Devilish (2 page)

“It’s a four-sided plane,” I said. “The opposite sides are parallel.”

“A four-sided
plane
?” she repeated. “Okay, I am
not
falling for that one.”

Joan is two years younger than me. She didn’t get into St. Teresa’s Preparatory School for Girls. I’m completely used to her looking up at me with that lip-glossy stare of hers and asking questions like, “Is the Tour de France in Spain?” or, “Do they make cotton out of plastic?” This is a girl who I had convinced that Alaska used to be called Frigidaire. So sometimes she thought I lied to her.

My father smiled and shook his head. It never
bothered him that Joan was like that. While she didn’t get my father’s savage intelligence or my mother’s dexterous common sense, she did get all the height, the muscle tone, and the strong and shiny brown hair. She was lovely and happy, even if she was as intelligent as a rubber band.

Whereas I, as the Junior Judges had so rightly pointed out, was four-foot ten and five-sixths inches (in school shoes) with blond hair, and I looked like an escaped street urchin from
Oliver Twist
. (The hair was dry and brittle because I dyed it with a home-brewed peroxide solution, which worked really well when I first started doing it as a freshman and couldn’t stop doing because if I used anything else on my hair, it turned a kind of moss-green color.)

Joan set her Froot Loops down and gazed at me evenly.

“You have that look on your face,” she said. “Are you thinking about Elton?”

My dad glanced up from his puzzle.

“No.” I gave her a silencing look, stiffening my jaw. She knew she wasn’t supposed to mention my ex in front of my dad because he would think I was still upset. It had been six months, three weeks, and two days since our breakup. I was over it.

“It’s Allison,” I said. “Today is Big-Little Day. I need to make sure she gets a little. This is the first big event since the prom. It means a lot to her. I can’t let anything bad happen.”

“Allison will be fine,” my dad chimed in. “Why would you need to worry about her?”

This was one thing Joan understood completely.

“Ally needs to relax,” Joan said. “Someone will definitely take her as long as she doesn’t get all … you know … spazzy.”

“How do you keep someone from being spazzy?” I asked, pushing aside some mushrooms that had attached themselves to the steaky goodness. “I know she’s great, but she’s going to be wound up today. She’s going to start breathing fast and get dizzy and scare away the freshmen.”

“You can’t worry about something that hasn’t happened yet,” my father said, turning back to his Sudoku. “You have to take life as it comes.”

This irritated me. When I worry about one thing, I frequently take it out on something or someone else. And the fact that my dad was offering stupid and totally untrue advice set me off.

“Oh no?” I said. “Isn’t worrying about things that haven’t happened yet the purpose of several major government agencies, like the army and FEMA? What about yearly checkups? Savings accounts? Tornado shelters? Earthquake-proofing?”

“Moisturizer?” Joan added.

“You’re a math professor,” I said. “What’s the study of probability? Figuring out what will
probably
happen. And then you dump all of that probability information into huge tables that insurance companies use. So they know
who will probably crash their car, which places will probably get flooded, who might trip into the fireplace and set themselves on fire …”

“I don’t think there’s a category for that, Jane.”

“You see my point,” I said archly. “Of
course
we know bad things do happen. And I know that Allison is probably going to spaz. She will probably start talking about her collection of Build-A-Bears or quoting entire episodes of
Charmed
, and while I think she’s cute, most people will think she’s insane and they will run.”

I was getting a little frenzied now. Joan was nodding away, like I was preaching and she had been infected by the spirit—but my dad was still back a few steps.

“But she hasn’t done any of that yet,” he said. “If you go into it with that attitude, there’s almost no point. Probability isn’t a guarantee. Give her some credit. You have to assume that she’ll do just fine.”

“But she
won’t
.”

“Well, then,” my dad said, quietly folding his completed puzzle in half, “sounds like she had no chance in the first place. So I guess …”

He stood and flicked a lost Froot Loop over at Joan.

“… you’ll just have to save her from herself.”

