Brendan Buckley's Sixth-Grade Experiment (24 page)

I perched on the love seat.

“I got a call from your vice principal.”

Now probably wasn't the best time to inquire about their college days.

“You going to tell me what happened?”

I cleared my throat. “Um … well, see … this kid was harassing Morgan.” Dad had once used the same word to describe how a female detective was getting treated at work. He'd been really ticked about it.

“And hitting him was the answer?”

“He was
attacking
her.”

“Huh.” Dad crossed his arms. “That's a pretty different account from what I heard. Sounded to me like the kid made a fumble and you sacked him after the whistle had blown.”

“Morgan's not a football!”

Dad looked at me intently, his jaw clenched tight. He sat in the armchair. “Look, Brendan, I'm sure you meant well. But you overreacted. You hammer-fisted a kid for chasing a girl. And you used your Tae Kwon Do at school. Something we agreed you'd never do.”

I had no defense against those charges.

“Is this boy as big as you, at least?”

I shook my head. “He's kind of small, actually.” A wave of shame washed over me. I'd really messed up.

“What's gotten into you?” Dad sounded exasperated. “First, excessive force with Khalfani, and now this?”

I shrugged. Did Dad want me to be tough or didn't he? I guessed hitting a kid who was smaller than me didn't fit into Dad's definition of toughness. If I was honest, it didn't fit into mine, either. But what
did
it mean to be tough? And did I or did I not need to be it?

“Well, you'll have plenty of time to think about it on Thursday.” Dad exhaled. “Go to your room. We'll talk more about this later.”

“Yes, sir.”

I went and sat at my desk. I stared at my open math book, but all I could think about was my dad. I'd let him down. Not just by hitting Dwight David over the head. It was more than that. Something about myself. Who I was. Or wasn't.

I would never be the superjock baseball or football player. I didn't want to raid drug houses or put people in jail, even people who deserved it.

I liked
thinking
about stuff, and learning about things, like supernovas, and phytoplankton, and subterranean microbes that ate rocks far below the Earth's crust and kept the cycle of life going. I liked doing experiments with cow manure.

I was all right with that. I knew Mom was, too. But was Dad? Would he ever be?

I got busy working on my math assignment. Compared to my dad and me, these problems would be a breeze.

Mom, Dad, and I had our “big conversation” over teriyaki that night. Not wanting to get into everything again, I told them right away that I knew I was in the wrong and they didn't need to worry about me doing anything like that ever again.

Dad said, “Good,” thumped me on the back a couple of times, then shoveled down his food and rushed out the door for class. I got out of Tae Kwon Do by saying I felt sick, which I did. Sick to my stomach.

The morning of my suspension, first Morgan called, and then Khal. It was nice to know I had friends.

I hung up the phone after telling Khal I'd see him Friday. “Hey, Boo,” Mom said, coming into the kitchen. “Ready for breakfast?” Mom didn't work on
Thursdays. She'd already told me she planned to be home with me all day. I glanced at the clock: 8:20. I'd been so busy talking to my friends, I hadn't given Einstein his crickets.

“After I feed Einstein,” I said, heading for my room.

“How about eggs and bacon?” Mom called.

“Sure!” I hollered. I turned on my bedroom light. “Guess what, Einstein? I get to stay home with you today.” Einstein lay in a corner with his back against the glass. I'd never seen him lie in that spot before. “Einstein?” He was too still. “Einstein!” I snatched off the lid and peered over the edge. His eyes were closed. He didn't move.

I reached in and touched him with the end of my pointer finger. He still didn't move. His long tail drooped as I lifted his lifeless body from the tank.

I dropped to the floor, cradling my anole in my palms. Crickets hopped around inside the cricket carrier under the card table. They would live to see another day, but not my lizard. Einstein was gone.

