“I… do you have a cell phone I could borrow ma’am?” She tried to sound meek, but as if she had a plan and was actually covering her internal sureness. Like a hundred year old Demon might. Confidence oozed out of her enough that the woman didn’t question the situation, and handed the small device over.
The card for the Chief had been left at home, but she’d seen it already, so it was easy enough to recall the number.
“Chief Benson?” The officer that had been standing and watching his men work spun to stare at her. He looked a little angry, until Keeley waved at him a little, to get him to come over.
The conversation on her end sounded decently worried, but Roy was having to fight laughter on his side.
“So, basically it’s going a little too well? Let me see if I can’t back this off a little…” He sounded confident then and got her to hand the phone back to its owner.
It took half an hour of wrangling, including Keeley crying into the phone and begging the Chief not to let her party be ruined, which got a half sympathetic look from a few officers, most of whom weren’t bad guys after all. Some had daughters of their own, no doubt. True, a few probably thought she was cute, but that didn’t hurt when trying to manipulate things like this. Darla had mentioned that several times in fact.
Finally the Principal, Givens was her name, hung up and sighed, looking at Keeley bitterly. Edith Givens, she’d told the voice on the phone. Because every fifty something woman was named Edith. It was a name that hadn’t been popular for nearly seventy years though. That didn’t mean it couldn’t be her name, but given everything, it seemed likely she was a bit older than she seemed. Not a Demon though. Something else. A Demon would have done a better job of acting, for one thing.
Much better.
This woman seemed so insincere that even the cops were giving her funny looks.
“The Chief is willing to get all the charges dropped and let us deal with this in house, the alcohol will have to be confiscated by the police, and the students suspended for a week each, effective immediately, but we can keep it off their criminal records, which is something. No one needs the extra black marks. Now I have to get with the coach and round up the students in question. I suppose that we should ban them from the game and dance. I don’t know about the Coretechs party… It’s not technically a school function.” She seemed to be trying to act sly about the whole thing, as if she was leading Keeley. To get them in place there.
Right. That would work. She nodded and gave the officer in charge a solid look.
“Let’s leave that to officer Danner here. The police are in on this too. What do you say Sir? Should we let the kids come to the party or leave them to run around, angry at the world and looking to get some payback for having been caught?” It wasn’t subtle and wasn’t meant to be. It got a laugh though, a real one, from several of the police.
Danner coughed, trying to hide his expression as his eyes danced merrily, “why not? They might as well be somewhere we can keep an eye on them. If their parents are even going to let them out of the house. I wouldn’t if they were my kids, but not every parent views things the same way.” That got enough nods that everyone seemed happy enough with the idea.
Especially Edith, who tried to smile. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to see. It looked like she smelled something bad, instead of feeling genuine joy. Like she was disgusted.
“Have no fear officers, I’ll be attending this function myself, to ensure there are no problems.” She gave Keeley a look that she nearly felt, it was so hard. “If I’m welcome, I mean?”
“Of course you are. I need to get with the other schools principals and let them know that they are too, if they want to check on things. If this happened here, it’s just possible that all the other schools have something similar going on. These were just the ones caught.” She grimaced.
“Not my job though. I’m just on party planning. Speaking of which I need to call Carla and Glen, to make sure everything is going smoothly.” Keeley smiled, a happy enough thing. “They’re good though, really good. Say, how do you know them? I wanted to ask yesterday, but got sidetracked.” Having to get ready to bash the woman’s head in with a metal chair at the time really had been distracting. Something to watch for in the future no doubt.
Plus, honestly, she hadn’t thought about it at all. It hadn’t seemed relevant. Now that the woman had tried to run her mother off the road, while she drove a vehicle that Edith had never seen, which wasn’t in Keeley’s name at all, everything seemed a lot more important, didn’t it? Either the woman had her own spy agency and just liked to kill random people, or something spooky was going on. Keeley was willing to bet some of Darla’s money that it was that last one.
The woman sneered at her, it was pretty obvious and even the police watching seemed uneasy about it, so it was really over the top. A precursor to violence which everyone around could pick up on.
