Children Say

1.  Dominique

Lots of people be saying he’s a homo.  One day I flat out asked him.

“Is you gay?” I said.

He said no, but man, you could tell he was probably lying.  Can’t blame him though – I know some cats who would jump him in the hallway if they heard he was gay.  Or maybe wait out in the parking lot after school, in those woods where we go to smoke up, and jump him right before he got in his car.  Bam, bam, bam.  That would be it.  Bust his nose, leave him on the pavement, crying like a bitch.  Man:

That

would

be

something.

Sometimes, I think he’s looking at, you know, my junk.  Always telling me to pull my pants up  But yesterday I could have sworn I seen him looking at Dequanda’s boobs.  The way I know is that I was looking at them too, and then I looked up for a second ‘cause I was getting all hot and I seen that his eyes were looking at the same thing.  I’m like, no way – Mr. Freeman looking at ‘Quanda’s boobs!

Wonder if he seen how the right one is just a little bit bigger than the left.  They lopsided.

2.  Crump

I like to jump on Mr. Freeman.  It’s the best when he’s down the hall a ways and I can run and then – bam – wrap my arms around his shoulders.  He pretends like it isn’t ok, but he likes it.

Just like when we go outside in the afternoons and yell at all the kids and tell ‘em to get on the bus.  One time, I stole the loud-machine from him and yelled:  “Get on the bus you evil children!”  He stole it back from me real quick – he’s the quickest of all the teachers here – but he was smiling when he did it.  He said only teachers, not sixth graders, get to yell in the loud-machine.  But, I know he thinks those kids are evil too, but he can’t say it ‘cause he’s a teacher.

Just like when I told him ‘bout how I got in a fight with Ryan.

That

fat

bastard.

He said, “Crump, it’s not nice to call Ryan fat or that other word.”

I said, “But, he is fat – you’ve got to admit that.”

He didn’t say anything after that.

Mr. Freeman likes me even when I refuse to take my pills.  I don’t like how they make me feel and when I beg my mom not to take them she’ll tell me that it’s ok.  Ms. Sanders, my teacher, always says that she’d like my mom to have to teach me when I don’t take my pill, but we all know that’s silly.  My isn’t a teacher.

But, yeah, Mr. Freeman doesn’t seem to mind when I’m all wild and pulling branches off the trees on the bus lot and jumping on him and grabbing the loud-machine.  One day when I was ‘specially wild, he told me I needed to guard the fire hydrant.  So that’s what I did.  Sat right on top of it and told everyone that came near it to get away.

“Get away you evil children,” I said.  “This is my fire hydrant!”

They laughed.  So did Mr. Freeman.  It was funny.

I’m his favorite, I know it.

3.  Dequanda, Part One

At first, I thought I was his favorite.  He wouldn’t say that, but I knew he was thinking that in the back of his brain.  It’s like, I can just tell.  What do they call it?  A sick sense?  Like when I could tell that Dominique was crushing on me when – well, when I started getting my curves.

I remember the first day I stepped up in his classroom.  Thought, oh hell no, I’m in one of those retard classes.  Tre’von, Anthony, Michael, they was all there and ev’rybody knows they is stupid.  Olympia was there too; she’s not stupid, she just ain’t got no sense.  There’s a difference.

So anyway, I’m looking around and I’m not too happy that I’m in a retard class.  I got mostly D’s in sixth grade, but that’s because the teachers were mean.  I was not expecting this.  So I asked him:

“Is this one of those retard classes?”

You know what he did?  He looked me in the eye and he said no, this was a class for students who needed to be in a small class so they didn’t get distracted.  You know how he is, all proper like he’s in church or something.  Anyway, he said it like he meant it and I believed him that day.

For the first few months, we was cool.  What I liked about him – it’s weird saying this – he wouldn’t let me just, you know, slack or whatever.  All my other teachers, they just yell and roll they eyes when I tell them I forgot my homework or I don’t know how to do the work.  No, not Mr. Freeman.  He would tell me he knew I could do better, that he wanted me to do better, that it was important that I do better.  It was annoying a lot of the times, but I could tell he thought of me something special.

I wasn’t no retard to him.

4.  Michael

Mr. Freeman’s alright.  Lately, on Thursdays, he’s been letting me and Anthony stay with him after school.  He makes us practice reading words – hard words, long words like “thought” and “might” – the kind of words I be too embarrassed to even try in class ‘cause those fools would laugh at me.

