“All right, you two.” Mr. Saunders was not amused.
Most of the onlookers, however, were. “What is wrong with Louis?” people wondered, and “What is wrong with Mikey?” People also thought, Why don’t they grow up? but nobody said that out loud.
“You know the drill,” Mr. Saunders told Mikey and Louis.
They did. Since September there had been several opportunities for the principal’s innovative response to violent eruptions of junior-high tensions, so everybody knew the drill. For the observers the drill was enjoyable and instructive. For the participants it tended to be embarrassing and instructive.
Instructive, and corrective, too; although this time it involved Mikey Elsinger, who never thought she was in the wrong, and Louis Caselli, who never thought. Between them, Mikey and Louis might come up with the disagreement that was the drill-breaker, and nobody wanted to miss that.
Mr. Saunders put one hand on Mikey’s left shoulder and one hand on Louis’s right shoulder and pushed the two of them in front of him out of the cafeteria. He sent Hadrian Klenk to his office. “Get me the gloves,” he told Hadrian as he steered his two miscreants down the hall to the gym.
After Hadrian brought the fat brown leather boxing gloves, and Mr. Saunders had laced them on Louis and Mikey, he asked the usual drill questions.
“What’s this fight about?” he asked. “Mikey?”
“Ask Louis,” Mikey said.
“Louis?”
“It’s not my fault.”
Mr. Saunders said, “You know we’re not looking to assign blame, Louis. We’re interested in the cause. We like to know what we’re fighting about.”
“About name-calling,” Mikey said.
“Louis called you a name?”
“I didn’t say one thing about her.”
“You didn’t call names?”
That, Louis couldn’t deny. But he pointed out, “It wasn’t her. So what’s her problem?”
“It wasn’t you?” Mr. Saunders asked Mikey. “Then who?”
Mikey shook her head.
Hoping to embarrass Mikey, Louis volunteered, “It was her boyfriend.”
Mikey smiled a little pleased smile—Margalo could have sworn she saw that—and more than one girl’s voice called from the onlookers, “He is not.”
“OK, her big crush. Shawn. Macavity. You know,” he smirked around at the watching seventh and eighth graders, several of whom groaned softly, hoping that Louis was not going to make this particular joke in front of the principal, under these circumstances, and several of whom hoped that he would. He did. “Mr. Tooth Decay.”
Mr. Saunders considered this information before he decided, “I don’t need to know just what you said. Although,” he warned Louis and everyone else, “I can guess what it might have been. Also,” he warned Mikey, “I don’t need to hear why you found this enough reason to assault a fellow student.”
“Yeah,” Louis said.
“But I want you both to take a full minute of silence—everybody silent now, you know the drill—to think about whether or not you want to go ahead with this fight.”
“I’m not scared of her.” Louis feinted a couple of times. Mikey drew her arm back and punched at his head but Louis danced back, out of reach. She assumed a boxing stance, arms raised and elbows close to her sides, her gloved fists out in front, and jabbed twice at his face.
Whispers spread the question and its answer, “What did he call Shawn? Aside from Tooth Decay.”
Mr. Saunders cleared his throat.
The whole big, hollow room grew silent. Mikey glared at her sneakers. Louis glared at Mikey, then turned to catch his cousin Sal’s eye, then glared at Mikey again.
Mr. Saunders, like an orchestra conductor, kept everybody pretty much quiet together. People were staring at Shawn Macavity; or they carefully didn’t even look at him; or they looked at him, then looked away. So everybody noticed when he leaned forward to whisper something to Heather McGinty, who was, as always, positioned right next to him—unless Rhonda Ransom got there first. If you were watching the crowd, as Margalo was, you could see the way what Shawn whispered snaked forward to the inside ring of students, as Heather McGinty whispered into Rhonda’s ear, and Rhonda told Derrie, and Derrie told Lynn, and Lynn told Ira, who told Will, who told Sal.
“Says who?” Sal demanded, too loudly.
“Says who what?” Mr. Saunders asked Sal, checking the clock to see that the minute was as good as up.
“Nothing.”
