by Kelli Kimble
“Yes,” she continued at a fast clip that didn’t allow me to politely speak, “and, in accordance with the rules of the league — as well as the pledge you signed when you tried out for the team,” she pointed to a binder that was opened to my application on the desk beside her, “you are hereby removed from the team. I require the return of your uniform — cleaned, pressed, and neatly folded — by Friday. I’d like to take this opportunity to express my disappointment in your behavior and beg you to accept all responsibility for the incident.”
A million thoughts clogged my brain, log-jamming at my mouth.
“You will not participate in practice today, and you may not try out for the team again.”
“I’m a senior,” I finally managed to say. “Why would I try out again?”
She ignored my statement, pushing away from the desk. “I have practice to see to.”
“But . . . I don’t understand,” I said.
“What’s there to understand?”
“Why?”
“Are you disputing that you assaulted Gary Damien?”
“Of course, I’m disputing it. I was only defending myself.”
She tipped her head back, looking down at me along the side of her nose. “Self-defense doesn’t usually translate to the types of injuries that Mr. Damien has.”
“Oh,” I said. Right at that moment, the unjustness of it all overwhelmed me, and I couldn’t keep in my response. “So, I should have let him do whatever he wanted to do? I shouldn’t have fought for my virtue?”
She sniffed. “The fact that you needed to fight for your virtue tells me you had none to fight for in the first place. You think good boys like Gary just go around, doing whatever they want, to whomever they want? No. You did something to encourage him.”
“Actually, no. I don’t think boys like Gary go around doing whatever to whomever. I think he picks his victims very carefully.”
Coach Dimmit’s chest puffed up like she’d swallowed a porcupine, and the apples of her cheeks flushed an intense red. She pointed first at me and then at the door. “I’ve heard enough. I expect your uniform on my desk on Friday, and I don’t want to speak with you again.”
I counted it a victory that I didn’t call her any names as I left the closet.
Outside, I sat on the curb, my chin propped on my hand. Daddy wouldn’t be here to collect me for another two hours. I didn’t want to walk home, but it seemed like that was my only option.
I squashed down the urge to feel sorry for myself, hefted my school bag over my shoulder, and started walking. A horn began honking somewhere in the parking lot. The sound irritated me. Maybe it was the brassy note, the volume, or the urgency — actually, it was probably all three.
The honking got louder and more insistent.
Some people. I turned out of the parking lot and onto the sidewalk heading towards town. The horn blared again, this time right next to me. I jumped.
“Oh! I’m so sorry, Iris. I didn’t mean to startle you. You just didn’t seem to hear me.” It was Miss Cucciolo, driving in a little red convertible with the top down. She had a scarf that matched the fire-engine color of her car tied over her bouffant hairdo and black sunglasses that nearly eclipsed her face. “You aren’t walking home alone, are you?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “I’m not staying for practice, and my father won’t be here to pick me up for another two hours.”
“You can’t walk home. I’ll drive you. Hop in.”
“But —”
“No buts. Get in, young lady.” She softened the demand with a huge grin. Were her canine teeth extra sharp?
I opened the passenger door and got in. She leaned over and opened the glovebox, rooting around until she pulled out a lavender scarf. She dropped it in my lap. “Tie this over your hair, unless you want to be brushing out a rat’s nest all evening.”
I tied it over my head, and she put the car in gear. “Where to? Feel like going for a soda first?”
A little thrill ran down my spine. Miss Cucciolo wasn’t a student. But she was young, for a faculty member. And female. And . . . Anubian?
“That sounds terrific,” I said. I leaned over far enough to check the way the scarf was arranged in the side view mirror.
“No need to look,” she said. “You look fabulous.”
She jammed a foot on the gas, pressing me back into the seat. A giggle bubbled up. Not wanting to seem childish, I suppressed it and smiled back at her instead.
She drove into town and parked in front of Freddie’s, the only drugstore in Salvation. It occupied a two-story brick building with plate glass windows on the first floor that Freddie, even though he was so old he could barely stand upright, obsessively cleaned every day. He was out there now, carrying a bucket and a rag. I’d only been inside twice; Daddy felt it was too expensive.
“Miss Cucciolo,” he said, spotting us. “So nice to see you. How are you liking your new car?”
“I love it,” she said. She swept off her glasses and removed her scarf with a flourish, wrapping it around the strap of her pocketbook. I stuffed the one she gave me into the pocket of my skirt.
“It suits you.” He held the door open for us. He didn’t say anything to me, but his eyes followed me as we went inside. The door swung shut behind us, tinkling a bell.
Freddie’s son, Jay, came out of the backroom. He had a white paper cap on with a red line along the side and wore a white button-down shirt with a red and white striped tie. An apron with soda stains on it hung around his neck. He beamed when he saw Miss Cucciolo.
“Good afternoon, Miss Cucciolo. What can I get you?” He didn’t even glance at me.
We went up to the counter and each climbed onto a stool. “Jay, so nice to see you,” she said. “I’ll have a soda. Iris?”
I nodded. “I’ll have the same, please.”
