“For I am still thy lover true, come once again and love me….”
As they sang, Ms. Finkleman glanced anxiously at the clock. She knew that this magical period, like the romance depicted in the song, would soon have to end.
Actually, it ended early. At 1:53, seven minutes before the period bell, the door of the Band and Chorus room abruptly swung open, revealing Jasper Ferrars, the assistant principal. Ms. Finkleman lowered her baton, and the children grew quiet. “Excuse me, children,” said Jasper, rubbing his thin hands together rapidly. “Ms. Finkleman, Principal Van Vreeland would like a moment of your time. Immediately after class. If you don’t mind.” He shut the door, and the little voice in Ms. Finkleman’s head returned: I told you so.
10
THE TINIEST CHANCE IN PLAN
Bethesda Fielding was having a tough time getting down the hall. She was on her way to her seventh-period class, Pre-algebra with Mr. Carlsbad, but everywhere she turned she was thronged by excited kids. They tugged on her elbow, tapped on her shoulders, stood in her way.
“So, wait—Ms. Finkleman?” they asked.
“The music lady?”
“She was in a band?”
“A punk band? ”
“Seriously?”
“Yup,” answered Bethesda with a wide smile. “Seriously. All documented by numerous primary sources.”
Her whole day had been like this. At lunch, between classes, during classes, she had explained about the magazine articles, about the tattoo, about the set list. And all day long, she had gotten the same response.
“Awesome!” “Cool.” “So cool.”
“Thank you,” she said, grinning, bouncing a little on her heels. “I know.”
Bethesda’s friends were nearly as worked up by the whole thing as she was. “Man,” said Chester Hu, shaking his head with glee. “You’re a detective! You’re like whatever-his-face! The guy with the hat!”
“Sherlock Holmes,” murmured Victor Glebe.
“You should do all the teachers! ” Chester continued, ignoring him. “You should do Mr. Vasouvian next! I bet he’s a former serial killer!”
“Bethesda, you realize you’re famous now, right?” said Suzie. “I mean, like, world famous. Right, Shelly?”
But Shelly was busy explaining to a tall eighth grader named Rick Triplehorn that she had been the visual assistant and was therefore an important part of the whole discovery. “Nice work,” said Rick, causing Shelly to blush bright red and drop her backpack on her foot.
Just then, Pamela Preston approached and offered her congratulations, which sounded the tiniest bit like they weren’t congratulations at all. “Bethesda!” Pamela said in a slight singsong. “Have I even said to you yet how amazing your Special Project was?” (She hadn’t.) “No, it was really good, Bethesda. It really was. It’s just too bad Ms. Finkleman didn’t turn out to be related to someone really interesting. Like, oh, I don’t know, Jesse James or someone. Not to be, like, negative.”
Bethesda thought it was a bit, like, negative, but she didn’t let it bother her. She said thanks, and kept on grinning. She felt like she had been grinning all day.
Ida Finkleman sat in a gray rolling chair in Principal Van Vreeland’s office. Jasper, thin and wiry, stood just behind her, his arms crossed.
“So,” said Principal Van Vreeland, smiling with pursed lips and leaning back in her own chair, which was just like the one Ms. Finkleman was in, except twice as big.
“Ida.”
“Yes, Principal Van Vreeland,” said Ms. Finkleman. “Ida, Ida, Ida.”
“Yes, Principal Van Vreeland,” said Ms. Finkleman again.
This was very odd. Just as in eight years at Mary Todd Lincoln Ms. Finkleman had never had a class full of respectful children, she had also never been called in for a sit-down meeting with the principal. Ms. Finkleman was surprised, in fact, that Principal Van Vreeland even knew her first name. But now here she was, saying it over and over, in a fashion clearly intended to be friendly—but which Ms. Finkleman found rather intimidating. Then the principal nodded sharply to Jasper, who nodded back and left the room. Ms. Finkleman wasn’t sure, but she thought she heard the door lock from the outside.
“Ida, dear, how go the preparations for the All-County Choral Corral?”
“Oh,” Ms. Finkleman said. “Fine, thank you. Pretty good.” Why on earth was the principal asking her about the Choral Corral?
