My eyebrows shot up as Ms. Barch paired me with the man Jane reviled only a little less than her own brother. I tuned out Kevin and Brittany's protests, and Ms. Barch's instructions, as it struck me that it was a perfect opportunity to grill Kevin for information. Jane was still tight-lipped on the specifics of Kevin's abuses, and we spent too much time together both in and out of school for me to interrogate one of our peers without her looming over my shoulder.
I knew (or, at least, feared) that this constant digging into Jane's private life might blow up in my face, but I guess her self-destructive recklessness was starting to rub off on me. (Or I was controlling my own less and less).
At lunch, I told Jane of the assignment, and she went stiff. "Daria, I don't think I'll be coming with you after school today," she said in a buzzing monotone. I knew her well enough that that particular tone of voice was her fighting not to scream at the top of her lungs until she ran out of air.
"Are you sure? Where will you go after school?" Code for: Are you going to experience hours of hell with Trent over this?
Jane shook her head. "I haven't been running in a while...think I'll do that for the evening." Jane could see I was dubios, so she flashed me a rare smile. "Really, it'll be fine," she assured me. I nodded, not entirely convinced.
XXXX
I led Kevin into the garage. It was practically empty; my father never bothered with home repair or car maintenance, so he owned no tools, and he accumulated very little clutter which otherwise found its way into people's garages.
I had already finished the maze and trained the mouse to run through it well before Kevin had said he would come over. The maze and its resident sat on a table, off in one corner. I had set a chair up specifically for Kevin to sit in.
"Okay, where's the maze thingy?" he asked cluelessly, unaware that turning his head a mere three inches right would bring it into view.
"We're going to work on a different experiment today, Kevin." I pulled the crystal out of my pocket and dangled it in front of his face from the simple chain I used to hang it around my neck with. "Can you keep your eye on the crystal, Kevin?"
"Ooh, shiny," he praised.
I gently began to swing it back and forth, and my tone changed into a calm, soothing one. "Kevin, I'm going to count backwards from three, okay?"
"Okay," Kevin agreed. A little bit of drool was starting to run down his chin. I made a face.
"When I reach one, you will fall into a deep sleep and answer only to my commands. Do you understand?"
"Yeah," he said, eyelids already drooping.
"Three...two...one."
Kevin's head slumped.
"...Can you hear me, Kevin?"
"Yes," he said. His voice had lost its high-pitched exuberance it usually had. This Kevin was more serious.
"Tell me about Jane, Kevin."
"Jane's this art chick who hangs out with the weird new girl. She was the first girl I ever did it with."
I frowned. "Kevin, you are eleven years old, not yet in the Lawndale Cubs. Tell me about Jane."
"Jane's, like, my best friend. She comes over to my house all the time, and sometimes she cries. I don't know why she cries, 'cause she won't tell me, so I just hug her and tell her everything's going to be all right. Dad says Jane is a really nice girl, and tells me if there's grass on the field to play ball. So Jane and I go outside and play baseball. She's real good at it too. Whenever she hits the ball she runs all the bases before I even pick the ball back up."
I shudder, revulsed at the advice Kevin's father had given him. But still, I press on.
"Kevin, let's go forward a few months. You're now in the Cubs. Tell me what you think of Jane now."
"Being in the Cubs is awesome! But I have all these practices and stuff I have to go to, and the games too, and Jane comes to those sometimes, but I don't get to see her as much. She cries more often." He frowned at that. "I wish I knew how to make her stop crying. I feel funny when I look at Jane now."
I roll my eyes, as the last thing I want to hear about is Kevin going through puberty.
"Tell me about the last time you saw Jane before she stopped being your friend. When was that?"
"It was just after the last game I played with the Cubs before I came to high school. We won! I was, like, the most popular kid ever after that. Jane was real glad for me and stuff. I really like Jane. Dad says I should sh...poop or get off the pot with her, and I don't know what he means. I asked Jane if she wanted to poop with me one time, and she just laughed and gave me a noogie. Some of the other kids on the team think I should go out with Brittany, one of the cheerleaders. Brittany's nice, and I like to look at her, but...I dunno, I really really like Jane."
