The Boomerang Effect

by Gordon Jack

“How does this picture match my description?”

  “You were the last one seen in possession of this Viking costume.”

  “But I already told you, it was stolen from my car.”

  “Yes, that’s what you told me.” He let that one linger too, hoping his stress of the word would persuade me to confess. It didn’t.

  “Can I go now?” I asked, after we sat in silence for what seemed like hours. “I’d like to get back to Ms. Atkins and the League of Nations.”

  “Fine,” Stone barked. “But know this. You are not going to ruin homecoming for this school. It’s the one week in the goddamn year that everyone looks forward to. No matter what it takes, I’m going to stop you. The terrorists will not win!”

  I backed up slowly until I was out the door. Stone had just begun his rant against the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution when I exited the building.

  I plodded back to class feeling like a warty ogre in Fairyland. Over the weekend, the more spirited members of our student body had beautified the campus with homecoming decorations. A giant banner hung at the entrance of the quad with the words “Once Upon a Time” written in large golden Old English script. Posters depicting scenes of various fairy tales were taped up on walls, like pages ripped out of a giant’s children book. Colorful paper streamers hung from the hallway overhangs and snaked up every post. The cafeteria had been transformed into the gingerbread house from Hansel and Gretel, a rather ominous metaphor for all the students who ate there regularly.

  The decorations did nothing to lift my spirits. This was turning out to be the worst day of my life and it was only 8:30 a.m. Estrella had the week off, so I’d woken up late and missed my meeting with Spencer. He probably could have found a way out of this mess in the time it takes him to eat his yogurt. Then I got to U.S. History to find Audrey had transformed back into her homeless attire and wouldn’t even say hello to me. When the summons came from Stone, a chorus of “oohs” and “ahhs” filled the class as if my history teacher had just turned the slip of paper she was holding into a dove and launched it in the room.

  I debated going home, but that would just make me look even guiltier. Besides, I wanted to see Audrey before class ended and apologize for being such an ass last night. Maybe make plans to do another stakeout. Now more than ever, I needed a crime-fighting partner.

  Just before I reached my classroom, Jerry Tortelli grabbed me by my shoulders and slammed me up against the wall. “Where you off to, Larry?” I hated it when people called me Larry, only because it invited the unfortunate coupling with my last name. That’s right. When my parents named me after some favorite great uncle, they didn’t consider that my name might one day be Larry Barry. Jerry had yet to make this connection. “Back to class,” I said with what little breath I had left in my lungs.

  Jerry stared at me. He had a ferret face that just asked to be punched. It’s probably how he turned out so mean.

  “Let me see something first,” he said. He grabbed my left arm with both hands and examined my flesh as if looking for the meatiest section to take a bite. His thin lips twisted into the kind of snarl you see on animals in the middle of the food chain. “You’ve got girly arms,” he said.

  I yanked my girly arm out of his grip. “I’m not going to prom with you, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said, and tried to scoot sideways into my classroom. Jerry pushed me up against the wall again and thrust his meaty arm up against my throat.

  “Feel that, Larry?” His breath smelled of partially digested bacon. Or it could be the fried flesh of a younger sibling. Jerry’s crushing of my windpipe made it impossible for me to speak, so I simply nodded.

  “That’s the last thing you’re going to feel if I find out it was you in that mascot costume. We would have won that game if it wasn’t for you.”

  “It wasn’t me,” I squeaked. A fitting epitaph for my tombstone, I figured.

  “Pictures don’t lie. Crystal showed me the photos.”

  “So?”

  “Your arms are as skinny and weak as the mascot’s. I’d say they were a perfect match.”

  The bell rang and I assumed our boxing match would end with Jerry releasing me from the ropes and returning to his corner. But he didn’t. He kept me pinned to the wall for all the passing students to see. Boys and girls paused on their way to class and admired the scene, as if I were some squirming piece of art hanging in a museum. “His face is a nice shade of purple,” one commented. “I like how he appears to be floating, his feet just inches above the ground.” I pleaded with my eyes for someone to intervene, but no one dared come near and ruin our tableau. Brett, his scandal senses tingling, ran up with his camera and snapped our picture. “Any comment on your current predicament?” he asked.

