Straighten Your Ties / Book 1

Lay down, sleep my little darling

I'll be nothing when you're gone

Lay down just like in a coffin

Then I'll have nothing but a song
-Priestess – Lay Down

We entered homeroom, titled 8A, a few minutes early, which was the math room in the Spencer building. Since there was only one real classroom in the Spencer (the rest was taken up by office space) it was aptly named the Spencer classroom. I thought the name was perfect for it. And original too! The walls were covered with a few math posters, and a long number line that went across one side of the class below the windows. The windows were located high up the wall and were like the windows you would find in a basement. While we weren’t in the basement, the playground outside the class located high because of the slant the school was built on.

Our homeroom teacher, and our former seventh grade math teacher, Miss (April) Evans, was already there clicking keys on her laptop not paying any attention. He had straightened out her hair today, which was an odd look. For one thing, her usual brown hair now had turned to a darker brown… or so it seemed, and we never saw her without her thick curly locks.
“Morning, Miss Evans.” Greg and I said in unison, putting down our books and binders on the first table on the left at the front. A few students had already arrived like Mark, Ben, Jason, and Ramsey, one of our other good friends.

“Morning boys.” April said as she took a quick glance up from her IBM. “Weekend was good?"

“Meh, boring on my side of the fence,” I said leaned my head back against the wall of 8A. “Although I see you were up to something.” April raised an eyebrow, rather confused and partly disgusted. “Oh God. NO! I mean your hair Miss Evans.”

“Ah!” she said, as if just noticing it. She fixed her dark red, wide-rimmed glasses and twirled a portion of hair. “Yeah, I was having second thoughts. But thank you. I suppose you like it?”

“It’s good for a change,” I replied nicely, reminiscing about when I used to spike my hair. As of September, I hadn’t spiked it except for a few times.

“Well, thanks again. And you Greg? Anything new and exciting?” I stopped listening for a bit as Greg said a few things to April. I couldn’t help but smile. She wasn’t like other teachers. Most teachers would sit at their desk and not willingly talk to students as if they were friends. I had had some bad teachers in the past. I had considered April Evans to be one of the best. Other students remarked her for having the best ass in school, which several of us thought over the past year. I’ve heard it less and less since. We were boys stuck in an all-boys school after all. What else were going to look at all day if the porn was blocked on our computers? It’s a sad fact that rings true with most all-boy schools. I did consider her a very beautiful woman, but I never felt on the verge of being infatuated with her. I know some people thought I was. Our friendship was purely professional, I swear to you – and nothing more. Although I could see how you would doubt that.

“…Tons of homework, and I’m not sure I even finished it.” Greg finished his chat with April.
“Did you lose track of what you did for homework before or after I called you last night?” I smirked.

Greg punched my arm, “Dude, never call me that late again!”

“Can’t promise you anything…”

“Well, you didn’t get homework from yours truly. Can’t blame me.” April replied chuckling.

“Or get in trouble from Miss Evans,” I pointed out removing one hand from behind my head and jabbing my finger against Greg’s shoulder.

“True.” She gave a nod, going back to whatever she was doing on her laptop. “Anyways, I better…” she seemed to give a glance at the clock in the corner of her screen, “…get homeroom started. Jordan,” she called to the back of the room. Jordan looked up from his black and gold lion emblazed school agenda, “Could you close the door please?” And so he did.

I looked at the clock posted above the class SmartBoard. 8:10 as usual. Here come the lates.

And sure enough, they did. Will, George. Corey, Jean, and Daniel were all late.

“What the fuck?!” I heard George mutter.

“Fucking bullshit, man.” Will.

“FRUCK.” Jean. Through gritted teeth

“Shhhhhhhhhhhhit!” Corey.

“Oh c’mon.” The only one that didn’t swear: Daniel. I guess he wasn’t in the mood or just didn’t really care.

