The Sacrificial Daughter (15 page)

To Jesse this wasn't an explanation, it was rationalization. He was still the teacher whether she sat or not. "Thanks, but I don't want to debate."

"Is that because you're taking your father's side, out of love and respect, because he's your father? That's understandable, if you are."

I'm still on trial
, Jesse thought. Telling the truth didn't much matter to Jesse just then. She just wanted this little episode to be done. "Yeah, I guess you're right. I am."

"That is very sweet, Jesse. Unfortunately in economics we can't be swayed by emotion like this. Your love, which, I'm sure is..."

Jesse couldn't take it anymore. Her shoulders slumped and she, in a languid motion as if her hand weighed fifty pounds, slapped her desk with the flat of her palm. "I lied," she confessed. "I don't love my father. He's an ass. I just wanted to shut you up, but...I don't see that happening anytime soon."

The class had been for the most part silent, now it went absolutely still as well. They seemed to be expecting some sort of volcanic explosion from Mr. Irving, but instead he turned cold. "Lying is not permitted in this school. When you first arrived you signed the honor code."

"Yeah, sure did. I guess I was lying there too."

"I think maybe you need to leave my classroom," he said in a quiet voice.

"Thank God!" Jesse exclaimed and meant it. She couldn't imagine anything worse that having too put up with Mr. Irving for another minute.

"Take a trip down to see Principal Peterson and explain to him the extent of your disrespect."

Casually, completely unrushed, Jesse strolled down the empty halls. After all, where was the great hurry? In the past, she had been such a frequent visitor to the principal's office that she knew the routine by heart.

She would drag herself in, pretending to be contrite. She would suffer the annoying looks of Mrs. Daly. And she would sit. And sit, sit, sit. Probably for an hour, but maybe two. She would sit cooling her heels, not because Principal Peterson was so busy, but because that's what principals did. Jesse was sure that at ‘principal school' this was the very first thing that was taught to them.

So instead of rushing toward that bit of fun, she slouched around the school. However, this didn't take long, even with as slow as she was going. There just wasn't much to the long two-story, T shaped building. After a trip to the bathroom—she knew she wouldn't be allowed one in her long wait for Principal Peterson—Jesse strolled into the school's office.

"Yes?" Mrs. Daly asked with her eyebrows raised. Her face was expectant as if she had been anticipating this moment for some time.

"Jesse Clarke to see Principal Peterson." The way Jesse said this made it seem as if they'd had a pre-arranged meeting and Mrs. Daly face fell a little.

"Concerning..."

"I have an issue respecting authority figures." Not only had Jesse seen many a principal in her time, she had also seen her share of therapists. In her mind there wasn't much difference between the two. With both it was all sitting around and talking about dealing with the consequences of her actions, controlling her feelings, and working through her negativity.

Mrs. Daly wasn't one for flippancy. "Who sent you down?"

"The Honorable Judge Irving has sentenced me to life without parole in the principal's office." Flippancy was all Jesse had sometimes.

A heavy put-upon sigh escaped Mrs. Daly. "What did you do?"

With the feeling that she had just gone through a mini-version of The Salem Witch trials still upon her, Jesse almost said
witchcraft.
However, a more clever, more exact answer jumped to front of her mind.

"I'm here for the crime of
Heresy
."

Mrs. Daly's eyes narrowed and then glanced down. She was obviously tying to work out what Jesse could possibly mean.

Jesse explained, assuming the air of a parent talking to a child, "Heresy is when you have an opinion that is different...or opposed to that of an authority figure." She didn't really know if the last part was correct, she only knew that charges of heresy only flowed downwards, from those with power to those without.

"I know the term," Mrs. Daly replied coldly. "Have a seat."

And thus Jesse's sentence began.

Her wait to get through Principal Peterson's door extended deep into seventh period and this agitated her. After the bell rang she took to watching the clock.

"Do you know if he will be much longer," she asked the receptionist. "I gotta turn in my paper to Mr. Johnson, he'll be mad if I don't."

