chapter 1: the birth of an idea
October 30, 2001
Walkerville High School
Walkerville, PA
Dorothy Ann was ever so slightly ashamed of herself. She'd argued with Keesha that the social sciences weren't real science, not like physics or biology. She only took AP Psychology at Keesha's insistence.
DA had gone into senior year of high school with every intention of bulldozing general credits in college so she could get right down to her major – chemistry. She wasn't entirely sure what she'd do with it yet; maybe she'd go into research or academia.
Yet here she was, engrossed in her psychology notes when she had an epiphany somewhere between post-traumatic stress and Stockholm Syndrome.
She gasped and flipped to a blank page in her notebook, then started writing.
"What?" Keesha whispered, confused. They were supposed to be watching a video about fainting goats. It was actually pretty funny, but DA was scribbling some manifesto down like her life depended on it. Every now and then she'd stop, her eyes would widen, and she'd write more. "WHAT?" Keesha hissed.
"Tell you later." DA didn't look up.
Keesha looked over at Phoebe and shrugged. The three girls had psychology together with Ralphie, who was engrossed in the hilarious fainting goats video, as one would expect from Ralphie.
After the bell rang, DA closed her notebook quickly before Keesha could see.
"What was that?" Keesha asked.
"A theory I'm developing."
"Theory?" Ralphie asked. "Is this like your McDonald's theory?"
DA glared at him. She'd done in-depth research on the accuracy of fast food restaurants' orders. She'd thoroughly tested all the restaurants around town and had identified a McDonald's on the west side as being the most reliably correct with finicky orders and correct change. Her in-depth testing had meant that she had to meticulously check her order and change at each restaurant she visited. She'd posited that particular McDonald's was more accurate than any other restaurant in town, and had been correct. Only the best would do for DA, now that she knew what the best was. She'd make a point of driving all the way across town to go to that McDonald's, much to the rest of her friends' chagrin. Every now and then one of the guys would suggest that she repeat the experiment as a stupid joke.
DA wasn't ready to present the theory yet. It was still just an idea. "This theory is – bigger. And it's not ready yet."
"Bigger how?" Phoebe asked.
"Does the fate of the world hinge on your theory being right?" Keesha wondered skeptically.
"Not quite." DA pressed her lips together. "But almost." She said softly.
November 21, 2001
Walkerville City Park
Walkerville, PA
DA had gathered the group together in the park across from Walker Elementary. She'd arrived early and couldn't help but look for the old bus, even though it had been gone for years. She sat at a picnic table, and her friends gathered around.
"What are we doing here?" Arnold asked. "Isn't it a bit chilly for a picnic?"
Carlos, who hated the cold, was wearing a winter coat already. He sat down and scooted right next to DA, who rolled her eyes. Keesha sat on the other side of her.
"I have to tell you guys this." DA said. "Sit down."
DA was often serious, but she was rarely this serious.
"Are you dying? You're never this serious. Are you dying?" Tim wondered.
"I'm not dying. No one's dying." DA tried to sound patient, but it didn't work.
"Technically, we're all dying." Tim trailed off.
"Thank you for that cheerful reminder, Mr. Sunshine." Carlos remarked. Phoebe smiled at Tim in a weak attempt at reassurance. Arnold took her hand underneath the table and squeezed. They'd been dating since the middle of junior year. Carlos saw and rolled his eyes, having given up on love since DA broke up with him ("for good this time!") in June. Wanda folded her arms, waiting to hear what the terrible news was before reacting. Keesha and Ralphie looked at each other across the table, but not for too long before Ralphie looked away.
DA took a deep breath and cleared her throat. "I have a theory."
"Is this what you were writing in psych that day?" Keesha asked.
"Hold your questions, please – and there will be questions." DA had carefully planned how this would go. She'd written down her main points on a piece of paper. She wasn't worried about Carlos looking – she'd written especially small and Carlos was somewhat nearsighted, but too proud to admit that he may need glasses. She was quiet again and looked around, trying to savor this last moment before she turned her friends' worlds upside down.
"Have you ever wondered why we're even friends?"
"Yes." Wanda replied quickly.
