by Adam Rapp
Corinthia teeters a bit, and the unexpected act of her standing and the peril of her brief teetering create a sudden anxious hush in Lugo Memorial’s Connie and Dillard Deet Field House. Principal Ticonderoga’s fervent chant-along has ceased. The only thing that can be heard is the toiling of the blue-jumpsuited workers securing the many all-weather tarpaulins.
“What is it, Corinthia?” Principal Ticonderoga asks.
For the briefest moment, Corinthia Bledsoe’s eyes roll into the back of her head. Her hands reach high above her, spastically, as if they suddenly possess their own lunatic intelligence. There is a collective intake of breath. Even Coach Task and his assistant coach, the rhino-faced Roy Toscas, are completely agog, their mouths hanging open as if they are suddenly starving.
Corinthia’s hands fall to rest at her sides, and she simply says, “There will be birds.”
“Birds?” Principal Ticonderoga replies, sort of bewildered, understandably so.
“Birds will eat the football field,” Corinthia says.
“What kind of birds?” Vice Principal Doogan Mejerus interjects, his high voice tooting.
“Important birds,” Corinthia hears herself say.
“Well, thank you for the information, Ms. Bledsoe,” Principal Ticonderoga says, still off mic.
“It’ll be the greatest flock of birds anyone in Lugo’s ever seen.”
There is nothing threatening in Corinthia’s voice. Nothing obnoxious. In fact, if anything, her voice carries with it a calm certainty, a resolve one possesses when one has grasped something truly remarkable.
“Again, thank you,” Principal Ticonderoga says, directly into the microphone this time, sending a blade of feedback into the proceedings. While all assembled squint and paw at their ears, Vice Principal Doogan Mejerus performs a little jig of assistance and adjusts the grooved flexible neck of the microphone holder for her.
“Please sit down, Ms. Bledsoe,” Principal Ticonderoga adds.
Corinthia waits a few moments, casting her large, round, haunted eyes out over the entire assembly.
Where is my brother? she suddenly wonders.
She can’t find Channing anywhere. Usually he’s within arm’s reach of Winter Hornacek or clustered with his football buddies — they’re all wearing their game-day varsity letterman jackets today — but Channing’s not with them either.
Where is the senior class’s most cherished varsity athlete?
Has he shrunk down to the size of an ant? Corinthia wonders. Does he have the ability to do that, too? Has he so mastered his body that he can actually change shape like a superhero? Has he lowered himself under the bleachers, where he is snapping off a fast set of fifty push-ups?
Corinthia gazes up at the men on the scaffolding. They’ve ceased working now and simply stare down at her as the long blue tarpaulins flutter and pop high above the assembly.
“Do I need to have you removed from the assembly, Ms. Bledsoe?”
Principal Ticonderoga’s voice is kind, forthright, maternal. Its arrangement of even, mellifluous notes drifts through the field house like the sound of an oboe. It almost makes Corinthia sleepy, this sound. It’s a long way down for her to sit, but Corinthia manages it in a three-part move, finding the wooden surface of the bleachers with her hands, lowering her hips, and easing herself down.
Nothing else is said for close to twenty seconds. Guidance Counselor Denton Smock engages the stopwatch feature on his digital Timex and copies the exact interval of seconds (19.55) in his little notebook, which obviously survived the tornadoes, as did his clown fish, Rodney, and his aquarium that pulses with pastel brain light.
Principal Ticonderoga details the immediate plans for classes while the cleanup team gets the main school building back in order. Specifically, the high school will be leasing a fleet of Airstream trailers from nearby Ketchum, which will be parked at close proximity to the main school building. Temporary classrooms as a kind of utopian campsite.
“Things are going to be a bit creative for a while,” she warns lovingly, “so I expect everyone to be on their best behavior. It’s time to be more than simply a member of the student body or a member of the faculty or the staff. Let’s challenge ourselves to come together as dynamic citizens of Lugo!”
The applause is thunderous and heartfelt. Head Librarian Doris Dabaduda practically lifts up off her first-row pinewood bleacher — leg brace, cane, and all.
