Fast Times at Ridgemont High (32 page)

“Is that it?”

“I think I’ve made my point with you, Jeff.”

“You mean I can go to Ditch Night after all?”

“I don’t care what you do with your time, Mr. Spicoli.”

Spicoli jumped up and reached to shake Hand’s hand.

“Hey, Mr. Hand,” said Spicoli. “Can I ask you a question?”

“What’s that?”

“Do you have a guy like me every year? A guy to . . . I don’t know, make a show of. Teach the other kids lessons and stuff?”

Hand finished packing and looked at the surfer who’d hounded him all year long. “Well,” he said, “why don’t you come back next year and find out?”

“No way,” said Spicoli. “I’m not going to be like those guys who come back and hang around lunch court. When I graduate, I’m
outta
here.”

“If
you graduate.”

Spicoli was taken aback.
Not graduating?
No thumbing up the Coast, meeting ladies and moving to Hawaii for the dyno lobster season? More school? “Not graduating?” he said.

Hand broke into the nearest thing approximating a grin, for him. It wasn’t much, of course, but it was noticeable to Jeff. His lips crinkled at the ends. That was plenty for Hand.

“Don’t worry, Spicoli,” said Hand. “You’ll probably squeak by.”

“All right!”

“Aloha, Spicoli.”

“Aloha, Mr. Hand.”

Mr. Hand descended the stairway of the Spicoli home, went out the door, and on to his car, which he had parked just around the corner
—always use the element of surprise.
Hand knew one day next year he would look to that green metal door and it would be Spicoli standing there. He’d act like he had a million other things to do, and then he’d probably stay all day. All his boys came back sooner or later.

Hand drove back to his small apartment in Richards Bay to turn on his television and catch the evening’s “Five-O” rerun.

A P.R. Problem

E
ver since the Lt. Flowers gun incident, Ridgemont High had been all over the front of the local section. Then, if that wasn’t bad enough, there had been an accident on the way to a junior varsity baseball game. Two vans, both driven by students, were headed out to the last game of the year when one of the vehicles “just flipped over.” None of the students would explain how the accident happened, but three sets of parents were now suing the school.

Mr. Gray, like most principals, took the bad publicity personally. Of course he had an ego. Ridgemont High was his school. Egg was dripping from
his
face. Principal William Gray had what was called in his Media Guide a “P.R. problem.”

At a time when most other principals were concerned with the details of their own summer vacations, Gray was on the phones. Talking to the board, talking to lawyers, and talking to goddamn parents and reporters. There had even been a picture of him looking haggard in his own school newspaper, the
Reader,
with the caption, “Gray reviews mishaps.”

A P.R. problem.

Principal Gray’s first move was to take Del Taco, the nearest and most popular fast-food stand for ditchers, by force. On a lazy afternoon toward the end of school, as students crunched into third-period tacos, the doors were suddenly clamped shut from the outside.

Two county security officers swept in and rounded up twenty-two ditchers. Trouble was, as Gray would soon learn, all but two went to Paul Revere Junior High School.

Even though Gray made a
big deal
about busting the two Ridgemont High ditchers, it was a well-known fact—Principal Gray, as the man himself might say, was P.O.’ed.

The buxom message girl from the front office came swinging into English Literature with a blue slip, a slip that meant you had a personal meeting with the principal at that very moment.

She delivered the slip to the teacher with a flourish.

“Mark Ratner?”

The Rat walked up to the front, got the slip, and headed out the door. Nerves of steel. Now Ratner couldn’t imagine what Gray would want with him, what this was all about. He trudged down the hall. Maybe they wanted him to give a speech! Or better yet—of
course
—he was probably going to get the Debate Award. Who else would they give that to? Of course! This was what they did for the award winners. They let Principal Gray slip you the news.

Ratner was ushered into the principal’s office.

“Mr. Ratner?”

“Yes, sir. Nice to see you, sir.”

“This is the new annual.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes,” said Mr. Gray, “it is.”

“It looks excellent, sir. That’s pretty great. That you get them this early, sir.”

Definitely the Debate Award.

“Yes. We do get them early. It’s a very nice annual. I like it very much this year.”

Ratner nodded his head. Gray sure was acting strange. “Are you sure you wanted to talk to me, sir? I didn’t work on the annual staff or anything . . . even though I would have
liked
to. I was pretty busy with Debate.”

“I don’t believe I’m mistaken,” Gray said coldly.

Gray then opened the annual on his desk and flipped through it carefully, so as not to break its new binding. Finally he reached a two-page picture and spun it around to face The Rat. The title of the school group shot was What a Way to Go!

“Mr. Ratner, are you aware that you are posed obscenely in this year’s
Rapier
?”

The Rat began to get a deep acidic feeling that started in his groin and worked its way up into the very pit of his stomach. He was dizzy.

It was the school group picture, taken last October by Arthur Chubb.

“We have information that this is you, Mr. Ratner.”

Circled at the far right corner of the group picture was Ratner, his ass stuck out in the air. They’d printed it all right. No airbrushing for this year’s
Rapier!

The Rat’s eyes immediately raced to the opposite side of the shot. There was Damone, smiling serenely in an Arrow sport shirt. His pants were on. His hands were in his pockets.

