“A good idea?” said Buddy. “Sure, we just get our asses blowed off and for what? Some packs of cigarettes?”
“Back on the road, Buddy,” said Leroy.
“Leroy…,” said Buddy.
“Drive!”
The car pulled back onto the road. Nobody said anything for a few minutes. They passed a row of small signs, sitting deep in weeds. Each one bore a single word.
"Jesus."
"Loves."
"You."
"Repent."
"Or”
“Burn."
"In."
"Hell."
“Hell!” giggled DeeWee, pointing at the final sign.
Another minute of silence. Tony sat back against the seat and grabbed her elbows with her hands. She pulled her arms tightly into her stomach until she couldn’t catch her breath. Let Leroy think it over. He was as bored as she was. He hated things as much as she did.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven….
Then Leroy said, “Tony’s right. We gotta do something to show we got balls.”
“Tony ain’t got balls,” said DeeWee. “Girls got holes!”
"What we gonna rob?" asked Little Joe. "Pippins ain't got nothing but the grocery, the Exxon, churches, and the old engine shop. And Capron ain't got more than Pippins."
Something crawled from Tony’s ear to the nape of her neck. Maybe it was lice after all. She pinched her elbows to keep from scratching. "Exxon's got a money machine we could whack off the wall. Got a cash register, too, and only Mrs. Martin works there in the day. We know the place. Ain't no surprises. She don’t have a gun. We’d hold all the cards."
DeeWee picked something out of his nose and rubbed it on his sleeve.
“We’ll make the news,” said Tony. “Be on T.V. Kids other places always making news for stuff they do. And their mamas, oh, shit, there they stand with their head up their asses lookin’ all surprised. They stand there lookin’ at the T.V. camera, wiping their eyes, crying, ‘I had no idea she would do that! Oh! It’s so terrible!’ Fuck it, it’d be great!” Ecstatic laughter bubbled up in the back of Tony’s throat; she swallowed it back.
In the rearview outside the passenger window, Tony saw Leroy's jaw clench in and out and in and out. “Yeah, this is good, man, this is good. But we gotta wear something they can't know who we is."
"No shit," said Tony. “I coulda told you that. You gave me time I woulda told you that.”
“Gotta get real guns.”
“That we do.”
“What if we get caught?” said Buddy.
“Stay home, that the way you feel. We don’t need you.”
The car reached an intersection and Buddy, for once, stopped at the stop sign. Straight ahead was more countryside, leading to the town of Pippins. To the right, down a couple tenths of a mile, were the Presbyterian Church and the Riverside Holiness Church, side by side as if they really got along, which they didn't since the Presbyterians had Halloween parties for their kids and the Holiness folks believed it to be of the devil. To the left was a field with cattle and the road leading to the row of houses where Tony lived.
"Who's got a real gun?" asked Leroy.
"My great-uncle Henry does," said Little Joe. "Under his mattress. Got some kinda pistol."
"Ammo?" asked Tony.
"Who has a pistol and no ammo? Morons, that’s who!"
"He home now, your great-uncle?"
Little Joe sat up straight, like he finally felt he had something worth offering. "He don't go to work 'til two o'clock. But then ain't nobody home 'til after five."
“I got a gun at home, too,” said Tony. “Revolver. Was my dad’s.”
"Well, then," said Leroy.
DeeWee said, "Well, then!" He giggled.
"Buddy, drop us all off at our places," said Leroy. "Everybody find a disguise to wear. Then Buddy'll pick everybody back up ‘bout four o’clock. We'll go do us the Exxon store. We won’t let nobody know who we are, but we gonna show ‘em what we are!"
"But we didn’t get our doughnut sticks yet," said Whitey.
Tony grabbed Whitey's ear across Little Joe’s lap and pulled it until he shrieked.
"Shut your mouth about the doughnuts, don’t you care about important things?" Tony said. "And find a good disguise. Make yourself look like a white boy or Mexican boy or Chinese boy or something."
