He made a point of smiling at Molly when she rounded Christopher up. She did not smile back.
Roddy thought, May as well stick around. There might be some more action. Who knows what could happen next?
He grinned even wider.
Chapter 15
KIP MISSED THE FIGHT.
Moments before it broke out, the doorman came up to her. He was completely soaked. “Oh, you poor thing,” said Kip. “But you still look impressive. In a wet sort of way.”
He didn’t laugh back. “Miss Elliott, I’ve got to get out of these clothes. I kept thinking the rain would stop and I’d dry out, but I’m soaked through. I’m gonna get pneumonia and I had that last winter. I know I promised you all night long, but I’m going to have to leave. I’m real sorry.”
“Of course you should go home,” Kip said. “Don’t worry about it. Everybody had that great uniform on the way into the dance and they don’t need it going out. Thank you for lasting this long. You were a wonderful addition to the dance.”
He was pleased to be complimented. “You don’t have to pay me for the rest of the evening,” he told her.
Kip shook her head. “You earned it all.”
They shook hands and she walked with him to the front exit. It was still pouring. “Goodbye,” she said, “and thanks again.”
The doorman nodded and dashed out into the rain.
Wind flicked into Kip’s face. She stepped back into the foyer, and right onto somebody’s foot. She was wearing tiny sharp heels and they came down hard.
“Ouch!”
Kip whirled around. “I’m so sorry, Con! I didn’t know anybody was there!”
He smiled at her. It wasn’t much of a smile. He was pretty annoyed to have been stepped on. “It’s okay,” he said. He moved around her and stood for a moment in the door, assessing the rain.
“Have to get something out of the car?” she asked. “Here. Use the umbrella.” She picked up the enormous black umbrella she’d gotten for the doorman.
“No, thanks.” Con looked neither at her nor at the umbrella. He walked out into the rain. He didn’t run, the way the doorman had. He just walked. Within moments his hair was plastered to his skull. He didn’t seem to notice at all. He got to his car, unlocked it, and sat for a while in the driver’s seat.
Kip could not take her eyes off him. No, Con, no, she thought. Don’t drive away. Anne needs you. Don’t let her be right!
Con drove away. Alone. He vanished in the black rain.
Oh, Anne! Kip thought, her own heart hurting as much as Anne’s must be right now. You were right. He is walking out on you.
The unfairness of the world hit her. She moved limply back into the foyer and leaned on one of the huge dividing pillars.
“You jerk!” came a furious girl’s voice. “You stupid worthless jerk! What made you do that! You’ve ruined my whole evening. I hate you. Why did I ever come with you?”
Molly and Christopher were next to her in seconds. They never even saw her. Molly was pulling a raincoat over her shoulders and peering out into the rain. Deciding that her hair mattered more than her dress, she tugged the coat off and draped it over her head.
Christopher just stood there dully.
Molly began swearing at him. He roused himself enough to swear back but he lost interest after a few syllables. “Give me your car keys, you drunken idiot,” Molly said. “Kicked out of Harvard. Who needs you?”
“Maybe I was,” said Christopher. “But still. …” He couldn’t seem to figure out how to finish his sentence. Molly fished in his pockets to find his keys and saw Kip. “What’s the matter, Kip?” said Molly viciously. “You don’t have anything better to do than stand around and gloat?”
Gloat? Kip thought.
Molly grabbed Christopher’s arm and hauled him out into the rain.
Wow, Kip thought. What did I miss?
She hurried back to the cafeteria and spotted Pammy, a sure informant. “So what happened with Molly and Christopher?” Kip asked.
Pammy giggled. “You missed that? Probably just as well. You would have been a wreck worrying that your dance was ruined. Christopher beat up Billy and Roy, and Roddy punched Christopher back, and the cops made Molly take Christopher home.”
“Roddy punched Christopher back?” Kip said. “Did anybody have a video tape going? That would be worth seeing. What else did I miss? This will teach me to escort wet doormen to their cars.”