“Now, what is it that Jasper tells me you’re planning for this year’s concert? Victorian Sea Shanties? Is that right? ”
“No,” answered Ms. Finkleman. “Not exactly. Traditional English folk ballads from the—”
Principal Van Vreeland sprang forward in her chair with such velocity that Ida shrank back. For a terrifying moment, she thought her boss was going to bite her on the nose. Instead, Principal Van Vreeland narrowed her eyes, looked directly at Ms. Finkleman, and said a single word.
“No.”
“No?”
“No. You see, Ida dear, there’s been the tiniest change in plan.”
Ninety seconds later, Ida Finkleman was standing in the hallway outside the main office, her face flushed, her heart pumping, trying to process Principal Van Vreeland’s bizarre request.
Request? Demand was more like it.
A rock-and-roll show? For the Choral Corral?
How was she going to do it? She wouldn’t! She couldn’t!
But the principal’s tone had been unmistakable: Say no, and Mary Todd Lincoln would find itself a new music teacher. Ms. Finkleman staggered down the hallway, trying to get her bearings. She had to get to seventh period, but somehow she couldn’t remember where her room was. She raised an unsteady hand and ran it weakly through her hair.
This was a catastrophe!
She wanted to throw herself down on the grimy, gum-sticky floor of the hallway and pound her head against the ground.
And that’s when Ms. Finkleman saw her. In Converse sneakers and a navy blue skirt, her hair in two jaunty pigtails, Bethesda Fielding leaned on a locker outside Mr. Carlsbad’s room, laughing and gesturing enthusiastically amid a boisterous crowd of admirers. Ms. Finkleman looked hard at Bethesda. Principal Van Vreeland had explained the origin of this “tiny change in plan,” including which bright young student had unearthed the “fascinating secret” of Ms. Finkleman’s past—and had seen fit to share it with the entire student body.
She strode swiftly down the hall and said, “Bethesda,” in a low voice. The other children got quiet and looked at Ida with wide eyes. This was the same awed, respectful expression she had seen during sixth period, but its origin was no longer a puzzle. These children didn’t see Ms. Finkleman anymore. They saw Little Miss Mystery. Their gawking curiosity made her feel cold and sick and angry, as angry as she had ever felt.
“Will you excuse us?” Ms. Finkleman said sharply, and watched the other kids scamper rapidly down the hall, glancing backward over their shoulders at Mary Todd Lincoln’s first-ever confirmed rock star.
“Ms. Finkleman? Hi!” said Bethesda warmly. “I—”
Ms. Finkleman looked her square in the eye. “You had no right to do what you’ve done.”
Bethesda blinked. “What?”
“My past is none of your business.”
“But—”
“And if I choose not to discuss it with the world, it’s for a reason.”
Bethesda said, “I—” again, and again Ms. Finkleman interrupted. “My life is not a joke, or a game, or a school project. It belongs to me.”
Bethesda’s face burned red and she blinked back tears. “I …” she said for a third time, and trailed off helplessly.
But it didn’t matter. Ms. Finkleman walked away.
11
THE NOTE
Bethesda s father put down his fork and sighed a big woe-is-me kind of sigh.
“This must be the worst dinner in the world,” he said sadly.
“What, Dad?”
“Oh! Bethesda! So sorry
to bother you, dear. It’s just that I slaved away over a hot stove for five to eight minutes, carefully combining all the ingredients as directed by the box. And yet my perfect little child, more precious to me than life itself, won’t eat. You hate it. You hate me. I shall stab myself with a salad fork.”
“Knock it off, Dad,” cautioned Bethesda. “I’m not in the mood.”
Bethesda’s dad never knocked it off when people asked him to. It was kind of a problem. “Oh, and it looked like such a simple recipe,” he said, moaning in his fake distress. “Just macaroni and … shoot, what’s the other thing? ”
Bethesda crossed her arms, trying not to be amused. “Cheese, Dad.”
Her father smacked himself in the head with an open palm. “Oh, man! No wonder! I put in maple syrup!”
“That’s gross.”
“Oh? Well, bad news, Grouchykins. You’re smiling.”
Like all people in a bad mood, Bethesda hated to be told when she was smiling. She stopped immediately.
