Fiction.

The only light in James’s room came from the reading lamp above his head.

I could make out the rise and fall of his chest as he slept. Kaiser sat in another chair across from my, the sliver of light showing the up and down bob of his head as he tried to fight off sleep.

After James introduced the light pole to Amelia’s torso, he immediately collapsed on the pavement. Police had started to swarm at the sound of the crashing cars, so we were able to get him on an ambulance pretty quick.

The doctor said James had gone into shock. Aside from a few broken bones, he would be fine. They gave him something to sleep and kept telling Kaiser and I to go home and get some rest. We couldn’t bring ourselves to do it, not believing that it was actually over. Jack Arrow was dead. We left Amelia flattened in the middle of the street. But still. Things just didn’t feel safe yet.

My heart stopped as the door swung open. The comforting sound of the nurse’s sneakers squeaking on the laminate tile brought my breath back to my chest. She gave me a quick smile as she checked James’s pulse and temperature.

He’s sleeping real good, ” she said on her way out. “I bet they let him go tomorrow. Hey, aren’t you a little young to be out so late, honey?

I shrugged and smiled.

“Ma’am, after what I’ve been through, nothing my parents do is gonna be so bad.”

The truth was, I just didn’t want to go back to my aunt’s house. It wasn’t the idea of being grounded until the end of time that bothered me. I knew that me going back meant that I would have to say goodbye to Kaiser. I mean, I knew it was ridiculous. I was still 17 and he was still, well, old. And seriously, while my parents might let a little destructive alchemy slide, they are not down with statutory rape. Or, whatever. Nevertheless, I wanted to put off goodbye as much as possible.

Naturally, Kaiser’s head popped up just as I started thinking about him. His abilities are quite inconvenient for someone who’s trying to keep her feelings under wraps. But he didn’t say anything asshole-ish. He just sighed and smiled.

“How’s he doing?”

“The same,” I answered. “The nurse thinks he might be able to leave tomorrow.”

“Oh, good.” He paused, seemingly unsure of what to say next. I couldn’t help him out, either.

“Listen, Lauren,” he started. “You know, if you’re ever in Blacksburg, we could hang out or whatever. I mean, if you wanted to.”

“Would you want to?” I asked, picking at my shoe, unable to make eye contact with him.

“Sure. You’d be pretty useful to have around. Like, if we run out of beer or something. You could go Jesus-like with the tap water and hook us up,” he suggested.

If he had made that remark just a few hours ago I would have called him an asshole and turned his chair into a mountain of pudding, or something equally awkward. But, I knew things were different now. Even I know what a hard time those frat boys have with real emotions. I could take what I got for now.

“Anytime, Kaiser,” I laughed, looking up to see him looking at me with a soul-crushingly sincere smile. I felt the blood rush up to my face but I couldn’t seem to look away.

He got up and walked quietly over to my chair. Taking my hand in his, he pulled me to my feet and brushed the hair out of my face. He leaned over and kissed me gently on the cheek, pulling back just long enough to look me straight in the eye before putting his lips on mine.

“Well, look what we have here,” said a voice behind us. The bulbs in James’s overhead light popped, showering him with shards of glass as he still lay asleep.

The entire room was drowned in darkness…except for the unmistakable glow of a lit cigarette.

“You first.”

“What? No. Be a fucking gentleman. You go.”

“Look, Lite Brite, I’m not the one who can glow here. It’s probably pretty fucking dark in there, considering it’s underground. So, I suggest you get your ass in there.”

I turned away from James and Amelia to let them work it out on their own and faced Kaiser. He seemed to be pulling out of the daze he was in, shaking his head back and forth and blinking his eyes frantically. He looked around and the situation started to sink in. Quickly he pulled himself to his feet and scaled up the base of the monument. We had all seen the bum effortlessly lift that panel and drag Diana behind it, but Kaiser couldn’t make it budge.

“James!” he shouted. “Come here and help me!”

“Hold on one second, Kaiser. I’m in the middle of something here.” James turned back to face Amelia whose face had by then turned an undeniably angry shade of red. “If you think for one second I’m going to let some bartender whose only “talent” is to glow tell me what to do-”

” Getthefuckoverhere!” Kaiser grunted, still struggling to separate the iron panel from the stone it was wedged into.

