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did you learn anything?” Yeah, I
learned I should take self-defense classes to protect myself from
Jody and the rest of the bimbos of Jimmy Carter High.
    “Nope.” The usual teenage answer. We haven’t
learned anything at school since the fifties when it was
appropriate to talk about one’s day. Back then they were probably
beaten for not learning anything. Oh, how times have changed. Now
we are beaten for being helped up off the floor by the head
cheerleader’s boyfriend.
    “Well, I’m sure it wasn’t all wasted. I
remember that I always had the same answer for your grandparents,
too. Your dad though, well, he always wanted to let them know how
he was doing and his newest accomplishments. They always liked
hearing that about him. Maybe you’re more like me, though.”
    More like me? I didn’t know where the
comparison was coming from. Because I answered no to her mundane
question? Did she really think I was anything like her? If it had
been Mom or Dad sitting in the driver’s seat, I would have spilled
my guts. I would have told them that I tried to make things right
with Jody only to get punched in the eye and that she and her
friends all hated me. That now I was subject to sit at the loser
table with the daughter of the crazy history teacher. I would have
told them all that and more.
    And oh, how Mom would have jumped into
action. “Punched? My daughter?” she would have said. I could hear
the tires streak across the pavement as she would have made a hard
U-turn right back to school with Tyler in the back saying something
of the sort, “Oh-oh, Mom’s going to go kick some butt.” Everyone
would have known that this thing doesn’t happen at school, that
parents don’t drop their kids off in the morning for them to be
assaulted out of the sight of the teacher, um coach, in charge.
Things would have changed quickly and for good reason. But back
home, things had no reason to change. This just didn’t happen, and
if it did, those sorts of people were never heard of again at our
prep school. But I just had no reason to tell Mags. She was a
person, a stranger that chose to leave her life behind to follow
one loser after another. And I certainly didn’t want to be compared
to her. Ick!
    We pulled into the drive and I got out
quickly, clomping to the front door and making a bee-line to my
room. I had knowledge of makeup, not that I wore a lot, but I could
hide most of the redness that was certainly going to turn black.
The puffiness would be a problem. Maybe when Mags wasn’t looking I
could sneak a steak out of the freezer? Wait, does she have
steak? Yes, I concluded, everyone in Texas has steak. It’s like
firearms, they practically hand them out at the Red River when
crossing the border. The evening was spent nursing my wound in
solitary, breaking for leftover pot roast, and reading about the
New Deal. FDR, I wish I had your problems.
    The next day, I made a straight-line power
walk to Mr. Peet’s room, arriving twenty minutes before class even
started. It wasn’t something we were supposed to do. Teachers were
allowed until the bell for prep time, so students usually loitered
in the foyer. I wasn’t sure a crowded area with a bunch of
strangers was a good place to be at the moment, though, so I went
to a classroom with a witness in it, no matter how crazy he might
be. When I pushed the door open, I saw the teacher staring at his
computer screen, his back to me.
    “Darn it,” blurted out Mr. Peet, much to my
chagrin. It must have been computer troubles because he didn’t even
acknowledge me. He was rattled already, at 7:35 in the morning. I
took a step back, thinking that I might just sit in the hallway,
that there was no need to bother him.
    “Well, are you coming in or not, New York?”
He turned his head and gave me a glare and a grin.
    “If it’s okay with you?”
    “Sure, just leave the door open because of
the whole male teacher-female student thing. I don’t need you
harassing me behind