Burned Out
Chapter 4: Cafe Side Effecto
Seeing Daria walk in the room, Jennifer breathed a sigh of relief. English class always seemed to go by a lot easier when she was around. She not only helped her understand the subject better than Mr. O'Neil ever could, but she had grown accustomed to actually having a friend to whom she could talk before and after (and sometimes during) class. It had only been a few weeks since the auburn- haired girl had entered her life, but the changes had been profound.
This time however, they didn't have to say more than hello before Mr. O'Neil came in looking troubled. "Class, I thought today we'd take a break from the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet to discuss the real life tragedy that happened last night here in Lawndale. Let's share our feelings of violation following the loss of our beloved cybercafe, .com. Who would like to start?" He looked over to Kevin after checking his seating chart, and said, "Charles? Charles, did you hear me?"
"You mean Kevin?" the football jock replied in confusion.
Mr. O'Neil blushed as he double-checked his charts, and switched it with another behind the one he read. "Kevin, heh. I'm sorry. You uh, look like somebody else. What do you have to say about last night's horrible event?"
Like any teen when asked a question about a crime by an adult, he immediately went into denial mode. "I was home all night. You can ask my parents. Besides, I already have a computer."
Shaking his head, O'Neil tried a different phrasing. "No, Kevin. I mean, how did the theft make you feel?"
Kevin's face looked like he was trying to solve three calculus problems at once. "Um... sad?"
O'Neil's eyebrow quirked up. "Are you asking me, or telling me?"
"Angry?" Kevin tried.
Heaving a tiny sigh of disappointment, the teacher moved on to someone else. "Hmm... Jodie, how about you?"
Jodie crossed her legs as she replied, "I think the cybercafe served one very particular segment of the community, but it still pisses me off when people take what isn't theirs."
"That's how I feel!" Kevin interjected.
"Thank you, Kevin," O'Neil said before returning to his pontificating. "Jodie, about that word, "community." Isn't that the whole idea of a cybercafe? To jack us into the global community? I think what's most disturbing about this crime is the symbolism involved." He turned to look at another student. "Don't you agree, Jane?"
The girl gave a simple, one-word response. "No."
However, O'Neil was now on a roll, and it almost appeared he didn't even hear her reply. "Suddenly, we're cut off. We can't hail our friends across the globe and say, 'It's a beautiful day in the cyberhood.' They didn't just take a few computers. They took the symbol of our virtual community. To visit alt-dot-lawndale-dot-com was to come together with the planet!"
"Oh, come on," Daria said, finally bringing his pulpiteering to an end.
More curious than insulted, O'Neil looked at her inquisitively. "Yes?"
This time, it was Daria's turn to mount the soap box. "'Come together with the planet'? By staring at a screen for hours? Sitting in a room full of people you never say a word to?"
Mr. O'Neil rested his chin in his hand as he pondered this. "Hmm... an interesting point, Dorian."
"Daria."
Looking down at the seating chart more closely, Mr. O'Neil noticed a small spider next to Daria's name, partially obscuring it. In an uncharacteristic show of primal masculinity, he smashed it with his hand and brushed it off onto the floor. "Uh! Damn spiders. Daria, you believe that while connecting Lawndale citizens to our global neighbors, the cafe was alienating us from each other."
"I'm saying if you really miss the place, put a Mr. Coffee in the computer lab," she replied.
However, Mr. O'Neil now had a new toy to chew on, and wasn't keen on letting it go. "So, in your opinion, what we really need is a return to the traditional coffee house of yore, where you'd watch some performers and share a cup with your friends, face to face."
Jennifer leaned over to her and said, "Truly, you are a visionary."
Mr. O'Neil leaned back against his desk and pounded a fist into his other palm. "Right here; right now, let's pledge to make Daria's dream a reality!"
"You mean the one where people walking down the street burst into flames?" she asked, with apparent sudden interest.
"The coffee house! We'll plan it, locate it, raise the money, and open it!" the teacher replied enthusiastically.
Jennifer leaned over and whispered, "My uncle has a barn, we can use that!"
Daria whispered back, "And for coffee beans we can use regular beans. It's brilliant." A sudden thought occurred to her and she spoke up so the teacher could hear her. "Question; would this count as an extracurricular activity?"
"Of course it will," Mr. O'Neil replied happily.
"Then I'd like to register as a conscientious objector," she said.
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Jennifer leaned back in the desk chair in her room, as she contemplated the list before her. "Hmm... The busking is a bust; it's not allowed at all in Lawndale. We'd need to reserve a gazebo in the park if we want to put on a free concert, and the waiting list for that is pretty bad on the weekends. Only hope there is if someone cancels at the last minute, and it would take to long to set up then. We could try El Ranchero, but I kinda doubt that's the kind of club whose audience would welcome the Harpies." She threw the pen down in disgust and scrubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands.
