Chapter 3
We get back to our rooms fifteen minutes before the bell for breakfast rings, giving us just enough time to shower and get dressed.
We head down the hall to the cafeteria, but I stop just as Bethany is about to open one of the huge doors.
She turns to look at me, confused. “What’s wrong?”
“I can’t go in there. Not after last night.”
“That’s ridiculous. What are you going to do? Starve? Miss all your classes?” She asks incredulously.
“Actually, now that you say it, that sounds like a great idea. I can get thin and avoid a second round of humiliation at the same time. Just bring me my class work, and, if you’re feeling kind-hearted, a toasted bagel and some bacon,” I say over my shoulder, heading back upstairs.
“Oh no, you don’t,” she says, grabbing the collar of my shirt and pulling me back around. “You’re going to march back in there with pride. You are going to act like nothing happened last night, and if someone feels the need to bring it up, you will laugh whole-heartedly as if you meant to make a complete and total fool of yourself. Do you understand?”
“Yes, ma’am, Sergeant General Dictator, ma’am. Is there anything else, ma’am, you would also like me to do, Your Highness, ma’am?” I say, saluting her.
“Haha, very funny. Now, shoulders back like you’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.”
With this, she flings open the heavy oak door (How such a small person can have so much strength, I do not know), and pushes me inside.
The entire room goes quite and more than 563 faces turn to look at me (I mean, of course all the under classmen would have heard, but the lunch ladies? Really? Why must everyone know of my misfortunes?). I consider bolting, but Bethany is behind me blocking my path. It is possible I could knock her down, but she runs faster than me and is really quite scary when she is angry. I do not want her chasing me down and beating me with someone’s breakfast tray. So instead of running, I clear my throat then walk over to the breakfast buffet, my footsteps echoing loudly in the huge and now uncomfortably silent room. I get my toasted bagel and bacon and sit down next to Heath and a few other people from our class. He looks at me sympathetically.
Cathy Lawrence from Physics leans over Ryder and whispers loudly to me over the table “Don’t worry. I’m sure it’ll pass in a few days.” I imagine she thinks she is being helpful. But ‘a few days’? Really?! How was I supposed to cope with this for ‘a few days’?
Then McKenna the Vile plants her horrid self in the empty seat in front of me.
“Um, that seat was saved for someone,” Ryder states pointedly.
McKenna the Vile simply ignores him. “Why, Penelope,” she says with a malicious smile, “How are you, dear? I heard about your little… mishap last night. It must have been so humiliating; I’m so glad it wasn’t me. Of course, I never wear white after Labor Day, so it never would have happened to me.” She laughs her stupid jingling bell laugh that everyone says is so pretty.
At this moment, Brock Garnett takes the seat next to McKenna the Vile. He slings his arm over her shoulders haphazardly, so it rests just over her boob. God, he is such a tool. He ignores me completely, whispering something in the Great Vile One’s ear. She laughs her stupid jingle bell laugh again then turns back to me. “Well, I must be off now; I have important boyfriend-related things to do. You know how it is,” she says, standing. “Oh wait, you don’t know because you don’t have a boyfriend anymore. Oopsy-daisy!”
She walks away, leaving me with the sound of more of her stupid jingle bell laughter.
I don’t even bother waiting until she is out of ear shot before exclaiming to Heath “Ooh, I hate her; I hate her; I hate her!”
“I know; she’s a jerk, but you can’t let her get to you.”
When I sit there, still fuming, he bumps my shoulder with his and says “It’ll be all right. Relax. Don’t let her see that she’s won.”
“Fine, but I don’t have to like it.” I take a bite of my bagel, glaring daggers into the Vile One’s back.
The rest of the day passes pretty well in comparison. At least, it does until I get to Spanish.
In Spanish, all the exhaustion from last night and from the mindless running of Phys. Ed. catches up to me, and I accidentally, well, fall asleep. Yes, so I am drooling happily on my desk having wonderful dreams full of Shia LaBeouf coming to me and declaring himself to be fully in love with me when someone pokes me in the ribs.
“Penelope.” I hear Heath whisper.
“Arrgen jubben jingleheimen.” I mumble, shooing him away. I hear scattered giggling.
“Penelope.” Shia speaks in Mrs. Garza’s voice. You’d think that I would wake up at this point but I don’t. I just sit there and say “Oh, Shia, dear, what’s wrong with your voice?” There is more snickering.
It seems that I said it OUT LOUD. Why? What is wrong with me?
“Ms. McPhee?” This time I open my eyes to see Ms. Garza standing in front of me.
“Oh, uh, hello Mrs. Garza,” I mumble drowsily, rubbing my eyes. “What brings you hereabouts?”
She smiles to herself. “Ms. McPhee, this happens to be my classroom—Spanish 3 to be exact.”
“Really?” I look around, bewildered, my brain still not functioning properly and reminding me, as it should, that I am always in Spanish this time of day. There is more laughter.
“Ms. McPhee, I realize you are busy with your dreaming of Mr. LaBeouf, but would you care to continue that later and right now answer the question I gave you?”
I can only stare, dumbfounded.
“She asked you to translate ‘Juan esta leyendo el libro Animal Farm.’” Heath whispers in my ear, finally being helpful.
She shoots him a warning look, one that says ‘Do not help those who slack. It is intolerable.’
“Oh, um, well, let’s see. It would be…” my drowsy brain struggles to translate. “Um, would it be ‘Juan is reading the book Animal Farm.’?”
