Chapter 4
In Algebra, we turned in the ridiculous worksheet that we had to do. I missed maybe six or seven problems, but it was out of one hundred so I was happy with it. Mrs. Higgins didn’t give us any assignments in math, probably trying to let us recover from yesterday. I chuckled under my breath. Mrs. Dameson had given us more of a gift than she knew.
Then was History. We turned in our assignments on time, and Mrs. Lancaster gave us kudos and marked us off as one hundred. Yet again we had no homework. For most of the class, the eight of us sat together and discussed the airsoft war on Friday.
Afterwards was recess. This was sure to be interesting, having football so soon after a fight. Normally, the sevies would have declined to play us, but they were in good humor; we had taken all of the punishment, if you can call it that. Both sides agreed to play the game without aggression. Despite that, the game was still interesting.
There weren’t many fouls, and we ended up winning the first recess, 2-1.
Afterwards was Language. We turned in the Vocabulary and the teacher gave us full marks. Again, she let us off the hook to recuperate. I was thrilled. Is she actually giving us a day off? Again?
Lunch rolled around, and I ate one of the McDonald’s meals that they sell at school. I shared the fries with the others while we discussed the battle on Friday. As I walked to get a drink, I noticed that the sevies were doing the same. Don’t think they’ll be less prepared. Some of them have been to Luke’s in previous battles. They’ll know the place, too.
At second recess, almost the same pattern followed as the last. The main difference being that I caught the winning touchdown ball when it bobbled out of one of my classmate’s hands. I was the hero of that game, and we won 3-2.
Afterwards were the last two classes of the day: Literature and Science. We again were let off with no homework, and again discussed the battle. We were going to be entirely ready for this battle. We were going to win.
It was a fun day, even if it wasn’t very noteworthy. We went home with smiles yet again.
I again had no homework, and I decided to go to the gym this time. My system for a workout was just lift a third of the max weight. It always gave me a pretty good exercise. After this, I rode home tired out. Jess, Mom, and Dad were all back home. I walked in to find dinner well on its way. I took a shower and changed for dinner.
It was Trailer Trash Night; there was chicken-fried steak, chicken-fried chicken, a sausage gravy for the two, homemade macaroni and cheese, and a jello dessert. All in all, it was delicious. We saved some of the leftovers for my older brother, who was coming home on Thursday.
Before practicing piano, I asked Dad whether or not he had heard of The Screwtape Letters. It turns out that he actually owned the book in his library. He lent the book to me eagerly, happy to find me reading, as he said, good literature.
After piano I watched TV and shuffled into bed when the time came. As I scurried under the covers, I grabbed the book from my nightstand and read the intro. I laughed, as I read of the priest who accused it of being “diabolical”.
I spent most of the night reading the book, which was very interesting. It was about, or rather, from the viewpoint of, devils. Wormwood was a young, inexperienced devil that received many letters of advice from his wizened uncle, Screwtape.
Each letter told about certain aspects of humanity, that the devils used to trick them and tempt them. It pointed at how religion unintentionally could harbor arrogance and sin. Even more interesting was the thesis that a human’s emotions undulated, from troughs to peaks, both of which could be used against them. The subtle ways that they tempted and tricked a human were almost believable. I read almost ten of the letters that night ‘til about midnight. I took a look at the author’s name- C. S. Lewis.
Hey, what do you know? It’s that guy who wrote the Narnia series. I didn’t know he wrote stuff like this. But there was something else in that name. I scrambled out of bed and picked up the scrap from my desk. C.S. Lewis. Conner S. Laneson. CSL? The two authors had the exact same initials. Coincidence? Probably. But could it be the same author? Was this in fact a sample of the red books teachings? And if it was, then why would my principal be reading “diabolical” psychology books?
I paced the room, thinking hard. As for C. S. Lewis, it didn’t seem entirely unlikely that he would have a background in psychology. It wouldn’t surprise me after reading the letters.
As I stopped pacing and sat down on the bed, I realized that I was exhausted. This is more important than sleep! I tried to tell myself. Another voice said Quite. In fact, it is too important to think about without a full night of sleep. I chuckled, recognizing the method from the book. I laid down in my bed, set my alarm, and fell asleep dreaming of tomorrow.
I awoke to the sound of music, and it would be drawing a fine line to determine whether or not it was lulling me back into sleep or pulling me from it. I lifted my head up to see Mr. Brightside blasting out of the stereo. I pulled myself away from my bed yet again and climbed into the shower, leaving the music on. The warm water and steam woke me up quite well as the stereo burned through more of my Killers music. As I got dressed, I grabbed my Ipod and put on my headphones, so as to continue my playlist through the morning.
I prepared a bagel for breakfast while my Ipod finished my Killers and moved on to a Ben Folds Five song. I chomped my breakfast down and went upstairs to the tune of Taking Care of Business by BTO. I got my backpack still listening. I hooked the music player back up to the stereo and waited for the song to finish before I continued out of the house. The song still rang in my ears when I got there.
When I walked into the gymnasium to greet my friends, I couldn’t help but notice the affect of my presence. Every head turned, every mouth quieted. Immediately. I looked around the room in confusion. This was not a normal Thursday mood. As I tried to ignore the gaping eyes, I strode over to Mark.
“Dude, what’s going on?” I whispered to him. A few of the heads began to turn away. Apparently I was only a momentary distraction.
“I hate to tell you this, but Mrs. Dameson’s got a grudge on you. She’s been waiting to talk to you in detail about the fight. She hasn’t yet because she’s been in a lot of mud with school renovations, meetings, the normal busy week.”
“And why did I just learn this while everybody else has heard?” I looked around. Nobody was staring at me anymore, but the impression of those faces were still implemented in my head.
“Complicated really,” He explained, “You know how that Larry kid in our class is related to Mrs. Dameson?” I nodded. “Well, I guess Larry somehow over heard his mother talking to Mrs. D.”
Just then, the bell rung, and I shuffled up to class in amazement. I would’ve been anxious, but I was too stunned really. When I walked past the huge map of the world as usual, I heard people muttering. There’s that kid that started the fight on Monday. He’s in for it now. I absentmindedly went through my first two subjects when the call came. I watched Mrs. Lancaster put down the phone and call out my name. I felt almost numb. I staggered out of the room and hobbled past the huge map again to the office.
I opened the door to her office, and Mrs. D’s secretary handed me a clipboard and pointed me to a seat. I looked at the worksheet on it. I finished it quickly as the adrenaline rush boosted my writing. As I scrawled down my answers, I was able to draw some vague similarities between it and some of the concepts described in Screwtape. I noticed that the questions, and for that matter, most of what I had heard in school, emphasized the importance of education. But it almost intentionally blurred the difference between the schools authority and the valuable education. It was always suggesting that if the concept was good, the source must be good. And if the source was good, the rest of sources rules should be followed.
Almost all the way through the worksheet, the bell for second recess rung and the kids came in. Many of them stared in at me as if a zoo creature. I had had a lot of that today. I ignored them and tried to finish my work, but all the while, I mused as to why I hadn’t heard any bells for first recess. I guessed it had something to do with the talent show. Was the talent show today? Ah crud. I was supposed to play piano today. What rotten luck.
I drew one further observance before Mrs. Dameson came in. As I looked at the worksheet, I was admiring my finished work when I saw a company logo and name on the bottom right hand corner. Fly-ed. It had a picture of a book with wings. To distract me further from the inevitable, I looked out the window. It was gray out, but there was not a drop of moisture on the window.
Mrs. Dameson stormed into her office. The first several moments revealed that this would not be anything like my previous encounters with her. She was usually friendly and “disappointed” at most. The truth was, her venom came from her punish-ments, not her encounters. That was how it was most of the time.
Not this time.
“So this is the little brat who started the fight, eh?” she half yelled to nobody in particular.
“Uh…” I stuttered, “W-We already talked about this.”
She gave me a look as though I had cursed at her. She motioned me into her office. I scuffled in and took a seat. As she glared at me lividly, she asked me, “Why did you start that riot?”
“It wasn’t a riot, it was just-“
“Answer the question!” She yelled.
“I, uh…” I was going to have to decide how to go through this now. I could either act sorry and lie, or be sincere and take the consequences. And I decided. “I did it because of the sevies.”
