The Lost Causes of Bleak Creek

by Rhett McLaughlin

“I’m not dying.”

  “What about your hand?” Rex asked. “Seems like you might not be dying, but you’re definitely getting hurt.”

  For the first time, the wild boy seemed unsure of himself as he briefly looked down at his bandaged hand. “Oh. That was from before.”

  “What was before?” Rex asked.

  The boy looked around, including once over each shoulder, even though there was nothing surrounding them except trees and mosquitoes. He took another step forward, and, lowering his voice, said, “Can I trust you?”

  Rex and Leif looked at each other and began a slow nod, not quite sure which of them was initiating their response, then let out a collective “Yes.”

  “I heard you say your friend is at Whitewood,” the boy said.

  Rex felt a flash of embarrassment, wondering how much of their conversation he had heard.

  “I know things about that place. Your friend’s in a lot of danger.”

  The boy’s words hung in the air between them.

  “What kind of danger?” Leif asked, his worry for Alicia suddenly doubling, momentarily eclipsing his concern for himself.

  “Not sure I can tell you.”

  The boy raised his squirrel-on-a-stick and took a healthy bite, ripping a chunk of dark meat from one of the rear legs. He chewed it slowly, beginning to pace in an arc around them.

  “I’ll tell you what. If you can do something for me, I’ll say what I know about the school.”

  “Okay,” Rex said slowly.

  Leif hoped he wasn’t about to ask them to kill another squirrel. But he thought he could do it. For Alicia.

  “Bring me a rake,” the boy said matter-of-factly. Rex looked around. The ground around the Tree was mostly clear, a mix of dirt, moss, and patches of grass. Grooming it seemed unnecessary, but he didn’t think this was the time to question the boy’s reasoning.

  “And a pack of hot dogs, three cans of Cheerwine. And a fire extinguisher. The carbon dioxide kind.”

  “Are you messing with us?” Rex asked.

  “Do I look like the kind of person who messes with people?”

  Rex declined to answer.

  “You bring those things to me, I tell you what I know.”

  “Can’t you get those things yourself?” Rex asked.

  “Would I be living like a caveman in the woods if I could just stroll into the Piggly Wiggly?” the boy answered.

  “All right. We’ll get you what you’re asking for,” Rex said.

  Leif shot appalled eyes at Rex. “Uh, we really should be getting back,” he said. “It’ll be dark soon.” It wouldn’t be dark for hours.

  “Okay,” the boy said as he took another bite of squirrel, though it seemed mostly for effect, as he came away with little to no meat. “I believe our business here is done anyway.”

  Rex stuck out his hand. “It was nice to meet you, uh…”

  “Ben. The name’s Ben.”

  “Nice to meet you, Ben.”

  “Likewise.” Ben dropped the spear to his side, letting the blunt end rest on the ground, and extended his non-bandaged but still dirty hand, grabbing Rex’s.

  Leif was already backing away, hoping to avoid a handshake and wondering why Rex had found one necessary.

  “Don’t tell anyone I’m out here, or I’ll have to kill you,” Ben added, thrusting his spear toward them and winking.

  It seemed like a joke and also not a joke.

  Nobody laughed.

  5

  “CANDIDATUS,” THE UNSMILING woman at the front of the classroom said.

  She was staring directly at Alicia.

  The woman wore a collared blouse, along with a skirt that struck just below the knee, revealing skin-colored hose several shades darker than her pale face. Her modest, fashion-backward style was not unlike what Alicia would expect to see on a teacher at Bleak Creek High School, the place she had been planning to start ninth grade in only a matter of days. There was one notable difference, though: Every article of clothing was a uniform beige. Even the woman’s shoes. Her outfit alone was strange enough, but even more unsettling was how the woman blended in with the classroom itself, as its walls, floor, and ceiling were all painted the same shade of lifeless yellowish brown.

  “Candidatus,” she said again, this time overly pronouncing each consonant, the final, aggressive syllable rhyming with the word moose.

