Ham on Rye

In fourth grade, Henry learns about the mechanics of sex from a boy at school. He is horrified at the thought of his parents having sex but then intrigued by the “thought about doing It with Lila Jane” (55). He spends the next day thinking about sex, even when Mrs. Westphal, his teacher, keeps him behind after school. She takes pity on him because he is always “fighting everybody” (56). Henry misinterprets her pity for romantic interest. She is shocked and then calmly tells him never to repeat his sexual comments. As he walks home, Henry is hit by a car.

Henry wakes up in the hospital. The doctor tells him he was run down by a drunk driver. The doctor jokes about Henry taking the attractive nurse on a date. Henry Senior arrives, taking his son out of the hospital and blaming him for getting involved in an accident. As they reach the car, Henry Senior complains about the drunk driver and threatens to sue him. He dreams of using the compensation to move to the South Seas. The police catch the driver, who is an unemployed family man and described as a “penniless alcoholic” (59) so Henry Senior does not press charges.

The neighborhood kids tease Henry for being German. A red-haired boy with one arm who is described as attending “some kind of special school” moves to the neighborhood (60). He introduces himself to Henry as Red, and they become friends. They throw a football. One day, kids from another school try to take Red’s football. Red chases the aggressive boys away, swinging his prosthetic arm “like a club” (62). Henry and Red go swimming in a local pool. In the water, Henry tries to subtly look at Red’s arm, which ends at the elbow. As he tries to play with Red, Henry accidentally swims into a large woman who accuses him of being a “dirty little pervert” (64). She chases him through the pool, threatening to accuse him of sexually harassing her. Henry escapes and admits to touching the woman’s crotch. A month later, Red’s family moves away.

Henry practices football and, occasionally, is allowed to join the other boys. While playing one day, his father calls him back to the house because he is “big enough to mow the lawn now” (66). As he works, Henry hears the other boys playing football. Henry Senior shouts angry advice from the porch. When Henry Junior thinks he is finished, his father carefully inspects the lawn and finds two errors. He beats his son with the razor strop.

When a boy named Frank is ostracized by the others, he befriends Henry. Delighted to have a new friend, Henry even attends the Catholic church with Frank even though he is not Catholic. While on their way to their first confession, the boys decide to baptize a stray dog in the church because “he deserves a chance to go to heaven” (72). In the confession, Henry admits he baptized a dog. The priest is shocked, and Henry leaves. He never attends confession again.

Henry gets to know Frank’s parents. Frank’s father gives them the money to hitchhike to an air show. An old man named Daniel offers them a ride. David tells the boys a story about gay men who were observed performing sexual acts on one another. He offers to drive them all the way to the air show if he can go with them. When they reach the air show, however, Frank tells Henry to run. They escape from Daniel. Under the grandstand, they find two teenagers who are looking up a woman’s skirt. The teenagers tell the young boys to leave. Henry and Frank watch the plane acrobatics. During one race, Henry watches several planes crash, and the paramedics pull the injured or dead pilots from the wreckage. The final performance is a parachute jump. One man’s parachute fails to open, and Henry watches the man crash into the ground and die. The boys agree not to hitchhike home.

In fifth grade, Henry grows more and is bullied less. Frequently, a boy named Juan follows him home while smoking a cigarette. Henry is vaguely aware of the stock market crash and the Great Depression when his teacher asks the students to share their fathers’ job titles. He lies and claims his father is a dentist. When President Hoover is scheduled to visit the area, the teacher tells them to write an essay about how they went to see the president. Since he needs to mow the lawn, he cannot go. Henry invents a story. The teacher reads his “very creative” essay aloud to the class (83). After, he confesses to the teacher he did not attend the speech. When she dismisses him, he comes to believe the rest of the world can be satiated with “beautiful lies” (84).

Henry and Frank hitchhike to many places. The other kids are not as friendly to Henry. Frank is also friends with Chuck, Gene, and Eddie, who occasionally tolerate Henry and often forget whatever he did to aggravate them. Frank’s family is forced to move when his father dies by suicide. He and Henry send each other cartoons in the mail. More people struggle for money and food as the Great Depression intensifies. Henry is horrified when Chuck, Gene, and Eddie corner a small white cat with Chuck’s bulldog, Barney. Henry pleads for them to release the cat, but he knows they want to see it killed by the dog. Neighbors lean out of the window, also keen to watch the kill. Henry walks away, despondent that the cat is “facing Humanity” as well as the bulldog (90).

Henry attends Mt. Justin Jr. High. Many of the students are big and tough, even though they are from “Depression families” (91). Henry learns about masturbation. Henry revels in his tough attitude and thinks about fighting his gym teacher, Mr. Wagner.

A “small and thin” (94) boy attaches himself to Henry, just as David did before. Due to his lack of hair, the boy is nicknamed “Baldy.” He introduces Henry to his family and shows Henry his family’s house, where barrels of wine are stored in the basement. They drink wine together, and Henry begins to feel better. He feels as though he found something that will help him “for a long, long time to come” (96).