I am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil and I Want to be Your Class (7 page)

 

He looks a little green. I don’t think he likes flying much, either—at least not in anything less technically advanced than a corporate jet. But I prefer the old-fashioned elegance of riding on the underside of a giant bag of helium. And the vibrations from the spinning propeller feel good (I have a tummy ache).

 

“Tell Research I want full probes done on Jack Chapman and Liz Twombley.”

 

Sheldrake makes a note. “Who are they?”

 

“Classmates of mine.”

 

He turns a shade greener. “You’re ordering probes on
children
?”

 

I smile mischievously at him. “And what am I, Lionel? Chopped liver?”

 

Old jokes are wasted on Sheldrake. He merely nods and mumbles, “Sometimes I forget. . . .”

 

We’ve moved past the river now and are circling over downtown Omaha. I can see the skyline, Rosenblatt Stadium, the classical elegance of Central High,
³⁹
and the crystal dome that squats on the front lawn of the Mutual of Omaha Building. It delights me to look down at my city and know I own so much of it. And what I don’t own I’ve tunneled under, infiltrated, compromised. This is how the pharaohs must have felt when they gazed at their pyramids in Giza—those gigantic pointy peaks jutting out of the sand like the humps of an enormous snake buried in the desert. A snake that would shake off the sand and
rise
someday at the pharaohs’ command. That would slither out of the desert and bite the world on the butt.

 

But there’s more to life than midnight blimp rides. I pull the speaking horn to my mouth and tell the captain to take us down.

 

Morning finds me trotting down the hallway before homeroom, on a quest to catch Principal Pinckney in his office.

 

Maybe
catch
isn’t the right word. I know he’s in there; I told Pistol, Bardolph, and Nym to make sure of that. Because I turned down the nomination when it was offered to me, I need Pinckney’s approval to get on the ballot.

 

Randy Sparks, the Most Pathetic Boy in School, stands by his locker, trying to scrub the sweat stains from the armpits of his T-shirt with an old toothbrush. All of Randy’s shirts have horrible sweat stains—he lives with his dad, and his dad isn’t very good at doing laundry. Plus, Randy sweats a lot. A lot of people—let’s say,
everyone in the world but Randy Sparks
—would be trying to clean their shirt’s armpits in the boys’ bathroom, where the entire school couldn’t see them. But bad things happen to Randy Sparks when he goes into the boys’ bathroom. He doesn’t have any bodyguards with Lazopril watching after him. I doubt he’s taken a pee at school once in the last three years.

 

As I pass the teachers’ lounge, the door opens and Mr. Moorhead backs out. He’s clearly trying to slow the exit of my homeroom teacher, Ms. Sokolov, who just as clearly wants to get past him. She carries a dog-eared book under her arm; I squint to see the title—
Pnin
by Vladimir Nabokov. “. . . absolutely amazing,” Moorhead gushes. “I mean, it really blew my mind.” His traditional aura of sweat and smoke and stale coffee floods the immediate vicinity. It can’t be healthy to smell so much like death this early in the morning.

 

“Mmm.” Sokolov makes one final semi-polite noise, then slips past Moorhead to freedom. He watches her go, his eyebrows arched with lovesick yearning.

 

So Moorhead has a crush. Well, well, well . . . This could be an opportunity for real fun, in the screwing-with-peoples’- heads department. “Get me tape from Listening Post 2,” I whisper. “Last half hour.”

 

Principal Pinckney is still in his office when I get there, largely because some thoughtless custodian has blocked the door with two enormous boxes full of textbooks. I arrive just as he forces his way out, sending copies of
American History: A Glorious Feast
sliding across the glossy floor. He looks at them with annoyance, then at me with surprise. “What can I do for you, Oliver?”

 

“I want to be class president.”

 

“I see,” he says. He turns and kicks the nearest textbook so hard it bounces off three walls.

 

Leon Pinckney is a kindhearted, middle-aged ex-jock who is a more than competent science teacher. Unfortunately for him, his intelligence and large, expensive family have conspired to put him in the (marginally) more lucrative field of administration. And it’s the job of administrators to tell half-witted little boys they can’t be class president.