  I thought I’d be stuck smelling Jerry’s bacon breath for the entire passing period, but then something struck him on the back of the head, causing him to drop me to the ground. I looked at the floor and saw an apple roll away. Jerry picked it up and looked around for the wayward Madison Bumgarner but found no one matching that description. I did my own visual scan and saw Audrey at the end of the hall, smiling mischievously like she did after swatting Zoe with the strand of garlic. She nodded, then disappeared around the corner. Jerry ran after some poor freshman wearing a Giants baseball hat and I sneaked back into my classroom and collected my things. My mood improved a little knowing at least one person at this school had my back.

  Unfortunately, the feeling of security that my alliance with Audrey produced only lasted till brunch. When I went looking for Spencer in the cafeteria, an angry sophomore flung a carton of chocolate milk at me, missing my head by inches. Its contents exploded on the wall behind me, splattering a tile mosaic of Cesar Chavez and nearly starting a race riot.

  Pretty much everyone else shunned me both in and out of class. Apparently, you can vandalize the school all you want, but touch a class’s homecoming float and you’re suddenly America’s Most Wanted. Even Eddie wanted nothing to do with me. “Dude, I can’t be seen with you right now,” he said when I approached him in Yearbook. “No offense.”

  “Et tu, Eddie?” I muttered, repeating the only line I remembered from my eighth-grade reading of Julius Caesar. I was only in this mess because of him and his stupid crush on Dawn Bronson.

  At lunch, I went searching for Spencer in the library, but he was nowhere to be found. Was he avoiding me too? On my way out, I overheard a group of tenth-grade girls talking about making me the sole participant in a dunk tank fund-raiser, which sounded like a spirited way to waterboard someone.

  The only person who would talk with me was Brett Bridges, and that was only because he needed a confession for his “School Under Attack” series on the BS website. He had already posted his story about the morning altercation I had with Jerry. “Tortelli Corners Suspect” was the headline that ran over a picture of Jerry pinning me to the wall. “Stone doesn’t summon you to his office unless you’ve done something wrong,” Tortelli said in the article. “I know that dude’s guilty.” Brett talked with students in my first-period class who confirmed my summons to Stone’s office and with students who knew me in my younger, wilder days. “That guy threw up on my pony,” Samantha Fitzsimmons said, dredging up an incident I had hoped had faded from memory.

  After school, he tracked me down on my way out to the parking lot and hounded me for a quote. “Why do you hate homecoming?” he asked, thrusting his iPhone in my face.

  “I don’t hate homecoming. I’m innocent.”

  “Where were you at the time of the float attack?”

  “I was studying.”

  “Any witnesses?”

  I thought about Audrey. The one girl who could rise to my defense wouldn’t speak unless dressed in her Renaissance Faire costume, and even then most people wouldn’t understand her. “No. Do you usually have people witnessing your studying?”

  “Yes. I work in study groups. Is it just homecoming you hate, or the whole school?”

  “I don
’t hate either.”

  “Because you were kind of a derelict last year. Didn’t your friend get sent to Quiet Haven?”

  “So?”

  “So, is your plot to destroy homecoming some kind of revenge?”

  “This interview is over, Brett.”

  “Vote for me for homecoming king!” he said, and slapped one of his stickers on my chest. When Brett saw his neon sticker on my polo shirt, he paused, then ripped it off like a Band-Aid. “Actually, you’re not the best billboard for me right now. No offense.”

  I needed Spencer’s help to find a way out of this mess. I drove to his apartment but no one was there. Either that or his mom saw me standing outside and locked her son in a panic room until the intruder disappeared. I ran through the list of places Spencer was allowed to visit. Luckily, it was a short list. If he wasn’t at home or school, he was probably at the public library. I got in my car and drove there, Fast & Furious style.

