by Gail Banning
I went inside to look for my classroom. The class lists were posted on the bulletin board outside the office. A bunch of kids stood around reading them. “Hey Devo, we’re in the same class, man,” one guy said, punching the shoulder of another guy. I guessed that Devo was RADCLIFFE, Devon. MCGRADY, Rosamund, was on the same class list.
“Rankle’s class two years in a row,” Devo rolled his eyes. “That really burns.” For a while I watched all the boys talking to this Devo. He barely said anything and he didn’t even look at them, but somehow he got their attention. Devo moved off down the hall and the other guys all moved with him, just like the fish in our stream. I followed them to my classroom and took a seat.
Other kids drifted in and sat down. When the afterclang of the nine o’clock bell was still in the air, Miss Rankle came in. She got all of us to say our names, and then she introduced herself. “My name is Miss Rankle,” she said, as if daring us to say that it wasn’t true. She was writing her name in block letters on the blackboard when the classroom door twirled open and a blonde girl twirled in. When Miss Rankle turned to glare, a bunch of other girls waved at the blonde and mouthed ‘Hi’. A couple of them moved books and stuff from the seat they had been saving for her.
“You are late, Kendra,” Miss Rankle said.
“Sorreeeeeeee!”
Miss Rankle started the morning with a lecture on social responsibility. I didn’t really listen to her advice on how not to be a racist and how not to be a vandal. I was watching the jerking hands of the overhead clock bringing me toward my own future. The recess bell rang, sounding a bit hysterical. I pulled myself upright and went to the classroom door.
A bunch of girls were walking downstairs with the late, blonde Kendra. I tailed them. Outside they walked really slowly. Sometimes they stopped altogether, to concentrate on exclaiming or laughing. I caught up to them before I was really ready. I stood almost as close to these girls as they stood to each other. It felt weird to just attach myself to their personal space as if they were a washroom lineup or something. But wasn’t that what I had to do? It was time to just join in.
“So, Kendra, was it just, like, too fun for words?” A girl named Sienna was saying this.
“I wish,” said Kendra. “I just wish acting was, like, one-sixteenth as glamorous as everybody thinks. You have no idea. My first day on the set, I’m thinking—this is brutal! Like, no wonder they have to pay actresses mega millions.”
“How’s it so brutal?” asked another girl called Twyla.
“Where do I start? Okay, makeup,” Kendra said. “I’m trapped in this chair with people swarming all over me, like, so serious you’d figure they’re doing brain surgery, and every time I blink they’re like—Don’t move! And I’m like—Okay ... will it be all right if I keep breathing? Then after about five hours this makeup guy calls the director over and he’s like—Oh my God! That hair! It’s celestial! He actually used that word—celestial. Weird huh? And I’m like—It’s my hair, okay, what’s the big deal?”
“Wow, you were in a movie?” I asked. I know I said it out loud, but no one else seemed to hear.
“And then we start shooting,” Kendra continued, “and it’s like—More stress on the‘and’! Slower on the‘if’! And blah blah blah blah blah. I mean, the money is great and all, but fun? Uh, no.”
“How much did you get paid?” Twyla asked.
“Mom forbids me to discuss it,” Kendra said. “She says it’s rude to make people jealous. Anyway, she snatched my entire paycheque and stuck it in this fund thingy that I can’t touch ’til I’m nineteen. And I’m like—Mom, just let me have a thousand to spend now. Just one thousand. And she’s like—No way! It’s invested in a mutual fund, leave it alone and you’ll be a wealthy woman someday.”
“Wow,” said a girl named Nova. “I’d love to be in a movie.”
“Trust me, you wouldn’t,” Kendra said.
“What’s it called again?” Twyla asked.
“Clean Getaway,” Kendra replied.
“Let’s all go see it,” said Nova.
“It might not get released here,” Kendra said. “Some copyright suing thingy.”
“Clean Getaway,” Twyla announced. “Starring Kendra Amelie Madeleine Smith!”
“Hardly,” Kendra said. “I’m barely a co-star. Like, I’m way down there in the credits.”
