Why We Took the Car Read Online Free Page B

which the therapist said, “Aha!” It was supposed to sound clever, as if the therapist had just figured something out. Gottlieb, aha! My mother had no idea what the therapist had figured out, and he never said. And that’s the way it went the entire time. They all tried like crazy to act as if they had things figured out, but they never gave away what they knew. When my father heard about it — the thing with the cardboard box — he nearly fell out of his chair laughing. He kept saying, “My God that’s sad,” though he was laughing. So I had to laugh too, and my mother decided it was funny as well, at least in retrospect.
    And I put all of that into my school essay. And in order to get the word “rescue” in, I added the scene with the kitchen knife. And since I was on a roll, I even added a bit about how she mistook me for my father when she came down the stairs one morning. It was the longest assignment I’d ever written — at least eight pages long — and still I could have written a Part Two, a Part Three, and a Part Four if I’d felt like it. Though as I found out, Part One was more than enough.
    The class totally lost it while I was reading it aloud. Schuermann told everyone to quiet down and then said, “Nice, very nice. How much longer is it? Still so much to go? That’ll do for now, I’d say.” I didn’t have to read the rest. Schuermann had me stay after class so he could read the rest of it on his own, and I stood there next to him feeling very proud — first because it had been such a success and second because Schuermann wanted to read the whole thing personally. Mike Klingenberg, author. And then Schuermann closed the notebook I’d written my assignment in and shook his head. I took it as an appreciative shake of the head, the kind that signals, How can a sixth grader write such an incredibly great essay? But then he said, “Why are you grinning like an idiot? Do you think this is funny?” And it slowly dawned on me that it hadn’t been such a success after all. At least not as far as Schuermann was concerned.
    He got up from his desk, walked over to the window, and stood there looking out at the schoolyard. “Mike,” he said, turning around again to face me. “That’s your mother . Did you ever stop to think about that?”
    Obviously I’d made a huge mistake. I just didn’t know what it was. But it was clear from Schuermann’s reaction that I’d committed an absolutely massive error with my assignment. And that he thought it was the most embarrassing essay the world had ever witnessed. But I couldn’t figure out why this was the case — he never said, and to be honest I don’t know why to this day. He just kept repeating that it was my mother , until he suddenly started getting very loud and said my assignment was the most sickening, unsavory, and shameless one he’d encountered in fifteen years of teaching — blah, blah, blah — and that I should immediately rip the pages out of my notebook. I was totally devastated, and of course I reached straight for my notebook, like a moron, to rip out the pages. But Schuermann grabbed my hand and shouted, “I don’t mean literally rip it out. Don’t you understand anything? What you need to do is think hard about what you’ve done. Really think!” I thought for a minute about it, but to be honest I just didn’t get it. I still don’t get it. I mean, it’s not as if I made any of it up or anything.

CHAPTER 7
    After that I was called Psycho. For almost a year, everyone called me that. Even in class. Even when the teacher was there. “Come on, Psycho, pass the ball! You can do it, Psycho! Chill out, Psycho!” And it only stopped when André landed in our class. André Langin. Handsome André.
    André had been held back. He had a girlfriend by the end of his first day in