Chapter 31
It was 10:13 a.m. Tuesday morning, and the bell signaling the transition to second period at Peach Creek High School had just sounded. Accordingly, the hallway was filled with students, making their way to their next class while using their precious five minute break from academia to fraternize with friends.
In the case of Ed, Double Dee, Lee, Marie, and May, second period happened to be chemistry lab. Double Dee and Marie walked side-by-side, holding hands all along the way, as they carried their backpacks on their shoulders; a green standard strapped bag for Marie, and a blue, single-strapped "man-bag" for Double Dee. Ed and May had also taken each others hands in a laced finger hold, and were currently conversing happily as they walked a few paces behind Double Dee and Marie. Lee was walking next to Double Dee, in lock step with the couple; her signature black high-heeled boots clicking on the marble floor with every step as her face displayed it's typical sardonic expression
As the five adolescents made their way down the hallway on the way to the classroom, Double Dee decided to initiate a conversation.
"So Lee," said Double Dee with a smile, "Tommorrow's the big night! I absolutely cannot wait to see yourself and Eddy perform your interpretation of the wonderful Nutcracker Grand Pas de Deux!"
"Yeah Lee!" said Marie as she turned towards her sister with a smile, "We'll finally get to see that Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy you've been keeping secret all this time!"
"Whatever," said Lee, "All's I know is I can finally stop worrying about it after tomorrow night."
"C'mon Lee," said Marie, "Can't you just cut out the cynical bullshit for once and admit that you enjoy something you are good at? I mean, you spend every night front the time Eddy leaves to midnight locked in Moms ballet room practicing, so you can't say you aren't taking pride in perfecting your work."
"Huh," said Lee, "Yeah right, you think I want to waste my free time on some stupid ballet?"
"Obviously you do!" said Marie in her characteristic "cackling" intonation, "Cause you and mom spent hours and hours fine tuning the choreography and talking about it before you even started actually practicing."
At that point, the group had reached the door leading into the science lab. As they made their way into the classroom, Lee continued to rebuttal her little sisters comments.
"Look," said Lee, "I agreed to this stupid contest for one reason and one reason only. And that reason to make sure that SHE doesn't get yet another thing handed to her like she gets everything else in life."
As Lee uttered the word "she", she pointed towards a lab bench located on the far side of the classroom. At this particular lab bench, Lindsay sat by her lonesome, wearing her signature maroon coat as she leaned back in her chair. She held her right hand outstretched in front of her, nursing her left hand to file her perfectly manicured nails. Upon sensing the presence of the group entering the classroom, she glanced up towards the door, eventually locking eyes with Lee.
As Lee made her way across the classroom with her friends, the two girls remained locked in an antagonistic stare, their faces adorned with intense scowls of what seemed to be complete disgust. After a few seconds, Lee reached her destination and took her seat, at which point Lindsay slowly turned her attention back to her nails. Lee, in a rather violent manner, removed her chemistry text book from her handbag, dropped it on her desk, and flung it open to the chapter applicable to the days lesson, staring at the text with an angry expression.
While Lee took her seat at her own lab bench, Double Dee, Marie, Ed and May took their seats at the bench in front of Lee, which was large enough to accommodate four students. As Ed and May engaged in a light hearted, innocent conversation typical of the couple, Double Dee spent a few seconds observing the classroom, specifically the unspoken tensions radiating between the eldest Kanker and the Statorowski girl. Every few moments, each girl glanced up, delivering a brief scowl to the other before promptly returning to their task at hand.
Double Dee's observation was quickly interrupted as he felt Marie's hand grasp his.
"So cutie?" asked Marie, "Are we science partners or what?"
"Of course Marie," said Double Dee, after which he unconsciously turned his attention back towards the girls. Marie took notice of his absentmindedness.
"Hey, what's got you so distracted?" asked Marie, "It's Chemistry class! Your little adorable smart self would usually have your lab coat on and the whole experiment set up by now."
"I apologize Marie," said Double Dee as he leaned towards his girlfriend, and lowered his voice to a whisper "I'm afraid that I am still quite overwhelmed by the information you provided me last night at the diner. By the manner in which they are currently behaving, it seems completely preposterous that the girls were once as close as, if not closer than, I am to Ed and Eddy. It absolutely pains me to see such a beautiful bond go to waste."
"Trust me," said Marie, "After a while you learn to ignore it. It's easy to let it all go once you realize how much of a lost cause Lindsay really is."
Double Dee turned forward towards the front of the classroom, his face displaying confusion as thoughts ran through his head at machine guns pace. It was not in the intelligent adolescent's heart to simply let conflict continue unnecessarily.
Marie, being able to read her boyfriend like a book, took notice of his demeanor. She reached her hand up and grabbed his chin, turning his face towards hers.
