by Seth Fishman
I close my eyes for a second to replay the night, terrified that I might have forgotten something. He went for my cheek, yes, but I would rather puke my guts up than kiss him. I look across the room at Rory, who’s making out with an invisible me, his tongue going deep down my invisible throat.
I can imagine Rory spreading lies about me to his boys this morning, them hungry for stories of his night’s conquests. I’d spit at him if my mouth wasn’t so full of cotton.
Mr. Geller comes in then, so I can’t say anything, I just cross my arms and sink into my seat, hating this morning more and more. Geller’s the enthusiastic type, fairly young and always in a sports coat. He often tosses his curly hair excitedly as he lectures about the Habsburgs and the Bourbons (both families with descendants in attendance at the school). He goes to his chair but remains standing, puts down his book, begins to flip pages and without looking up, asks, “Who has something to ask me about the reading?” He always starts class like this, and we never answer. Even if we’re all legitimately smart, no one is going to fall for such a sucker question. Ask him something about the reading and then spend ten minutes answering his follow-ups. Today, though, I can barely hear him. My blood is pulsing so hard in anger that I can feel my ears go deaf.
“He’s lying, you know.” Rob’s still keeping his head down, but he’s spoken up, and Geller tilts his head in confusion.
“What’s that, Rob?”
“I said ‘he’s lying.’ But I guess what I meant was ‘Rory’s pathetic if he has to lie about something like that.’”
“You mean he’s gay!” shouts Freddy Prince—his real name.
Geller, still confused and sensing that he’s losing our attention, shouts, “I don’t accept that kind of derogatory language in my classroom, Freddy.”
At the same time, though, Rory jumps up from his seat. He’s not as tall as his roommate, Todd, but he’s a heavyweight on the rowing squad, which means he’s an angry built little guy. He’s not looking at me at all—I might as well not exist. Rob’s not only made fun of him in public, but he’s gotten other richies to laugh at him. He takes a step toward Rob, his normally pale face flushed crimson, and points an angry finger.
“Why don’t we ask Baby Mia?” he says, his voice a growl. “Or have you been wishing all along she was sucking your dick?”
This isn’t particularly funny to the rest of the class. And considering that Rory is threatening a student in front of a teacher, he’s already going to be in a ton of shit. But maybe it’s the hangover or maybe it’s the way he’s talking to Rob or maybe it’s the way Rory will push or take whatever he wants, but suddenly I’m up, the textbook full of glossy maps and mini print covering ten thousand years of history in my hand, weighing five, ten, twenty pounds, and before I can think, I smash Rory in the face, his smile disappearing into a picture of Elizabeth I. Rory topples over backward and hits the floor hard, rolls over and spits bright blood from his mouth onto the white linoleum. There’s no noise except for the thumping of my own heart. And Mr. Geller has me by the arm. He drags me outside and throws me toward Dean Griffin’s office.
“What were you thinking, Mia!?” he says, his voice sounding honestly confused. “You’re lucky I pulled you out of there. He’ll punch a girl.” Mr. Geller runs both hands through his hair to get ahold of the situation, sucks in a breath and then looks back at me, his face set. “Get to the dean’s, and if I find out you didn’t make it, I’ll have you expelled.” He pauses, moves toward the door. “I mean it, Mia.”
He slams the door shut. I can hear Rory moaning, and my hands shake. There’s blood on my Converses. I walk, dazed, toward the dean’s office, down a long hallway filled with tall and shiny trophies, some of them mine.
I can’t take my eyes off the blood, and I keep thinking of last night with a puddle of shame in my stomach. Does everyone think I hooked up with Rory? Has he already managed to convince everyone that I’m just another conquest for him? I wonder what he said. Baby Mia’s not a baby anymore! Did you see her chug that beer? She chugged more than that! My hand feels heavy, the weight of the book still there, the sound of his nose breaking. I’m at the entrance to the dean’s office, an enormous old-growth oak, split and cut and fashioned into two doors, supposedly donated by a school alum from the keep of his castle in France. They are big and heavy, hard to open, and standing there, I think that if I knock, I’m going to have to go home forever. I let a stupid asshole get to me.
My father will be so disappointed. Mom would have been too.
