Authors: Randy Russell
ARVA TUGGED JANA'S ARM.
“Homeroom,” she said in her creaky voice as she led Jana inside. Bluish faces were the trend here. And more.
“Your desk is next to mine,” Arva croaked cheerfully. “See, your notebook is already there. Pencils and pens. You can take notes, but you leave your notebook here when class is over.”
Jana sat slumped in her desk. She leaned her head over her notebook, letting the fall of her dark brown hair hide her face. One wall of the classroom had windows. The seats along the windows had been taken by boys, except the first desk. It was empty.
“Hi,” someone said to Arva. Jana didn't look up right away.
She barely wanted to look at anyone. There were things about some of these students she didn't want to see twice. Disfigured faces. Bodies damaged in odd ways. The bus had been bad enough. The hallway was worse. With Arva, it was the little black feather in the corner of her mouth and that muffled rasp and croak of her broken voice. But with others . . .
“This is Beatrice,” Arva was saying.
“What's your name?” Beatrice asked.
“Jana Webster,” Jana answered, still slumped forward, still hiding her eyes from the classroom.
“Of Webster and Haynes,” Arva hoarsely choked out. Jana had told Arva all about Michael on their way to class. She couldn't help it.
“Oh, sounds juicy,” Beatrice said, catching on quickly. “How hunky is he?”
“Big-time,” Arva said.
With that, Jana lifted her head and pulled her hair behind her ear to look at Beatrice. Jana had her smile in place, the one she used when she met new people at speech and acting tournaments.
Jana looked once at Beatrice, then quickly looked away.
“I'm sorry,” Jana mumbled. She held her hand to her mouth then dropped it. “I'm so sorry . . . but there's something . . . there's . . .”
Beatrice apparently was accustomed to an initial gasp or two when being introduced. She grinned at Jana. Beatrice had a wide mouth that pointed downward when she grinned. She looked cute when she did that. Jana would have to practice the technique. It was a look she could copy when there was a reason to smile about something you weren't really happy about.
“Something sticking out of my head?” Beatrice asked. “Looks like a hat, doesn't it? A clown hat or a big fake flower.”
“What is it?”
“Yard dart. Church picnic.”
“I didn't know they still made those.”
“Oh, they don't,” Beatrice told her. “They're bona fide collector's items.”
Jana nodded like an idiot. Beatrice sat in the desk behind her. Jana faced forward and slumped into place, letting her hair fall again to hide her face. She tried not to shiver, wondering whether Beatrice had tried to pull the thing out of her head. She had such pretty brown eyes, but no one in the world was going to notice with a metal rod and three bright yellow plastic fins sticking out the top of her skull.
A new sound caught Jana's attention. Three kids on gurneys with squeaky wheels were brought into homeroom by attendants wearing gray. The students on gurneys were placed in a row, heads along the wall without the windows, toes pointing at the class. Jana, apparently, had been transferred to a magnet school for the critically lame.
She peeked over her shoulder at the back of the class, her eyes shielded by the fall of her hair. Boys talking in low, chiding voices were punching one another in the arm.
Sliders. That's what Arva had called them. A couple of them wore jeans instead of the black school uniform slacks. Mars was right in the middle of the group. He caught her looking at him.
“Roll!” a male voice boomed from the speaker mounted next to the institutional clock above the blackboard. The students' names were read in alphabetical order. His last name was Dreamcote. Mars Dreamcote. It sounded like something you wore to bed if you wanted to meet Martians in your sleep.
Their teacher appeared. He stood at the front of the room, peering over their heads, looking at none of them. Jana didn't blame him.
“All present,” he said. He glanced at the empty desk at the front of class and added, “Vacancy noted.”
Jana opened her notebook and saw that someone had already written on the first page in dark pencil. It was one simple word, followed by a short notation in smaller, carefully printed letters underneath.
The word was
Murder
. The notation below said
From a Friend.
Murder
. What was that supposed to mean?
“Jeff Bridges,” Jana said.
She was on the phone with Michael. Jana had spent the evening searching online, finding just the right activity for their double date with Nathan Mills and Sherry Simmons.
