Woooooooooo tenth chapter...woooooooooo...
Chapter 10: First Day of School
Something big and white landed on Billy's nose, and the way it tickled him when he inhaled it interrupted his slumber. A piece of paper with the letters of the alphabet printed on it lay plastered to his face, and there were more sheets scribbled with words and sentence fragments littered around him. He looked up at his desk, the source of this avalanche of loose leaf and squinted to see Mandi in the same spot he had last seen her, working busily on something with a pencil.
Her instrument pressed hard against the pad of paper, sketching long, dark strokes against the white backdrop--she herself so concentrated on these written characters that she didn't even realize Billy was leaning in over her. Surprised and a little flattered, he instantly recognized the lettering of his name printed at least once on every parchment spread across the desk, each one displaying the girl's development as a writer; older copies looked like little more than the squiggles a toddler would draw, while more recent editions exhibited a degree of penmanship that far exceeded the boy's own, featuring B-I-L-L-Y printed over and over again across every inch of page in ink, pencil, crayon, marker, every writing utensil in reach.
He must have said something or let out a gust of air because she had just turned around to notice him. "Did I spell it right?" She asked shyly, now that the holder of the name himself was there to critique her writing.
Billy's jaw lowered a little, but he said nothing, stunned that Mandi was no longer speaking in her usual halting, infantile manner. Her voice was just as gentle as it had ever been, but she chose her words deliberately and without the long pauses and simply repetitions he had grow accustomed to.
"Well, I don't know..." He began, "You forgot to add the giant monkey with a flaming clown head on a stick between the two l's!"
The girl's heart sank, and she looked despondently down at her rejected work.
Billy quickly realized his mistake. "I'm just kiddin'" He hurriedly explained. "It looks good, Mandi. It's gooder than good. I can't even write my name the way you do it!"
Suddenly rejuvenated by the boy's words of praise, she looked up at him with overwhelming joy. "Do you really mean that, Billy?"
He nodded--after all, it really was the truth. However, the question of her newfound ability of speech stilled remained, and he wasn't quite sure how to address it. "So...I noticed you're talking...more than usual." He said slowly, dragging out every word.
"I've been reading your books--math, English, history," She explained, flipping up the covers of every volume, "But my favorites were the science textbooks."
"Um, yeah, I love reading all that math and litertarary stuffs--complication tables, the civil world war of 1812 for American independence and Iraqi freedom, chocolate shake spears, pieology..." He stuttered, terrified of what would happen if she finally realized how mentally challenged he really was. His spewing of faux, near incoherent information would have continued had he not been struck by a precious rarity: a brilliant idea.
"Hey, why don't you come to school with me today?"
"You…want me to go to school with you?"
"Of course I do!" Billy exclaimed, already getting his clothes ready. "Besides, Mandy has been absent the last couple days, so no one will freak out!"
Mandi didn't understand. "I've been...absent?" She wondered, her eyes narrowing.
"Sorry, I keeps forgetting you guys have the same name." He apologized. "I was talking about Mean Mandy, Mandy with a y, not you. Maybe I'll tell you about that Mandy when we gots more time, but right nows we gotta get to school before we're late!"
All this talk about another Mandi eluded her, but the thought of going to class with Billy pushed everything else out of her mind. "At school will they teach me how to become an embarrassment to all sentient life like you?"
"Yep, and lots more too. I promise, you'll be embarrassing the masses in no time!"
Mandi stood up, her face beaming. "What kind of hair should I wear to school, Billy?" She asked, running her hand through her golden locks, which hung uncombed around her head.
Billy felt a queasiness swelling in his stomach, though it differed from his usual junk food induced aches. "I liked it...the way it was before." He replied quietly, not sure why he suddenly felt so timid around her.
Incredibly, the girl heard every one of his nearly inaudible words, and without any visible exertion her curls stood on end and twisted together into the familiar shape of two blonde horns, just as they had the first time in the tower.
Billy stood embarrassed in front of the smiling girl for some time before his dulled senses returned to him. "Uh, I guess we better go." He mumbled, moving stiffly as he led her out the door.
A flock of school children was gathering at the bus stop, though every one of them wished they were still asleep in bed. Huddled close together to fend off the early morning chill, they chattered ceaselessly, shifting back and forth to ease both the boredom of this daily routine and the numbness in their toes.
This herd of small people waddling around with overstuffed packs strapped to their backs was an odd sight, and Mandi wasn't sure what to think of it all. She stayed close to Billy, trying not to look into the myriad of faces that had been following her and her unusual outfit since they had entered the fringe of the crowd. With her hands in her pockets and her chin tucked into her neck, she felt unbelievably uncomfortable, imagining that every gossiping voice she heard was ridiculing her, and that every giggle was at her expense.