Mom and I stood outside in our backyard, white puffs appearing in front of our faces whenever we exhaled. It started to drizzle. I clutched the shoe box that held Einstein, along with some orchid bark, a couple of crickets (they'd feed off his body before dying themselves, helping him to decompose more quickly), and
one of the quartz crystals I'd found on the dig back in August.

Mom held out the shovel. “You want to do the honors?”

I gave her the box and took the shovel. I stabbed the hard ground, then pushed on the edge of the spade with my foot. This was going to take a while.

As the hole got bigger, I started to think about last spring. Being at the cemetery. Sitting on a hard folding chair at the side of that huge dug-out rectangle. Listening to the sound of some lady singing:
God has smiled on me. He has set me free.…
Feeling Mom tremble next to me. Hearing Gladys's choked cries as she muttered,
My Clem.…
Watching a single tear trickle down Dad's wooden cheek on its way to his clenched jaw.

Why did everything die? I knew there was a scientific explanation, but I didn't care. It wasn't right. It shouldn't be this way.

I dropped the shovel and looked at Mom. Her eyes squinted and her lips turned down. “Sorry, Boo,” she said, handing me the box.

My fingers were stiff and achy, but I grasped the box tightly. I faced the hole. “You were a great pet and a good friend. I'm sorry we didn't get to know each other for longer.” I crouched and set the box in the hole, remembering how those strangers had lowered Grampa Clem's coffin into the dug-out rectangle. We passed by, one by one, tossing in flowers that had been handed to us.

I looked around Mom's flower beds but there were no flowers in December. I pulled up a handful of wet grass, sprinkled it on top of the box, and then shoveled the dirt back into the hole.

When it was done, we went inside. Dad would probably be annoyed that Einstein was dead after just four months, but I didn't care. He could be annoyed all he wanted. I was still going to miss my lizard.

The following week, Mr. Hammond asked Morgan and me to stay after class. “Do you think he's got news about the contest?” Morgan whispered excitedly from her seat behind me. Khal and I still sat at the same table, but right then he was leaning over to Cordé talking about something.

“That's got to be it!” I said, starting to get the Jitters.

Shyla-Ann giggled a few seats away. Dwight David, who'd been hanging around her more and more the last few days, had apparently done something funny.

The bell rang and Mr. H handed out our final exam for the quarter. Winter break started this weekend. I was so ready—for the break and for our science test. I breezed through the questions, turned in my test, and had fifteen minutes left to read
Percy Jackson
.

When time was up, Mr. Hammond asked those still
working to hand in their papers. “How'd you do?” I asked Khal as he got up to go to the front.

“I may not be a scientific genius like you or Morgan.” His eyes slid over to where Morgan sat. “But I did all right, I think.”

“Hey, I have an idea!” Morgan said. “We could form a team of three for next year's contest. What do you think, Khalfani?” She always used his full name. “Brendan and I have already begun thinking about what we're going to do. Probably something related to deep-sea exploration.”

Khal looked doubtful. He still wasn't sure whether Morgan was someone he could be friends with. “I don't know. Maybe … it
sounds
cool.”

“Tests in, please,” Mr. H called again. Kids filed out the door. We said goodbye to Khal and went to the front of the room to wait for whatever Mr. Hammond had to tell us.

When everyone was gone, Mr. H turned to us. “So.”

I could see it on his face. “We didn't win, did we?” I said.

“You didn't win first place.”

My shoulders dropped.

Mr. H looked us in the eyes. “But you still won.”

Morgan nodded. “That's true. It's a really big deal that we were regional finalists.”

“Absolutely,” Mr. Hammond agreed. “Not to mention you've both earned a science kit of your choice and
three hundred dollars to spend on our classroom. I'm grateful for that!”

I knew they were right, but I was disappointed anyway. I'd been hoping to win a trip to MIT. “Who got the top prize?” I asked.

“A team from Louisiana. For a project on algae blooms in the Gulf of Mexico.”

“Algae,” I said, looking at Morgan. “That's what you proposed.”