The Fifth Circle

by Tricia Drammeh

  Chapter 15- Alex

  And afterward I will rejoin my band

  Which goes lamenting its eternal doom

  (Canto XV, lines 41 & 42)

  My guidance counselor, Mrs. Pedrotti, shuffled through stacks of paperwork and each time she licked her finger to turn a page, I cringed. I hated the idea that her spit would mark each paper in my file. Did traces of her saliva infect the permanent records of every student in the school? She pushed her glasses higher on her nose and looked across the desk where I sat waiting to see why she’d summoned me.

  I never got in trouble, so I wasn’t worried when I received the crisp pink slip that told me to appear in the guidance counselor’s office, but since I wasn’t exactly a frequent flyer in the main offices, I couldn’t help but feel somewhat curious. Several scenarios shot through my mind during the three minutes I’d been sitting in the cramped space filled with overflowing files and half-dead plants.

  The fear of being ‘reported’ was never far from the back of my mind. When I was younger, I often fantasized about the day someone would notice the physical symptoms of my father’s rage, but it was as much a nightmare as a dream. The shame kept me from truly wishing for deliverance. I racked my brains and tried to remember the last time I’d come to school with a visible bruise, but it had been a while. Besides, no one had ever cared before, and now that I was eighteen, anything that happened to me couldn’t be considered child abuse.

  Mrs. Pedrotti’s smoker’s cough practically shook the foundations of the school building. She reeked of nicotine. With all the anti-smoking campaigns aimed toward teens, her presence seemed counterproductive. At last, her hacking subsided and she cleared her throat.

  “Alexandra, I’ve just received copies of your ACT scores. Why did you wait so long to take the test? Many of the application deadlines have passed for the good schools…” her speech trailed off to make way for more hacking and throat clearing. “Which colleges did you send your scores to?”

  “Um, maybe UMSL. Oh, and Saint Louis Community College, but I doubt I’ll go there.” I chewed on a ragged fingernail and watched while the placid expression on her face morphed to stunned disbelief.

  “Community college?” Her eyes bulged from behind her thick, coke-bottle glasses. “Alex, you have an English score of thirty-four! In math, you pulled a thirty-one, and that’s one of your weakest subjects according to your report cards. With some extra-curricular activities under your belt, maybe some volunteer work…we could get started on a plan right away…I’d have to check on deadlines, and it might be too late…we’ve never had an Ivy League bound student…”

  She spoke of Composite scores and Application essays while tapping wildly on her keyboard. Her eyes lit up from the glow of fanaticism and the flickering computer screen. My head felt heavy and Mrs. Pedrotti’s voice seemed far away. I began to tune her out. In all likelihood, she’d mixed up my records with those of another student. No way was I Harvard material. But, on the off chance she wasn’t mistaken and those test scores belonged to me, I couldn’t fathom actually following through on any of the suggestions she made.

  “Alex,” she snapped, and I whipped my head up to look at her. “Sports? Do you play any sports?” I shook my head. “Do you volunteer anywhere?” Her mouth turned down when I shook my head again and the hope faded from her eyes.

  I hated to be such a disappointment, so I struggled to remember if I’d done anything worthwhile over the past four years. “I’m in Honor Choir…there was a reward…oh, yeah, like, I had a solo and got first place at the Missouri Junior competition.”

  “Maybe we can work with that. Alex, it’s not too late to join one of the clubs here. I’ll ask around. What I need you to do in the meantime is volunteer. Nursing homes, the Humane Society, Special Olympics…something.” She sounded desperate. I was her one great hope to crank out an Ivy Leaguer before retirement, and she was determined to make it happen.

  “I did the Polar Bear Plunge for Special Olympics. You know, we went into the freezing cold lake to raise money…”

  “That’s excellent! You can use that for a college essay… how it made you feel, the motive behind doing it…” Her smile seemed just a little too bright, but I appreciated her misguided faith in me. “I want you back here next Wednesday during fourth period so we can fill out online applications together. You need to have your parents fill out the FAFSA for financial aid and I’ll start looking into scholarships. We have a lot to do, Alex. I hope it isn’t too late.”

