Rhyme Schemer Read online

today.

  He thought it was hilarious.

  Yeah.

  Funny.

  I had to climb out the window.

  And no one even noticed.

  Petey and Philip.

  Sixteen and seventeen.

  Dumb as hammers.

  Paul is almost out of here.

  He wants to be a psychiatrist.

  That means he asks a lot of annoying questions.

  Patrick is the oldest.

  He’s in college and only comes home for

  laundry.

  And food.

  That leaves me.

  Kevin.

  The baby.

  The accident.

  One college guy.

  One senior.

  One junior.

  One sophomore.

  And a seventh grader.

  You can see how it might not work.

  Paul says it could work.

  It should work.

  If my parents spent less time at work.

  Maybe he’s onto something.

  Or maybe he’s just annoying.

  DAY 15

  Give me that! Petey shouted

  this morning in the car

  on the way to school.

  No, I said.

  But he grabbed for it

  swerving the car

  just missing a fire hydrant.

  NO! I said again,

  but his arms are long

  and his car is small.

  That’s why I’m writing this

  on the back of old homework.

  My notebook

  is on the street

  somewhere

  because Petey is a moron

  and says poetry is for old ladies.

  By the way,

  this isn’t even poetry.

  It’s just thoughts

  on paper

  rapid fire

  with not as many words

  as usual thoughts

  and none of those dumb

  likes or as-es

  or talking about trees

  that old ladies like.

  These are real thoughts

  like a TV scroll

  with a flow that’s like a stream

  that just flies out of my brain

  like barf

  but less gross.

  Most of the time.

  Wait.

  Three likes just then.

  Oh man.

  Maybe this is poetry.

  But cooler than regular poetry.

  Yeah.

  I’ll walk home from school today

  after detention.

  No ride home in Petey’s cruddy car.

  I’ll walk the whole 1.9 miles.

  Maybe my notebook will still be in the road.

  Or on the sidewalk.

  Or in the grass.

  Wherever it landed.

  I didn’t see.

  Petey drives way too fast.

  DAY 16

  No luck.

  The notebook is gone.

  Or turned invisible.

  I’m going to kill Petey.

  When I get bigger than him.

  Which might take a while.

  Because he’s like King Kong

  with zits

  and worse breath.

  No one gets past me today.

  I am a rock.

  I am huge.

  My face is stone

  like those giant statues

  from that one island

  with giant face statues.

  My island today:

  the boys’ bathroom

  in the hallway outside the library.

  No entry for dorks.

  Unless they pay a toll

  to the giant statue.

  Robin in the hall,

  so small compared to everyone.

  He can sneak between them

  unseen

  like a bug.

  But I see him.

  I see what he’s doing.

  Freckle-Face Kelly’s face is in flames,

  Robin’s hands flipping up her skirt.

  She pushes him away

  but she’s too late.

  Now everyone sees.

  Her white, freckly legs.

  Her white, flowery underpants.

  And for just a second

  I am moving fast.

  I scatter the crowd

  like a burst of bees exploding

  when you hit their nest

  with a rock.

  Freckle-Face Kelly wipes her face.

  Those little red spots don’t smear

  like you think they should.

  She looks at me.

  Robin looks at me.

  Everyone looks at me.

  Freckle-Face Kelly looks away first.

  I think she wants to be stone, too.

  In one move Robin is under my arm

  kicking

  yelling

  but he can’t sting me.

  You can’t sting stone.

  Weenie Robin fits perfectly

  under the sinks.

  Toll paid.

  He snaps right in

  between the pipes

  like a Lego

  like he was made to fit there.

  He’s way noisier than a Lego, though

  which is why Mrs. Little came

  INTO

  the boys’ bathroom.

  She is obviously

  not a boy.

  She is obviously

  a librarian.

  She is obviously

  mad.

  I am obviously

  in trouble.

  Mr. Hartwick is obviously

  wearing an ugly tie.

  Surprise.

  Mrs. Little isn’t even a teacher

  so why can she send me to Hartwick?

  Life’s mysteries

  abound.

  Suspended.

  A word that can describe medicine.

