Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance Read online

  12

  MRS. MEG LOWRY

  It was the first day of class and I was already exhausted. I had spent the last month shoveling facts into my brain like it was a landfill for useless knowledge. I would never tell my students that most of what I taught them had no practical application—they would find that out once they entered the workforce—but I was a firm believer in knowledge for knowledge’s sake, even if it was the gestation period of a sloth.

  Students began to filter in, looking bored already and I hadn’t even said anything. A girl wearing a yellow halter top looked at my map of the United States on the wall and actually rolled her eyes. I’d call on her first.

  Five minutes before the bell, Mr. Rash, the school counselor, poked his head through the doorway. “Mrs. Lowry? Can I speak with you a moment?”

  “Sure.” I joined him in the hallway. George Rash was a nervous little man who wore sweaters every day, regardless of the season, and always carried a number-two pencil. “What is it, George?”

  “I just wanted to give you a heads-up about one of your students.”

  “Which student?”

  “Weylyn Grey. Parents died years ago. Moved in this summer with his foster parents. Mrs. Kramer, his foster mom, said he can be … peculiar.”

  “Peculiar how?”

  George hesitated. “He was raised by wolves.”

  “He was what?”

  “I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true. He was caught trying to steal cattle. The wolf that was with him nearly took the rancher’s head off.”

  “Well, that’s a first.”

  “I just thought you should know.”

  “Yeah, sure. Thanks, George.” Maybe he was just yanking my chain, although George wasn’t really the type. His idea of a joke was writing weird things in Sharpie on his brown-bagged lunches like “Killer tomatoes. Do not touch!” or “Human tongue. Don’t ask.” He brought beans once and wrote, “Air quality alert 12:00 P.M. Enter lounge at your own risk.” When George took his lunch break, he found an empty bag with a note written in grape-scented marker that read, “I found this at 11:55. Not sufficient enough warning. You’ll find it on the front lawn.” George found his beans and ate them on the lawn, but the aftershocks were felt for hours.

  The bell rang, and I returned to my classroom. “Good morning!” I was greeted with twenty blank stares, two groans, and one middle finger disguised as a nose scratch. “I’m Mrs. Lowry, and I will be your teacher for this semester’s general education class.” I scribbled my name on the board in chalk.

  “Now you know my name, I’d like to know yours.” I took out my attendance sheet and was about to start reading names when I heard a voice, “My name is Weylyn Grey!”

  I turned and saw the boy sitting, not in his chair but cross-legged on top of his desk in the front row by the window. He wasn’t what I had expected—feral, long-haired, snarling through rotten teeth—but rather the exact opposite: mint condition, white tablecloth, dry-clean-only down to his pleated khakis and perfectly parted hair, the kind of kid that should be on a yacht somewhere eating crudités and driving golf balls off the deck.

  Weylyn pulled a small white card out of his shirt pocket and held it out to me. I walked over to him and took the card. It was plain aside from the name Weylyn Grey printed in black text.

  “I left the bottom blank so I can fill it in when I get a job,” he said. The class snickered.

  “First you have to go to school before you can get a job, and while we’re on the subject, will you sit in your seat, please? This isn’t a drum circle.”

  “Beg your pardon, ma’am, but I haven’t sat in a chair since I was six, so I’m pretty sure I’d stink at it.”

  The other students got a kick out of that one. I could feel my control over them slipping away. “Don’t worry,” I said through gritted teeth. “It’s just like riding a bike. Once you learn, you never forget how.”

  “A bike is just a chair with wheels. Would you like to use a different metaphor?” he said so politely I could have punched him in the mouth.

  “I’m sorry, but if you don’t sit, you can’t be part of this class. I suggest you go to the principal’s office.”

  “Wonderful! I haven’t had a chance to introduce myself to him yet,” Weylyn chirped as he slid off his desk.

  I ignored that last remark and handed him a yellow slip. “Give this to the secretary when you get there.”

  Weylyn headed toward the door, and I continued with the attendance. “Mara Andrews?”