The sky was red that morning, which I think is supposed to be a sailor’s warning about something … storms, waves, sea monsters. It was a stupidly hot morning, too. October in Providence, Rhode Island, is not a hot time, normally. It’s New England—we like it cold and grim. We cultivate colds like some areas of the world nurture grapes and produce fine wines.

There was no homeroom for us. We were all instructed to go right to the gym, where folding tables had already been set up all along the walls. Where we, the seniors, were supposed to sit. The freshmen and new students would all stream in and approach us.

My fears turned out to be for nothing. Instead of the weepy Ally I was expecting, she walked in proudly examining a red velvet cupcake at arm’s length, displaying it to me.

“I found it in my locker,” she said with a grin. “With this.”

She held up a note that read:
WILL YOU BE MY BIG
?

“Some freshman must be trying to suck up to you!” I said with enthusiasm. “Would have helped if she’d left her
name
. But points for busting into your locker to leave you cake.”

She broke it in half and offered a piece to me, then immediately withdrew it and hid it behind her back.

“Sorry,” she said. “Red chocolate. I wasn’t thinking.”

I can’t eat red foods. They freak me out. No food should be the color of blood.

There was a warning squawk of the microphone, so Allison crammed the rest of the cupcake into her mouth, getting a little frosting on her cheek in the process. I felt bad about doubting her that morning. Allison was a big girl—she could handle herself.

“Today’s your day,” I said. “I can feel it. You’re doing a lot better than me. I got squat.”

“Someone will come for you,” she said. “Everyone
knows
you.”

Our vice principal, Sister Dominic, came up to the microphone to lead us through a Hail Mary; two specially written appeals to St. Teresa, begging her to help us all become better sisters; and one verse of “Join Us Together with a Rainbow of Love,” a hymn written by a former student of questionable sanity. Then our student counsel president, Donna Skal, went to the microphone in the middle of the room.

“Good morning, St. T.’s!” she said, much, much too loudly. “A little warm in here today, huh? Must be all of that big-little energy!”

We were roasting in our polyester uniforms, yanking desperately at our collars, and twisting to find more air.

“Sisterhood,” Donna went on. “What does it mean?”

“It usually means having a sister,” I said to Ally in a low voice.

“Would you shut up?” she whispered. “They’ll kick us out, and then I won’t get a little.”

“I can’t help it,” I said. “I’m allergic to people who talk like spokesmodels.”

This wasn’t really fair. There was nothing particularly wrong with Donna, except for the fact that she was successful because she had that odd squeaky-cleanness that lots of teen pop stars exude, the kind that seems to have been manufactured in a laboratory. Her hair was genuinely golden, and her eyes were large, like a cartoon deer’s. She could sometimes be heard saying things like, “My sister told me I laugh in my sleep!” (The best I’ve ever gotten from my sister was, “I thought there was something wrong with the dog, but it was just you snoring.”)

“Sisterhood means loving each other no matter what we look like or how we dress outside of school,” Donna explained. “Sisterhood means putting each other first. Sisterhood means believing in each other and going the extra mile.”

“Or it means having a sister,” I added quickly.

Ally giggled before she could stop herself and shoved her fist into her mouth, but she was a hair too late. Sister Dominic lifted herself up on her toes and scanned the
seniors. She found us quickly. She held two fingers up in the air and then poked a finger first at me, then at Ally. I knew this gesture well. It translated into two demerits, each of you. Ally let out a low groan.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

One of the doors in the back opened. We all heard it, and everyone turned in unison.

“There they are,” Ally said, suddenly awed.

In a minute of shuffling and whispering, the freshmen were lined up like an advancing army, all with bright, crazy looks in their eyes. We quickly assumed our positions in the chairs. A jumpy, almost volatile vibe came into the room, and the temperature shot up about ten degrees.

“And now,” Donna said, “the big-little ceremony begins!”

The first flank of freshmen broke free and literally ran at us, targeting very specific people. They charged at Donna, who actually opened her arms to welcome them, like some kind of mother goddess.

“I can’t watch,” I said. But I did anyway.

