I felt my phone vibrate as I was walking briskly along the quads. While these ridiculously shallow pockets make it easy for me to lose things out of my jeans, they also make it really easy to find things. I fished it out as I passed a group of underclassmen.
"Yeah, and then there was this cop there in the alley, and I managed to get away, he couldn't get all of us-" I walked out of range, unable to hear the end of the story of my rather successful operation. It was but a pin prick of what I would do to those bastards if I ever managed to actually get my hands on them, but I was happier to have done something. I'd spent years just taking it.
I opened my phone to find a text from Royce. I don't know if you can be considered a friend if all you've done is get the person punched in the stomach, but it actually seemed like a start.
Want to hang after work?
I quickly tapped out an answer as I reached the door to the building that had Carly's, and now, my, office.
Sure ttyl
-A
It certainly would be different than Bella, or any of those so called "friends" that I had in Jasper and Emmett's crowd before she died, but maybe I would give this friends thing another shot. Hustling up the stairs I made it to the door, pausing to listen to tell if Carly was in a meeting or on the phone. This was only my fourth day, but I was surprised to find silence on the other side of the door. I guess there was a first time for everything.
I walked in, smiling. "Hi, Ms. Cullen. How has-"
"Sit." She commanded. If she'd spoken louder, she would have barked the order, but it was somehow more powerful from the fact that it was said at the whisper level that she picked.
"Did I do something?" I asked, ready to play my innocence to the hilt. I'd become a rather good liar over the years, for the psychiatrists and for everyone else around.
A police report was thrown open in front of me. It was dated last night, and seemed to have a rather detailed description of the incident that had resulted in the party being broken up.
"You can't think I had anything to do with-"
Carly flipped over to the next page, slamming it back flat onto the table. A list of names was there, and highlighted was my own, along with the name Royce King. I don't know why they were highlighted. They were the very top of the list.
"What? This doesn't prove anything," I insisted. "I'm allowed to attend parties, aren't I?"
"Not there you aren't. You think I don't know your history with that frat?" She stared at me, until I finally looked down and pretended to be reading the report again. That was when she snatched it from me. "If you ever pull any thing like that again, I'll have you out of this university on your ass!"
"For what?" I finally demanded. "You have no proof that I did anything. Nothing."
"Who would tell me not to, Alice?" she asked, almost sadly. "Is there any one who would stand up to try to defend you?"
I thought about it, and couldn't even come up with a teacher that I got along very well with. I did the work and nothing more.
"You've made a lot of enemies, Alice. And the only people who's job it is to make sure that you get a fair hearing work in this office." She sighed. "I want you to succeed, Alice. I really do. But I can't be covering up for you, if something like this gets out of hand."
"I understand," I said.
"Do you?" I nodded slowly, staring into her golden brown eye.
"We'll see," she muttered, handing me a different folder. "This one's for you. I want you to do the interviews and give me a report of what you think happened, and what the usable evidence shows."
"Are those supposed to be the same thing?"
"I'd be surprised if they were, kid."
***
I'd had to cancel hanging out with Royce, though he had seemed pretty understanding about the whole thing. Having what amounted to my own case was pretty time consuming, and I wanted to not mess anything up.
The facts of the case seemed simple enough. A third year grader of a calculus 161 course had had a complaint leveled against her by one of the students in the class. Apparently the grader, one Lauren Mallory, had given the student a zero for copying the answers out of the solutions manual. The student, named Jessica Stanley, insisted that she had not copied the answers, but was just being targeted unfairly by Ms. Mallory for unstated reasons. I'd scheduled a meeting with Lauren to discuss her side of the case at lunch.
She wandered into the study room I'd reserved at the library part way through the peanut butter and jelly sandwich that I had made for my lunch. Part of me couldn't help but seethe upon seeing her. Short skirt, heels, a top that was too tight for breasts that seemed just a bit too large for her. And taller than me of course. She looked exactly like one of those fake bitches that always seemed to go for Edward.
"Are you Alice?" she asked, flipping back her much too blond hair. Her eyes suddenly narrowed, as she made a connection that she probably should have made day ago. "Ohhh. You're that Alice."
"I'm the person you're meeting."
"From the … ummm... the om.."
"Yes, from the ombudsperson's office."
"Ok," she said, shrugging a large puke green purse off her shoulder. It thudded when it hit the table. "What do we do now?"
She fidgeted a little. Part of me wanted to draw this out as long as possible to increase her discomfort, but really, I liked being here with her as little as she did. "Have you heard the complain that's been made against you?"
