Chapter Six
It became an unspoken rule. No one mention that night. Ever. On the threat of death! And Merton was rather relieved. It never happened. Nu uh. And denial is just a river in Egypt.
And if Merton stayed a little closer to Tommy, no one noticed. I mean, the freaker was Tommy's shadow, right?
It was eleven o'clock in the morning, and the bruises were starting to fade, and Tommy and Lori were throwing French fries at each other. Lori was definitely getting the worst of it, before they ran out of French fries, (Tommy had been eating more than he had been throwing, geez, Tommy was catching and eating the French fries Lori was throwing. Werewolf metabolism. Perhaps it was a direct result of the transformational effect imposed on Tommy's digestive system. . . Another possible hypothesis to present to Dr. Holtz . . . Of course, advertising his thesis', however brilliantly they were written, never seemed to be a good thing. I mean look at Dr. Flügelhoff. ).
"Okay, I win." Lori said.
"Excuse me?" Tommy said, raising an eyebrow.
"You had an unfair advantage." Lori pointed out. "Taking handicaps into consideration. . . Speaking of which. Old Pleasantville has been rather quiet lately."
"I'm sure that something will pop up soon." Tommy said, nonchalantly. "The evil undead, or evil Easter bunnies or something. Maybe the Easter bunny's evil long lost cousin."
Lori snorted. "Yeah, it would sort of fit in with the theme of this place, huh? Did you see the new substitute, Ms Howard? She looks like a walking robot. Maybe she's the next evil. You know, time for the gallant Pleasantville werewolf to step up and save the world from personality deficient substitute teachers."
"Somehow, I don't think the world will benefit if Tommy spends his time beating up poor little school teachers, Lori." Merton said as the bell rung, "Education is a constitutional right that -"
"Yeah, and I'd never get any sleep, neither." Tommy interrupted. "Let's get to class. Have fun in biology, Lore." He draped an arm over Merton, and steered him towards their English class.
Tommy had been very protective lately. He walked Merton to all his classes. Was there when Merton got out them. Even stayed late for the gothic fantasy guild meetings to end. And Merton tried to tell himself it meant nothing, just superhero Dawkins on the case, but his doubts refused to take root.
Lori wasn't quite sure what was up with Tommy and Merton, they seemed to be living in a little dream world. They were still acting pretty normal, but it was like there was this big thing that lay unresolved behind them.
Lori had every intention of going to biology class. Since transferring out of private school, her attendance had improved a hundred percent. (Maybe it was the fact that there were boys in the class to go for. Since she broke up with Tommy, she had been finding Jeffrey Statler particularly hot.) But when she saw Ms Howard coming out of the school supply closet with a bizarre look on her face, and run hell-bent for the staff parking lot, she couldn't resist.
She followed her.
And man, could she move. It should be a rule, forty-year old teachers should be forbidden from moving like that. It defied the laws of gravity, or normality, or something.
Lori dashed around the corner of the school only to see there was no one there. The parking lot was completely empty, and there was no where she could have gone.
Lori walked in and around the cars for twenty minutes before she came to a decision. Tommy and Merton were too busy wrapped up in whatever it was they were wrapped up in. She couldn't tell them about this. They'd probably laugh at her. Or at least, be very suspicious. Lori, you can't use Tommy to pound your teachers. It's bad manners. Besides, didn't she deserve an adventure of her own for once? Lori was a little sick of being the one who was just a little stupider than Merton, and a little (well, a lot) weaker than Tommy.
Lori took a lot of pride in not being one of those girls, and it seemed since she hooked up with Tommy and Merton, being a girly-girl was all she had to occupy her time.