Bursting Bubbles (2 page)

“We’re not trying to create Mother Teresas,” argues Mrs Mahoney. “Just open them up a little and encourage a sense of public responsibility. And in any case, you can’t blame them for the less challenging options. The brief is necessarily rather broad.”

“I’m not blaming them. But the majority of placements are within our township.” Dr Kilpatiky absent-mindedly twists her wedding ring around her finger. “Which means that many of our students have no idea how most people live.”

Sebastian Marks from the language-arts department stops doodling at the bottom of his agenda and puts down his pen. “With all due respect, Irenie, ‘most people’ don’t live in the United States. So even if you have them running a soup kitchen they’re not going to know how most people in the world live.”

Dr Kilpatiky’s mouth looks like patience stretched to its limits. “I meant most people around here, Seb.”

“Even so,” says Mr Marks. “You can hardly blame them for that, either. This is their community, after all. They don’t live in a trailer park or a suburban slum, they live in Shell Harbour.” Where, besides the ocean and the bay for their boats, everyone has a pool. “As far as our kids are concerned, being poor means having one bathroom, one car and only two TVs.”

Because she has years of training and experience, Dr Kilpatiky manages to sigh only in her heart. “I appreciate that, Seb, but I overhear things and I observe. And my general impression is that a lot of them believe that life is a meritocracy and that those who don’t succeed have only themselves to blame.”

“Be that as it may—” begins Dr Goldblatt from science.

“Be that as it may, besides this general impression of mine, several things happened last year that have convinced me that many of our students live in a bubble. A bubble of advantage. Which I believe it is our duty to burst.”

“Are we talking about the war on poverty debate?” asks Mr Marks. It was in his class that Georgiana Shiller suggested that throwing a party could be used as a weapon against hunger.

Dr Kilpatiky does believe that if life were a candy bar Georgiana Shiller would eat the wrapper, but it wasn’t Georgiana who started the principal thinking about reforming the programme. “Not specifically.”

“Asher Grossman coming to the Halloween dance as a homeless person?” guesses Ms Sketz. Asher, dressed in clothes that obviously weren’t his (they were cheap and well-worn), had sat himself near the door of the gym, a dog wearing a bandana on one side and a cardboard cup that held a few dimes and nickels on the other. On his lap he had a sign that said
GOD BLESS YOU
. When Dr Kilpatiky saw him Ms Sketz thought the principal might have a seizure. Her face turned a shade of red normally associated with over-ripe tomatoes, and her nose started twitching uncontrollably, a sign that she is very angry. “He was being ironic,” adds Ms Sketz. Asher not only has the highest GPA in the school but is the star of her Advanced Placement Calculus class (and every other class he takes) and, therefore, deserving of her protection.

“That’s one interpretation of what he was,” says Dr Kilpatiky. “But to be honest, it was as much the dog as anything. You don’t see that many people living on the street with a dog that costs over a thousand dollars. But, again, I wasn’t thinking specifically of Asher.”

“Oh,” Mrs Mahoney sighs. “It’s Marigold Liotta who’s brought this on, isn’t it?”

It is. If there is any one student who stands out among the scores whose comments and jokes and behaviour have caused the principal’s eyes to narrow and nose to twitch like a hound on the scent of a hare over the last year, it is probably Marigold Liotta, who, though her heart is very much in the right place, wins the so-out-of-touch-she-might-as-well-be-in-orbit prize. Dr Kilpatiky really never will forget her first sight of the golf clubs, although it was probably the expired caviar that was the sliver of straw that would have had her flat on the ground and waiting for the ambulance if she were a camel.

“I’m still not sure what it is you want to do,” says Mrs Mahoney. “You can’t punish them because their parents have money.”

“I don’t want to punish them,” says Dr Kilpatiky. “I want to help them become the sensitive and aware people I know they can be.”

“What are you planning to do?” asks Mrs Moreno from foreign languages. “Pack them all off to dig wells in Africa?”

“I don’t think we need to do anything quite that drastic. However, it won’t do them any harm to broaden their definition of community a little. After all, we’re not an island. There are other, less wealthy, towns and villages all around us, but very few of our students choose the placements they offer.” She can’t restructure the entire programme, but she can do something to redress the balance – even if only slightly. “What I’m suggesting is that we remove the element of choice, so those who would automatically choose the soft option won’t be able to.”

