Dinosaur Boy Read Online Free Page B

side of the room in the Butt Brain chant.
    I closed my eyes. I couldn’t see anything, so I actually felt the icy chill of the outside air before I saw who was responsible for letting it in.
    â€œ SILENCE !” a voice rang out.
    I opened my eyes.
    The voice, part yowling cat and part booming cannon, caused everybody in the room to freeze. Parker stopped gesturing so abruptly that he almost fell off his chair.
    An extremely small, skinny woman with extremely large, poofy hair stood in the doorway. She was wearing a very stiff-looking suit and glasses that were so large they took up most of her face. She nodded at Mr. Broome, who was blinking sleepily at her from behind his desk.
    â€œSo sorry to wake you,” she said gravely.
    â€œWhat? Oh, uh, not at all, Principal Mathis,” Mr. Broome stammered. He cleared his throat loudly and struggled to sit up straight.
    Principal Mathis…so this was our new principal. Principal Kline, our last principal, had resigned suddenly in the middle of the summer and none of us had seen his replacement.
    Until now.
    Principal Mathis turned away from Mr. Broome. Her eyes, squinting behind her enormous glasses, scanned the room until they came to rest on Parker.
    â€œWhat is your name, young man?”
    â€œP-P-Parker Douglas,” he answered, and I thought I saw his knees start to shake.
    â€œMr. Douglas,” she said. Her voice was so quiet now, we all had to strain to hear her over the crushing silence. “I see you have come up with a new nickname for one of your classmates.”
    â€œIt wasn’t me,” Parker choked out. “We were just looking some stuff up—”
    â€œWhat was it?”
    Parker, still up on the chair, pointed down at the computer.
    â€œJust a website on types of—”
    â€œNo,” Principal Mathis said quietly. “The name. What was it?”
    â€œB-B-Butt Brain,” he stammered. And even in the midst of his terror, for tiny Principal Mathis was truly terrifying at that moment, I saw a small smile tug at the edge of his lips.
    I don’t know if Principal Mathis saw it too. I’m not sure it would have made any difference.
    â€œI believe you are aware, Mr. Douglas, that we have a zero tolerance policy at this school regarding the belittling and harassment of students?”
    â€œYes, ma’am,” Parker mumbled. The smile was suddenly gone from his face.
    â€œAnd you would agree, I assume, that name-calling is a form of belittling? And also harassment?”
    â€œYes, ma’am,” Parker mumbled, barely audible now.
    â€œThank you, Mr. Douglas,” Principal Mathis said flatly. “Please come with me.”
    She turned toward the door.
    Parker climbed self-consciously down from the chair. He took a step toward Principal Mathis, then froze again as she suddenly turned back around.
    â€œBring your things. You shan’t be returning.”
    Now that Parker wasn’t hurling insults at me, I felt almost sorry for him as he stooped down to pick up his backpack. He looked very small and pathetic as he exchanged a miserable look with Allan and then followed Principal Mathis out of the door.

The Zero Tolerance Policy
    At the end of the day, just before the final bell, I received a note that I was wanted in Principal Mathis’s office.
    When I entered the administration building, I shivered at the excessive air-conditioning. And the first person I saw was Ms. Helen.
    I’m not sure what Ms. Helen’s actual job was. She never seemed busy. But every time I walked into the administrative office, there she was. Wearing a sleeveless top and sitting perfectly still right beneath the air-conditioner vent. The only things on her desk were a huge fan, which was always aimed directly at her face, and a small model solar system. And Ms. Helen couldn’t have known that much about space, because her model was totally out of date; there were nine planets in it.
    Nobody had