I raise my hand and knock, but the wood’s so thick I barely make a sound. I try again, harder, and at the same moment, an alarm goes off. Not the fire alarm. This one sounds different. Is farther away but somehow louder. There’s an up and down to it—eeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-RRRRRRRRRRRRRR-rrrrreeeeeee-RRRRRRRRRRRR-rrr—and I’m frozen, listening to the school’s sirens, my hand still in a fist. My hangover headache goes into overdrive, and I can barely move. The sirens mean forest fire. Or tornado. Or nuclear attack. Or baby down a well. Anything that demands pay attention, something’s wrong. But there’s something different now. I’ve heard them before, and usually they echo off each other around town. These are solo, tinnier, only from the school. Why would the school’s alarm go off on its own?
There’s a squeak of feedback as the school’s announcement system goes live, and then there’s the dean’s voice, but I can also hear it though the doors, where the speaker system is.
Students and faculty, please make your way immediately to Dylan Auditorium for a mandatory general assembly. This is NOT a drill, but note that we will not be sending students back to their dormitories as would normally be the case with our alarm system. Repeat, ALL students and faculty to Dylan Auditorium immediately.
There’s a rustle of the speakers turning off, and almost immediately, the great oak doors pull wide to reveal Dean Griffin, a short man—he’s smaller than I am—his face long and lined, and when he frowns, his wrinkles smush together and terrify everyone. He’s been using that frown for decades, and was even a teacher here when my dad attended. He’s the only member of staff I know who isn’t scared of the rich kids. He’s someone I actually fear and respect in equal measure. And he’s staring me in the face.
“Miss Kish,” he says, his voice steady, but his eyes roving about, “you, having been raised in Fenton, know what that noise means more than most of the students here. I expect you to report to Dylan immediately. Tell everyone you see.”
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“You will be informed in due course. Now, to the auditorium!”
And he’s gone, the great doors ajar, and I see his secretary, Mrs. Applebaum, lying on the giant green visitor’s couch, her hand dangling to the ground. Dr. Seymore, the on-staff physician, is on his knees bending over her, a mask covering his mouth. There’s a breeze pushing Applebaum’s tacky silk shirt around in small ripples, but otherwise she’s not moving, and from here, she looks pale, gaunt, her hair grayer and tossed about. I can’t move. I saw her just yesterday, shaking that reporter’s hand. I take a step closer.
The siren is so oddly captivating. I look out the window, past the snowy fields of the quad and beyond the lake toward the outskirts of Fenton, where I can see Route 467 winding down the mountains. The road is busy, and for a second, I think nothing of it. But then I realize that there are trucks, many of them, and they’re camouflaged.
“The army?” I say aloud.
Dr. Seymore looks up and waves me away. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
I startle, and beyond the doctor, I can make out Mrs. Applebaum’s face more clearly now, her lips ringed in blood, her face somehow as wrinkled as the dean’s.
“Is she going to be okay?”
“You need to leave, now. Do you hear me?” he yells. “Go!”
I shuffle back out the door and into a hallway now filled with students, all heading to
Dylan. No one is worried; there’s an atmosphere of abandon—we’ve been released from classes early and can screw around. No one seems to get that something is going on. I feel like I’m holding a terrible secret, but I’m not 100 percent sure what it is . . . There are some high fives, a girl named Robin pulls Seth Winter’s saggy pants down, and he chases her clear out the doors where I’m sure, if I caught up, I could see him piling snow down her hoodie.
I follow them blindly, in a daze.
Before I hit the outer doors, though, I walk by Mr. Geller’s room and see that the class is already emptied. I see a trail of blood on the floor, and the other students do too, giving the stream a wide berth. I walk right through it and out into the quad, listening to the up and down of the siren. It’s like a hypnotist’s call to arms. The sun’s bright, despite the cold, and I squint away the searing pain in my head from last night and the incessant siren buzz in my ear.
You can’t see the highway from this vantage, so there’s no panic or even realization of the soldiers, of what I’ve seen. There’s music playing from a portable speaker someone’s lame enough to lug around, and a few groups huddle around cigarettes. Someone even whipped a Frisbee out of nowhere. I can’t see Jo or Rob. There are teachers slowly herding us toward Dylan, capturing the milling mass and pushing us through the doors. The snowy quad makes the task easier, because most of us stick to the plowed walkways and don’t want to trudge through the deep snow.