“Let’s see. Rumor has it that Con dumped Anne because she’s pregnant. Nobody believes that because Molly started the rumor just to be rotten. Molly racks up boys like charges on her American Express card. Maybe this will slow her down a little.” Pammy looked hopeful. Then, being Pammy, she changed the subject so fast Kip got confused. “All those hot little cheese things are gone. They were yummy. We went back for the little bacon things, too, and they’re gone. Next dance be sure to order more of them, okay, Kip?”
“Sure,” said Kip. But she gave no thought to bacon things, or cheese things, or even Molly. Rumor has it. Molly started it. Somebody did walk in on us in the bathroom. And now I have five hundred people here talking about Con leaving—and he just left. Pammy missed that. Must have been busy watching the fight with Roddy and Christopher. But Anne didn’t miss it. She knows Con is gone. Poor Anne! I’d better go see if I can help her.
Sue dragged Jimmy to the other end of the cafeteria to join Anne and Con. “I don’t want to go there,” objected Jimmy. “What if it’s true? I can’t handle it.”
“If it’s true, we won’t have to handle it,” Sue said. “Anne will be the one handling it. Pick up your feet, Jimmy.”
“I want to go real slow,” Jimmy said. “I don’t want to have to watch Anne handling it, either.”
“Coward,” Sue said.
“Runs in the family,” said Jimmy.
Sue pulled him through the crowd. “Don’t worry about it,” she said. “Have faith in the Couple of the Year.”
On a wooden bench in the farthest corner they saw the pink and ivory-gray gown that was Beth Rose. Thirty or forty feet away, Gary was dancing with Jennie. Sue dragged Jimmy farther on. Beth Rose and Anne were the only ones on the bench.
No Con.
Sue’s eyes flew around the room.
But now they were close enough to see Anne’s face. Stunned, totally wiped out, Anne was a shadow of herself.
It was true, Sue thought. The knowledge hit her as hard the second time as it had the first. She walked over to Anne. Jimmy read her face as well as Sue had, and he dropped behind, busying himself at the food.
Sue plunged right in. “Anne, I just heard. Are you okay?”
Anne’s dull eyes focused on her. “Heard what?”
Oh boy that was stupid, Sue thought. Of course Anne doesn’t know the whole room is talking about it. And if she finds that out from me I’d rather be dead. What I have to do is get her out of here before she realizes the gossip is spreading like that lightning. “That you weren’t feeling well,” she said quickly, trying to cover up.
Anne looked away. “I feel lousy.”
“Want us to drive you home?” Sue asked.
Anne got straight A’s. She was no fool. If Sue was offering a ride home, it could only be because Sue knew that Con wasn’t around to take her himself.
Home, Anne thought. The minute I walk in early without Con I have to tell my mother and my grandmother. “No, thanks,” she told Sue.
Sue looked at Beth Rose. Beth did not look anywhere but at the floor. She was good at watching the floor; she did it all the time under normal circumstances.
Sue knelt down in front of Anne, feeling both stupid and yet right. Taking a limp hand in hers she said softly, “I’m sorry, Annie. I’ll help you if you’ll let me.”
Anne trembled. Her eyes locked with Sue’s. Sue thought that Anne would break down, and she didn’t know if that was the right thing or not.
But Jimmy couldn’t stand the emotional level the girls were reaching. “
Oh, big deal,” he said. “So they’ve split up. Happens all the time. Anne’s tough. She doesn’t need Con.”
Everybody looked at Anne. She didn’t look tough. She looked as if she needed Con desperately.
The band started a very fast, very wild number, with hard crashing chords and zinging guitar slides that hurt the ears. Out on the dance floor the kids burst into crazed stomping and flinging of arms and legs. Gary led the way.
Anne laughed, and it sounded like a bell with a crack in it. “That’s one point of view,” she said to Jimmy. “A person can make it on her own, right?”
“Right,” Jimmy said.
Anne stood up. “Come on, Beth!” she cried. “We’re both alone. We’ll dance together. Who needs boys?” She grabbed Beth’s hand and dragged her out among the dancers.
