Written By: Chaim Sciamma

With Halloween creeping up, RCDS is once again confronted with a new wave of paranormal activity. That’s right—everyone’s least favorite ghost, Arnold, is back in town. Arnold returned from his summer home in the Hamptons earlier this month and is already terrorizing the RCDS community, leaving candy wrappers throughout the Pinkham building and dumping bags all over the alcoves. Thanks to decades of practice, Arnold has become a bona fide master of his craft, each year becoming more elusive and disruptive. Arnold’s hatred for the RCDS community dates all the way back to 1949, when a rogue banana peel in the cafeteria made him slip onto the ground, killing him. Since his death, Arnold’s sole mission has been to bring as much pain to our school as possible. He started simple, taking pens from students’ backpacks and throwing away their homework. He has since devised more elaborate schemes, including deleting club forms from students’ emails and changing deadlines for assignments on Schoology.

Arnold’s signature is, of course, creating messes in the cafeteria, stacking dirty plates on top of each other, and littering tables with food. In recent years, Arnold has even gone so far as to possess juniors’ cars in the morning and drive them into the senior lot, leaving no space for the seniors to park. Magnus Rasmussen ‘27, a concerned member of the student body, voiced his disappointment. “No one I know, including myself, has ever left a mess in the cafeteria,” said Rasmussen. “I don’t know a single person who’s ever parked in the wrong lot. I really think it’s gotta be Arnold who’s doing all this stuff.” Students have worked together for years to combat his roguery, but Arnold has yet to be caught or hindered. In a time already filled with work, projects, and tests, our resident ghost’s antics have done nothing but bring down morale.

Arnold’s vendetta is not limited to the student body. Science teacher and concert enthusiast Mr. Hirsch shared his experience with the malevolent spirit, noting, “I can’t find any assignments to grade. So Arnold clearly takes these assignments from my desk, puts them in a weird location, and that’s why it takes me longer to grade things in the second half of October.” Mr. Hirsch also accused Arnold of following him home and hitting the snooze on his alarm in the morning. “I love grading and waking up early, it’s my two favorite things. But ah, uh, blast you… uh… damn you Arnold [shakes fist].” Mr. Hirsch’s insights have shed light on a recent spell of general tardiness that can only be explained by supernatural intervention. Grade 10 Dean Mr. Burt shared similar complaints, adding that “some of the lab equipment was moved around without our awareness—there was a hotplate that was unplugged when I had plugged it in earlier.” Arnold’s depravity truly knows no bounds.

While investigating paranormal activity during Z Block, I came upon Arnold himself, turning the hands of the clock in the Garden Lounge ten minutes earlier so juniors would be late to their classes after lunch. It was then that I had the rare opportunity to interview Arnold in hopes of understanding the mind of such a wicked wrongdoer.

Chaim: Why are you so hellbent on making everyone’s lives harder at this school?

Arnold: At this point, it’s really just for love of the game. I get so much satisfaction creating conflict in an otherwise exemplary school. It’s a tradition. Maybe it’s a principle, too. I really think it’s sorta become my purpose.

Chaim: Surely you must feel some sort of shame? You really are making everything worse for the community—the students, the teachers, Flik, the cleaning staff, security, truly everyone.

Arnold: One side has to balance the other side out, [that’s] just the natural order of things. If I weren’t here, who’d unplug your computer at night? Who’d delete your essay drafts the day before they’re due, or mix up the folders outside the choir room? If we’re talking dress code, you’ve got no one to thank but me. Really, you should be thanking me for everything.

Chaim: Do you have any plans to hang up the jersey in the foreseeable future?

Arnold: I’ll retire when I get bored of messing with you guys. So not in the foreseeable future, no.

Consumed by rage, I lunged at Arnold, but my hand passed right through him and out the other side of his quarter zip. Taking this as a sign that the interview had concluded, he floated away, presumably off to make more trouble. Thankfully, with Halloween season’s end in sight, Arnold will soon leave the campus, and our school will return to normalcy. Once again, the cafeteria will be spotless, our cars will be parked correctly, and assignments will be handed in and graded in a timely manner. In the meantime, we must remember to treat one another with grace and respect during a time of deadlines, assessments, late nights, and, of course, Arnold.