‘That’s right. I ought to send him to George for a battery, I mean a battery of reassessment tests, only right now George has a pretty full case-load over at the junior high, you know what with that Russian roulette club —’
‘I imagine. How is the Vulich boy by the way?’
‘As well as can be expected, understand his parents are seeking a court order to have the machine turned off — where were we?’
‘Think we ought to do something, this Wood boy told me he dreams of skulls and scissor trees…’
‘Well sure, I’ll try to get George to fit him in, otherwise we’ll just have to let him go on thinking he’s a Martian — yes, at least we can send him to Ms Beek for some remedial, hand me one of those green forms will you, Bill? No, the
The new eye cost Pa and Ma a lot of money, but at least he could go right back to school. The other kids seemed glad to see him, even Chauncey.
Roderick couldn’t figure Chauncey out at all. Whenever they were alone, the bigger boy called him ‘Rick’, treated him like a pal, and even shared stuff with him, as now:
‘Hey Rick, wanna see some real dirty pitchers?’
‘Dirty?’
‘Yeah I found ’em in old Festy’s desk. And these really neat binoculars too, only Billy keeps ’em at home, me and him take turns with ’em. Here, take a look.’
He pulled up his sweater and fished out a dog-eared magazine,
‘Hey looka that, wow!’
‘Yeah wow, but how come—’
‘Look, looka
A pair of people were wrestling like Bax and Indica. ‘Hey is it dirty because like this they wrestle on the ground or—?’
‘Naw, dirty is
Roderick said, ‘Sure, plenty of times. Once.’
‘Okay then. See this is how they get babies.’
‘
Chauncey hesitated. ‘Well sure. Must be, look it probably tells all about it here—’
‘Lemme see.’
Whoa there! While Calamity Jayne shucks her buckskins to saddle up for some bunkhouse fun, Miss Kitti is ‘bound’ to please some lonesome cowpoke. But what’s Brazos gonna do with thet there branding iron?
‘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 goz fastr ?an a skul 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.
‘?u ideea uv kumbiniNg speeCh Thayrupee wiTh ree-meedyul reediNg iz just wun mor exampul ov ?u braykdown ov ?u hol godawful sistum HwiCh ?ay keep erjiNg mee tu joyn (az ?o peepul wur glu…’
