The Big Cheese

 Reading the first part of the chapter "Spooks" had me flashing back to high school. When Jason steps up to tie the cotton thread to the door knocker, I couldn't help but think back to math class and my time in the "spotlight".

Like Jason, I was pretty low on the social hierarchy.  I was squarely above the "picked-on" cadre of students - I sought refuge in the Who? island of anonymity. I hate coconuts. We were in Mr. Mozzarella's (we pronounced it incorrectly, like the cheese) mathematics class when he stepped out of the room for a minute. He told us to finish working on whatever "fun" math problems we had in front of us. Dutifully, we began to work as most honors students would.

How we pronounced the teacher's name...mozzarella!

Suddenly, a kid had the brilliant idea of locking out the teacher. I watched halfheartedly as a few resident "geniuses" tried to tie string around the knob and knot it so the knob wouldn't budge. Fail. Next, they tried to stack some chairs by the door. Okay - I had seen plenty of movies (mostly on TV - thanks WPIX Saturday Afternoon Matinee - as my parents rarely took me or let me go to the movie theater) where the hero has to keep the villain from getting into a room with only a chair as an option.

I couldn't watch the incompetent display of this simple maneuver reign any longer. Without saying anything, I got out of my seat and stacked two chairs together. I leaned the chairs towards the door so the back would fit comfortably under the knob.   Was I doing this for social acceptance? Was I doing it because 80s movie icons had taught me more about life than any of my teachers? Still couldn't tell you.

Jam the chair under the knob and presto! The person is locked out!

Whatever the case, when Mr. Mozz returned and was stymied by the unyielding doorknob, his face erupted into what can only be compared to cosmic explosions, possibly something akin to the Big Bang.  Sorry, Denzel, but King Kong had nothing on him. The door may have prevented his physical body from entering, but his world-class obscenities infiltrated our student-commandeered fiefdom.

Despite our innocent ears being shocked with R-rated bombast, we were a collective herd of deer, caught in a Hummer's blinding headlights.  Water bottles had long since passed the small tremors of a T-rex approaching, and were vibrating off several desks, landing like mortar shells on Normandy. Some students who fancied another day of life on this earth, ran to the door and let in the "Irate Cheese" as it came to be known.

All I could think about was if one of the other students would lift a finger and point in my direction (since my name probably escaped their collective memories). As the "Irate Cheese" surveyed the petrified class, my heart raced into mach 1. The class should have had an advisory sign before entering Mr. Mozzarella's classroom:

For safety and comfort, you should be in good health and free from heart, back, or neck problems, motion sickness, or other conditions that could be aggravated by math. Expectant mothers and the lactose intolerant should not enter!

Since other students were doing it, I glanced around to see who would be the beneficiary of this social blame game.

No one said anything. No points. No eye-gestures or head nods in my direction. Somehow I escaped justice. Was I finally accepted? Or had no one actually seen me do the deed? Did not matter. I felt awful and, like Jason, could not envision the easy-to-forecast response from the person being pranked.  We both didn't have the intention to prank someone, yet that's what we both did. Prank + Ignorance = Regret.  Maybe Mr. Mozz did teach me something in math after all.  This was so not ace.