“Hey, genius, why don’t you get Sweet Tits over there to help you? Remember that whole steel to aluminum foil incident a few hours ago? And honestly, I doubt I’ll be able to convince the panel to move and I don’t think Lite Brite over here will be able to put on a fireworks show good enough to distract it. Looks like Madame GoodRack is gonna be your best bet.”

Amelia looked at me. She nodded her head over towards Kaiser, silently and begrudgingly agreeing with James. I climbed up to where Kaiser was crouching down, trying to slip his fingers past the iron panel. I could see blisters and cuts already forming.

“Stop,” I said quietly. “Let me.” As he took his hands away, I placed mine on the panel. A sharp tingle traveled from my head and through my fingertips. The panel softened, allowing my fingers to push deeper and deeper into it’s surface. Suddenly it buckled into a flimsy, slippery plastic in my hands, like a tarp or a trash bag. I pulled the length of the plastic towards me, crumpling it into my arms to reveal an opening to what looked to be a long, dark tunnel leading down from the monument and under the street.

“Seriously, Lauren. That shit you do is useful!”

“Thanks,” I said, smiling. I turned to James and Amelia who had now gone to their separate corners, probably after too many boob comments.

“Amelia? Can you come up here, please?”

“Yes,” she said immediately and made her way to Kaiser and I.

“Great!” hollered James. “We just spent 15 minutes arguing about how YOU needed to go first and you wouldn’t do it. Why the hell are you going up there now?”

“Two reasons. One, she said “please” and two, you’re an asshole.” Amelia turned back to look at the gaping hole.

“Maybe there’s a ladder or something,” I said. “I mean, how else would he be able to get down there?”

Amelia reached one arm into the blackness and soon a dim, amber glow seeped from her fingertips. She slowly scanned the perimeter of the hole.

“Jackpot,” she whispered as she revealed a narrow ladder dropping down into a tunnel below. “It looks like a pretty long fall from the bottom of the ladder to the floor, but we can make it. Not sure how we’ll get back up, but I guess we’ll deal with that when we get there. Kaiser, Lauren, Asshole, let’s go.”

Amelia began to ease herself onto the ladder, the amber glow now coming from all of her fingers, when the tunnel was filled with a sharp, high-pitched scream. Kaiser shoved Amelia out of the way.

“DIANA!!!” Kaiser screamed into the tunnel, an undeniable note of desperation in his voice. The screams continued, but sounded like they were getting closer and closer with each passing second.

“I’M RIGHT HERE!!! DIANA?!?!?” Kaiser looked at me, just like he did earlier that night at the Byrd, straight at my face but completely through me. “It’s her! I can see her coming!”

“Is there anyone with her?” I asked, grabbing his arm. “Is he chasing her?”

“No! No, I don’t see anyone!” He laughed and called out, “We’re right here, Diana! Keep running!” his voice echoing into the tunnel. Soon the screaming mixed with the sound of frantic footsteps, slapping against the floor of the tunnel. The glow from Amelia’s hands strengthened just in time to reveal Diana’s face as she passed under the opening. She looked confused, terrified, and exhausted. She opened her mouth to speak but all that got out were relieved sobs at the sight of her own brother.

“It’s ok. We’ll get you out,” Kaiser said softly. “Is he behind you?” Diana shook her head and limply pointed back towards the tunnel behind her.

“Diana, can you reach the ladder?” Amelia asked. Diana stretched out to reach it, but the bottom rung was too high for her to reach. Without a word, Kaiser jumped down onto the ladder and climbed down to pull his sister back up. James, Amelia, and I managed to hoist the two of them out of the opening and onto the platform. Diana crumbled into Kaiser’s arms, crying shaking all over. He rocked her back and forth, whispering in her ears, looking like he was crying himself.

“Come on, guys,” said James. “Let’s get out of here. We probably should get her checked out, make sure she’s ok.”

“James is right,” Amelia nodded. “But first, we need to do something about that,” she said, pointing the hole. “Otherwise he’s going to be able to get in and out even more easily. Lauren, I guess you can just change the panel back and leave it where we found it.”

I gathered up the black plastic and was about to spread it back out over the hole when I got an idea. I reached down and touched the top rung of the ladder. Slowly the metal became softer, turning to liquid and dripping to a molten pool at the bottom of the tunnel. Carefully I spread the black plastic over the hole and felt it turn back to solid iron underneath the palms of my hand. I stood up, brushed my hands on my jeans, and turned to look at everyone else.