His eyes lingered on her with a dreamy expression for a moment more before he seemed to wake up. He stared at me; his eyes narrowed. “Iris? Are you Iris Hond?”
I licked my lips. “Yes, sir.”
“Iris is my favorite student,” Miss Cucciolo said in a bright voice. “She had kind of a bad day. I brought her here to cheer her up.”
Jay’s gaze swung back to her. “I don’t know if my father would like me serving her.”
“Oh.” She started to get down. “If you feel that way, then I guess you don’t want to serve me, either.”
“Wait!”
She stopped. “Yes?”
“I suppose one soda wouldn’t hurt.”
She settled back into place. “Terrific.”
He busied himself with our order.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I said when he’d moved out of earshot.
“No. He was out of line.”
Jay delivered our sodas. He hovered around Miss Cucciolo for a few minutes, asking her inane questions about the weather and happenings at the school. When another customer tinkled the bell, he moved away to greet them.
“I think he likes you,” I whispered.
“I know. I’ve been waiting for him to get up the nerve to ask me on a date. I might have to ask him myself.” She laughed. “He’s attractive and seems sweet, but I’m afraid he’ll need permission from his father.”
“Isn’t he kind of old?”
She shrugged. “I’d prefer someone my own age. But there aren’t many eligible bachelors around a small town like Salvation.”
Mr. Anu flashed into my mind, since he’s the only bachelor I know, though I couldn’t see him with Miss Cucciolo. Once he was in my mind I couldn’t get away from his theory that she was Anubian.
“Do you know anything about ancient Egypt?” I asked, taking a sip of my soda. The bubbles tickled my nose.
“Lots, actually. Before I decided to be a librarian I wanted to be an archaeologist.”
“What changed your mind?”
She stirred her soda with the straw, her expression turning melancholy. “A boy.”
“What
happened? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“No, it’s okay. I thought I was in love. He stole the research from a project I’d been working on. He published my findings and got some recognition and kudos. Nobody believed my accusations that he’d stolen my work when I raised them, and I was driven out of the department.”
The world slowed for a moment. She was talking about the same kind of treatment I was experiencing.
“You understand,” I said.
She nodded. “Somewhat. Better than most.” She put a cool palm on my forearm. “It feels terrible, what you’re going through. The way people want to believe the worst of you, the way they think he’s infallible with nothing to base that on except that they think he’s charming.” She chewed on her straw. “It’s frustrating.”
“Yeah.” We sipped our sodas in silence. Jay came over.
“Can I get you ladies anything else?”
“Just the total, please, Jay,” she said. “For both.” She completed the transaction with him, and he didn’t say anything more about who I was and whether I was welcome.
“Ready?” she asked me.
We returned to the car. She replaced her scarf and I did the same. “Would you mind if we went to my father’s office? Just so he doesn’t look for me at the school.”
“Sure,” she said. She started the car. “You haven’t mentioned why you didn’t stay for practice.” She gave me a sideways look before she put her sunglasses on.
“Coach Dimmit cut me.”
“Oh.” Her mouth twisted into a frustrated expression, but she said nothing more.
I directed her to the insurance office. I thought she’d wait in the car, but she came in.
His office building used to be a two-bedroom cottage. The owner had lived and worked there, but he moved out and locked all his old things in the master bedroom while he went on a retirement trip around the United States with his wife. Every now and then, Daddy would mention receiving a postcard featuring an image of some roadside tourist trap from him.
Daddy’s office was in what used to be the dining area. It was small, with a window overlooking the side yard, and only just big enough for a desk and his chair. The chairs set out for clients to sit in sat half in the dining room and half in the kitchen. Daddy only used the kitchen to make coffee so it didn’t really matter all that much.
“Iris,” he said, looking up from his work when I came in. “How did you get here? Why aren’t you at practice?”
“Hi, Daddy,” I said. “This is the school librarian, Miss Cucciolo. She offered me a ride home today.”
“A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Hond. You have a lovely daughter.”
“Likewise,” he said. His eyes never left me.
“I’ve been invited to leave the cheerleading team,” I said. I chewed on my lip.
He frowned.
“I’m sure it’s a misunderstanding,” Miss Cucciolo said.
“It’s not,” he said.
She shook her head. “I’m sorry.”
“It isn’t something for you to be sorry for.” He gathered the papers on his desk and began organizing them into folders. “Come along, Iris. I’ll take you home, and Miss Cucciolo can get on with her day.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble at all for me to drop her at your home,” she said. “She only wanted to be sure that you didn’t worry if you went to the school looking for her.”
“There’s reason to worry.”
“Yes.”
I wanted to cry. I wanted to yell at them for talking about me as if I couldn’t hear, I wanted everyone else to stop acting like I was the bad guy, I wanted Gary to get what was coming. But none of that would happen.
“All right then. Iris, why don’t you let your teacher take you home. I’ll be along soon.”
“Yes, sir.”
Back in the car, Miss Cucciolo gave me a sympathetic look.
“Can you smell things really well?” I blurted, before she could say anything more about Gary or being cut from the team or how life is almost unbearable and then you die.
“That’s a strange question,” she said. “Since you mentioned it, though, yes. It does happen that I have a particularly good sense of smell.”
