Middle School: Get Me Out of Here! (7 page)

Getting in was one thing.

Now I had to figure out how to
stay
in.

A
fter orientation, my first three periods of the day were math, social studies, and…

You get the idea. All that stuff is just as boring in art school as it is anywhere else.

But then for fourth and fifth, every seventh grader had a double period of art, every single day. That meant ten periods a week I could actually look forward to, which was ten more than I had at Hills Village. Not too bad.

My first actual art class was drawing with Mr. Beekman, and let me tell you a few things about him. If there was ever a contest for world’s oldest teacher, I’d definitely enter Mr. Beekman, and he might even win. He talked with an English accent and said stuff like “ladies and gentlemen” a lot.

The very first thing he ever said to us was this:

So there it was, thirty seconds into my first art class, and I was already totally confused.

I was still trying to figure out that last part when Mr. Beekman turned on the slide projector and showed us a drawing of a big, fat horse. (At least, I think it was a horse. I wasn’t sure about anything right then.)

“Twenty-three thousand years ago, someone created this image on the wall of a cave,” Mr. Beekman said. “Now, who do you suppose was the artist here?”

“Was it you?” I heard someone say, too quietly for Beekman to hear.

“The answer, of course, is that we can’t possibly know,” he said. “Even so, these early images
can
tell us quite a bit about the people who created them—the animals they hunted, the stories they told each other, the
elements of the world around them, and the objects of their everyday lives. Do you see?”

No, I did not.

Then Beekman turned around and wrote on the board:
ART = LIFE = ART
.

“In this class, I’ll teach you about proper materials, line quality, composition—all the techniques you might use as artists. But the rest of it depends on what you bring to the table.”

He was really getting into it now and walking all around the room. In fact, he didn’t seem so old anymore either.

“What fascinates you? What life experiences have you had? What makes you
you
?” Beekman said. “Because
that
, ladies and gentlemen, is the true stuff of art!”

“I’m going to throw up the true stuff of breakfast in a second,” the same kid from before said. This time, I looked over.

He was sitting all the way in the back, like me, drawing a fake tattoo on his arm while Beekman talked. And I’d say he was dressed weird, but this was Planet Cathedral. Weird is kind of its version of normal.

Meanwhile, Beekman was still going.

“With all of this in mind, your first assignment of the year will be a self-portrait,” he said. Then he wrote on the board again:
WHO ARE YOU?

“I want you to answer that question with your drawings. Then tomorrow in class, we’ll have our first crit,” he said. “Remember, ladies and gentlemen, bring your life to your art, and your art comes to life!”

I didn’t understand half of the stuff he said, but all the other kids were nodding their heads like crazy. I mean, like, what the heck is a crit? And that’s when I started to think maybe I’d missed out on more than just sixth grade at this place.

I was going to have to make up for some lost time.

T
hat night, I stayed up late and did all my homework before I went to bed.

And no, you didn’t just accidentally pick up someone else’s book. This is still me, Rafe K. I just figured that the first day of the year was the wrong time to start falling behind.

But even then, after I finally turned out the light and tried to go to sleep, I couldn’t stop thinking about everything.

I never thought art school would be so complicated. I just thought it would be, well, art and school. But now I had all this other stuff I had to think about. Like not getting kicked out, for instance. And getting a life in the meantime.

“Sounds like a mission to me,” Leo said right away. “When do you want to start?”

This is the thing with Leo: There’s no off switch. He’s ready to go anytime.

Also, he loves a good mission.

The last one was called Operation R.A.F.E., which stood for Rules Aren’t For Everyone, and it earned me an all-expenses-paid trip to summer school.

“Slow down,” I said. “I can’t start getting in trouble all over again. I promised Mom.”

“No, you promised yourself,” Leo reminded me. “Besides, who said anything about that? I’m talking about something better. Bigger!”

“Like what?”

“Like
real life
! All that ‘stuff of art’ Beekman was talking about. Maybe being an artist is supposed to be about more than just showing up at Cathedral every day and sleeping on this couch every night.”

I couldn’t argue with that part, but still—

“What am I supposed to do?” I said. “Just start… living?”

“You’re closer than you think,” Leo said. “It can be whatever you want. Ride the subway standing on your head. Eat chocolate-covered tarantulas. Go to twelve movies in a row. As long as you’ve never done it before, it’s on the list.”

“Hang on. There’s a list?”

“We’ll call it Operation: Get a Life. What do you think?”

That’s another thing about Leo. He’s always about a step and a half ahead of me.

“I think you’re not the one who has to actually do all this stuff,” I said. “Did you happen to notice all that homework? I can’t start some whole new project now.”

“Or,” Leo said, “maybe you can’t afford not to. Remember what Mrs. Ling said? ‘Not every student is invited back.’ I mean, unless you’re trying to set some kind of record for getting kicked out of middle schools…”

I didn’t know what to say to that. Instead, I just turned over and put a pillow on top of my head.

It wasn’t like I thought Leo was wrong, exactly. It was more like, after the day I’d had, my brain felt like a stuffed mushroom, and there wasn’t room for anything else.

“I’m going to sleep now,” I said.

“I seriously doubt it,” Leo said.

And, of course, he was right about that too.