Chapter 14: New Friends

Two days later Kennedy stood next to Harriet, looking up at the granite facing of the high school. "This is weird," Kennedy whispered to Harriet.

Harriet laughed. "You have no idea. Fortunately, you aren't likely to be intimidated by anyone who makes fun of the fact that you haven't been in school before."

Kennedy slapped one fist into her other palm. "Modest displays of certitude!"

Harriet nearly convulsed with laughter. "Kennedy, approach this like you did the first day of camp. Take it easy; take it slow. Let things happen!"

Kennedy cast a sidelong glance at her friend. That would be, Harriet, the day you decided to spend the night with our counselor. That was the night I spent time with not one, but two different girls. Do you really want me to take it that easy?

Harriet waved at tall skinny girl hurrying towards the entrance. "That's Alicia Grundig. She wants to be the grade point leader of the class. Think of Ruby, only cubed."

"I don't know how to take that," Kennedy admitted.

"Queer as us, chip on her shoulder, persecuted, smart as a person can be."

Kennedy lowered her voice. "I'm not queer; I'm not strange or weird. Eccentric, perhaps."

Harriet patted Kennedy's arm. "Relax and try to adjust. To these people you are going to be a queer duck. If they find out how literally true that is, your life will be much more difficult. You don't want to get expelled for fighting."

Kennedy laughed. "I got expelled the last time for being right when the teacher was wrong."

"Put a sock in it, Kennedy," Harriet said seriously. "Things are different here. You will want to take it slow at first. It's like finding your footing in a sword fight."

That got Kennedy's attention. "I will go slow. I also left Lady Kennedy at home." She grinned at Harriet. "Still, I'm not going to listen to teachers who try to teach me wrong; I'm not going to kowtow to bullies."

"Trust me, Kennedy, bullies do it much better in high school. Those sorts of people have had years to learn how to game the system. You never did. If you tangle with them, you'll be the one in trouble."

Kennedy grinned. "You forgot my native wit, my basic cleverness and above all, you've underestimated Mr. Glastonbury as a teacher."

They joined the throngs marching inside. Kennedy waved goodbye to Harriet, then went and sat down in her first class, English Grammar and Composition. The teacher's idea of a test to see where they were was by reading something from the poem "Hiawatha" by Longfellow.

To Kennedy's way of thinking, it was probably a poor test, because there were a lot of Indian names in the poem, and even good readers stumbled over them. When it came to her turn, she stood, instead of staying seated as the others did and spoke the passage from memory.

In a way, it was kind of a fake, because Mr. Glastonbury hadn't been very big about memorizing American poets -- he far preferred her to learn English poetry, and she was quite sure if she stayed his student long enough, she'd know all of Shakespeare by heart. But "Hiawatha" was one of three American poems she'd learned and by far the longest.

The teacher picked up right away that she wasn't reading the passage; most of the class didn't until she sat back down and still didn't bother to open the booklet that had been passed out for the reading.

After everyone had a chance to read, the teacher asked if there were any volunteers. A few people held up their hands and eventually Kennedy held up hers. When she stood, the teacher smiled at her. "Do you know the whole poem?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Chapter 15, from the top, the first eight lines."

Kennedy smiled and said,

"In those days the Evil Spirits,
All the Manitos of mischief,
Fearing Hiawatha's wisdom,
And his love for Chibiabos,
Jealous of their faithful friendship,
And their noble words and actions,
Made at length a league against them,
To molest them and destroy them."

The teacher smiled at her. "And what's the title of Chapter 21?"

"The White Man's Foot."

"And which white man's foot is Wordsworth talking about?"

"It's Longfellow, ma'am; Wadsworth was his middle name. The White Man's Foot was a kind of flower."

"And how did you come to memorize the poem?"

"My tutor thinks only a few American poems are worthy of the name. There are only two others I know by heart. Ask me something about Shakespeare and I'm on top of it! Jonson, Chaucer, all those guys."

"Your tutor?"

Kennedy decided to get it out of the way. "I'm a Scarsdale girl, ma'am. Tutored from second grade to now. Thrown upon the tender mercies of public education to learn how to socialize."

