And no one's wrong and no one's right.
Chapter 3: The Gap
The next day dawned cool and clear, the perfect weather for a football Friday in the Texas hill country. I pulled my hair up in a ponytail tied with a blue ribbon that Honey had decorated for me by painting “Go Dogs!” on one end and “BHS” on the other using a white fabric pen. Along with my Bowdon Bulldogs jersey and the pair of white, pawprint-covered Keds I reserve for game days, I was ready to cheer on my team.
I was thinking some sort of miracle had happened when I found Bobby already dressed and in the kitchen eating a bowl of Cheerios with slices of banana, but the miracle was actually Brian, who grinned at me as I went to the fridge for the pitcher of OJ we always have on hand.
“Thanks for that,” I said, with a brief nod in the direction of our little brother.
“No prob. I don’t have to be to school early today and I’m happy to help.”
I poured myself a glass of juice and contemplated my breakfast choices, settling on toast, blackberry yogurt, and an apple. “You coming to the game tonight?” I asked him as I popped a slice of bread into the toaster and tore the lid off my yogurt. You never knew with Brian. While it seemed like the entire town of Bowdon never missed a game, Brian wasn’t always there with the rest of us. Sometimes, he actually stayed home and studied. Yeah. Studied. On a Friday night.
Have I mentioned my big brother is such a nerd? That was okay, though. I couldn’t imagine him any other way and his nerdiness was part of what made him so endearing. If you knew Brian, you liked him. You couldn’t help but do so. As soon as I thought that, though, a disquieting reminder followed behind it. Someone apparently knew Brian and didn’t like him, as impossible as that was to imagine. Someone willing to see him go down for a crime there was no way he actually committed.
“I’ll be there,” Brian replied cheerfully. “I’m bringing Bobby and Terry.”
My expression must’ve revealed my horror at the very idea, because he laughed and ruffled Bobby’s hair. “We’ll have fun, won’t we, kiddo,” he said. “I’ll even buy you some nachos if you do well on your spelling test today, okay?”
“Hey, did you see Regan here yesterday evening, by any chance?” I asked, suddenly remembering the groom passing through our back garden area.
Brian nodded. “He came by. He wanted to speak with Moms, but she wasn’t home yet, so he just told me to tell her he’d decided to take her advice.”
My brows shot up. “Her advice? About what? And since when did Regan start coming to see Moms for advice?”
“I don’t know, Trix,” Brian answered calmly, “And no, I didn’t ask. He would’ve said more if he’d wanted me to know.”
Ugh. Why couldn’t Brian have at least one curious bone in his body like normal people? Of course he didn’t ask.
The back door opened and Mart walked in, followed closely by our rambunctious Irish Setter, Reddy. Reddy is a beautiful dog, but not what most people would call very smart, unfortunately. That doesn't matter to any of us, though. He’s goofy and lovable and the whole family adores him. I scratched his head as he came bounding over to me, tail wagging furiously.
“Hustle it, Bobby,” Mart said, crooking a thumb over his shoulder. “Your bus is almost here.”
Brian handed Bobby his E.T. lunch box as I picked up his bowl and carried it to the sink. Mart hurried Bobby out the door and I grabbed my toast and quickly buttered it. “Did Mart get a chance to talk to you last night?” I asked once Bobby was no longer around to overhear.
Brian’s shoulders slumped a little and I felt a pang at knowing I’d reminded him of something he most likely wanted to forget. “Yeah,” he replied. “And Jim had already mentioned it. But, Trix, I don’t understand. I never went anywhere near there. I didn’t even know that’s where the books were. If someone had asked me and I’d thought about it hard enough, that storeroom would’ve been my guess, probably? But once the book drive was over, I quit thinking about it.”
“You know none of us think you’re guilty, right?” I asked, studying him closely. “I mean, you don’t have to convince us you’re innocent. We just want to find out what really happened.”
Brian sighed and nodded. “I know. And thanks.”
