Cornered

by Rhoda Belleza

  “I mean, it’s cool, I guess. I know everybody.”

  She smiles at me. “Having some difficulty this year, though? A little tougher than eighth grade?”

  I know what she means, but I’m not going to talk about it with her. “Math, definitely. Algebra two is a big step up. I mean, it goes a lot faster. But otherwise—”

  “Well, I’ll tell you something. This is a rigorous school.” I do not roll my eyes. They talk about the rigor here all the freaking time. The next thing that comes will be the tradition. “Boston Classical has a long tradition”—ding!—“of excellence, and, as you’ve discovered, this is not a place where anything less than excellence will be accepted.”

  So far this is the same, canned speech that we get the first day of school and at parents’ night and at the open house in the spring when the new students come in to see the school. Am I really missing study for this? I’ve got serious homework to do.

  “And in this pursuit of excellence, it’s true that not every teacher is going to necessarily be as kind and gentle and nurturing as you might be used to. Our staff is a demanding bunch; they expect the best and they don’t suffer fools gladly.”

  This pisses me off. “So I’m a fool?”

  Ms. Williams smiles at me, but it’s a creepy smile with no humor behind it. “Well, none of us act as wise as we should at times, now do we? But here is my point. You are, what, fifteen now?”

  “Fourteen.” My birthday is in the file sitting right in front of you. Why are you asking me questions you know the answer to?

  “Okay. So as we grow, we’re expected to mature. This means we avoid juvenile behavior like removing our shoes in class; but more importantly it means we start to show more accountability for our actions. And it means that when we encounter difficulties, we face them head-on.” It means it means it means.

  “Um. Okay.”

  “Do you get what I’m saying here, Kevin?”

  “Not really.”

  ”I mean that as we grow older, we can no longer rely on our parents to solve our problems. If I have a bad day at work, I can’t expect my parents to handle it for me. And it’s time for you to start showing some of that maturity.”

  And she goes on and on, but it basically comes down to this: Don’t tell your mom what goes on here. Are you a man or a snot-nosed little boy? Not that she actually says any of this, but it’s pretty clear to me what she means.

  The bell rings, and I’ve lost my entire study listening to this crap.

  After dinner, I’m sitting at the kitchen table doing my homework like I always do, and Mom wants to know why it’s taking me so long to finish tonight. “I missed my study,” I say.

  She looks up from the laptop. “Why’s that?”

  “Ms. Williams wanted to talk to me.” I’m hoping I can just get out of the conversation and back to the math.

  And now the laptop gets closed. I am seriously never going to get my math done. “What did she have to say?”

  “Uh, just that, you know, I’m a big boy now and I can’t be running to Mommy with my problems all the time.”

  “She said what?”

  “I mean. She didn’t really say that. But that was the general idea.”

  “Tell me exactly what she said.” And we’re off. I spend another twenty minutes telling Mom about my forty-minute conversation with Ms. Williams, and then she’s clacking away at her keyboard again and calling Mrs. DiNuzzio.

  By the next day, Mom and Mrs. DiNuzzio have booked a meeting with the superintendent of schools. It’s scheduled for a week from now. The week goes pretty quietly, which is to say Kruzeman taunts me at the beginning of class every day but otherwise doesn’t pick on me. When Friday afternoon comes, I’m so relieved I feel like I could float out of school.

  So far so good, until the day before the meeting. It happens to be the same day Jimmy Flanigan comes up to me outside of Kruzeman’s class and announces he’s gotten Unearth tickets for an all-ages show at the House of Blues. He asks if I want to go, and I’m stoked beyond belief, so I go up for the high five. Unfortunately Jimmy turns his head at that moment to watch Suzy Simpson walk down the hall (and, I mean, who can blame him), so we miss our high five and I end up smacking Jimmy in the face. It’s pretty funny, and Jimmy and I are both cracking up until Kruzeman suddenly appears. “Mr. Michaels. I’m not sure why you find assaulting a fellow student so amusing, but that is behavior that cannot be tolerated at Boston Classical. To the dean’s office, sir.”

