“He’s not gonna save anyone,” said Eddie. “This kid’s dad is a commie. That’s what my pop told me. I bet Siddharth’s a pussy too.”
Siddharth swallowed again, and the air went down his throat like little bits of metal. He hated Mohan Lal, but he hated Eddie more.
“Siddharth!” Sharon stood up, her eyes going wide.
“Shit,” said Luca, clapping his hands, “I think they’re breaking up.”
Siddharth gritted his teeth. Those shitty stories and those shitty illustrations — they were all her fucking idea in the first place. He suddenly realized something: he wasn’t even twelve years old, and he already had too many people to worry about. He didn’t need to worry about someone else. He didn’t need to worry about Sharon.
“What?” he said, throwing his hands in the air. “What do you want, Sharon?”
She broke into a jog and headed toward the exit. The lunch monitor yelled after her, but she kept on going.
4. My Father’s Tree Houses
Siddharth daydreamed as Mr. Latella droned on about an upcoming independent book project. Students would have to read a novel by themselves, and they would respond to it by creating an art project or a five-page report. Upon hearing this news, the class let out a collective grumble. “This is baby stuff, guys,” said Mr. Latella. “They’re gonna eat you for breakfast in junior high.” Alyssa D. raised her hand. She was one of the hot girls. Her bangs had been sprayed into a blond tidal wave. Alyssa asked the teacher if she could read To Kill a Mockingbird, and Mr. Latella said he would be impressed if she could manage such a big book. He gave her a high five, her reward for saying something that pleased him.
Siddharth gave his head an almost imperceptible shake. Alyssa D. was an ass-kisser — what his father called a brown-noser. Mohan Lal had told him to avoid brown-nosers. Siddharth turned toward the window and stared at a few ravens sipping water from a puddle on the crumbling tennis courts. A dream from last night was looping in his mind. In it, his mother had returned from the dead. But she had cancer and would only survive for three more months. When Siddharth started crying, his brother punched him in the arm. “This is objectively good news,” said Arjun. “It’s good news, and you should be grateful.”
Over the past two weeks, Siddharth had had several bad dreams, and his life had become painfully lonely. After the incident with Luca Peroti, Sharon had started sitting at a new lunch table on the other side of the cafeteria, which contained a mixture of girls — girls who seemed younger than their age and talked about horses, and girls with tight shirts and too much hairspray who hooked up with older boys from West Haven. When Mr. Latella noticed Siddharth eating alone, he made him sit at a table with freaks like Bobby Meyers. Bobby was practically a midget and had lots of acne, and he always dressed as if he were attending a dinner party. His grandfather was from Russia, so people called him a commie too.
Siddharth could have hung out with Bobby during recess, but he usually preferred to remain alone. Sometimes he got a special pass for the library so that he could read or draw. Occasionally Mr. Latella let him stay inside and do things around the classroom, like staple portraits of Jackie Robinson and Ronald Reagan to the rear bulletin board. As Siddharth completed these chores, Mr. Latella lectured him. He said that it wasn’t healthy for young people to be so solitary, which made Siddharth want to punch him in the face. But he just shrugged, explaining that being alone gave him a chance to think. Mr. Latella told him that a sixth grader shouldn’t spend so much time thinking.
The crows outside leaped from the tennis court to a rusty fence that was slowly collapsing. As Mr. Latella babbled on about the independent book project, Siddharth sat at his desk wishing he could go back in time, like in one of his favorite movies. If he could go back in time, he would do the right thing with Sharon. He would tell Luca Peroti the truth about his drawings. A few days earlier, he had tried calling Sharon to apologize. Her brother said, “Hang on a sec,” but then came back to say that she wasn’t home. As Siddharth recalled the phone call, anger smoldered inside of him and burned away his remorse. Screw Sharon, he thought. He decided he was glad about what he had done. He was glad that her parents had gotten divorced. She deserved that — for being such a bitch to him.
A loud bang went off near his right ear.
He jumped in his chair, and his eyes flashed open. Everything was blurry for a second, and he struggled to remember where he was. He turned his head to find Mr. Latella standing a few feet away from him. He had no idea how long he’d zoned out for. He had no idea why his teacher was staring at him. He swallowed, tried to moisten his mouth, but his tongue felt like one of the crinkled leaves outside the window.
Mr. Latella’s hairy, ringed fingers were grasping Siddharth’s desk, and he was breathing hard. Like an angry bull. “Earth to Siddharth,” said Mr. Latella. “Where exactly are you right now, Mr. Arora?”
He shook his head to straighten out his mind. Everyone’s eyes were on him, and he needed to do something. He needed to prove that he was normal. What if he pushed Mr. Latella’s hand off his desk? What if he said something funny — that there was a girl outside who was so slutty that she was fooling around with a black crow?
“I asked you a question,” said Mr. Latella. “Do you have any ideas for a book?”
“A book?” he whispered. Alyssa D. caught his eye. She was smiling. Did she want to help him? No, she was holding her chin. She was holding her chin to keep from laughing.
“For your independent book project?” Mr. Latella wheezed between his words. “The one we’ve been discussing for the last twenty minutes?”
Come on, he told himself. Think, you idiot.
Mr. Latella gripped his fat, red neck and put one of his wingtip shoes on an empty chair. “You’re in sixth grade now, Siddharth. Do you really think this type of behavior is appropriate?”
Bastard, thought Siddharth. The classroom was silent for a few seconds — seconds that felt like hours. He closed his eyes, hoping that his teacher would vanish. But when he opened them, Mr. Latella was still glaring at him. His mind returned to the concept of time travel. If time travel were possible, he would go back to last July, when there was no school. When his brother was still at home. No, he would go further back. He would go back to his mother’s last day on earth. He would intercept the call from the hospital and say that she wasn’t home.
Luca Peroti shouted, “Hey, Mr. Latella!”
“Not now, Luca.”
“But I have a question.”
“What?”
“What about Playboy?” said Luca. “Can I read a Playboy for my project?”
Siddharth relaxed for a moment. Was Luca trying to help him?
Mr. Latella’s mouth was wide open, but the wall phone buzzed before he could reprimand Luca. He took the call, then pointed at Siddharth and snapped his fingers. “Today’s your lucky day, mister. Ms. Farber wants you — on the double.”
Luca said, “Yo, Siddharth, have fun in the retard room.”
The entire class broke into laughter.
With his eyes fixed on the floor, Siddharth grabbed his backpack and left the classroom.
* * *
He sipped some water at the handicap fountain, then grazed his fingers against the smooth cinder-block walls. He palmed the cold steel of a bright red fire extinguisher, wondering what would happen if he pulled a fire alarm. Today he wasn’t in the mood for Ms. Farber. He didn’t feel like hearing about the different stages of grief. He didn’t feel like hearing about the way death changed your relationship with the people you love, so that grieving people have to mourn twice — for the people they lost, and for the people who are still living but will never be the same again. Today he wasn’t in the mood for any of that bullshit.