Cornerstone (14 page)

“Nobody beats us...” Regina begins but Jen cuts her off with a wave of her hand.

“No, listen.” Jen’s smile curls like toxic fumes. “Look at us. And look at her. There’s not a scratch on her. We came in here separately and The Waste jumped us, right? She jumped us in a school that has a well-known, no-tolerance policy on fighting. Think about it.”

A bruised smile spreads across Regina’s face and she starts nodding, still cupping her cheek. Bile rises up and plugs my throat.

“That’s right.” Regina giggles. “No Tolerance. You’re getting suspended, Waste.”

“Oh no, it’s worse.” Jen laughs. “Way worse. You’re seventeen, aren’t you, Waste?”

I don’t answer. I’m trying to keep myself from throwing up on the floor in front of them.

“Oh yeah,” Regina laughs crazily beneath her hand. “Cops. You’re gonna go to jail.”

Jen bends over and scoops her purse off the floor.

“That’s right, Waste,” she says. “I’m pressing charges. C’mon Reggie.”

And Jen is suddenly steady, as she adjusts to walking on her toes, out the bathroom door.

~ * * * ~

My mouth fills with burning saliva after Jen and Regina leave, and I rush to pull open one of the stall doors, but it doesn’t budge. Desperate, I lift my foot and kick the handicap stall door as hard as I can. It flies open. Inside, hunched down on top of the horseshoe toilet seat, is Cora. I only get a glimpse of her wide eyes as she stands up, balancing on the seat. Before she can even hop down, I throw myself between her ankles, heaving into the porcelain bowl beneath her feet.

There is no place for her to go unless she vaults over me and Cora is no vaulter, so she stands there talking while I hold onto her ankles and puke between her sneakers. Her voice falls down around me.

“Jeez, my legs were cramping up. I wasn’t really eavesdropping. I just stuck around because I thought you were having some secret rendezvous with Garrett.” she laughs. “But, wow. I can’t believe how awful Jen is! I mean, she was almost Home Coming Queen!”

Cora lifts one Ked onto the flushing lever and steps down on it, whooshing away what little actually came out of my stomach. The spray of the water on my face makes me retch again.

“Good thing I stuck around, though.” Cora sniffs twice overhead. “At least now you’ve got two witnesses. Me and whatever I got on my phone. I think I got all of it, though.”

I lift my head away from the toilet as Cora steps on the flushing lever again. This time, I push myself farther away and wipe my mouth on the back of my hand. Cora holds open her phone and pushes buttons as she hops down off the toilet seat.

“You recorded it?” My voice is hoarse.

“Yup.” Cora says. She stands in the door of the stall and holds her phone down in front of me. “See?”

On the itty bitty screen, there is a birds-eye view of the entire fight. Jen and Regina lunge at me, and on screen, I look like I’m just really skilled at stepping out of the way. Cora must’ve had her phone perched over the top of the stall the whole time. She jacks up the volume so it sounds like we’re all talking in a soup can, but everything Jen said about getting me in trouble is there.

I should jump up and hug Cora, but the relief of it all squeezes my stomach again and I throw myself forward over the toilet bowl as the bell rings.

“I’m going to get the school nurse first.” Cora says behind me. “And then we can go show Principal VanWeider what really happened.”

~ * * * ~

I don’t want the school nurse, but Cora’s gone before I can object. I try to get to my feet and my head instantly spins, so I just sit back down on the floor and rest my shoulder blades against the cool metal wall beside the toilet. When the bathroom door opens again, I hear the rush of the crowded hallway outside, even though the stall door blocks my view.

“She’s in here.” I hear Cora saying. And then I want to throw up again when I hear the wrong voice answer her.

“Where?” Garrett asks. I see his shoes before he pulls the door open and looks down at me, sitting on the bathroom floor. The worry, pulling at his brow, dissolves as he kneels down beside me. The calming blue of his eyes settles my stomach.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” he says. “Cora said Jen came after you. Are you okay?”

