The Secret Life of Ms. Finkleman (16 page)

She glanced up at the clock and breathed a small sigh of relief. First period was almost over, and then it would be time for the Choral Corral. She pictured herself holding the microphone, jumping around the stage,
and felt a small burst of adrenalin.
Get through this!
she thought.
Stay on target!

Question thirty-three had to do with Thomas Jefferson, and it was the first thing on the test that Bethesda didn’t know the answer to right away. She was trying to remember whether it was John Jay who cowrote the Federalist Papers, or James Monroe, when she remembered something else entirely. Mr. Melville didn’t make kids ask for the hall pass. When people asked if they could go to the bathroom, even during tests, he always said something huffy like, “Believe it or not, I am not interested in your bodily functions.”

So what was Pamela doing at his desk?

Ms. Finkleman took a big step away from the mirror and looked at herself up and down. She made a series of contorted faces, sticking out her tongue, narrowing her eyes, practicing the rock-star attitude she would soon be displaying in front of a cheering crowd of Mary Todd Lincolnites. She played a little air guitar, laughed selfconsciously at herself, and then reached her right arm up to her left bicep. She let her hand rest on the tattoo, a permanent reminder of her sister and all they had gone through together.

“Well, sis, what do you think? ” she said to the mirror. “Do I look like a rock star or not?”

*   *   *

Bethesda didn’t even wait for pencil tapping this time. No way Tenny was going to remember the name Crispus Attucks. She coughed, once, for A, and pressed on.

One more question, and then it would be time for the Choral Corral. One more question and she could go back to being herself. Bethesda Fielding, Non-Cheater.

She giggled a little, under her breath. That was funny—people having titles in the negative. Albert Einstein, Non-Idiot. Mother Teresa, Non-Jerk. Funny.

Bethesda was still smiling as she turned to question forty. Before she could read it, though, a large shadow fell across her desk. “Ms. Fielding,” came Mr. Melville’s voice, gruff and ominous.

Bethesda’s stomach tightened and lurched. Slowly, slowly she put down her pencil and turned around to face him.

“Um. Yes?” she ventured. But she knew. She knew with terrible certainty what came next.

“If that dreadful cough of yours has not entirely sapped your strength, I wonder if you wouldn’t mind joining me at the front of the room for a little chat.”

Bethesda didn’t say anything. Her knees wobbled as she rose to her feet. A hot flush crept down her neck and cheeks, and she felt the eyes of every kid in class as they peered over to see what was happening. She heard Chester Hu whisper, “Whoa! What the—” to Victor Glebe.

The scene felt painfully familiar, and she recalled in an ironic, despairing flash that this exact same thing had occurred in the TV special about the kids who cheated on the test.

Step by miserable step, Bethesda made her way to the front of the room. But Mr. Melville was not behind her. He was three seats over and one seat back.

“Mr. Boyer? Aren’t you going to join us?”

Jasper stood
outside his boss’s office for forty-five seconds, breathing deeply and wringing his hands together, before he went inside. He contemplated a variety of options for what he might do next, all of which were more appealing than going in. He could take the rest of the day off and go antiquing. Or he could quit and join the navy! Jasper had always loved boats.

He sighed, turned the knob, and pushed open the door.

“Excuse me, ma’am.” “Ah! Jasper!”

Principal Van Vreeland was beaming, as Jasper had known she would be. Her hands reached out to him, her fingers extended in a wide welcoming gesture that, he couldn’t help noticing, could easily be transformed into a choking motion. “Ma’am, there’s something—”

“Oh, hush, man! No time now! The Choral Corral begins in—” Principal Van Vreeland cast a gleeful glance at the clock above the door. “Twenty minutes! In an hour and a half, our utter destruction of Grover Cleveland will be complete!”

“Yes, ma’am. It’s just that we have a slight problem.”

The smile froze on Principal Van Vreeland’s face. Her hands began to twitch alarmingly. Jasper took a big step backward.

“What kind of …
problem?”
the principal over-enunciated the final word in the sentence, her face contorting with intense disgust, as if she were pulling a dead rat out of a sink.

It was Harry Melville who answered, muscling past Jasper’s thin frame and marching unbidden into the principal’s office.

“A
cheating
problem.”

Bethesda and Tenny sat in silence on the hard bench in the hallway outside the principal’s office.

“I’m really sorry,” Bethesda whispered.