 

His chocolate-brown brow wrinkles with real sympathy as he tells me, “Uh . . . class president. You know, you have to get elected to do that. . . .”

 

He smiles with relief when I explain the situation. He has an easy out. “I’m sorry, Oliver, but if you declined the nomination, there’s really nothing I can do. It wouldn’t be fair to the other kids if I made an exception, would it?”

 

He knows how much stupid children cherish fairness. I make a disappointed face and walk away, but I’m not particularly surprised. I knew it wouldn’t be this simple. “Send in The Motivator,” I whisper, as I make my way to homeroom.

 

Moorhead continues his discourse on
Fahrenheit 451
. I’m listening even less than usual—the conversation that’s playing over my earbud is much more interesting. It stars Moorhead and Sokolov and was recorded in the teachers’ lounge two hours earlier, just before I passed them in the hall.

 

MOORHEAD
: (
fake surprise
) Oh, hey, Lucy! Fancy seeing you here (
lame giggle
)!

SOKOLOV
: Oh. Hi . . . (
tries to remember his name
) Neil.

MOORHEAD
: Can I pour you a cup of coffee?

SOKOLOV
: No thanks. I don’t drink coffee.

MOORHEAD
: Smart. I’m on my third cup today (
lame giggle
).

SOKOLOV
: That’s too bad. Well, I’d really better get to class.

MOORHEAD
: Oh! You’re reading
Pnin
. That’s by Nabokov, right?

 

Here I smile broadly. Not only is his flirting pathetic, he’s also managed to mispronounce Nabokov’s name. Normally excusable, but I know for a fact Sokolov wrote her master’s thesis on that particular fat dead Russian genius.

 

SOKOLOV
: Erm, yes. Wow, look at the time—

MOORHEAD
: You know, I read
Pale Fire
in college. He wrote that, too.

 

(
Sound of door opening, voices become fainter as they move into hallway
)

 

MOORHEAD
: I just thought it was . . . absolutely amazing.

SOKOLOV
: Mmm.

MOORHEAD
: I mean, it really blew my mind.

 

(
Poof! And she’s gone!
)

(
Scene
)

 

“Something funny, Oliver?”

 

At this moment, I realize I’m laughing out loud.

 

Moorhead glares at me from the dry-erase board. “Sorry if I seem surprised. I’m just not used to students laughing while I describe an all too plausible dystopian future, where books are illegal and people who think freely are
penalized
for—”

 

I laugh again, even louder, and clap my hands. His glare hardens into something glassy. Pammy Quattlebaum purses her lips and shakes her moonlike head at me.

 

I smile feebly: “You said
penal
.”

 

The entire class explodes into joyful, sub-human glee. Moorhead sighs and turns his back on me; I am a lost cause.

 

The real lost cause, of course, is his attempt to woo
La Sokolova
. The lady is out of his league. She’s ten times smarter than he is, and much better looking, even if she is too skinny. She’s the kind of woman his sort can only press its nose against the glass and watch as they walk past. I guess he thinks he has a chance because she’s trapped in the same school with him.

 

The irony is that Moorhead is definitely much happier
without
her than he ever would be
with
her. Despite her beauty and intelligence, Sokolov is a short-tempered, hypercritical witch. She may be the meanest woman I’ve ever met. She once told Benito Guzman, the Shyest Boy in School, that he had the personality of a used diaper. If Moorhead were ever unlucky enough to actually be in a relationship with her . . . well, a woman like that would just
crush
him.

 

Hmmm.

 

There might be something to work with here.

 

I stick around after class. I want to see Moorhead read his latest cigarette:
YOU NEED TO TRY A NEW DEODORANT
.

 

Social studies might be my least favorite class—which is strange, because I kind of like the teacher. It’s just so dull. I feel like we’re all being taught how boring the people in other countries are.

 

I raise my hand. My social studies teacher, Mrs. Magoffin, says, “What is it, Oliver?”

 

“My stomach hurts.”

 

Tatiana says, “That’s serious, Miz Magoffin. When his stomach hurts, they can feel it in China.”