Worst of all was the chubby, bespectacled boy standing so close to her that they were nearly touching, no doubt mocking her with his smug grin, raising his eyebrows suggestively every brief moment her eyes moved in his direction.
"Hello..." She said with apprehension, hoping that if she acknowledged his presence he would go away.
"Hey Mandy, new look, huh?" He replied immediately, because he had been waiting eagerly for her to speak. "Has anyone ever told you how good you look in brown? It really brings out the green in your eyes."
"Thank...you..." The girl whispered, afraid to even move.
The desperate Casanova made his move, stepping within an inch of his prey and causally putting his arm around her shoulder. "So, the cabbage festival dance is next week, and I was thinking we'd make a beautiful couple."
Billy, who had been trying to imitate an acorn-stuffed squirrel on the other side of the road, caught sight of the situation unfolding next to him and rushed to Mandi's rescue. "Get out of here Irwin, she's not interested!" He shouted, pulling her away from her tormenter.
"Billy, I thought I told you to never bother me when I'm with a lady, yo!" Irwin growled.
"It's not Mandy, Irwin. You're wasting your times."
"Not Mandy?" Irwin snapped, folding his arms. "You've got a lot of nerve, Billy."
"We don't gots to hear this!" Billy exclaimed. "Come on, Mandi, the bus is here." Taking the girl by the arm, he and the rest of his classmates began to shuffle to the curb, leaving Irwin screaming behind them.
"You won't be able to keep Mandy to yourself forever, yo! You'll see! One day your precious companion will be ripped away from you! Right under your pink nose! And when that happens, I'll be there, Billy! I'LL BE THERE!!!"
"Don't pay any attention to Irwin, he's just a loser." Billy explained, wiping a cluster of nose hairs onto his shirt. "I feels kind of bad for him, actually."
Mandi nodded slowly, relieved that the strange encounter was over. The excitement she had felt earlier about going to school was welling up again, though this sensation ended quickly when she saw the 'bus' he had been talking about. Standing in the shadow of this shining yellow monster in the street she could feel her blood turning to ice, her thoughts turning to nothing except to run back under the bed where she had waited for the boy to come home before. But with the force of the mob behind her, escape was impossible, and with all her strength draining from her she was thrust into the black cloud that encompassed the beast and everything around it. Through the flashes of red the giant's jaws flung open to reveal not teeth, but a small flight of stairs that led directly up to a heavyset woman sitting in a leather seat.
The girl gawked at this unexpected anomaly, kids pushing her aside and filing into the bus. Through no effort of her own she was hauled inside with them, stopping in front of the woman who had somehow found a way to tame and control the rumbling machine.
Amazed and without knowing what else to say, she introduced herself, "My name's Mandi and today is my first day of school."
The bus driver snorted and spit into a jar on the floor. "That's wonderful, sweetheart." She replied, her voice hoarse from years of smoking. "Now stop talking to me and get your pretty little behind into one of those seats."
These words were like a slap in the face, nothing like Billy's, which seemed able to lift her spirits even from the deepest fear or depression. He had nothing to say however, and she crawled into one of the seats next to him, feeling more embarrassed and pitiful than she could remember. The bus was simply too small, there were too many people crammed in around her, and the noise they were making was unbearable. Dodging paper balls and airplanes above her head (which may or may not have been aimed at her), she felt the suffocating grip of claustrophobia seize her. The vehicle started with a jolt, quickly picking up speed along the road, and with her face deep in her friend's shoulder she wished she would just melt into the floor and disappear.
Out of the countless conversations going on around her, Mandi could hear the bitter voice of another young girl only a few feet away, and realized these antagonizing words were apparently intended for her and Billy.
"Hey losers." The snotty redhead called again, closing in on her targets.
"Hi Mindy!" Billy replied, as if 'hey losers' were some kind of greeting. His cheerfulness was clearly not genuine, only a programmed response, and the blonde noticed how he began to sink into the back of his seat.
"I'm surprised you've decided to show your hideous face at school again, Mandy." Mindy chided, relishing the attention she was getting from her peers. "If I looked like you, I would have stayed absent forever. What is that you're wearing anyway, an old bear suit? And what's with your eyes? Contact lenses won't make you look pretty, Mandy, they'll just make everyone else look better."
This got a few laughs, and Mandi could feel her face grow hot. Billy's kindness was the only thing she was accustomed to, and in the face of this hostility she felt defenseless. The bus was quiet--now everyone was looking at her. She turned to Billy for help, but the boy sat still, his cap covering most of his face. He wasn't going to save her this time.
"So Mandy, what do you have to say?"
