Chapter 49

Ms. Bird stared at the strange contraption that Sean was setting up in the biology room. She had lots of students raise all kinds of creatures, but none of them had lived in such a strange habitat. Unable to hold back her curiosity, she asked, “What is that?”

“It is the habitat for my project,” Sean answered. He fiddled with it to make sure that it was still in one piece.

“It looks like what Pablo Piccasi would do if he were to make an abstract structure of an octopus wrestling with a scorpion,” Ms. Bird said. She didn’t think too much of Pablo Piccasi. She figured that he conned women into posing naked for him before discovering that he didn’t have any talent. She had fallen for that trick once.

Sean stepped back and looked at the habitat. He had been trying to find some way to describe it and just hadn’t been able to find the words. He said, “You’re right. It does look a little like that.”

“What are you raising?” Ms. Bird asked. She knew all of the basic things sold in pet stores in the area and everything that grew wild. She just couldn’t imagine what required a habitat like that.

“It is a secret,” Sean answered filling the habitat with water from one of the four five gallon jugs of salt water he had brought to school with him.

“Do you know what you are doing?” Ms. Bird asked. She jumped back when the water started moving through the habitat as if by magic. She couldn’t see any moving parts that would cause it to flow like that.

“Of course not,” Sean answered deciding that whatever was making the water move was powered by salt water like his truck. He muttered, “I should never have let the dwarves make this.”

“What is making the water move around like that?” Ms. Bird answered.

“I have no idea,” Sean answered unable to find any mechanism responsible for it. He finished filling the tank with salt water.

“When are you getting your animals?” Ms. Bird asked.

“I’m going during my library period. I wanted to make sure that I had the habitat set up before getting them from the store,” Sean answered.

“Which pet store are you going to?” Ms. Bird asked hoping to get a hint of what he was going to get. There were only two pet stores in the area and they both carried the normal salt water aquarium stock. She wondered if he was going to try raising a sponge.

Sean laughed at the question and said, “I would never do anything so obvious as to go to a pet store for a project like this.”

“You wouldn’t?” Ms. Bird asked.

“Nope,” Sean answered shaking his head.

Ms. Bird asked, “Why not?”

“Everyone goes to the pet store. What kind of challenge is it to raise a pet? No challenge at all,” Sean said smiling over at Ms. Bird.

“I guess,” Ms. Bird said frowning. A lot of students had their projects die on them.

“I’ll be the first of your students to raise these creatures,” Sean said proudly.

“You don’t say,” Ms. Bird said.

“That’s right. I’m also doing a report,” Sean said.

“Really?” Ms. Bird said. She had never had a student raise a project and do a report for the class.

Nodding his head, Sean said, “I want to make sure that I get an A in this class.”

“Will it be thorough?”

“Oh, I’ve got Mr. Booker ordering hundreds of articles about it. Such an exciting little creature,” Sean said.

“Exciting?” Ms. Bird asked. She had students describe the subjects of their papers as interesting, but never exciting. She tried to think of something that someone would find exciting and came up blank.

“Very. I was on the edge of my seat reading about it.”

“What are you doing your report on?”

Sean leaned over and, in the conspiratorial tone of voice that one might use when passing along a hot stock tip, said, “Sea Cucumbers.”

“You find sea cucumbers exciting?” Ms. Bird asked wondering what Sean considered boring.

“Definitely,” Sean said.

“They aren’t noted for doing much of anything,” Ms. Bird said trying to remember what she could of them. She remembered that they were of the starfish family, but couldn’t remember any specifics.

“They eviscerate and shoot out Cuvierian tubules,” Sean said.

“Remind me what that means again,” Ms. Bird said. She must have missed the class where they covered sea cucumbers when she was in college because she was drawing an absolute blank concerning them now.

“They throw up and shoot tentacles out their ass,” Sean said. He leaned over and whispered, “Believe it or not, it makes them very dangerous.”

“That sounds disgusting,” Ms. Bird commented.

“Quite,” Sean said with a grin. The first bell rang and Sean said, “I must get off to my English class with Mr. Kindle.”

“He teaches history,” Ms. Bird said.

“I’ve got to start remembering that. I keep showing up to class with the wrong book,” Sean said. He packed up his stuff and headed out the door. Looking over his shoulder, he said, “I’ll be back after lunch. I should be able to make it to the Wiggly Pig and buy my project.”

“That’s a grocery store,” Ms. Bird said staring at the door. She noticed Ms. Woodhill walk past with a stack of books in her hands. Shaking her head, she said, “Oh no. She’s handing out poetry books again. I better tell the school nurse to start handing out condoms.”

Sean ran into Sid on the way to class. Looking over at the young man, Sean said, “How’s it going, Sid?”

Anita Huskings was over at her locker juggling her books. Sid managed to tear his eyes away from her long enough to answer, “I’m fine.”

Frowning, Sean asked, “What’s up with Anita?”

“She’s pretty, isn’t she?” Sid asked. He wished that he had enough nerve to go over to her and give her a hand.

“I suppose. Of course, Suzie is prettier,” Sean said looking over at Anita. She was rather well developed in the chest area and had legs that went on forever. He thought the rest of her was a little skinny.

“Anita is gorgeous,” Sid said.

“I guess,” Sean said looking at Sid.

“She’s real smart, too,” Sid said. She wasn’t mathematically inclined, but she did have one of the highest GPAs in school.

