The Basic Eight (16 page)

Well, don’t feel bad, I didn’t realize it either until I showed up late for Calculus and everybody was getting their tests back. Baker didn’t even look at me until the bell rang and everybody left us alone.

“Are you going to try the I Have A Really Good Reason For This approach, or just skip directly to Have Mercy On Me Mr. Baker?” he asked, erasing the board.

I swallowed. “That would be the latter,” I said.

He turned around. “You know, based on the score for your last test, you could form a cohesive argument that statistically you had a chance of a better score if you didn’t show up, but even so I take it as a personal insult.”

If there’s one thing that drives me nuts it’s when teachers take it as a personal insult when you screw up. I

mean, I was already taking it as a personal insult to
myself
, getting an F on a Calc test and thus keeping my F average at an even keel and ending up living under a bridge, and now, Mr. Baker was insulted, too. Bring on the Fs, leave out the bonus guilt, thanks very much. “I didn’t mean it as a personal insult,” I said, standing up and getting my books together. “I was stressed out, I cut class, I forgot there was a test. I’m sorry. I’ll send you a balloon-o-gram or something so you’ll feel better about giving me an F.”

“You know,” he said, “your
attitude
isn’t going to help you get anywhere, either.”

How wrong he turned out to be. I looked at him, and realizing that Super Student or no, it wasn’t a very good plan to alienate all of my teachers during the first semester of my senior year, I put my books back down. “I guess now wouldn’t be the right time to ask you for a letter of recommendation.” He and I looked sternly at each other, and then both shrugged, both smiled.

“Can I give you a makeup test?” he asked. I wanted to tell him I’d already had one this morning, with Douglas, but instead I just nodded. “Will you get an F on it anyway?” I nodded again.

“You know,” he said, “one of my students in fourth-period class has been doing some tutoring. The two of you could meet, after school or something. I don’t need to tell you that it’s an im- portant semester, Flannery.”

“I know, I know. Who is this
wunderkind
?” “Her name’s Flora Habstat. Do you know her?”

I’m sorry, I’m too miserable to write down the rest of the con- versation. I’m missing what Hattie Lewis is saying, anyway. We’re starting Poe today. You know, ever since I heard Poe was manic- depressive, I’m thinking maybe I am too. Who knows? I mean, plenty of people purport to

know, from Dr. Tert’s (in)expert testimony to talk-show queen Winnie Moprah: “I’m guessing that Flannery Culp had lots of pain in her life.” That’s really what she said, “lots of pain,” like I owned some undeveloped land somewhere, filled with prickly plants and broken glass. I’m guessing, Winnie, that you have lots of money in your life, but little else. Ah well, life goes on, I guess, as Hattie Lewis writes page numbers on the blackboard, and I look at Flora Habstat’s phone number which Baker scribbled on paper for me. All these numbers, assigned to me: numbers on dockets, prison record numbers, legal fees, where I fit into national statistics on teenagers, murder, witchcraft.

LATER

Gabriel was waiting for me outside of choir. You’d think that
sweet
would be a land far, far away from
irritating
, but as it turns out they’re right next door, and always having border disputes. Gabriel would do anything for me. Why don’t I want him to?

“Hi,” I said.

Gabriel looked at me for a moment before saying, “Hi. Can we talk?”

“Of course,” I said, leading him out the side entrance where Adam had led me. The comparisons were driving me nuts. I opened the door and we walked out and sat on a bench just as someone was getting up from it. A woman in her twenties, grinding out her cigarette with her bright red shoe, too old to be a student and too young to be a teacher; what was
she
doing here? What was I?

“I just wanted to say,” he said quickly, and my heart sank. He just wanted to say that he’d had too much to drink the other night, or that he’s had second thoughts and realized I’m a fat lesbian, or something. “I just wanted

to say that it’s OK with me, I’m happy for you, and that I’m not angry at you, though I am a little angry at
him
, though just for Lily’s sake, not for mine. I just think it was bad timing for me, that’s all. That’s all I wanted to say. That’s all,” he said, and actu- ally stood up like there was nothing else to say.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“I know about you and Douglas,” he said. He smiled, weakly. “I think it’s great that you guys are back together. You always made a great couple.”

