Read Online On The Wings of Heroes by Richard Peck - Free Book Online Page B

down, down. But it cured me.
    Beverly got an F for her skull and crossbones, and stalked out of the room without her coat.
    â€œWhere’s she going?” somebody said.
    â€œWho?” Walter Meece said.
    Where she went was Raycraft’s Drug Store to order a cherry Coke she didn’t pay for. She was nabbed going out the door with a bottle of eyedrops, a pair of dress shields, and a roll of Tums down her shirtfront, which must have been the first things she happened to see. All this came out later.
    But Beverly sulked into school the next morning, and Miss Titus said nothing.
    Then we got company again. They should have put a revolving door in for all the company we got. Beverly’s mom was back, steaming like a kettle. The tails on her big bandanna vibrated, and she kicked the door on her way in. She was one burly woman.
    We were doing fractions, and Miss Titus turned from the blackboard. Beverly’s mom skidded to a stop. Nobody’d told her about Miss Titus, who would come as a surprise to anyone. For a moment, she might have thought this was Miss Landis after two months of us.
    â€œBeverly’s parent?” Miss Titus’s eyebrows rose over her specs.
    â€œYes, and I’m on a cigarette break from the plant. What do you mean turning her loose to waltz out of sch—”
    â€œI let her go,” Miss Titus said.
    â€œWhy in th—”
    â€œBecause it was high time I saw you,” Miss Titus said. “I can’t picture you at a PTA meeting.”
    Beverly’s mom simmered, but said, “Well, I can see you’re no better than the last so-called teacher.”
    â€œPossibly worse,” Miss Titus said. “They had to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find me. They had to burn the woods and sift the ashes. There’s a war on, you know.”
    The nutcracker jaw on Beverly’s mom clamped shut. Threats weren’t going to work.
    â€œYou give her an F. It . . . upset her.”
    â€œAn F’s for not trying,” Miss Titus said. “In this class you learn, or the police get involved. What’s it going to be?”
    That too slowed down Beverly’s mom, way down. But she turned over a big hand. “Oh well, me and school never got along either.”
    â€œYou mean school and I never got along either,” Miss Titus said, correcting her. “Don’t use bad English in front of my pupils. They need all the good examples they can get.”
    Beverly sat at her desk, kind of clenched up, just under their line of fire. We were all ears.
    The sizzle went out of Beverly’s big mom. Her voice fell a mile. “I make twice the wages here I made back home. But it ain’t—isn’t worth it.”
    She turned on Beverly, who was staring into the distance the way girls do around their mothers. “You’re not cutting the mustard here,” her mom told her. “They’re going to have to win the war without me because I’m taking you back down home. I’ll get my old job back, and when I’m not set—sitting on your head, your grandma will be.”
    Beverly erupted. “Grandma! NOT GRANDMA!”
    We tried to picture her grandma, but couldn’t.
    Her mom checked the classroom clock and left.
    It was nearly noon, but Miss Titus got us back to fractions in five-eighths of a second. When we left for lunch, Beverly stormed out first, opening the pocketknife she always carried to carve her desk with. We all gave her a running start. The other eight-to-five orphans opened their lunches. Doreen and Janis weren’t sitting together.
    When the coast was clear, Scooter and I strolled out to look along the curb for Miss Titus’s banged-up Chevy with the suicide doors. When we spotted it, Scooter checked around on the street to find a pocketknife stuck in the flat front tire.
    But it was worth it. Beverly was gone for good. And next semester Doreen made the honor roll. She was good at math,