Tommy takes a second to confirm this, then nods. “Right.”
“Okay. And I don’t want Jake to get in trouble for hitting you with the book. So I’ll make you a deal.”
I outline my idea to Tommy, and he listens carefully. At the end of my explanation, he seems to look at me in a new way.
“Wow. I judged you wrong,” he says. “I thought you were smart.”
CHAPTER 17
* * *
A MINUTE LATER, MR. HARTMAN finally walks out of Mr. Braun’s office with Trey strolling behind him, Trey smiling like Mr. Braun just gave him a student-of-the-year award. Mr. Hartman is fuming. Tommy and I are both concentrating on the scam we’re about to pull. Trey’s the only person in the room who’s happy. When he sees me twisting my hands in the waiting-room chair, he waves. “Hey, Kirb! What are you in for?”
“Uh, well, it’s kind of complicated. . . .”
“Bullshit, right?” Trey says before I can finish. “Were you framed just like I was? I bet you were. Did you know they even searched my locker for drugs?” He winks at me. “They didn’t find anything, though. I’m not stupid.”
“Hey, hey, hey, no talking.” Mr. Hartman grabs Trey by the arm and shoves him into the chair between Tommy and me. “You. Sit,” he growls, then points at Tommy and me. “You two clowns: in there.” Clipped to his belt, his walkie-talkie crackles loudly. He swears and flicks a button, turning it off. Then he shoves the principal’s door open wider, revealing Mr. Braun dwarfed behind a massive desk.
“Gentlemen,” Mr. Braun greets us, beckoning us in with his chubby little hands. “Please come in.”
— — —
I haven’t been in Mr. Braun’s office since the first day of school, when he welcomed Mom and me to Upchuck High, but the office is much as I remember it, small and cozy, lined with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. I had forgotten, however, that the back wall has French doors that open out to the field behind the school. The doors seem out of place, and as Mr. Braun sits at his desk, the light shining through them backlights his tiny form, an elvish god whose eminence is blinding.
Despite the intimidating lighting, Mr. Braun himself is warm and reassuring. He actually looks more like a hobbit than an elf: short and round, old and jolly, wearing a deep green vest over a blue dress shirt. His bald head is so shiny I swear he must polish it twice a day, the dome surrounded by a shock of puffy white hair. He smiles at Tommy and me, and his face folds up along a million well-worn wrinkles.
In the morning, when we all walk in, he stands outside the office like a Walmart greeter and says hello to students whose names he knows.
Just ’cause he’s nice doesn’t mean he’s dumb, though. His clever little eyes shine like wet stones beneath his bristling gray eyebrows. I really hope Tommy and I can pull off my plan. I mean, I’m pretty sure I can hold up my end, but Tommy is dimmer than a box of broken light bulbs.
I can’t fail to notice that my German book—the murder weapon, exhibit A—is theatrically placed in the center of his desk. Man, I’m having a lot of trouble with books today.
“Well, Tommy,” Mr. Braun says cheerily, “that’s quite a bump you’ve got on your nose! How did that happen?”
Tommy glances at me—which I wish he hadn’t done, because giving someone a shifty sideways glance is not something you do right before you tell the truth—then launches into his spiel. He talks mechanically, like a GPS trying to pronounce a difficult street name.
“Well, Mr. Braun, I asked Kirby to give me his German book. And he threw it to me, and it accidentally hit me in the nose.”
Mr. Braun’s bushy eyebrows draw together, like two caterpillars kissing. “I thought you told Mr. Hartman that Jake Grivas hit you with the book?”
Tommy looks at me again, a threatening glance this time, which I interpret as You better hold up your end of the bargain.
“Kirby threw the book at me, yes. But he didn’t mean to hit me. It was an accident.” Tommy leans forward and a little drop of blood from his nose leaks out around the cotton and splatters onto Mr. Braun’s desk.
Mr. Braun quickly moves some papers and looks at me for help. “Kirby, is this true? Did you throw your book at Tommy? Are you sure it wasn’t Jake who threw the book?”
I’m a little nervous about lying to Mr. Braun, so I ease into it by employing one of Ms. Torres’s unanswerable questions.
“Why would Jake throw my book at Tommy?”