“I’m not buying that, Salvatore.”
Sal knew better than to try to avoid answering. “He”—Sal jerked his head back toward where Shawn Macavity was standing—”thinks this is stupid. Not the drill, sir. Everybody likes the drill. He means her. Her fighting about what Louis called him. Because he definitely isn’t. But even if he was, he doesn’t believe in homophobia. He thinks Louis is having homophobia.”
Mr. Saunders looked over at Shawn Macavity, whose alarm at this attention was visible. Then he looked down at Louis and Mikey, and both of their faces were pink, although Louis’s was closer to red. Mikey dropped her hands to her sides and shrugged her shoulders. “All right,” she said.
“All right?” Mr. Saunders asked, surprised.
“All right I don’t want to fight,” she told him.
Louis put both of his gloved hands over his head and shook them together, the boxer who just got the decision.
“I’m not apologizing,” Mikey told Mr. Saunders.
Mr. Saunders pretended that the topic of apology had never come up. He unlaced the boxing gloves and pulled them off her hands. Next he turned around and did the same for Louis. “That’s it, then,” he said. “All right, people, it’s time for class.”
This was how the drill had always worked out so far; and it had always been something of a disappointment as well as a relief. As if nothing much had happened—and in fact, nothing at all had happened—Mr. Saunders strode to the door, turning there to tell them all, “Let’s get going, people. You’ve got six and a half minutes.” But before he left them, he added, “Louis, I want to see you in my office at the end of the day. No”—he held up his hand—”excuses.”
This was a variation on the usual final step of the drill. Usually, both combatants were summoned to Mr. Saunders’s office at the end of the drill. “What about her?” Louis demanded.
Mr. Saunders ignored his tone of voice. “It’s you I want to see today.”
“Why not her?” Louis insisted.
Mr. Saunders did not like being insisted at. “Because she isn’t the person who also trashed another student, more than once, and more than twice, too. I mean, literally trashed.”
Louis whipped around to locate Hadrian. “You told! You geek, you squealed!”
Hadrian looked a little pale, but he didn’t try to hide. And when he spoke, his voice didn’t creak. He sounded like an actor playing George Washington in a patriotic movie, or Abraham Lincoln, somebody whose word you would never even think of doubting, Harrison Ford. Hadrian’s voice sounded deep and grown up, absolutely truthful, and wise, too.
“I wouldn’t,” Hadrian said.
“Why would I tell?” that voice continued, meaning, You’re so unimportant, why would I bother getting you in trouble?
“As if,” Louis muttered.
Mr. Saunders informed him, “It doesn’t matter how I found out, but I can assure you the information didn’t come from Hadrian. I repeat, Louis: I expect you at the end of the day. In my office. You’ll be there?”
Louis gave up. “Yeah. Is that all?”
“I hope so,” Mr. Saunders said, and then he exited the gym through the big doors, with Louis right behind him.
The rest of the students dispersed then, mostly talking about Louis Caselli, if he was a real jerk, or a real rebel, or real stupid, or real brave, or what. They left the gym the way passengers leave an aircraft, some hurrying to be ahead of everyone else, some lingering to be last, and most—absent-mindedl
y—crowding along together between first and last. Mikey lingered, so Margalo lingered with her. Just like last year, they had the same afternoon classes, because they were in the same seminar with the same teacher as last year. Being in the same seminar meant that Mikey and Margalo took earth science together, and the tech courses, too—home ec, industrial arts, computer. Margalo usually reviewed her science notes during those tech classes, while Mikey accused her of trying to get the better grade in science, then went on to accuse her of being overly competitive. “You have everything except math and science to be best at,” Mikey reminded her. “Except sports, too,” Margalo reminded her, and “Except sports,” Mikey agreed. “And cooking.” Mikey nodded. “And these tech courses, all of them,” Margalo reminded her, but Mikey maintained, “That doesn’t mean you can’t let me keep science. I don’t know what’s wrong with you this year. Next thing I know, you’ll be in some A-level math class,” she said, and they both laughed. Margalo and math began with the same letter, but that was as far as it went.
