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Robert Frost, Atomic Wedgie, Are You Kidding Me?

By WordArtisan

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A/N: I find Zack to be a character that can as easily be more deep than he lets on. The idea was to write a fanfiction from the POV of a person that's trying to figure him out, which turned out to be Max.

This fanfic is really drabbly, taking place during the six weeks of summer school that we never really saw. It doesn't really comply with the episode, however. I'll say that it's the way I'd rewrite the whole summer school experience, and a few other episodes, to include Max. Max is very sarcastic in this fanfic, and cheesed off at the moment.

The first part of the chapter doesn't really flow seamlessly, it's just bits and pieces of the beginning of the episode that Max notes in particular. Also, I might not get the quotes exactly right—even though I saw the episode today, I have a horrible short-term memory. And I can't clarify who says what (not because I can't remember, but because of the style), not that you can't figure that out.

I'm trying to improve my writing. Please list any corrections in your review—don't flame me, but tell me what you think. This chapter's kind of slow, but I think I stayed relatively IC.

-WordArtisan-

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"If I sit in the front, the teacher will call me. But if I sit in the back and there's a fire, I might not make it out. But if I sit in near the window, a large bird could swoop in and carry me away."

"Good luck with that."

Selfish.

"You're in my seat!"

"Who're you?"

"Brick."

"Is that because your face is all red and shaped like a rectangle?"

Smartmouth.

"Well, well, well…who do we have here? And you are…?"

"Shy. Painfully shy. Don't look at me!"

Egocentric.

Sassy, arrogant, self-absorbed. Zack had definitely lowered his standards since I'd seen him last, and I wasn't happy about it. Not that I disliked him, or anything—it's just, I was really disappointed at the moment.

"Hello, class. I'm Ms. Bird. That's Buh-urd. Bird." She wrote her name on the board and opened the book in her hands. "Today we'll start with some rhymes about summer."

There was the dull roar of 'Huh?' across the desks.

"Oh, I'm sorry—rhymy-words about the hot time."

Then a dull roar of oh's and ah's.

Ms. Bird cleared her throat. "'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?' Now, who do you think Shakespeare is addressing? Brick?"

"Uh…false?"

I slapped my forehead. What a dummy.

"No. Anyone else?"

Naturally, Zack raised his hand. "Um, I think Shakespeare's hittin' on a chick, y'know, telling her she's hot like a summer's day."

"No. Wait a second…that's right!"

Well, at least Zack wasn't as hopeless as Brick, I'd hand him that.

Why was I here, anyway? Oh, yeah—it was Brittany's fault, as usual.

Brittany hung out in the teachers' lounge with her older brother after school, and I had a bad habit of really ticking her off. So it was only a matter of time before something like this happened. She hacked into the computers, changed the grade on my dreaded counts-for-fifty-percent-of-your-grade English term paper, and landed me with a big fat F and a month and a half of summer school. I hadn't been doing so great, anyway, but I might've been able to scrape by if Brittany hadn't pulled another stunt.

A few seats down I heard Mark coughing. It sounded a lot like 'nerd'.

The bell rang. "There's the bell. If anyone needs help opening their pudding, ask Zack." As soon as Ms. Bird was out of earshot, everybody got up and started moving in towards Zack's desk, just a couple of rows ahead of mine.

"Hey, guys…anyone wanna share a ham sandwich…?"

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"I'll take that as a no!"

There he was, hung up on the coat rack by his underwear. If I was a really mean person, I probably would've taken a picture rather than laugh.

"A little help here?" he called.

"Hold on a second…" I gripped the back of one of the chairs and dragged it over. "There. Stand on it and unhook yourself."

"Y'know, you could've done a little more than watch when I was actually getting the atomic wedgie."

"Well, in case you hadn't noticed, there's a classroom full of the other kids and only one of me," I retorted. "Maybe you could try thanking me for hanging around in the first place," I added, crossing my arms.

I walked over to my desk to pitch my empty lunch bag and toss my backpack over one shoulder. Zack jumped down off of the chair and started yanking at his pants like a five-year-old that'd been sitting for an hour. I held back snickers. "Why don't we do anything, anymore? I mean, like me and you and Cody used to do in seventh grade," I said abruptly. Oh crap, did I just say that?

Zack got a really thoughtful expression on his face. "I dunno…I think it started when they split up the basketball team."

I mentally reminded myself to shut up while I was ahead—I could beg off of that one, but if I opened my big mouth again I might say something like 'I miss you' that'd get me into real trouble.

"Is there any part of my lunch left?" asked Zack.

"Nope, they stole it and split it amongst themselves," I said. "Listen, I've gotta get going, my mom wants me home early to meet her new boyfriend Vick."

"See ya, I guess," smiled Zack, reaching for his own backpack.

I wiggled my fingers in a half-wave and set off down the hall. Zack would seem like the simplest person in the world to figure out, but sometimes it made me wonder: who was the real Zack, the one that'd smarted off to Brick and tried to hit on Hailey, or the nice one that'd been on our date in seventh grade and traded woodshop projects with Cody? Call me an idiot, but it seemed like he had a virtual tragedy mask and comedy mask sometimes.

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