"All These Tremendous Lies"
A/N: In an attempt to revive my fading muse, I've written a really dumb one-shot. I took one of our conversations on the boards into consideration while making this: What if some of the 'lies' told during that day in detention were true? What if some 'truths' were lies? A semi-AU taking place the morning of the detention before the kids arrive at the school. Some of the 'lies' I took into account are: Bender's "bullshit" home life, Brian's "virginity," Allison's plans to run away, Andy's 'racehorse' speech about his coach and dad pushing him because he was a winner, and Claire's parental situation. NOTE THIS: This is an AU…meaning these DIDN'T happen in the movie, so don't ream me on the fact that these seem unlikely. This is only intended to be MEDICINE FOR MY MUSE!!! Got all that? Good, enjoy, bitches!
Summary: I think I just covered it, but again, what if some of the 'lies' told during that day in detention were true? What if some 'truths' were lies? A semi-AU taking place the morning of the detention before the kids arrive at the school.
Brian looked at himself in the long mirror beside his armoire. Looking at himself, he couldn't believe his misery. An F. How could THAT happen to salutatorian Brian Johnson? It was truly a nightmare. His mother had nearly pulled her hair plugs out, and his father went whiter in the face than he usually was. If the pressure was on him before, now it was going to increase. He must have dropped to below tenth rank at school. Of course, that wasn't his top concern. Brian may have to give up Syracuse University now if his scholarship fell through. He could hear the voices in his head right now. His father would have not yelled, but rather moaned…
"Brian, you are certainly better than this. You don't know how to make a lamp? I can show you, just like my father taught me. We can't afford to have this happen again, and I'm VERY disappointed! With your sister's learning disorder, she'd be lucky to get into community college. So, please try harder, if anyone, at least for Maura…"
His mother, on the other hand, took the more masculine (ironically) approach: yelling.
"Brian Ralph Johnson! Of all the times for you to choose to goof off! The middle of March is SCHOLARSHIP SEASON! You just threw full-tuition out the window! Forget going back East, Brian, unless you march straight upstairs and crack the books so you can compensate for that F with your next AP English exam! MARCH, young man!"
But what was worse, but he couldn't have remembered to put the safety on the flare gun he brought to school yesterday to end his life…did flare guns even HAVE safety locks like other guns? Reflecting back in bed the other night, it did seem a little stupid to try and kill himself, with all things, a flare gun. If anything, a handgun would've been a better choice.
It wouldn't have gone off in his locker, and he wouldn't have to sit in detention with a bunch of thugs today. Because it was his little sister's 8th birthday, and Gina Johnson had planned a surprise party for her little princess, Brian had hoped his mother could've called the school and offered to have him serve an after-school detention instead. Why after-school? More witnesses in case any of the thugs tried to kill him. But his perfectionist mother had told him the detention was a necessity for him, and that she was taking Maura into Chicago anyways for a shopping day and that his father would pick him up that afternoon anyways.
Brian had put on the simplest and least-offensive of his outfits. A green sweatshirt and khaki-colored pants. Oh well, function before fashion, anyways. It's not like the Queen Bee of the senior class would be in detention.
"BRIAN?" his mother's shrill voice called from downstairs. "Phone call!! And HURRY! You have to be at the school in half an hour!"
Brian moaned. "Don't remind me…" He have not been a stereotypical teenager, but he still liked his full 8-hours of sleep. He managed to squeeze in 5 short hours last night.
Grabbing his coat and knapsack, Brian slowly came down the stairs into the den. Gina Johnson and Maura Johnson sat on the sofa eating waffles. Gina held the phone in her small wrist.
"It's Eileen," Gina muttered.
"Oooooh! You kissed her!!" Maura mocked. Brian rolled his eyes.
I did more than that with her, he thought to himself as he took the phone from his mother.
"Don't be long. Long-distance calls are expensive!" said Gina. Brian held his hand up and went into the kitchen for some privacy.
"Brian?" said a deep, melodic voice from the other end of the line…which lied in Niagara Fall up in Canada.
