“We both know who did it, Mr. Harris.”
He flashes a patronizing grin at me. “I’ll handle the investigation, Mr. Smith.”
There’s no point in saying anything further, so I walk out of his office and head to the bathroom to run cold water over my hands and face. I have to calm down. I don’t want to have to wear the gloves again today. Maybe I should do nothing at all, just let it slide. Will that end it? And besides, what other choice is there? I’m outmatched and my only ally is a hundred-pound sophomore with a penchant for the extraterrestrial. Maybe that isn’t the whole truth—maybe I have another ally in Sarah Hart.
I look down. My hands are fine, no glow. I walk out of the bathroom. The janitor is already sweeping the manure from my locker, lifting out books and placing them in the trash. I walk past him and into the classroom and wait for class to start. Rules of grammar are discussed, the main topic being the difference between a gerund and a verb, and why a gerund is not a verb. I pay closer attention than I did the day before, but as the end of the period nears I start to get nervous about the next class. But not because I might see Mark…because I might see Sarah. Will she smile at me again today? I think it’ll be best to arrive before she does so I can find my seat and watch her walk in. That way I can see if she says hello to me first.
When the bell rings, I dash out of class and rush down the hall. I’m the first one to enter astronomy. The classroom fills and Sam sits beside me again. Just before the bell rings Sarah and Mark enter together. She’s dressed in a white button-up shirt and black pants. She smiles at me before sitting down. I smile back. Mark doesn’t look my way at all. I can still smell the manure on my shoes, or maybe the odor is coming from Sam’s.
He pulls a pamphlet from his bag with the title They Walk Among Us on the cover. It looks as though it was printed in somebody’s basement. Sam flips to an article in the center and starts reading intently.
I look at Sarah four desks in front of me, at her hair pulled back in a ponytail. I can see the nape of her slender neck. She crosses her legs and sits straight in her chair. I wish I were sitting beside her, that I could reach over and take her hand in mine. I wish it were eighth period already. I wonder if I’ll be her partner in home ec again.
Mrs. Burton begins lecturing. She’s still on the topic of Saturn. Sam takes out a sheet of paper and begins scribbling wildly, pausing at times to consult an article in the magazine he has opened beside him. I look over his shoulder and read the title: “Entire Montana Town Abducted by Aliens.”
Before last night I would have never pondered such a theory. But Henri believes the Mogadorians are plotting to take over Earth, and I must admit, even though the theory in Sam’s publication is ludicrous, at its most basic level there might be something there. I know for a fact that the Loric have visited Earth many times over the life of this planet. We watched Earth develop, watched it through the times of growth and abundance when everything moved, and through the times of ice and snow when nothing did. We helped the humans, taught them to make fire, gave them the tools to develop speech and language, which is why our language is so similar to the languages of Earth. And even though we never abducted humans, that doesn’t mean it’s never been done. I look at Sam. I’ve never met somebody with a fascination in aliens to the point of reading and taking notes on conspiracy theories.
Just then the door opens and Mr. Harris sticks his smiling face in.
“Sorry to interrupt, Mrs. Burton. I’m going to have to snag Mark from you. The Gazette reporters are here to interview him for the paper,” he says loudly enough so everyone in the class can hear.
Mark stands, grabs his bag and casually strolls out of the room. From the doorway I see Mr. Harris pat him on the back. Then I look back at Sarah, wishing I could sit in the empty seat beside her.
Fourth period is physical education. Sam is in my class. After changing we sit beside each other on the gymnasium floor. He is wearing tennis shoes, shorts, a T-shirt two or three sizes too large. He looks like a stork, all knees and elbows, somewhat lanky even though he’s short.
The gym teacher, Mr. Wallace, stands firmly in front of us, his feet shoulder width apart, his hands clenched into fists on his hips.
“All right, guys, listen up. This is probably the last chance we’ll get to work outdoors, so make it count. One-mile run, as hard as you can. Your times will be noted and saved for when we run the mile again in the spring. So run hard!”
The outside track is made of synthetic rubber. It circles around the football field, and beyond it are some woods that I imagine might lead to our house, but I’m not sure. The wind is cool and goose bumps traverse the length of Sam’s arms. He tries to rub them away.
“Have you run this before?” I ask.
Sam nods. “We ran it the second week of class.”
“What was your time?”
“Nine minutes and fifty-four seconds.”
I look at him. “I thought skinny kids are supposed to be fast.”
“Shut up,” he says.
I run side by side with Sam towards the back of the crowd. Four laps. That is how many times I must circle the track to have run a mile. Halfway around I begin to pull away from Sam. I wonder how fast I could run a mile if I really tried. Two minutes, maybe one, maybe less?
The exercise feels great, and without paying much attention, I pass the lead runner. Then I slow and feign exhaustion. When I do I see a brown and white blur come dashing out of the bushes by the entrance of the grandstand and head straight towards me. My mind is playing tricks on me, I think. I look away and keep running. I pass the teacher. He is holding a stopwatch. He yells words of encouragement but he is looking behind me, away from the track. I follow his eyes. They are fixated on the brown and white blur. It is still coming straight for me and all at once the images from the day before come rushing back. The Mogadorian beasts. There were small ones too, with teeth that glinted in the light like razor blades, fast creatures intent on killing. I start sprinting.
