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Authors: David Lubar

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ack in sixth grade when I’d been an astronomy nut, I’d learned this neat word: syzygy. It’s what they call it when several heavenly bodies line up. But syzygy can be bad news when earthly bodies are involved. Torchie found that out on Wednesday. We were walking along the first-floor hall right after lunch. Torchie was ahead of me. Down the hall, someone had left the door open on one of the broom closets. Hindenburg was ahead of us. He’d stopped near the closet to tie his shoe. The sight of his gas-filled butt pointing in my direction was enough to slow me down, but Torchie kept walking. Right when Torchie reached the closet, Bloodbath came along in the opposite direction. The three of them—Torchie, Hindenburg, and Bloodbath—were lined up perfectly with the open closet.
Syzygy.
Bloodbath took one look at the two of them and I guess he just grabbed the opportunity. He charged into Torchie, knocking him into Hindenburg and pushing both of them into the closet. Then he slammed the door shut and leaned against it.
“Hey!” Torchie yelled from inside. He started pounding on the door.
I wanted to help him, but I wasn’t sure what I could do.
“Come on,” Torchie shouted. “I’m dying in here.”
“Gas chamber,” Bloodbath said.
Kids clustered around, getting close enough to see what was going
on, but not so close that Bloodbath could reach out and snag them.
“Please!” Torchie wailed. “Let me out. I can’t breathe.” He pounded on the door.
I heard a louder crash. It sounded like Torchie was kicking the door. Two more kicks jarred the door. I took a step closer, then stopped as I realized the danger of Torchie, the human flame, trapped in a closet with Hindenburg, the human gas tank. I turned and raced away.
An instant later, along with the smash of the loudest kick yet, a huge
WHUMPF
of an explosion ripped the air. I glanced over my shoulder in time to see the door go flying, pushing Bloodbath across the hall. Too bad it hadn’t flattened him. I’d have loved to have seen him knocked on his butt.
Bloodbath took off, strolling down the hall as if he’d had nothing to do with the destruction.
Torchie staggered out, gasping, as the smell of the world’s largest lit fart rolled through the hall. It was a good thing the inspection wasn’t today. The smell alone would have been enough to close the school forever. Behind Torchie, Hindenburg stumbled out, looking dazed.
“You okay?” I asked Torchie.
“It was awful … .”
“I can imagine.” We hurried off to class.
“We’re going to get that guy, aren’t we?” Torchie asked as we reached Mr. Briggs’s classroom.
“You bet.” I tried to sound confident. I really wanted to score a few points for our side. That was all I thought about for the rest of the day.
“Have you learned anything?” I asked Cheater that evening. The inspection was only two days away.
He shook his head. “It’s not that easy. I told you, I get stuff people are thinking, but it’s not like reading a book. I can’t just look into someone’s mind. I guess it’s more like a radio. You know, like when you’re in a car and you start scanning through the stations.”
“Maybe if you got closer to them,” I suggested.
“Good idea,” Torchie said.
“That’s easy for you to say,” Cheater told him. “If you got in trouble with them, you could just set something on fire. I don’t have any way to protect myself. I’m not going near those guys. I’m the kind of person they like tossing around. In case you hadn’t noticed, Bloodbath isn’t just mean and violent and ignorant. He’s also prejudiced.”
“I’ve noticed,” Flinch said. “I think we’ve all noticed.”
“You want to get sent somewhere else?” I asked.
Cheater shook his head.
“Do you trust us?” I asked him.
Cheater paused for a second, then nodded. “Yeah.”
“Will you take a bit of a risk?” I asked.
“I guess,” Cheater said. Then he asked me a question. “Do you have any idea what you are doing?”
I shook my head. “Not a clue.”
“
O
kay,” I asked the group, “how do we get Cheater close to Bloodbath?”
“Without getting me killed,” Cheater added.
“I know,” Lucky said. “Torchie could start a fire. And then when everyone comes running to see what happened, that would give Cheater a chance to sneak up behind Bloodbath.”