"Eileen?" Brian sighed with a sort of mild happiness. If anything in this world kept him from pulling the trigger on that flare gun yesterday, it was Eileen Becker. The Johnson family had been in Niagara Fall last summer for a family reunion, and at some point or another, Brian's jerk cousins had chased him out of the building. Eileen worked in a convenience store near the hotel where the reunion was happening, so when he went in for a slushie, he came out with a love interest. Eileen was a pretty girl a year older than Brian. She had fiery red hair, green eyes with the intensity of a cat's eye, her skin was tan and sturdy, but not unfeminine, mind you. She wasn't a bony girl, either. She had about 1-1/2 times the pant size of Brian, and her hips were big enough to use as a boat hull. But she was all Brian's. Brian had purposely never gotten involved in his hometown at the idea of he reuniting with Eileen one day in the future. If he could manage to hold on the Syracuse University, that area was only a few hours from Niagara.
Sure, Brian Johnson was the last person on earth one would expect to have a one-night stand with. But it wasn't like Eileen was a whore. She gave Brian her phone number and even introduced him to her family before he left. Eileen's mother had a great hand with a skillet, and she made Brian the best omelets he'd ever had. Besides, that night in the Michelangelo Inn was the best night Brian had ever had in his life.
"Brian, how are you?"
"Eileen, why are you calling so early? It must be 5:30 AM where you live!" Brian remarked.
"Listen, Brian, I've been thinking about us since our weekend together last summer. I miss you, Bri."
"Same here. I don't know when I can be up there again!" Brian said.
"I can't find a time to come down there either," said Eileen. "But, Brian, how old are you?"
"16, turning 17 next March," answered Brian.
"Really? Oh, that's great, Brian!" said Eileen. "Because I think we should get married…"
Brian dropped the phone.
"Claire! You up?"
"Yes, Mom, I'll be right down!"
Claire Douglas finished applying her makeup and looked at herself in disgust. If there WERE thugs in detention, they wouldn't beat up a girl, would they? Not to mention, if her friends caught wind that she, Claire Douglas-Standish, was spending her Saturday sitting in detention, she'd never be able to live it down.
Claire had many brutal secrets that put a lot of pressure on her to keep from her friends. It got worse every day. Claire, a junior, had managed too keep some pretty hard-to-keep secrets locked away in her heart, away from the student body's ears. They'd smash and smother her reputation as Shermer High's Princess. Her friends would ditch her for good, and then what? No self-respecting country-club girl would want to be friends with a foster girl.
When she was 12, Claire's mother just got up and left her father for the Caribbean. She sent a few postcards to Claire once in a blue moon, but all of them sounded like she'd been drinking too much tequila. Claire's father wasn't a very good father either, and almost immediately left Claire to Child Services so he could chase after his wife and attempt reconciliation. Claire had been put in a home with Gordon and Marietta Standish, a nice sugar-sweet upper-middle-class family who couldn't have children of their own. Claire and her older brother Mark had tried to stay together, but unfortunately, Child Services pulled them apart. Mark lived somewhere near Peoria, and Claire sometimes visited him on weekends.
Gordon and Marietta were good people, but lately, they're sweetness and love for each other began to disintegrate. Gordon and Marietta fought more and more consistently, giving Claire miserable flashbacks to her biological parents' relationship. Marietta and Gordon mainly fought OVER Claire. It was pathetic. They would be nice in front of their ward, but when Claire went up to her room, it would be World War III.
"She needs to meet new people!"
"Her friends are fine!"
"Her grades are too low!"
"She's doing her best!"
And then Marietta would take Claire out for ice cream and Gordon would buy her another pink cashmere sweater.
Claire was counting the 14 months she had left in foster care until she turned 18 and could go down to Bermuda herself to search for her parents with Mark.
But in the meantime, Claire didn't want a single person at Shermer High to know about her foster situation. She made it look like The Standish family was her biological family, even going as far as to unofficially adopting their last name. Everyone at school knew her as Claire Standish instead of Claire Douglas. It rolled off the tongue better anyways. Gordon and Marietta were asked to play along when she invited friends over to the large Victorian house she called home, and they always obliged. When her name was called "Claire Douglas-Standish" in the morning roll call in school, Claire played Douglas off as her middle name. So what if it was a male name when used as a first or middle name? Claire's friends thought it sounded trendy. Nobody at school knew that she was a ward of the state until her 18th birthday.
