All Good Children - Catherine Austen [16]
Dallas swats Austin’s hand away and accidentally hits the ice cream cone to the floor. There’s a moment of silence before Austin jumps on Dallas’s head. The screen dissolves. It seems that in every two-child family, only one child is normal.
My first day of classes falls two weeks into term. Everyone is angry at me for missing so much school. Fortunately, my favorite teacher, Mr. Reese, is taking his weekly hypochondriac day, so I get a midmorning break from the nagging. A substitute stands at the front of history class, wringing her hands as we take our seats. She’s young, homely, scared. I can’t resist.
I answer the roll call for Pepper Cassidy before Pepper can get her hand up. The sub squints at me like she thought Pepper was a girl’s name but you never know these days. “Maxwell Connors?” she calls out next.
I wait. There’s a risk to jokes like this. I might lead the classroom fun or I might be laid to waste. Fortunately, word has spread on how I thrashed Tyler last week. Brennan Emery raises his hand and says, “Here.” I’m stamped with approval, checked off the list.
When Brennan’s name is called, three hands shoot up, all wanting to be him. Montgomery from cheerleading stands to attention. He lowers his voice and squares his shoulders. “I’m Brennan,” he says, trying to look straight.
Dallas answers for Montgomery. He snaps his fingers and sings, “Have no fear! I am here!” Dallas is a supreme actor. He played a drag-queen elf in the grade nine Christmas production, and the entire football team avoided him for weeks afterward. He jumps at the chance to revive the role. Mincing opportunities are rare for a fifteen-year-old giant whose entire family is named after parts of Texas.
Pepper answers for Kayla Farmer, the ultimate cheerleader. Pepper wiggles her fingers, jiggles her boobs, cheers, “That’s me! I’m Kayla. K-A-Y-L-A. That spells Kayla!”
Soon everybody has a new name and personality except the honest kids whose names start with A and B and Tyler Wilkins, whom nobody answers for.
I play a premium Pepper, but Dallas steals my limelight. No one can take their eyes off him as he mimics Montgomery, who’s flamboyant even for a gay boy. Dallas doesn’t hold back. He opens a pack of mints and waltzes up the aisle— literally, spinning and stepping, one, two, three—past all the girls and average guys, right up to Brennan, who’s playing me. “Hi, Max,” Dallas says. He leans across Brennan’s desk, stretching to pull his shirt up over his muscled belly. He bats his lashes and whispers, “Want a mint?”
Brennan tries not to laugh.
Washington Anderson swears from the desk in front of them. He’s Tyler’s ugliest goon, a rabid homophobe and racist who’s stuck playing his own damaged personality this morning. “You reeking hemorrhage, Richmond,” Washington mutters. “Get back to your desk.”
Dallas sticks a mint between his teeth and pulls back his lips. He leans close to Washington, daring him to take it.
Washington leaps to his feet and raises a fist.
The substitute teacher screams.
Dallas lifts himself off Brennan’s desk and stands up to his height of six feet two inches, transforming instantly from a happy fag into a serious fighter. He crushes the mint between his teeth.
Tyler hurdles a desk to hover beside Washington. I hop beside Dallas, smiling at the opportunity to kick Tyler’s ass again. Brennan stands up next to me with Bay, the biggest, blackest boy on the football team. “You don’t want to do anything rash,” Brennan tells Washington. The room is silent and tense.
The sub looks from us to the surveillance camera to the door, too scared to say a word.
Dallas smiles at Washington. “Do you have a problem with my mints? Not your favorite flavor?”
Washington snorts and swears, clenching his fists. His eyes gleam with fury. But his grades are borderline and a suspension might get him sent to throwaway school, so he backs off with a muttered, “Outside.” The sub resumes her lecture on climate change in the twenty-first century. She stutters so quietly I can barely understand her.
“I’m wasting