Alibi Junior High (4 page)

My mind drifts. I wish I were back at the cottage with Aunt Jenny. Yesterday she showed me a bunch of old photographs. The one I really liked was a picture of my mother and Jenny wading in a lake with my dad. It looked like they weren’t much older than me. They all had their pant legs pulled up and large smiles stretched across their faces. There was a happiness in my dad’s eyes that I’d never seen before.

I asked her if I could keep it. I put it in a little wooden frame. It’s on my nightstand next to the alarm clock.

Something catches my eye. A girl walks into the outer office. I can’t stop looking at her. She glides across the room; it’s like she owns the space that surrounds her. I’m drawn to her smile, her hair, those big brown eyes.

She’s beautiful.

One of the secretaries is talking to her. They’re laughing. The girl reaches for something and then jumps back, the secretary springs to her feet. There’s a large cup of coffee on its side. The brown expanding puddle quickly overtakes papers on the desk. Everyone’s frantically running for paper towels.

“Cody?”

“Um, yeah?”

“Are you paying attention?”

I turn away from the coffee cup circus. “What? Oh, yeah, sure. Passes in the hall.”

She stands up and closes the handbook. “I guess that’s it. Any questions?”

I rise to my feet and motion at the girl running with the paper towels. “I was wondering if you know who that girl is?”

Miss DeNitto looks across the room. “Which one?”

“Um, the one who just knocked over the potted plant.”

“Oh, that’s Renee Carrington. She helps out around the office. She’s a bit of a klutz but she’s a really sweet girl. Would you like to meet her?”

I look across the room. The secretary’s still mopping up the coffee from her desk. Renee is on her hands and knees scooping potting soil off the floor. The plant that used to occupy the pot looks hopelessly mangled. She has a huge apologetic smile stretched across her face.

I don’t think anyone has ever looked better.

“Come on. I’ll introduce you.”

There’s this ball of fear that suddenly grows in my chest and quickly spreads through my body. It’s a different type of fear than I’m used to. This kind robs your self-confidence and keeps words from forming on your tongue. I suddenly can’t think of anything
I could talk to her about. There’s not a doubt in my mind that if I were to meet her right now I’d just stand there like a mindless, wordless zombie.

I put on my most confident smile. “Oh, that’s okay. Maybe later. I think I’d like to…you know, uh, go to my classes or something.”

F
ifteen right, twenty-six left, right eight, and…nothing!

I kick the locker. I can’t believe it. I’ve been trying to open this thing forever. I check the number again. Nope, it’s the right locker. I check the card Miss DeNitto gave me. Nope, I’m dialing the right numbers. This combination must be wrong. I give it another kick, this time even harder.

“Young man! Is there a problem here?” I jump and turn around. There’s an angry teacher standing a few feet away from me. She has the type of face that’s ageless; it’s impossible to tell whether she’s twenty-five or forty-five.

I mumble, “No problem, just trying to open this locker.”

“Speak up. I can’t hear you.”

A small crowd starts to form around us. I hear a girl say to her friend, “Look at his shorts and socks.” They both laugh.

I try to speak louder but it comes out sounding more like a shout. “I’m just trying to open this locker!”

“Kicking it is not the way to open it. Did you try the combination?”

I throw up my arms. “Of course I tried the combination. It doesn’t work.”

“Did you spin past the second number?”

I try to keep the frustration out of my voice but it bleeds through. “Of course I did. What do I look like, an idiot?”

Mrs. Ageless takes the card out of my hand and quickly spins the numbers. The door clicks open. Everyone laughs like she just pulled an elephant out of a hat.

I
raise my hand; at first Mrs. Smith ignores me but then she looks my way. “What is it now, Mr. Saron?”

I rise to my feet. “Actually the First World War wasn’t really the first world war. Many scholars consider it to be the eighth. You had the Nine Years’ War, the War of Spanish Succession, the War of the Austrian Succession, the Seven Years’ War, then you had the War of American Rev—”

“Mr. Saron!”

I look at Mrs. Smith. She seems very annoyed. “Yes?”

“Didn’t I tell you before to stop interrupting me?”

“I raised my hand.”

