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Hey You -*- Copyright 2006 by Ellen Hayes.
Any resemblance between the writings in this work, and any actual
persons or places, living or dead, are purely coincidental, except when
used for satirical purposes.
This work contains adult situations, adult language, adult concepts, and
possibly sex. If you are legally not allowed to read materials
containing such things, then you will be breaking the law by reading
this. I am not responsible.
Continuing to read this document, or storing it or reproducing it
in any format means that you explicitly affirm that you are legally
allowed to possess and read such materials in your city, county/parish,
state, and country.
All rights reserved. See the bottom for distribution rights.
Hey You
***
*Well, son of a BITCH,* Debbie thought in amazement. She'd heard
Kelly's announcement and put-down of that little preteen clique that
had been harassing her; everyone had, because the first few words had
made everyone shut up. Debbie had heard most of it, and she STILL
couldn't quite believe Kelly had said it all out loud, here, now...
*Shit. This is gonna confuse things...* Just what she didn't need
was a major distraction from what she was trying to get people to think.
*Fuck...* And there was NO way she could ignore this; it was too...
*Too big,* she finally decided.
***
*I guess...* Bridgette was still creeped out, but none of the
other girls seemed to be, since they were all laughing and talking and
stuff about it like it was somehow no big deal. She KNEW some of the
older girls weren't lesbians, since they'd talked casually about
boyfriends and sex and sexual performance in a way that told her that
some of them at least had actually DONE what they were talking about;
even, or maybe especially, Pam (who looked like she ought to be
'frigid') and Jill (who looked the most like what Bridgette had thought
a lesbian would look like).
"It's about one in ten," Amanda said loudly to someone else over
the table.
"What?!" Bridgette gasped.
"About one in ten," Amanda insisted. "And it's even more than that
that've tried it at least once."
Several of the older girls were nodding at that like they knew that
already. "Are you serious? What about you?" That burst out of her
before she could stop herself.
As Bridgette turned a dark hot red - she could feel it - Amanda
grinned lazily at her and said, "A lady never talks about her- what goes
on in her boudoir, Bridgette."
"No, she was asking YOU," Jill grinned. "Not a 'lady'."
"FUCK you Jill-"
"How come," Kelly interjected, "nobody's asking ME?"
"'Cause," Pam answered instantly, "I told you; if you want to get
the babes, you need some new clothes, and a make-"
"That is not FAIR!" Kelly protested, blushing hard. "I do NOT!"
"_I_ certainly wouldn't date YOU looking like THAT," Sabrina
huffed, stunning Bridgette because SHE was the LAST girl she'd have
thought-
"Sabrina, you date guys, remember?" Pam mentioned through her own
giggles.
"Oh! Right," Sabrina said as she slapped her forehead, like she'd
forgotten that little fact. "Still, though," she said to Kelly, who was
sort of grinning uncertainly as her blush faded.
"I can't figure out if they're serious," Cory whispered in her ear.
Bridgette twisted back and answered in Cory's ear, "I thought they
were, at first..." *Maybe it IS just a big joke? She can't REALLY be a
lesbian, can she?*
***
Amanda was kind of letting everyone else carry things at this
point, because she wasn't sure that she hadn't said just the wrong thing
with the 'one in ten' comment, even though it was true, she'd read it.
Gina, who seemed the most comfortable of the freshman girls with
Kelly's revelation, asked her directly, "So, um, do you like look at the
girls in gym class? 'Cause if I was into girls, I would," she admitted.
"Uhhhhhuh," Kelly shrugged with a grimace, looking like she meant
'not really'.
"'Uhhhhhhhhhuhhh?'" Anne-Marie, who happened to share gym class
with Kelly, repeated, and pointed her boobs - which were substantial for
her age - at Kelly. "That's all you can say? Is 'uhhhhhuhhhhhh'?"
"They're not THAT big," Kim corrected.
Anne-Marie continued, ignoring Kim, "The BOYS don't go 'Uhhhhhhh-
huhhhh'!" Gina was trying to keep from laughing, as were Cory and most
of the other little sisters. Sally looked confused but sort of
fascinated, like she was trying to figure out what was going on.
"Well maybe you should date boys," Kelly shot back at Anne-Marie,
sort of belligerently. Amanda couldn't tell if Anne-Marie was joking or
not either.
"Did you just DUMP her?" Jill crowed in mock disbelief.
"What?" Anne-Marie asked, and Amanda caught the wink Jill slipped
the other girl. "Hey, wait, you can't just DISS on me like that!"
Anne-Marie protested to Kelly, though she was starting to giggle.
"I guess you're just not COOL enough, to date a lesbian," Jill
smirked, which made them all laugh again, even as Anne-Marie laughingly
protested, "I am too!"
Anne-Marie turned to Kelly with a fake look of desperation on her
face and wailed, "You HAVE to date me now! I'll fling myself off a
BRIDGE if you don't!"
"No way, bitch! _I_ asked her first!" Jill disputed.
"Actually, she asked Kathy first," Pam mentioned, but a glance at
Kathy, who was choking again, told all of them that she wouldn't be
saying anything coherent for a while. Amanda put her hands close to her
ears in case Kathy did that shrieking thing again.
***
"Why don't you take Tuck back out to the car," Bill suggested to
Mike. "Give him something out of the cooler, let him sit down. If he
needs a Big Cough, do what you can." Mike nodded without speaking, and
escorted Tuck slowly out of the building.
"Sir?"
"Uh, sorry," he said as he turned back around. He also preferred
to get the kids away from the register area when he was making large
purchases; it helped cut down on whining later if they didn't know how
much something cost, or if they hadn't gone to the trouble of adding it
all up. And today was going to cost him close to two thousand dollars,
though he thought it was money well spent, and he had the money free to
spend, and most importantly Sarah had agreed to it before they'd left
the house that morning. *Maybe we could come out here, get her a set,
make a day of it out of town...* She liked romantic stuff like that,
sometimes; if he planned for it and rested for a few days before, he
could handle them, and the results. *Have to be next week or later,
though,* he realized. *Can't toss Tuck out of the house when he's like
this. Well, I could,* he realized, *over to Mike's house. Hmm...*
***
Kathy had had to go to the bathroom, finally, to rinse her face in
cold water and remove some trashed makeup and either reapply it or leave
it off, she wasn't sure yet. *At least I finally stopped laughing,* she
sighed. She felt good, but rather limp, and she hadn't been able to
contribute much to the discussion. *Usually it's me that cracks
everyone else up... Not today, though.* Kelly had zinged her but
GOOD, and she hadn't managed to recover until now.
She hadn't expected basically all the girls to come with her, but
the noise hadn't changed when she'd gone halfway, so she looked back
over her shoulder. And there they all were, following her like they
were a bunch of ducklings. "Oh man," Kathy sighed as she turned around
again and kept walking. And snickered, a (hopefully) last spasm.
***
Kelly protested, "But I don't-"
"Shut UP," Pam insisted, and then started doing things around her
eyes. "I'm not as good as Debbie, but I'm pretty good... just don't
MOVE, okay?"
***
*Well, this explains some of what was going on with them,* Dan
decided. Mike and Tuck had gotten a lot closer to Kelly than the rest
of them had to their own Little Brothers. He swallowed, which hurt, and
tried to think. Then he realized what the pain meant.
