I woke up on Monday feeling sick to my stomach.
Just like that…the revelation last week, the fifteen million thoughts going through my mind about what I was going to do and then that occurred. Since I hadn’t eaten much the night before it was mostly dry-heaving and even though I felt hungry, the thought of eating anything started the process all over again. I got dressed for school and tried to make myself as presentable as I wanted to for a Monday. Surprisingly, Alexis and Alex were in the kitchen waiting for me. We all nodded to each other and walked out of the house. Paul’s car was in the driveway so it was safe to assume Wednesday wasn’t riding with us.
Alexis got in the back seat of the car without arguing with Alex or throwing any glares at me.
I climbed in as Alex threw the remains of his cigarette on the ground. He then got behind the wheel and started the car.
I wanted to ask what the occasion was or if someone had switched bodies with my siblings.
“Cherr,” Alexis said from the backseat. She didn’t have her make-up case out or anything and she actually looked at me when I turned back to her. “We need to talk. The three of us.”
“Yeah,” Alex said as he pulled the car out onto the road and casually drove away from the house. It wasn’t the standard slam the accelerator down and into fifth gear in ten seconds, but a gradual acceleration.
“About what?”
“Are you missing any of your stuff?” Alexis asked.
“No, not that I know of.”
“No earrings, necklaces or, maybe, money?”
“Especially money,” Alex replied.
“No.”
“We think Wednesday and Paul are robbing Mom and us blind. I’m missing money.”
“Mom’s tools are missing and someone tried to break into the locker.” The locker was Alex’s name for the growing room in the garage.
“You think it was Wednesday.”
“I know Paul’s responsible. I’m sure Wednesday’s a part of it too,” Alexis replied.
I looked at the two of them and tried to think of things that were missing or misplaced but I couldn’t. I didn’t have anything worth stealing and I assumed that Alex had “borrowed without asking” on several occasions.
“The happy-go-lucky announcement last night was the thing that broke it for me, or us.” Alexis said and Alex nodded. “They’re planning something. Maybe some big wedding or maybe they’re going to elope but Mom’s blind to it. We, the three us, need to help her see the shit that’s going on.”
“This stays with the three of us, right Cherr?”
“Yeah. Yes, of course,” I replied with sincerity as there was no way in Hell I would attempt to just tell Mom, Wednesday or Paul because of the repercussions that would happen from any of them if I said anything.
“I found a pawn ticket for Mom’s drill hammer.”
“Shit, that too?”
“Hmm-mm. They only got like fifty bucks for it. It wasn’t in their name. It was in Tom’s. I’m going kill that son of bitch one day.”

I wanted to kind of feel happy for Wednesday. I mean, happy days had been few and far between for our family. If mom bought anything else besides hash browns and ramen?
Happy day.
Two-ply toilet paper?
Happier day.
Not leaving a towering stack of cigarette butts on an ashtray in the middle of the living room?
Please cue the choir of angels.

So, I wanted to feel for her happiness but I couldn’t. Not when I felt like shit and not when she was indirectly making the rest of us feel shitty too. Wednesday could float and float around the house and school like she was a Disney princess but we all knew her price charming stole the ideas, and the ring, and shoes from: the rest of us.
Alex shook his head and lit another cigarette. “I’m going to quit smoking tobacco one day.”
“Just tobacco?” Alexis asked,
“Yep. Pot doesn’t cause the crud to build in your lungs.”
“But fogs up your brain.”
“It’s worked for Jimmy Hendrix, all of the Beatles, Jerry Garcia.”
“You don’t play guitar.” Alexis replied as she rolled down the window.
“I know, But they all had a business side to their music. Business, Alexis; that’s where it goes.”
“You’ll smoke your product before you make any money whatsoever.”
“Beats stealing from the the ones who need it the most.”
Alex refused to hide any bitterness about the situation
“Instead, sell it to the ones who need it the least?” Apparently, Alexis never noticed how some of the kids at Reardan had money for cigarettes, dip and beer. What was one more drug?
“I will have you know that the folks on the north side of town, the ones who live in the two-story houses.”
“We live in a two-story house, Alex.”
“We live in a shack, not a mansion.”
“I feel sad for any girl who ever played “MASH” with you.”

