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I threw up again before school on Monday. I almost convinced my mom to let me stay home, but I’d told Wayne that I would bring his makeup homework by the hospital. Even though I had my driver’s license, my mom still drove me to school most days. She let me borrow her car on the weekends sometimes, but she needed it to run errands during the week. Today, she needed it to deliver casseroles.
It took a lot more courage than it should have required getting out of the car and walking to my first period English class. I didn’t expect to see Denise, one of Matilda’s top minions, but I should have known she would be ready to turn the tragedy into a limelight opportunity.
Denise and Danielle, or the Double Ds, as they were often called, were little carbon copies of Matilda. If either one of them had an original thought in their blond bubbleheads, they sure had me fooled. They were usually content letting Matilda make the snide remarks and only had to worry about giggling just enough to appease her. Denise’s extra low cut top told me that the competition for who would be filling the shoes of Matilda the Hun was already underway.
“I can’t believe she’s gone. I just don’t know what we’re going to do without her.” Denise sniffled and rubbed at her streaky mascara. It was extra thick today, probably to enhance her performance.
“We’ll get through this together.” Mitch Brown, Jasper High’s star quarterback, rubbed Denise’s back and scooted his desk closer to hers so that he could rest his chin on her shoulder. At least he had the decency to wait until she looked away before stealing a glance down her blouse.
I slipped past them and quickly made my way to the front row desk closest to the window. I could feel their eyes on me. Everyone knew that Matilda had hated my guts. Chloe said it was because she was jealous that I lived next door to Wayne and because I had more history with him. I was pretty sure it was just because she needed someone to torture, and I was an easy target. No one expects the quiet nerd to fight back, and I hadn’t. I bit my tongue. I walked away. My face turned into a tomato, and I fantasized about her demise. It was somewhat of a tradition amongst the nerds.
Denise’s voice dropped down to a whisper, but I caught the words party and chicken and knew they were talking about me. The back of my neck began to itch, but I didn’t move to scratch it. I sat perfectly still and held my breath until the bell rang and Mr. Hammond took up his usual perch on the edge of his desk. He cleared his throat and waited for everyone to settle down.
“By now, I’m sure all of you have heard the unfortunate news that Jasper High lost a student this past weekend.”
Denise sobbed and threw her head down over her arms. Mitch took that as his cue to start rubbing her back again.
Mr. Hammond’s droopy jowls sagged lower as he continued. “There will be a memorial assembly Wednesday afternoon, but if any of you feel the need to talk to someone before then, Ms. Nader will be in her office all day and after school.”
Ms. Nader was Jasper High’s guidance counselor. She had been a bodybuilder in her youth, but she still retained enough muscle and testosterone from her heyday that most students were afraid to even look at her. I wondered what she would have to say about my hybrid Matilda guilt.
Mr. Hammond carried on with class as usual. I hadn’t pegged him as the emotionally stunted type, and maybe he wasn’t. Maybe his disdain for the hormonally challenged student body had finally taken its toll and he didn’t view us as real people anymore.
Denise excused herself to go talk to Ms. Nader, even though everyone knew she was really slipping off to the bathroom to smoke with Danielle, who was more than likely making a scene in her own first period class. Sometimes I wondered what it must feel like, always needing to be the center of attention. Were they incapable of acting like normal human beings? Or did they constantly strive to be the obnoxious way that they were?
When the bell rang, I went directly to my second class, stalling the inevitable run-in with the Ds. They were going to make a scene. I was sure of it. The anxious eyes that followed me through the hallways told me that everyone else was expecting it too. I was just hoping that it could wait until tomorrow. The plan was to survive the day, hide out in the bathroom until the halls cleared, go collect Wayne’s makeup homework, and walk to the hospital. I wondered if the Ds had been by to see Wayne yet. I somehow doubted it. They wouldn’t want Officer Russell to connect them to Matilda or the party.
Second period was my breather from Matilda’s minions for the day. There were only twelve students in Mrs. Roth’s advanced chemistry class. Plus, my lab partner, Lisa Wallace, was an even bigger nerd than me. Somehow, having a pint-sized chemist turn her nose up at my above average intellect always improved my mood. I felt moderately cooler for a whole hour.