  On a swift wind of mock-enthusiasm and false promises, I swept from the guidance office, my arms laden with paperwork and brochures. A quick glance at the clock above the secretary’s desk told me my lunch period had already begun, so I scurried to the cafeteria.

  Sean sat at our usual table with an irritable scowl on his face. When he saw me approach, he snapped something at Cole, and his friend quickly moved his feet from the chair next to Sean. A waterfall of black hair cascaded over Cole’s face, but I could see one shifty eye peeking out from behind a greasy lock. I glanced away before Sean caught me looking. I didn’t want him to think I was scamming on his creepy friend.

  “What’s all that shit?” Sean asked, waving dismissively toward the mish-mash of paperwork I placed in front of me.

  “Oh, you know. College information. Mrs. Pedrotti gave me a bunch of stuff,” I said with a shrug. I worked to neaten the stack of papers and shoved them into my binder before Sean got too nosy.

  “Is that why you were late?”

  “Yeah, she likes to talk a lot.” I prayed he wouldn’t insist on looking through my papers. If he saw the Harvard sample essay questions, he’d freak out and accuse me of trying to escape to Boston without him. I’d prefer to have that conversation later…or, better yet, not at all.

  “So…” He trailed off when Cole interrupted. It was the first time I’d actually liked the weird Emo kid who usually gave me bad vibes.

  “Dude, so like I was saying before, you must have been up all night! Our rank has never been so high. I mean, only the quads with Aussies or some shit get to that level. A quad full of people in the same time zone is usually not successful. Bender actually wanted me to find a player on the other side of the world to fill the spot, but he’s glad we gave you a shot. So, when do you sleep?”

  “I sleep. Just not lately,” Sean said.

  “That’s not good. You really…” I stopped speaking when he threw me a nasty look.

  “Don’t start with me.”

  “Sorry, I…”

  “Yeah, I haven’t really slept in about three days. I don’t need to. I’ve logged about thirty hours on the game in the last three days, caught up on all my homework, cleaned my whole house, and moved all the furniture in my room. You have no idea how much shit you can get done when you don’t have to sleep like a normal person. I’ve even written a couple of songs. I’m thinking about learning to play the guitar and starting a band.”

  What did he mean when he said “sleep like a normal person?” I focused on him more closely and noticed what I’d chosen to overlook over the past few days: the dark circles under eyes that glowed with a manic light, the nervous twitching, and the excessive talking about his grandiose plans. I wondered if his mother had noticed the beginning signs of his reemerging illness, but then remembered—Sean was my responsibility now.

  ***

  I tried not to dwell on the meeting with Mrs. Pedrotti, but it was impossible. Ignoring unpleasant or unwanted thoughts was my most valuable skill, but for some reason, I couldn’t stop thinking about my ACT scores and what it could mean for my future.

  Fortunately, Sean was so caught up in Tales of Andrometis, he had little time to worry about my petty concerns. No further mention of the college brochures were made. After school, he made love to me until I was sore, then ate half the contents of his mother’s refrigerator before logging on to the game. Sharp bursts of laughter punctuated my afternoon, and by the time he left for work, I’d become exhausted f
rom listening to his incessant chatter.

  Even my newest vampire romance novel could not distract me, so I finally called my sister. I rarely initiated contact with Claire, but she was the one person who could help me put the meeting with my guidance counselor into perspective. Although I knew I would never take any advice Claire offered, I just wanted to hear someone say, “I knew you could do it. I knew you were smart.”

  I regretted calling her almost instantly. She sounded rushed and hurried when she answered the phone. “Alex? What’s going on?” Background noise nearly obscured her voice.

  “Nothing. If you’re busy…”

  “No. Hold on. Let me just go somewhere a little more quiet,” she shouted into the phone. The sound of an apparent party faded into the distance. I heard a door slam door before my sister spoke again. “Everything okay?”

  I filled her in on my meeting with Mrs. Pedrotti. “So, that’s about it. I mean, I guess it’s pretty cool, but it’ll be impossible for me to get everything together so quickly. I’ll probably just go to Saint Louis Community College for a year while I try to get everything organized for next year.”

