Adventures of a Middle School Zombie (8 page)

And right then, I thought I knew how.

Halloween. God, I hate Halloween. I stayed in my bedroom, and nobody bothered me. As far as I was concerned, Halloween was amateur hour.

I’m not sure who thought woodworking and middle school went together, but whoever decided to put a bunch of thirteen-year-olds around very sharp tools with minimal adult supervision, I salute you. Woodshop was always my favorite class of the day, even if I wasn’t very handy. In that, I followed in my dad’s footsteps.

“When something needs fixing around the house, I’m very good with my hands,” Dad always said. “They know how to pick up a phone and write a check. Perfect.”

Each day I walked in to the smell of sawdust and left with the smell of defeat. I didn’t care. I loved Woodshop, despite the fact that Robbie sat just a few desks away. And I didn’t know it yet, but that class would play an important role in my survival as a zombie, if that makes sense.

Desks were lined in six perfect rows, looking strangely out of place in the large workshop cluttered with circular saws, table saws, band saws, hand saws, lathes, and sanders. Given the tools and the lumber stacked along the walls, together we could have built the biggest and most awkward-looking birdhouse ever, capable of bringing years of shame to Mr. Anderson, the shop teacher.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Mr. Anderson said. “You should have assignments. Lineups are attached to each piece of equipment. Only those people listed may use the equipment. They must use the equipment in list order. No deviation. Understood? Get to work.”

There was no hesitation between Mr. Anderson’s question and his answer. The only result you’d get out of raising your hand in his class was having it chopped off. I knew from the first day in Woodshop, and the second I laid eyes on Mr. Anderson, that this was not an environment where differences would be embraced and encouraged.

Mr. Anderson stood six feet, two and five-eighths inches (we knew because on that first day, he paired up all twenty-six of us and had each team measure him because “before I see if you can handle this class, I have to make sure you can handle a tape measure”). And he was precisely six feet, two and five-eighths inches because he stood ramrod straight, his very thin frame capable of bending only at the waist and knees.

With his close-cropped hair, it was pretty easy to tell he was ex-military, even before he spent the rest of the first class filling us in on his career record.

Many of us can still quote him from that first day, when he laid out the Woodshop rules.

“I don’t expect all of you to be able to build a bridge in an hour,” he said. “Like I was trained to do in Desert Storm. Not a great call for that in I-raq. I was ready if needed. And why was I able to do so? And how? Because I could handle a tape measure. Had it on me at all times. Slept with it. Knew it better than my best friends. Because it was my best friend.”

Really, he talked like that. As if commas were un-American.

He pulled chalk from the pocket of his white, short-sleeve button-down shirt (he wore khaki shorts and work boots every day) and, right by his desk, drew a circle so perfect on the concrete floor it was eerie. He stepped into it, leaving just a few inches between his heels and the line—four inches and thirteen-sixteenths, to be exact.

“This is the Circle of Shame,” Mr. Anderson said, still standing in it. “There is only one way to earn a stint in the Circle of Shame: break the rules. That means talk out of turn. Misuse equipment. Abuse equipment. Fail to clean or properly maintain equipment. Use a tool without signing it out. Replace a tool improperly. Chew gum … ”

It went on for another five minutes. At the end: “Any questions. No. Good.”

Only there was a question. A hand in the front row shot up. It could have gone up between “questions” and “good,” but I was pretty sure no one’s reflexes were that fast.

“Yes?” Mr. Anderson said, in what we would later call his “displeased voice,” which he used about ninety-five percent of the time.

“Uh, you said there was only one way to spend time in the Circle of Shame,” the kid said. I was pretty sure he was in Chess Club. Kids in Chess Club just didn’t get it.

“That’s correct.”

“But then you listed, like, fifty things.”

“And you are?”

“Ray Knowles.”

“Mr. Knowles. Thank you for pointing that out. There actually are fifty-one ways to get into the Circle of Shame. I left out asking stupid questions.”

“But wouldn’t that make it fifty-two things?” I told you, Chess Club kids just didn’t get it.

“Mr. Knowles. You have the honor of being the Circle of Shame’s first guest. Ten minutes. Five minutes added each time you step out.”

The kid wound up spending almost that whole first day in the tiny circle.

Since then, there was usually at least one kid who spent the class in the Circle of Shame. Not because they had no skills for sawing, shaping, or gluing wood. It was usually for a stupid question. Or chewing gum.

On this particular day, I was continuing work on a bookshelf I’d been building since the start of the year. If middle-school Woodshops banded together, they could supply developing nations with all the bookshelves and birdhouses they would ever need. That’s my guess, anyway.

I really wanted to do a good job on it. My plan was to give it to Anna. Things were progressing really well. We’d gone from nodding in the hallway to saying hi in the quad, and by this time it was pretty common for us to exchange small talk at lunch, where we would discuss TV shows or the weather for, like, almost five minutes.