  “Here,” the girl in the yellow halter mumbled.

  “Dylan Atkins?”

  Before Dylan could answer, Weylyn chimed in, “Excuse me, Mrs. Lowry?” He had his hand on the doorknob, grinning back at me like the Cheshire Cat.

  I sighed. “Yes, Weylyn?”

  “I’m not very good with doors, either. I never know when to push or pull. Which kind is this one?”

  The class roared with laughter.

  That was it. “All right, smart guy. That’s detention, too!”

  Weylyn beamed. “Is that where all the smart kids go?”

  “No. It’s where the kids who talk back to their teachers go.”

  The boy looked confused, then tried pushing open the door, but it didn’t budge.

  “Pull! It’s a pull,” I snapped. Weylyn pulled the door open, thanked me, and left the classroom.

  * * *

  I had just sat down to lunch when I was called into Evans’s office myself. “How’s the first day of class going?” he said while gobbling a cherry danish.

  I fantasized about the microwavable brownie in my lunch box that I would probably have to wait until tonight to eat. “Good,” I said unconvincingly.

  “Yes, it must be relaxing seeing as half your class has ended up in my office.”

  I looked into the hall where almost a dozen of my students were seated. Weylyn was sitting cross-legged on the floor. “Is there a problem?” I said.

  He pulled out a yellow slip with my handwriting on it and read, “Ms. Garber was chewing her gum in an exaggerated way.”

  “I could see the whole wad every time she opened her mouth,” I said meekly.

  He sighed. “Mrs. Lowry, I picked you for this class because I thought you could handle it. Now, if I’m going to have to do all your disciplining for you, maybe I need to find someone else.”

  “No! I can handle it.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Positive.”

  “Just don’t let it happen again.”

  I stood up to leave when he stopped me. “Oh, one more thing. Weylyn Grey—”

  “Yeah, um … he was sitting on top of his desk. I asked him to sit down—”

  “If he wants to sit on top of his desk, let him.”

  “What? Why?”

  “He’s living with the Kramers.”

  I shrugged.

  “Reverend Thomas Kramer. St. Agnes.”

  “Oh. Sure.” I had seen his name on a pamphlet. I found it tucked in my screen door inviting me to a bake sale with a cutesy name like The Batter, the Bun, and the Holy Toast. I remember wondering if they were actually selling toast.

  “The Kramers are pillars of this community and personal friends of mine, so we’re going to do whatever we can to make Weylyn feel comfortable.” Evans was always sucking up to folks with bigger houses than his so they would invite him to their parties. He would roll up in his leased BMW and the same tux he got married in and spend the next four hours telling made-up stories starring people he had never met. No one knew where he lived, but Mr. Hagerty—geometry—postulated that it probably had wheels.

  “Sure. If that’s what you want.”

  “Good. Now, could you send Weylyn in? I might have to do some damage control.”

  Damage control? I had asked him to sit in a desk, not pushed him down a flight of stairs.

  When I left the room, Weylyn looked up at me with that silly grin of his.

  “Weylyn. Principal Evans w
ould like to see you in his office.” I noticed his shoes were gone. “What happened to your shoes?”

  He shrugged. “I dunno.”

  As I walked away, I could hear Weylyn pulling the door when he should have been pushing.

  * * *

  “Maybe you should give him a break. The kid’s obviously been through a lot,” Nate said as he filled up the watering can in the kitchen sink.

  “I know. But I also can’t let the behavior of one kid allow the entire class to descend into anarchy. I’m gonna have a hard enough time getting these kids to understand photosynthesis as it is with this thing as an example,” I said, poking at the yellowing ficus that I was supposed to be using in a class demonstration the next day. With all the papers I’d been grading over the past week, I had neglected to water it and was honestly considering spray-painting the leaves green.

  “I’m just saying. Sometimes you can be a little … severe.”

  “Severe?” I tightened my grip around one of the plant’s stems, bending it in half. “Shit … I guess you’re not totally wrong.”