“It’s me.” The Rat’s teeth started to chatter as he confessed. “It was supposed to be a gag . . .”

An icy stare.

“I was a ham in my time, Mr. Ratner. It’s just that
parents
pay for these things and, once in a while, they like to read through their child’s annual. And when they see your
butt,
they might be a little
curious.
They might get a little P.O.’ed. And you know what? This phone on my desk
rings.
Quite a bit. And if they were to see this picture in those 1,500 copies sitting in the gymnasium, that phone
would ring.
A lot.”

“Are you going to expel me?”

“Well,” said Gray. “What I’m going to do is tell you a little secret, Mr. Ratner. A secret between you and me.”

“What is that, sir?”

“Those parents aren’t going to see your butt this year. Do you know why?”

“Why, sir?”

“Because we have arranged for you to spend this weekend in the school gym. And you will be doing the following. Without soiling or breaking the binding on any of these books—which is to say, VERY CAREFULLY—you will be erasing your posterior from every one of our new
Rapier.
As you can see, the bond
is
erasable.”

He demonstrated with the tip of a pencil.

“Thank you, Mr. Gray.”

“You will supply your own erasers. And, oh yes, Mr. Ratner. Don’t forget to sweep up after yourself. I don’t want eraser shavings all over the floor.”

The Rat drifted out of the office. Stunned. A whole weekend of erasing.

“We have information,” my ass. The Rat hadn’t told anybody
anything.
It could only have come from Damone.

Damone. The Mouth. Mr. All Talk. The Rat walked straight over to Youth and Law class, where he knew Damone would be. The Rat walked straight into the room and pulled Damone out of his seat. Outside the door The Rat began the first step of the high school prefight ritual. He threw his books down and beckoned to Damone. Even though Damone was stockier and in much better shape, Ratner went ahead and spoke the unretractable words.

“Well, Damone,” he said, “COME ON.”

“What’s going on, Rat? What are you doing? Why do I want to fight you?”

“Mr. GRAY just called me in to show me the new
Calumet,
which features my
ass
hanging out. You fuckin’ lied to me, Damone. You told me to play that joke on Chubb, and you told me it would be airbrushed. But it wasn’t, you
asshole
. . . SO COME ON.”

“I don’t want to fight you,” said Damone. “No way.”

“COME ON.” Ratner was as pissed as Damone had ever seen him. “I’ve got to spend the weekend erasing all the new annuals, thanks to you . . .”

“Is
that
all,” said Damone. “That’ll be a
blast.
We’ll do it this weekend.”

Ratner slowly let his hands down. “You’ll help?”

“No sweat,” said Damone. “It’ll be great.”

It was kind of funny, really. A good story for the grandchildren, The Rat figured. At the end of the Erasing Ass Weekend, as it would come to be called, Principal Gray had been so proud of the job The Rat and Damone did, that he rewarded them both with the right to go to Grad Nite. Everything, it seemed, was going their way.

The Exer-Gro Plus

T
he Rat had developed the habit of coming home and checking the mail before anyone else. It was just a little routine he’d gotten into six weeks, to the day, after he’d ordered the Exer-Gro Plus back in March. The Rat knew all the bills by heart, all the junk mail. By now he was sure they’d mailed it to someone else.

On this day toward the end of the year, The Rat walked back to his house after school. He said hello to the kids next door who were always building something in the garage, and casually flipped open the mailbox.

It was a small square package. He knew the instant he saw it what it was. This was it, just in time for Grad Nite, too. The Exer-Gro Plus.

The Rat set down his books, went to the bathroom, did everything he possibly could do to delay the pleasure of opening his package. He wasn’t sure what it would be. Perhaps some kind of stretching device, an exercise machine. Whatever, he just hoped it didn’t take too long.

Now, to use a penknife or just rip it open? Of course. Rip that thing open. The Rat tore into it, separated the newspaper wrapping that had been used to pack it, and there it sat. The Exer-Gro Plus.

It was a rubber dickhead.

No special formula, no exercise machine, no nothing. Just a rubber dickhead. Phony as hell.

There was a letter with it:

CONGRATULATIONS ON RECEIVING YOUR NEW EXER-GRO PLUS, THE EVER NEWEST IN OUR LINE OF SEXUAL-ENHANCEMENT ITEMS. NOW YOU CAN THRILL AND IMPRESS WOMEN EVERYWHERE BY WEARING THE EXER-GRO PLUS EVERYWHERE YOU GO, IN ANYTHING YOU DO. LIFELIKE, MADE OF QUALITY NONTOXIC MATERIALS, THE EXER-GRO PLUS IS GUARANTEED TO LENGTHEN THE DESIRABILITY OF ANY MAN BY AT LEAST THREE INCHES. GOOD LUCK IN YOUR NEW LIFE WITH THE EXER-GRO PLUS.

It was a three-inch-high nine-dollar rubber dickhead. The Rat couldn’t believe it. He went back and reread the ad. There was nothing that promised it would be anything else. But it was still a rip-off! And it wasn’t like he could write the Action Line about this one. Shit. Besides, it didn’t even work. The Rat wore it into Safeway once, and it fell down his pantleg.