five dollar words

part one: what we do

I ate lunch in Bert's classroom again, with the usual group of kids who didn't have anywhere else to go. Bert didn't mind, as long as we didn't make a mess or touch his homemade statues of mythical creatures. If we left the desks and chairs where we found them, and maybe graded a few of the papers he had forgotten about, he was perfectly happy with us. "You're like a club," he kept telling us. We really weren't; I hadn't spoken to anyone in there since October. But Bert seemed to think otherwise. Bert always thought otherwise.

My teacher's real name wasn't Bert – it was John – but he thought his birth name was too common and didn't express who he was as a person. "My name should convey zeal! Enthusiasm! Passion! I am not a John. I am a Bert, through and through!" He said it like it was a declaration of war, but against who? His parents, for giving him such a common name? Society, for continuing to call him John?

We sat through his rants and never-ending monologues day after day. They were never the same – some days he enlightened us on the topic of pomegranates, or Google's database, or the Second Punic War. I think his objective was to spark some kind of curiosity or fascination in our minds. When we continued to stare straight ahead, apathetic as ever, part of him seemed to deflate, as if he realized that he was speaking to a group of high schoolers instead of a convention center full of brilliant minds.

All of his students thought he was strange. Well, not strange, exactly, but definitely eccentric, and certainly more interesting than the other teachers at our school. Everyone who didn't have him as a teacher wished they did, and everyone who was lucky enough to be in one of his four English classes told stories about him at every opportunity. There were four of us who ate lunch in his room, and I think we continued to show up, day after day, just because we liked him as a person. I know that's why I did it.

The five of us had absolutely nothing in common. Adrian was timid and only spoke when he absolutely needed to – I had only heard him talk once, in science class, at the very beginning of the year when Mr. Caius gave him detention for refusing to participate and he made Adrian call his mom to let her know. Sofia and Noelle seemed amiable – they were always smiling and laughing at something the other had said. But I knew I couldn't become friends with them, because trying to wedge yourself in between two lifelong best friends was never a good plan.