But today, Claire wasn't thinking about all of that. Today she had to serve detention. For shopping. Okay, it was SKIPPING SCHOOL to go shopping, but Claire didn't really care what the different was. The end of the school year and the stresses going alongside it were really pushing down on Claire this year. Her grades were dropping and even Marietta and Gordon were cracking down on Claire. Friday, she couldn't take the pressure. After Gordon dropped her off in front of the school in his silver BMW, Claire and two of her friends, Mitzi and Donna, decided to skip school for the day and relieve a bit of the stress on Claire. She ended up buying a really cute lavender blouse and a brown calf-length skirt. She was wearing them now.
But she didn't feel new as the clothes on her back. The detention thugs were going to rip her apart.
"CLAIRE! We're waiting, honey! Gordon's driving you!" yelled Marietta from downstairs.
Claire groaned and headed downstairs, wishing that she were 12 years old again.
Andy slipped on his blue fleece jacket and sighed to himself. Detention, god. This was going to suck. His dad was already pissed enough at him. No, strike that. His dad was giving up on him.
Getting suspended from the wrestling team was bad enough. His coach was beginning to believe that Andy had peaked last season and was losing hope in his once-sterling wrestler. Even Andy wasn't fully aware of what was happening to him. His strength was weakening and his speed was slowing down. His friends blamed senioritis, but Andy couldn't give a crap about graduating. Coach Hall told George Clark, Andy's father, that Andy was declining and either had to work harder or choose another, less physical sport. But, initially, George Clark hadn't given up so easily. He hardened up on his son. He made him work thrice as hard to make up for his lack of performance. Andy was getting fed up with it. Andy purposely began to rebel a little bit. Which explained why he was scheduled to serve detention that day. In short, it was a fit of rebellion.
On Monday that week, Andy realized that George was almost ready to surrender when the extra training didn't work. Andy almost felt ashamed that he was considered a disappointment to his family. His coach had given up on him. Screw it if he blew his ride for college. George Clark, however, was in denial. His son WAS a somebody.
Either that, or George loved making Andy feel like shit by hinting that his ride wasn't blown yet. Andy knew it was dead. His future at MIT was killed. George kept mentioning how he still had to work for the scholarship. There was still a scholarship in it for Andy if he pushed himself a little bit harder! It almost hurt Andy even more than failing to hear those words from his father.
So, on Friday morning, after a long, hard gym class, Andy cracked. He taped the ass-cheeks of a nerdy student named Larry Lester together with the tape for his knee. Of, course, his father yelled and made him workout and yelled more when he was given the Saturday detention, but Andy's mind was elsewhere. What was he DOING with his life? If wailing on an innocent kid gave him a feeling of brief satisfaction, then what kind of shit would he pull in the future to feel the same brief euphoria?
"Andrew! Get in here and eat before I drag you out here!"
Andy wandered into the kitchen and sat in front of the plate of bacon and eggs before him. Kathleen Clark was getting a huge paper bag together with Andy's lunch inside. Andy dug in. He was REALLY hungry.
"I really hope you learn a lesson in that school today, Andrew," muttered George between sips of coffee. "Maybe this is the wake-up call you need to get in good with the coach again. You used to be a goddamn racehorse, Andrew! Faster than lightning, stronger than steel! Now you're My Little Pony, Andrew. You don't want to be My Little Pony," George ranted.
"All we'd have to do is draw a flower on his ass and dye his hair pink!" laughed Andy's twin sister Mitzi, coming into the kitchen in her cheerleading uniform. "Mr. Criminal needs to shape up!" she mocked.
"Who the hell asked you?" asked Andy.
"Andrew! Mind your damn language around you mother and sister!" George barked. Andy buried his face in his meal. Kathleen sighed woefully.
"George, you need to drop Mitzi off at practice before you drop Andrew off," she said. "Mitzi has a competition in Peoria next week—"
"—and I just got picked to be the top of the pyramid!" Mitzi beamed proudly. George smiled at his daughter.
"At least one of the Clarks is worth the college they got into…you're gonna be the gem of Stanford, Mitzi!"
"Thanks daddy! I promise I'll send Andy some money when he's living out of a refrigerator box!" Mitzi smirked.
"Shut UP!" Andy hollered. George shot up, nearly turning the table over.
