Free Lockdown by Diane Tullson

Chapter One
    Science 10 is chaos. Josh’s hamster had babies. It’s Ms. Topett’s classroom hamster, but Josh comes in at lunch to clean the cage. He takes the hamster home on weekends and holidays. It may as well be Josh’s hamster. It’s weird, the way Josh bonds with that hamster, but it’s just one of many things that mark Josh as weird. For example, he always wears a blue shirt, the kind with buttons and a pocket. Always. He must have four or five blue shirts with buttons and a pocket.No one wears blue shirts like that. Even if they wanted to, they wouldn’t, because Josh always wears one. A blue shirt, jeans and boots—Josh always wears boots.
    The hamster is an experiment. The hamster’s coat is an unusual rusty red color—a genetic variation, Ms. Topett calls it. She bred the hamster with a normal amber-colored hamster to see if the young would have the darker color. We haven’t seen the babies yet. Ms. Topett says it’s too soon to disturb the nest. Right now, Ms. Topett is out of the classroom photocopying handouts. Before she left the room, Ms. Topett gave us direct orders to stay in our seats. But no one listened. Now, packed around the hamster cage, Science 10 wants to see the baby hamsters.
    Josh stands with his hands jammed in his pockets, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Josh outweighs me and I’m no lightweight. The idiots of Science 10 like to oink when Josh walks past. Hilarious. With one large index finger, Josh shoves his glasses back up onto his nose. He says, “We have to be quiet.”
    A girl, Natalie, pushes me to get to the table with the hamster cage. I let her past. Everyone lets her past—Natalie has that kind of power. She whines, “I can’t see the babies.”
    I can’t either. The mother hamster has them hidden in a cotton-ball nest. Natalie raps the metal cage with her fingernail. To Josh she says, “Make them come out.”
    Josh shakes his head. “The m-mother needs quiet. It’s her first l-litter.”
    I watch Josh’s face. When he stutters, it means he’s stressed. When Josh gets stressed, he gets quiet. It reminds me of a storm, all the energy swirling in on itself. Once in a while Josh loses it, but it’s amazing what he puts up with. The idiots of Science 10 have made this term a living hell for Josh.
    Some of what they do is funny. I admit it, I’ve had a good laugh in this class. Like the time they told Josh, before class, that Ms. Topett was giving bonus marks that day for volunteers. So when Ms. Topett asked for volunteers, Josh stabbed his hand in the air to be picked. And he was. Josh ended uprolling a condom on a banana. His face went so red even his eyes filled with blood. Later, I could make him laugh about it too.
    Now Natalie directs her gaze to the king of the idiots of Science 10: Chase. Chase is all talk, all the time. If there’s one good thing about the way he targets Josh, it’s that he leaves me alone. Chase slithers in front of Josh. He only comes up to Josh’s chin, but Josh steps back. Chase says, “Who made you the freaking hamster expert? We just want to see them.” He leans down to look right into the cage and slaps his hand on the desk. “Come on, mama. Come on out.”
    Josh has bright red spots on his cheeks. “You’re scaring her.”
    Chase tilts the cage and lets it drop down on the desk. To Josh he says, “You’re scaring it with your buggy eyes. I just want them to come out of the nest.”
    Josh blinks. I see him take a deep breath. Then he says, “They can’t come out. They don’t have their eyes open yet.”
    Natalie squeals, “Their eyes are still shut? I want to see!” She fumbles with the door in the top of the cage.
    â€œNo!” Josh swats her hand from the cage.
    â€œOw!” Natalie holds her hands up to her chin. She says to Chase, “He hit me, the