Risen (5 page)

Jay and I are sitting at adjacent workstations, and he briefly glances over at me with a look that I know well from when we were younger. To anyone else he seems like the same old confident Jay, but I can tell he’s panicking. He hasn’t done a shred of work for this class.

Jay throws up his hands. “I don’t see why I should have to start. I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Because I asked you to, and I’m in charge here.” She waits in the center of the room while everyone turns and stares in our direction.

“We always go in alphabetical order. I don’t see why you’re punishing me for trying to help out a friend.”

Ms. Gedwell smirks. “So you aren’t prepared. That’s what I thought, Mr.

Stevens. Typical. I hope you don’t mind taking this class again over the summer.”

“Who says I’m not prepared?”

“If you’re prepared then you shouldn’t have a problem explaining your website to us. Please elucidate. What’s the website name, how are you branding it, who will be your customer base and what service will you provide? Let’s see the work you’ve done on the homepage, which was supposed to be done by now as well.

“Well—the thing is…“ He licks his lips. I see his desperation growing. His eyes dart from side to side, as if he’s searching for an escape route.

“We’re working on it together,” I say, surprising even myself. But I figure one good turn deserves another.

“Oh, is that so?” Ms. Gedwell’s head turns and her hawk eyes are suddenly boring into me.

“You said that eventually we would be paired up so Tim and I just kind of went ahead and paired up to get a jump on things, so to speak,” Jay says, immediately taking my lie and running with it.

Ms. Gedwell folds her arms. “I planned on making the decision regarding who would be partners. And I’d rather not pair someone who puts in very little effort with a partner that’s going to do all the work for the team.”

Jay looks hurt. “But I am working. Yesterday afternoon I spent like three hours on the project. Right, Richardson?”

This is a complete and total lie. Jay doesn’t even know what kind of site I’m working on.

I nod vigorously. “It’s true. He helped a lot. I mean, I had to explain some things and show him what to do, but he did work on it. He wrote a bunch of homepage content. And he thought up the idea of the blackboard. But you don’t know what that is, I’ll show you in a second.”

“And Jay Stevens helped you with all of this.” She says it almost like it’s an impossibility that Jay did any work at all, and of course she’s right, but I can’t let her know that.

“He did like probably fifty percent of it. I swear.” I look her right in the eye and she seems to momentarily buy it. I keep up the sales pitch, hoping she doesn’t notice that Jay has no idea what I’m talking about.

I pull up my login screen as Ms. Gedwell approaches. She puts her glasses on and peers down at the monitor.

“So, this is the entry portal to the site,” I say, showing her the main login page.

I’ve put a lot of work into making a very slick design—but not TOO slick—she wouldn’t approve of anything overly flashy.

“Mister Stevens, what’s that logo in the upper right corner stand for?”

Jay looks at me and then back at the screen. The logo says MHSO in bright red and black school colors.

“Ahhh—that stands for Middlebury High School,” Jay replies.

“Online,” I finish. “Middlebury High School Online.”

Jay grins. “What a team we make. He even finishes my sentences for me.”

Ms. Gedwell’s lips tighten like she’s holding back the world’s nastiest burp.

“Middlebury High School Online is basically Facebook for our school. But it’s not just a social website,” I say.

Jay shakes his head. “No. Heck no.”

“It’s really one-stop shopping for all your Middlebury school needs. Whether it’s asking a question of a teacher, turning in a book report, making a suggestion to the Vice Principal, or even just sending a friendly email to a classmate. MHS Online has it all.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Candice Simmons watching me attentively.

Candice is one of the hottest—and probably meanest—girls in school. Something about the way she’s looking at me is weirding me out.

I think she might hate me.

“That’s a very professional presentation,” Ms. Gedwell says. “Everyone, notice how clearly and concisely Mr. Richardson states his website purpose and customer base.”

I quickly move on. “So once you give your screen name and password, you’re in.” I quickly enter into the main site. “It’s a fairly basic layout with limited functionality at the moment,” I say.

“Yeah, we’re planning on getting a lot more functionality on there soon,” Jay chimes in. “Lots more.”

