Thirst (12 page)

CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

THE ASSIGNMENT

The next day, Hanna’s teacher thought it would be a fun idea to have all of the students present their assignments to the whole class. Each student took turns standing at the front of the class, reading out the paper they had written the night before. Each presentation only took a couple of minutes.

Students boasted their perfect mothers and their amazing fathers. Every paper included bits about how many people their parents helped and how philanthropic they were.

Then, it was Hanna’s turn.

Hanna walked up to the front of the class with her reluctantly written paper in hand. Everyone snickered as she stared nervously at the class in silence.

“Read your paper please, Hanna,” the teacher said with glaring eyes.

Hanna’s hands trembled as she looked back down at her sheet.

“Freak!” someone in the class coughed, eliciting laughter from the rest of the snickering students.

“My dad…” Hanna started out slowly.

There was a long silence in the class.

“Hanna please—just read the assignment. Everyone has to do it,” the teacher said.

All of the students began to giggle and whisper to one another.

The young shy girl took a deep breath, legs trembling. “My dad—My dad kills people.”

The entire class turned dead silent.

“He kills lots of people. He kills people every day. He says that he does not have to do it. He says that other people will not do it, but that does not mean they make him do it. I guess that makes him a bad person. He knows that he is a bad person, but he still does it anyway.”

“Um, Hanna—Maybe that’s enough,” Hanna’s teacher said quietly, reaching her hand out to take the assignment away from the girl.

“He says that none of the people he kills deserve to be killed, and that some of them are probably even innocent, and he knows it,” Hanna continued, unable to stop her pseudo-therapeutic venting. “But he does it anyway, even though he doesn’t have to. He always tells me that people cry on the chair. They cry for their wives, and their kids. He says that sometimes their wives and kids are there, watching him pull the lever, but he still does it anyway.”

“Hanna—that’s enough,” the teacher said again with a firm tone.

Hanna ignored her teacher. “Because of my dad, everyone hates me. He says that it is too bad because life is not fair. But I think he is wrong, because everyone else’s life is fair. Why can’t my life be fair?”

“Hanna!” the teacher snapped.

“I wish my father was dead,” Hanna finished.

The class was painfully silent. Eyes were wide and mouths were dropped in shock and awe. The teacher stood up and swiftly took the paper away from Hanna. She placed a hand on Hanna’s shoulder. “Hanna—go down to the office right now.”

“Why?” Hanna asked. “I did what you told me to do.”

“I—You—Just go!” the teacher said, unsure of how to handle the peculiar situation.

Hanna walked out of the class with her chin against her chest, past all of the shocked and scoffing students.

“Psychopath,” someone muttered as she passed.

There was one person in the class who was not laughing, one person who felt as though she understood how Hanna felt—Brittany.

Hanna found herself sitting in the office for the rest of the school day. The principal called and left messages on Francis’ phone, but Francis never showed up to face the situation. Hanna’s teacher stood in the office with the principal, and they discussed the situation. Hanna could hear bits of the conversation through the thin office door.

“There’s something wrong with her—I don’t want her in my class,” Hanna’s teacher said.

“I can’t just move her into a different class because you don’t like her,” the principal replied. “That isn’t fair to the other teachers.”

“I’m not saying that. She needs to go somewhere else—a boarding school for kids like her—a mental hospital—anywhere but here. We can’t have this girl in our school.”

“What has she done besides this?”

“She’s just—Freaky. There are some loose screws in her twisted little head.”

“Define ‘freaky’.”

“She just scares me—like she’s always plotting something. I wasn’t that worried about it until today. Now—I’m scared shitless she’s going to come and hurt someone—or worse.”

The principal sighed. “I can see that she’s quiet, but I can’t just expel her because of this paper. I mean—her dad is the prison executioner. She did what you asked her to do. I can give her a suspension, and I can suggest to her father that he look into boarding schools and therapists, but that’s it.”

“I already made her father get her a therapist.”

“Has it helped at all?”

“No. If anything, it’s made her weirder. She’d be better off keeping that creepy mouth of hers shut.”

Tears filled up in Hanna’s eyes as she listened to her teacher talking about her. She never “plotted” and she never thought about “hurting” anyone. She just wanted to be normal. She just wanted to be left alone. Was that too much to ask?

Her father, because of his overwhelming social anxiety, never came to pick Hanna up from school. It was the middle of winter, and far too cold for a little girl to walk home by herself. The school’s principal ended up giving her a ride home.

In the car, the principal awkwardly tried to start some small talk with the emotionally beaten up girl.

“What do you like to do, Hanna?” the principal asked.

Hanna stared silently out the window, watching the falling snow flutter past the window.

“Hanna?” the principal prodded.

Hanna remained silent.

“There must be something you enjoy—Do you play any sports?”

Without turning to look at the principal, Hanna nodded her head ‘no’.

“What about coloring? Do you like to color?”

Again, Hanna nodded ‘no’.

The principal sighed. “What’s your favorite subject in school?” he asked.

Hanna was silent once again, still trying to contain her tears from her teacher’s sour words.

“Do you like gym class?”

Hanna nodded ‘no’.

“Art class?”

No.

“Science?”

No.

“Do you like any class?”

Hanna was silent.

“What does your mom do for a living?”

Hanna shrugged.

The principal was starting to see why Hanna was such an outcast.

“She doesn’t tell you?”

“She’s dead,” Hanna said firmly.

The principal went silent. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay. Neither do I,” Hanna said, before returning to her silence for the remainder of the ride.

As they pulled up to Hanna’s house, the principal noticed a man standing on Hanna’s doorstep. He had a can of spray paint in his hand, and was finishing up a large, red “MURDERER.”

The principal rolled down his window and leaned out. “Hey! Stop that!”

The man turned around and swiftly began to run away, dropping his can on the patio.

“I’ll go let the police know what happened,” the principal said.

“Don’t bother,” Hanna said. “Everyone does it.”

The principal stared at Hanna—beginning to understand why she was the way she was. He looked back out at the house. The tree and the house’s rooftop were covered in toilet paper. Windows were broken from thrown stones and there was spray-painted slander everywhere—on just about every square foot of the home.

“Christ,” the principal muttered, “I’m sorry you have to deal with this, Hanna. No kid should have to deal with this kind of thing...”

Hanna silently sat in the passenger seat.

“I’m going to see what I can do about this. Maybe I could meet with your father to try and come up with a solution.”

“He won’t meet with you.”

“Why not?”

Hanna shrugged. She legitimately did not know why. Francis hated talking to teachers—he hated talking to anyone.

The principal sighed. “You’d better get inside. Your dad is probably worried about you.”

There was a cold silence as the winter breeze died down.

“Can I walk you to your door?” the principal asked timidly.

Hanna nodded ‘no’.

There was another silence.

“Why do people hate me?” Hanna asked.

“No one hates you,” the principal lied, trying to console the vulnerable girl.

“Yes they do. You know they do. That’s why you’re treating me like this.”

The principal was silent. “Sometimes people don’t like what they have a hard time understanding. It’s not that people don’t like you—it’s that they don’t understand you.”

“Why?”

“I wish I could say, Hanna. Have you tried asking them?”

“Yes. They just laugh at me.”

“Kids can be cruel. Which kids laugh at you? Maybe I can talk to their parents and find a solution...”