  TWENTY

  The library was only a few blocks away, sandwiched between the police department and an old folks’ home. I could see why Spencer’s mom okayed the venue. Having never been inside before, I was surprised how bright and bustling the place was. There were parents reading to their kids, middle schoolers playing games on computers, and a cluster of teens hanging out in the manga section, devouring the comics with a concentration I normally associate with secret agents dismantling a bomb.

  I spotted Spencer sitting alone at a table in the back corner and made my way toward him. I don’t know why I had such faith that he could help me win back my reputation. It’s not like his previous plans had worked in my favor, although it wasn’t fair to blame him when I was the one who bungled his brilliant tactics. Maybe I just liked talking to him. He, Eddie, and Audrey were the only ones who didn’t judge me for being such a screwup. They listened to my problems and sincerely wanted to help me solve them. No one else in my life showed that kind of interest, except maybe Estrella, but all her advice was in Spanish and usually involved an excessive number of Hail Marys.

  “Hey, Spencer,” I said.

  “Lawrence,” he said, positioning his finger on the magazine page to keep his place. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

  “Watcha reading?”

  Spencer held up the magazine, which was titled The Journal of American Folklore. “I’m trying to familiarize myself with the American fairy tales on display for homecoming.”

  “I think you’d have better luck in the children’s section.”

  “Yes, you’re probably right,” he said, closing the magazine. “But the rules governing the children’s behavior in that section of the library are fairly lax.”

  “Listen, I was hoping you could help me.” I sat down across from him and explained my predicament. Spencer nodded, acknowledging that he was aware of the growing animosity toward me on campus. “I overheard a group of sophomore boys talking about deflating your car tires this morning.”

  “I have to prove to everyone it wasn’t me. How can I do that?”

  “You still believe the person wearing the Viking mask is Miss Cosmos?”

  “I’m sure of it.”

  Spencer cocked his head and thought for a moment. “Our strategy must be twofold.”

  I liked how he referred to this as “our” strategy. Spencer and I were in this together.

  “First, we must warn the other class presidents that their floats are in danger.”

  “I can do that,” I said. “Dawn is the senior class president. Eddie can give me her phone number. I’m Facebook friends with Susie Durango, our class president. I can post something on her wall.”

  “If Miss Cosmos is trying to frame you, she’ll probably leave the junior class float alone.”

  “Right. That leaves the freshman class. Unfortunately, I don’t know any freshmen.”

  “I am a freshman.”

  “Oh, that’s right. I keep forgetting you’re not a graduate student. Who’s your class president?”

  “Heidi Schwam. I know her. We can warn her now if you have a car.”

  “You’re allowed to leave the library? What about your mom?”

  “She’s running errands. She said she’d return in one hour, which gives us thirty-two minutes to alert Miss Schwam if we leave now.”

  Spencer didn’t wait for my answer. He packed up his things and ran a hand over his hair, which was already as flat and neatly divided as the magazine he left open on the table. It suddenly struck me that Spencer may have actual feelings for this Heidi Schwam. This meant that he wasn’t an android after all. Of course, deep down I’d always known Spencer was human, but still it was nice to see this confirmed. I escorted him to my car and within minutes we were driving to Miss Schwam’s house.

  “So what’s the other fold in our twofold plan?”

  “After we warn the presidents, you must follow Miss Cosmos.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Now that she is targeting sites beyond the school grounds, her actions are less predictable. You must follow her to discover the next site of attack.”

  “A preemptive strike. I like it. I’m like a military drone.”

  “I’m not advocating you eliminate her.”

  “Right. Understood.”

  “Just follow and stop her before she destroys another float. Perhaps Miss Sieminski can assist you?”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” I said. In my mind I pictured Audrey in a tight corset taking Zoe down in a shallow mud puddle, the two of them splashing about, getting all wet and dirty, bodies intertwined . . .