“Ah, but the blame still lies in you for-“
“No it does not! They antagonize me and antagonize me, and if we respond, we get in trouble from you or the teachers! What I did was self-defense and-“
“YOU MAY NOT INTERRUPT ME!” She screamed. There was a three-secod pause. “It was your fault and you shouldn’t put the blame on others!”
“Fine!” I yelled. “But I’m not sorry!”
“WHAT? You better keep your mouth shut, boy, or I may lose my temper.”
“I’m not sorry! Any honorable boy would’ve done the same thing in my position. What was I supposed to do when they
kept pushing me around?”
“Tell a teacher!”
“No! That’s not by any means being honorable! If I’ll teach them a lesson, I’ll do it myself! Come to think of it, you
teachers don’t teach quite as well as you claim-“
“SILENCE YOURSELF!” She now stood up and pointed her finger at me.
I folded my arms and waited for the worst. Hit me with you best shot, you jackass. I can take it all. She breathed deeply; she sounded as if she was steaming. She stood in the same position for nearly a minute. Suddenly her face changed. Her
originally livid face curled into an awkward smile. She said to me out loud, “Don’t worry. I will. I already have.”
As I sat, stunned, the scene slowed down. She smiled, and tried to grab her drink, but she knocked it over in the process. She yelled for the secretary, and she was in within a moment to help clean up the mess. “Oh what a mess” “And all over my diary” “I’m so sorry for the trouble” she said in increments. Obviously she was no longer enraged. The bell rang. While still rather dazed, I saw my opportunity. I rushed out of the office and out the front door. I heard Mrs. Dameson scream behind me. I ran as fast as I could to my bike on the rack, and I was soon desperately dialing the numbers into my bike lock.
As I finally unhooked my bike after what seemed like minutes, I backed it out of the bike rack and looked toward the front door. Mrs. Dameson was twenty feet away from me, walking toward me with a strong stride. As I pedaled furiously, I looked back again. She was ten feet from me, and running now. I moved my feet faster, and was soon at her speed. I looked behind again. Five feet. With an extra boost of fearful adrenaline, I finally began putting distance on her. She lunged at me. She was truly only a few centimeters off, but she missed and only caught grass.
As I rode out from the school, I looked back again to see Mrs. Dameson, cursing wildly at me as I disappeared from view.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Mondays - Chapter 3
Chapter 3
Even though the librarian hawked over us, we still managed to communicate in bits and pieces. We were able to split up the work between us; we would each do twelve problems and pass the answers around when the librarian wasn’t looking. We were done within a half-hour, and tried to look busy for the rest of the time. Ironically, it’s not as easy as it looks.
After Algebra was over, the librarian sent us back to our room to switch to History. Mrs. Lancaster assigned us a one-page essay on slavery due tomorrow. She said the same thing as Mr. Higgins: “Principal’s orders, not mine.” It didn’t matter much. We had spent the whole of seventh grade learning to write essays. They were pretty easy; they just took time. By the time the period was done, I had finished my rough draft and was ready to start typing. We helped each other out and were able to finish our rough drafts by the time that the bell rang.
When it did, Mrs. Higgins told us to stay in to try to finish our work. So the eight of us all set to work typing up our History essays. By helping each other, we were all about a third done when the students came back in.
The next subject was language. We were assigned the whole unit’s problems in vocabulary, which we all managed to finish before the class ended.
Next was Lunch. We had to eat separated, but all of us could deal with that. As I ate in one of the halls, I saw Mrs. Dameson walk down the hall. She recognized me as the troublemaker who had started the fight and glared at me. She asked a few sarcastic questions such as “Enjoying your day?” I couldn’t think of anything to do but to not say anything.
During second recess, we again stayed in and worked on our essays. Most of us had it finished when the bell rang.
After that was Literature. We had to read the rest of the book and take the test tomorrow, when it would normally be next week. We had already read the whole book.
Following that was Science. The due date for the big science project was moved from next week to tomorrow. Again, no problem, we’d all done it in groups and finished it the week before.
And then we had P.E. We weren’t allowed to participate, so we stayed in and finished whatever work we hadn’t finished. We finished our essays and y the end of the day, virtually none of us had any homework at all.
Before dismissal, Mrs. Dameson called us down to her office. We entered her office nervously, trying to predict what would happen. We had all silently agreed to act repentant. “So,” she started, “I’m guessing you’ve noticed a difference in your assignments.”
We all muttered and nodded in agreement, trying hard to keep a convincing, straight face. “That was your punishment for your behavior yesterday. We can’t have these things happening here. They reflect badly on the school. Now I don’t want this to happen again, or your assignments will be even bigger. Understand? Good, now scram.”
We exited her office and stepped into our homeroom. We all laughed over our good luck. And the rest of the class didn’t have any assignments; it was just supposed to be us with homework. But even with their ridiculous work they had us do, we’d all finished it. The dismissal bell rang, and we all left school with smiles on our faces.
Since I had no homework, I had to answer a question: what do I do now? I didn’t have much to do until six or so, so I decided that I would go biking. I left a note and readied my bike.
It was a sunny day, so I rode to Camelsback. I climbed up the hill with my bike and then rode down a couple of times, but I soon left and went to Hyde’s park.
I stopped at Goody’s, a candy store, to buy some candy with the money I brought. I bought some sour strips and some jawbreakers. I was halfway through with my sweets when I saw Mrs. Dameson pull up. What is she doing here? Doesn’t she have stuff to do? My confusion soon gave way to panic, as I realized what would happen if she found that I dodged her punishment. I probably overstressed it, but I hate to think that she’d give me extra assignments.
I quickly got up from my seat and started walking toward the back door, trying to keep out of sight from the main door. I dodged her sight by ducking below the windows, working my way toward my bike. When she sat down facing the opposite direction, I dashed to my bike and unlocked it. I hid the bike behind the building next door, and then went in through the back. I had to see what she was doing here.
She walked out of the candy shop with one of the huge lollipops that they sell. It must be for her niece or daughter or something. Before getting into her car, she crossed the street and walked into a bookshop. I could see that she only bought one book, and then got into her car and drove off.
I waited for a couple of minutes, and then rode to the bookshop. I asked the clerk, “The lady who just walked in, what did she buy?” Remembering her first name I added “Maria’s a good friend of mine, I wanted to see what she’s reading these days.”
The clerk looked like he couldn’t care less. “What? Oh, yeah. She bought The Screwtape Letters. I forget who the author was.”
“Thanks.” I said, and resolved to try to check out the book at the library. I rode home, tired from biking Camelsback.
Mom greeted me and asked me how my day was. I decided to tell her about the whole fight scene at school, and how we were able to slide by Mrs. Dameson’s punishment. She smiled and nodded the whole way through, thoroughly entertained. She laughed at it and said it was okay with her.
“Where’s Dad?”
“He’s on call in Meridian.”
“Okay.” This happened maybe once a week, that Dad would be out the whole night in the hospital. This didn’t bother me too much, since it didn’t happen very often, but I had wanted to ask him about the book.
“Hey Mom, can I go to this airsoft thing on Friday?”
“Get the specifics, and I’ll take you.”
Mom always had to know the specifics. I had dinner and watched TV, and the rest of the day pretty much passed without me knowing it. It was a good day over all, I thought, as I climbed into bed. I remembered what Luke said about the airsoft party. I soon fantasized about airsoft battles and wars. I finally fell into sleep.
I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock, blaring incessantly, tearing me away from sleep. I slammed the snooze button, hoping it would leave me better rested. It didn’t of course, and it rang again in a few minutes. I turned the alarm off and tore myself away from the warm sheets and pillows to meet the tough morning.
I climbed into the shower, thinking normal Wednesday thoughts. I’m tired. I can’t wait until Friday. I wonder if we’ll win the airsoft battle.
I got dressed and walked downstairs to scavenge my breakfast. I had spare time, so I prepared Andy and me a bagel. Andy came down, and we shared the bagels. “Go to school without me,” Andy said, “I need to finish some work.” I laughed and got ready for school.
It was not too cold of a morning, and I arrived at school with my fingers mostly intact. I again had the tremendous temptation to turn and ride away from school, but there was a part of me that resisted with all its strength. I felt like it was another voice telling me I had to go to school. At any rate I listened, and again walked into the gymnasium.
