“I beheaded him.”
Her mouth opened a little and I could see the knobby bright green of her gum between her tongue and her teeth.
“Kropp! You! Kropp!”
It was Barry Lancaster, pushing people out of the way in the crowded hall to get to me.
“Are you still his girlfriend?” I asked Amy Pouchard.
“Sort of. Not really. I mean, he’s never beheaded anybody or anything like that. Do you want my cell phone number?”
Barry had reached me by that point. He shoved me hard in the right shoulder and said, “What are you doing here, Kropp? Aren’t you supposed to be in jail or something?”
“Actually,” I said, “I’m supposed to be in social studies.”
“But instead you’re talking to my girlfriend. Pretty stupid, Kropp.”
“She’s not your girlfriend, Barry.”
“Like you would know.”
He shoved me again.
“Don’t shove me, Barry.”
“Yeah? Who’s gonna stop me, Kropp?”
He shoved me again.
“Barry,” Amy Pouchard said. “Cut it out.”
A crowd had gathered by that point. The bell rang but nobody paid attention.
“Maybe this is the point I should tell you that the last guy who shoved me around like this got his head chopped off,” I told Barry.
“You’re so full of it,” he snarled, and then he launched himself at me.
He really didn’t have a chance. I sidestepped to the right and landed a haymaker to the side of his blond head as he flew past. Barry went down and he stayed down, and I guess if I had been Barry, I might have kicked him in the ribs. But I wasn’t Barry Lancaster. I was Alfred Kropp, not exactly a knight bound by the code of chivalry, but I was the descendant of the greatest knight who had ever lived. Plus I guess dying gives you some perspective on what’s worth fighting about.
I held out my hand.
“This is nuts, Barry,” I said. “We’re both gonna get expelled.”
“That was just a lucky punch,” he gasped, and he slapped my hand away.
“The odds are against that,” I answered. “I’ve never had too much luck.”
I pulled him to his feet and he spat, “You’re a freak.”
But he didn’t shove me again or try to punch me, and after that nobody teased me about my size or the remark about my IQ. People left me alone. Even my teachers kept their distance and went out of their way to give me a break. Of course, it got all around school that I had admitted to killing someone, and the rumor about me being a terrorist persisted.
I spent most afternoons in the Old City, walking aimlessly or sitting in the Ye Olde Coffee Shop, where I had met Bennacio. I always took the last stool at the end of the counter and sipped lattes, staring at the people walking past the big window. Sometimes I took out the card Abigail Smith had given me in London and stared at it. Most of the time, though, I just stared out the window. And I always dreaded going home to the Tuttles.
Sitting in the coffee shop made me feel close to Bennacio, the nearest thing to a father I ever had, and sometimes I would hear his voice in my head: Do not concern yourself so much with guilt and grief, Alfred. No battle was ever won, no great deed ever accomplished by wallowing in guilt and grief.
I began to understand I had claimed more than the Sword of Kings in Merlin’s cave. I had claimed something even more powerful and scary.
I had claimed who I was.