“Why? ” Tenny whispered back. “If I wasn’t such a moron, this never would have happened.”

“Or if I was a halfway decent mountain climber.”

“Huh?”

“Tutor. A halfway decent tutor.” “Shush!” snapped Mrs. Gingertee, the secretary, from where she sat typing at her desk. “No talking.” “Sorry,” replied Tenny and Bethesda in unison. “Shh!” she snapped again.

Bethesda lowered her eyes to the carpet. The incessant
clack-clack-clack
of Mrs. Gingertee’s fingers on the keys sounded to her like the rattling of a long steel chain as it drew tighter and tighter around her heart.
Hey, that’s a good metaphor,
she thought, and then, immediately:
Oh, shut up.

In her twelve years on earth, Bethesda had never been sent to the principal’s office. She had never sat on this uncomfortable bench, never felt this hard feeling like a dense, undigested mass in the very depths of her gut. And though she knew Tenny had been in trouble before—for not doing his homework, for tardiness, for not paying attention—this was different. Cheating on a test was
serious
trouble. Grade A trouble. Bethesda lowered her face into her hands and started to cry.

“Aw … hey …” started Tenny.

“No crying,” said Mrs. Gingertee, still typing.

The door to Principal Van Vreeland’s office opened,
and Jasper’s thin head emerged, like a rodent’s emerging from the desert sand. “This way, children.”

In the office, Bethesda and Tenny avoided both the fierce stare of Principal Van Vreeland, who sat drumming her fingernails on her desk, and the stern glare of Mr. Melville, whose considerable bulk was settled into a student-size chair, his arms folded across his big barrel of a chest. It might have been funny if Bethesda wasn’t so miserable. Her gaze followed Tenny’s to the clock above the door, which said 10:45. Third period, and the Choral Corral, started in fifteen minutes. Right now, the other students from sixth-period Music Fundamentals were being pulled out of their regular classes to assemble backstage in the auditorium.

“Mr. Melville has brought to my attention the rather serious infraction you two have committed,” said Principal Van Vreeland rapidly, while Jasper stood behind her and stroked his chin disapprovingly. From the outer office, Bethesda heard the sharp clacking of Ms. Gingertee’s fingers at the keyboard.

“I think we can all agree that the most important thing is to wrap this up quickly,” the principal continued. Mr. Melville raised a skeptical eyebrow at her. “I mean,
fairly,
of course. To wrap this up fairly.”

Bethesda couldn’t take it anymore. She had heard thirty seconds of the Serious Trouble Speech, and she thought if she heard another thirty seconds she would weep profusely and/or barf all over the rug.

“It was all my fault! ” she blurted out, pulling off her glasses and wiping roughly at her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt. “The whole thing was my idea! And I dragged Tenny into it, and he said it was a bad idea and I
knew
it was a bad idea, and I’m really, really sorry.”

Mr. Melville scowled, but Principal Van Vreeland seemed extremely pleased with Bethesda’s sudden confession. “Okay, then, young lady,” she said quickly, hopping out of her chair. “Very disappointed in you, naughty naughty, don’t do it again, et cetera, et cetera. Jasper? ”

Jasper and Principal Van Vreeland moved swiftly toward the door.

“Wait! ” shouted Tenny.

“Wait? ” said Principal Van Vreeland. “What do you mean, wait? Why? ”

“Because it’s not true.” Tenny turned to Bethesda and said it again. “It’s not true, and you know it.”

“It’s not? ” asked the principal, looking at Tenny with irritation.

“No.” Tenny addressed Bethesda. “I mean, technically, you weren’t even cheating. You were just
coughing.”

“Yeah, but the coughing
was
the cheating!”

“No, the cheating was the cheating. The coughing was just coughing.”

Principal Van Vreeland looked at the clock and groaned. “Cheating! Coughing! It’s all bad. Very, very bad. Don’t do it again. Jasper! Let’s go.”

Mr. Melville cleared his throat noisily, and all eyes turned to him. “Slow down, people. Let’s just take this nice and slow.”

At the word
slow,
Principal Van Vreeland sighed and returned wearily to her chair. “I just want to destroy my enemies. Is that so wrong?” And then, realizing everyone was staring at her, she turned to Mr. Melville. “Please,” she moaned. “Continue. Take your time.”