This, at least, seemed to set her at ease. "Yeah, they told me what that little bi- they told me what she said I did. And it's complete bullshit. I didn't treat her papers any different than I did any others. The first time she did it, I caught half the class copying. But Jessica has handed in three assignments, over the last five weeks, and all of them have been pretty much straight out of the solutions manual."
"Isn't it possible that she just did it the exact same way? I mean, even variable choices are pretty standard in a lot of situations, aren't they?"
"Here," said Lauren, pulling out a book and a stack of papers. The papers were the most recent, as yet not handed back assignment from the offending class, judging by the dates on them. Some of them had been marked by some ridiculous pink pen, which I realized was Lauren's from how often it appeared. "Look for yourself."
She rifled through the stack, until finding Jessica's homework, and pulling it out. Next, she deftly flipped to a page that coincided with the assignment that they had been given.
"Here," she said again, pointing at an empty space she had circled and labeled 'where's this step?' on Jessica's paper.
"And here." She shifted to a page of the book, with the exact same problem, missing that same step. She went onto the next problem, pointing out the similarities, and the ways that they were both missing steps. And again, on a third problem.
"Ok," I said, "I think I get the point."
"And it isn't like the solutions manual always gives the right answer," she added in exasperation.
"Yeah, I hear Spivak deliberately messes up sometimes to keep people on there toes."
"You know who Michael Spivak is?" she asked, surprised.
"Hey, I did take 160s," I defended.
"I just never really thought of you as a math person." She seemed to be looking at me in a slightly different light. "Jessica definitely isn't."
"She got into honors calc somehow."
"It's her second year. Who puts off their math requirement for a year, then takes the honors class?" It was weird. Not really any sort of offense, but a little strange.
"Well, I don't think it's a crime."
"No, I've heard of it happening, but it's just weird, you know?"
"Yeah," I said, finding myself a bit surprised to have any shared beliefs with this girl. "Look, I think you've given me more than enough. We'll call you if anything else comes up."
"Thanks," said Lauren, flashing a rather fake smile that might actually have just be her honest to god normal smile.
***
The next meeting was scheduled with Jessica Stanley. Obviously. I would see if she really had any sort of defense for herself, since it seemed like Lauren was completely correct.
I met Jessica in the same study room, just six hours later. She had brown hair with blond highlights, which, when you really got down to it, was heading down the path towards hair like Lauren's, if you just put even more dye into the job. Other than that though, she seemed much more girl next door in jeans and a tshirt. Heck, I might have worn her outfit, if I wasn't trying to present my professional, private investigator image that had me in a black jacket over a white button down and black suit pants.
"Hi," she said. "Alice, right?"
There was no flash of recognition, or if there was she was just good at hiding it.
"That's me," I said, smiling. I held my hand for her to shake, and she didn't seem to have any problem with it. Fortunately she wasn't one of those people who held on too long or tried to shake or squeeze more than they needed to.
"So," I said, feeling rather strange since I expected to know she was lying to me, "in your own words, tell me why you filed the complaint against Ms. Mallory."
"I filed it because she said she would give me zeros unless I stopped dating Edward."
Now, through out these interviews, and during a lot of the reading on my own, I'd been taking notes. This meant that I was clutching a pencil a lot of the time. Which meant that when my hand spasmed at that boy's name, my pencil flipped over my thumb and sailed into the door.
"Sorry," I said, scrambling after it and ruining whatever PI demeanor I had been going for. I resurfaced with my pencil a moment later. "She said she would give you zeros unless you stopped dating Edward?"
She nodded. I gritted my teeth. "Edward Masen?"
"Yeah," she said, getting a dreamy look on her face. I wondered if I was allowed to smack her out of whatever haze she was going into. She snapped out of it on her own though. "After she did it the first time, I didn't really see any reason to keep doing the work. I just copied down whatever was in the solutions manual and handed it in."
"You didn't think that you should maybe do something about it?" I asked, incredulous. I mean, her story was crazy, but the kind of crazy that you could see it happening in real life and shaking your head over it as you read whatever Sunday paper you preferred.
"I filed this complaint, didn't I?" she retorted. "You all finally got around to it, like, five weeks later or something."
Well crap. Maybe she had a point. "Do you have any proof?"
"Just all the zeros. Like I told you guys at the beginning of the quarter." Well, technically, the first one could corroborate her story a little, if the zero seemed unfounded. But if it seemed on the level, it wouldn't disprove her story either.
"Well, we should have this all wrapped up very soon," I said, wondering how the hell I was supposed to figure out what to tell Carly.