DA took a deep breath. "Okay, the questions I'm about to ask you are rhetorical. Do you even know what a rhetorical question is?"
"Do I?" Arnold asked. The rest of the group laughed. Ralphie nodded his approval to Arnold, who tipped his head toward Ralphie.
"Anyway." DA continued. She glanced down at the paper she had in front of her.
"You wrote down your speech?" Carlos asked. "Can I see?"
"JUST LET ME TALK." DA hadn't counted on how easily distractible her friends would be. This was an oversight, she admitted.
"Fine." Carlos held up his hands and leaned away from DA, pushing Tim even closer to the edge of the bench. Tim scooted back into Carlos in reaction.
"Okay… I'm sure you've all wondered why we're even friends. We're so different – we want different things out of life. The only thing we have in common is, well…" she looked over Wanda's shoulder at the elementary school. "… and we don't really talk about it."
Wanda wanted to argue. DA could see it on her face.
"Do you know the probability of any of us still being friends? It's pretty low. For all of us being friends? Practically zero." She continued. "And for us to start dating," she looked quickly at Carlos before settling her gaze on Phoebe and Arnold, "is pretty normal, actually, but for us to remain friends through breakups is very odd."
Wanda wanted to say something again, but settled for clenching her teeth together.
"So the question is why."
"The field trips." Wanda answered. DA glared at her again, but Keesha laughed that Wanda had discovered DA's complicated theory. Wanda wasn't as dumb as most people thought, but she didn't place the emphasis on intellect and theorizing that DA did.
"Exactly." DA continued. She had to regain control. It was better than starting over. "We've all experienced something major together – something that could even be described as traumatic, and something none of us ever talked about to anyone not around this table, right?"
"Our parents knew we were going on field trips." Tim said. "They just didn't know... exactly what happened."
"Exactly." DA said. "We always went 'to the planetarium' or 'took cooking lessons' - we never told them the parts about shrinking and being in ovens and volcanoes and stuff. No one knows about what really happened."
She'd expected an argument, but her friends remained quiet for a moment before Carlos spoke up. "Mikey knows. So does Janet."
"They were a part of the experience, even in a small way." DA conceded. "But did anyone tell their parents about everything?"
"I told my mom something when I got sick." Ralphie admitted. "She thought it was a fever dream."
"Okay, but no one except Ralphie said anything?" DA asked. "Not even you, Arnold?"
"Why 'not even me'?" Arnold demanded.
"You hated the field trips." Tim explained before DA could. "Didn't you ask your parents if you could stay home? Did you fake sick?"
"After what happened when Ralphie stayed home sick? No way." Arnold dropped Phoebe's hand and folded his arms. "I didn't want you guys running around in my nose."
"We were in your colon, Arnold." Tim shuddered.
"Don't remind me." Ralphie groaned.
"I couldn't smell you in my colon." Arnold explained. "I'd probably be able to smell you if you were in my nose." It was weird to be talking about this. Arnold got a pit in his stomach, even though he knew it should be safe with his friends. He just couldn't be sure no one else was listening. If they overheard him say some of these things, they'd think he was crazy.
DA was staring pointedly at the guys. She wanted to get this back on track. "So, I did some research."
"Because that's what you do." Carlos interjected.
"How many field trips did the class before us take?" She asked.
"How are we supposed to know?" Wanda asked.
"Guess." DA challenged.
"Didn't we know some kid that was in that class?" Arnold thought back. "You knew him too, Wanda."
"Oh!" Wanda remembered. "Yeah, the kid with the freckles. What was his name? Wasn't he hairy?"
"Harry Arm?" DA smirked. She loved the satisfaction that came with doing her research. "His class went on two field trips."
"The whole year?" Phoebe asked.
"The whole year." DA echoed. "And Carlos, Mikey was in the year after us, right?"
"Two years after." Carlos said. "One field trip."
"So Ms. Frizzle gets this freakishly small class of kids that is oddly ethnically diverse and from all over. Have you ever wondered about that? A class of eight is unheard of. Why didn't our parents say anything?" DA asked. Her friends paused a moment.
"Is that a rhetorical question, or..." Tim trailed off.