We arrived at the school and I got out of the car and walked up to the grade school. Becky and Christy met me halfway.
“You look like shit,” Becky said.
“I feel like it. Too much drama at home.”
“And now you’re here for more,” Christy replied as she took my backpack.
“I bet Christy that you’re going to be pissed.”
“She didn’t bet me,”
“I wanted to,” Becky replied.
“What are you talking about?”
“Another low point for Josh Daniels.”
“What?”
Christy held the door open for me as I stepped past her and Becky.
I ran down the hall and turned the corner into the junior high wing and found my locker opened with everything covered in red paint.
“What the hell?” I whispered to myself. “Why?”
“I was going to borrow a pen and when I opened the door, this all came out.”
“What’s going on here?” We all froze as we heard Mrs. J’s voice behind us. She looked at the three of us and then at the red paint inside my locker. “What is this?”
“I just got here, Mrs. J, I have no idea. But look, my books are ruined. So are my pencils and papers.”
Mrs. J’s expression went from annoyed to pained as she must havre read my face that I was just as surprised as she was. She reached in and touched the paint, which was still fresh.
“Josh?” Christy asked.
“He would never admit to it if it was him.”
“Can I go kick his ass?”
“That’s enough, Miss Petty.” Mrs. J said as she looked at me. “Cherry, let’s go to the office and let them know that we need to have your locker cleaned out.”
“We’ll stay here and guard it, Mrs. J.” Becky replied, I assumed to try and get on her good side after her proficient use of French.
I walked down the hall with Mrs. J and for some reason I thought I was the one being punished. In away I was, as everyone saw my locker. I would have red-tinted everything until the end of the school year. All of my papers would look like I had stained them in blood…actually that would have been kind of cool if the school allowed me to keep everything. Instead, all of the crimson soaked items were thrown out of my locker and into a cardboard box layered with paper towels.
I spent the rest of the morning feeling more pissed than I ever thought I could have. The restless thought of not knowing who did it. Sure, in the court of mfo Josh did it and I could confront him about it but it wouldn’t get me anywhere so I said nothing to him as we sat at our walled-in desks. I stared at the desk wall and fought the urge to get up and tell Josh everything I thought about him. How I hated him with so much piss and and anger that I wanted to rip him to pieces because I was pregnant by him!
“Heard about your locker,” he said form the other side of the desk partition.
“Yeah, like you had nothing to do with it.”
“I swear I didn’t.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Believe what you want to.”
“I will”, I replied.
“I guess we shouldn’t even talk.”
“I guess not, “ I said as I folded my arms and laid my head on my desk. My pulse quickened and I wanted to blurt everything out but I refused because he would deny it and then twist my words around to any brainless idiot who would listen and believe his crock of shit story about me. It would be just like if we were back in sixth grade except with dirtier vocabularies. I was fine with not telling him anything about us or anything to do with my life. I didn’t need him in our lives.
After lunchtime detention I went on to my fifth period class and just stuck to doing my classwork; an idea that would have been great to have started doing weeks ago instead of thinking of other things. I used to imagine that I didn’t really need school and on some days I would have just said screw it, I’m staying in bed or going out to party like Wednesday always did and everything seemed to work out fine for her in world. She didn’t have someone dredge her locker in paint. She didn’t have fears that people would talk about her. My sister didn’t care about anything except for herself and Paul.
I really wanted to think like that too but I would have to stop caring about everyone around me and just live in a bubble. I couldn’t do that because for as much sadness and shit rained on me on a daily basis I kind of knew that dancing out in that cesspool downpour would help me to cope with the future. Junior high sucked but I learned enough form my parents to know that the adult world sucked royally and there were no teachers out there to try and help you. And at the moment, I felt like I needed to talk to someone who could give me a straight answer.

I ran to the high school in order to make it to Home Ed so I could, maybe, try to talk to Mrs. Jantz about everything. She was removed enough from the teachers in the junior high that I thought I wouldn’t have to worry about her talking to the other teachers but a voice stopped me: Mom.
“Why can't I have a week go by without you doing something that pisses me off!”
Mom stepped out of the office doorway and I ducked behind the Pepsi machine that was off to the left side of the hallway. I hoped that she had parked up front.
“Paul is a fucking thief, mom. Too bad you can't see that.”
“So you have to go and break his nose? Smart, Alex. Really smart!”
“Well he is.”
“Can you prove that?”
“You’re missing two saws from the garage; money and other shit’s missing. Do you want me to dust for fingerprints?”
“No, I want you to give me your keys.”
“What?”
“Your car keys. Hand them over, Alexander Wayne Moone.
Alex usually had a keychain full of keys that no one else knew what they went to. One of them was to his growing room.
“How the fuck do I get home then?”
“Ride the damn bus.” Mom’s voice tailed-off. “Get back to class.” She had performed the Linda Moone Order: what she said went. No discussion, because she would then walk away from you.,
At that time, then high school bell, signaling the end of sixth period, rang out.
I stepped out from behind the Pepsi machine and ran to Alex. His face was bruised but if he was in a fight, it looks like he may have won.
“Some guy named Lenny,” I saiid as I felt all of the blood rising to my head.
“Who?”
“They took our stuff to some guy named Lenny, they got like, maybe five hundred dollars.”
“Son of bitch. They said Lenny?”
“Who’s Lenny?”
“A lowlife. I’ll go and pay him a little visit this afternoon.”
“Didn't mom take your keys?”
Alex reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a keychain. “She took a key.”