“Wow,” I said. “How did you get the part?” To make sure I was heard this time, I had raised my voice. More than I meant to. You could say that I shouted.
“Pardon?” said Kendra. Pardon sounds like a polite thing to say, but it was not. She looked surprised and disgusted, as if I’d just tossed her a leaking lunch bag or something.
“I said, wow, how did you get the part?”
“How did I get the part. No offence,” said Kendra, “but why are you talking to me?”
Why was I talking to her? Why would anybody talk to her? That is what I was tempted to say, but it was too risky for day one at a brand new school. Instead, I clenched my face into a smile. The smile hurt.
Sienna looked at Kendra, then at me. “Yeah,” Sienna said. “Why are you, like, following us around?”
“Just ...” I said. “Just.” Still smiling, I turned away.
“This is her,” Kendra whispered behind me. She was probably imitating my stupid, phony smile, but I didn’t turn around to see.
My face was hot as I walked away, but I was determined to have a better joining-in experience immediately, as an urgent antidote. A game of Capture the Flag was happening on the hill that sloped down from the school toward the basketball court. The hill was the perfect place for Capture the Flag. It was all landscaped with a million beautiful shrubs, so there were lots of good ambush spots, and lots of places to hide flags. I watched as kids ran between bushes, and ran around bushes, and got tagged, and sat on the ground in invisible jail. Then a guy came streaking out of the rhododendrons, a black hoodie flapping in his hand. He was being chased, but the chaser couldn’t catch him. The first guy ran and ran, then stopped and made victory arms. It was Devo. He had captured the flag, and the game was over.
As they headed to the bottom of the hill to start another game, I followed, prepared to join in. I intended to ask somebody about it. “Can I play,” I would say, but no—that sounded childish. “Can I join you?” would make me sound about forty-five years old. “What team should I be on,” sounded better. I was still examining this phrase for flaws, though, when everybody started running. The game was on. I was about to miss my chance. Should I just pick a team myself? Mom’s voice played in my mind, telling me to just join in. Her voice was sympathetic, but a bit impatient too. So I did just join in. I ran with Devo’s team into enemy territory.
I ran for all I was worth between and around and in and out of bushes. I sort of wanted to get tagged, because I thought I might meet kids in jail. Jail could be a bonding experience. No one tagged me though, so I kept on running. And then I saw the black hoodie, lying in the dust under a bright red bush. The enemy flag. It was a cool hoodie with a heart and crossbone logo and it looked more expensive than any piece of clothing I owned. I bent down and snatched it by the cuff. I had captured the flag: this would be even better than jail for my social advancement.
I turned to start my run back to home territory. Devo stood in front of me. Why was he doing that? I was on his team. He was going to wreck my victory. He was going to get me tagged. Because suddenly there were kids all around. I stepped to the left. Devo blocked my way. Then he just stared. He stared, deciding what he wanted to do with me. “Excuse me,” he said, pointing to the black hoodie, “but we need that for our game.” He said this very politely. He said it too politely, as if he was making fun of the whole idea of politeness. And what was he suggesting? That I was stealing the hoodie?
The game seemed to have stopped. Everybody was just standing around us watching. I held out the hoodie.A slow second later, Devo lifted his hand to take it. I knew I should just say that I wanted to jo
in the game. But I could not say it. I turned and walked up the hill. Holding the black hoodie, Devo headed down the hill and everyone else came straggling from the bushes after him. One of the girls trailed the yellow sweatshirt that was Devo’s team flag. “Okay,” Devo yelled. “Let’s try this again.”
I’d had all the joining in that I could stand. I wanted to be alone. Not that I hadn’t been alone when I was trying to talk to Kendra. Not that I hadn’t been alone when I was trying to play Capture the Flag. But I wanted to be alone in private. I went to the washroom and sat in a stall, reading the manufacturer’s directions for dispensing toilet paper. I left the stall and went to the sink, looking in the mirror at the face that no one, it turned out, loved at first sight. I washed my hands for something to do. In only four more minutes, recess would be over. I was making a tower of lather in the palm of my hand when another girl came into the empty washroom and stood at the sink next to me.