  I look at him for a minute waiting for him to crack a smile. I mean, I know the guy doesn’t really have a sense of humor, but I figure he’s just messing with me. “Mr. Michaels. I said go to the dean’s office.”

  And this is how I wind up getting suspended for assaulting a fellow student. Jim comes to tell them the whole thing was just a joke, but no dice. “Bullying is a serious matter,” they tell him. “We know victims are often too intimidated to speak up and may even cover up for their bullies for fear of reprisals.”

  I am five feet four inches tall and weigh a hundred and twenty pounds. There is not a single person in this school who is intimidated by me. Seriously. The seventh graders aren’t even intimidated by me.

  When Mom gets home, the first thing she says is, “We have to do a quick cleanup, kiddo. Mrs. DiNuzzio is coming over so we can strategize. I think she’s bringing Toni, too.”

  “Wait. Toni DiNuzzio is coming here?” I may have a girl in my bedroom. This fills me with panic and arousal, and I head to my room and go into a frenzy of cleaning. By which I mean shoving stuff under my bed and into my closet. Metal posters, guitar, amp—cool. Incredible Hulk poster—probably not that cool. Down it comes.

  Finally I remember that I got suspended today and I should probably tell Mom. So I do. It all pours out in one jumble because maybe if I say it fast it’ll sound less ridiculous. “Oh, yeah, by the way, Mom, I got suspended again today for missing when I gave Jimmy Flanigan a high five and I accidentally hit him in the face.”

  Mom looks at me, annoyed. “Kevin. Be serious. Nobody gets suspended for a high five. That didn’t happen. You’re just messing with me, right?”

  “Mom, I swear to God. Jimmy even told them it was just a mistake, but they told him I was a bully and that he shouldn’t be intimidated by me. . . .”

  “Well, not much danger of that.” Mom actually snorts.

  “Mom!”

  “Well, I mean, look . . . I love you and you are an awesome, wonderful kid. You even look like kind of a badass when you play your guitar, but nobody’s ever going to accuse you of being intimidating.”

  “Somebody already did. Mom, do they know you’re meeting with the superintendent?”

  “Well, Dr. Jackson said she would be doing some investigating, and—”

  “Agh, Mom. That’s why! They’re punishing me for this!”

  If you’ve ever seen one of those survival shows, they tell you not to get between a mama bear and her cub, because she’ll maul you without even thinking to protect her offspring. Well, Mom sets her jaw and gets this steely look in her eyes, and I realize maybe this isn’t just true for bears.

  “We will appeal this,” Mom says. “And they will be held accountable. I promise you. They’re not going to win.”

  I’m not going to argue with Mama Bear, but I don’t really believe her. She doesn’t have to go in there every day. And no matter what they tell her, when they’ve got me alone, they’re gonna make me pay.

  Well I might as well enjoy the fact that Toni DiNuzzio’s coming over. When they arrive, our moms take over the kitchen table with a bottle of wine and leave us sitting in the living room. I don’t really know what to say, and I wonder if I should start a conversation or turn on the TV. It’s kind of awkward. No, actually painfully awkward.

  “So. Sorry you got suspended,” she finally says.

  “Thanks. I guess it’ll give me time to learn a couple of new songs on the guitar.”

  “Cool! You play guitar?” This bi
g smile breaks out on her face and she raises her left eyebrow. I’ve rarely seen her like this at school, but then again, I’m not exactly at my happiest there either. “Can I see?”

  Now, every kid with a guitar sells his parents on the idea somehow. I love music, it’ll keep me out of trouble, I need a hobby . . . or whatever. But this is why a boy really wants a guitar. So when he tells a girl he plays, she’ll smile and say, “Cool!”

  We head into my room, and she takes it all in. I am SO glad I took that Hulk poster down. “Whoa. That thing is badass!” she exclaims when I pick up the guitar. I flip the amp on, turn up the distortion to a level I hope will be loud enough to drown out my inevitable mistakes, and crunch out a few chords.