  Nate handed me the filled watering can. “Maybe you should talk to him. One-on-one. Find out what’s really going on before you rush to judgment.”

  Nate was a grief counselor at the local hospital. He could take Greek-tragedy kind of pain and use it as fuel for extraordinary displays of love. Everyone he counseled had different beliefs, and he adapted to their needs. For those who believed in God, death was only the end of the first act of their story; for those who didn’t, it was up to their loved ones to write the epilogue.

  When we first started dating, I asked him which one he believed. He said he didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to spend the precious moments he did have agonizing over which was which. I was guilty of agonizing now and then, of letting my uncertainty sabotage my chances at happiness. I mourned for things that hadn’t happened, things that never would. So much of life is marked by birthdays, graduations, weddings, births. I’d had my fair share of birthdays, graduated twice, and married a man I loved. Without children to experience those same things, time seemed to stand still. The selfish years of my teens and twenties were long gone, and now, it didn’t seem like enough to just take care of myself.

  Nate cared for other people all day. Maybe taking care of a kid on top of all that was just too much for him to handle.

  “I’ll talk to Weylyn tomorrow,” I said, fruitlessly pouring water over the sad, neglected houseplant. Nate was right (as usual). The boy had been through a lot. Despite losing his parents, he managed to survive in the wilderness and not get eaten by wolves. It was admirable, really. I just had to be patient—something I admittedly wasn’t very good at—and help Weylyn navigate what was probably a strange and scary new world.

  * * *

  “And what gives plants their”—I tentatively pointed at the mostly yellow plant sitting on my desk—“green color?”

  “Chlorophyll!” Weylyn shouted with more enthusiasm than I was prepared for. He still sat cross-legged on top of his desk, a quirk I was willing to let slide for today.

  “Yes. Thank you, Weylyn.” He had done the reading and was actively participating. I scanned the other students who were either asleep or in the middle of doodling. I suddenly felt ashamed of my behavior the day before. He was a good kid—eccentric, but good.

  The end-of-the-day bell rang, startling the napping teens in the back. As the students filed out of the classroom, Weylyn lingered by my desk, bending over to inspect the sickly ficus.

  “Good job today, Weylyn,” I said as I packed up my things.

  He beamed. “Thank you, Mrs. Lowry.”

  “Do you mind if we talk for a minute?”

  “Sure.”

  “So. This is your first time in a school?”

  “I went to kindergarten for a few weeks, but all we did was glue macaroni to stuff.”

  “Well, I have to say you’re a very fast learner. Where did you learn to read?”

  “My parents taught me a little. And my friend Mary. She’s really smart. She gave me a book.”

  “What book?”

  “To Kill a Mockingbird.”

  “That’s one of my favorites. How do you like it?”

  “I like it very much,” he said excitedly. “At first, I thought it was about birds—you know, ’cause of the title—but I didn’t care that it wasn’t really about birds because it was a good story. I’d like to read some books about real birds, though. Or wolves. I like wolves, too.”

  “Have you heard of Julie of the Wolves?”

  “No. Is it a book?”

  I nodded. “Tell you what. Tomorrow, I’ll let you borrow my copy if you sit in a chair like the rest of the students.” I instantly cringed at my own words. Bribing a student? With books? Clearly, I was still in need of some sensitivity training.

  Weylyn frowned. “Mr. Kramer got me a library card. They let me read on the lawn.”

  “Oh. That’s nice of them.” This conversation wasn’t exactly going the way I’d planned. I tried to think of something Nate would say in my situation. “Look … I know starting a new school can be hard, so if you ever find yourself worried about something, I hope you know you can talk to me.”

  Weylyn shouldered his bag, lumpy with book corners, and smiled. “Thanks, Mrs. Lowry. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “See you tomorrow, Weylyn,” I said as he headed toward the door. I stuffed a stack of essays on the fall of the Roman Empire in my satchel, then turned to grab the potted ficus.

  I froze. The plant I had effectively left for dead minutes earlier was now a vibrant green with full, hardy leaves, just like the day I bought it. I prodded a leaf to make sure I wasn’t imagining things, and sure enough, it bounced back like a healthy leaf should.

