Three hours may not seem like much, but a girl can learn a lot in that time. I, for example, had learned that our so-called civilization was built on a tissue of lies. I had spent the first three hours of my new life as a wage slave cleaning up after wild animals, presumably as a reminder that we live in a cruel and fundamentally unjust universe, and was now being sent to deal with the beasts directly.
"Welcome to the Busy Bee. What can I get you?"
"A Whoopie Pie, " said the customer, a man in a sharp suit who was doing a convincing impression of a walking stick. My giggle fit at the ensuing mental image was met with a questioning look from the man.
"I just remembered something funny from Citizen Kane," I said as I handed over his tasty treat.
"That may have worked on him, but don't think you can fool me," said Stacey, my fellow worker bee, once he was out of earshot.
"I was imagining him as a walking stick."
Stacey groaned. "Is this the sort of thing I can expect from you? Bad puns and insults hurled at the customers?"
"Not just the customers."
"Can I get a slice of chocolate cake?" asked a twentysomething wearing a Companion Cube t-shirt.
"I'm sorry, but the cake is a lie."
"What?"
"It's a Portal reference." Seeing his blank face, I added, "The video game? You're wearing a Portal shirt."
"I stole this from my dormmate. It's laundry day."
"Oh." We stared at each other for a month's worth of awkwardness compressed into ten seconds.
"Here's your cake, sir," said Stacey, rescuing me from myself.
"There ought to be a law against wearing shirts if you don't get the reference," I muttered under my breath.
"I'm not gonna lie, that was the most pitiful attempt to talk to a boy I've seen since the Fairground Fiasco of '08." Stacey put her arm around my shoulder. Her tone and mannerisms reminded me of the way I sometimes spoke to Allison, especially when I wanted to annoy her. "Maybe you should leave the college boys for someone with a little more experience. I mean, I can't blame you for trying something. Did you see his abs? You could probably bounce a quarter off them."
"Huh?" Okay, that last part wasn't something I'd say to Allie. I guess he was cute if you're into square jaws and huge biceps. I just wanted to talk about Portal. The sequel would be coming out ne—
"And who knew little Madison was a closet geek?"
"What? I'm not a geek."
"It's okay to come out, Madison. Admitting you're a geek is the first step to recovery."
"I'm really not a geek; I just like video games. My little sister and I started watching Über and Leet's stream—"
I was interrupted by the sound of metal crashing against the tiled floor. Taylor stood at the threshold to the kitchen, an empty baking tray lying at her feet. Her face had turned bright pink, and she mumbled a bashful apology.
"So you like capes? Or do bad boys get your motor running?"
"Is this what having a big sister is like? I really should thank my parents for practicing birth control."
Stacey laughed. "So, Über and Leet?"
I shrugged. "They're funny, and they aren't, like, Hookwolf bad, y'know?"
"How would we know? Maybe they're worse, but nobody knows on account of the whole gross incompetence thing."
"They aren't incompetent." I paused. "Well, not grossly incompetent."
"Sorry for insulting your favorite capes."
"I wouldn't exactly call them my favorites."
"So who is?"
"I've never really thought about it. Alexandria, I guess. Who do you like?"
"Local or anywhere?"
"Anywhere."
"Either way, my answer's Battery. Other capes might be more powerful, but none of them feels like they really care about the community, you know? Battery's different. I'm a Girl Scout Ambassador. She always makes time for our troop. That means a lot to me." Stacey turned towards Amanda, who was carrying a trayful of donuts from the kitchen, and said, "Hey Mandy, who's your favorite cape?"
"Laserdream. She's been my favorite ever since I found out she was a cape. I probably would have failed 6th-grade math without her," said Amanda.
"A cape tutoring some brainless schmuck? That'll be the day."
"Actually, she let me copy her answers, so there." Amanda poked her tongue out at Stacey, who focused her attention on the customer she was serving.
"You know Laserdream?" I asked.
"She was just Crystal back then."
"Even so, it's weird."
"What's weird?" said Stacey.
"To think of capes as real people."
"Of course they're real people."
"I know, but they've always felt larger than life. It's just, you know, weird that Alexandria might be a scrapbooker."
"Probably not. She has an eidetic memory," said Taylor. Had she been there the whole time? "That means she-"
"I know what it means," I said. "I'm not an idiot."
After about ten seconds, Stacey said, "I wonder if lampshading an awkward silence does anything to alleviate the awkwardness." We all stared at her. "Turns out it doesn't."
Amanda cleared her throat. "So, who's your favorite cape, Taylor?"
"Alexandria. When we were kids, my best friend and I would pretend to be capes. I was always Alexandria," said Taylor, her voice hitching a little when she said the f-word.
"Oh, hey! You've got something in common with Madison," said Stacey.
"I'm not so sure. You were pretty persuasive about Battery." I smiled at the newest arrival, a woman in a power suit that made her look like an extra in Wall Street. "Welcome to the Busy Bee, ma'am. How can I help you?" Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Stacey staring at me. Did I say something wrong?
Two girls entered the bakery. Recognizing the prettier of the two from my French class, I decided it was high time I made like a tree and got out of there. I shouted something about taking my government mandated fifteen-minute break and ran out the back, only to find myself face-to-face with Taylor.