All alone in a crowd, I look down at my shoes and the blood there. The wind is cold on my skin, and I shiver and pull out my phone. It rings a few times before he answers.
“Hi, honey, what’s up?”
“Dad, the school sirens went off.”
His voice gets real serious real quick. “What is it? Tell me everything. Did you see the reporter again?”
“What?” I say, pulling back the phone to look at it. What did the reporter have to do with sirens? “No, I didn’t see him, but he texted me last night to try to meet up again.”
“You didn’t, did you?” Dad’s voice is aghast.
“Dad! Of course not. Who cares? The sirens are going off!”
He’s quiet, but I can hear him fiddling with something in the background for a second. “I just linked to the emergency grid, and there’s no alarm in town. Are you sure it’s the sirens and not an ambulance?”
I roll my eyes and raise the phone into the air for a few seconds and then bring it back. “Can you hear them now?”
“Yeah, but do you see anything wrong? A fire or something?”
“No,” I reply, biting at a cuticle. “But I see army vans coming down the highway toward the school, and we’re supposed to go to an assembly because this ‘is not a drill,’ and Mrs. Applebaum’s sick, so I don’t—”
“What did you say?” His voice is urgent.
“Mrs. Applebaum’s sick . . . I don’t know with what.”
“Did you touch her?”
“Dad, no! She’s in the dean’s office lying on the couch. The doctor’s with her. Dad, what’s going on?”
“Mia,” he says, his voice very clear, intent in a way I have never heard before, “I want you to leave the school. Right now. Come to the Cave—no, wait. This might sound weird, but go through the woods and get to Wilkins’s. Tell him I sent you and that you need to get into the Cave.”
“What are you talking about? How would Wilkins know how to get into the Cave?” My hangover is gone, dwarfed by the alarms ringing throughout my body. The one person who is supposed to take care of me is telling me to run. “Why can’t you just come and pick me up?” I know my voice is cracking, sounding like a whine, but I don’t care.
“Oh, Mia, Mia. I’m so sorry. This must be really confusing. You’re right. Listen, you just have to trust me. You have to get off campus and make your way to Wilkins’s at the aqueduct, okay? Please listen to me. Will you go?”
“What about Jo? And Rob?”
There’s a pause. “They’ll be fine, Mia. I’m going to tell you something that may scare you, but you’re strong and I think you can take it, okay?”
I don’t answer, and hold my breath. The students are almost all into the auditorium now, leaving only me and a few stragglers. Mr. Banner, Jo’s father, is making his way toward me to walk me in.
Dad continues. “Mia, all of this has to do with me. If you leave now, right now, then nothing at all will happen to your friends, to anyone, and everything will be okay.”
It’s hard to take in what he’s saying. But just then the phone beeps and loses the connection. I look down at it and have no more bars left, nothing: Searching.
“Mia,” Mr. Banner says. He puts one arm on my back and leads my numb body toward the door. “Hurry up, now. We have to get in there.”
“But I need to leave,” I say quietly. I believe my father, but I don’t believe this is happening.
Mr. Banner pulls up short and looks at me straight on. “Mia, Jo’s already inside. So is Rob. I’ll be in there too.” He’s talking to me like I’m a baby. “I know the sirens are scary; I bet somewhere deep down you remember them from the well, don’t you?” That is the farthest from what’s on my mind right now, so out of left field that I can only stare at him dumbly. Mr. Banner is an attractive man, tall with prematurely gray but sexy curls and frameless glasses. Jo’s been given a lot of hell from the girls about him. Crushes abound in calculus land. But here he looks sallow and thirsty, confused away from his equations.
“Okay, just go on in, and everything will be fine. As soon as we figure out what’s going on, we’ll get you two girls packed for the swim meet and out of here. I promise.”
I think about what my dad said, and how Rob and Jo are inside. Everyone’s inside. I can’t just take off like this. Mr. Banner would follow, I don’t have any snow gear on, and most of all, I want to know what’s happening. I’ll wait, I’ll talk to the others and then I’ll go.
“You coming?” Mr. Banner asks, nodding toward the door.
In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have.