The heads that turned was only a bit more than the usual turnout, and it seemed like the fight was fading already. Luke, Mark, and John greeted me as usual. “I got news.” Luke said.
“Yeah, what?”
“I was calling some of my friends the other night, and there’s been the same thing going on in a bunch of the other schools.”
“What, you mean the fight?”
“Yeah! They all want to come- eight and seventh.”
“Wait, you mean that we’re going to be fighting along North kids and stuff like that?”
“Yeah! I got the final count in. It’s us and three other schools. All eigths versus all sevies.”
I was stunned. This wasn’t an airsoft battle. It was war. “Listen,” he said, “It’s Friday right after school at my place. I’ll take you if you need. Oh, and bring money tomorrow, at least twenty dollars. I’m gonna buy some airsoft grenades and stuff.”
“Alright.” Two grades from four schools? There could be as many as eighty people fighting. This was going to be insane. Luke was planning the battle carefully. He was getting people to bring walkie-talkies, flashlights; everything. He told me to go out and buy a good gun with a flashlight if I could.
I was considering it when Mrs. Dameson walked into the gymnasium and stepped in front of us. All discussion of airsoft ceased immediately as she cleared her throat to speak. “I assume we learned our lesson yesterday?” We nodded. “And it won’t happen again?” We nodded again. “Good. I think you all are mature enough to recover this quickly, so I’m going to let you play football today.” She threw a football at Nick and walked out.
Nick and some of the others cheered, and I just chuckled. She had hardly punished us at all, and she was already giving back our privileges. “Weird week, huh?” John asked.
“No kidding. You don’t even know the half of it.”
“Yeah, what’s the half of it?”
I knew I could tell John. “You do remember the fight?”
“I think I do...” he said sarcastically.
“Yeah, well I looked up at one of the teachers when we were fighting, and even though he was looking straight at the fight, he was smiling. A really smug smile.”
“Yeah, but he was probably just laughing at us. It would’ve seemed funny to me.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” I considered telling him about the psychology book, but I knew that it both was and would seem paranoid or just stupid.
“Dude just relax. Within a week or two and a couple of detentions later, this’ll all blow over. It was just an incident.” He said with newfound confidence.
“Yeah, you’re right man. It’ll be fine....” But in my heart of hearts, I wanted there to be more to it.
Even though the librarian hawked over us, we still managed to communicate in bits and pieces. We were able to split up the work between us; we would each do twelve problems and pass the answers around when the librarian wasn’t looking. We were done within a half-hour, and tried to look busy for the rest of the time. Ironically, it’s not as easy as it looks.
After Algebra was over, the librarian sent us back to our room to switch to History. Mrs. Lancaster assigned us a one-page essay on slavery due tomorrow. She said the same thing as Mr. Higgins: “Principal’s orders, not mine.” It didn’t matter much. We had spent the whole of seventh grade learning to write essays. They were pretty easy; they just took time. By the time the period was done, I had finished my rough draft and was ready to start typing. We helped each other out and were able to finish our rough drafts by the time that the bell rang.
When it did, Mrs. Higgins told us to stay in to try to finish our work. So the eight of us all set to work typing up our History essays. By helping each other, we were all about a third done when the students came back in.
The next subject was language. We were assigned the whole unit’s problems in vocabulary, which we all managed to finish before the class ended.
Next was Lunch. We had to eat separated, but all of us could deal with that. As I ate in one of the halls, I saw Mrs. Dameson walk down the hall. She recognized me as the troublemaker who had started the fight and glared at me. She asked a few sarcastic questions such as “Enjoying your day?” I couldn’t think of anything to do but to not say anything.
During second recess, we again stayed in and worked on our essays. Most of us had it finished when the bell rang.
After that was Literature. We had to read the rest of the book and take the test tomorrow, when it would normally be next week. We had already read the whole book.
Following that was Science. The due date for the big science project was moved from next week to tomorrow. Again, no problem, we’d all done it in groups and finished it the week before.
And then we had P.E. We weren’t allowed to participate, so we stayed in and finished whatever work we hadn’t finished. We finished our essays and y the end of the day, virtually none of us had any homework at all.
Before dismissal, Mrs. Dameson called us down to her office. We entered her office nervously, trying to predict what would happen. We had all silently agreed to act repentant. “So,” she started, “I’m guessing you’ve noticed a difference in your assignments.”
We all muttered and nodded in agreement, trying hard to keep a convincing, straight face. “That was your punishment for your behavior yesterday. We can’t have these things happening here. They reflect badly on the school. Now I don’t want this to happen again, or your assignments will be even bigger. Understand? Good, now scram.”
We exited her office and stepped into our homeroom. We all laughed over our good luck. And the rest of the class didn’t have any assignments; it was just supposed to be us with homework. But even with their ridiculous work they had us do, we’d all finished it. The dismissal bell rang, and we all left school with smiles on our faces.
Since I had no homework, I had to answer a question: what do I do now? I didn’t have much to do until six or so, so I decided that I would go biking. I left a note and readied my bike.
It was a sunny day, so I rode to Camelsback. I climbed up the hill with my bike and then rode down a couple of times, but I soon left and went to Hyde’s park.
I stopped at Goody’s, a candy store, to buy some candy with the money I brought. I bought some sour strips and some jawbreakers. I was halfway through with my sweets when I saw Mrs. Dameson pull up. What is she doing here? Doesn’t she have stuff to do? My confusion soon gave way to panic, as I realized what would happen if she found that I dodged her punishment. I probably overstressed it, but I hate to think that she’d give me extra assignments.
I quickly got up from my seat and started walking toward the back door, trying to keep out of sight from the main door. I dodged her sight by ducking below the windows, working my way toward my bike. When she sat down facing the opposite direction, I dashed to my bike and unlocked it. I hid the bike behind the building next door, and then went in through the back. I had to see what she was doing here.
She walked out of the candy shop with one of the huge lollipops that they sell. It must be for her niece or daughter or something. Before getting into her car, she crossed the street and walked into a bookshop. I could see that she only bought one book, and then got into her car and drove off.
I waited for a couple of minutes, and then rode to the bookshop. I asked the clerk, “The lady who just walked in, what did she buy?” Remembering her first name I added “Maria’s a good friend of mine, I wanted to see what she’s reading these days.”
The clerk looked like he couldn’t care less. “What? Oh, yeah. She bought The Screwtape Letters. I forget who the author was.”
“Thanks.” I said, and resolved to try to check out the book at the library. I rode home, tired from biking Camelsback.
Mom greeted me and asked me how my day was. I decided to tell her about the whole fight scene at school, and how we were able to slide by Mrs. Dameson’s punishment. She smiled and nodded the whole way through, thoroughly entertained. She laughed at it and said it was okay with her.
“Where’s Dad?”
“He’s on call in Meridian.”
“Okay.” This happened maybe once a week, that Dad would be out the whole night in the hospital. This didn’t bother me too much, since it didn’t happen very often, but I had wanted to ask him about the book.
“Hey Mom, can I go to this airsoft thing on Friday?”
“Get the specifics, and I’ll take you.”
Mom always had to know the specifics. I had dinner and watched TV, and the rest of the day pretty much passed without me knowing it. It was a good day over all, I thought, as I climbed into bed. I remembered what Luke said about the airsoft party. I soon fantasized about airsoft battles and wars. I finally fell into sleep.
I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock, blaring incessantly, tearing me away from sleep. I slammed the snooze button, hoping it would leave me better rested. It didn’t of course, and it rang again in a few minutes. I turned the alarm off and tore myself away from the warm sheets and pillows to meet the tough morning.
I climbed into the shower, thinking normal Wednesday thoughts. I’m tired. I can’t wait until Friday. I wonder if we’ll win the airsoft battle.
I got dressed and walked downstairs to scavenge my breakfast. I had spare time, so I prepared Andy and me a bagel. Andy came down, and we shared the bagels. “Go to school without me,” Andy said, “I need to finish some work.” I laughed and got ready for school.
It was not too cold of a morning, and I arrived at school with my fingers mostly intact. I again had the tremendous temptation to turn and ride away from school, but there was a part of me that resisted with all its strength. I felt like it was another voice telling me I had to go to school. At any rate I listened, and again walked into the gymnasium.
The heads that turned was only a bit more than the usual turnout, and it seemed like the fight was fading already. Luke, Mark, and John greeted me as usual. “I got news.” Luke said.
