November Surprise (2 page)

In junior high he would sneak up to me while I was standing
at my locker and snap my bra strap. “Hey, training bra!” he’d shout. “It takes
more than wishful thinking to grow a pair of tits!”

Five minutes after he walked away I would come up with the
perfect response to his abuse, like “Hey Reggie, it takes more than idiotic
behavior to develop a personality!” But when the abuse was actually being
inflicted I was paralyzed, unable to defend myself, and hating that I’m such a
wimp.

Then in eighth grade I made friends with Sharon Williams.
She wasn’t afraid of standing up to Reggie, even if I was. When I confided in
her about his years of torment, she came up with a plan.

“Have a squirt gun in your locker,” she said. “The next time
he comes up and snaps your bra strap, spray him with it, but do it in the
crotch so it will look like he peed his pants.”

I took her advice and had my spray gun ready, so when he
inevitably came up behind me I grabbed it, whirled around, and in my
adrenaline-filled confusion, threw the gun at his crotch rather than spraying
him.

It had the desired effect.

The water gun ejaculated upon contact, so not only was
Reggie hit in the soft stuff with some fairly hard plastic traveling at a
fairly fast speed, he got a fairly large water stain in the crotch of his khaki
pants.

Sharon and I laughed about it for days, and every time she
saw Reggie she’d yell, “Hey, Hanson, toilet trained yet?”

It was enough to make him choose somebody else to pick on
for a few years. Then Sharon, who is a year ahead of me, graduated, and I was
without my role model.

Reggie can smell my fear.

I walk into school, find my locker, and deposit my blue felt
coat inside. All I have now is a mirror hanging in my locker door, and I check
my reflection. My hair is pulled back into a tight ponytail, and tendrils are
already escaping to form into renegade curls. I smooth them back, and pick up
my textbook for first hour. As I close my locker door, my sort-of-friend Anna,
who just moved here and is a fellow member of Young Democrats, comes rushing up
to me.

“Did you watch the debate last night?” I ask.

“Oh my God! Yes!” Anna cries. She grabs my arm. Anna does
everything with a sense of urgency. “It was unbelievable! Lloyd Bentsen was
amazing! I wish he was the one running for president!”

I nod my head, but I don’t really agree. Commentators said
similar things on the news this morning, but as much as I enjoyed his moment
last night, I don’t think Bentsen would make a good president. Actually, I
don’t even like Bentsen that much; we just don’t see eye to eye on gun control.

I’m about to explain this to Anna when I feel a tight hand
grip my shoulder.

It’s Reggie.

He looms over me. Most people loom over me, since I’m not
even 5’2”. But his height difference, like everything else, seems menacing.

“Lucy, why’d you walk away? I thought we had something.
You’re not breaking up with me, are you?” He jeers, then he pushes me a little
and walks away.

“What was that about?” Anna asks. Her voice becomes low and
conspiratorial. “You’re not going out with him, are you?”

“He was just kidding around.” I start walking towards my
first hour class, and Anna follows me. Luckily the turnoff is immediate, so I
easily escape without having to explain anything more. “See you later.”

She waves goodbye.

My day goes by fairly smoothly after that. Seniors are
allowed to leave campus for lunch, so later I walk to the nearby convenience
store, buy a Snapple and a bag of pretzel cheese Combos, and sit outside and
enjoy the Indian summer day. Someone close by in a car has U2 cranked, which is
one of the few popular bands I can recognize. I enjoy the solitude of sitting
by myself and listening to good music.

By evening I’m home and in a good mood once again. That’s
partly because there was a letter from Sharon waiting for me. It’s full of
happy news about classes, roommates and boys, and the end of the letter was the
best part.

Lucy, college is so
much better than high school! Just think, in less than a year you’ll be in
college too, and you won’t have to deal with all those idiots every day.
Believe me, you will be SO MUCH HAPPIER! So hang in there, the best is totally
yet to come.

I decide she’s right. My days
of high school and Reggie Hanson are numbered, and coming up is what will
probably be the best time of my life. All I have to do is wait it out.

The next morning Reggie is outside the school doors again,
hanging with his buddies, but he either doesn’t see me, or he doesn’t care, and
I walk away from him unscathed.

