Crucifixions @ 2 p.m., After Lunch

by Julien Lowenfels

He threatened all of us with a tuning fork but at the moment was pointing the twin forks directly at my face. He said he would bury it in the forehead of the next kid who jumped out of his seat without permission. This meant my forehead.

I trembled at my desk. I was very confused. I was one of the only children who did not run to the window when the car backfired. Why was I in trouble?

His booming voice was full of rage as he continued to eye me while bouncing the fork in his right hand. I sunk lower in my seat. I felt ridiculous and skinny in the face of this grown man, suddenly smaller in my desk. I became aware of my pale, birdlike arms as they protruded from my short sleeve shirt. I folded them nervously over the cable knit blue vest my grandmother had given me for Christmas --- the one I hated but felt obligated to wear. I moved my hands under my thighs and slumped my face further toward the surface of the desk.

He continued to glare at me, his face now flushed with his anger. It made his large salt and pepper mustache seem all the more bristly. The pores of his nose looked large under the fluorescent lights and sweat was collecting around the edges of his Bruce Jenner-style feathered hairdo. I could smell the coffee breath emanating from behind his yellowed, crooked teeth. The blue of his eyes was made more intense by the red blood vessels that surrounded the irises. He was repulsive to me.

By now, all of the children who had run to the windows when the car made its large exploding noise had now returned to their desks. The teacher began to pace back and forth in front of the class, breathing heavily.

“This is my class and my rules. Do you know what happens to children who do not follow the rules of the classroom?” he asked, in a tone that suggested we best not answer. “They will be sent to the Principal’s office.” He spun on his feet and pointed the fork at me.

“This is NOT like your other school. In this school, we have rules which we expect you to obey.” I didn’t like the sound of that.

Burning me with his eyes, he continued. “You’ve been in my class only one week and you have behaved disrespectfully every day of that week.” His face was a stone. I had no idea what he meant – what had I done?

Afraid to cry, I repressed all the fear and frustration, gulping painfully – it felt like I was swallowing a knife.

I could not believe that my parents had sent me to the Christian Day School. My brother, three years ahead of me in sixth grade, was having a bad time of it also. We had been attending a public school, Wilson, at the end of Victoria Street, right next to the 101 Freeway. Transferred a year earlier to Wilson during a re-designation of school districts, we had both been repeatedly beaten by the tough Wilson kids who were not taken with the idea of these two wasp boys being dropped off every morning in a ’66 Cadillac Fleetwood limousine. Seeing us step out of that car every morning fully enraged our peers – the fact that my father decided to wear a chauffeur’s cap to drive us to school (for fun) had not made it any easier.

My father was a car fanatic and had purchased the low-flying limo to shuttle my gout-ridden Grandmother around town. My Grandmother had complained that our other cars were too difficult for her to get in and out of. She had been living with us since my Grandfather died, and my mother had been obliged to deliver her around town to various functions, doctor’s appointments, hair rinses and bridge games. My father, the auto-addict, thereby justified the purchase of the limo without realizing the catastrophic effect the car would have on the lives of his two young sons.

After a year of limo rides to school and the resulting attacks, my parents thought it best to cough up the money and send us to a private school rather than move to a better district. The Christian Day School was the most affordable and the closest to our home.

The first problem was that neither my brother nor I had not been raised Christian. In fact, we weren’t not even baptized – our parents decided to let us choose our spiritual paths for ourselves. We never prayed, nor had we ever attended church. My brother and I had also just spent a year in a rough public school with very little rules and even less discipline. Keeping none of that in mind, our parents enrolled their two pagan boys in the Christian Day School to protect us from the bullies at Wilson.

The Christian school was run like a police state. The teachers were extremely committed to punctuality and Christianity, two concepts completely new to us. It was all very mature. We were to arrive promptly at 7:45 a.m. every morning and remained in class until 9:00 a.m. at which time we received a 15-minute break. Next, we began our physical education class, which was done by the entire school (all grades – even kindergarten) out on the playground. At 10:00 a.m. we were to report to Chapel, where we were expected to pray and study the Bible. At 11:45 a.m. we received lunch, and at 12:15 p.m. it was back to class, where we remained until 3:15 p.m. when it was time to go home. The schedule was rigidly adhered to. 