Jean went on though. He marched up to April and made the same comments he made nearly everyday. “OK, no! What the hell miss? I was like with another teacher! I’m only like 30 seconds late – this is crap.” Crap was actually an OK word to April. Most of the time.

April breathed in a deep sigh, and rambled out, “I’ve told you this since the beginning of the year Jean – it isn’t my fault. Those are the rules, I have to follow them. If I do, so do you. Miss Mullins implements these rules, and not me. Complain to her and not to me. If this rule really is crap, it’s not my problem. I don’t deal with crap.” She owned him repeatedly. It was pretty amusing to watch.

People were always pissed when they were late. If you got more than three lates in the term, you were then eligible, and obligated to attend detention for 30 minutes each subsequent late. So if you had seven lates over a period, you had to serve a three and a half hour detention after school one day with Miss Mullins, head of the middle school at Seguin. It wouldn’t be that bad in my case, because I usually enjoy detentions. Back in elementary, I used to help teachers with a number of things around the school. That is essentially what you do for detentions at Seguin as well. There was no such thing as detentions at my elementary school, and I had no idea why. The concept was totally backwards. Kids wanted to help out teachers.

“Done?” April asked Jean. He just merely rolled his eyes and went to take his seat. April went back to her laptop. Content.

April went on to read the e-nouncements, the email Miss Mullins sent every morning listing the few things going on around school, and sent her absences note with Ben up to the office on the third floor. While everyone left class, I stayed behind and told Greg I’d meet him in English class soon. He nodded and left.

April had her back turned to me, writing her class schedule on the board, as I walked up to her.

“Uh, Miss Evans?”

She spun around, red white board marker still in hand. “Yes, Derrick?”

“Could I, uh, talk to you after-school?”

“About what exactly?” she eyed me, smiling, her teeth white like the fluorescents above.

“Something non-Seguin related.” I looked down, somewhat ashamed. Kicking thin air.

“Hmmm. I could fit you in, I think. You just wanna meet me here?”

“Um, yeah. That’d be fine.”

“If I’m not here by 3:15, don’t bother waiting around. I might have a meeting that goes till four. Might not though.”

“No problem. See you later.”

“Alright, have a good day Derrick.” As if that was likely. I started walking away but April asked something else. “Derrick,” I turned, “Are you… OK?”

What should I say? Tell her the lie – I’m fine. Oh just tell her the truth – no, at the moment I feel totally miserable. “Yeah… Fine.” Lie it is. I had said it rather sarcastically too. I turned again and walked out the door, and up to the second floor.

***

English class was always my favorite. I loved everything about it. My marks were great, the books we read were pretty good, and I loved the writing assignments. The teacher was great too. Mr. Tim Caldwell was one of the best teachers in the school, and was usually the voice of reason for everyone and everything.

“Alright, close your laptops, shut it and sit down.” Well… Most of the time. He marched into class carrying his mug of coffee for the period. He might not sound like a great teacher, but trust me when I say that he makes us laugh nearly every class. Though when he says shut it – he usually means it.

As told, we all shut up and waited silently. Caldwell sat down at his desk, slouching back, obviously tired, which we sort of used to. It was nearly a monthly and sometimes weekly ritual where he would come in insanely tired. He told us he had only gotten to sleep at four, watching the CW and its random shows. I don’t blame the guy one bit. I believe he has two kids… and if I’m wrong I apologize… If Mr. Caldwell reads this that is. And I hope he does.

The fun classes were the ones where Caldwell was tired. He usually didn’t have the capacity to concentrate on English or History, and we ended fooling around the whole class. That was the class secret. It was a silent agreement that we just wouldn’t tell our parents. They’d be pissed.

We sat around for most of the class asking questions. Extremely random ones at that. Why? Well, we saw Caldwell as the voice of reason as I said. He always had some kind of insight to something. It was just plain fun to ask questions to him. The answers might be sarcastic, or serious. We laughed. All class. Let’s just let the class play out.

I was sitting next to Greg, half asleep myself. Caldwell started speaking. “So…” He groaned out, stretching. “What were we supposed to do today now?”

