Election (8 page)

IT WAS
the Sunday before the election. Joe was right where I expected him to be, in the driveway, tinkering with the engine of his Cadillac. It was a penny-colored Fleetwood with white leather seats, not the kind of car
you'd expect a janitor to drive. He washed it every week and changed the oil like clockwork, every three months.

“Joe,” I said, “can I ask you a humongous favor?”

“Sure, princess.”

“I forgot my math book in my locker.”

He straightened up, wiping his greasy hands on an old dish towel. He didn't look too happy.

“Yeah?”

“We've got a big test tomorrow.”

He cocked one eyebrow a fraction of an inch, then nodded very slowly to let me know his patience was beginning to wear thin. This was the third weekend in a row I'd supposedly forgotten something in my locker.

“Okay,” he said. “I've got to stop in for a minute anyway. How's two?”

“Two's great.”

I'm not sure why I went through the charade with the math book. Joe knew exactly what I was up to. At two o'clock I met him in the driveway with a box of campaign posters in my arms and a tape dispenser sticking out of my jacket pocket.

“
SO TELL ME
,” said Dad. “Who's gonna win this election?”

Lisa shot me a surprised glance, her pretty eyes widening with alarm. Tammy stared blankly at her pancakes. Mom twisted her head, apparently searching for our waitress. Dad pressed on.

“What's the matter? We're all intelligent people. Doesn't anyone have an opinion?”

The whole brunch had gone like that, Dad playing teacher, the rest of us fumbling for answers. Mom was stiff and tongue-tied, Tammy sullen, Lisa polite. I'd done my best to keep the conversation afloat, but I was starting to lose heart.

“I'm a lifelong Republican,” he went on, “but I'm actually thinking about pulling the lever for Jerry Brown.”

The sense of relief around the table was immediate and conspicuous.

“Jerry Brown?” Mom scoffed. “You've got to be kidding.”

“I'm serious,” he insisted. “This country's corrupt from top to bottom, and Brown's the only one with the guts to say so.”

“Perot's saying it too,” Lisa reminded them.

“He's nuttier than Brown,” Mom observed. “The ears on that man.”

“What about Clinton?” I asked. “He's pretty interesting.”

“Ugh.” Dad looked disgusted. “That guy. He could stand out in the rain all day and not get wet.”

“I'm surprised,” said Mom. “I had you pegged for a Clinton man.”

“Me?” he said. “What gave you that idea?”

THE SCHOOL ALWAYS
seemed so big with no one around, so clean and silent and forgotten. Every noise I made—every squeak of my sneakers, every rip of tape and rustle of paper—echoed spookily in that vast emptiness.

Joe had disappeared into his closet of an office, leaving me to decorate the hallways in perfect solitude. It was easier to do this work in private, invisibly, to not be caught in the embarrassing but necessary task of self-promotion. I fixed my posters to every fifth locker, pleased by the effect of my name stretching rhythmically down the endless corridor—
Tracy Flick, Tracy Flick Tracy Flick—
like the school itself was whispering its true preference. I liked the idea of everyone walking in on Monday morning, fresh and well rested, to be greeted by my bright new message.

I'm not sure why, but being alone in the building always made me think of Jack. Only the good parts came back to me, the long talks and stolen kisses, the adventure of our sneaking around, the way the building
seemed to conspire with our secret. There was always an empty room to duck into, another dark corner waiting to hide us from the world. The school was our playground and refuge. As soon as we stepped outside its boundaries, the rules changed and everyone got hurt.

Room 17 used to be his classroom. I pressed my nose to the window of the door, fogging the glass with my warm breath. I wanted to see him leaning back in his chair, both hands behind his head. I wanted to see myself sitting a few feet away, telling him about this great idea I'd had for
The Watchdog
.

“Tracy,” he'd say. “Slow down. One word at a time.”

But there was no sign of him in the empty room, no posters of Michael Jordan and Ernest Hemingway, no bowling pin on top of the file cabinet, no “Word of the Day” calendar anchoring the blotter of his tiny desk. Miss Benson had changed everything.

