Stanly squirmed uncomfortably as he waited for the principal
to return. He knew he had really done it
this time; there would be no talking his way out of this.
He could hear voices from the outer office but not enough to
tell what was being said. His hands felt
a little sweaty and he felt a little sick, like he might throw up.
Stan looked around the office.
The only way out that he could see was to climb out the window. The other door in the office was to the
principal’s private bathroom. Maybe, he thought, there was another window in
there that would be easier to climb out of, and once in the bathroom he could
lock the door, giving him more time to make his escape.
The more Stan thought about the principal returning, the more
he panicked. No
one he knew had ever been inside the principal’s private bathroom. This offence alone would land him in the
school record book. He’d be famous, if he survived.
Suddenly Stan no longer heard any talking from the outer
office. It’s now or never, he said to
himself. He slowly and quietly slid himself off the chair and tip-toed to the
bathroom door. Stan reached up and
turned the doorknob. “Rats!” It felt locked. “No, wait.” Stan turned it the
other way and the knob turned and the door opened. Reaching the knob was hard. Stan hoped he
would be able to reach the light switch.
As he stepped inside the bathroom, the heavy door closed automatically
behind him. He could see light coming in
from a window but not enough. He still
needed to reach the wall switch. He
stretched up and felt along the wall, it had to be here somewhere.
The tips of his fingers felt a bump. This had to be the wall
plate around the switch. Stan gave a
little jump and he felt the switch, but not enough to flip it on. He scrunched down low and jumped as high as
he could. It worked but suddenly there was a very loud rattle. Not only had the
light come on but the exhaust fan as well.
Stanly was sure the whole school could hear the fan making
this awful noise. He was going to have
to work fast. It looked like he might be able
to turn the waste basket upside-down, stand on it and then climb up on to the
edge of the sink. Once up there he should be able to reach the window latch.
Stan heard the recess bell ringing and he could hear all the
kids yelling as they ran out onto the playground, but he couldn’t let this
distract him. He was now all the way up and standing on the slippery edge of
the sink. He was thinking his friends would never believe that he’d gotten this
far.
As Stan reached up for the window latch he heard the office
door open and then close. The principal must be back in his office. Stan looked over at the doorknob. He had
forgotten to lock it. Surely the principal could hear this stupid fan making
such a racket. The last thing he needed was to get caught in his private
bathroom, and certainly not standing on his stupid, private sink. He knew how upset everyone got whenever
somebody wore their shoes onto the gym floor.
He could picture the principal’s head actually exploding if he should
see shoes up on his sink.
Stan snickered out loud at the mental image he had just
created, but stopped quickly as someone knocked on the bathroom door. Stanley
froze.
“Is anyone in there?” a voice from the other side of the door
was asking. Obviously they could hear
the fan rattling, and maybe whoever it was just heard him snickering.
Stan held tight to the edges of the wall mirror, then reached
over to the toilet with one foot and pushed on the handle to flush it. Now he wouldn’t have to answer with his
little kid voice. Whoever it was would
have heard the flushing sound and realize someone was in here under normal
circumstances and they’d go away.
“Knock, knock… Are you
alright?” the voice inquired.
Stanley suddenly
got the feeling that his plan of climbing out the window was not going to work.
“I’ll be out in a minute.” Stan called back. There was no reply.
He carefully tried to climb back down onto the upside-down
trash can but he was running out of things to hold onto. Climbing up seemed so much easier, he thought
to himself.
Again he heard the outer door open and then close. He wondered if whoever had just been in the
principal’s office left. That would be
great, he thought. He could just scurry
back out and sit in the chair like he had never left. Yep, I was here the whole time, he could see
himself saying.
As soon as Stan was again safe on the bathroom floor, he put
the trash can back the way it had been and he headed over to the light
switch. He was going to have to jump for
it again but this time to shut it off.
This was going to be harder to do as the switch was now pointing
up. Stan was going to have to jump
higher to get his finger tips to the top of the switch to pull it down and
off. He looked at the door and was
wishing he had something to wedge it open, because once the lights were off he
didn’t want to have to feel around for the doorknob.
Stan unrolled some toilet paper and pulled the door open just
enough to stick the paper in the doorjamb.
As the big door once again closed itself the wad of toilet paper was
just enough to keep it from clicking closed.
Stan was very pleased for coming up with that idea, but now came the
light switch. Just maybe he could once
again use the trashcan trick, he thought.
He carried it over and quietly upended it. Using the wall to study himself, he climbed
up and quiet easily flipped off the lights.
There was just enough light left in the room for him to put the can
back. Once it was right-side up and in
place, he went back to the door and pulled it open.
The outer office was empty.
Stan smiled as he scooted back into the chair he had waited in
originally. That was just enough
adventure to keep his mind off of his impending doom. He had momentarily forgotten all about his
crime and upcoming punishment, but now remembering it, just as quickly his
smile disappeared. He sat quiet, just
fidgeting with his fingers and wiggling his shoes in the air when he suddenly remembered
the small wad of toilet paper. It must
have fallen to the floor when he pulled the bathroom door open, he thought to
himself. Someone is sure to see that, he
mumbled. He stared at the bathroom door
but thought better of trying to retrieve the wad of paper. He just closed his eyes, sat back in the
chair and tried to relax.