The teacher laughed and waved for her to sit down.

The rest of the day, though, was deadly dull. Kennedy and Harriet had different lunch periods, different classes. It was mildly frustrating that she didn't get a chance to see Harriet until after the last bell.

"Well," Harriet asked, "how was your first day?"

"In English we were supposed to read aloud. The teacher picked one of three American poems I knew by heart. By force, I kept myself from tap dancing and juggling and just kept to reciting the words. Although I thought it would cause more of a stir because I knew it by heart."

"Kennedy, if you were to do something radically against the rules, the word would go around the school before the end of the next period. Do something well in class? It never gets out the door."

"That seems ... perverse."

"It is perverse, if you think the goal of school is teaching or that the students are here to learn. The real purpose of the modern American high school is to warehouse students until it's time for them to go to college. They fail almost no one; they leave that for the colleges. Odd, how it is, that so many kids think college is unfairly hard. They've been working to get college to be the same as high school: show up and you have a B average. Do all the homework and take all the tests and you'll get A's."

"Then why is that girl from this morning trying so hard to finish first?"

"Kudos, a few of them, go to whoever finishes first. For the rest of us, it's just that we finish and how well we do on the SAT."

"The SAT?"

"It's a test that seniors take in the fall. Do well on it and you go to college. Do very well on it, you get colleges calling you up, asking you to come there. Except the top tier of colleges, the Ivy League, Stanford, MIT and Caltech, places like that. Those you have to kiss bootie for, not to mention collect all the right ticket punches."

"Well, I might go to college, I suppose. It depends on whether or not I get picked."

Harriet nodded, and linked arms with Kennedy. "Well, you'll have to understand, I hope you're never picked."

"I know. It's a strange thing," Kennedy said as they walked outside. "If I get picked, I'm dead in a few years at best. If I'm not picked, I become just like you. And, if the rumors are true, the average Potential then jumps off the nearest high cliff unable to bear the disappointment."

"That doesn't sound very appetizing," Harriet said, trying to sound light.

Kennedy decided that Harriet never, ever, needed to know that twice she'd been inside someone's mind when they died.

For the next few weeks Kennedy simply did what was set out in front of her. The homework was absurdly light, and she knew that when she told Mr. Glastonbury about it, he'd find something else for her to learn. She was careful to tell him as soon as it was clear the public schools didn't much believe in out-of-class-assignments that took longer than twenty minutes.

It was, in a way, a little fatiguing. She warmed up and worked out early, before school, then once again as soon as she got home. Still, after a few weeks she'd adjusted just fine to the slightly longer hours and was content.

Then, a month into school things changed. She was walking to her locker, when ahead of her, a white boy, coldly, deliberately slammed his fist into a Hispanic boy's stomach. They were juniors, Kennedy thought.

The Hispanic boy shook off the blow, his hand dipped and she could see the knife move in a glittering arc, coming from the low attack position and quite clearly with intended malice. She took a quick step, grabbed his wrist and pulled it offline and went with the stroke.

The Hispanic boy couldn't help it. He had to flip or break his shoulder. He flipped and slammed down on his back. Kennedy put her foot on the wrist with the knife. His eyes glittered black with hate. "I'm gonna cut you, chica!"

A teacher appeared; one of the mice teachers. She'd already realized that there were teachers who were in control and those that weren't. She called the latter group "mice." Harriet thought she was being cruel.

"You, girl! Let him go! What have you done to him?"

Half a dozen of the nearest kids laughed sarcastically. Kennedy applied a bit more pressure with her foot and the knife came free. She toed it away, skidding it skittering across the floor towards the teacher.

"That's not mine," Kennedy said mildly. "If I let this guy up, he's promised to try to cut me. You won't mind if I keep a little pressure until you call one of the guards?"

There was a bit more fuss, then it was all over. Kennedy told Harriet about it later. "I was tempted to mention my pointy stick is a lot bigger than his," Kennedy joked, "but I figure it's guys with the size issues."