The day goes by pleasantly enough,

Then comes third hour. I sit in my Advanced Civics and
Modern Government class, the one class I share with Reggie. He sits towards the
back, and I sit in the front row, so at least proximity isn’t an issue. But I
can feel his eyes on my back, and I bury my head into my textbook, hoping that
his glare is a figment of my imagination.

Still, it’s my favorite class. Mrs. Fischer, a fiery Asian
lady in her mid-fifties, is an awesome teacher and she loves to engage us in
political discussions. It is one arena in which I shine.

“What did you all think of the debate?” she asks. Yesterday
she had a sub, so it’s our first chance to discuss it.

Nobody says anything.

She crosses her arms and peers at us over her glasses. “Who
watched it?” Anna, myself, Reggie, and about a dozen other people raise their
hands. Mrs. Fischer smiles. “Wonderful,” she says. “So what are your thoughts?”

“I loved it,” says Anna. “Bentsen totally gave it to Quayle.
It was classic.”

“So what?” demands Reggie. “Everybody knows the
vice-president debate doesn’t mean anything. Bush is still going to win.”

“Why do you think so, Reggie?” Mrs. Fischer tries to be very
diplomatic, and gives everyone an equal opportunity to express their opinions,
even an ignorant jerk like Reggie.

“Have you turned on the news lately?” asks Reggie. “Dukakis
is a short, weird guy who talks like he’s an alien, and Bush is a tall guy who
actually makes sense when he has something to say. Only a nimrod would vote for
Dukakis.”

“Are you kidding?” Anna practically shouts. “You care about
how tall they are? Like that has
anything
to do with how they can run a country.”

“It has everything to do with it.” Reggie speaks before Mrs.
Fischer can call on anyone else, although several other people have their hands
raised. “World leaders aren’t going to respect some midget they have to crouch
down to see. If we elect Dukakis, Gorbachev will nuke us in no time flat.”

I’m sort of shocked that Reggie actually knows who Gorbachev
is, but my overwhelming response to his statement is of course, anger. Being
short myself, I resent any insinuation that height is somehow connected to
personal power.

I speak even though I haven’t been called upon.

“Height didn’t seem to help you much, back in third grade.”

Reggie squints at me. “What?”

“You know,” I say. “You ran for every class office possible,
and you were the tallest person in our class. Yet you still lost, even to me.
So I guess that proves height has nothing to do with electability, likeability,
and most especially, intelligence.”

Everybody is silent for a moment, probably because they’re
in shock. Nobody is more in shock than me, however, and when Mrs. Fischer
shakes her head to show her disapproval I feel the burn of embarrassment in my
cheeks. But then Anna begins to clap. I glare at her, trying to get her to
stop, but she doesn’t. Instead, she is joined by some of the other
liberal-minded students in our class. Soon several people are clapping, others
are laughing, and even Reggie’s friends are joining in.

“I’d forgotten about that,” I hear one of them say.

“She totally got you,” another one says.

I sit up straighter, my shame turned to pride.

“Ha ha,” says Reggie. He pretends he’s not bothered, but I
can see that he is. Good. He deserves it. I immediately start crafting my
letter to Sharon in my mind. She’s going to love this.

“You need a Prozac,” Reggie says to me. “I think it would
help you mellow out a lot.”

Now Mrs. Fischer sternly shakes her head at Reggie. She
switches the subject. “It’s interesting, Reggie, that you mentioned world
leaders. I do agree that their impression of us will be important in the next
few years, especially with the international landscape changing so. Does anyone
have any thoughts?”

I raise my hand, but since I’ve
already spoken, it takes a while for her to call on me. When she does I tell
the class that when the USSR pulled their troops out of Afghanistan they
created ramifications that could lead to civil war, and that affects everyone,
and we need someone diplomatic like Dukakis to handle it. But by that time most
people are no longer listening.

My good mood lasts several days, until the evening of the
second and last presidential debate. I keep hoping that Dukakis’ poll numbers
will rise after Quayle’s disastrous performance the other night, but they
haven’t. So now I’m hoping Dukakis will score big in his debate like Bentsen
did. But when Dukakis’ pivotal moment comes, he fumbles. When asked if he’d
want the death penalty for some guy who raped and murdered his wife, he
stammers a little, but remains as calm and emotionless as if he were reading
the phone book.