“Okay, so you weren’t in that part of the building yesterday,” I murmured before taking a bite of my toast. I considered this for a few moments. “Who did you see before school? Anyone? I mean, besides Loyola?”
“Uh… there were some band kids on their way to the practice room, but I don’t think they even noticed me. I ran into Chuck Altemus and Nick Roberts. They were hanging some posters advertising the Fall art show. Um, Miss Jenkins said ‘hello’ when she walked by me, but she was actually looking at some papers she was holding so I think I more registered as someone there than specifically as me. Oh, and I saw Mr. Hollybrook.”
“Who?” That was a name I didn’t recognize.
“Mr. Hollybrook. He’s the new drama teacher,” Brian explained.
“Oh. I didn’t know we lost our last drama teacher. Didn’t we just get a new one last year?” I asked him uncertainly.
“Yes. Mr. Hollybrook is our new new drama teacher. Miss Darcy got married and moved to Austin.”
“Right. Okay. So, in a nutshell, you didn’t see anyone who was automatically suspicious, but that doesn’t mean we should assume they’re all innocent, either.”
Brian’s expression was troubled. “I don’t want to start suspecting everyone, Trix. And Chuck and Nick don’t have anything against me.”
“That we know of,” I pointed out. “But someone lied about you, big brother. And that someone probably wouldn’t have named you unless he was certain you were on campus before school started. So even if you didn’t see him, he must’ve seen you.”
“Geeze, Trix,” Mart muttered as he let himself back in the kitchen. “If you’re done creeping Bri out, we should get going.”
“I haven’t made my lunch yet,” I protested as I shoved the rest of my toast in my mouth and rinsed Bobby’s bowl and my utensils before dropping them in the dishwasher.
Brian picked up a sack from the counter and held it out to me as I dried my hands on the towel hanging from the oven door.
“Isn’t that yours?” I asked, confused.
“No. I made it for you,” he told me. “It was easy enough to do two lunches when I was already making Bobby’s.”
See what I mean? If you know Brian, how could you possibly not love the guy?
“If you think of anything today or notice anyone acting weird, or just anything comes up at all, let me know, okay?” I said to him as I let Mart usher me out the door. “Anything! I want to know.”
I rolled down my window to enjoy the fresh air as Mart drove us into town. He tuned the radio to our favorite station. Every Breath You Take was just winding down and then the next song started up without any interruption from the morning DJ and his sidekick crew. We looked at each other and grinned widely.
“Oooh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oooooh…”
So, not that you’ll ever find us rocking out on a stage anywhere or anything, but Mart and I are both really good singers, especially together. We’ve been in the youth church choir since second grade and our pastor has recently said he’d like us to move up to the adult choir soon. We haven’t made up our minds on that, but for now, we were belting out Tarzan Boy like we had auditions for a Broadway musical. This was followed by We Built This City and ended with Everybody Wants to Rule the World as we pulled into a parking space on campus.
I have to admit, I was in a much better mood than I’d been in when I first got up. It really was a beautiful day and it was Friday, so the weekend was almost here. I hadn’t gotten very far in my mission to help Brian, but I had extracted a promise from Monica during our telephone conversation that she’d make me a copy of the partial inventory she’d been preparing before the books had disappeared. And she’d let me in on one significant fact she’d learned. She told me that the janitor, Mr. Parker, kept the storeroom locked and there were only three keys to open it. One for Mr. Stratton, one for Mr. Parker, and one that was kept in a desk in the office along with a collection of spares for all the other various locks around the whole campus. She also said Spider Webster told Stratton there was no evidence the lock had been forced, so one of those three keys had been used during the theft’s execution. I couldn’t see Mr. Parker stealing the books and while I wasn’t exactly a huge Principal Stratton fan, I was reasonably sure he wasn’t our thief, either. That left the question of who had retrieved the key from the office to use it? Who had even known it was there?