“Well, I don’t know,” Mr. Braun replies immediately. “Why would you throw the book at Tommy?”
Dammit. Okay, there’s no turning back now. I feel like I’m stepping off a diving board as I jump headfirst into the lie. “You know, it’s so crowded in the Thun—I mean, the lobby—and Tommy asked me for my German book, and I couldn’t reach him, so I tried to toss it to him, but someone bumped into me and it threw my aim off.” I cap off my big stinking lie with what I hope is the smile of an innocent baby.
Mr. Braun leans back a little, either because he’s surprised by my brown teeth or because he can actually smell the bullshit I’m shoveling. He squints at me for a long time, like he’s trying to peer inside my brain. It reminds me of how Mom stares at me when she’s trying to figure out if I’m lying.
Finally he asks, “Is Tommy in your German class?”
“Uh . . . no.”
“Tommy, do you take German?”
“No,” Tommy says. “Spanish.”
“Well, then,” Mr. Braun asks him, “why would you ask Kirby for his German book?”
Oh. Crap. I can’t believe that didn’t even occur to us. Now it’s my turn to give Tommy a guilty sideways look. Luckily, we’re both saved by the believability of his own ignorance.
“You know what?” Tommy shrugs. “I don’t know.”
Our exchange is so absurd, it sounds like one of the strange dialogues from my German book.
Mr. Braun: Tommy, do you speak German?
Tommy: No. I speak Spanish.
Mr. Braun: Then why did you ask Kirby for his German book?
Tommy: I do not know.
Kirby: There are many students in the Thunderdome. It is a place of danger.
Mr. Braun runs his hands through his snowy hair and rocks back in his chair, staring at the ceiling like he longs to return to his humble hole in Hobbiton. When he looks at me and Tommy again, all the gee shucks friendliness is gone.
Mr. Braun places his hands on his desk with exaggerated calmness and speaks in a deadly quiet voice. “I just want to make sure I have this straight.” He points at Tommy. “You’re telling me that you asked Kirby for his German book, even though you’re not taking German. And then, Kirby, instead of asking him why he’d want your book, or walking over and handing it to him, you threw it at his face so hard that it broke his nose.”
I utter the first honest sentence I’ve said since walking into this office. “I’m not very good at throwing.”
He looks at Tommy. “Does that sound plausible to you, Tommy?”
Tommy shrugs again.
Mr. Braun knows that we’re both lying, but he can’t prove it. Also, at this point, it seems like he might not care anymore. I’m glad Trey was in here before us, because I think he wore Mr. Braun down a little bit. He tries to smile at us, but he can only muster a grimace. He pushes Komm Mit! at me so hard it almost slides off the edge of the desk.
“See Mrs. Tews at the front desk on your way out; she’ll write you both hall passes to return to class.”
— — —
As Tommy and I walk out of the inner office and close the door behind us, we pass Trey, still in the waiting room. He’s sitting backward in one of the chairs, facing the wall and patiently peeling a long strip of wallpaper off.
“Hey,” I say. “What are you still doing here?”
He rips the wallpaper strip off and it flutters to the ground. “Oh, they wanna send me home, but they can’t because my mom’s still at work.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
“Me too.
I wanna get out of this crummy place. Little advice, Kirby: You don’t wanna be around when my mom finally gets here. She is gonna be piiiiiiiiiiiissed.” His face suddenly lights up. “Hey, did you see me throw the raccoon up onto the roof? Wasn’t that awesome?”
Disturbing is what I’d say, but since this is a day for deception, I agree. “Yeah, it was awesome.”
“Do you think it’s still up there?”
“I guess it must be. It didn’t look well enough to climb down on its own.”
“Yeah, no duh. But I mean, I thought maybe vultures would have gotten to it by now.”
Vultures? Are there vultures around here? I try to picture a flock of them circling the school, black wings flapping behind pink, featherless heads.
“I tried to go up on the roof to check,” Trey continues, “but the door behind the drama stage was locked.”
I’m struggling to figure out how the hell Trey escaped custody long enough to try to access the roof when Mrs. Tews clears her throat. She’s a large woman, rising behind the front desk counter; her dyed red hair and wide, sloping shoulders make her look like an angry volcano.