A group with the easy stride of athletes made their way to Brooke Makepeace, the understated captain of the basket-ball team. There was a lot of giggling and near-skipping to Hillary Vorpel, school musical diva and former child star (of local theaters and supposedly “a very big show in New York” that was never named). Within a minute, she was blinding four freshmen with her laser whites. We were sitting next to Kristin Durkin, who had no real portfolio except for being
nice and kind of pretty, a good safety choice. Within a minute, she had two applicants.

“Where is she?” Allison asked, glaring at Kristin’s short line. “Why hasn’t she come up to me?”

“Give it a minute,” I said. “There’s still some in the back.”

The next wave was a slower, more considered group. They made their way to the next tier—not the superstars, but the perfectly acceptable people. The everyone elses. This was a slow, trickle-down kind of thing.

“No one’s coming over here,” Allison said. Her voice sounded odd. She was suddenly gruff, almost angry-sounding. I turned to find that she had gone a little bit gray. She was sweating, but then everyone else was too. But she was also gripping the edge of her folding desk with an intensity that couldn’t be good.

“Hey, Al,” I said. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said tersely.

The mysterious little didn’t come. Ten agonizing minutes went by. Allison watched the room and watched the clock. I watched Allison. She was naturally pretty pale, but now she was turning a color kind of like freezer-burned bread: not quite gray, not quite blue, not quite bread. Not a good shade to be. It started at her chin and zipped right up her head, right to her hairline—and that’s kind of a long way. I couldn’t take it anymore.

“You’re not okay,” I said. “You need to get some air. Just tell them you don’t feel good.”

“I’ll be
fine
,” she said, clenching her teeth. “I’m just hot. I have to get a little.”

I became aware of a buzzing, which I at first thought was the undertow of all the conversations going on. I looked around, but all that was in front of me was a mob of schmooze. I don’t know why I looked up. I just did. That’s when I saw them … the flies. Hundreds of them were streaming in through the open windows. Most had gone right for the ceiling and were dripping down like icicles. I had never seen so many flies. There were entire constellations of them.

My hand automatically went out to tap Allison and point this out, but then I realized that this might not be good, not the way she was feeling. I looked around to see if anyone else saw this or if the heat had just driven me insane.

There was a loud scraping noise of a chair being pushed back. It echoed through the gym and caused many people to turn, including me. The sound came from directly next to me. It was Allison, leaping up from her seat. She was obviously trying to cut through the room and get to the door, but she ran straight into a freshman who was slowly and deliberately coming in the direction of Ally or me or Kristin.

Then Ally threw up.

Well, it was more than that, unfortunately. It was truly projectile, and it was accompanied by horrible coughing noises that almost sounded like barking. She got the poor freshman completely and totally, mostly in the hair.

For a second, there was no sound. Then there was a loud intake of breath and a sound of awe. A few higher-pitched squeaks. People backed up and moved away. The freshman let out a wail the likes of which I have never heard before. It was a real end-of-the-world scream. This stirred the room, and sound increased—cries of sympathetic horror from all corners, as if Allison had just thrown up on everyone in the gym, everyone in the world. A few people rushed toward the freshman to help. No one was quite able to bring themselves to touch her—most pulled out tissues or anything they had on them and passed them to the girl.

No one reached out to help Ally except for me and one of the sisters who was standing nearby. Allison pulled away from us and ran for it. The crowd parted for her, and she was gone.

“It’s not that bad,” I lied.

I could see the soles of Allison’s saddle shoes poking out from under the pink stall door, toes to the ground. Classic puking position. But she wasn’t sick anymore—she was dead silent. I poked at the sole of one of her shoes with my foot. Nothing.

“People will forget,” I added. “They’re all too busy.”

Nothing.

“And not everyone saw it.” I was talking stupidly now, relentlessly, just to fill the air. Everyone saw it. Everyone would remember it for all time. It would be written into the fossil record.

I heard voices outside as people left the assembly and started to repopulate the halls. I heard cries of excitement. Just outside the bathroom door, freshmen were showing each other rings. Outside, there was joy. It was at that moment I realized I also hadn’t gotten a little. The shock and awe of what happened to Ally had stunned me briefly. But now, now I saw it—and it hit me harder than I imagined it would.