The classroom was quiet.

It was recess time. Everyone was outside, playing basketball on the court, eating snacks at the canteen, or playing cards on the bench. The sky was clear and blue, the sun blindingly bright, so bright the lights inside the classroom seemed burnt out, though they weren't.

"Aren't you coming?"

Martin looked up from his Desk. Benjy was at the classroom door, half in, half out, an expectant look on his face.

“Sorry," Martin told him. "I have to finish my art project. Agh. I’ll be lucky if I can submit it on time. Who needs this anyway?"

"Uh-huh. Well, there's a game going on. If I'm not there when they pick teams, I'm out." With that, Benjy vanished from the doorway.

Martin's gaze went back to the sheet of drawing paper on his desk. It was a stupid project anyway. He had to think of an ordinary animal and then turn it into an imaginary animal by drawing extra stuff on it. But their teacher had ruled out those animals already thought of before, like horses with wings or horses with horns. "Be original," Ms. Magno said in what Martin thought of as a Mom— voice , pleasant to the ears yet with a quiet note of command behind the music. Not that Martin could draw horse. Not that Martin could draw, period. He could run faster than anybody in his class and could slam hands to the table in arm wrestling, but when it came to drawing, he was useless.

But he was good at the stuff that mattered. Nobody could beat him in one-on-one, on or off the court. Anybody who laughed at him or teased him would regret it. Not that he was the class bully, mean and stupid, but he was the biggest and the strongest guy in class. It was just that those big hands, capable of handling a basketball like a pro or getting a crushing grip on you, couldn't manage a pencil to draw a stick man.

Art class was always tough for him. He hated cutting and, pasting; he either used too much paste and turned the paper into a soggy mess, or used too little and whatever he had pasted on his activity sheet would come off and get lost. Painting was worse, because just when he was about to finish, the brush would slip and smear his painting. But what he hated most about art class was Ms. Magno's litany of "Be creative, be original." How could anyone keep being creative? You had to run out of ideas sometime, except that he never seemed to have any to start with.

The day before, when the assignments were given, Ms. Magno had also returned their previous projects, movie ads based on a story they took up in English. Martin had looked at the red “C” at the back of his paper, its redness an accusation: this is not your best.

He had slumped in his chair. Art class wasn't that important anyway; it wasn't included in your grade average. But he hated it when Parent's Day came, and all their schoolwork was displayed along the classroom walls. He always placed his work in an obscure corner, hoping his parents wouldn't look for it. But they always did. Well, this time I'm going to make something I can place in the center, where everyone can see it, he thought. Then Ms. Magno announced their next project with the words, "Your next assignment, class, will really require some creativity..." And Martin had groaned:

Now, he just sat in his chair, fiddling with his polo shirt or smoothing out the creases in his khaki pants, waiting for the lightning bolt of inspiration to strike, hoping that indeed it would. He could just strike off a chicken, with maybe a cat's tail, but he didn't want to. That was the easy way out, the wimp’s way out. Even though he thought it was a stupid project, he would do his best on it. It was the way he was he couldn't do a so-so job and feel good about it. He didn’t need a basketball game since he was already the best at that. There was no more thrill, no more challenge, no more fun. Who needs it? I do.

He looked around, as if the answer would be posted on the blackboard. But the blackboard had been erased for the next class. The walls were no help her with their banners and class pictures and a signed picture of the president. The picture smiled as it all were right with the world. Not with Martin's world, not with a still blank sheet of paper on his desk, and not with fifteen minutes till the bell rang and art class started.

Martin stopped his eyes on the only other occupied chair in the classroom. The new boy was hunched over something there at his desk in the back corner of the classroom, far from Martin's front row seat. He was still "the new boy" even though three months had passed; he'd still be "the new boy" until the end of the year, maybe even until they graduated. Nobody knew anything about him except his name, Noel, and that was because the class moderator introduced him at the start of the school year. He was never invited to play in any of the games at break time, since he looked too slow to be any good, and he always sat alone in the classroom during recess and lunch, his meals always covering his entire desk. He remembered the first time Noel tried to join a game. He came out onto the court and asked for a game. Benjy had looked at him and said, "Sure. You can be the ball." After that, Noel never even came near the courts.

Noel had the dumb, trusting look of a contented cow, although Benjy would make oinking and mooing sounds when he passed him in the corridor. Noel didn't walk; he waddled, more than a hundred pounds of pure target, his back a billboard for "Kick me" signs, his face just begging to be punched in, his feet just asking to be tripped.

What is he doing over there, Martin wondered. In fact, what does he do besides eat during breaks? No one could keep eating for all that time, even though Noel looked as if he did. So Martin left his desk and went over to Noel's little island of silence inside quiet.

Doesn't this guy take a bath, Martin wondered, and stopped, not at the smell of old sweat, but at what lay on Noel's desk. It wasn't one of his enormous lunches but a sheet of drawing paper, much like the one on his own desk, but all resemblances ended there. For on that piece of paper fish with dogs' heads splashed, cats with eagles' wings ruled the sky, and eagles prowled the land on lions' paws. Those at least he could recognize. Popular mythology hadn't given some of the beasts' names yet. And the merging of the creatures looked natural, feather fitting in with fur, fins matching with paws. And as Martin watched, another beast came to live in Noel's paper world. A fish with dove's wing or the cats to prey on, scales meshing with feathers, took its place in the stark white sky. This fish would never swim. It would soar. It would swoop. It would glide. It would fly.

Martin stood there speechless, his mouth dry, not even a "wow" escaping his lips. Then Noel realized he had an audience. He looked up and saw the wonder in Martin's eyes. He said nothing to Martin; at least his tongue was still, just like his admirer's. The Mongol No. 2 stopped its smooth waltz on its oslo dance floor and was now tripping in an uneasy rhythm. Noel's face went down, then lifted up again, almost in apology. "It's all I can do. Please don't take it against me," the scared eyes seemed to say, behind lenses as thick as the bottoms of Coke bottles.

Martin smiled. It's okay, the smile said. "You're good," he said aloud, and patted Noel's padded shoulder and felt a bit like a king blessing a knight when Noel smiled a shy smile. Martin walked away, not wiping his hand as his other classmates would have done, and sat back in his desk, and began to work on a shark that would roam about on the thundering hooves of an elephant, plated with an alligator's armor.