For the first few days I faked it pretty well. P.E. was scary and overwhelming - at eight-years old, I’d never changed before in a locker room nor had I ever participated in any formal exercise. I was smaller than kids my own age and that, combined with a deep-seated nervous anxiety, made me a fairly poor athlete. I was scolded by the teachers for my lack of ability and taunted by the other children. All the kids in the school were breaking under the weight of their oppression, which made them into vile bullies. By the third day, I spent most of P.E. period sitting on a curb crying with teachers and students alike howling at me to get up and stop being a baby.

Chapel was a nightmare. The concept of religion, spirituality, and Christ were utterly foreign to me. The only significant male I celebrated at Christmas was the big guy in the red suit that brought you toys. I had no clue who the sucker nailed to the cross was. The concept of crucifixion scared me and grossed me out. On my fourth day in Chapel I asked a kid sitting next to me, “Did they really NAIL him to a cross?” I wondered if the same punishment would befall me if I were to fail to stay within school guidelines. I sheepishly glanced at the crucifix, which hung over the altar of the Chapel, with its life-sized plaster Jesus bleeding from his wrists, ribs and ankles. I was incredibly terrified. I realized at that moment that my best bet was to just mouth the words of the “prayers” along with the other kids and do my best to hide the fact that I hadn’t a clue what any of it meant, or why we should bow our heads to the morbid display on the cross hanging from the wall in the first place. These people were truly weird, and my ignorance as to the ways of Christianity gave me the objectivity to see just how creepy the whole enterprise really was. It was utterly revolting to me.

The first week at the Christian School felt like an endurance test. I was completely elated to see my mother pull up in the big black Cadillac on Friday and to know that I had two whole days away from hell’s private school. My elation was mixed with an undercurrent - a sinking feeling that I would have to return the following Monday. At this point, I began to feel nostalgic about the beatings at Wilson.

As soon as I was in the car, I began pleading with my Mother. “Please, please, don’t make me go back there – I HATE IT! Please Mommy, please Mommy, I don’t want to go to this school, I want to go to the other school, please!” When we got home, both my parents insisted that I attend the Christian school saying that I would get used to it, would receive a better education and I would be protected.

Monday morning of my second week arrived very quickly. My mother had decided to drive our other Cadillac, a 1959 black four-door (very Batmobile). As it pulled away, I chased after the great black fins and red rocket tail lights screaming for my mother. She didn’t stop as I chased her to the end of the school’s driveway.

All the chasing and screaming had made me late to class and caught someone’s attention. I was immediately seized on the upper arm with the tight grip of a Christian teacher and roughly dragged to my classroom. I was thrown in the door. The teacher who had grabbed me told my homeroom teacher that I had chased my mother’s car. According to this Gestapo for Christ, I was clearly a difficult child and would require extra discipline. My homeroom teacher glared at me as if he were taking it as a personal insult that I did not want to be in his class.

As soon as the other teacher left, he was glowering at me and hovering large over my desk. Loudly in front of the whole class he said, “So, you do not like our school? You do not like your classmates? You do not like your teacher? Too good for us, are you?” I kept fantasizing that he was talking to someone else. How could this have happened? I felt horror in the knowledge that he was on to me. I couldn’t answer.

“From now on, I am going to be watching your every move. You are going to learn some manners and some responsibility.” I sat unmoving in my seat. I almost threw-up. That’s when the car backfired outside.

After threatening me with the tuning fork, my homeroom teacher suddenly shouted “Get UP! Apologize to the class, immediately!” The sound of his voice made me jump. I withered out of my seat. Trying to hide my shaking, I tentatively passed in front of the teacher and stood in front of the chalkboard. I apologized not knowing why I was apologizing. I again took my seat.

At 9:00 a.m., I reported to the locker room and changed for P.E. I walked out onto the playground and instead of stopping in the middle, I continued until I was at the rear up against the fence. As the P.E. teacher began to count-off our jumping jacks through his megaphone, I looked over my right shoulder. The fence was about six-feet high and chain link. It had green plastic slats inserted between the links, making it difficult to see what was on the other side. I simply did not care. With each one of my jumping jacks, I hopped backward and a little closer to the fence until I was standing right in front of it. The teacher with the megaphone suddenly moved to my left to castigate a child who was out of breath. I spun on my feet and began to climb the fence.

It was a cold morning, so it was difficult to insert my stiff fingers into the links. Also, the green plastic slats were not exactly pliable and gave the feeling that my fingers and toes were just barely inserted in each link. I climbed the fence swiftly and at the top, flung my right leg over. I took my last glance at the playground. The teacher was staring at me. He dangled the megaphone loosely over his right thigh. His mouth was open.

