Class - Cecily Von Ziegesar [85]
Less than half a mile away, Tragedy lay bleeding in the snow. Whoever had shot her had broken the law; bear hunting season had ended just after Thanksgiving. Not that she was a bear. She was a person, wearing a coat, which wasn’t even made out of bear fur. Raccoon hunting season might well have run all year, the little pests.
“At least I’m not fucking dead,” she swore, attempting to stand. “Hey!” she shouted. “Hey! I’m fucking bleeding over here!”
Nothing. Snowflakes drifted prettily down through the whitewashed trees. The storm was tapering off.
“Hey!” Tragedy shouted again, but her shout came out too hoarse to go anywhere. The bullet had gone right through her, somewhere near her belly button. She felt like she’d eaten a whole fucking pound of hot chili peppers. “Hey!” she shouted, even more hoarsely this time. Her voice was just a whisper, quieter than a snowflake.
She couldn’t walk, so she dragged herself through the snow, scraping at it with her bare hands. A break in the trees and there was Dexter College, sitting prettily on its hill, the brick buildings all frosted with snow, the blue light shining from the chapel spire like a Christmas tree topper. It looked just like it did in the snow globes they sold at the campus bookstore. It looked like a fucking Christmas present. And just on the fringes of campus was that huge tent. She’d have to drag herself a hundred fucking miles to get there, but she’d get there. And then she’d yell her fucking head off until someone came.
“Shit,” she whimpered. Her hands hurt. “Mom’s going to kill me.”
20
They say a pet can do wonders for your mental health. A pet is a source of comfort. Making a home for a pet gives you a sense of security and well-being. Providing for a pet is very satisfying and teaches responsibility for others. Pets appreciate leftover surf and turf from the Lobster Shack. Most of them do anyway.
Patrick hadn’t thought of the right name for the kitten yet. Frodo was a good one, but once you named your cat after a character from The Lord of the Rings, you were pretty much done for—just you and your cat, living in your own little fairyland of magic and wizardry. Blackie was retarded. Jet was too gay. Raymond—so gay. Hugo was sort of theatrical. Or maybe Victor? No, gay again. Pink Patrick with a black cat named Victor. It was like something out of Psycho.
His Outward Bound instructors had written about the Pink Patrick incident in the report that went out to his parents.
“Patrick, are you gay?” his father had asked him after reading the report.
“What?” Patrick said. “Huh?” It was all he could think of to say. He’d never had a girlfriend, but he’d never had a boyfriend either. He was Pink Patrick. People avoided him.
“Here, kitty,” he called, setting down a plastic bowl of surf and turf that he’d shredded into tiny scraps. The kitten scampered over to the bowl and sniffed it. Then it sat down on its haunches and began licking its asshole.
“Are you gay?” Patrick demanded of the kitten. He cracked a smile when it paused to look up at him with its big yellow eyes.
One of the thick wool blankets that girl had brought for him lay in a heap on the floor, right where he’d left it a few days ago. He lay down and rolled himself up in it, rubbing his palms against his thighs. The yurt’s flaps were shut tight, but it was still freezing. He thought about lighting the little stove for the kitten’s sake but he wanted to sleep, and it said in the directions not to leave the camp stove unattended.
“Here, kitty,” he said again, but the kitten didn’t move.
“Suit yourself,” Patrick told it and rolled over.
He’d been driving for hours, hypnotized by the snow and the flap, flap, flap of the Mercedes’s windshield wipers. He almost hit the same white car several times. Idiot, driving a white car in the snow. Eventually the kitten started mewing like crazy in the backseat and he decided it must have to poop. He couldn’t very well let a cat poop all over a room at the Holiday Inn, so he’d brought it back to the yurt. He’d even dug away