The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier Page A

gave Jerry a glimpse into the hell that was burning inside the teacher. Those moist eyes, the white eyeballs and the diluted blue of his pupils, eyes that reflected everything thatwent on in the class, reacting to everything. After Jerry had learned that the secret of Brother Leon lurked in his eyes, he became watchful, seeing the way the eyes betrayed the teacher at every turn. And then there came a time when Jerry was tired of it all, tired of watching the teacher, disgusted with the contest of wills that wasn’t really a contest because Jerry had no choice. Cruelty sickened Jerry—and the assignment, he realized after a few days, was cruel, even though Archie Costello had insisted that it was only a stunt that everyone would get a kick out of later. And so he had finally waited, impatient for the assignment to come to an end, eager for that silent battle between Brother Leon and himself to be over with. He wanted life to be normal again—football, even his homework, without that daily burden weighing him down. He had felt isolated from the other fellows, separated by the secret he was forced to carry. He’d been tempted once or twice to talk it over with The Goober. In fact, he’d almost done so once when Goob tried to start a conversation. Instead, he’d cautioned himself to hold on for the two weeks, to carry it off, secrecy and all, and be done with it for good. He had met Brother Leon in the corridor late one afternoon after football practice and had seen hate flashing in the teacher’s eyes. More than hate: something sick. Jerry had felt soiled, dirty, as if he should run to confession andbare his soul. And he’d consoled himself: when I accept the chocolates and Brother Leon realizes I was only carrying out a Vigil assignment then everything will be fine again.
    Then why had he called
No
this morning? He’d wanted to end the ordeal—and then that terrible
No
had issued from his mouth.
    In bed once more, Jerry lay without moving, trying to summon sleep. Listening to his father’s snores, he thought of how his father was actually sleeping his life away, sleeping even when he was awake, not really alive. And how about me? What was it the guy on the Common had said the other day, his chin resting on the Volkswagen like some grotesque John the Baptist?
You’re missing a lot of things in the world
.
    He turned over, dismissing his doubts and calling to mind the figure of a girl he’d seen downtown the other day. Her sweater had bulged beautifully, her schoolbooks pressed against her rounded breasts. If my hands were only those books, he’d thought longingly. His hand now curled between his legs, he concentrated on the girl. But for once, it was no good, no good.

CHAPTER
  NINETEEN  
    THE NEXT MORNING Jerry found out how a hangover must feel. His eyes burned with fire, fueled by lack of sleep. His head throbbed with shooting pains. His stomach was sensitive to the slightest movement and the lurching of the bus caused strange reactions in his body. It reminded him of when he was a kid and got carsick sometimes on trips to the beach with his parents so that they’d have to stop the car by the side of the road while Jerry either vomited or waited for the storm in his stomach to subside. What added to his troubles this morning was the possibility of a test in geography and he hadn’t studied at all last night so wrapped up had he been in the chocolate sale and what had happened in Leon’s class. Now, he was paying the penalty for too little sleep and no study—trying to read a lousy geography lesson on a lumbering lurching bus, the morning light dazzling on the white page.
    Somebody slipped into the seat beside him.
    “Hey, Renault, you got guts, know that?”
    Jerry looked up, blinded momentarily as his eyes shifted from the page to the face of the kid who’d spoken to him. He knew him vaguely from school—a junior, maybe. Lighting a cigarette the way all the smokers did despite the “No Smoking”