“Oh, well, we have an arrangement. I did a favor for them once, and now they help me on occasion. Luckily for me you were working on the same party idea though. They really are the best in the area. They have been, for a very long time. I only deal with the best.”
Keeley got the point of what the woman was doing, she was trying to find out if Keeley was anything other than a schoolgirl with connections. Of course, she wasn’t right now, so she played it straight and just agreed heartily.
“I’m very happy with the work so far. It’s short notice, but they really seem to know what they’re doing. Well, I should be getting back to work myself. This whole thing is more of a chore than I thought it would be. It feels like I’m just running today.” Mainly because she was. Her feet didn’t hurt, but that was an act of will and constant healing, more than anything else.
She needed to eat again too.
It took about five minutes to get out of the parking lot, students that weren’t in trouble having stayed to watch, covertly, starting to leave about the same time she was. It was later than she liked, but not stopping to eat would be worse than losing the time she decided. She got a dozen Big Mac’s and a matching number of large fries. Nothing to drink, because she didn’t want to juggle that many cups, and getting just one would look strange. She found a spot behind a building, a small appliance repair shop, that had shade, were no one would see her scarfing food like a maniac with a tape worm. It really was kind of gross, but she didn’t have time to savor what she ate.
Letting herself feel the hunger made it easier at least. The food tasted a lot better too.
Then, after cleaning up, reapplying make-up which had run a little, embarrassingly enough, from the fake tears she’d used with Roy. Then she got back on the road, not really certain what she should do next. There was a game, true, which she was going to skip, a dance which she needed to help decorate for, and then all the party stuff after that. If she got to the Raintree gym then she could start decorating right away. It was just four O’clock, but it might take that long to get it all done. It would open up at nine…
Darla, Hally and Eve were actually needed at the game, since they were a quarter of the cheerleading squad, it kind of surprised her to find them all in the gym working away at full speed, along with most of the rest of the group. Keeley didn’t know any of them, but got who they were.
The little skirts in ugly blue and orange gave them away.
“Keeley!” Hally bounded over, almost skipping, red hair bouncing as she did, ending in a near tackle that caused them both to stumble back a little, laughing.
“I came to help. I have a couple of hours before I need to start on the other things. The after parties. Oh… some news. Nine members of the Wilson High Football team, and about twelve other students there, mainly cheerleaders, all got suspended for having alcohol on school grounds. They were close to being locked up for it, but the Chief of Police stepped in and made a deal with the Principal there. They can’t play in the game though, suspended players can’t, by district rules. It’s most of their first string.” Keeley shook her head as if saddened by the news.
Darla nodded, her face serious.
“Yeah, the police are really cracking down on teenage drinking right now. We need to tell everyone to ditch their booze, tonight is not the time to be caught carrying.”
Three of the girls giggled meaningfully.
“Do you know what I had to do for all that beer?” One of them, a girl who was delicate looking and had clearly had a nose job, giving her a pretty, but nearly bland appearance to go with her brown hair.
“No way am I dumping it. Hide it maybe, but dump? No way, no how.”
Darla sighed but didn’t say anything. It reminded Keeley to get rid of the stuff she had, since it hadn’t been needed at all. Driving around with it was just asking for trouble. Maybe she could give it to Clara and Glen to take care of? They’re kind drank, and if the memories from Clara were correct, they weren’t overly picky about what it was exactly, as long as it got them drunk. It took a lot to do that too.
It was an idea, since they were all “friends” now. Less littering than just dumping it alongside the road too. She decided to do that, just as soon as possible.
The girl that had done questionable things to get several eighteen packs of off brand beer kept talking, mainly about herself, as they all ran around working. She seemed kind of convinced that the whole squad revolved around her. They’d been at it for half an hour, Keeley hanging streamers bought at the last minute with Hally, she climbed the tall ladder, figuring that if she fell it would be easier for her to handle.