“Yeah, what?”
“I was calling some of my friends the other night, and there’s been the same thing going on in a bunch of the other schools.”
“What, you mean the fight?”
“Yeah! They all want to come- eight and seventh.”
“Wait, you mean that we’re going to be fighting along North kids and stuff like that?”
“Yeah! I got the final count in. It’s us and three other schools. All eigths versus all sevies.”
I was stunned. This wasn’t an airsoft battle. It was war. “Listen,” he said, “It’s Friday right after school at my place. I’ll take you if you need. Oh, and bring money tomorrow, at least twenty dollars. I’m gonna buy some airsoft grenades and stuff.”
“Alright.” Two grades from four schools? There could be as many as eighty people fighting. This was going to be insane. Luke was planning the battle carefully. He was getting people to bring walkie-talkies, flashlights; everything. He told me to go out and buy a good gun with a flashlight if I could.
I was considering it when Mrs. Dameson walked into the gymnasium and stepped in front of us. All discussion of airsoft ceased immediately as she cleared her throat to speak. “I assume we learned our lesson yesterday?” We nodded. “And it won’t happen again?” We nodded again. “Good. I think you all are mature enough to recover this quickly, so I’m going to let you play football today.” She threw a football at Nick and walked out.
Nick and some of the others cheered, and I just chuckled. She had hardly punished us at all, and she was already giving back our privileges. “Weird week, huh?” John asked.
“No kidding. You don’t even know the half of it.”
“Yeah, what’s the half of it?”
I knew I could tell John. “You do remember the fight?”
“I think I do...” he said sarcastically.
“Yeah, well I looked up at one of the teachers when we were fighting, and even though he was looking straight at the fight, he was smiling. A really smug smile.”
“Yeah, but he was probably just laughing at us. It would’ve seemed funny to me.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” I considered telling him about the psychology book, but I knew that it both was and would seem paranoid or just stupid.
“Dude just relax. Within a week or two and a couple of detentions later, this’ll all blow over. It was just an incident.” He said with newfound confidence.
“Yeah, you’re right man. It’ll be fine....” But in my heart of hearts, I wanted there to be more to it.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Mondays - Chapter 2
Chapter 2
The rest of school zipped by without much excitement, and the dismissal bell was ringing before I knew it. Mondays I had piano lessons, so I left the school behind and rode to my lesson, maybe seven blocks away. I had been playing piano for a very long time, maybe eight or nine years of formal lessons. I had had four or five teachers so far, and my current teacher, Jules, was a very interesting person. To sum him up, he’s a crazy old New Yorker Jew who got kicked out of the Einstein medical institute twice. He’s traveled the world for half his life, playing in bars. He’s been to Jerusalem, Greece, Rome, and all the great European cities.
Jules, instead of making me do classical music and scales all day (I’ve had previous experience with this; it sucks), has me playing bar tunes, jazz, and improvisation. His teaching style fitted me perfectly; I’d been practicing scales and chords with all my previous teachers. The years of memorizing chords and scales came in handy when I had to use it to play fakes at first glance. (Fakes are pieces of music that have a one-note melody and letters above it. If you look at a song book, most pieces will have guitar notes above it. C, Bmaj, E7, Gmaj9, so on. I use these to help me play the song.)
He had been teaching me some classical music too, but this was mostly exercises, not my main repertoire. My main repertoire consisted of songs like “Ain’t Misbehavin” and “You’ve got a friend in me”. It was all very fun, and they were great songs to show off and play.
But playing was only half the lesson. Truthfully, we’d spend maybe half the time going into some conversation about religion or politics. One of his quotes was, “I don’t know if there’s a God or not, but if there is, He’s a very peculiar person.” Most of the time we’ll end up discussing politics or religion. I don’t know how we got into these conversations, but they were, if nothing else, interesting.
After a while of such talk, we’d jam on the piano for a few minutes. Afterwards, he’d give me a song to work on over the week (I don’t need instruction for the simpler pieces anymore) and we’d work on something that I would need his help on.
And of course, there was always the Rhapsody. Jules and I had been long working on George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. It is a beautiful piece, and I can almost play the whole concerto, take a few parts. The last few parts are extremely difficult, and Jules has always had trouble with it. Jules and I had just started the last parts.
I walked up to the door and knocked. “Come innnnn!” he said in a singsong voice. I smiled, for perhaps the first time that day, and walked in. He and another student were just finishing up. The student left and Jules told me to wait for a second while he got some sheet music from the house. The lessons were in his workshop, in front of the driveway. The workshop was right next to his house. So while he was finding today’s material, I got to improvise for a little while.
He walked back in and told me to play Rhapsody in Blue for him. I began the piece but halfway through, something stopped me. Some sort of musical theme in the piece seemed familiar. “Jules, that last part, it sounds like a theme. What is it?”
“It’s allegretto, but I’ve this theme repeats throughout the piece. It’s supposed sound suspicious.”
“What do you mean?”
“It reels the listener in, catching them in the tension. Of course, most people would just say it sound fancy, wouldn’t they?”
Afterwards, we ended up discussing musical themes for a while. Jules acted serious about a discussion, and then broke the ice with a ridiculous joke, and it was hard to keep up.
He ended up giving me a bar tune and a new small portion of Rhapsody. I rode the rest of the way home in a more cheerful mood. Jules always cheered me up.
I finally got home around 4:40. Mom and Dad weren’t home yet, but my twenty-one-year-old sister, Jessica, was on break from college and it was good to see her. After welcoming Jessica back, I grabbed some jellybeans left over from Easter and went up to my room to finish my homework. There wasn’t much, and I finished it quickly. Afterwards, Andy, Jessica, and I watched movies on the TV downstairs, which was a newly installed plasma screen with surround sound. When Mom and Dad got home, they welcomed Jessica, and then shooed us out of the house until they could get dinner. Andy and I played football out front while Jessica went out to get some milk from the grocery store. Dinner was soon ready: lamb, biscuits, salad, and potato au gratin. After dinner Andy, Jess, and I all did dishes while Mom and Dad sipped wine and discussed the day of work. Mom was a nurse and Dad was a doctor, (yeah, they met over a body) so they always had interesting patients to talk about.
After dishes, Andy and I went downstairs. He watched the history channel while I surfed the net. In a little bit, Mom and Dad called us all up to watch Two and a Half Men, followed by Heroes. After a while they sent us to bed. While brushing my teeth, I realized that something wasn’t quite right. This routine was virtually the same thing that happened every night. School didn’t seem appealing, but it at least seemed more interesting. Listening to my own description of the day, it was only school that was engaging. I kept going because it was interesting. Keeps reeling me in...
Before undressing, I set my note on my desk, the one that read Conner S. Laneson. I lay in bed thinking about the strange day. Football fights and psychology writers had worn me out. Laughing, I decided to write it all down in a little notebook. Were the staff conspirators? I highly doubted it. The half of them were morons, it’s hard to think that they created some system. I smiled. It didn’t work very well then, we were constantly having disciplinary problems.
I dozed off after a while, thinking of tomorrow.
I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock, blaring incessantly, tearing me away from sleep. This time, I decided to just get up without a struggle. I tore myself away from my warm sheets and pillows to meet the cold morning. I turned the alarm off and climbed into the shower thinking normal Tuesday thoughts: I wish I didn’t have school today. Why can’t it be Friday? Did I finish that English assignment?
Tuesdays were never as bad as Mondays, but I disliked it almost as much. I felt like there was no progress being made, that I still had to muddle through four more days. It didn’t have quite the bad vibe that Monday did, but I still didn’t like the day.
Andy was up the same time that I was, and we both went to the kitchen to find Mom cooking us eggs. After getting ready, she dropped us off at school. It was one of our better mornings.
While I was walking toward the gymnasium, John walked up to me and started talking. “Anxious?”
“No. why?”
“Because today’s judgment day.”
Oh God, I thought, I forgot. The principal would always punish us for our
actions the day after the incident. So we would get in trouble today for what happened yesterday, and probably a lot of trouble.
“Oh, crud, I didn’t even realize it. I forgot about the whole thing.”
“Yeah, you better be on your toes. I’m afraid. My grades ain’t that good, I don’t need stuff like this happening.”
