The Dream Where the Losers Go (7 page)

“No one else has ever been here,” he said quickly. “I’ve never felt any ideas in these walls.”

“Just try,” she said. “With your fingertips.”

“Shut up and be quiet,” he ordered. “Or they’ll get us.”

S
KEY WOKE TO
knocking on her door. “Yeah yeah,” she mumbled.

“Morning, sunshine,” said Terry and moved on to Ann’s door.

“Yeah yeah,” Ann mumbled.

Curled in her bed, Skey lifted the rock to her face and ran its rough surface over her cheek. Warmed by her hand, the rock felt as if it was the dream stroking her, as if the dream had reached through to daylight and was touching her here.

She and the boy had gone on for the rest of the night without speaking, feeling their way along opposite walls of the tunnel. If she stopped to touch an idea in her wall, he stopped too, continuing on when she did. Once he began to sob, whispering, “They’re coming, I can hear them coming. They’ll get me again, they’ll get me and hurt me.” Then he began a long complicated sequence of swearing. She had listened without interrupting, sensing that to speak to him then would be a threat; he had forgotten she was there and they were both alone, following parallel trajectories through the never-ending dark.

Gently Skey traced the rock’s white markings. She knew nothing about the boy—his name, his secret name. His face. Or the place in which he lived the other side of his
life. Was it Timbuktu? Albania? New Zealand? She knew nothing about him, yet she felt closer to him than anyone she saw in the day side of her life.

“S
O
,”
SAID
T
ERRY
. “What color are you feeling?”

Skey paused, looking out the open doorway. Jigger would be parked around the corner, car idling. Her wrist had stopped aching. “Blue-green,” she said.

“Blue-green like the sea?” asked Terry.

“Blue-green like the first day of a bruise,” said Skey. She patted Terry’s shoulder with her bruised hand, but Terry didn’t notice. “See ya,” Skey said and stepped out into sky and wind.

“Skey,” called Terry.

“What?” asked Skey, turning back.

“You forgot your bus tickets,” said Terry.

“Oh yeah,” said Skey. Returning through blowing leaves, she took the tickets from Terry’s outstretched hand.

“Not gonna get far in this world if you forget your bus tickets,” said Terry, watching her closely.

“But Terry,” Skey said innocently. “Today all the buses are sunshine yellow, and they’re only letting on happy faces.”

Terry’s eyes didn’t leave her face.

Skey turned away. “See ya,” she said.

S
HE SETTLED BACK
into the seat as the car pulled out from the curb, taking her away from Terry, locked doors, scratched wrists and window wire. Jigger’s car had always felt like Jigger himself to her—when she climbed into the front seat, she climbed into his body and let him carry her wherever he wanted, cradled by the muffled rumble of the engine, the smooth ongoing wave of the ride.

“I talked to Cheryl,” Jigger said over the radio. “She’s going to the Orifice today to get your pills.” “Orifice” was Jigger’s term for the Family Planning Clinic. “You’ll get them tomorrow morning,” he added, giving a heartfelt groan. “They ever let you out of that place at night?”

“I can ask,” Skey said. “But I’d have an early curfew.”

“Real prison, eh?” he grunted.

“Dungeon of shit and puke, like I told you,” she said lightly. “Hey?”

“Hey?” he repeated, quirking an eyebrow at her.

“Got any weed you can spare?” she asked, giving him her most entrancing smile.

“
Before
school?!” He gave her a stern glance.

“For tonight,” she said, sliding in against him. “In my prison cell. I’ll stare at the bars on my window, suck in deep, relax and think of you.” Skey kissed the pulse in his throat, feeling it quicken.

“What time?” he asked, his voice growing husky.

“Lights out at 9:30,” said Skey. “Light up at 9:45.”

“And you’ll be thinking of me?” he asked.

“Uh-huh,” she promised.

He stopped for a red light. “Then 9:45,” he said and kissed her. “I’ll light up and think of you. Check the glove compartment.”

Skey opened the glove compartment and slid some rolled-up weed into her pencil case, then added a pack of matches—they would get her extra points with Viv. With a sigh, she settled against Jigger’s shoulder. The day’s first problem had been solved and it wasn’t even 8:30.

“Oh,” she said, suddenly remembering. “I have to meet my tutor for lunch.” She held her breath, waiting. Was Jigger going to get mad?

