Ethan Marcus Stands Up

by Michele Weber Hurwitz

  To everyone who stands up for something they believe in. Keep it up.

  CHAPTER ONE

  What Went Down

  BRIAN

  The thing about this, and what I seriously don’t get here, is that it was Ethan.

  The guy’s been my best friend since kindergarten, when we both ran into the bathroom at Zoe Feld-Kramer’s birthday party at the Great Ape Pizza Company. We were terrified of the giant fake (but scarily real-looking) gorillas that “play” in a band on a stage by the tables. Can I just say, the silverback with the tambourine gave me nightmares for weeks.

  Anyway, no one, not one single person at McNutt Junior High, would ever describe Ethan Marcus as a troublemaker. You look up “good kid” online and a picture of Ethan would come up, I swear. I’m the one who mouths off, not him.

  It all happened so fast. One minute, the Delmanator was going over stuff that’s gonna be on the test and we were all so bored we could barely keep our eyes open. The next minute, Ethan was standing by his desk for some reason and wouldn’t sit down, even though Delman asked him to about five times. The room got real quiet. Ethan said no thank you, he’d had enough sitting for the day. I mean, it was 2:20 at that point. We’d all had enough sitting for the day.

  Ethan said, in that super-polite way he has with adults, “If you don’t mind, I’d like to stand for the rest of class.” Delman’s face turned really red, and he said “in fact” he did mind, and told Ethan to “sit down immediately or there will be consequences.”

  He didn’t.

  Right then, I could tell Delman was gonna make Ethan sit, just to be tough and show his authority, but I gotta give Ethan credit for sticking to it. Who knew he had it in him? He stood his ground. Literally. Said that sitting was really bad for you, hadn’t Mr. Delman heard that? And he was going on strike or something. I couldn’t exactly hear that part because the kid behind me had a sudden coughing attack.

  Delman looked like he was gonna lose it, so it was unclear whether he’d heard that or not. He must’ve sent an invisible bat signal to the principal, because then Mrs. D’Antonio marched in and sort of took Ethan’s elbow and maneuvered him out the door. And that was the last we saw of him that warm October Monday in seventh-grade language arts.

  If you don’t count Wesley Pinto pulling the fire alarm (he claimed he smelled smoke, yeah, right) and Zoe almost blowing up the science lab, what Ethan did was by far the coolest thing that’s ever happened in school this year. He became a legend in less than five minutes.

  ERIN

  My brother’s gone insane. That’s the only explanation I can come up with.

  I was taking my usual detailed notes in LA. We have a big test on figures of speech in two days, and I wanted to make sure I understood all the different terms. They can be quite confusing, you know. Brian Kowalski was breathing louder than usual, directly into my ear, so it was hard to concentrate, but I was doing the best I could under those challenging circumstances.

  Then out of nowhere, Ethan stood up and started arguing with Mr. Delman, saying something about a protest. I almost dropped my mechanical pencil. Let me clarify here that Ethan got a C-minus in social studies last year. I’m willing to bet that he never read the chapter on the famous demonstrations in history, so how could he even know what a protest is?

  Mr. Delman was talking nicely and calmly, exactly the way you would with a crazy person. I tried catching Ethan’s eye to advise him to sit down so he wouldn’t get in trouble, but he wouldn’t look my way. Then Mrs. D’Antonio came in and escorted him out.

  He’ll probably get suspended. What was he thinking? I can’t even begin to imagine. That’s why the only reason I can think of is the insanity plea. I mean, my brother’s made some questionable, rash decisions before, but nothing like this.

  The truth is, Ethan’s always had trouble sitting still for long periods of time. Mom and Dad had him tested when he was little, but he didn’t have ADHD. The report said he was a high-energy, super-active kid. So Dad concluded that Ethan had ESD (Ethan Squiggle Disease), which Dad has a little of himself, I think. The two of them at dinner? Up and down like yo-yos. Mom and I just roll our eyes and try to eat in peace. It’s not easy, let me tell you.

