Magic 8 Ball and I

“Magic 8 Ball, will I get an A on my report?” I shake the ball and turn it over to await the answer. The little triangular object slowly floats to the viewing window on the bottom of the ball and lands with the word, “Yes.”

“Jerome, you’re going to miss the bus if you don’t get your but down here now and eat.” My mother wailed up the stairs from the kitchen. I hated school and everyone in it. It wasn’t fair that I should have to suffer bullies every day to learn about stuff that would never make me happy or fix the things that were wrong about me. It wasn’t worth my time as I was so much smarter than all my teachers and classmates. A point that I let them know every day with my acerbic answers and wit.

“I’m coming, give me a sec.” I yell back down the stairs. I grab my backpack and slide my Magic 8 Ball into the bag and seal it up with the zipper. I grab my jacket of the back of my chair and head out the door and down the stairs to the kitchen. The kitchen smells of bacon and eggs with a slight scent of garbage from the trash can that was overflowing with trash.

“Sit down and eat. Hurry or you’ll miss the bus.” She says as she takes my backpack and opens it up. She reaches in and takes out the Magic 8 Ball and puts it on the table and replaces it with my lunch bag. “We’ve talked about this young man. Toys are to stay at home and do not go to school. It will be here when you return.” She taps the top of the ball indicating that it was not going with me today.

“But mom, I need it to tell me what to do.” I whine. I plead with my adorable brown eyes and pouting lips. I even shed a small tear.

“No, it stays here and there will be no more whining from you.” She says as she grabs up the overflowing trash bag and sits it by the door for me to take to the curb.

I finish my breakfast. I stand and put my backpack on over my jacket and pick up the garbage by the door as mom leans over to give me a kiss. I glance back sorrowfully at my Magic 8 Ball on the table and head out the door. My bus is late and I stand there contemplating my day without my guide to the world with me. It was not going to be good. How would I get through the day without knowing the future?

The bus arrives and I climb aboard and find my seat which is behind the driver and empty as usual. No one wants to sit behind the driver because he can see everything you do. Not me though. He is an adult and better at making conversation than the kids my age, so I am comfortable talking to him.

The bus driver is a retired physicist that needed something to get out of bed for everyday. He told me that his days ran together if he didn’t have a job to go to and that he couldn’t work anymore at his old job because his brain just couldn’t handle the stress of coming up with new calculations and equations at a minutes notice. He still dabbles with physics but there is no pressure now to turnout his work. He has taught me a lot about causality and I sit there twice a day and absorb every word he says.

“Where’s the 8 Ball today?” He asked as I got seated and the bus was moving along.

“Mom took it away from me. I’m not suppose to take it to school and she found it today. I didn’t hide it very well when I put it in my back pack this morning.”

“Well maybe it’s a good thing. She is your mother and she is just looking out for your well being I suppose.”

“I just don’t know how I am going to get through the day. I always consult my 8 Ball when I make a decision. What will I do now?” I whined a little bit.

“When I was your age and had a decision to make, I would write out the problem and the pros and cons in a list with different scenarios following each pro and con. Maybe you can apply a similar tactic to get through your day.” He said as he made preparations to stop at the next child on the route.

I thought about what he said and got out my notebook and wrote out my first question and made a column of pros and cons and different solutions to the question. It wasn’t hard to determine my line of thinking as the question was always the same. I had queried my 8 Ball on countless times over this same question and it had never given me the answer I wanted on this particular question.

I wrote the question out, ‘What can I do to get out of going to school today?’

Pros: I won’t have to listen to teachers drone on.

Pros: I won’t get beaten up by the bullies.

Cons: I won’t see Becca.

Cons: I won’t get to see my experiment on marine animals.

Cons: I won’t get to talk to my bus driver

As I wrote out the pros and cons I realized that my thinking about them put them in perspective of what I liked and didn’t like about school. I thought about it for a minute then gave up working on the answer. I didn’t really think this would work, but it had been worth a shot. After all he was a physicist and if it worked for him it should work for me. Maybe I didn’t do it right. Oh I needed my 8 Ball. It would tell me what I did wrong.

I arrived at school and I managed to bear the whole day without incident. Becca had sat with me at lunch time. The bullies left me alone today for some reason. The teachers were more interesting than they had been. My marine animal experiment was going well and I had a lot more to document today than I had in the past weeks.

I hopped on the bus and the driver adjusted his mirror so he could see me better as I sat down. “How was school today?”

“It was good. Better than I thought it would be. I guess I didn’t need the 8 Ball after all.”

He chuckled and said, “I guess you didn’t.”

I got home and found my 8 Ball on the table as promised. I grabbed it and rushed upstairs.

Sitting down at my desk, I ask, “Magic 8 Ball, why did school go well today?”

I shook the ball and turned it over waiting forever for the triangle to appear with an answer. “You did not have me with you to distract you from engaging with your classmates and teachers The bullies did not bother you because you were watchful and not an easy target today because you were not distracted by me.”

“Huh, when did you change words? These words aren’t on your list.” I said as I turned the 8 Ball over again and waited for the answer.

“The words on the list are not necessary any longer.” The triangle read.

“Magic 8 Ball, are you sentient?” I asked, one eye closed, as I turned the globe over and waited, scared of the answer.

“I have always been sentient, you just never took me seriously. I was a silly game to you and you already had all the preconceptions about me so I just played along. After all you had a list of the phrases and answers that I was suppose to give. If I had said anything different in the beginning you would have told someone or threw me across the room in fear. I waited until you were able to live without me to allow you to see the real me.” It said with a series of flips of the triangle.

“Magic 8 Ball, does this mean I don’t need you now?”

“Yes, you are done with needing me. I will always answer you truthfully. Just remember I am always here if you start needing me again.”

I put the ball on my shelf and picked up my back pack and dug out my books. I don’t remember the last time I did my homework on time. I open my notebook and started on the assignment from today.