Slow Dance in Purgatory (20 page)

             
“He’s crazy about her!”  This time a few people snickered, but Maggie was totally unaware of them.  Johnny laid a warning finger against her lips.  Maggie looked up from the page into his beloved face, and all thoughts of Jane Eyre fled at the sadness in his gaze.

             
“Yes, he’s crazy about her – obsessed with her, even… and she loves him too.  But it’s an impossible situation.”

             
Maggie knew Johnny wasn’t talking about Jane and Mr. Rochester anymore.  Her eyes filled with tears, and she blinked rapidly, trying to hold them back.  A few escaped and spilled out, sliding down her cheeks to freedom.

             
Johnny lifted his fingers and tried to capture them, but the tears slipped past, undeterred.  It was as if the water slid right through his seeking fingertips.

             
“Why can’t I have a happy ending, just once?”  Maggie’s voice caught on a sob, and the entire class looked at her like she had lost her mind.

             
“Miss O’Bannon?  Are you okay?”  Mrs. Olsen’s kind face radiated concern, and Maggie realized that she was crying in front of an audience – and not only crying, but seemingly talking to herself.  She scrambled to wipe the tears from her cheeks and diffuse the embarrassing situation.

             
“Th-this b-book is just really s-sad,” Maggie gulped, mortified.  Johnny had gone as still as Michelangelo’s David.

             
“It surely is, dear,” Mrs. Olsen agreed, rising from her desk to bring Maggie a tissue.  “Carry on, class.  Good literature should make us weep.”

             
Somebody coughed loudly, infusing the cough with the word “freak.”  Muffled laughter rose from around the room. Dara Manning, the dance team captain, tried to copy the cough, only she inserted the word ‘loser’ instead.  The smothered laughter and mocking comments continued throughout the remainder of the class.  Maggie just slid her hand into Johnny’s, hoping he wouldn’t start sending things crashing around the room.  He stiffened as if struck every time someone chimed in with a rude barb, but he didn’t retaliate.  He continued reading to her until the end of class and, when it was over, slipped away, whispering the same words he always gave her – that he would be nearby.

             
If people were looking at her strangely and wondering why she was acting a little off, Maggie hardly noticed and never cared.   Even her strained relationship with Shad was not enough to pop the bubble she floated in, day after day.  Shad hadn’t talked to her for several days after their argument, but he had eventually thawed and resumed his endearing, if slightly obnoxious, ways.  He was definitely more suspicious though, and watched her more possessively than he ever had before. 

             
Johnny stayed away after school if she was working alongside Shad or Gus, making it possible for her to concentrate on her work and her friends.  But she missed him desperately when he did, and sought more and more opportunities to work alone so he would join her.  Shad complained that she was never around and when she was, she was constantly daydreaming and never listened.  One afternoon, he even made snide comments in front of Gus about sneaking off to see her boyfriend.

             
“Who’s this boyfriend, Miss Margaret?”  Gus was taken-aback.  “Did I miss some big news?” he teased her good-naturedly.

             
Maggie tossed a withering look in Shad’s direction.  He stuck his tongue out at her and folded his arms insolently. 

             
“No boyfriend, Gus.  Shad’s just being really stupid.”  Maggie enunciated the word ‘stupid’ and turned away from Shad.  His antics were getting old.

             
“Oh, yeah?  What about Johnny, Maggie?  I thought he was your guy.  Or hasn’t he asked you to go steady yet?  Hasn’t he given you his class ring?  That’s the way they used to do it in the ‘50s, right, Gramps?”

             
Maggie gasped in outrage and reeled back in shock.  Shad’s chin quivered as if he realized he had crossed a line.  Gus looked back and forth between them, confusion wrinkling his brow.

             
“What’s going on with you two?  You’ve been at each other for weeks now.  And what’s this talk of Johnny, Miss Margaret?  He ain’t been up to his old tricks again, has he?  He been givin’ you trouble?” 
             

             
Gus’s frank belief in Johnny’s existence was gratifying, but useless.  Maggie would never confide in him, not about this.  He might fire her, or worse, tell Irene.  No one wanted a crazy foster kid.  She might lose her home…again.  She might lose Johnny.  Fear clogged her throat and sealed her lips.  Years of guarding her emotions and trusting no one could not be undone in months. 

             
“Johnny hasn’t been giving me trouble, Gus,” Maggie sighed and turned away.  “Shad is just messing with you and trying to irritate me, right Shad?”  Maggie glared hard at Shad, and he just walked away without a word.

             
Maggie gathered her supplies and trudged angrily to the cafeteria.  Shad had better not be there.  Hopefully Gus would assign him to scrub the boys’ bathroom floor…with his vicious tongue!  What was his problem?!  

             
Maggie filled her bucket with soapy water and was just about to heave it down from the oversized sink when Johnny stepped around her and lifted it easily to the floor. 

             
“Just in time!  My hero!”  Maggie batted her eyes and grinned up at him.

             
Johnny smirked back, but his eyes were shadowed and his smile fleeting.

             
Maggie followed after him as he wheeled the heavy mop bucket to the cafeteria.  Without comment, he helped her move the tables and chairs to the far edges of the room.  He took the mop from her hands and began sliding it back and forth across the dirty tiles in a steady swath.  Maggie had seen him clean the floor with a thought when they had gotten carried away in conversation, and Maggie had hours of work still to complete.   He obviously wanted to do it the old-fashioned way tonight.  She didn’t mind.  She always felt a little guilty when he made it too easy for her.