  Anyway, ESD’s perfectly fine when you’re four or five, but we’re in junior high. You’d think Ethan would be calming down by now.

  My stomach was in knots after he left class. I could hardly continue my note taking. I was going to attend the Be Green Club meeting after school with Zoe today, but immediate change of plans. I need to find out what happened to my brother, ASAP.

  By the way, Ethan and I aren’t twins, in case you were wondering. Everyone always thinks we are, even though we don’t look anything alike. I look like Mom—impossibly frizzy light brown hair, a pointy chin, exactly five-two and a half.

  Ethan looks like Dad—tall and skinny, physically awkward in most situations. We’re eleven months apart. With our September and August birthdays, that puts us in the same grade. Sometimes good, many times not.

  FYI, I’m the older one. You probably figured that out already.

  ZOE

  This is so exciting! No one ever wants to do anything around here. I can’t tell you how many petitions I’ve circulated to save parks, endangered animals, and polluted lakes. Mostly, people sign their name and move on, but I don’t let that bother me. I just have to work harder to convince them how important these things are.

  Last summer I volunteered with the forest preserve to help remove invasive plant species. Do you know that invasive plants can destroy native habitats and threaten vital ecosystems? I get upset just thinking about it.

  This year, I’m president of the Be Green Club at McNutt. I’m constantly researching ways to make our school more environmentally friendly. There’s so much that can be done! Composting, rain barrels, banning plastic water bottles—and the list goes on. (By the way, I’m looking for more members, because presently, it’s only me and Erin. So if you’re interested, please let me know.)

  Anyway, to see someone else championing an issue that’s important to him, well, I actually got tears in my eyes! I wanted to applaud Ethan’s small act of rebellion. Which I did. Softly, under my desk.

  Sidebar: I think Ethan is really cute. Please do not tell anyone I said that. Thank you.

  WESLEY

  This isn’t right, man. This is my territory. This is what I do. Everybody at McNutt knows that. I own trouble, okay, and trouble owns me.

  I don’t have a clue what Marcus thought he was doing, but if that skinny dude pulls something like that again, he and I are gonna have to have a serious talk, if you know what I mean.

  Yeah, I’m sure you do.

  CHAPTER TWO

  What Really Went Down

  ETHAN

  I have a secret. I am a human Ping-Pong ball.

  Not really. Just feels like it most of the time.

  For the record, the day started out like any other scoma Monday. In a long line of scoma Mondays. And Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays.

  Scoma: my word for a school-coma. Yeah, first you were like, what’s he talking about? But now you completely get it. A scoma is what I call that semiconscious, numb, bleary condition we’re all sadly familiar with that occurs only during school hours.

  It’s an epidemic, but no one talks about it.

  I’ve totaled up how long I sit at a desk, and it’s about seven hours. It’s not so bad at first, in the morning. But later in the day, my feet and legs fall asleep, my brain shuts down, and my butt hurts so bad, I swear when I get home, it’s square-shaped. So when I’m not a Ping-Pong ball, I’m SpongeBob.

  Monday in Delman’s class, it was the perfect storm. The classroom
was blindingly sunny and must’ve been close to ninety degrees. There was an almost-dead fly buzzing on the window, hanging on to its last bit of life. It couldn’t escape and neither could we. Delman was droning on and on about similes, metaphors, alliteration, hyperboles. We were all chained to our desks, as per usual.

  My sister was raising her hand for every question, with those urgent “Oh! Oh!” please-call-on-me little shouts she does. She was sitting straight up in her chair like always. No slumping, no sliding. No scomas for her. Somehow, she is immune.

  Delman, in his blue button-down shirt and trying-to-be-a-cool-teacher tie that says LA IS THE BOMB, was strolling down the aisles. His loafers were tapping in rhythm, exactly matching the ticks of the clock.

  We sit in rows in his class—he told us on the first day that he’s a “row kind of guy”—and that makes it worse. All you’re looking at is the kid’s head in front of you, and no amount of interesting hair can keep you from scomatizing.