***
"Well, I mean," Debbie said, trying to figure out how to phrase
what she was going to say so that Sonia would think it. *Oh!* "I
mean," she repeated to slow herself down and curb her enthusiasm,
because she'd just figured out how to tie it in, "it makes sense. You
know what happened to the band hall today?" Sonia nodded impatiently,
so Debbie rapidly continued, "There's a LOT of people in band, and so
they're all pissed. But nobody did anything IN school, you know? They
waited until after school when no one was here. I heard the drama
people are talking about hiring a security guard or getting parents to
work shifts to keep it from happening to the theater. But, you know,
it's like, it takes almost no time at all to just HURT someone, you
know? That's been happening IN school, DURING school," Debbie
emphasized. "And more and more lately, like people are figuring out
they can get away with it. And people were calling her a lesbian when
school started, before she said anything - she just moved here this
year, from Alaska, you know; so it's not like anyone knew from before -
so it's not like staying in the closet was any protection or anything.
So, you know, maybe this will sort of act like to get the other gay and
lesbian students-"
"Like Brian Long?" Sonia interrupted.
"Or that guy Victor Kloskowski, or-"
"Shelly Fields," Sonia interrupted again, naming another of the
rumored 'deviants' that everyone 'knew' and no one had evidence for.
"Yeah, like, there's sort of a natural grouping there, and maybe if
they all get together, they can sort of watch each other's backs. I've
been trying to keep an eye on MY friends, you know, and vice versa, and
I've heard of some other cliques doing the same thing, even sitting down
and figuring out who has classes next to who. So maybe she'll be safer
after this, since she could have someone to watch out for her. Speaking
of classes," she said as they turned in to math class just as the bell
rang.
*That went pretty well, I think,* Debbie decided as she sat down.
*Damn, she really did it,* she exclaimed silently as she remembered
Kelly's lunchtime outburst. *I can't believe it...* She was going to
have to keep track of what happened to Kelly as a presumed result,
though apparently she'd previously been deemed 'unpopular' and 'weird'
and so she was already taking abuse for that; it would be harder to tell
if people objected more to Kelly's announced lesbianism, or just the
increased notoriety. It wasn't always good to be noticed for any reason
at all, Debbie knew.
***
Paul Dobson wasn't sure he'd heard correctly. "She what?"
"She announced to the ENTIRE cafeteria that she was homosexual!"
Susan Reiter, one of the German teachers, re-exclaimed in horror as she
stopped shaking her head for a few moments. "I can't believe," she
added as she resumed, "that anyone would be so bold as to ANNOUNCE such
a thing! And in front of all of her friends?!"
"What else happened, Miz Reiter?" Paul pressed. "Was there any
other disturbance, or violence, or-"
"There was one very tall girl, I think she's on the newspaper staff
as a photographer," she said, and Paul guessed it was Kathy Collins, one
of Eugene's friends. "She was on the floor just laughing like a
lunatic, so loud you couldn't hear yourself THINK!"
*Kathy,* he agreed.
***
*I still can't believe I did that...* Kelly thought as she waved at
Sabrina and went into her class. Sabrina had been arguing with her
about clothing, and what she could do to make Kelly look much more
fashionable and 'in tune' - which Kelly didn't think was necessary; she
was comfortable in what she wore now - but she hadn't even mentioned...
*I wonder if she was doing that to AVOID talking about me?* Kelly
wondered suddenly. *She DOES know clothing and stuff; maybe she just
wanted to find something to talk about that she knew already.* That
made some sense, she decided as she sat in her desk and started getting
her notebook out. *But then why was she trying to change-*
A burst of giggles broke her out of her reverie, and she knew it
was the usual cluster of girls, snickering at her from behind her. She
felt the usual flash of shame and embarrassment as her neck heated up,
but then realized, *Hey, they must be talking about what I did at lunch.
Man, that WAS pretty wild... Especially Kathy!* She started snickering
at the memory of tall, fit, ever-so-competent Kathy thrashing helplessly
on the floor and making those immensely loud and attention-getting
noises, and from the looks of it being unable to stop herself too. *She
was really funny like that...* Kelly wondered if she could ever let
herself go like that, but she wasn't sure she wanted to, really; it
seemed undignified somehow, or something like that.
The bell rang, which made her look up, which made her remember that
there was going to be a test today, so she stuffed her notebook back
into her pack and waited. *Huh,* she realized, *they stopped giggling.
Worried about the test, I guess.*
***
"Well, at least now she'll start getting points..." Amanda grinned
to herself.
"Say what?" Paul Grant asked.
"You know, for a microwave? Recruiting?" Amanda explained, her
grin broadening.
"What are you talking about?" Paul challenged.
"Oh, it's from that Ellen Degeneres show, you know?" He didn't
look like he did. "Oh come ON! Last April? She came out on national
television?"
"Oh yeah... points?"
Amanda shook her head. "Never mind. See ya Monday!"
***
Bill smiled after checking the children's-view mirror - the
interior rear-view repositioned so he could keep an eye on the kids,
who could be contentious liars if not watched by a relatively impartial
judge. Both boys looked like they'd fallen asleep, like they'd done on
the drive up. Any time his son was sleeping, he was healing; there
seemed to be a definite positive correlation between time spent sleeping
and speed of recuperation, either from injury or illness. He'd supposed
it made sense; they had been treating Eugene's symptoms partially on
that basis for years, which is why he was taking-
*Wait, IS he taking Valium?* Bill wondered. *Sarah put it on the
to-do list for this morning, but I don't know if she called Dana yet...
and if she prescribed any, I didn't pick it up after we got him out of
the hospital. Hmmm.* He glanced back at his son again, who was
apparently sleeping peacefully, sprawled out over the back seat. *Not
having any now...* Still, it was inevitable that he'd have them; he'd
better check when he got home.
*So what's the best way to protect those broken ribs?* he asked
himself.
***
"Oh, no," Paul Dobson said for Ms. Raleigh's benefit. "We are
QUITE liable." A chance remark had stuck in his head, and he'd spent
the last ten minutes looking the reference up via the World Wide Web and
the multi-engine search option. "Nabozny versus Podlesny, U.S. Seventh
Circuit Court of Appeals." He decided to print this page out.
"Basically, if we - the school district - do not address any sort of
sexual or gender-related abuse, the school district as a whole may be
held liable. To the tune of millions of dollars," he added.
***
"You didn't hear?" Evelyn Thomas, who was one of the shortest
girls in school, shook her head at Debbie. She was also a flute and
piccolo player, which somehow fit, and stories had it that she could be
absolutely merciless to people who couldn't march. Debbie guessed that
she used her smaller size to bully people, though she apparently didn't
do it that much outside of band. "Tom Wallace, he's one of the bass
drums... He got into a fight with some football jackoff at lunch 'cause
the jackoff said something about how band DESERVED what'd happened
because we were so stuck up and shit."
"BAND stuck up?" Debbie exclaimed, thinking, *Must've been A lunch
because it didn't happen during B, and it's too soon for her to hear
about anything during C.*
"Yeah I know," Evelyn said back, then sighed and looked away. "The
monitors managed to pull 'em apart, but the jackoff threatened him,
saying he'd get it later."
"That sounds ominous, with all the other stuff going on," Debbie
said carefully.
"Yeah I know," Evelyn agreed again, looking worried.
***
"Man, I still can't believe she did that," James said to Cory as
the two of them walked along the halls. Cory didn't need to ask who he
was talking about.