She flaps two hall passes at Tommy and me. “Boys?” she says threateningly. “Would you like to go back to class, or would you prefer to go back in with Mr. Braun?”
“I think I’d like to go back to class,” Trey says, hopping up and reaching for a hall pass.
Mrs. Tews gives him a withering look, and Trey sits back down, smiling. I toss him a jaunty salute as Tommy and I leave.
“Don’t forget about me, boys,” Trey calls after us. “Tell the girls back home to write!”
Tommy and I leave the principal’s office, and I’m turning left to return to English class when Tommy grabs my shoulder. His grip is so strong I’m worried he’ll crack my clavicle if he sneezes.
“Hey,” he mumbles. “Hey, um . . .”
There’s a strange expression on his face, almost a look of pain, like he’s constipated.
“You’re fucking lucky,” he finally blurts. “I don’t know how you did it, but you got us out of trouble.” He hits me on the back so hard my glasses almost fall off.
“Yeah,” I say, pushing them back up my nose. “Well, you know . . .”
“I would’ve been fucking dead if I had gotten in trouble,” he continues, trying to sound as tough as possible. “My old man . . .” He whistles. “He would’ve flipped the fuck out.”
There’s an unfamiliar feeling between us, and it takes me a second to recognize it: camaraderie. Tommy’s not making fun of me. He’s actually trying to be nice. For a moment we’re just two dudes hanging out.
“Well . . . see you around?” I offer awkwardly.
Tommy groans. “Look, wait . . .” Whatever he wants to say, he can’t seem to say it, so instead he says, “You might want to skip lunch today.”
“Skip lunch? Why?”
“I don’t know. Just maybe you should.”
I remember the manic gleam Jake got in his eyes when I mentioned that Mark would be at lunch, and I remember the wicked blade resting in his palm, and I tell Tommy, “Actually, maybe you should skip lunch.”
Tommy’s expression suddenly goes hard. “What the fuck does that mean? You telling me what to do?” He advances toward me, chest puffed out. “Yo, just ’cause I’m being nice to you for a second doesn’t make me a fucking pussy, bro.”
I throw my hands up in surrender and backpedal. “What? No, that’s not what I meant. I didn’t mean it like that—”
Someone knocks on the glass inside the office. It’s Mrs. Tews, scowling at us. “Get to class!” she says, her voice muffled by the glass.
Tommy gives me one last dirty look as he stalks away toward Circle A, and I hurry in the opposite direction, toward my locker in the Thunderdome. With the bloody German book in my hand, I feel like a killer who just got away with murder and is about to dispose of the weapon.
CHAPTER 18
* * *
ABSURDLY, GIVEN ALL THE ROTTEN stuff that’s happened today, I feel kind of lucky. I guess it’s like how you might feel lucky after surviving a car accident, although if you look at it the other way, you’re unlucky for having gotten in a car accident in the first place.
Whether it’s fortune or misfortune, though, today isn’t over yet. Tommy’s warning that I shouldn’t go to lunch means that Mark is probably going to fight me then. Assuming Jake doesn’t carve him up like a side of roast beef first.
And then and then and then—assuming I live through all that—I get to go home and face the music.
Thinking about it that way, I kind of hope I don’t make it past lunch.
I put my German book in my locker and check my phone. There’s about twenty minutes left of English class, and after that it’s lunch. What the hell am I supposed to do in only twenty minutes?
I slam my locker shut. I wonder if Jake will really stab Mark? I don’t have a clue. I feel like I know Jake well, but we’ve only been hanging out for a couple of months. Maybe I don’t know him at all.
Ah, fuck it. Once again I feel guilty for even caring about this little stuff. What a great way to spend Melanie’s anniversary, worrying about my petty bullshit.
Why am I going out of my way to protect Jake or Mark? I lied to Mr. Braun to get Jake out of trouble—I put my ass on the line—but Jake’s just going to get himself back in trouble later today anyhow. And I tried to warn Tommy about Jake, but of course he’s too stupid to listen. So fuck ’em both. All those psychopaths can murder each other during lunch if that’s what they wanna do. I’d have better luck training the horse dogs to roll over than I would have trying to control these killers.