Panicked, I quickly threw the rest of my body over the top of the fence. I was hanging for a moment from the top of the fence before I dropped to the ground, falling backward onto my ass. I had cut the palms of my hands open on the ground and gravel had been driven into the skin by the force of my fall. I sat for a moment feeling the pain and that’s when I heard the dogs.

It started as a low rumble. Afraid to look behind me, I assessed their sizes by the depth of their growls. Both beasts had meaty, baritone registers. I swallowed audibly. In an instant, I popped off the ground and landed on the fence. The dogs let loose into full bark and I could hear them running toward me. I scaled the fence in seconds flat and hurled myself over the top. As I hung, this time on the school side of the fence, I felt the hands on my calves. I was unceremoniously yanked from the fence and slammed onto the ground, which knocked the wind from my chest. It was my homeroom teacher.

The veins bulged on the sides of his forehead and his face was beat red. He slammed me repeatedly on the ground and screamed at me unintelligibly. I began to scream and cry – he slapped me across the face. The force of the blow knocked the tears off my cheeks. I was in shock. Terrified, I forced myself to hold in the tears. He yanked me up by my shoulders and stood me on my feet. He seized the back of my neck in a pinch and forced me to walk with him across the playground. I realized that he was taking me to the Principal’s office. My legs buckled beneath me and he dragged down the hall of the main building. He tossed me into a chair once inside the office. There was a woman sitting at a desk typing on a manual typewriter. She peered at me for a moment as my homeroom teacher explained what had transpired. She got up from her desk and entered a door behind her, pulling it tightly shut as she entered. My homeroom teacher stomped out without a word to me.

My face still stung from the teacher’s slap. Never had I experienced anything like it before. I tried to understand what was happening, but my mind would not let it all in – I was too terrified. I thought they were going to kill me.

The woman emerged from the Principal’s door and said, “He is waiting for you.” She extended her hand to me and smiled. It was the first friendly gesture anyone at the school had done so I took her hand. She walked me slowly into the Principal’s office.

He sat behind a large dark desk in a sparsely decorated office. There was absolutely no clutter other than a yardstick placed carefully at the leading edge of the desk’s surface. He was a stern looking man, wearing a navy-blue wool suit, white shirt and blue necktie. His face was emotionless. The starkness of the man and his surroundings gave him an unequaled malevolence. He looked at me and said, “One more stunt like that and I will be forced to use extreme discipline – is that what you want?” I couldn’t answer. “Good. I see you understand. Now walk directly to Chapel. Next time I will not be so forgiving.”

I couldn’t believe my good fortune – that was it – I was free to leave. I quickly turned and walked towards the door.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” he called after me. I turned and faced him. I did not know what he meant. “Say, “Thank you, Sir” and excuse yourself.” I quietly mumbled “Thank you, Sir,” bowed and left the room.

I arrived early at Chapel. No one else was in the building. It was cold, and I was alone with Jesus. He looked exhausted. I was exhausted. I looked up at the bleeding white guy on the cross and actually found myself praying. I prayed for a way out of this school. I prayed to return to Wilson public school. I prayed for the strength to handle the bullies at Wilson. I prayed that my father would lose his chauffeur’s cap. I prayed in the pew until eventually I fell asleep.

I awoke to the sound of other children entering the chapel and sat-up and looked around just as they began to file into the pews. Everyone was giving me funny looks as they quietly took their places. The Chapel teacher entered the room and instead of starting us all off with a prayer, as usual, he asked one of us to volunteer and lead the prayer. No one raised his or her hand. I stared at my lap as hard as I could in an attempt to avoid eye contact. I heard his voice say my name. I was utterly speechless. He admonished me to begin, snapping his fingers. I opened my mouth and said, “Our father who are…giving us daily bread, hollow is your name. Over the lips and through the gums, watch out stomach, here it comes. Amen.”

The other children were laughing. I looked at the floor and wondered if there was room for me under the pew. One spiritual concept became clear at that moment; I gazed around the room at the cackling kids and the frowning angry teacher and knew then that evil did exist. The teacher, obviously miffed by my performance, asked another child to begin the prayers.

We were dismissed, and I walked a safe ten feet behind the rest of my classmates back to our homeroom. I finished the rest of my day with my homeroom teacher glaring at me through each lesson.

By the end of the second week, I was a gelatinous mess. I spent most of that Friday at school hiding or crying, further enraging my captors. No longer feeling an alliance with my Mother, I had long since stopped chasing the car in the morning and instead focused my energies on a new plan of escape from school and from home. When I got in the car with my Mother, my brother was in the back seat. He had been expelled from the Christian School.