"Me neither," she said, though it sort of made sense if you looked
at her.
On the other hand, she'd been accused of being a lesbian once, by
one bitch who'd gotten entirely too jealous about the guy SHE wanted
being totally uninterested in her and completely fascinated with Cory
(not that Cory was that interested in the guy, but nobody paid attention
to that part either.) And she KNEW she wasn't...
She'd actually thought about it, months later, during a few days
when she'd had some dental work and some Vicodin to really derange her
thoughts; just thinking about it to think about it, really, and wonder
if she was, and how she would know, and whether she would notice right
away, and all sorts of weird philosophical points. It was far more
interesting than late-morning television.
At least James was talking to her again, though; she'd felt
immensely bad about not paying attention when whoever it'd been had
knocked his glasses off, and every time he got more than usually awkward
around her (which was every time he'd seen her), she felt bad about it
all over again.
"Do you," she said to keep him talking, then changed her mind.
"Why do you think she did it? Like that, I mean, in front of
everybody?"
James shrugged. "Some other freshthing girl was teasing-"
"'Freshthing'?"
He shrugged again. "Something I picked up from the guys, Tuck and
them."
"Oh yeah... Hey, what happened to the other guy, Mike? And, uh,
the, uh-"
"George?"
"Yeah, I thought they had lunch with you-"
"Out sick, Dan said," he said. "Strep throat, I think. Tuck..."
He shrugged. "You probably know more about him than I do."
"Huh? Why?"
"Oh, I, uh, I thought some of the girls went to visit him
yesterday."
"Huh. Wasn't me, anyway, an' I didn't hear anything about it," she
disclaimed. They were at his class, so she waved at him and said, "See
you Monday, okay? Have a good weekend."
"Huh? Isn't Kathy taking us-"
"Oh, yeah, right," she nodded. She'd almost forgotten. "Uh, well,
see you after school, then," she said rapidly. "I gotta git," she
pointed towards her next class.
"Yeah, see ya," he called over his shoulder as he went in.
*Well, that went better...* she thought with some relief as she
picked up her pace.
***
James walked in feeling halfway decent for once, so of course the
usual dorks had to try and spoil it. "Oooh, new girlfriend, geek?"
Ralph sneered.
"She's just a friend, dork."
"One of them lunchtime LEZZZZZZZZBO's?" he sneered, drawing it out,
and everyone in his group laughed on cue. "She gonna teach you how to
get girls, squint?" And everyone laughed on cue.
*Sq- Oh. Lame. Tucker could do better...* "Not like YOU could
tell me anything," he tossed back. Then he remembered the way the other
girls, especially the older ones, had been telling Kelly, or teasing
her, how to get girls, and laughed out loud.
***
"Hey Kelly!" Kelly looked up from trying to untangle her sports
bra, over at Anne-Marie, who was staring at her with an expectant grin.
"Uhhhhhhhh?" she grinned as she pushed her chest out and wiggled, making
her bra-covered breasts bounce.
The locker room got totally silent.
"AHahahaha!" Kelly burst out, followed an instant later by Anne-
Marie.
***
"They were like making lesbian jokes in there!" Bonnie whined, and
Sherry Eaton had to stiffen her face to keep from sneering. Bonnie was
a whining snitch, whose father seemed to have an uncanny ability to find
teachers' home numbers and call at the worst possible time to complain
about some lack of preferential treatment for his daughter.
"Just ignore it," Sherry said as calmly as she could.
"But I can't get undressed in a room with those PERVERTS in it!"
Bonnie squealed.
"Fine, you can sit out today," Sherry snapped as she pointed at the
bleachers. *Damnit!* She KNEW she shouldn't do things like that, and
she was fairly sure that Bonnie did them on purpose to get her way, but
sometimes she just wanted the whining to stop too much to restrain
herself.
***
Paul gave the stack of printed memos to Trisha and said, "Make sure
these get in everyone's mailbox NOW, before school lets out." He'd
thought it prudent to get a memo in before the weekend, about the
official policy he was making on gay and lesbian students coming out,
and the reasoning why they had to remain apparently unbiased. *Some of
the reasoning,* he admitted to himself as he walked back to his office.*
The Nabozny case should scare any administrator with half an ounce of
cunning or self-preservation; he wanted the teachers to realize that if
they set the school district up for a similar legal case, they would be
cut adrift instantly.
*Sometimes I like this job,* he realized suddenly, when he had to
stop himself from whistling.
***
*I was supposed to do something... Look at cards and shit,* Tuck
remembered. *Inna minute...* He hurt so bad after the last cough, and
he was just starting to warm up again in the hammock, he didn't want to
stick his arm out and lose the stored heat.
***
"Where's Jody?" Coach Walls asked, looking concerned.
Everyone shrugged, so when it looked like no one else knew
anything, Shannon said, "She was looking pretty sick at lunch."
"Look," interrupted Jennifer, "what about what happened today,
about the pep rally?" Everyone started complaining about that, and
Coach Walls eventually had to shout everyone down.
***
"Yeah, sorry, but she's having problems with Carol, so I said I'd
drop her off," Debbie explained to Monica as she waved at Honor. "You
want to get in the front seat now?" With hardly any prompting, Honor
had talked a lot about Carol and the other cheerleaders, and Monica had
been pretty bitter and upset about most of it. Debbie had barely needed
to say anything at all. *That worked out pretty well...*
"Did you hear about that girl at lunch today?" Monica asked Debbie
as she slid into the seat and slammed her door shut.
"Which-"
"The one who said she was gay!" Monica insisted.
"Oh! Yeah, I saw it even," Debbie said. "Man, that was pretty
brave, I mean after all the shit that's been going on at school lately.
Do your seat belt, okay?"
"Shit," Monica said as she grappled with the belt. "I dunno, I
mean, I don't see how she could do that, right in the open like that."
"I don't either," Debbie said absently as she checked the mirrors
before pulling away from Honor's house.
After a few seconds, Monica speculated, "Maybe she just figured she
doesn't have anything to lose."
"What? How so?"
Monica shook her head. "I mean, after band..." Debbie nodded
solemnly. "Anyway," she continued, sounding subdued, "maybe she just
figured that if things like that could happen to anyone, she might as
well come out, you know? Like, before anything happened to her for some
other reason. Or NO reason."
"That's kind of weird," Debbie remarked. "You think that was it?"
she prodded.
"I dunno, but, I mean, I'm getting this weird feeling at school,
like I'd better do what I need to do NOW, before something happens to
ME, you know?"
Debbie was respectfully silent for several seconds, in case Monica
had just blurted that out; if she had, Debbie wanted her to think about
it. Then she said, "Jeez... that's pretty scary. I mean, what IF, you
know?" Monica was nodding at her. "I never thought of it like that..."
"Maybe that's what she's thinking of, like 'if I don't do it now, I
might never get the chance...'"
***
"We ordered three cellphones," Sarah told the clerk. "Name of
Bill or Sarah Tucker? I'm here to pick them up."
***
"Nope," Kathy answered before cranking the starter on her Talon,
which blotted out all conversation for several seconds.
"It really doesn't bother you?" Cory asked as Kathy pulled out of
the parking lot, consciously trying not to drive like Debbie even though
she'd been several minutes late getting out to her car.
"No, not really," Kathy replied idly, more concerned with keeping
her Talon a minimum distance away from other peoples' vehicles. "Don't
talk for a minute."