Tony let go of Whitey's ear, gave Little Joe's boots another kick, sat back, and looked out at the world through the snotty-slicked window. Her heart raced; the blood in her fingers was fiery. She counted the pulses and got to nearly two hundred before the car slowed down in front of her little house and it was time to get out.
Gonna do. For once in our lives, we're gonna do! Won’t Mam just love this? Won’t the Martin bitch just dump in her prissy little drawers?
Tony’s pants tugged and her head itched but this time, they felt good.
4
It was the urine on the floor that threw everything over the edge, a small puddle, intentionally leaked there by Willie Harrold, a fine, upstanding student in the fourth grade. Willie was short, with black hair, blue eyes and groping hands. He had quite the history, little Willie. He explored the forms beneath the shirts of every fourth grade female who happened to wander within his reach. Willie bit kindergarteners on the playground then said he didn’t. He cussed and stole anything small enough to fit into his book bag or pockets. And to keep Willie free to continue his antics, his father swore a lawsuit every time Willie was removed from the mainstream of the classroom and put into a study carrel or seated on the bench outside the principal's office.
"Look what Willie did!" Marion Kiddel shouted from her desk. Kate McDolen, who had been standing at the front of the room in her peach sweater and gray wool skirt, writing on the chalk board, fine, yellow chalk dust coating her hands, showing once again that adjectives described things, adjectives like "happy" and "sunny" and "snowy" and "soft" made writing stories much more FUN! spun about on her toe. She stared where Marion was pointing.
Some of the students were in their seats, also staring. Most of the students were up and giggling, glancing between the teacher and culprit. Jenny Wise, slumped in her desk near the door, had actually looked up from the fingernail polish she'd been picking at and was paying attention.
"He went on the floor, just standing there like a dog and went on the floor!" This was Christopher May. He was Willie's best friend. His prime pleasure in life was heralding Willie's accomplishments.
Willie himself had his arms crossed and his mouth open in a wide grin, revealing the crooked teeth his daddy didn't have time to have fixed at the free dental clinic because he was too busy with lawyers, working up law suits against the school system.
Happy. Sunny.
Insane.
Kate felt her fingers crush around the stub of yellow chalk.
Impotent.
The arthritic spot in her jaw clicked. She said, "Sit down, everyone. Right now."
Most everyone slid into seats. A few students on the periphery of the classroom remained standing. They didn't want to miss the view. Christopher dropped into his seat, not taking his gaze off Willie.
Standard question, coming up. Standard, worthless teacher question. "Willie," Kate asked. "Why did you do that?"
And Willie's standard, broken-record response. "Do what?"
Jaws clenched, as tightly as her fingers on the chalk. Fuzzy, furious stars rising in the corner of her vision. Her sweater no longer keeping out the chill of the classroom air in December. "I asked you a question."
Willie grinned. "I didn't do nothin’. Why you always picking on me?"
Jenny scrunched her eyebrows. Another girl giggled then put her hand over her mouth. Christopher popped his lips and bounced the heel of his shoe off the floor, enthralled with the diversion. The showdown rarely varied from its usual choreography. It was an old movie known well by the students. The ending never changed. Willie did whatever he pleased. Ms. McDolen kept her coo
l and sent Willie to the office after a heated argument. Show over. Willie one. Ms. McDolen zip.
Hopeless. Impotent.
Kate took ten slow breaths. A routine that was supposed to work. Take a few moments, breathe slowly, and you can put things into perspective. Things need to be in perspective. Teachers were patient, understanding. Teachers always knew how to maintain control, regardless of the circumstances. Teachers were good with perspectives. It's what they were paid for; it's what they were trained for. God bless teachers.
God bless us, every one.
Willie looked at Christopher and grinned.
"Go to the office, Willie," said Kate. The veins in the backs of her hands tingled the way they did when she took three cold tablets instead of two. I hate this. This is wrong. It’s always wrong.
Willie licked his finger off then wiped it on his jeans leg. "Can't make me," he said. "My daddy said you couldn't make me leave 'cause it's against my rights. I gotta get my education.”
