“I’ve had enough of that kid.”
“Me too,” she said, “and I don’t think you even need to worry about asking God to forgive you for that one.”
Nurse Sharon’s office was simple. She had several rusted filing cabinets and a dresser along one wall, a sink area, and her old brown desk—all of which rested on the white-tiled floor. Off her work space there was a sickroom, which contained ten green beds for her visitors who weren’t feeling well or her fakers in need of a nap or any excuse to cut class. Nurse Sharon wasn’t all that naïve, though. She knew when she had a faker, and those kids were often sent back to class after a brief stay.
Opposite the sickroom there was a door and hallway that led to the main office. I could see how this design made sense, making it easy for the nurse to communicate with the office staff about any students who needed to leave early or had something else going on, but I also saw how the short hallway between Nurse Sharon and the school secretary, Betsy Rollins, made it easy for the two of them to get together and gossip. And Danielle and I would find them doing just that almost every time we showed up.
You would think our arrival would’ve signaled for them to stop all that gabbing, but instead, Danielle and her diabetes brought out the best of that gossiping in Nurse Sharon. She was such a nervous wreck about Danielle’s blood sugars and the mere thought of her passing out on the floor that, whenever we walked in, her mouth seemed to kick into overdrive. It was like Danielle was the medical expert and she was the one with diabetes. Nurse Sharon turned into a fidgeting and blabbering fool the whole time we were there. And heaven forbid if Danielle was ever low. The one time her sugars dropped down to 49, Nurse Sharon darn near fainted. She turned white as a ghost. Mrs. Rollins and I had to sit her in a chair and tend to her while Danielle drank some juice and took care of herself.
It’s safe to say Nurse Sharon and Mrs. Rollins made for entertaining visits, and Danielle and I seemed to leave with a little more dirt each time. It was thanks to them that we made the decision to declare ourselves Spy Sisters. (We were done waiting for Charlie.) We were determined to get as much of the inside scoop on the junior high school as possible. Of course, we had no way of knowing that overhearing “innocent” gossip would lead to our discovering something so awful.
—
The only person who seemed to always know more than us was Mr. Terupt. We saw him and Mrs. Terupt at church on Sunday and he asked us how things with the guppy had worked out.
“Great,” Danielle told him. She and I looked at each other, both of us wondering how in the world Mr. Terupt knew about that.
“Glad to hear it,” he said. “Listen, I’d like to have the gang visit my class on Thursday. I’m hoping to try something with my sixth graders. If it works out, we could make it a regular Thursday thing. Do you think you could round everybody up and tell them for me?”
Danielle and I looked at each other again. Neither one of us had the courage to tell him we couldn’t. So we said, “Sure.”
“Great,” he said. “I’ll see you then.”
Leaving the church, I asked Danielle, “Why do you think Mr. Terupt wants all of us to visit?”
“Because he can sense things even better than a farmer,” she said. “He can say it’s about his sixth graders, but I think he knows something’s up with all of us.”
“Well, he’s right. So, how do you propose we tell everybody?”
“We’re the Spy Sisters. We’ll make secret notes and slip them into everyone’s lockers.”
Dear Journal,
I found the note in my locker after third period.
Thursdays with Terupt
Mr. Terupt requests your presence in his classroom this Thursday. He needs your help with a project. All members of the old gang should report to the lobby immediately following school. Do not let him down.
I could tell from the handwriting and the artistic flair in the title that the note was the work of Anna and Danielle. The last line was particularly powerful. We could let each other down, but not Mr. Terupt. I knew everyone would show up.
I slipped the note into my pocket. I wanted to keep it close. Just knowing that we were going to his classroom again made me feel better, but the words had me nervous. Thursdays with Terupt reminded me of Tuesdays with Morrie. Is there such a thing as a bad omen?