Just then, the doorbell rang, but she didn't bother to get up. Sam will take care of whoever it is. The blonde returned to contemplating the patterns in the ceiling, and was surprised when there was a hesitant knock on her door, followed by Daria's head poking in.
"Um, I'm not disturbing you, am I?"
Sitting upright, Jennifer motioned over towards the bed as a seat. "No, just wondering how to approach the rest of the band with a proposal to perform more, without having anywhere to perform."
"Oh." Daria looked a little down at that. "Are there really so few places in town to perform?" Jennifer raised one eyebrow at her, and the girl shook her head. "Right, silly of me. The is Lawndale, after all."
"Where excitement comes to die," Jennifer agreed.
They sat there in silence for a moment, until Daria broke it again. "This may be the last weekend I have free for a while. My mom has voluntold me to participate for that stupid coffee shop idea of Mr. O'Neil's. Something about looking good for college applications."
"I thought it was mostly about whether or not you could pay, these days," Jennifer asked.
Daria shrugged noncommittally. "She insists that there are some schools that still look for a quote/unquote: 'well-rounded student.'" She held up her fingers in an air-quote gesture. "I asked her if these were the same colleges that believed the Earth to be flat."
Jennifer chuckled as she imagined Daria saying just that to her mother. "What was her response?"
"It went from a 'request' to parental commandment." Needless to say, Daria didn't look too pleased by the situation.
"You know..." Jennifer said with a sly smile, "a coffeehouse would be an ideal place to expose new potential audience members to a band. A whole, untapped collection of ears."
"Let's just hope these ears stay attached to their heads, and not mailed to their significant others," Daria replied with a wry grin.
"Optimist," Jennifer shot back. "What about you, though? Thinking of reciting some of your own work onstage?"
Daria shook her head emphatically. "No way. It's bad enough when Mr. O'Neil recites it in class. Read by me on a literal stage with up to a dozen sets of eyes on me? May as well have my parents in the audience, and go for the trifecta."
Jennifer leaned back in the chair again, making it squeak. "Yeah, it's not for everyone. If it weren't for the lights blinding me to the actual audience, I doubt I could do it myself."
"So, I take it, you're going to get the Harpies to perform there?" Daria asked.
With a nod, Jennifer replied, "It may take some doing, but I'll try. I know Monique and Lisa aren't too keen on coffeehouses on general principle, Lisa more so than Monique. Personally, I think it's because they think that all coffeehouses are like the one on Friends or something." Looking over to her friend, she asked, "So, what are you planning to do, if not recite?"
Daria collapsed backwards on the bed, letting her feet dangle off the side. "Fundraising, I guess. That seems pretty safe."
Jennifer thought about it for a minute, then nodded, even though Daria couldn't see it. "Want some company? It'll cut a little into practice time, but I think I can spare an hour or two after school to go door-to-door with you."
Daria sighed and gave a limp wave of her hand without sitting up. "No, it's okay. You're going to have your hands full with the thing you're doing; throwing in fundraising with me will just add unnecessary hassle."
Swiveling the chair to face the bed properly, Jennifer said, "Daria, friends aren't a hassle."
Daria lifted her head to see her properly and gave a small smile. "Thanks, Jenn."
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Daria and Jennifer approached the suburban house with trepidation. So far today, they had rung the bell on fifteen houses. Six were either empty or not answering, five were "No thank you"s, and four only bought one chocolate bar to make them go away. Jennifer looked through the mostly full box on top in disappointment, noting the persistent presence of the chocolate. "If we don't sell a lot more of these soon, we're definitely not going to make quota this weekend, and you'll have to do it again next weekend."
Daria's shoulders slumped in defeat. "One weekend is bad enough. Let's just sell these stupid things and move on with our lives." She rang the doorbell, and they waited.
Jennifer was about to ring the bell again when it opened to reveal a very large woman in a moo-moo, sweating profusely and wheezing.
"Um, hi. I'm selling chocolate bars for the new student coffeehouse," Daria said.
The woman looked at her in confusion and asked, "New coffeehouse?"
"Our cybercafe got robbed," Jennifer helpfully supplied.
Wiping her brow with a handkerchief, the woman replied, "Well, I enjoy chocolate. Doctor says I'm not supposed to have too much of it, but he wouldn't mind if it's for a good cause." She stepped away to fetch her purse, and Jennifer craned her neck to look around the door, noting all the plastic fruit displayed in bowls everywhere. She returned and rummaged through her purse, searching for money. "Just... just a second, girls." She paused for a moment, swaying on her feet as sweat dripped from her face and soaked her dress.