Monica said Patty Morris was an office assistant second period. I planned to find a reason to be excused to go to the office during PE so I could quiz her about it. I didn’t suspect Patty herself. I guess there was a chance she could’ve been involved, but this was the girl who once informed our eighth grade Language Arts teacher that she wouldn’t be giving an oral book report because she was allergic to books. Seriously. To this day, I haven’t decided if she really thought that was gonna work or not.
Absolutely no one was talking about the stolen books as I made my way to my locker. This wasn’t really a shock. Football was the only topic and I did my best to look as enthused about it as everyone else was. A passing cheerleader handed me a spirit ribbon that read, “Pulverize the Panthers!” and I pinned it to my shirt as I took my seat in first period.
My thoughts were drifting about ten minutes into class when Madame Geary called on me. “Beatrix! Quand la Révolution française a-t-elle commencé?”
I gritted my teeth before answering. It did not matter how many times I told my teacher I preferred my nickname, she refused to use it. Trying to ignore the high-pitched giggle behind me, I pasted a patently false smile on my face and replied, “Mai 1789.”
“Très bien,” Madame murmured, turning her stern eye on another student.
I was one of the first to bolt out of the room as soon as the bell rang. It wasn’t so much that I was eager to get to PE, because of course, I wasn’t, but that I was happy to escape French. Honestly, I have no idea what prompted me to take French over Spanish, other than it seemed like it would be cool to learn something that wasn’t what probably 90% of my classmates had chosen for their required two years of a foreign language. I clearly hadn’t thought it all the way through. When was I ever going to find a need to converse in la langue française? It could’ve been worse, I supposed. Our school also offered German, but someone once told me there was only one class of it with only eight students total, so that sounded like a real bust to me.
My luck kicked in when I got to the locker room. I was still trying to think of a reason for Coach to give me a permission slip for the office, when I learned we had a sub for the day. I found her waiting in the gym and she didn’t even question my earnestly stated need to see the Vice Principal right away about a reference letter for one of my college applications.
The main administration office had a surprising number of people in the waiting area when I arrived. My attention was immediately caught by two of them, sitting side-by-side. The first was Mr. Maypenny. He’s one of the only other non-millionaires living out on Glen Road. He has a small, pie-shaped piece of land with a lovely view of the Brazos. His cabin is… rustic, to put it kindly, and Maypenny is known town-wide as an elderly recluse who prefers to be left alone. Honey’s dad pays him a small salary to keep watch over the Wheeler property and estate, mostly to discourage trespassers who are not one Master Robert Belden from roaming about freely. I couldn’t even begin to guess what had brought him to our school, dressed in a suit that I think he might’ve purchased somewhere in the 1960s, if not earlier.
The second person to claim my notice was Danny Zuko.
No, really.
Slicked back dark hair, white t-shirt, combat boots, black leather jacket.
I glanced over to the announcements board. Had the new new drama teacher changed our planned musical? Nope. There was a flyer for South Pacific, debuting the week before Thanksgiving break. So what was the deal with the T-Bird in our office, then?
I looked back at Zuko to find he was watching me. Our eyes met for a moment and for some reason, there seemed to be a challenge in his cold, hard gaze. I arched one brow as if to say, “You cannot possibly think I’d be intimidated by the likes of you?” before deliberately turning away.
Truth is, I’m not nearly as brave as I was pretending at that moment, and, yes, I could most definitely be intimidated by the likes of him, if he so chose to really come at me at any time. But for now, I was hoping he saw me as someone not worth messing with.
Stratton opened the door to his office and stuck his head out. “Dan?” he said, nodding to Zuko. “Come on in.”
I blinked at that. He really was Danny? For real? Both Zuko and Maypenny rose from their seats and crossed the room. Without realizing it, I’d been expecting to see some sort of gang name on the back of Zuko’s jacket, but there was nothing there. He vanished into Stratton’s office along with Maypenny and the door was firmly shut.
Great. Now I had two mysteries to occupy my mind and distract me from class. Something told me, if I wasn’t careful, I could very well find myself failing math again after all. Who stole the books and what was up with Maypenny and his… grandson? Why was the old guy here and what did he have to do with Zuko? I didn’t know every kid at Bowdon Senior, but I was positive this was the first day Zuko had ever been on our campus. Was he a new student, registering for class? Where’d he come from? Definitely not a local boy. Not in that get-up.
