It was the glasses that had clued me in. With a single leap of my heart I realized that I was looking at Bertha, but it wasn’t Bertha; at least not the Bertha I knew. She was positively beautiful. Her once tangled and greasy jet-black hair had been washed and combed and hung about her shoulders like a gleaming black veil. And—and… those horrible brown teeth of hers, though not white were sparkling ’cause she’d finally brushed them. All of her dark, smelly clothes had been traded for a very tight yellow dress that seemed to make her eyes pop… not to mention the rest of her figure; if you get what I am saying here.
“B-b-b-bertha?” I stammered in disbelief, “W-w-what happened to you?”
Bertha shifted her weight to one foot, rolled her eyes and asked, “Why? What’s wrong? My sister did it!”
“N-nothing!” I said, unable to stop grinning, “I-I-I mean you’re beautiful!” for the life of me I couldn’t stop stumbling through my words.
But I guess I said the right thing because she smiled again and I think my heart leapt in my chest for the second time.
“Oh my,” She gasped when she finally realized that it was Larry in the wheelchair, “Shit Larry! What the hell happened to you?!”
“Oh shit, Larry!” I thought, or did I say it? I’m not sure.
I spun around to see that Larry had the same kind of expression on his face at seeing Bertha cleaned up and looking HOT! I guess it was the first time he’d ever seen her like that too.
Bertha pushed me aside, almost knocking me into the punch table and despite her tight fitting dress she squatted beside him.
“What happened to you?” she asked again, but before Larry could say anything she bounced right back up again.
She spun around and jabbed a hard, accusing finger into my chest. “You did this, didn’t you?!”
“Bertha, wait!” Larry shouted.
Thank God she heard him or I probably wouldn’t be alive right now to tell you about all this.
“It was my fault!” Larry said, “I…” he faltered momentarily, but quickly recovered, “I was the one that jumped him in the park the other day.”
He went on to tell her exactly what happened. Boy he sure did a good job of making me sound like a real hero too. When he finished telling it all she turned back toward me and those normally cold, doll-like eyes seemed soft and warm.
I jumped when she threw herself at me. I swear I thought she was going to attack me. I even threw up my hands to block my face, but instead of hitting me, she wrapped her arms around me and kissed me on the cheek. Actually, she almost missed my cheek, another inch or so and she would have been kissing my ear.
Bertha didn’t say anything; I guess it would have been better if she had. Maybe I wouldn’t have been so confused when she let me go, turned back to Larry and kissed him. I am talking about a soul sucking, full on the lips kiss and when she didn’t stop I started to really feel very uncomfortable.
Thankfully, that slow song ended and someone in the band started talking so I turned my attention toward the band. I still couldn’t see through the crowd to who was talking, but whoever it was, even though he shouted and talked like a seasoned rock and roll star, he sounded quite young.
“GOOD EVENING BOYD JUNIOR HIGH!” the guy in the band shouted, but it wasn’t like normal shouting. Actually it took me a second to figure out that it was more like he was singing the words rather than just shouting them. It made for a really cool effect on the crowd.
The combined cheers of the crowd were deafening. I glanced back to Bertha and Larry; they were still lip-locked.
“Geez, get a room already would ya!” I thought to myself.
“COME ON! YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THAT! LET’S HERE IT BOYD JUNIOR HIGH!”
The crowd screamed even louder and I was forced to cover my ears in a feeble attempt to shield them from the roar. And then my eye caught sight of something, I wasn’t sure, but for a second somewhere in the crowd of students I thought I saw a boy from behind, wearing a blue shirt with a red collar. But the crowd was moving and jumping around so much that I couldn’t be sure. I wasn’t really thinking about it when I started pushing my way through the throngs of people.
As the guy from the Band continued to rev up the crowd I pushed forward until someone grabbed me by the back of the neck. I turned to see Stacks standing there. She looked even more beautiful and stunning than Bertha had. I even found myself gawking at her with my mouth hanging open.
“Wow you look so much better.” She commented.
“Stacks you look a-a-amazing!” I said still staring at her.
“So I hear you’re supposed to be here with Bertha?” Stacks asked.
I grimaced and finally broke my dumbfounded gaze as I pointed toward the punch table.
“Oh, they’re back together again.” She said drolly.
“Yeah, well he really loves her.” I said not really realizing that I had said it.
“Then you’re free?” She asked.
“Huh?” I grunted.
“To dance?” She said motioning toward the band.
“Uh, yeah I guess so, but don’t you have a date?” I asked.
“He doesn’t seem to be here yet.” She said.
“Hey did you get into any trouble?” I asked her.
“You don’t really want to hear about that?” she said almost as though she was hoping I would drop the subject, but the way she had put it only served to peek my curiosity.
Fearing the worst I nearly pounced on her as I asked, “Why? What happened?”
“Oh alright, I’ll tell you about it, but only if we can dance too.” She said grasping my good hand and dragging me into the crowd of dancing students.
The gist was that she could have been expelled for attacking a teacher. However, because of the circumstances and all, she was given 2 weeks of after school detention and she has to sit out five hockey games. The way she made it sound, I think she would have rather been dragged before a firing squad then miss out on hockey.
“I really am sorry that it got so messy!” I said.
“Well she’s an old witch and she’ll get what’s coming to her now!” Stacks said with utter contempt.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
I didn’t even realize that Stacks and I were dancing as close as we were while we spoke. I suppose to those around us we must have looked like we were an oddly matched couple or something, but we had to be that close so that we could hear each other.
I looked up into Stacks face as she said with an evil grin, “Well, she attacked a student now didn’t she?”
“You mean me? She didn’t attack me.” I argued.
“Sure she did. What do you call what she did to you? You were nearly in tears because she was hurting you so badly.” Stacks answered back.
In my own defense I quickly answered back, “I wasn’t crying!”
Stacks grinned ruefully, “That’s why I said nearly.”