"I...don't know who you are..." The girl whispered, her body going limp.
"Don't play dumb, Mandy, that's monkey boy's job." Mindy scoffed, starting to leave. She looked back like she had something more to say, then raised her nose with an air of superiority and sat down.
Within no time, the students were animated again, blathering to each other--all except for the boy and girl sitting miserably in the front row.
Endsville elementary school loomed above the top of the hill, but by that time it was the last thing Mandi wanted to see, the sting from her altercation with the redhead still lingering. Billy, on the other hand, must have completely forgot about it--drumming against his legs as if everything was going fine so far. How he was able to let those kinds of things roll off his back was incomprehensible to the young blonde.
"What did we do wrong to make that girl so angry?" She wondered, disrupting Billy's rhythm.
"Nuthin', she's just like that." He answered, and went back to hitting himself.
"But how can people be like that all the time?" Mandi half choked, becoming more and more distressed. "How can someone treat another person like that? I don't understand…"
"You gotta be way less sensitive, stuffs like that can't get to you, or you'd never last a day in schools."
"HEY BILLY, YOU SUCK!!!" Taunted someone from the other end of the sidewalk.
"Ya see?" Billy exclaimed, waving to his verbal assailent. "None of that bothers me at all!"
Mandi couldn't accept that. That couldn't be the way things were supposed to work. Why would someone act so cruelly on their own freewill? Why couldn't everybody be more like Billy? As she became absorbed in her thoughts, a short but muscular boy, whose build resembled that of a tree stump, marched into their path.
"You stiffed me on your lunch money yesterday, punk!" Stumpy growled, launching Billy to the pavement with one move of his swollen fist.
"Thanks Sperg, I was getting tired of all those baby teeth anyway." The weakling mumbled, coiling up like a beaten animal.
"Good, then let me be of further service!" Sperg sneered, cracking his fingers in preperation for another walloping. Just as his knuckles were about to collide with the face of their victim, something with the force of a brick wall held them back. "What is this?"
Mandi, unable to stand any more humilation of her only friend, had absorbed the devastating punch with her palm and was single-handedly keeping the hated bully's arm locked in place, much to the amazement of Billy and all the students nearby. Sperg let out an agonized scream as the frail little girl snapped his bones backwards before lifting him off the ground with unforeseen strength and hurling him into a parked car.
The screaming ball of fat and muscle struck the windshield, shoving the entire vehicle down the slope where it bump into another. What followed was a domino effect, with every car along the street being displaced and sent into lawns, driveways, even through front porches.
A police cruiser by the school building watched the destructive path of screeching metal rolling down to its location, and its sirens sounded just before a blue mailbox shattered the front bumper. Mandi stared blankly at the blinking red and blue object coming in closer, and had to be ripped away by Billy, who heaved her into a row of bushes.
"I…didn't mean to Billy, I…" Mandi stammered, breathing heavily. "Do you think I hurt anyone?"
"I'm sure everyone is fine." Billy replied, not really caring about Sperg's well-being. He could hear the cruiser about to pass by, and held Mandi to the ground until the droning alarm became fainter.
"What are we going to do now?"
"Well…it's not safe for you here anymores." He said slowly, rubbing his head.
"What will they do to us if we're caught?
Billy said nothing, plucking up clumps of grass and replanting them. The crystal ball fell from his pocket, and the sight of it reminded him of the empress.
"Do you remember where I first found you, Mandi?"
"Yes…" She answered, even though she had tried to rid herself of the memory of that bleak, deserted place.
"There's this lady there, named the empress. She kinda looks like you, and I think she might be your moms or somethin."
The girl looked taken aback, "My mother?"
"Yeah. Maybe if I took you there to see her she'd protect you…since I couldn't."
Mandi let the boy's words soak in before speaking, "But I don't want to leave. I want to stay here in Endsville with you."
Billy would have smiled had they been under happier and less urgent circumstances. "Don't worrys, I'll come with you, but you can't stay here." He said firmly--this wasn't the time to be stupid.
More than anything the girl wanted to stay, but she gave a melancholy nod and moved closer to the glass orb. Before she could realize it, Endsville was far behind them.
Okay, Mandi hates automobiles, in case the past couple chapters haven't made that clear.
Long chapter, took a long time, no excuses, etc. etc., what the hell is wrong with you?, etc. etc…
Anyways sorry for the wait, but it is summer now, so let's hope things take a turn for the better (they will). So, summer's here, chapter 10 is done, the Billy and Mandy movie is coming soon, and the Sentry does care. Things are looking pretty good.
Though I kind of preferred 'dumb Mandi'. I found writing her dialogue to be somewhat easier.