  “I—I mostly do metal stuff. I make, like, backing tracks on Garage Band and stuff. And then I play along. Or try to. But, you know, it always sounds better in my mind than it does in real life.” Why am I telling her this? It sounds pathetic.

  “Nice,” she says. I examine her face for traces of sarcasm. I don’t find any. “Do you ever put anything up on YouTube or anything?”

  “Oh God no. It sucks way too bad for that.”

  “I bet it doesn’t. But most stuff on YouTube is horrible. I mean if I can get twelve hundred hits—”

  “On what?”

  “It’s dumb. I just mixed some horror movie footage together and put a Disney Channel song under it. Disney filed a copyright violation complaint after half a day and they took it down, but I got twelve hundred hits before that. And I . . . I have a vlog.”

  “What is it? I mean, what do you—”

  “Just look me up. But like, not while I’m here. It’s way too embarrassing. ToniDBoston.”

  There’s a weird moment when we just kind of look at each other. Making your own terrible metal tracks and doing horror movie video mashups are not cool things to do at our school. Probably at any school. We’ve just exchanged information that could ruin us both. It’s weirdly intimate. Which I guess makes it weirdly hot. Which I guess is what makes it awkward again.

  “Anybody want ice cream?” My mom calls out, all extra loud. This kills the moment, which is kind of a relief in that it stops me from accidentally ruining it.

  • • •

  We can’t appeal the suspension until a hearing officer from the central office is available, which means I have to serve out my suspension and then they’ll have the hearing. From what my mom says it’ll probably be overturned, and then officially, my three-day suspension will never have happened. Except I’ll still be missing three days of notes—and I’ll have a test and three quizzes to make up on my own time—which means less time in studies for at least a few days after I get back. Unlike last time, Mom concurs I did absolutely nothing wrong, so at least she doesn’t punish me by taking anything away.

  Not that it would matter, since I have so much homework to do. It’s not like I can just kick back and watch movies or something. I spend all morning on the first day trying to stay caught up in Kruzeman’s class. Actually, that’s not true, because I also watch Toni’s vlogs. She’s really funny and caustic. Just the way I like ’em. So that’s cool, but I can’t forget that I eventually have to go back to school. I’m all alone in the house, and when I start thinking about returning, I start to despair. Kruzeman can’t be beaten; Boston Classical can’t be beaten. Mom tried to go to our city councilor about the whole thing, but he never returned her phone calls because of course, he’s a Boston Classical alum.

  And then the day turns around when my phone buzzes during what would be first lunch period. It’s a text from Toni. K man was priceless today. Made J Chen cry again.

  Wish you could video it. It’s entertaining when you don’t have to be there, I send back.

  Excellent idea! I’m totes doing it tomorrow. Stay tuned!

  This is how it starts. While I’m suspended, Toni starts her video project. She cuts a little hole in her bag and records him the whole time she’s in class.

  When I make my big return from my bullshit suspension, I take a deep breath and count to ten before walking into Kruzeman’s room. As I expected, he lays into me pretty good:

  “Mister Michaels! I hope you’ve learned a little lesson. But I’m sure you haven’t. People like you never do.”

  I look at Toni’s bag and see the light glint off the camera lens and smile.

  “Do you think it’s funny, Mr. Michaels? That you’ll never amount to anything?”

  “I do not,” I say.

  “Good. Sit down,” he barks.

  It’s not funny yet, I think to myself, but it’s going to be.

  Toni comes over on Saturday with her camera and two SD cards full of Kruzeman video. “So I had an idea,” she says. “Do you think we could make this into a song? Can we Auto-Tune him like they do with those news videos and stuff?”

  The thought of making an Auto-Tuned song kind of makes me cringe. I’d much rather make a metal song. But Toni’s the one with all the footage and if we do her project, I’ll get to sit next to her at the computer for probably hours at a time. And she still smells good.

  The first thing we do is watch hours of video and pick out Kruzeman’s greatest hits. “Let me take this audio track and see what I can do,” I say.