“Nothing’s on the calendar.” Greg motioned to the calendar near the wood door of the class.

“Well, I’m too tired to focus on anything.” Now rubbing his eyes.

“Games day!” Ben (Miller) yelled.

“Shut your piehole, Miller ‘Lite’. Guh…” Caldwell paused, scratching his left ear. Cocking his head to the left. “I was up on my laptop, playing games all night. I’m not exactly in the mood for more games, boys. Plus, It seems Derrick hasn’t gotten much sleep either.”

“I blame Russell Peters.” Putting up my hand. Then laying it back down. “There is a bunch of crap on YouTube.”

“Indeed.” Caldwell remarked.

“Chocolate Rain!” Joseph yelled, halfway across the class.

“Shut up!” Several people replied.

“Hey, hey, hey…” Caldwell’s eyes were closed now. “Shhhhh… We’ve got 65 minutes left in this class. We have to fill it with something semi-productive. Listen, read The Chrysalids for now or something. If you want, sleep like Der here.” Pointing to me, now nearly drooling, ¾ asleep. “Give me 20 minutes. We’ll talk randomly after that. I’ve had a bad start to the morning, boys.”

I slept. 20 minutes of bliss.

At some point, I had to wake up which was fine: “OK boys… wake up Derrick.”

“Sure thing, sir.” I mumbled. I pushed my head up off the desk, flinging the long-ish red hair out of my face.

“Like I said, I’m too tired to do much today. ‘Jeopardy’ or ‘You don’t know Jack?’”

Oh, the joys of English class. How I sorely miss you now.

***

We played Jeopardy for the rest of the period, with Caldwell cracking jokes half the time. Miller’s Jeopardy team was called El Bandito because he had been joking about Mexicans for a while. He drew a donkey with a messed up bandit on the blue name screen of the Jeopardy on the computer. Another team wanted to be called “My pen is big.” Caldwell obliged.

The next periods were actual work. Science and Math for me. Our science teacher really has this mindset on this higher level of thinking, and not memorizing things but understanding them in several contexts. Don’t get me wrong, it’s an OK method of learning but your test marks end up being brutally awful. I’ve gotten above an 80 thrice. And we had taken several tests so far. They were HARD. You’d get to a question, and your mind would just blank. Before you even read the whole the question. Luckily we didn’t have a test that period. Today was a lab period, and I’m sure you don’t want to know what it was about. Gruesome. Dissections. And stuff. *shivers* Sheep eyes are the shiz though.

For math, we have a really hard-ass teacher. Seriously. She got pissed off so easily. But class was fine that day. Just a few tough problems in the package of equations she gave us. Other than that, no outbursts, and I remained as quiet as I ever was during classes other than English or History. I liked to stay in my insignificant corner when I wasn’t around Caldwell. He brought out my tiny wild side.

At Seguin, we have a three-period morning, then lunch, then one-period afternoon. So obviously I headed off to the lunch room to sit at the usual random table with the usual friends. But the menu today wasn’t so great. Veal steakettes are famous for being stale pieces of sit that we eat anyways, but not me. Screw that. So, I had bread. Stale bread at that. It was just so stupid. Why couldn’t we be like other schools and buy our own lunch? The tuition price would appear cheaper anyways. But they put it high for a reason I guess: weed out the poor, welcome the rich.

Carrying my two pieces of bread, I strolled past teachers monitoring the room, and over to the plain wooden/looks like plastic table where Greg, Seth, David, Joseph, Ramsey, and Eric sat. I’ve already introduced Greg and Seth, not so much Joseph, Eric, Ramsey, and David. There were a few others missing from our usual group. Anthony, who’s mother is a published author, while he is a vegetarian human rights activist who is intensely philosophical, and Jason: a rather fat kid who is very cynical in a sarcastic way. He was still an awesome guy. He had also been friends with David for an extremely long period of time. Long before Seguin. Cole wasn’t there either, which was weird, as he never missed lunch… being fatter than Jason. But he was actually annoying. And he wasn’t exactly my friend, and hadn’t been for a while. But back to explaining who the others are.

