I shudder. Why don’t his parents stop him?
“Hey, break it up over there,” Mr. Borglund’s voice booms. I immediately return to the lab equipment. I do not want to get on my teacher’s bad side.
Tomper, however, heads back to his lab station at a pace rivaling Marcel Marceau’s “Walking against the Wind.” He stops to turn around and wink.
“Hope I see you at the Pits,” he says.
“I’d like to go out with Jessie to the late-late show,” I tell Mom casually as I dry the dinner dishes. Mom raises an eyebrow.
“Do you have all your homework done?”
My stomach is shrinking to the size of a prune.
“Yes—all of it.” I am so glad Father is on call, because, of the two, usually Mom is more sympathetic. “Please—I’d really like to go.”
“You’ll come home right after the movie?”
Mom’s face is soft in the kitchen light. It’s hard not being like Michelle and staying in to study all the time. I want to please Mom and Father, but I also can’t imagine being a senior and not going to at least one party.
“Yes, Mom,” I say, but I’m suddenly thinking about what will happen to me if I don’t get into Harvard, not because I’m going to a party, but because I’m not smart enough. I know for a fact that I’m not as smart as Michelle—just talking to her always confuses me; she uses such big, obscure words. I wish Mom and Father would give me alternatives. Instead, I feel I have to get into Harvard or fall into a black hole. Some choice.
Still, at 8:00, I back out our Chevy Blazer from the garage and drive across town to Jessie’s.
When I pull up, her house is dark; her father doesn’t come home from the mines until late in the evening, so she doesn’t leave the lights on.
I’ve never met Jessie’s mom. One Thanksgiving, long before Jessie and I became friends, an Arkin High student killed her when he came barreling down the wrong side of the street in his pickup—apparently he’d been drinking while watching the football game.
I stare out at the night. I won’t drive drunk tonight—or any night. No way.
Jessie opens the door to the car. “Hi, Ellen,” she says. As she hoists herself into the Blazer, the flowery smell of Sweet Honesty fills the car, followed by a slight trace of cooking smell—fried something.
“Do you know how to get there?” I ask.
“Yeah, go down that dirt road behind the old Saint Andrews School, and I’ll show you. It’s a bit of a drive.”
I have visions of taking a wrong turn and pitching the Blazer headlong over a cliff. But then I think of Tomper Sandel and the way he was talking to me in chemistry. I shift the car into gear.
“Okay, Jess, you’re the navigator.”
As it turns out, the sign to Karl Pit, aka the Sand Pits, is well marked. I even see a few cars driving into it.
“Duck,” Jessie says as overhanging branches slap the windshield. I downshift and let the car bounce in and out of the ruts in the road. Our headlights bash holes into the peaceful darkness.
As the car pulls into a clearing, I feel as if we’re at the county fair, with all the lights around: from the moon, car headlights, and the huge bonfire spewing sparks into the sky.
Shadowy forms move restlessly; laughter pops and crackles out of the fire.
A jean-jacketed blob immediately approaches us in the dark. The blob is Rocky Jukich, one of the “burnout” guys in our class. If you sit around smoking on the school lawn, as I’ve seen Rocky do, you’re considered a burnout; and there has always seemed to be some kind of correlation between burnouts and trouble: smoking, bad grades, drugs, you name it. Right now, the red end of Rocky’s cigarette looks like a glowworm in the dark. I can’t tell where his mouth is.
“It’s a two-dollar contribution tonight,” he drawls.
Jessie and I dig awkwardly in the pockets of our tight Levi’s and extract dollars.
“Have a good time, girls.” He hands us two flimsy plastic cups.
“I’m sure we will,” Jessie calls gaily as she pushes me toward a thick of kids where, I guess, the kegs must be. “Ugh,” she says as we fall into a sea of kids shoving to fill cups. “Where’s the line?”
“Hey, move it, you assholes!” Tomper bursts through an opening on the other side of the crowd. A keg is firmly attached to both arms. He is in a white T-shirt, no jacket, and his biceps dance as he heaves the keg to the ground.
“You guys want to break your legs or something?” he bellows to the kids standing around the kegs. “Get out of the way when someone comes through carrying a keg, for Christ’s sake.”
I watch with fascination as Tomper pierces the dull silver keg with the tap and starts the beer running. I hope he won’t see me trying to pour myself a beer—I have no idea how a tap works. It just seems to be a long, skinny hose with some small contraption at the end, not one of those huge levers with beer logos like the ones I’ve seen on Cheers.
“Well hello there,” he says, his eyes suddenly finding me. “You made it.”
“Yeah,” I say, feeling my blood pressure rise.
“Here, give me your cup.”
Tomper’s strong fingers take my cup away. He presses the little contraption and beer fizzes out—first a golden foam, which he throws away, and then real beer. He politely hands my cup to me. His eyes are navy blue in the dark.
“Here, gimme your glass,” he says to Jessie, who is standing openmouthed.
When Jessie has her beer, Tomper gives me a wave and a smile as he walks away. I’m so surprised, I almost forget to smile back.
“Wow,” Jessie says as we move toward the fire. “I didn’t know you knew Tomper Sandel.”
I take a swig of beer and am surprised by its cool, acrid taste. I am tempted to act as though Tomper and I have been buddies for a long time.
“Actually, Jess, he’s just started talking to me in chemistry and stuff,” I say as we reach the fire. I am feeling better now that I see there’s no sign of the police, undercover teachers, or my gymnastics coach.
“He’s definitely on my Gorgeous Burnout List,” she says, closing her eyes and letting the fire shine on her face. “Right up there with Rocky Jukich.”
“Do you think Tomper’s a burnout?” I ask. “After all, he plays football and hockey.” Most of the burnouts like Rocky abhor sports, and while I know that Tomper does smoke, he doesn’t seem to get into the heavy trouble—drugs, skipping classes, fighting—that people like Rocky do.