  I jumped out of my chair and ran to the door just in time to see Weylyn’s overstuffed backpack disappearing around the corner at the end of the hallway.

  13

  LYDIA KRAMER

  “Do you think you have to be seventeen to read Seventeen?” My best friend, June, had stolen one of the magazines from Caroline’s room and was now flipping through it at the kitchen table, unimpressed.

  “No, but you apparently have to be in the seventeenth percentile in intelligence.” I didn’t read those kinds of magazines, mainly because I didn’t need one more person telling me I was too fat.

  “Did you know that a sense of humor is ‘in’ this season?” June continued.

  “What?”

  “It says, ‘A sense of humor is making a comeback this season with sexy lady comedians making the A-List. Try out some of your favorite jokes on your friends or sign up for an improv troupe. Or take your crush to an open mic night and impress him with your best Nixon impersonation.’”

  “A Nixon impression? That’s the funniest thing they could think of?”

  “Apparently,” June said flatly. She had been my best friend since the seventh grade when we were picked last and second-to-last, respectively, in kickball. June had twenty pounds on me, and even though I had thirty pounds on my heaviest sister, she still called me skinny. She was of Polynesian descent with skin the color of rawhide, and had a tiny heart tattoo by her left eye that her crow’s-feet would later crinkle like crêpe paper.

  She was apathetic about almost everything, including herself. The only thing I ever saw her get excited about was when a tornado swept through our school with us inside. Everyone else took shelter, but June stood at the window, cheering as the tornado tore out the stadium goalpost. Eventually, I managed to drag her into the hallway, where the rest of the students quivered with books over their heads. As they cowered, June eagerly watched the ceiling and listened to the building groan as the twister tried to pry it off its foundation.

  “So, does that mean taking yourself too seriously is out? If so, your sisters should read this.” June tossed the magazine at me, nearly landing it in my bowl of Lucky Charms.

  “I’d kill to see Caroline attempt improv as her ‘t
alent’ in her next pageant.” I then did my most nasal, breathiest impression of Caroline to date. “Soooo, what’s the deal with lighting in department store dressing rooms? Are they trying to get us to buy the clothes or donate them to charity for ugly people to wear? Am I right or am I right?”

  The kitchen door swung open, and in walked Caroline on a pair of strappy wedges that had steeper inclines than most ski slopes. She wobbled over to the fridge without so much as a hello, pulled out a jar of peanut butter, and started eating it with a spoon.

  June watched her. “One hundred.”

  “What?” Caroline snapped, then ate another spoonful.

  “Two hundred.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing.” June went back to her magazine. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Caroline scoop herself another helping. “Three hundred.”

  Caroline slammed down the jar. “Okay. What are you doing? Lydia! What is she doing?”

  I shrugged.

  “I’m counting,” June said.

  “Great. You can count. Now shut up!”

  “I’m counting the number of calories you’re eating.”

  “Calories?”

  “It’s the stuff in food that makes you fat. At least that’s what Seventeen says.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “No, I’m not. See?” June turned the magazine so Caroline could see it. Sure enough, on the page was a picture of a peanut butter jar with a big 100 stamped next to it in bold type. “Every spoonful of peanut butter is one hundred calories. You just ate three hundred calories in less than thirty seconds!”

  Caroline, horrified, dropped her spoon and stormed away, leaving the peanut butter open on the kitchen counter.

  “You’re mean.” I laughed.

  The door opened again, but this time it was Weylyn carrying the world’s heaviest backpack. “Hey, Weylyn. How was school today?” I asked.

  “Good!” he said and dropped his bag like a ton of bricks. “I learned what makes plants green. Chlorophyll!”

  “Cool,” I said, feigning interest. “Make any friends yet?”

  “Mrs. Lowry.”

  “Your teacher?”

  He nodded.

  “Teachers aren’t your friends,” June corrected. “Most of them are aliens in disguise.”