  But see, then, it wasn’t like another scoma Monday. Mr. Delman asked someone for an example of personification, and Zoe’s hand shot up. Delman called on her and she said, “The waffle jumped out of the toaster.”

  Delman said, “Excellent example, Zoe,” but that didn’t make me think about personification, it made me think about waffles. They’re one of the most underrated foods, really. Once, when my family stayed at a hotel where you can make your own waffles in the breakfast area, I was in heaven. Peeling off that warm waffle from the flippy machine and dousing it in syrup? Priceless.

  Your brain does random weird things when you’re in a scoma, I can tell you that. Waffles jumping from toasters led me to think about jumping, and how every day at recess in elementary school, all I did was jump off the top of the jungle gym. I lived for that millisecond of flying through the air. In first grade, I counted how many times I jumped every day. My average was thirty. My high, one amazing day in April, was fifty-nine. I’ll never forget that day.

  Then I started missing recess because, of course, we don’t get that in seventh grade. Too serious now. That led to watching the fly on the window and feeling bad that it was trapped indoors. Then I noticed this little kid outside with his mom in the park by McNutt. He had a giant kite he kept trying to fly, but it was flopping to the ground every time.

  The thing was, though, the kid didn’t seem to care. He ran with that kite over and over, and after a while, I thought it didn’t matter if the kite flew or not because the kid was having a blast just running around the park with it. When you’re in seventh, it’s not like that anymore. Doing something just to do it. Not worrying about the outcome.

  Delman’s loafers tapped down my aisle, and it hit me. How come he—and every teacher in the universe—gets to stand and walk around anytime (and even jump or run if they want to), but I have to sit at my desk and suffer through scoma after scoma?

  Breaking point, tipping point, point of no return. Whatever kind of point you call it, I was there. It was like I was possessed or something. It felt like if I didn’t get up that very second, I was going to explode.

  I snapped. That’s the only way I can put it.

  I stood up by my desk, told Delman I was doing a protest about how much we have to sit in school. Truthfully, between you and me, I don’t even really know why I said the protest part, but it sounded good. Like I knew what I was doing. Like I’d thought it out and had some sort of long-term plan.

  The room was sickly quiet as Delman asked me to sit and I kept saying no. I couldn’t. I felt so much better standing. My feet were starting to wake up, and I was able to feel my legs again. The fog around my brain was starting to clear.

  Delman’s face got bright red and mad-looking. “Excuse me?”

  I thought about trying to explain. Waffles and recess and jumping and the fly on the window and the kid with the kite. I wasn’t exactly going to announce all that to the whole room. But by then it wasn’t about the standing anymore, it was about Delman and me, and I knew my reasons wouldn’t matter to him. Stuff like that doesn’t matter to a row kind of guy.

  So I was hauled into D’Antonio’s office. Just to sit in another chair and have the scoma return, full force.

  Mrs. D pushed her glasses on top of her head and perched on the edge of her desk. “I’m surprised to see you here, Ethan. This isn’t like you. Would you like to tell me what happened?”

  I sat there. This was actually the first time I’d gotten in trouble in school, but I was surprisingly calm.

  She fake-smiled. Said she wanted to give me the “benefit of the doubt” but looked at me in that way adults do, like they’re asking you to tell them your side, but they’ve already formed their opinion.

  I almost tried to explain it to her, even though I figured she wouldn’t understand. “The thing is . . . ,” I started to say.

  “Yes?” She crossed her arms.

  I could’ve come up with a brownnose type of reason. I could’ve apologized. I could’ve told her I’d behave and wouldn’t disrupt class again. That’s what you’d think Ethan Marcus would do.

  But I started reading the MCNUTT SCHOOL RULES AND CONDUCT sign on the wall behind her desk. I’d seen it before, of course; there’s one in the entryway, another on the cafeteria doors, and one by the gym, too. I’d never really read it completely through, though.