I only nod because the hot, awful taste is still on my tongue and clinging in my cheek. His eyes begin a thorough inspection of me anyway, studying my face as if he wants to be sure to catch even the slightest scratch. His gaze moves over me, as meticulous as a physician, but his hands are caught in the air around me as if he is afraid that his touch might hurt my skin. I feel the heat of his hands hovering inches over my body, moving around me with waves of energy that knit the air between us and tingle into my muscles. I close my eyes and let my body feel him despite the lack of actual contact. The heat rolls beneath his palms, leaving me feeling sedated and fuzzy.

“She was throwing up.” I hear Cora say. I’d like her to go away.

“That true?” Garrett asks softly and he cups my cheek in his hand. My lips go numb, paralyzed with his touch. He grumbles, more to himself than to me, “I never should’ve left. What the hell is the matter with Jen anyway?”

I don’t speak. When Garrett finishes his assessment, he relaxes back on his heels and smirks at me. “And what’s this I hear about some ninja moves?”

I don’t even have to open my mouth. Cora pushes her phone screen into his face.

“Oh my God,” she gushes. “It’s like Nali’s some Judo master. Isn’t it Judo where you avoid getting hit? She just kept stepping out of the way and Jen and Regina kept slamming into stuff. Nali didn’t even touch them.”

Garrett’s brow pulls together again as he reaches for the phone.

“Oh really?” he says and he watches the whole thing on the little screen as if he’s memorizing it for a test. The recording seems to go on forever, even though it is really only a couple of minutes, and Cora streams a one-sided conversation the entire time. I ignore Cora and just keep my eyes on Garrett’s face. As he watches, his eyes narrow and his brow arcs. When the recording is done, he hands the phone back to Cora.

“Can you stand up?” Garrett asks me. “I’m sure VanWeider is looking for you.”

I try to get up on my own because the last thing I want to do is lean so close to Garrett with the bitter taste still in my mouth. I wobble the second I’m on my feet and Garrett immediately ducks under my arm, wrapping his arm around my waist. His touch sends a heartbeat through my body like a defibrillator but the smell of his cologne makes me even more unsteady.

“I’ve got you.” he says, but my limbs tremble against my will. Cora points at my quivering arms excitedly.

“That’s dehydration!” She sounds like she’s on a game show. “They talked about it in my first aid class! Throwing up dehydrates you and it can make you shake like that.”

As if my legs agree with her, they buckle under me. Garrett adjusts and still holds me up effortlessly as he pulls a bill from his pocket and hands it to Cora. “Could you go down to the cafeteria and get her some water and something to eat? We’ll meet you down at the office.”

“I’m on it!” Cora salutes him and speeds out of the bathroom as if getting me water is the most important thing she’s ever done. Garrett waits for the door to swing shut again.

“Ok, I’m right here. Just lean on me and I’ll get you there, okay?” he says. I just nod, unwilling to open my mouth. We walk and my whole body tremors out of my control while I lean on Garrett. He tells me over and over again in his honey-warm voice that I’m going to be okay. My feet feel like they are just brushing over the floor but Garrett doesn’t complain. He hardly even seems to notice by the time we head down the now-empty hallway to the stairs leading to the main floor. I wobble at the top step and gasp, but Garrett’s hands are there, holding me steady.

“I’m not letting go of you.” he assures me and I nod that I believe him. “We’ll just take it slow. One step at a time, all right?”

I nod. Three steps down, Garrett’s voice is warm in my ear again. “That was some impressive stuff you did with Jen.”

I think he feels my shrug against his chest when we pause on the next step but I’m not sure because the way my shoulders are shaking might feel like a thousand little shrugs. His arms stay steady around me.

“I mean it. It looked like you’re some cage fighter or something.” he chuckles. I just shake my head.

“You’re not going to talk to me because of throwing up, right?” he asks and I nod, blushing. Garrett just laughs.

