~~~
On Wednesday, Rob went from his History class to his English class in relatively good spirits. All in all, Kile had not been much of a problem at school or in the neighborhood and they were beginning to enjoy each other’s companionship about as well as he and Ricky did. In other words, Kile hung around him all Tuesday afternoon, and Robert only mildly begrudgingly agreed to teach him a little about baseball and basketball. Apparently the troll had seen the sports played out on television and he wondered why, over the seasons, teams kept playing and playing, frequently playing them more than once. As it turned out, the only sports-like events that trolls engaged in were more like battles and were generally to settle a score or to select a troll for a particularly ostentatious position.
But, as he stepped into the classroom he found about six or seven of his fellow students giggling, four girls standing and a couple boys getting into their seats. When he entered they stopped for about a half a second’s hesitation to look at him and then started laughing outright. All but Marissa, that was. She was slumped into a chair and covering her face with her hands, though Robert could see she was rather red underneath them. He didn’t notice as he looked towards the front board but Marissa did sneak a peek at Robert between her fingers to watch what he would do.
There, on the board was a collage of various things collected from the board area and the teacher’s desk depicting an extremely well-muscled and handsome Robert in a pose that would not be entirely out of place on one of the grocery store romance novel covers with what might have been a beautiful princess Marissa draping off his left arm and swooning with her right hand pressed to her forehead. Worse than that, a huge paper-mache drawing of a heart with an arrow through it and some lettering inside finalized the effect. It read:
Robert Johansson
+
Marissa
It took a few seconds for Robert to take it all in, during which time a couple more students walked in, paused to take in the scene and started laughing themselves. Ronald walked in and glancing at the board, then round about the room lost with his mouth hanging open, he recovered in due time and slapped Rob on the back, saying, “Excellent art, dude!”
Truly, the craftsmanship of the drawing was excellent. It had been created by a combination of several different colors of wipeboard markers, most notably a bright red for Marissa’s hair, and toilet paper, apparently clumped together with white glue, as well as what may actually have been shadows and reliefs carved into the whiteboard itself. Clearly, Kile had been “helping”. But the work seemed so realistic and detailed, it didn’t seem much like the glowing blue carvings that were so rough and perhaps amateurish in comparison. No, this was truly a work of art. And it had to come down.
It had to come down right now!
Robert dropped his binder and slipped his backpack off in a flurry. He first grabbed the teacher’s wipeboard eraser and got to work on all the inks and things that would come off. But the majority of the display was thoroughly stuck on or embedded into the board already. While Rob began desperately picking at the toilet paper and who-knows-what paper mache heart he happened to glance to the entrance door, partly looking for Mr. Stuart, the English teacher. There he caught in just a moment’s peek the little troll, undisguised in his glimmer for Rob’s view, holding up both hands in a thumbs-up and huge grin. Then he was gone instantly with the aid of his shimmer magic. Rob bolted.
Once in the doorway of the classroom Robert was pawing at the air. He knew the little doofus had to be standing there somewhere, but he looked like a crazed maniac swatting at invisible flies to the students passing by in the hallway. From inside the room Robert could hear several other kids laughing all the more loudly and he made another dash.
Running towards the Elementary wing of the school through the connecting hallway Robert could hear the little troll giggling ahead of him, but there was still no Kile or Little Ricky in site. He began flailing his arms back and forth as he went feeling he was closing in the twerp. As it happened some of the elementary grades were returning from a recess and about five paces in front him Rob heard a sharp exhale of wind and suddenly one of the fifth graders was knocked to the ground.
“Sorry!” a raspy, giggling, troll-sounding voice said loudly.
Robert slowed to get around the pileup of smaller children around the one who had fallen and grumbled through his teeth, “I’m gonna kill you, Kile!”
Rounding the last corner before heading straight into Mrs. Haversham’s classroom Robert could just about swear he saw a little troll-shaped shadow dart inside the room. He arrived and came to a stop in the doorway, hands smacking the doorjam to catch him in a clatter. The students were just returning to their seats and Mrs. H looked up surprised from her desk. Kile was in Little Ricky’s seat, glimmer on full force, with hands interlaced before him on the desk and looking utterly innocent and sweet. He blinked rapidly when Robert spoke.