“You mean assign them placements?”

Guarded glances are exchanged and eyes roll. Choice is something the pupils of Shell Harbour think of as a constitutional right. The menu in the cafeteria is testament to that.

“I was thinking of something more random and lottery-like.” Dr Kilpatiky focuses her smile on Mr Jacobwitz, chairperson of IT. “I was thinking there must be a computer program that could make the selections.”

“
No
problema
,” says Mr Jacobwitz. “We have the technology.”

“What if they get something they can’t do?” Mrs Moreno wants to know. “Something they aren’t any good at? Let’s face it, you wouldn’t want someone like Georgiana cutting the grass in the park.”

When the laughter finally stops, Dr Kilpatiky says, “Then we do it again.”

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” says Mr Marks.

“They’re not going to like it,” warns Mrs Mahoney.

“They don’t have to like it,” says Dr Kilpatiky. “They just have to do it.”

A statement that, though the principal has no way of knowing it, easily fits under the heading: Famous Last Words.

Six
teenagers and a Yorkshire terrier lie on rattan loungers by a large swimming pool. The pool water is the colour of a tropical lagoon on a very good day in a very good year, and all seven are shaded by brightly coloured umbrellas (souvenirs, like the loungers, of a trip to Thailand the summer before). The pool has a view of the ocean and gives the impression that if you dived in and kept swimming you would effortlessly flow into the Atlantic (and, presumably, be washed out to sea). Three of the six – Marigold, Asher and Georgiana – are being discussed at this very moment by Dr Kilpatiky and her staff. The remaining three are Claudelia Gillen, Byron Locke and Will Lundquist. The Yorkshire terrier’s name is Dunkin. Dunkin belongs to Will. The pool belongs to Georgiana.

Summer is almost over. Soon the leaves will begin to turn colour and fall, and the days will grow shorter and cool. Even sooner, the pool, the swimsuits, the Ray-Bans and the sunblock will be replaced with classrooms, school clothes and iPads; the planning of beach parties and boat rides replaced with organizing what everyone’s doing on Saturday night or after the game. Which is not a thought that makes them all happy.

Beneath the umbrella decorated with dragons, Georgiana sighs, a sound like someone trying to blow out a fire. “God, can you believe the summer’s almost over?” It seems to Georgiana that it was only yesterday that she walked out of Shell Harbour High, free as a bird and full of anticipation and plans, and now here she is about to walk back in, the door slamming shut behind her. Caged again. “I had so many things I wanted to do that I never did, and already it’s back to the old grind.”

“But we did have some really good times.” Marigold believes in positive thinking. There is no cloud so black that she can’t find a silver lining in it – or, at least, a silver thread. “And there are a lot of fun things to look forward to in the fall and winter.”

Byron grins. “What? Like flu and getting stuck in the snow?”

Marigold laughs in her good-natured way. “You know what I mean. It’s not all gloom and doom, is it? There are dances and parties. Homecoming. Christmas. Skiing. All that cool stuff.”

“Yeah, sure there is. And I love all that, too.” Georgiana absent-mindedly twists a strand of hair around one finger. “But, I don’t know – the winter’s not like the summer. It’s all routine and schedules and regular life. In the summer it’s like anything could happen.” By “anything” Georgiana means romance and adventure. Not that there has been much of either in her life so far. This summer the most exciting thing that happened to her was nearly drowning in the undertow swimming at her aunt’s house in Baja. Last summer all Georgiana got in Thailand was dysentery.

“Let’s not start talking about snow yet, OK?” says Claudelia. “I mean, I’ve only just gotten my tan even and soon it’ll be all leggings and sweaters and boots.”

“I wasn’t even thinking of that stuff.” Georgiana sighs again. “You know, sometimes I really wish I lived in LA. I know it has its downside…”

“You mean like the weird people, the earthquakes and the terminal pollution?” asks Will.

“Don’t forget the Godzilla traffic,” chips in Byron. “We were stuck in a jam so bad it would’ve been faster to walk back to the hotel over the cars.”

“But at least it’s always warm and sunny,” says Claudelia.

“Permanent summer.” Georgiana looks wistful. “I could do that. It’d be awesome.”

“But you’d still have to go to school,” points out Will.

