hideous face turned sad and lonely.
I felt sorry for the boy. Being a loner myself, I knew the emptiness he must have felt. Ms. Adams must have felt the same way I did because soon she found ways to force him to interact with the rest of the class, though he never made an effort by himself.
But, with his lack of effort, it never made a difference. In a game of dodge ball, all the boys aimed directly at him, hoping to knock out a tooth in order to claim a souvenir. Billy Ripley came close, striking the boy on the side of the face. But the ball just stuck there, deflating on a tooth which was poking through the boy’s cheek.
When he slept during nap time, kids would throw things into his mouth just to see if he would chew them up. It started out with pencils, crayons, and erasers and progressed to pencil sharpeners, gym shoes, and glue bottles.
His one moment of glory was when everyone in the cafeteria gathered around him to watch an entire tray of corndogs being devoured, sticks and all.
He proved to me a number of things that day: the boy wanted to be liked, he needed to be accepted, and that cafeteria corndogs were actually digestible.
His face started turning grey and weary, always looking downward. He always kept his mouth shut, never even smiled or yawned. It was as if his difference kept him from opening up to the others. Months had passed and he made no effort to fit in.
Show-and-tell rolled around week after week and he sat there, saying and showing us nothing about himself.
Until one day.
To the class’s surprise, he answered Ms. Adam’s request with a jagged, horrible smile, looked around and spoke for the very first time.
“I want to show everyone something.”
“Go right ahead, Daniel.”
He pulled out a small box with a collection of both plastic and glass bottles.
“What do you have to share with us?”
He faintly smiled, uncapped a liquid-filled bottle and began sprinkling it over everyone.
Girls giggled and boys smeared the substance on one another.
“Daniel, you’re making a mess. Please stop it!”
The Boy With the Razor-Sharp Teeth continued relentlessly dousing his peers in liquids and powders and other substances.
A glass bottled rolled against my leg. I hesitated to touch it, frightened that it might be some form of potion which would mutate everyone into People With Razor-Sharp Teeth. Finally I mustered the nerve to flip the bottle over and read the label.
Suddenly Jenny and Susie screamed. Liquids and sandlike granules with an eye-watering fragrance pelted my arm. Crimson splashed against my shirt, running down atop the bottle of meat tenderizer I held tightly. It took what seemed minutes to be brave enough to look up toward the screams.
Susie’s legs were missing and Tony’s face was half-eaten. Bobby crawled toward the door, dragging behind him a mass leaking from his punctured stomach.
The door slammed shut. Dark, beady eyes glared at me, but lunged in another direction, to where Ms. Adams stood, breaking a window with an umbrella. The Boy With the Razor-Sharp Teeth came down on her, sinking his mouth into her neck, ripping out a segment of her spine. She flopped wildly against the heat register, her body trembling in shock.
There was a disturbance at the door, a few more screams, distant sirens closing in.
I crawled into a corner and sat there, witnessing the boy returning to the wounded to devour what remained.
Even when the police arrived, the horror of what they saw repelled them from the door. No shots were fired, no dogs came barging in. Just Daniel, the boy with the razor-sharp teeth, and I glaring face to face, surrounded by fresh carnage and crimson-stained carpeting between blood-splattered walls.
Slowly, his dark beady eyes gazed over to a bottle next to me. He picked up the bottle and serenaded me with tenderizer like a priest exorcising demons with holy water. He smiled and I saw flesh caked
I felt sorry for the boy. Being a loner myself, I knew the emptiness he must have felt. Ms. Adams must have felt the same way I did because soon she found ways to force him to interact with the rest of the class, though he never made an effort by himself.
But, with his lack of effort, it never made a difference. In a game of dodge ball, all the boys aimed directly at him, hoping to knock out a tooth in order to claim a souvenir. Billy Ripley came close, striking the boy on the side of the face. But the ball just stuck there, deflating on a tooth which was poking through the boy’s cheek.
When he slept during nap time, kids would throw things into his mouth just to see if he would chew them up. It started out with pencils, crayons, and erasers and progressed to pencil sharpeners, gym shoes, and glue bottles.
His one moment of glory was when everyone in the cafeteria gathered around him to watch an entire tray of corndogs being devoured, sticks and all.
He proved to me a number of things that day: the boy wanted to be liked, he needed to be accepted, and that cafeteria corndogs were actually digestible.
His face started turning grey and weary, always looking downward. He always kept his mouth shut, never even smiled or yawned. It was as if his difference kept him from opening up to the others. Months had passed and he made no effort to fit in.
Show-and-tell rolled around week after week and he sat there, saying and showing us nothing about himself.
Until one day.
To the class’s surprise, he answered Ms. Adam’s request with a jagged, horrible smile, looked around and spoke for the very first time.
“I want to show everyone something.”
“Go right ahead, Daniel.”
He pulled out a small box with a collection of both plastic and glass bottles.
“What do you have to share with us?”
He faintly smiled, uncapped a liquid-filled bottle and began sprinkling it over everyone.
Girls giggled and boys smeared the substance on one another.
“Daniel, you’re making a mess. Please stop it!”
The Boy With the Razor-Sharp Teeth continued relentlessly dousing his peers in liquids and powders and other substances.
A glass bottled rolled against my leg. I hesitated to touch it, frightened that it might be some form of potion which would mutate everyone into People With Razor-Sharp Teeth. Finally I mustered the nerve to flip the bottle over and read the label.
Suddenly Jenny and Susie screamed. Liquids and sandlike granules with an eye-watering fragrance pelted my arm. Crimson splashed against my shirt, running down atop the bottle of meat tenderizer I held tightly. It took what seemed minutes to be brave enough to look up toward the screams.
Susie’s legs were missing and Tony’s face was half-eaten. Bobby crawled toward the door, dragging behind him a mass leaking from his punctured stomach.
The door slammed shut. Dark, beady eyes glared at me, but lunged in another direction, to where Ms. Adams stood, breaking a window with an umbrella. The Boy With the Razor-Sharp Teeth came down on her, sinking his mouth into her neck, ripping out a segment of her spine. She flopped wildly against the heat register, her body trembling in shock.
There was a disturbance at the door, a few more screams, distant sirens closing in.
I crawled into a corner and sat there, witnessing the boy returning to the wounded to devour what remained.
Even when the police arrived, the horror of what they saw repelled them from the door. No shots were fired, no dogs came barging in. Just Daniel, the boy with the razor-sharp teeth, and I glaring face to face, surrounded by fresh carnage and crimson-stained carpeting between blood-splattered walls.
Slowly, his dark beady eyes gazed over to a bottle next to me. He picked up the bottle and serenaded me with tenderizer like a priest exorcising demons with holy water. He smiled and I saw flesh caked
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