If Patty Morris thought it was strange that mediocre-student-at-best me was there to request a college reference letter from Vice Principal Lee, she didn’t let on. I assured her I could wait if Mrs. Lee was otherwise occupied.
“She’s got a discipline case right now,” Patty told me disinterestedly, most of her attention focused on Jerry Vanderhoef. He was sitting outside Mrs. Lee’s office, leading me to assume he was probably another “discipline case” for her to handle. At the moment, Patty was shooting Jerry flirtatious smiles and he seemed to be receptive to them, if his self-satisfied answering grin was anything to go by. She fluffed out her crimped, light brown hair and pursed her lips. I wanted to gag, but since I needed Patty’s help, I clamped down on that understandable reaction.
“Listen, Patty,” I said, wondering if she’d already tuned me out entirely. “Do you know where the spare keys are kept?”
“Huh?” She smacked her gum as she looked at me like she thought I was an escapee from a lunatic asylum. Man, they let her basically sit around with nothing to do and chew gum while she was here? I wondered how exactly someone went about landing the apparently cushy job of student office assistant.
“They keys,” I repeated, forcing myself to focus on the matter at hand. “Do you know where they are?”
“Yeah. Why do you wanna know?”
“Would they be easy for someone to sneak off with and return?” I asked, ignoring her question.
Patty rolled her eyes and opened a drawer under the counter where she sat. “Only if no one’s sitting right here and watching,” she said, holding up a ring with an assortment of various keys. She dropped them back in the drawer and slammed it shut. It was obvious she considered that the end of our conversation as her eyes cut back to Jerry.
I mumbled something about returning another time when Mrs. Lee wasn’t so busy, but that was probably a complete waste of my breath. I’d become invisible again in Patty’s world. With a last glance at Stratton’s closed door and another moment of wondering about Zuko and Maypenny, I headed back to gym class.
If I maybe took a rather long, circuitous route so I didn’t arrive until it was almost time for everyone to return to the locker room and change back into their street clothes, would you really blame me?
I was thinking some sort of miracle had happened when I found Bobby already dressed and in the kitchen eating a bowl of Cheerios with slices of banana, but the miracle was actually Brian, who grinned at me as I went to the fridge for the pitcher of OJ we always have on hand.
“Thanks for that,” I said, with a brief nod in the direction of our little brother.
“No prob. I don’t have to be to school early today and I’m happy to help.”
I poured myself a glass of juice and contemplated my breakfast choices, settling on toast, blackberry yogurt, and an apple. “You coming to the game tonight?” I asked him as I popped a slice of bread into the toaster and tore the lid off my yogurt. You never knew with Brian. While it seemed like the entire town of Bowdon never missed a game, Brian wasn’t always there with the rest of us. Sometimes, he actually stayed home and studied. Yeah. Studied. On a Friday night.
Have I mentioned my big brother is such a nerd? That was okay, though. I couldn’t imagine him any other way and his nerdiness was part of what made him so endearing. If you knew Brian, you liked him. You couldn’t help but do so. As soon as I thought that, though, a disquieting reminder followed behind it. Someone apparently knew Brian and didn’t like him, as impossible as that was to imagine. Someone willing to see him go down for a crime there was no way he actually committed.
“I’ll be there,” Brian replied cheerfully. “I’m bringing Bobby and Terry.”
My expression must’ve revealed my horror at the very idea, because he laughed and ruffled Bobby’s hair. “We’ll have fun, won’t we, kiddo,” he said. “I’ll even buy you some nachos if you do well on your spelling test today, okay?”
“Hey, did you see Regan here yesterday evening, by any chance?” I asked, suddenly remembering the groom passing through our back garden area.
Brian nodded. “He came by. He wanted to speak with Moms, but she wasn’t home yet, so he just told me to tell her he’d decided to take her advice.”
