Tevan Wright hated his name. He supposed it could’ve been worse. Most of the kids he knew from the block had even more exotic names like J’quan and Kennidie. That last one felt more like a misspelling than an actual choice. He’d recently confirmed that when he asked her mother why she chose the name and she said, “I wanted to name my girl after the greatest president I’ve ever known.” His own mother was party to such gaffes. She liked to tell him she named him after the love of her life, a 90’s R&B singer that looked more ‘black boy band’ than what he thought of as R&B. Anyhow, that man’s name was Tevin, a clever bastardization of Kevin, he supposed. Whatever the root, his own name sprouted from it a very unintelligent way.
Which is why he was changing his name to Tom. He stood deep in the queue at the Pinal County Courthouse pressed in close to people who stank of sweat and perfume. A hundred conversations in several different languages popped around him like chaffe. One stray question whistled his way and he acted like he didn’t hear it. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the speaker, a tall woman who looked a decade younger than his mother. She was staring at him with round, friendly eyes. He looked away, grateful for the comfort of a hooded sweatshirt. She bumped him ans said, “Did you hear me, young man?”
Tevan hunched his shoulders and tried to disappear deeper into his hoodie but the lady bumped him again. He didn’t respond again so she bumped him again and this time she said, “Boy, don’t be rude.”
He wondered if it would be ruder to respond to her with exactly what he wanted to say, but his mother raised him well enough not to test those scales…
Some Thoughts:
- Started free writing this while waiting for a tire change. I don’t know what it is or where it is going but the story comes around at some point to a conversation with the boy’s mom about changing his name and her lying about how she feels about it. He knows because she smiles when she lies and frowns when she doesn’t. Something about that simple lie detector compelled me to start writing about Tevan/Tom. Maybe I’ll continue.