Chapter 69

"What is this supposed to be?" Mr. Kincaid asked, interrupting my daydreams about baseball practice that afternoon. It hadn't rained in almost a week, so the field should be perfect.

"My project." Sometimes teachers could be so dense.

"Your project," he said stiffly, "was an abstract art piece on an emotion. This is... is... is almost representational."

My drawing was a guy standing on a hill. He was surrounded by a heart, and the heart was surrounded by a sunburst as the guy stared at a girl on another slightly higher hill. It was supposed to represent my undying love for the girl on the other hill. For once, it didn't take a lot of imagination to see a boy and a girl in the picture.

I don't like to draw or paint, and I ain't good at it. And I really don't want to be.

"That's not a bad thing. Art should be representational."

"No, no, no. This is art," he said pointing to a copy of a Jackson Pollock on the wall. "It's bold, it's evocative, it makes you think."

"That is a guy cleaning his paint brushes on a canvas and laughing all the way to the bank. Pollock, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Picasso, they're all playing this huge joke on the world and laughing 'cause we don't get it."

"I'm afraid you don't get it. You're getting an F on your project and an F in my course."

An F. I'd never had an F. Hell, I'd never had a C.

"No wait." I grabbed a fresh sheet of paper. Tami was working on a painting next to me. I grabbed the brush out of her hand and smeared some paint on the paper before handing it back. It was a dark purple. Then I took a jar or red paint and tipped a little onto the paper letting it run down and through the purple smear.

I showed it to Mr. Kincaid. "I call it Portrait of a Failed Artist Who Pretends to Teach and Criticize."

Mr. Kincaid's face went through almost the entire spectrum. First white, then pink, red, and purple. He opened his mouth to speak several times, then shut it again, before stomping out of the classroom.

I looked at Tami. "Do you think I should sign it Tony, or Sims, or do I need a pen name?"

"I think you went too far this time," she said as she put her brush down.

"I think you need to learn to read a calendar," Robbie said from across the room.

"A calendar?"

She pointed at the one behind the teacher's desk. "It's still February. March doesn't start 'till tomorrow."

"Mr. Sims, I am extremely tired of your attitude. Of your disrespect for this school and it's teachers."

My stomach growled. Parker had kept me sitting outside his office for over an hour. It was lunch time, and I was hungry, though I figured it wasn't the best time to mention it. "Don't forget you. I have no respect for you."

Parker went crimson. "You see what I have to put up with," he said, looking at my mom. Parker had gotten smart. He called Mom before he talked to me. She and I were sitting on one side of the large conference table. Parker and Kincaid on the other. Mr. Mulino and Mrs. Jeffries sat on the side, though they said they were just observing.

"Tony!" Mom said warning.

"Just trying to be helpful," I said with a shrug. "Mr. Parker knows I have no respect for him, though I have to show him respect due to his office."

"Stop helping," Mom instructed. I shrugged again. "What seems to be the problem this time?"

"Just Mr. Parker's continued persecution of me," I answered before he could.

"This is not a persecution, it's a prosecution. Persecution is something completely different." He said with an air of superiority.

"Please don't lecture me on my word choice. I know the difference between persecution and prosecution. In fact I'd be happy to match my vocabulary against yours anytime."

"Tony, Mr. Parker is not persecuting you," Mrs. Jeffries said.

"I wonder how the state board of education would see it. I'm one of the top students of this school..."

"According to who?" Parker asked.

"Well, at the end of the first semester, I was number four in my class academically. That probably puts me in the top ten for the school. I'm involved with two extra curricular sports and all the performing shows. I recently participated in the state-wide play competition and just spent two months helping the middle school gymnastics team. By most people's standards, that would make me one of the top students. What's your criteria?"

"That's not important. Nobody's persecuting you."

"How many times have you suspended me? Or attempted to?"

"Are you saying you didn't deserve it?"

"No, I'm just wondering how even-handed punishment is in this school. I know one student who's been caught smoking three times and hasn't been suspended. Of course, he's a favorite of yours."

"That's a lie!" Parker thundered.

Mom sighed. "I still don't know why we're here."

"Your son said some distasteful things about me," Kincaid accused.

"I did?" I asked in my best surprised innocent voice.

"Don't try to deny it. You know what you said. I have witnesses."

I looked at Mom and shrugged.