This was true enough but also a lie. Jesse didn't care about some stupid essay and neither did Mr. Johnson. She was sure that he wasn't sitting in excitement, desperate to find out her views on Rosa Parks. If anything he was only desperate to flunk her. Whoever heard of a five-page essay as a punishment for daydreaming?

The real reason that she wanted to get to her history class lay in what her mind kept picturing: her desk, the one that she shared with Ky. It fascinated her with its one word message. The carved letters: ALONE was a testament to misery. Couldn't he see that she shared that misery with him? That it would be better to share it together rather than alone?

Even though she had already been rebuffed by him three times, she hoped that it was because she had approached him publicly. That was why she was pinning her slight hopes on the note that she had left him. Urgently she wanted to see if there was a note waiting for her in return.

Jesse didn't find out that day.

Principal Peterson, true to his principal training, kept her waiting until after the eighth period bell rang. Deflated, knowing that checking the desk would have to wait another painfully long day, she went in to see him. She had worried that, in true ogre form, he would scream and threaten, but it turned out that Mr. Peterson really wasn't all that bad. In fact she felt a little sorry for him.

He was clearly stuck in a very difficult position.

James Clarke could in no way legally dictate to either the school or the School Board, any of its policies. He couldn't tell them to fire a single soul, but as the town's main taxing authority he could cut back funding.

And he did.

James was a very smart and ruthless man. His initial funding cuts were such a nightmare that Principal Peterson strongly considered resigning, but then James relented...slightly...with
conditions
. The conditions extended the town manager's purview deep into the workings of the School Board and gave him more control than anyone would have dared thought.

In a way this worked to Principal Peterson's advantage. He was no longer forced to be the bad guy in charge of mass layoffs. The flip side of the coin was that as the head of the school he was pressured to stand up to the town manager. He couldn't seem to win. If he pushed James too hard he would lose his funding. If he was seen not to push hard enough he would lose the respect of his staff and who knows what would happen then. His not-so-secret fear was that they would go on strike, which would be a disaster.

This had all been explained to Jesse in a gleeful manner by her father. The only thing that he loved more than the political infighting was gloating over his victories. Or so it seemed to Jesse.

This one victory put the thinnest silver lining around the maelstrom of Jesse's life. Principal Peterson spent the time with her, not yelling, not screaming, not handing out ridiculous punishments, but, in a not so subtle manner, begging her to get her father to relent and give up more funding.

He didn't know that he was wasting his time and she didn't clue him in. James had
never
taken his daughter's advice when it came to running his towns and he never would. In truth she gave up even trying a long time before.

After a good thirty minutes of veiled pleading, Principal Peterson let her go, with a final word of advice: "Do yourself a favor and try to fit in."

She smiled as best as she was able to after such a stupid remark and assured him that she would do everything she could. As she left his office, she shook her head in disbelief and made her way to her biology class. It might have been smarter to wait out the rest of the final period in the bathroom, but she had to see
him
.

Due to how the world treated her, Jesse could boast of having had only two crushes in her life. The last was in the ninth grade and it was with a boy who would only talk to her when no one was around. It didn't last long. She couldn't like someone who was ashamed to be seen with her and who wouldn't stand up for her.

Now she could record crush number three. Despite the note he had written earlier that morning, she was crushing on him hard. When she entered the biology room she was forced to listen as Mr. Daniels blah, blah, blahed, on and on about the importance of the current lab, about how much of it would go to her grade, about the importance of being on time...and all the while she secretly wished that Ky would look up at her.

He never did.

And that was ok. Maybe even for the best. He probably was so anti-social for a reason and not a good reason either. But he was perfect as a dream. He would always be the handsome boy in her class who was never mean to her.

What about the note from this morning, telling you to leave you the F*** alone?
her voice of reason asked.

Was it all that mean? Really? He didn't even spell the curse word out completely, which was kind of cute when she thought about it. If that was his greatest attempt at being mean, she would take it. She wished all the kids in school were
that
mean.

These thoughts filtered through her mind as she took her time messing about with the lab paraphernalia. She had no interest in the lab. As far as she could gather, it was a week-long experiment designed for two people. She had till the end of the week to finish it; three class periods. It wasn't going to happen, and she didn't care.