“Exactly,” I agree, nodding like a bobble-head doll. I use the mouse to show the main features. “Right here every student has their own mailbox which contains personal communications whether it’s from teachers, other students, or even school administration.”

“Very nice,” Gedwell says, smiling a little despite herself.

I point the arrow to the right of the screen where there’s a large blackboard (that took me a full day to design). “This is the “blackboard” where other school students and faculty can write public messages and so forth.”

“Like a Facebook Wall,” Jay says. “That was my idea.”

“That’s right, it was,” I say, shooting him a grin.

Jay smiles triumphantly. He’s managing to catch on to what I’m explaining and add just enough that it’s possible we’ve been working together on the project.

“And this link here,” I say, clicking on an icon that looks like a graduation cap,

“brings you to your class list. This page is under construction but eventually it will allow each student to view their own grades and see all their test scores, what homework they owe, future assignments, that sort of thing.”

“And we’re also planning on having a link so you can check out the schedule of the football team and get up-to-date game scores and player stats,” Jay says.

I want to punch him for adding a ton of work to my plate, because I’d never considered having any of that stuff on the site. At least not until version 2.0 comes out.

“This is all very impressive,” Gedwell says, adjusting her glasses. “It has the makings of a project that I’d be more than willing to show to the Principle as something to be implemented next school year. You’ve got a great talent for this work.”

“What about me?” Jay says. “We worked on it together.”

Gedwell turns on him. “And what exactly did you DO, Mr. Stevens, other then run that mouth of yours? As far as I can tell, it’s your little sidekick who did all the real work and innovation on this project.”

Jay raps his knuckles on his desk. “I admit I’m more of an idea man. Kind of a big thinker. But that’s what makes me and Richardson such a great duo. Like Batman and Robin.”

“Or Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling,” she replies.

“Huh?”

“You probably never heard of them, but they were the two men behind Enron, a company that had a lot of big ideas it didn’t deliver on,” Gedwell says. She looks at both of us. “Please don’t make me regret letting the two of you work together.”

And then she moves on to the next project and the spotlight is finally off of us.

Jay gives me a pound and a big grin. “Nice job, Richardson,” he says. “Fucking Bill Gates and shit. I always knew you were a genius.”

“I’m not a genius.”

But the compliment feels good nonetheless. With about ten minutes left in class, Ms. Gedwell excuses herself to go to the bathroom and tells us to keep quiet and work on our projects.

When she leaves, Jay immediately lets out a cackle. “Spreadwell’s probably going to the bathroom to beat off over Richardson’s website.”

“I thought you both worked on it together,” Candice Simmons says. She’s exactly what you’d expect someone with the name Candice to be. Fiery red hair, killer body, nasty temper. “But I guess you’re just trying to get away with not doing any work, as usual,” she says with a dramatic sigh.

Jay simply grins at her. “You got a big mouth for such a little girl.”

“And I hear you’ve got big balls for having such a little dick.”

A few oohs and laughs from the other kids, but Jay is unfazed, as usual. “Sorry, honey. You must have me confused with your fag cousin, Nate.”

“Try saying that to my cousin’s face and see how that goes.”

On top of being super hot and popular and mean, Candice Simmons is Nate Diaz’s cousin.

Jay unwraps a piece of gum. “As a matter of fact, me and my boy Richardson here just sent little Nate running with his tail between his legs. Some tough guy.”

Don’t drag me into this, I think. I try to melt into the background.

Candice looks momentarily surprised, but quickly recovers. “You shouldn’t even be taking this class, Stevens. Why don’t you go back to basket-weaving so you can keep playing football with your C minus talent and your D minus brains.”

“Baby, you wish you had half my talent and brains.”

“I’d be surprised if your IQ is bigger than your pant size,” Candice says, “but you keep thinking you’re the shit, Stevens. See where it gets you.”

“I hear ten bucks and a joint could get me pretty far with you, baby.” Jay sticks out his tongue and grins like an ape as some kids snicker appreciatively.

Candice gives him the finger and goes back to her computer.

Jay rolls his eyes and then slides over to my desk where I’ve gone back to work.

