I am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil and I Want to be Your Class (13 page)

 

“You want a go?” I ask.

 

Sheldrake glances at the marionette. “Not to criticize, but you’re torturing a child.”

 

I snort. “He’s taller than you are. Heavier, too.”

 

But he shakes his head. “Nah, I’m no good at video games. Congratulations, by the way.”

 

“On what?”

 

“On the election.”

 

“It’s not over yet.” My fingers slide across the sweat-slick buttons.

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“Daddy says I can’t win without an opponent.”

 

“Oh,” says Sheldrake. “When did he—”

 

“Tonight.”

 

Sheldrake looks at me funny. Then he looks at the marionette funny.

 

“I’m gonna get you—ow! I’ll make you sorry—ow!” threatens the marionette, as he does a double somersault.

 

Sheldrake puts a hand on my shoulder. “Maybe you should play this game when you’re a little less”—he searches for the right words—“
on edge
.”

 

“But I feel like playing it now.”.

 

He reaches for the controller. “I’ve changed my mind about playing.”

 

But I won’t give it to him. “I’ve changed my mind about sharing.”

 

I’m a fan of Lynyrd Skynyrd, too. Their songs are full of brutal, punishing guitar solos. I end up playing every track on their first three albums.

Sorry. I just felt like saying that.

 

I sleep a lot in class. It’s sort of expected of me. Nobody ever seems to wonder why dumb children are so much sleepier than smart ones. It all depends on the dumb child in question. Some of them have chores to do, or younger siblings to take care of, or crappy parents who fight all the time and won’t let them sleep. Some of them are true morons who stay up all night watching TV. And some of them burn the midnight oil, running secret global empires.

 

Most teachers are happy to let their worst students sleep, so that their better students can learn. Not Lucy Sokolov.

 

She’s jabbing me with a yardstick. That’s the first of my senses to be engaged—I
feel
the yardstick in my ribs. Then I
hear
the baboons around me laughing, and Sokolov’s vinegar-thin voice above the din: “Wake up. Now.” When I open my eyes, I see Tatiana, skewed sideways, smirking down at me from her desk.

 

But that’s significant: She’s smirking, not laughing. Not like the animals. I
smell
her sweet, cheap aroma—fabric softener, bubble gum, and ChapStick; it wraps itself around me, sends its scented fingers down my throat. Suddenly, I can
taste
the saliva in my mouth, alkaline and hungry. And I’m reminded of why I’m so hungry in the first place.

 

Then Sokolov walks between us and ruins it all.
⁷⁶
“Face off the desk,” she orders. I comply with a bare-thigh-on-vinyl
rip
(some of the saliva has leaked from my mouth). She pulls out her roll book. “Watson, Oliver,” she reads.

 

“Here.”

 

I hate study hall.

 

Randy Sparks, the Most Pathetic Boy in School, is sharpening a pencil. Sokolov gives him a quick glance, then gives him an abrupt order: “Randy Sparks. Please go to the front of the room.”

 

When she says “please,” it sounds wet and bloody, like somebody clubbing a baby seal to death.

 

Randy gives her a puzzled look, then, eager to please as ever, walks to the front of the room and turns to face the class. He has a strange, hopeful smile on his face. What could this be about?

 

Ms. Sokolov says, “Your fly is unzipped.”

 

Everyone in the room stops looking at Randy’s face and starts looking at his crotch. His fly isn’t just unzipped—it’s
gaping
. And the tighty-whities he’s wearing don’t look very clean, either. His fingers fumble as they yank his stubborn zipper back up. Now our eyes go back to his face. He’s blushing so badly it looks like someone has dipped his head in the stuff they use to make red candy apples. The smile is still on his lips, frozen there, but now it is the saddest, most hopeless smile on earth.

 

He honestly looks like he might cry. He is having a very hard time deciding not to—

 

Then the bell rings and he rushes out the door. I feel like sprinting out myself—but I get stuck in my chair for the briefest of moments, and by the time I extricate myself, Tatiana is blocking the door. She leans negligently against the wall like some B-movie villain, picking at the electric-pink spackle on her left thumbnail. She doesn’t bother to look at me.