“We made a lousy couple,” I said, “but that’s not the point. We aren’t back together. What are you talking about?”

“Didn’t you guys have a date on Saturday?”

“Well, we walked across the bridge and talked. It wasn’t a
date
.” “What did you talk about?”

“
Gabriel
!”

He shrugged sheepishly. “Sorry. I guess it was nothing.” “How did you even hear about it?”

“From Kate.”

“And Douglas told Kate?” Douglas was getting odder by the moment.

“No. This will really sound like she’s a spy, but it’s true. Kate had some cousins in town, and they took some pictures Saturday afternoon at the bridge. They went to one of those one-hour de- velopment places and were showing them to Kate when she saw you and Douglas in the background.”

“No way.”

“It’s true.”

“Come
on
.”

“
Really
.”

“And so Kate called you right away, and you just decided to accept it as gospel, not even calling me?” I asked.

“Give me a break, Flan,” he said gently. “I was feeling delicate enough, and everybody knows the bridge was you guys’ big date thing.”

I put a hand on his shoulder. He smiled like I knew he would, instantly and from the eyes. “And you were going to give me up without a fight,” I said. “Shame on you.”

He turned toward me. We looked at each other, mouth to mouth. “So what are you saying?” he said. I hesitated, and that’s when the side door banged open and out came Adam, laughing with a couple of people I didn’t know. I suddenly felt like I needed a little room, like Adam had said to me.

“I gotta go,” I said. “I have Biology. I’ll talk to you soon.” I got up and brushed past Adam, who pretended like he was just noti- cing me. “Hey Flan,” he said. I looked at him and wished I had been marked absent so I could throw him down a well. But
anyone
could have thought that, Dr. Tert; it’s just in the context of my later actions that my wish becomes sinister.

I muttered all the way to Biology like a bag lady, and when I got there I had a small humiliating experience. I tried the door, found it locked and realized I was early. Sheepishly I realized why they were locking the doors, and as I backed up I ran into the science geeks who were sitting in the hallway, locked out of their study hall.

“Something you need to do in there?” one of them asked, and I did my best to maintain a dignified expression. Life goes on, I guess; when Biology finally began Carr introduced his new assis- tant. The woman grinding out her cigarette. Remember? With her bright red shoe.

Tuesday September 28th

Not one to wear much makeup, except during a brief period of unfortunate experiments with glitter eye shadow in seventh grade, I never got to experience the girls-in-front-of-the-bathroom-mir- ror-giggling-and-gossiping bonding that has been promised me on TV since I was very little, so having Douglas meet me every morning for Cover The Hickey is the closest thing. It gives me a sort of closure with him, too–first we were friends, then lovers (well, sort of–we never did much of
that
, Pusher), and now we meet every morning so I can help him hide his love bite from his love interest. Ah, the way of the world. Or
this
world, anyway; I don’t suppose peasants in Zaire are discussing Oscar Wilde and applying the right shade of base. Or
are
there even peasants in Zaire? Zaire’s in Africa, right? Just kidding, Peter Pusher, I just wanted to hear you gnash your teeth. I can hear it clearly, over the gurgling, even.

“Do you know what I’ve been thinking about?” Douglas asked me, craning his neck while I moved in for the kill. We were in my bathroom. If he had his eyes open, Douglas could have seen my bedroom in the reflection in the bathroom mirror, seen his hat perched on Kate’s navy blue sweater. For some reason I haven’t gotten around to returning either of those things yet. I don’t know why. Douglas always keeps his eyes closed during this process, though.

“Telling me where you got this?” I asked, halfheartedly. There was no progress on that.

“No,” he said. “Absinthe. Oscar Wilde had it sometimes.” “Oh yeah? Mrs. Lewis was telling us that Poe took it too. What

about it?”

“Well, it might be fun to try some.”

I looked at him. Drugs weren’t usually something the Basic Eight did. Not out of any Puritan goody-goodiness,

but because it just seems so
uncouth
. Marijuana conjures up un- washed longhaired men, LSD brings to mind a spirituality that we would consider immature even if it were genuine, and all those powdered things can’t help but make me think of men with slicked-back hair, wearing silk suits of ghastly colors, with tall thin blondes on their arm, high and dumb. But absinthe? Writers, artists and thinkers, lounging around salons, their thinking growing ever lucid thanks to some magical potion–
that
was pure
us
. “You know,” I said, “it might be. Where would we get some?”

