The Bully Book (13 page)

I'm afraid that if I even say “Hi” to Melody, she'll know everything that's going on inside of me.

Because the things going on inside are not pretty.

So I didn't say anything to her at all. But as I was walking away she said, in a weird tone of voice:

“Eric. Are you mad at me?”

You have no idea.

If you think shy people don't want to be noticed, you're wrong. They just want to be seen in their own way.

Everybody wants to be seen in their own way. That's why they choose the clothes they do, talk how they do, and lie how they do. Everybody is acting the way they want you to see them.

Guys that throw up gang signs want you to think they're tough. Girls that wear tons of makeup want you to think they're confident. But, of course, real tough guys don't need to show it and confident girls don't have to cover themselves.

Shy people aren't dumb. They know how easy it is to see through that kind of stuff. They don't want you to see through them, so they disappear.

Figure out how the kids in your class want to be seen. Then treat them that way. Even though you know it's a front.

They'll be grateful.

Not getting too far in interpreting the Bully Book page, so I thought I'd go a different way. I went back to the library and pulled the 6th-grade yearbooks for all known Grunts: Richard, Daniel, and myself.

I wrote out all the things I knew about us, trying to find what we had in common. I ended up with a big, messy list. It went nowhere.

The last thing I remember, I was writing down everything I knew about the Grunts' eating habits—and then I must have fallen asleep.

Next thing I knew, the library windows had gone dark. I was groggy and the corner of the table was imprinted on my forearm. I checked my digital watch: 7:34 p.m.

No.

Mom would not be happy about this.

I threw the yearbooks back on the shelf and left the library. The school was dark and deserted. But luckily the doors weren't locked from the inside.

The streetlamps were on in the parking lot. They made two big pools of yellow light on the snow and pavement. The bike racks were under the lamp on the Old Side of the school. Even way over from the New Side entrance, I could see my bike was the only one left on the rack.

It was so cold it hurt. My hands were like flippers and I could barely fish the bike key out of my jeans. I put it between my teeth and tried to adjust my gloves. Then I saw something that made my mouth drop open, and the key fell in the snow.

My bike had a chain wrapped around it. Not my U lock. A thick black chain. A heavy padlock kept it fastened tight.

Someone's stalking me, I thought. They tied up my bike so I couldn't escape, and now they're behind me, getting ready to attack. I felt around for the key but didn't dare to look down. My ears were pressed to the night.

Snow crunched under a boot.

I forgot the key and ran. I had no destination, just away from the trap. I heard a voice behind me. I ran faster.

This is what Jason had threatened. They were coming to get me. I shouldn't have talked back to Donovan. Mom always said, “Even if you don't agree with the laws, even if you think they're crazy, you follow them or you get into trouble.” She was right. I could think The Bully Book was as dumb as I liked, but I'm living in their world now. They make the rules.

I charged over Evergreen Road and knew I couldn't keep this pace. Every recess, while I'm walking around with my hands in my pockets, these guys are playing football. I could hear their voices behind me. I ran into the woods.

If I could make it to the bottom of the ravine, I thought I could lose them. I'd been in this chase before, with Daniel. If I watched my step, I could make it.

Behind me, I heard a thump and a yell. Maybe they fell, I thought. I hoped so, because it was pitch-black out here and we'd gone at least a quarter mile from all humanity. It was cold and quiet and no one could hear when I screamed.

And I did scream. The snow in the ravine wasn't crispy like in the parking lot. Underneath the pristine whiteness was a layer of deadly ice. One moment, I was speeding down a hill, and the next, I was on my back, staring up at the stars.

My legs felt numb and sore at the same time. I think a tree root was wrapped around my foot, because I couldn't move.

My backpack was strapped beneath me and the textbooks stabbed my shoulder blades. Snow crunched under a boot. I tried to flip myself to my stomach but my arms were weak. A tree branch snapped under a hand. I pulled at my foot to free it, but couldn't get the right angle and it was too hard to lift my head. The moon was above my face. Safe and far out in the sky. A dark shadow came across it.

“You have something of mine,” said a voice. I winced, I couldn't even lift my arms to protect myself. I got ready for the punch.

“You have something of mine and I want it back.” The voice said again. Had what? I thought. I didn't take anything from them. The figure leaned low over me and the moonlight off the snow lit up his face. A dark eye blinked blankly.

“Clarence!” I gasped, and coughed uncontrollably. The fall had knocked the wind out of me. I was up against the wrath of a psychopath. I coughed and coughed.