  “Alex, do you have a job?” she asked.

  “No.” I couldn’t see where she was going with that question. Maybe she thought I had enough money to pay for school without doing all the financial aid stuff.

  “Do you do a lot of volunteer work?”

  “No.” I’d already made that clear when I filled her in on every detail of my conversation with Mrs. Pedrotti.

  “Then what the hell else do you have to do that takes up so much of your time? And don’t mention Sean,” she said. “If you’re waiting for me to tell you you’re smart, that’s fine. You are. I’ve told you that before. Now, if you think I’m going to agree that you don’t have enough time to get your shit together in order to apply to a good school, forget it! I’m not going to help you make excuses.”

  “But, there’s a lot…”

  “No there’s not. So, maybe you won’t get into an Ivy League school, but still. There are tons of good schools you could apply to.” She lowered her voice. “Alex, I don’t think you should go somewhere local. You need to get out of Saint Edmunds. Even if you don’t go to a great school, at least go somewhere that isn’t close to home.”

  “But, then I’ll have to worry about housing and transportation…”

  “So what? You’re not an idiot. Your test scores prove that. It’s just a matter of making phone calls. Not even that—most of what you need is online. You don’t even have to talk to anyone. You should come here. That way, I can help you get settled. I have another year before I graduate.”

  The conversation wasn’t going the way I’d hoped. I wanted her to tell me how smart I was, not browbeat me into doing a bunch of stuff I wasn’t ready for. Change was difficult for me. Did I hate Saint Edmunds? Yes. Did I want to move away? Maybe in my vague daydreams. Was I willing to actively make changes in my life? Not right now.

  “Are you still there?”

  “Yeah. Look Claire, you know how hard it is for me to get anything done. I’ll apply to Lindenwood. It’s a good school,” I said.

  “It’s not about going to a good school,” Claire shouted. “It’s about getting away and having a real life. Alex, do you know what I did during my first semester here? Nothing. I sat in my room, did my work, and talked to no one. When I wasn’t studying, I slept. Then the nightmares came. I tried to take a whole bottle of my roommate’s Prozac right before finals because I couldn’t face going back home.”

  “Oh, Claire. Why?”

  “Why do you think? Alex, I’ve been in counseling for two years. You need to do the same. It’ll be difficult to face everything if you’re still living in that house. You need to…”

  Breathing heavily, I disconnected the call. When the phone vibrated in my hand, I dropped it to the floor. I sat down at the edge of my bed and waited for my heart to stop pounding in my ears. My whole body shivered from head to toe as I leaned over to pick up my phone. Sean was at work, but I sent him a text and prayed he’d call me back when he went on break.

  Claire was such a bitch. Why did she have to bring up a bunch of crap that had nothing to do with my current situation? I just wanted her to tell me she was proud of me, maybe give me some advice for next year—advice I didn’t have to act on right away. Instead she pushed me headfirst into a pool of unwanted memories.

  Closing my eyes, I could feel the room spinning around me. Flashes of light danced behind my eyelids, and with each spot of light, a new memory insinuated itself into my throbbing head: groping hands in the dark; pressure and pain and the sensation of not being able to breathe; blood-stained panties; Claire’s pale face when she returned from her first trip alone with Daddy. And what all these memories added up to was my fucked-up existence and the fact that I had nothing worth living for.

  My stomach churned. I flew from my bedroom and down the hallway. Slamming the bathroom door behind me, I fell to the floor in front of the toilet and emptied the contents of my stomach. I heaved and choked until nothing was left, until snot dripped from my nose, until tears fell from my eyes.

  “Alex? Are you okay, honey?” The sound of my mother’s voice helped me focus on something other than my roiling stomach. Weak with exhaustion, I leaned against the wall and tried to work up the strength to speak.

  “I’m fine. Just ate something bad,” I lied.

  “Well, call me if you need me,” she said. I could hear her footsteps moving down the hallway.