  Was Alicia supposed to respond? She nodded, sitting up straight in her seat, giving the woman her undivided attention, but it didn’t seem to be enough. Maybe somewhere in that depressing, barely furnished dorm room she’d been hurled into last night—every surface that now familiar beige—there was a student handbook that explained stuff like this. If so, she definitely hadn’t found it. She’d been too busy lying in that sad excuse for a bed—just stiff sheets laid over what felt more like a piece of plywood than a mattress—trying to sleep instead of crying, all the while doing her best to avoid eye contact with the only thing that broke the room’s sad color scheme: a portrait of Mr. Whitewood that hung on the wall opposite her bed, reminding her of what she’d done to get herself here. It looked like the pictures she’d seen of Joseph Stalin in her world history book, complete with a similar non-smile and faraway look.

  The woman continued to stare.

  “Sorry,” Alicia said. “I don’t know…”

  “You don’t know what?” The woman jabbed the air with her words.

  Alicia used her peripheral vision to survey the students in her immediate vicinity, hoping to find a helpful face, anyone who might throw her a line. There was no one. Every head was forward, all eyes glued to the teacher. That was more disturbing than the woman herself.

  “I didn’t know if you wanted me to respond,” Alicia said.

  “I’m looking right at you saying your name and you didn’t know if you should respond?” The woman’s face remained stern, but in her eyes was a trace of playfulness not unlike a cat’s gaze as it toys with a mouse.

  Alicia was confused. “Um,” she said. “My name is Alic—”

  “Your name,” the woman barked, “is Candidatus. The same as every other student in this building. The name that Headmaster gave you. Isn’t that right, Candidatus?” She stared at a short blond boy in the front row, who looked to be several years younger than Alicia. The class, she realized, was filled with kids of all ages. Were they all going to be taught the same material?

  “Yes, Helper,” the short blond boy said.

  “You see?” the woman said, her head swiveling back to Alicia, who noticed the light reflecting off a silver pin—an upside-down seven-pointed star—attached to the woman’s collar. She suddenly realized she recognized the woman. Alicia had seen her at the jewelry store next to the Twin Plaza movie theater.

  “Do you think you and you alone deserve a different name?” she asked.

  “No, ma’am,” Alicia said, trying to demonstrate how quickly she was catching on.

  “I am not ‘ma’am.’ I am Headmaster’s helper. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, um, Helper,” Alicia said, recognizing the similarity to Hamburger Helper but not daring to laugh.

  “Good. Do you think you can do whatever you desire in this world?” the woman asked.

  “No, Helper.”

  “Do you think you know better than Headmaster?”

  “No, Helper.”

  “Do you think your curly hair makes you unique? Special?” She spit out the last two words as if they were swears.

  “No, Helper,” Alicia said, even though the weirdness of this question caught her off-guard. And even though this, like her other answers, wasn’t the truth. She loved her hair.

  “Good, Candidatus,” the helper said. “Headmaster would be very pleased.”

  Alicia held eye contact and ignored the itch on her should
er from the scratchy, ill-fitting beige jumpsuit she’d been forced to wear, the same one every kid had on. She was just three minutes into her first class—if that’s what you would even call this—and she already hated it here.

  Not that she’d thought she would enjoy it, but she’d still been allowing for the possibility that maybe it could be good for her. That maybe she deserved it.

  But no, this awful woman with her shoulder-length black hair who seemed like she could be one of Alicia’s mom’s friends, except missing a soul, left no doubt: This experience would not be good. If the blank faces on all sides were any indication, it was going to be very, very bad.

  She couldn’t believe her parents had actually sent her away.

  “I know what you did, Candidatus,” the helper said, eyes still locked on Alicia, “and it disgusts me.”

  “I’m sorry,” Alicia said. She wondered how long this interrogation would last, how long she would be in this room. She had no sense of the day’s schedule, which she suspected was by design. It was disorienting enough going to school on a Sunday, but as she’d learned from her roommate that morning—the only thing the freckled preteen had said to her—there were no weekends at the Whitewood School. Occasionally the students were given break periods, but they came without warning. And they would end just as suddenly as they’d begun.