"Go to the office now."
"You can't make me."
What is wrong with me? Why can’t I ever get this right? He’s a child, for heaven’s sake, a little delinquent, but I’m the adult here.
"'Gainst my rights. You can't boss me, you can't touch me, neither."
This is insane.
“Can’t touch me! Can’t touch me!”
I can't do this anymore. I’ve tried, God, for three years I’ve tried and I just can’t do it anymore.
Kate McDolen, trained professional, patient teacher, leader and guide to young minds, felt the snap in her neck. Felt the electric clotting behind her eyes, static and immense. The chalk dropped from her fingers and bounced, once, on the floor by her Easy Spirit pumps.
Willie sniffed, a harsh, challenging sound.
When she spoke this time, her heartbeat was in her mouth. Her tongue tasted of metal. "Willie. Go. Now."
Here’s your last chance, Willie. Here it is. Take it.
Please, just this once, Willie.
Willie, grinning, "I'm sick of you trying to tell me what to do. Call my daddy and see what he says."
"Go."
"Ain't going." The smile given to Christopher, the nasal snicker.
You little shit, just go!
“Ain’t going ain’t going ain’t going ain’t going!” A shrug.
Maybe it was the shrug more than it was the pee.
But in that second Kate was rushing from her desk in a whirl of sweater and skirt and chalky fingers and she was slamming her fist against little Willie Harrold's grinning face and sending that little grinning face with the body to which it was attached to the floor like a roped calf in a rodeo. The boy fell on his butt, crumpled onto his back, and slid several feet, thumping into a couple of the nearby desks on his way. When he gasped and looked up, there was a streak of blood on his face.
A slight alteration in the usual Willie-Kate dance. Just a minor change of routine.
"Whoa!" shouted Christopher.
"Mrs. McDolen!" screamed Marion Kiddel.
Kate stared at the boy on the floor. She was panting as if she’d just run a mile. The teacher in her said she should offer him her hand and help him up and then proceed to figure out how the hell to remedy this situation. To apologize, to do some quick double-talk to gloss over the situation. But she couldn't.
Not this time.
Her heart drove against her ribs like the gloves of a prizefighter hammering home his final blows.
Kate turned on her heel, walked back to her desk and said, "Marion, go to the office and tell Mr. Byron that I need him immediately." Her voice was steeled and far away in her ear.
And as she returned to the chalkboard and picked up a nice, new stick of chalk, to continue her lesson on adjectives, the only one she could think of was "fucked."
5
“What is that you’re wearing?” asked Mistie’s teacher.
Mistie looked down at herself. She had on her coat. She had on her pretty nightie. Princess Silverlace had a pink gown like this.
The other children at the math table stopped playing with the colorful little base ten logs and stared at her. They never talked much to Mistie except to tell her when to get in line or when to get away from them.
“Mistie?” repeated the teacher. “Let me see.”
Mistie stood still while the teacher pulled back the coat and looked at the nightie. “My goodness, just what is that?”
Mistie put her finger in her ear.
“Mistie, what are you wearing?”
Mistie thought of Princess Silverlace on Nick. Princess Silverlace was beautiful like Tessa except she was older and taller and she had a crown that glittered gold and silver. She wore a long, pink, and sparkly gown. She had a throne in a castle and everybody loved her. People gave her presents because they loved her and she did good things for the people because she loved them. Mistie watched it when her Daddy wasn’t around. When he was around he would say, “What’s that shit? I didn’t work out gettin’ cable to waste it on this crap,” and turn the channel.
“Is that your night gown?” asked the teacher.
Mistie rubbed the acetate and it felt good.
“Mistie, I’m writing a note. I want you to take it to the office and give it to the secretary. Do you understand me?”
Mistie nodded. She knew where the office was. It was a bright place with grownups. It had a bench and it had potted plants.
The teacher scribbled something on paper at her desk. She put the note into Mistie’s hand. Mistie didn’t read it. She wasn’t good at reading.
“That’s all, Mistie. Go on.”