“Too dangerous,” Torchie said. “I’m just starting to get control.”
“Yeah,” Flinch said, “and if there was a fire, they might accidentally serve us a hot meal.”
“But some kind of distraction isn’t a bad idea.” I turned to Trash. “Could you make some noise at lunch?”
“I guess,” Trash said. “I could make some trays fall off a table or something like that.”
I nodded. “That would do the trick. When everyone is looking, Cheater can sneak up behind Bloodbath and try to figure out what’s in his mind.”
“I know what’s in his mind,” Flinch said. “Nothing. Blankness. Empty space. The final frontier. Zip. Diddly squat.”
“There’s
something
rattling around in there,” Torchie said.
“Yeah,” Lucky agreed. “I’ve heard it rattling.”
“I’ll do it,” Cheater said. “But I’m not sure if it’s right.”
That surprised me. “What’s wrong with listening in on someone’s thoughts?” I asked.
“Well, it’s kind of like spying,” Cheater said.
I hadn’t looked at it that way. I guess people have a right to keep their thoughts secret. This was a special case, though. “It’s for a good cause,” I said. “Right?”
“Yeah,” Cheater agreed, “I suppose so.”
“Hey, if I could read minds, I’d be thinking about how I could use my power to rule the world,” I said.
“You sound like a cartoon character,” Lucky told me.
Flinch nodded. “Martin Mindmaster, Conqueror of the Universe.”
Lucky started laughing. “With his faithful sidekick, Zucchini, who can read the minds of vegetables and fruits.”
Things pretty much collapsed after that. We didn’t spend any more time working on our plan. The guys were too busy making fun of me. But I figured Trash would give it his best shot, and that was all I could ask.
The next day, as we took our seats at lunch, nobody was joking around. “You ready?” I asked Cheater.
“No, but I guess that doesn’t matter.” He got up from the table, then looked at Trash. In a voice like someone from a bad western movie, he said, “Cover me.”
Trash nodded and turned so he could watch Cheater’s path around the room. Cheater hugged the walls as he made his way over to Bloodbath’s table. Then Trash focused his attention toward a table of the runts. One of the runts slammed his fist down on the table. At that very instant, his tray flew up. It was almost breathtaking—the silverware and dishes seemed to dance in the air as they shot above the tray. Each piece took its own path, arcing still higher, then falling toward the ground like spray from a silver water fountain.
“Wow,” I whispered, wishing I could do that. Trash really was an artist.
Everyone looked over. I snuck a glimpse at Cheater as he rushed up behind Bloodbath. Cheater’s face was scrunched up so much I wondered whether he was grunting. Bloodbath, and the rest of the kids at
his table, were all standing to get a better look at the action.
I heard another tray launch. There were shouts of protest from the runts’ table. Cheater was still in place. Trash launched a third tray, then slumped back, breathing like he was exhausted.
“Oh no,” I said, looking back at Bloodbath. He seemed to have lost interest in the flying trays. He’d sat back down, then started to glance over his shoulder. When Bloodbath saw who was behind him, it would be Cheater who’d get tossed up in the air like a piece of silverware.
Trash groaned like he was lifting something heavy. A spoon catapulted from a bowl of pudding in front of the kid opposite Bloodbath. It hit Bloodbath right in the middle of the forehead. For an instant, the spoon hung in place, glued to Bloodbath’s head by the legendary sticking power of cafeteria tapioca. Then it slid down and fell to his tray.
Cheater managed to get away as Bloodbath struck back at the kid opposite him and a food fight broke out. He scurried over to us.
“Well?” I asked.
“I picked up something about candles.”
“What about them?” I asked.
He shook his head. “It didn’t make sense.
Thirty minutes for a candle.
I wish I knew what that meant.”
“Well,” Lucky said, “that was a waste of time.”
I looked over at Bloodbath’s table. “I don’t know. It’s kind of nice to see him with a face full of pudding.”