  “Sorry,” the helper said, finally looking away to address the entire class. “She says sorry. You should know, Candidati, this is the student who burned Headmaster.”

  The students quietly gasped. Alicia looked down at her desk, her face hot. It was becoming abundantly clear that her innocent tumble into Mr. Whitewood wasn’t just disrespectful. It was blasphemous.

  “Don’t look down!” the helper barked at Alicia. “You look at me when I’m talking about you.”

  “Sorry, sorry,” Alicia said, her head snapping up.

  “Stop saying sorry!” It was a full-on scream, the woman’s dark hair temporarily losing its shape as her voice shook. She composed herself, seeming to recognize that she’d lost control. “I don’t need you to say it, I need you to feel it. I need to see it in your actions. I need to know that you will never disappoint Headmaster. That you will never again bring Headmaster harm.”

  “I will not disappoint or harm Headmaster, Helper,” Alicia said, willing the tears in her eyes not to drop as she registered how ridiculous this conversation was. For the first time that morning, she allowed herself to think about Rex and Leif, to wonder what their take on all this would be. She knew how horrible they were probably feeling, and it gave her some comfort to know they were likely, even at this very moment, coming up with some ludicrous plot to save her. Probably sitting on those stupid rocks.

  But she also knew there was no way they’d be able to pull it off. And even if they did, her parents would just send her right back.

  “This is embarrassing for us,” her mother had said in June, as Alicia had sat on her bed, staring a hole through the Salt-N-Pepa poster on her wall. Both of her parents had paced around, taking turns lecturing her for pulling down the pants of five mannequins earlier that day.

  “Do you understand how this looks?” her dad had said. Alicia did understand. It looked like a teenage girl doing a mischievous prank you’d normally associate with a preschooler. The truth was, it had been an impulsive and cathartic expression of rage, her response to being left out—yet again—by the people who claimed to be her best friends. But Alicia knew the truth wouldn’t help much with easing her parents’ anger.

  “It looks like you’re a bad kid, Alicia,” her dad continued. “But we know you’re not a bad kid. You’re a good kid.”

  “Can’t I be both?” Alicia asked, sort of kidding, but also not.

  That had stopped her parents cold. Her dad took slow steps toward her, which is when Alicia started to get scared. “You think this is a joke?”

  “No,” Alicia said.

  “How many times do we have to talk about this? This town’s hard enough on kids as it is, but you…you have to be extra careful.”

  “I know, Dad.” This wasn’t the first time he’d reminded her that in Bleak Creek, having a black father and white mother (not to mention being a girl with zero interest in acting like a young lady) meant that she would never be given the same margin of error as the other kids in town. She understood where he was coming from—she had watched how hard her father had worked to project strength and pride, even in the face of the whispered comments and snide remarks—but it was still exhausting to be on her best behavior every second of every day.

  “Good. Because, Alicia, we’re torn up about this. And we’re not sure grounding you is working anymore.” Her dad looked at her mother, who nodded after a moment, then stared out the window. “We didn’t want to tell you this, but your mother and I have even started talking about…the Whitewood School.”

  Alicia internally shuddered as she looked to her mom, who again nodded solemnly. “Because of some pantsed mannequins?”

  “It’s not just that,” her dad said. “It’s your whole…attitude lately. Always talking back, rolling your eyes at everything we say. Or else you’re holed up in your room, listening to that Nervous band…”

  “Nirvana, Dad.”

  “Even worse,” her mother said.

  “What’s wrong with Mariah Carey?” her dad asked.

  “Or Amy Grant?” her mom added.

  “Do you really think Nirvana made me pull down mannequin pants?”

  “This is what I’m talking about!” her dad said, exasperated. “That tone!”

  “And your little sister looks up to you so much,” Alicia’s mom said. “What if Melissa starts getting these same sorts of ideas?” Alicia knew her parents were using that as an excuse; her sister rarely crossed any lines, and when she did, it wasn’t unusual to find her in her room praying for forgiveness.