He grabbed me by the straps of my backpack, kicked the tree root pinning my leg, and pulled me up to my feet. He was surprisingly strong. He looked down at me with black eyes. The night reflected in them like angry stars.

“Do you have what you took from me?” he asked slowly and, I could tell, for the last time.

“Uh …” My mind struggled to work. Everything was falling apart. I had the page but didn't know what to do with it. Now I was going to lose it, and God knows what else. “Yeah,” I said, “in here.”

Clarence pushed me aside and ripped off my backpack like an animal. He yanked it open in a panic. I caught my breath while he emptied it, every book, every paper. They all went into the snow until he got what he wanted—the laminated page. The Bully Book. He held it up to the moonlight, and in its glow, I saw a look of relief on his face.

In an instant, the laminated page was tucked away in Clarence's own bag. He refilled my backpack and handed it over.

“Are you going to be all right getting home?” he asked, all trace of emotion gone.

“Yeah, I think so,” I said, unsure of myself. How much trouble was I in with this guy? What was he going to do to me?

“Sorry for locking your bike. I had to keep you here somehow.”

“Well, it worked …” I said nervously.

“The combination to the padlock is just 1-2-3-4. Keep it if you want, or throw it away. I don't care.” Clarence turned away from me and started walking up the side of the hill. I couldn't believe it. That was all he was going to do? Not beat me up, not anything?

“Eric,” he said, turning around. “You and I have a lot in common. More than you know. Come by my house this Saturday. I imagine you know … how to get in.”

Nobody helped me with any of this. I want you to remember that. My life has not been easy.

There was nobody giving me a handbook of what to do. I had to make it up for myself. Something you'll never experience.

This year, we did American history in social studies class. We learned all about Benjamin Franklin and John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. The men who wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and started the Revolutionary War. A kid in my class, a real idiot, interrupted the teacher. He asked her, “Why do we need to learn about these old, dead guys?” Everyone in the class started laughing. I got so mad.

“Because,” I said to this idiot. I stood up and shouted real loud. “Because,” I said, “they invented the entire country you're living in. They made it up. You can just sit back because they spent their entire lives making a country that'll last ten thousand years. You better know their names.”

Everybody got real quiet after that one.

You gotta give respect to the people that came before you and set things up. The Founding Fathers worked hard on America. They struggled their whole lives so we could sit around and enjoy it.

It's always that way with people who make great things. Everybody that comes after really gets the benefits.

“I don't believe it!”

Clarence looked strange laughing, but he was doing it anyway. We were in the depths of his basement, which wasn't as scary with the lights on.

“Thought I was a Bully Booker, oh my God!” Clarence kept it up, doubled over laughing.

I had come over first thing Saturday morning, not knowing why Clarence wanted to see me again.

“You thought that”—Clarence pushed the hair from his eye—“when we were on the same mission all along.”

Clarence isn't the author of The Bully Book. That's not to say he has nothing to do with it. Clarence is the 10th-grade Grunt.

I should have known when I saw his picture in the yearbook. He has the same sad expression as Richard and Daniel. His goth-kid tendencies would naturally keep him from being too popular. And at his birthday party, there were no kids. I thought they might have been upstairs. “That's where we put the coats,” Clarence told me.

Clarence's story wasn't too much different from my own, just more extreme. Things turned bad in 6th grade, and being an intelligent kid, Clarence wondered why. He'd heard rumors about a conspiracy, a sort of secret organization, but it wasn't until he dropped his pen in a school trash can that he found proof. Along with his pen, Clarence pulled up a note that mentioned himself and his three worst bullies.

“This was the start of my collection.” Clarence flung open the double doors of his enormous file cabinet and picked a crumpled sheet of paper from a left-hand drawer.

Keepers of The Book—
Tonight we'll meet again in the dark part of the parking lot. Clarence is doing well as the Grunt, but we still need to study The Book and strategize. Neil Armand is forming a base of power separate from ours. We need to take him down.

Finding that note set Clarence on an insane quest. Desperate to figure out his situation, he began combing every trash can in the school at the end of the day. He's kept this up for the past 4 years. Even after leaving elementary school, he would make it his business to find that year's Bully Bookers and gather what information he could on them. He would come to the elementary school secretly, after hours, and pick through the tests, essays, and notes the students had thrown away. He brought all of his findings here, to his basement lair, where he organized and analyzed each day's find.

“Most of it's junk,” he said to me, flipping through the collection. “But every so often, you find something worthwhile.”

He handed me a disciplinary report he'd found when the office dumped out all their old files: