was time for me to move on as well. I had gone from being a member at the youth center to volunteering as a teenager to taking a position as a counselor right out of college and I had ended up as the program director. It was a wonderful and interesting transformation, but the time had come for me to go elsewhere and to do something else and I did. I saw Rene on the street the other day. She didn�t see me. I was driving by with a friend and she was walking down the street with a few other girls, at 15 they were a whirl of cigarette smoke and exploding sexuality. A pack of boys was not far behind. I would occasionally visit the youth center after I left. At first all the kids would call out my name and come over to talk to me, but as time passed, I recognized fewer and fewer members and I visited less and less often. Recently I went by to say hello to the one staff member who I worked with who is still there. I walked into the center and looked around and saw him standing at the end of the hallway with some kids. As I walked by the gameroom I saw a small boy who was holding a pool cue turn his head and stare at me. He didn�t say a word, but it was easy to recognize the question in his eyes. �Who�s that guy?� |