Why I Quit Zombie School Read Free Page A

strange silence fell all around me.
    I peered down the stairs. Wayne lay crumpled at the bottom. Like a wadded-up ball of paper. He didn’t move.
    Angelo stood beside me, gazing down at his twin. He didn’t speak. He didn’t move.
    I expected him to fly down the stairs to help Wayne. But he just stood there staring blankly. He didn’t look upset. He didn’t even look surprised.
    My heart thudded in my chest.
Come on, Wayne — get up! Come on, move! Move your arms, your legs!
I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move.
    A group of kids gathered at the bottom of the stairs. Everyone stared down at Wayne in silence. No one screamed or cried out or dropped beside him.
    No one did
anything
.
    And suddenly, almost without realizing it, I began screaming: “HELP him! Somebody — get help! HELP him!”
    Angelo squinted at me. Like he was trying to figure out why I was screaming.
    His face was still totally calm. And he made no move to hurry down to his brother.
    Finally, I saw two teachers appear downstairs. They pushed through the silent crowd of kids. They unfolded a canvas stretcher and placed it on the floor next to Wayne.
    “Is he okay? Is he ALIVE?” I screamed.
    For some reason, a few kids laughed.
    What was funny about it?
    The teachers didn’t examine Wayne or anything. They rolled him onto the stretcher. His body was limp. His arms dangled over the sides.
    The teachers strained to lift the stretcher. Wayne is a big dude. Finally, they raised him off the floor and carried him away.
    My heart was still pounding. And I heard the sick
splaaat
Wayne’s head made against the concrete steps again and again. I couldn’t force that horrible sound from my mind.
    I jumped when Angelo put a big hand on my shoulder. He finally spoke: “Hey, Matt, it’s a good thing you came to Romero. We’ll need you to replace Wayne on the soccer team.”
    Huh?
    My mouth dropped open.
    “Angelo,” I said in a shaky voice, “Wayne is your brother. Aren’t you worried about him?”
    Angelo shrugged. “You know how it is.”

7
    I caught up with my parents and Jamie in my room. The room was just big enough for a narrow bed, a dresser, and a tiny desk.
    “The bathroom is down the hall,” Mom said. “Can you handle it?”
    Do I have a choice?
    Jamie sat on the bed, texting someone on her phone. Dad gazed out the tiny square window, down to the playing fields below. Mom was stuffing my T-shirts into a dresser drawer.
    “Listen to me!” I cried breathlessly from the doorway. “Something is totally weird!”
    Jamie looked up from her phone. “Your face?”
    “Don’t make jokes,” I said. “Something
horrible
just happened.”
    That got their attention.
    I told them about Wayne. “His head hit the steps hard, and he fell all the way down. He just lay there at the bottom, all crunched up. He didn’t move.”
    “How awful —” Dad started.
    I raised a hand. “No. Wait. I’m not finished.”
    I told them about how Angelo didn’t move. “His own twin brother,” I said. “He didn’t shout or scream or call for help or anything. He just stood there. Like it was no big deal. None of the kids acted upset. None of them.”
    “Matt, you must be exaggerating,” Mom said.
    “No, I’m not!” I insisted. My head felt like it was bursting. I wanted to pace back and forth. But there was no room.
    “I’m telling the truth,” I said. “No one even bent down to see if Wayne was okay. It seemed to take
hours
for the teachers to arrive. And they just loaded him onto a stretcher and carried him away.”
    “It said on the website that they have nurses on duty here twenty-four hours a day,” Dad said.
    “That’s not the point!” I screamed. “The kid didn’t move. His head was cracked. I heard it. And no one checked him out. And all the kids … they … they weren’t even upset.”
    Jamie gazed up from her phone again. “They were in shock,” she said. “I studied it in Psych class.”
    “Huh?” I stared at her. “Jamie,