John was huge, burly, strong, and fierce. I was surprised-and worried- to see him afraid of this. “What do you think will happen?”
“I don’t know, but it’s probably going to be bad for something like this.”
“Yeah...” He was right. The principal was calm yesterday, but it was the false sort of calm, the calm before a storm. Whatever was in store for today, couldn’t be good. I said a quick private prayer and entered the gym.
This time, a lot of heads did turn, even some from the teachers. At first, I was surprised, and had to think to find why. I hadn’t thought about it, but I technically started the fight. The seventh graders would surely blame the whole thing on me, and plenty of the eighth graders would resent me. But that’s not fair! I was provoked! Anybody else would’ve done the same thing in my position. But nobody was in the position that I was in, and they wouldn’t think that through before hating me. I was going to have to endure condescendence from not only the teachers, but the school as well.
Luke, though, greeted me as usual, but sensed that I was uncomfortable. “Just ignore them if they try anything. With any luck, the whole thing will blow over in a week or two. You coming to my airsoft party on Friday?”
“An airsoft party? Your mom’s letting you have an airsoft party in the midst of all this? You knocked one of the sevies to the ground!”
Luke smiled. “Yeah, but that was only because I didn’t like the little brat.
I told my mom the whole story, and she kind of understood, and sided with us. She says it’s better if we battle with play guns rather than fists. Oh yeah, we’re battling the sevies.”
“The sevies? How many of them?”
“Just the twelve boys. We might be outnumbered, but this battle is ‘fight until you surrender’, so we definitely ain’t outmatched.”
I smiled. “I’ll make it if I can.” Luke smiled too, and began contemplating the battle with John and Mark. The teams would be even, the guns split fairly, and scores settled.
Just then the principal, Mrs. Dameson, stormed into the room, glared at us, and whispered something to our teachers. My friends and I all exchanged glances, what could this mean?
We found out soon enough. The late bell rung and we headed to class. Mrs. Higgins, once the whole class was in the room, said to the class, “All the boys who were playing football yesterday, please come up to my desk.” We walked up, and she was handing out a one-hundred-problem algebra worksheet. “You will have to go to the library to do this.” We looked at her in disbelief, but she simply said, “Principal’s orders, not mine.”
We shuffled into the library, wondering what else was in store for us. As we walked in the librarian said to us, “Mrs. Dameson just called me, anyone who talks gets and extra twenty problems.” We were infuriated, but there was nothing we could do. And we couldn’t talk about it either. We glanced at each other, regretting our incident from Monday. It was going to be a long day.
The rest of school zipped by without much excitement, and the dismissal bell was ringing before I knew it. Mondays I had piano lessons, so I left the school behind and rode to my lesson, maybe seven blocks away. I had been playing piano for a very long time, maybe eight or nine years of formal lessons. I had had four or five teachers so far, and my current teacher, Jules, was a very interesting person. To sum him up, he’s a crazy old New Yorker Jew who got kicked out of the Einstein medical institute twice. He’s traveled the world for half his life, playing in bars. He’s been to Jerusalem, Greece, Rome, and all the great European cities.
Jules, instead of making me do classical music and scales all day (I’ve had previous experience with this; it sucks), has me playing bar tunes, jazz, and improvisation. His teaching style fitted me perfectly; I’d been practicing scales and chords with all my previous teachers. The years of memorizing chords and scales came in handy when I had to use it to play fakes at first glance. (Fakes are pieces of music that have a one-note melody and letters above it. If you look at a song book, most pieces will have guitar notes above it. C, Bmaj, E7, Gmaj9, so on. I use these to help me play the song.)
He had been teaching me some classical music too, but this was mostly exercises, not my main repertoire. My main repertoire consisted of songs like “Ain’t Misbehavin” and “You’ve got a friend in me”. It was all very fun, and they were great songs to show off and play.
But playing was only half the lesson. Truthfully, we’d spend maybe half the time going into some conversation about religion or politics. One of his quotes was, “I don’t know if there’s a God or not, but if there is, He’s a very peculiar person.” Most of the time we’ll end up discussing politics or religion. I don’t know how we got into these conversations, but they were, if nothing else, interesting.
After a while of such talk, we’d jam on the piano for a few minutes. Afterwards, he’d give me a song to work on over the week (I don’t need instruction for the simpler pieces anymore) and we’d work on something that I would need his help on.
And of course, there was always the Rhapsody. Jules and I had been long working on George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. It is a beautiful piece, and I can almost play the whole concerto, take a few parts. The last few parts are extremely difficult, and Jules has always had trouble with it. Jules and I had just started the last parts.
I walked up to the door and knocked. “Come innnnn!” he said in a singsong voice. I smiled, for perhaps the first time that day, and walked in. He and another student were just finishing up. The student left and Jules told me to wait for a second while he got some sheet music from the house. The lessons were in his workshop, in front of the driveway. The workshop was right next to his house. So while he was finding today’s material, I got to improvise for a little while.
He walked back in and told me to play Rhapsody in Blue for him. I began the piece but halfway through, something stopped me. Some sort of musical theme in the piece seemed familiar. “Jules, that last part, it sounds like a theme. What is it?”
“It’s allegretto, but I’ve this theme repeats throughout the piece. It’s supposed sound suspicious.”
“What do you mean?”
“It reels the listener in, catching them in the tension. Of course, most people would just say it sound fancy, wouldn’t they?”
Afterwards, we ended up discussing musical themes for a while. Jules acted serious about a discussion, and then broke the ice with a ridiculous joke, and it was hard to keep up.
He ended up giving me a bar tune and a new small portion of Rhapsody. I rode the rest of the way home in a more cheerful mood. Jules always cheered me up.
I finally got home around 4:40. Mom and Dad weren’t home yet, but my twenty-one-year-old sister, Jessica, was on break from college and it was good to see her. After welcoming Jessica back, I grabbed some jellybeans left over from Easter and went up to my room to finish my homework. There wasn’t much, and I finished it quickly. Afterwards, Andy, Jessica, and I watched movies on the TV downstairs, which was a newly installed plasma screen with surround sound. When Mom and Dad got home, they welcomed Jessica, and then shooed us out of the house until they could get dinner. Andy and I played football out front while Jessica went out to get some milk from the grocery store. Dinner was soon ready: lamb, biscuits, salad, and potato au gratin. After dinner Andy, Jess, and I all did dishes while Mom and Dad sipped wine and discussed the day of work. Mom was a nurse and Dad was a doctor, (yeah, they met over a body) so they always had interesting patients to talk about.
After dishes, Andy and I went downstairs. He watched the history channel while I surfed the net. In a little bit, Mom and Dad called us all up to watch Two and a Half Men, followed by Heroes. After a while they sent us to bed. While brushing my teeth, I realized that something wasn’t quite right. This routine was virtually the same thing that happened every night. School didn’t seem appealing, but it at least seemed more interesting. Listening to my own description of the day, it was only school that was engaging. I kept going because it was interesting. Keeps reeling me in...
Before undressing, I set my note on my desk, the one that read Conner S. Laneson. I lay in bed thinking about the strange day. Football fights and psychology writers had worn me out. Laughing, I decided to write it all down in a little notebook. Were the staff conspirators? I highly doubted it. The half of them were morons, it’s hard to think that they created some system. I smiled. It didn’t work very well then, we were constantly having disciplinary problems.
I dozed off after a while, thinking of tomorrow.
I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock, blaring incessantly, tearing me away from sleep. This time, I decided to just get up without a struggle. I tore myself away from my warm sheets and pillows to meet the cold morning. I turned the alarm off and climbed into the shower thinking normal Tuesday thoughts: I wish I didn’t have school today. Why can’t it be Friday? Did I finish that English assignment?
Tuesdays were never as bad as Mondays, but I disliked it almost as much. I felt like there was no progress being made, that I still had to muddle through four more days. It didn’t have quite the bad vibe that Monday did, but I still didn’t like the day.
Andy was up the same time that I was, and we both went to the kitchen to find Mom cooking us eggs. After getting ready, she dropped us off at school. It was one of our better mornings.
While I was walking toward the gymnasium, John walked up to me and started talking. “Anxious?”
“No. why?”
“Because today’s judgment day.”
Oh God, I thought, I forgot. The principal would always punish us for our
actions the day after the incident. So we would get in trouble today for what happened yesterday, and probably a lot of trouble.
