The Boy Who Called God "She" (2 page)

Weltzer is a major crock.

I see Julian in the hall around lunchtime but I let him alone. So does Brent.

Me ’n Brent been buddies practically since kindergarten but that day we don’t have a whole lot to say to each other. We walk out slow after school. Neither of us can think of anything fun to do.

Until I see Weltzer’s car. There it sits at the far end of the parking lot, a gray Ford Escort with a Jesus fish window sticker and You’ve Got A Friend In JESUS Pennsylvania on the front license plate and some bumper stickers on the back—Don’t Drive Faster Than Your Angel Can Fly, that sort of thing. Me ’n Brent walk past it and I say, “Whoa.” Weltzer has a bright new bumper sticker:

GOD IS NOT POLITICALLY

CORRECT, BUT HE’S RIGHT

Big black letters. The minute I see it—I can’t explain what makes the thought fly into my head—but I just have to do it. It’s gonna make him so pissed.

“Gimme a black marker, Brent!”

“Huh?”

“A black marker! In your book bag, dork! Give it!”

I’m not worried about somebody seeing me, what with all the cars roaring past between me and school. Anyhow, it only takes a minute. A quick curved line, an
S
:

GOD IS NOT POLITICALLY

CORRECT, BUT
S
HE’S RIGHT

“You been around Julian too much,” is all Brent says.

I don’t say a thing; I just grin. See, I’m bad.

But get this: I’m so big and bad, I never once think to figure that Julian will get blamed.

First thing next day, about half a minute into homeroom period, Weltzer’s voice blares over the intercom, yelling for Julian to report to the office.

Not like me ’n Brent are in homeroom. We are hanging out in our private office, by the urinals. But there’s a speaker in the bathroom too. We hear it. And at the same time we both get it, what is happening. I look at Brent and he looks at me.

He goes all round-eyed. “Perfect!” he whispers.

I don’t say anything.

“Derek, my man…” He whacks me on the back. “The perfect revenge.”

I don’t say anything.

“Paddle central, here comes Julian!”

I don’t say anything. I look at Brent, my buddy. Since kindergarten, or first grade anyway. Both of us in this so-called Christian school because our parents hope it will straighten us out.

I head toward the door.

“Hey man, where you going?”

I don’t answer. I just go charging out.

I run mach 100 down the empty hallway and skid into the office just in time. Weltzer is yanking Julian toward the back room, the principal is waiting in the doorway, and Julian—I mean, I never met anybody with more guts, the way he stuck up for his She-God, but he doesn’t need this. He isn’t fighting Weltzer, but Weltzer is giving him the rough hand anyway, and Julian just looks sick.

“It was me!” I yell, barging in.

Weltzer swings around with his head jutting out like he’s a ticked-off bear. He gives me the glare, his face like he has hives, he is so pumped full of high blood pressure and preacher wrath. “What do you—” he starts to yell at me.

But I yell at him instead. “It was me put the damn
S
on your asshole bumper sticker!”

Well, that does it. I mean, how would I know what it was all about if I didn’t do it? They have to let Julian go. I am the one who gets to experience the joy of the back room.

But while I’m in there I have a talk with the principal. Me and the principal kind of understand each other in a weird way, he is so used to hitting me. He’s seen me bullshit him so much he knows this time something’s different. I tell him what’s been happening with Weltzer and Julian, and he listens.

After I’m finished he thinks about it a couple minutes.

“Vandalism was not the right way to handle it,” he says finally.

“I wasn’t trying to handle anything!”

“Well…you’re trying to handle it now, aren’t you, Derek?”

Give me a break. “Just paddle me and let me go.”

“Paddle a rescuing hero? I don’t think so. You try to stay out of trouble now, you hear?”

I can’t believe it. But no problem, the principal gives me a pass back to class. I can tell by his face he’s still thinking about what I said, and I know he can’t say so, but I think he’s going to have a little talk with Weltzer. Maybe Julian won’t get sent to the office again just for saying what he believes.

Guess what. Julian is supposed to be in class but he’s a bad boy out in the hall, waiting for me around the first corner. He reaches out a hand to stop me. “Thanks,” he says, his voice almost a whisper.

I growl, “Thanks for what?”

“What you did…”

“I didn’t do anything but act stupid.”

“But I—you—”

I don’t want him trying to thank me. Anyway, it’s all kind of his fault. I burst out, “Why do you call God She, anyway?”

“Why not?”

“But do you believe it?”

He shrugs.

“You think God’s got
boobs
?”

“You think She’s got a wanker?”

I can’t deal with this. I don’t know what to think anymore. I say, almost begging him, “You’re just doing it to yank Weltzer’s chain, right?”

He shakes his head. “No.”

“Then
why
?”

He smiles at me. And his sky-gray eyes are quiet and happy and really freaky under that purple hair, like he’s a crazy angel. He smiles, the bell rings, he walks away.

Next day Weltzer sort of apologizes to the whole Religion class for being a turd, except that’s not what he calls it, but Julian is not there. Julian is not in school the next day, either, or the next.

I haven’t seen him since.

I keep looking for him at malls and stuff, but I haven’t seen him. I don’t know what happened to him. Maybe his parents yanked him out of that school. Maybe he ran off. Maybe he’s training with the Olympic swim team. Maybe he went back to wherever he came from.

It’s been a couple years now, actually, and I’m still thinking about him.

Weird, huh? But the thing is, I really want to talk with him. Like, is his God a mother to him, or more like a sister, or kind of a girlfriend? How does he talk with Her? Like a buddy, like me ’n Brent used to talk? Or better than that?

I haven’t been to church since I was a little kid, but I’m kinda thinking about going back. I mean, if I can’t talk with Julian, could I maybe talk with God? Would God listen? Like Julian said, could it be God is alive and things might change? Could it be God doesn’t want me to be scared of Her?

Edgar Award–winning author
Nancy Springer
,

well known for her science fiction, fantasy, and young adult novels,

has written a gripping psychological thriller—smart, chilling, and unrelenting…

DARK LIE

available in paperback and e-book in November 2012

from New American Library

Dorrie and Sam White are not the ordinary Midwestern couple they seem. For plain, hard-working Sam hides a deep passion for his wife. And Dorrie is secretly following the sixteen-year-old daughter, Juliet, she gave up for adoption long ago. Then one day at the mall, Dorrie watches horror-stricken as Juliet is forced into a van that drives away. Instinctively, Dorrie sends her own car speeding after it—an act of reckless courage that puts her on a collision course with a depraved killer…and draws Sam into a desperate search to save his wife. And as mother and daughter unite in a terrifying struggle to survive, Dorrie must confront her own dark, tormented past.

“A darkly riveting read...compelling.”

—Wendy Corsi Staub, national bestselling author
of Nightwatcher
and
Sleepwalker

“
A fast-paced, edge-of-your-seat thriller that will have you reading late into the night and cheering for the novel's unlikely but steadfast heroine.”

—Heather Gudenkauf,
New York Tim
es best-selling author of
The Weight of Silence
and
These Things Hidden

Learn more about all of Nancy’s titles at her website, www.nancyspringer.com.