Jim Shepard - Project X

“Could you give us some examples?” my mom finally asks.

Ms. Meier gives them a few. Some I didn’t even know she knew about. “He’s got a good head on his shoulders,” she says at the end. “He’s very bright.”

“He’s bright, we know that,” my dad goes.

“He’s so bright,” my mom goes.

“He’s had trouble in math, but verbally he’s tested off the charts,” the vice principal says. “Is that your sense of him, as well?” he asks Ms. Meier.

“It is,” she goes. “Though this year he seems to be actively working, in his essays, to rein in his vocabulary.”

“Are you doing that?” my dad goes. “Are you working to rein in your vocabulary?”

Everybody looks at me. “I’m working to rein in everything,” I go.

Nobody answers. They all look at each other. The vice principal smiles.

“How long have you been noticing this?” my mom goes. “This is a question for either of you, I guess. Do you have some idea when it started?”

“Don’t pick at your fingernails,” my dad goes to me.

The vice principal looks at Ms. Meier to see who’s going to go first. “I’ve just started with Edwin,” she says. “I didn’t have him last year. But I’ve checked with Mrs. Fisher, and she said he tailed off badly in the spring.”

“That’s been my impression, too,” the vice principal says. My dad jots a note to himself on a little pad of paper he’s brought along. “Were there any traumatic events, or did anything in particular happen last spring that you guys know about?” the vice principal asks.

They think about it. They look at each other. “Not that I know of,” my dad goes. My mom agrees with him.

“Was there anything in the spring you can remember that really affected you?” Ms. Meier asks me.

“No, not really,” I go.

“But there was something?” my mom goes.

“No, not really,” I go.

“You can’t think of one thing?” my mom goes.

“Well, I got older,” I go.

Everybody sits back in their chairs. The vice principal slides his palm back and forth on the desk blotter in front of him. He watches his hand while he does it.

“So where do we go from here?” my mom wants to know.

“Well, there are various options,” the vice principal tells her. “One place to start is with a special-ed program we have for extra work with socialization. It meets one day a week during school hours and one day a week after school hours. So it’s not too burdensome.”

“You mean like for retards?” I go.

“I don’t know what you mean,” the vice principal says, mad.

“You mean like special-needs kids?” I go.

“Special-ed programs are just that,” he goes. “They’re for all sorts of things. Whatever someone needs extra help with.”

“What’s it involve?” my mom wants to know.

“It’s mostly a workshop,” the vice principal goes. “A workshop with his peers. Other kids who’re also having difficulties. They’re given tasks to perform together. They do skits and hypotheticals, stuff like that.”

I imagine sitting across a table from Dickhead and Weensie and Hogan and every other asshole in the school and doing skits.

“Is that it? Is that all we’re going to try, at first?” my dad goes.

“We also have worksheets and exercises to send home,” the vice principal tells him.

Ms. Meier starts to say something, and my dad interrupts her. The vice principal lowers his head and holds up a palm to my dad and rotates his other hand to let her know it’s her turn.

“We find the combination can work very well,” she goes.

“Ms. Meier used to help out in the program,” the vice principal tells us.

“That sound amenable to everyone?” he asks, after no one says anything for a while. “If you guys don’t do the work on your end, it doesn’t matter what we do here,” he adds. “We can only do so much with the time we have him.”

My dad lets out a huge amount of air. “Sounds fine with me,” he says. “What about the patient?” he goes to me. “How’s it sound to you?”

“Fine with me,” I go.

“Fine with you,” he goes. “Everything’s fine with you.”

“Well, I guess that’s about it,” the vice principal says. “Edwin, do you have anything that you’d like to add?”

“Nothing I can think of,” I go. I stand up. My dad stands up.

“Mr. Hanratty,” Ms. Meier says. “Does Edwin have a chemistry set?”

“Not that I know of,” my dad says.

“Did we get him a chemistry set?” my mom asks.

“Not that I know of,” my dad says.

My stomach feels like it jumped up and froze in midair. Ms. Meier moves her mouth back and forth like she’s thinking.

“Why do you ask?” my dad goes. He sits back down.

“Edwin showed me something he was working on,” she finally tells him. “Actually he didn’t show me. It fell out of his backpack. He said it was from a chemistry set that you’d gotten him.”

My dad turns to me. “What’s the deal, Sport?” he asks.

“Are you a scientist at the college?” she asks.

“Economist,” my dad goes. He looks back at me.

“What?” I go.

“What’s she talking about?” he goes.

“I do these stupid drawings,” I go. “They’re just drawings.”

“Did you tell her you have a chemistry set?” he goes.

“Yeah,” I go.

“Why?” my mom goes.

“They’re embarrassing,” I go. Everybody’s looking at me. I can’t tell who believes me. “They’re embarrassing, ” I go again.

“So you lied about it?” he goes.

“Yeah,” I go.

My dad looks at Ms. Meier. “I don’t know what to tell you,” he goes. “You’re not going to lie to her anymore,” he says to me. “Right?”

“No,” I go.

She looks at me for a minute and then turns to him and shrugs. “Well, we’ll try and keep an eye on things,” she tells him.

“So will we,” my mom tells her. She stands up and Ms. Meier stands up and they shake hands. “Thanks so much,” my mom goes. “And we’re sorry for all the trouble.”

“Oh, don’t be sorry,” Ms. Meier tells her. “We all want to do everything we can.”

“What do you say?” my dad says to me. We’re all up now and he’s got a hand on my shoulder.

“Good-bye,” I go.

The vice principal laughs.

“What else do you say?” my dad goes.

“Sorry,” I go.

“It’s all right, son,” the vice principal says. He sticks out a hand and I give it a good shake. “Let’s try and see a little less of each other for a while,” he suggests.

“Definitely,” I go. “And thanks again.”

On the way home, my mom thanks me for thanking him. I tell them I’m sorry, and I am. She feels so much better that we have a kind of half-party with just us and Gus when we get home. Gus keeps going “So I get two parties?” while we dish out cake and some of the presents.

“That’s right, hon,” my mom goes. “You get two parties.”

“It’s all right to be queer, you know,” Michelle tells Flake and me at lunch the next day. I’m not in the best of moods and neither is he.

“My sister in high school’s in the Lesbian Alliance,” she goes.

“What’re you talking about?” Flake finally brings himself to say. Kids go back and forth past our table. It’s another rainy day and everybody seems worn out by the suckiness of everything.

Lunch is spaghetti and meatballs and the spaghetti’s cold. We’ve already eaten all the meatballs. I got a 40 on my math quiz. I had headaches all morning. A girl in English stared at me the whole period like I was a fingernail she found in her whipped cream.