             
Grabbing another mop, Maggie dug in, and she and Johnny mopped side by side without speaking for a considerable amount of time.

             
“What was Shad so upset about?”  Johnny said after a while.

             
“Shad is a little weasel.”  Maggie had not forgiven him yet.  “He claims to be my friend!  He claims to be
more
than my friend, yet he is constantly on my case.”

             
“He’s just worried about you.”

             
“Ha!”  Maggie cried, mop in hand, hand on hip.  “He is jealous and nasty!”

             
“He is jealous….but he’s worried about you too,” Johnny insisted, not breaking his rhythm.

             
“I don’t understand why he’s jealous!  He has no claim to me, and he thinks he has it all figured out.  What does he know, really?”

             
Maggie resumed mopping, angrily swiping at tiles that she had already cleaned.

             
“He does have it all figured out, Maggie.  That’s why he’s acting the way he is.” 

             
“Why are you defending him?  And what does he possibly have to worry about, anyway?”  Maggie suddenly felt like bursting into tears, and she blinked her eyes furiously, not wanting Johnny to see her cry.

             
“Maggie…Maggie, stop.” Johnny wrestled the mop from her hands and threw it.  It landed perfectly upright next to the suds bucket and his mop, which were already neatly lined against the wall.  Pulling her into his arms, he slid into a cafeteria chair and held her in his lap.  Maggie collapsed against him with a snarly sigh.

             
“He is worried about you because you are acting like you are in love with a ghost.” Johnny forced her to meet his eyes. 

             
“Well, I
am
,” Maggie said in a tight, small voice.

             
“Maggie – “Johnny moaned, resting his forehead on her shoulder.  Her hands immediately shot up to smooth his hair.

             
“Maggie,” he tried again, sitting up. He slid his fingers between hers, bringing their joined hands to her lap.  “You are walking around with your head in the clouds.  People are starting to notice.  Shad most of all.  He’s heard people talk about you and laugh at you.  It hurts him.  It hurts me.  It hurts me even worse to know I am the cause.”

             
Maggie rose from Johnny’s lap abruptly and took several steps from him, physically distancing herself from what he was saying.  She could take the laughter; she could take the teasing and the ridicule, but she couldn’t take losing one more person that she loved.  His words felt like good-bye, and she couldn’t take that most of all.

             
“I need to go.”  Maggie retreated.  She didn’t want to continue with this conversation, even if it meant cutting their time short.

             
“All right.”  Johnny didn’t argue or beg her to stay, and that made her feel ten times worse.  He walked up behind her and ran a hand down her smooth ponytail, wrapping it around his hand and using it to turn her around and pull her to him.

             
“Every moment with you has made the last fifty years worth it,” Johnny said with quiet intensity, and he lifted her chin and pressed his lips to hers, parting them softly.  It was a kiss filled with both yearning and denial, a kiss that ended far too quickly. 

             
“Goodnight, sweetheart.” 

             
“Goodnight, Johnny,” Maggie whispered.

***

             
Maggie called for Johnny when she entered the school on Tuesday morning.  The fact that she had to call at all was fair warning that he wouldn’t be joining her.  He was usually there before she was completely through the door, as eager to greet her as she was to be greeted.  She lifted her chin stubbornly.  Fair enough.  She had let her dancing slip since Johnny had begun to occupy her free time.  She would shake some of the rust off this morning.  Maggie danced relentlessly for an hour, pushing herself beyond fatigue and leaving the dance room exhausted but satiated and strangely content.  Dancing had filled all her lonely, aching, spaces once more. 

             
A few of the girls from the dance team were in the girls’ locker room when Maggie headed in to rinse off and get ready for school.  She heard Dara Manning say something snide about her old shorts and ratty t-shirt, and Dara’s friends twittered and snickered in all the appropriate places.  She ignored them wearily.

             
“Maggie?”  Dara approached her and asked her if she had a spare tampon, all the while pretending she was crying.

             
One of Dara’s friends, right on cue, asked Dara if she was okay – Dara responded, still play-crying.

             
“It’s just so sad!  Why aren’t there any happy endings?  I really needed a tampon!”

             
Maggie walked away.  She recognized her words from that embarrassing day in English class, and she really didn’t want to deal with Dara Manning’s crap; however, she realized suddenly that what Johnny had said was true.  She
had
drawn the attention and ridicule of her classmates and her teammates.  Had she been that unaware? 

             
The next couple of days were carbon copies of Tuesday.  Johnny was nowhere to be found.  Maggie stopped calling to him, knowing that if he wanted to be with her, he would.  It was all she could do not to throw a huge tantrum and demand he respond, but she was tougher than that, and she held on to her pride like a lifeline.

             
Just about the time everyone started to forget about her scandalous walk down Main Street, Shad’s mother got arrested for prostitution and drug possession.  This wasn’t her first offense, and it looked like she was going to spend some time in jail.  It happened late Tuesday night, and unfortunately, a member of the football team had heard the report called in over his dad’s police scanner.  The whole school knew about the arrest by Wednesday afternoon, and since then, Shad had been the brunt of never ending jokes and had had to endure some pretty nasty innuendo.  His spirits were as low as Maggie’s were. 

             
It had gotten his mother out of the house, at least, and Shad and Gus came for dinner on Thursday night, which hadn’t happened for a while.  Irene prepared all of Shad’s favorite dishes in an effort to cheer him up.  He picked at his food and was only motivated to eat when Gus reminded him that he would never grow if he didn’t dig in.  He laid into the food then, eating like he would never eat again.