Larry “Oh, for Pete’s Sake!” Ambromitis, the putty-faced band leader and JV cross-country coach who is rumored to have an inoperable ganglion cyst on the back side of his left knee that bears an uncanny resemblance to Whoopi Goldberg, is so enthused that his arms rise up and he begins conducting a marching band that isn’t even there.
Denton Smock presses the top of his most trusted mechanical pencil, extending the filament of soft lead, and duly notes all the necessary information. He is particularly drawn to one new student, Billy Ball, a prepubescent freshman loner seated in the center of the bleachers, so diminutive that, in the crush of normal-size students, he looks puppetlike. Over the summer break, Billy Ball’s father, the owner of a local potato chips distributor, collapsed and died at his dining-room table, and his widow, Kitty Ball, called the Lugo Memorial guidance counselor a few days after the funeral to see if Mr. Smock would begin seeing her son the week before school began. She told him that Billy had been acting extremely withdrawn and that his obsession with Native American culture was starting to border on disturbing. One night, for instance, Billy came to the dinner table and sat in his father’s seat with several arrowheads arranged in his hair as well as a stroke of red face paint splitting his eyebrows. It frightened Kitty Ball, and she hasn’t since been able to shake the image.
“Dan used to take him canoeing and arrowhead hunting,” she explained. “But it wasn’t anything serious.”
A week before classes, Billy Ball and the Lugo Memorial guidance counselor met in the little basement office with the orange clown fish, and after thirty minutes of intermittent chatting about this and that, Denton Smock thought it would be a good idea for Billy Ball to start writing in a journal, to essay his private thoughts.
“Don’t think of it as an assignment,” he urged Billy. “It’s a place where you can tell things to yourself. A safe place. These are things you might not even tell me.”
Denton Smock unlocked a special drawer and produced a new thick notebook of green graph paper, exactly like the one he keeps his statistics logged in. He then slid it across his desk to Billy and could’ve sworn that his new friend took it in his small, pale hands and regarded the notebook with a kind of awe, that perhaps the very idea of writing in a diary opened up a whole new world for this young, grieving teen.
In general, Denton Smock was struck by Billy Ball’s quiet stillness, his large hazel eyes that rarely seemed to blink, and a subtle self-possession that belied his physical stature. He found he could make no explicit assessment about the boy’s psychological well-being, and when asked about his father’s death, Billy Ball seemed neither grief-stricken nor particularly interested in the subject. In Denton Smock’s estimation, he was a fascinating but somewhat inaccessible boy.
Denton Smock looks forward to their next session — he’s seen Billy Ball four times thus far — and with this thought, he locates his new counselee, who is seated beside ginger-haired sophomore Ben Krabbenhoff. Denton Smock even gently waves to get Billy Ball’s attention — a simple extension of the right hand, palm facing out, as if in benediction — but the boy’s large hazel eyes seem to be focused on a point somewhere between the fiberglass backboards and the blue-jumpsuited workers maneuvering on the scaffolding high overhead. Billy Ball is “somewhere else,” as Denton Smock likes to say. He is outside of his young, unformed body, perhaps roaming some ethereal rolling meadow where dad death, peer pressure, and the greedy-eyed hoarders of puberty aren’t looming behind every corner.
During their second meeting, Billy Ball confirmed that, yes, he had begun writing in
this notebook. He pulled it out of his backpack and held it up so Mr. Smock could see. Billy Ball had written DAVE across the front cover with black Sharpie.
“Who’s Dave?” Denton Smock asked.
“Dave the Diary,” Billy Ball replied, and then returned the notebook to his backpack as if it were as insignificant as an unbreakable comb. Then the high-pitched three-second tone signifying the end of the period sounded, and that was that. Billy rose and exited with an odd, almost vacant look of bemusement that reminded Denton Smock of Merlin Whitehawk, a fellow altar boy from his youth. Merlin Whitehawk, also large-eyed, quiet, and pale, so fascinated Denton Smock that he would follow him home after Sunday Mass, all the way to the Whitehawks’ unremarkable clapboard ranch house, where Merlin would enter through the slim front door that would open and close behind him as if by its own will.
