Mr. Greger's Short Story: Layup War

Mr. Greger, who kids called “The Blob” when he wasn’t looking, was waddling around inspecting lay-ups. He worked for Denver Middle school #123 and hated it. As he was waddling, the kids could hear his stomach sloshing around and at the same time see it jiggle. It was hard to suppress a laugh. He would occasionally stop to criticize kid’s form but he wouldn’t make a big deal about it. That is, until he stopped at a certain group, Carrie and Teddy’s group. They didn’t notice that he was watching them until he boomed, “What are you doing Carrie? That’s all wrong! You need to do it like this!” After he was done showing them how to do it Carrie asked, “But Mr. Greger, I have only missed two in the past ten minutes, and Gary has missed ten, what
Mr. Greger made up a game just to infuriate Carrie, he called it “Layup War.” It was where you had to make the best lay-up in a group of two to move up. Carrie started at the bottom and never moved up the whole time when she had clearly made the best lay-up most of the time. Mr. Greger decided who got to move up and who didn’t. “I guess that Carrie is the worst at ‘Layup War’ in the whole world! No one had ever in the history of the game has not beat one person! I mean, she couldn’t even beat Tod or Garry!” Mr. Greger boomed at the end of the game, like always getting Teddy’s name wrong. Mr. Greger chose the wrong time to say that though, because the secretary had just walked
The Gym exploded in excitement. “But under one condition, you all have to go to study hall!”

Once they got to the office the secretary hissed “In this school, I have heard of kids bullying kids, adults bullying adults, even parents and other adults, including teachers on drugs, bullying kids, but I have never had a teacher bully a kid like you were!” she was yelling by then, “You should be ashamed! I am amazed that Carrie isn’t crying in a corner right now for goodness sakes!” “You didn’t see half of it!” Mr. Greger said, “This Brat-” “No more excuses!” the secretary cut in, “I stood outside watching your class! You can consider your job lost!” “Well, good!” Mr. Greger yelled, “I don’t want to work anywhere unless this brat is ten miles away!” and he marched out of the room. Suddenly the secretary’s tone changed, “I am sorry that Mr. Greger was so jerky to you. He was kicked out of the military because he was on drugs, since then he has got off them, but he must feel empty, and mad, so he took it out on you.”

When Carrie finally found Teddy he asked, “What happened in there? You looked