She narrows her eyes as she looks between Heath and I. “Yes, you are correct Ms. McPhee, and see to it that you do not fall asleep in my classroom again.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I sputter.
When the bell rings a few minutes later, I gather all my things and rush out by the time anyone else even gets out of their seat.
I skip last period (Physics, ugh.) and instead go hide in one of my favorite places—the library.
Ashmore Academy has a huge library; it’s two stories high and has thousands of books. There are tall, sloping stained glass windows and cherry paneling. On the second story, which is not really a “story” per say but a balcony jutting out from another layer of book shelves, there is a small alcove. Now if you are lucky and no one is making out in this little alcove (which is more common in lunch and after-dinner hours, but not unheard of during school hours), you can get to my favorite spot. If you twist the cat statue’s head to the left 90˚ and then pull the eagle statue’s right wing down, a door pops open behind the bookshelf. Cool, huh? Yeah, Ashmore was built back in the late 1850s, and when the Civil War started a lot of extra passageways were built in. Anyways, as time wore on a lot of them were forgotten about.
I’m fairly certain that I’m the only one who knows about this one because who’d want to make out in an alcove when they could have an entire secret room? Yeah. I wouldn’t. Not that I have anyone to make out with, but that’s beside the point. What was I saying?
Oh, yes. So I go through the door and into my secret room (Yes, I call it my room). Once inside, I pass the old desk and the bookshelf and instead sit in the old armchair that faces the stained glass window (I have looked for this window repeatedly from outside but I have never seen it. It’s pretty much hidden behind the vines and the tree’s branches and such). There is a faint dappled light coming from the window, casting the shadows of leaves and vines on the wooden floor. It is a soft light, but still strong enough to read by. So, I pull out one of my favorite novels and curl up in the ancient sitting chair, heat seeping in through the cracks in the walls.
I get lost in the novel, vaguely aware of the school bell ringing to signal the end of Physics, and then before I know it, the junior dinner bell is ringing and I can hear the sounds of the masses (laughing, shouting, etc.) making their way to the cafeteria below me.
Oh, crap! I say to myself, leaping to my feet. I’ve got to go before my absence is noticed.
On second thought, they probably won’t miss me at dinner. I mean there are 563 kids in the junior class... But I hear they’re serving tapioca pudding for dessert tonight. It would be a shame to waste such deliciousness because I’m hiding from a little bit of embarrassment.
Okay, a lot of embarrassment. But it’s tapioca pudding for goodness sakes! I HAVE to go.
The library is practically empty when I emerge from my secret room. The only person I see is the librarian and a couple of freshmen boys giggling in the Anatomy section. I shake my head, tsk-tsking to myself, and frowning at them as I walk toward the stairs.
I am not looking where I am going in the least and run right into someone.
“I’m so sorry…” I begin, turning towards the person. Then I see who it is.
“You,” I say, glaring.
He doesn’t say anything.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, not bothering to hide my contempt.
Richard stares at his feet, clearly uncomfortable. Good. It serves him right, the turd bucket.
“I was just putting these away.” He holds up an armful of books to prove his point.
“Yes, I see that. Why, pray tell, are you putting them away? Or, more importantly, why are you even here? I thought I was through with you when you graduated last year.”
“Yes, well, about that… see, I’ve been made to get a job and—”
“You?” I interrupt. “Work? That has got to be about the funniest thing I’ve ever heard in my life. Why would you have to work? You’re filthy rich!”
He doesn’t say anything, just looks about like he’d rather be anywhere else. I realize he looks a bit… bedraggled. His clothes are crumpled and not the newest styles. His shoes are scuffed, and he doesn’t smell of any expensive cologne, or any cologne for that matter.
“Wait a second.” A laugh begins to rise in my throat. “Did your parents cut you off? Finally? After you’ve been leeching off of them for years, crashing your expensive sports cars and buying newer, more expensive European ones, throwing keggers every other weekend, helping yourself to thousand-dollar outfits and blowing off classes at the school they pay tens of thousands of dollars to send you to every year?” I let out a bit of a cackle as he begins to look angry.
“This is just too good to be true.” I smile, enjoying tormenting him a bit too much. “So now you have to work in the library to pay for what you want? You are a loser.”
I try to go past him and down the stairs to dinner, but he moves in front of me.
“Now just one minute,” he begins in protest. “Listen here, Penelope, you are being quite rude and I will not stand for it.”
“ ‘Quite rude’, eh?” I challenge, my voice rising. By now the librarian and the two Anatomy section pervs are staring but I keep talking. “So, it’s ‘quite rude’ that I call a greedy scum bag like you a loser, but it isn’t ‘quite rude’ of you to use me? It isn’t ‘quite rude’ of you to cheat on me with two other girls? It isn’t ‘quite rude’ of you to declare me useless, childish and ugly, and then dump me in front of the entire school? You break my heart and publicly humiliate me, and yet I’m the rude one?!” I scream, choking back tears.
He doesn’t respond. He just gulps and shuffles about on his feet, looking guilty.
“You disgust me.” And with that, I push past him and hurry down the stairs and out the library doors. I stop and lean against a wall, taking deep breaths, trying to stop the tears. A few slip out but I manage to start breathing smoothly and slowly again. Finally, I wipe at my cheeks, and, bracing myself, head solemn-faced into the Grand Hall.