"Taylor!" I said in a way that was decidedly unsqueaklike. If anything, I did the opposite: a kaeuqs. "What are you doing out here?"
"What am I doing out here? What are you doing out here? I thought you'd be jumping at the chance to treat your fellow minions to your employee discount."
"At least I have friends to avoid."
Almost instantly, she seemed to deflate. "I wish I didn't," she said. Her voice was almost too quiet for me to hear; maybe I wasn't meant to. She started walking towards the door.
"Taylor, wait." She stopped and looked at me. Had her eyes always been that lifeless?
"Do we really get an employee discount?" She sighed and trudged back inside, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
As promised, Mom picked me up at the end of my shift. As soon as my seatbelt was buckled, she asked me how my first day went.
"I am no longer the naive girl you once knew. She is dead; her spirit crushed and remolded by forces far beyond mortal understanding. Market forces. I am now a cog in the massive capitalist machine."
"That's nice, dear. Can cogs eat at Fugly Bob's, or will we have to give your dinner to Allison?"
"You can't do that! If anything, cogs need twice as much as their little sisters, especially the ones who haven't worked a day in their lives."
Mom laughed. "Okay, honey."
"Mom, what does 'eidetic' mean?"
###
"We need to talk," said Mom.
"In a minute." Allie and I were playing Metal Gear Solid. We had gotten to the first boss fight against Revolver Ocelot, and I was finally having a good run.
"Now, Madison."
I sighed and handed Allie the controller. "Don't mess this up, Alleycat." I followed Mom out of the den. As soon as we were out of the room, I heard the telltale sounds of the C4 being set off.
"I just read your report card." Oh. "Judging from the look on your face, I think you know where this is going. Three Cs and a D." She looked at me, clearly expecting me to play my part.
"I don't know how things worked when you were a kid, but these days, we call that passing."
Mom folded her arms. "Stop kidding around. In middle school, you got As and Bs."
"In middle school, the work was easier." Mom opened her mouth to speak, but I just kept going. "What do you want me to say? That I'll try harder next year? I tried my hardest this year, Mom. You've seen how that turned out."
"Maybe the problem isn't how hard you're trying, but how smart you're trying."
"Great, now you're calling me dumb, too."
Mom wrapped her arms around and squeezed me in one of those hugs that all moms seemed to know—the type that feels like breakfast in bed on a Saturday morning. "Oh honey, of course, you're not dumb. I meant that maybe your learning strategy isn't right for you." She pulled back and looked me in the eye. "I know you can do better than this."
"I'm never going to be a Rhodes Scholar. At best, I might be a Rhode Island Scholar."
"Honestly, I think I'd prefer your made-up scholarship to the real thing. Being a Rhodes Scholar means studying in England."
"Huh. I'd never really thought about what it actually meant. In my head, it's just been something they say about smart people in movies."
"Anyway, we're going to work on developing a plan that works for you over the summer."
"Maddie!" said Allie.
"Don't shout when Mom's around!" Mom was unimpressed, so I added, "Or when she isn't around!" I gave Mom my winningest smile.
"I don't know why I bother."
I ran back into the den and dove onto Allison.
"Get off, Maddie."
"Not until you say the magic word."
"Mom!"
"And there it is." I rolled onto the spot next to her on the sofa bed. "What's the sitch?"
"This robot ninja came and chopped off Revolver Ocelot's hand, and the old guy strapped to the bomb told me to call the Colonel's niece before he had a heart attack and died."
"So call her."
"He said her number is on the back of the CD case. He gave us an optical disc, but I can't work out how to look at the back of it."
"We can try to solve the puzzle, or we can find our own solution."
"What do you mean?"
"We could just go through all the numbers until we find the right one."
"Isn't that cheating?" asked Allison, her childish innocence not yet crushed by middle school.
I said, "I prefer to think of it as creative problem-solving." Allison's face scrunched up at this. "I tell you what. Why don't we keep trying for now? We can always choose to do it my way later."
She smiled at me brightly. "Okay." She handed me the controller. "You take over."
"Gee, thanks."
As Solid Snake infiltrated the Shadow Moses Island military base on-screen, from next to me, Allison said, "So, I've been hanging out with Mike a lot recently. I really like him." Mike was our thirteen-year-old neighbor.
"I like him, too; he's a good kid."
"No, I mean I like him."
"Oh. Oooooooh. Oh! You can't date him. He's too old for you."
"I'm two months older."
"Then he's too immature."
"What would you have said if somebody said that about your first crush."
"What?" I was so put off by Allison's question, that I almost walked right into a trap in the game. I paused the game and put the controller down. Then, my face aflame and my voice small, I said, "I haven't had a crush on anyone, yet."
"Huh? But you're two years older than me."
"I know." I started fiddling with the Metal Gear Solid case. "I think I'm just a late bloomer. That's what Mom always says."
"I think she's talking about your height."
"I know." Unable to meet Allison's gaze, I studied the case in my hands. After a while, I noticed something. "Holy hell!"
"What?" asked Allison.
I grabbed the controller and went into the codec screen and entered the frequency 140.15 and hit send. It connected to a woman in a balaclava.
"How the hell did you do that?"
"The game's case. Her number is on the back of the game's case."
Allison, my sweet sister, swore loudly. Her face was a mix of awe and disbelief. "What kind of game is this?"