“Well, that ought to buy us some time,” I said. “At least for a little while.”

We all eased ourselves down the base of the monument and made our way towards the grass, the spotlights surrounding us pulsing with each step we took.

“He’s taking her. He’s taking her through a back door.” Kaiser’s voice
caught in his throat and his breath quickened. He charged into Diana’s
room and ripped the covers off of Dan.

“Where did he take her??!?!!”

Nothing.

Kaiser grabbed Dan’s shoulders and flipped him over on his back. Dan’s
mouth hung open but his eyes were squeezed shut.

“Dan! What the fuck is wrong with you?!?!? She’s gone! Wake up,
asshole!” Kaiser slammed Dan back down on the bed. He tried to peel
his eyes open, but they wouldn’t budge. Kaiser placed to fingers on
Dan’s neck, although I’m not sure why. We’d all had considerable
experience with dead bodies by now, you’d think Kaiser would know one
when he saw it.

“We have to go. We have to get her. I can’t let him…I can’t let him
do what I saw him do.” Kaiser scrambled for his shoes and made his way
to the door.

“Wait, hold on, Kaiser, ” said James, in a voice kinder than I ever
thought him capable of. “Just stop for a minute.”

“Stop?!? I can’t stop! He’s going to kill her!”

“James is right,” said Amelia. “We’re not going to be able to help her
at all if we don’t know where we’re going.”

Kaiser stopped in his tracks and turned to her.

“You said you saw him taking her through a back door. Look harder, do
you know where they might be? What does it look like”

Kaiser bent at the knees and shoved his fingers through his hair.

“He was walking her through a parking deck. At least I think it was a
parking deck. They looked like they were outside but there was a
ceiling, a low ceiling. He was dragging her. Her eyes are closed, but
I don’t know if she’s asleep or - whoa wait..wait a second.”

He was looking at me, but not looking at me at the same time. It was
more like he was looking through me, using my face as a physical focal
point so his mind could go somewhere else. He jumped.

“He’s pulling her up an aisle. It looks really old. There are all
these chairs and a huge chandalier,” Kaiser mumbled. Then recognition
flashed across his face. “Wait a second, I would know that carpet
anywhere. I’ve done like 10 chicks in that spot.”

“Where?” I asked, trying to ignore the 10 chicks comment. “What spot?”

“They’re at the Byrd. I know it. We need to get there, now. I now he
hasn’t hurt her yet, but I can’t tell when he’s going to.”

“He took her to a fucking landmark. Well, I’d say that makes a
statement,” said James. “Ok, Tits, Lite Brite. Shall we?” as he
followed a sprinting Kaiser out the door. Amelia and I looked at each
other.

“What do we do about Dan? I mean, should we just leave him here?” I asked.

“Not a hell of a whole lot we can do for him now,” she answered. “If
we hurry, we might be able to keep tonight’s death toll down to just
one.” She took me by the arm and lead me after the guys.

We made good time over to the theater, even though we were all
struggling to keep up with Kaiser the whole way there. Who knew a
drunk frat boy could run so fast?

He quickly found the door that he’d seen Diana dragged through. We
exchanged worried glances before we walked in. There hadn’t really
been time to discuss a plan. But, there was no going back at
that point.

Kaiser walked in first, followed by James, Amelia, then me. I think he
was still seeing several steps of what was happening in real time, but
his quickening pace showed me that he was getting more anxious. We
made our way to the entrance to the lower level of the theater. Kaiser
opened the door and we were greeted by a flood of complete darkness.

“Amelia!” James whispered. “Do your stuff!”

I heard her feet shuffle along the carpet. Slowly, the room was filled
with a gentle glow. I quickly noticed it was coming from the
chandelier suspended from the ceiling.

Peeking over Kaiser’s shoulder, I blinked as my eyes adjusted to the
growing light. We saw it at the same time. Diana was sprawled out at
the top of the aisle, her face relaxed and her breathing rhythmic as
if she were stretched out on her own sofa taking a Sunday nap. He
stood over her, brandishing his saw blade.

Kaiser turned to me, “Do something! Now!” he pleaded desperately.