They swirled in spinning, uneven circles, jerking heads and spines, thrusting out toes and wrists. Like a whirlpool in a high tide, Beth was swept into the dance, spun around by it, past Anne, away from Sue and Jimmy, between Gary and Jennie, up to Bob, Jennie’s boyfriend.
It was like the Twilight Zone. The cafeteria no longer seemed romantic, but just poorly lit. She did not seem to be dancing herself, but thrown about by some greater force. Beth Rose wanted to scream, but the music screamed for her, vibrating across the room, piercing her ears, making her dance with more and more violence.
Anne was terrified. Where her strength had come from she had no idea. She did not know what emotion she was experiencing. Not anger. Not fear. Something dreadful: cold and hot, frantic and panicky.
Like the edge of a cliff, tempting her to jump.
It was ten-seventeen.
Gary, dancing with Jennie, was oblivious to the world.
Anne, madly dancing alone, was caught in the cyclone of her own fears.
Emily was leaving the emergency room, standing in the bathroom with the nurse, using the nurse’s lipstick and powder. Matt was hanging in the doorway, telling her to hurry up. Her father was standing behind Matt, telling her to slow down.
Beth could not bear the crazed energy that had seized them all. Suddenly she yearned to be alone—had to be alone. She fled behind the scarecrow to the corner where she had hoped Gary would kiss her, and there in the shadows she leaned against the wall and shivered.
Kip, seeing Anne dance alone, decided that she, too, could dance. She didn’t need a boy, either. What was this but a time for dancing? A time to forget your troubles and lose yourself in the satisfying repetition of rhythm and footwork.
Separated by the smallest of distances, their hearts and their minds were worlds apart.
Outside, the storm began to wind down. The wind lessened. The rain stopped completely. The center of the storm shifted. Now the lightning was on the horizon. The thunder came many seconds later, a faint echo instead of a jarring boom.
One last gust tore across the open playing fields and the wide parking lots. An old maple tree, whose core was eaten away by age and disease, began to split. A huge weakened limb tore from the tree. Thousands of tiny branches and twigs brushed the air. The roots and bark of the dying tree screamed in protest.
Halfway down, it caught the wires that brought electricity into Westerly Senior High.
Without fanfare, without warning, the lights went off inside the decorated cafeteria.
The instruments were instantly silenced.
The dancing ceased.
The dark came down, frightening, total darkness, enveloping everyone.
Chapter 16
THIS IS MY LIFE, Anne thought. The lights are out. And they’re not going to come on again, either.
The strange energy that had tossed her into the dance abandoned her. She felt as weak as if she had just been through some terrible illness. She could hardly stand, let alone dance.
For several moments the room was eerily silent. Then the chatter, the giggling, the shouting began. “Where are you?” a girl screamed, making the most of anonymity. “I’m over here,” bellowed a boy.
“Ooooooh, I just touched something slimy!” Megan screamed in her high voice.
“Ooooooh, I just touched something sexy,” said a boy very clearly. The whole room dissolved into laughter.
Shuffling feet replaced the scuffling sounds of the drummer. Outstretched hands found the wrong places or the wrong people, and laughter rocketed around the room.
Anne tried to orient herself. She had been near the far wall. If she backed up she’d be at the food barn. Behind that would be the wall. She yearned for the wall. Solid. Safe.
She began inching toward it. She had never been afraid of the dark, and yet she felt things coming out of it, trying to hit her, and she cringed as she moved.
The junior high kids who were supposed to be waiters and waitresses were giggling like maniacs. Drinking soda in the dark, they began throwing cheese balls at each other and squashing them under their feet.
Anne found the wall. She felt it, her arms outstretched to their greatest length. Nobody else, and no objects, shared her wall. She walked her fingers up the wall. Nobody. Nothing.
Am I still sane? she thought.
Twice people literally passed over her. Feeling their way along the wall, they were headed for the pay phones in the front foyer. A girl tripped over Anne’s foot. “Oooof. Are you okay?”