“Oh, crud, I didn’t even realize it. I forgot about the whole thing.”
“Yeah, you better be on your toes. I’m afraid. My grades ain’t that good, I don’t need stuff like this happening.”
John was huge, burly, strong, and fierce. I was surprised-and worried- to see him afraid of this. “What do you think will happen?”
“I don’t know, but it’s probably going to be bad for something like this.”
“Yeah...” He was right. The principal was calm yesterday, but it was the false sort of calm, the calm before a storm. Whatever was in store for today, couldn’t be good. I said a quick private prayer and entered the gym.
This time, a lot of heads did turn, even some from the teachers. At first, I was surprised, and had to think to find why. I hadn’t thought about it, but I technically started the fight. The seventh graders would surely blame the whole thing on me, and plenty of the eighth graders would resent me. But that’s not fair! I was provoked! Anybody else would’ve done the same thing in my position. But nobody was in the position that I was in, and they wouldn’t think that through before hating me. I was going to have to endure condescendence from not only the teachers, but the school as well.
Luke, though, greeted me as usual, but sensed that I was uncomfortable. “Just ignore them if they try anything. With any luck, the whole thing will blow over in a week or two. You coming to my airsoft party on Friday?”
“An airsoft party? Your mom’s letting you have an airsoft party in the midst of all this? You knocked one of the sevies to the ground!”
Luke smiled. “Yeah, but that was only because I didn’t like the little brat.
I told my mom the whole story, and she kind of understood, and sided with us. She says it’s better if we battle with play guns rather than fists. Oh yeah, we’re battling the sevies.”
“The sevies? How many of them?”
“Just the twelve boys. We might be outnumbered, but this battle is ‘fight until you surrender’, so we definitely ain’t outmatched.”
I smiled. “I’ll make it if I can.” Luke smiled too, and began contemplating the battle with John and Mark. The teams would be even, the guns split fairly, and scores settled.
Just then the principal, Mrs. Dameson, stormed into the room, glared at us, and whispered something to our teachers. My friends and I all exchanged glances, what could this mean?
We found out soon enough. The late bell rung and we headed to class. Mrs. Higgins, once the whole class was in the room, said to the class, “All the boys who were playing football yesterday, please come up to my desk.” We walked up, and she was handing out a one-hundred-problem algebra worksheet. “You will have to go to the library to do this.” We looked at her in disbelief, but she simply said, “Principal’s orders, not mine.”
We shuffled into the library, wondering what else was in store for us. As we walked in the librarian said to us, “Mrs. Dameson just called me, anyone who talks gets and extra twenty problems.” We were infuriated, but there was nothing we could do. And we couldn’t talk about it either. We glanced at each other, regretting our incident from Monday. It was going to be a long day.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Mondays - Chapter 1
Mondays
Chapter 1
I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock, blaring incessantly, tearing me away from sleep. I slammed the snooze button, even when I knew it didn’t do me any good. I fell back to sleep for a few minutes, but only to have the clock ring again as programmed. This time, sleep had left me again.
I tore myself away from the warm sheets and pillows to meet the harsh morning. As usual, I took my shower and dried off, thinking my normal Monday thoughts. This is stupid. Why do we have school today? Why do we have school at all? I always had these sorts of thoughts on Mondays, and this one was no different.
After getting dressed I walked downstairs to the kitchen to scrounge some breakfast. Bagel? Cereal? Toast? I grabbed the quickest meal available to me- a breakfast bar from the cupboard- and ate it while climbing back up the stairs. Andy had just gotten up and dressed, and we passed through the hall silently.
I brushed my teeth and gathered up my things for school, just beginning to worry about the half-dozen assignments that I hadn’t done. It was late in the morning by now, so I didn’t wait for Andy, but got my bike ready once I was packed. It was a cold morning, and the nine-block ride, albeit I had a jacket, numbed my fingers and made me shiver. Upon reaching the school, I harbored a tremendous temptation to turn around and do something useful or fun for the day, but I resisted as usual. After all, it was just another Monday.
I stepped into the gymnasium to face the day that awaited me. A few of my classmates looked as I walked in and greeted me, but most looked apathetic, concealing their own storms of anger. Not that I expected anything more; they were all as mad at the world as I was. Monday did this to people, especially students and teachers. There was something about this godforsaken day that put everybody in bad moods.
Mark, Luke, and John were three of my closest friends. Mark was a Hispanic boy who I had known since first grade. He was very strong and knew enough weak points and body locks to beat the crap out of nearly anyone in a fair fight. Luke, I had known since third or fourth grade, and though obnoxious and a bit short, was fun to be around. John was a huge, burly character who had joined the class just this year, but he immediately fit in with us and was soon a close friend of mine. I hung with them until the bell rung and we shuffled off toward homeroom.
Algebra was our first period subject, but it seemed like stupid placement to me. Most assignments that you forget to do can be done throughout the day, but not for Algebra, and when there was an assignment virtually every day, there were few days where we didn’t have homework. Mrs. Higgins was our teacher, and she was pretty nice, but I still had to go to the library to try to catch up with the math that I didn’t do. I tried to do the work that was assigned, but you always had to have a good calculator, which I didn’t have at home. And the math seemed so repetitive after a while, it was hard not to be sidetracked. I finished the unfinished work and got my late grade as usual. After all, it was just another Monday.
After Algebra, there was History with Mrs. Lancaster. As usual in the class, I sat with everyone else, but read ahead, ignored the teacher’s discussion and did none of the checkpoint questions that everyone else did. So far, I’d been doing this for a month with no consequences. While they were reading about the War of 1812, I was reading about the end of the Depression. I had asked Mrs. Lancaster if she knew, but she just laughed and told me to do my work. She was a character.
While switching back to homeroom Andy bumped into me and said, “You suck. Wait for me next time you jackass.” I did my best to ignore the comment, and set my things on my desk. It was hard to ignore him sometimes, but it was always harder to punish him for it. For example, if I punched him for insulting me or annoying me, he would not logically link the two together and stop doing what caused me to punch him, but defiantly say something along the lines of “I didn’t do anything. You’re just a jerk.” This did nothing for either of us but further infuriated me. But for now it didn’t matter what he said to me. It was time for recess.
The school was small, maybe two hundred kids for the nine grades it offered; Kindergarten through eighth grade. Each of the grades got recess, but this was the last year that I would get the privilege before high school. The upper grades, the fifth, sixth seventh, and eighth grades had their recess right after the lower grades, which was fourth on down.
As for the games, classes usually compete against the others. Eighth versus Seventh; Sixth versus Fifth; and so on. The sport was a variable, and the game pool included kickball, bump, basketball, dodgeball, four-square, wallball, red-ass, and many others. But the eighth and seventh played two-hand-touch football out on the grass field.
I ran out onto the field to face the seventh grade with my team. The odds were stacked against us. They had perhaps a seven-man advantage. Nick, our quarterback was shouting orders at everyone. We were receiving the kickoff. The ball soared into the end zone and Mark kneed it for a touchback. Hike! Nick dumped it to Luke, who made some good running yardage. Hike! An incomplete pass. Hike! A long pass to Mark. Hike! A short dump to me, touchdown. Score, 1-0, us.
I was a surprised at a touchdown so early; we weren’t usually this smooth this early in the game. When you’re in a football game and you’re outnumbered, no yardage marks, and no first downs, it’s hard to get a good start. On top of that, there were no referees, so if they cheated, than oh well.
We kicked off and I managed to tag the recipient before he could make it too far. John and I rushed Peter, the seventh grade quarterback. We had to rush through maybe three times as many blockers, but we pretty consistently made it through and if we didn’t make a sack, then we at least put good pressure on their QB, Peter.
So it was their ball. Hike! John and I sack Peter. Hike! QB run, maybe a ten yard gain. Hike! Incomplete pass. Punt! A quick recovery for us. We didn’t do so well for the next series of plays, and the game continued in such patterns until the score was 2-2, and we had the ball perhaps fifteen yards from the end zone. It was fourth down, too long to give an easy pass, and too short to give a soaring one. I whispered to John, “I’ll be open.” On the hike, I ran straight into the end zone as fast as I humanly could. Still running, I turned to see the ball hurtling toward me. Still running, I felt my foot connect with a leg, and tripped over it. Crashing down, I saw Peter grin and make a grab at the ball.