I felt my breath stop in my throat. I looked back at the saw and felt
my body fill with a certain prickly feeling I’d become accustomed to
over the last day. The blade started to warp slightly when the room
was filled with a deafening pop.

Sparks showered down from the ceiling with a downpour of shattered, gleaming crystals.

“Wait. You do what?”

“I sparkle, ok?” A slight hint of pink crept into Amelia’s cheeks as
she turned away from James.

“Like you just start spouting glitter or something? That is so lame.”
James laughed and turned to Kaiser and I for confirmation. Seeing
Amelia’s growing frustration, we just shrugged.

“It’s not any more lame then making cops want donuts,” she snapped.
“What good is that going to do?”

“A fucking lot of good considering those fat-ass cops flattened that
pyscho so we could get away.” Pleased with himself, James stretched
out his arms and clasped his hands behind his head. He looked
incredibly relaxed considering what we just been through. More
specifically what they had all witnessed me go through.

I really don’t know how I did it. I had to do something though, since
everyone I was with seemed to be ready for nap while I had a rusty
blade digging into my neck. The next thing I knew, I felt the blade
crumble, giving in from the pressure of the bum’s grip. In one move
Kaiser knocked the guy out, I was off the ground, and the four of us
were running like crazy away from Monroe Park.

We ended up at Amelia’s house, sprawled out around her living room
trying to grasp what was going on. James was taking up the couch
while Kaiser and I were huddled around the coffee table. Amelia paced
back and forth, biting her nails.

“All I’m saying, ” said James, “is that it seems like all of us can do
something useful. We all started off just be able to do weird things,
but now we’re getting control over it. Kaiser knows about people’s
pasts. Lauren can change shit around. I mean, did you see that blade
crumble like that? And I’m sure I could make somebody want something other than donuts if I gave a shit. What the hell are you gonna do next time we meet up with some nutcase? Shimmer at him?” Amelia whipped around, her face now beet red. “Listen, asshole, just because you th-” She was interrupted by a pounding on the front door.

We all scrambled to our feet, our eyes wide and darting from person to
person. My heart jumped into my throat. Suddenly the door burst open
to reveal a familiar figure in an even more familiar trench coat.

“All right, Lite Brite, ” hissed James. “Get ready to glow.”

“You have to tell me what you saw.”

I just shook my head. I couldn’t say anything.

Amelia sat down next to me on the ratty, tweed couch and rested her elbows on her knees. She took a deep breath. I wasn’t sure why I ended up in the living room of Amelia’s house. But there I was.

She had come for me that morning without any questions - other than, “Where are you?”

“At my aunt’s house - she lives at Grove and Boulevard.”

“Don’t move. I’m coming to get you. Do you hear me, Lauren? Do not move.” With that, she hung up.

She pulled up in front of my aunt’s house in a beat-up old Accord about 15 minutes later. I called some lame excuse to my mom about getting lunch with some friends - luckily she’s been pretty occupied with helping Aunt Carol handle the continually gruesome details of Courtney’s death, so she wasn’t really concerned about where I was going.

I shuffled out the door, down the steps, and into the passenger seat of Amelia’s car. She didn’t say anything; she just pulled away from the curb and drove. I was glad she didn’t want to talk yet. I still couldn’t wrap my head around what I saw the night before - or the fact that some of Lily’s blood was still smeared on my shoe.

After Amelia and I had parted ways outside of Grandma’s, I felt a slight buzz coming from my back pocket. I reached for my phone and flipped it open. Lily had called about 20 minutes before - I guessed I missed it with all of the commotion of trying to get into Grandma’s and then getting accosted by Amelia.

I dialed my voice mail and heard a message from Lily. It was a typical Lily voice mail: really loud and broken up by her conversations with people around her. Eventually she called out an address, saying the Tom’s friends were having people over which would be better than trying to scream over the all of the people at Grandma’s.

The building was pretty nondescript - just your standard apartment building on the corner of Stuart and Navy. I walked through the front door cautiously because both the porch light and the light in the building entrance looked like they had been smashed in. Unfortunate but not strange - this neighborhood is pretty well-known for the rowdiness of its college/post-college residents. I expected there to be a lot more noise going on, but as I walked up the stairs to apartment 2A, things seemed to get quieter.

