Chapter 4 — An Interesting Assignment
Both arms came out of the water at her hips as her legs thrust her almost completely into the air. She literally dove back in and coasted with another dolphin kick. That was her dad’s secret to the butterfly and she employed it beautifully. She extended her arms fully in front of her and pulled as much of the liquid as she could down to her sides before stretching her hands out for the lunge to the finish. Both palms slapped into the side and she touched both feet to the bottom as she stood in the waist-deep water to wait for Chelsea. A full two seconds later, Chelsea popped up after jabbing her own fingertips into the same sensitive wall surface. She immediately looked up to the electronic timer.
“Don’t you ever look at your time, Alex?”
“I have a clock in my head. Was it good?”
“I’d say so — it’s 28.05!!”
“What about you?” Alex asked expectantly, seeming oblivious to her own accomplishment.
“Don’t you know what that means, Alex?”
Alex looked at her blankly, and then peered up at the scoreboard, “Your time is 30.02! I told you 29 seconds isn’t far away for you!”
Chelsea put her hands on her hips and glared at Alex. “You really don’t care if you just set the best time of the year in our age group, do you? You make me sick, girl!”
Alex just shrugged and hugged her.
Chelsea was fifteen and eight inches taller and 25 pounds heavier than Alex. Her short black hair and bushy eyebrows stood out on her otherwise plain face. Last year she had won every event, but this year she had placed second whenever she had competed with Alex. A distant second. She had started entering back- and breast-stroke just so she could win something other than relays this year. Alex could beat her in those too, but chose to enter the distance races for freestyle and butterfly. Chelsea didn’t mind second place, even a very distant second place, because she knew Alex would be something special.
Chelsea also knew Alex had made her better, teaching her and pushing her to the point that she might just pull off some blue ribbons next year and more the following years, in the sixteen to eighteen age group… at least she’d have a chance then because she would be competing against someone other than Alex.
“I told you you’re going to Nationals with me this year. I can’t go without you. Two more hundredths puts you in the top ten, and two more tenths could land you in the main heat,” Alex said calmly, ignoring her praise.
“You don’t get it. That girl from California posted a 28.38 as her best, and you beat that all four times we raced today!”
Alex shrugged and replied, “I posted 29.15 nationally, so she could be half a second faster now, too! I’ll be more confident when I hit 27… or 26.”
Chelsea laughed, “My dear, you’d be on the podium in the Olympics with a 26.”
“Well, for now, you’re going to Nationals with me, and that’s final. Next year you’re going too.”
Chelsea raised the corner of her lip as well as an eyebrow at her.
“Don’t give me that look, you’re not done improving. By next year you’ll be clawing at 28.”
Chelsea snorted in disbelief, “Right. Let’s go get dressed; it’s already past 8:00.”
“Race you to the shower!” Alex yelled.
“You don’t stand a chance against me on land, Flipper!” Chelsea teased.
Both girls jumped from the water and sprinted to the shower room, with Chelsea arriving yards ahead. “If they ever drain the pool at the Olympics, I’ve got a shot to beat you!” Chelsea panted as she entered the shower room and hurriedly peeled off her suit.
“They call that track and field, dork!” Alex laughed back at her as she followed and did the same.
They sped through their showers and left on their bikes ten minutes later — again racing. Chelsea winning again too. They took a paved bike trail that cut through the woods, and after about half a mile they crossed a bridge over a nearly flooded stream of chocolate water. It was still raining slightly but the stream seemed to be slowly dropping, evidenced by the patterns on the edge of the banks. Another mile through the trail put them in the middle of town, one block from school. Chelsea slowed up and waited for Alex to catch her. Alex took advantage and sped by, claiming victory and taunting her as they stopped to chain their bikes.
“That wasn’t fair!” Chelsea argued, not truly upset by it.
“Your fault! Do I ever let up on you in the pool?”
“So I’m a sucker then, eh?”
“Yep! You goin’ to practice after school?” Alex asked.
“No it’s Friday; I go to my dad’s house this weekend.”
“Oh. OK, see ya Monday then!” Alex said as they hugged. Chelsea walked across the street to the high school; Alex rushed into the junior high, the first bell ringing just as she entered.
