Officer Spence Makes No Sense (5 page)

Dr. Brad climbed up on the stage. He’s an old guy with frizzy hair and a cane. He talks funny.
*

“I know vye he deed eet,” Dr. Brad said.

“Vye?” asked Mr. Klutz. “I mean, why?
Why did he do it?”

Dr. Brad put his arm around Officer Spence’s shoulder. Officer Spence looked all sad.

“Ven you ver a leetle boy, you vatched thee brave policemen on thee television and in zee movies, yes?”

“Yes,” said Officer Spence.

“They ver heroes to you, yes?”

“Yes.”

“And you vanted to grow up and become like von of zem, fighting crime, yes?”

“Yes.”

“But zee boys und girls at our school are so nice, zer eez no crime to fight here, yes? So you decided to invent some crime,
yes? And zen you vould be zee beeg hero, yes?”

“Yes,” said Officer Spence. He was whimpering now, like a kid who lost his dog or something.

“Tell me about your childhood,” Dr. Brad said. “It vasn’t happy, no?”

“No.”

“Somezing bad happened to you ven you ver a leetle boy, yes?”

“Yes.”

“Eet vas somezing with peanut butter, yes?”

“Yes!”

“Mommy vouldn’t geeve you peanut butter, vould she?”

“It’s true! It’s all true!” Officer Spence whimpered. He was totally crying now. “Mommy wouldn’t let me have peanut butter. All the other kids had peanut butter every day. But my mommy wouldn’t give it to me. Ever! Why? Why? Why?”

Wow, Dr. Brad should be in the gifted and talented program! He had Officer Spence sobbing and blubbering all over
the stage. And we got to see it live and in person.

Mr. Klutz handed Officer Spence a tissue, and he blew his nose into it. Well, I mean, he just blew his nose. If you blew your nose into a tissue, your nose would fall off. You’d have a tissue with a nose in it. And a hole in your face. That would be weird.

“And how did you feel ven Mommy vouldn’t geeve you zee peanut butter?” Dr. Brad asked.

“Angry,” Officer Spence said. “Hurt. I had to eat jelly sandwiches with no peanut butter. I
hate
jelly sandwiches! All I wanted was a little peanut butter on my sandwich.
Was that too much to ask? But Mommy wouldn’t give it to me! Boo hoo!”

“And zat eez vye you took zee sandwiches, yes?”

“Yes. I’m sorry,” Officer Spence said. “I didn’t mean to. I won’t do it anymore. And I’ll stop carving peanut butter sculptures in my basement, too.”

“You carve peanut butter sculptures in your basement?” asked Mr. Klutz.

Yuck. Disgusting! I thought I was gonna throw up.

Officer Spence wiped his eyes and blew his nose again. Sheesh, get a grip! That guy is a bigger crybaby than Emily.

“There, there,” Mr. Klutz said as he gave
Officer Spence a hug. “Everything is going to be all right.”

“Zees man does not need to go to jail,” said Dr. Brad. “He needs help.”

“We’ll get him the help he needs,” said Mr. Klutz.

Dr. Brad and Mr. Klutz put their arms around Officer Spence, and together they walked away into the sunset.

Well, they didn’t really walk away into the sunset. In the movies, people always walk away into the sunset at the end. That would have been cool, except that it was three o’clock in the afternoon. And even though we call it the all-purpose room, watching the sunset isn’t one of the
purposes. If you’re going to have a happy ending, you should always schedule it around sunset in a place where you can actually walk into it.

It didn’t matter, because that’s when the bell rang. It was time to go home! We all rushed out the door, screaming our heads off. My mom was waiting in the car for me, because I had to go to the dentist after school.

“How was school?” my mom asked as I got in the car.

“Fine.”

“Did anything exciting happen today, A.J.?”

I thought about how Officer Spence
went crazy and arrested all the grown-ups. I thought about how he put them in cages. I thought about how Mr. Klutz and Mrs. Jafee broke out of jail and tunneled their way back to school with yogurt spoons. I thought about how Dr. Brad made Officer Spence start crying.

“Nah,” I told my mom. “Nothing exciting happened. It was a really boring day.”

Well, I wasn’t gonna tell
her
what happened! She would just think I made it all up.

“That’s nice,” Mom said as she pulled away from the curb. “Oh, by the way, I forgot to pack your peanut butter and jelly sandwich this morning. Here, you
can eat it now.”

Man, that was the best peanut butter and jelly sandwich I ever tasted!

Well, that’s pretty much what happened. Maybe Officer Spence will stop arresting people and stealing their sandwiches. Maybe we’ll get a new security guard who
doesn’t have peanut butter problems. Maybe Ms. LaGrange will start a company that sells poodlenasta. Maybe Andrea will get kicked off the Principal’s Advisory Committee. Maybe Mrs. Jafee will get her own book. Maybe a truck full of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches will fall on Andrea’s head. Maybe Dr. Brad will stop talking funny. Maybe Mr. Klutz will finally get to eat his yogurt. Maybe Rent-A-Jail will give Officer Spence his money back. Maybe a museum will put his peanut butter sculptures on display. Maybe we’ll figure out why so much weird stuff is always happening at our school.

But it won’t be easy!

Cover art © 2006 by Jim Paillot