My Time as Caz Hazard (4 page)

“Hello? Earth to alien parents? I thought that since you're involving the whole
neighborhood in this fight, you might want to consult your kids.”

They barely looked at me. “Go to your room,” my mom said.

“Ted and I aren't moving.”

This time my mom took a step toward me. “Mind your own business,” she said.

“That makes no sense. How can you even say this isn't my business?”

I could see her gritting her teeth. For a minute I thought she was going to scream at me. Instead she held her voice to a hiss. “Go to your room, shut the door and stay there until someone asks for your opinion. Which they probably won't.”

I left then, slamming the door behind me. Then I went to my room and slammed that door, too. “Bitch,” I said aloud to the empty room. I wasn't sure who I was madder at — my mom for being so mean, or my dad for not defending me. If he wasn't such a wimp, maybe we wouldn't be in this mess.

My mom and dad had been having the exact same fight about twice a year since I could remember. Probably since before I was
born. My dad was on his twentieth year in shipping and receiving. He liked it. He said he was good at it.

The fight went like this: Mom would see another job in a newspaper ad and cut it out for my dad. Dad would ignore it. Mom would tell him to apply. Dad wouldn't. Mom would say he had no interest in providing for his family. Dad would say he provided just fine and not to worry so much.

My mom's idea of providing and my dad's idea of providing were two different things. Maybe because of all those home décor magazines my mom read. A couple of years ago, I guess she gave up on him. She got her real estate license and started selling houses. She was good at it, too. Better than she was at ironing and making lunches. She was never exactly Betty Crocker material.

There was a soft knock at my door and Ted poked his head in.

“Nice going,” he said softly.

“Yeah. Thanks a lot.”

“So I guess we're moving?”

“Dad's never won a fight in his life. What do you think?”

In the morning, I woke up aching to see Mel — someone who knew me so well that I could completely relax. Suddenly all the reasons I hadn't called her seemed trivial. It wasn't like she was going to interrogate me about my new classes. I didn't have to tell her about Ms. Samuels and remedial reading. Unless I wanted to.

I called her before I left the house, and she agreed to meet for coffee after school. Of course, everything went wrong from the start. For instance, I couldn't stop at my locker without bumping into Amanda, and I couldn't bump into Amanda without inviting her along.

I knew they wouldn't like each other. The minute I introduced them I could see Mel taking in Amanda's black eyeliner and chunky earrings. I held my breath, waiting for Amanda to make some snide comment about Mel's brand-name jeans. She didn't, though. Instead she tagged along quietly
until we reached the door to the coffee shop.

“Coffee's so boring. Let's go somewhere interesting. Come on.”

Before Mel could protest, the two of us were in tow down the block, then into a back alley. I was about to ask where we were going when Amanda ducked into a doorway. A vivid hand-painted sign on the wall above read “Tally's Tattoo Parlor.”

“She can't be serious,” Mel said, stopping dead.

I grinned at her. “We might as well look. They can't force-tattoo us or anything.”

Inside, a hulking guy with his arms covered in tattoos and his hair dyed purple leaned across the counter. I assumed that this was Tally.

“You lookin' at your options again?” he asked Amanda.

Ignoring him, Amanda waved us over to the sample designs on the wall. “This is the one I'm getting. It's going to take three visits — one for the black outline, one for the purple scales and one for the orange.
It's going to stretch from my shoulder blade to just below my waist.” She pointed to a winged dragon with stylized black flames issuing from its jaws.

“Lovely,” was all that Mel said.

“I need almost three hundred bucks just to get it started,” Amanda mourned.

Grinning, I offered the fifty-dollar bill still in my wallet.

“Where did you get that?” she gaped.

“Courtesy of my mom's dresser. Which isn't actually her dresser anymore, since she's moving out.”

Now it was Mel's turn to gape. “Your mom's moving out?”

I could tell she was mad that I hadn't told her. Luckily I was saved by Tally the tattoo man leaning even farther over the counter. “Fifty bucks will get you a nice belly button ring,” he said, raising one pierced eyebrow for emphasis.

