Little Chicago by Adam Rapp Page B

gets this look in his eye.
    Besides being the sixth-grade Math Skills teacher Mr. Stone is also the wrestling coach and he never lets you forget this fact. He’s always trying to bring wrestling themes into the classroom.
    He’ll say, If Ray Larkin, my guy at a hundred and thirty-five pounds, needs to lose eight pounds to make weight but it’s Districts and the officials are granting a two-pound leeway, what’s the absolute heaviest Ray Larkin can weigh in order to be allowed to wrestle the match?
    Or:
    If Tom Piano has been my heavyweight and he wants to wrestle for me at one sixty-five and he’s been up all night wrapped in plastics trying to sweat off the six pounds he was over at weigh-ins, what’s his actual weight before he puts the plastics on, considering it’s not Districts and there’s only a one-pound leeway?
    It can go on this way for weeks.
    Once when I was leaving class he said, You could be wrestling peewee for us this year, Brown.
    I just stood there like wood.
    He added, There’s nobody light enough to wrestle that weight. You’re a skinny little runt but I’ll bet you’re wiry.
    I thought about wires and imagined breaking a phone and yanking all the guts out.
    Mr. Stone said, It’s a good way to get the girls after you.
    I said, No, thanks.
    Then he added, We’ll make a man of you yet, Brown.
    Today we’re simplifying fractions. Eight tenths down to four fifths. Nine twenty-sevenths to one third. Numerators and denominators.
    I think this would be a good name for a rock band: the Numerators and Denominators.
    While Mr. Stone is at the board simplifying forty-two one-hundred-and-twenty-eighths I take the letter from the kitchen table out of my back pocket and slide it into my Math Skills spiral notebook.
    I use the tip of my pencil to make a slit in the envelope.
    I am careful to use very tiny movements.
    While at the chalkboard Mr. Stone can get very casual. But if he suspects something going on behind him he’ll turn into a secret agent ready to pounce.
    All those wrestler types are good when their backs are turned, I’m convinced of this.
    After I make the slit I slide my thumb into the hole and carefully open the top of the envelope. Inside there is a short letter printed on a scrap of notebook paper.
    Dear Girl,
    It’s hard being apart. Will you come visit me?
    Endlessly, Boy
    PS. Don’t tell your mother I wrote this.
    I wonder if Al Johnson could read my letter from the windshield of that bulldozer.
    I wonder if it’s possible for people to know your thoughts before you think them.
    My face gets so hot it almost stings.
    Suddenly the letter is snatched off my desk.
    I whirl.
    Mr. Stone is holding it over his head.
    What have we here? he says. Are you writing notes during class, Mr. Brown?
    No, I say.
    He says, Perhaps I should share it.
    Don’t, I say.
    Don’t? he says, smiling.
    His teeth are crooked and loose-looking. One of them is long and sharp and this sometimes makes him resemble a wolf with human skin.
    Read it, Chad Orlin says behind me.
    Mr. Stone says, I should, shouldn’t I, Chad.
    Read it, Ellen Hedd says, and laughs.
    Please don’t, I say.
    Through the window you can see the rain freezing.
    I believe in lessons, Mr. Stone says to the class. A lesson taught is a lesson learned.
    Ellen Hedd suddenly laughs.
    I imagine them nude together. He’s turning her nipples like dials.
    Fuck you, I suddenly say to Mr. Stone.
    It barks out of my mouth like a cough.
    Excuse me? Mr. Stone says, his face serious all of a sudden.
    Nobody says a word. You can hear the sleet hitting cars in the parking lot.
    And then I am crying and my face is twitching so much I think it might stick funny.
    That, my friend, is a mistake, Mr. Stone says, handing me the letter back.
    I put it in my pocket and just sit there.
    He adds, That is a very big mistake. I hope you don’t have anything planned after school