“Too bad the school district decided we couldn’t hold the dance in that barn we rented. I’ve spent most of the last week with Eve getting it ready.” Hally sounded conversational about it, rather than truly put out, but Eve made a loud grunting sound as she carried cans of fruit punch over to the refreshment table.
“No doubt. I mean, I get the idea, and the school gym really probably is safer, but I just don’t think any of us are going to be gay bashed tonight. I could be wrong about that of course... I’m not, but I could be.”
For her part, she sounded a little disgruntled. Eve was bright, but kind of expected the world to screw her over, and when it did, she really took it personally. Hally just kind of rolled with almost everything, it was nice. Relaxing to be around in a way.
At six all the other girls had to leave, even though only half the work was really done. They had a job to do though. Leading the cheers. Keeley chuckled as Hally wondered how it was all going to get done.
“You’re kidding right Hal? The second you all get out of my hair, and I don’t have to worry about looking good, I can go into overdrive and knock this out in an hour. It’ll be ready.”
They all laughed, so she joined in. Everyone but Darla that was, she just winked.
“Make sure you eat enough. Passing out won’t help things go smoothly and it’s likely to be a long night.” She didn’t whisper the words, but somehow no one else seemed to notice her saying anything. How it was done Keeley didn’t know. Then there was a lot she didn’t get yet, wasn’t there? Not about being a modern schoolgirl.
“It’s not my first dance, kid. You too though.” The words had a wry tone to them, as if she were a lot older than she seemed, she hoped. It got a chuckle.
“Right. So, see you at the dance?”
“Nope. I’m skipping it. I have too much to do, besides… You know.” This was for everyone else’s benefit, but perky Barb the beer slut asked the right question.
“We know what?”
Eve was the one that said the words, not Darla. Explaining in a half hushed tone.
“Rob was going to the dance with Keelzebub here.” She sounded sad about it. Keeley could tell the whole thing really hurt for her still. She hadn’t even been in love with the boy, they were just loosely friends. That was enough in Eve’s world. You didn’t mess with her friends. It was about all she had.
But really… Keelzebub? It was hilarious as a nickname, but a little too close to home, to tell the truth.
Darla actually blinked, but Keeley let it go. They could talk about it later. Except that Barb wanted to know everything now. Had she and Rob been dating? Couldn’t she get another date? Keelzebub?
It was Hally that jumped in there.
“Yeah. There was this demon once that attacked us all, at least it was a guy in a mask like one, I guess, and he was chasing us, yelling that he was going to kill us all, so Keeley hoped out of the van and walked right up to him, even though he had this huge stick he was waving around and she scared him so bad he called her a demon. So, you know, like Beelzebub? Keelzebub.” She said it like that made some kind of sense.
Maybe to her it did. Eve too from the look on her face.
“Oh yeah, Keels is a total bad ass, don’t let the good looks fool you.”
Barb started toward the door, since Darla had headed that way already, pleased enough with the new nickname it seemed, once explained for public consumption.
“Hmmm. Keelzebub, Lord of the Cheerleaders? I’ll have to give her my job as team captain.”
Keeley shook her head and made shewing motions.
“I don’t know the cheers. Plus, I’m content just being the power behind this mighty all girl squad of doom. Or I will be, once I become that, and you know, you all get about ninety-three percent more doomy. Maybe some new uniforms? Black with a skull and cross bones on the front?” She deadpanned the line perfectly, but Eve nodded.
“Getting right on that then, boss.”
Several of the girls chuckled at least and waved in her general direction as they hit the door.
They all left then, but Barb gave her a look that did not seem happy as she did it. Whatever that was about.
It would probably end up being about the girl feeling Keeley was butting in, or worried that her position as team narcissist was being threatened. Keeley would have reassured her, but decided to let Darla do it. The girl was one of hers anyway, wasn’t she? At least as far as their little squad went.
As soon as they left Keeley took a deep breath and closed her eyes tightly, made herself relax for a minute, just reveling in the quiet and calm, then she focused on a feeling of energy and speed, like she had earlier in the day. Not as intense, but closer to that than was strictly good energy management. She wasn’t hungry yet at least, but this would probably push her too it.