He missed of course, but my class immediately sprang into action. John, having seen the deliberate tripping laid Peter out on the grass, and the seventh graders tried to come and wrestle us down. They weren’t able to; they couldn’t. While our age and strength may not be much use for two-hand-touch football, any sevie would be sadly outmatched to us when it came to fighting. But it was very hard for seven of us to fend off fifteen of them, even with our advantage of strength.
There wasn’t much else but tackles, but the two classes were in an all-out brawl by the time a teacher came and broke it up. He took the ball and said a little speech about our behavior, and said that the next time it happened, it would be gone for the week. It’s a simple thing to say, right? Not for him. He turned this into a five-minute long ordeal. I didn’t pay much attention, but there was something strange about how he said the speech. It was probably just that his voice kept on squeaking in the middle of it. I didn’t care. He was a pathetic teacher, and I had disliked him ever since I first set foot in the school. The only reason we hadn’t gotten in worse trouble was because he wouldn’t have known how to deal with it. All I gathered was that if it happened again, the football would be taken.
The bell rung and we clamored up the stairs, by the huge map of the world, and into our separate classrooms with plenty of exchanged glares. The day went on, and the next subject we had was Language. I never liked the subject but the work was simple enough and I finished my assignments before the class ended. Shortly after was Lunch. Me, Mark, Luke, and John all sat at the same table and talked about what had happened during the first recess quarrel; who tackled who, who’s fault it was; etc.
Second recess came soon after, and we again walked out on the field to face our opponents. There were no niceties about it. John and I were hit with more fouls than there were people on the field. People who possessed the ball were tackled instead of tagged. Both team threw out the five-alligator rush rule and blitzed on the hike. Basically everyone was cheating and nobody cared.
To make this all worse, the sevie blockers who were constantly fouling John and me kept on coming up to me way after the play and pushing me around. (They left John alone. He’s too intimidating.) I told them to stop but they only laughed at me. Under any normal conditions I would’ve given them a few chances to back off and then slugged the little brats if they didn’t,
but I didn’t want to lose the football for my class. So I did my very best to simply ignore them.
It was nearly the end of the game and we had the ball on fourth down. The score was tied again and we were smack dab in the middle of the field. We knew we could stop them if it was a turnover, so we decided to try to go for it. Nick called Hike and we ran about in all directions. He sent one flying to Luke, but as my head turned to watch, Peter deliberately shoved Luke to the ground and ran up to catch the ball. It wasn’t long before he was tagged, but I was infuriated. When the next sevie shoved me, I grabbed him by his shirt and threw him to the ground.
I knew what would certainly follow. I turned around to find Peter lunging toward me. I swiftly dodged him and tackled the next sevie in my path. I turned again to try to face Peter, but not before feeling his fist connect with my jaw. As I reeled back I saw John and Mark headed toward Peter, He didn’t stand a chance; I didn’t need to worry about him. I ignored the stinging in my mouth and quickly recovered to see the rest of the two grades joining the clamor. To my left, I saw a sevie climbing on Luke’s back. I ran over and gave the kid a square punch to the head. The kid lost his grip and doubled up on the ground, and Luke glanced at me, and that was thanks enough right then. I turned around to see two more sevies confronting me. I fake swung at the first, who ducked, and used the momentum to punch the second, who was caught by surprise. The first then stood up and I kicked him in the stomach. I knew they would get back up, but I couldn’t worry about them. We still had the rest of the sevies to deal with.
I noticed after a while that we were moving more toward the center of the fight, while the sevies were clearly moving towards the outside. Before long, we were surrounded, seven of us versus thirteen of them. One of ours was down, and Peter was on the ground with a bloody nose as well as another sevie. We were outnumbered, but not quite outmatched. Not yet. I was just beginning to worry about how conspicuous the whole ordeal was when my gaze wandered up to where the recess duty teachers usually stood. There was only one of the two there. I squinted, and saw Albeit the one present was looking straight at the fight, his face bore a smug little smile.
Before anymore fighting could happen, I heard the second teacher’s whistle go off loudly and looked to my right to see the football being taken. All of us were sent inside. I don’t remember all of what happened next, but I remember sitting in the hall with Nick and being called into the principal’s office to talk to Mrs. Dameson. I told her the story as accurately as I could, but she left plenty of awkward silences, plenty of idle time.
I took a look at her office. On the wall in front of me there was a USA flag, a large painting behind me, and a bookshelves on either side of me. The first was filled with pictures, awards, and other knick-knacks. The bookshelf closest to me on my left actually had books in it, but most of it was normal schoolbook/teacher’s manual fodder. I had seen nearly all of the books in other classrooms as well. How to Maintain Sanity in the Classroom and A Guide to Education was just a couple. But there was one book that seemed out of place, something I hadn’t seen in any of the other classrooms. It was a big red book with several bookmarks sticking out of the top. I peered close and was able to decipher that it was titled The Definitive Study of Psychology. Go figure, I thought to myself silently.
The interrogation went on, and I noticed that she was distinctly asking just for the factual details. Most of the time, when I got in trouble, it was something more along the lines of “Why did you do this?” “Is this how you want to be remembered?” I counted myself lucky, not having to endure this, and answered the rest of her questions.
As I was dismissed, I was apathetically caught the name of the author of the red book: Conners S. Laneson. I went back out into the hall and passed the time fiddling with the studs on my belt. After a while, I was dismissed and sent back to my current class- Reading. I’d done all my work, and nothing interesting happened. After all, it was just another Monday, right?
Chapter 1
I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock, blaring incessantly, tearing me away from sleep. I slammed the snooze button, even when I knew it didn’t do me any good. I fell back to sleep for a few minutes, but only to have the clock ring again as programmed. This time, sleep had left me again.
I tore myself away from the warm sheets and pillows to meet the harsh morning. As usual, I took my shower and dried off, thinking my normal Monday thoughts. This is stupid. Why do we have school today? Why do we have school at all? I always had these sorts of thoughts on Mondays, and this one was no different.
After getting dressed I walked downstairs to the kitchen to scrounge some breakfast. Bagel? Cereal? Toast? I grabbed the quickest meal available to me- a breakfast bar from the cupboard- and ate it while climbing back up the stairs. Andy had just gotten up and dressed, and we passed through the hall silently.
I brushed my teeth and gathered up my things for school, just beginning to worry about the half-dozen assignments that I hadn’t done. It was late in the morning by now, so I didn’t wait for Andy, but got my bike ready once I was packed. It was a cold morning, and the nine-block ride, albeit I had a jacket, numbed my fingers and made me shiver. Upon reaching the school, I harbored a tremendous temptation to turn around and do something useful or fun for the day, but I resisted as usual. After all, it was just another Monday.
I stepped into the gymnasium to face the day that awaited me. A few of my classmates looked as I walked in and greeted me, but most looked apathetic, concealing their own storms of anger. Not that I expected anything more; they were all as mad at the world as I was. Monday did this to people, especially students and teachers. There was something about this godforsaken day that put everybody in bad moods.
Mark, Luke, and John were three of my closest friends. Mark was a Hispanic boy who I had known since first grade. He was very strong and knew enough weak points and body locks to beat the crap out of nearly anyone in a fair fight. Luke, I had known since third or fourth grade, and though obnoxious and a bit short, was fun to be around. John was a huge, burly character who had joined the class just this year, but he immediately fit in with us and was soon a close friend of mine. I hung with them until the bell rung and we shuffled off toward homeroom.
Algebra was our first period subject, but it seemed like stupid placement to me. Most assignments that you forget to do can be done throughout the day, but not for Algebra, and when there was an assignment virtually every day, there were few days where we didn’t have homework. Mrs. Higgins was our teacher, and she was pretty nice, but I still had to go to the library to try to catch up with the math that I didn’t do. I tried to do the work that was assigned, but you always had to have a good calculator, which I didn’t have at home. And the math seemed so repetitive after a while, it was hard not to be sidetracked. I finished the unfinished work and got my late grade as usual. After all, it was just another Monday.
After Algebra, there was History with Mrs. Lancaster. As usual in the class, I sat with everyone else, but read ahead, ignored the teacher’s discussion and did none of the checkpoint questions that everyone else did. So far, I’d been doing this for a month with no consequences. While they were reading about the War of 1812, I was reading about the end of the Depression. I had asked Mrs. Lancaster if she knew, but she just laughed and told me to do my work. She was a character.