“Yes,” said Anne. She was weeping. Her face and throat were soaked as if she had been in the rain. The couple passed on over her, like any obstacle to a journey, and bumped into somebody else.
“Oooh, who’s that?” the girl squealed.
“Amanda and Jason.”
The four talked about the blackout, how long it might last, and whether they should go home. “I just heard some hot gossip,” Amanda said.
“Yeah? Tell all. I love even cold gossip.”
“Anne Stephens is pregnant and Con walked out on her.”
“That’s not hot. I heard that half an hour ago.”
No, Anne thought. No, no, no, no. Kip, whom I trusted completely. Kip told? Let it not be true. Not Kip!
But it was true. Their conversation drifted back to her. Well, I can’t pretend now, Anne thought. The whole school knows. No matter what I decide, no matter whether Con’s around or not, it’s out.
It’s not just my mother and grandmother I have to face.
It’s my whole world.
It’s every class, every kid, every teacher, every parent.
Kip had told.
I might as well lie down and die, Anne thought, but she did neither. She wept. When the lights come on, I will look so awful. But who cares? You can’t get any lower than I already am. It can’t get worse.
Beth Rose was close enough to embrace the scarecrow. He’s my partner, she thought crazily. I could dance with him in the dark. Or even in the light. And who would know the difference? There’s old Beth Rose Chapman, they’ll say. Dating a scarecrow again. Just her type.
Now the rest were over the initial fear and enjoying the sudden complete dark! They were treating it like some special effect arranged by Kip for their entertainment.
“Gary?” she said. “Gary, where are you?”
She spoke too softly for anyone to hear, let alone Gary, who must be on the far side of the room. She didn’t really want him to hear. How would it make her feel better when he discovered how desperate she was? How frantic she was for rescue?
Rescue. But I’m not afraid of the dark. I kind of like the dark. I want him to rescue me from being unpopular.
But that, too, was a kind of darkness.
Beth Rose waited, hoping her guardian angel would guide Gary across the floor to her, but of course that was ridiculous. Gary would stay where it was fun: in the midst of Jennie and Bob and that crowd, laughing until the lights came on. For a person like Gary, Beth thought, the lights were always on.
Perhaps the blackout was a fortunate thing, though. She could make her exit in the dark and not have to look at any of them. She wouldn’t have to leave with her head hung, in failur
e. She would just not be there when the electricity was returned to the cafeteria.
She worked her way around the walls, stepping over people when she felt them with her outstretched fingers, apologizing, responding to their giggles with her giggles. Eventually she reached the long black corridor.
Somebody stepped on her with a bone-crushing weight.
She could not stifle her moan of pain.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to do that. I knew I would do that.” A boy’s voice. Hands patted her anxiously, found her arms, pulled her back on her feet. “Are you okay? Did I break any bones? It sounded as crunchy as potato chips!”
“I’m fine.” She did not recognize his voice. She hung onto him. “I think it was more my shoe and the hem of my dress.”
“Oh, no. I probably ripped the whole dress.”
“I hope not. But we’ll find out when the lights come on.”
The hall was so completely, utterly dark. People poured up and down, hunting for adventure. To judge by laughter and silly jokes, they were finding it.
“Which way are you going?” Beth asked the boy.
“I’m leaving. I’m having a lousy time.”
“Don’t go,” she said.
She was shocked at her own voice. There was a desperation in it that she had not even known she was feeling. Misery. Don’t go. It was a cry of anguish. Hold onto me in the dark. Please don’t go away. Stay with me.
Hysterically laughing people, at least ten or twelve of them, stumbled past. Shrieks of, “I’m tripping on somebody’s feet!” “I can’t see where I’m going!” “Do you believe this?” “Wonder how long it’ll be off.” “Let’s go outside and shine the car headlights on ourselves so we can see who we’re kissing!”
Wild laughter.
Pounding feet.
Pushing bodies.
And then they were past. It was quiet in the hall. The cafeteria doors closed with a slap.
Very slowly she put her fingers out.
Nobody else was there.
She swung her arm in a circle.
She touched nothing.