“What-ingly attentive?”
“I guess, like you’re falling all over somebody, praising them.”
“Like you’re kissing their ass.”
“Yeah. That’s it.”
Reg flicked his cigarette away. “Okay. Good. I’m gonna use those words.”
“Use them three times and you’ll own them.”
“Is that right?”
“That’s what they say.”
We both watched Lilly and Uno walk out of the store arm in arm, heading toward us. They stopped at Uno’s Jeep, six spaces away.
Reg called out, “Hey, Uno! Use that three times and you’ll own it, bro!”
Uno scrunched his face and called back, “What?”
Reg just laughed evilly.
Lilly snarled at him.
I wondered what Lilly was doing walking that way with Uno. Last year, I might have blackmailed her about this, threatening to tell Mom. But not anymore. What Lilly does now is her business. Especially after work. Especially with Uno.
Mr. Proctor said it: Everything is changing.
As I approached my homeroom today, I spotted the hulking figure of Rick Dorfman standing by the door. I slowed down, assuming he was going in or out, but he just stood there, so I continued on.
That was a mistake.
He was waiting for me. As soon as he spotted me, he started clenching his fists. When I got within arm’s length, he reached out, grabbed the back of my neck, and force-walked me inside.
Coach Malloy wasn’t in there. The few kids who were quickly backed away.
Dorfman twisted me around until my face was directly in front of his. His eyes were ablaze with anger. With hatred. I was instantly terrified.
He spat out some words, spraying saliva in my face. “I been thinking about you, Coleman. You little nerd, you joke, you nobody! You think you can laugh at me?”
I remember feeling surprised that he knew my name. Otherwise, though, I lapsed into craven-coward mode. I shook, and I stammered, “N-n-no. I wouldn’t. You don’t understand.”
He switched his grip to the front of my neck, grabbing me with both hands and squeezing, like he really might kill me.
Suddenly someone screamed at him. A girl’s voice. That caused him to loosen his grip.
It was Jenny Weaver.
She looked every bit as angry as Dorfman. “Get your hands off him! And get out of here. You don’t belong in here!”
Dorfman released his grip, but he didn’t leave. He just took a step back.
Unafraid, Jenny screamed at him again. “Get back to the high school side, or I’ll call Officer O’Dell!”
Dorfman’s face muscles twitched, like he had a spasm.
Suddenly the mad-dog glare went out of his eyes, like a light switching off. He lowered his head and bulled his way out the door, knocking Ben Gibbons three feet back into the hallway.
Jenny took my elbow and walked me to my seat like she was helping an old man at a nursing home. She asked, “Are you okay, Tom?”
I reached up to my throat and tried to swallow. I couldn’t answer.
She asked, “Do you want a glass of water?”
I shook my head no. I couldn’t even look at her. I sat there in total humiliation, as red as a tomato, and on the verge of crying. I felt like everyone was staring at me.
I looked up at the TV. I imagined Wendy Lyle was staring at me through the screen as she delivered the morning announcements: “Tom Coleman today proved that he is a sniveling coward and a total wuss. Please join me in laughing at Tom about his ultimate humiliation. Now let’s all rise to say the Pledge of Allegiance.”
I didn’t regain my normal breathing until halfway through first period.
And Coach Malloy didn’t notice a thing.
I guess Wendy didn’t notice anything, either, when she entered Mr. Proctor’s room, although I still had a big red welt on my neck. She started right in, as if nothing was wrong. “I was talking to Mrs. Cantwell about the academics here. I’ve been trying to convince my dad that Haven’s not so bad. He calls it ‘a school for coal miners.’ ”
I choked out, “Oh?”
“She started telling me about her top students. Guess who’s the number one student, academically, of all the incoming freshmen.”
I shrugged.
“Tom Coleman.” When I didn’t reply, she added, “That’s you, right? The kid who works at the supermarket?”
Trying to be funny, I flipped open my notebook. “Let me check.”
She laughed. “Does everybody know this but me? Does everybody know you’re number one?”
I shrugged again. “
“Well, congratulations! You stay number one, Tom Coleman!”
I said, “I’ll try.” And suddenly I felt a lot better.
Mr. Proctor started class by pulling out a poster, unrolling it, and taping it to the whiteboard (Coach Malloy– style). It was a movie poster with screaming teenagers on it. It was black and white except for the slime-green title:
Mr. Proctor pointed to the board and explained, “This is the original poster for
“George Romero, a college student from Pittsburgh, was shooting commercials and bits for a kids’ show called
“This movie is not set in Transylvania, with some foreign-sounding Count Dracula as the monster. No. It’s set in a town like yours, with regular people as the monsters. Regular people who had been your neighbors and your friends and your family just a week ago, but who are all bloodthirsty zombies now.
“We will watch this movie over the next two class periods. Then I want you to write an essay comparing and contrasting
He popped a video into the slot beneath the TV screen. Blaring, evil zombie music filled the room. It was cool stuff, but I thought,
Near the end of class, Mr. Proctor stopped the video to point out, “Karen, the cute little girl in the movie, is already infected with the zombie plague, but no one knows it. She’ll wind up devouring her own mother and father. That seems pretty bizarre, right? And unbelievable. But let me tell you, I think
Arthur raised his hand immediately. “Yeah. I’ve seen meth zombies around, too, Mr. Proctor. Around my house. We definitely have them in Caldera.”
Hands shot up all around the room. Other kids started to say similar things—that they had seen meth zombies around Blackwater. As I listened to their stories, I realized that I had seen one, too. I raised my hand, and Mr. Proctor pointed to me. I contributed this:
