All American Boy by William J. Mann

this way a little? Yeah, that’s it. Say cheese!”
    The photographer from the Brown’s Mill Reminder snaps his camera, Wally blinking from the flash. Around his shoulder his father’s arm feels heavy and damp. The temperature outside is steadily ratcheting up into the nineties but Captain Day is nonetheless in full uniform, and Wally’s in a long-sleeved shirt with a clip-on blue necktie. After all, it’s not every day that one is named All American Boy by the American Legion.
    â€œYou must be very proud of your son,” the photographer says.
    Captain Day’s face glows as brightly as his buttons. “You bet I am.”
    â€œHow’s it feel to be asked to lead the Fourth of July parade, Wally?” the photographer asks, snapping another shot.
    â€œIt feels great,” Wally says.
    His eyes move over to the kitchen, where his mother is watching from the doorway. She wasn’t asked to be in the picture. Wally feels bad about that but says nothing. She doesn’t seem to mind.
    â€œIs that it then?” Captain Day asks.
    â€œI think so,” the photographer tells him. “Until the parade.”
    â€œDon’t you want a picture of the certificate?” Captain Day lifts the piece of paper that officially names Wally the town’s All American Boy. “ For excellence in academic achievement and extraordinary devotion to community and nation ,” he reads.
    â€œGood idea,” the photographer says, snapping a picture of Wally’s father holding the certificate. “You know what they say about the apple not falling far from the tree.”
    Captain Day beams.
    Wally feels as if he’ll pass out from the heat. “May I take the tie off now?”
    â€œGo ahead,” the photographer tells him, being escorted to the door by Captain Day. “We’ll have you on the front page of next week’s paper, Wally.”
    The boy unclips his tie, popping open the shirt button that’s been cutting off his windpipe.
    â€œWe’ll put this in our scrapbook,” his mother says, finally coming out of the kitchen. She lifts the certificate from the table to gaze at it. Wally can see his name written in calligraphy beneath stark black letters that read ALL AMERICAN BOY.
    â€œScrapbook?” his father barks, returning to the room and startling his wife. “We’ll do no such thing. We’ll frame it! Hang it on the wall! This is the American Legion , for God’s sake, Regina. We’re not going to hide it away in a scrapbook.”
    Wally blushes. His father takes the certificate from her and hands it to his son. Looking down at it, Wally feels his face burn.
    â€œMay I change my clothes now and go over to Freddie’s?” he asks.
    His father tousles his hair. “Of course, Wally.”
    The boy carries the certificate to his room and stuffs it into the top drawer of his dresser. He hopes his father doesn’t have it framed. It’s not that Wally isn’t proud of it. He is. He just doesn’t want to have to look at it.
    He changes out of his starched shirt and wool pants. His skin feels clammy. He pulls on a pair of plaid shorts and a T-shirt.
    He’s late. He told Josephine he’d be at her house by noon.
    â€œI’m going to Freddie’s,” he says, coming back into the living room.
    â€œAnother softball game?” his father asks.
    â€œYup.”
    â€œOkay, son. Hit a homer for me!”
    â€œWill do!”
    The screen door slams behind him.
    Of course, there’s no softball game. There’s never a softball game when Wally tells his father there is.
    Instead, he’s heading to see Josephine Leopold, who’s eighty-seven years old, and who, in her day, had been a great actress. She had trod the boards, as she put it, with all of the greats: Mrs. Fiske, Mrs. Campbell, and all three of the Barrymores.
    â€œBut mostly Miss Le Gallienne,” Josephine told