Spit Catherine Miller Michelle stamped her feet free of snow at the door and trudged up the stairs, her galoshes squeaking, to the second floor of Dillinger Day School. The acrid smell of radiators on full blast and institutional paint filled the air. She tried to banish from her mind all traces of the last hour: being trapped in the school van as it wound its way through one neighborhood after the other, the driver stopping every so often to pick up another bundled child. Michelle always marveled as smiling parents waved from warm doorways as their little ones were driven away. They don’t even have a clue, Michelle thought to herself. The driver seemed impervious to his surroundings. His habit was to stare straight ahead, amid the shouting and taunting of others already on board. Ugly, ugly, ugly, they had chanted at Michelle in unison today. She took a deep breath and entered Mrs. Daly’s seventh grade homeroom. At this hour, the room was half filled with her classmates. No teachers were there yet, unless they were in their lounge. Michelle wondered what teachers did in their lounge, anyway. Jenny and Millie (short for Millicent, as she was loathe to be reminded) were in the corner by the world map, playing jacks. The soft, dull thud of the ball and the gentle clink of the jacks drew her attention there momentarily. Millie was smiling. Jenny looked cross. Michelle could guess who was winning this time. His face dappled with freckles, Danny was taking his usual pleasure in sneaking up behind unsuspecting others and plopping down one of his assortment of bouncy rubber snakes, bugs, and bearded dragons on their desks. This drew satisfying screams at first, and then the inevitable attempts to shake Danny off. She watched as Danny’s maniacal grin faded when Russell, his latest victim, finally shouted, “Get lost, man!” Steven, with his thick, black glasses (Four eyes, four eyes...) Had his head together with Jason, the Amad scientist,” as he was often called, talking about the latest Trekkie artifacts he’d gotten at the convention over the weekend. Alma, who’d arrived from the Philippines only one month ago, was doing what she always did in homeroom, drawing pictures of palm trees, and what Michelle imagined were fishing villages from home, her head bent over her sketchbook, her colored pens neatly arranged on the old wooden desk. “Hey, Chel! Over here,” called Amy, her best friend at school. She walked past the In Crowd, the girls whose hair was never out of place, whose clothes always looked in fashion, and the boys whose confident swagger was by turns captivating and unnerving. She felt their eyes on her. Their conversations were easy, but the bits and pieces Michelle could hear suggested their laughter was usually at someone else’s expense.
Volume 13, Number 1
SPRING 2001
phoebe
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Spit Michelle had spent hours in front of her closet mirror trying to imitate the In Crowd look, but never seemed to get it right. Something was missing. She slid into the desk next to Amy and plopped her backpack on the floor, pulling out the deck of cards before sliding her bag under the chair. Amy’s eyes sparkled with anticipation. It was time. “Any of you losers out there want to play ‘Spit’?” Amy called to the others with a confidence Michelle could not muster. Groans were heard from the four corners of the room. “Okay, suit yourselves,” Amy said, with an air of indifference. Whispers among some of the In Crowd girls alternated with little laughing smiles directed at them, as Michelle took the cards from their box and started shuffling. Then an amazing thing happened. Christine with the straight blond hair, looking like she had just emerged from a fashion magazine, moved towards them, smiling with disdain. “I’ll play,” she said, dragging a chair over from an adjacent desk. The In Crowd tittered from their side of the room. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea, Michelle thought to herself, keeping her gaze steady. She gave Christine her cards and concentrated on laying out her own, solitaire-style, on the desk. Christine was done before Michelle by a few seconds. “Ready, set, go!” cried Amy, who had a future as a master of ceremonies if she wanted it, thought Michelle, dryly. Both girls concentrated on putting their twos on aces or threes in the center pile, their sevens on eights or sixes, their jacks on tens or queens, flipping over their face down cards at breakneck speed as they rid themselves of the ones on top. A couple of times, Michelle slipped a card right under Christine’s, beating her to the punch, which made Christine have to take her card back until the next similar card appeared. Slap, slap, slap the cards went and, out of the corner of her eye, Michelle could see that the others had drawn near to the desk where they were playing. Danny’s rubber menagerie hung limply by his side and his eyes widened. Jenny and Millie had abandoned their jacks to watch. Even Alma was looking over at them, her pens idle for the moment. Michelle looked over at Christine, whose face was contorted beyond all recognition, her hair slipping out of place. Michelle felt like a big cat ready to pounce. A musky scent seemed to fill the air. “The lioness does not attempt to prey on all the available animals she sees; rather she carefully selects the most vulnerable individuals in the herd: the sick, the young...” she recalled from the nature programs she and Dad watched together. For once, she was not the prey.
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Spit Their cards were all flipped up now, the others long since added to the increasing piles between them. Michelle did not know how many Christine had left and there was no time to check. It wouldn’t be long now. Four cards... three... two... one... and “Spit!” Michelle cried out in a voice she didn’t recognize. She looked at Christine who had two cards left, one clenched in her hand, the other lying limp on the desk. Was that a bead of sweat on Christine’s forehead? Christine pouted for a moment, then put on her best smile. “Good game, ugly,” she smirked, retreating to her friends on the other side of the room. Michelle hardly heard her. She and Amy shared a triumphant high-five; then Michelle shuffled the cards and put them back in their box. “Good morning, Mrs. Daly,” she heard the class sing out in unison as their teacher walked in. Somehow, everyone had slipped back to their desks just before Mrs. Daly arrived. “Good morning,” Mrs. Daly chirped back as she was accustomed to do. Michelle slipped the box of cards back into her bag just in time to avoid being discovered. “Please open your history books to page 123.” As the books banged and the pages rustled, Michelle smiled. It was a brand new day.