Pug Hill - Alison Pace [66]
Rachel looks momentarily flustered. Beth Anne, who is sitting right next to where the video camera guy is standing, looks up at him and whispers something, and he nods.
Rachel looks down at an index card she is holding in her hands, pauses, takes a breath, and looks back at us. “I’m here to talk to you about remote viewing,” she says. “Remote viewing is the ability to watch other people from inside your own mind.”
And I know that poems don’t have to rhyme, but this is sounding very un-poem-like to me. I wonder if it matters. I wonder if maybe all that matters is that she’s up there.
“Remote viewing is a very powerful tool if used correctly,” she says slowly, enunciating, pausing after every word. “But you need to be sure to use it only for good and not for evil.”
Lawrence shoots his hand up in the air, waves it at Beth Anne. She shakes her head sternly at him, puts a finger to her lips. Rachel looks directly at Lawrence, her eyes fiery, her cheeks beginning to redden as she says, “A lot of people use it for evil.”
It’s definitely not a poem. But still, she’s up there, she’s up there in front of a video camera, and she hasn’t thrown up, or gurgled, or simply stood there staring in a daze, or run screaming from the room. All things, by the way, that I do not rule out for myself. I imagine Beth Anne agrees that it doesn’t have to be a poem, because she doesn’t interrupt Rachel, to tell her, “That is not a poem, dear.” And for the next five minutes, we learn all about Rachel’s belief in the ability we all have to watch people telekinetically. We learn how so many people are actually watching us right now and how even more people are using their telekinetic powers for evil, and terrorism, and, of course, devil worship. And the “of course,” just so you know, that was Rachel’s “of course,” not mine.
What makes it even weirder, even creepier than it already is, simply by virtue of its subject matter, is this: at the end of her non-poem speech, Rachel looks up, over her left shoulder and says, quite calmly, “Scratch that.”
I’m trying not to, but I’m feeling a little scared. I’ve changed my mind, I’ve decided that it does matter, that a poem would have been so much nicer, since that, after all, is what was assigned.
Rachel looks out at us, and says, “Scratch that,” again. After a stunned silence-filled moment or two, everyone starts clapping; a polite, cautious clapping, and so I do, too.
“Um, yes, thank you, Rachel,” Beth Anne says, smoothing down her skirt again as she says it.
“You are welcome.”
“On a scale of one to ten, what was your anxiety level?” Beth Anne asks. Rachel’s eyes, and I’m not making this up, they are all ablaze. I want to raise my hand and say that my anxiety level is pretty freaking high right now, but I try to be respectful of the fact that Beth Anne, right now, is not speaking to me. I wait for the theme from The Twilight Zone to start up in the background.
“About a seven,” Rachel says, and looks up over her left shoulder, and walks to her seat.
“Well,” Beth Anne says, exhaling. “I think Rachel did an excellent job of, uh, of, uh, Taking the Room and making eye contact.”
Lawrence’s hand shoots up again.
“Yes, Lawrence?”
“We’re supposed to read a. poem, though, right?”
“Yes, uh, right,” Beth Anne says nodding her head sagely, though with the stammering it seems that she, like me, like everyone else I would venture to guess, is stuck somewhere between slightly and extremely disturbed. “But if you’re not comfortable with a poem, remember we discussed you could read a passage from a book?”
“I thought this was more important,” Rachel offers and everyone looks at the floor.
“Yes, well, interesting topic and good job, Rachel,” Beth Anne says, standing and smoothing down the front of her skirt again, and then smoothing it down one more time.
“Lawrence, who would you like to be your coach?”
I tense up again, because while you’d think Lawrence would pick Rachel because she picked him, you’d also think that maybe he doesn’t want to be remotely viewed and that, along with everyone else,