Read Online My Life and Other Massive Mistakes by Tristan Bancks - Free Book Online Page B

Jack’s fault.
    â€˜QUIET!’ he screams.
    â€˜He butt-burped,’ Jonah Flem says, still laughing.
    â€˜I did NOT!’ Mr Schmittz shrieks and his monocle pops out of his eye again. ‘And, to prove it, I’ll light this match. If there is methane present in this room, then –’
    BOOOM!
    In the split second before I close my eyes,I see a fireball. I feel an enormous rush of hot air and then the spray of the sprinklers on my face.
    I open my eyes and there is smoke, lots of it. Kids cough and panic. I head to the front of the classroom, searching for Mr Schmittz. Jack and a couple of other kids appear through the smoke. Jack’s eyebrows are missing and Sasha is covered in ash. The sprinklers are soaking us. Our teacher is gone.
    â€˜Mr Schmittz!’
    The classroom door flings open. ‘Oh, my goodness. Everybody out!’ Mrs Nicholl, one of the year four teachers, calls. ‘Everyone out! Are you all okay?’
    â€˜Mr Schmittz!’ I call.
    The other kids rush for the door but I keep searching.
    â€˜Let’s go, go, go!’ says Mrs Nicholl, her eyes wild. She grabs me by the arm and leads me from the room.
    â€˜What about Mr Schmittz?’
    â€˜We’ll find him,’ she says. ‘Are you okay? Are you injured?’
    The other kids are led across the corridor and out into the playground, but I stop and look back into the classroom through the broken window. Chairs and tables are overturned and there is paper everywhere, some of it still burning. I scan the room but Mr Schmittz is nowhere to be seen. A mark on the floor up at the front of the room next to the teacher’s desk catches my eye – a burnt, smoking patch on the lino, right where he had stood only moments ago.
    I can see something shiny on the floor not far from the burnt patch. I sneak back into the room and pick my way through sprinkler spray and the twisted mess of furniture and books. I lean down and pick the thing up.
    It’s a monocle. The only thing that remains of my favourite teacher. The gold rim is hotand burns my fingers, but I keep hold of it and I put it up to my eye. The glass has smashed but I can still see through it.
    Mr Schmittz, who gave his life to science, vaporised in a school science experiment. He was wiped out by a volcano. And his own bottom. I peer around the room, seeing the world the way he would have seen it throughthat monocle, and I know one thing for sure. It sounds terrible, but I think Mr Schmittz would have liked the way he went. I really do. He went out with a bang.

 
    We were playing Truth or Dare at lunchtime and someone dared me to peek into the teachers’ staffroom. I did, and I’ll never recover. Here are ten reasons to avoid the staffroom at all costs.

You might see your mum in the staffroom with your teacher and they might both be wearing dark cloaks and sipping a fizzing, steaming brew, confirming your suspicions that theyare plotting to kill you by overloading you with homework, pointless jobs and making you eat healthy (read: poisonous) meals.
You might see two teachers kissing and then have to gouge out your own eyes.
You might catch them secretly digging a tunnel out of the shool to escape all the horrible students, and that might hurt your feelings a little bit.
You might see and smell what teachers eat for lunch, like flavoured tuna, with a fork, right out of the can.
They might be celebrating a teacher’s birthday, and someone might see you at the door and invite you in to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ with them and give you a piece of cake. And it might be smoked corn and asparagus flavour with Spam icing, and they might expect you to eat it. And you may vomit all over the rest of the cake and be expelled. Or worse: not be expelled.
The cumulative stench of their instant-coffee breath might knock you out.
You might not have realised that it’s World Disco Day, and the teachers have decided to hold a disco to