Mr. Terupt Falls Again (19 page)

That was a class meeting that left me with lots to think about. I thought about Mr. Terupt as a boy and all that he suffered, and I thought about what he had said.
Sometimes answers come at unexpected times, in unexpected ways and unexpected places
. I definitely wasn’t expecting an answer to my yearlong question about the man in our fields when I got it. Following that class meeting we had to pack up because it was the end of the day. I was folding up the newspaper I had used for example obituaries when something on the front page caught my eye. It took my breath away. I stuffed the paper into my backpack and read the article as soon as I got home and was alone in my bedroom.

LAND WARS

Moonsuc Tribe Sues Several Landowners
By Thomas Freed
November 13

The man in our fields must have been an Indian. Excuse me, a Native American. Right now, though, I didn’t give two hoots about that sensitive stuff. I was angry! My grandpa and grandma had been living and working this land for a long, long time. My mom grew up on the farm. My dad had been working it alongside my grandparents since before Charlie was born. And now some Indians were deciding it was really theirs, and we actually had to listen. My family takes pride in keeping their word. A handshake is a solemn promise never to be broken. We didn’t steal their land, so we weren’t giving it back. The Indians needed to fight this treaty thing with somebody else a long time ago. It was too late now. Sorry. I’d pray for them, but I wasn’t giving my land back, and neither was my family.

Dear God
,

Thanks for leading me to the article, but I’ll need your support. I’m not going to say anything to my family, because ignorance is bliss. There’s no need for any of them to know I know
and then have to worry about me. And they’d worry, especially if they saw me now. I’ll be honest, I’ve been crying all night. I’ve been crying enough as it is, every time I get my period. Add this new Indian lawsuit on top of that and I won’t have a dry eye ever. God, we’ll need a way to solve this land war. Please help us with that. Amen
.

T
he most important project of my school career was still going strong—my work as wedding manager. So far we were under budget because we had figured out many ways to do things ourselves. Jeffrey and his father were making our special class gift for Mr. Terupt and Ms. Newberry, so we didn’t have to buy one. Lexie and her mother and a cook named Vincent were going to prepare the food for the party, so we didn’t need to hire a catering company. And Peter was going to DJ the reception, so we didn’t have to find anyone else. All this kept our expenses down and allowed Mr. Terupt to spend money elsewhere, like on the fancy video camera that Jeffrey used as videographer with Jessica. Overall, our wedding work was going well.

The only thing I was bummed about was Lincoln and Jackson dying. Losing them was a big blow. They didn’t
even make it through the year. Yes, I knew they wouldn’t live forever, but I didn’t expect to be the one to bury them. I was very upset, but I wasn’t alone, and I wasn’t the one to discover them dead. That had been Peter and Jeffrey, and they got all worked up over it. Their fight wasn’t like some dumb girl war that you didn’t even know was happening. They took care of it on the spot with a wrestling match in the back of the classroom. I know you’re not supposed to fight in school, but this was way better than those crazy girl tactics. Besides, Jeffrey and Peter got over it and made up in no time. The only thing I still don’t understand is how their rumble led to me and Peter and some other boys in class attending wrestling practice with Jeffrey and Mr. Terupt. I’m not sure whose brilliant idea that was, but I could have told you from the start that it wasn’t a good one.

I walked into the gym and looked over the sea of mats and was hit with a connection. I felt just like Stanley Yelnats. Stanley is the main character in Louis Sachar’s book
Holes
. Stanley is sentenced to Camp Green Lake for something he didn’t do, same as
I
was sentenced to wrestling practice for something
I
didn’t do. Stanley finds that there is no lake at
Camp Green Lake, only sweltering heat and hard work to be done. It didn’t take long on those wrestling mats before I was hot and sweaty and tired and looking for an escape.

We did some running and stretching and then practiced techniques. I’ve always been a fast learner, getting all As, but I surprised myself when I discovered I could learn wrestling moves just as easily. The new move taught that night was a bar arm. It’s a pinning move from the top position when you flatten your opponent on his belly and then pull his arms back. This creates an opening under his elbow for you to slide your arm through. You should have your fist in the middle of his back and his arm hooked around your forearm if you’ve done it correctly. The guy on the bottom can’t do a thing. Then you’re supposed to push off your feet and try to drive your opponent’s shoulder into his ear. This inflicts pain and causes him to roll over onto his back, where you can pin him. I was good at practicing these moves, but when it came time for scrimmaging, it was a different story.

Coach Terupt matched me up with some kid who was around my size, but unfortunately, he wasn’t another geek. He had the flashy sneakers, the special knee pads, and some fancy headgear. I knew experience was something that counted as a huge advantage. I had none. My opponent had a ton.