My only complaint about my third period history class was Mitch Brown, who liked to gripe on a daily basis about how useless history was to his future NFL career. Fourth period was the longest of the day, since it split the lunch shifts. Half of Jasper High ate before class, and half ate after. Luckily, the Ds were in the early shift. I ate after my fourth period health class, right before algebra. I considered skipping lunch so I could have a longer visit with Chloe, but I changed my mind. My lunchroom companion would be all by his lonesome, and I couldn’t have that.
Eddie Paris was absolutely the weirdest boy I had ever known. He also happened to be my friend, I reminded myself as I watched him ball up the hair he had just scavenged from my hair brush. He slid the brush back across the lunchroom table to me.
“Hair is potent stuff. It’s good for all kinds of Voodoo rituals,” he said, answering my bewildered look with a blushing grin.
Eddie had soft, cocoa colored skin. His mom was white, and his dad had been black, so he had that creamy in-between skin tone that always made me crave hot chocolate. His hair was thick and curly, and it trailed down his temples, just past his ears, in cute little almost-sideburns. If he hadn’t been so nuts, he would have been a shoe-in for the cool crowd.
Eddie held up his new hairball and scratched his head, like he didn’t know what to do with it now that he had claimed it. Finally, his eyes lit up and he fished a plastic sandwich bag out of his lunchbox. He turned it inside out, sprinkling crumbs all over the table, and tucked my hair inside it for safekeeping.
“My great-gramma was a Voodoo queen in Louisiana. Did ya know?”
I shook my head and took another bite of my sandwich.
“Yup, she was the real deal. She could exorcise demons and cast hexes on people. All she needed most the time was a little hair and some chicken blood.”
I rolled my eyes.
“It’s true,” Eddie insisted. “I found all her old spell books in my dad’s stuff after he died.”
Lunch with Eddie was anything but boring. He was a weirdo to the nth degree, but since he was one of the very few people who would actually speak to me after Matilda decided I was a leper, I appreciated his reliably odd company.
Our table was in the far back corner of the cafeteria, near the double doors that led back down the main hall of Jasper High. An inflatable Lancelot on a white horse hovered above us, the proud mascot of the Jasper High Knights. The thing had been there forever, and it was badly in need of a few fresh breaths of air. Lancelot had been the source of full array of corny jokes due to his lance, which had gone from fully erect to slightly droopy as the air seeped from him.
Sitting under the blow-up mascot wasn’t exactly the best way to make new friends, but there weren’t any other open tables, and the jokes eventually got old. The spot did have its advantages, being so close to the exit. It was good for a quick getaway, especially when I was trying to avoid the wrath of Matilda’s toxic tongue.
Eddie cleared his throat and picked at the crumbs on the table. “So, uh, you going to the last football game Friday?”
“Yeah right,” I huffed. “I haven’t been to one all year, and I’m not about to start now.”
“How about the homecoming dance?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Probably not.” Although, it didn’t sound half bad now that Matilda wouldn’t be there.
“Yeah, me neither.” Eddie frowned and raised an eyebrow at me. “We could say we’re going to the dance and go do something else. You know, if you want.”
“I don’t know.” I’d had my fill of risk taking and lying for the time being. Maybe I would try my luck again when I was thirty. That, and Eddie kind of creeped me out. He’d probably want to go tromping through a graveyard. Then I’d fall and sprain my ankle. Or worse yet, we’d get caught by someone like Officer Russell.
“We could go to the movies or the arcade,” Eddie suggested.
“If we’re only going to the movies or the arcade, why would we have to lie about it?”
He shrugged. “I dunno. So we could stop by the dance first, act bored out of our minds, stick our noses up in the air, and say we have better things to do,” he offered.
“Right. Of course,” I laughed.
“So it’s a date?”
I blushed at the word date. “I really shouldn’t. Besides, I have to tutor Wayne until he’s well enough to come back to school.”
Eddie probably didn’t mean anything by it, but I had never been on a real date. I had always hoped Wayne would be the one to ask, but that hope had been squashed after the Hun came into the picture.
“Oh, that’s right.” Eddie frowned. “I forgot you two were neighbors.” He was quiet for a few minutes, which seemed like an eternity when it came to Eddie. When he finally opened his mouth again, the bell cut him off.
“Thanks for the hair,” he shouted over the last minute chattering. We waved goodbye. I picked up my backpack and slipped out of the cafeteria before everyone else so I could squeeze in a visit with Chloe.
The main hall filled with the leftover smells of school pizza and tacos. It mingled with the sweaty sock odor that crept out of the gym across from the cafeteria and dispersed down the hall with the herd of students heading back to class. I hurried up to the second floor and to the painting room.