I knocked on the door, a little pissed because I figured Lily had gotten the address wrong. But, with my first knock, the door pushed open. It was dark and eerily silent in the apartment. Everything I had ever been taught told me not to go in there, but still I stepped inside.

I fumbled around in the darkness, trying to find a light. Running my hand against the wall, I eventually made contact with a switch plate. I flipped the switch. Nothing. I kept searching along the wall, eventually bumping into what I took to be a lamp. My fingers crept down the shade and found the switch. Again, nothing. I followed the shape of the lamp down to the table it was resting on. My hand landed on what was undoubtedly a remote control. I pointed into the air, frantically pushing the buttons as the realization of how dark it really was in there started to make me panic a little.

A television in the corner of the room snapped on, the light from its screen sporadically bouncing off of the surfaces in the room. I was able to make out a couch, a table, and someone hanging from the ceiling fan about 4 feet from where I was standing.

I opened my mouth to scream, but nothing came out. Instead, at that very moment, every light in the apartment suddenly flashed back on, revealing the carnage that I had unknowingly been walking around for the last five minutes. In the living room I could see two figure, a girl and a guy (who I am assuming was Tom) slumped on the floor, each in their own pool of blood. I couldn’t help but walk towards them. Maybe one of them was still alive.

As I crossed over into the living room, I noticed that the blood on the floor wasn’t limited to the pool surrounding the two people on the floor. Tiny red splotches made a path on the hardwood floor back to the other end of the apartment. A path that looked like it belonged to someone who was trying to get away. I followed the path toward the kitchen in the back of the apartment. It continued into a closet on the other side of the room, right next to the door opening out onto the fire escape.

I opened to the door of the closet. I didn’t see her face but I recognized her red curls immediately - she always let them go loose and wild like that. Lily was curled up next to the water heater, knees to chest. Blood surrounded her, starting from a deep gash in her stomach and trickling out of the doorway where I was standing.

I couldn’t scream or run or anything. I just walked out and called the police. I didn’t give my name - I just told them that I had heard a lot of screaming coming from the apartment.

I stood at the end of the hall and waited for the police to get there. I didn’t want to talk to them, but I had to know what was going to happen. It was too dark to see them come inside, but I heard two sets of feet meander up the stairs and toward the front door of 2A. Sobs formed in my chest and throat, but I choked them back as I strained to hear what they were saying. Their conversation was muffled at first but became more clear and frantic as they discovered what I saw just a few moments before.

The following minutes were confusing. A lot of yelling and stomping up and down the stairs. Cops coming in urgent swarms and leaving in more urgent swarms a few moments later. A different pair of feet shuffling up the stairs and going into the apartment, only to be followed by what sounded like another police stampede up the fire escape. Two figures darted out the front door and down the steps as I heard the police explode into the kitchen in the back of the apartment.

“Whoa!” one of them shouted out. “We got another one in here. Up the tally to four. Man, what a nightmare!”

I took that as my cue. They had found everyone, they knew everything I knew, so I could go. I eased my way back down the hall and down the stairs. Once the air outside hit my face, I broke into a run. Tears (well, pennies) rolled off my cheeks, hitting the surfaces around me with an inappropriately pleasant pings.

What happened that night was obviously too much to share with my family - but for some reason I felt like I had to tell Amelia about it. The events of the last few days were all too bizarre not to be connected.

And yet, while I sat on Amelia’s couch, her staring at me intently, I couldn’t find a way to begin. My eyes started to fill as a painful lump took shape in my throat. Amelia leaned forward and scooped the pennies away from my eyes. She clicked them back and forth in her hands, deep in thought, the floor lamp giving off green and yellow sparks with every breath she took.

My parents and I got to Richmond to make Courtney’s 1:00 service at St. Paul’s. Needless to say, it was weird. Courtney was just 7 months older than me and we buried her yesterday. Her mom, my Aunt Carol, is a complete wreck. They still haven’t officially released the autopsy report so my parents haven’t gotten into specifics with me about how she died. Honestly, I don’t want to know. The only details I got were that she was found sprawled out in front of one of the mausoleums at Hollywood Cemetery.

