Authors: Jeanette Battista
“Some of them, yeah.” She slid through, feeling like she was breaking the rules. “Should I even be back here?”
He nodded and pointed to the computer. “Oh yeah, no problem. I have some shelving and requests to find so as long as you put everything back where you found it, we’re good.”
“Um, okay.” She looked around. “Is there a copier around here I can use?”
“Yeah, it’s in the back. Just keep a list of the copies you’ve made and you can pay at the front desk.” He turned and showed her how to search the database to find the filing cabinet or archive shelf where the records she needed were. When he was sure she understood what to do, he began to walk away. “I’ll be down in the basement archives if you get stuck.”
“Okay. Sure. Thanks.” Devon pulled out her notebook and a pen and sat in the high swivel chair in front of the monitor.
Brock cocked his head and looked at her. “You look familiar.”
Devon turned halfway around in the chair. “I’m Devon Mackson. We go to the same high school. We were in the same Civics class sophomore year.”
She waited for his reaction to her last name. Everyone in town knew the name and the scandal associated with her mother and father. Even Gammy’s fearsome reputation as an upstanding Christian woman—and folk healer—couldn’t stand against the town’s opinion of Devon’s mother. Her stint in prison only proved how trashy she was in their eyes. And so was Devon—guilt by association, by birth.
She thought she saw a flicker in the back of his eyes, but she couldn’t be sure. He ran a hand through his dark brown hair. “Oh yeah. I remember now.”
Devon highly doubted it. She turned back to face the monitor, uncomfortable with his eyes on her. In the class they had shared, she’d sat behind him in the second row to the left. She had spent a lot of time staring at his arms as they rested at the edges of his desk. He had very nice arms. But she knew he would never have noticed her, even if she had painted herself chartreuse and stood on her head on top of his desk.
“You had all the answers,” he continued while she swanned about in memories of sophomore year. “You always blew the curve for the rest of us.”
“Sorry.” She began typing search criteria into the screen. She made a what the hell face where he couldn’t see. Why should she be sorry? She was smart and she studied. If other students didn’t do as well as she did, it wasn’t her fault. She felt like she was trying to hide something.
“Anyway, let me know if you need something down in the archives; just shout.” He tromped off back down the stairs.
Devon jotted down her first set of results, then entered in more dates. She knew her mother and father’s birth dates, and she knew her father’s date of death. She’d need records for her grandparents, at least one set anyway. She’d already picked Gammy’s brain for family names and dates and had only come up with the vaguest of ranges. She knew her grandmother had boxes of old family papers; she planned on going through those after she’d gotten as far as she could here.
She grabbed her notebook and hopped down from the chair, heading to the rows of filing cabinets that lined the walls. Devon started pulling files, leaving a marker in the spot so she knew where to return each folder. Birth records were the simplest to pull so she started photocopying those she could find. It was boring, monotonous work, but Devon slogged through, knowing it would be worth it if she got the money.
Returning the first round of files, Devon started on her second pass. These were questionable relatives—they may or may not be part of her immediate family—but she wanted to have their information just in case. She believed in being thorough. She took the next set of papers over to the copier, keeping track of her copies in her small notepad where she kept everything about her college apps. She put in the first certificate and hit the Start button. The copier started up with a clonk and began to run the job with the noise of a commuter jet taking off.
“Hey,” came a voice from behind her.
She yelped, jumping straight up in surprise. Devon hadn’t heard anyone coming up behind her. Then again, the French Foreign Legion in full regalia could have been behind her and she wouldn’t have heard them over the whine and wheezes of the copier.
She whirled around, coming face to face with Brock. “Take it easy,” he said, holding his hands up in what she assumed was supposed to be a comforting gesture. “I didn’t mean to sneak up on you like that.”
Despite her heart lolloping through her chest like a psychotic thoroughbred, Devon managed a smile. “You startled me. The copier’s so loud, I didn’t hear you.”
Brock picked up the notepad that had fallen when he’d scared her. He returned it to her. “My shift here’s almost over and the place closes in about ten minutes. Just wanted to let you know.”
“Thanks.” Devon gathered up her copies and the originals once the machine finally stopped with the noise like an elephant dying. She turned and saw his hazel eyes surveying her.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” Brock leaned against one of the cabinets. He looked relaxed, completely at ease with himself and his surroundings. Devon envied him that quality. She wished she had something like that.
“Some of it, yeah.” She began to put the originals back where she found them. “You were right. It’s going to definitely take more than one day.”
He took some of the stack of folders from her and began to reshelve them. “Sounds pretty important though.” He closed a file drawer with a push. “I work here Tuesdays and Thursdays,” he began, his hands busy with sifting through upright stacks of files. “I can help you out, if you want.”
Devon gave him a sharp look. Why would he volunteer to help her? Maybe he was bored—it couldn’t be that exciting down in the archives below. A little company and some different work might just be a change of pace for him. She shrugged. “I work most Wednesdays and Fridays at the drugstore,” she said, not wanting him to think that if she showed up here it was because of his schedule. She may have had a crush on him in sophomore year, but she wasn’t the type of person who usually stalked the object of her affections. “I’ll be back to finish up though. Thanks for the offer.”
He shrugged, eyes still on his filing. “No problem.” He shut the last drawer he’d been working on, his hands empty. “Catch you at school.”
“Sure,” she said, watching him grab his backpack and make his way through the door. When she couldn’t see him any longer, she finished up what she was doing, reeling a little from his words. He’d see her at school? He’d never seen her at school before, and she somehow doubted he’d start now.
Still, it gave her a very warm sensation down in the pit of her stomach to think that he might.