“And?” Michael asked.
“Sam Elliott.”
Michael stalled. “That's not an easy one,” he said.
“It will be when I give you one more.”
“No, I'm getting it.”
She waited.
“Okay.” Michael gave up. “One more.”
“John Goodman.”
“
The Big Lebowski
,” Michael said, then swore for needing three actors' names to get it. “One of my favorites. I should have had it at Sam Elliott.”
“Fart, fudge, and popcorn,” Jana said in return, laughing. It was her catch phrase, the one she used in place of cursing. “You didn't.”
“I guess we're going bowling?”
“Yep,” Jana said. “The perfect double date. I've already reserved a lane.”
Jana didn't like bowling. It was too loud, for one thing, and she felt utterly wretched when she rolled a gutter ball. But bowling would save her from having to do anything the least bit romantic with Nathan and Sherry along. More importantly, it would keep those two from doing anything romantic in front of Jana. The idea of watching them kiss made her shudder.
“I didn't know you liked bowling, Jana.”
“I hate it,” she said brightly. “But I'll live. And the next time we go on a double date, it's going to be with people I choose. Okay?”
“Woody Harrelson,” Michael said in reply.
“
Kingpin
,” Jana said, nailing it. “Way too easy, Michael.” Then she added quickly, “Bill Murray, Randy Quaid.” She earned ten bonus points for naming the movie and two additional actors in the cast. The more actors who had to be named before you guessed the right movie, the more difficult it was to come up with additional cast members.
“Bonus noted,” Michael said reluctantly.
“Don't you just love me?” Jana teased.
Of course he did. Of that, Jana was most certain. Webster and Haynes loved each other dearly, deeply, and for all of time.
One of the Sliders wrote it, Jana decided.
Murder. From a Friend.
The printing was so precise. She glanced at the back of the classroom to see if they were watching her, waiting to laugh when she read the spooky note.
Mars caught her looking at him again. He let one corner of his mouth smile. There was a dimple.
She quickly turned her head around. The teacher was writing on the blackboard. He had greased hair parted high on one side. Nearly two inches around his ears had been shaved. He was in his early forties, she guessed, but his face looked more tired than his age. His hands were too large for his sleeves.
The instructor's name was at the top of the blackboard: Mr. Fitzgerald. He didn't wear a ring on either hand. After writing
Today's Assignment
on the chalkboard, he turned around to check his notes. He wore a twill jacket with a small checkered pattern and a funny knitted tie. It had perfectly horizontal contrasting stripes and was too short. It was also cut flat across the bottom.
Jana liked watching older people. She worked hard to figure out what motivated them. It was part of being a good actor. Mr. Fitzgerald, however, didn't seem motivated by anything. He had tired eyes and the flesh of his face sagged. She bet he drank. He was an alcoholic and she wondered why.
Failed romance, Jana concluded. He had loved and lost. And he was still obsessed by it. Not everyone could be Webster and Haynes.
Thursday night, Jana and Sherry had gone to the restroom to check their makeup.
“Do you like him?” Jana asked the younger girl. Sherry's hair was thick and straight, cut far short of reaching her shoulders. It was plain brown hair, but Sherry wore it with fat, cherry red streaks dyed from the part across both sides. Each red streak had a narrow yellow stripe down the middle. Her head look like a piece of striped candy.
“Huge crush,” Sherry said. She was telling the truth, but it had nothing to do with Nathan.
“Be careful,” Jana warned the younger girl. “He's a senior and you're a sophomore.”
Jana's hair was simply dark brown without natural or unnatural highlights. When she wasn't performing, she wore very little makeup. Her mother said Jana was born with bedroom eyes. Her eyelids were well defined, but Jana believed her eye color was dull and boring. Hazel. Almost green, but hazel. It was just one of the reasons Jana wasn't as pretty as her mother. And never would be.
She knew all her faults and could live with them. Her eyebrows weren't dark enough. Her chin was a bit too prominent. Her mouth was too big. When Jana smiled for real, it took over her face.
