Barker
“A promise is a promise, so let me tell you how all of this madness started. Want to join the crew? We’ll meet at the usual spot. The beauty of our friendship is that we are just as different as we are the same, and we love each equally. If you had asked me a few years ago if you thought our crew would be at the nexus of world-changing events, I would’ve said, “what’s a nexus?” and then I would hav etold you no way; we are too chill to be at the heart of all of this. But here we are.” – Huey
I’m leaving my last class of the day and heading back toward the science lab. The hallways are emptying quick, with athletes heading out to the fields and most everybody else heading home. I skip through the abandoned hallways on my way to the lab.
Mr. Barker’s science class was better than ever today! I had never even heard of spherification. We took orange juice and turned it into balls of orange juice, like boba. Just took a little sodium alginate, calcium chloride, and sodium citrate. We all thought we were cool when we made a few of them, but then Mr. Barker showed us how to make tons of them with spoons on a stick. It was pretty ingenious.
Almost everything he does is amazing to me. He is in his eighties but is totally modern. You never have to explain anything like hashtags, technology, or pop culture to him. Well, maybe music. But otherwise, he’s woke. The big thing is that he really cares about what he is teaching, and I think it makes him happy to have students that dig it. I sometimes feel the other kids are not as into it, but chemistry speaks to me. I don’t know why; it just does.
Once I started hanging out with him in his class, I discovered he is almost always there, day and night. I guess he’s planning for the next day. I’d think his wife and kids would be mad about how late he stays, but he is so incredibly sweet they probably always forgive him.
‘’ Millions are truly depressed. It doesn’t matter if they win the lottery, lose the lottery, get the girl or boy, or lose the girl or boy. It never matters what is going on outside them. Their insides keep them shackled.’’