After we got back to Aunt Carol’s house, I went up to the guest room to change. I heard a burbling sound coming from the floor. I managed to dig my cell phone out of my jeans pockets before it switched over to voice mail. It was exactly who I needed: Lily my best friend from elementary school. She is exactly the opposite of me: she’s loud and obnoxious and wonderful. Her parents are big wigs who own a mansion on Monument Avenue and rue the day that Lily entered puberty. Since then she has been involved with every guy that has looked at her (and they all do) - not necessarily physically but always dramatically.

“Lily!”

“HOLA, BITCHEZZZZ!” she screamed into the phone. “Sucks about Courtney, huh?” Lily always had an overwhelming sense of appropriateness.

“Yeah, well,” I answered, realizing for the first time that I was actually pretty freaked out about the whole thing.

“Anyway,” said Lily. “Come hang out with me and Tom tonight.”

“Who?”

“Tom. That guy I told you about. The one who’s a senior at VCU.”

“What is he doing hanging out with you? You’re only 17,” I reminded her, sensing the late night phone calls to me and threats to run away to her parents that were guaranteed to come out in the following weeks.

“Hey, I’m hot. What can I say? But seriously, come hang out. You don’t want to spend the whole night cooped up in your aunt’s living room watching everyone cry, do you?”

That was an easy one to answer. We planned to meet up at 10:30 at Grandma’s, the most hipster place in the entire world - apparently Tom fit into that category and I was sure Lily would show up looking the part. But they have really good zucchini fritters, so it’s easy to look passed the gross haircuts that they all seem to think are really cool.

My mom was unusually reasonable about letting me go out. She was too tired from the funeral to argue, and the fact that I told her I was going to Lily’s house and not a bar (which Grandma’s technically is) probably helped things. Let me say something here: I don’t usually lie, particularly to my mother because she can pick it out pretty easily. But, I can sense an opportunity as well as the next girl. So, lie I did.

Anyway, I got to Grandma’s about 10 minutes late, but still before Lily and Tom. Just as I sat down on the sidewalk near the entrance, I got a text from her: omg so late be there soon. Typical.

I waited for about 15 minutes and still no Lily or Tom, but lots of tight denim. I decided to go and stand around *inside* because it seemed less lame that standing around *outside.*

Now, entering a bar can prove to be difficult when you are 18. Despite my clean track record, I have been in many bars, usually with Lily. I have never gotten caught and I have never tried to get any alcohol, just so you know. Anyway, if you do it enough, you start to learn how to go about it. The best thing to do is have your ID in your hand, ready to show whoever is in charge of the door. I don’t have a fake ID, I just use my real driver’s license. If you look like you’re not scared of someone seeing it, they typically don’t ask for it. When you walk by the door, make enough eye contact to warrant a quick smile, but don’t stare. Being really tall helps, too. For some reason, people don’t typically think 178years olds can be 5′11″ which I am.

I saw a swarm of people heading towards the door, so I thought I’d just mingle in with them to get inside. Things were going great and was just about to slip my ID back into my pocket when I felt someone’s hand wrap around my wrist.

“Hold on. I need to see that.”

I looked up and was face-to-face with a blond girl who I recognized as one of the bartenders (which is weird because I hadn’t been there for a year and usually people cycle through Grandma’s pretty quickly). I remembered her as being really nice, but she sure looked pissed off right then.

“Please don’t make this harder than it has to be. Just let me see it,” she said. I sighed and held up my very underage ID, a bit nauseous from the unknown of what was going to happen next.

“Do you know how much trouble we could get in if people found out you were in here? I’m sorry, but I’m not going to lose my shitty job because some teenager thinks she can do whatever she wants. Come with me.” She was still holding onto my wrist and started to pull me out the door.

That’s when everything hit me: Courtney’s death, how much trouble I could potentially be in if I got caught for this. My chin started quivering uncontrollably. I actually started crying, but for real this time.

Just as we made it out the door and the bartender turned around to officially kick me out, I felt it. What started as the normal tickle in my nose and lump in my throat turned into a dull ache moving up my cheeks and into the corner of my eye. The bartender stared at me. I was sure she was about to lose it on me, the annoying teenager whose mere presence could not only get her fired, but who now was crying like a tool in front of the city of Richmond. Seriously, I wanted to sidewalk to open up and swallow me.

But suddenly, she lifted her hand up to my face and plucked something out of my eye. It was a penny. She looked up at me and smiled.