My brows shot up. “Her advice? About what? And since when did Regan start coming to see Moms for advice?”
“I don’t know, Trix,” Brian answered calmly, “And no, I didn’t ask. He would’ve said more if he’d wanted me to know.”
Ugh. Why couldn’t Brian have at least one curious bone in his body like normal people? Of course he didn’t ask.
The back door opened and Mart walked in, followed closely by our rambunctious Irish Setter, Reddy. Reddy is a beautiful dog, but not what most people would call very smart, unfortunately. That doesn't matter to any of us, though. He’s goofy and lovable and the whole family adores him. I scratched his head as he came bounding over to me, tail wagging furiously.
“Hustle it, Bobby,” Mart said, crooking a thumb over his shoulder. “Your bus is almost here.”
Brian handed Bobby his E.T. lunch box as I picked up his bowl and carried it to the sink. Mart hurried Bobby out the door and I grabbed my toast and quickly buttered it. “Did Mart get a chance to talk to you last night?” I asked once Bobby was no longer around to overhear.
Brian’s shoulders slumped a little and I felt a pang at knowing I’d reminded him of something he most likely wanted to forget. “Yeah,” he replied. “And Jim had already mentioned it. But, Trix, I don’t understand. I never went anywhere near there. I didn’t even know that’s where the books were. If someone had asked me and I’d thought about it hard enough, that storeroom would’ve been my guess, probably? But once the book drive was over, I quit thinking about it.”
“You know none of us think you’re guilty, right?” I asked, studying him closely. “I mean, you don’t have to convince us you’re innocent. We just want to find out what really happened.”
Brian sighed and nodded. “I know. And thanks.”
“Okay, so you weren’t in that part of the building yesterday,” I murmured before taking a bite of my toast. I considered this for a few moments. “Who did you see before school? Anyone? I mean, besides Loyola?”
“Uh… there were some band kids on their way to the practice room, but I don’t think they even noticed me. I ran into Chuck Altemus and Nick Roberts. They were hanging some posters advertising the Fall art show. Um, Miss Jenkins said ‘hello’ when she walked by me, but she was actually looking at some papers she was holding so I think I more registered as someone there than specifically as me. Oh, and I saw Mr. Hollybrook.”
“Who?” That was a name I didn’t recognize.
“Mr. Hollybrook. He’s the new drama teacher,” Brian explained.
“Oh. I didn’t know we lost our last drama teacher. Didn’t we just get a new one last year?” I asked him uncertainly.
“Yes. Mr. Hollybrook is our new new drama teacher. Miss Darcy got married and moved to Austin.”
“Right. Okay. So, in a nutshell, you didn’t see anyone who was automatically suspicious, but that doesn’t mean we should assume they’re all innocent, either.”
Brian’s expression was troubled. “I don’t want to start suspecting everyone, Trix. And Chuck and Nick don’t have anything against me.”
“That we know of,” I pointed out. “But someone lied about you, big brother. And that someone probably wouldn’t have named you unless he was certain you were on campus before school started. So even if you didn’t see him, he must’ve seen you.”
“Geeze, Trix,” Mart muttered as he let himself back in the kitchen. “If you’re done creeping Bri out, we should get going.”
“I haven’t made my lunch yet,” I protested as I shoved the rest of my toast in my mouth and rinsed Bobby’s bowl and my utensils before dropping them in the dishwasher.
Brian picked up a sack from the counter and held it out to me as I dried my hands on the towel hanging from the oven door.
“Isn’t that yours?” I asked, confused.
“No. I made it for you,” he told me. “It was easy enough to do two lunches when I was already making Bobby’s.”
See what I mean? If you know Brian, how could you possibly not love the guy?
“If you think of anything today or notice anyone acting weird, or just anything comes up at all, let me know, okay?” I said to him as I let Mart usher me out the door. “Anything! I want to know.”