I run halfway around the track in a dead sprint before I turn back around. There is nothing behind me. I have outrun it. Twenty seconds have passed. Then I turn back around and the thing is right in front of me. It must have cut across the field. I stop dead in my tracks and my perspective corrects itself. It’s Bernie Kosar! He’s sitting in the middle of the track with his tongue dangling, tail wagging.
“Bernie Kosar!” I yell. “You scared the hell out of me!”
I resume running at a slow pace and Bernie Kosar runs alongside me. I hope nobody noticed how fast I ran. Then I stop and bend over as though I have cramps and can’t catch my breath. I walk for a bit. Then I jog a little. Before I finish the second lap two people have passed me.
“Smith! What happened? You were dusting everyone!” Mr. Wallace yells when I run by him.
I breathe heavily, for show. “I—have—asthma,” I say.
He shakes his head in disapproval. “And here I thought I had this year’s Ohio state track champion in my class.”
I shrug and keep going, stopping every so often to walk. Bernie Kosar stays with me, sometimes walking, sometimes trotting. When I start the last lap Sam catches up to me and we run together. His face is bright red.
“So what were you reading in astronomy today?” I ask. “An entire Montana town abducted by aliens?”
He grins at me. “Yeah, that’s the theory,” he says somewhat shyly, as though embarrassed.
“Why would an entire town be abducted?”
Sam shrugs, doesn’t answer.
“No, really?” I ask.
“Do you really want to know?”
“Of course.”
“Well, the theory is that the government has been allowing alien abductions in exchange for technology.”
“Really? What kind of technology?” I ask.
“Like chips for supercomputers and formulas for more bombs and green technologies. Stuff like that.”
“Green technology for live specimens? Weird. Why do aliens want to abduct humans?”
“So they can study us.”
“But why? I mean, what reason could they possibly have?”
“So that when Armageddon comes they’ll know our weaknesses and be able to easily defeat us by exposing them.”
I’m kind of taken aback by his answer, but only because of the scenes still playing in my head from the night before, remembering the weapons I saw the Mogadorians use, and the massive beasts.
“Wouldn’t it be easy for them if they already have bombs and technologies far superior to our own?”
“Well, some people seem to think that they’re hoping we’ll kill ourselves first.”
I look at Sam. He is smiling at me, trying to decide whether I’m taking the conversation seriously.
“Why would they want us to kill ourselves first? What is their incentive?”
“Because they’re jealous.”
“Jealous of us? Why, because of our rugged good looks?”
Sam laughs. “Something like that.”
I nod. We run in silence for a minute and I can tell Sam is having a tough time, breathing heavily. “How did you get interested in all this?”
He shrugs. “It’s just a hobby,” he says, though I get the distinct feeling that he’s keeping something from me.
We finish the mile at eight minutes fifty-nine seconds, better than the last time Sam ran it. Bernie Kosar follows the class back to the school. The others pet him, and when we walk in he tries to come in with us. I don’t know how he knew where I was. Could he have memorized the way to the school this morning on the ride in? The thought seems ridiculous.
He stays at the door. I walk to the locker room with Sam and the second he catches his breath he rattles off a ton of other conspiracy theories, one right after another, most of which are laughable. I like him, and find him amusing, but sometimes I wish he would stop talking.
When home ec begins Sarah isn’t in class. Mrs. Benshoff gives instruction for the first ten minutes and then we head to the kitchen. I enter the station alone, resigned to the fact that I’ll be cooking alone today, and as soon as that thought occurs to me, Sarah walks in.
“Did I miss anything good?” she asks.
“About ten minutes of quality time with me,” I say with a smile.
She laughs. “I heard about your locker this morning. I’m sorry.”
“You put the manure there?” I ask.
She laughs again. “No, of course not. But I know they’re picking on you because of me.”
“They’re just lucky I didn’t use my superpowers and throw them into the next county.”
She playfully grabs my biceps. “Right, these huge muscles. Your superpowers. Boy, they are lucky.”
Our project for the day is to make blueberry cupcakes. As we start mixing the batter, Sarah begins telling me about her history with Mark. They dated for two years, but the longer they were together, the more she drifted from her parents and her friends. She was Mark’s girlfriend, nothing else. She knew she had started to change, to adopt some of his attitudes towards people: being mean and judgmental, thinking she was better than them. She also started drinking and her grades slipped. At the end of the last school year, her parents sent her to live with her aunt in Colorado for the summer. When she got there, she started taking long hikes in the mountains, taking pictures of the scenery with her aunt’s camera. She fell in love with photography and had the best summer ever, realizing there was far more to life than being a cheerleader and dating the quarterback of the football team. When she got home she broke up with Mark and quit cheerleading, and made a vow that she was going to be good, and kind, to everyone. Mark hasn’t gotten over it. She says he still considers her his girlfriend, and believes she’s going to come back to him. She says the only thing she misses about him are his dogs, which she hung out with whenever she was at his house. I then tell her about Bernie Kosar, and how he showed up at our doorstep unexpectedly after that first morning at the school.