Free Mr. Terupt Falls Again by Rob Buyea Page B

more interested in the girl who teased him. The good news was, Lexie got sick so she didn’t get to parade around in her new look for very long.
    Jessica, Danielle, and I never got around to talking about Lexie because of what happened with Jeffrey and the kid, but I know Mr. Terupt noticed Lexie’s other changes, too—like her lipstick and everything-is-chill attitude. So after her stuffed bra, and maybe because of that unbelievable day, Mr. Terupt decided it was time to talk to Lexie.
    “Hey, Lex,” I heard him say. “I’d like you to hang out for a few minutes after school today so we can talk.”
    “Gee, Teach. I’d love to, but like, I got someplace I need to be right after school.”
    “I just need a few minutes, Lex. I’m sure whatever you need to do can wait those few minutes. Don’t you think?”
    I was waiting for Mom to pick me up after school. Jeffrey was at home serving his suspension so I was going to the center by myself. As it turned out, Mom just happened to be running a few minutes late that day, so I was still there when Mr. Terupt started talking to Lexie.
    “Lex, what’s up these days? I notice you’ve replaced the lip gloss with lipstick, the boas with scarves, you have new clothes and new words, and now you’re in a big hurry to get out of here after school every day. Where’ve you been going?”
    Lexie shrugged. “Nowhere,” she said.
    Lie, I thought. She wasn’t looking at Mr. Terupt.
    I didn’t get to hear any more of their talk. Mr. Terupt knew I was eavesdropping and he gave me a look. I moved to the other side of the room, away from them. I stood looking out the windows, waiting for my mom. Lexie ended up leaving before me.
    “Anna,” Mr. Terupt said, after I spotted Mom and turned to go. “Lexie’s your friend.”
    “Yes,” I said. But he didn’t say anything else. Ms. Newberry walked into our classroom just then, so I left with a smile, but I was wondering why Mr. Terupt had said that to me.
    After our visit to the center that afternoon, Mom decidedto drive home a different way. “Where are we going?” I asked.
    “Home, but I thought we’d take the scenic route,” she said.
    What a lucky coincidence that turned out to be. We turned down Old Woods Road and went for a while before passing a run-down, abandoned house. And what did I see lying on the ground next to that old house’s front porch?
    Lexie’s bike.

A fter the episode, and I’m referring to Mr. Terupt’s stuttering and stumbling, not Jeffrey’s explosion, my research felt urgent. I ended up learning more about post–head trauma than I think I wanted to know.
    Simple things like dizzy spells or stuttering can be an indication of some recurring bleeding at the site of an injury. There’s also a possibility of seizures. Seizures are a result of sudden, abnormal electrical activity in the brain. There are people who have seizures regularly, but that’s because they have a brain disorder called epilepsy. Epilepsy didn’t apply to Mr. Terupt, so I didn’t spend much time reading about it. However, seizures can also happen to anyone with a problem in the brain, and head trauma can cause a problem. Seizures can last from a few seconds to several minutes, and they can range from mild, which might be Mr. Terupt stoppingmidsentence and spacing out for a moment, to severe, in which case we would know, because Mr. Terupt would be on the ground, convulsing. Convulsions are when the body shakes out of control. I didn’t want that to happen to Mr. Terupt, but if he was already having dizzy spells and stuttering, wasn’t this next?
    OBSERVATION

—Mr. Terupt is having repeated dizzy spells and is stuttering now
.
    QUESTION

—What is wrong with Mr. Terupt?
    Detective Luke

I t didn’t take long for me to get bored at home. Plus I was missing Asher. So I decided to get Mom out and take her to the center.
    I didn’t bother asking if she wanted to go. I simply told her we needed to go, which was the truth,