The Ghost of Lizard's Rock (5 page)

“Good morning Mr. Anders,”
I answered with a sheepish grin on my face. I wondered if he had
somehow heard me.

Oliver whispered, “Good
morning Kathryn!” His mischievous blue eyes twinkled.

Without even thinking, I
threw out my free arm and smacked him in the chest. The blow
knocked him back two steps.

Mr. Anders had seen the
whole thing. He looked at Oliver with the same look that Ms. Kelly
had given him in the hallway.

Oliver stepped back in
line with a look of confusion on his face and whispered, “How is it
everyone seems to know me?”

Mr. Anders looked up into
the eighth grade section to Susan Jackson for a moment with a big
smile on his face. Susan had to look down at her feet in order to
not laugh.

I went to the end of the
line and turned back to the students still seated on the benches. I
gave a small wave to Allie, who was now all by herself.

Mr. Anders read the next
name, “Maddison Norris”.  The words echoed through my
brain.

I wanted to puke as she
walked past Mr. Anders and gave him her little cutesy smile.
“Aagh!”

Maddison held her hand up
for a ‘high-five’ from Rebecca and Heather as she passed
by.

Oliver placed his hand out
quickly but pulled it back at the last second, as Maddison’s hand
swished through the empty air. Maddison responded with her usual
glaring look.

Maddison saw Dan’s hand
out right behind Oliver. Her head began a small shaking motion, “No
way!”

Oliver turned to Dan and
slapped his hand. “Way to go dude.”

A small grin formed on
Dan’s face.

Oliver quickly looked down
at his hand and back up at Dan.

“Gotcha!” said Dan
quietly.

Maddison stepped behind
me, “How’s the shoe?”

I was so distracted with
my silent cursing that I hadn’t even heard Troy’s name called out
right after Maddison.

Troy walked across the
floor, nodded to the teacher and stopped right beside me instead of
standing behind Maddison.

Troy looked up through his
incredibly long brown eyelashes and said, “Hey.” 

For a moment, I thought my
heart had stopped. I smiled nervously and tucked my hair behind my
ear again. I replied, “Hey.”

I turned around to
Maddison, whose eyes were bulging out with envy. “Thank you for the
compliment on my new shoes.”

Maddison stood speechless,
as she didn’t want to do anything in front of Troy.

I turned back around and
glanced for a moment at Troy beside me. Our eyes met
again.

I thought, “This day is
turning out to be pretty good.”

Ms. Kelly stepped to the
microphone again, “The rest of you seventh graders are in Ms.
Carson’s class. Please join her.”

“Okay class,” directed Mr.
Anders, “head for our room.”

I looked back at Allie. She was
the last person walking behind Ms. Carson’s class. Her head was
drooped over. Her long dark hair covered her face. I felt a sadness
sink into my heart.

Slippery Ice

Sometimes starting over in a new
school is like trying to walk on slippery ice.

Ms. Carson led her class out of
the gym and down the hallway. The students in her class followed
behind - visiting with each other. Ms. Carson stopped at the
doorway to her room and looked back at the line of kids behind
her.

“Pick your own seats for today.
We’ll see how it goes.”

Ms. Carson turned around and
walked into the room.

The students quickly scrambled
here and there to find seats next to their friends – all except one
person.

Allie stood near the door watching
the mad rush of bodies in search of a desk.

Five or six boys took over the
desks in the back of the room closest to the windows, while a small
group of girls laid stake to a group of desks in the center of the
room. The rest of the students scattered throughout the room
quickly.

The only desk left was one right
in front of the boys. This was not where Allie wanted to
be.

The boys whispered something to
each other and giggled softly.

Allie was sure they were talking
about her. She dropped her head and began walking across the front
toward the desk. Ms. Carson smiled as Allie walked by.

The walk from the front of the
room to the empty seat seemed to take forever for Allie. She placed
her things on the top of the desk as she looked into the eyes of
the boy seated right behind her. Something about the way he looked
at Allie made chills run up and down her spine. It was hard to
describe, but he just looked mean!

Allie turned and sat down.
Startled, she quickly stood up again and looked down. The boy’s
foot was on the edge of her seat.

The other boys began to laugh
softly.

Ms. Carson walked back toward
Allie and the other boy, “Is there a problem?”

Allie glanced back down at her
seat. The boy’s foot was gone. She looked back at the teacher and
shook her head ‘no’ and sat down.

Ms. Carson stepped past Allie and
looked down at the boy, “Robert isn’t it?”

The boy looked up,
“Yep.”

Ms. Carson turned her back and
began walking back up to the front of the room, knowing full well
that Robert was probably doing something behind her
back.

“And it’s only the first day of
school,” thought the teacher.

Robert looked at the other guys as
if he had done something special.

“Okay,” said the teacher from the
front of the room. “The first thing that you will do today is to
write a short story about your summer. You will have about an hour
to complete this task.” Ms. Carson looked down the row past Allie
to Robert and the other boys around him. “I will be looking at your
grammar, what you said, and how you said it.”

The teacher looked around the
entire room, “Get started.”

“Should I tell her how I beat up
Tim Garretsen at the pool this summer?” Robert laughed and the
other guys in the group looked at one another before laughing back
in turn.

“Boys,” said Ms. Carson from her
desk. “Get to work!”

Robert smiled, looked out the
window for several minutes before starting to write.

