~~~
Through the day all seemed to be going according to plan. Kile had indeed met Robert outside Mrs. Haversham’s class for lunch. She only shook her head at Rob when she saw him come to collect Little Ricky. He wasn’t really sure whether she were shaking her head at him for being out of class at the Middle School, or if something had happened, but he didn’t ask and decided unless someone said something it was better not to know.
Lunch was relatively straight-forward too. Rob watched Kile long enough in the cafeteria to ensure he got some food, a chicken-fried steak and mashed potatoes dish to which the troll turned up his nose only a little, and then sit down. He was reasonably confident Kile would get back to the classroom. He was not entirely right about that last part though.
At the end of school, the middle-graders were released about ten minutes before the elementary so that they could get all the way to the end of the building and be in line for the buses without interfering with the younger kids’ assault on the hallways when the last bell rang. Robert went to Mrs. Haversham’s class and awaited his “brother” in the hallway.
But Kile didn’t come out. After twenty-some-odd other children poured out, pushed past and bumped Robert to get to the buses first in line, Kile was still not to be seen. He stuck his head in the room just as Mrs. H was headed out.
“Oh!” she said clasping a few papers she’d been carrying bundled close to her chest. “Why, um? Are you looking for Richard, young man?”
“Yes,” Rob said as he tried to peer past and take in a look at the entire classroom. Ricky’s backpack was there at the right desk, but no Kile. “Is he not here?”
“Honestly, I thought he was. But about twenty minutes ago as we returned to our seats from our reading pods, he was gone,” she replied.
“Uh-oh,” Rob said quietly under his breath as he turned away and looked down the hallways.”
“I can’t explain it. I know he was right there one moment…then the next he was gone.”
“Okay,” he acknowledged and then shouldered his pack on both arms and started trotting down the hallway to see if the little doofus of a troll had headed towards the buses on his own.
Mrs. H called after him, “I’ve called the office and asked them to look for him about ten minutes ago. Good luck!”
Apparently Mrs. Haversham was not too quick on taking up the search for Little Ricky, or wasn’t very worried. It didn’t surprise Robert too much. Something similar had happened a couple times earlier in the year with the real Ricky too. But Robert was sensing this was likely a little different situation. Then it happened.
Overhead the speakers suddenly blared in a nervous, older woman’s voice, “Would Mr. Robert Johansson from the middle school please come to Mrs. Gardner’s kindergarten class in the Elementary wing?”
Then there was a bang and a scrape like a school desk or table was being slid across the linoleum, followed by the same voice calling out in surprise, “Oh!”
Robert quickly reversed directions and started heading to the area where the younger aged classes were on the east side of the building. Under his breath he grumped, “So that’s where you went you little twerp.”
While nearing the open doorway to Mrs. Gardner’s kindergarten he heard what had to have been old Mrs. G herself trying to control the situation and Rob’s heart sank. “No, no, no! Don’t use those! Really Richard! Why are you so out of control? You’re always out of control! But why do you have to do it in my classroom?”
Once standing in the doorway, a hand on the doorjam of either side of the opening, Robert was pleased to see the situation actually wasn’t nearly as bad as the bedroom the night before. While Kile ran about with one boy and one girl chasing him and laughing as they held rolls of toilet paper that were draped around Kile’s head and neck, the teacher was busily picking up loose items from the floor. There were a couple other children in the room but it seemed they had finally lost interest and though smiling as they watched Little Ricky they were heading out the door. Mrs. Gardner caught him standing in the doorway as a pair of six-year-olds squeezed past him.
“Oh thank goodness! Robert, isn’t it?” she said, approaching him with both hands extended. “Please take your little brother to the bus. He’s got his hands into everything!”
Kile had his glimmer on full force so Robert saw what everyone else saw: Little Ricky running around with something white smeared all over his shirt, some various princess and car stickers up and down his arms, and a great big Cheshire grin. Between his laughter and the two kindergarteners trailing after him, Rob couldn’t help but smile himself. Then he entered the room and got ready to grab Kile on his next pass nearby.
“Actually, Mrs. Gardner, this really doesn’t seem that bad. You should see what he did to the carpet last night.”
Mrs. G stopped and placed her hands on her hips dramatically. “Oh really?! And who is it you’re expecting to clean up this mess, anyway? Will you?”
Rob tried to mouth an answer but before he could, she continued, “I hardly think so! No! You and your hellion little brother have to get on the bus! You can’t miss getting home or you’ll be in trouble with your parents! I know! I know! Now, go on and take your brother away, and be sure he doesn’t return tomorrow.”
“Ricky! Hey Ricky!” Robert yelled to catch the little troll’s attention. Suddenly as he came full circle around the room towards the entrance Kile ran full force into Robert’s hands and nearly knocked him down. As it turned out, Kile was considerably heavier than Little Ricky. “Ooof! Ricky! Ricky, listen! We have to go now or we’ll miss the bus.”
Just as Robert was muscling the troll out the door and the two remaining kindergarteners waved goodbye, Mr. Fisch, the principal, entered the room. He eyed the two boys, and then looked at Mrs. Gardner who was pouting and near tears as she straightened some papers and books that had been knocked over during Kile’s escapades.
Turning to Rob, Mr. Fisch said, “Robert, I think you and your brother better hurry to the buses if you don’t want to spend the night here.”