I still get letters from Jack. He says he's not mad at me, that he only got what he deserved. He tells me about his job at the hardware store, and about the novel he's thinking about trying to write. He wants to know if I'm seeing anyone.

“
THIS IS GOOD CAKE
, ” said Mom.

“Sure is,” agreed Dad.

Lisa and I concurred. We all stared at Tammy, waiting for her to make it unanimous. She broke off a tiny piece with her fork, chewed it thoughtfully, then swallowed.

“I want to go to Catholic school,” she announced.

“Excuse me?” said Mom.

“I said I want to transfer to Catholic school. Immaculate Mary.”

She sounded serious. Dad scratched his beard.

“Why would you want to do that?”

“I need a change.”

Mom looked puzzled.

“Honey, we're not Catholic.”

Tammy rolled her eyes. She took another bite of cake and surveyed the table.

“That's all girls,” I reminded her.

“I know.”

“You have to wear uniforms,” Lisa muttered.

“I know.” Tammy smiled. “Don't you think I'd look cute? ”

ABOUT HALFWAY THROUGH
, I ran into an obstacle. One of Paul's ridiculous posters was taped to a locker that I needed to use.

The locker belonged to his girlfriend, Lisa Flanagan. I guess I could've skipped it, but I didn't want to break the rhythm. I wanted to cover the whole school, every fifth locker.

The poster smirked at me, and something about it made me angry. Maybe it was Paul's sweet handsome face, or maybe it was that stupid slogan: WE NEED HIM. Maybe it was the way he and Lisa kissed in front of everyone, like they were getting nourishment from each other's tongues. Really, though, it was because in spite of everything—in spite of his pathetic speech and my superior experience with student government and his sister's presence in the race—he was probably going to win. Not because he deserved it, but simply because he was Paul Warren.

Can you imagine if I'd lined the hallways with pictures of my face? People would have laughed me out of the school.

“What a bitch!” they'd say. “Who does she think she is?”

I didn't really think about it. I just looked down and saw the poster in my hands, ripped into two unequal pieces.

I GOT IN LATE
the Monday before the election, the one morning of the year Walt Hendricks needed to see me first thing. He'd worked himself into a minor frenzy waiting for me to show up.

“Goddammit Jim, where the hell were you? We've got ourselves a fucking problem.”

“What's that?”

Walt took a sip of coffee and grimaced like it was vinegar. His green and yellow plaid sportcoat was not available in any store.

“It's this election of yours. What's-her-name was just in here sobbing. God, I hate that shit.”

“What's-her-name? ”

“You know. The flat-chested one. Paul's girlfriend.”

“Lisa Flanagan.”

“That's it.” Walt's face grew mournful as he cupped his flabby pectorals. “Flat as a board, Jim.”

“She was crying?”

He twisted the top off a bottle of Tylenol, shook three extra-strength Caplets into his palm, and swallowed them without the aid of liquid.

“Hope they're laced with cyanide,” he muttered. “Put me out of my misery.”

“What was she crying about?”

His hands turned in vague spirals around his ears, as if the whole thing were too complicated for words.

“Something about Paul's posters. She came in this morning and they were gone. Someone ripped them off the walls.”

The phone rang on his desk. He lifted the receiver, then slammed it back down in its cradle.

“See?” he told me. “This is what I do with my fucking life. I'm barely in here two minutes and already I have to suspend someone. What's with these kids anyway? Nobody used to rip posters off the walls.”

“So what do you want me to do?”

He cocked his head and stared at me as though I were a complete imbecile.

“Get to the bottom of it. Tell me who I have to discipline. What's-her-name thinks it was Flick, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was Paul's little bitch of a sister.”

OKAY, SO
I lost my head and ripped a couple of posters. From the way people reacted, you would have thought I'd murdered Paul Warren and stuffed the dismembered pieces of his body into my locker.

Mr. M. called me out of study hall for a one-on-one interrogation in his classroom. I'm surprised he didn't have a tape recorder and one of those blinding spotlights shining on my face.

“I guess you know why you're here.”

“Aren't you supposed to read me my rights?”