As things were going, she could count on passing only Calculus and study hall...and maybe lunch. English, art, and economics were all definite fails, while history was only a possible fail—she didn't have enough information yet. Biology was in a category of its own. Mr. Daniels didn't seem to have any particular resentment towards her, yet the way the class was structured, with partnered labs, it suggested she would always be behind.

Of course, her father would blame her for her grades. He never cut her a break, ever, and would likely ground her when he found out. This in itself was a bit of a joke. Where would she be going anyway? She had no friends at all. Her normal hangout, the local library, had been turned into a babysitters club by the presence of the town-killer. She couldn't even go for a walk if she wanted to.

Just then the bell rang and she got her wish. Jesse had been going over her pathetic life in a day-dreamy way when the shrill
brrrrinng
made her jump a little. It also made her realize that while her thoughts had been turning in her mind, she had been staring at Ky. She hadn't noticed and neither had he, but the second the bell rang Ky's head came up and he looked her straight in the eyes for the second time.

As before when they looked at each other, her full lips parted and her mouth came open in a small way. It was the best second and a half of her day. He then blinked, gave a little twitch of head, and turned away. Jesse sighed.

She didn't hop up and rush for the door like the rest of the class. What was the point? So people could stare? So they could knock into her? So she could hear her limerick for the hundredth time? All day she had heard snippets of it in the halls as people had passed. No thank you.

It also didn't hurt that she was practically alone with Ky. It was humorous to her as well. The longer she dallied, the longer he lingered. Finally when the halls went from shouts and laughter to an echoey silence, Mr. Daniels seemed to notice them.

"You better get going...it's getting late," he said with a glance at his watch. It was only a few minutes after three. How could anyone consider that late? Before walking out the door, she glanced again at Ky, but he refused to look up or in any way acknowledge her.

She found the hallway, strange. It was so quiet that she felt compelled not to disturb the silence and almost tiptoed along. Ky was quiet as well. Always the Ghost, he made just as much noise as one and she wouldn't have known he was behind her if she hadn't caught his reflection in a bulletin board as they passed. When she got to the rear door that led to the buses and student parking she paused and waited for the last of the cars to pull away before she ventured out into the chill air.

Her breath blew out smokey-white. It didn't bode well for her ride home, but anything was better than walking, especially after her scare from the day before. She planned to ride smack down the middle of the road on the yellow line, and in no way was she going to stop for strangers. That was the plan at least.

If riding her bike had been an option.

As she rounded the corner, she saw her bike as if it was a giant thing. Every surreal detail stood out clear against the backdrop of the red schoolhouse bricks: The rubber tires weren't just slashed, they hung from the bent rims in tatters, the spokes were sprung and twisted wildly as if they had been kicked in, the chain was missing entirely, and even the fork had been pulled back and apart.

Jesse stared. She was dimly aware of a rushing in her ears and then she found herself sitting on the ground; her legs had buckled beneath her and still she just stared. A movement next to her attracted her attention. It was Ky. Unperturbed, as always, he walked past her, climbed on his bike, and began to kick off.

"No, Ky! Wait...wait!" Jesse felt a deep panic that hadn't been there only a moment before. He was about to leave her. Just like the day before she would be very alone. Alone with the man who lurked in the forest.

She was up, sprinting to catch up to Ky. "Please Ky, don't leave me here! Please...please." She begged as she ran, but she begged in a hissing voice, afraid to announce to the world that once again Jesse Clarke would be all alone. She begged and Ky ignored her. He only went on riding in his usual unhurried manner and she might have caught up to him, but she ran out of building.

She went to the corner, but could not force herself to step out of the shadow of the school where she could be seen. "Don't leave me..."

Ky left her. His cruel indifference had her staggering. She was alone again. All alone...

The teachers!

The thought was like a slap to the face and brought her out of the sudden leaden depression that had gripped her.

The quickest way to get to the teacher's lot was to go across the front of the school, something that just wasn't possible for Jesse. There was no cover in the front of the school. It was wide open and she would be seen. A man could sit, tucked up in the hilly forest and see all the front of the school and he wouldn't have to be too far away to read the fear writ plain across her face.