"Hey," said Marie with a rather stern expression, "I can hear those gears turning up there in that brain of yours. Remember our promise cutie? Don't make me regret telling you about that."
Double Dee stared into Marie's eyes for a few seconds, after which he decided to reply.
"Marie," said Double Dee, "I'm putting my full trust in your judgement. I can only hope that this ridiculous competition does not effect the integrity of Eddy and Lee's relationship."
"I agree, we're caught between a rock and a hard place" said Marie, "But the best we can do is stay out of it and let the events play out. Trust me, I've known Lee through my whole life, and nothing gets in between her and the people she loves."
As Marie completed her previous sentence, the science teacher entered the classroom to begin the preliminary lab lecture. The instructor briefed the class on the reactions to be performed and the data to be collected, after which he passed out goggles and latex gloves to protect the students hands from the chemicals.
While the teacher typically allowed the students to work alone or in groups of two, due to constraints on laboratory material resources, the teacher mandated that students work in groups of two. In addition, the teacher had decided that he would be assigning laboratory partners, rather than allowing students to choose their own, due to a "reckless display" that had occurred in the previous lab caused by two good friends working together (implicitly referring to horseplay conducted by Eddy and Kevin in his other chemistry lab class).
Accordingly, the teacher had decided to select partners based on the names that the students had listed on their previous weeks laboratory reports; specifically the students were paired based on the alphabetical order of their first name. Fortunately, due to Ed and Double Dee sharing the same name, the two boys were assigned as partners in accordance with the teachers system. Likewise, May and Marie had been assigned as partners due to having similar first names; Annamae and Annemarie. Appropriately, Double Dee swapped seating positions with May to facilitate the assigned pairing.
Under ordinary circumstances, due to the oldest and youngest Kanker sisters both having an "Anna" prefix, Lee and May would have been assigned as partners, while Marie, due to her prefix bring "Anne" would have been assigned to another student. However, in a very rare turn of events, Lee had signed her previous lab report simply as "Lee", rather than "Annalee" as per usual. This unanticipated turned of events caused her to be grouped with the students whose last names began with "L": the closest of whom happened to be Lindsay Statorowski.
Upon the teachers annunciation of the words "Lee Kanker and Lindsay Statorowski", the two younger Kanker girls, who were in the process of preparing their lab equipment, stopped in their tracks; both of them appearing quite nervous. At the same time, Double Dee who was currently donning his safety glasses and lab coat, ceased his actions momentarily out of surprise. He glanced towards Marie, eventually meeting eyes with her; both adolescent's shared a discrete grimace, as they knew that nothing good could possibly come out of this situation.
Lee herself appeared quite shocked at this turn of events as well, glancing up from her chemistry textbook as if she was a deer in the headlights of an oncoming vehicle. Lindsay ceased filing her nails, frozen in place as if she were a statue. A few seconds passed, at which point both girls shot each other an angry glare. The girls remained in place momentarily, appearing visibly irritated as they remained locked in a bitter staring contest. This proverbial standoff was finally broken by the sound of the teachers voice, encouraging "Ms. Kanker and Ms. Statorowski not to dawdle" as he pointed the two girls to an empty lab bench.
At the point, Lee slammed her chemistry textbook shut, threw it into her handbag, and lifted her bag up off of the floor. She proceeded to angrily stomp towards the lab bench assigned to her by the teacher, and promptly took a seat on the stool. At the same time, Lindsay made her way to the bench in a similar manner, dropping her handbag into the floor with an audible thud while taking a seat on the stool next to Lee. Both girls sat with their legs crossed and their arms folded, looking away from each other towards the wall; their body positions appeared to be an exact mirror image of one another.
As Double Dee began to set up he and Ed's laboratory equipment, he simultaneously remained focused on the events occurring near the the two arch rivals. A few moments passed, at which point the girls finally decided to engage each other.
"Lindsay," said Lee as she continued staring towards the wall.
"Annalee," said Lindsay in a rather monotone manner.
There was a slight pause, after which Lindsay retrieved her fold up mirror from her pocket. She opened it up, inspecting her eyes carefully as she continued speaking.
"Just my luck," said Lindsay, "I get paired up with the queen of the geeks. I guess I can put up with being seen next to you for an hour if it means I don't have to be bothered with any of this nerd stuff. I mean, I really don't have to lift a finger, cause I know you aren't going to want to fail and give up that "A", Ms. Goody Two-Shoes."
"Oh God forbid the great Lindsay even attempts to earn a passing grade through hard work," said Lee, "I hate to burst your bubble, but those perky tits and pretty face ain't gonna last forever. You should probably have something to fall back on anyway...oh wait you do, your fathers estate."