I closed my locker and hurried off to my double period with Mrs. Reeder. Out of all my classes, ELA was the easiest one for me to pay attention in, but not on this day. My mind was preoccupied. I began thinking about Thursday and our walk over to Snow Hill School in the bitter cold. That was when I decided I’d have Mom drive us. It was the perfect solution. Excited to tell Anna and Danielle, I took out a small piece of paper and jotted down my idea. I didn’t realize passing a note in class required such stealth and precise timing. I thought I had it all figured out, but I was a beginner when it came to this stuff. The moment Mrs. Reeder turned around to list vocabulary words on the board, I leaned across the aisle and held out my note.
“I’ll take that,” Mrs. Reeder said. Like any good teacher, she had eyes in the back of her head. She caught me red-handed and marched straight over to my desk. “I must say, I’m surprised, Jessica. This isn’t like you.” She held out her hand, expecting to confiscate my note, but I didn’t give it to her.
“Mrs. Reeder, you can trust that these are important words. I wouldn’t have been passing the note otherwise. Could you please give it to Anna?”
“That’s bold, Miss Writeman, but if these are such important words, you could speak them to Anna after class.”
“Sometimes it’s easier to say things in writing,” I said.
Mrs. Reeder gave me a thoughtful expression. Then she took my note and delivered it to Anna, telling her, “You can read it after class.”
Feeling lucky, but nervous,
Jessica
P.S. I am beyond excited to see Mr. Terupt, but why did he have to pick Thursday? Am I being ridiculous, or is there bad news coming? For Mr. Terupt? Mrs. Terupt? Their baby? The gang? Me?
Omen (n): a sign or warning of impending happiness…or disaster.
Mr. Terupt was like our sun, and we were his planets. We weren’t getting away from him. He was still at the center of our lives. When Jessica’s mother pulled up in front of the junior high after school on Thursday, we were all there waiting for her.
“Hello, Ms. Writeman,” I said, climbing into her SUV—on the opposite side from her heartless daughter.
“Hi, Luke. It’s nice to see you. How are you?”
“Fine, thanks.”
She seemed overly nice. I caught her casting a quick glance and smirk at Jessica, who stuck her tongue out in return. What was that all about?
It was a tight fit with all our bags and bodies squished together, but we made it work. We closed the doors and started on our way. This was the first time we’d all been together since the party, and it wasn’t feeling anything like old times. No one said a word, except for Ms. Writeman, who was determined to be a friendly mother and kept asking about our days and our parents.
“How’s your mother, Anna?” Ms. Writeman asked.
“She’s doing well,” Anna said.
“Tell her I said hi.”
“I will.”
“And how’s your mom doing, Lexie?” Ms. Writeman asked next.
“Good,” Lexie replied.
Jessica shot her mother a look and subtly shook her head. More signals between the two of them that I didn’t understand. We didn’t give Ms. Writeman much for answers, but she was the first one to get us talking around each other, if not to each other.
Once we reached Snow Hill School, we all said thanks and then jumped out of her vehicle. I had wondered what the moment of our arrival would look like, us knocking on the door and then a classroom full of eyeballs turning to stare at us, but that didn’t happen. Instead, we found Mr. Terupt’s sixth graders spread out all over the place—like we used to do. They were busy working on a variety
of projects.
“It’s great to see you guys,” Mr. Terupt said, meeting us at the door. Not one of us was left standing there without a smile. (He was the first one to get us doing that around each other, if not at each other.) “Thanks for coming. I wanted my students to meet all of you so they have your friendly faces to count on next year when they arrive at the junior high.”
“This sounds like another one of your exchange programs,” Jessica said. “Like with Mrs. Stern’s class from Woods View School last year.”
“Yeah, I guess so. I’m hoping you’ll come every Thursday.”
“Okay,” I said, speaking for everyone.
Wasting no more time, Mr. Terupt led us to different groups of students and had us jump right in. It’s normal practice for a teacher to start a session like this with some sort of icebreaker—an activity designed to help strangers get to know one another—so you become comfortable and then can work together on something more substantial. His students were prepared. Each group began role-playing, acting as if they were the reporters interviewing us on TV.
