Only the Good Die Young

Chapter 2.3

The class ripples with outrage and worry. Several students dash for the small row of books near Freud's desk and empty it of every volume. Others consult their friends or dive into their backpacks for textbooks, flipping pages for a poem that will save them from an F. But I don't have a textbook or a friend.

Only three are unconcerned: Miss Lee, the model-slash-Shakespeare expert up at the front who is touching up her lipstick; J.J., who's beating a different rhythm in each hand; and Mister Foster, sitting in his desk, smoldering. He looks my way and his fingernail stops scratching. The frantic terror in my eyes meets the anger in his.

"Give me a sheet of paper," he whispers, leaning into the aisle.

"What?"

"Quick."

The last thing I want to do is get into trouble, but I can't start off school like this. I open my spiral bound notebook and rip out a single sheet as quietly as I can. I make sure Freud isn't looking – he's angrily writing in a journal on his desk – and pass it over. The class is so busy flipping through textbooks that no one notices.

"What are you doing?" I say. Mister Foster clicks the end of his pen and starts scrawling rapidly.

"Four minutes," calls Freud, consulting a brass pocket watch on the end of a chain.

My heart is in my throat. I'm completely at the mercy of Mister Foster, the wannabe rock star. I have no poem, no friends, and what very much looks to be an F on my first day of school. Mom will kill me.

"Time," calls Freud, scraping his chair against the floor as he stands. Mister Foster waits until Freud puts his watch back into his pocket, then tosses the page on to my desk.

"Miss Lockhart," says Freud. He towers over me and I smell Old Spice. "Are you prepared?"

My mouth is dry, but Mister Foster nods. The paper is covered with scrawlings, legible, but only just, and an S in the second line is backwards. Freud escorts me to the front of the room. I stare at the sea of the faces and their prying eyes. My stomach is in knots. Freud stands to my side, impatient.

"Ready as I'll ever be," I mumble.

The class is silent. Most of the girls are sympathetic to the new student, but a few guys in the back lean forward over their desks and leer. Jerks.

"Very well, Miss Lockhart," says Freud. "What's the poet's name?"

The paper in my hands trembles, but I read the name off the page: "James Hetfield."

"I haven't heard of him," says Freud.

That makes two of us. This is great.

"And the name of the poem?"

"Enter Sandman," I read, hoping to God that Mister Foster's intentions are good, and he's not out to get a laugh at my expense.

"Nor have I heard of his work," says Freud. "What is the poet's nationality?"

Mister Foster has cautiously turned both of his hands into guns and is pulling the triggers of his thumbs.

"Uh, I think he's American."

"Very well," says Freud. "Proceed."

I nervously clear my throat and begin, trying to sound as regal and dignified as possible as I read about a parent tucking a boy into bed, trying to protect him from the evils of the world.

The class's reaction is mixed: Mister Foster's expression is a mixture of anger and satisfaction. Miss Lee's face shows disbelief. J.J. gazes at me with an expression of shock. Daydreaming students yawn and draw graffiti on their desks, but the ones who are paying attention gape in horror.