  “Okay,” Alicia said. She respected her parents enough to take the threat seriously, though she still assumed they were bluffing. After all, pretty much every parent in Bleak Creek threatened to send their kids to Whitewood at some point. Alicia had always thought that was kind of the main reason the school existed at all. Like the hundreds of times her mom had said she was “going to go get the wooden spoon” if Alicia didn’t stop some particular misdeed. She’d never seen her mom use that wooden spoon for anything other than stirring her infamous fifteen-bean soup, which her dad had always secretly called “ruptured spleen” soup due to its legendary gastrointestinal consequences.

  What she wouldn’t do for a spoonful of her mom’s ruptured spleen soup now.

  “Candidatus.” The helper was suddenly very close to Alicia’s face. “If I catch you daydreaming again, you’re going to the Roll.”

  Alicia almost said sorry before remembering not to and simply nodding instead. She guessed the Roll was considerably less fun than this classroom, although it did sound like a ride she’d wait an hour to get on at the State Fair.

  “Now, can you tell me what this sign says?” The woman walked back up to the front of the room and gestured to the wall behind her, which was mostly bare—not even a chalkboard—except for a portrait of Mr. Whitewood just like the one in Alicia’s dorm room and a large white piece of paper with one word painted in red letters.

  “Follow,” Alicia said quietly.

  “I can’t hear you,” the helper said.

  “Follow!” Alicia shouted, finally accessing some of her rage.

  “That’s right, Candidatus. Follow. If you stick to this simple advice, you will do just fine here. If you don’t…Well, I wouldn’t advise that.”

  Alicia nodded again, though she no longer felt like crying. Igniting her anger had been helpful. It simmered in her chest, reminding her who she was. She thought again of Rex and Leif, and she suddenly knew where they’d stand on all this: They’d be terrified. Rex might be
a little better at hiding it, but neither of them would stand up to the helper.

  In the triumvirate, confrontation had always been Alicia’s thing. Unlike Rex and Leif, she actually loved a good fight, mostly because it helped her deal with feeling stuck between the two worlds that her parents represented, two worlds that remained remarkably separated in Bleak Creek. Screw trying to fit in. She’d decided years ago that the easiest way to counteract ostracism was to stand out as much as possible. It still hurt to never feel completely at home, but at least she’d become pretty damn good at sticking up for herself.

  So, no, Alicia decided: She wasn’t going to Follow, and she wasn’t going to wait for her best friends to rescue her, either. She was no Princess Peach, trapped in a castle hoping that two plumbers were coming to save her.

  She was going to save herself.

  “Are we clear?” the helper asked.

  “Crystal,” Alicia said, her lips turning to the slightest smile.

  6

  BIG GARY’S KIDNEY stones weren’t as vomit-inducing as Janine had been expecting. In fact, if she hadn’t already known what she was staring at, she might have mistaken it for a jar of pebbles, something she would’ve kept on the shelf in her bedroom during her “collecting pointless things” phase.

  “Now, don’t forget this side,” Big Gary said, turning the jar so Janine and her camcorder could capture every cubic inch of kidney stone. While the colossal man wore a nearly constant broad smile, his eyes betrayed the baseline level of skepticism he reserved for anyone from outside of Harland County.

  “Great,” Janine said, her eye pressed to the lens, zero emotion in her voice. “Really great.” They were standing in the back of Li’l Dino’s Pizza ’n’ Subs, Donna behind them, already immersed in the process of washing dishes.

  Big Gary had a habit of filling any gaps in conversation with a series of gentle but guttural noises, almost like he was tasting something he liked. The volume and frequency of these sounds increased as Janine racked focus across the jar. As she stood there, pointing her camcorder at a grown man’s rock collection, birthed from his own urethra, listening to him say mmm-mmmm over and over again, she couldn’t ignore the voice in her head screaming, This is why you went to grad school? This is why you’re thousands of dollars in debt? So you could do this?