Daria started to look a little concerned. "Are you all right?"
The woman wiped her brow again and wheezed out, "Yeah- yeah. Just- just, I was in the basement when the doorbell rang. Need to catch my breath a little. How many chocolate bars you got there?"
"We've got about two boxes. That's twenty," Daria answered.
The woman's face had gone pale, but she still appeared happy. "Tell you what. I'll take all of them."
Jennifer was dubious as well, catching on that something was wrong here. "All of them? Are you sure about that?"
"You sure that's okay with your doctor?" Daria asked.
The woman beamed at them and winked conspiratorially. "It's okay as long as he don't know about it!" She resumed her futile search through the purse, then said something that confused both of the girls. "Dammit! Where's that purse?"
"Umm..." Jennifer said just as the woman leaned heavily against the door frame and fell over backwards in a dead faint. The thump she made as she hit the floor could be felt through their boots. "Uh, is that normal?"
Daria looked like a deer caught in the headlights as she stared at the scene before her. "Uh, oh," she said helpfully.
Jennifer was also staring down at the collapsed woman in shock. "Should we be giving her CPR? I don't know any CPR, do you?"
"I once gave the Heimlich Maneuver to Quinn."
"Did it help?"
"She wasn't choking."
"I really think we should be doing something right now," Jennifer said with an edge of rising panic in her voice.
"Yeah, I think you're right." There was a moment of silence, and then Daria gently kicked the bottom of the woman's slipper-clad foot.
As if she had found her reset button, the woman roused, one hand going to her head. With great effort, she slowly rose to her feet unsteadily. "Damn hypoglycemia. I'm sorry, girls, I'm holding up the works. Okay, now. How much apiece on those chocolate bars?"
Daria closed the box and lowered her arms so it didn't seem like she was presenting the bars anymore. "Ma'am, I'm not sure I can sell you any chocolate bars."
Immediately, the woman's expression shifted to anger. "What's the matter; my money's not good enough for you?" she spat out.
"It's not that, it's just... maybe it's not such a good idea." Daria took a step back to put some distance between them.
The woman reached out, trying to grab the box from her. "Gimme those chocolate bars!"
Appearing much relieved, Jennifer stepped back as well. "Thanks for the offer though, ma'am. I hope this hippo glycomol works out for you."
As a parting gesture, Daria added, "We could call your doctor or the hospital if you like. Otherwise, we'll be going."
The woman shouted at their retreating backs, "I don't need a damn doctor, I need a damn chocolate bar! Gimme! I'll pay ya five bucks a piece!"
"Have a nice day, ma'am," Daria said without turning around.
As they turned onto the sidewalk, they could hear the woman shouting like a petulant child from her porch, "I want those chocolate bars! I want chocolate, dammit!"
"I'm not sure I could handle another one like that," Jennifer said. She looked down at her watch and groaned. "I need to get back. Sam was gonna take me to Monique's so I could talk to the girls about doing this coffeehouse gig."
Daria looked down at the boxes and sighed. "Just as well, I suppose. I'm not sure I could take another house like that. I'm going home. Maybe tomorrow will be better." She rummaged through the box and pulled out one of the fundraising bars, handing it over to Jennifer. "Here. You deserve it after that. My treat."
Jennifer smiled and took the bar, breaking it in half and giving one back to Daria. "I think we both do. See you tomorrow, partner."
Taking a bite of the bar, Daria smiled at her friend's retreating back.
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Taking a swallow of water to wash down the chocolate, Jennifer said, "So, that's the deal. We play at this student lounge-"
"Coffeehouse," Lisa snarled, correcting the band's youngest member.
"Fine, coffeehouse, and we drum up some attention for the band, hopefully getting some fresh faces to watch us at the Zon or wherever. Who knows? Maybe someone there will like us so much, they'll hire us to perform," the small blonde finished.
Monique leaned back in the couch, contemplating the proposal. "I dunno. A coffeehouse is just so... pedestrian and pretentious. And besides, will Mr. O'Neil even let us play? You're the only one of us still in school, and this is a school thing, and he's pretty uptight, from what I remember of him."
Shrugging, Jennifer replied, "Sure, he can be uptight, but I've already cleared it with him, so no problems there. As for it being a coffeehouse, remember that this is a school funded coffeehouse, so the pretension there is going to be fairly minimal or at least, juvenile. Worst case scenario, we get booed offstage. You really think our rep is gonna be hurt by high schoolers booing us in a school coffeehouse?"