“I knew that she was an artist,” Sean said.

“Yeah,” Sid said. He sighed when she grabbed her stuff and left.

“I thought you and Bubbles were an item,” Sean said.

Shaking his head, Sid said, “She’s a nymph. I discovered you can’t have a meaningful relationship with a nymph. There’s just no depth to them.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Sean said.

“I wasn’t the only guy she was letting catch her,” Sid said.

“Oh, that’s horrible,” Sean said.

Sid shrugged his shoulders and said, “That’s okay. I still chase her around on occasion.”

Sean entered his history class and looked around the room to find Suzie seated in her normal place. He waved at Mr. Kindle and asked, “What are you talking about today?”

Mr. Kindle smiled and said, “We’re going to cover a particularly favorite period of history of mine — the hundred year’s war.”

“Let me guess, it was a war that lasted a hundred years,” Sean said.

“No. It was a hundred and sixteen years long,” Mr. Kindle said.

“It makes you think.”

“What makes you think?” Mr. Kindle asked.

“Most people think you should start the day looking forward to all that you have to accomplish and spend the evening thinking about what you’ve done. We start the day off by looking at the past,” Sean said.

“Interesting observation,” Mr. Kindle said.

Sean took his seat next to Suzie and said, “I’ve got to go out for lunch today.”

“Can I go with you?” Suzie asked. She batted her eyes to assure that his answer would be yes.

“Yes,” Sean said automatically. He was unable to deny any request from Suzie that was accompanied by a batting of her eyes. He thought about it for a second and realized that he couldn’t resist any request from Suzie regardless of whether her eyes batted or not.

He settled into his chair. Much to his surprise, he found the hundred year’s war to be totally boring. Usually, he could find something interesting in just about any topic. People did the strangest things and strange actions demanded comment. For a change, he was short of comments.

He opened his text book and stared at it. Doing something that he hadn’t done in a while, he started thinking about how he was going to get some more gold for the next magic gift. The Dwarves had used all of his gold to coat his truck. His money was flying away at an ever increasing rate.

Thoughts about the next gift made him think about his current magic gift. He came to the rather remarkable conclusion that his use of it was rather limited. He could make things move. He could use light things to move heavier things. That’s not to say that he couldn’t accomplish some pretty amazing things with it. After all, he could pull a pretty good sized tree out of the ground.

He could also have things change their shape. So far, the only use that he had found for that was flattening soda cans. He wondered if he could use his magic to make little statues. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a ball bearing. Cupping it in his hand, he ordered it to turn into a little statue of Suzie. The ball bearing turned into a remarkable accurate rendering of Suzie. Unfortunately, the figurine was naked. His eyes got wide on seeing it. He quickly changed it into a Dwarf before anyone had a chance to see it.

He stared at the perfect rendition of Chom thinking that he could really make a lot of money with that use of his talent. He slipped the little statue into his pocket thinking that he’d give it to Chom when he got home. Ideas of what he could to do make larger statues came to mind. With a lightweight plastic, he could make a pretty substantial sized statue and then cover it with metal.

He was still lost in thought when class came to an end. Suzie shook his arm to get his attention and said, “You really paid attention in class today.”

“I was a little distracted. I hope no one noticed,” Sean said.

“Everyone noticed,” Suzie said. Mr. Kindle had called on Sean three times and had given up when Sean hadn’t answered.

Mr. Kindle looked over at Sean and said, “I’m glad to see you’re back among the living. Please pay attention in class. We missed your comments.”

“Sorry,” Sean said.

Mr. Kindle had seen students zone out before, but none of them had been as bad as Sean. He wasn’t sure what to make of that. It was obvious that Sean had been thinking about something and it wasn’t history. He hoped that Sean wasn’t having problems in his life. He knew that a person with such a talented and creative mind would often find peer approval a very difficult thing to achieve.

He asked, “Is there something bothering you?”

“No. I was just thinking about things,” Sean said.

Mr. Kindle said, “If you need someone to talk with, I’m always available.”

“Thanks, Mr. Kindle,” Sean said.

“Let’s get to class before we’re late,” Suzie said.

As they were walking to class, Max came over and said, “You won’t believe who the new assistant football coach is.”

“Ms. Woodhill?”

“How did you know?” Max asked.

“I talked about it with Coach Slaughter,” Sean answered.

“I thought he hated you,” Max said.

Looking around a little nervously, Sean said, “He probably does.”

“This season is going to be a disaster,” Max said thinking about having Ms. Woodhill acting as a coach.

“I don’t think so,” Suzie said.

The trio entered the English class. Smiling, Ms. Woodhill clapped her hands together and said, “Hello, Sean. How’s my favorite student?”

“I’m fine,” Sean answered. He leaned over to Max and said, “She’s such a great teacher.”

“She likes you,” Max said shaking his head. Everyone knew that Ms. Woodhill was a flake. He wondered how she had become the assistant coach for the football team.

Ms. Woodhill looked at Max. The smile on her face instantly disappeared. In a stern voice, she said, “Mr. Baxter.”

“Uh, yes,” Max replied wondering what he had done wrong.

“You had better be ready to bust your balls on the football field this afternoon. Your ass is mine. We’re having a double length practice today.”

“Huh?” Max said staring at Ms. Woodhill in shock. Teachers didn’t use language like that. Only coaches talked like that.