  Call her if I needed her? Why the hell would I do that? She’d never helped me before. I’d needed her for years, but she never listened… never wanted to hear. She’d tuned me out. All those years, I hated my father and prayed my mother would finally open her eyes to see what she refused to see. And now, I hated her too. I hated him. Most of all I hated me.

  I curled up on the bathroom rug and let the rage wash over me. Each wave of fury crashed over me and brought me to a new crescendo of anger. I thought about revenge. One phone call, and I could ruin my father. I could turn him in. Claire might back me up. But, that would bring about an endless round of court dates and I’d have to testify…

  Maybe I could just tell my mom and my aunt. Then I remembered: no one believed Claire, and she was the sensible one. If no one believed her, they wouldn’t believe me. It would just stir up a bunch of crap I wasn’t ready to face.

  I could tamper with my dad’s truck… maybe do something to cause him to have an accident. But, what if my tampering caused someone else to get hurt? Or, I could…

  My eyes flickered shut as apathy settled over me like a blanket, stifling the flames of my wrath. I would do nothing. Just like my teachers did. Just like my mom. Just like my aunt. I would do nothing because that’s what I always did. I was an accessory to the destruction of my own life.

  Chapter 16- Sean

  Thy living feet dost move along through Hell

  (Canto XVI, line 33)

  I didn’t want to go to work Saturday afternoon. In hindsight, I shouldn’t have gone. So much could have been avoided if I’d just trusted my own instincts and stayed at home on the computer. I tried to call in sick, but Jake forced me to come to work. He regretted it later.

  “Hey, this is Sean,” I said, trying to sound congested. I coughed into the phone. “I’m sick, dude. I can’t come in.”

  “Bullshit,” Jake replied. I could just imagine the smirk on his face. “I told you the last time: the next time you call in sick, you’re fired. So, either get your ass in here, or start looking for another job.

  “Fine. Whatever. But, I’ll probably cough all over everyone’s pizzas and get all the customers sick and …”

  “That’s a chance I’m willing to take,” he said.

  “Asswipe,” I muttered, tossing my phone onto my bed. Maybe a customer would come to pick up an order and see me coughing… then they would get sick and sue the shit out of Saint Ed’s Pizza. Then, I remembered I wasn’t really sick
. Sometimes I got so wrapped up in my own lies, I began to believe them.

  When I pulled into the parking lot, I sat in my truck for a couple of minutes. I didn’t want to walk in there too early. I wouldn’t give those bastards one single second of my time unless I was on the clock. If I clocked in a couple minutes early, I wouldn’t get paid for it because the crooks rounded up to the nearest hour. Sons of bitches.

  For the first hour of my shift, I concentrated on looking sick, acting sick, and basically doing as little as possible so Jake would feel bad for making me come in. I coughed half-heartedly on the prep table and he scowled at me.

  “Take out the trash, then get a mop and clean up in here. I don’t want you near the food,” he snapped.

  Oh, great. I hated taking out the trash and I hated mopping. After I emptied all the trash cans into a larger one, I wheeled it outside. I wasted as much time as I could even though it was uncomfortably cold outside. When my hands were numb from the bitter temperatures, I rolled the trash can back inside.

  “Since when does it take fifteen minutes to empty the trash?” Jake stood with his arms crossed in front of him. I wanted to smack the smart-ass glower off his face. “Get a mop and get busy.”

  I filled up a bucket of hot water and poured a crap-load of soap into it. I dipped the mop into the bucket, removed it without wringing it out, and flung the mop onto the floor with a splat. When Jake came back into the storeroom, he slipped on the water and fell on his ass. I laughed.

  “What the hell? Did you just dump the bucket on the floor? Are you too stupid to wring out the mop?” he shouted, struggling to his feet.

  My anger had given away to giddy laughter and I was bent over double in an attempt to catch my breath. Jake had a wet spot on his ass and that made me laugh even harder. When his face turned red with rage, I laughed harder still.

  “You’re fired. Get out,” he shouted.

  Those were the magic words that made my laughter subside. I let the mop fall to the floor. “You can’t fire me just for laughing at your stupid ass for falling.”