“Very funny.” He made a few preliminary squiggles on a piece of scratch paper, then looked up. “Did you doit?”

In a perfect world, I could've just confessed:
Yes, I ripped the first one by accident and it felt so good that I decided to rip the rest. It was stupid and I'm sorry.
But it wasn't a perfect world, and I wasn't about to get myself suspended the day before the election.

“Are you accusing me?”

He closed his eyes and sat there for a few seconds without speaking, like he'd forgotten all about me. Mr. M. wasn't as cute as Jack, but he had nice eyelashes and thick curly hair.

“No one is accusing you of anything, Tracy. I'm just asking you a simple question.”

“Well, the answer is no.”

His smile was patronizing, as if he'd fully expected me to lie.

“Frankly,” he said, “I find that hard to believe.”

“Why?”

“Because it looks like the posters were defaced over the weekend. That means the perpetrator had to have access to the building on Saturday or Sunday.”

My face got hot. Mr. M. was a friend of Jack's, and I had this uncomfortable feeling he knew everything about me.

“How would I get in on the weekend?”

He shrugged like Columbo. “Who knows, Tracy. Maybe it wasn't you. Maybe it was one of the janitors. I guess I could call them in for questioning.”

My stomach hurt and I started to get scared. I tried to imagine what my mother might do in this situation.

“Can I make a phone call?”

“Why?”

“I need to talk to my lawyer.”

That startled him. He gave me a look like I was from another planet.

“Your
lawyer?”

“My mother's a legal secretary. Her boss handles all our litigation.”

“Whoa, Tracy.” Mr. M. signaled for a time-out. “You're getting a little ahead of yourself.”

I knew an advantage when I saw one. I made my voice as indignant as possible.

“Well, I'm not about to sit here and be accused of something I didn't do.”

He shook his head, studying me with a deep, unspoken disgust. I should have realized then that he was prepared to hurt me if he thought he could get away with it.

“Get the hell out of here,” he said. “You're giving me a headache.”

NONE OF IT
was real to me, not Walt's ravings or Paul's vanished posters, not Tracy's laughable threats of legal action. The only thing that was real to me was Sherry Dexter and the line we'd crossed that morning in her living room.

I'd stopped by her house on the way to school, supposedly to drop off this John Grisham novel she'd been bugging me about. I expected her to be dressed for work, but she answered the door in a blue oxford shirt of Jack's and nothing else, an outfit I thought women only wore in TV commercials. Her smile was shy and inviting.

I handed her the book. She glanced at the cover, then laughed and tossed it over her shoulder. In a single fluid motion she stepped into my arms and kicked the door
shut with her bare foot. Her body was warm through the soft cotton, sweeter than I'd dreamed. I felt no guilt, only a joy so pure it hurt.

“This is wrong,” she said, reaching for my belt buckle.

“Awful,” I agreed, peering over her shoulder to check my watch. “Things are going to get complicated.”

We made love right there on the floor, surrounded by the colorful clutter of Darren's toys. It wasn't slow or tender, the way I'd anticipated, but reckless, hungry, almost violent in its urgency.
This is it
, I realized.
She's what I've been missing.
Even while it was happening, I knew I'd never get enough. When it was over, we lay side by side on the pale gray carpet, stunned by our bodies and what they'd done.

“Come back after school,” she whispered.

“You'll be at work.”

“I'll take the afternoon off. Darren's with the sitter till five-thirty.”

That's what I was thinking about around two-twenty in the afternoon, when Tammy Warren knocked on my door.

MR. M. APOLOGIZED
as soon as I sat down.

“Tammy, I want you to know that this isn't my
idea. Mr. Hendricks asked me to conduct an investigation into the disappearance of Paul's posters. As far as I'm concerned, this is pure formality. You're under no suspicion whatsoever.”

I was surprised by his kindness. He'd never been nice to me before.

“Thanks,” I said. “Ask away.”

He stared at the wall clock for ten or fifteen seconds, as if fascinated by the concept of time. He seemed jittery, and I wondered if something was wrong in his personal life. Maybe he was a cocaine addict living in a house with no furniture. Maybe he exposed himself to Cub Scouts.