"Oh Hun, don't be jealous," said Lindsay, as she turned towards Lee with a cocky smile, "It's clearly obvious that I'm the superior girl when it comes to looks. Face it girl, just cause you won three modeling contracts within the past year doesn't mean you're something special. No matter how much you try to change it, you'll always be a geek in my book."
"I'd rather be a geek than a fake bitch," said Lee, "And if you think I give a shit what a spoiled brat like you thinks about me, you're obviously stupider than you look."
At that point Lee stood up and began the process of tying her hair up into a tight bun.
"Anyway, I ain't got time for your bullshit," said Lee as she opened the lab bench drawer, removing several beakers, test tube racks, and other laboratory apparatus. "But I'll be damned if I do all of the work while you just sit around and mess with that trashy crap you put on your face."
Lee grabbed one of the large beakers in her hand, and the jug of distilled water provided by the teacher. She proceeded to slide them with force down the bench toward Lindsay.
"Here," said Lee, "Fill that beaker with 50ml of distilled water while I set up the rest of the stuff. I hope that's not too much of a task for your limited brain capacity."
Lindsay remained seated with her arms folded as the laboratory equipment slid to a stop in front of her. She rolled her eyes, and returned to staring toward the opposite wall with a scowl.
"And take that tacky coat off while your at it." said Lee.
"Uh, no." said Lindsay as she held her hand out in front her face, examining her nails.
"Look you moron," said Lee as she set up a Bunsen burner on the lab table, connecting the gas line to the service nipple, "We're gonna be using fire, and you can't have loose sleeves like that near an open flame, unless you want to see that precious rabbits-fur go up in smoke. Besides, you didn't spend all that money having that coat constantly altered as you grew since you were five to have it get a tiny spec of splatter on it. Man oh man the world will end!"
Surprisingly, Lindsay did not provide a snarky retort to Lee's comment; rather, she remained completely silent, fixated on the Bunsen burner. A few seconds passed, after which Lee turned the gas supply knob, causing the fuel to flow through the burner with an audible hiss. Lee quickly picked up a striker and, with one short click, ignited the gas creating a thin blue flame.
At the point of ignition, Lindsay's overconfident resolve seemed to disappear, and she appeared to enter a catatonic state. Her eyes remained intently focused on the flame, with what seemed to be an expression of utter distress. While the roar of the small flame was barely audible over the sound of the entire class conversing about their lab experiment, to Lindsay it seemed to be of a volume comparable to that of Niagra falls.
"Yo!" yelled Lee, "Are ya gonna fill that beaker or what? We ain't got all day."
A brief moment passed, at which point Lindsay finally regained her senses, her face returning to it's typical resting scowl expression.
"Listen Nerd Girl," said Lindsay as she stood up from her chair, picking up her handbag in the process, "I don't take orders from those who aren't on the same tier as me, and last time I checked, you aren't even worthy to clean the bottom of my shoes."
"You don't even need me to clean them," said Lee, "All's ya gotta do is pay those fake friends of yours to come lick the dirt off of them. Isn't that how you get everything else done for ya?"
Lee sarcastically giggled, as Lindsay's face turned a bright shade of red.
"Oh yeah!?" yelled Lindsay, "We'll see who has friends tomorrow night! The audience gets to vote on the winner. I got a whole auditorium of people that love me, and who do you got? Deadeye, Braceface, and your little Loud-Mouthed boyfriend. Get real and face it, I'm the most popular, and the prettiest girl in the freshman class, and that's all that matters in this world. I don't care how smart you are, you'll never be nothing more than a four-eyed wierdo geek, you just remember that."
"Typical overconfident spoiled brat," said Lee, "If you think you can win just by buying people's love, this is gonna be too easy for me. It's going to be so fun watching your little empire go up in flames when I use actual skill to put your smart ass back in place."
"Haha," said Lindsay, "You know, I'll give it to ya Annalee. You're still trying even though you know in the back of your mind that you will never be better than me."
Lindsay began laughing as she made her way towards the classroom door.
"Have fun with your little nerdy experiment." said Lindsay, "A girl like me can't be bothered with such a waste of time. And I suppose, out of pity I should wish you good luck on stage tomorrow night. You're gonna need all the luck you can get."
Lindsay opened the door to the classroom, and exited out into the hallway, as she cackled like a witch. As the door closed, Lee raised her right hand in the air to the point where Lindsay could see it and extended her middle finger, displaying a common obscene gesture.
Upon hearing the latch to the door engage, Lee angrily returned to her experiment and completed the entire operation by her lonesome. In the midst of working on he and Ed's experiment, Double Dee had kept an eye on the two girls, observing their interactions with sadness as he meticulously measured his chemicals.