The winter of eighth grade, during Christmas break, Merlin Whitehawk fell through the ice and drowned in Big Bear Lake, and there is always a moment in the late fall, just as the temperature grows too chilly for sweaters and thin jackets, when Denton Smock is reminded of this loss.
At the end of Principal Ticonderoga’s tornado assembly, everyone is released and sent home. As instructed, classes will commence tomorrow, and the rest of the day will be spent getting those Airstreams up and running.
Just as Corinthia is about to exit the field house, Principal Ticonderoga stops her. In her calm, controlled voice, she says, “Can I have a word with you, Ms. Bledsoe?”
Corinthia nods, and Principal Ticonderoga guides her toward the corner, just under a pull-up bar, to be exact, which Corinthia has to negotiate her head underneath and then up, so that her face is now positioned between the iron pull-up bar and the field house’s unforgiving brick wall.
Vice Principal Doogan Mejerus stands a few feet away now, hands behind his back, his bald head gleaming, his always-smiling eyes cast down deferentially.
“Corinthia, I think you should take a few days at home,” Principal Ticonderoga begins. “Some time away from school will be good for you.”
“Because of what I said about the birds?”
The pull-up bar is now abutting the little fleshy valley between her lower teeth and chin.
Principal Ticonderoga makes a strained face — her liver-colored lips sort of curl into her teeth, and her eyes go small in a reptilian way. She says, “You’ve obviously been under considerable strain. Sometimes it’s best to take a step back. Think of it as an opportunity to get some perspective.”
Corinthia says, “But what about my perfect attendance?”
“I’ll make sure your student record isn’t compromised in any significant way. Vice Principal Mejerus spoke to your mother just a moment ago. And he also left word for your father at work. Right, Doogan?”
Corinthia looks down and over at Vice Principal Mejerus, who is nodding so animatedly, he might be mistaken for some overly eager cartoon platypus.
“The Airstreams are gonna be pretty cramped,” he offers in his congested soprano.
“This is true,” Principal Ticonderoga agrees. “Many of them are only six and a half feet tall.”
“Seventy-five inches, actually,” Vice Principal Mejerus confirms. “The standard exterior height is a hundred inches, but we can’t very well put you on top of one of those puppies.”
“But we’ll eventually solve that,” Principal Ticonderoga says. “In the meantime, take this time. We’ll make sure your class assignments are delivered to you via e-mail. The important thing is that you get some rest. And try to clear your mind of these apocalyptic thoughts.”
“They’re not just thoughts,” Corinthia says, her lips grazing the cold, indifferent, molecular surface of the pull-up bar.
“Bad thoughts are what usually does a person in,” Vice Principal Mejerus offers obliquely, inching closer to his boss, his hands still clasped behind his back.
“One more thing,” Principal Ticonderoga adds, again conspicuously not contending with Corinthia’s comment about her apocalyptic thoughts. “Your brother didn’t attend the assembly.”
“Yeah, Channing wasn’t here, was he?” Vice Principal Mejerus says.
“Any idea where he might be?” Principal Ticonderoga asks. “I understand he wasn’t on your bus this morning.”
“On game days he walks to school,” Corinthia says.
“Well, today was supposed to be a game day,” Vice Principal Mejerus offers. “I wonder if Coach Task has any idea where he might be.”
Corinthia tells them that the last time she saw him was at last night’s dinner.
“You didn’t see him this morning?” Vice Principal Mejerus asks.
Corinthia shakes her head, grazing the pull-up bar with a cheek.
“Huh,” Principal Ticonderoga offers. A simple “Huh.” As if she turned the light on in a room and a man she’s never met before is sitting at a table, carving an apple.
