The Pyle Inside

CHAPTER 1

MRS. COLOGNE

The air was cold. Patrick Morny hopped off the bus, with a chilled look on his face. The sound of his shoes crunching the frosty grass was music to his ears. His face, motionless, stood in front of Heather Middle School. It was just an ordinary day, because like any other day, school was just school.

Patrick was scrawny and underweight. He could pass for a 4 grader, because of how little he was. He was about 4 feet 6 inches, the average height for a 10-year-old.

            The bell had just rung. Patrick sprinted to his locker. Patrick never got used to his locker. He was in 8th grade, and was still having difficulties opening a simple locker. It took him about 3 tries to finally open his locker, and then he rushed to his first period. Patrick hated first period. He hated it so much. Not because of the kids, but because of the teacher.

His teacher, Mrs. Cologne, was a complete jerk. She always dressed fancy, and bragged about how wealthy she was. One day in class, Mrs. Cologne once said, “OK, shut up everybody, and listen to me or I’ll give you detention for 3 years. And yes, that means that’ll continue to high school as well. So, if I hear a peep out of you brats, you’ll suffer a long time.”

Patrick sat in his seat, smelling the disgusting perfume from Mrs. Cologne. Every day, Mrs. Cologne would wear perfume, $1,000 earrings, lipstick, foundation, 4 inch heels, and a nasty looking face. Every kid in her class are terrified of her, they were even afraid to speak. But it was on this day, where Patrick decided to say something, which was a big mistake.

CHAPTER 2

THE MISTAKE

            The whole class was seated, and no one spoke. You could even hear the birds outside chirping, the heater humming, and the sound of nervous 8th graders. Every student was motionless as they were watching Mrs. Cologne write on her chalkboard. When she was finished, she slammed the chalk on her desk, and pointed to Patrick.

            “You, scrub,” she hollered. And all of a sudden, the birds stopped chirping, the heater stopped humming, and the noise of the nervous 8th graders got louder and louder. “Finish this stupid math problem or I’ll give you detention for 6 months.” You’ve probably guessed it, but Patrick’s first period was math. Math was in fact Patrick’s favorite subject, and he was very good at it. He couldn’t mess up this problem, or the results would be ugly.

            “Yes, Mrs. Cologne,” Patrick mumbled under his breath. Patrick was starting to sweat as he nervously stumbled in front of the chalkboard, right next to Mrs. Cologne.

            “Don’t talk back to me, scrub? Ya hear me? Don’t talk back!”

            Patrick nodded, knowing that any other mistake could lead him to 6 months of detention. He looked at the math problem on the chalkboard which had the problem: “What is 24,567+526,802?”  

            Patrick took the chalk from the desk, and started writing the answer on the chalkboard. He could hear Mrs. Cologne put gum in her mouth and chewing it aggressively. When Patrick finished the problem, he set the chalk down on Mrs. Cologne’s desk, and stepped aside so Mrs. Cologne could see the chalkboard. She gave Patrick a glare, and then turned her head in front of the chalkboard.

            As Mrs. Cologne slowly turned her head towards Patrick’s answer, she started to smile, but not in a good way.

            “This is WRONG!” yelled Mrs. Cologne. She took the chalk and circled Patrick’s answer. “THIS IS WRONG, I TELL YOU!”

            “What?” Patrick started, “how can the answer 551,365 be wrong? I double checked the answer!” You can probably guess that Patrick’s answer is correct, but Mrs. Cologne was just in the mood to make someone’s day miserable.

            “WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME? THAT’S DETENTION!” Just then, Mrs. Cologne put her face about 3 inches from Patrick’s and whispered, “That’s just because you’re the only stupid kid to speak up to me. And don’t think I won’t give you a worse punishment the next time you ever do that again.”

            Patrick was trembling. All the muscles in his body didn’t want to move, and the audience was just like that as well. The bell rung, and Mrs. Cologne told everybody to get their stinkin’ butts outta here.

            The rest of the day was normal. Patrick didn’t get into any sort of trouble, so the rest of the day for him was quite alright. It was at the end of the day Patrick was upset about.

CHAPTER 3

SPORTS IN DETENTION

            Patrick nervously walked into the detention room. He sat in the only seat that was open, surrounded by other naughty middle schoolers. 1 hour of detention went by so slow. Patrick was about to drift off to sleep, until a finger tapped his shoulder. That finger belonged to none other but William J. Turner.

            Patrick instantly turned around, because what better thing could he possibly do during detention? He looked at William’s grin, and asked, “What do you want?” “To ask you a question!” William replied, with an even bigger grin on his face. Patrick was sort of confused on why a stranger wanted to ask him a question, so he just sort of nodded in response.

 William whispered, “Do you like sports?”