Talking trash about how I’m a kindergartner or something.

Reading ain’t my thing even though I’m in seventh grade.  I’m good at basketball though; my mom says I’m gonna get my growth spurt any minute.  Says that by the end of eighth grade, I’mma be bigger than her.

Anyway, after school with Mr. Freeman on Thursdays, it’s just me and Ant, none of them other chaps, so I don’t mind trying hard words.  Mr. Freeman makes us read and we take breaks and we help him clean the room up a bit too.

Mostly, though, we just eat.  He’s got a stash of cookies – got ‘em from the Dollar Store, I can tell – that he keep in his desk.  He tells me and Ant that for every 30 minutes we practice reading, we can have two cookies.  But he doesn’t mean it.  When I beg, he’ll give me as many cookies as I want.  One time, I ate ten.  Went home and threw up.

Last Thursday, we were all done and my mom forgot to pick me up and wasn’t picking up her phone.  We waited for a bit but then Mr. Freeman said he could drive me home.  He’s got a silver car, and I wouldn’t say that it’s tight, but it ain’t broke either.  Anyway, we were driving along and my mind was drifting off – the medicine always starts to wear off right before dinner – and I kept thinking about my mom and my stepdad’s fight from the night ‘fore.

See, he was real angry and neither of them would tell me why.  Had me worried he was goin’ back to jail or my mom was pregnant again.  When I was in bed, I could hear them yellin’.  My mom kept saying she didn’t know where the pound went and he kept saying the pound was worth $300 and they had better motherfu – well, you know – find it.

My mom got me this pocket dictionary for my birthday because I can’t spell words, so that next morning I looked up pound. First thing come up was this:

pound

n.

1. Abbr. lb.

a. A unit of weight equal to 16 ounces (453.592 grams).

Now, I was thinking there was no way they would be mad if my mom lost a pound, you know, of her body  – she’s no thin woman, ‘specially since she had Ray – so, this couldn’t be the right definition.  Then, I was thinking that a pound is a place where they put dogs who don’t have homes, but my mom couldn’t have lost a dog pound.  We don’t even have a dog.  Been wanting a rottweiler.

Sitting in the car, I was thinking Mr. Freeman is a smart man and he would know what they were fighting about.

“What’s a pound?”  I said.

He did that thing where he scrunched his eyebrows and his dorky glasses – sorry, they is dorky – moved up and then down his nose.  “A pound, as in, weight?” he asked.

“Well, I don’t know.  See, my mom and stepdad were fighting last night, and they kept talking about how she lost some pound, and how it was worth $300.  They were really worried like this pound was real important.”

“Hmm…I don’t know Michael, that’s weird,” he said.  But, thing is – I know he was lying.  That’s the thing, Mr. Freeman lies sometimes, not ‘bout big stuff, but he’s a real bad liar.  I can’t really explain why, but you can just tell when the man is lying.

You can tell he ain’t ever been in the streets.

“Aw, come on, Mr. Freeman…tell me,” I said.  I figured if I begged him like I do for the cookies, he would tell me – he always caves.

“You should look it up in your pocket dictionary,” he said.  He loves that thing.

I told him I already had, told him my thoughts ‘bout the dog pound, all that.  I begged him to tell me, even told him that I knew that he knew.  Begged him real hard.  You know what?  He never did tell me.  Weird.

5. Dequanda, Part Two

Don’t think he ever figured out where all the Kleenex went.

See, middle of the year I started getting my curves.  Real fast.  But, problem was, one of them was a little bit bigger than the other.  I asked my mom about that, thinking I needed to get some implants or something and she said it was normal, but I don’t give a fuck about normal when I be looking like that.

I heard people were talking ‘bout my curves, too, and usually I like them to keep my name out their mouth, but I figured if it was my curves they were gonna talk about, that was ok.  But, then I got worried that someone would notice, you know, the difference, and I started freaking out.

I could  not

be the girl

with the lopsided boobs.

Believe that.  Anyway, most mornings before school, I would remember to stuff my bra with Kleenex from home, get them looking all right, but sometimes I would forget.  I am not right in the morning, I tell you that.

So, sometimes I would show up at school and I would be like, damn, I forgot.  So, when Mr. Freeman was in the boy’s bathroom yelling at them boys to get to class, I would grab ‘bout five or six Kleenex from his desk real quick and head to the bathroom.  Correct  myself.