  The little bits of healthy mold

  suspended

  in pink goo

  so that the kids like the bits enough

  to swallow them.

  Suspended.

  A word that can describe stopping

  like someone hit a pause button and you are

  suspended

  in time and space

  your finger frozen inches from your

  nose.

  Suspended.

  A word that can describe

  me.

  You should have seen Mom’s face

  when she came to pick me up.

  Not red.

  Not purple.

  No forehead veins,

  like Hartwick’s.

  She just smiled really big.

  I’ll deal with him, she said

  and then she laughed

  but I know she wasn’t really laughing.

  Unless something

  was funny

  on her phone.

  DAY 17

  I dreamed about that smile last night

  and woke up

  shivering.

  Mom hasn’t talked to me

  in 24 hours.

  Dad is on call so he’ll be back tomorrow.

  Today is the first day

  of three days

  of not being allowed at school.

  Is this what it means to be dealt with?

  Isn’t this sort of every kid’s dream?

  Missing parents.

  No school.

  Long weekend.

  Is suspension really that big of a deal?

  Paul says yes. It is a big deal.

  But Paul never gets in trouble,

  so how does he know?

  The band is here tonight,

  Petey and his friends

  who all look the same.

  They make sounds kind of like

  the tornado did

  but noisier

  and less memorable.

  Noisier Tornado.

/>   That could be their band name.

  DAY 19

  I guess when you’re suspended you’re supposed to

  think

  about what you’ve done.

  I am supposed to

  think

  shoving Robin under the sinks was

  not cool.

  I am supposed to

  think

  I’ll never do anything like that

  again.

  You know what I really

  think?

  Petey shoves me under the sink

  in the bathroom at home

  All.

  The.

  Time.

  No.

  Big.

  Deal.

  No.

  One.

  Cares.

  DAY 20

  Get this.

  As part of my punishment

  Mom and Dad say Petey can’t drive me

  to school

  anymore.

  If I had known these were the

  severe consequences

  I’d face

  I would have gotten suspended

  a lot

  sooner.

  WEEKEND

  Intervention.

  That’s what Paul called it.

  He’s taking a nighttime college class.

  It’s for nerds who want to be psychiatrists.

  It teaches them words like “intervention.”

  When he said it, I thought he meant for me

  but he meant for Petey.

  He took Petey aside

  while Petey rolled his eyes.

  Paul told him to be a better big brother,

  a better person.

  Paul is the only one who sees Petey

  as he is,

  a King Kong jerk.

  You’d think

  Philip would see the King Kong jerk part, too—

  but Philip is too busy

  with football and girls

  to notice anything

  other than cheerleaders or boobs.

  Paul told Petey to watch it.

  Petey said Watch THIS.

  And then punched a wall.

  Paul rumpled my hair.

  I think my getting suspended bothered Paul

  more than anyone else.

  More than

  me.

  DAY 23

  Well.

  My notebook is not lost.

  Guess who found it?

  Shrimpy Robin.

  His face is like a dog

  with a juicy bone.

  Whatever.

  No one can hear your heart beat fast

  when you are jagged stone.

  Mrs. Little put 50 pounds of books

  in my arms.

  Shelve them, she said.

  Her mouth was tight,

  puckered

  like a cat

  (’s

  butt).

  This is part of the punishment.

  Not just suspension.

  Becoming Mrs. Little’s slave

  for two weeks

  after school.

  So boring

  I might

  die.

  DAY 24

  I did not die.

  But now I might.

  Robin made copies of some pages from my

  notebook.

  COPIES.

  Gave them to everyone.

  EVERYONE.

  Guess who’s going to get to watch his nose

  EXPLODE OFF HIS FACE?

  At least Robin didn’t copy my secret

  about messing up the books.

  And at least he didn’t copy Petey’s crying secret.

  Even with Petey in high school

  he would still find out

  from someone’s big mouth.

  I’m sure of it.

  So now I’m worried

  because Robin knows my secrets.

  And I know he knows.

  And he knows I know he knows.

  And the way his smile curls like the Grinch

  is no good.

  That I know for sure.

