“Then the kid’s head popped off, and the mom went crazy, she tried stapling it, but it didn’t stay on, so then she tried sewing it back on.” Eddie widened his bulgy eyes for added effect. “Eww.” The gathered boys responded. “It’s all true.” “Is not!” “Is too!” “Is not!” “Uh huh!” The recess bell rang sending all the kids back to their respective lines in front of the teacher’s aids.

Seemeuller’s mouth worked quietly as he intently illustrated the gruesome war scene – Boom! Psck! Psck! – machine guns rattled, guts hung out of tiny stick warriors, tanks  loaded down with outrageous numbers, and calibers of cannon rolled over entire platoons, turning them to bloody mush. A single engine world war two-era fighter dove into the picture, spitting a dashed line of tracer fire into the armor. It exploded, the bits of tank flying in all directions, pieces of twisted metal meticulously added to the ragged star- shaped explosion, this element of realism he just learned how to draw, it thrilled him. Another stick soldier armed with a bazooka takes aim at the plane – Fwoosh! – “Waaaaa!” down goes the plane…

“Mr. Seemueller, are you quite finished with your sound effects?” Miss Cardin gave him a withering look. “If you could tear yourself away from your art for a little while, I’d like to continue this lesson.” Matt Seemueller’s face erupted in redness and a half smile played on his face as he pushed his drawing under his arm. The students laughed loudly.     He had been disinterested in the Word Book ever since the first week when he had excitedly raised his hand when Miss Cardin, after passing out the books, had asked what it said on the book’s cover. “Yes.” She had directed her gaze at him. “World book!” he had enthusiastically shouted. The book’s cover had misled him, it had a patchwork of multi-colored, mappish-looking, almost state shapes all over it. “No.” Miss Cardin’s eyes drifted across the room “Anyone else?” Oh, oh, it was obvious now. The book would not contain, battles, pyramids, mega-fauna, black-skinned African natives with amazingly developed lips, or stories of ships on the high seas. It would be about words not worlds.
Miss Cardin turned back to the blackboard and …Seemueller drifted watching her hips shake as she reached the chalk across the slate surface, the scritch-scratch sound of the chalk hitting the board, the chalk dust on her dress and shoes, her frazzled hair – Seemueller pictured her in the monster movie he saw just this past Saturday on the Creature Double Feature. Her smooth features distorted into an arm-flung scream as the tentacled beast wrapped her up and drew her flailing toward it’s chomping, and disgusting mouth. He flipped his war paper over, and began to illustrate the scene, thick juicy legs, her shoes flying. He worked his extra-thick pencil over the bit of newsprint math paper. The huge teeth of the beast, moments away from biting her head off, and Seemueller’s heart sending his blood racing. He looked up again to watch Miss Cardin’s big behind as she shook it and wrote a lesson about “i”s and “e”s. “Chomp!” he said softly as he drew the beast now enjoying her as a meal. “EEEEK!”

“Mr. Seemueller!” The students all laughed roaringly this time. Seemueller sunk his face down to his paper and wanted to cry with frustration. “Go to the office.” Miss Cardin said handing him a specially penned note just for the occasion. The faces of his classmates full of glee, belittling him, making him feel trapped. Sensing the lack of escape, he got up feeling the slow motion of the concentration of the moment – took the note from Miss Cardin’s chalky hand, noting her nail polish, quickly meeting her eyes, and looking away, and slowly heading out into the huge white hall, his head spinning.

Eddie had shown Seemueller a cool game. Each of the boys meticulously drew an army on the side of a sheet of paper, and then took turns scratching a pencil line as fast as he could across from his guys to Eddie’s guys. Scritch! and Seemueller’s cannon takes out a line of infantry guys. Eddie’s turn, scritch! The black pencil line runs right through a tank. Seemueller’s turn, scritch! Eddie’s turn, scritch! Faster now, and with less control, the pencil running through piles of stickman infantry. Then, an accounting must be made, the survivors are added up and compared. Seemueller kept the sheet in his pocket, and now took it out, and studied it while waiting in Mr. Deluca’s office. Mr. Deluca had a photograph of an erupting volcano on the wall of his waiting room. Seemueller’s eyes lit on it and he slowly rose to study it more carefully. The lights glowing in a festive splash, as if the hot molten rock were being spit out of the ground by an unseen sprinkler, caused him endless wonder. How had the picture been taken, it seemed any photographer would be too close? Where was this volcano? Was it nearby? Is it still erupting? Can we go see it?