“Yes, a lot actually.” Patrick replied. Patrick in fact loved sports, especially basketball.

“Well, then, take this paper, it’ll tell you all about joining teams for sports!”

When Patrick went home, he looked at the paper. This is exactly what it said:

            Are you interested in joining a sports team? Well this is the place for you!

“Forney St. for soccer, Enderle Dr. for football, Stanton Rd. for tennis, Johnson Dr. for baseball, and McEvoy Rd. for basketball.” Go to these locations on November 13!

            And if you think any of these places are for you, join the team! Have some fun! We’ll see you there!

            For the first time in a while, something unusual actually happened to Patrick.

CHAPTER 4

THE JOCKS

            The weather was the same on November 13. People believed that this was the coldest it has ever been. Patrick quickly walked towards McEvoy Rd. for basketball. His shoulders were scrunched up, and his feet were freezing. He was quite confused whether he was supposed to bring clothes to actually play basketball, but the letter was very vague, so Patrick thought otherwise.

            As Patrick was strolling around the road, he saw a group of people standing near the basketball court. There was a big blue sign above them that read: BASKETBALL: HEATHER MIDDLE SCHOOL. This was the time where Patrick decided that he should do something with his life.

            Patrick walked towards the sign, thinking many things at once. Will the people there like me? Or will they hate me? What if I’m not good enough? Patrick’s head was twirling in a moment of confusion as he tripped on his own, right on top of 2 jocks.

CHAPTER 5

THE 2ND MISTAKE

            Patrick’s head was bruised and he could barely think. All he could hear was the laughter of the people around him. What’s going on? He thought, still confused of his surroundings. Why is everyone laughing?

            When Patrick finally gained full conscious, he knew the laughing was no joke. “What’re you doing, red face?” 1 of the jocks laughed. “Are you OK, red face? You seem to be hurt!” After that, everybody around him laughed even harder, making Patrick both embarrassed and confused. Red face? He thought, Red Face?

The 2nd jock was wearing green Nike shorts, an orange Under Armour t-shirt, and beat up black shoes. He shoved his phone in Patrick’s face. “This is what you look like, UGLY!”

The phone showed a camera facing Patrick. Just then, Patrick realized that his whole face was bleeding. His face was red, it looked like his face was covered with pepperoni sticks.

Patrick stood up, and looked down on the ground. Even under his bleeding face, he was blushing like a fire hydrant. The moment of laughter only lasted about 2 seconds until a man wearing a grey hat and long shorts held up a microphone. “OK, kids, settle down now,” the man blasted into the microphone. Complete silence. “As you all know, you’re here to join the basketball team.” All the kids nodded their heads, but then one person yelled out, “How about for humiliation?”

Just then the whole crowd started to laugh again as one of the jocks pointed at Patrick and his bleeding face. “SILENCE!” the man shouted once again into the microphone. “Bullying WILL NOT be tolerated!” The laughter finally died down, and the man continued to speak. “If you all don’t know, my name is Mr. McEvoy. I will be your coach for your basketball team.”

Patrick finally stood up, and slowly turned his head to the point where he was looking at Mr. McEvoy. Patrick already knew, Staying on this basketball team will be harder than I thought.

Mr. McEvoy explained how the basketball team was going to work. Every Wednesday, the basketball team would meet and play a game against another school. He didn’t exactly specify what school they would face, but Patrick didn’t think too much about it. At the end of Mr. McEvoy’s infinite speaking, he told everybody to prepare to play a game. Oh, no, Patrick thought, I didn’t bring any clothes. And I’m bleeding. Don’t worry Patrick. Just ask Mr. McEvoy that I need to go home and heal my scratches.

From that, Patrick quietly walked up to Mr. McEvoy.

“Um, excuse me, Mr. McEvoy?” Patrick asked shyly. Mr. McEvoy turned around, with his gray hat on his head and his black sunglasses on.

            “Yes, umm…” Mr. McEvoy trailed off as he was obviously telling Patrick that he didn’t know his name.

“Patrick.”

“Ah! Yes, Patrick! What is it?”

“I didn’t bring any clothes, and as you can probably tell, my face is pretty bloody. So, do you mind if I go home, wash off, and come back next week?”

“Not at all, Patrick! Just make sure you don’t hurt yourself again!”

Mr. McEvoy laughed at his joke as you, the reader, probably has no idea what the joke even was.

As Patrick was walking towards home, he could hear the voices behind him as one of the jocks was pointing at Patrick. “Oh,” one of them started, “it’s a little girl! Too scared to play some basketball!”

Patrick started to walk even faster as he could hear the crowd of laughter grow smaller and smaller, to the point where Patrick couldn’t hear them at all. After that, Patrick went home and cried in his bed. Never to return to the outside world. Never to step foot on another basketball court.