She grabs a pen and paper off her desk and starts writing something on it. I can tell she’s really angry, although I’m not sure what I did wrong. Then she marches across the room and slaps the paper into my hand.

“I want you to take this to Mrs. Owens’s office.”

The class starts making
Ooooh
sounds. Mrs. Smith barks, “Quiet! There will be none of that!”

I gather my books and quickly glance around the room. Everyone seems to be happy that I’m getting kicked out of class. I don’t understand why. The girl I saw in the office, the beautiful one, Renee Carrington, isn’t even looking at me; she’s just drawing something in her notebook. I don’t think I’ve impressed her. Figures.

As I walk past her desk she looks up at me and it’s as if something explodes inside me. I’m not sure if I should smile, nod, or keep my face expressionless. I can feel my brain firing all these different thoughts at the same time.

Her eyes are so beautiful.

Something suddenly catches my foot and I feel myself stumbling forward. I come close to falling but awkwardly manage to stay on my feet.

Everyone starts to laugh and I quickly turn my eyes to the door and move toward it. All I want in this world right now is to be out of this room.

I
look at my plate. “Excuse me, what is this?”

The older woman runs the back of her gloved hand across her forehead and then adjusts her hairnet. She snorts. “It’s lunch.”

I stare at the red ooze leaking out of a bun. “No, really, what
do you call it?”

“It’s the Cowboy Burger.”

I pick up the tray and examine the burger, trying to figure out what’s inside. It doesn’t look like anything I’ve ever seen before. “What’s in a Cowboy Burger?”

A tall kid behind me lets out a long, exaggerated sigh and says, “It’s like a Sloppy Joe.”

“What’s a Sloppy Joe?”

He rolls his eyes. “You’ve never had a Sloppy Joe?”

“Of course not. What’s in it?”

“How can you not have ever had a Sloppy Joe? I thought everyone knows what Sloppy Joes are. It’s you know, like hamburger, but mushy like chili and not as spicy. Kind of like meat sauce.”

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “And whose idea was it to put it on a roll? How do you eat it?”

He picks up his tray and walks around me. “Listen, I don’t care if you eat it. I just want to eat
my
lunch.”

There are a few things I’m familiar with and I pile them onto my tray. It looks like my lunch will mainly consist of side dishes and desserts.

I’m waiting in line at the register when the comments start again. “Mr. Shorty Shorts” and your basic “Socks” seem to be the most common. I find that just ignoring them seems to work best, but it’s hard. I look at my “Sloppy Joe” there are things I’d love to do with it and none of them involves me putting it into my mouth.

After paying for my lunch, I look around for someplace to sit. It’s strange, the way the seating arrangement works out. It’s not like anyone is telling me where I can and can’t sit, but people have a way of looking at you that keeps you moving along.

In the end I sit by myself in the corner.

I
’m hurrying down a hallway. This doesn’t make any sense. There are two floors and three blocks, A block, B block, and C block, but they’re not in order. It should go A, B, C, right? Not A, C, B. And these numbers! If you’re going to number rooms, you should number them in order. Not odd numbers here, even there.

The bell goes off. I’m late again.

I take out the map that Miss DeNitto made for me. I study it and wonder why I can’t seem to figure out where I am. Two girls walk past me. I’m about to ask them for help when one of them says, “Hey, it’s Mr. Shorty Shorts.” They giggle as they walk away.

The hall quickly empties. Doors are closing all around me. I’m alone in a hall that twenty seconds ago was packed with kids. When the last door closes the sound echoes. I stand there feeling even more lost. I’m overwhelmed by a sense of frustrating incompetence. I’ve never felt anything like this before.

I wait for
the bus to drive off before swinging my backpack over my shoulder. I look up and notice Jenny waiting for me in her Jeep. It’s idling on the side of the road and I can hear faint music. She offers me a quick wave and a welcoming grin.

I open the door and heave my full backpack into the backseat before plopping down beside her.

“Hey, Cody! How was your first day of school?”

I don’t say anything. I can’t. I’m too angry. I just sit there and stare out the window, listening to one of her mindless pop songs on the radio.

After a while she lets out a huge, almost comical, sigh. “Oh, come on. I’m dying to know. Tell me about your school.”