I actually got summoned to my guidance counselor’s office today. Who knew they really did that? Well, they do and they do it to me.

To make matters worse, rather than sending a discrete note, they called me over the intercom right in the middle of art class, the only time of the day when I’m not hating my life. My schedule didn’t let me take art with the rest of the seniors so Mr. Temple, my teacher, worked it out for me to do an independent study during the time he teaches Art I to a bunch of freshman who either don’t know anything or don’t care. It’s not too bad, though. He’s set me up a spot in the back of the room so I can have my own space to work. I decided to do my independent study on printmaking. I’m doing a series of pieces inspired by traditional Japanese art. In fact, I was halfway through inking the plate for my first piece when the school secretary’s voice crackled out over the P.A. that I was to report to Miss Gregory’s office immediately. Being that I’m in high school and it is by definition awesome, I was assaulted with choruses of “ooooooooooooooooooooh” and “Someone’s in troooooouuuuuuuubllllllllllle” as I quickly washed my hands and bolted out of the room to avoid any further undesired attention from my classmates.

I wiped my hands on my jeans and started down the hall to Miss Gregory’s office. I knew exactly why she was calling me to her office, but I clung to the slim chance that it was something else. Maybe someone had started a rumor that I was pregnant and she wanted to see if it was true. Or maybe she had gotten a line on a scholarship at SCAD (that’s Savannah College of Art and Design to you) and she couldn’t wait to tell me.

Yeah right. I knew why she wanted to see me.

Chemistry.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate chemistry. Ok, yes I do, but it’s not like I’m rude about it or anything. I go to class and I’m polite to the teacher and all. I just don’t so much do the work. It turns out that not doing the work means that you fail. And failing chemistry doesn’t make graduation a particularly real possibility. Teachers, guidance counselors, and especially parents don’t really like it when you don’t graduate. Neither do colleges.

Miss Gregory’s office door was open when I arrived. She looked up as I got there and didn’t say a word - she just nodded towards the chair facing her desk. I slumped down in the seat and stuffed my hands into the pockets of my sweatshirt. Miss Gregory slowly got up, walked around the desk to shut the door, and sat back down. She leaned back in her chair and pressed her finger tips together. She did not look happy.

I decided to make the first move. And by move, I mean idiotic babbling, a teenage girl’s second most valuable weapon. It’s goal is to put forth as many words as possible in at an ultrasonic pitch as to confuse the listener to the point where he/she will do anything to get you to go away. And it went a little something like this:

“Miss Gregory I know why I’m here and I know how serious it is but it’s just that I don’t like chemistry and I never have and I haven’t liked it since I started it but the problem is even if I started to like chemistry now I’m too far behind to ever know anything and all those symbols and numbers make me nauseous and I’ll do anything I’ll do summer school or tutoring or whatever because I know that I need to graduate because college is the only way for me to get out of this town it’s just I don’t understand anything in chemistry and if you look at my record you’ll see that this is the first time I’ve ever even come close to failing something and I don’t know what to do.”

Miss Gregory just looked at me, an unreadable expression on her face. I started to think maybe I needed to conjure up some tears to get some sympathy - that would be a teenage girl’s *most* valuable weapon, one most used by the more spoiled variety but useful in a pinch to even to girls like me. Miss Gregory has been my guidance counselor since 9th grade and she knows me really well, so there was little chance she’d really fall for it. But, it was worth a shot.

I was ready to start the chin-trembling when Miss Gregory took a deep breath and cleared her throat.

“Lauren, I would love it if this meeting were about your grade in Mr. Goode’s class. And believe me, we will be addressing it and soon. But unfortunately, I called you in to see me because of something else. I’m afraid I have some bad news.”

“What?” I asked her, my eyes wide.

“I just got a call from your mother. She’s on her way to pick you up but she wanted me to talk to you before she got here. Your cousin Courtney’s body was found last night. In some cemetery in Richmond.”

Courtney. A cousin, yes, but someone I hadn’t seen since we moved from Richmond to Allentown when I was 10. We had been back lots of times during the summers, but Courtney was always off at some cheering camp thing. I wasn’t sure how to feel about it - on the one hand it was shocking and tragic, on the other it meant a trip to back to see my family in Richmond and a break from Mr. Goode and his periodic table for a few days.

Is it bad to be excited for a funeral?