Georgiana scowls at him. “Like I could forget that, right?” Georgiana is not the biggest fan the education system has ever had. She believes that life is for living, not sitting in a room being taught a whole lot of things she’s never going to have any use for. Does she need to understand
Hamlet
to shop? Grasp the basics of quantum mechanics to play tennis? Master quadratic equations in order to have a bank account? No, no and no. People spend a lot more time under the ground than above it. Life’s too short to read Proust. That’s what Georgiana thinks.

“Oh, come on,” says Marigold. “School’s not so bad. I like it.” Which is true. Marigold is a straight-A student with a special passion for literature. She’s already read Proust.

“I wonder if there’s any place in California where you can go to school in a bathing suit.” Claudelia is still thinking about her tan. “I mean, if there’s anywhere on the planet where you could, that would have to be it, right? Or maybe Florida. Florida’s pretty laid-back.”

“Oh my God!” Something has finally made Georgiana smile. “Can you imagine the cow Dr Kilpatiky would have if you showed up in a bikini? She wouldn’t shut up about it for months!” Georgiana’s laughter makes her lounger tremble and wakes up Dunkin on the chair beside her (though not for long).

Will, who has been lolling, sits up, straight as a bolt. “Wow! That’d be so awesome. Can’t you just picture it? I’d pay to see that. I really would.”

“Never mind paying,” says Asher. “We could sell tickets. Make a fortune.”

Too-funny-for-words tears fill Georgiana’s eyes. “Oh God, wouldn’t it be fantastic?” she gasps. “The old witch would be so outraged! And you know how her nose twitches when she’s really upset? I bet she’d go into lift-off.”

“Oh, man!” Byron is in danger of falling off his chair. “I don’t know how, but I forgot about the twitching nose! The twitching nose is phenomenal. Can you grasp the total wonderfulness of what would happen if we got it on camera? Put it on YouTube?” He turns to Claudelia. “Come on, Claudelia, why don’t you do it? Show up the first day wearing what you’re wearing now.” Three small triangles of material and several lengths of string. “Just to see the Killjoy’s reaction.”

Claudelia knows exactly what the principal’s reaction would be. “Yeah, in your dreams.” She jerks her head towards Asher. “Why don’t you get Ash to do it? He’s the pro at dressing down.”

Asher pretends to laugh. Hahaha. “You’re very funny.” When it comes to wearing inappropriate clothes and causing the Kilpatiky nose to twitch so much it looked as if it were trying to wrest itself from the Kilpatiky face, Asher, of course, has history. It is, however, a history he’d rather not repeat. Not a year away from graduation. “I still can’t get within a yard of the old bat without her making some crack about last Halloween.”

“Halloween!” Will falls back against the cushion again. If a bull could laugh, it would sound like Will. “Now that was truly awesome. It was like you created the Legend of Shell Harbour. We should probably write a song about it. No one’s ever going to forget it.”

“Well I wish the Killjoy would.” Even wearing swimming trunks and a T-shirt, Asher manages to give the impression that he’s wearing a suit. An immaculate and well-pressed suit. This ability of Asher’s to always look as if he’s going to an important interview, no matter what he has on, was noticed by Dr Kilpatiky at the Halloween dance. Which didn’t make her like his costume any more. “I don’t really think grudge-holding is a desirable trait in an authority figure. It shows a lack of flexibility. She needs to learn how to let go of things. Crissake, it was just a joke.” Which is where he went wrong, of course. If you converted the Killjoy’s sense of humour into money she wouldn’t be able to buy a small cup of coffee. Not even at twentieth-century prices.

“Grudge-holder is right,” says Georgiana. “Unlike you, Ash, I didn’t actually do anything. I just
said
something. In a debate, for Pete’s sake. In language arts.” Which is about the same as saying something silently and to yourself in an igloo in the middle of the frozen tundra. The only person who was actually listening was Dr Kilpatiky. “Look at the dumb things politicians say on TV and nobody gets on their case, do they? But boy, just say one little thing about parties helping fight poverty and she acts like I was arguing to bring back slavery.”

Byron smirks. “I guess she’s old-fashioned enough to think that the last thing somebody living in a cardboard box needs is a party.”

Georgiana rolls her eyes. “Um-duh, Byron. I didn’t mean throw
them
a party. I meant as a fundraiser. Gees Louise, everybody does stuff like that. It’s called charity.”