I rolled down my window to enjoy the fresh air as Mart drove us into town. He tuned the radio to our favorite station. Every Breath You Take was just winding down and then the next song started up without any interruption from the morning DJ and his sidekick crew. We looked at each other and grinned widely.
“Oooh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oooooh…”
So, not that you’ll ever find us rocking out on a stage anywhere or anything, but Mart and I are both really good singers, especially together. We’ve been in the youth church choir since second grade and our pastor has recently said he’d like us to move up to the adult choir soon. We haven’t made up our minds on that, but for now, we were belting out Tarzan Boy like we had auditions for a Broadway musical. This was followed by We Built This City and ended with Everybody Wants to Rule the World as we pulled into a parking space on campus.
I have to admit, I was in a much better mood than I’d been in when I first got up. It really was a beautiful day and it was Friday, so the weekend was almost here. I hadn’t gotten very far in my mission to help Brian, but I had extracted a promise from Monica during our telephone conversation that she’d make me a copy of the partial inventory she’d been preparing before the books had disappeared. And she’d let me in on one significant fact she’d learned. She told me that the janitor, Mr. Parker, kept the storeroom locked and there were only three keys to open it. One for Mr. Stratton, one for Mr. Parker, and one that was kept in a desk in the office along with a collection of spares for all the other various locks around the whole campus. She also said Spider Webster told Stratton there was no evidence the lock had been forced, so one of those three keys had been used during the theft’s execution. I couldn’t see Mr. Parker stealing the books and while I wasn’t exactly a huge Principal Stratton fan, I was reasonably sure he wasn’t our thief, either. That left the question of who had retrieved the key from the office to use it? Who had even known it was there?
Monica said Patty Morris was an office assistant second period. I planned to find a reason to be excused to go to the office during PE so I could quiz her about it. I didn’t suspect Patty herself. I guess there was a chance she could’ve been involved, but this was the girl who once informed our eighth grade Language Arts teacher that she wouldn’t be giving an oral book report because she was allergic to books. Seriously. To this day, I haven’t decided if she really thought that was gonna work or not.
Absolutely no one was talking about the stolen books as I made my way to my locker. This wasn’t really a shock. Football was the only topic and I did my best to look as enthused about it as everyone else was. A passing cheerleader handed me a spirit ribbon that read, “Pulverize the Panthers!” and I pinned it to my shirt as I took my seat in first period.
My thoughts were drifting about ten minutes into class when Madame Geary called on me. “Beatrix! Quand la Révolution française a-t-elle commencé?”
I gritted my teeth before answering. It did not matter how many times I told my teacher I preferred my nickname, she refused to use it. Trying to ignore the high-pitched giggle behind me, I pasted a patently false smile on my face and replied, “Mai 1789.”
“Très bien,” Madame murmured, turning her stern eye on another student.
I was one of the first to bolt out of the room as soon as the bell rang. It wasn’t so much that I was eager to get to PE, because of course, I wasn’t, but that I was happy to escape French. Honestly, I have no idea what prompted me to take French over Spanish, other than it seemed like it would be cool to learn something that wasn’t what probably 90% of my classmates had chosen for their required two years of a foreign language. I clearly hadn’t thought it all the way through. When was I ever going to find a need to converse in la langue française? It could’ve been worse, I supposed. Our school also offered German, but someone once told me there was only one class of it with only eight students total, so that sounded like a real bust to me.
My luck kicked in when I got to the locker room. I was still trying to think of a reason for Coach to give me a permission slip for the office, when I learned we had a sub for the day. I found her waiting in the gym and she didn’t even question my earnestly stated need to see the Vice Principal right away about a reference letter for one of my college applications.
The main administration office had a surprising number of people in the waiting area when I arrived. My attention was immediately caught by two of them, sitting side-by-side. The first was Mr. Maypenny. He’s one of the only other non-millionaires living out on Glen Road. He has a small, pie-shaped piece of land with a lovely view of the Brazos. His cabin is… rustic, to put it kindly, and Maypenny is known town-wide as an elderly recluse who prefers to be left alone. Honey’s dad pays him a small salary to keep watch over the Wheeler property and estate, mostly to discourage trespassers who are not one Master Robert Belden from roaming about freely. I couldn’t even begin to guess what had brought him to our school, dressed in a suit that I think he might’ve purchased somewhere in the 1960s, if not earlier.