  It’s against all my musical instincts, but I take the audio from Kruzeman’s greatest hits video and take most of Sunday assembling an Auto-Tuned dance pop song with Kruzeman on vocals. “You’re a disgrace,” he warbles on the chorus. I e-mail the file to Toni and don’t think much about it until she comes up to me at lunch, smartphone in hand, and says, “Look at this!”

  On the screen is a YouTube video entitled “Bringin’ Crazy Back.” And it has ten thousand hits. “It’s only been uploaded since last night! We’ve got ten thousand views already!”

  I like how she said “we.”

  The next day, I turn on the radio while I’m eating breakfast and the Morning Zoo guys are playing our song.

  “Can you imagine if that guy was your teacher?” one says.

  “I think I would have been expelled,” the other guy responds.

  The following day, Mom gets an e-mail from the Massachusetts Anti-Bullying task force. They want to talk to all the parents whose kids are in Kruzeman’s classes as they investigate allegations of educational bullying.

  Three days and one point two million views later, the news trucks show up at Boston Classical High School. Bridget Tran y Garcia from Fox 36 stops me on my way in to school. I panic for a minute. Toni told me how she created a new e-mail and a different YouTube account through anonomizing proxy servers, like I have any idea what that means, but I’m still afraid they’ve nailed me as a co-creator. “Excuse me, young man. We’re here to get student reactions to the ‘Bringin’ Crazy Back’ video. Have you seen it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And how do you think it reflects on Boston Classical High School that one of your teachers is the laughingstock of the nation?” Oh man, I am totally recording this. That phrase is just music to my ears.

  “I guess it doesn’t make Boston Classical High School look very good.”

  “How do you like the video?”

  I can’t help smiling. “I freaking love it,” I say.

  • • •

  I wish I could say that Kruzeman resigns in disgrace, but no.

  Here’s what happens instead: an assembly for ninth grade students in which Mr. Kelly reads to us some Massachusetts law statute or whatever about how videotaping someone without their knowledge or consent is forbidden. Oh yeah, and then there’s the fact that they’ve figured out that the footage came from our class. So every member of our class gets called in one by one.

  I look at Toni when they start calling people out of our class, and she smiles at me. It’s nice to know my co-conspirator won’t give me up.

  When it’s my turn to get to Mr. Kelly’s office, I sit down and he says to me, “We know it was you, Kevin.”

  “Funny,” I say. “But apparently you’v
e said that to everybody you’ve had in here today.” He really doesn’t think students talk to each other?

  This actually seems to catch him off-guard for a second, but he quickly gets his mojo back. “This is a serious matter. Tell me everything you know about this video.”

  “I know it’s kind of a dance-pop number. Not my favorite kind of music, but that ‘you’re a disgrace’ hook is really catchy, I’m not gonna lie. Is it based on, like a Justin Timberlake song? Lady Gaga, maybe?”

  Mr. Kelly takes a deep breath, and when he speaks again, he’s very quiet. “When we find out who’s responsible for this, there will be serious consequences.”

  “Well,” I say. “Good luck with that. I don’t know a thing about it.”

  “That’s not what Julie Chen told us,” he says. I look at him. It’s a good try, but he just picked the wrong girl.

  I reach into my backpack and pull out my agenda book, which contains the Boston Classical code of conduct.

  “Honor is crucial to academic excellence,” I read. “Cheating, plagiarism, and other forms of dishonesty undermine the Boston Classical learning environment and will be dealt with within the code of discipline.”

  I look up at Mr. Kelly and smile.

  “Are you accusing me of lying?” he says.

  “No, sir. I just like to recite the code of conduct. I find it comforting.”

  “Get out of my office,” he says.

  • • •

  When she gets home from work that day, Mom asks how school was.

  “Oh, you know, the usual. Mr. Kelly called me in to the office and asked if I made the ‘Bringin’ Crazy Back’ video.”

  Mom looks at me. A hint of a smile creeps to her lips. “And what did you tell him?”

  “I told him I had no idea who made the video.”

  “And is that true?”

  I’m not sure exactly how to play this. I don’t think she’d be mad, but I really don’t want to risk a lecture about how you have to follow the rules and not take stupid chances, or whatever kind of thing she might say.