Weed galloped around a corner to the science department just as Mr. Pretty began hall duty from the table outside Mrs. Fan’s biology class, where this second Weed was supposed to be getting ready to take a quiz.
‘Whoa,’ Mr. Pretty called out as Weed ran past and the tardy bell stopped and doors up and down the halls shut.
‘I’m going to Mrs. Fan’s class,’ Weed gasped.
‘Do you know where it is?’
‘Yes, sir, Mr. Pretty. Right there.’ Weed pointed at the red door less than twenty steps away, and wondered what kind of stupid question was that.
‘You’re late,’ Mr. Pretty told him.
‘The bell just quit,’ Weed said. ‘You can almost still hear it.’
‘Late is late, Weed.’
‘I didn’t mean to be.’
‘And I don’t guess you have a pass,’ said Mr. Pretty, who taught ninth-grade Western Civilization.
‘I don’t got a pass,’ Weed said as indignation gathered, ’cause I wasn’t planning on being late. But my ride just got here and there wasn’t nothing I could do about it and I ran all the way so I wouldn’t be late. And now you’re making me later, Mr. Pretty.’
Mr. Pretty’s compulsion was to pull kids but not ticket them. He was young and nice-looking and had an insatiable need for captive audiences. He was notorious for holding kids in the hall as long as possible while they fidgeted and stared at the rooms where they were supposed to be as classes and quizzes went on without them.
‘Don’t blame me or your ride for being tardy,’ said Mr. Pretty from behind his small table in the empty intersection of shiny, empty hallways.
‘I’m not blaming. I’m just saying the way it is.’
‘If I were you, I’d watch my mouth, Weed.’
‘What you want me to do, walk around with a mirror?’ Weed sassed him.
Mr. Pretty might have let Weed go on to class, but Mr. Pretty was pissed and decided to draw things out.
‘Let’s see, I believe you’re in my third period,’ he said. ‘You remember what we talked about on Friday?’
Weed didn’t remember anything about Friday except that he wasn’t looking forward to spending the weekend with his father.
‘Ah. Maybe this will jog your memory,’ Mr. Pretty said curtly. ‘What happened in 1556?’
Weed’s nerves were tangling and popping. He could hear Mrs. Fan’s voice through her shut door. She was passing out the quiz and going over instructions.
‘Come on, I know you know it.’ Mr. Pretty picked on Weed some more. ‘What happened?’
‘A war.’ Weed threw out the first thing that came to mind.
‘A fairly safe guess since there were so many of them. But you’re wrong. Fifteen fifty-six was when Akbar became emperor of India.’
‘Is it okay if I go in Mrs. Fan’s class now?’
‘And then what?’ Mr. Pretty demanded. ‘What happened next?’
‘What?’
‘I asked you first.’
‘About what?’ Weed was getting furious.
‘About what happened next?’ Mr. Pretty asked.
‘Depends on what you mean by next,’ Weed smarted off.
‘Next as in what’s next in the chronology of events that I handed out to every person in my class,’ Mr. Pretty answered with an edge. ‘Of course, you probably never looked at it.’
‘I did too. And it says right on it we don’t have to memorize nothing unless it’s in bold, and the India thing and what happened next ain’t in bold.’
‘Oh really?’ Mr. Pretty got haughty. ‘And how can you remember whether something was in bold or not if you don’t remember anything in the first place?’
‘I remember when something’s in bold!’ Weed raised his voice, as if he were suddenly talking in bold.
‘No you don’t!’
‘Yes I do!’
Mr. Pretty angrily grabbed a ballpoint pen out of his shirt pocket. He began scribbling words on the Hall Duty passes and no passes sheet.
‘All right, smarty pants,’ said Mr. Pretty as self-control slipped further out of reach. ‘I’ve written down ten words, some in bold, some not. You get one minute to look them over.’
He handed the list to Weed: for/end, effigy, pogrom, Versailles, mead, Faberge, Fabian, Waterloo, edict, pact. Not one word was familiar. Mr. Pretty snatched back the list.