“What do they think, you’re gonna be—a university professor?” He didn’t seem to be angry, just irritated, his fingers tapping rapidly against the steering wheel.

“I guess they think I need extra ABCs.” Skey snuggled closer. “Why don’t you turn down that street?” she said, pointing. “We’ve got fifteen minutes, don’t we?”

“You got it,” he said, his voice growing husky again.

She closed her eyes and rode the car’s smooth turn as if they were going anywhere, Jigger could take her anywhere she wanted. The turn was so smooth, it was almost like traveling under a summer sky in the middle of a blue afternoon, with nothing to do. She just had to close her eyes, settle back into his body, and her dreams would take them there.

T
AMMY HAD GOTTEN
there first. When Skey arrived, she saw her tutor sitting at a table in the empty office, textbooks stacked in a neat skyscraper and surveying her empire with a satisfied expression. Drooping under her own armload of books, Skey stood in the Counseling office lobby and watched the other girl. What on earth could possess a teenage girl to
volunteer
to tutor another teenage girl? That meant reading and completing homework assignments that weren’t even her own. Who was Tammy Nanji—the next Mother Teresa? If she thought Skey was a leper begging for a cure, she had another thing coming.

Skey walked slowly into the office, keeping her gaze directly on Tammy. Just as directly, Tammy eyed her back. Choosing a chair opposite, Skey sat down and the girls continued to watch each other in silence. Behind her thick glasses, Tammy’s enlarged eyes were very determined. Skey had thought she would be able to stare her down easily, but Tammy’s gaze held. As the silence between them lengthened,
the air grew dark and a tunnel began to take shape around Skey. Determinedly she fought it off, digging her fingernails into her palms, shaking her head and swallowing hard.

“So, what’s up, Doc?” she asked, giving in first, her eyes flicking away from Tammy’s, then back again.

Tammy didn’t blink. “What do you want to do?” she asked calmly.

Skey shrugged. “Whatever,” she said.

“What are you having problems with?” asked Tammy.

“I’m not having problems,” said Skey.

Another silence began, bringing a second stare fight. Tammy took a long deep breath.

“I feel an incredible need to piss,” she said, getting to her feet. “I’ll be back in five minutes. If you’re here, we can get to work. I’d suggest Algebra. If you’re not here, I guess that means I’ve got free lunch hours until they find someone who wants help.” She leaned forward and added, “Whoopee.” Then she walked out.

The room was suddenly full of wings, panic swooping in from every direction. The breathing, it was the breathing that got Skey—the way air faded so she couldn’t get any. Sliding her hand into her pocket, she touched the rock. Immediately there was darkness, the boy sitting next to her, his breathing slow, even.

“You’re here again,” he said.

She paced her breathing down to his.

“I can tell when you’re coming in from the other side,” he said. “The air changes. There’s an electric tingle.”

“Positive vibes?” she asked.

“It’s a buzz,” he said. “Somewhere between blue and green.”

Alarm jerked through her. “You can see me?” she asked.

“No,” he said. “It’s just a feeling—the way blue-green feels. Not a happy camper.”

“First day of a bruise,” she said softly.

“Something like that,” he agreed.

“What do you do,” she asked, “when you’ve pissed someone off? It’s someone you don’t like much and you wouldn’t care, except she has some power over you and you have to make up.”

“How old is she?” he asked.

“Seventeen, I think,” she said.

“Bribery,” he said immediately. “Something illegal works best.”

“Not with her,” she said emphatically.

“Then grovel,” he said. “They like it when you grovel.”

“How do you grovel?” she asked.

“My particular style?” he said. “I wimp out. Beg, whine, whimper. I’m a Class A groveler. As in a groveler without class.”

“I can’t do it,” she said decidedly. “Not with her.”

“Why not?” he asked.

“I grovel all day, every day of my life,” she said. “My whole life is one long grovel.”

He went into a thinking pause, then said, “How much power does she have?”

From a long way off, she heard Tammy re-enter the office. “I take your point,” she muttered and returned to the well-lit room, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the fluorescent light.

“Have a good piss?” asked Skey.

“It was fine,” Tammy said, sitting down.

“Did you wash your hands?” asked Skey.

Tammy smiled a little. “Yes.”

“Algebra would be fine,” Skey said.