They had seminar to get to now and books to take from their lockers, but Mikey didn’t seem to be in any hurry to leave the gym. She hung around so long that the students from the next class started to drift back into the big room in shorts and T’s. Still Mikey didn’t get herself out the door, even though this was a boys’ gym class—
And then it all made sense to Margalo. “Let’s go, Mikey,” she urged. “I’m going,” she announced.
Slowly, Mikey drifted toward the door. Her lingering paid off, because just as they were coming out Shawn was entering. “Hey, Shawn,” Mikey said. And stopped.
“Hi,” he answered, moving on into the gym.
“See you,” Mikey said to his back. She walked on a few slow steps, dragging behind Margalo like some little red wagon. Then she caught up.
“He didn’t say anything to me,” she told Margalo. “I mean, right after. But he had gym to get changed for. But he could have said something. But he did say hi. But he didn’t . . .” She was quiet, thoughtful, for a few paces before she asked, “Do you think he’ll ask me to the dance?”
5
WHAT IS THE WAY TO A MAN’S HEART?
On Friday, an icy cold rain drove down out of the sky. It was not, however, icy enough to close schools, so the day was colored by disappointment. In the cafeteria Shawn Macavity sat with his back to Mikey, not the angle she preferred. Also, lunch that day was tuna noodle casserole with anonymous-fruit crumble for dessert, which did not improve Mikey’s spirits, and Margalo’s lunch choices had been so limited that she had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, peanut butter crackers, and no fruit. Lousy weather, lousy Shawn op, lousy food, and only halfway through the day—both Margolo and Mikey were having low spirits.
To speed time along, Mikey and Margalo were making up possibilities for what Mikey’s weekend with Ms. Barcley might include (a day at the spa, with facials and pedicures; a day at the office, with video games and being no trouble; shopping for sofa cushions or shoes) and griping about their lunches. Then Tan thwacked a tray of salads—green salad and fruit salad, plus pasta salad for carbohydrates—down onto the table. She slumped into a chair, sticking her long legs out in front of her. She jerked open one of three milk cartons and jammed a straw into it. “I can’t take it anymore,” she grumbled, and picked up her fork. “We all get warned about the same things about how girls our age change and give up, we all watch the same TV shows, you’d think . . .” She pronged a chunk of cantaloupe and looked across at Mikey and Margalo. “I mean, nobody but me is interested in the team anymore. Me and you, Mikey. You do still want to play, don’t you?” She studied the orange chunk of melon, looked at Mikey, then at Margalo. “Sometimes I wish I was like you two and didn’t care about having friends.”
“Is the team mad at you?” Margalo guessed.
“Not me personally. Just mad at what I think. Or, mad at what I don’t think. Or maybe because I say what I think? But I’m not one of his fans, so I’m no competition, so they’re not mad at me. Not exactly. Bored at me is more like it.”
“Shawn Macavity,” Margalo guessed.
Tanisha nodded.
“The whole team has a crush on Shawn? All of them?” Margalo wondered.
“Except Ronnie, of course. And me,” Tan said.
“But what about me and Shawn?” Mikey demanded.
“You know what really gets me? What really gets me is the way everybody acts about it. Pretending,” Tan grumbled.
Mikey reassured herself. “He doesn’t care about sports.”
“You mean, talking like friends do?” Margalo guessed. “All supportive? Saying, He should like you, when what they’re really thinking is I hope he chooses me.”
“I wouldn’t mind if they were like Mikey and had no pride.”
“I have plenty of pride,” Mikey argued. “But what does that have to do with Shawn?”
Tan had another complaint. “Darlene’s asking him to her party tonight.”
“She hasn’t asked me,” Mikey reported.
They didn’t say anything. It was too obvious.
“But how will I ever get him to like me if everybody else goes to parties with him and I don’t?” Mikey demanded. “I better give my own party.”
They didn’t bother responding to that, either.
“OK, then, if you don’t go to parties with them, how else can you make boys like you?” Mikey asked.
“Who cares?” Tan asked.