Chloe was alone, which was a relief, since she had the voice of an anchorwoman. She had her back to me and was bouncing on her toes in time to a Lady Gaga song crooning softly from a paint-splattered radio on the windowsill that spanned the entire back wall.
“I swiped an extra tardy slip from Nader’s office this morning, and Sharon doesn’t have a fifth period class in here, so you can stay as long as you like,” Chloe said, still focused on her canvas. She had to be the only student who could get away with addressing the art teachers by first name.
“You went to see Ms. Nader?” I whispered, pushing the classroom door closed to shut out the swarm of students passing by outside.
“Yup.” She didn’t even blink.
“Well, what did you say to her?”
“Ah ah ahhh. Doctor-patient confidentiality.”
“Whatever.” I crossed my arms.
Chloe finally dropped her brush back in the bucket of mineral spirits on her easel and turned to me, wiping her hands on the ragged flannel shirt she wore over her regular clothes. “What do you think I said? I told her I felt guilty because I prayed to Buddha every night that she would die, and she finally did.”
“People don’t pray to Buddha.”
“Whatever.”
“Well? What did she say?”
“She said that she doubted Buddha was the reason Matilda Hunt decided to drink and drive. Then she gave me some book written by the Dalai Lama and said that if I was going to be a Buddhist, I should do my homework.” Chloe dug the book out of her messenger bag and tossed it to me. “Merry Christmas. Oh, wait! Do Buddhists celebrate Christmas?”
“I think they call it Bodhi Day.”
“Happy Bodhi Day then. The tardy pass is between pages two and three. That’s how far I made it before I fell asleep in biology.” She turned back to her painting. “What do you think of my latest masterpiece?”
Chloe’s work always made me uncomfortable. She said that was the mark of a true artist. If it didn’t make people feel something primal, then it wouldn’t sell for millions after they died. Her current piece was of a nearly naked model sitting in an oversized teacup. Her feet were crammed in tiny glass slippers that looked like they might pop off any second. She had a tiny scepter in one hand and a plate of sandwiches in her other. A hennin, one of those cone-shaped hats medieval ladies wore, sat on her head with dirty, torn up ribbons flowing out of the tip. Behind her stretched a dingy cityscape.
“It’s... nice.” That’s all I ever had to say about Chloe’s work. It was my safe word.
Chloe sighed. “You don’t get it. Do you?”
“What’s to get?”
“It’s supposed to signify the ridiculousness of feminine expectation in the modern world. Men want a woman with the purity of a princess, but with less clothing. They also want her to be experienced in the workforce.” She pointed to the dirty ribbons. “But they still want her to be a homemaker.” Her finger moved to the sandwiches. “Though it’s hard to fit into all these roles, especially since the added responsibility has made us grow and evolve beyond any one particular persona.” She ended her summary on the too tight slippers.
“Nice,” I said again, more genuinely now that I “got it.”
Chloe picked up a Dr. Pepper off her easel and cracked it open. “So, are you going to see Wayne again after school?” She took a drink and passed the can to me.
“Yeah. I’m bringing him his makeup homework.”
“Is that all you’re bringing him?”
“Come on, Chloe. His girlfriend just died.”
“His evil girlfriend who hated you and stole him away from you.”
“He was never mine.” I sighed and sat down on the windowsill.
“He was your friend, and after she came along, he wasn’t. So, in a way, he was yours.”
“I better get to class.”
“You don’t want to use the tardy slip?”
“I shouldn’t.” I flipped through Ms. Nader’s book and handed the slip back to Chloe.
“Such a good girl,” she smirked.
“I’m going to be in enough hot water once my parents find out that I was at that party.”
“You worry too much.” Chloe turned back to her painting and added bits of lettuce to the sandwiches.
“What I’m most worried about is the Ds. I have algebra with Danielle, and Denise will be waiting for her after class. That’s probably when they’re planning to ambush me.”
“You want the tardy slip back? You could tell the teacher you need to see Nader, and then bring her the slip after the sixth period bell rings.”
“I’ll be okay. Maybe I can just wait after class and talk to Ms. Powell. Wayne has her for algebra too, so I can go ahead and pick up his homework from her.”
The noise in the hall was fading fast. I slung my backpack over my shoulder and said goodbye to Chloe.
“Call me after you get home from the hospital,” she shouted as I hurried out of the painting room.