The second person to claim my notice was Danny Zuko.
No, really.
Slicked back dark hair, white t-shirt, combat boots, black leather jacket.
I glanced over to the announcements board. Had the new new drama teacher changed our planned musical? Nope. There was a flyer for South Pacific, debuting the week before Thanksgiving break. So what was the deal with the T-Bird in our office, then?
I looked back at Zuko to find he was watching me. Our eyes met for a moment and for some reason, there seemed to be a challenge in his cold, hard gaze. I arched one brow as if to say, “You cannot possibly think I’d be intimidated by the likes of you?” before deliberately turning away.
Truth is, I’m not nearly as brave as I was pretending at that moment, and, yes, I could most definitely be intimidated by the likes of him, if he so chose to really come at me at any time. But for now, I was hoping he saw me as someone not worth messing with.
Stratton opened the door to his office and stuck his head out. “Dan?” he said, nodding to Zuko. “Come on in.”
I blinked at that. He really was Danny? For real? Both Zuko and Maypenny rose from their seats and crossed the room. Without realizing it, I’d been expecting to see some sort of gang name on the back of Zuko’s jacket, but there was nothing there. He vanished into Stratton’s office along with Maypenny and the door was firmly shut.
Great. Now I had two mysteries to occupy my mind and distract me from class. Something told me, if I wasn’t careful, I could very well find myself failing math again after all. Who stole the books and what was up with Maypenny and his… grandson? Why was the old guy here and what did he have to do with Zuko? I didn’t know every kid at Bowdon Senior, but I was positive this was the first day Zuko had ever been on our campus. Was he a new student, registering for class? Where’d he come from? Definitely not a local boy. Not in that get-up.
If Patty Morris thought it was strange that mediocre-student-at-best me was there to request a college reference letter from Vice Principal Lee, she didn’t let on. I assured her I could wait if Mrs. Lee was otherwise occupied.
“She’s got a discipline case right now,” Patty told me disinterestedly, most of her attention focused on Jerry Vanderhoef. He was sitting outside Mrs. Lee’s office, leading me to assume he was probably another “discipline case” for her to handle. At the moment, Patty was shooting Jerry flirtatious smiles and he seemed to be receptive to them, if his self-satisfied answering grin was anything to go by. She fluffed out her crimped, light brown hair and pursed her lips. I wanted to gag, but since I needed Patty’s help, I clamped down on that understandable reaction.
“Listen, Patty,” I said, wondering if she’d already tuned me out entirely. “Do you know where the spare keys are kept?”
“Huh?” She smacked her gum as she looked at me like she thought I was an escapee from a lunatic asylum. Man, they let her basically sit around with nothing to do and chew gum while she was here? I wondered how exactly someone went about landing the apparently cushy job of student office assistant.
“They keys,” I repeated, forcing myself to focus on the matter at hand. “Do you know where they are?”
“Yeah. Why do you wanna know?”
“Would they be easy for someone to sneak off with and return?” I asked, ignoring her question.
Patty rolled her eyes and opened a drawer under the counter where she sat. “Only if no one’s sitting right here and watching,” she said, holding up a ring with an assortment of various keys. She dropped them back in the drawer and slammed it shut. It was obvious she considered that the end of our conversation as her eyes cut back to Jerry.
I mumbled something about returning another time when Mrs. Lee wasn’t so busy, but that was probably a complete waste of my breath. I’d become invisible again in Patty’s world. With a last glance at Stratton’s closed door and another moment of wondering about Zuko and Maypenny, I headed back to gym class.
If I maybe took a rather long, circuitous route so I didn’t arrive until it was almost time for everyone to return to the locker room and change back into their street clothes, would you really blame me?