Underschool
A
Kid Story by Stephen Geez
www.StephenGeez.com
Art
by Ray Gray
“Above and below,” said Robert, The Watson Boy, that red-haired lad of ten or twelve. He saw a butterfly flutter by the window.
“Goola! Ka-wozzle!” his teacher sort of said. She used real words meaning the same thing.
He wrinkled his nose, took a deep breath, and acted like a salesman. “It’s the BEST way to learn! It’s the RIGHT thing to do! It’s what the WHOLE WORLD needs!” he pitched. “—We young people most of all.”
“Ack! Moozle! Woo Figgle?”
“I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” he answered. “It was my friend Freddie’s idea to show everyone. He lives near the shore. People live above. Fish live below. Anybody who SEES this will know it’s important to protect the other side.”
Good teachers want students to learn, but Robert’s was busy busy busy. “Tikka! Boola!” she said. “Tell the principal!”
The principal reminded Robert of an ogre blocking a bridge. “Grrr! Say the right words,” the ogre growled, “and I MIGHT let you pass.”
Robert flung big words at the ogre: “Environment! Ecology! Marine life! Recycling! Respecting nature!”
“Grrr!” growled the principal. “You may pass to the school board.”
Armed with his own media show, Robert stood up front like a target. Questions shot toward him like lasers. He fired back with charts and graphs and photos his dad taught him how to make. He showed them life near the shore, above and below.
The school board approved the idea. But like a flock of crazy old birds, they started squawking, “Money! Money! Awk-money!”
BUDGET, it turned out, can be a very scary word. Robert just wrinkled his nose and left to put his thinker to thinking.
“Money!” cried the squirrels in the school yard.
“Money money!” hollered trees along the road.
A butterfly fluttered by, then hovered to whisper in Robert’s ear: “Money, honey. Raise the money, honey.”
Robert wrinkled his nose and went to work.
CAR WASH, was the plan. Krystal Casey pitched in to help make it happen. Not just a teenager, but a WAY-COOL young lady, she asked ALL her friends to help. Robert gave everybody soap that won’t pollute the water. The whole town brought their cars.
BAKE SALE, came next. Robert’s idea grew legs and ran. Emily Watts browned a zillion brownies. Kevin Bibby cooked more cookies than any cook could count. Kids from class, moms and dads, even the lady baker who bakes at the local bakery all baked for the cause. All day Saturday cars filled the school lot. Hungry neighbors bought every last yum-yum crumb.
“Money!” croaked the old toad under a bush. “Burrup-money!”
Still short of the goal, Robert talked to Emily’s brother, Benjamin. “Stories! We need stories!”
“Print them and sell copies,” Benjamin agreed.
“Use our friends’ names and they’ll all want one,” Robert said, which made Benjamin laugh.
Robert asked his friend Stephen Geez to write one. Then he asked all his friends, and they asked all theirs. Soon they had a bookful that everybody bought. They counted a BIG pile of money.
A flock of funny finches flew by, singing, “More than enough! More than enough!”
The big day came. A school bus zoomed down the highway, faces pressing the windows. They drove up to the marina, scattering gulls every which way.
“Two sides of the same world,” Robert told the group as they boarded the glass-bottom boat. Each back sported a back-pack packed with lunches and pictures of what they might spy. “—A chance to see how the other half lives,” he said.
“Where’s your friend Freddie?” Dylan Capps asked.
Brother Austen added, “The one who lives near the shore.”
“He’ll come around,” said Robert.
A school of young fish schooled under the boat’s glass bottom. 60 kids filled the cabin and peered down through the water-window. Robert stayed outside, hanging over the rail.
Freddie the Fish poked his face above the water. “Hi, Robert! My friends’ first fishy field trip is FUN!”
Robert said, “And they’ll see that some dry-landers DO want to help.”
Freddie wrinkled his “nose” at a patch of rainbow-colored oil slick floating nearby. “And yours will see that it’s not too late.”
A gull flew by, squawking “Awk! Over and under!”
“Let’s meet each other’s friends,” said Freddie, flipping his fin toward the boat.
“Above AND below,” said Robert. He headed inside as his fine fishy friend swam under the boat’s glass bottom.
A butterfly fluttered by the window and smiled.
* * *
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