When she got to the first real stoplight away from school, where
she thought she was moderately safe from the rest of the students, she
answered further, "I mean, hell, it's not like I haven't been asked
before either."
"You have?!" James and Cory both gasped, in unison.
She couldn't look at both of them at the same time, so she settled
for glaring at Cory. "I'm big and butch, and I'm not very feminine when
it gets in the way of things I want to do. So of course I've been
asked."
After several seconds of very pregnant silence, Cory dared, "Who?"
"None of your business," Kathy said firmly. "Besides Kelly," she
found herself grinning. James let out a single bleat of laughter behind
her. "If they wanted you to know, they'd tell you." She shook her
head. "Besides, it's not really... I mean, I wouldn't want everyone to
know what GUYS have asked me out, so I don't think I want everyone to
know what GIRLS have asked me out, the same way."
"Why not?" James dared.
Kathy sighed. "I dunno... Just seems, like it's not really
everyone's business, like not something that ought to be common
knowledge or discussed in the halls. If someone asks and gets- Well,
if someone asks me to go out and I say 'yes', then of course people
might find out about it, because they might see us together, yah?" They
both nodded. "But if someone asks and I say 'no', then it might be
embarrassing... For some reason, getting told 'no' is- it's seen as a
failure for some reason. Like how's anyone going to know without
asking? It's stupid but it seems to work that way. So, since there's
a, uh, a social stigma of failure attached to getting told 'no', I don't
see a reason to put that stigma on someone just for asking."
"There's a stigma? Just for asking?" Cory asked.
Kathy looked over at her for a second, but she saw the light turn
green out of her peripheral vision and had to re-center her head.
"Hell yes. James? Am I right?" she asked over the increased engine
noise.
"Uh... Yeah, I guess..." he admitted from the back seat.
"Really?" Cory asked, like she'd never even considered this before.
***
"I'm back," Debbie said, getting Monica to look up from her lap;
homework, Debbie guessed.
"Good God!" Monica complained as she saw the shopping cart Debbie
was pushing.
"Trust me, it'll all be worth it," Debbie assured her. And,
whatever she didn't use on Monica, she could use on herself. Or eat; at
least a quarter of what was in the cart was food of one kind or another.
***
"So, uh..."
"What?" James looked really uncomfortable, again, Cory noticed.
"Do you think Kathy, uh, that she's, uh... she's-"
"Oh!" she exclaimed when she finally got it. "I don't think so...
unless she was making it all up."
"What was she making up?"
"Oh, she's said stuff about guys she's dated, and a couple she
wished she was still dating but can't, and some that sound good but you
shouldn't even consider dating," Cory recalled. She'd already been
asked by one of the last kind, and it was a good thing Kathy had warned
her first or she'd have fallen for his stupid lines like Kathy'd said
she did. "But I don't think she was making that stuff up, I mean."
"Oh."
"You really thought she was?" Cory asked, curious.
He shrugged with his head bent down, staring at the ground. "Well,
I mean, she never actually SAID, one way or the other. And she sort of
gave the impression that she wouldn't say if she was; you know how she
said she wouldn't say who had asked her, and how she sort of turned that
into anyone asking her? So, like, she didn't really like answer it
directly."
"Huh," Cory remarked, now able to see what he was talking about.
"Yeah, okay... I don't think she is, though..." Though she wasn't
entirely sure, now. *That dork... Like I don't have enough to worry
about already!*
***
Jody finally pushed herself out of her car, walked around it to the
Tucker's mailbox, and pushed her battered letter through the little
slot. She couldn't really do it before school let out, but there was no
way she was going to practice today, or the parties tonight, or any of
it. And she HAD to get this done.
Unfortunately, she didn't feel any better when the deed was done.
She just felt empty.
She took a few deep breaths before she found the energy to walk
back to her car and get in. *It won't make any difference...*
But she'd had to do it.
***
Bill typed the car's description and the partial license plate he'd
gotten with the binocs before the car passed out of sight behind a
neighbor's shrubbery. *Wonder who that was...* He hadn't seen her
right away, but nothing had alarmed, so she hadn't done anything. And
while he hadn't recognized her, the number of girls in the house in the
last week was more than he could keep track of.
***
Kelly unlocked her apartment and came in, dumping her pack on the
floor as she relocked the door then rushed to the bathroom. She hadn't
been let go long enough after lunch to go, and after that... she felt a
little weird about going into a bathroom at school now, and especially
in the locker room, because she was afraid people might complain, or do
something bad. "Yeah, real brave NOW, stupid," she sighed to herself.
*Why didn't I THINK before I did that?*
*And maybe I can take this makeup off.* It was illogical, but she
kept FEELING it on her face, like it was a thick coat of paint.
***
"My GOD, did you hear what happened at B lunch?" Reina asked.
"What hap-"
"Some freshman girl, she's like with all those geeks you know? She
just up and announced she was a LESBIAN!"
"WHAT?!" Ginger shrieked.
***
Allison Hunter picked up the phone, then put it down. For the
fourth time. "Stop it!" she demanded.
***
"So, I mean..." Rose repeated, feeling unsure what to say next.
"I don't think it matters," Tracy said.
"What?!"
"Well look, I mean, you know, how many kids at school are gay?
Just by percentages, some of 'em are. We've got, what, over a thousand
people there; SOME of them have to be gay, right?"
"I guess," Rose agreed unhappily.
"So, so what? I mean, if she asks you out that's one thing, but,
you know, I don't care, as long as she leaves ME alone. I mean, what
does it matter if she is? It's her life, and not mine. Thank GOD!" she
said, which made Rose laugh. "I couldn't stand being a lesbian!"
"What? Why not?"
"Dude I'd have to break up with Alan!" Tracy rushed, laughing.
"Oh so like you've forgiven him for the prom thing?"
"Yeah, I think so... he's been really nice to me all week, since I
called-"
"I'm the one that called him!" Rose protested, laughing. They'd
ALL called him, on a speakerphone, and tortured both Tracy and Alan
mercilessly until Tracy had finally hung up.
"Well still, he took the hint-"
"Hint?!"
***
"Man, I am so shit," Dan sighed to himself. He wasn't entirely
sure if he was sick, but he knew he was illin'. The late nights and
lack of sleep were catching up to him fast. But, once he reported
everything to Mike and Tuck, he could go home and sleep. He'd taken the
last of Debbie's pep pills half an hour ago, when he'd been home for a
few minutes, but it hadn't helped yet. Waiting for the bus wasn't
helping either, but at least he didn't have to walk all the way.
***
"I just can't figure out why she did it today," Kim told Pam.
"I think she just got tired of being called the name, you know?"
Pam suggested. "I mean, if I WAS, and I kept getting called it,
especially as an insult, it would REALLY piss me off after a while."
"So are YOU coming out Monday?" Kim teased.
"Hell no! I'd have to stop dating guys!" Pam laughed.
***
There was a silence over the phone, then Karen Stockman asked
plaintively, "Why?"
"'Cause it was funny!" Anne-Marie defended herself. "It was kind
of weird, though, because everyone stopped talking, and then it was like
nobody did anything except get dressed after that. I think some of 'em
were whispering and stuff, but you know the normal talk? There wasn't
any of that."
"God, do you think they think you're one now?" Karen asked.
