Snowed in Together (3 page)

Jeff shrugged. "I was counting on you guys."

My hopes for solving the mysteries of puberty rites were quickly dissolving. We rode in silence the rest of the way to school.

Just before we were dropped off Mrs. Hughes said, "We'll be in
Springfield
for a couple hours running errands, but we'll be home after that. Just call when you want a ride home."

"Thanks!" we all said as we hopped out of the car.

"
Sayonara
," Mrs. Hughes said.

"
Sayonara
!" we shouted in unison.

"Man, it's cold," Tony said as we dashed through the pouring rain to the front door of the school.

I didn't say anything. My thin jacket was practically useless, but I didn't like to call attention to the fact.

Jeff pulled on the front door handle. "Hey! It's locked!"

We huddled under the overhang and looked around.

"You know, I don't see any cars here," Tony said. "You think we got the time wrong?"

"Nah," Jeff said. "We must've gotten here early, that's all."

My teeth chattered. My feet already felt like chunks of ice. If Ellyce ever showed up, she'd mistake me for an ice sculpture.

"Okay," I finally said, "we're three of the smartest guys in the whole school. You'd think one of us could come up with a brilliant plan to impress the girls."

"Yup," Tony said. "You'd think so."

"If only there was a book on the subject," Jeff said. "All our lives we've learned everything we needed to know from books."

"I guess you just can't study Spontaneous Conversation." I stomped my feet and rubbed my hands together.

"Yeah…. Hey! Is that snow?" Tony pointed to the sky.

We watched a fat flake drift down to the pavement and melt instantly.

"Wow!" Jeff exclaimed. "Snow!"

"Yeah, wow," I said, even though I was freezing. I figured that focusing on a snowflake was better than thinking about how socially inept we were.

"Hey! A car!" Tony pointed to a red dot at the bottom of the long, sloping driveway to the school.

"It looks like Ms. Tenray," I said, as the dot got bigger. "And the girls are with her!" I shoved my hands into my pockets to cover my reaction to the sighting. It was bad enough Ellyce was going to see me standing around shivering and looking like a skinny blue doofus.

"What'll we do? What'll we do?" Tony jabbered.

The panic in his voice did not exactly instill confidence. Neither did the fact that Jeff suddenly had all the animation of a fence post.

The car pulled up by the door, right where we were standing, and stopped. The girls piled out. Ms. Tenray pulled over to a parking spot.

There we were, face-to-face with the girls of our dreams. Just the three of us. Just the three of them. The opportunity of a lifetime.

Why didn't one of us do something? Why didn't one of us say something? Why did my mouth feel as if it had been hermetically sealed?

The girls stared at us, then each other, then at us again.

Finally, Ellyce focused on me, with a puzzled look in her beautiful green eyes. "What are you doing here, Wes?"

What are you doing here, Wes?
The first words, other than a distracted Hi or two that Ellyce ever said to me! And she called me Wes! That's my name! Well, of course it is. The important thing is, she knew it!

With superhuman strength I finally opened my mouth. I wanted to say something witty, something clever, something that would totally sweep her off her feet. But all that came out was, "Uhhhg..."

Chapter Four

"Well …." Ms. Tenray approached us, smiling, keys in hand. "I didn't expect a welcoming committee."

With her waist-length hair and full lips, Tenray was pretty good looking for someone pushing thirty, especially without the half-circle glasses she usually had perched on the end of her nose. Rumor was that she'd been through a nasty divorce just before she came to
Willamette
Valley
Regional
High School
and she hadn't dated at all since.

There were no gory details. That was the thing about WVRHS. It was small enough so you something about everyone, but big enough so you didn't know everything about everyone.

"What are you boys doing here?" Tenray asked as she fumbled with the keys.

I couldn't tell if that was suspicion in her voice, or just curiosity.

"M-m-mr K-Korman," I spluttered.

"Art room," Tony grunted.

Jeff maintained the spirit of a fence post, his usual defense mechanism.

"I see," Tenray said, although the baffled expression that flitted across her face indicated that she didn't see.

Just then Korman roared into parking lot and honked. Ms. Tenray briefly glanced his way, then unlocked the front door and she and girls went inside.

We'd had our golden moment alone with the girls and we'd let it turn to lead. We didn't even have the presence of mind to follow them inside. Instead, we stood out in the cold and waited for Mr. Korman.

"Hi, sorry I'm late, fellas," Korman said. "I had to round up my cat. I don't want him outside too long in this cold and we'll probably be here for several hours." He shook the rain off his umbrella and we all went inside to face the morning knowing a golden opportunity was lost.