Corinthia stops by her locker to retrieve her spiral notebook binder and the rest of her textbooks. Someone has scrawled FUM across the face of her locker in black Sharpie, the ink so freshly applied that she can smell its quick chemical odor. The letters have been composed with long, stilt-like elegance and are pristinely framed by the tall, thin rectangle of her locker door, just below the three grooved ventilation slats. She goes down on a knee to confirm the careful arrangement of the sloping middle vowel and two terminal consonants. FUM. As in fee-fi fo . . .? Whoever tagged her locker did it recently, most likely after the assembly, while she was being cornered. Did Principal Ticonderoga and Vice Principal Mejerus sense something like this would happen? Is this why they’ve asked her to stay away from school? What would be next, more explicit graffiti? A scarier message? A beat-down? A death threat? But the tornadoes weren’t her fault! She wasn’t responsible for their arrival! She can’t control Mother Nature!
After she gathers her things, Corinthia shuts her locker and takes in the single syllable once more.
FUM
It’s the first time anyone’s ever written on her locker. Once, when she was a freshman, a girl named Shawna Dabonis got her period for the first time in the middle of home ec and wound up running out of class with an embarrassing stain seeping through the seat of her white Dittos. A few hours later, after a visit to the school nurse, Shawna Dabonis was allowed to go home to change her clothes. When she returned to Lugo Memorial, someone had painted FIRST PERIOD in red nail polish across the face of her locker.
The second floor of Lugo Memorial is quiet. Per Principal Ticonderoga’s instructions, the rest of the student body has gone home. The hall smells strange, like wet leaves and soil. The tornadoes have unleashed something in the air. Perhaps Mother Nature herself has been somehow perverted. Will there be earthworms in the water fountain? Baby birds in the wood shop cubbies? Grass growing in the cafeteria?
Down the hall, two men in blue jumpsuits are using push brooms to sweep up the scattered debris. Corinthia feels like she and this duo have survived an apocalypse, like they’ve emerged simultaneously from some underground bomb shelter. The men stop and stare at her, their brooms at rest at their sides, mouths agape, but she is a giant, after all. She’s used to this.
“You okay, miss?” one of them asks. He is slim and pale. The other one is taller, darker, shaped like a kangaroo, and is wearing what appear to be safety goggles, which reflect squibs of light from the overhead fluorescents.
Corinthia nods to them.
“I’m fine,” she says.
They return the nod and resume their work.
Before she heads out, she stops by her private bathroom, where she is greeted by the same word. FUM has been written with slasher-movie violence across the heavy blond-wood door. Corinthia takes in the dark, runny spray paint and starts to reach toward the letter F when she hears a voice.
“I wouldn’t touch that.”
Corinthia turns to face one of the blue-jumpsuited workers. He is African American, of average height, thin, and very dark-skinned. He holds a
bucket containing a rag and a rectangular aluminum can of turpentine. His woolly hair is thinning at the crown of his head. His large brown eyes appear tired, the whites a bit dull.
“It’s still wet,” he adds. His voice is deep and dry. When he speaks, Corinthia notices that he’s missing an incisor.
“Sorry,” Corinthia says, retracting her hand.
He tells her that the girls’ bathroom is empty.
“This one’s mine,” Corinthia says.
“You got your own personalized spot?” he says. “You must have juice around here.”
“No, I just seem to keep breaking stuff,” Corinthia explains. “Too unwieldy for standard utilities.”
“Well, some dude with a clipboard just sent me up here to clean that word off the door.”
“Go ahead,” Corinthia says, and simply stands there. For the first time today, she feels her sleepless night catching up with her. A faint gaseous warmth passes through her brain. She’d like to slide down the wall and sit for a while. Though she tried to keep thoughts of the tornadoes at bay, the few times she closed her eyes, the funnels materialized.
“You okay?” the man asks.
“I’m fine,” she says.
“You ain’t gonna be sick, are you?”
“I’m just tired,” she replies. “I didn’t sleep much last night.”
“I couldn’t sleep neither,” he says. “I think them tornadoes was messin’ with the equilibriums. Didn’t nobody know they were comin’. Not even the weatherman on the news.”
He douses his rag with turpentine.
“They sure did a number on your school,” the man says, rubbing the rag over the surface of the door. “Whole first floor looks like wild dogs was let loose. All the windows are blown out. Glass everywhere. Cafeteria tables tossed this way and that. Third floor’s even worse. All the locker doors got tore off. Y’all lucky this happened at night; otherwise there’d be a lotta hurt people.”