The halls were crowded as they always were in the rush to get to first period. Devon slipped through blocky bodies that took up more than their fair share of the hallways as she tried to get to her locker. Getting impatient, she stopped being so polite and just began to shove her way through. It earned her a few dark looks and a couple of muttered curses, but at least she was able to grab her books for the next two periods.
She slammed her locker shut and turned to go back the way she’d come. Her first period class, AP Physics, was at the end of the hall, which was in the process of emptying out as the warning bell rang. There were still plenty of people lingering outside of classrooms, but Devon found she didn’t have to push her way through a wall of jocks to make any progress. It was like being a salmon trying to swim upstream, except instead of the current, she was swimming against student athletes. She grinned; that sounded dirtier than she thought it would
Devon rushed past the swirl of people where two hallways met in a T. She knew she had time, but she hated being late to class. She skirted a few stragglers, intent on getting to Mr. Ryan’s physics class, when a hand caught her arm.
“Hey Devon.”
Her head swung around, her eyes first lighting on the hand on her arm, then on Brock Cutler’s very handsome face. The skin at the corner of his hazel eyes crinkled as he smiled at her. She liked his smile quite a lot. He had nice, white, even teeth.
She reminded herself to breathe because suffocation didn’t suit her, and managed a weak, “Hi.” Pathetic. She tried again. “I didn’t see you,” she explained.
“Late for class?” he asked, though he was just as likely to be late as she was.
“YO, Cutler!” One of the other basketball players was waving Brock over.
“You’re being paged,” she remarked with a grin. “Better go.”
“See you later,” Brock said, then yelled to his teammate, “I’m coming, dude!”
Devon continued on to physics, but she found her mind wasn’t on the homework they were going over. Brock Cutler had stopped her in the hall to say hi to her. He’d meant it when he’d said he see her around. She wanted to find Gil and tell him everything right away, but they wouldn’t see each other until English. If anyone would understand this minor social coup, it would be him.
*****
After she’d finished lunch, Devon went to the restroom. She avoided the one directly across from the cafeteria; the girls with reputations for sleeping around hung out there, reapplying their metric ton of makeup and gossiping about boys. She didn’t feel like navigating that minefield, so she headed for the bathrooms at the other end of the school, closer to the back entrance and the student parking lot.
She was just pulling up her jeans when she heard the restroom door open. One girl was in mid-sentence, “…do you think you’re going to do?”
Devon didn’t recognize the voice, but she did recognize the one who answered her. “I’m going to get him back. Brock and I were meant for each other.” It was Skylar.
Crap. Devon didn’t know what to do. Should she wait until they left to come out of the stall? That felt too much like eavesdropping, and besides, she had just as much right to use a restroom as anybody else. But to walk out there with all of them standing in front of the sinks just felt weird.
Skylar continued. “He was devastated when I said we needed time apart. He’ll be so glad that I decided we should get back together.”
Oh for God’s sake, man up
, she thought, mentally kicking herself for being a gigantic wuss. The cheerleaders did not have sole possession of a freaking bathroom! Devon flushed the toilet and stepped out of the stall. Four sets of eyes swiveled in her direction. She ignored them, making her way to an unoccupied sink to wash her hands. The silence was nerve-wracking. She took her time, trying to appear completely unconcerned that she’d crashed a cheerleader gossip session. She couldn’t wait to get out of there, but she wasn’t going to let them know that.
“What are you doing in here?” Skylar snarled.
Devon raised an eyebrow at her. She grabbed a few paper towels from the dispenser and dried her hands. “If I have to tell you that, maybe you shouldn’t be graduating this year.” She smiled sweetly at the blonde.
One of the girls snickered. Skylar shot her a glare that, if weaponized, would have annihilated the giggler on the spot. Then the cheerleader gave Devon her full attention. Devon had to fight the urge to fidget as she was speared by the other girl’s blue gaze. “Nice shirt,” she commented.
Devon looked down. She was wearing her usual button down with one of her grandfather’s old woolen vests over it. She’d been going for a kind of nerdy chic aesthetic today. Usually she didn’t bother with clothes, but today she’d felt like trying something different. She looked at Skylar dubiously, not believing for a second that the girl meant her compliment. She waited for the rest of it, trying to look bored.
“No really,” Skylar said, her voice bright. “Poor white trash and dumpster chic are totally in this season.”
Devon eyed Skylar’s skintight ensemble. Her shirt had sequins and her jeans looked like they’d been painted on. “As opposed to trashy pop singer, which apparently never goes out of fashion.” She couldn’t believe she was trading insults with Skylar. Senior year must be messing with her head. Still, it felt good to give as good as she got. She threw the paper towels in the trash can and walked at her regular pace to the door. But she stopped before she opened it and said in her most insincere voice, “Good luck with Brock. I hope everything works out for you crazy kids.” Then she pulled the door open and was through it before Skylar could come up with a response.
*****
She wasn’t able to get back to the Records room that week. Friday night found her at her shift at the drugstore. It was slow, like Friday nights always were. It gave her time to restock shelves and do any chores that the shop owner, Mr. McCalhan, came up with for her. When she was through, he usually let her work on her homework until closing time.
Devon was at the front of the store, restocking the candy and gum section, when the bell above the door rang. She finished stacking Twix bars in their cardboard boxes and took herself to the front of the store. She passed the aisle that held the aspirin and other medicines on her way back up to the register, when she saw a tall guy peering at the bottles and jars.
“Can I help you find something?” Devon asked, stopping at the mouth of the aisle.
The customer turned and Devon felt her stomach flip over. Brock stood there, holding two different boxes of medicine in his hands. “Hi.”