Charlie
(Cognitive Dissonance)
By Wayne Koehler

     Charlie was a good kid. He played well with the other children, always ate his green food, and never missed a bath. Charlie was his mother’s only child. He grew up learning his numbers, his colors, and a little algebra. By the time Charlie was in first grade he had memorized his multiplication table through the twelve’s.

     Charlie was ready for his first day of school almost a full hour before the bus would come around the corner at Mrs. Whipple’s large brick house, making its way along Oak street until it would stop right in front of Charlie’s house. How fortunate for a little boy who couldn’t wait to get to school and learn something new to have the school bus park right outside his front door. He was running for the yard as soon as he heard the bus, dragging the backpack that he had almost forgotten in the excitement and gripping fast the paper bag with his sandwich and banana, he would get milk at the school cafeteria.

     Charlie stopped, his mouth wide and eyes scanning the rows upon rows of seats, hoping that someone he knew would be riding also. Then he saw Ray and Pete, two of the neighborhood kids who played with Charlie last summer. Charlie slowly moved towards them, hoping now that they would let him sit there also. Ray saw Charlie coming and moved his things off the seat to make room for him.

     “Hi, Charlie!” he said, offering the seat to his sometimes play friend. “I can’t wait to get home today, I got a new game for the Xbox!”

     Charlie heard Ray, but was busy looking at the other kids and didn’t answer. Charlie noticed things about these kids that he hadn’t seen before. One kid, a short redheaded boy who Charlie thought he remembered from the weekend at the city pool, was wearing the shirt that Charlie had been looking at when his mother took him to the mall for school clothes. Charlie liked the shirt his Mom had picked for him, but he really wanted the monster shirt.

     “No, Charlie.” his mother had told him. “That’s really not appropriate for school.”

     Charlie knew his mother was right and quickly went to try on the jeans she had picked for him. Charlie liked having his mother pick out his clothes, it made him feel warm when he finally got the chance to wear them. He remembered the little girl at the mall, her mother was letting her run around and pull stuff off the manikins right there in the store! Charlie knew better than to do this, his mother would not allow that type of behavior.

     The little redheaded boy caught Charlie looking at him and stuck out his tongue. Charlie already knew that was beneath a first grader, although he might slip occasionally and do the same to his little sister Carrie. Charlie’s gaze drifted to other kids on the bus, Michael, who lived two blocks away, had the jacket with the Nike swoosh on the breast, his mother must have lots of money. Charlie wished he could wear that jacket, but knew his own would be warm enough.

     “We’re gonna get old Mrs. Williams this year!” yelled Pete. Mrs. Williams had been teaching at this school forever, or at least as much of forever as these first graders knew about. Anyways it was a long time, and Mrs. Williams had horses at home so she must have been here in the cowboy days.

     “That was a really long, long time ago!” said Ray, staring out the bus window as if the answer were somewhere waiting for him. “My brother had her two years ago.”

     “She must be really smart. And old!” added Pete.

     Charlie couldn’t stand it any more, as the bus pulled into the school, he quickly got off and headed straight to the new classroom. Inside he saw the jackets of all the other kids. Green jackets, yellow jackets, black jackets, most of them had some sort of decoration. Some were of sports teams, others were famous brands that Charlie had never heard of. He wondered what one of these jackets would look like on him. His mother picked out what was best for him, to keep him warm, to keep him dry; but still, he wondered how it would feel to wear one.

     The lunch pails and backpacks also were covered in TV commercials. The show about the little brother and sister who fight monsters after their parents put them to bed, the new movie about the cops who always found the bad guys, and gals. Charlie had kind of wanted a Scooby Do lunch box, but had forgotten about it at the mall so Mom bought a bunch of lunch sacks. Brown paper bags, like the ones Mom got here groceries in many years ago. Charlie thought that was neat, to pretend that he and his Mother were shopping together and putting things into the little brown bags.

     During the morning classes, Charlie thought some of the kids were really annoying for teasing the girls and talking back to Mrs. Williams, his Mother had taught Charlie to respect grownups and to not tease. Charlie wondered who these other Moms were and why they didn’t know as much as his own. These seemed to be the popular kids though, Charlie would like to have more friends.

     At lunch, Charlie lined up and waited for the class to walk to the cafeteria together. Some of the boys were talking and playing so Mrs. Williams made them go the rear of the line where they had to wait and eat last. Charlie didn’t even think about playing, he was too hungry.

     That afternoon, on the way home on the bus, Charlie thought about his day in school. He couldn’t understand how those kids could have learned to act that way when they all lived in the same city, the same neighborhood. Maybe their Moms didn’t know his Mom, and had never been told that it was rude to act like that.

     Charlie met his Mom in the kitchen, where she had been making a pie for after dinner.

     “Hi Sweetie!” she said, smiling and happy now that her baby was home. “Did you make any new friends today?”

     “Can we go to the mall, Mom?” asked Charlie. “I want a new jacket.”