The GHOST and Charlie Dusenberry
Chapter Eight: Zepher!

PG. 25 TGACD R. ZEIS

“No, Claudia, the Nile River in Egypt does not flow up.” Charlie Dusenberry smiled as he graded the pop quizzes from this morning. The Nile River flowed northward. Charlie remembered pulling the map of Egypt down on the classroom wall and tracing the river “up” with his finger towards the Mediterranean Sea. Apparently Claudia thought north meant “up.” Charlie gave the little girl half credit for her answer. At least she was trying to pay attention.

“Yo, Mr. Dusenberry!”

Charlie looked up from his desk and the pile of ungraded quizzes. Sitting five feet away was Zeph Yarnell. Zeph had a sour expression on his face. The sour look was worse than the one he had yesterday at this time.

“What’s the problem, Zeph?”

“Mr. Dusenberry, it’s 3:30! I’ve got baseball practice in a half hour. Can I go now?”

Zeph had kept Charlie company for two afternoons after school. His bad behavior again this afternoon had landed him where he sat. “Is baseball practice important to you, Zeph?”

“Heck yes! The season starts in less than a week and we are going to be the BEST team. The Dodgers rule!”

It was the most animated Charlie had ever seen Zeph get. If he put only half of that enthusiasm into his school work the young boy’s grades would soar.

“What position do you play, Zeph?”

“I’m the pitcher! I strike almost everyone out.” Zeph then displayed a nasty smirk, “And if anybody gives me a tough time at the plate, I throw the ZEPHER!”

“The Zepher?”

Zeph stood up and began pawing the floor with his right foot, Charlie could tell the boy was pretending to be on the pitcher’s mound.

“Anybody who thinks they can get a hit off of me gets the ZEPHER!” With that Zeph went into a pitcher’s windup and with a quick overhand motion pretended to throw a ball. “Whoosh!”

PG. 26 TGACD R. ZEIS

Zeph then quickly turned around and pretended to be the batter. “The batter all of a sudden sees my pitch headin’ right at him!” Zeph suddenly let out a scream and threw himself on the floor. “The ZEPHER claims another victim!”

“You throw at him?” asked Charlie.

A broad smile appeared on Zeph’s face as he climbed back to his feet. “Sure! They mostly dive out of the way though. But, you should see how far away from the plate they stand for the next pitch! HA!”

“Zeph, the intimidator.”

“Yeah, Mr. Dusenberry. The Dodgers are gonna win ’em all this season!”

“What about the Yankees?” Charlie asked. “My son is on that team.”

“HA! The Yankees? They’re a joke!” Zeph gave his best impression of an ESPN analyst. “They got nobody! Half of those kids don’t know what a baseball looks like!”

“Well, we’ll see about that,” mused Charlie. “OK, Zeph, you can go. But, I better see an improvement in your classroom behavior or you and I will be afterschool buddies again.”

Then without so much as a thank you, Zeph fled the classroom and was gone.

Charlie sat very still for a minute and listened to how quiet it was in his classroom. He loved being a teacher. However, he got a funny feeling that he was going to teach outside of a classroom very soon.

“Go Yanks….” he thought.

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