chapter 9

A week later, and I feel even more like a rat. Trapped in a maze disguised as a closet disguised as a testing room, with Jackson playing the role of mad scientist. Not sure why I agreed to this. Mostly to shut everyone up.

I’m sweating in here, probably starting to smell bad like I’m rotting from the inside out. Serves Jackson right for making me do this.

“OK, Sadie, I’m going to read you some number sequences. I would like you to repeat them exactly as you hear them. Remember, they’re supposed to be hard, so don’t worry if you have trouble.”

Easy for her to say. She knows the way out of the maze.

I’m staring at a blank wall that doesn’t have any answers for me.

“Auditory processing,” Jackson explains, even though I haven’t asked. “It doesn’t measure whether or not you can actually hear. It helps to measure whether or not you can process what you hear. Do the messages come in clearly, or do they get scrambled a little in translation.”

Lots of messages get scrambled in my world, but that isn’t because I have a problem listening. It’s because the so-called adults in my life have problems communicating. Maybe Jackson should test them.

I sit there repeating numbers to her, probably all in the wrong order. Then she switches to words, which don’t have to be in the right order. This I can do. Then she revs it up to full sentences which start out OK, but then start to sound like Rhiannon, they’re so long. This I cannot do. I’m already tired of this. They should put a TV in front of me instead of a blank wall. I can watch TV just fine. So long as there isn’t a quiz after the show.

“Visual processing,” Jackson explains as we enter Phase Two of the torture session, even though I still don’t ask. Assessing whether my eyes can process what they see. Do the signals get to my brain the way they’re supposed to, or do they get totally screwed up on the way.

I have to look at rows of little pictures that disappear from my brain two seconds after I try to put them in. They aren’t getting scrambled. They don’t even make it into the frying pan.

Phase Three and it only gets worse.

“I’m going to give you some words, and I just want you to read them one at a time. Don’t rush it and don’t worry if you have trouble. Just sound them out as best you can and move on.”

Doesn’t she remember how we met in the first place?

“You want me to read? Out loud?”

“I know you hate reading. I need you to do this part. It’s only one word at a time and no one else can hear you.”

The words are all sitting in a row, mocking me and daring me to call them by name. I manage the first few but the sweat gets into my eyes and I can’t read the rest.

“That’s OK. We’ll move on.”

It’s not really OK.

Phase Four and I start to see a little light. Numbers and equations have always been much friendlier than letters and words. They don’t make fun of me. Especially when Jackson reads all of the questions to me, and I answer without a pencil.

Phase Five and I’m totally lost again. More words on the page, but this time there are whole paragraphs. The words swirl around and trip over each other, jumping from line to line, laughing at me when I try to get them to stay still. Jackson asks questions that have no answers.

The rat loses.

“OK, just a couple more sections. You’re doing great.” Such a nice lie. She’s not even looking at me when she says it. If she was, she’d notice that I’m melting away into a puddle in the chair. Maybe she doesn’t care. She’ll just mop me up and move on to the next kid.

Phase Six. Stories on a CD with questions I can answer without writing. The reader’s voice draws pictures in my mind that stay with me long enough to give Jackson an answer or two before I start to melt again.

Last, and most definitely least, I am handed a pencil and asked to write my way out. This I cannot do. I guess I will be trapped in here forever.

“OK, we’re done. You look a little done in.” My captor takes pity on me and takes away my pencil, which I give up willingly.

“Yeah. Room’s kind of small and hot.” Not to mention the instruments of torture she has been tormenting me with.

“I know. I spend a lot of time in here.”

“Doing what?”

“What I’m doing right now with you.”

“You test that many kids?” Somehow, I thought I was the only one.

“I do. This is a big school, even though the town is small. We bring kids in from all over the county. There are lots of kids who manage to get through to high school without recognizing their learning problems.”

“Yeah, figures. Lots of crappy teachers out there.” I figured she would be ticked with that one. She surprises me by half-smiling and shaking her head.

“It’s too bad you feel that way. I can’t lie and say that everyone who teaches does a great job. Lots do, though. There are other reasons kids slip through.” Slip through? She makes it sound like something easy, like tubing down a water slide. I sure didn’t slip through school. It’s more like being shoved through, kicking and screaming and begging for mercy.

She thanks me for coming, as if we have just had a tea party or something. I think I even say “you’re welcome,” which is a total lie, because she isn’t welcome at all. I would be happy if I never saw her or her lame brain tests again. It’s only going to prove what I’ve always known.

When it comes to the real world, my brain does me just fine. When it comes to reading and writing at school, my brain is basically useless. Put a pen in my hand and nothing comes out the end of it. I can’t think of anything to say, and even if a miracle happens and a thought does creep into my mind, I can’t get it to go down on the paper the same way it came into my head. By the time I finish making a mess of Thought One, any other thoughts have gone screaming away into the night.

Reading. I don’t know what the deal is with that. I probably didn’t pay any attention back in baby school and that’s why the words are so hard to figure out. I mean, I can read. Everyone can read. There’s lots of words I recognize ’cause I’ve seen them a million times. But you put a whole page of those suckers in front of me and they all seem to blend together and do a happy dance across the page. I can’t see where one ends and the next one starts, and it takes me forever to figure it all out. Which might just mean I am stupid, in spite of what Jackson says. It also means I do not read out loud. Wilsons of the world take note.

I head home at the end of the day, just late enough that Rhiannon actually gave up and left without me. I thought I’d be glad for the silence, seeing as I feel like I’ve been beaten over the head with a baseball bat for four hours or so.

The weird thing is, I kind of wish she was here so I could tell her about the testing and hear her talk for forty-five minutes about how awesome it sounded and how she wished she could have testing and how wonderful she thinks I did and how great Jackson is and how super our school is and…

Just weird.