Touch

11

It's the last block of the day, and everyone's talking about Zayn's locker.

Sometime before lunch there was another sign left on it. Only this time, Zayn couldn't tear it down. Someone had written the words Killer Go Home down the length of the door in permanent black marker.

The sign was up there for two full hours before Mr. Snell, the school principal, ordered a janitor to come and cover it up with a few strokes of red paint.

"Remember last year," Hanna says, applying a fresh coat of my peach colored lip gloss, "when Polly Piranha got vandalized?"

Since our English teacher is out sick today, Hanna, Luke, and I have the rare treat of an extra free block. And so we're sitting in the courtyard behind the school.

Basically a glorified asphalt driveway with a bunch of picnic tables set up, pretending to do our homework.

I laugh, still able to picture it, the giant wooden cutout of a piranha, our school mascot, with boobs spray-painted right over her fins.

Poor Polly har apparently sat in the same spot by the football field for more than thirty years, and this was the first time she's sported hooters.

"Yeah," I say, "but in that case Snell had her taken down within minutes."

"A damned shame." Luke shakes his head. "Those were some nice hooters."

"The only ones you'll ever see up close," Hanna says.

"Um, excuse me, but haven't you ever heard of Playboy?" he asks.

"Haven't you ever heard of hard-up boy?"

"I wonder how the truth even leaked out about Zayn," I say, cutting through their banter.

"Are you kidding?" Luke squawks. "This is a small town, with even smaller minds. A guy can't even scratch the wrong way without people suspecting he's got a killer case of the crabs."

"Something you want to tell us about?" Hanna asks.

Luke gives her a middle-finger nose scratch.

"Well, if this town is so small," I ask, "how come nobody told me Harry was dating Steph Maruso?"

"What?" Hanna's jaw drops.

"Apparently true. I talked to him earlier."

"Not true," Hanna protests. "Steph's in my Spanish class. The girl tells me eveything."

"Maybe she only tells you some things," Luke says.

"Or maybe Harry's trying to make you jealous," Hanna says. "It's the oldest trick in the book."

"Actually that's you." Luke says.

Hanna glares at him.

"Well, whatever," I say, eager to get back to business. "I've been asking people about him."

"Harry?" Hanna perks up.

"No, Zayn."

"Okay, so, no offense," she says, "but does this fascination with Zayn have anything to do with you deciding to give up your senior-citizen way of life?"

"Senior citizen?"

"Yeah, you know, safe, habitual, carefully planned, doesn't like surprises, likes to be in before dark---"

"You have to admit, you're a bit of an old lady," Luke adds.

"Of course, we love that about you," Hanna insists.

"Right," Luke says. "I mean, who doesn't love their grandma? And it could explain your sudden fixation with Danger Boy."

"Hold up," Hanna says. "If Zayn were a real danger boy, who really killed his girlfriend, do you honestly think they'd allow him back in school?"

"You don't think he did it?" I ask.

"What I think is that you're starting to sound just a tad bit obsessed."

"Well, it's a little hard not to be. I mean, Zayn's name is everywhere, in practically every conversation."

"In practically every girl's worst nightmare," Luke says, creepifying his voice by making it superdeep. He uses a pencil as a makeshift knife to jab at the air.

"Well, dangerous or not," Hanna says, popping a fireball candy into her mouth, "the boy is hot, for an alleged killer, that is."

"Why is it that all the good ones have to be killers?" Luke lets out an exaggerated sigh.

"You're such a spaz," I say, throwing a corn chip at his head. It sticks in his dirty blonde hair, but he picks it out and eats it anyways. Licking his lips and lip ring.

"So, what did you find out about him, Nancy Drew?" Hanna asks me.

"Nothing reliable." I shrug. "The stories are getting more ridiculous by the minute."

Luke nods. "Last I heard, the boy chopped up his entire family and ate them for breakfast."

"That's sick," Hanna says.

"But tasty." He thieves a handful of my corn chips.

"Speaking of sick," I say, "what was up with the photo you left in my mailbox?"

"Photo?"

I nod. "The one of me...in front of the school...with a heart around it."

He tilts his head, visibly confused. "Qué?"

"Don't be a dick," Hanna says. "Fess up. It was you. Just like it was you with the Teletubbt stunt."

"Honestly," he says, "dicks and Teletubbies aside, I have absolutely no idea what you're even talking about."

"Hold up," I say. "You didn't leave a photo of me in my mailbox?"

Luke shakes his head.

"Aren't you taking photography this year?" I ask.

"And so, what does that prove, that I'm suddenly taking random pictures of people and leaving them in their mailboxes?"

"I wouldn't worry about it." Hanna spits her fireball into her palm.

"It's probably just some lame-o's idea of a joke." She shoots Luke an evil look.

"Hey, don't look at this lame-o," he says pointing out the front of his T-shirt, where the words Innocenr Until Proven Guilty are printed across the chest.

●●●

Sorry for the hold up.

School -_-.

And parties lol.

Vote and comment?

~ Malum