It was a little bit of a threat, which Rob caught on to immediately. It wasn’t hard to recognize the oh-not-Little-Ricky-Johansson-again glower in his eyes. And then Mr. F turned and walked quickly over to Mrs. G. On their way down the hallway, the boys heard Mrs. G’s sobs and frustration pour out. Apparently, Kile’s tirade was just the icing on the cake for a particularly bad day. But later, Robert couldn’t help but feel bad about the day when he learned that this was to be the last year Mrs. Gardner ever taught Kindergarten. She retired, moved to Cancun, and never looked back on her forty-three years of teaching ever again.
“Kile! What were you thinking?” Rob asked in hushed tones as he half dragged the troll by his shirt sleeve through the now nearly empty hallways.
“I hungry some more,” Kile said, dropping the glimmer effect for Robert’s sake and showing his own forty-seven-toothed grin.
“What? Didn’t you get enough for lunch?”
“Um…it wasn’t very good. Not enough potatoes…and they were all smashed up” the troll said matter-of-factly while he pondered something on his left index and fore-fingers and then stuck them into his mouth to lick them.
“So…why were you in the Kindergarten room then?” Robert asked.
“I smell something good! When I find it, smaller humans were eating brown, yummy-smelling sticks.”
“I see… that was probably their afternoon snack.”
“Yes! Snack!” Kile said excited and grinned again, squeezing his eyes shut momentarily with delight. “One small human see me at the door while teacher reading a book and he give me snack!”
“Is that right?” Robert huffed as he continued to try to quicken Kile’s pace. “But that doesn’t mean you can just go into any old class you want to.”
“Yes, but then I see bottles of their white snack. I point and ask small human for it because the other snack make me feel
so good! So, he take me in class.”
“Didn’t the teacher say anything?”
“Er…yes. She say something. I smiled at her and said I hurry. Then boy give me bottle of white snack and it wasn’t as good. But brown snack give me energy.”
“Wait? Are you saying you tried to eat the paste?” Robert stopped for a moment to ask.
“Yes! Paste! That what teacher called it. But she got very angry.”
Robert thought that was pretty funny, that a one-hundred and thirty-seven year-old troll still had no better sense than a kindergartener. “And how did it taste?”
“Blech!” Kile stuck out his tongue. “But I eat it all. I was hungry.”
Rob’s eyebrows rose. “You ate a whole bottle?”
“Yes! Not as bad as MacN’Cheese…it like that cheese…but a little bit spicier.”
Kile started walking again, and so did Robert to keep up.
“And the running around?”
“The bell rang and then all the kids start running to put stuff away and get backpacks. I help them.”
“Oh…” Rob thought perhaps that wasn’t the worst thing in the world. But obviously the hub-bub transition into Tee-Peeing the room along with Kile was a bit too much. “And how about these stickers?”
“Some new human friends put them on me. Pretty cool, huh?” Kile said, pressing one or two of the stickers more firmly onto his arm.
“Cool? Where’d you hear that?”
Kile grinned at Robert yet again, pleased as punch. “The new friends tell me it is cool.”
“Mmm, hmm,” Rob nodded.
They walked out the front door of the Elementary side of the buildings and approached the bus number 94G that took them back up to their street in Maple Springs. While waiting for the last child or two to climb on before they did themselves, Robert asked one last question.
“So how did you get out of Mrs. Haversham’s class, then?”
“Oh! I just used shimmer,” Kile said. Then realization dawned on the troll’s face. “Oh! I forget Ricky’s back pack there.”
“It’s alright. Let’s just get home. I have a feeling Mom’s going to be getting a call soon, and we’d better make sure she doesn’t have to drive down here to get us or it will be worse,” Robert answered.
“When will we get it, Robbie?” Kile asked.
“Don’t worry about it. It will be there tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow? Oh! How many days do we go to school?” Kile said with heavy anticipation.
“Oh. Yeah. Well, if you don’t get kicked out in the next two weeks we’ve got another…nine days of school left.”
“Wow! Nine whole days! I will have lots of fun,” the troll smirked as he plopped into the bench seat to which Rob had pointed. The smirk and look in Kile’s eye was a little bit dis-settling to Robert at that point.
“Oh boy,” Rob said under his breath. “Are you sure we don’t need to trade back with Little Ricky before then?”
“No, no!” Kile answered, bobbing his head and bouncing slightly on the seat. “This is very good. I am learning a lot about humans.”
“Yeah… at least you seem to be learning how to speak English a little better anyway.”
“And Spanish too!”
“What?” Rob asked.
“Teacher had us read some words that she said were Spanish. I not ever hear them before,” Kile’s face was very serious. He put his finger to his lips again and concentrated. “Gato means cat. Quattro means four. Dias means day, and dos means two!”
Robert nodded and said with little conviction, “Very impressive.”
Secretly, Robert wondered how many near-twelve-year-olds there could be in the world that were friends with a multi-lingual smallish troll. Of the billions of kids my age, why do I get to be the lucky one? he asked himself in frustration.
The bus started up and rumbled away from the school. Kile closed his eyes and enjoyed the feeling of the rattling and the vibrations from the exhaust tingling his head. Robert closed his eyes and thought about how good it would be to just sneak off to the family room with a bowl of icecream and watch a sci-fi marathon on Saturday without Ricky. And then he realized it was less likely that Kile would find something to do on his own, and that he’d be stuck playing host for a long, stressful while.
Troll Brother Page 19