“Hello, this is Kevin Cross coming at you live from Mr. Terupt’s sixth-grade classroom, and here with us today is one of his former students. Can you tell us your name, sir?” Kevin held his makeshift microphone out to me.
“Luke Bennett,” I said.
“Great. Now, Mr. Bennett, why don’t you start by telling us about one of your favorite memories from your days with Mr. Terupt.”
“I have lots of them.”
“Give us one,” Kevin said.
“Well, back in fifth grade, we did this plant unit and…” I went on telling them about the crazy concoction I had created that led to a cloud of smoke and a fire alarm. As I shared the story, I found myself talking about Jeffrey and Peter and the rest of the gang, and laughing and smiling while I was doing it. And when I glanced over my shoulder I saw that other good times were being shared. We were talking about each other and laughing and smiling while doing it. Our storytelling made it feel like old times that afternoon, even though it wasn’t. But this was an important first step. Did Mr. Terupt know what he was doing?
Before leaving his classroom that day, the two of us shared a moment off to the side. I was standing by the windows, waiting for my mom to show up, when he clapped a hand on the back of my shoulder. “Lukester, this is the first I’ve seen you in quite a while. Congratulations on becoming the seventh-grade class president,” he said.
“Thanks. Does that mean you heard about Lexie and Peter, then?”
“I did. Must be they decided you were the best person for the job. Smart move on their part.”
My gaze immediately left his eyes and fell to the floor. “Yeah,” I mumbled.
“Have you had any meetings yet?” he asked.
“A couple, but we didn’t accomplish much. There was just a lot of grumbling about the lack of money in our class budgets.”
“Budgets are important. It’s hard to get anything done when you don’t have the money,” he said.
“Tell me about it.”
“Do me a favor, Luke. Don’t mention anything about a lack of money and budgets around Mrs. Terupt. It gets her upset whenever she hears things like that, and that’s not good for her right now—or the baby.”
“Okay,” I said, not thinking anything of it.
“I know you’ll make a terrific president, Luke,” Mr. Terupt said. “It’s your phenotype.”
I looked up at him again. He smiled and pointed out the window. “Your ride’s here.”
LUKE’S SEVENTH-GRADE SURVIVAL GUIDE
TIP #11 (courtesy of Mr. Terupt): Budgets are important.
Dear Journal,
Stories and books provide me comfort—and so does Mr. Terupt. During our first Thursday afternoon with him, he had us sharing stories with his sixth graders. Luke was a main character in my tale about our Westing Game competition. And then for our second afternoon meeting he had Lexie and me join a literature circle with two girls and two boys (Suzi, Olivia, Jarrod, and Seth) who were in the middle of reading The School Story by Andrew Clements.
Lexie and I were familiar with literature circles from our days with Mr. Terupt, and this book was one I had read when I was in fourth grade and still living in California. It was one of the titles Dad had given me because the plot twist had to do with writing and acting.
“This is a good book,” I said, sitting down with the group.
“You read it?” Jarrod asked.
“There aren’t many books that Jessica hasn’t read,” Lexie said, plopping down across from me.
“I read it a while ago, so I don’t remember everything about it,” I said, “but I know I liked it.”
“We like it, too,” Olivia said.
“So how far into the story are you guys?” Lexie asked, thumbing through the pages of the copy Mr. Terupt had loaned her.
With ease, we began a conversation about the book. Initially, I listened to what the sixth graders had to say, only adding a comment occasionally. They were insightful readers with lots of thinking recorded in their journals; they had plenty to share, and as their discussion moved along, I was struck by a thought.
“Have you ever pretended to be someone you weren’t?” I asked them. “Like Natalie does in this book?”