He’d always real mad at me when I came back in ‘cause it would usually take a couple minutes.  He’d always say something about how it was important to get to class on time, that he’d seen me in the hallway, shit like that.  It kind of hurt that he was mad at me, but I didn’t have no choice.  Not like I could tell him what I was doing and not like I could just sit through class looking the way I was.

6. Him

One of these days I am just going to go off.  Ma says I can’t be hitting no teachers, but I don’t care.  Would love to see my fist hit his nose.  I think about that a lot during class, just shut off his yabbering and put that picture in my mind.

His nose.

My fist.

Blood.

The thing I can’t stand ‘bout Mr. Freeman is he pretends he cares one day and then backstabs you the next.  I remember at the beginning of the year when I was acting a fool and he called my Ma and told her he thought I was real smart, but I wouldn’t do well if I couldn’t get control of my behavior in class.

Control my behavior. Like my behavior is something I want to control.  I’m the baddest kid at Ransom and everybody knows that.  I’m not the baddest because I can’t help myself, I’m the baddest because that’s how I want to be.

Anyway, that night Mr. Freeman called, Ma told me she thought he sounded like a nice man; he might actually want to help me.  My Ma went to Ransom too and she know that place is a fucking hell hole.  I swear I could learn more if I just stayed home, smoked some dope and watched Springer and Maury.  Eat some cheeto’s.

So, the next day I go to class thinking he’s on my side; I’m sitting in my seat all nice and he tells us we’re learning about memory.  Goes on about how we’re all going to call each other by nicknames to prove some shit about how if you say something enough, you will remember it.  He tells us that we get to choose our own nicknames.  Everyone says their nickname – stupid shit like Tre Money and King – and finally it gets to me.

“Purple Haze,” I say.

You should have seen his face.  He’s so easy to get mad.  Man gets mad over the littlest thing.  One time, I swear he ‘bout had a heart attack when I took a pencil from the drawer in his desk.  Talking some shit about how that’s theft.  I told him if I was going to steal anything, it would be his wallet, which I knew was brown leather and he kept in his file cabinet, second drawer from the top.  Just needed to borrow a pencil to do some of the damn work he wanted.

Anyway, I say “Purple Haze” and then he goes on about how he knows what that means and how I need to pick another name.  I’m thinking it’s funny that he knows what weed is; man looks like he’s never even had a sip of alcohol in his life.

“What does ‘Purple Haze’ mean?” I say, smiling, acting all innocent.

He gets real red.  “It isn’t appropriate for this classroom,” he says.  He’s always using words like “appropriate,” breaking them up all choppy.

A

pro

pri

it

“I don’t know what it means,” I say.  “And, you told us we got to pick our names.  Now you’re telling me we don’t?  You a liar.”  At this point, all the guys are with me; they calling him a liar too.  He’s getting real red.  I know I’m white too, but I never get that red.  It’s so funny, for real.

Then, he comes over, puts his hand on my desk and leans over, giving me that “I’m serious face.”  Well, that’s when I went off.  Don’t like no man getting all close to me like that ‘cause of those things that happened with my dad, so I get up out of the chair and head to the door.

“If you walk out, I’m writing you up,” he says as I open the door.  Like I give a fuck ‘bout being written up.  I been suspended so many times from this place, I done lost count.  Vacation I call it.

Don’t really remember what I said next, but you can bet there were some cuss words.  Might have called him a cracker fag, something like that.  I hope it was good.  Anyway, the point is, I seen the referral he wrote, and he wrote “Student verbally threatened teacher.”  Now, that shit is a damn lie.  I may think about punching him all the time, but you better believe I never said I would do it.  Well, not that day at least.

Yup, that’s the thing I can’t stand about Mr. Freeman.  Calling home one night saying to my Ma that I’m all smart and shit; lying on me the next.

7. Anthony

Everyone else think I dumb.

I told Mr. Freeman when I am in the NFL I’mma do two things.

1. Buy my mom a house.
2. Buy him a house.

He told me I had to pass high school first.  I guess that why he say I can stay late on Thursdays.  Get my reading up so I can pass high school, go to the NFL, buy him a house.

His house won’t be big as hers.  She my mom and all.  He should get a nice one though.  At least a two car garage or something.

8. Quanique

Fuck yeah, I threw that pencil at him.  I don’t care what kind of dollars it is; I ain’t paying 7 dollars for no fuckin’ pencil.  7 dollars.  I mean come on.