"That's it! Both Clark children in the Bronco ASAP before I lose my sanity!" George yelled, pointing to the front door. Mitzi stuck her tongue out at Andy before skipping out the door with George. Kathleen looked at Andy and handed him the large, heavily-packed brown bag.
"You'll be fine, just believe in yourself!" Kathleen whispered, kissing her son's cheek.
"ANDREW!! GET OUT HERE!!! ON THE DOUBLE!!" barked George. Andy tapped his mother's shoulder and dashed out the door.
But, how could he believe in himself if there was nothing in him TO believe?
"Allison, I'm sorry, but we can't pick you up until tonight."
Allison couldn't believe what she was hearing. The phone in her room was at risk of being yanked off the hook. Were her plans being ruined already?
"Morty, please? You promised we'd be in San Francisco by tonight!" pleaded Allison, keeping her voice down. She was rarely one to plead, but her cousin Morty did promise that she'd be out of Illinois today. Her bag was all packed and everything.
"Allison, I'm sorry, but they're getting rain out there, and traffic is hell all the way to Montana anyways, so Jenn, Chris, and I can't come until 6 tonight."
"My parents—"
"—Al, do you think your parents would care if you grew a sycamore out of your ass?"
"No," Allison said quickly.
"Then chill out! Lie low for today, and I'll play it off as a night out with your ever-so-responsible cousins, okay? You be out before you know it!"
Allison nodded, as if her cousin Morty could see it from the other end of the line. After nodding, she hung up the phone and fell back on to her bed. The clock flashed 6:30 AM.
So, she had to wait another 12 hours before her two cousins and Morty's girlfriend came to take her away from this hellhole she called her parents' house. Allison, Morty, Jenn, and Chris had been planning this escape for months now. Each one of them hated being a Reynolds child, even Jenn, who wasn't related by blood. Being a Reynolds child meant you were on your own. It must have been genetic, but something about Marty Reynolds, and her brother Fred, made family life miserable. Allison existed as a tax break for her money-hungry parents (oddly, the family was lower-middle class, drove a crappy blue station wagon, and barely got by on cash), and Morty and Chris were the bane of Fred Reynolds' existence.
Allison had threatened for a long time to run away and never return. But now that it was happening, it was happening almost too fast. She was going to start a career as a street-painter in San Francisco, live with her cousins in an old tenement, and live free at last. Allison had lived 17 years as a caged bird. Marty and Daniel, who had no idea how to raise a child other than feeding, clothing, and sheltering it, were no help in freeing her soul. They gave her the minimum amount of attention. Despite being an only child, poor Allison was never given the attention that a middle child of 20 kids would receive. She wasn't starving, so her parents figured that she'd be fine on her own. They never bothered asking her how she felt, or praise her when her artwork won a prize in the Shermer Young Artists Art Show for the fifth time in 7 years.
Allison needed more than a roof over her head. She needed love, attention, freedom. And she never was going to get it at home. So she was ready. Ready to jam. She just had to extend her wait for 12 more hours.
God they were going to be a long 12 hours! What the hell could she do? Lately, her muse was in a pit, so she wouldn't be able to make anything. The TV was busted and the repair man wasn't coming until Sunday. Daniel and Marty were going to be home all day, so Allison needed to get OUT of the house. Where could she spend a whole Saturday?
Well, the first thing that came to her mind: Saturday detention at Shermer High. That'd sure be an interesting pastime. To witness all the tough thugs and how they interacted. Maybe her muse would bite her there and she could make an artistic statement on underestimated and overlooked teenagers. Plus, it'd be fun to stir up a thing or two! Allison hopped out of bed, grabbed the first items of clothing she found in her closet, threw them on, ran her fingers through her hair, and grabbed her large 'purse' that contained everything she was taking to San Francisco with her.
She moved out into the kitchen, where Marty and Danny were eating bagels and reading the paper.
"I have a detention at school," Allison said blankly. Danny barely looked up from his paper.
"What did you do?"
Allison spoke as she thought. "I spilled chemicals on Mary Sanders in chemistry."
"So? Accidents shouldn't be punished. There go my damn tax dollars! Fucking Reagenomics…"
"Dad, it was on purpose," said Allison. Marty rose and eyebrow and licked some cream cheese off her fingers.