The art room was down the hall and around the corner. Maybe it was just because I felt as if I was in the not-so-early stages of frostbite, but the school didn't seem all that much warmer than the outside, even.

I saw the girls at the far end of the hallway where Tenray was unlocking the door to the gym.

Korman waved. "Good morning, Leslie!"

Tenray nodded, then ducked into the gym. The girls filed in right behind her, not even glancing in our direction.

"Good thing they're doing something as active as practicing cheerleading," Korman said. "The thermostat is set at fifty-five for the weekend and there's no way to get into the principal's office to change it." He quickly added, "Not that I'd change it without permission."

I wondered how Korman knew Tenray and the girls were there for cheerleading practice. I suppose he just figured it out, since they went into the gym.

In the art room, Korman turned on the heater first thing. As a blast of warm air hit my face, I was quickly reminded that Room Five had its own hellish source of heat. I imagined the windowless room as a place where people who'd led evil lives would be sent for eternity, or at least for detention.

Korman hung up his coat, then rubbed his hands together. "Okay, fellas," he said with a smile that made his chubby cheeks plump out even more. "Let's get started." He gestured toward the supply closet at the back of the room.

The closet was a walk-in big enough for all four of us. Korman handed us each a clipboard, pointed to the walls filled with shelves that were filled with boxes of art supplies and said, "Start counting."

I couldn't believe how much stuff there was. Judging by the thickness of dust on some of the boxes, I figured a lot of the supplies had been just sitting there for a long time.

We worked our way through boxes of paint, chalk, charcoal, paper, paste, glue, clay, drawing pencils, sketch paper, paraffin and candles. That was the ordinary stuff. As we plowed through some of the dustier boxes, we discovered what must've been props made by art classes for school plays. There were "silver" coins, "diamond" necklaces, and wooden swords painted so that they looked real. We found candlesticks and candelabras that looked as if they belonged in a castle. There was minor excitement when we opened a round box and discovered a "gold" crown.

Tony, naturally, put it on his head. Raising one finger, he declared, "I'm King of Willamette Valley Regional High and I hereby cancel the rest of the school year."

"Sorry, King Russo," Korman said. "That rule can't go into effect until we finish taking inventory and you fellas finish your latest art assignment."

"Huh." With an exaggerated look of disgust, Tony placed the crown back in the box. "What good is a crown if it doesn't come with absolute power?"

We went back to writing down the inventory on our clipboards and marking the boxes so that in the future no one would have to guess at the contents.

"Excuse me, fellas," Korman said. "I need to, uh, stretch my legs again."

Tony waited a few seconds after Korman left, then said, "That's the fourth time he's 'stretched his legs.' He can't be peeing all the time. I'm gonna see what he's up to."

He tiptoed out of the room.

"What do you think they're doing?" Jeff asked.

"Tony and Korman?" I shrugged. "Who knows?"

"No, the girls, Wes. The girls."

"Oh. Yeah. I don't know. Flips. Splits …." I pictured Ellyce doing a flip and for a second I forgot where I was. "Um, cartwheels …."

"No, no." Jeff shook his head. "I mean, what do you think they're thinking?"

"What do
I
think they're thinking?" I pointed to myself. "Do you think I actually have a clue as to what they're thinking?"

"Do you think they're thinking about us? Do you think they're wondering if they'll, you know, see us again while we're here?"

I realized Jeff was just doing some wishful thinking out loud. Okay, I wouldn't destroy his fantasy. Besides, I needed a break from taking inventory. I needed to escape into a fantasy of my own.

I put down my clipboard, closed my eyes and said, "Sure, they're thinking about us. They're wondering why they never bothered to get to know us better. They've developed a burning desire for us and any second they're going to run in here, throw themselves on us and whisper--"

A hand gripped my shoulder.

"Guys! Guess what?"

I opened my eyes and saw Tony standing there, grinning.

"What?" I asked, wishing I could recapture the image of Ellyce throwing herself at me.

"The girls are coming?" Jeff asked, his brown eyes full of hope.

"It's Korman." Tony's grin stretched to the breaking point.

"Oh." Jeff deflated like a leaky balloon.

"So … what about Korman?" I asked.

"He's a pervert!" Tony laughed like one of the loons on
Dexter
Lake
.

"How do you know he's a pervert?" Jeff asked. "Unless--are the girls in the locker room? Are they naked? Is Korman peeking--"

"Cut!" Tony made a slashing gesture across his throat. "What he's peeking through is the crack in the
gym door
. He's spying on Tenray."