“You don’t have to worry about it.” he says, but I just shake my head again.

“Have it your way, then.” His tone is apologetic. “You’ll just have to listen to me all the way down to the office.”

I shrug again and weakly chuckle behind closed lips. The shaking makes it sound like a giggle shaken up in can, but all I want to do is listen to him and even more, I want to do it while he’s holding me in the unwavering support of his arms.

My body is still quivering when we reach the office and I am starting to wonder if it has anything to do with food or water after all.

~ * * * ~

I end up saying hardly anything at all in Principal VanWeider’s office. He knows me mostly from the destruction my nickname has done to his school, caused by my nickname. I’ve been in the Principal’s office several times, while he’s asked if I could identify who’s painted my nickname on the lockers or written things about me on the bathroom walls. I’ve never been able to help, but Principal VanWeider has always seemed genuinely upset that this is happening to me. The last time, when someone announced on the PA that there would be a paper drive and that the school could meet their goal with one stop at The Waste’s house, he even apologized for not being able to stop it himself.

I eat the whole sandwich and drink the water that Cora brings and the principal allows Garrett and Cora to explain most of what happened. Principal VanWeider listens without emotion and then he watches Cora’s recording off her cell phone, his eyebrows rising as he exhales,
huh,
a few different times.

“It certainly changes my opinion of the story I heard from Ms. Ballard and Ms. Runklan.” he says when he’s finished watching. “I’d like to keep your phone, Ms. Paguli, if that’s okay with you, so I can show it to the other parties involved, and their parents, if need be.”

“I’ll get it back, right?” Cora asks.

“Of course. I’ll be dealing with this matter immediately and I’ll have your phone back in your possession by lunch tomorrow.”

“Okay.” Cora says, but she keeps her arms folded tightly over her chest, rubbing her nose with two fingers, like she really wants her phone back now.

“Your sacrifice is noted and appreciated.” Principal VanWeider adds and Cora stops rubbing, straightening her shoulders with a grin. The principal leans back in his chair. “Part of the issue I have with this situation is that, while Simon Valley has a no-tolerance policy concerning actual fighting, I think that some of the students haven’t grasped that the policy extends to provocation of an incident as well.

“I must mention too that I’m particularly proud of how you handled yourself in this situation, Ms. Maxwell. I’m very impressed with how you were able to defend yourself without ever touching the other students. Their injuries were created as a direct consequence of their own actions. That is quite an honorable and skilled form of defense that you displayed.

“Since the nature in which this was originally presented to me is completely opposite of what you’ve shown me on tape, you can be certain that it will be dealt with in like fashion. Are you feeling any better now?”

“A little.” I say.

“Well, under these circumstances, I’m going to excuse you for the day. Do you have a way of getting home?”

“No.” I say.

“Sir,” Garrett says from behind me. “I’ve only got a Lit class and a study hall this afternoon and Ms. Kale can vouch for my being ahead in Lit. I could take Nalena home.”

I don’t bother to mention that my home has been temporarily relocated to Garrett’s house anyway. Principal VanWeider leans back in his office chair and drums his fingers thoughtfully on the desk before he says, “I suppose I don’t have a problem with that. You’re both excused for the remainder of the day.”

Cora slumps in her chair and says, “I wish I had a car.”

~ * * * ~

Garrett walks me back to my locker and takes my backpack from me once it’s filled.

“Can you talk to me yet?” he asks.

“Maybe. A little.” I say, fighting back a giggle that spins around my heart.

“Good. I think I can work with ‘a little’.” Garrett says. He takes my hand again and laces his fingers through mine in a way that reminds me of the shapes in the bottom of our tea mugs this morning.

“I wonder what’s going to happen to Jen and Regina.” I say as we reach the front doors. Garrett holds the door open with one arm so I can walk through.

“Yeah, about that,” he says. “How
did
you move like that? Are you some secret lethal weapon or something?”