“Mr. Seemueller.” Mr. Deluca said softly, but in his usual bass tone. Seemueller leapt out of his skin, and spun around. “We need to talk, come on in.” In the office the boy was directed to sit on a plush bench, while the principal sat behind his dark desk. “It seems you won’t stop making noises while Miss Cardin is teaching.” “I’m sorry.” Seemueller said softly staring at Mr. Deluca’s huge black glasses which somewhat obscured his eyes. “I’m not the one you need to apologize to.” “Oh.” Seemueller nodded seeing the logic of this. “Can I count on you to be quiet while Miss Cardin is teaching?” Seemueller nodded vigorously. “What’s in your hand?” Seemueller looked down at his unfolded war drawing with all the battle lines scratched across it. “Nothing.” “Well it’s not nothing, it’s something isn’t it?” Seemueller nodded seeing the logic of this too. Everything is something after all. But, what about the volcano, he wanted to ask. And what about that picture behind your head, and Eddie said you have a stuffed bat in here, where is it? Seemueller’s eyes lit on a family picture, then danced off and touched down on a small brightly lit aquarium with some reddish colored fish in it, then bounced off that and watched Mr. Deluca’s fat nose wobble as he spoke. “Now, Matthew,” Mr. Deluca switched casually to Seemueller’s given name, ” I need you to go back to class and pay attention, and try not to be disruptive, ok? I’m counting on you, will you give me your word?” “Yes.” Seemueller nodded.   Mr. Deluca did not call his parents. Miss Cardin did not hold a grudge. The students rapidly forgot his shame.

On his bicycle Seemueller flew. At the end of the day, shoving all papers and books back into the hollow of the desk, and rushing to the coat hooks grabbing his jacket, and looking over his shoulder to see Miss Cardin erasing the board, he escaped mingling with the hoards of students. The bus ride home an interminable waste of stopping, and going, and watching the students dwindle down, all of them noisy and jumpy. Finally, it’s his stop and finally he can do as he pleases. He takes his Huffy down the trail and into the forest, along side the tiny creek where he stages plastic army battles lying on his belly while mosquitoes bite him, he arranges the troops. Curse this crappy set of army guys, there’s too many radiomen. But no matter, they fall over as he flings his handfuls of gravel at them, scooped from the water. “Waaa!” he cried, hurling a mud-bomb and splashing across the creek to study a skunk cabbage, and crush its leaves to smell the fragrant smell. He had found a very good stick for this job and was using to bash in almost all the soft plants.

“Matthew!” he heard his mother call from the front door of the home. “Dinner time! And you had better not be filthy!” Seemueller looked down at himself in desperate surprise, he was indeed filthy, and soaking wet. As he was nearly every day, and nearly every day he was asked not to get filthy and soaking wet. Just then, a spotted sun turtle paddled down the rivulet, passing him in leisurely style. He bounded after it, his feet sinking in sucking muck, his mind sparkling with the discovery of this living creature. He couldn’t reach it though, not without really getting sopping wet. In his hesitation the turtle managed to escape him, this time.

“You can go up to Phones’ pond and catch electric eels.” “There’s no electric eels in Phones’.” “Is too!” “Is not”. Eddie argued with Peter, while the boys walked back and forth on the seesaws tipping them in the middle, and walking to the end only to turn around and do the same the other direction, just as they were not allowed to do. “I don’t know about eels, but my uncle said there’s bears out by the ice house pond. He said he saw one, and it was big!” “There’s no bears here.” “He said!” “I saw a turtle.” Seemueller added carefully. The boys turned toward him with incredulous looks. “How big?” asked Todd. Seemueller raised his hands exaggerating the size just a little. “That’s nothing! My dad said he used to stand on the backs of alligator snapping turtles and ride them …” The bell ending recess rang, sending the boys scampering to their lines racing one another for position.

The pressure was off Seemueller today as Allen was getting into some trouble for picking on the girls. Allen pinched them, and sometimes punched them, and they made a lot of noise about it. Seemueller lowered his head and rested his chin on his arm as he carefully drew an ultimate war machine. Huge knobby tires, chain flails, flame throwers, grinding mechanisms, spitting mechanisms, running on human flesh, lubricated with human blood, nazi swastikas plastered all over it, skulls and crossbones, flags with stars, cannons, machine guns, impenetrable armor… and more – the machine grew on his paper as he dreamed up ever more outrageous equipment to add to it, studied it, and found a place to add more. Once again his lips began to move, as he imagined the engines – oh the stacks! He drew on the fat pipes that would stick out the back of the motorized behemoth spewing gobs of black smoke as it trekked across the desolate battlefields. Then, he paused, and looked up to make sure he had not been found out. Everything was situation normal, Miss Cardin in her blue dress, scratching at the board, collecting chalk dust, the girls on their side of the room scowling at Allen, Allen swinging his legs with excess energy, Hugh, the fat kid, hording his food in his desk. The peace sign on the wall, the number line, the alphabet. Seemueller allowed his gaze to take it all in, adding a look out the window, and a second look at the clock, and back to his machine.