"And you don't?" Harriet said with a laugh. "For what it's worth, the gossip says you took the knife away from him." Harriet eyed Kennedy. "Kennedy, can I tell you something?"

"Sure, Harriet, you always can! Why would you think differently?"

"Kennedy, you put the wrong guy on the ground."

"He was going to knife the other boy!"

"The boy with the knife -- the white guy beat up his girlfriend and then raped her. The white kid wanted to show how helpless the Mexican kid was. He slugged him, knowing if the Mexican kid did anything back, it wouldn't be him getting in trouble. And that's what happened isn't it?"

"He raped a girl?" Kennedy's blood ran cold.

"Yeah. Several girls, actually. He picks someone helpless, usually Hispanic, and does his thing. Afterwards he taunts the boyfriend until he does something stupid."

"And the school lets this happen?" Kennedy was shocked to the core.

"Officially, they don't know about it. No one wants to testify against him."

Kennedy turned without a word and started jogging towards the school office. She looked around, saw a bunch of people waiting for this and that. She bellied up to the counter and a harried woman said, "You'll have to take a number."

"There was a boy today. I took a knife away from him earlier. I was replaying it in my mind, and I think I made a mistake."

The woman looked at her, a sarcastic expression on her face. "Girl, do you know that it's against the rules to strike another student? To knock him down and take something from him? That if you keep going this way, you'll be in trouble?"

"Who do I see about revising my story?" Kennedy asked coldly, ignoring the warning.

The woman looked at her sourly, and then went into an office. In a minute a man in his forties, looking trim and fit, ex-military, Kennedy thought, came out. "What's this?"

"Earlier, I thought I saw this guy trying to stick a knife into someone. Only, I kept replaying it in my mind, see? He picked it up off the floor, and was trying to hand it back to some guy in the hall. I screwed up. Suspend me, and all of that, not him."

"I'm Eric Dunbar, the Vice Principal in charge of discipline. I have two assistants, one for the women, one for the men. I've never seen you before, which just shouts that you're a new student. You remembered it, eh?"

"Yeah, it's like a film I can play in my mind. I thought I saw one thing, then, when I replayed it, I realized it was something else. You were a soldier; you know what I mean."

He looked at her coolly. "Well, it's a story. Let's see if you can convince two detectives; I'll warn you right now, it didn't work with me."

She followed him down a hall into a room where the Hispanic boy was sitting, hand-cuffed to a chair. The two policemen were talking to him, while a man that Kennedy had seen in the school halls was sitting at a desk a few feet away, listening to the questions.

Kennedy explained what she'd said before, and the lead detective just laughed. "That's just bullshit!"

"I assure you, it's not. I can remember each and every move. It's a technique my Master taught me."

He laughed. "And if you can do that, why didn't you see it at the time?"

"It happened very quick, sir. I thought I saw a threat and I reacted. It's my training, sir. Defensive only." Unless, she added under her breath, you're a vampire and then it's open season.

"Well, little honey, you just turn yourself around and walk on out of here. This isn't something you want to get involved with," the lead detective told her.

Kennedy smiled innocently. "If you say so, sir. Still, no hard feelings, eh?" she held out her hand to shake his.

Habit and custom, Mr. Glastonbury had said a million times, are your allies. Your enemies expect certain things when you move a certain way, behave a certain way. As soon as she had a solid grip on his hand, she yanked hard, putting her hip between him and his forward progress. He went ass over teakettle, landing on the ass, not the teakettle. She swept his partner's feet, bounced up and put the two pistols on the other man's desk. "Someone dropped these," she said innocently.

After a second the first policeman said, "Shit!" looking dazed. The second one was eying Kennedy warily, his hand resting on his ankle. Kennedy grinned. He had another gun in his sock! She'd seen that one on TV!

Her move was lightning quick: a kick that didn't connect with his face, but left her boot a fraction of an inch from his nose. The policeman flinched.

"Take your hand away from your ankle, sir, or contemplate how much that might have hurt," Kennedy said coldly.

The lead detective got up from the floor, took two steps and retrieved his weapon. At least he had the good sense to holster it. "You're under arrest for assaulting a police officer," he said smugly.

