Chapter 3

Monday Night

I stroked Larry’s hair, as we lay naked facing each other, our bodies pressed together, our faces so close that it looked to me as though Larry had a single, enormous eye. I giggled at the image, and pressed my lips against Larry’s once more, feeling his lips move to return the soft kiss.

I could just glimpse Grant and Laney sixty-nining on the rollaway bed, making soft moaning sounds as they licked and sucked, looking like a mysterious new animal that was all legs. The thought made me giggle again.

Larry rubbed his hand against my back idly, and whispered, “You know it’s going to go okay, right? All the boys today got through it. If they can, you know you can.”

Grant’s and my turn at the Fifteen was coming up Wednesday, the day after tomorrow. We had agreed to spend tonight with Larry and Laney. Tomorrow night would be ours to spend alone together.

My lips curled upward against Larry’s. “I know. In my head I know that. But nothing’s ever for sure. If, if, if, the big if ... If anything bad does happen, I’d be so mad at myself if I hadn’t said goodbye to you.”

“You think you’d be mad? I’d throw a shoe through the TV. Well, one of Laney’s. I might need mine for my show.”

My eyes shot open. “Did you get an offer?”

Larry shook his head, making his lips rub mine. “I’m just thinking ahead. Oh! Tammy did, though! She’s so pumped about it. First one in our class! She’ll be hanged a week from Saturday.”

“That’s so neat! I’d better stop by her room tomorrow.”

“Oh, I wasn’t supposed to tell. I just kind of overheard her saying something to Manfred.” Manfred was Tammy’s roommate. “She made me swear I wouldn’t pass it on to anybody. You just dragged it out of me.”

I laughed. “So why’s she want it to be a big secret?”

“She’s going to have a party in the caf this Saturday, and make everybody try to guess who’s hosting it and then spring it on them. So could you wait before you see her?”

“But...”

I could see Larry roll his single eye. “Amy, would you quit thinking tomorrow is your last chance to do anything? Nothing’s going to happen!”

I heard Grant’s moans rising in pitch, and knew he was getting close to cumming. He was good at clamping down on it and letting Laney get caught up, though.

I laughed. “Okay, let’s make plans for Wednesday night then.”

Larry grinned. “Hey, tonight’s not over yet.” He rolled over on top of me and kissed me hard, his tongue licking at my teeth.

Tuesday Morning

I looked around the demo room, pointing and counting under my breath, “Twenty-one, twenty-two...” My attention was caught by the entrance of two more students at the door. “Twenty-three, twenty-four.” I turned to Grant. “Okay, that’s everybody.”

Grant shrugged and smiled, and gave me a go-ahead gesture. I looked up at the Third Year boys scattered among the seats. I was standing where a dozen of my classmates had died in the last two years so that their peers could learn more about the art and science of hanging—beginning with my own first roommate. I remembered how nearly all of the seats had been filled at that first demonstration. Now the whole class fit on one side of the stands, facing me. The special Fifteen platform and noose were right behind me. I cleared my throat, and the murmurs died out.

“I’m sorry, I know this was a day nearly all of you wanted to sleep in, with no classes this week and all that. But we’re all going through the Fifteen this week, and Grant saw something yesterday that we thought was really important to pass along.”

Before going down to Larry’s and Laney’s room the previous evening, Grant and I had secured permission to use the demo room, then tacked notes to the doors of all of the occupied rooms in the Third Year dorm, asking the students to assemble there at 8 am. I was glad everyone had come, though some of them looked a little bleary, some grumpy.

“Before he does that, I see Don, Rene, Shelby, Brock, Litton, Shawna, and Garrett are all here. They’re here, and not at the converter’s, which means they got through the Fifteen yesterday!” I grinned and clapped my hands, and everyone else started applauding the seven students who had passed the previous day, those nearest them patting them or otherwise congratulating them while they beamed happily at their classmates. I caught Shawna’s eye and gave her a thumbs up; Shawna returned it with a grin.

As the applause died down, I stepped back as Grant came forward.

“I’m sorry about the early hour too,” Grant began, “But it’s hard to get everybody gathered together in the evening, and I wanted us somehow all to come together before any more of us went through the Fifteen. And that’s starting up again in less than an hour.” All of the background murmuring ceased now, as the issue that occupied all our attention this week came to the fore.

Grant continued, “Shelby started having a little trouble yesterday. Shelby, do you remember what I’m talking about?”

Shelby grinned shyly, reddened a little and put his hand up to his face, finding himself the sudden center of attention as all heads turned to him. “Sort of. I know you and I talked about it last night, so I know what you’re going to talk about, but honestly it’s all still kind of a blur.”

“Your heart started racing, right?”

“Yeah, and I do remember everything kind of felt ... weird, like ... like I suddenly forgot how to ride a bicycle, or something. Everything was just ... off.”

Grant nodded. He looked around the room. “The Fifteen is not like any situation we’ve ever been in before. When we practice, it’s not life or death, but you get in here for the Fifteen, and no matter what else you’ve done in the last two years, you can suddenly fail out of the program, and not even see it coming.” The murmurs started up again. “You know I’m not saying anything you haven’t all thought about, right?”

There were several nods. Grant went on, “Now obviously, what I’m talking about here won’t happen to everybody. But it could happen to any one of us. A panic attack. Your heart starts pounding a mile a minute, and it doesn’t feel like any practice session you’ve ever had. You haven’t run into this problem before. You try to adjust to it, but you can’t find the timing, and that makes it worse, and everything falls apart. Shelby, do you remember how you ended up handling it?”

Shelby shook his head, biting his lip. “I wish I could help. I really don’t know. I just don’t remember it all that well.”

Shelby was probably expecting criticism, but Grant smiled. “No, that’s okay. That’s good. And the fact you can’t remember might be what saved your life. That’s going to be the point I want to make.”

Grant looked from side to side, trying to make eye contact with every student. He said slowly, emphasizing each word, “If you get in a panic attack, you can’t think your way out of it.”

Lucas, frowning, spoke up, probably echoing the thoughts of many of the students. “So what do you do?”

Grant smiled again. “This is hard, but just remember to tell yourself to do it—trust your body. Trust your training. Trust your instincts. And stop thinking! You’ve been working on this for two years. Your own body knows when it’s doing it right. And it knows when it’s doing it wrong. When you’re off, it’s like static on the radio, and your body fiddles with the tuning knob and pretty soon a radio station comes in. And a Noosemeister doesn’t have to think to do that tuning.

“Look, how the hell do we know how to get our breath rhythm, our heartbeat, and our head movements all in synch? Are we able to do that because we read it in a book? Are we up there calculating how to make all those different things come together when we’re hanging? We can’t. Nobody has a conscious mind that can do that. But we do it. We don’t even know we’re doing it, let alone know how we’re doing it. That part of the process is something our bodies do for us. Not without all the training, but the training fine-tunes something inside us that’s beyond any conscious thought.

“If you’re up there today, or later this week, and you find your heart has suddenly started going nuts, tell yourself this, and make yourself believe it: I’m a Noosemeister! I can hang when my heart is going a mile a minute, because my body knows how to find a way. And then just ... stop ... thinking!