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Language:
English
Collections:
Yuletide 2021
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Published:
2021-12-25
Completed:
2021-12-25
Words:
3,163
Chapters:
8/8
Comments:
46
Kudos:
69
Bookmarks:
12
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424

Wayside School and the Next Generation

Chapter 8: Jackson II

Chapter Text

The door to the classroom on the thirtieth story creaked open. The room beyond the door was dark. The class might be sitting there in silence, or the whole building might be empty. Jackson couldn't see through the gloom.

"Hello?" he said. "It's me, Jackson. I got sent to the teacher's lounge during the first week of school?"

There was a rustle of quickly hushed voices. Jackson felt along the wall for the light switch.

"Sorry I missed most of the year," he said. "That's a long time, but I finally found Mrs. Ebbles, and she helped me get back. It's been a pretty long year, and I look a little different now, but it's still me."

There was no more rustling. The class was well trained, but so were the other options.

"I'm not sure what day it is," he said. "If it's a weekday, I'd like to rejoin the class, if my desk is still here. If it's Saturday, I apologize for disturbing the Council. If it's Sunday..." Jackson thought for a moment. His hand found the light switch. "I hope it's not Sunday. Is everyone ready?"

With a click, the light came on. Everybody viewed.

Notes:

What a wonderful set of stories to return to in adulthood! I reread Sideways Stories from Wayside School while completing this fic, and I was surprised and thrilled to find out how many of the stories were lodged in my memory, almost twenty years after I was first introduced to them. There's simply no way to do Louis Sachar's voice justice, but I hope at least some of the weirdness, horror, humor, and delight of the originals comes through.

I did realize as I went along that a lot of the things I was covering--the ballroom dancing, the gravity lessons--were actually things that Sachar himself covered in the later entries. That speaks a lot to how universal what he captured about the elementary school experience was, but also certainly to how infectious his ideas are. I apologize for the retread, where it exists. I also took a look at your (eyeballboba's) fandoms, and we didn't share any, so I avoided the crossover route and invented a new class of characters that hopefully we can both enjoy.

Happy Yuletide, eyeballboba--I'm so pleased you had this idea, and thank you for sharing it and giving me the chance to come back to this lovely world.