Anne-Marie shrugged the phone where it was pinched between her
cheek and her shoulder. "Maybe, but... I mean, I'm NOT."
"Does it really matter?"
"DOES it really matter?" Anne-Marie asked back.
There was a silence on the other end of the phone.
***
"You think she's a lesbian too?" Mark asked.
"What, the- Kathy?" Brendan remembered her name. "I dunno... I mean,
I've seen her dating- like on dates with guys, before."
"She wasn't at Homecoming with anyone," Mark said.
"No, she was there taking pictures," Brendan asserted. "I
remember. She was wearing jeans and some kind of shirt, and had a
camera bag and stuff-"
"She didn't get a date to Homecoming? Don't you think that's kind
of suspicious?" Mark argued.
"Well, someone had to take pictures, right? She took one of me and
Courtney-"
"Yeah, but like she didn't even try to go? Or dress up for it?"
"I think I've seen her at other dances," Brendan said, but he
didn't seem very sure of that.
***
"So? Better?" Debbie asked.
"Ohhhh yeah," Monica smiled lazily back, as she lay supine on her
bed. "I gotta get my dad to give me enough money so you can do this
every week," she breathed, and Debbie chuckled appropriately.
Debbie had done nearly everything she could think of to do to
Monica in an hour and a half, from a deep conditioning treatment on her
hair down to a pedicure, and Monica honestly looked a lot better, and
most importantly a lot more relaxed and un-tense than she had when
they'd gone inside Monica's house. Luckily, Debbie had learned to get
payment for this service up front; otherwise, clients would choke and
get all tense again when she mentioned the cost.
*_I_ really ought to do this to MYSELF tomorrow,* Debbie decided,
saying nice things to Monica on autopilot as she packed up her stuff.
*Now... call Lisa and get her, before I have to talk to Miz Tucker at
dinner.*
***
"Dude, I'm telling you, it was Debbie," Brian asserted.
Dan challenged, "Why did you say she had reddish hair, though? It
should've looked darker under the sodium, not lighter."
And Debbie's hair was pretty dark already, close to black. Brian
shrugged. "I dunno, man, I'm just telling you what I saw."
"It was her normal color today, I saw it at lunch."
"Anon-" Tuck's computer said before he apparently changed his mind
and stopped it somehow. Then it said, "Anomalous."
"Yeah, that's it," Brian agreed. "I'm not saying you're lying or
that you're wrong or anything, I'm just saying that I saw what _I_ saw,
you know? And Jill," he remembered, "identified it as Lisa's car.
Don't those two hang around together sometimes?"
Dan looked at Mike who looked at Tuck who nodded.
Then he frowned, and typed, and the computer spoke, "I thought you
said the other girl had black hair query."
"The one who wasn't Debbie, yeah," Brian agreed.
"L-I-S-A is blond," the computer said, and Mike blinked and looked
over at Tuck, but he was nodding at the same time.
"It's WHAT I SAW," Brian emphasized slowly.
***
"God, I can't believe she just ANNOUNCED it like that?" Steve
complained. BS'ing over the phone was a lot easier than trying to get
to Andy Costello's house; he lived miles away.
"Well, hell, man, if she was, she might as well-"
"WHAT?!"
"Dude, have you seen her?"
"No? What does that have to do with-"
"Everybody has been giving her shit since day one, since school
started, man. I heard the cheerleaders did something to her on that
first day, too, to fuck with her, like they assigned her to some guy as
a little brother, as a joke on her-"
"THAT's cold."
"Dude, you know it. So, man, why the hell NOT tell everybody?
It's like being black, you know? Are you gonna try and hide it, be
white all the time, or-"
"Don't you think being black is kind of more obvious than being gay
or whatever?" Steve asked; Andy ought to know, being black at least.
"Maybe." Before Steve could say anything else, Andy continued, "I
heard stuff from my grandpa, about stuff, like black guys trying to pass
as white, and it was important then, 'cause they couldn't get good jobs
otherwise-"
"What?"
"Yeah, back in the Forties, man, it was REAL important."
***
"Body armor? Like Kevlar?" Sarah was looking at him skeptically,
which wasn't what Bill had hoped.
"Uh, well," he said as he looked down and took his glasses off,
"what I was thinking, was that we could sort of make a day of it. You
know, check out a restaurant, maybe see whatever sights are there..."
"Get a hotel room?" she asked, but he detected amusement rather
than scorn or bewilderment.
"Well, if you wanted to," he said as he slipped his glasses back
on. It was amazing how dirty they got just-
"I think I might rather go camping for that, dear," Sarah smirked
at him.
"A hotel would be nice," he hinted hopefully. He liked having a
proper bed, and sheets, and a bathroom, and a roof that was quite a
distance over his head, and real walls and such things that would keep
curious hikers and animals out and the noises in, for times like those.
***
"I just, uh, heard, uh, what you like said, uh, in the cafeteria
today, and, uh, I, uh, I was, uh..." The entire message was like this,
and there was a name but no phone number to call; Kelly was already
irritated because some of the makeup wasn't coming off, and Audrey
wasn't home so she couldn't ask her how to get rid of it. And now this.
*Who is this twit?* Kelly wondered as the message playback finished
for the second time. 'Allison Hunter' didn't tell her anything. *And
why is she calling me?*
*And why is she so nervous?*
***
Joan Rieke cursed out loud and grabbed the phone and dialed before
she could get afraid again and not do it. *This is STUPID!* she told
herself as it purred into her ear.
***
"Ah!" Kelly jumped as the phone rang right as she was reaching for
it. *I think I'll let the answering machine get it,* she decided.
*Might be that Allison again, and maybe I'll have some idea of what she
WANTS this time. Maybe she had a couple of drinks before now and got
calmer? I hope so...* She was enjoying being home, alone, and not
worrying about what people were going to do.
***
Julia sighed; rehearsal today was shit, and it was completely
obvious to her why. If it wasn't worry about what had happened to band,
and what therefore might happen to THEM next, it was conversational
'buzz' about what Kelly had done in the cafeteria. Not unusually,
nearly everyone had heard about it by the time practice started after
school. Though that definitely did NOT mean that they were all done
talking about it.
But the two things in combination were sure messing things up. She
thought Ms. Kane was going to have a full-on fit, and not to show
someone what she wanted in a scene either.
***
"Hello?"
"Sarah, it's Dana Treble. Are you home today?"
"In and out; right now, I am." She'd just finished taking Dan home
when she'd found him; he didn't look much better than Michael. He'd
been tiredly effusive in his thanks, and swore upon his immortal soul -
she'd been rather bemused when he'd said that, unprompted by anything
she thought she'd said or done - that he would rest all night and sleep
late the next day, to recuperate. "Calling about Eugene and Michael?"
"Yeah, I had a few minutes in between patients; I thought I'd see
what was up before I came over tonight. Six okay?"
"I think so... let me check." She got up and went to go ask Bill
if six o'clock would be a good time for her to come by.
***
"Dear Valerie," the letter started. It was laboriously scribed in
beginner's cursive, the letters simultaneously standard-form and really
messed up because he obviously wasn't very practiced in writing yet.
*Third grade,* Tucker remembered.
Im sorry to hear that you are sick. I hope you get better soon.
Kim is okay and fun sometimes but I miss you. Shes not as fun as
you and she doesnt cook either.
*No apostrophes,* Tucker noted.
