Daniel Artz:

Lyle and I blinked at this bloke.

“Uh… can we help you?” I asked. The bloke kept staring at us. An uneasy feeling came over me. I leaned in close to Lyle.

“What’s wrong with him?” I whispered.

“I don’t know,” he whispered back. We looked at this guy again. A twisted smile came onto his face.

“Are you Ms. Gain’s kids?” he asked.

“Uh… yeah…” Lyle said. “Why?” There was a long pause. He laughed at us. The bloke clapped his hands as well.

“You’re Ms. Gain’s kids?” he asked again.

“Yes…” I said. The bloke calmed down.

“I am so glad to meet you!” he said. Lyle and I continued to stare at him.

“What’s with this weirdo?” I asked my brother.

“You got me there,” he whispered back. Lyle turned to the older bloke in front of us.

“Why is that?” he asked. “How do you know Kat?”

“Ms. Gains is my professor,” the bloke said. There was something in the way he said that made me think of Forrest Gump. A German version of Forrest Gump at that. We stared at the crazy man after he said that. Okay, now we’re not trying to rude little pricks.

“Really now?” I asked.

“Uh-huh!” he said with a slow wit nod. “She’s really smart!”

“Yes, she is,” I said.

“And nice,” the bloke said.

“Thank you,” Lyle said.

“And pretty,” the bloke said. “Really pretty.” Lyle and my face dropped. Okay, this just got creepy. The fact that he’s German and smiling makes it worse. (Okay, that’s stereotyping, I know. But still…) I leaned over to my brother.

“He’s creepy!” I whispered.

“Be nice,” he whispered to me. But I could tell by his tone that he was thinking the same thing I was. We both wanted to run, but where to?

“Leave ‘em alone, Dan!” someone shouted at us. We looked up and saw a group of college students staring at us. A few blokes at a table looked like footballers. One of them threw his chips at the crazy bloke at our table.

“Stupid wit!” another footballer yelled. Dan turned to them, frowning.

“I wasn’t doing anything!” he cried.

“They don’t want you there, you freak!” another footballer yelled.

“Yeah, they don’t want you there!” a third one said.

“You freak!” the footballer yelled.

“Freak!”

“Freak!”

“I didn’t do anything!” Dan cried again. He broke down into tears. The footballers began laughing. I looked at them and Dan in slight discomfort now. He was weird and creepy, but he didn’t deserve any of this! Lyle and I took our dinner and quietly slipped away.

We didn’t talk until we made it to Kat’s office. She looked up from her paperwork at us.

“Oh hi kids,” she said. “How was dinner?”

“Great,” Lyle lied. “Don’t you need any help?”

“Not really,” Kat replied. “You can just start on your homework.” We nodded in silence.

“Yeah, yeah,” my brother replied. We sat down at a small table near the corner and got to work. The silence began to kill me after a few minutes. I bit down on my lip. I looked over and saw Lyle cutting a cold glare at me.

“Say a word and you’re dead!” he hissed at me. I nodded at him with a ghost pale face. I buried my head back to work. The clock ticking didn’t help me. I bit my lip again. I glanced up at Kat. She was still grading some papers. I gritted my teeth.

“Don’t falter, Claudia!” Lyle hissed. I nodded and held my breath.

“Is something wrong?” we heard Kat ask. We looked up at the sound of her voice. She gave us a curious look. I gritted teeth again. I could feel Lyle’s eyes on my back. Oh god, I thought. I couldn’t hold back any longer.

“Why does everyone hate that retarded kid in your class?” I blurted out. Lyle pinched me on the ankle.

“Ow,” I mumbled. Then, I heard the pen drop on the desk. I looked up and saw Kat with a sharp burn in her eyes. Uh-oh, now I’ve done it, I thought. I had never seen her look that angry before in my life.

“First of all,” Kat spoke up. “Don’t call him retarded. That word is cruel and ignorant. I raised you both better than that.”

“Sorry Kat,” I said.

“His name is Daniel Artz,” she answered me. “He has special needs, but he tries really hard in my class. In fact, come over here and look at this.” Lyle and I walked over to her desk. Kat reached into her desk and pulled out a stack of papers. She drew out Daniel’s and showed it to us. We read over the paper. Looking back, the words were misspelled, but the ideas could be called “idiot savant.” The C+ on his paper was proof of this. Lyle and I looked up at Kat.

“What is this?” Lyle asked.

“This is Daniel’s paper,” Kat replied. She pointed to the C+. “He has come a long way since he first started school,” she went out. “Daniel is still trying every day. Those students that pick on him are just ignorant.” Lyle and I said nothing as Kat sat back at her desk. She seemed to have high faith in this Dan Artz kid. Years later, I began to understand what she saw in him.

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