“Hah!” Mel said, like it was the most ridiculous idea in the world.

That's what made me do it, I think. Ten minutes later I was lying on a raised cot, with
the bottom of my shirt rolled up and the top of my pants rolled down. Tattoo man swabbed my belly button with alcohol, pinched it a few times and then raised what looked like a giant darning needle.

Both Amanda and Mel sucked in their breath. I closed my eyes.

The needle felt like an icicle going through my skin, but it was over surprisingly quickly. Within five minutes I was standing at the counter, listening to instructions about rubbing alcohol.

“I can't believe you did that,” Mel and Amanda said at the same time as the door to the tattoo parlor banged shut behind us. Mel looked entirely shocked. Amanda looked impressed. I thought both reactions were equally enjoyable.

I slumped into my chair at school the next morning. I could think of a hundred reasons that school should start in the afternoon. Amanda caught me yawning and did an exaggerated imitation, displaying her tonsils and her usual wad of gum.

“I slept in, okay?” I grumbled. I'd skipped breakfast, too, grabbing an orange juice at the corner store on my way to school. It wasn't helping to keep me awake.

In fact, the only thing keeping me awake was the neon yellow glow of Dodie's shirt. The more I looked at her, the more she annoyed me. It was bad enough that the entire school population called us speds. Did she have to dress like a sped? Did she have to smile at me every morning like a puppy dog, hoping I would pet her? Did she have to hand in all her assignments on time?

Her latest outfit was the worst so far. Her fluorescent yellow sweater with its draw-string top was paired with green cords — the kind that made that horrible
swish, swish
noise whenever she shifted in her seat. She looked like a 1970s lounge act.

The worst part was the blank look on her face as Ms. Samuels came in and began writing word lists on the board. Dodie's eyes were vacant, like she was watching some secret movie in her own head. It was because of her that kids like Amanda and me got such a bad rep. The more I thought about it, Dodie was the worst part of being in this class.

Maybe Amanda was thinking the same thing. She waited until Ms. Samuels wasn't
watching, then she kicked Dodie under the table. Dodie flinched but didn't say anything. A couple of minutes later, Amanda kicked her again. This time Dodie pulled her chair away from the table.

Ms. Samuels turned around. “Dodie, pull your chair in and write these down, please,” she said.

Amanda smirked and I grinned at her.

I looked again at Dodie's hideous yellow shirt and then at the half-empty orange juice container I'd brought for breakfast. The next time Ms. Samuels turned to the board, I gave the container a swat and it went flying across the table and into Dodie's lap. She yelped.

Ms. Samuels jumped, sending a streak of chalk across the board.

“I'm so sorry,” I said, jumping up.

“What's going on here?”

“An accident,” I said. “I'll run for some paper towels.”

Escaping into the empty hallway, I felt wide-awake for the first time all morning. It was the same feeling that I'd had in the
mall. For a minute I felt smarter than anyone else — Dodie, Ms. Samuels, the store clerks.

The feeling lasted all the way to the bathroom, where I grabbed the whole roll of paper towel. When I got back to the classroom, Dodie was gone.

“She's gone home to change,” Ms. Samuels said, looking at me with a hint of disapproval. Was it because of the interruption, or did she know I'd spilled the juice on purpose?

“Wipe off the table and sit down, please. Let's try to focus,” she said. She didn't even thank me for the paper towels.

In art class, Mr. Spectacles loomed over me as soon as I arrived.

“We missed you yesterday, Miss Hallard,” he boomed. “Virgos are supposed to be punctual. Responsible. Par-ti-cu-lar,” he said, tapping his ruler on the table with every syllable. “I don't suppose I was wrong about you? You're not really an Aquarius are you?”

I shook my head and dug in my pack for my sketchbook. When I pulled out my assignment, his eyes brightened.

“Ah. Very nice. Very nice, Miss Hallard.”

I had drawn the back of Ted's head, big and round, in the foreground of the picture, with his basketball hoop in the background and the basketball in the air partway between. I was pleased with how it had turned out, although Ted had said that he wanted to be wearing number 34 next time — Shaquille O'Neal.

