Part 3 (1/2)

Margo ran behind Stacey. ”Save me from her,” she pleaded in an urgent whisper. ”She hasn't stopped since last Thursday when Claudia was here. She really thinks she's a teacher.” Mrs. Pike entered the room and sized up the situation. ”Margo, you don't have to play school with Vanessa if you don't want to,” she said as she took her jacket from the front hall.

”She makes me, Mom,” Margo replied. ”She follows me all over the house until I agree to be her student.” ”Vanessa,” Mrs. Pike called into the living room.

Vanessa looked at her mother and then turned back to Nicky and Claire, who were sitting on the couch like obedient students. ”Excuse me, cla.s.s,” she said to them. ”I have to have a word with the princ.i.p.al. I'll return in a moment.” Vanessa joined her mother in the hall. ”Yes, Princ.i.p.al Pike?” ”Vanessa, I know this is a fun game,” Mrs. Pike said, ”but remember, it's only a game. And if Margo doesn't want to be your student, she doesn't have to be.” Vanessa studied Margo for a moment. ”All right,” she agreed.

”Good,” Mrs. Pike said. ”I'm going to be at the elementary school, watching Byron and Adam's soccer game, but I'll leave my cell phone on so you can reach me at the number posted on the fridge. Jordan is sleeping - just check up on him every now and then, and call me if there's a problem.” She pulled open the front door. Then she leaned in closer to Stacey and whispered, ” 'Bye, and good luck with the persistent teacher.” Stacey smiled at this description of Vanessa. ”Thanks. We'll be fine.” When her mother was gone, Vanessa took hold of Margo's wrist and pulled her toward the living room. ”But you said I didn't have to be a student!” Margo objected.

”You're not going to be,” Vanessa told her. ”I've made you an a.s.sistant teacher.” ”Oh.” Margo seemed warily interested in this. ”What does an a.s.sistant teacher do?” Vanessa took hold of Margo's shoulders and pressed her down onto the couch beside eight- year-old Nicky. ”An a.s.sistant teacher observes what a real teacher does so that someday she, or he, will be able to teach.” Jessi and Stacey stood by the stairs and exchanged skeptical glances. But Margo nodded and stayed seated. Vanessa squared her shoulders and cleared her throat. ”Now, cla.s.s,” she began in a voice filled with teacherly authority, ”today I will teach you about finding good subjects to write about.” ”I want to write a poem about soccer,” Nicky said.

Vanessa stopped to consider this, then shook her head. ”No.” ”Why not?” ”What rhymes with soccer?” Vanessa asked.

”Mock her,” Jessi volunteered from the bottom of the stairs. Then she ran upstairs to check on Jordan, who was fast asleep.

”When Mallory plays soccer, the kids all mock her,” Nicky suggested.

”They do not,” Claire disagreed, scowling at Nicky.

”She's not a very good player,” Margo said in the interest of accuracy.

”Yeah, but no one has ever mocked her,” Claire insisted.

Stacey recalled Mallory complaining about some boys in her cla.s.s who had given her a hard time about her athletic ability, or lack of it. She kept quiet, though. She didn't think bringing this up would serve any real purpose.

”All right,” Nicky said, giving in. ” 'I know a girl who plays soccer/When she does, the kids always mock her.' ” He turned to Claire. ”Okay?” ”That's better,” Claire agreed.

”But now what?” Vanessa asked. ”There's no place to go from there. Besides, soccer isn't a very poetic subject. It's not suitable for a poem.” ”Wait a minute,” Jessi spoke up as she returned to the kids on the couch. ”In school I learned that you can write a poem about anything you want.” Nicky stuck out his tongue at Vanessa.

Vanessa's hands flew to her hips. ”Who is the teacher around here?” she demanded. ”I'm teaching poetry my way.” She turned to Nicky with a stern expression. ”I saw that tongue, young man. You are on detention.” ”Oh, yeah? What are you going to do to me?” Vanessa strode up to him and s.n.a.t.c.hed an electronic game from his s.h.i.+rt pocket. ”I will keep this until your detention is over,” she informed him.

Nicky leaped up from the couch. ”Give me that!” He tried to grab it. Vanessa held it behind her back. Then she knelt and shot it across the floor, sending it spinning under the couch.

”Vanessa!” Nicky shouted indignantly. He dropped to his stomach and tried to fish it out. ”I can't reach it!” Vanessa grinned. ”You'll have to wait until one of the triplets comes home to help you move the couch.” She peered at Margo and Claire. ”See what happens when you act up in my cla.s.s?” ”But I'm a teacher,” Margo reminded her.

”A student teacher.” ”You said a.s.sistant teacher.” ”It's the same thing,” Vanessa replied. ”Now, if we might get back to cla.s.s, please.” ”I'm not playing,” Nicky announced.

”Nicky, I think you are playing,” Vanessa said confidently. ”Because if you aren't, I can report on a certain someone and his friends who stomped all over the bushes by the driveway the other day while trying to catch a ball. Right now, Mom and Dad think Pow did it.” (Pow is the Pikes' ba.s.set hound.) ”But I know what really happened.” ”It was an accident!” Nicky cried.