Anyway, I threw the pencil at him and he’s starts going off, saying “’Nique, the pencil is free.”  Free? How is it free if it’s 7 dollars?  “It’s Freeman Store money,” he says, “fake money that you earn by doing good.  I bought the pencil using real money so that you could use fake money to get it and use it during class because you never bring a pencil to class.”  He’s saying this real uppity-like, like he offended I won’t buy his pencil.

“Well, I still ain’t paying 7 dollars,” I say.  My mama didn’t raise no fool.  He crazy if he bought that pencil for 7 dollars.

And that was that.

9.  Dequanda, Part Three

I was his favorite, and then I was his not-favorite.

The last day of school it was real, real, real hot.  The heat was broke.  Now, I don’t know ‘bout you, but I am a bitch when it is hot.  Like my mind can’t get a hold of itself or something.  But this day, I was a bitch and I was happy – summer was starting – so it was this weird feeling.  Hot and happy.

Anyway, ‘cause it was so hot and they was all worried about fights hap’ning we had to stay in our first block class all day – Mr. Freeman.  I was not happy ‘bout that ‘cause that was my class with all those retards, and Dominique too, and we had broken up that week.

For the

third

time.

So, I’ll admit, I was being a bit – how would Mr. Freeman put it – difficult. Was telling him he needed to do something ‘bout the heat.  Got a little mad when everyone voted for the movie I didn’t want to see.  When we was walking to lunch in our line, I just walked real fast and ‘head of ev’rybody, which Mr. Freeman just hates.  During lunch, I may have said a few F words, but he shouldn’t have been listening.

Anyway, on the way home from lunch he told me that he was going to send me home if I broke anymore rules.

I said, “You can’t send me home; it’s the last day.”  How he gon’ send me home?  Yeah right.  I thought he was joking.  I got up in his face a little bit, I’ll admit that, but, you’ve got to remember, it was hot.

He gets this calm look on his face.  He says, “Dequanda, I can surely send you home.”  All serious like and mean.  Please, I’m thinking, Mr. Freeman ain’t gonna send me home on the last day of school. That’s when I walked away and just waited at the door for ev’ryone to come back from lunch.

When they got back, he told me to pack up.  Told me he had called my mom on his cell phone and told her that I couldn’t handle myself and that someone needed to come pick me up.

I started to cry.  Don’t know why.  Probably because it was hot, but also maybe, well maybe just a little, because I was thinking ‘bout in the beginning of the year how I had thought I had been his favorite – someone’s favorite – and how much had changed.  But, mostly because I was hot.

“If you send me home, I’m not going to come visit you next year,” I said to him.  “I’m never going to talk to you again.”

You know what he said?

“And this would be a punishment how?”

It hurt then, but I laughed about it the next week.  It was the first time I’d ever heard Mr. Freeman tell it like it is, dish it.  Maybe he learned something from us too.

10. Malik

Sometimes, I wonder what his house is like.  Figure it has to be real nice since he’s so particular ‘bout how the classroom is.  He’s funny like that.  Doesn’t like anything to be on the floor, hates it when people write their names on the desk.  Says it’s vandalism.

Still don’t know what that means.

Sometimes, I wonder what it would be like to live with him.  He says he’s a vege-something; don’t eat no meat.  Now, I don’t know how he stay alive, but I guess I could give that a try.  I bet his house is real quiet and peaceful like.  If I lived with him, he could help me with my homework every night.  But then people would say that my grades aren’t fair and all, seeing as how I’m living with the teacher.  I guess we could work all that out.

One time, when I was sleepy and a little teary in class, he told me I could talk to him ‘bout everything.  I almost told him.  Almost told him everything.  Said to myself that I was going to tell him everything – that stuff ‘bout my Dad being home after being locked-up and how things haven’t changed between him and my mom, that stuff ‘bout how I hear her crying at night – yup, I was going to tell him everything right after class.

Was gonna go up to him and say, “Mr. Freeman, I need to talk you.”  He would tell me to go to his office in the back of the class and then I would:

Tell

him

everything.

But, the bell rang and he was too busy telling Cleonna he was gonna call her mama that night ‘cause she didn’t do no work – didn’t even write her name – on the quiz.  So I didn’t tell him.

Bet his house is real nice, even if it don’t got no meat.