Please get well and come back. I miss you LOTS! Stella does too
and Mom and Dad and everyone. So please please please come back
when youre better!
Ricky Parker
His vision blurred before he closed his eyes to concentrate on
eliminating the swelling pain in his throat. *Stupid kid.*
***
"I dunno, Debbie, I don't like it..." Debbie looked up at Lisa,
waiting for her to finish.
When it became apparent that she had, Debbie asked, "Can you think
of a better idea? I mean, SHE called ME, wanting to discuss things...
I got the impression I'd better do it. You know, she has too much on
both of us right now. We HAVE to..." *Especially NOW.* Why Lisa
waited to object to things like this until the last minute, was one of
her more annoying habits.
"I don't like that either," Lisa complained. "What if she decides
it's in her best interest to do something, like turn us in? To the cops
or something?"
Debbie sighed as she shook her head. "She won't; she's in as deep
as we are."
"No," Lisa disputed firmly, "she's NOT."
Debbie finished loading her car, ignoring Lisa's imploring look as
long as she could. "Look, like, it's too late to stop now, it's too
late to back away from her now. We're stuck with her. And she had some
good ideas, you know? The posters have really been working."
"I just don't trust her. I don't trust any of 'em," Lisa admitted
as she looked away.
"Just 'cause you can't trust 'em with one thing doesn't NECESSARILY
mean you can't trust them with other things, Lisa. You know that." It
was a reversal of the way things usually worked, but she knew that she
could trust Tucker not to involve the police, under any circumstances;
and she thought the rest of his family were the same way, now that she'd
dealt more directly with them. And she well knew that sometimes you
could trust people in business you'd be stupid to trust in a personal
relationship. She put a hand on Lisa's shoulder. "Please, Lisa, I need
to talk to her tonight. Will you come with me? It'd make me feel
better... safer, if you were with me."
Lisa just nodded, without looking up.
***
"I haven't even asked," Sarah admitted to Dana Treble, "I'd just
assumed he was."
"Well, what's he been eating?"
"Whatever we can get him to eat. You know how he gets...
Michael's been bullying him as usual, even though he's sick too, and-"
"I wish," Dana smiled into the phone, "that I could prescribe
someone like Mike to all my teenage patients."
"He's pretty effective." In one limited way, it was a good thing
that Michael had been sick this week; it meant that he would hang around
Eugene all the time, and to the extent he could, ensure that Eugene
drank, ate, took his medications on time, rested or slept as much as
possible, and so on. "I mean, he can be pretty mean, but it seems to
work."
"It's a boy thing," Dana said, and Sarah nodded. If she tried the
same tactics on Eugene, he'd get utterly stubborn and refuse to do them
at all.
***
Kelly was very grateful that the answering machine speaker could be
turned off. She just wished she could turn off the tape noise it made
too. And the living room phone; it was old enough that it didn't have a
switch to turn off the ringer, and old enough that Dad had had to wire
it into the jack, instead of plugging it like a modern phone. The calls
kept coming, and she was scared to pick up the phone and call someone,
in case she answered one just as they connected. They were getting
weirder, too.
She decided to get up and check the door locks again.
***
"Yes, Ricky," Kim sighed. "She IS going to get better. I saw her
last night. She's still sick, but she's out of the hospital at least."
She didn't say that she wondered if Valerie would come back before
Christmas; she looked almost DEAD, hanging there in that net or whatever
she was in, pale and bruised and hot with fever, and utterly mute.
"Did she read my letter yet?" Ricky asked shyly.
"I think she did, but I didn't ask. She's still really sick,
Ricky," Kim warned. "It may be a while before she comes back."
He sighed and slumped, obviously displeased. *Well, hell, it's not
like I WANT her to stay gone!* Kim snarled internally. Ricky was
getting on her nerves, moping around for Valerie all the time like he'd
been doing all week.
***
"Gotta go talk to Deborah, and probably Lisa, tonight," Sarah
reminded Bill after she kissed the top of his head. "Michael's mother
called and I'm taking advantage of her again tonight; make sure Michael
looks good at dinner or she'll take him back. She misses him." Nearly
every time Michael got sick, Eugene did too, so Bill and Sarah had
historically watched both boys most of those times, which allowed
Elaine to do her church-related work during the day. It wasn't much
harder to care for the two of them than it was for one; and Elaine was
perfectly willing to watch Eugene if both of them were busy. Despite
this, Elaine still apparently felt guilty about leaving Michael at their
house for days on end.
"Maybe we could ship both of them over there," Bill mentioned.
"How're you doing? Tired?"
She thought about it for a moment. "I suppose... I'm not sure it
would help, having them at Michael's house, though. With the two of
them together, we hardly have to bother with them. It's everything
else. Oh, and Dana's coming over tonight about six, six thirty, to have
a look at both of them. Among other things she wants to check on
Eugene's constipation." He was prone to it when his normal diet and
routine were disrupted, and of course being reluctant to eat like he was
when he was in respiratory distress, just exacerbated the problem
because his system didn't have enough bulk to work with. "She said
she'd bring some kind of stool softener, but she wants him to start
drinking Metamucil again."
"Well, shit."
"That's the idea," she grinned, the same time he did. She'd half
expected him to say, "Garbage in garbage out," but sometimes he still
surprised her.
***
"That was so weird..." Sabrina mentioned.
"Yeah, but... I dunno. How do you feel about it?"
"How do YOU feel about it?"
"I dunno..."
They didn't say anything for several seconds.
In theory, Sabrina was for gay rights, equality, openness, and all
that; it was, she'd just discovered, a little different to have One Of
Them sitting at the same table and looking back at her (sometimes). It
made her a little uneasy, for reasons she couldn't really explain.
Everyone had rallied around Kelly instantly, almost by instinct, but now
Sabrina was- *Not second thoughts, exactly,* she told herself, *but, I
guess... wondering what it means. Implications, ramifications, all
that.*
"I think," Pam finally said into the vaguely uncomfortable silence,
"that it was kind of cool, the way WE acted. I mean-"
"Yeah." Sabrina was sure of that. Whatever she thought about
Kelly personally, or about having a lesbian sitting across from her
looking at her, she didn't think that it deserved the kind of abuse
she'd seen happen to Kelly right there in front of all of them. And
that had started before anyone even knew about her. "And Kathy..."
Pam laughed, though thankfully in a normal way, not Kathy-type ear-
bursting insanity. "_I_ think she thought it was funny!"
"Well, DUH!" Sabrina snapped back, and then both of them were
laughing.
***
Mrs. Tucker was waiting by the door as Debbie pulled into the
parking lot. "Oh God," Lisa sighed as she stared straight ahead,
pretending she hadn't been looking around.
"She can't do anything to us IN the restaurant, Lisa," Debbie said,
hoping to convince them both.
"So why are we going out to the parking lot afterwards?" Lisa
snapped.
"There's some things you shouldn't talk about in a public place,
remember?" Lisa could be a bit dense once in a while. Or, she was
really displeased about the meeting and acting dumb to try and get
Debbie to do something else.
***
"Oh, right, she works," Kelly said to herself, before hanging up
the phone. "Damn..." The quarter rattled down into the slot, and she
scooped it out absently, trying to think of who else she could call.
***
"Three please, and a booth," Mrs. Tucker informed the hostess.
Debbie felt uncomfortable letting her take charge, but didn't feel like
it was wise to argue.