"My God," I utter out loud.
Kevin kept talking. "Jane came over after the game, and I told her I was going to go out for the Lions in high school next year. I told her what the other kids said about Brittany, and she got this funny look on her face. Then she asked if I wanted to be her boyfriend, and kissed me before I could say anything." Kevin's voice lowered, almost to a whisper. "Then, she like, started takin' off her clothes and stuff, and she started takin' off my clothes and stuff, and -"
"Skip ahead to what happened after, Kevin," I quickly said, wanting to be spared the details.
"Well, I was glad that Jane was my girlfriend. It was, like, the happiest day of my life! So I told all the guys on the team."
I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. "What exactly did you tell them?" I asked him.
"I told them that Jane kissed me, and she touched my you-know-what, and I put my you-know-what you-know-where, and we were boyfriend and girlfriend after that."
"Jesus H. Christ," I swore. "You fucking idiot."
Kevin frowned. "That's what Jane said. She came up to me after school that day and said she didn't want to be friends anymore." I couldn't believe my eyes as I saw silent tears streak their way down his cheeks. "I started going out with Brittany that summer."
I sat there for several minutes, absorbing the information. What a clusterfuck.
"Kevin, I want you to forget that you ever told me any of that, okay?"
"Okay," he nodded.
After that, it was simple to rouse him from the hypnotic slumber and send him on his way. All I had to do was show him the maze that 'he' completed, convince him he had nodded off afterward, and close the door after him.
I contemplated what I should do next as I gazed at the crystal myself. I had bought it on a lark from a bin full of accessories at the local Goodwill during my own middle school years back at Highland, and had worn it until moving to Lawndale, where the school dress code had prohibited it as being religious wear. (My queries as to which religion worshipped crystals went unanswered).
I decided to go out and find Jane. A little inconspicuous surveillance at the Lane home demonstrated to me that Trent was home, but Jane was not. I didn't know where Jane's runs usually took her, so I investigated our usual hangouts, among them Pizza King, Dega Street, and the hotel where UFO conventions were usually held at. I checked the running track behind the high school, the various paths which criss-crossed the park, and even hiked up to the quarry, a.k.a. the spot where everybody went to make out with their date.
Exhausted from running all over Lawndale, I found refuge in a playground, abandoned for the day by youngsters going home to loving families. (They can't all be as bad as mine and Jane's, right?) I took a seat on one of the swings, enjoying the gentle rocking motion from merely sitting there. "Where are you, Jane?" I whispered into the darkness.
"RIGHT BEHIND YOU!"
"GAAH!" Jane's scream startled me, propelling me from the swing and onto the dirt. I shot Jane a dirty look as she clutched her stomach from laughing so hard.
"Very funny, Lane," I growled, standing up and brushing dirt off my legs and skirt.
"What's funnier is I've been following you around for nearly an hour," she smirked as the laughter subsided.
"An hour? I've been walking around for nothing for an hour?"
"Not for nothing, amiga - for my amusement." She climbed into the swing next to the one I had recently vacated and gestured that I should join her. So we sat quietly together, the only sounds coming from the squeaking chains of the swings, and occasionally a breeze rustling the grass. "Beautiful night," she said of the three-quarters full moon steadily climbing into the sky.
"Mmhmm," I agreed.
"I was glad to get out running today. I sometimes forget why I love running, and then I stretch my legs and put one foot in front of the other, and I just feel like I can run forever." I glanced over and saw her gazing at something farther away than the moon. "Like I can leave Lawndale and never come back," she continued, barely above a whisper.
"Why don't you?" I prompted her.
She snapped her head towards me, her face thoughtful. I could hear my comment rattling around inside her head, as she came up with a justification.
"Because you can't run worth shit," she finally answered, smiling. She looked back up at the night sky, but stretched out her left hand towards me. I reached out my right hand and grabbed it, and together we watched the cosmos play out before us.