Allie stared at the blank sheet of
paper on her desktop for a long time. A single teardrop fell square
in the middle of the paper. She picked up her pen and wrote three
words on the paper and then turned it over.

The rest of the hour went by in
peaceful quiet as Allie continued to stare at the paper in front of
her and think about the three words.

“Stop,” directed Ms. Carson. “Fold
your papers in half and set them on the corner of your desk. I will
walk by and pick them up.”

Allie looked at the three words
one last time, folded the paper in half, and pushed it slowly to
the corner of her desk.

Ms. Carson walked down the row of
desks picking up each folded paper. She smiled at Allie as she
picked up her paper. The smile quickly disappeared as Ms. Carson
looked at Robert in the next seat.

“Your next class is music,” stated
Ms. Carson. “I will walk you to the class and come back to get you
in an hour.” She walked over to the doorway and faced the students.
“Line up, please.”

As Allie stood up, Robert stepped
to the side of her and shoved her back down in her seat. He looked
down at her with an evil grin and walked up to the front of the
room with his buddies. Robert whispered something to the guys that
made them all laugh.

Allie looked around her to make
sure there was no one else to shove her and then walked up the row
to the end of the line. She was standing right behind Robert and
his gang.

The fear inside her was on the
edge of exploding. Allie just stared at her feet and tried her best
to ignore the boys in front of her as they walked down the hallway
to music.

Music class was pretty uneventful
for Allie. Mr. Edwards had assigned everyone seats when they walked
into the room. Allie was seated in the first seat next to the door.
Robert was three rows straight across from Allie in the middle of
the room - right in front of the teacher! The rest of Robert’s
buddies were spread throughout the room.

While her class was in music, Ms.
Carson sat at her desk in the classroom to read the short stories
her students had written. For the most part, they were pretty
similar.

The teacher picked up Allie’s paper
and opened it. She stared at the piece of paper for several seconds
without blinking. Tears began to well up in her eyes as she read
the three words in front of her –
My mom
died.

Ms. Carson looked at the paper for
a few moments longer and then stood up. She walked briskly down the
hallway to music class - lost in her thoughts.

The teacher stopped in the doorway
of the music room, looked down at Allie for a second, and then
gazed around the room at the seating of her class. It was easy to
see that Robert had found his permanent home.

“Okay guys,” said Ms. Carson.
“It’s time to go back to our room.”

Allie stood up in front of the
teacher. Her dark eyes seemed to be searching for a secure
place.

The walk back to the room was
fairly quiet.

Ms. Carson stopped in the doorway
of the room and faced the students, “Pick up your things and stand
around the outside edges of the room. I will now assign you to your
permanent seats.”

There were many moans and groans
as students thought they were already in their assigned places.
Robert was especially vocal.

The teacher waited for all the
students to get themselves situated around the edges of the room.
Allie made a point to stand as far away from Robert as
possible.

Ms. Carson stood beside the desk
at the front of the room next to the door. “Allie,” she said
calmly, “I’d like you to be seated here.”

Allie walked around the room
without looking into the faces of any of the students. She glanced
up for a moment into the eyes of the teacher and forced a tiny
smile.

Ms. Carson winked backed at
her.

“Robert,” she pointed to a seat at
the front of the room right in front of her desk. “That’s
yours.”

“What?” Robert stomped up the
aisle toward the desk the teacher was pointing at. “I didn’t do
anything.”

“Never said you did…” Ms. Carson
gave him the ‘stop complaining’ look. She glanced back at Allie
with a twinkle in her eyes.

“
Thank you class,” said the
teacher, “for the quick adjustment.” She looked directly at Robert.
“I’m sure this will work out much better.”

Robert turned his head toward
Allie sitting in the desk by the doorway. No one could hear what he
said under his breath, “You caused this to happen!”

Allie looked back at Robert
through the long dark hair that covered her face. Even though she
didn’t hear it, she knew exactly what Robert had said.

“I read each of your papers during
music class,” said Carson from her desk. “I appreciate you sharing
your thoughts with me.” She looked over at Allie and
smiled.

Allie looked past the teacher
across the room - Robert was still glaring at her.

“I am now going to place each of
you in groups of four. You will be given a topic to discuss in
relationship to science. You cannot use any books or computers to
help you. You must rely on your past knowledge and the things you
learned in the sixth grade.”

Ms. Carson walked over to Allie
and pointed to three students. “You will join with Allie and become
Group 1.”

Allie looked up at the teacher for
a moment. She was surprised that the teacher already knew her
name.

Ms. Carson looked down at the
group, “You are to discuss the term ‘atomic model’ in your
group.”

The three students assigned to the
group with Allie seemed to whisper at the same time, “Atomic
model?”

Allie sat quietly without
reacting.

Ms. Carson walked from group to
group assigning each of them extremely difficult topics for
discussion.

The teacher walked back to the
middle of the class, “Begin!”

Allie’s group all turned their
chairs toward each other – two girls and one boy.

The boy learned forward and softly
said, “I haven’t a clue what an atomic model is.”

Both girls chimed in at the same
time, “Me neither!”

Ms. Carson walked up to the group
at that very moment, “Are we having a bit of trouble?”

None of the students in Allie’s
group wanted to say anything. Instead, they just stared at their
laps.

“The atomic model,” started Allie
slowly in a quiet voice, “is a way to take a look at a specific
atom.”