“What’s that?” he says, nodding to the monitor.

“I’m making a Javascript Alert,” I tell him, as my fingers rapidly click over the keys.

“Tell me in plain English. I don’t speak computer geek.”

I click over to the messaging tab. “I’m just trying to work out some of the kinks on this page. See, like here you can make an announcement and broadcast it to the whole network, or just a few select people.”

“Really?” His eyes widen with interest and he leans forward. “Let me slide in here, I want to try something.”

I give him the keyboard and he starts pecking at it slowly.

He writes this:

Candice Simmons sucked Jay Stevens dick on Friday night. She swallowed. Pics
to come soon.

Then he clicks on the BROADCAST button.

“Come on, man,” I whisper. “What if the site was live?”

“It’s not, though.”

“Don’t go doing anything crazy, okay?”

He just snickers. I select the text and delete it.

For a second I get this awful feeling in my stomach. Along with the sick feeling is an uneasy thought that suddenly pops in my head.

It just so happens that Jay started being friendly to me again when we ended up in this computer class together. Is it possible that the only reason he’s being nice to me is because he knows I can help him pass the class?

TRE (3)

A few hours later, Jay meets up with me on my way down to the first floor for gym.

“Come on, let’s walk together,” he says, more of a command then an invitation.

Lately this has been happening more and more. Jay seeking me out, cracking jokes, pretending nothing’s changed. Like we’ve been friends all along and the last six years never happened.

We’re about to head to the locker room when a couple of freshmen boys intercept us.

The two of them look nervous. Both are shorter than me, each of them wears baggy jeans and oversized t-shirts. One is skinny, wearing glasses, while the other is kind of chubby. The chubby one gives Jay a head nod.

Jay stares at the chubby kid with mild amusement. “You’re on the freshman squad, aren’t you?”

“Yeah. I play right tackle.”

“You guys any good this year?”

“Not really.”

Jay laughs. “JV is where you learn the game, no pressure little man.”

“Hey, is it true that you knocked out Nate Diaz?” the chubby kid asks Jay.

“The gossip mill is alive and kicking around here,” Jay says.

“Is it true though?”

“I didn’t knock him out.”

“But you could, if you wanted to,” the chubby kid clarifies. “Right?”

“I don’t know. If he gives me a reason to, we might find out sometime.”

“Like what kind of reason?”

Jay doesn’t answer at first, just watches them for a moment. “Is he bothering you?” Jays says, finally.

“Not me,” the chubby kid says. “Him.” He points to the skinny kid with glasses.

“What did he say to you?”

The skinny one pulls on his shirt as if it’s sticking to him. “He told me he’s going to smash my stupid face in.”

“Why did he say that?”

The skinny kid shrugs. “Because he’s going to smash my face in?”

“Your stupid face,” Jay corrects.

“You probably made eye contact with him by accident,” I say. “Rule number one. Never make eye contact with a maniac.”

“I didn’t do anything, I was just standing there and he came up to me and said it.”

The kid is panicked, almost crying as he tells us this.

I wonder if I had that same look of doom on my face when Nate cornered me earlier. It’s a combination of trying to appear brave while simultaneously looking like you might pee your pants at any moment.

“Relax, son,” Jay tells the kid, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I can take care of it.”

“I told you he’d handle it,” the chubby one says. “Stevens is the man.”

“That brings me to my next point.” Jay’s expression turns serious. “How much is it worth to you?”

I can tell he’s just giving them a hard time, but they seem oblivious to the joke.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, how much?” Jay holds out his hand and rubs his fingers together.

“Money talks and bullshit walks, fellas.”

The two boys consult. Jay gives me a smile and a wink.

The chubby kid shrugs. “I’m broke.”

The skinny one obviously has the most at stake. He takes a deep breath. “I could get like…I don’t know…a hundred bucks?”

Jay blinks, a little surprised. “Dude, I’m just busting chops. Relax, I don’t need your money.”

“No, I can get it. A hundred. Is that enough?”

“I said I don’t need your money.”

But I can already see the wheels are turning in Jay’s head, even as he denies wanting to be compensated.