“If you sin, you go to hell, unless you get your sins cleared by a priest.” “What are you talking about? What’s a sin?” “A sin is a black mark on your soul.” Eddie the alter boy was laying out the Catholic for the rest of the boys. “What’s a soul?” “Dumbass, a soul is like your inner spirit.” “I knew that, I just meant like, how do I know these black marks are there?” “Oh they’re there, alright you can count on that!” “Everyone has sin.” “We all sin, that’s why Jesus died for us.”  “Jesus died for us so we can all go to heaven.” “Yeah, that’s right.” “My dad said you Catholics are idiots.” “My dad said your whole family stinks.” Eddie shoved Todd. “Oh yeah?” “Yeah!” “The Lebruns stink. He said.”   The recess bell rang, and everyone lined up in time to see Allen kick Rosie in the shins. Rosie went down to the tar crying and clutching her shin, her little purple skirt up around her hips, showing her skinny kid legs. Mrs. Scott grabbed him and hauled him into the building. The students all stared silently at the sobbing girl, and then started chatting again, forgetting her. But, stopping to watch again as the nurse came out and helped Rosie into the building.

The next day, Seemeuller found a puff-ball mushroom. It was the size of a football, and without hesitating he pulled it from the lawn, and marched it straight to school, where he presented it to Miss Cardin. Beaming with pride over his find, and the attention it was garnering he asked if he could show it to Mr. Deluca. Instead, Miss Cardin called Mr. Deluca on the intercom, and it was agreed that he would come later in the day to examine the specimen. The boys poked at the pitted skin of the fat fungus. “Woah.”

All day, Seemeuller looked from his mushroom, to the clock. He ate his peanut butter and jelly absently at lunch. He listened to Eddie tell stories about two foot long mashed pennies left on the train tracks. He saw Allen kick another girl. Finally, it was time for Mr. Deluca to come and talk about the mushroom. But where was he? Seemueller watched the mushroom and imagined what would be inside. He saw himself on the cover of the newspaper holding it under his arm, “Boy Finds Record Mushroom”.

Suddenly, Mr. Deluca arrived. “Oh good,” Miss Cardin said “I’ve been worried about it growing legs and teeth!” She joked. Seemueller glanced at her, and back at Mr. Deluca. Teeth?  Mr. Deluca picked up the mushroom and placed it on a desk at the front of the room, and began a discussion about fungus. “This is a fruting body of a fungus,” Mr. Deluca exclaimed, as he spoke he jammed a hand into the flesh and tore the football in half. The white flesh exposed, the class sighed a kind of disappointment. “what you see here are the millions of spores that will be produced when the mushroom matures.” A little girl’s hand went up. “Yes.” Deluca asks. “Can you eat it?” “I don’t think so.” Mr. Deluca said, unsure, but not wanting to give kids the idea that they should go eat wild mushrooms. Another hand went up. “Yes.” “Um, well, one time I was walking with my dad in the woods, and we saw a bear.” “Well, how about that.” Mr. Deluca began dusting his hands off, and walking toward the classroom sink to wash. Another hand went up. “Yes.” “I saw a snake one time.” “Be careful with snakes they can bite sometimes, you should just let them go on their way.” “My daddy killed it.” Mr. Deluca looked a bit tired. His horn- rimmed glasses gave his eyes a very far away look.

Seemueller shot up his hand. “Yes.” Mr. Deluca smiled at him. “That’s my mushroom.” He said shyly. “Oh yes, I wanted to thank you for bringing it in to show us.  You’ll probably see some more like it where you found it.” “Should I bring those in too?” he said hopefully. ” No, no, this one’s enough, thank you.” Another kid shot up her hand.  She told a story about seeing a bee’s nest, then another boy began speaking simultaneously – but Seemueller was lost in thought, he had a question for Mr. Deluca, he meant to ask. He began waving his hand again, but Miss Cardin was already trying to quiet the room, too many kids wanted to talk all at once.

Seemeuller jumped up, waved his hand, and Miss Cardin caught him before he leapt onto Mr. Deluca. Mr. Deluca turned to him smiling “Ok, Mr. Seemeuller what is it?” “Can we go see the volcano?” he shouted breathlessly, to the tremendous amusement of the entire class. Mr. Deluca laughingly looked at Miss Cardin who shrugged her shoulders. “Ok, Thank you Mr. Deluca, everyone thank Mr. Deluca.” The children all thanked the big man as he left the room.

He chuckled to himself as he walked down the hall trying to remember the names of the few mushrooms he used to collect with his grandfather. He turned into his office remembering a supply order he needed to make, and walked straight past the erupting volcano picture, nearly sitting down, he suddenly had a twinge of recognition, turned on his heel, and walked back to the waiting room. There in front of his framed picture of an erupting volcano, Mr. Deluca smiled.