“Stay here. Do not leave this spot. Wait here until called inside.”
The fat boy with braces was waiting outside the hallway door to the room where he would take the next test. The monitor looked at him one last time, then walked away down the hall. He was almost twelve. He could follow instructions. She didn’t have to lean down and look in his eyes when she repeated the command not to leave this spot.
He knew better.
He’d taken more than a dozen tests already this year at this special testing center near his new school, and he knew lots of things about this place. He knew, for instance, that the room down at the far end of the hall had a guard outside of it. And he knew the guard had a real M-16 machine gun and a uniform, but not like any uniform he’d ever seen before. It was gray and black, and the camouflage pattern was blocky and looked computer generated. And there were never any insignias or name tags on the guard’s uniform, either.
The fat boy with braces wasn’t sure what was behind the door with the guard, but he knew he’d never been in that room. Neither had anyone else he’d spoken to in this place.
That was another thing. You weren’t supposed to speak to anyone here. There was a rule book, an actual book. And that was rule number one. No talking to anyone, ever. Rule two was no names. He was never referred to by name; none of the children were. In fact, they were never referred to at all. The amount of talking in the entire building was almost nothing. Instructions were always written. The only verbalizations were more like commands than instructions, or talking.
But they had to feed the kids who were here at lunchtime. And they didn’t feed them in isolation. They fed them in a cafeteria. And the children talked. The adults couldn’t stop them, even though they tried. Eventually a truce was reached. The children talked very quietly without moving their lips. And the adults either turned a blind eye, or they were not nearly as smart as the group of pre-teens they were supposed to be watching.
The fat boy with braces was sure the adults here were stupid.
It was the children who were the ones who felt like they were in charge. The adults who were at the testing facility never felt like they were in control of anything. They never had any idea what the hell was going on around them. Most of them were just babysitters with sidearms. They were not teachers or educators, just test monitors. During these tests, there were no verbal questions or clarifications that would be asked or given by anyone. And the layers of secrecy surrounding the program ensured the staff did not talk among themselves. The only consistent factor became the kids. Certain kids stuck around. Most of the others did not. Kids who stuck around got to be known. They kept coming back for more and more tests. And this particular testing facility was one of the few that had The Legend show up at it. And he did it on a pretty regular basis. At least that’s what the fat boy with braces had heard.
But that was all anybody did when it came to The Legend, hear things.
The Legend only came in by himself and rarely did anyone else get to see him. He always tested alone, always. Nobody else was ever even allowed in the room with him. The fat boy with braces had spoken to a girl at lunch on the last testing day a week ago, who said she had seen him after a test session. She said he looked like he’d been at the beach. This caused the small group of kids at the lunch table to gasp quietly while everyone silently listened to the girl’s story. The reason everyone gasped was because all of the tests given here were extremely difficult. Even the kids in the cafeteria did not fly through them. The tests took effort and attention to do well on them. It was exhausting to take these tests. Some kids came out of the tests crying or worse.
But not The Legend.
They were only stories, but the stories were unbelievable. He’d never missed a question. Nobody had ever scored a perfect score on so many exams. No one had ever gotten close to his scores. He finished in half the time. He took the test in pen. He never checked his answers. And the biggest one, he never talked to anyone, ever.
The rumors were all true.
The fat boy with braces leaned against the wall and sat on his hands. His belly growled as he stared down at his feet. He didn’t know it yet, but this would be his last day here. He will not score well on today’s test. He will be returned to his regular, advanced school program, and he will never come to this facility again or take another of these tests. He would go on to finish high school and go to college afterward. He would have average success in college. However, he would succeed well in life.
But right now, he just wished the proctor would open the door and let him go inside. He hated being out in the hall. This place scared him. To many Guvv-ment Geeks as he liked to call them. All the same haircut, all the same attitude.
Just then, the fat boy with braces heard something coming from the far end of the hall; the end with the mystery room and the guard with the M-16 machine gun. When he glanced up, he suddenly saw the guard as he walked toward the fat boy with braces.
And there was a boy who was walking next to him.
‘It’s him… It’s The Legend.’ the round little boy thought to himself. The fat boy with braces had never seen him, but the girl who claimed she saw him had described him to everyone. And this kid looked just like him. He had brown hair and was fit, not like the fat boy with braces. He was chubby. The fat boy with braces had just gone shopping with his Mom for a suit to wear for Easter. He had to get a husky-sized suit. It was written on the label. He knew what husky meant. It meant fat.
The fat boy with braces had cried all night when they got home from the store. That next morning, he decided he was not going to be husky. He decided he was going to lose weight. And he had started to lose weight. He would continue to lose weight, too. And he would start college as a normal-sized young man.
But right now, he was still chubby, or husky, or whatever. What the fat boy with braces was not, was fit; like the boy who was quickly approaching him next to the guard with the big gun. The fat boy with braces could not see it, but his jaw was hanging down slightly.
• • •
As the boy with the big brain approached the rotund little boy in the hall, he laughed a little to himself.
‘He looks like a baby Humpty Dumpty.’
He was in a foul mood because he was hungry and started to say something mean to the fat boy, who looked like he might start drooling at any moment. The fat boy’s mouth was slightly hanging open as he approached him. As smart as the boy with the big brain was, he had no idea he’d become a geek celebrity among the other children in the nationwide secret program.
He changed his mind about being mean and just smiled at the fat kid with braces as he walked up. When he got right next to him, he stopped. The guard turned to say something, but the boy with the big brain pointed at his face with his finger and spoke very slowly.
“Don’t say a word.”
The guard gritted his teeth, but kept his mouth shut.
The boy with the big brain looked over at the round boy, who was a few years younger than him. Then he smiled at him again before speaking.
“Hey.”
Before the husky boy could answer, the boy with the big brain turned and continued down the hall, to be alone and eat.
They always fed him in a room by himself; in front of a mirror.
• • •
The fat boy with braces smiled at the boy’s back. He will remember this day, forever. At least, that’s what he told himself as The Legend walked by him.
‘He spoke to me…’
He won’t care that he never gets brought back to this testing facility ever again. The fat boy with braces already knew something that the boy with the big brain would take years more to learn. And that was, school and tests don’t matter; not in the real world.
The fat boy with braces knew what mattered. He was going to show everyone one of these days. He already knew that, too.
But right now, he just watched The Legend as the tall good-loo
king boy walked away down the hall with his armed escort.
The two boys will meet again.
But when that happens, neither of them will remember this day in the hall of the testing facility.