The whistle blew, and seconds later this mat rat had ahold of my legs and took me to the ground. I was on my belly with my arms pulled behind me. He rammed my shoulder into my ear and drove me over onto my back. I thought he was going to rip my arms off. By the time the whistle sounded to signal
the end of the first period, I was teary-eyed and in pain. My hypothesis had been tested and confirmed—I wasn’t enjoying this. But like all hypotheses, it had to be tested over and over before being accepted as true.

I started the second period on the bottom, again—where I wasn’t very confident and didn’t know enough moves. It didn’t take long for Mr. Mat Rat to flatten me to my belly with my arms yanked back again. This time he not only made my shoulder feel like it was going to come off, but when he had me on my back he wrapped his legs around my head and squeezed. I found out later that this thing with his legs was called a figure four. I thought my head was going to pop like a pimple. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move. I only got out because the whistle blasted for the end of the second period. There was a God, and he didn’t want me to die. But wait … there are three periods in a wrestling match.

Fortunately, I started the third period on top. The only thing I knew was that bar arm, so I tried it and I did it my hardest. The last thing I wanted was to let this kid get on top of
me
again. I managed to get him to his belly and I pulled his arm back. That’s when I heard his father screaming, “Get up!” But I held him down until the whistle sounded. I couldn’t turn him over, but I didn’t let him budge. That wasn’t good enough for that boy’s father. He kept yelling at his kid for not getting away.

I looked over at my dad and saw him sitting against the wall reading a book, something about quantum physics. He had his glasses perched across his nose, and his pocket protector and pens poked up from his shirt. I had a father like
Stanley Yelnats’s, and I was so proud of that. I felt sorry for the boy I had wrestled.

T
he next wrestling practice was something Peter and I looked forward to, but not Luke. He decided wrestling wasn’t his thing after just one try. It was funny listening to him retell his experience. It was on a day when the three of us sat together at lunch.

“Hey, Luke,” I said. “Peter and I are going to wrestling tonight. Do you want to come?”

Luke shook his head. “No thanks! I need to save my brain and body for the future.”

“Maybe you should try it again,” Peter said. “You can’t be the best at everything your first time.”

Luke got excited. “Be the best! I’m never going to be the best at wrestling.” He planted his hands on the table and leaned across it. His butt wasn’t even in his chair anymore. “Did you see what that kid did to me? He squeezed my head
so hard I thought my brain was going to ooze out through my ears!”

A speck of sandwich flew out of Luke’s mouth and stuck to Peter’s cheek. Luke was so revved up he didn’t even notice, and that’s saying something for Mr. Detective. Peter wiped the spit and food from his face and elbowed me in the ribs because I was laughing at him.

“Did you
see
what he did to me?!” Luke said again.

“Yes. Yes, we saw it,” I said. “He had a figure four on your head.”

“Yeah, after he almost ripped my arm off, he put a figure whatever on my head and tried to make it pop like a pimple.” Luke sat back down. “No thanks. I won’t be going back to wrestling practice.” He took another bite of his sandwich. This time it stayed in his mouth.

Peter and I looked at each other and chuckled. Good ol’ Lukester. We’d had a feeling wrestling wasn’t going to be for him, but we loved it. We went twice a week while Luke stuck to the Boy Scouts. He was working on his first-aid badge now.

Dad and I picked Peter up and gave him a ride to practice one night. Peter and I had been friends all along in class, give or take a few disagreements, but once wrestling became a part of our lives, we became buddies. We were good. Coach Terupt told us we were naturals.

During the scrimmaging there is always a bunch of yelling and shouting from the sidelines. Fathers and even some mothers sit on the edge screaming out encouragement and instruction. Most of the time I don’t hear anything. I sort of
enter a different world as I’m wrestling and my mind goes blank, and even though it’s crazy loud in the gym, everything is silent to me. But that changed one night.

I was in the middle of a match when I heard a series of rapid, sharp clicks. Up to this point, I was undefeated. But when I heard that strange sound, I stopped wrestling, and before I knew it I was on my back. I quickly rolled to my belly and looked up to see what was making the noise. It was a woman. There was no mistaking her.

She stood on the side of the mat holding a piece of mail in her hand. She was all decked out in a business suit and high heels—which explained the clicking sound. She wasn’t far from where I lay on the mat, so I heard what she said.

“Your father’s in the car. He’d like to know what this is all about. And so would I.” She waved the mail in Peter’s face, her voice already beginning to rise. She was one mad lady.

The whistle blew, so I was able to get up. I walked over to Peter while all the other kids got ready for the next period.

“What’s that?” I said.

“Mind your own business, young man. This doesn’t concern you.”