Mikey never minded stating the obvious. “I do. That’s why I’m asking. What’s wrong with you today, Tan?”
Tan reported, “He’s not going to Darlene’s anyway.”
Margalo volunteered, “The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Steven said that last night, to Aurora, because dinner was so bad.”
“He said that?” Mikey asked.
“Of course,” Margalo added, “most of Aurora’s dinners are pretty lame.”
“Do you think he’s right?” Mikey asked. She was getting that gleam in her eye.
“It’s an old saying,” Margalo told her, before she pointed out, “It was a joke, Mikey.”
Who cared if it was a joke? Mikey was having An Idea.
“Obviously it’s about looks,” Tan said. “On TV, in movies—when a guy explains why he’s in love, he always says, ‘You’re so beautiful.’ And the most popular girls are the prettiest ones. Like Melissa and Ronnie. Or even Rhonda. I know how you feel about Rhonda, but she is pretty. She has that long, thick hair, and it’s blonde—OK, but you have to give her a good body. Ronnie’s is better, but Rhonda’s is”—Tan phrased it delicately—”more noticeable.” Then, “C’mon, stop groaning, stop laughing, it’s true. C’mon you guys, I mean it.”
Margalo and Mikey were hooting with laughter, and Tan eventually joined in. Their loud laughter cut through the other noises in the cafeteria and the two teachers on lunch duty—Mr. Schramm and Mrs. Sanabria that day—looked at each other, wondering if one of them needed to come quiet the girls down, if this noisiness heralded trouble better nipped in the bud than hacked down in full flower. Margalo watched this exchange and saw that when Frannie Arenberg at that moment sat down next to Tan, the two teachers went back to their slow pacing around the cafeteria.
“What’s so funny?” Frannie asked them.
Casey slid into the chair beside Frannie and they both waited for the answer to that question. They would go on to seminar together, after lunch, Casey, Frannie, Mikey, and Margalo.
Mikey turned to Frannie. “Did you ever hear that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach?”
“Yes,” Frannie said.
“It’s an old saying,” Casey explained to Mikey.
“Why?” Frannie asked.
“Nothing,” Mikey said, but she still had that look in her eye, and that lining-up-a-backhand-down-the-line, going-for-a-winner smile.
“It’s because that’s the stereotype. Women are supposed to be good cooks,” Casey explained. “To be a real woman.
Like in the Little House books, Ma’s a good cook.”
“Of course she is, she’s the mother,” Tan pointed out. “But we’re not talking about old-fashioned mothers.”
“Although,” Frannie argued, “if you think about it, in order to get to be a mother, you have to start with a boyfriend. Someone you might want to—you know—marry, to be the father. So it could help if you show him what a good cook you are.”
“Like Water for Chocolate,” Margalo remembered.
“You saw that?” Casey asked. “That’s an R rating.”
“The little kids were in bed before we put it on.” Margalo called over to Cassie, who was passing by, “Did you see Like Water for Chocolate?”
“On video,” Cassie said, waving Jace on without her. She joined them at their table. “Great running nude scene. But way unbelievable plot, if you ask me.”
“Actually, we were talking about the cooking,” Margalo said.
“Didn’t believe that, either,” Cassie told them.
“I’ve never seen an R-rated film,” Casey said. “My parents won’t let me.”
“I bet they read you Grimm’s Fairy Tales, though, didn’t they?” Cassie argued. “Really grim, those old Grimm brothers, like when they make Snow White’s wicked stepmother put on iron shoes—they’ve been heated in the fire, too, red-hot iron shoes. And make her dance, at their wedding, isn’t it?”
“How would I know that?” Tan demanded. “I just know that the prince falls in love with a dead girl. What’s that called, Margalo?”
“Necrophilia,” Margalo said.
“Yeah,” Tan said. “Yuck.”
“She’s not really dead,” Casey pointed out.
“He doesn’t know that,” Tan argued. “All he cares about is she’s beautiful. I ask you.”
Cassie completed her argument, “They make her dance until she falls down dead.”
“They should at least let me watch Like Water for Chocolate on video.”
Bad Girls in Love Page 5