Apparently, he had been riding his bicycle to school the entire two weeks. On several occasions, his bike flag had been snapped off or stolen during the day. As a preventative measure, he had planned to stash the flag outside his classroom this day. Unfortunately, he had arrived late for school, pulled the flag off his bike and was running through the hallways to class when he turned a corner, skewering a teacher square in the forehead with the flag. A bike flag! Why hadn’t I thought of that? Apparently, the only way to get out of the school was attempted. 

Envious of my Brother, I quietly stewed in the front seat all the way home, plotting my own mischievous escape. On Monday, I would return to school as a model student. I would do everything as asked, would not cry, and gain trust. Once trusted, I would no longer be monitored and could escape, this time avoiding the chain link fence at the rear of the playground.

I returned to school after the weekend poised with confidence. I had a plan. I entered my homeroom on time and took my seat. The teacher immediately approached me.

“I’m sorry. You will not be joining us this week. I have received word of your disrespectful mocking of a prayer on Friday, and I think it would be in your best interest to visit with a class of other troubled children such as yourself.” His mustache lifted slightly to the right as he smirked.

My mouth lost all moisture and I was unable to swallow. He yanked me out of my seat and squeezed my right wrist tightly. He announced to the class that he would return shortly, and they were to remain in their desks.

He walked me briskly down the three flights of stairs to the ground floor. We hustled across the parking lot and looped around behind the main building. There was a small single wide trailer back there and I could hear the sounds of children’s voices emanating from within. When we entered the trailer, I knew instantly the subtleties of his fiendish plan. The children in this class were all clearly physically or mentally challenged. The room smelled like fried food. Their teacher was a fat slob wearing a stained short-sleeve dress shirt with a black greasy comb-over. He was at the front of the room eating extra-crispy chicken legs out of a Kentucky Fried Chicken box. When he noticed us standing in the rear of the darkened classroom, he stood up wiping his hands on his shirt. My homeroom teacher and he exchanged knowing nods and glances. I was placed at a desk and my teacher left.

All the children in the room had become quiet when we entered, and now they were all staring at me. I had not been exposed to mentally or physically challenged children before me and to my ignorance they appeared to be deformed monsters. I swallowed the vomit that was rising in my throat.

Slowly a few of the kids rose from their desks and approached me. Some of them began to speak to me but I could not understand what they were saying. Some began to touch my hair. A few were drooling. I sat paralyzed in my seat. The teacher suddenly announced, “Time for dodgeball!”

Upon hearing this, the whole room became very animated. The children began to laugh and clap their hands. They all began filing out of the trailer. Pointing at me with a chicken leg, their teacher said, “Go on, go outside and play dodge ball.” Feeling suddenly apathetic, I had no choice but to follow.

There was a large yellow circle painted on the asphalt just outside the trailer. My new classmates all stepped inside the circle. One child handed me the ball and motioned for me to stand outside of the circle. Once I had assumed my position, all the children began to run around inside the circle screaming. One boy looked at me and yelled, “Throw the ball! Throw the ball!” I lifted the ball and threw it, easily picking off a child who had a severe limp. She gathered up the bouncing ball and joined me outside the circle.

Next, she threw the ball and picked off another slow-moving child. He also left the circle to join the limping girl and me at the perimeter. I quickly saw where this was leading. Being disabled, none of the children were particularly fast. It was like picking off disabled fish in a barrel. It was long before there were two boys left inside the circle. They were shouting and whooping excitedly. The ball had come around to me again and I, without even trying, quickly picked off one of them. The kid last standing began yelling at the top of his lungs and jumping up and down (as best he could). The child I had just nailed grabbed the ball, and after a few throws, managed to hit the last kid in the circle. For some reason, this solidified his victory. He gathered the ball in his hands and instructed all of us to get in the circle.

As the next game commenced, I immediately realized my advantage. I was extremely coordinated and fast in comparison to all of these kids and in a very short time, I was the last kid standing. Each one of the other children tried in vain to hit me. The ball went around the entire circle twice. The excitement of the experience began to turn into frustration. Several of the children were becoming flushed with anger. Soon they were screaming and throwing the ball violently at me. I still managed to out run all of the balls thrown. Some of the children began crying. Soon, the entire circle of kids was furiously throwing the ball at me, screaming or crying. And I had descended to yet another layer of hell. So as the next ball sailed past me, I snatched it from the air.