"Well, I think it's a great idea!" Sylvie said, bouncing in her seat next to Samantha.
Lisa glared at her, the uncharacteristic emotion seeming all the stronger for being so out of place. "You think everything is a great idea."
Unperturbed, Sylvie replied with a smile, "Oh, you're just grumpy because it's in a coffeehouse; and it is a good idea. Anything that increases our exposure can't be all bad."
"Why don't we put it to a vote, then? Try out our newfound democracy?" Samantha suggested. "All in favor of the proposed gig?" Her hand was joined by Jennifer's and Sylvie's, but the most surprising was Monique's. "Opposed?" Only Lisa's hand went up, but it seemed reluctant to be up.
Monique stood and brushed her skirt down. "Now that that's settled, let's talk songs..."
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Standing next to Principal Li's desk, Mr. O'Neil studied his hands, reading to himself the names he had written there. "Daria... Jennifer. Daria... Jennifer. Daria... Jennifer."
The door opened, allowing Daria and Jennifer to enter. Ms. Li gestured towards the two chairs before her desk. "Come in, Ms. Morgendorffer, Ms. Peterson. Sit down." Once seated, she said, "The school received a phone call this morning from a Mrs. Johannsen. She said two girls came to her door to sell her chocolate bars, and then suddenly refused to do so, even after she offered five dollars a bar, or more than twice the asking price."
With a shrug, Daria replied, "She was hypoglycemic. The chocolate would've killed her."
"It's true," Jennifer added. "She must have weighed three hundred pounds. When she collapsed in front of us, we could feel the impact."
Ms. Li got a sly look on her face and asked, "Did she ask you to feed her the chocolate?"
"No..." Daria answered, not liking where this was headed.
Steepling her fingers, Ms. Li leaned forward, trying her best to look authoritarian and in control. "How do you know that the chocolate wasn't for her family?"
Jennifer was unperturbed by the show. "Look, she collapsed in front of us. If we had sold her the chocolate and she had been hospitalized because of it, how do you think Lawndale High would look?"
"I don't follow," Ms. Li replied.
"Think about it. Students of this school selling something which hospitalized someone when it was plain to anyone that it was dangerously unhealthy for her? And if you think we were going to fall on our swords for this and accept the full blame, then you're obviously overestimating our school spirit." Jennifer's words seemed to percolate in Ms. Li's head, and her shoulders slumped a little.
Mr. O'Neil however still had more to say. "Daria, Jean, we're two hundred dollars short of what we need to open the coffeehouse."
Ms. LI nodded sadly. "Well, I can't force you to do fundraising, but I can't give you credit for participating in the coffee house project, either."
Brightening as if struck by a brilliant idea, Mr. O'Neil asked, "Wait. Daria, what about what we discussed? Reading something on opening night."
"I don't think so..." Daria said, clearly not liking the idea.
Ms. Li looked at her speculatively, knowing she had her over a barrel. "You do want this extracurricular activity, don't you?"
Seeing that she needed a little push, Jennifer leaned over and whispered from the side of her mouth, "Pop goes the weasel..."
The corners of Daria's mouth turned down slightly and her gaze hardened. "...Fine," she bit out through her teeth.
"Wonderful!" Mr. O'Neil exclaimed.
Ms. Li looked relieved at having won even this small concession, though her expression didn't lighten in the least. "Although I still don't know where we're going to find that two hundred dollars. Well, maybe the freshman volunteers will make up some of it."
At that moment, Quinn walked in without bothering to knock, her hands and pockets stuffed to overflowing with cash. "Hi. You got any more of those phone cards?"
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Daria sorted through a stack of papers on the floor of her bedroom, looking decidedly unhappy, while Jennifer paged through a guitar magazine on her bed. Finding a likely candidate, she pulled out a small pile paperclipped together and asked, "How about, 'The Bleakness That Lies Ahead'?"
Jennifer shook her head, momentarily showing both eyes. "Nah. Too mushy."
"'No Life, No Hope, No Future'?"
"Too optimistic."
"'Mommy's Little Hypocrite'?"
"Too much like a Dr. Seuss book."
Dropping the papers, Daria leaned against the bed and sighed. "I wish I were dead."
Jennifer tilted her head in interest. "That sounds promising." Looking down at her, she smiled. "Look, you're making much ado about nothing. These are your classmates were talking about, not a talent scout for a publishing firm. These are the same people who- mostly- did not realize that you were comparing them to barnyard animals in that one paper of yours Mr. O'Neil read aloud to the class."
"Don't remind me," Daria replied. "What are you getting at?"