"Yes," the hostess nodded, and scurried out with a handful of
menus. They followed the small woman to a booth near the back. Debbie
looked around and found few other patrons seated near them. They
ordered drinks - Debbie was pleased that Mrs. Tucker didn't order
anything alcoholic - and then stared at anything but each other for a
few moments.
"Deborah," Mrs. Tucker started, and Debbie glanced up, feeling
unreasonably guilty. "Eugene wanted me to apologize again to you, for
what happened yesterday."
Debbie just nodded to Mrs. Tucker and grabbed Lisa's hand and
squeezed as tight as she could. She didn't kick her leg because that
was the one thing that would set Lisa off instantly.
"He thought," she continued, "that somehow a cheerleader had gotten
into our house and was chasing Mike with intent to harm him."
After a long moment's consideration of dozens of responses, Debbie
replied, "I hope none of them are actually that stupid."
Mrs. Tucker's lips twitched, like she was about to smile, and she
said, "So do I."
***
*Well, the lies have already started,* Sarah commented to herself.
*The unplanned lies,* she corrected, because she hadn't had time to talk
to Eugene about why he needed to apologize. Bill was supposed to do
that tonight, and if he didn't she'd talk to Eugene tomorrow. *Thank
heavens Michael was quick-witted enough to say that Thursday.*
"Anyway," Deborah said briskly. "That's not what you wanted to
talk about tonight, was it?"
"No," Sarah agreed, noticing that Lisa looked less uncomfortable
when she said that.
***
"So anyway-" Pam was interrupted by the doorbell. "Oh! Date's
here, gotta go!"
"Have fun, don't do anything all of us wouldn't do," Sabrina
suggested.
Pam laughed, said, "Bye!" and hung up. "Commmmminnnnggggggg!" she
yelled as she trotted towards the front door.
***
"I was counting on him NOT coming back!" Deborah burst out.
Sarah gasped, "What?!"
"See, one of their best academic students - I've seen his grades -
and he's so abused and terrified that he won't come back to school? I
mean-"
"I can see that," Sarah interrupted. "But he said he IS going to
go back. And he means it too. We can't actually force him NOT to
go..." That wasn't entirely true; it was just that trying to hold
Eugene captive for the rest of the school year would be unworkably
difficult, requiring either Bill or Sarah, or possibly both, to quit
their jobs so they could be full-time jailers. And, if he wanted to go
as badly as he seemed to, that's what they would have to do to thwart
him. If THAT would work, and Bill was vaguely hinting that it wouldn't-
"Shit," the girl said softly. "And, there's no way you can talk
him out of it?"
Sarah looked away, and wanted a cigarette. "I don't think so. The
little shit's as stubborn as I am." She snarled suddenly, "We didn't
KNOW it was that bad there, as bad as it was; he didn't say anything
about it to us..." Things had happened, but Sarah and Bill had both
thought - or assumed - that it was more random opportunity attacks than
directed against him specifically.
"So why does he want to go BACK there?"
"_I_ don't damn well know!" Sarah shot back. Then she sighed; she
did know. She just didn't want to think about it, because the memory
still made her shiver. "He said, 'They came for me. Just like for the
fucking Jews.' That's what he said," Sarah added, "just like that.
Then he said, 'They're not getting my friends.'"
Both girls looked shocked.
"He thinks it's his duty to be there for them," she sighed. Then
she looked at Deborah. "Do you think you could talk him out of going
back?" She knew she was grasping at straws, but...
Debbie actually seemed to consider it, because she stared away for
a while, fretting, before shaking her head. "I don't think so. I don't
think he'd listen to me any more. Esp-" She cut herself off. "Mike's
not staying home, though, right?"
"What? No. So of course Tuck's not going to leave school if
Mike's there," she said as Deborah nodded repeatedly in agreement. "He
said that last night." She'd probably semi-deliberately forgotten that
part, she realized. She REALLY wanted a cigarette at the moment. "God
damn it," she said as her jaw clenched.
"Uh, h-h-h-hey, I-" Lisa reached out to Deborah protectively.
"It's not your fault, Deborah; I know that," Sarah snapped as she
turned partially away from the two. "I'm just, so... How can he be so
goddamned stubborn about something that could get him killed?!"
Deborah's helpless shrug mirrored her thoughts.
***
<Why not?> Eugene signed while glaring at Bill.
Bill explained, "Because you don't have unlimited minutes, they're
expensive, and if you had the chance you'd overspend your budget without
realizing it dialing up from class."
<Got you,> Mike signed, grinning. Tucker slapped at him.
***
"Maybe earlier?" Debbie presented hesitantly. "It would be helpful
if the parents YOU call, start talking to each other, and the best
time would be over the weekend, when most of 'em aren't working."
"I can see that," Sarah sighed, "but I have to work too; I've got
three showings after noon, and those take a while."
"Well, I mean, just, when you can," Debbie said.
***
The phone rang again - the old one that she couldn't turn off - and
Audrey asked, "Do you want to get it?"
"No!" Kelly exclaimed.
"What?"
They stared at each other as the phone rang again, and Audrey
finally said, "Okay, I'll-"
"No!" Kelly said again as she rushed around and put her body
between Audrey and the phone. "Um," she said as Audrey looked really
confused. "I've, uh, I... Look, I don't want to explain this right
now," she said desperately, "but I'm getting calls that I really don't
want to answer, and-"
"Well just tell 'em to buzz off," Audrey suggested, sounding like
she thought Kelly was losing it.
"Um... that's not it," Kelly said.
"Well, what is it?"
"Um." She REALLY didn't want to talk about this right now, not
like this. "When's Dad going to be home?"
"Eleven tonight," she replied in a challenging tone.
"Um. Can we talk about this tomorrow?" Kelly asked desperately.
"Please? And, uh, just ignore the phone for a while?"
"I can't ignore the phone, Kelly! What if it's your dad?"
"He's got your cellphone number!" Kelly said desperately. She
didn't want to ignore the people calling her; she just didn't want to
talk to them yet. She REALLY wanted to talk to someone like Kim, or
Jill, or Kathy maybe, or Tuck, but NONE of them were home or talking.
"Please, just this one thing... please?"
***
"No, look," Sarah argued. "You're not thinking. A hierarchy will
automatically be co-opted by the existing power structure-"
"No it won't!"
"It WILL, Deborah; if not now, then in a couple of years. Wasn't
the previous principal a fascist?" Eugene had claimed he was, more than
once. "What would someone like that do with a position like this?
They'd co-opt it!" It was so blindingly obvious to her, she couldn't
really understand why Debbie wasn't seeing- "Or were you not planning
for the long term on this?"
"What long term?"
*Stupid,* Sarah thought, though mildly. "You can't just do
something like this to solve a current problem; it makes it harder for
anyone after you. If you don't set up something deliberately to be in
opposition to the current power structure, then-"
"But that's what I'm trying to do!"
"Deborah, stop interrupting. The way you're setting this up is the
same way it works currently, just with a different leader, a different
hierarchy. That's too easy to incorporate into the existing status quo
later, when someone less reponsible or idealistic or too easily bribed
gets in. You need to organize things, start it from the BEGINNING in a
way that is resistant or impossible to incorporate. The United States
government has the separation of powers, and we've managed to hold on to
that for over two hundred years; it'll keep working until we throw the
Constitution away." *Somewhat,* she amended to herself, but it was far
better than nothing. "You need to set up- deliberately set up the
opposition to the establishment, so that it CANNOT be incorporated INTO
the establishment, by its own structure, or it WILL be incorporated,
guaranteed. I've seen it, dozens of times." Well, that was probably an
exaggeration; she had seen it more than once, though.