DA realized that Tim was right; her questions were rhetorical. "I don't know that it was fated that we come together. That's not the theory."
"You still haven't got to the theory yet?" Keesha asked. "Is this what you were writing in psych – your overly dramatic introductory speech?"
"No." DA snapped.
"Out with it." Tim urged.
DA took a deep breath and looked around at her friends again. This time it was for real – the moment before her friends knew the theory. She wanted to memorize their faces this way – so innocent and unknowing and, if she was honest, irritated and cold.
"My theory is that because of Ms. Frizzle's class, we'll never make really deep friendships outside this group, because eventually third grade will come up and none of us will tell the truth about what happened. We just can't. We'll look crazy."
"Or Ms. Frizzle goes to jail." Phoebe said softly.
"And we look crazy." Ralphie added. Several people nodded.
"She moved away five years ago. No one knows where she moved. Did you know that?" DA asked before getting back to her train of thought. "My theory is that we're incapable of having emotionally intimate relationships outside of this group."
"Are you saying I can't make friends?" Carlos demanded. "I make tons of friends. I'm friends with lots of guys on the football team!"
"But how good of friends are they? When they ask you the weirdest thing that's happened to you, you say…" DA prompted.
Carlos paused. "I would tell them that –"
"But you won't tell them the truth, because 'I watched Ralphie spin around in circles when he hit a home run on a baseball field without friction – that happened to be inside a book' sounds insane." DA interrupted. "And eventually, things come out. Something happens that reminds you of something else that happened, so you talk about it. For example, if we talk about going to Adventure Park, that reminds me of the time we went in middle school and Ralphie threw up on the roller coaster, and the time Wanda wanted to take Arnold on –"
"The wildest, scariest, best scream-your-lungs-out ride in the world!" Wanda recited. "The ride of my dreams."
"And there you have it." DA said. "Imagine a relationship with someone that you can tell everything to – except possibly some of the most important things that ever happened to you."
She let that sink in before moving on to what she found the single most interesting part of the theory.
"You know what this means?" She asked.
"We all have to stay friends." Tim raised his eyebrows. "I think we all figured out that we stayed friends because of Ms. Frizzle's class."
"It's actually kind of obvious." Ralphie added.
"That's only the beginning." DA lowered her voice.
"What's the rest of it?" Wanda asked, leaning in to hear.
"I don't think any romantic relationship outside this group will be successful." There it was. DA looked back at her friends' faces to see what they looked like with their minds blown.
They looked about the same - still cold, only less irritated and more confused as it sunk in.
"You mean… we're all going to marry each other?" Phoebe asked.
"Or stay single." DA nodded.
"What if Arnold and Ralphie are gay?" Carlos asked. "Then some of the girls would have to be gay to balance it out. Which of you are gay?" He looked at each of the girls.
"Sorry, Carlos, but I'm not gay." Arnold had explained this to Carlos before. He and Ralphie were just close, that was all.
"I don't get how one year in elementary school could decide our entire adult lives." Keesha shook her head. "You do know that we're all about to go to college, right?"
"It's the perfect way to test the theory." DA smiled. "We've been isolated in our small town."
"We're half an hour from a huge city." Keesha argued. "We're not 'isolated.'"
"But it's been easier for us to stay within our group of friends. We're not all going to the same college."
"We are." Ralphie pointed at Arnold.
"Because you love each other." Carlos added. "Sorry, Phoebe."
"You're just jealous I got to him first." Ralphie snarked as Phoebe glared at Carlos.
"Does anyone find this as fascinating and serious as I do?" DA wondered loudly.
Keesha raised her eyebrows. Phoebe looked around sheepishly. Arnold shrugged, and looked at Ralphie, who did the same. Carlos was deep in thought, trying to figure out something else he could say. Tim looked slightly relieved that this wasn't too serious. Wanda looked agitated.
"I'm going to college in California." Wanda said. "We'll see how your 'theory' holds up then."
"So we shall." DA smiled.
author's note: of course I don't own McDonald's or the fainting goats video, which is real. There are also several references to MSB episodes here. Have fun identifying them.
