Mort pointed. “Who’s that guy in front?” He pulled the book
closer. “There’s something funny about his face.” He looked at Sally. “He looks
like he lost his teeth somewhere.”
I turned toward the couch where Mort and Sally were sitting,
thumbing through a yearbook.
Sally was wearing a little grin.
She looked at me and I smiled.
“It’s a…rather long story,” Sally said, finally.
Mort raised his eyebrows. “I like long stories.”
Sally looked at me expectantly.
I rolled my eyes and, clutching Peter’s hand a little
tighter, said, “Promise you won’t think badly of me?”
He just laughed.
For the record, that isn’t a response.
Ahem…
“Sally and I were nearing the end of school,” I began. “Grade twelve. We’d made it. The top of the heap.
The kings and queens of the school. And the town.”
Sally laughed. “Speak for yourself. I’ve always been
royalty!”
She wasn’t wrong.
“Anyways, there was this teacher, Mr. S. And he was the
nastiest, meanest man there ever was.” I made a face. “Oh, he was nice to the ‘A’
students—including Sally and me, fortunately. But he would pick a struggling student
every year to drive out of school.”
Peter shifted in his chair. “Seriously?”
I nodded. “Yup. He had a reputation. We’d heard about it,
but only got to see it first-hand when we finally reached the upper echelons.”
Sally snorted and rolled her eyes. “Upper echelons!”
“You know what I mean. Anyways, there was this one guy,
Randy. He was struggling. Wasn’t happy about school
in the first place. Struggling with family connections at home. Just kinda—lost.
The sort of guy who needs a bit of honest encouragement and a teaspoon or two
of basic human kindness.”
Peter tightened his grip on my hand and I gave him a brief
smile.
“He was the one Mr. S had singled out that year. Used to
watch for him to come into the school and make a beeline for him and start
haranguing him. ‘What are you doing here? You’re wasting your time and ours!
You should quit and just go find a job!’ That sort of thing. It was pretty
awful.”
Sally’s smile returned. She sat and twisted one earring.
Peter frowned at her. “Smiling, Sally-girl?”
Her smile widened, but she said nothing.
“Sally’s jumping ahead to the rest of the story,” I said. I
smiled, too. “It was pretty sweet.”
“Well, you’d better get to it, because I’m wanting to
strangle that Mr. S with my bare hands about now,” Dad said.
I turned to see him coming down the stairs toward us.
I raised my eyebrows. I’d like to have sent this former
marine after Mr. Nasty just to watch the inevitable outcome. I cleared my
throat.
“Anyways, Mr. S finally succeeded. Randy stopped coming to school.” I rubbed my forehead. “A real feather in his cap, don’t you think?”
“Better be getting to this ‘good part’ or I’m going to go hunting this ‘Mr. S’.”
I smiled at Dad, once again grateful for him in our lives. “Well, Sally and I had an appointment with the school
counselor. Something all the kids had to do. Something about ‘planning-their-futures-now-that-they-were-on-the-cusp-of-growing-up’.”
I shrugged. “Real important stuff.”
Dad crooked an eyebrow and gave me a look. “It is.”
I laughed and held up my hands in surrender. “Okay! Okay! While
we were walking to the counselor’s office, we had to walk past Mr. S’s. And,
through the partially open door, we saw him taking out some false teeth! I mean, who knew he even had them?”
‘You stole them?” Mort asked, pointing to the picture.
“Patience, my son.” I grinned. “It was a few weeks later and
we were at the big closing school party and corn bust. You know, where everyone
eats too much and regrets it for about six hours?”
“Speak for yourself,” Sally said.
I laughed. “And they were calling everyone together for the
big picture.” I pointed to the book on Mort’s lap. “Mr. S started toward his
car and Sally and I knew instantly what he was going to do.”
“Clean the corn out of those biters?” Peter asked.
“Yup.” I looked at Sally. “We followed him.”
“But…how did you get them?” Mort asked.
“Actually, it was quite easy. We snagged Angela—Mr. S’s
special pet—to come with us to get him for the picture. She was only too happy
to oblige.” I smiled in remembrance. “Actually, it worked out perfectly! When
we arrived, he had just removed his teeth. Angela went up to him and he shoved
them out of site on the passenger side of the car and turned to talk to her
with one hand over his mouth. Then I quietly opened the passenger door and Sally
reached in and grabbed them. We rolled under the next couple of cars, then,
when we were far enough away, stood up and made our escape.”
“Where did you put his teeth?”
“Tossed them into the creek on our way back to the picnic
site.” I grinned. “We were sitting with everyone else by the time Angela
returned saying that Mr. S was having problems. The principal finally went and
got him.”
“The funniest thing was that he always insisted on being in
the front row of the pictures. This time, he tried to go to the back, but the
principal wouldn’t let him. So there he was, toothless for all the world to
see!”
Sally looked down at the picture. “Quite satisfying.”
“He never caught you?”
“Nope. He left the party right after the pictures and wasn’t
in school for the next week. He must have found somewhere to get some new
dentures made in a hurry because when he finally returned, he was sporting some
shiny new ones.”
Dad chuckled. “Sometimes a little payback feels so good.”
“It didn’t really help Randy. But, you’re right. It felt
good.”
Peter laughed. “Sooo…the moral is: don’t anger either of the
Hart sisters.”
I pinned him with a gaze. “Or
if you do, hang onto your teeth!”
Neither of us knows what the other will do with her words.
This month, Karen gave me:
pin ~ school ~ town ~ earring ~ teeth
Thank you, my friend!
Now go see what Karen did with my words!
