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be any limit to how many kinds there are.
    I do the chin thrust a few more times before getting to the front door of my school. The pressure is so strong on my spine it feels like it’s about to snap. This is not such a wild thought. I already know that my tics can make me hurt myself. Before I ripped the muscle in my back, I was biting down so hard on a bottom tooth that I broke it in half and had to be rushed to the dentist. The dentist didn’t believe what had actually happened.
    Even though I’m trying hard to be good, this day gets off to a terrible start. During the spelling lesson, Mrs. Wilkens asks me to write the “word of the day” on the blackboard, and I feel proud to have been selected. I can tell she likes me, even though I tic a lot in class and require some extra work on her part.
    When I get to the front of the class, Mrs. Wilkens pronounces the word of the day and asks me to write it.
    My writing isn’t very good because I have trouble holding the chalk and forming the letters, but I always try my best to please her. And everybody else.
    Before I start, I sound out the word in my mind, the way she told us to do. Then I turn to the blackboard and get the chalk ready.
    But instead of writing the word of the day, my hand writes the word SHIT in great big letters.
    For a moment I stand there, staring at the word in horror and shame.
    I don’t know what just happened, only that something told me to do it. I know it’s one of the worst things I could have done, and I’m as shocked as anyone.
    As soon as the kids see the word, they start laughing and pointing at the blackboard. I’m so embarrassed, I want to erase it, but I can’t.
    “Sorry,” I say to Mrs. Wilkens. “Sorry. Sorry.”
    My face contorts, and my eyes close and open fast and tight. Not only have I written a bad word on the blackboard but it’s making my tics worse. The combination of what I’ve written and my silly faces starts the other kids laughing harder and louder. Mrs. Wilkens isn’t laughing at all. She’s angry.
    “Everyone be quiet,”
she shouts.
“Cory, take your seat. Now.”
    “Sorry,” I say again, but I don’t think she’s listening.
    Then I get the idea that it will be better if I make it look like I’m doing everything on purpose, as a joke. The kids will think that I’m funny and not just weird. So I make a few more silly faces, including a dopey grin. This makes the kids laugh again. I laugh along with them.
    Mrs. Wilkens yells at us again, and this time the room goes completely silent.
    I get to my seat and slip into it quietly. Inside, I’m feeling so bad that I let Mrs. Wilkens down when she trusted me at the blackboard. But I also realize for the first time that I can get kids to laugh
with
me instead of
at
me when I do something inappropriate. I can become the class clown.
    One thing is for sure. From this day on, I can’t go to my classroom without thinking about writing SHIT or some other bad word. And I live in paralyzing fear of going up to the blackboard again.

Danger Everywhere

Chapter 12
    I’M MAKING IT very hard for my mother to drive. We’re coming home from the YMCA, where she’s taken me to play basketball with some kids like me who don’t have much else to do or other kids to play with.
    We’re on a narrow country road, and the traffic is bad. My mother is trying to make a left turn at an intersection, but there’s another car coming at us, and she has to decide if she can make it in time.
    Already on this ride I’ve been sticking my head out the window and also making silly faces in the rearview mirror, like I used to do in my bathroom. This is getting my mother upset, but not as upset as when I need to
open my door while the car is moving.
    The reason I’m so wild today may be the new medicine I’m on. I’m getting anxious about starting third grade only a few weeks from now, so my doctor is trying a new drug called Haldol. This one was made for people with problems such as