  1. Be safe, responsible, and respectful.

  2. Show courtesy and consideration for all students and adults. Do not touch other people or their property.

  3. Keep our school neat and clean. Trash goes in the trash bins, recycling in the recycling bins.

  4. The use of cell phones, including text messaging and photo taking, is not allowed during school hours.

  There were twelve RULES AND CONDUCT on the sign, but it was number seven that got me. Stabbed me in the heart.

  7. Sit at your own desk. Feet and chair legs on the floor at all times.

  They probably have number seven hanging on a sign in a prison. I looked down at my feet, flat on the floor and already dozing off.

  “Ethan.” Mrs. D raised an eyebrow. “I’ll ask you once more. Would you like to tell me what prompted your disruptive behavior? You’re a good kid. I don’t think you’ve been in my office before.”

  Second breaking point/tipping point/point of no return. Two in one day. A record for a “good kid” like me.

  I pointed to the sign, then blurted, “Number seven is completely unfair! You sit at a desk for seven hours a day and see how it feels.”

  Mavis D’Antonio’s nostrils flared. I don’t think that was the explanation she was looking for. The number seven reference was completely lost on her.

  She stood and brushed her hands like she’d had enough of me. “Very well. You give me no choice, Ethan. I believe that two after-school sessions of Reflection are just what you need right now.”

  Reflection. Take off the Reflec and put in Deten and you’ve got what it really is. Who are they trying to fool? Everyone knows it’s Detention with a capital D. I’d never gotten it before.

  Mrs. D leaned out of her office door. “Mrs. Grimes?”

  “I’m on it!” Grimes replied like she’d been listening to every word.

  Mrs. D shooed me out. “Please pick up your Reflection slip from Mrs. Grimes. I will be making a call home. I trust we won’t see any more of this behavior.”

  I got up and walked toward Grimes, otherwise known as Mean Secretary because of her permanently cheerful attitude toward students. Her large butt was glued to her chair like she hadn’t gotten up once since school started. On her desk was a collection of about ten of the weirdest-looking cactuses I’d ever seen. Or is it cacti?

  “Here you go,” she said, handing me a paper and doing this tsk-tsk sound. “Let’s hope better days are ahead for you, Mr. Marcus.”

  I ran out of there like the kid with the kite.

  “Walk!” Mean shouted.

  Of course. That’s number five on the sign: Walk at all times. No running, shoving, or bois
terous play of any kind.

  By the way, you know what number twelve is? Uphold the McNutt motto at all times—We Care!

  Uh-huh. Right. If they really cared, they wouldn’t have made such a big deal out of a kid needing to stand for a few minutes.

  CHAPTER THREE

  My Advice

  ERIN

  As soon as the bell rings, I gather my stuff and rush out of class. When I get to my locker, Ethan’s standing in front of his. Lockers are alphabetical, so ours are right next to each other. He’s calmly looking at his phone. Now he’s calm?

  I grab his arm. “Ethan! What happened in there? What were you doing? Have you gone insane?”

  He holds up his phone. “Look, I have twenty-five texts. Everyone’s saying way to go on the protest.”

  I narrow my eyes. “Great, you’re a celebrity and a troublemaker. You did not answer my questions.”

  He shoves the phone into his jean pocket. “I was gonna explode if I had to sit another second. I snapped, okay? You know how I am. I just needed to get up. Which shouldn’t have been a big thing, but Delman turned it into one.”

  I put my palm across his forehead. Maybe he has a fever. I didn’t think of that before. I can’t tell if he feels warm because he leans back and swats my hand away.

  “What are you doing?” he shouts.

  “I thought maybe you were sick.”

  “I’m not sick. Stop looking at me like that, all worried and everything!”

  “But I am worried. How couldn’t I be?” I glance around the hallway, lower my voice. “What did Mrs. D’Antonio do to you?”

  He shrugs, like he gets sent to the principal every day. “Reflection. Two days. I kind of said something to her.”

  I gasp. “No! Ethan, tell me you didn’t!”

  “Uh . . . can’t do that.”

  “What did you say?”