‘They don’t get babies like that.’
‘Sure they do, ask anybody, ask Billy, when his old man’s cow had a calf, they tied a rope around her neck and look here at this one, this “necktie party girl” she’s got—’
‘Yeah but hey wait a minute why do they have to wear all this stuft?’
Chauncey said, ‘Look stupid, it’s called Stud Ranch so they all gotta wear these belts with studs, boy, when my little brother was born my old lady had to wear all kinds of stuff to keep the baby from coming out her belly button too soon I guess — hey wow, looka that rattlesnake — men don’t have babies because they take pills I guess — looka that, “Bathtime at the Rocking 69” — see we had all about it last year, these little tadpoles inside and the Vast Difference—’
‘Hahaha, looka that, he thinks this other guys a girl, look it says “When a gay cabaleero…” What’s a cabaleero anyway?’
‘Just some word, who knows. Wow! Looka that pair!’
‘Yeah, Colt .45 Peacemakers, the sheriffs got one like that only not so fancy… Hey but Chauncey, what about the tadpoles?’
‘Aw who cares, sex is too complicated. Let’s play guns, okay?’
But whenever he was with the gang, Chauncey called him ‘freaky’ and threatened to take a can-opener and rip his guts out. You just couldn’t figure out some people.
Roderick couldn’t figure out Mrs Dorano either. She was always telling the other kids to be especially nice to him because of his handy cap, and then when they passed out the readers she gave him a different one, real hard and no pictures at all, and all long words. He had to spend hours every night at home going through the dictionary, and it still didn’t make sense.
Billy agreed, it wasn’t fair. ‘Heck my reader’s okay. All about this here Dick and Jane and how their mother works hard at the car factory, and like how they get helped by Big Joe the social worker. How come yours is different, boy, I’d make a stink about that.’
‘Yeah, listen to this, it don’t make sense: “The actualization of catalyzing factors in inter-personal relationships is provided first by the furtherance of participatory options within the framework of an unstructured data base of conceptual parameters, notwithstanding the counter-productive and often marginal motivational mix inducing affectual restructuring of the –” Shit man, this doesn’t even tell a story. I mean it’s supposed to be about this girl, a doll-scent girl, only here I am on page twenty one and they don’t even have her name down here yet.’
‘Boy, I’d make a stink—’
‘Yeah I guess it don’t matter now they’re switching me to Miz Beek for redeemial anyway, I got this other reader where they spell everything like it sounds…’
Jump. Jump. Jump.
See Bob jump.
Bob jumps on a fast wagon.
Bob gøz fastr ðan a skūl bus.
The hour started off well, with Miz Beek cheerful and pleasant. She sat with Roderick and two other kids around a little table. While they read aloud, she nodded and smiled and occasionally swallowed another of her little white pills.
But towards the end of the hour she no longer seemed to be listening. After making a quick note in her Teacher’s Manual, she got up and left the room.
‘I bet thee’th going wee-wee,’ said one of the kids. ‘Thee hath to go wee-wee.’
The other said, ‘L-let’s g-g-get outa here hey.’
‘But thee might come back after thee taketh a pith.’
The door opened, but it was only Mr Fest, telling them he knew all of their names and not to try anything just because Miz Beek was out of the room, understand?
‘Yethir, Mithter Fetht.’
‘Y-y-y — sure.’
‘I’m glad you know my name,’ said Roderick, ‘because everybody else around here keeps calling me—’
‘At ease! At ease! I don’t want to hear another peep outa this room.’
He went away. They waited.
‘Look, thee forgot her pillth. Let’th get high, come on.’
‘H-he-hell with that. I’m g-g-gonna s-sell these up in the eighth-graders’ c-c-c — toilet.’ The stammerer grabbed the pill bottle and ran out, chased by the lisper. Roderick waited until the bell rang, then leaned over and read Miz Beek’s note.
‘ðu īdeea uv kumbīniNg speeCh Thayrupee wiTh ree-meedyul reediNg iz just wun mōr exampul ov ðu braykdown ov ðu hōl godawful sistum HwiCh ðay keep erjiNg mee tu joyn (az ðō peepul wur glū…’
Nat walked him home from school. ‘I feel safer,’ he explained. ‘Not that I’m really afraid of Chauncey and his gang but heck, two of us got a lot better chance than one, right?’
‘Right.’ said Roderick. ‘I was just wondering you know, how come I read all right at home only at school everything goes wrong?’
‘Yeah? Hey, we could become blood brothers, pledge ourselves to fight to the death, back to back in case Chaun—’
‘Look, I ain’t got any blood.’
‘We could use oil then, you got oil.’
So Roderick tapped a few drops of hydraulic fluid and Nat took a drop of blood from his thumb, and they mixed them.
‘We both swear, right? To defend ourselfs against anybody even Chaunce, we swear on my blood and your oil. Brothers.’
‘Brothers.’
‘To the death.’
‘To the death.’ Roderick walked him to his door. ‘See you tomorrow ’
‘Not tomorrow, hey remember? We got the day off on account of Miz Beek drowning herself in the swimming pool.’
‘See you the day after, then. Brother.’
‘Okay brother.’
‘Settle down, all of you,’ said the principal. ‘I’m not even going to start until you’re quiet. What’s more, no one goes home until we finish here, understood?’
They shifted uneasily, and one or two who had been glancing through the pages of Educationalist Today sat up straight.
‘That’s better. Now you all know why I’ve called this special meeting. But in case anyone hasn’t seen today’s Herald, let me read it out to you.’
Following the alleged suicide of a teacher at Newer Public School (Stubbs Cty) come rumours of serious mental disturbances among the pupils. Teachers have confirmed that at least one boy thinks he is a mechanical robot.
The boy, Robert Wool, ‘acts just like a little machine,’ according to second-grade teacher Mrs Delia Dorano. He believes he has mechanical grappling hooks for hands, and tank tracks in place of feet. ‘Robert doesn’t even answer to his name,’ she said. ‘No wonder, what with the constant harping on sex and filth everywhere you look. We must protect our children from the sex-merchants of the state educational system.’
‘George George, school psychologist, blamed the computerizing of modern society, including our schools. ‘We have teaching machines, testing machines, magnetic report cards,’ he said. ‘Where do we stop?’ According to another source, books in the school library have been keypunched on to IBM cards which are unreadable. Said George, ‘It’s getting like Brig Bother around here.’ Mr George is the brother of Hal George, prominent hog auctioneer.
Newer Junior High, like Newer P.S., has had its share of tragedies. Last year Beanie Vulich, 16, became the first tragic victim of the school’s ‘Russian roulette club’, whose members made use of a school computer to select a duelling pistol at random from a number…