12.

~ Lunch time and Norma saw Alex abandon his normal round of basketball so that he could sit with her alone in the bleachers.

"Won't your friends be mad at you?" Norma asked nodding to the perplexed looks of the other boys.

Alex pretended not to care.

"Um… Tell me about this job of yours." he said shyly while Norma flipped through her english reading assignment and tried to look nonchalant. She was well aware of the outright stares they were getting from everyone just now. Some of their fellow students stopping what they were doing and gaping at them with open mouths; Maggie Summers being the most obvious.

"It's just a job." she shook her head and tried not to blush.

"What are you reading?" Alex teased and pulled her assignment away. "The Glass Menagerie?" he said reading the title upside down. "I remember that. It's…"

"Crazy?" Norma offered. "The mother is crazy?"

"I was going to say interesting." Alex said unconvincingly.

Norma nodded and pretended to believe him.
"Does Miss Harris still make you read it out loud?" he asked seeming to eye a particularly menacingly looking Junior who was glaring at them.

"Well, it's a play." Norma told him with a shrug. "You have to read it out loud."

"You like that kind of thing?" Alex asked suspiciously. "Plays I mean?"

Norma shrugged. She wasn't sure if she liked plays or not. She didn't want to be the kind of girl who liked what he liked just to make him happy. She also didn't want to say she didn't like plays just because he apparently didn't like them. That was what her mother would do. Fanny always changed her entire interests and personality to suit those around her. Norma wasn't at all sure who her mother really was.

"My mom likes that kind of stuff." Alex admitted sourly and his expression became a little dark.

Norma let a few seconds of silence fall away before speaking.

"What are you planning to do after school?" she asked.

"Go home." he said casually.

"No." Norma laughed. "I meant after you graduate.
"Oh." Alex grinned and shrugged. "I haven't given it much thought. Anything but become a cop I guess."

"What's wrong with being a cop?" Norma asked gently. She wanted to sound sympathetic and not accusing but felt her tone came out harsher than she meant it to.

It was Alex's turn to shrug.

"It turns people bitter." he admitted finally. "What do you plan to do after you're done with school?"

Norma hadn't thought much about it. She and her family existed only in a world of 'help wanted' signs and non skilled labor. She didn't live a life where she could plan on a career. One that would need actual training and education.

"Well…" she said after a long moment. "I was thinking about becoming a bitter cop, but you make it seem a lot less glamorous now."

Alex cast her a sly smile. One that, if they were alone and more familiar with each other, might lead to something. As it was, they were in a crowded gym with what felt like everyone staring at them.

"Cute." was all he said and Norma said up a little straiter, pulling back her reading assignment.

"Alex?" came a haughty female voice. "Aren't you going to introduce us?"

Norma looked up from her paperwork to see the audacious redhead that George had pointed out her first day there. She was in her fire engine red jacket and was smiling an uncomfortably wide grin at them.

Alex shifted his body so that he seemed to shield her from Rebecca and her gaggle of friends.

"Norma." Alex said carefully looking away from this shinning crew of Juniors who were all well groomed and wearing name brand clothing. "This is Rebecca Hamilton." he waved to the redhead in her red coat. "Bob Paris." a tall boy with perfectly blow-dried hair. "Jimmy Brennan and Jessica White." he said waving at a mean looking young man standing next to a perfectly quaffed girl with dark hair.

"Hi." Norma said nervously as no one but Rebecca Hamilton presented her with a smile.

"So you're the new girl." Rebecca said and Bob Paris looked Norma over with his seemingly lazy, but overly large eyes. Norma remembered something she'd read about royal inbreeding and how it could cause such abnormalities.

The idea gave her a sudden urge to giggle and she used it to smile back at Rebecca.

"Guilty." Norma said as Rebecca made herself comfortable in front of her.

"Well, since you and Alex have gotten so close, you should hang out with us." Rebecca told her glaring knowingly at Alex.

"I-" Alex tried to say.

"I know we don't have any of the same classes but since you're such a good friend of Alex, I think you should know his friends." Rebecca rudely interrupted him.

Norma knew a bully when she saw one. She'd heard the gossip and recognized that she was being challenged.

"Sounds fun." Norma said casually. "Alex and I were just thinking we could do something Sunday."

"Wonderful!" Rebecca said with her jester like grin. "Weather is supposed to be warm this weekend. We can go to the query and swim."

"I don't think that's a good idea." Alex interrupted. "The water is…"

He looked at Norma worryingly.

"We like to jump off the rocks and swim." Rebecca said. "Kind of our secret place." she added in a lower volume.

"It's where we orientate all of Alex's girlfriends." Bob Paris said in a catty tone.

Norma didn't miss the angry glare Alex gave to Bob Paris and she felt a little nervous about going anywhere with these people.

"This Sunday." Rebecca said happily. She glanced back at her pack of friends and her wolf like grin never wavered. "Alex knows exactly where it is."

Norma and Alex watched them troop away.

"You don't have to go." He said at last. "They just want to embarrass you."

"It should be nice." Norma told him. "I'm a good swimmer."

"You never went swimming with sharks before." he told her cautiously.

"We had gators in Florida." she reminded him as the bell rang for the end of lunch.