Jana's mother was a spectacular beauty, a once-famous cover girl model. She'd told Jana time and time again that being beautiful was dangerous. That Jana was lucky to be a little on the plain side, because just look at what being ravishingly beautiful had done to her mother.
“When you're beautiful, everyone sees a different story for you, but it's not your story,” her mother explained. “Be glad you get to go through life being plain old Jana. You can define yourself rather than have someone else do it for you.”
Jana wore waterproof mascara because she was on a date and didn't want to smudge Michael's shirt. Afraid that the bright lights of the bowling alley would wash out her features entirely, she carefully applied a new coating of peach lip gloss. It felt like silk on her lips. It made her feel pretty, even though she would never be as pretty as her mother.
Jana smacked her lips in the mirror and smiled. But not too big a smile.
“Sometimes, you have to make up your mind who you want and not worry about the little things that might get in the way,” Sherry said. “I'm not perfect, like you are. So I have to try harder.”
Jana laughed. She wasn't perfect. She caught Sherry's stare in the bathroom mirror and saw the seriousness in her eyes. Sherry stared at Jana with a funny little pout that made her eyes look mean.
“Little things?” Jana asked.
“You know, other people.” Sherry shrugged. “Little things like that.”
Strangely Jana found herself agreeing with the sophomore's assessment of getting what you wanted in life. Other people wouldn't get in the way of Webster and Haynes. Ever.
“Also, I'm not perfect,” Jana said. “You want perfect, you should meet my mother. And just wait till you see me bowl.”
Sherry grinned. This time it was for real. Her mean eyes twinkled.
“And neither is Michael,” Jana continued. “We just happen to be perfect for each other.”
Sherry's purse was open on the vanity counter. Jana glanced at it and saw an aerosol spray on top of her other stuff.
“Is that hair spray?” Aerosols ate holes in the atmosphere.
Sherry closed her purse with a snap. “Pepper spray,” she said. “My dad's paranoid. He won't let me leave the house without it. I have enough to take out an entire football team.”
“Well, if you have any trouble with Nathan, just let me know. Michael will make him behave.”
Sherry stepped back from the mirror and did something Jana had never seen another girl do before. She tugged her T-shirt down in front and lightly rubbed the palms of her hands up and down over the points of her breasts. Jana had to turn around to keep from saying something rude. No wonder she needed pepper spray, Jana thought.
They joined Michael and Nathan at the bowling carousel.
The sound of heavy balls hitting the floor and rolling down the alleys echoed from wall to wall. The crash and fall of pins sounded almost like a war going on. People whooped and hollered. They jumped up and down and screeched.
Michael sat behind the electronic scoreboard. As Jana walked toward him, she was overcome by a keen sense of déjà vu. She saw him twice in a row, sitting, entering their names on the tabulator keyboard. Jana wanted to tap him on the shoulder and ask him to leave with her. There were butterflies in her stomach that shouldn't be there. Something was wrong tonight.
Jana shook off the tickling of dread. Michael was with her and she was safe.
Nathan and Sherry sat together on the half-circle bench behind Michael. Jana sat down next to Sherry to put on her bowling shoes. She carefully and evenly tugged the laces of her bowling shoes and tied them tightly. Then she tied each of the loops into a knot on top.
“What are you doing?” Nathan asked. “Crochet?” Nathan laughed at his own joke. His laugh sounded like a motorcycle trying to start. That's what he did when he drank beer. He laughed. He would laugh all night. It was so boring.
Sherry bent forward to watch Jana tie the second knot in each of her shoelaces. Nathan accidentally kicked Sherry's purse and the pepper spray rolled out. The sophomore must have been embarrassed by it, because she immediately got down on her knees in front of Jana and reached under the seats to retrieve the canister before anyone else could see what it was.
While Sherry was bent over, Nathan made a face at Jana, bouncing his eyebrows and letting his tongue loll out of his mouth like a panting dog. Nathan was such a creep.
“Jana, your turn,” Michael said. He turned around and winked at her. “Break a leg,” he added for good luck.