“So what are the bad mood ground rules here? Am I allowed to ask you a question? ” Bethesda just shrugged. “What happened with the Special Project? Speaking as your unofficial research assistant, I feel it’s my right to know. According to the fine print of the unofficial research assistant contract I …”
Bethesda’s father stopped mid-joke and looked at his daughter seriously. “Bethesda?”
She pushed the plate away and laid down her silverware. Her father gazed at her for a long moment until she looked up and said, “You know what, Dad? I’ve got a lot of homework.”
“Okey smokey,” he replied softly. “More ice cream for me.”
* * *
In her room, Bethesda sat glumly on her bed, hugging Ted-Wo to her chest. She had three chapters of early American history to read, two chapters of To Kill a Mockingbird, four pages of Pre-algebra problem sets, and an earth sciences quiz on Friday. She didn’t feel like doing any of it. In fact, she didn’t feel like doing anything.
“My life is not a joke, or a game, or a school project,” Ms. Finkleman had said, her eyes flashing. “It belongs to me.”
Bethesda groaned. What kind of terrible person was she? She hadn’t even thought of Ms. Finkleman’s feelings, never stopped to consider how the dumb Special Project would affect her.
She groaned again and listlessly started unpacking her book bag.
That’s when she saw the note.
At 8:25 that night, Tenny Boyer pushed open the glass doors of the Pilverton Plaza Mall. As always, he wore an ancient rock-and-roll T-shirt (in this case, from AC/DC’s 1980 world tour, purchased at a yard sale last summer), jeans of dubious cleanliness, and his well-worn blue-hooded sweatshirt with the hood pulled up loosely around his thick hair. As always, his iPod ear buds were firmly in place. Listening to King of America, Elvis Costello’s tenth (and in Tenny’s opinion, best) album, Tenny slouched past the arcade and rode the escalator up to the food court. He slouched past the Sbarro, past the Cinnabon, past the China Wok, past the Auntie Anne’s, and at last arrived at his destination: Chef Pilverton.
Chef Pilverton was a life-sized automated puppet of a French chef. He lived inside the big clock that sat in the northeast corner of the food court, across from Arthur Treacher’s Fish & Chips. Every fifteen minutes, Chef Pilverton popped out of the top of the clock like a jack-in-the-box, brandishing a rolling pin and an eggbeater, and made some sort of food-court-related announcement in a dramatic French accent. Stuff like, “Bonjour! Bienvenue à la Food Court! ” or “Mmm! J’adore China Wok! ”
When Tenny was a little kid and came to the mall with his parents and his brothers, he would stare at the clock, just waiting for Chef Pilverton, and fall over laughing every time he popped out. Now, age twelve, Tenny thought Chef Pilverton was sort of lame. In fact, he thought Pilverton Mall as a whole was kind of lame, especially since the only thing not lame about it—namely, Record World—had closed three years ago.
Tenny was only here tonight because of the note.
The note was written on a piece of eight and a half by eleven notebook paper and folded over and then over again. Sometime during seventh period, someone had slid it through the tiny slats on the front of his locker. And all that it said, in careful, neat handwriting in red ink, was CHEF PILVERTON 8:30.
Tenny had no idea who the note was from. He didn’t really have any friends. He wasn’t in any clubs or extracurricular activities. There were Ian and Frank, a couple of guys from Grover Cleveland who he had sort of tried to start a band with last year, but Ian had moved, and he hadn’t talked to Frank since last summer. Tenny had let himself wonder if maybe it was a girl who had slipped him the note, like a secret admirer or whatever. But he had to admit that it was pretty unlikely. For one thing, girls didn’t usually go around randomly asking guys out. And girls definitely didn’t go around asking him out. And who asks anybody out by writing them a note to meet at Chef Pilverton?
So Tenny didn’t know what or who he was waiting for. But here he was, standing by the big clock, bobbing his head to “Lovable,” and waiting. What else was he going to do—his homework?
And then, at precisely eight thirty, just as Chef Pilverton popped out and said, “Je voudrais un cheese stick, s’il vous plait,” the mystery was revealed. An unremarkable woman with unremarkable brown hair, dressed in plain dull brown, approached Tenny Boyer and tapped him on the shoulder.