Stan wasn’t sure how long he had been asleep but he felt
hungry. He got himself off of his chair
and walked around the principal’s desk to see the small clock that sat next to
the picture of what he assumed was the principal’s family. It was 6:17.
The time on the clock didn’t make any sense to him. How could it possibly be 6:17, he thought.
Stan went to the window and pulled back the blinds. It was way too dark outside. Why had nobody come to yell at him? Where was everybody?
Stanley ran to
the office door and opened it. There
were no people. No one was at their
desks, and only the exit signs over the doorways were lit. He couldn’t believe it. They had forgotten about him. Everyone had gone home and just left him
there. Was this his punishment, he
wondered. Why hadn’t his parents come
for him? Weren’t they worried, wondering
where he was?
Stan stood there for a minute just thinking all kinds of
thoughts, and getting more scared by the minute. He had never heard the school this quiet. He wanted to go through the outer offices and
into the hallway but he was too frightened.
He turned and went back into the principal’s office and picked up the
receiver on the desk phone. He was
trying hard to remember his home phone number but at the moment his thoughts
were a jumble.
Maybe I should call 911.
Boy, that would surely get me into trouble, he thought. He put the phone to his ear and dialed what
he remembered to be his home number.
There was no change in the dial tone. No beeps, nothing. He hung up and then picked up the receiver
and tried it again. Again there was
nothing, just the study dial tone as if he hadn’t dialed at all.
He tried to think back, before he had fallen asleep. Maybe the recess bell he had heard wasn’t the
recess bell at all. Maybe it was the
last bell, and the kids weren’t running out onto the playground but heading
home because school was out. But where
was the principal? Why didn’t he ever
come back into his office? Wait… he
remembered someone had come into the office while he was in the bathroom. Was that the principal, or maybe it was Ned,
the janitor, waiting around to clean up.
And maybe, when he heard me in the bathroom he thought it was Mr.
Parker, the principal. I should have
never gone in there, Stan thought to himself, as tears started running down his
cheeks.
Stan couldn’t face wandering around the dark school hallways
to get to the front door, and besides, he thought, they are probably
locked. He picked the phone up again and
pushed 911. This time the phone did
work. A woman’s voice came on and asked
him what the nature of his emergency was.
By this time, however, he was crying harder and having a hard time
talking on the phone. He wanted to say
that his name was Stanley
and he was locked in the school, but incoherent blubbering was all that was
coming out over the phone.
It was right about then that Stan could see car headlights
pull up in front of Mr. Parker’s window.
Then another set with flashing police lights. Stan hung the phone up and ran to the
window. He pulled at the blinds and
swung them wildly back and forth, trying to signal where he was. As he peeked out he could see that it wasn’t
his rescue at all. Someone was getting a
ticket. He could see the policeman standing by the driver’s window of the first
car. He was leaning down and they were
talking. Stan wanted to bang on the
window to get their attention. He
started pounding on the glass with his fist but the little thuds he was making
against the glass were not being heard over the running car engines.
Stanly wanted so much to be home. He wanted his dinner and he wanted to be with
Larry, his brother, and even with Nancy, his older sister, who was always so
mean to him. He kept swinging the blinds
back and forth, hoping someone would notice, but they didn’t. Why hadn’t his parents come looking for him,
he wondered.
Surely, if not Nancy,
Larry would have noticed he hadn’t come home from school. Stan collapsed onto the floor and cried,
wondering what his family had for dinner.
He wondered how they could all sit around the dinner table eating while
his empty chair sat there looking them in the face.
Through teary eyes he noticed a cockroach crawling down the
leg of Mr. Parker’s desk. The last time
he had seen a cockroach he had been in the nurse’s office with a bloody
nose. Suddenly he remembered; when the
nurse’s assistant tried to call his parents the nurse told her she had to dial
9 to get an outside line. A small spark
of hope lit up in Stan. He got himself
up off the floor and picked up the phone.
As he did, he saw a second pair of headlights sweep across the office
wall, as another car pulled into the lot out front.
As Stan pushed 9 on the phone he could hear a lot of commotion
outside. As the dial tone changed in his
ear, the commotion that had just been outside was now coming from the outer
office. He heard strange voices but then
he heard his mother calling his name.
Stan dropped the receiver just as the office door burst open. He could see his mother coming in with his
dad right behind her. He suddenly found
himself up in his mother’s arms being hugged almost too tightly, but Stan
didn’t care. He had his arms around her
and was not about to let go.
In the excitement Stan could see a policeman, the principal
and his brother and sister following close behind. Suddenly Stan felt safe
again. Everyone seemed to be talking at
once and Stan could see the policeman was having a time of it keeping his dad
away from Mr. Parker.
What surprised Stan most of all was what happened next. As his mother was hugging him, crying and
spinning around with joy, he saw his sister walk over and kick Mr. Parker in
the shin. Stan closed his eyes and
smiled. It seemed Mr. Parker was the one
in trouble now.
The End