“Kile!” Robert rumbled like thunder, but quickly changed his mind before he let loose. “I mean, Ricky! Come’ere!”
Mrs. Haversham stood awkwardly, unsure of what was going on. Robert was breathing heavily, but it didn’t appear to be to regain his breath, but rather like a great bear about to strike.
“May I help you Mr. Johansson?” She asked politely.
“Yeah. I need to talk to Ricky for a moment,” Rob’s voice was rusty sounding and unpleasant.
Mrs. H seemed to hesitate for just a moment before nodding and granting permission to Ricky to leave the room.
Outside, Robert grabbed the troll’s shirt shoulder and pulled it to the wall. He wanted to make sure the little jerk didn’t disappear and make another run for it.
“What. Are. You. Doing?” Robert said as best as he could through teeth that had been cemented together.
Kile was timid, fidgeting with his hands as he answered. “I am helping. You like girl, right? So I help you.”
“No! That. Is. Not. Helping!” Rob let him go.
The problem was it was very much something Little Ricky might be expected to do, if he’d had the artistic ability. So Kile was very much like having his little brother around. It was hard to stay angry, not because he didn’t want to, but because living with someone makes them more vulnerable and in many ways more understandable. Maybe as trolls go, Kile was a bit of a ditz. But he had still become a close friend and Robert found himself recognizing the mistake as one.
“You can’t do that, Kile,” he said in a long sigh.
“Why not? It’s very pretty I think. Makes you look good!” Kile retorted tapping one of his black-nailed index fingers on Robert’s chest.
“Yeah, but you can’t do that. My teacher is going to kill me,” Robert was pacing a bit and flapping his arms. “And…Marissa is going to think I’m a complete dip-wad now!”
“No, no,” Kile assured him, waving his palms upright back and forth and shaking his head. “She will think you are romantic!”
“Romantic? Really? Where did you hear that word?”
“I read it! It’s on all the books your Mom has,” Kile said, gleaming.
“Oh, Jeez! You got the idea from my mom’s romance novels?” Robert hung his head and tried to breath in deeply. “Kile. You’re going kill me. Or worse, get me grounded.”
Kile stepped around Robert cautiously still but shrugged his shoulders and seemed perplexed. “Why would you be grounded. I made it very sweet. I bet you will get a kiss from both Marissa and your mom!”
“No, no I won’t, Kile. I’m going to get in trouble with the teacher because I can’t get it off, and Marissa probably won’t talk to me for ages.”
“Richard?” Mrs. Haversham was standing at the class door. “Are you ready to join us again? We’re about to start reading our last book for the year.”
Mrs. H had apparently been watching from through the doorway. It seemed she had made her own determination that the boys’ conversation was over and w
as moving to intercept. As Kile entered the room and went back to his desk she stepped outside the door and put her hand on Robert’s shoulder.
“You know, I have an older brother, myself,” she said.
“Yeah?”
“Yes. And when we were kids I thought he was a major pain-in-the-neck. Always teasing me and such. But there were times where he’d also stand up for me. One time he even fought a boy that had been teasing me too much.”
“Really?” Robert looked at Mrs. Haversham with new-found respect. She’d lived through a childhood too, and that made her a lot more likeable in his eyes.
“Oh yes. He knocked that boy down and told him to stay away.”
“Did it work?” Robert asked trying to politely participate in the conversation. He found his nerves were calming a bit too.
“Not really. I still got picked on sometimes. But Chuck would always be there to fight for me when I couldn’t.”
“Sounds like a good brother,” Rob said.
“Yes, it might. But he really was a pain-in-the-neck most of the time. He was the tease when there wasn’t one around to do it in his place. But you know what I learned?”
Robert shook his head.
“Even though he seemed to be really good at being a pain, he also wanted to help. …Sometimes brothers just want to help…even if they don’t really know the best way to do it.”
Robert thought about a retort, something on the order of saying that Kile wasn’t really his brother. But he realized of course that he couldn’t do that. He simple nodded and turned to leave. As he walked away, Mrs. Haversham wished him luck and reminded him that whatever was wrong likely wouldn’t matter by next Fall when they returned to school.
Hoping that it likely wouldn’t matter by his birthday the following day, Robert returned to his English class to find out what kind of trouble he’d be in.