“… I think you know that I've opposed the death penalty
during all of my life. I don't see any evidence that it's a deterrent and I
think there are better and more effective ways to deal with violent
crime."

God. Reggie is right; Dukakis really is an alien. Nobody
could be so unemotional unless they were the direct descendent of Spock.

I had recorded the debate and afterward I keep rewinding and
watching that one moment again and again, irrationally hoping I’ll find a
different moment, a different response, if I just watch it one more time.
Finally my mother tells me to stop being obsessive and go to bed.

The next day as I walk to school the ugly truth sinks in.
The sun bounces off the autumn leaves, a gentle breeze promises another warm
fall day, and I’m confident that I’ll ace my test this afternoon on
Beowulf
, but none of it can deter me
from admitting a horrible reality: Bush has already won. The Willie
Horton-soft-on-crime character slams, the silly pictures of Dukakis in a tank,
the rumors about Kitty Dukakis burning flags and Dukakis’ mental instability,
they’ve all built to what seems like an inevitable loss for Dukakis.

I reach the school doors, and of course, Reggie is there,
and he is looking for me. When he sees me approach he starts walking in my
direction.

I keep going.

“Lucy, wait up!” he yells.

I walk faster. I think maybe I’ve lost him by the time I
reach my locker, because the crowd of students in the halls makes it difficult
to see if he’s still behind me or not. Quickly I take off my coat, and my heart
is racing in the hope that I’ll make it to first hour without a run-in.
Unfortunately though, I feel a hand on my shoulder as I lean down to retrieve
my book.

This time, his touch isn’t irritating. It’s just a guy’s
hand on top of my Calgary Olympics t-shirt, and I can feel the coolness of his
skin through the thin fabric. I sigh and turn around.

I speak quickly, and my words have an angry edge. “What do
you want?”

He flinches and takes his hand away.

“You really hate me, don’t you?” He asks me this simply,
just a statement of fact phrased as a question.

“You’ve bullied me since third grade. Am I supposed to like
you?”

“I wasn’t exactly bullying you,” he says in a soft voice. He
drops his head for just a moment, and his dark hair hangs in his eyes. “You
need to look at things from my side.”

“No, I don’t.” I hug my book to my chest and close my locker
door with my foot. I try to move past Reggie, but he steps in my way.

“You don’t understand how humiliated I was, losing to you
like that.” He looks down and tugs on the sleeve of his sweatshirt. It’s almost
like he’s humble.

I shift my weight from one foot to the other. My palms are
growing damp, and I’m not sure why. Yes, I’m nervous, but about what, exactly?
I clutch my textbook and my doodle-covered notebook more closely to my chest,
and wipe my other hand against my corduroy skirt. Good choice. Never let them
see you sweat.

I look Reggie in the eyes, and he gives me a modest smile,
like he’s admitting a mistake.

“Can we talk sometime?” he asks.

“Aren’t we talking now?”

He laughs, as if I’d said something flirtatious, when
really, I was simply asking a question. His laugh is low and intimate, and now
my heart is starting to race.

“Are you going to Donna English’s party this weekend?”

“I, uhmm… is she having a party?” I stammer a little. “I
don’t think I’m invited.”

He laughs again and punches me playfully in the shoulder.
“We’re not in the fifth grade,” he says. “This isn’t a birthday party at Chuck
E. Cheese. You don’t have to be invited; you just have to know about it.”

Even though my throat is dry, I swallow. I’m starting to
form a reply when he continues to speak.

“You should come. We can talk there.” He brushes his hair
away from his face, looks down at his faded black Converse high-tops, and kicks
his toe against the floor. Without looking at me he says softly, “I’d really
like to talk to you, so I hope you can make it.”

With that he walks away, and
I’m left standing at my locker, feeling as if the ground has just shifted
beneath me.

All day and for the rest of the week, whenever I see Reggie
I catch him looking at me first, and if our eyes meet he gives me the same shy
smile. Then on Friday, during Modern Government class, Mrs. Fischer begins a
discussion about the election.