Mr. Spectacles didn't say anything to the rest of the class. Instead, he turned to the blackboard again and wrote “Inclines and Declines” at the top. Our new assignment was a landscape scene showing a road with both a dip and a curve.

I was feeling better after art, but it only lasted until Amanda caught up with me in the hall.

“Check out the loser gear,” she said immediately, meaning my shoes. True, I'd thrown on my oldest runners that morning, but what had I done to deserve Amanda nitpicking at me?

“Is something wrong with you today?” I asked her.

“Is something wrong with you?” she snapped back.

“I asked first.”

She sighed dramatically, sending her hair fluttering off her forehead. “I'm just hyped up. My foster mom's meeting with my case worker today.”

“Why?”

“Some dope about me not attaining my full potential. It's like she thinks I'm secretly a genius and I'm hiding it from her.”

“But that's good, isn't it? That she thinks you're smart?”

“Whatever.”

“Hey, Sped!” At the word, our heads snapped up to scan the hallway. It was one of Brad's friends, but he wasn't talking to us. He was walking half a step behind Jaz, practically stepping on his heels. I could see Jaz clench his fists, but he didn't turn around.

“Hey, Sped!” he said again. Jaz didn't respond.

“That guy had better watch it,” Amanda said softly, sounding somewhat entertained by the situation. “He doesn't know what Jaz can — ”

As Stud Boy made a grab for Jaz's sleeve, the hallway seemed to explode into action. Jaz whipped around, fist already pulled back and plowed one into Stud Boy's face. Stud Boy went half flying, half stumbling backward until he rammed into Amanda and me. We pushed him off us and he dropped to his knees. He looked like he was clutching his nose.

“What's going on?” A teacher appeared, eons too late, as usual. Soon Jaz, Amanda and I were all being herded toward the principal's office. We flopped into orange plastic seats by the front desk, and the teacher disappeared inside.

“Nice going,” I muttered to Jaz.

Amanda, surprisingly, leapt to his defense. “Come on. What was he supposed to do? He ignored it for a while. But that guy definitely deserved to be slugged.”

“He did deserve it,” I admitted. For a second I thought Jaz actually smiled at us. That was all he had time for, though, because another teacher ushered in Stud Boy, a piece of gauze pressed to his nose. They
disappeared into the office, and a moment later the three of us were ushered in as well. We stood crowded around the expanse of oak desk.

“It was like they planned an ambush or something,” Stud Boy was saying, his voice slightly muffled by the gauze. “I was walking along when this guy spun around and attacked me. The other two were waiting behind.”

“That's crazy!” Amanda protested.

The principal turned cold eyes toward her. “You'll be given your chance to speak.”

But we weren't. Or at least, by the time we got to talk, it seemed as if Stud Boy had already convinced everyone. Then Amanda and I talked over top of one another, and Jaz said nothing. He just stood there glaring, as if he might “attack” again at any moment.

We were shuffled back to the orange chairs to wait. Eventually Amanda's foster mother turned up. They disappeared into the office, then left. Amanda gave me a hidden wave on the way out.

Next my dad showed up, looking grim, and we got our turn in the office. The principal said
that since they weren't absolutely convinced of my direct involvement, I would be given two weeks of lunchtime detention instead of a suspension. I was to consider myself on probation. Any further incidents would mean immediate expulsion.

Jaz was still alone on the chairs when Dad and I left.

If I thought the worst was over, I was wrong. As soon as we were in the car, Dad turned to me, his lips pressed together and his eyes intent, as if he were trying to see into me.

“Why would you do this sort of thing?”

“Dad, I had nothing to do with this. Honestly.”

“Violence isn't going to solve things. You should know better than that.”

Suddenly it was all too much. There was no use trying to convince these people — even Dad. They were already convinced that I was going to end up a convicted felon. I blew up.

“Yeah? What's going to solve things then, Dad? Should I solve things like you do, by
saying nothing? If that worked, Ted and I wouldn't be moving into Mom's apartment, would we? Don't tell me how I should deal with things when you can't deal with anything!”