”You can discuss that with Mom and Dad. You know they told you to play ball in the backyard, not the front.” ”It's not nice to tattle,” Claire said. ”I won't play either if you tell on Nicky.” Vanessa's hand went to her forehead. ”I just thought of another poem. 'I know a girl named Claire, who hates to brush her hair/So, what she did, the brush she hid. But I could tell her mother where.' ” ”I didn't hide it,” Claire protested.

”I know. You threw it in the garbage, which is even worse.” Stacey stepped into the living room. ”Vanessa, you can't blackmail them into being your students. This was supposed to be fun.” ”No, it wasn't. It was to teach poetry. It's serious.” ”But I can't even write yet!” Claire cried.

Vanessa folded her arms and studied her students. ”You know, I've noticed that Margo and Nicky don't write very well either.” ”I write fine,” Margo said.

”Not really,” Vanessa disagreed. ”Your handwriting isn't the greatest.” She took some white paper from the coffee table and handed them each a sheet. ”Take out your pencils. We're going to go over basic letter formation. We will begin by making capital A's. I want twenty of them on your papers.” Claire was interested in this. ”I make very good A's,” she said.

”I'm not doing this anymore,” Margo shouted, slamming down her pencil.

”Fine,” Vanessa said. ”But Mom and Dad will be so disappointed in you when they hear how you were scolded today for blowing straw wrappers in the lunchroom.” ”I didn't start it,” Margo said sulkily. She went back to making A's.

”Should we stop this?” Jessi asked Stacey. ”It doesn't seem right. It's as if they're her prisoners.” Stacey sighed. ”But what if Vanessa really tells on them?” Stacey asked to see Vanessa alone in the kitchen. ”You wouldn't really tattle on them, would you?” she asked.

”Maybe I would, maybe I wouldn't.” ”You can't force them to play,” Stacey insisted.

”Oh, they really want to learn poetry,” Vanessa a.s.sured her. ”You just have to know how to control the cla.s.s if you're going to be a teacher.” ”Your teachers don't threaten to tell on you if you don't obey the rules. They don't blackmail you.” ”Of course they do. They say, I'll report you to the princ.i.p.al.' Or, 'Your parents will be getting a note about this.' It's exactly what they do. Where do you think I got the idea from?” Stacey was stunned. She didn't know how to argue with this.

”Excuse me, but I have to get back to cla.s.s,” Vanessa told her.

Jessi poked her head in the kitchen door.

”Did you get through to her?” she asked. Stacey shook her head. ”Not even a little.” Jessi looked out into the living room, where cla.s.s was continuing. ”What are we going to do?” ”I don't know, but we have to do something. Nicky, Margo, and Claire can't be held prisoners in The Vanessa School of Poetry forever.”

Chapter 10.

The TOT program was scheduled for a day on and then a day off. In other words, we taught only every other day. So on Tuesday, I was off.

I was surprised at how light and free I felt that morning as I opened my locker. I was a plain old student again and was glad not to have to think about Ms. Walden or Gary Retlin for a whole day.

Or so I thought.

Then I looked up from my books and saw Ms. Walden striding purposefully down the hall, her sights locked onto a definite target. Me.

”Thomas, I need to talk to you,” she said. ”When will you have a minute today?” ”Ummm ...” I was so startled that I couldn't even think. ”Before lunch?” I suggested.

”Fine,” she confirmed. ”See me in the phys. ed. office.” ”Is everything all right?” I asked anxiously.

”We need to talk about some things.” If I had to wait until lunch to find out what this was about, I'd lose my mind. I certainly wouldn't be able to pay attention in my cla.s.ses. ”Is it about yesterday?” I asked.

”We'll talk later,” Ms. Walden replied. ”Hurry, or you'll be late for homeroom.” As she walked away, I made a decision. I didn't like Ms. Walden. I didn't know if she was different from last year. Maybe I had been different, younger, and didn't mind her gruff bossiness then. Whatever. I absolutely did not like her this year.

I knew Mallory had gone through a phase when she despised her. Then, when she joined the archery club, which Ms. Walden ran, she didn't loathe her as much. That was because she enjoyed archery and did well at it.

But all along I'd told Mallory that Ms. Walden wasn't so bad. I'd been wrong. I owed Mallory an apology.

I wondered how Mal was doing today. At the BSC meeting yesterday she'd been quiet - too quiet. I'd asked her how her conference with Mrs. Simon had gone.

”Okay,” she'd replied. ”She suggested I forget about teaching a story poem and teach a poem I really love instead. I'll choose some- thing by Emily d.i.c.kinson. I'm not sure which one, though.” As you might imagine, all I thought about that morning was what my talk with Ms. Walden would be like. Was she angry that I'd lost control of the cla.s.s? Was she about to fire me?

How humiliating would that be?

Thrown out of the TOT program! I'd never live it down.

The BSC members would hear about it. Sure, they'd be nice. They were my friends, after all. But would they lose respect for me? Would they stop listening to the rules I made for the club? I imagined them showing up late, missing jobs, and not paying dues. The club would fall apart.

And what about Kristy's Krushers? Would the kids ever obey me again if they heard I was fired from TOT?

Calm down, Kristy, I told myself as I sat in math cla.s.s. That won't happen - none of it.