At that precise moment, finally disturbed by the noise, the teacher emerged from the trailer with several new grease stains on the front of his shirt. “What the heck is going on out here?” he shouted.

All the kids immediately stopped the racket and stood in place. And there I was in the middle, holding the ball.

“Are you keeping the ball away from these kids, is that what you’re doing?” he said to me, angrily.

“No, they were trying to hit me, and I was too fast, so they couldn’t, so I just kept running around so I….”

“Oh, I see, because you think you’re so much better than they are, you’ve been taking advantage of their handicaps and have been keeping the ball away from them. You’ve upset the whole class!” he said while angrily gesticulating with a drumstick in my general direction.

“No, I, no, we were playing dodgeball, that’s all…” I said, on the verge of tears.

“Looks more like a vicious game of keep-away to me! Now, everyone, inside – return to your desks!” He stomped back into the trailer.

Just as he turned his back, one of the children slapped the back of my head as hard as he could, which practically dislodged my brain from its case. Barely able to breath and seeing white spots before my eyes, I returned to my seat in the trailer.

I spent the remainder of the morning watching these forgotten children glue their fingers together, sleep, or fondle themselves. The teacher maintained his post at the front of the room, eating the entire time. Just before lunch, my homeroom teacher appeared at the door and asked if I’d had enough. I nodded in agreement and he escorted me to the cafeteria. After lunch, he returned me to the trailer.

As he walked out the door, I was surprised to actually be sorry he was leaving. Of course, I reasoned, the upside was that this class never went to Chapel. I had also noted another bonus -- the trailer, placed behind the main building in the rear parking lot, afforded an easy escape to a side street behind the school.

Thirty minutes or so passed, and I slipped easily out the door of the trailer without the now sleeping greasy teacher’s notice. I ducked behind a few cars in the parking lot as I slowly made my way to the exit. I did not see a soul. There was a large open space in the fencing, which allowed the cars to leave. After the car I was now kneeling behind, there were no others between freedom and myself. I would have to make a run for it. I took a deep breath and broke off into a full sprint toward the exit. I quickly passed through the opening and turned left, running toward the main street. It wasn’t until I got to the stoplight that I heard the feet pounding the pavement behind me. Like a creature from a horror movie, there was my homeroom teacher. Being a full grown, six-foot tall man, he caught up with me quickly. He sadistically grabbed the back of my shirt and sweater vest and shook me violently – it felt like my teeth were going to fall out. Without speaking, he walked me briskly back onto school grounds and into the building where the Principal sat waiting.

Once inside the office, it was clear that the Principal’s demeanor had changed significantly from our last meeting. My homeroom teacher left quickly, slamming the door behind him. The Principal, an exceedingly tall man, stood up and came around his desk toward me. He was malice personified. He asked me several confusing questions about who I thought I was and why I thought I had the right to behave the way I did. I guess telling him, “I’m not even baptized, thank God!” may have been a mistake. Everything began to happen in slow motion for me – I was blacking out. I saw his lips part and the words “This is going to hurt me a lot more than it’s going to hurt you,” left his mouth at an ultra-slow speed. I watched his arm as it slowly reached for the yardstick on the end of his desk. I realized he was about to beat me with it. Suddenly, I came to from my delirium, spun on my heels and opened the door in one movement. As I sped past his secretary’s desk, my sweater vest caught on the page return lever of her manual typewriter and pulled the machine off her desk. I heard it crashing to the floor with a loud thud and the sound from its bell behind me, but I didn’t stop. I ripped through the door and into the hall, never looking back. My stride felt suddenly larger – I seemed to be flying.

In no time I was out on the street, running down the sidewalk at full sprint. I never looked to see if I was being followed. I ran for eight blocks before I ducked into a liquor store. I was coughing and choking on my own saliva. I walked the rest of the way home in the afternoon heat.

When I walked in the door, I spilled my guts and told my Mother everything. She was horrified and sorry she had not listened to me. I eavesdropped with joyous enthusiasm as she made the call to the Christian Day School’s Principal. I stomped my feet with glee as she chewed him out and told him that neither of her boys would ever return to his school. I had never known such happiness.

The following week, my brother and I returned to public school. The week after, she enrolled us both in Karate lessons. Not only did I learn to defend myself, I gained the title of the youngest green belt in the tri-county area. My father sold the limousine and I began riding my bike to school. There was a moment at the end of the school year when I realized that all I had prayed for in Chapel that one morning back at the Christian School had come true, and I finally understood the power of prayer -- and the power of a good pair of running shoes.