I laughed and bent my arms at an angle, while simultaneously jumping up with both knees almost touching my elbows.
"Oh my God, " I responded, "while I worked at Miller Grove a story went around about a kid that acted like shit and his mom came to school with him. He kept acting up in front of his friends and his mom punched him in the chest in front of everybody".
"I gonna do that to you if you fail me!" Conroy screamed.
"Alright, chamacos, I have to write some crap on the board now, if you don't mind watching my back so I don't get shanked" I responded, and continued my lesson.
The final exam schedule was super pinche fucked up. I am part-time, so I don't go there for eight hours a day. I knew on Monday that I didn't have to go in until eleven to deliver my final exam. I got up around eight and drank coffee in the yard while Lola ran around. Suddenly, a massive flatbed truck pulled up, carrying a giant sized pool liner on the back. It roared in front of my driveway, blocked it and parked. A couple of dudes jumped out and walked over to the McMansion next to my place, without a care in the world.
What the fuck, I thought. But I knew I didn't have to go to work for a few hours and ignored it.
"And one day we will die
And our ashes will fly from the aeroplane over the sea
But for now we are young
Let us lay in the sun
And count every beautiful thing we can see
Love to be
In the arms of all I'm keeping here with me, me..."
"¡Quiero pelear!" Devone yelled.
"Looking good, silly, nice vocabulary use. ¿Con quién quieres pelear?"
"With administrators".
"Really, Devone? You want to fight Ms. Warren?"
"Nah, not her".
"Mr. Springer?"
"Nah, I like him".
"Ms. McMan? The principal?".
"Nah. I want LaVerne".
Everyone started laughing. He used the first name of an administrator. A big, older, white administrator.
"LaVerne, you want her?" I howled.
"Yeah, I'm goin' for her," he said, laughing.
"Ms. Wagner, you got a pen?"
I gave him one and he did his work.
"What a curious life we have found here tonight
There is music that sounds from the street
There are lights in the clouds
Anna's ghost all around
Hear her voice as it's rolling and ringing through me
Soft and sweet!!!!!" I sang to Lola, hugging her close.
Okay, it was ten thirty. The pinche flatbed with a pool on the back had been there for hours. Now, I had to go to work. I climbed through the mud pit the trucks had made between my yard and theirs, in my work clothes.
"Oh my God," the stay at home mom breathed, in her weird cotton ball voice.
"I have been meaning to talk to you...".
"Awesome, but I have to go to work. I'm blocked in by my yer, um, pool".
"Well, but I really wanted to talk to you....about all this mess I mean...I didn't know it would be so messy!"
"Okay, yeah, thanks. I don't care about that. I just really have to go to work. Please move the pool".
I tore off to work. A CSX train had crashed into a mass transit bus that stalled on the tracks on the corner next to the school. The school schedule was all fucked again. News trucks sat in our parking lot while I tried to pull my hooptie in to work.
I asked them if they wanted my autograph, but they weren't interested.
I roared home. Another flatbed was blocking my driveway. I slowed down. Pool men waived me around the block, impatiently.
"I'm not trying to get through," I said.
"That is my house".
A couple of dudes got in the truck blocking my driveway, only after one of them gave me a dismissive, fuck you gesture.
My bad. Really. My bad.
I tore down the road next to the tracks again on the last day of school. I had finished my grades, went home and had some beers and then returned for the graduation of the class of 2013. I grabbed the bag with my Masters robe and Middlebury scarf thing from the back of my car and trucked it over to the place where faculty had to get dressed.
My Middlebury hood was missing. I dropped it somewhere in the parking lot. I put on the winged black robe and strolled out with the rest of the faculty, Middlebury scarf thing-less.
And I clapped and smiled and laughed.
School's out for summer.
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