“I think it is perfectly clear that both students share some portion of the culpability here, Madame Principal,” Mr. Melville intoned gravely. “I would expect, therefore, that a multifaceted punishment be imposed on both. Obviously to include retaking the test, certainly to involve some parental conversations—”

Fresh tears sprang into Bethesda’s eyes.

“And, of course, immediate exclusion from all
extracurricular activities, including participation in this … musical activity.”

“Wait a minute,” stammered Tenny, turning to Bethesda. “Wait—does he mean the Choral Corral?”

Bethesda nodded miserably.

“No! Come on! We’re—we’re
necessary.
It’s
our
show!” But it was too late. Principal Van Vreeland saw her opportunity.

“Come now, young man. There is only one person crucial to the rock show, and that is Ms. Finkleman.” She was out of her chair again, back at the door with her hand at the knob. “Mr. Melville, you read my mind. A multi—What was that word again? The fancy one?”

“Multifaceted.”

“Yes! A multifaceted punishment for both cheaters! Now let’s all proceed to the auditorium for the Choral Corral!” She paused and gestured vaguely to Bethesda and Tenny. “Um, except you two, of course.”

Bethesda looked through her fingers down at the rug. She simply couldn’t bear to look at Tenny Boyer. Her and her stupid Special Project! The rock show, this incredible event he had created, this is the project that was
actually
special … and now he wouldn’t even get to be in it.

“Hang on,” said Tenny.

Principal Van Vreeland glared at Tenny from the doorway.
“
What
now?”

There was a look on Tenny Boyer’s face that Bethesda had never seen before. A smile twisted up the corners of his lips. His eyes were bright, glowing with inspiration and a hint of mischief. They had a glimmer in them, like—like Christmas lights.

“Thing is, the Choral Corral isn’t an extracurricular.”

Principal Van Vreeland stood at the door, one hand tightly clutching Jasper’s arm, staring daggers back across the room. Mr. Melville furrowed his brow with perplexed irritation. “What?” he said darkly, elongating the single syllable with a thick undercurrent of menace.

Bethesda knew immediately where Tenny was going, and she joined him, like they were two guitarists playing in unison. “Of course. Music Fundamentals is a
class.
Participation in the Choral Corral is
required!”

“So I totally agree,” Tenny went on, picking up where Bethesda left off, “that we should be barred from extracurriculars. I mean, obviously. But the Choral Corral is an
assignment!”

“Now wait just one second,” Mr. Melville began. “Surely the
spirit
of the rule suggests—”

Bethesda, now fully in lawyer-lady mode, interrupted.

“Wait now, Mr. Melville. Are you saying that what the rule actually
says
doesn’t matter?”

“You know perfectly well that is not what I’m saying, Ms. Fielding. However …”

As this animated conversation continued, Principal Van Vreeland got redder and redder where she stood in the doorway. “Stop!” she shouted. “We need to settle this, and fast. Mrs. Gingertee! Get me Ida Finkleman.”

Three minutes later, Ms. Finkleman walked into the room, though it took a long moment for everyone to realize that it was her. Never before had any of them seen the Mary Todd Lincoln Band and Chorus teacher in any color other than drab, unremarkable brown. Now she stood before them in a red leather skirt, hot pink leather boots, and a black leather jacket bristling with brass and copper studs. Her face had always been plain and unpainted; now she wore thick, elaborate slashes of makeup, in rich scarlet and purple, concentrated on her cheekbones and eyelashes like she was an Egyptian princess. Her hair, previously tied back in an unremarkable ponytail or hanging limply about her face, was now a wild, tousled pile of blacks and browns, teased across her eyes and streaked with red.

The person standing in Principal Van Vreeland’s office hardly looked like Ms. Finkleman at all. She was a stranger, a stranger who had just climbed off a motorcycle that she had ridden in from somewhere smoky, dangerous, and dark.

Even from the terrible depths of trouble she was in, Bethesda grinned to see her once-unremarkable music teacher so transformed. From the corner of her eye, she could see that Tenny was grinning, too.

Ms. Finkleman looked WR.
TWR.

When everyone recovered from the shock of seeing Little Miss Mystery in person, Mr. Melville curtly invited her to take a seat and join the conversation. (Everyone recovered from the shock, that is, except for Jasper, who at the moment she crossed the threshold of the room fell completely, head over heels in love with Ida Finkleman. He heard not a word of the ensuing tense and combative conversation, as he was deep in his head, busily planning a wedding, honeymoon, and happy life together for himself and the new Mrs. Jasper Ferrars.)