"Okay so what DO I do?" Debbie snapped, obviously irritated.
"This is something we should take outside," Sarah said slowly and
quietly. "Really; we need to make sure we aren't overheard." Deborah's
jaw muscles tensed, as did Lisa's a moment later, but neither of them
argued with her, and after a few seconds Lisa turned her attention to
her food.
***
Dana Treble waited for the scale to finish swinging, but she'd
already estimated what the reading would be, which confirmed her earlier
guess. "You've lost at least five pounds," she told Eugene. He
shrugged dully, making the scale bounce again, but it settled quickly to
114. "Maybe seven? Since the camping trip?" She entered '114lbs' into
his file on her Palm. "Okay, you can sit down; Mike, c'mere and let's
see what you weigh." She helped Eugene off the scales and to the
toilet, where she helped him sit down.
***
"He looked pretty bad, I think," Sabrina told Julia, who'd called
a couple of minutes ago. She'd wondered what the call was about; this
was possibly the reason. "I mean, he was ALIVE and stuff, and he looked
like he WOULD be okay, I mean not crippled or anything, but... He
looked pretty ill, to me. And his parents want him to rest as much as
possible.
"I was wondering," Julia asked, "you have tutoring with Tuck's dad,
right? Were you going over there tonight? I wanted to say hi, give him
a card or something."
*Aha.* "I hadn't really planned on it," Sabrina answered; she
hadn't really thought about it either. She'd 'planned', as far as that
went, on eating and going to bed as soon as she could manage without her
parents getting suspicious or setting herself a bad precedent. "Oh,
damn," she remembered, "I've got all his homework, and Mike's too. They
asked me to get it yesterday." She thought for a second, then asked out
loud, "Do you really think he'd want it tonight, or would tomorrow be
soon enough?"
"I dunno. Depends on whether he's coming back to school or not."
"Oh hell." She hadn't thought about that. "Do you think he
won't?"
"M'dear, I am seriously wondering why ANY of us go," Julia answered
soberly. "And I'm not the one that spent a week in the hospital. That
place is getting insane, like the Middle East."
Sabrina didn't think it was that bad yet; she hadn't seen any
checkpoints and nobody was openly armed. But those memories were really
dim, and she wasn't entirely sure she actually remembered them; she
might have picked them up from newscasts.
"I mean," Julia continued, "I like the drama group and stuff, but
for the rest of it? You know, I mean, I was thinking, maybe I SHOULD
just drop out now, go to community college and start work on a real
degree, and just skip the last year and a half of bullshit. You know?"
"Yeah, I mean, I can kinda see what you mean... MY parents would
shit bricks, and then the weeping and wailing, gnashing of teeth and
rending of garments..." Oddly enough, it was her father's reaction she
dreaded most. She could talk rationally enough with her mom about
things like that, and while the two of them would argue, it would stay
relatively quiet and calm; her dad was the one that would pull in
everything wrong she'd ever done in her life, every possible problem,
and just blow things completely out of proportion until something like
being two hours late from a date turned into three (literally) more
hours of yelling and screaming. She'd wondered sometimes if it wasn't
some sort of plot on her dad's part, to make disobedience just too much
of a hassle to even attempt.
"A reaction of truly biblical proportions?" Julia asked with a grin
in her voice.
"You know it! Uck!"
***
"How much are you drinking?" Doc Treble asked Tucker directly.
He shrugged, then typed, "Enough to keep my throat from hurting."
"You need to be drinking more. You don't want another urinary
tract infection, do you?" Tucker shook his head; the one time he'd had
one, he had been possessed of a desire to castrate himself or otherwise
amputate the ITCHING which had driven him crazy, and only insanely large
quantities of cranberry juice - which he hadn't especially liked BEFORE
then - plus the fortuitous coincidence of the basement toilet having
enough room to mount a computer, monitor, and a small cooler full of
liquids had kept him from doing it. That and his sister's half-joyous
declaration that women, who had no penis, had these ALL THE TIME.
Tucker had figured that this was one of those cases in which alleviating
the symptoms only made the real problem worse, and had restrained
himself. Barely.
So he took the bottle that was nearest and drank, breathed, drank,
breathed, one-and-two-and-one-and-two until the bottle was empty.
"Good!" Doc Treble smiled down at him. "Did you have any Metamucil?"
*Oh, no...*
***
"Can I have the receipt?" Debbie asked.
"Wh- Oh, for business meal deduction?" Mrs. Tucker asked. Debbie
nodded. "No," she said.
"Why not?"
"Because for one thing I paid for it, and for another it's got my
credit card numbers on it," she explained.
*Ah well, doesn't hurt to ask,* Debbie thought, and Mrs. Tucker
didn't seem upset by the request. Thankfully. The night hadn't gone
badly, and Mrs. Tucker had assured her, unprompted, that Tucker was
sorry about yesterday without actually mentioning what had happened -
not that Debbie needed a reminder - and Lisa, thankfully, hadn't tried
to get into an argument with her about it.
***
"Sabrina?! Thank God!"
"Who is this please?" Sabrina asked, trying to be polite.
"It's Kelly, Tuck's little sister? Can, can we talk? Tonight?
I've got a BIG problem." She sounded like it.
"Uh, yeah, I guess... I have to go eat supper soon, though-"
"Could you like come over here and pick me up after? Or, I mean, I
could meet you somewhere, but, but... I don't know what to do!"
She sounded a lot worse than she had in the cafeteria today. "Uh,
yeah, I guess. Would it be okay if we stopped by Tuck's house? I might
as well give him his homework-"
"Yeah, I mean, I could talk to him too, or something..." She
sounded like she was losing her mind with the relief of getting some
help, for whatever it was; sometimes, just knowing someone else was
willing to help would dissolve whatever resolve had been keeping you
going alone. "I can meet you at Tuck's house if you want."
"Yeah, okay." She didn't know where Kelly lived, but Kelly hadn't
seemed the least bit upset about meeting her at Tucker's house. "What's
this about?" Sabrina asked.
"Um..."
"Can't talk about it over the phone? People there with you?"
Sabrina guessed.
"Yeah," Kelly breathed in relief, again.
"Parents? This is about, uh, you being a, a lesbian?"
"Yeah sorta. Please, can-"
"Yeah, give me about an hour and a half, is that okay?"
"Yeah," Kelly sighed.
"Okay, at Tucker's house, in an hour and a half. Right?"
"Yeah, great," Kelly breathed. "Oh God, yeah..."
"I'll be there," Sabrina promised.
***
Stephen took a deep breath and let it out. His heart was pounding
frantically, and he felt sick already. "Mom, I think-" *No!* he yelled
at himself. *Don't!* "No, I'm pretty sure... I'm gay."
It was out, now, and strangely he felt for an instant like he was
flying.
***
"Hey you
Don't tell me there's no hope at all.
Together we stand,
Divided we fall..."
Distribution:
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+ @>--,--'----- Ellen Hayes o===[-------- __ vicki .sig +
-=[1990]=- \/ virus 12.2
+ http://www.barkingduck.net/ehayes PGP key: EFC9 5D55 (1996) +
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