 

Mrs. Magoffin ignores Tatiana. “Well, Oliver, I’m not surprised. I saw you eating beef jerky and chunky peanut butter in the hallway before class. But if it’ll make you feel any better, you may go to the restroom.”

 

Mrs. Magoffin is normally a painfully polite woman, so I’m surprised she’s called attention to my mid-afternoon snack.
⁴⁰
But I thank her and head to the boys’ room.

 

It’s empty, as I expected. I head for the third stall, which has a permanent
OUT OF ORDER
sign on its door. Even if you wanted to ignore the sign, you couldn’t; the door is sealed shut by electromagnets and won’t open unless you jiggle the handle in the proper combination.
⁴¹

 

Inside, the porcelain looks as stained and crusted and cruddy as any other toilet at school, but that’s all just paint and makeup. This toilet isn’t really a toilet, and I insist that it be kept scrupulously clean.

 

I lift the lid off the “water tank” behind the “toilet”—it’s full of Milk Duds, fresh popcorn, and soda pop. I grab a bag of popcorn, then I “flush” the toilet. The light fixture overhead starts projecting a movie onto the water in the bowl.

 

The film was taken about twenty minutes after I saw Mr. Pinckney this morning. The setting is his office. He’s at his desk, doing paperwork and grumbling about it. Then The Motivator walks in.

 

I pop in my earbud and click it over to the movie channel so I can listen.

 

Mr. Pinckney says, “Who are you?”

 

The Motivator smiles (and it is a terrifying smile) and says, “I suggest you reconsider putting Oliver Watson on the ballot for class president.”

 

Pinckney looks at him funny. “Who are you? Oliver’s father?”

 

The Motivator just broadens his smile. “I suggest you reconsider putting Oliver Watson on the ballot for class president.”

 

“Look, whoever you are, you can’t just barge in here making demands. Don’t make me call security.” Pinckney picks up his phone. The line is dead, of course.

 

Now The Motivator’s smile reaches from ear to pointed ear. “I suggest you reconsider putting Oliver Watson on the ballot for class president.”

 

Most people cave in at this point. They just get too spooked. They look at this man—this
monster
—standing in front of them, this seven foot tall, bald-headed, black-clad
beast
, and they say, “Yes, yes! Whatever you want! Just leave!”

 

But Pinckney’s a tough man. “I don’t know who you are,” he says. “Quite frankly, I don’t know
what
you are. But you have no right to tell me how to run my school. My decision on the Watson boy is final.”

 

I put my popcorn under the toilet paper dispenser and press down on it. Hot butter squirts out. This is getting exciting!

 

The Motivator laces his massive fingers together. His hands look like bleached-white baseball mitts, covered with hairy moles and warts. He can see that Phase One isn’t working on Pinckney, so he moves to Phase Three
⁴²
—bribery.

 

“I will give you anything—and I mean
anything
in the world—if you reconsider putting Oliver Watson on the ballot for class president.”

 

Now Pinckney smiles, incredulous. “Are you serious? You’re actually trying to
bribe
me? For a student-council election?”

 

The Motivator doesn’t move. He doesn’t appear to breathe. He just smiles, smiles, smiles. His big square teeth jut out of his skull like two rows of broken yellow tombstones.

 

Pinckney laughs. “Okay, fine. Anything? All right then: I want a Rocket-Firing Boba Fett action figure. You get me that, and I’ll do whatever you want. Sky’s the limit.”

 

The Motivator stops smiling. He nods and exits.

 

Pinckney stares at the empty doorway, still not sure he didn’t hallucinate the whole thing. Then the phone receiver, which he’s still holding, starts buzzing with a dial tone. The movie flickers to a stop.

 

This is going to be a little more difficult than I’d hoped.

 

I’ve run up against this Boba Fett doll before. In 1979, the company that made
Star Wars
toys made a special offer to fans: Send in four proofs of purchase and get a free dolly of Boba Fett the bounty hunter that fires
actual rockets
out of its backpack (
see plate 8
). Yes, real, actual, cheap crummy plastic “rockets” that flew about six inches when you released the cheap crummy spring they were loaded into.