“They’ve got to be doing it,” said Linda, “or else Gregg would be blue in the face by now.”
“I see a little green, but no blue.”
Linda Barrett bit into her cheese sandwich. “Everything starts to look green around here after a while,” she said.
Biology Class
Stacy Hamilton’s next class was Biology II. Most classes at Ridgemont were notorious for one reason or another—perhaps the teacher was someone like Mr. Hand, or the room was lopsided, or the students were allowed to grade themselves—but none had quite the macabre lure of Biology II with Mr. Vargas.
Walking into the room, Stacy was at first struck by the all-white interior of the biology lab. Each student was to sit at his own lab/workshop, complete with Bunsen burner, around the perimeter of the room. Stacy took her seat. Then she noticed something odd. There was a large formaldehyde jar sitting on the windowsill in front of her, and it contained a strange bug-eyed animal that was staring directly at her. She looked at the labeclass="underline" Pig Embryo, 6 months.
Stacy moved to another seat and found yet another formaldehyde jar poised directly in front of her. This one wasn’t as menacing—just a baby squid. She looked around the room. There was a jar on every windowsill, facing every student.
Stacy began to key into all the student conversations around her. Everyone seemed to know one thing going into this class. Somewhere, sometime toward the end of the year, the class was going to be taken on a mandatory field trip to the bottom floor of nearby University Hospital. It was there that Biology II culminated in the display and study of human cadavers. Cadavers were said to be the private passion of Mr. Vargas, the biology teacher.
Even before the third bell rang on the first day, there was only one topic of conversation around the room.
“I’ll tell you right now,” a girl two seats up was saying, “I’m not going to go. I’m going to get sick or something. I’m not going into a room with a bunch of dead bodies.”
“You’ll go,” said the boy next to her.
“Have you heard what they do, Mike?”
“What?”
“I’m serious. Have you heard?”
“What?”
“The bodies are dissected, Mike, and Mr. Vargas pulls out parts of the dead body and holds them up. Okay?”
“You mean he reaches in and pulls this stuff out?”
“Yes.”
“Like a heart?”
“Like a heart.”
Mike beamed.
“Bitchin’.”
Mr. Vargas arrived in the classroom, a diminutive man with an inscribed coffee mug in hand. He looked nothing like his ghoulish reputation.
“Good day,” said Mr. Vargas in sprightly tones. “I just switched to Sanka. I’m running a little slow today.” He pulled on a smock. “So have a little heart.”
Mike turned and faced the students behind him, eyes wide with mock terror, as Mr. Vargas began passing out his own purple mimeographed assignment sheets.
So this was high school, Stacy thought. Weird, exotic teachers and a lot of purple mimeographed sheets. It was enough to make her long for Swenson’s Ice Cream Parlor.
A School Night
When Stacy Hamilton arrived home from school, her brother, Brad, was in the driveway washing his LTD sedan. He called the car his Cruising Vessel. Some went for a sporty domestic like a Camaro, others went straight for a Datsun or Toyota. Brad liked to drive to work at Carl’s in a nice big clean American machine, even if the car ate up most of his fast-food money. It was a small price to pay for style, as far as he was concerned.
“So how do you like high school?” asked Brad.
“Some pretty strange teachers,” said Stacy.
“You’ll get used to it.”
Stacy stood there for a moment, watching Brad lovingly polishing the windows of his car.
“Brad,” said Stacy, “how come I never see you with Lisa anymore?”
“Jesus,” said Brad. He threw a chamois rag onto his windshield. “Everybody wants to know about Lisa. Everybody is such big friends with Lisa . . .”
“Sorry I asked.”
“You got some flowers,” said Brad. “They’re right inside the door.”
Stacy went inside. There, sitting on the living room coffee table, their fragrance cascading throughout the Hamilton home, was a summer floral arrangement. Stacy read the attached note, marked “personal”: Memories of You, Ron Johnson.
Stacy’s heart quickened. This was a perilous situation, one that set off all her inner alarms. This involved her mother, the notorious Evelyn. For Mrs. H., the word strict was weak. First she had refused Stacy a bra, then, two years later, she wouldn’t let Stacy out of the house without one. She banned any mention of alcohol or drugs in the house. Allowing rock music in the Hamilton home was enough of a battle. Once Evelyn threw away a copy of AC/DC’s If You Want Blood album because there was blood gushing from the lead guitarist’s mouth and chest on the cover. She wouldn’t even consider discussing the subject of dating until Stacy had reached the age of sixteen.
Evelyn also had a nose like a foxhound. Once, when Stacy had come home from her first concert (a major fight), her mother even sniffed her clothes.
“I smell marijuana smoke! I smell it all over you!”
“No you don’t, mother. You’re crazy.”
“Don’t call me crazy, young lady! And don’t you ever come home smelling like a marijuana factory again. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, mother. But there was no marijuana smoke around me. You’re wrong this time.”
But, of course, Evelyn was right. Marijuana had been all around her, all night long. Stacy did not relish the act of lying to her mother, that much she knew. In fact, she had made a private pact with her conscience that called for a moratorium after her sixteenth birthday on white lies and sneaking out. Until then, however, it was a matter of survival.
Stacy gathered up the floral arrangement and headed back outside to her brother. She fanned the door a few times. “Brad! Have Mom or Dad seen this?”
Brad was concentrating on his chrome job. “Not home yet.”
“Brad,” said Stacy, “what would you say if I asked you to just put these flowers in the trunk of the LTD and get rid of them at work?”
“I’d say,” responded Brad, “who the hell is Ron Johnson?”
Stacy had expected her brother to give her a lot more trouble about their both attending the same high school. But Brad had been supportive, almost helpful. Brad, his little sister had decided, was in the “I’m an adult” phase.
Growing up, they had argued a lot. Almost every fight had been over The Phone. When Brad wanted to use The Phone, he wanted to use The Phone. He would make Stacy give up the line by the crudest of methods—by listening in on her conversation. Stacy would yell, threaten to go to Mom and Dad. Then Brad would sing into the extension, hum, laugh, anything to destroy the conversation entirely. When Stacy ran to complain to their parents, Brad would simply use the phone, just like he wanted to, while everyone else fought.
Evelyn and Frank Hamilton were easy on Brad, the oldest child. It had been their philosophy that the male should be fully prepared to go out into the world and provide for a family. How this had translated into the family chores, Stacy was not sure. Brad “the provider” didn’t have to do the dishes. Or his own sewing. Or clean the floors. No, all her parents had asked Brad to do was “the man’s chore.” Taking out the trash.