  “Lawrence, stop, we’re here,” Spencer said, snapping me out of my fantasy. I shook my head clear and parked in front of Heidi’s house, which was decorated with political ad sign-age for the upcoming election. If I recognized any of the candidates or understood any of the initiatives, I would be able to tell you her family’s political leanings. But unfortunately, I did not. The This House Is Protected by Smith & Wesson sign made me think they leaned Republican.

  I looked over at Spencer and saw him anxiously running his hands down his pant legs, like they were twin irons pressing out creases. What fantasies were running through his overdeveloped brain right now? Probably something involving him and Heidi in front of a giant whiteboard covered with a complicated math equation. I had to help him win her over. He might be an expert in all things that required thinking, but when it came to matters of the heart, no one could incite strong feelings like Lawrence Barry.

  We rang the doorbell. Before anyone answered, I quickly untucked Spencer and ruffled his hair. “Trust me, dude,” I said, when he grunted something. “Girls like to see something they can fix.”

  Heidi opened the door and smiled like she didn’t know her teeth were covered in braces. Her sandy blond hair was in pigtails and she held a clarinet in her hands.

  “Hey, Spence!” she said.

  “Hello.” Spencer’s voice cracked just a little. “Heidi, this is Lawrence Barry.”

  “’S’up,” I said, nodding my head.

  Heidi nodded back, but something in her response seemed a little apprehensive. I figured it was because she wasn’t used to having cool upperclassmen dropping by her house uninvited. This could be useful in helping her see Spencer as a dangerous bad boy. Another thing the ladies seemed to like.

  “We’ve come to talk with you about some concerns we have about the freshman homecoming float’s safety,” Spencer said.

  “What do you mean?” Heidi looked a little confused, so I clarified.

  “We think someone’s going to trash it.”

  Heidi opened the door and led us inside. Any questions about her family’s political leanings were cleared up when I glanced around at the walls and mantels of her living room. A framed copy of the Constitution hung under a spotlight above their fireplace. Next to it was a picture of a man in full military garb I assumed to be Heidi’s father shaking the hand of President Bush. There were other framed photos of military vessels as well as mo
del replicas of fighter planes, battleships, and tanks. Medals of valor and a neatly folded flag were encased in what looked like a glass coffin.

  Heidi must have noticed my mouth hanging open because she said, “My dad’s a Marine.”

  “That’s cool. Where does he keep his weapons?” I asked, trying to lighten the mood.

  “In the bedroom,” Heidi said. “I’m not allowed in there.” An orange tabby cat sauntered into the room. “C’mere, Patches,” she said, scooping him up and cradling the squirming animal in her arms.

  We walked to the backyard, where the float was being assembled. My first thought in seeing it was that we were too late; the vandal had already struck. When I saw Heidi standing before the structure proudly, I realized that this was what it was supposed to look like, but for the life of me I could not figure out what fairy tale it was modeled after, unless there’s some Brothers Grimm story about a massive piece of chicken wire and tissue paper that I hadn’t read. “The Little Mermaid?” I guessed, just to be polite.

  “Thank you!” Heidi beamed, finally losing some of her apprehension toward me. “No one else seems to get it.”

  I looked at Spencer to gauge his reaction, but as usual he was about as easy to read as my trigonometry textbook. At most, I detected a forlorn expression as he looked at the pile of rubbish that sat on the truck bed on Heidi’s lawn. It was a disaster, but most freshman floats are. The biggest question I had was how our Viking vandal was going to sabotage something that already looked like a pile of junk.

  “I heard about the sophomores’ float getting destroyed,” Heidi said. “Everyone thinks you did it.”

  “That’s not true,” I said. “Someone is trying to frame me.”

  Heidi turned to Spencer for confirmation. “The person committing these acts of vandalism is using the Viking mascot uniform to hide his or her identity. Since Lawrence was the last one seen in possession of the uniform, suspicion has fallen on him.”

  “You don’t think he’s doing it?” Heidi asked.

  “I do not,” Spencer said.

  “We just came to warn you,” I said.