Clayton kept the window cracked open just in case Cool Papa decided to breeze on through. He knew his grandfather's body had been buried in the cemetery. He'd seen the oak casket lowered into the ground with Cool Papa' s body inside. But he wasn't certain about his grandfather's spirit and where it went. Clayton's list of what he believed like music, was in the air, and Clayton didn't want to miss his last chance to feel him near.

The next morning Clayton awoke in a foul mood and found it hard to stay wrapped in his blanket, with sunbeams streaming into his room. It might as well have been a school day instead of Saturday. He planned to stay indoors, and under his blanket. He'd tell· his mother he was sick, but there was noise rising up into his room, noise that had nothing to do with his grandfather's roaming spirit.

Clayton poked his head out from his blanket to hear what was stirring below. He got out of bed and pressed his forehead against the window. There were people in his yard. Neighbors and strangers milling. Looking. Carrying things away. Cool Papa's things.

A charge shot through Clayton, from the blood beneath his skin to the tips of his toenails. He got out of his pajamas and into his jeans, pullover, and sneakers and was dashing down the stairs and out into the yard to stop the takers.

A man rifled through his grandfather's crate of record albums. Cool Papa had promised the collection to Clayton, even though Clayton didn't have the right player for the large black discs. Still, they were his, and he was on a mission to stop the man from taking them.

The man must have seen Clayton spring out of the house, because he asked him right away, "Son, how much for the records? Right fine treasures." The man wasn't from around the neighborhood. He had a cowboy twang that Clayton would have liked if he hadn't been one of the takers.

''They're not for sale," Clayton told the man.

His mother, who'd been showing ladies souvenirs from places Cool Papa had traveled, stopped talking and turned her head toward Clayton and the man. She left the ladies with the knickknacks and sped over. ''They're all for sale, mister," she said. "Every last one."

"You can't!" Clayton said.

"Bob," the man told Ms. Byrd. Ms. Byrd said, "They're all for sale, Bob. Take the whole crate." She looked to the sky. "Ten dollars."

"You can't!" Clayton said louder, although that didn't matter.

Bob looked at Ms. Byrd with big, astonished eyes. "Madam," he said politely, flipping the through the flat cardboard covers, "why, there's Bessie. Billie. Rosetta. Son. Robert. RB. King, Albert King, and Alberta King. And Howlin' Wolf, too! And there's Stevie Ray! Madam, are you sure you know what you're giving away?"

"I know what they are," Clayton's mother sang flatly-but not in the flat notes that gave the blues its funk.

"Tell you what." Bob's voice was cowboy twangy and amazed. ''I'll give you fifty. Only way I can sleep at night and I might still toss and turn."

"Suit yourself," Clayton's mother said.

"That's not right," Clayton told his mother. "Those are Cool Papa's blues people. He meant them for me!"

"It's old stuff, Clayton. And it's taking up too much space. It’s gotta go.”

It didn't matter. People continued to fill Clayton's front yard. They saw the sign “Yard Sale-All/Must Go!” and stopped their jogging, bike riding; and dog walking. Ms. Byrd gave them whatever they offered for Cool Papa's treasures.

Sometimes she said, "Just take it."

''Great stuff!" Omar exclaimed. At that moment, "friend" was the last thing Clayton would have called Omar. Omar pinned one of Cool Papa's navy medals to his T-shirt and plopped Cool Papa's navy cap on his head. The front slunk down over Omar's eyes, which Omar thought was funny.

Clayton could have bashed his face in.

"Take that off," Clayton said.

"Nope."

''Take it off.''

"I paid a quarter. It's mine."

Clayton didn't bash Omar's face in like he wanted to but shoved him instead. Hard. Omar stumbled backward. ''What's the big idea?" Omar shouted.

Clayton was too angry to answer. And he was on a mission. He had to stop the takers from walking away with his grandpa's treasures. They'd ask how much, and Clayton would say, "Not for sale." Then his mother would scold him and sell Cool Papa's treasures anyway.

No matter what he did or said, he couldn't stop the takers. There were too' many, and his mother kept accepting their few dollars or few coins.

A shaggy-haired teen walked away with Cool Papa's showtime alligator boots-the ones he always wore onstage with Show Guitar. A woman older than Clayton's mother tried on Cool Papa's showtime vest, "oohed" in F major, and hollered, "I must have it! But when a young woman picked up Cool Papa's porkpie hat and placed it on her head, Clayton couldn't stop himself. He set eyes on his target, crouched low, and with a running start, jumped high, because she was tall, and snatched the porkpie hat off her head. "Not for sale!" he snapped at her. He might have hurt the young woman. He might have tugged on her hair, because she cried "Ouch!" and walked away.

His hands were awfully angry. Ms. Byrd had seen enough and came toward him. Like Clayton's angry hands, his mother's feet and face were awfully angry. Clayton ran into the house, up the stairs, and inside his room and slammed the door.

"Stay in there!" his mother called up to him. "Stay until I say you can come out."

Clayton hurled the porkpie hat high up on a shelf in his closet. He fell on his bed and mumbled, "I don't care," among other things.

It was a bad Saturday morning, on the verge of getting worse. But Clayton didn't know the worst of it until it happened.

He got out of his bed to see if the takers had gone. He pressed his forehead against the windowpane and looked down. One by one he saw the takers: The first walked out of his yard with Cool Papa's First Guitar. The second had Cool Papa's Show Guitar. And the last taker had Wah-Wah Nita slung over his back as he carried her out of the gate. Clayton could hear her crying, wah-wah. But he didn't cry

with her. He just let his crying boil up inside him.

Excerpt from Clayton Byrd Goes Underground by Rita Garcia-Williams