"Really?" Alex smiled.
"Yeah." she nodded.

"Real… like alligators?" he asked.

"Well, you just stay away from them." Norma told him honestly. "They don't move very fast on land."

She wanted to tell him the always funny story of an alligator skulking into their trailer park during the night and being pelted with beer cans by angry drunken rednecks till the police came and had tell everyone to go back inside. She and Caleb had witnessed the whole incident from the living room window and had laughed and been wonderfully afraid at seeing the lumbering beast move from trailer to trailer.

She would have, but such a story would let Alex know exactly where she came from and she was trying to be different now. Trying to erase that shameful past.

"Back home, no one was really afraid of them." Norma admitted. "We were just… inconvenienced by them." she admitted simply.

"You'll have to tell me more about it." Alex said and Norma felt his hand go to the small of her back as they walked down the bleachers.

~ Blair Watson was a chatty little girl who just wanted a playmate and not a babysitter. Norma had thought, after Alex had dropped her off at Nick Ford's house, that Mr. Ford wouldn't be home, but he was in his office talking on the phone.

The cook let her in and with the strict instructions of not to bother Mr. Ford with Blair.

"You just keep her quite while he's here." the older woman warned.

Norma noticed there were other people seeming to stream in and out of the house. Large looking men who glanced at her with hard eyes.

Blair's bedroom and playroom were at the very back of the house. Well away from the business of the front. Blair didn't seem interested in TV or anything other than playing dress up today.

"Do you like your new school?" Norma asked allowing Blair to wrap a pink feathery boa around her neck.

Blair shrugged.

"So okay." the girl said. "I don't have a boyfriend."

"Oh." Norma said and tried not to smile.

"Do you have a boyfriend?" the Blair asked.

Norma put on the white gloves from the dress up trunk and marveled at how quickly Blair took to her.

"Well, I don't know." she said honestly. "I don't think we really need boyfriends. Do you?" she asked Blair.

"My mom needs boyfriends." Blair sighed.

Norma felt a slight sadness rush through her.

"I like the blue dress." Norma said pointing to the sparkly dress of a flapper in Blair's dress up game.

~ They played for a few hours before cook brought them something to eat and Norma helped Blair finished her school work. A coloring project where she had to pick unusual colors for a bird, and stay in the lines. She helped her take a bath and get ready for bed before the cook knocked on the door to tell her the driver was ready to take her home.

Blair reached up and hugged her.

"Will you come back?" she asked in a hopeful whisper.

"Of course I will." Norma whispered back feeling Blair's fierce grip around her neck. "We had fun today didn't we?"

Blair nodded but seemed reluctant.

"Okay." Norma said feeling bad about leaving this child all alone. Sure there were people in the house, but they seemed to ignore her.

Blair looked ready to cry but Norma told her she'd be back and to think of a fun game for them to play when they saw each other again.

~ Norma was escorted out of the house through the garage and the driver didn't say a word to her except to ask where she wanted to go.

"Just downtown." Norma said uneasily. "By the new sheriff station."

The driver scowled at her but started the engine. He kept peering at her from the rear view mirror and Norma didn't feel as safe in this car as she did with Alex, or even George.

~ She was relived to be dropped off in front of the sheriff's station. Something inside her screaming to not give this guy her address.

"Thank you." she called and darted out of the back seat. The black car wasted no time at all in leaving her there. Not caring at all if she got home safely or even where her home was.

"Date night not going so well?" came a gruff voice from the parking lot.

Norma looked and saw a burly, angry looking man scowling at her. His gaze only momentarily distracted by the black car that was now vanishing out of the quite down town.

"No." Norma said honestly. "I… I had a babysitting job and I told… the dad to drop me off here. Didn't want him to know where I live."

"Smart girl." the man said with his gruff voice and Norma noticed he was wearing a police uniform.

She looked away from him, feeling uncomfortable at his stare, but he was looking back at the car and where it had driven off.

"Never tell a strange man where you live." he said. "No matter how charming he is. Lot of perverts out there."

"Tell me about it." Norma said sourly. She knew all about strange men who tried to grab at her or cat-call her back home.

"You just tell them to drop you off here." the bulky older man said. "If they try and follow you, just come inside and ask for Sheriff Romero. I'll deal with them. They won't like me." he said casually.

Norma glanced at the older man in surprise. He had to be Alex's father, but had none of the kindness in the eyes or face about him.

"Alright." Norma said sheepishly.

"You live in the old newspaper building?" Sheriff Romero asked. Norma nodded.

Sheriff Romero looked annoyed.
"Your mother named Fanny?" he asked.

Norma nodded.

Sheriff Romero remained silent.
"You go home now. Keep a light on. Lock the doors behind you." he ordered.

Norma nodded and could feel Sheriff Romero's eyes on her as she half walked, half ran across the street to the apartment. She didn't look back as she locked to door to the street behind her and the door for to the apartment. She could still see the large older man in the parking lot when she turned on a small light in the kitchen.

She knew she didn't like Alex's dad at all, but felt that he meant well by her. That if she was ever in any real trouble, she could go to him and he would help her. She wished she could say the same for Nick Ford's house and his lonely daughter Blair.