"How do you know he isn't spying on the girls?" Jeff asked.

"Dude," Tony said, "he's way too old for them."

"Okay," Jeff said, "We'll ignore the fact that no guy ever thinks he's too old for any female--Korman is too young for Tenray."

"Korman's only five or six years younger than Tenray," I said. “No big deal there."

"Okay. But he's only six or seven years older than the girls," Jeff pointed out.

"Well, yeah …." I rubbed my chin and for a second was distracted by the fact that I felt some stubble there. Had I missed a spot shaving, or were my chin hairs rushing full speed ahead? But back to the subject. "Korman just doesn't seem like the type to--"

Tony did that fingers-in-the-mouth whistle thing that I had in all my years on earth yet to master.

Jeff and I stared at him.

"It has to be Tenray he's so hung up on," Tony said. "I mean, he's no dope …."

"Who's not a dope?" Korman materialized out of nowhere. His eyes blinked and his face plumped up in a smile of curiosity.

"Um … Mr. Glenn," Tony said, referring to our fearless principal. "As I've always said, 'Now there's a guy who's not a dope.'"

"Oh. Er. Yes." Korman stared at Tony in confusion. "Well. Back to work. I think if we keep at it, we'll be finished soon."

Finished soon. Then what?

I picked up my clipboard and started counting a hoard of slender paintbrushes I'd found in a small box. When we finished taking inventory, we'd leave and we might as well have never been there. The girls would have forgotten our nanosecond encounter at the front door and our relationship with them would remain purely theoretical.

"Hey, another hat box," Tony said. "Maybe it's a crown for my queen."

The next thing I heard was a blood-chilling scream, followed by a resounding thud.

I looked up from my clipboard and saw Tony lying on the floor.

Immediately, Korman was kneeling next to Tony, taking his pulse and checking to see if he was breathing. There was an interminable silence. Finally, Korman said, "I think he fainted."

Just then Tony moaned and tried to get up.

"Easy," Korman said. "Don't try to stand up too quickly. Just sit up and put your head between your knees."

"H-head …." Tony said, as he did what he was told.

Jeff and I were still standing there with our jaws unhinged. Finally, I maneuvered my jawbone and said, "Tony, what happened?"

"B-box," Tony stammered. "Th-the box."

Jeff pointed to round box Tony had been looking at. The lid was half-off. "You mean this box?"

"Don't look!" Tony shouted.

Jeff yanked his hand away from the box and almost jumped out of his socks.

"Now, Tony," Korman said soothingly. "There can't be anything all that shocking in that box." He stood up, grabbed the box off the shelf and opened it.

He let out a gasp, almost dropped the box and slammed the lid back on.

"I told you not to look." Tony grabbed the edge of the counter and pulled himself up to a standing position.

Jeff and I looked at each other. I was dying to know what was in the box.

"It can't be what I thought it was," Korman said, looking much more composed than he had a few seconds ago. He peeked inside the box, and laughed.

He reached in and pulled out … a head!

Jeff let out something that sounded like, "Yieee!"

I was ready to run for it, but my knees shook. Then, at second glance, I realized the head was made out of wax. I laughed. "I guess that explains all those boxes of paraffin."

I heard footsteps. Ms. Tenray appeared in the doorway of the supply closet.

"We thought we heard someone scream--" She let out a short, quick gasp. Then she laughed. "Oh. I bet it's Macbeth."

"Ah, yes," Korman said, unable to take his eyes of Ms. Tenray. "Of course. The poor fellow does get beheaded at the end of the play. The school must have done a performance of Macbeth."

"It's okay, girls," Ms. Tenray called over her shoulder. "In fact, you ought to see this."

And suddenly, there they were. Like the sunrise, the faces of Ellyce, Tiffany and Cari appeared and filled the room with a soft rosy glow.

I quickly held my clipboard in front of me.

Ellyce stood there in her cheerleading outfit, her coat slung over her arm. The skirt was short enough to show off almost the entire stretch of her long legs. The thin, tight sweater was cropped off at the waist, so (I knew from careful study at games) that when she lifted her arms to cheer it raised up to reveal a portion of her taut, smooth stomach. I clutched my clipboard and let my imagination run free.

A high-pitched scream took me out of my reverie.

Cari had her hands over her eyes.

"Gross, a head," Tiffany said with disgust. Then, quickly realizing what it was, she let out a low, throaty laugh.