I followed the others to the bank of lockers where we kept our projects. I was the only one struggling with the bookshelf. Everyone else had moved on.

Pulling out my project, I looked at what I had—one plank, notched poorly at the end, and another plank cut unevenly. The second plank was supposed to go in that notch, but it wasn’t even close. Is the lack of skills a zombie thing? I’d blame genetics, if I had any.

“Jed, hey, don’t just stand there, you’re blocking the aisle.”

I turned around to see Chris Puckett. Chris wasn’t really a friend, but he was one of the few who’d at least chat with me every now and then. And he was a whiz with power tools. He had already completed his birdhouse and bookshelf, and he was nearly done with his jewelry box. At this pace, he would be putting the finishing touches on a bedroom set by the time summer came along.

“Sorry, just lost in thought,” I said, staring at what existed of my bookshelf.

“No kidding,” Chris said. “If Mr. Anderson saw you—”

“Circle of Shame,” we both said. To go with that, we all called the bell signaling the end of class the “Ring” of Redemption. Get it? When the bell went off, the kid could finally leave the Circle of Shame. We thought it was funny, anyway. Robbie didn’t. He called it the Dong of Done. Whatever.

“How you coming on your project?” Chris said. “If you need help … ”

“Nah. I think I’m OK,” I said. “Nice jewelry box.”

“Oh, this old thing?” The lid was intricately carved with birds and branches. The box itself looked to be cut from one piece of wood, even though I knew better.

“Yeah, that old thing. You have a talent.”

“I’m not bad. It’s all about knowing how to use the saw. The band saw is the best.”

“Really? Why?”

Chris looked disappointed. “Jed, it’s the best. Super fast, super sharp, lets you make every little twist and turn as the wood just melts away. You just have to be careful. You could lose a finger and not even know it.”

“A finger, huh? I had no idea.”

“Only if you’re not careful. Just make sure you pay attention. Try it, you’ll see.”

Yes, I was going to have to try it. Very soon.

“Everyone should have their permission slips; please pass them forward, and Jacob, will you please collect them. And welcome to a very special edition of Biology.”

With that, Mr. Landrum turned his back to the class and reached up to one of the many rollers that hung over the whiteboard. He grabbed the handle and yanked, unfurling the poster like pulling down blinds.

It was, as we had all expected, a frog. Only, this frog was on his back with his guts exposed, and various arrows and lines pointing to his vital organs. It reminded me of a map, except instead of cities it showed what kept the frog ticking—heart, liver, kidney, and a long tube that looked like spaghetti but wasn’t.

On the diagram it looked fine. But I’m sure I wasn’t the only one wondering how it was going to look in person, because this was frog-dissection day.

“For those who don’t have slips,” Mr. Landrum continued, “please proceed to room 12E where you will be shown a computer simulation that, I’m afraid, is like watching a video of someone skydiving rather than skydiving yourself. For the rest of us, the adventure will begin in just a few minutes.”

With that, he waved his hand as if to dismiss the handful of kids who stood and walked out. I was shocked to see Robbie, Ben, and Joe among them. If there were three guys who’d want nothing more than to cut something open and look inside, I’d thought it would be them.

Robbie glanced back as he walked out, and looked right at me. “Later, losers,” he said. Ben and Joe giggled in the hall.

Dustin, closest to me alphabetically and thus my lab partner, leaned over. “What’s up with Robbie skipping out?” he whispered. “I heard that last year, he took the frog apart in about three minutes and started flicking guts at people.”

“Oh, right, that’s the LaVomit story, right?” I whispered back. “LaVomit” was LaDonna Currie, an eighth grader who almost no one called LaDonna.

“She was in this class last year, and I guess Robbie hit her with a string of intestines,” Dustin said. “It landed right below her nose, and I guess she thought it was snot or something, so she sniffed in. Hard.”

“Geez, no wonder she spewed.”

“It’s been said that there are still chunks in this room that haven’t been found. And if you stand real still, you can smell them.”

I laughed out loud.

“Jed, something funny?” Mr. Landrum said. “Share it with the class, please; I’m sure we could all use a little levity now to brighten our day.”

“No, sorry, Mr. Landrum.” My mind was now locked on the rest of the LaVomit story, how her brother, a junior, waited for Robbie after school about a week later. One punch in the stomach, and things were pretty much even. Though it had just served to make Robbie even meaner.

“Since you have some dead time”—soft laughter all around—“I’m sorry, I mean downtime,” Mr. Landrum picked up without missing a beat, “please retrieve the four racks from the refrigerator.”

I made my way to the large white box in the corner under the American flag and pulled on the door to reveal racks, each containing a single layer of metal trays. One by one, I placed the racks on the desk in front of the room, seeing that every tray contained a fat green frog, each with all four legs pinned to the corners. But something wasn’t right. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Once finished, I returned to my seat.

“Thank you, Jed,” Mr. Landrum said. “Now, will one lab partner for each station come up and take a tray.”