T
HE DESKS IN
S
KEY’S
English class were arranged in two half circles, facing the front. Ms. Fleck, the teacher, had decided upon an alphabetical seating plan, telling the class it was more democratic because it broke up cliques and encouraged new relationships. Skey thought it was stupid. San and Trevor were trapped five desks apart in the back row and Skey’s seat was at one end of the front. Beside her sat Brenda Murdoch, alias Miss Upchuck because of frequent gagging noises she made in washroom cubicles. At the other end of the first row, directly opposite Skey, sat the loser from her homeroom, Elwin Serkowski. Alias Lick.

He hadn’t washed his arm and was keeping his left sleeve pushed up. Every now and then his eyes would flick over her writing and shoot toward her, as if he was continually startled at this tiny connection between them, her touch still on his skin. If their eyes happened to meet, he blushed furiously and ducked his head. Every twenty seconds, he licked his lips. Skey wanted to donate some Lypsyl to the future of his mouth, soften his first kiss for the lucky girl.

For something to do, she watched him. If he wasn’t spinning his pen, he was tapping a finger or bouncing a knee. His lips moved constantly as he talked soundlessly to himself, and she could almost hear the whine in his head driving him insane. He probably heard mysterious voices talking about alien invasions or the next apocalypse. Whatever disaster was approaching the human race, Lick would know about it well ahead of everyone else. Every nerve in his body was radar scanning for danger, just like hers. What separated them, what made Lick the loser and Skey the success, was that he advertised it. She sat absolutely still. No one saw her fidget, gulp and swallow every five seconds.

It was Wednesday afternoon, just after Skey’s first session with Tammy Nanji. Class hadn’t started, San and Trevor hadn’t shown yet and most of the students were milling around, talking. Drifting to her desk, Skey deposited her books. Beside her, Brenda sat reading
The Guide to Nutritious Dieting
. A member of the Cafeteria Board of Directors, it was Brenda’s personal goal to delete every donut, French fry and greasy hamburger that was stuffed down a student’s throat. Last year she had started a petition for a salad bar. No one had signed.

“Where’d you get that, the Book of the Month Club?” Skey asked vaguely as she scanned the room for someone of interest.

Brenda straightened eagerly. “I’m researching vegetarian menus,” she said. “You know—yogurt, cottage cheese, the kind of food you need to diet properly. How are you supposed to keep thin with the crap they feed you here? You ought to be interested in this. A couple of us are meeting Tuesday and Thursday lunch hours to work out a plan. Want to come?”

“Can I bring my boyfriend?” asked Skey, but she didn’t listen to Brenda’s reply. Her gaze had settled on Lick. Turned around in his desk, he was talking to some guys in the back row, his right knee jitterbugging as if it was trapped in the fifties. Feeling very intent, Skey walked over to his desk, sat down on it, and tapped his shoulder. Startled, Lick spun around so quickly that he lurched forward. Skey had to put out a hand to stop his face from implanting itself into a vital part of her anatomy.

Guffaws broke out around them.

“Hey, Lick, you want to make a meal?” someone in the back row howled.

The shape of Lick’s face seemed to glow against her palm, blue-green, like pain. Without asking, Skey knew Lick could feel it too, this sudden strange connection. For a long suspended moment, the two of them sat surrounded by laughter, his face buried in her hand. Then the weird moment of deep meaning passed. Lick pulled back, his face radioactive, dancing his butt all over his seat. The poor guy didn’t know where to look. Everything he most wanted was eye-level, sitting on his desk, and he was bursting at the seams. This was exactly the situation Skey knew how to handle. Smiling, she touched his forearm. Lick let out a moan.

“May I?” she asked. Not waiting for an answer, she pulled his left arm across her lap. Kids crowded in, snickering.

“Hey, Lick, you want crisis counseling?” called someone.

“The guy needs coaching, man,” said someone else.

“Kiss her, Lick,” a guy hollered. “Pull her down and give her.”

Using a fingertip, Skey traced the words she had written on Lick’s arm and watched his face burn. Every ten seconds, his body gave a convulsive jerk.

“Hey,” she said.

His green eyes flicked up to meet hers—the green of an alpine lake, all the inner life fled deep.

“You bored yet, reading this?” she asked.

Staring fixedly at the teacher’s desk, Lick shook his head.

“Maybe I can make it more interesting,” she said. “Anyone got a pen?”

An array of pens flashed toward her. Skey fingered one after another, rejecting them. “No,” she said, “I want red. Anyone got red?”