“I don’t have the faintest idea.”

“
Good
,” Lily said at lunchtime when I told her about it. Natasha and Lily and Douglas and I were in the courtyard, discussing the possibility. Natasha, of course, was up for it right away, but Lily looked at us over her tortoiseshell glasses like we had gone mad. Do you think that transition from home to courtyard was a smooth one? “That stuff is supposed to fry your brain.”

“So’s coffee,” Natasha said carelessly. Today she was wearing, and getting away with, a cape. A
cape
. No one else could wear a
cape
to school; people would think they were pretending to be a wizard or something. But Natasha looked like a visiting countess, sexy and regal.

“It is
not
,” Lily said. “Absinthe messes with the chemicals in your head. Chemicals I would presume to say most of us want to keep intact.”

“Poe took it,” I offered.

“And
he
was certainly a picture of perfect mental health,” Lily said. How was I to know that Dr. Tert’s book
Crying Too Hard to Be Scared
would contain chapters on both Poe and me, though never making the absinthe connection? Which is odd, considering that Winnie Moprah not only focused on it in the episode about the

Basic Eight but then had a separate show about absinthe abuse in teenagers, also starring Flora Habstat, once again talking about something she knew nothing about. What a bitch.

“You’re no fun,” Douglas said.

“Thanks a lot.” Lily looked at him sharply.

“Come
on
,” he said. “Flan’s up for it. Don’t you think it would be fun?”

“I feel like I’m in a bad TV movie about peer pressure,” she said. “I have to go somewhere and practice.”

“You have to practice going somewhere?” Douglas said, modifying V ’s mockery. Natasha and I couldn’t help it; we laughed. She stood up and stalked off, or as close to stalking off as you can do while dragging a cello case along with you.

“It seems you guys are always bickering lately,” Natasha said, stretching her legs out on the bench where Lily and her cello had sat.

Douglas sighed. “It’s not her fault. It’s mine. Hey, speaking of mine, do you have my hat, Flan? I think I left it at your house.”

“No,” I said, for no reason. “I mean, I’ll look, but I don’t think so.” I don’t know why I said that. Like a slowly dying engine, stuck underwater, my head gurgles along, waiting for all my sentences to end: the one that keeps me in high school, the one that keeps me in prison, and this one, which is a run-on. Actually, they’re all run-ons. I’m babbling, aren’t I?

LATER

Today is the day that my Advanced Bio report was due, and I think the fact that I’ve never mentioned it in this journal reflects my interest. Mine’s on sunburn. Just

before class began, I went up to Carr’s desk to add my report to the little pile of reports. Carr was standing at the sink, behind the new teaching assistant who was washing out test tubes with a miniature toilet scrubber. His hand was on her ass, but when he heard someone at his desk he took it away. Then he saw it was me, looked right at me and put his hand back on her ass. I didn’t blink. I just stood there for a second and felt a chill like when you bite directly down on ice cream. Walking up to the bus stop, I saw the assistant sitting disconsolately at the bus stop again, alone. I just walked across the street and took the right bus. I’m on it now. Where is my life? Where is it interesting?

Wednesday September 29th

Natasha and I cut school all day today. Between Adam, Gabriel, Douglas and Carr there was scarcely an island in the Roewer Sea where this little castaway felt safe. And Natasha–well, Natasha wouldn’t worry about such trivial, earthly matters as attendance. We drove out of there, stopping briefly at Well-Kept Grounds for a latte to go, and went to the beach. We bundled together on a big rock, me sipping latte and Natasha sipping from her flask, and talked of more important things than the school we were missing. Talked about, I don’t know, books and love and what we were going to do after we left our hallowed halls. We made a date for Saturday night, just the two of us, seeing a revival of one of Natasha’s favorite non-Marlene movies,
Way Down East
. We made a standing date for any Saturday night when we didn’t have something absolutely fabulous to do–then the two of us would do something, just us. All we needed was each other, we decided. Flan and Natasha were all Flan and Natasha needed. Sure, the other Eight