This choice: Move to another high school • Go Back...Chapter #17Schools of Thought by: Seuzz   Your life really isn't very appealing—as today's run-ins with Kirkham and the Molester showed—but you're not ready to conquer Westside High with a lot of duplicates and doppelgangers. Getting a life outside of Westside, though, could be a compromise. It sounds like Caleb might settle for something like that.
"Getting out of school," you muse.
"Like how?" Jessica asks.
"Well, getting out of Westside."
"You mean going over to Eastman?"
That wasn't what you meant exactly. "There's other schools in town," you point out.
"The university?" Her eyes light up.
But you're also not sure you're ready to graduate. "I mean, there's other schools."
"Like what?" Jessica furrows her brow. "You're not talking about starting over in kindergarten, are you?" she cries.
"No! But ... Well, let's make a list."
"There's only two high schools in town, Will. Westside and Eastman."
"There's Agape."
"The Christian place?" Her jaw falls open. "Gimme a friggin' break, man!"
"If someone out there's got a good life, what's it matter?" you retort. "Isn't that what you're saying we should do? Get some good lives for ourselves?"
Jessica's mouth turns prim. "And how are we supposed to—?"
But she cuts herself off, and her expression turns thoughtful. "I do know a couple of people out there," she murmurs.
"You do?"
"Well, Jessica does. Her memories are starting to come through."
The remark puzzles you, but you don't pick it up, and she continues. "Yeah, there might be some people. We could use Eva to get to them. But Agape?" Her face briefly twists up again with skepticism before softening again. "Still, taking over a Christian school," she muses, "turning all the students into robot duplicates, might be kind of neat."
You cut him off with a grunt. "Okay, so there's Agape. Um. Okay, I guess that's—"
"Xavier's!" Jessica exclaims. Her eyes nearly pop from her head. "We could get into Xavier's!"
Your own eyes nearly pop out of their socket. How could you forget the Mutant school?
Okay, it's not like you ever have a reason to think of it. St. Francis Xavier's is a private prep academy west of town, and no one you know has anything to do with it. They're all a bunch of snooty rich fucks, as near as you can tell, who you only rarely run across in town, though they are easily identifiable by their slacks and blazers with the school crest on the pocket. When anyone talks about it—which is rare enough—they call it "The Mutant School" as a joke on the name "Xavier."
How would you like to be the kind of rich, privileged asshole who goes there?
"I like it," Jessica says, speaking for both of you.
"You know how to get us in?"
"Well, no. Shit."
"Jessica doesn't either?"
"Not off the top of her head."
"Looks like we're gonna have to do some research, then."
"I'll get started!" Jessica bolts for the door, but stops at a word from you. "What?"
"You gonna go home like that?"
She looks down at herself and makes a face.
"Gimme the keys," she tells you. "I'll lock up."
"What are you gonna do?"
"Have some quality time with these tits. But I'll also try to figure out if Jessica knows a way of getting into Xavier's."
"Need any help?"
"Not unless you can help me do my thinking for me."
"No, I mean with your tits."
You duck and run before she can throw something at you.
* * * * *
Your little brother and two of his friends are standing in the driveway with their bikes when you pull up. You honk at them to get out of the way, and Robert flashes you a snarl.
You'd bite him back when you hop from the cab, but his face is flushed, and he has a haggard look. "Something wrong?" you ask.
"What's it to you, fuck-face?" he snarls back.
"Jesus, man," one of his loser friends mutters at him.
But you just raise your hands and back into the garage. If Robert wants to be in a pissy mood, you figure, let him.
He's mulish all through dinner, but you're distracted and don't pay him much attention. Still, when you bump into him in the hallway bathroom as he's coming out and you're going in, you ask him what his deal is. "No deal," he snaps back.
"Well, is that what you're gonna tell dad if he hauls you into his study to ask how come you're acting this way?"
He makes a face at you. "Just some motherfuckers at school I'd really like to settle things with," he says. He stomps off for his bedroom, and slams the door.
You have a thoughtful expression on your face as you wash up after peeing. It hasn't occurred to you that your eighth-grade brother might be having trouble at his school, like the way you have trouble at yours.
If Caleb wants to take over and fix something, you wonder, why not take over and fix Schuyler Middle School?
Okay, he's not going to go for that, and you're not enthused by the idea of going back to middle school either. But at the very least you could investigate things out there. There's an easy way to do it, too: Make a mind-band, get it on Robert, and find out what the situation is at Schuyler.
* * * * *
"No luck on finding an easy way into Xavier's," Caleb tells you the next morning, when you meet in the student parking lot. "The only way I can see is to ask around, see if anyone at Westside knows someone who goes there."
"No one here is going to know anyone there," you retort.
Caleb punches you hard in the shoulder.
"Don't be such a fucking pessimist," he says. "There's probably lots of overlap. I did a lot more research on them last night, turns out like a quarter of the students there are locals. Live here in town."
"Bullshit. Then how come Kelsey Blankenship goes to Westside instead of there?" Kelsey Blankenship is one of—if not the—richest girl in school."
"Ask her," Caleb retorts. "But the school is associated with the cathedral, and there's scholarships for locals who are members of it. Lotta people we know probably know someone who goes there. We just have to ask around."
Or, you think, we could do the easy thing and use Jessica to get into Agape. Or hijack someone at Eastman.
And there's still the situation at Schuyler to look into.  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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