Read There’s A Boy in the Girl’s Bathroom Online

Authors: Louis Sachar

There’s A Boy in the Girl’s Bathroom (7 page)

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“What do you want to play?” asked Ronnie.

“Anything but basketball,” said Bartholomew. “I hate basketball.”

“Basketball is a stupid game,” Ronnie agreed.

“It’s the worst game in the world,” said the hippopotamus.

“Why would anybody want to play
basketball?”
laughed the ivory donkey.

All the other animals laughed too.

19
.

Everything returned to normal.

Bradley scribbled, cut up bits of paper, and taped things together. He hated everyone and everyone hated him. That was the way he liked it.

He shuddered whenever he remembered that he actually had almost done his
homework
. He couldn’t imagine anything more horrible than that!

And he was glad Jeff wasn’t his friend anymore. He realized he was better off without friends. In fact, he never was friends with Jeff! I
was just pretending to be his friend
.

He decided he’d never pretend to be anybody’s friend again.

Jeff was normal now too. That was what he told Carla. He walked into her office and announced, “I don’t need any help anymore. I have eight friends now. We play basketball every recess and lunch, and I’m the best player.”

“Good for you, Jeff,” said Carla. “I’m very proud of you.”

“How many friends have you made?” he asked.

“I don’t keep score,” said Carla.

“I’ve made eight,” said Jeff.

“I’ve always considered quality to be more important than quantity when it comes to friendship,” said Carla.

“Eight,” Jeff repeated. “And I’m not friends with Bradley anymore either.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Why? I’m not. I hate him. In fact”—he looked around the room—“I gave him a black eye!” He quickly glanced at Carla to see if she knew he was lying, then looked away.

“What happened?” Carla asked.

“Oh, you know, he wouldn’t stop bothering me. I kept telling him to get lost, but he kept hanging around. I never liked him. No one does. Then he said to me, ‘Give me a dollar or I’ll spit on you!’ Well, no one threatens me and gets away with it! I don’t take that from nobody. So he tried to hit me, but I ducked, then punched his face in. I didn’t want to do it, but I had no choice.”

That was the short version. Jeff had told that same story to his eight new friends, but he usually made it much longer.

“So I don’t think I need to see a counselor anymore,” he said, “since I have eight friends.”

“Okay, Jeff, if that’s how you feel,” said Carla.

“They might think I’m weird or something,” he explained.

“Well, we can’t have them thinking that.”

“Does that mean I can go?”

Carla nodded. “But anytime you want to talk again, please feel free to come and see me.” She smiled. “Even if you just feel like getting out of class for a while.”

He left, glad to be out of there.

On his way back to class, he walked past the girls’ bathroom. He stopped, shook his head, and chuckled to himself. It seemed like it was such a long time ago when he accidentally went in there.
I used to be such a jerk
, he thought.

He smiled a strange smile. He stretched his mouth so wide, it was hard to tell whether it was a smile or a frown.

20
.

Colleen walked into Carla’s office.

“I just came to tell you I can’t talk to you,” she said.

“Your parents didn’t sign the form?”

“No, and they won’t either! You know what they said? They said it was a waste of money for the school to hire you. They said you should get married and have your own children before you start telling other parents how they should raise theirs.”

Carla shrugged.

“They said if I have any problems I should talk to them. But when I try to talk to them, they don’t listen.” She sighed. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. Jeff has lots of other friends now besides Bradley.”

“Eight,” said Carla with a smile.

“So now I can invite Jeff to my birthday party without having to invite Bradley. I can invite one of Jeff’s other friends. Andy’s nice. I couldn’t invite Bradley even if I wanted to, because Melinda is my best friend, except for Lori, and she gave Bradley a black eye.”

Colleen quickly covered her mouth with her hand, then slowly took it away. “That was supposed to be a secret,” she said. “Melinda doesn’t want anybody to know.”

“I never repeat anything anyone tells me,” Carla assured her.

“Good,” said Colleen. “Melinda would kill me.”

“Have you asked Jeff to your party yet?”

“No, not yet, but I will. I know he likes me because he always says hello to me when I say hello to him. But then I always get so scared. I never know what to say next. I wish you could help me. Why did my parents say such bad things about you? They don’t even know you.”

“Your parents are just trying to do what’s best for you,” said Carla. “A lot of people think counselors don’t belong in schools.” She shrugged. “I guess they’re afraid I might fill your head with all kinds of crazy ideas.”

21
.

“Hello, Bradley,” said Carla. “It’s a pleasure to see you today. I appreciate your coming to see me.” She held out her hand.

“I punched myself in the eye,” he said as he walked past her. He didn’t want her thinking someone else gave it to him. “I’m the only one who can beat me up.”

“Did it hurt?” she asked.

“No,” he said, sitting at the round table. “Nobody can hurt me. Not even me.”

She sat across from him. She was wearing a light blue shirt with yellow mice running all over it. The shirt was the same color as her eyes. The mice were the same color as her hair.

“I wanted to hit somebody,” he explained as he stared at her shirt. “But if I hit another kid, I would have gotten in trouble, so I hit myself.”

“Why’d you want to hit somebody?”

“Because I hate him.”

“Who?”

“Everybody.”

“Is that why you hit yourself? Do you hate yourself?”

He didn’t answer. He thought it was another one of her trick questions.

