Flintrock High School – Friday Noon, March 10, 1989
“Where’s Jessie?” Kendra asked Irene. The two couples, Kendra and Tommy, Irene and Donny, sat together at the lunch table talking about the Indiana Jones movie they saw the day before.
“You remind me of Indy,” Kendra said to Tommy next to her.
“How’s that?” Tommy said.
Donny snickered. “Named after the dog.” They laughed.
“I like ‘Indiana’,” Kendra implored.
“ ‘X’ never, ever marks the spot,” Tommy said, imitating Indiana while looking at Kendra.
Kendra kissed him. “Zat’s how Austrians say goodbye.”
“You’re leaving me already?” Tommy said.
“Just wanted an excuse to kiss you,” Kendra said. “With you, ‘X’ marks the spot.” She drew an ‘X’ on his busty chest.
“Well, look at that,” Tommy said, dismissing Kendra’s advance.
Sitting across from them, Irene and Donny turned to see what caught the attention of the cafeteria crowd. Was it Bobby walking with Jessie, or was it the white, super short sundress with a crisscross top that revealed more skin than cloth?
“Oh my gawd, she’s gonna be kicked out for that,” Irene said.
“Sheesh, Lauren’s gonna be pissed.” Donny scanned the cafeteria for Bobby’s girlfriend.
“How did she make it to lunch?” Kendra asked.
“Wow, like the belly button,” Tommy said. “ ‘X’ does mark the spot.” Kendra elbowed him.
“I saw her this morning, and she was wearing a cute sweater,” Irene said.
“Hot, hot, hot,” Donny said. Irene’s shoulders slumped with a look of rejection. “I mean, Lauren’s gonna be hot about this. Where is she?”
The backs of two, long-haired blondes standing in line hid Lauren from the scene. They turned as the cafeteria chatter ramped up a notch, everyone expressing their own version of surprise. Lauren’s stunned look turned to tight-lipped disdain. The twin blondes looked at her with identical reactions of what are you going to do, now? Lauren brushed them aside as she advanced toward the couple that drew everyone’s attention. The rumble of the cafeteria crowd lulled and then became silent. All eyes were on Lauren as she took slow decisive steps down the wide middle aisle. She fiddled with her left hand. Taking two more steps she stopped. Hands at her side, her right hand clenched in a fist. If life had a slow motion moment, this was it. Jessie and Bobby slowly turned their heads, their eyes registered a brief connection, and both showed wonderment about what was going on behind them. Lauren raised her right arm that incited a low rumble of voices. Although Lauren was a cheerleader, she excelled in her own sport—softball. With the deftness of a shortstop firing a ball to first base, she flung what was in her hand at the unaware couple.
“Ahhh!” Bobby’s head sprung back as the object hit his temple. The students erupted in a wave of cacophony. The silver object pinged off the floor and rolled. Bobby temporarily lost his balance and then rebounded like a fullback glanced by a tackler. The shift caused his tray to spill. His burger and fries were strewn across an unsuspecting face. Coke showered another. Glass broke and a plate wobbled down the aisle. Astonished, paralyzed, and bewildered, Bobbie held his empty tray in front of him.
Jessie continued a walk of nonchalance to her friends’ table.
“Bitch!” Lauren yelled through pursed lips. A moment of silence as the students tensed. Lauren scanned the room to find everyone now looking at her. She held her head high and with defiance, she walked away as a model would down the runway with distinctive poise.
A short and round teacher with a helmet hair perm who monitored the lunch hour approached the commotion. Students stood and gawked, the chatter increased. Bobby knelt to pick up the mess he made as Jessie set her tray at the table with Kendra and Irene and their two catches. The teacher glanced to the floor at Bobby and continued her parade towards Jessie. If she were in uniform, she would have passed as a female drill sergeant. She glared up at Jessie’s face and then slowly traced her gaze to the eye-level crisscross of cleavage with a disgust of the highest degree. Lowering her tight-lipped face, her shoulders hunched with displeasure, she scowled at Jessie’s bare midriff. Kendra and Irene, Donny and Tommy, and all that could see where the teacher’s eyes rested looked at the forbidden . . . belly button.
The teacher looked Jessie in the eye with total authority. “Miss . . . ”
“Jessie,” she said with an air of arrogance.
“Well, Miss Jessie.” She paused as if to collect her thoughts. “I haven’t seen you before, so I will give you the benefit of the doubt . . . you must be new to the school.”
“I am.” Jessie continued her superciliousness and looked out to the students whose eyes were pinned on her, totally silent, waiting to hear her conviction.
“At Flintrock High,” the short, helmet perm announced, “We have rules for proper decorum and attire . . . and what you are wearing . . .” She glared at the beautiful, white crisscross top that accentuated Jessie’s breasts. “Or rather, what you have exposed is strictly forbidden!”
Forbidden. It was as if the jailhouse door was slammed shut. Clang!
Students chuckled. Brash comments from the boys were aired.
“Beach baby!”
“Eye candy!”
Helmet hair took her by the arm and marched her from the cafeteria.
Hoots and hollers, cheers and clapping resounded. “Whoop, whoop! Jessie! Jessie!”
Bobby just stared at them as he held his messed up tray. His class ring ignored and forgotten.
v v v
Copyright 2017 © Jeff Cambridge
Excerpt from PURSUIT, a novel by Jeff Cambridge, a writer of transformational fiction with characters that tell life-changing stories.
This is a pre-published scene.
To read the scenes sequentially, begin with
“PURSUIT: A Novel – Prologue”
Your comments are welcomed and appreciated. Simply check one of the reaction boxes below, write a comment, or email me at bycambridge@gmail.com.
This novel is a work of fiction. Any references to real events, businesses, organizations, and locales are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
No comments:
Post a Comment