Alex was almost to her locker where Christy and Kaylie had been waiting for her. She grabbed her books and headed for class with them. They had all their classes together this year, which had made the year much easier for the trio.
“Anderson’s going to have a pop quiz today,” Kaylie announced as they marched lock-step toward their first class.
“Yeah, right,” said Alex skeptically. “It’s Friday. He never gives tests on Friday. Plus we’re not done with Caesar yet, he’s still alive, you know?”
“Who cares about Rome anyway, that’s like two centuries ago,” joked Christy.
“Millennia, dork, centuries are a hundred years, a millennium is a thousand,” corrected Kaylie.
“I want to know what life was really like back then, not what some stuffy old farts wearing blankets did. Why don’t we ever learn what’s important?”
Mr. Anderson was following closely behind, eavesdropping. Unofficially retired, at 72 years old, he was fairly tall and still well built. He was bald with a fluffy white ring of hair that always seemed to stick straight out. His hair was matched by his huge, bushy, white-as-snow eyebrows which rested over wide eyes and a big red nose. Anderson loved to teach and loved history. The kids all joked that he was alive when history started. That amused him.
As the kids filed into the classroom, Anderson grabbed his book and came around to the front of his desk where he kept his stool, and opened his book to a marked page.
Kaylie sat in the closest seat, Alex behind her, and Christy to the left of Alex.
“Open your books to page 217,” said the veteran teacher in a soft, but still strong voice. He paused as the kids reluctantly did so, mumbling dislike. He suddenly looked at Christy, who seemed pitifully bored with the idea of more book study. “No. Close your books, class,” he decided spontaneously.
Eyebrows raised, foreheads crinkled. Many kids could be heard murmuring about the rumored pop quiz.
The old man swiveled his stool, placed the book on his desk, and slowly turned to face the class.
“Told ya! Pop quiz,” Kaylie whispered to Alex.
“Class. I want to do something different. I heard an interesting question this morning on the way to class,” he nodded at Christy. “What Ms. Stapleton here asked was what everyday life was really like back in the days of the Roman Empire for normal people. Now I’ve read a lot of books about that period of time, and as you may know, it’s one of the most fascinating to me. Most every history class will tell you about the senate and the treachery of Caesar, or the military tactics of Rome’s imperial soldier legions, but never do you hear what life was like for the everyday Roman.” He then motioned to Christy, “Ms. Stapleton, would you please come forward and state your inquiries?”
Christy shrank back into her seat, pointing to her chest and squeaked, “Uh, me?” hoping he had made a mistake.
“Yes, dear, you. I think you have questions that are probably more interesting than facts about stuffy old farts in sheets, don’t you?” he challenged.
Christy, bolstered by a new confidence born of adolescent superiority complex, stood and firmly stated, “Yes, as a matter of f
act, I think I do!” and took up residence right beside the admired elder.
“Well,” she started, “we’ve heard about Julius Caesar and whoeverus maximus and all that stuff and it’s really no different than any other empire or government that ever existed, is it?”
Anderson raised a caterpillar eyebrow and pulled up a knee, rested his elbow on it, then his chin on his fist. She watched him carefully, guessing he was going to chastise her for her thoughts. “Please, explain, Christy. I like where you’re going with this!”
She relaxed and smiled, “OK. Well, it seems every government oppresses its people or is corrupt or even evil. Like our own—”
A chorus of cheers welled up instantly at those words.
“But, there are still people like us — I mean normal families and stuff. Were there normal families then? Of course there were! We just never hear about them. Everyone couldn’t live in palaces and have servants to do everything for them. What did the normal moms and dads do? What did the kids do?”
A prissy girl in the back stood up, dressed in an outfit that belonged on a runway, not in middle school. “Yeah, what did the kids our age wear? All we know is what the royalty wore.”
A large boy stood up then, “What did they eat?”
Others joined in, “What was school like?”
“Did the kids play sports?”
“Where did the kids hang out?”
“Were the kids of normal families forced to marry strangers too?”
The questions kept coming and Mr. Anderson stopped them for a few seconds while he asked Christy to go to the chalkboard and start writing them down. This went on for several minutes until they had over thirty questions scribbled hastily by a happy Christy.