Eric and Joseph are the acclaimed lunatics but very good friends who were once obsessed with Diablo II, and now play Counter-Strike more than anything at the moment (not that I don’t once in awhile). They were kind of like an old married couple who fought all the time, and who beat each other up and then forgave and forgot. One week they were friends. The next week they were fighting. All the domestic violence… it could be overwhelming sometimes.

Joseph was Italian and had been in Seguin since the beginning of his education, same as Eric. He could be quite loud at times and didn’t shut up. I didn’t mind. He was also obsessed with the fact that my room was located in the basement of my house, and that it was some kind of awful dungeon. There was also this big joke about his uncle and how Joe had put him up on a pedestal and had praised him as a god, who apparently had a Ferrari, owned a large portion of Microsoft, and already had the Playstation 4. He had grown out of this phase long ago, but people still made fun of him for it. There was also the fact that he definitely wasn’t one of the richest Seguin students, and that didn’t add much fuel to his fire.

Eric had been my friend/off and on friend ever since I was in Ms. Russell’s homeroom in grade seven. I think I’ll tell you the entire back-story of Eric and I soon. Eric was of British origin, but Canadian by birth of course. He figured he was really British though. Thing is, he couldn’t pull off a good accent for his life. He was quite the insane one, but really funny. You gotta love the guy sometimes, even though I absolutely despise him some days. No matter though.

Ramsey was a friend of Greg and I, and was Lebanese. Proud of it too. His father was involved in creating the Canadian Arm (that space thingy, you know?). Props to that. He was quiet and considered to be a joke killer last year. We even made up the term that if someone killed a joke and took it too far, that they “rammed” it. He came into Seguin in the seventh grade as I did.

David is the kid you’ll find in your grade who is the always the top of the class. Litterally. Whenever I asked him what he got on his science test it was between 97 and 100. I envied him. Really, I secretly did, as my father always told me that I should be getting an average in the nineties, but was getting a consistent average of 85. It wasn’t my place to ever be like him. And I knew it.

Despite my friends being an odd bunch, I didn’t mind. Not much. Hardly at all to be honest. And this still isn’t all of them. I have more friends. I’m more social than you think.

“Hey h’assh’oles.” I sat down, adding some random made up accent to my speech.

“Hallo!” someone said.

“Hey, Greg, best class ever this morning, eh?” I shouted at him down the table.

“Hell yeah! We did nothing.”

David finished chewing the stale shit-steak in his mouth, and asked, “What are you talking about?”

“8A insider. We played Jeopardy all class with Caldwell!” Joseph laughed.

“Chill indeed.” Greg agreed.

Eric snickered, “Yeah, that’s nice. You don’t have to read Julius Caesar over and over again.”

“Shouldn’t one time suffice anyways?” asked David, sharing the same torture as Eric.

“You’d think.” Eric replied. “How are you treating Russell anyways?”

“Ms. Russell hates me man…” Joseph said, food in mouth. “But I do treat her like shit.”

“Like what you’re eating?” I remarked.

“Nah… this is worse.” He replied, holding up a stale piece of what was somehow supposed to be a dead baby cow.

“You shouldn’t treat her like that anyways –”

“That’s just because we all know you have a mad crush on her –”

“Shut it Eric… You jerk off to gay porn.” I dart my eyes to him.

“No man. You do have a crush on her! Same with Evans.”

“Like I said, you jerk off to gay porn.” I wasn’t good with comebacks.

Eric looked around, reached over the table and punched me in the right shoulder area. “Ow. That’s why I hate you, you know?”

“Shut up dickhole.”

I flashed him the finger. I sat through lunch, pissed off that I really didn’t want to eat, and pissed off that my friends’ always thought I was in love with teachers. They never shut up about it. I made it through. And that was enough to keep me around.