Mistie went on.
6
The teachers' lounge was empty. Most of the teachers regularly ate in the cafeteria with their students, even though they were allowed a duty-free day once a week. Today was no different. It was 12:24 p.m. The fourth and fifth grades were at lunch working their way through potato barrels, oily green beans, and oven-fried chicken. It wasn't Kate's duty-free day but she'd hastily traded with another fourth grade teacher, Benita Little, who didn't care one way or other because she not only ate in the cafeteria with her students every day, she actually sat with them instead of at the teachers' table by the stage.
Kate had eaten lunch with her students every day for the first two years. But not this year.
This year teaching had dissolved into a shadow of most everything else in her life. Dull and uninspired. A set of motions which did little but spin circles around each other.
Through the lounge wall was muffled cafeteria commotion, the buzz of one hundred twenty-some students and occasional ping of the bell from the teachers' table, indicating the noise level was too high. In the corner of the lounge, the Pepsi machine hummed. The photocopy machine in the office down the hall chunked and clunked as it plagiarized a coloring book for one of the kindergarten teachers.
But the most insistent noise came from Kate's head.
Mr. Byron and Willie's father will talk with you tomorrow morning at seven thirty.
Kate closed her eyes, took her head in both hands and shook it like she shook the Pepsi machine when it ate her quarters. The humming in her mind rattled a-rhythmically, and then settled down again to the excruciating clamor.
Mr. Byron called Willie's father because Willie cut his face on the leg of a desk when you knocked him down and he needed stitches. We have a serious situation on our hands. Willie's mother and father will be tomorrow at seven thirty sharp. You must have that accident report filled out and everything in order before they get here.
The principal, Mr. Byron, had come to the classroom a few minutes after the incident, with Marion Kiddel bouncing beside him, her teeth chewing her lower lip, her eyes huge. "Here he is, Mrs. McDolen," she'd said in case poor Mrs. McDolen had gone so crazy that she could no longer recognize her superior. Willie was shrieking that he was dying, that Mrs. McDolen had killed him, and the rest of the students in the class, amazingly, were too stunned to do anything but st
are at the wreckage and wait to see what was going to happen. Willie had been escorted by the principal back to the office, but right before lunch, he had returned to Kate's room.
"Willie’s family is going to require more than an apology," Mr. Byron had said, taking her aside as her students lined up to go to lunch. In one hand he had clenched a blank accident report form, the other hand was drawn up around a pen and shaking like a bad Bob Dole impersonation. "They've been waiting to take us to task on something serious, Mrs. McDolen. I think we just handed it to them on a silver platter."
I don’t need this. This is wrong, completely wrong.
“Damn it all."
"Say what, hon?" It was the secretary, Miriam Calhoun, peering into the lounge. She was waiting to use the women's restroom across the hall, a popular meditation spot. She was young, with fluttery eyes and Pentecostal hair. Today, her vest and pants ensemble was a dark green Christmas thing, with red threading through the fabric that made it look, from this distance, like a little blood vessels all over the material.
"Oh, nothing," said Kate, trying a smile. "Just muttering to myself." But of course it wasn't nothing, and of course Miriam knew it wasn't nothing. Without a doubt she'd heard what had happened in Kate's classroom this morning. Every staff and faculty member would know by now. Word of mishaps and confrontations circulated the school as quickly as a case of chicken pox in kindergarten.
Miriam grinned, a pseudo-sympathetic and knowing grin. Kate sat straight to belie her panic, crossed her legs and drew her short auburn hair up behind her ears. On the center of the table were piles of educational magazines. She picked up one, Elementary Education Today, and let it fall open to where it would, which was a blow-in ad for sets of no-fail, individually-paced cards for reluctant readers called "Ready-To-Read."
She stared at the happy multi-cultural cartoon students, boys and girls, making a rainbow border around the card, assuring any interested teacher that yes, Asians and Caucasians and Afro-Americans and Hispanic children alike will find this program so inspirational that it makes them want to hold hands in a circle and smile.
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