“Good evening, Tennyson,” said Ms. Finkleman. “Can I buy you a Cinnabon? ”
You can ask anybody who’s taken life sciences with Dr. Kesselmann: Human beings, like all animals, are driven by what Maslow called the hierarchy of needs. Food and water. Safety and security. And, if you’re a rock-obsessed seventh grader perilously close to flunking social studies, avoiding a future at the St. Francis Xavier Young Men’s Education and Socialization Academy.
So when Ms. Finkleman made her proposal, Tenny didn’t even think it over. He didn’t even say “Huh?” He put down his Cinnabon, wiped the frosting off his hand, and extended it for Ms. Finkleman to shake.
Just as Bethesda Fielding, clutching a folded-up piece of notebook paper and wearing her Mystery Solver face, walked into the food court.
“Bethesda,” called Ms. Finkleman, waving her over. “Won’t you come and join us?”
12
FLOCCINAUCINIHILIPILIFICATION
The next day, Tuesday, Pamela Preston sat at her desk in sixth-period Music Fundamentals, a few minutes before the bell, her copy of Greensleeves and Other Traditional English Folk Ballads open on her desk beside a forty-ounce bottle of spring water. Pamela was a big believer that proper hydration was essential to maintaining a clear, glowy complexion. Pamela sincerely felt that the universe required people like her: People who always looked great and felt great, so other people had somewhere to focus their attention.
She sipped her water and looked impatiently around the room. Pamela was having an irritating week. Bethesda Fielding’s Special Project had been, like, this major sensation, which was totally marvelous for her. The only problem was that she, Pamela, who everyone knew always had the best Special Projects, hadn’t even been called on to present yet! Even though she had sat in the front row both Monday and Tuesday, raising her hand higher and higher each time Mr. Melville scanned the room for his next victim. And so for two whole days, Bethesda Fielding had been the reigning queen of Special Projects, and Pamela … was not. The proper balance of the universe, therefore, was seriously messed up.
Ms. Finkleman walked in, and Pamela’s classmates instantly hushed and leaned forward in their chairs, staring, just as they had yesterday. Pamela rolled her eyes and took a long swallow of spring water.
Okay, Pamela thought. So Ms. Finkleman used to be some sort of rock-and-roll whatever. Uh, hello? Big whoop?
Stupid universe.
Two rows back and almost all the way over at the window, Bethesda Fielding was drawing a cool squares-and-stars pattern on the back of her music folder and thinking about last n
ight.
At the food court, in the shadow of Chef Pilverton, Ms. Finkleman had made a surprising proposition to her and Tenny Boyer. Bethesda had agreed with no hesitation, and she was sure that her end of the bargain would be no problem. But there was one thing about Ms. Finkleman’s deal that didn’t make sense … one thing that didn’t add up….
Stop it, she warned herself sharply. Stop right there. No more mystery solving for you!
She looked around the room for Tenny, who had sat there with her at the food court last night and had also agreed to Ms. Finkleman’s plan. She wondered if he’d been struck by the new mystery, too, and whether it plagued him as much as it did her.
There he was, sitting in the last row as always, wearing that ratty blue-hooded sweatshirt and his usual blank expression. As she watched, he absentmindedly poked his pencil eraser around in his ear.
Okay then. I guess he’s not plagued.
“Good afternoon, children,” said Ms. Finkleman. “I have an announcement to make.”
First, she explained quickly and with a note of sadness in her voice, sixth-period Music Fundamentals would not be performing traditional English folk ballads at the upcoming Choral Corral after all. “I know some of you will be disappointed at this development,” she added, though she had to admit to herself that no one looked all that disappointed. The reaction seemed more along the lines of collective relief. Smiles blossomed on seventh-grade faces all over the room, and happy, curious whispers burbled to life like rippling streams. Chester Hu, who two days earlier had apologetically explained that his dog had peed all over his copy of Greensleeves and Other Traditional English Folk Ballads, looked particularly relieved.
“Instead of our previously planned program,” Ms. Finkleman continued, “We will be devoting our slot at the Choral Corral to …” She paused, and took a deep breath, and continued. “A rock-and-roll show.”
The Secret Life of Ms. Finkleman Page 5