She brushed her hair in the mirror. “Hi!” she said brightly.
“Hi,” I said, amazed to have found a friendly person.
“How are you doing,” the girl asked, and from the warmth in her voice, I could tell that she really cared.
“Pretty good,” I said. “Well, sort of nervous, actually. It’s my first day at this school, and I don’t know anybody, and you’re actually the very first person—”
“Hold on,” the girl said. “I can’t hear you. I’m in a washroom and there’s someone talking right beside me. Just a sec, okay Natalie?”
The girl turned toward me, and that’s when I saw the cell phone mouthpiece curved around her cheek. Her warmth had been for someone else. She had not been talking to me at all. “Were you talking to me?” she asked.
“Nope,” I said. “Just talking to myself again.” I faked another smile.
NOTEBOOK: #10
NAME: Rosamund McGrady
SUBJECT: Breaking and Entering
My first afternoon at Windward, I counted up all the instructional days in the school year. One hundred and ninety. One hundred and eighty-nine to go, I told myself after the first day. One hundred and eighty-eight to go. One hundred and eighty-seven.
It was hard to leave the treehouse in the mornings. Before school I’d eat my breakfast out on our porch, in the gauzy sunlight that slanted through the oak tree. I’d breathe in the special September damp earth smell. I’d inspect the perfectly perfect spider webs in the branches, sagging with jewels of dew. I was homesick for the treehouse before I’d even left it. When it was time to go to school my spirits dropped like backpacks in a dumbwaiter.
Miss Rankle was a crabby teacher, but class time wasn’t what bothered me. Recess and lunch were what I hated. What made them really bad is that they were supposed to be fun. Things that are supposed to be fun and are not are a lot worse than things that are well known to be awful. When things are supposed to be fun, you feel like a big loser for not enjoying them. I spent my recesses and lunches sitting outside against the brick wall, reading about cryptography. I’d stopped trying to join in, so no one bothered being mean. My classmates left me completely alone.
Tilley could be a pain sometimes, just like every little sister. But at the end of each school day, I was always glad to see her waiting for me in front of Sir Combover with her little pink trail bike and her dinosaur helmet. I was glad to ride through the woods away from the world of school. When we got to the ramp I’d pedal so hard that my bike became airborne. My spirits would lift along with my bike. As I coasted down the ramp into the grounds of Grand Oak Manor, I felt that I was back in my own little world.
There was only one thing that stopped me from feeling truly at home on the grounds, and that was Great-great-aunt Lydia’s new fence. The fence was complete by then, and delivering its unfriendly messages constantly. Keep Out. Trespassers Will Be Prosecuted. Private Property. Beware. Guard Dog on Duty .Warning. It was insulting, that fence. One September day as we rode our bikes across the plank bridge, we saw a new sign. It showed a stick person being thrown backward by a lightning bolt.
“Hey, a new sign,” Tilley said, catching up to me on the meadow side of the stream. “What does it say?”
“Danger: Electric Fence,” I read. “Now that I do not believe. That fence is so not electric.”
“It might be.”
“It isn’t.”
“How do you know?”
“It’s wood, for one thing, and wood isn’t a conductor. I’ll show you.” I veered off toward the fence.
“Rosie, don’t,” Tilley cried as I reached it. “I don’t want you to be like that stick man!”
“I won’t be. See?” I leaned from my bike and laid my hand flat against the fence. “Not electric. This fence is lying to us.”
“Like the guard dog’s a lie too, right?”
“Probably.” A gate in the fence left a crack the width of the hinges. I got off my bike to peer for guard dogs. When I put my eye to the crack, all I could see was a narrow vertical stripe of the Manor garden, and the Manor itself beyond. “No guard dog that I can see.” I rattled the gate but, just as I expected, it was locked on the inside. Tilley and I walked around the fence looking for other cracks and open knotholes. “That carpenter guy did a bad job,” Tilley said. “Look, he didn’t hammer the nails right.” It was true. There was one place in the fence where nails stuck out two whole inches. Tilley and I wiggled them with our fingers until they were practically falling out. I managed to pull one out completely. “So,” I said, dropping the nail into Tilley’s hand. “Great-great-aunt Lydia’s fence isn’t as great as she thinks it is.” We got back on our bikes and rode across the meadow to the treehouse.
