Dion finished his snack, finished his math, read the front page and entertainment sections of today's paper, and glanced through a two-week-old Time they'd brought from Arizona.
When his mom hadn't come home by six and still hadn't called, he found himself worrying. He turned off the stereo and turned on the TV, settling into the couch to watch the national news. It was strangely comforting to watch the news, though the majority of the stories concerned murders, disasters, and other tragic events. It was a stupid attitude, he knew, an ignorant, uneducated attitude, but he found it reassuring to see the incidents of the day categorized, dissected, and discussed on national television. It made him feel that no matter how chaotic the world seemed, someone was on top of things and doing something about them, though he knew, intellectually, that was probably not the case.
The first commercial break passed, and then the second and the third, and then it was six-thirty. He stood up and looked out the window.
Already the sky was getting dark, the orange color of dusk dimming into the bluish purple of evening.
She couldn't be starting again, could she? Not so soon after her last job. Not after promising him she'd change.
He almost hoped that she'd been in an accident instead.
No.
He pushed that thought from his mind.
Dion sat down again to watch the local news. He tried to remain optimistic, to tell himself that she'd merely stayed after work and forgotten to call, but he didn't believe any such thing.
He just hoped that she had enough sense not to bring the guy home.
He was in the kitchen and was about to make himself dinner--macaroni and cheese or one of the frozen dinners in the freezer--when he heard the familiar sound of the Pinto's brakes in the driveway. He wanted to go out front, to peek through the living room window, to see what was going on, but he remained in the kitchen, rooted in place. His muscles were tense, his palms sweaty.
He heard the front door open. "I'm home!"
He stepped through the doorway into the living room, and felt relief flood through him as he saw that his mother was alone. "Sorry I'm late," she said, dropping her briefcase in the entryway.
She was not drunk, but she had obviously been drinking. Her voice was louder than usual, happier and more vivacious, and her movements were loose, expansive. "I met the greatest people!" she said.
The worry returned. "Mom ..."
"No, I'm serious. I think even you'd like them."
"Who are they?"
"Well, I met them at happy hour--"
Dion took a deep breath. "Happy hour? Mom, you said--"
"Don't worry. A couple of people from work decided to go there after they got off, and they asked me if I wanted to go. But when we were there we met these people who--"
"Male or female?"
She stared at him, understanding dawning in her expression.
Dion shifted his weight nervously from one foot to the other. "You said you were going to change," he reminded her gently.
Her mood shifted. "I have," she said angrily. "And don't give me that accusing look. People at work asked me to go. What was I supposed to do, say no?"
"Yes."
"And ruin my chances for advancement?" She pushed past him into the kitchen. "Sit down," she ordered. "I'm making dinner."
"That's okay--" Dion began.
"I'm making dinner!"
He knew it was useless to argue. He watched her take out a pot from beneath the sink, slam it down on the counter. Sighing, he walked out to the living room. He watched TV as outside the night darkened and inside the kitchen his mother swore loudly to herself, banging spoon against pan as she made their meal.
On Friday, Mr. Holbrook greeted them with a pop quiz. Immediately after the bell rang, announcing the start of class, the Mythology teacher told the class to put all books under the desks and to take out pencils and paper.
"Number from one through twenty-five," he said, "leaving two lines between each number." He stood up from his chair and walked over to the blackboard, turning his back on the class and picking up a stubby piece of white chalk. "You are to copy down each question and write the answer on the line immediately beneath it."
"Fucker," Kevin whispered, holding up a middle finger.
Dion stifled a laugh.
The teacher began writing on the board. "You may begin."
There was a rustle of papers, a sighing of seats as the students settled in to do their work. Dion was already trying to figure out what grades he would have to get on the paper and the regularly scheduled tests to balance out the F he'd get today. He rubbed his pencil sideways on the desktop to sharpen it. At least Holbrook could have warned them ahead of time, told them he would be popping quizzes on them throughout the semester. The teacher had given them an outline of the course, had told them which pages in which book were supposed to have been read by which date, but he had said nothing about quizzes. At least he could have had the decency and courtesy to explain to them how his class was run, how grades were determined.
Of course, looking back on it now, Dion recalled that the teacher had said several times, "I expect you to keep up with your reading." He realized now that that cryptic warning had been a foreshadowing of things to come.
Unfortunately, he had not read a word of the assigned text. He did not study that way. Never had. He had always worked better under pressure, cramming at the last moment, force-feeding his brain with information.
He always completed questions and turn-in assignments on time, but the reading he left to the very end.
Now he was going to pay for it.
What made it even worse was that this was the day he had finally completed his sneaky maneuvers, had unobtrusively slid into the empty seat next to Penelope.
Things were not going well.
Dion dutifully copied the questions written by Mr. Holbrook on the board. He did not know the answers to any of them, was only vaguely familiar with some of the terms after hearing them in class, and he simply wrote down on the paper whatever single-word answers came into his head. He turned the paper over, putting down his pencil, to signal that he was finished.
When everyone had completed the test, the teacher faced the class. "All right," he said. "Please exchange papers with the person seated next to you."
The person seated next to him. That meant either Penelope or Kevin. He looked to his left, saw Kevin exchanging his paper with a short, boy on the other side of him. Dion looked at Penelope, forced himself to smile, handed her his reaper. She handed him hers. He stared down at the writing. Her letters were light, formed with almost calligraphic precision, definitely feminine.
"Question one," the teacher announced. "Zeus."
Dion went down the paper, marking plus signs next to answers which were correct, minus signs next to those which were incorrect, just as the instructor had explained. Penelope had gotten two wrong, for an A-minus.
He was right. She was smart.
Of course, that meant nothing now. They exchanged papers and Penelope handed back his quiz. He did not meet her eyes, did not look at his score. He had blown it. She probably thought he was a dim-witted jerk.
His chances of getting to know her had probably shrunk from fair to zilch. He glanced miserably at Kevin, then looked down at the paper in his hand.
He blinked.
He'd gotten a perfect score.
He had not missed a single question.
As always, the cafeteria was crowded, and he and Kevin sat on top of one of the round plastic tables in the adjacent eating area outside as they waited for the lines to die down.