"Finally," she said, getting up to leave. "I just don't feel like my personal life should be affecting my grades like this."
Oh, I could tell you all about personal life affecting your grades.
***
"Hello?" asked Royce into the phone.
"Hey, still up for hanging out? Even if I'm two days late?" I asked my potential friend.
"Oh, sure, I guess." There was a pause. "Do you like football, because I was kind of hoping to watch the Ohio State Penn State game?"
"Really?" I asked. "Because LSU and 'bama are on at the same time."
Any good Mississippi girl knows her football.
***
Apparently James was out, since it was Saturday night. I guess I was kind of hanging out with the less social elements in the school now. But at least he was a football fan. It was rarer up here.
"You know," said Royce, as we the Ohio State quarter back scrambled for a first down and out of bounds, "it's kind of weird to meet a girl who knows football."
"Every good southerner knows football," I said, thinking about the party that Jasper and Emmett had had during the Rose Bowl when Texas had won. "I followed it more back home. But if someone is really from the south, they oughta be able to tell you their team."
"So..." Was that his standard attempt to break an awkward silence? I'd run across that standby before. "What really happened? With Bella and Emmett and them?"
I sighed. I suppose that it was something I would have to deal with if I was ever going to hang out with people again. "What have you heard?"
"The regular story, I guess," he said, shifting around in his seat a little. "Isabella threw herself off the top of the theology school. No one knows why. You went crazy and insisted Edward had done it."
"Yeah, that's the story."
"But... that can't be it. You don't seem crazy."
I rolled my eyes. "Thanks. Just what every girl wants to hear."
"What really happened, Alice?" I looked at Royce. He didn't actually look like he believed me. I think he just wanted to hear something plausible. Something where I didn't seem crazy.
Man, I wish I had one of those stories. "I just, I saw Bella and Edward together that night, and then Edward pretended like he had no idea who she was. That doesn't seem guilty to you?"
He didn't respond, which was fine, because the place I'd seen them together was a dream. Or a vision or something. "They just didn't care. I mean, I knew them before. I knew them. Did the gossip say that?"
"Uh, no. Not that I know of."
"Yeah. Jasper and Emmett moved to Biloxi from Texas freshman year of high school." God, why did I bother to think about this. I'd been smitten with Jasper the first time I laid eyes on him. At the time, I had thought he was just perfect, the exact other half to me. Shows what I know about fate, right?
"What about Edward and Bella?" Royce asked.
"Bella was my roommate first year, and we ended up being best friends." I glanced up. "She wasn't depressed or anything. I would have known if anything had been wrong."
"And Edward?"
"Fuck Edward," I muttered, thinking about my current situation in addition to Bella's. "No one likes him."
"I hear, umm... differently."
"Yeah, it's just this stupid case that I'm working on now. Two girls fighting over him have managed to involve me in their stupid little lives."
"That sucks. Which one is going to get in trouble for it?"
"I don't know. Probably the lazier of them."
"Do you actually have to pick?"
"I guess not."
"Then who cares?" he asked, leaning over to a minfridge and pulling out two beers. I guess I had past whatever sanity screening test I'd been given. I took the beer, even though I didn't really drink any more. I heard the screen erupt as OSU managed to score again.
***
Monday rolled around, and it came time to make my report to Carly. I'd already given her an email that had my opinion of the whole thing, but now I would be making it official. Then, in the most fun twist possible, she'd scheduled a meeting with both girls for right before we closed up shop for the night.
There was someone in there this time, and I paused outside to let them finish. I took my bag off my shoulder, smoothed out my shirt, then stood around waiting. Part of me wanted to press my ear to the door, but I felt like Carly would frown on that sort of behavior. I could just imagine me getting thrown down the hall when the door was opened while I wasn't paying attention. I suppose that would be better than if the door had opened inward and dumped me into the office. At least, if thrown outward, I could pretend that I had merely been hit by the door.
It finally fell silent, and a tall, brown haired girl came striding angrily out of the office. She didn't even seem to notice me, pressed against the wall, and I snatched up my bag and danced around the door before it could close again.
"Well, any change since you emailed me?" asked Carly, getting straight to business. I kind of wondered if she was some sort of robot. I never saw the woman slow down. She was constantly working here, or at least was always here before and after me, plus she was a grad student in the anthropology department. Did she even sleep?
"No change. I looked at the first assignment, and it's pretty tough to tell if she cheated. The evidence is clear that she cheated after that, but the first assignment she might have actually done the work. I just can't tell."