Two afternoons later, Tilley and I were sitting on the treehouse porch eating honey sandwiches. Tilley was a mess of honey drips. She stood up and started for the washbasin, but stopped suddenly. “Rosie,” she said. “It’s that car!”
I jumped up beside her. Through the screen of oak leaves I glimpsed Great-great-aunt Lydia’s Bentley driving slowly out the stable door. At the speed of a parade float it bumped along the drive to the curly iron gates in the stone wall that separated the grounds from Bellemonde Drive. The curly iron gates magically opened for the Bentley. Or, it looked magical, but obviously Great-great-aunt Lydia had had them retrofitted with automatic openers. The Bentley paused while the gates opened, then disappeared onto Bellemonde Drive.
“Great-great-aunt Lydia’s gone.” I turned toward Tilley. “The Manor’s empty. We can explore.”
I hurried down to the shed, grabbed our hammer and rode my bike across the meadow. Stopping at the loose board, I began prying out nails. It was what Miss Rankle would call ironic. Before there was a fence to keep us out, I’d never considered trespassing into Great-great-aunt Lydia’s garden, but the fence had somehow dared me to get inside. I left just one nail to hold the board in place. I swung the board on the single nail and a gap opened in the fence. I stuck my head inside.
“It’s big enough,” I said. “Good.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t go in,” said Tilley, who had caught up to me.
“Why not?”
“Great-great-aunt Lydia will do that thing to us. The thing she does to trespassers.”
“Prosecute us? No she won’t. That’s just another lie, like the electric fence and the guard dog.” I put one foot over the hedge, swiveled my hips sideways, and followed with my other foot. I was inside. It was weird. Before the fence had been built I’d stood about a foot away from where I was now standing, looking right at this very spot. But this familiar spot felt thrillingly different, now that I was inside. I was violating Great-great-aunt Lydia’s space.
“Come on Tilley,” I said, all bad influence. Tilley slipped through the fence behind me, and we stood looking at the paths that wound through the garden. There were half a dozen to choose from.
“Pick a path,” I said, and we began to explore. The path was soft and mossy, but somehow our footsteps sounded exaggerated, like what a rabbit must hear. We wo
und our way between shrubs and came to a little fountain. Water spouted from the mouth of a man’s stone face, into a stone basin. It did not seem pleasant, for something to gush so forcefully from a person’s mouth. We continued down the forking paths.
We came to a pond, which we’d never seen properly from outside the hedge. The pond water was as dark as anti-matter. At first it seemed empty, but then enormous golden carp rose from the depths. They watched Tilley and me from the surface, and opened their gaping mouths as if getting ready to swallow us whole. They were prehistorically huge.
“These fish are man-eaters,” I told Tilley.
“Are not,” she said.
“Are too.” I threw in a chunk of leftover granola bar, and from the way those fish thrashed, it seemed that it might be true.
“Let’s go, Rosie,” Tilley said, pulling on the cuff of my fleece jacket.
“Okay,” I said, because it was hard not to be creeped out by those fish. We followed another path to a tree that had been all perfectly trimmed into the shape of a deer, with antlers and everything.
“This used to be a real deer,” I said.
“Did not,” Tilley said.
“Did too. It was a real deer, until Great-great-aunt Lydia put an evil spell on it.”
“She did not.”
“She did!” I thought of something, and got the torn blue strip out of my wallet. “‘Ives. It Turns. Possessed A. Treehouse I. It Turns O.You Are Who. It Turns Ou.’” I quoted. “You know what this is about Tilley? It’s about a spell, where you turn three times. It’s about the spell that made the deer possessed.”
“That is so not true. I saw the gardener clipping it.” “It is true,” I said. I didn’t believe what I was saying, but this dark view of Great-great-aunt Lydia suited my mood. “Then why does it say ‘treehouse’, and ‘you are who’” challenged Tilley.