  Deep breaths.

  Jagged stone turns to smooth rock.

  Cold rock.

  Rocks don’t die.

  Rocks have no feelings.

  Rocks don’t care.

  Mrs. Little relaxed her cat-butt mouth

  as she made me dust

  the computers.

  Your face is as white as a sheet, Kevin, she said.

  Are you quite well?

  Mrs. Little is from England.

  She hardly ever talks.

  But when she does,

  sometimes she talks with extra words.

  I didn’t say anything

  in case I threw up on the computers

  and then had to clean it.

  So much for being

  cold rock

  that doesn’t care.

  It turns out the problem with

  having been suspended

  is that you are not just on

  thin ice,

  as they say,

  you have been sucked into

  zero tolerance

  which is like

  zero gravity

  except instead of floating in space

  suspended,

  you are pinned against a wall.

  Frozen.

  One misstep

  and you’re done.

  I told Paul about the zero tolerance

  and how I can’t hit Robin

  for making copies of my notebook

  even though Robin could use a swift kick in the butt.

  Paul said it’s my own fault.

  He said Robin is protected from me

  because of me.

  I don’t know what that means

  other than that Paul is annoying.

  DAY 25

  Poetry boy.

  You’d think they could come up with something

  better.

  Poetry boy! Poetry boy!

  Who’s so tough now?

  Poetry boy! Poetry boy!

  Where’s your dress?

  Poetry boy! Poetry boy!

  Harry’s out to get you now.

  Why is poetry boy a bad thing

  when everyone loves the pages I put on the

  walls?

  Isn’t that like poetry, too?

  Messing with sentences to make new ones?

  I’m no boy. I’m an outlaw.

  Peter Pan

  I’m a poetry bandit.

  Maybe I should tell my secret.

  Spill the beans.

  Except what about zero tolerance?

  What about MAJOR CONSEQUENCES, MISTER?

  It’s all so dumb.

  It doesn’t bother me.

  Poetry boy! Poetry boy!

  Whatever.

  Robin is their leader.

  By the way.

  He thinks I’m easy prey

  as he leads the chants

  with his juicy dog-bone face.

  That I can’t hit.

  Anymore.

  DAY 26

  Robin says he’ll tell on me.

  He’ll tell everyone I’m the one

  who puts the marked-up pages on the walls

  and I’ll be in big trouble

  because of the zero tolerance thing.

  But

  He’ll keep my secret safe if I do one thing.

  He wants me to mark up the pages

  and then HE wants to put them on the walls.

  HE wants to be the outlaw.

  The Poetry Bandit.

  Hmph.

  I don’t care.

  I don’t.

  Really.

  I told him he’ll get in trouble.

  He says no he won’t.

  I told him those are my bandit words.

  He says not anymore.

  I said I won’t do it.

  He says he’ll make sure I get in trouble for it, then.
>
  He’ll make sure everyone sees my whole notebook, too.

  All of it.

  I’ll be murdered by Petey

  and then I’ll be expelled.

  This is a problem.

  They all loved it, of course.

  Well, except for the teachers.

  But no one cares about them.

  Now Robin wants me to “discover” him,

  so he can be King of the School for real.

  That made me laugh.

  “King of the School” is not an actual thing.

  (But it would be a good band name.)

  I was just making fun of him.

  Duh.

  DAY 9,342

  It’s not really day 9,342.

  But it feels like it.

  Shelving books.

  Poetry boy.

  Poetry boy.

  Shelving books.

  Poetry boy.

  Poetry boy.

  Shelving books.

  The days don’t even separate anymore.

  It is all just one long

  never

  end

  ing

  day.

  The Cat Stranglers.

  That should be Petey’s band’s name.

  Or Cat Tornadoes

  or Bleeding Ears

  or Bleeding Cat Tornado Ears.

  Something like that.

  I don’t know what they’re doing in there

  but it doesn’t sound like music.

  What they need is a real song,

  real words

  to scream

  in that microphone.

  We hate everybody!

  We hate you!

  We hate everybody!

  Especially you!

  We hate everybody!

  We hate you!

  We hate everybody!