Danny got up from his seat.
"Fine, then. I'll drop you off," he said. Marty stood up.
"It's on the way to K-mart, so I'll go too. It'll save on gas money," added Marty.
"Are you SURE you don't need a ride to school?" asked Elaine Bender, looking gently as her son ran his fingers through his long brown hair. John Bender was barely listening.
"No, I'll freaking walk like I always do!" John snapped.
"No need to be so loud," Elaine said gently. "Ever since your father died, you've been so hostile towards me, and I think Billy and I deserve a little more slack from you!"
As if his name was a cue, Billy Hansen, Elaine's fiancée, walked into the living room with a mug of coffee in his hand, already in his business suit. "Johnny, I can take you in the Rolls Royce. The company let me keep it an extra week…"
"NO," said John coldly.
"Wouldn't it be cool to be seen driven to school in a hot rod like that?"
"NO."
John didn't exactly dress and act like he had a loving mom and happy-go-lucky future-stepfather, nor did he look like he had a Rolls Royce. He looked like he belonged in a van under an overpass with a drunken, abusive dad and a skanky mom who was never home. And that's what he wanted the world to believe.
John's biological father, Jack, was a rugged man who didn't believe in closely-bonded families as much as he believed in independence and defying the law in order to get what he wanted. John always took after his father. Not that he looked UP to his father. Jack Bender was a bum. But still, Jack wasn't a drunk or a wife-beating asshole. When he was killed in a motorcycle crash, John felt like a piece of him died. Now that his sap-ass mom, Elaine, was marrying pussy in human form: Bill Hansen, John felt all the more need to be like his father. He was tough. He was unfeeling. He made geeks cry and he smoked pot in the alleys after school. No one would suspect John lived in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood. He had an image to keep up, after all.
"Need something to eat before you go?"
"No," John said.
"Well, if you're walking to school, your mother and I are going downtown to look at sofas for the den," said Billy.
So. Fucking. What. John thought to himself. Elaine stood behind John and appeared over his shoulder as he looked in the mirror.
"Oh, and if you plan on walking home—"
"—I plan to," John said with a hoarse voice.
"Make sure you walk home quickly. You have an appointment with the dentist at 4:45 this afternoon," Elaine said. "You haven't been in 7 months."
"Whatever," John muttered, looking at his mother's glowing face in the mirror. Thank god he didn't look like her. Elaine had a big nose and buckteeth in the front of her large mouth.
"Alright," said Elaine. "We're off."
Billy winked playfully at John and added, "Don't get into trouble in detention!"
John gave a subtle nod of disgust as Elaine and Billy walked out the door hand in hand.
As soon as he saw the car pull out of the driveway, John groaned and ran back to his room, slamming the door shut. He hated this life. Some might call him ungrateful, but he himself called it prison. These country club people, the white tennis outfits, shopping for designer sofas as a Saturday recreational activity wasn't who John Bender was.
Thank god that he was such a jerk in school. If John didn't get regular detentions, he might have thrown himself off a bridge by now. Bill was such a pussy, and after Jack died, Elaine would've married the first guy she caught staring at her jugs.
John took his wallet and clasped it to the chain on his jeans. Sitting down on his bed, he caught sight of a magazine on the floor beneath the bed. He pulled it out and flipped through it. He only lived a few blocks from the school. He had time. It's not like it would pop Richard Vernon's hemorrhoids if he was a few minutes late.
In an advertisement on page 25 of the magazine John was a nice picture of a redheaded rocker girl with a nose piercing staring intensely at the camera as if to say "come and get it, stud!" John smiled and ripped the page out of the magazine, tore the girl's picture off the rest of the page, opened his wallet, and slipped the image in a slot. Another 'girlfriend' for John Bender.
The clock on the far wall of the room told John it was almost 6:45.
"Guess I should hit the road," John moaned. He grabbed his huge gray trench coat, carefully pulling the sleeves down so as not to irritate the cigar burn on his arm he stupidly gave himself while high a few days ago.
He locked the house and started off down the street. The sun was bright that morning, so he put on his 2-dollar sunglasses and groaned. He had half a mind to skip detention today. Serious, why bother?
It wasn't like anything out of the ordinary was going to happen today, anyways.