I explode. “You really want to know? It’s stupid! That’s what it is. I hate that place. It’s so stupid!”

She turns off the Jeep, places her hand gently on my shoulder, and turns toward me. “Hey, what’s going on? Talk to me.”

“I hate that place. It’s so stupid!”

“Yes, you said that. Now tell me why.”

“Why? Where do I start? Everything about it is stupid.” I point at my full backpack in the rear seat, and my voice grows even louder. “Look at that thing. My dad and I hiked over the Andes with smaller packs than that! It’s insane!”

“I’m sorry, hon. Do you have a lot of homework?”

“No! That’s the stupid part of it. I just have a lot of books! Teachers want me to read two pages from one book and one page from another. Before you know it, I’m hauling around forty pounds of books to read twenty pages. It’s so stupid!”

Jenny rubs my shoulder. “Hey, calm down. It’s all going to work out. Maybe you could read ahead or something like that.”

She twitches her nose and backs away a little. “Um, by the way, are you wearing…really strong perfume?”

I throw up my arms. “Still? I’ve heard that all day! Don’t get me started. I do
not
want to talk about Cell Phone Girl!”

“Cell Phone Girl?”

“I said I don’t want to talk about Cell Phone Girl!”

She holds up her hands defensively. “Fine, fine. We don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to.”

I fume. “That girl’s just plain evil. I bet the walls turn black when she walks into a room.”

“No problem. We don’t have to talk about her. We’ll talk about something else. How about your teachers? Did you like your teachers?”

“Like my teachers? Are you serious? I have no idea if I like them or not, because they kept kicking me out of class and sending me to the assistant principal’s office.”

“You got sent to the office? What did you do?”

“Why do you assume I did something wrong?”

She raises her eyebrows. “Well, normally that’s how it works—you do something wrong, and then they send you to the office.”

“Apparently, you don’t have to do something wrong. Like in Spanish class, she kept correcting my Spanish over and over again. It was so aggravating. Finally I switched completely over to Spanish and asked her where she learned the language. She said the University of Wisconsin. I told her that maybe that’s how they speak Spanish in Wisconsin but in South America, Europe, and the rest of the world, they speak it like I do.”

Jenny bursts out laughing, then quickly pulls herself together. “Seriously? You really said that?”

“I did. I couldn’t help myself.”

“Cody. You have to treat your teachers with respect.”

“Treat them with respect? When they try to tell me some
thing’s right and it’s wrong, what am I supposed to do? Just sit there and nod my head?”

Jenny stares at me for a while. I guess she’s thinking, then she takes a deep breath and in an overly calm voice asks, “Cody…how many times did you get sent to the office?”

“Including the time the security guard dragged me there?”

Her eyes blink for a while. It reminds me of a radio searching for a signal. “Yes…including the security guard.”

“Four times.”

“Four times? Are you
kidding
me? Who gets sent to the office
four times
?”

“I guess I do.”

Jenny shakes her head and starts up the Jeep. I can tell she’s mad. We drive to the cottage in silence. I think I’d prefer if she yelled. She turns on the radio and it plays soft and low like a movie soundtrack.

I stare out the window and wonder what my dad’s doing right now. I look at my watch; he’s probably having a late lunch. We used to have the best lunches together. Restaurants would treat us like royalty. My dad has this great way of talking to people; he could thread a needle with words if he had to.

Even in a crowded restaurant you would think we were the only people in the room. The waiters and waitresses would fall all over us but I guess my dad’s generosity might have had something to do with that. People like to say that money talks. Well, my dad knows how to make it shout.

There’s this darkness now, this emptiness that surrounds me, and I can feel it slowly seeping into my skin. The longer I’m away from my dad the thicker this emptiness becomes. None of this would be happening to me if we were still together. Doesn’t he know there are other things in this world that can kill you besides bombs and bullets?

Try spending forty-five minutes in Mr. Stanton’s algebra class. Now
that’s
lethal. It should come with a warning.

The Jeep pulls into the driveway and stops by the garage. Jenny turns off the engine and the music dies with it.

I’m about to move but something stops me: a thought that’s been burning away in my head.

“Aunt Jenny.”

“Yes.”

“What was my mother like?”

