The Butch and the Beautiful by Kris Ripper

Author:Kris Ripper [Ripper, Kris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Riptide Publishing
Published: 2016-05-26T04:00:00+00:00

The key to a good lock-in event is having a whole lot of constant activity. From the registration table, I could pick out a Texas Hold’em area, some kind of arts-and-crafts station that seemed popular, three photo booths that never stopped running all night, and a small staged area for a hypnotist. Someone had set up one of those dance competition video games, and at some point they’d start painting the senior mural, which was made on Grad Nite and hung up the following year in the front hallway of the school in a place of honor. I looked forward to the mural mostly because a few of the cleverer kids always found a way to add inappropriate content and not get caught; Bill and I would spend most of September studying the mural and counting the penises.

I was tethered to the main table for the first two hours as kids trickled in. We didn’t lock the doors until ten, which felt roughly like a year and a half after we’d eaten black bean burgers. I really wished I’d brought one with me. Say what you want about food with faces, but at least it sat in your guts long enough to keep you full.

Mrs. Winchester gave me another narrow look. “By the way you’ve been jittering the last thirty minutes, I assume you have urgent business you have to take care of, Jaqueline. Don’t let us stop you.”

“Um.” Urgent business? I could definitely invent urgent business. “Yeah, well, anyway, I’ll be back in a few minutes.” Or never. Either way.

I’d opted for white shirt/black slacks as a nod to the formality of the evening, and it was a little disheartening to realize I basically blended in with the high schoolers. Walking across the gym in a sea of kids, also in formal wear, many of whom were taller than me, made me feel abruptly transported back in time to my own Grad Nite. I’d kissed a straight girl named Lula and she’d spent the next hour telling me how she’d expected it to be weird, but it wasn’t, it wasn’t at all, and did I know that it wasn’t that weird to kiss girls? Did I know?

At least tonight would not be a repeat of any personal disasters. I only had to be on guard against other people’s disasters.

None so far, though. Some tears. A few minor irritations cropping up here or there. As far as I could tell, the refreshments monitors hadn’t let any booze slip into the general punch bowl (you’d think that would be easy; it isn’t), so the only intoxication so far was what the kids had managed to do before walking in. There would be more later—they always found a way to sneak it in—but right now everything was basically copacetic.

I slipped out a door, nodding to the guard standing there (my fellow history teacher, Mr. Lanai), and into the cool, deserted hallway beyond.

So quiet. The music/laughter/talking/noise of the gym still rumbled beyond the wall, but my entire body was relieved for a moment of peace.

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