While switching back to homeroom Andy bumped into me and said, “You suck. Wait for me next time you jackass.” I did my best to ignore the comment, and set my things on my desk. It was hard to ignore him sometimes, but it was always harder to punish him for it. For example, if I punched him for insulting me or annoying me, he would not logically link the two together and stop doing what caused me to punch him, but defiantly say something along the lines of “I didn’t do anything. You’re just a jerk.” This did nothing for either of us but further infuriated me. But for now it didn’t matter what he said to me. It was time for recess.
The school was small, maybe two hundred kids for the nine grades it offered; Kindergarten through eighth grade. Each of the grades got recess, but this was the last year that I would get the privilege before high school. The upper grades, the fifth, sixth seventh, and eighth grades had their recess right after the lower grades, which was fourth on down.
As for the games, classes usually compete against the others. Eighth versus Seventh; Sixth versus Fifth; and so on. The sport was a variable, and the game pool included kickball, bump, basketball, dodgeball, four-square, wallball, red-ass, and many others. But the eighth and seventh played two-hand-touch football out on the grass field.
I ran out onto the field to face the seventh grade with my team. The odds were stacked against us. They had perhaps a seven-man advantage. Nick, our quarterback was shouting orders at everyone. We were receiving the kickoff. The ball soared into the end zone and Mark kneed it for a touchback. Hike! Nick dumped it to Luke, who made some good running yardage. Hike! An incomplete pass. Hike! A long pass to Mark. Hike! A short dump to me, touchdown. Score, 1-0, us.
I was a surprised at a touchdown so early; we weren’t usually this smooth this early in the game. When you’re in a football game and you’re outnumbered, no yardage marks, and no first downs, it’s hard to get a good start. On top of that, there were no referees, so if they cheated, than oh well.
We kicked off and I managed to tag the recipient before he could make it too far. John and I rushed Peter, the seventh grade quarterback. We had to rush through maybe three times as many blockers, but we pretty consistently made it through and if we didn’t make a sack, then we at least put good pressure on their QB, Peter.
So it was their ball. Hike! John and I sack Peter. Hike! QB run, maybe a ten yard gain. Hike! Incomplete pass. Punt! A quick recovery for us. We didn’t do so well for the next series of plays, and the game continued in such patterns until the score was 2-2, and we had the ball perhaps fifteen yards from the end zone. It was fourth down, too long to give an easy pass, and too short to give a soaring one. I whispered to John, “I’ll be open.” On the hike, I ran straight into the end zone as fast as I humanly could. Still running, I turned to see the ball hurtling toward me. Still running, I felt my foot connect with a leg, and tripped over it. Crashing down, I saw Peter grin and make a grab at the ball.
He missed of course, but my class immediately sprang into action. John, having seen the deliberate tripping laid Peter out on the grass, and the seventh graders tried to come and wrestle us down. They weren’t able to; they couldn’t. While our age and strength may not be much use for two-hand-touch football, any sevie would be sadly outmatched to us when it came to fighting. But it was very hard for seven of us to fend off fifteen of them, even with our advantage of strength.
There wasn’t much else but tackles, but the two classes were in an all-out brawl by the time a teacher came and broke it up. He took the ball and said a little speech about our behavior, and said that the next time it happened, it would be gone for the week. It’s a simple thing to say, right? Not for him. He turned this into a five-minute long ordeal. I didn’t pay much attention, but there was something strange about how he said the speech. It was probably just that his voice kept on squeaking in the middle of it. I didn’t care. He was a pathetic teacher, and I had disliked him ever since I first set foot in the school. The only reason we hadn’t gotten in worse trouble was because he wouldn’t have known how to deal with it. All I gathered was that if it happened again, the football would be taken.
The bell rung and we clamored up the stairs, by the huge map of the world, and into our separate classrooms with plenty of exchanged glares. The day went on, and the next subject we had was Language. I never liked the subject but the work was simple enough and I finished my assignments before the class ended. Shortly after was Lunch. Me, Mark, Luke, and John all sat at the same table and talked about what had happened during the first recess quarrel; who tackled who, who’s fault it was; etc.
Second recess came soon after, and we again walked out on the field to face our opponents. There were no niceties about it. John and I were hit with more fouls than there were people on the field. People who possessed the ball were tackled instead of tagged. Both team threw out the five-alligator rush rule and blitzed on the hike. Basically everyone was cheating and nobody cared.
To make this all worse, the sevie blockers who were constantly fouling John and me kept on coming up to me way after the play and pushing me around. (They left John alone. He’s too intimidating.) I told them to stop but they only laughed at me. Under any normal conditions I would’ve given them a few chances to back off and then slugged the little brats if they didn’t,
but I didn’t want to lose the football for my class. So I did my very best to simply ignore them.
It was nearly the end of the game and we had the ball on fourth down. The score was tied again and we were smack dab in the middle of the field. We knew we could stop them if it was a turnover, so we decided to try to go for it. Nick called Hike and we ran about in all directions. He sent one flying to Luke, but as my head turned to watch, Peter deliberately shoved Luke to the ground and ran up to catch the ball. It wasn’t long before he was tagged, but I was infuriated. When the next sevie shoved me, I grabbed him by his shirt and threw him to the ground.
I knew what would certainly follow. I turned around to find Peter lunging toward me. I swiftly dodged him and tackled the next sevie in my path. I turned again to try to face Peter, but not before feeling his fist connect with my jaw. As I reeled back I saw John and Mark headed toward Peter, He didn’t stand a chance; I didn’t need to worry about him. I ignored the stinging in my mouth and quickly recovered to see the rest of the two grades joining the clamor. To my left, I saw a sevie climbing on Luke’s back. I ran over and gave the kid a square punch to the head. The kid lost his grip and doubled up on the ground, and Luke glanced at me, and that was thanks enough right then. I turned around to see two more sevies confronting me. I fake swung at the first, who ducked, and used the momentum to punch the second, who was caught by surprise. The first then stood up and I kicked him in the stomach. I knew they would get back up, but I couldn’t worry about them. We still had the rest of the sevies to deal with.
I noticed after a while that we were moving more toward the center of the fight, while the sevies were clearly moving towards the outside. Before long, we were surrounded, seven of us versus thirteen of them. One of ours was down, and Peter was on the ground with a bloody nose as well as another sevie. We were outnumbered, but not quite outmatched. Not yet. I was just beginning to worry about how conspicuous the whole ordeal was when my gaze wandered up to where the recess duty teachers usually stood. There was only one of the two there. I squinted, and saw Albeit the one present was looking straight at the fight, his face bore a smug little smile.
Before anymore fighting could happen, I heard the second teacher’s whistle go off loudly and looked to my right to see the football being taken. All of us were sent inside. I don’t remember all of what happened next, but I remember sitting in the hall with Nick and being called into the principal’s office to talk to Mrs. Dameson. I told her the story as accurately as I could, but she left plenty of awkward silences, plenty of idle time.
I took a look at her office. On the wall in front of me there was a USA flag, a large painting behind me, and a bookshelves on either side of me. The first was filled with pictures, awards, and other knick-knacks. The bookshelf closest to me on my left actually had books in it, but most of it was normal schoolbook/teacher’s manual fodder. I had seen nearly all of the books in other classrooms as well. How to Maintain Sanity in the Classroom and A Guide to Education was just a couple. But there was one book that seemed out of place, something I hadn’t seen in any of the other classrooms. It was a big red book with several bookmarks sticking out of the top. I peered close and was able to decipher that it was titled The Definitive Study of Psychology. Go figure, I thought to myself silently.
The interrogation went on, and I noticed that she was distinctly asking just for the factual details. Most of the time, when I got in trouble, it was something more along the lines of “Why did you do this?” “Is this how you want to be remembered?” I counted myself lucky, not having to endure this, and answered the rest of her questions.
As I was dismissed, I was apathetically caught the name of the author of the red book: Conners S. Laneson. I went back out into the hall and passed the time fiddling with the studs on my belt. After a while, I was dismissed and sent back to my current class- Reading. I’d done all my work, and nothing interesting happened. After all, it was just another Monday, right?
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