Several teachers came in and broke things up. Nobody got punished. At Edgeview, a small food fight was nothing. No bones had been broken. No faces had been smashed.
“Now what?” Lucky asked as we left the lunchroom.
I shrugged. “I wish I knew.”
In science class after lunch, Mr. Briggs was the first teacher to mention anything about the inspectors. “Listen, class,” he said, “there are going to be some people here tomorrow to observe our school in action.”
“Yeah, action …” I heard Bloodbath whisper to one of his buddies.
That drew some snickers and laughs from the back of the room.
Mr. Briggs kept talking. “The important thing is for all of you to act the same way you would if nobody was watching. Just be yourselves. I’d appreciate it. And I’m sure the rest of the staff would, too.”
One of the runts raised his hand. “Yes, Michael, what is it?” Mr. Briggs asked.
“I heard they’re going to close Edgeview. Is that true?”
“They just want to see how well we’re doing things,” Mr. Briggs said. “If they feel we aren’t giving you the best education you can get, they might want to make some changes. Even if they decide to make changes, it won’t happen overnight. These things take time.”
He left it at that. But I knew my life was due for another jolt if the inspection didn’t go well. I hung back in the room as the period ended and everyone else filtered out into the hall.
“What is it, Martin?” Mr. Briggs asked.
I wasn’t sure. I wanted to say something nice, but I was afraid it would sound phony. So I asked about something that was on my mind, even though I didn’t expect any real answer. “The school,” I said. “I don’t know if it’s a good place or a bad place.”
“Few things are that simple.” Mr. Briggs stopped and ran his hand through his hair, then took a deep breath. “I don’t know if I should tell you this,” he said, “but you’d probably figure it out sooner or later. Maybe you already figured it out.”
“What?” I had no idea what he meant.
“Edgeview isn’t just the last stop for students.”
I still didn’t get what he was talking about. Instead of explaining, Mr. Briggs gave me his patented you-figure-it-out look.
It hit me. Not just us. Them, too. “Teachers …” I said. Mr. Briggs nodded. Then he smiled an embarrassed grin. “I’ve been kicked out of more than one school, too, Martin. Not for being bad. I just have my own ideas about how to teach. The people who run schools don’t always like that. They don’t like the way I dress.” He glanced down at his Penn State T-shirt and jeans. “They don’t like the way I teach.
Sometimes, they don’t like the way I think.”
“So you’ve kind of gotten into trouble, too,” I said. The thought made me smile.
Mr. Briggs nodded.
“What about the rest of them?” I asked. “Are they all here for that kind of reason?”
He shook his head. “I can’t speak for them. But I don’t think Edgeview was anyone’s first choice.”
“Not even Miss Nomad?” I asked.
He chuckled. “Maybe she’s an exception. But that doesn’t mean we aren’t all trying our best. Not one teacher here is giving you anything less than his best efforts. You might not think so, but I promise it’s true.”
“It must be tough,” I said, “ending up in a place like this when you don’t want to be here.”
“Who said I don’t?” Mr. Briggs stared out the window for a minute. “Maybe, at first, I felt I was getting shoved into Edgeview. But now that I’m here, I feel good. I feel good about the work I’m doing, and I feel good about myself. That’s important.” He held out his hand. “Whatever happens, it’s been a pleasure.”
It felt strange to shake his hand. I dropped it after the briefest instant. For once, I had nothing to say. I hurried out to my next class.
That evening, as we hung out in the room, we tried to think of anything else we could do, but we were out of ideas. So we ended up sitting around talking about other stuff.
I realized I’d really miss these guys if the school was closed. They were my friends. And here, at least, you were only considered abnormal if you didn’t get into trouble. Maybe this was where I belonged. Maybe I’d been lying to myself about my behavior. When I’d first met Torchie, I’d thought he was the one who couldn’t see how bad he was. Funny how things change.
“We’ll just have to do our best tomorrow,” I told them as the group broke up for the night.
“Our best can be pretty good,” Flinch said.
I smiled as I watched him leave the room. He was right. Our best really could be good.

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