Jennifer rolled over so that her head was hanging upside down off the side of the bed next to Daria's, her hair curtaining down. "What I'm getting at, is that you don't have to read something perfect, just something they'll find entertaining. Keep in mind that these people turn 'simple tastes' into an art form unto itself, and I'm sure you'll find the perfect thing to read."
Daria rolled her eyes and let her head rest against Jennifer's as she let out another sigh. "Well, that leaves out anything I've already written. Guess I'll just have to bite the bullet and write something new for the occasion."
"That's the lack of spirit!" Jennifer said happily.
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Opening night was an interesting affair, to say the least. Charles did a series of card tricks and parlor routines which pretty much devolved into him trying to get every girl's number in the room... unsuccessfully. Joey, Jeffie, and Jamie tried to imitate Quinn's favorite boy band, Boys2Guys, even going so far as to dress up like them, but failed to notice that she wasn't even in attendance.
A boy Jennifer recognized from guitar class performed as well, but due to a lack of talent, the best thing he did onstage was smash his guitar. The lyrics to his song were something worthy of a Mystik Spiral cover, and to make up for lack of singing ability, he screamed them out at the top of his lungs.
Brittany and Kevin tried to reenact a scene from Romeo and Juliet, but thanks to Kevin's total lack of preparedness and social graces, he did not bother to memorize his lines, and brought out a plastic Halloween skull onstage.
After Andrea's poem recital, the Harpies came on and performed Deadly is the Night, stirring the audience up into a frenzy. Mr. O'Neil was standing in a corner, wringing his hands, worried that the crowd would turn ugly, and was glad that the number of performers limited them to one song.
Students were standing and cheering, and some who knew the song were singing along to the chorus, while the adults carefully kept an eye on them to make sure their rowdiness didn't get too out of hand. Thankfully, the crowd reaction was fairly tame, so when the band finished up, the adults breathed a sigh of relief to find that nothing more serious than a coffee mug or two were broken. The Harpies left the stage, breaking down their gear while Monique said, "Thank you! If you're interested, we're performing at the Zon this weekend!"
Mr. O'Neil took the stage as they departed, but had to wait several minutes for the crowd to settle down enough to be heard over them. "Wow, talk about raw emotions! Speaking of raw emotions, it's my pleasure to introduce one of Lawndale High's most gifted writers: Daria Morgendorffer."
Daria stood before the microphone and stared out into the audience until the shop had gone almost silent. "Thank you. Tonight I'd like to read a new story I've written entitled, 'Where The Future Takes Us'." Looking down at the paper, she ignored the bored and disinterested looks on the audience, most of whom were still keyed up from the Harpies' song.
"As students standing at the dawn of a brand new century, we face certain choices. How do we prepare for the future? Melody Powers knew how she was going to prepare, as she checked the fit one more time on her tooled leather shoulder holster. She thought about all the communists she would be taking out tonight."
A few of the students perked up at the implications of what she said. "Melody harbored no illusions about unilaterally stemming the resurging red tide. 'But,' she reflected with a grim smile, 'what special agent could resist the opportunity to fill a few Bolshevik cemeteries?'"
Mr. O'Neil looked decidedly unsure of the topic of this story, but did not stop her. As the story wore on, the audience became more rapt in their attention, and the teacher grew more and more uncomfortable with the situation. As Daria wrapped up the story, the students leapt to their feet, cheering.
A small smile graced her face as she turned to walk off the stage.
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
Kimberly breathed a sigh of relief as she collapsed on the couch next to her daughters.
"Rough night, Mom?" Jennifer asked.
"You can say that again," she replied. "Had to work overtime just to get the headline about the riot last night done in time."
Samantha looked over at her curiously. "Riot? In Lawndale?"
Kimberly waved her hand dismissively. "Police are calling it a riot, but you know what they're like here. They think any gathering of people larger than two is cause for concern." She looked over at them without lifting her head from the back of the couch. "You two wouldn't happen to know anything about this, would you?"
Jennifer shook her head. "We were here all night after we left the coffee shop."
Pulling a photo out of her blazer, her mother said, "Good. I'd hate to think I kept this off of the front page for nothing."
Jennifer took the photo and smiled as she showed it to Samantha, who also smiled. "I'm sure it's just coincidence that someone spray painted 'Harpies Rule!' on a wall where this 'riot' took place."
(\ /)
( . .)
*(")(")
A/N: It's pretty interesting to see these events through the eyes of another character. If nothing else, I'm glad I did this project just for that. If you guys like the story, that's great. If you see something that could be improved upon, or you would like to see happen, leave a comment. Suggestions, while welcomed, may not be used, so don't get discouraged if that happens, but I can't count the number of times I've been inspired by a comment on one of my stories.