Ms. Cullen let out a breath. "Well, I'd been hoping for something better to use, but I guess I'll just have to play mediator. Like usual."
"When are they coming in?" I asked.
"Three hours. In the mean time, I need you to look over this case." She handed me a file that was labeled LGBQT.
***
The appointed hour finally rolled around. I was sort of dreading it, though I didn't know why. Shouldn't I have been perfectly willing to twist the knife in either of these girls? Plus, it wasn't like they were the least bit scary. There really was no reason to be worried about this at all. Jessica arrived first, accompanied by her boyfriend. I glared, but kept myself from saying anything. He acted as if there was nothing wrong with running into me in this situation. Little punk. Fortunately, he wasn't allowed in the meeting.
"I'll wait out here," I heard him murmur to Jessica before they kissed quickly, then parted ways. A few minutes after the appointed hour, and Lauren still was no where to be found. We'd been sitting awkwardly after some initial hellos, and I finally volunteered to break the stalemate.
"I'll call her," I said. I ducked into the hallway, hoping that she was on the same network as me so that I wouldn't lose any of my minutes making this call-
And there she was, in all her vaguely vomit inducing glory. Apparently, she'd been distracted, because right now, she was leaning against the wall right by Edward. I had to wonder if her skirt had been that short, or her blouse had shown that much cleavage, when she'd walked up. On second thought, probably.
"Lauren!" I hissed. "It's nearly five."
"What?" she said, seeming to snap out of the same thing that the mere mention of Edward had put Jessica into. "Oh, I'm so sorry!"
She scurried into the office after me, the difference being that I was annoyed she was such an idiot and she was blushing red from acting like such an idiot.
"Glad you could make it," taunted Jessica. Of course she would have to get in one more barb. God, what was with people? The girl was already mortified enough.
"Let's get right down to it," said Carly. "Because, honestly, I don't care about your stupid catty little fight and want to get on to some real work."
"What?" exploded Jessica. "She threatened me, manipulated my grade, and, and you saw her out there throwing herself at my boyfriend!"
"Did you threaten her?" Carly demanded of Lauren. "Physically, or academically?"
"What? No. Of course not," said Lauren, who still seemed slightly shocked at Jessica's outburst.
"Did you say anything she might have construed as such a threat?"
"No."
"What about when you said how spending so much time with Edward was going to start affecting my grades? Or all the other crap you always say when you see us together?"
"Just because I don't think he should be dating a little tramp like you doesn't mean I would actually try to manipulate your grade-"
"SHUT UP!" shouted Carly, slamming her hands down onto her desk. "My god, what is wrong with you people?"
"You," she said, pointing at Lauren, "shouldn't be getting involved in the personal lives of any of the students for a class you are grading. You're a representative of your professor and the university when you are doing that job, and you should act like it! This is exactly how you end up with a black mark on your record. How are you planning on going on in this university if the professor you worked closest with tells all his colleagues about how you handled yourself?"
Jessica smirked victoriously, just as Ms. Cullen rounded on her. "And you! Why would you think it was a good idea to keep handing in work that was obviously copied? Why not just do the work? Do you think that having a run in with your grader means you don't have to work any more? Maybe, if you hadn't acted so irresponsibly, you wouldn't have pinned your grades on a disciplinary hearing that has turned up absolutely nothing that could justify you copying all your answers verbatim from the solutions manual."
"Now everyone out of my office!" All of us scrambled to gather up our belongings, and bolted for the door. "Not you, Alice."
I stopped, a step away from the door that everyone else had just managed to escape through. "What did you think of your first case?"
"Well, I wish I could have actually turned up something that helped," I said to the suddenly much calmer woman. Seriously, it was like she had just flipped a switch. One minute, walls are shaking, lightning and thunder crashing around her, and the next, she's the quietly intense person that she was the whole time.
"You did fine," she said, waving me out of the room. "Go have fun. Or work. Whatever you do when you aren't here."
"What do you do when you aren't here?"
"What do you mean when I'm not here?" she retorted with a snort.
I waved as I headed out the door. I heard something crinkle under my foot as I did, and scooped up a folded piece of paper as I walked. I opened it up to find a flyer for some party that was being held on the next college break day.
This Friday, the Alpha Sigma Fraternity presents:
The Swan Dive Party
Come celebrate the next suicide prevention day in style!
I crumpled up the paper as tightly as I could, before tossing it in the nearest trash can. I tore down two more before I even left the building.
Author's Note: Should I try to extort more reviews out of you?
