Jerry Spinelli - Dead Wednesday

That it will never come again

Is what makes life so sweet.

Emily Dickinson

6:57 a.m.

No way.

This is Worms first groggy thought even before he opens his eyes. He actually whispers it to his pillow: No way. Because the feeling he wakes up withthe same one he went to bed withmakes no sense: he wants to go to school.

Wants to!

But noweyes open, head clearinghe realizes its true. For the first time in his life, he does want to go to school. He deliciously reviews the reasons:

1. Its a half dayhah!if

2.if youre an eighth grader. Then you get to motorize on outta there at the end of fourth period. Thats 11:43 if youre keeping score. And OMG, does it get any better?Even though hell be there, itll be like hes not there. Think it again, Worm: like hes not there. Why? Because of this dumb, gorgeous thing called Dead Wednesday. Hes been hearing it since his elementary days: if youre an eighth grader, you get to be invisible. In the past two years hes witnessed it. No teacher will ask you a question. Nobody will hassle you. You can goof off all you want and nobody will care. Worm has witnessed Frisbees and moose calls flying in the hallways. Eddie himself has said many times: You can stand on the teachers desk and blow a rocket blastoff fart, and you wont get sent to Discipline.

Worm doesnt doubt Eddie. But neither does he care much about the license to goof off. To begin with, hes not a goof-offer. Plus, he likes the part about being invisible. For Worm is well named. He prefers to be out of sight, underground, watching, listening. A spectator. He walked the world unseen. That would be Worms perfect epitaph. He mouths a silent thank-you to the Wrappers.

3. Every minute spent in school brings the end of it closer. Seven days and a wake-up. And then comes the only thing that makes the nine and a half months of school endurable: the ocean, the prairie, the vast Siberia of schoolless time known as summer vacation.

So yeahtodaytoday he wants to go to school.

Ohand how could he forget?

4. The fight. Jeep Waterstone and Snake Davis are going to fight at twelve-thirty at the old cannon in Veterans Park. Theyve hated each other since first grade and theyre finally going to settle it.

So Worm has awakened to a day like no other, a day of four beautiful things. He stretches in bed, reviews the beautiful things in his mind.

Every Thanksgiving, when two grandmas and a grandpa show up, Worms father stands over the turkey and smothers everybody in a stupid grin and shakes his head as if he cant believe it and says, We are truly blessed. Until that moment passes, Worm is always a tight knot of cringe. But now, for the first time, he gets it. He is blessed.