Part 12 (1/2)
It was raining harder than ever when they went to lunch. Looking out the cla.s.sroom windows, Baartock couldn't see the trees or the houses across the wide gra.s.s strip next to the school. He couldn't see the street. He could just barely see the gra.s.s outside the window. It was a blowing, dark gray rainstorm. At times, the wind would blow the raindrops right at the windows. Just a little while later, the rain was pouring straight down. Everybody seemed to be thinking of other things. Even Mrs. s...o...b..chner kept losing her place in the story she was reading, whenever the rain would come cras.h.i.+ng against the windows.
Finally it was lunchtime.
Baartock bought milk in the lunch line, but the fruit they had were some long yellow things that he hadn't seen before, so he didn't get any. When he sat at the table across from Jason, the red-haired boy asked, ”Why do you call that a fire drill?”
”Drill. Make holes same way,” Baartock answered, and made a back and forth motion with his hand.
”I guess you could get through wood. But it must take a long time.”
”Wood. Stone too,” replied Baartock.
”You can drill through stone like that?”
”Use many shafts,” said Baartock, making an up and down motion, meaning the straight stick he had used. ”Make hole.”
Jason was about to say something when there was a sudden flash of light and a tremendous thunderblast right outside the cafeteria. The people sitting by the windows jumped up, and someone knocked a lunch tray onto the floor. One of the women who worked in the cafeteria brought over a mop to clean up the spilled food, and everybody who had been sitting next to the windows moved to different seats. The rain was now squirting against the windows, and some water was coming in under the door to the playground. The woman with the mop went over to clean that up too.
Everybody ate very quietly, as if they were waiting for the next thunderbolt to strike. While they were eating a man came in with a mop and a bucket and some tools to try to stop the leak around the door.
Baartock was watching the man working, when Jason said, ”Let's go back to the cla.s.sroom.”
”Not go outside?” asked Baartock.
”They wouldn't let us. Not in this much rain. Who'd want to go out in this anyway?”
Baartock had been thinking about going out. It was only rain.
Instead, when he finished his lunch, he went with Jason back to the cla.s.sroom.
Some others were already back in the cla.s.sroom, in groups talking, or just staring out the windows at the rain. Mrs. s...o...b..chner was sitting at her desk, with a lunch tray from the cafeteria, eating, when they got there.
”Mrs. s...o...b..chner, can we get out the games?” asked Jason.
”All right. But you'll have to put them away when lunch time is over.”
”All right!” Jason whooped. ”Come on, Baartock.”
”And please be quiet,” she said, as she went back to her lunch.
”Yes, Mrs. s...o...b..chner,” Jason said.
They went into the back of the cla.s.sroom, and near the cubbies was a shelf with some large flat boxes and some smaller ones.
”You want to play checkers?” asked Jason.
”Don't know checkers. Show me,” said Baartock.
They sat in the back of the cla.s.sroom, and Jason taught him how to play checkers. When some other children saw them playing, they got out other games, and soon there were lots of people playing all kinds of games.
It kept on raining very hard, and there were occasional lightning flashes and crashes of thunder.
Lunch time seemed to be going on longer than usual. Baartock had just lost another game of checkers, and he let Jerry play. He didn't like checkers very much. None of the other games seemed too interesting either, so he walked over and looked out the window at the rain. He saw Ms. Laurence hurry in and go over to talk to Mrs. s...o...b..chner.