“Do you like yourself?” she asked.

He didn’t trust that question either.

“Maybe the reason you say you don’t like anybody else is because you really don’t like yourself.”

“I like myself,” he said. “You’re the one I don’t like!”

“Tell me some things about yourself that you like.”

He glared at her.

“I like you,” she said. “I think you have lots of good qualities. But I want you to tell me things you like about yourself.”

“I can’t talk anymore,” he said.

“Why not?”

“I’m sick. The doctor said I can’t talk. The more I talk, the sicker I get.”

“That sounds serious.”

“It is! I’ve probably said too much already, and it’s your fault. I’ll probably throw up.”

Carla nodded. “Don’t say another word,” she said quietly. “We’ll just sit together in silence. Sometimes people can learn a lot about each other just by sitting together in silence.” She locked her mouth shut, then opened it to swallow the key.

“You’re weird,” said Bradley.

“A lot of people tell me that,” she admitted, then put her finger to her lips.

They sat together in silence. Bradley shifted in his chair. His eyes darted restlessly around the room. He put his hands behind his head and leaned back, then brought his hands out in front of him and folded them. Then he unfolded them.

He didn’t like sitting together in silence. He thought she was probably learning too much about him. “I can probably talk a little bit,” he said.

“No, I don’t want you to get sick,” said Carla. “I like you too much.”

“The doctor says I’m supposed to talk a little, just not a lot.”

“All right. Shall we talk about school?”

“No! The doctor says if I talk about school, I’ll die!”

Carla frowned. “That’s a problem,” she said. “See, as part of my job, I’m supposed to help you do better in school. But how can I help you if we can’t even talk about it?”

Bradley put his fingers to his chin and thought it over. “I know!” he said. “Just tell everybody that you tried to help me, but I wouldn’t let you. Tell them that I was too mean and nasty. That’s it. Tell them I said I’d spit on you.”

“Oh no, I couldn’t say that about you,” said Carla. “You’re too nice.”

“They’ll believe you,” he assured her.

“It doesn’t matter whether they believe me or not,” said Carla. “I’d know it was a lie.”

“So?”

“So when you tell a lie, the only person you’re lying to is yourself.”

He didn’t see anything wrong with that. If you’re only lying to yourself, and you know it’s a lie, then it doesn’t matter.

“I just wish I knew why a smart kid like you keeps failing.”

“It’s because Mrs. Ebbel doesn’t like me,” said Bradley.

“Shh!” said Carla. “Don’t talk about it!”

“Well, I can probably talk about school a little bit without dying,” he said.

“O-kay,” Carla said hesitatingly, “but as soon as you feel even a little bit like dying, let me know and we’ll stop.”

They talked about school for about fifteen minutes before Bradley felt like dying. Carla pointed out that the same questions that were on the tests were also on his homework assignments. She suggested that if he did his homework, the tests might be easy for him.

“The tests
are
easy,” he told her. “I could get a hundred if I wanted. I’m the oldest kid in the class. I answer all the questions wrong on purpose.”

“You want to know what I think?” asked Carla. “I think you would like to get good grades. I think that the only reason you say you want to fail is because you’re afraid to try. You’re afraid that even if you try, you’ll still fail.”

“I’m not afraid of anything,” said Bradley.

“I think you’re afraid of yourself,” said Carla. “But you shouldn’t be. I have lots of confidence in you, Bradley. I know you’d do so well, if only you’d try. I can help you. We can help each other. We can try together.”

It was then that he told her he couldn’t talk about school anymore or else he’d die.

She thanked him for talking about it as much as he
had. “You were very brave,” she said. She suggested that for their next meeting he make a list of topics to discuss so that they wouldn’t have to risk talking about school again.

“Is that homework?” he asked.

“No-o-o,” she assured him. “You don’t even have to put your name at the top.”

“Good,” said Bradley. He was glad it wasn’t homework.

It was time to return to class. “Thank you for sharing so much with me today,” Carla said to him. “I enjoyed your visit very much.” She held out her hand.

He stuck his hands in his pockets and walked out of her office.

22
.

All week Bradley worked on his list of topics to discuss with Carla.
It’s not homework
, he kept telling himself.
In fact, it’s the opposite of homework! Because if I think of some good topics, then we won’t have to talk about homework
.

He didn’t scribble during class. He listened closely to what Mrs. Ebbel and the other kids said in order to get ideas for his list. He took it with him wherever he went. At recess, he kept his eyes and ears open, constantly on the lookout for a new topic.

The other kids were meaner to him than they’d ever been before. They were no longer afraid of him. They called him names, and when he didn’t do anything about it, they called him more names.

A fourth-grade boy who wanted to show off to his friends ran up to him and said, “You’re not even human! You’re a monster! You’re a monster from outer space!”

The boy ran away, but Bradley didn’t chase him. He added three new topics to his list: Humans, Monsters, and Outer Space.

Monday was Halloween. Most of the kids brought costumes, which they were allowed to put on at lunch. Brian, one of Jeff’s friends, didn’t bring a costume. So he borrowed a black Magic Marker from Mrs. Ebbel and colored a circle around one eye.
When he came back from lunch, he told everyone he was a Bradley Chalkers.

While everyone laughed, Bradley busily worked on his list. It covered both sides of three sheets of paper.