4
DYLAN IS ONE OF THE OLDEST BUILDINGS ON CAMPUS, originally built as the school’s performance venue and, with the help and ingenuity of one of Westbrook’s leading architectural alumni, is now an impressive hybrid building, half old marble, half exposed glass, an enormous room big enough to attract real music acts from across the country. Though, of course, Fentonites are rarely able to secure tickets at face value to see Radiohead or Bruce Springsteen when they come; recently graduated alums return in droves and snatch up the preferred tickets. Only alums and current students get tickets at the first-come, first-served price. I’ve made a killing selling my seats.
When I get inside, it looks like the students are rioting. Or as close as they can come. Turns out it wasn’t just my phone that lost service, but apparently every phone on campus. And for a prep-school crowd at a mandatory school function, that’s tantamount to chaos. Paper balls are being thrown everywhere, but mostly there’s just shouting. A sort of voiceless swell of complaints and anger from those who are very good at complaining and being angry.
I see Jo and Rob parked near the front, and they wave me into an open seat. Rob’s probably more upset about the lack of signal than the others here, but aside from twirling his enormous case in his hands, he doesn’t seem to show it.
“What do you think’s going on?” he asks me once I’m settled.
Jo beats me to it. “Dad says there’s a bad gas leak and that soldiers are coming to evacuate us.” She must be feeling better, because her sunglasses are off and her eyes are shockingly wide open.
“Then why are we all sitting together here?” replies Rob, his usual dubious self making a good point. Today his shirt says WE MISS YOU TEBOW. His hair drifts down his face along the edges, like sideburns, and he pulls at a tuft now, something I’ve come to recognize as distraction and worry. I don’t say a
thing to my friends about Dad’s warning, but only because I don’t see any use. Why add speculation to the fire? We’re here for a reason, and the professors will tell us what to do.
A paper ball flies past my face, and I search the seats behind me. Everyone is where they should be, sitting with their friends along fault lines that sometimes are too difficult to make out. In the far back are the seniors of high pedigree, and everywhere else is territory worth fighting over. But I’m not interested in just any face. I just want to make sure I know where Rory is, so I can plan my escape route after this. And sure enough, there he sits, about eight rows back and on my left, glaring at me from behind a balled-up bloody T-shirt. He’s already starting to sport two black eyes, an improvement, if you ask me. Next to him is Jimmy, who leans over and tries to poke his nose. I’m too far away to hear what they say, but Rory isn’t pleased and slugs him in the arm, which, for a guy as built as Jimmy, means nothing.
Someone’s hand not too far over from Jimmy catches my eye; Odessa’s waving at me and then points slowly over to Rory and mouths, Nice job! I can’t believe she even cares. I hate that she plays all the sides. And now she’s gone, already back to her friends, laughing loud enough to be heard over the entire student body. I can make out Todd, arms over the chair next to him, way up top. He tosses me a nod and indicates that I should get Jo, but I don’t have the energy to play messenger girl.
I settle back into my chair and glance at Jo, who I realize could probably sit somewhere else. But I’m not ever scared of that type of thing. Since freshman year, she has proved fiercely loyal, and we three basically subsist as our own little clique. Not nerds, geeks, losers. Not even townies. I just think we’re good friends. I remember what Dad said, about how he wanted me to leave now without her. Or Rob. She sees me looking and gives me a quick pucker of her red lips, but the tension under her skin is visible. We’re all freaking out.
Not so far away from us on the row, I find myself staring at a newly familiar face. The boy from last night, sitting by himself. He’s keeping his eyes down, rolling a pencil between his fingers, when he glances up and catches me staring. His eyes are brown, a comforting color, but near the pupils they shift to a bright and vivid yellow. I realize I didn’t get a good chance to stare last night. There’s something magical to these moments when a new kid doesn’t know the cliques and is willing to speak to or hang out with anyone for the first few days. I kinda feel sorry for him; coming into Westbrook junior year and trying to find a way through all the unspoken rules must be a nightmare. And considering how he fared last night, he’s probably worried about putting himself out there again. That or he’s sitting near us because of Jo. I always have to keep her in mind when it comes to vagrant boys. She notices him too, grabs my arms and squeezes hard, and suddenly I’m wishing I didn’t look like a burned-out marshmallow.