 

“Going somewhere, Fats?”

 

“Geometry.”

 

“Forget geometry. You’re going to the top, Tubby. The top.” She points her remarkably razor-sharp chin in my direction. “I’m glad it worked out for you. Too bad my little trick didn’t do it.”

 

I goggle at her. What trick is she talking about?

 

She rewards me with a sneaky smile. “See, I’m like your secret campaign manager. I’m the one who told everybody you were dying. So they’d vote for you, see?”

 

Ah! So it was Tatiana who started that rumor! I should’ve known! My classmates are far too feebleminded to come up with such an ingenious story without some master-mind pushing them in the right direction. Little gears in my head start clicking into place—no wonder she’d been so gleeful when everyone else felt bad for me.

 

She pauses, reconsiders. “Actually, I only told three people. They told everybody else. That’s how rumors work.”

 

Even for Tatiana, this is impressive. Few middle-school students have such an advanced understanding of the art of rumor spreading.

 

I dart a worried glance at Sokolov, who sits at the front of the room with her nose buried in a book.
⁷⁷
Tati follows my gaze. “You think that thing over there cares what we talk about?”

 

I’m impressed by her ability to dehumanize
La Sokolova
.

 

“She’s probably your favorite teacher.”

 

“What? ’Cause she’s so nasty? Nah.” Tati wrinkles her nose. “She’s nothing. Just a broken sofa spring that sticks through the cushion. It makes you bleed when you sit on it, but not ’cause it wants to. It’s just what it
is
. She ain’t mean. She’s just broken.”

 

Tatiana has raised her voice significantly for this summation. Maybe “that thing over there” doesn’t care about what we’re saying, but I notice its eyes are glowing behind the book.

Tatiana blows confetti off her thumbnail. “Just know—I’m watching you.”

 

I manage to stammer out a “Wh-why?”

 

This time she blows the confetti in my face. “Because nobody’s as dumb as you act.”

 

Two things occur to me as I rush to geometry, five minutes late:

 

I squeeze into my seat in geometry as Miss Broadway glares at me. Time to set my latest Great Evil Plan in motion. Step One:
Set up a Chump to Run Against Me for President
.

 

I glance over to see what Randy’s doing, but it looks like he’s skipping class today. I guess he’s waiting for the humiliation to wear off.

 

There’s a folder waiting for me, taped to the underside of my desk. I pull it out and start reading. It’s a hastily gathered Probe on Scott Sparks, the Most Pathetic Accountant in Omaha (
see plate 13
).

 

Barely graduated from a bad college. Barely hired by a bad accounting firm. Barely tolerated by his co-workers. No chance for promotion. No social life. Wife left him five years ago. One son.

 

Sparks and son live in a small rented house on Dundee Boulevard. The lawn is dying, and the interior photos taken by my Research Minion (who was posing as an exterminator) depict the very depths of lower middle-class hell. Dust everywhere. Abandoned pop bottles and pizza crusts on every flat surface. Towers of file folders and remnants of the just-passed tax season fill half the floor space, and the Sparks men must walk through the narrow caverns created by them just to get to the bathroom (
see plate 14
).

 

One bright spot: the shiny, top-of-the-line dirt bike Scott bought his son for Christmas. Randy rides it for hours after school. Scott always tells him to bring the bike inside when he’s done for the night, but more often than not, Randy just leans it against the front of the house. People are frequently careless with the things they love most.

 

The dad and the dirt bike. Those are my points of entry.

 

I’m studying these photos, formulating a plan, when a massive shadow envelops me. “What are you looking at, Oliver?” demands Miss Broadway, glowering.

 

I’m getting very tired of teachers sneaking up on me.

 

“Nothing,” I say, and start to close the file, but she is not to be put off so easily. “Let me see that.” She thrusts her hamlike hands at me.

 

“Fire drill,” I murmur. Instantly, the alarm goes off, and Broadway has much more important things on her mind.

 

And, quite frankly, so do I.