“What about your ears. Do you hear things, things other people can’t seem to hear?”
She started the car and backed out into the street, sticking her tongue out a little as she put the car back into first gear. “Why?”
“Can you see outside at night?”
“Iris. This is really bizarre. Why do you want to know?”
“Someone recently told me something about where I'm from, about what I am. I’m not sure if I believe it. But I think you share some of the same traits, and I’d like to know if you believe it.”
“All right,” she said. “What is it?”
“Earlier, you said you wanted to study archeology. Why?”
“The pyramids of Egypt have fascinated me since I was a child.”
“So, you know a lot about ancient Egypt?”
“Yes,” she laughed. “I suppose more than the average person.”
“You know who Anubis is?”
“He was the god of the underworld.”
“Was he real?”
She stopped the car. We were in the middle of the block. Her head turned to me in slow motion. A car behind us honked.
“Real? Iris, are you feeling unwell?”
“No. I’m asking if a god could have been a real physical being. Something that actually did what the Egyptians said.”
“That’s what I thought you were asking.” She set the car in motion. “Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that he was real. What does that mean to you?”
“If he were real, he could have had children with a human, and those children could have had more. Generation after generation of them, half-god, half-human. All the way to today. To me, and you.”
“You’re scaring me, Iris. Do your parents know about this?”
My shoulders drooped. I’d blown it. The closest thing you have to a friend in this entire world believes you were only defending yourself against Gary. And now she also believes you’re a nutball.
“This is my street,” I said. She turned and I pointed at my house. She stopped in front of it.
“Iris. Why would you think any of what you’re saying is true?”
I changed directions. “Did you know your last name means ‘young dog’ in Italian? Or that mine means ‘dog’ in Dutch?”
“Sure.” She took off her sunglasses and put them in a case. She studied me.
“What can dogs do, that humans can’t?”
“I don’t know. They have four legs and fur.”
I shook my head. “I mean their senses.”
“They see in black and white.”
She was missing it. “No. Dogs have an intense sense of smell. They have extra-sharp hearing, and they can see in the dark.” I paused to let her absorb that. “And so do we.”
“Iris.”
“Have you ever noticed that you have two upper teeth that are sharper?”
She blinked. Bingo.
“When I was small, a dentist accused me of trying to sharpen mine. I’ve never done anything to them.” I grimaced, pulling my lips up and away from my teeth to reveal them.
She stared at my mouth, and her hand drifted up to touch one of hers. “Other kids always made fun of them.”
“Those are your canine teeth. Everyone has them. But we have actual canine teeth.”
Her eyebrows went up.
“Do you know the man who bought the Thompson farm?” I asked.
“No.”
“I think you’d like to meet him.” I held out her scarf. “Thank you for the ride. I appreciate it.”
“Keep it. It suits you.”
My heart fluttered. She was trying to be my friend, to be supportive and understanding. And I was returning the favor by ramming a story about some Egyptian god down her throat.
“Thank you.” I
rubbed the silky fabric between my fingers and grabbed my school bag. “I’ll see you at school tomorrow. Thank you for the soda. And the ride.”
“Of course,” she said. “See you tomorrow.”
Inside, Mother was at the kitchen table drinking a cup of coffee. The cabinet where she kept her whiskey was ajar.
“Iris,” she said. “I’m so glad you’re home. Your father called.”
I sank into the chair beside her. “I’m not a cheerleader anymore.”
“I know.” She slid her arm over my shoulders and pulled me closer. I breathed in the smell of her coffee. Curiously, the sweet bite of Irish whiskey wasn’t present. “You’ve been having a rough time. Your father and I think maybe we need to investigate another way for you to get your diploma.”
“How?”
“You’re a smart girl, a good student. What about just getting your GED?”
I pulled back. “I could do that?”
“Of course. I think it would be better if you don’t go to that school anymore.”
The phone rang. Mother jumped as if I’d pinched her. “I’ll get it.” She hurried away to answer it.
I trailed after her, mulling over the GED idea. Could I still go to college with a GED?
The phone stopped ringing, and Mother started to greet the caller, but then her tone turned harsh. I stopped just short of the living room doorway. She was facing away from me, her shoulders hunched to her ears.
“Stop calling here,” she hissed. She hung up the phone.
“Mother? Who was it?”
She whirled around to me. “Nobody. Don’t worry about it.”
“Mother,” I said.
“We’ll talk about it when your father gets home. Go do your homework, please.”
“If I’m quitting school why would I do my homework?”
Her face crumpled, and she eased herself onto the sofa. She pulled a hankie from her apron pocket which wasn’t carefully folded; this wasn’t the first time today she’d used it.
“Mother?” I went and put an arm around her. Sobs were shaking her entire body, but she made no sound at all. The hankie was crushed in her fist and pressed against her mouth.
“We made such a mistake coming here,” she said when she’d calmed. “I’m sorry we dragged you here, away from everything you knew and made you start over. You should be having a good time in school, making friends, and maturing into a young woman. Instead, all of these terrible things are happening. How are we supposed to protect you?”