“OK, class, let’s try to answer all of these questions. This weekend, I want each of you to pick a question and write it down. Christy, you go first and mark off the question you want to answer.”
“I want to know if the kids played sports,” she said easily as she marked through the question.
Kaylie stood up immediately and volunteered, “I want to find out what the kids our age wore.”
A few kids later, Alex stood and said, “I want to find out what kind of houses normal people lived in.”
There were 24 students, 32 questions. After they had each selected one Mr. Anderson spoke, “Everyone, write down the remaining eight questions. If you can answer any of them I will give 25 bonus points each.”
A boy in the middle asked, “Where do we find the answers? It’s definitely not in our book!”
“Hmmm…” Anderson pondered, “You could use this fancy Internet you kids play around on all the time now… books, whatever. I’ll be lenient on this. I’m sure some of these answers will be very difficult to dredge up. I know I’ve never seen the answer to quite a few of these myself. I’ll make a deal with you all though, OK?”
Everyone nodded warily, waiting for the deal before answering.
“You can print or copy any information you find on your topic; this does not have to be an essay of your own words unless you want it to be. But!” he paused to get their attention, “if you cannot find any information on your particular topic, I want you to first show me where you looked to prove you actually made an effort to find the answer in at least three sources. Then, if you like, you can make up the answer — use your imagination to tell us whatever you think it might be. When done, leave it to me to guess whether you made it up or not. Does that sound fun?”
“Yeah!” they all cheered.
A boy on the left side of the room stood up and asked, “When are these reports due?”
“Some of you may be ready by Monday, so we’ll start then. But you best be finished by at least Friday. This assignment is mostly for fun, but I believe we all have a chance to learn a great deal by it, including me. Does anyone want to do the assignment I had originally planned for today?”
The same boy was still standing and asked, “Um, what assignment was that?”
“I’m so glad you asked! It was going to be an essay of at least one thousand words on the processes and regulations of how the Roman Senate proposed and passed laws.” He smiled broadly, “Anyone want to do that instead?”
Complete silence.
The bell then rang and the kids all started to get up. Mr. Anderson quickly stopped them, “I expect some of you to be ready by Monday, and there will be ten bonus points for all who are. OK, dismissed!”
There was a huge buzz about the homework; all the kids were completely energized by it. Mr. Anderson grinned broadly, enjoying their sudden enthusiasm in history as they all walked past him, smiling and talking about the great Roman Empire.
The girls went to their next classes. At lunch, the subject came up again, when Christy asked, “How are we going to find the answers to the questions in History class?”
Alex answered, “I’m checking the Net first, but dad has a bunch of books about Rome, too—”
Kaylie interrupted her, “I’m just going to ask your dad. He did so much research for that game he’s making, he has to be able to—”
“You always ask Alex’s dad, cuz you have a crush on him!” Christy teased her.
Kaylie blushed, “I do not! He just knows everything about the stuff I’m interested in. He reads the same books; he’s into the same games, movies, music—”
Alex put her hand up, “Don’t kid us, girl. You spend half your time at my house hanging over his shoulder drooling on him.”
“I do not! We just get along well! I can talk to him about anyt—”
“Cut it,” Christy said. “You kiss Alex’s picture of him every time you enter her room!”
“Well! That picture is just yummy…”
“Gross! That’s my dad, Kay!”
“Yeah, but he’s only fifteen in that picture, not ancient like he is now — he wasn’t your dad then,” she stuck out her tongue defiantly.
“God! Do I drool over your dad?” asked Alex.
Christy answered for her, “Kay’s dad is bald and fat. Definitely not drool material.”
“Good points,” Alex said.
Kaylie stuck out her tongue at both of them this time and went back to eating. They finished lunch and went through the rest of their classes.
After the last bell of the day, they all met at the bike rack.
“Are we all meeting up at my house tonight?” Alex asked.
“Yeah, my practice doesn’t start until after 4:30 today though,” answered Christy.
“I’ve only got ten minutes to get to the field for soccer practice, but you know I’ll be over afterwards. See ya there,” Kaylie said, trotting off to the field house next to the soccer park as Christy and Alex mounted up and rode off in opposite directions.