Kennedy held her ribs, she was laughing so hard. "Let's see, you're going to stand up in court and say that a thirteen-year-old girl, eight inches shorter than you, six inches shorter than your partner, assaulted both of you and took your weapons. My, won't that look good on your report! All before you had time to say 'Shit!'"

Mr. Dunbar laughed then. "Give it a rest, Detective Harrison! The charges and all that against Mr. Somoza have been dropped. You knew exactly what your chances were when you came in here and found out the person being assaulted was Dwight Evans. Non-existent, unless Mr. Somoza has a really bad attorney. There was never a chance Evans was going to press charges; your only other witness just recanted. I would say she has shown sufficient technical merit to justify her claim to remember each move she makes."

It took a few minutes, but at the end the boy was released from the handcuffs and the policemen left.

"Juan Baptiste," Mr. Dunbar said, speaking to the boy, still sitting, waiting for dismissal. "I understand what happened. Do you understand that you did exactly what Dwight wanted?"

"I'd have had him," he pointed to Kennedy, "if she hadn't butted in."

"And if you'd have had him, he'd have screwed you once again, Juan Baptiste. Because a knife is a poor weapon if you want to kill someone, and if you didn't kill him, he'd have seen you in jail for the rest of your life. Dwight isn't a coward, Juan; don't ever forget it."

"And yet, he keeps doing what he does."

"All you have to do is get Juanita to testify to what he did to her."

Kennedy could see the young man's face fall. "It would kill her parents, kill her, to say something like that. She's a good girl, Mr. Dunbar."

"I know, son. I know." He pointed at the door. "The two of you, get out of here. I don't want to see or hear about either of you for a long, long time. Next week, at the very least!"

Kennedy turned and walked out, but waited in the hall for the young man. "Busy?" she asked him.

"What do you care?" he said, obviously so angry, he was spitting.

"Humor me. Did you ever see that Crocodile Dundee movie where the punk pulls a knife on him, and he laughs and says, 'That's not a knife! Now this, this is a knife?' and pulls a huge blade from out of his ass?"

"Faked."

"Probably. I tell myself that I did good today, because you'd have hurt the guy, if I hadn't butted in. Mr. Dunbar was right, too. It would have been you in trouble, not this Dwight guy."

"What's it to you? In any case, it would have been enough to make the fucker bleed!"

"You don't know me and I don't know you. Come visit at my house for a few minutes. Let me show you my knife. Maybe it will impress you, maybe not. Maybe you'll listen to me, maybe not. You can always go back and just line up for jail time. It's easy, I hear, if you're a minority."

"Too fuckin' easy!"

"Well, what will it be then? Fuckin' easy and you go your way and I go mine, or mother fucking ass hard, you come to my place and listen?"

"Why should I care? Do you think I believe that you care about me? About Nita?" He spat on the ground. "Do you know your nickname at school, girl?"

Kennedy brightened. "I have a nickname?"

"Scarsdale poetry freak."

Kennedy laughed. "I take it that's not a compliment, is it?"

"Not!"

"Well, it's time to decide. My place or yours? I won't make this offer more than once."

"And what are we going to do at your place? Get it on? I love Nita, stupid! I don't get it on with anyone else, see?"

"I see just fine. And I'm gay, so if I were you, I'd try to keep me from meeting your Nita if she's cute. She is cute, right?"

He purpled and Kennedy laughed. "I'm jerking your chain. Please, yes or no?"

"And if yes, what?"

"What? We go to my house and I show you my knife. Then, if you're interested, we can sit down and figure out a way to stick something unpleasant into Dwight in such a way he's hurting afterwards and not us."

"You'd do that?"

"I won't physically hurt him," Kennedy warned. "Nor will I let you do it. But, yes. Something very, very unpleasant will happen to him."

"Okay."

Kennedy led Juan Baptiste outside and gestured for him to get in the back seat of Mr. Glastonbury's car. Mr. Glastonbury looked at Kennedy as she sat down next to him in the front seat. "I suppose you have an explanation for this?"

"He showed me his knife, sir. I'm going to show him mine."