I think the question caught her off guard. She seems hesitant, unsure, like a diver frozen at the end of a very high diving board thinking about a difficult jump.

“She was…a lot like me but completely different. I always lacked confidence, but not Jodi. She excelled at everything she did. She was athletic, popular, and always did well in school. She was a fantastic sister. I loved and admired her so much.”

Jenny stares through the windshield for a moment. “I guess you could say she was like this great, strong, mighty ship. Her only fault was when it came time to raise a sail she always left that
to others and the sails they cast were never large enough to pull her along.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Jenny puts her keys into her purse before giving me a sad smile. “I mean your mom was a strong, intelligent woman. If she had lived, I believe she would have done some incredible things in this world.”

“You really think so?”

“I know it. Actually, you remind me of her.”

I’d been studying my backpack. I look up into her eyes. “I do? How?”

“You have her determination, her intelligence, and her smile.”

“Really? She smiled like me?”

“She sure did. When I see you smile it brings back so many pleasant memories.”

W
e head over to the cottage. I quickly change, grab a water bottle, and go outside. A few days ago I took a bunch of thick, old cushions from discarded lawn chairs and wrapped them around a tree by the side of the cottage. I secured them with a ton of duct tape, and it turned out to be a really good kick bag.

All I want to do now is knock the stuffing out of those cushions for a while and forget all about this day. I’ll start with a hundred high front kicks and move on from there.

I think about Cell Phone Girl.

Bam, bam, smack, bam!

I think about Steroid Steve.

Bam, smack, bam, bam!

I think about the Ice Queen, Mrs. Owens, and her “low tolerance for troublemakers.”

Bam, bam, bam, smack!

I think about that dumb locker I couldn’t get open. I know how to hot-wire cars, pick locks, and bypass the best security systems money can buy, but I get stumped by a stupid junior high combination lock.

Bam, bam, bam, smack, smack!

That Spanish teacher.

Bam, bam, bam, smack.

The English teacher.

Bam, smack, bam, bam.

The terrible food they served for lunch.

Bam, bam, smack!

The way everyone made fun of my clothes.

Bam, smack, bam, bam.

My mother. Why was she taken from me? Why couldn’t she have lived? I can feel the tears of frustration starting to flow down my cheek.

Bam, bam, smack, smack.

I hate this.

Bam, smack, bam, bam.

It’s so stupid.

I hear a deep voice behind me. “If you lower your shoulder you’ll get greater height and force on that kick.”

Out of the corner of my eye I can see Andy. How long has he been standing there? I turn my back to him and quickly wipe my face.

I bury my emotions and follow his suggestion, lowering my shoulder, but it doesn’t seem to change anything.

“No, no, no. That’s too low. Here, turn around. I’ll show you.”

I turn around and face Andy. He’s wearing gray sweats and a T-shirt that says ARMY across the front. A tan, socklike thing covers his stump. If he noticed I was crying he doesn’t let on.

“Here, you lower your shoulder like this.”

He shows me what he means and I can immediately see how it would be helpful.

Then he sets his feet at a slight angle. “Now, this is what I want you to do: kick me in the chin.”

“You want me to kick you in the chin?”

He chuckles. “Well, I want you to
try
to kick me in the chin. Don’t worry, I’m a martial-arts instructor, I’ll move.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

I bow to him just like my dad taught me to. He smiles and bows back to me.

I get in my stance. “Okay. Are you ready?”

“I’m ready when you are.”

I kick him in the chin. He falls backward onto the grass.

Jenny bursts out of the cottage, and shouts, “Cody! What in the world is wrong with you? Why did you kick Andy?”

“He asked me to.”

She runs to my side and the two of us look down at Andy. He’s rubbing his chin and shaking his head. He grins up at me. “Man, for a little guy you sure pack a big wallop.”

Jenny kneels by his side. “Andy, are you okay? I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with Cody.”

He sits up and starts to laugh. “There’s nothing wrong with Cody. He’s right, I asked him to kick me. I just didn’t realize he was that quick. I guess he’s full of surprises.”

Andy slowly rises to his feet and then gives me a bow. “Here’s a very valuable lesson—I’m glad I was able to demonstrate it for you:
Never
underestimate your opponent.”