As soon as those words left my mouth the unimaginable popped into my head. I don’t even recall what the sixth graders had to say because Lexie and I locked eyes, and I knew she was thinking the same thing. I never thought I’d say great minds think alike when referring to the two of us, but that was exactly what had occurred in that moment. Besides, when it came to these sorts of wild ideas, Lexie was the expert. Having the same thoughts as her meant I’d just conjured up something truly crazy and dangerous.
The School Story was a bit easier than the novels I’m reading nowadays, but it spoke to me in a way that books always seem to in Mr. Terupt’s presence.
When I sat down to do my homework later that night, I found a different book resting inside my backpack. Mr. Terupt had placed The Giver in there when I wasn’t looking, along with a note.
Dear Jessica,
Here’s an important story. I chose it because it’s good timing. Pain, suffering, and struggle are all a part of life, and it’s because of them we can find celebration in what we have. We have choice, and sometimes we get to choose how things end.
With a dangerous idea and an important book to read,
Jessica
P.S. Farmers might have a special sense, but so do teachers, especially Mr. Terupt. He has a way of always knowing. What would we ever do without him?
Thursdays with Terupt turned out to be the medicine I needed. Don’t ask me to explain it, but just being with Teach made me feel better. And after our second rendezvous with his sixth graders, I was like, given something else to think about other than cancer—and it came at a time when I needed it most.
Mom’s lumpectomy was scheduled for a Friday morning. I didn’t want to go to school, but she made me. She wasn’t about to have me hanging out by myself in the hospital and worrying. She talked to Jessica’s mom, Ms. Writeman, who happily agreed to bring me after school. I was good with that because then Jessica got to come with me. I would’ve been fine with Vincent bringing me, but I needed him to keep Margo for the day. The hospital was one place she couldn’t go.
Mom was already out of the recovery room and in a regular room when we got there. She wasn’t looking her best, but hospital bedsheets and gowns certainly aren’t the most stylish accessories, either. Her doctor met us and explained that the surgery had gone well, but that the lump was a bit larger than they had previously estimated.
“That’s not any cause for alarm,” she told me, “but your mother’s blood pressure has been low since the surgery, and because of that we’ll be keeping her overnight as a precaution—merely as a precaution,” she promised.
So we made arrangements with the doc to meet her the next morning. She told us she’d go over some
instructions with us at that point, and then we’d be able to take Mom home. I took the flowers we’d picked up on the way and placed them by Mom’s window, giving that drab room a splash of color. Then I kissed the top of her head and watched her heavy eyes fall shut.
Jessica’s mom wasn’t about to leave me alone in my house all night, so she told me I was staying with them. It’s not like I had a choice, but I didn’t object. We swung by my house so I could pack an overnight bag, and then we popped by the restaurant so I could get Margo. (She had to come with me, but Ms. Writeman was cool with that.) Vincent asked about Mom and told me he planned to go over later to check in on her. Then he gave me a hug—and it felt like one of those that only Teach used to be able to give me.
At Jessica’s house, her mother got busy with dinner while the two of us—and Margo—got busy planning Jessica’s daring adventure. This was what I’d been given to think about thanks to yesterday’s visit to Teach’s classroom. In that book his sixth graders were reading, one of the girls pretends to be someone she isn’t. Jessica was going to pretend to be someone she wasn’t in order to attend the retreat. She was going as me!
The weekend retreat started the next Thursday afternoon and ran all day long on Friday and Saturday, with an official off-Broadway production hitting the stage on Sunday. It stunk that I was missing my chance to be a star onstage, but I couldn’t leave Mom, not now, and like, I was excited about helping Jessica. She loved talking about the characters from her novels, and how they were always there for her, and how she wished she could be like them. In my book, Jessica was one of those characters. That was why I was determined to help her get to New York City and to that retreat.
Once we put our heads together, we came up with a plan in no time. It was almost too easy. I don’t even think Luke could’ve thought up something better. I felt a little bad about taking advantage of Vincent, but was able to get past that by telling myself it was necessary and for a good cause.
Saving Mr. Terupt Page 12