I feel a little lighter having made that decision. Still, I’m in no rush to return to English—I know it’s going to be awkward, and I know Rob is going to embarrass me again—so I take the long way there, strolling slowly around the perimeter of the empty Thunderdome.
I’m walking past the gym when I literally bump into PJ. He stumbles out of the gymnasium doors, struggling to carry the torso of a huge papier-mâché bear. His bow tie hangs untied around his neck like he’s a lounge singer. His tuxedo jacket is off and his sleeves are rolled up. I wince as I notice the line of red scars running up his arm where Mark stapled him this morning. Behind PJ, in the gym, a strobe light flickers.
“Hey, PJ. What are you doing?”
“Oh! Hey. I’m just helping with the decorations for the dance. I’m on the party-planning committee.”
I shouldn’t be surprised. PJ is in every single club in school except for dodgeball, which he was kicked out of because they said he “didn’t take it seriously enough.” But I mean, who takes dodgeball seriously? How boring does your life have to be that you get passionate about dodgeball? Although I take cow painting seriously, so perhaps I can’t judge. People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw dodgeballs and all that.
PJ gives me a quizzical look. “What are you doing out of class?”
“I just left Mr. Braun’s office.”
“Oh man, did you get in trouble? What happened?”
“Welllllll, it’s a long story. Tommy jumped me in the hallway, and then Jake hit Tommy in the nose with a book, and then Rob embarrassed me in front of the English class, and then I got called into the principal’s office, and then Tommy pulled his sleeve up and there were all these crazy burns on it—”
“What? Seriously?!”
“Yeah, seriously, and then neither of us got in trouble because I convinced Tommy to lie about it, and then Tommy warned me not to go to lunch—”
PJ interrupts. “Because they’re serving tacos today?”
“No, because Mark’s going to beat me up then, I guess, and then I warned Tommy not to go to lunch—”
“Because they’re serving tacos today?”
“No, because Jake has his wicked ‘gravity knife,’ whatever the fuck that means, and he said he’s gonna stab Mark, and I’m pretty sure he means it.”
PJ’s mo
uth drops open. “Oh wow. Hold on. Lemme put this down.” PJ lowers the bear to the floor and cracks his back, then twists side to side and bounces down to touch his toes. “That bear is heavy!”
He pulls some loose jelly beans out of his pocket. A few nickels and dimes are mixed in with them. “You want some?”
I shake my head, like, No thanks. I’ve already had so many jelly beans today.
PJ pops a few into his mouth and talks around them as he chews. “So, what are you going to do?”
“Nothing,” I say proudly. “Not a damn thing. Let those guys fight if they want to. I’m out. I’m done.” Saying it makes me feel good, like I’m taking a stand, as opposed to how I should feel, which is cowardly, because I’m doing nothing. But I push that thought down as PJ nods and agrees with me.
“Sensible,” he says. “Very sensible.”
“Hey, I hate to ruin the mystery, but what are you doing with that bear?”
PJ tosses a jelly bean high into the air and then catches it in his mouth. “I’m helping set up the Fall Fling. Vern is helping too, and I thought it would be a good chance to talk to her, lay a little groundwork before I ask her out at lunch—oh shoot, do you think your fight with Mark is going to mess that up?”
I can’t believe PJ is still worried about Vern after I told him our friend might murder someone. “I don’t know, man. Maybe?”
“Okay, cool. Well, I guess we’ll see. If it doesn’t, remember, I need your help with that one part.”
I still don’t quite understand what PJ’s plan consists of, so I try to draw some information out of him by saying, “Oh right, the part with the . . .”
“Boom box. Just push play. Oh, but this bear—we borrowed it from the drama club; it was originally used in The Winter’s Tale—we had this bear hanging from the ceiling, but then it fell, and Vern was standing right underneath it, so I pushed her out of the way and the bear hit me instead.”
He rubs his forehead, and I notice a big bump starting to swell there. “I thought she’d be glad I saved her life, but I think I pushed her a little too hard, because she knocked over a couple of tables full of stuff. The punch bowl and, uh, some cupcakes. Some glasses and plates too . . . the chocolate fountain.”
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