To the Power of Three by Laura Lippman

Author:Laura Lippman
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
ISBN: 9780061836787
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2011-11-13T12:19:32.660000+00:00

20

Peter knew it was a bad idea to go to the high school Monday morning, but he just couldn’t help himself. He was bored out of his mind. Television was all girly stuff, even on pay cable—clearly no self-respecting man was supposed to be watching television before noon. The Glendale pool didn’t have weekday hours until later in the summer, and the early-June days were too cool for swimming anyway. Besides, he wasn’t sure how the producers would feel about him tanning. Guy Pearce was a pretty pale guy, although there was a hint of olive in his complexion. With all those self-tanners on the market, Peter could always go darker fast if need be, whereas if he overtanned, there was no makeup in the world that could take it down. Too bad, because Peter tanned beautifully.

A year ago, even as recently as Christmas, Peter might have found some of his old compadres hanging around Glendale, but college graduation had changed that dynamic. People had jobs or internships, or else they were doing big trips before they plunged into grad school. There were no students at the high school who knew him, although the real drama geeks might remember him from his community-theater work.

But his drama teacher was still on the faculty, and Peter couldn’t resist going up there, sharing his big news. Old Giff would be so happy for him. Really, it would be a favor to him, letting him be the first to know that one of his former students was succeeding at such a high level.

Vans from the local television stations were parked on the shoulder along Glendale Circle, and Peter had a hunch some security guy would be posted at the front door, making sure that all visitors reported to the office. But these were his old stomping grounds. He knew tricks that no reporter, no stranger, ever could. Instead of heading to the front doors, he ambled to one of the breezeways, losing himself in the crowd of students during a class change. The kids glanced his way—they weren’t fooled by the twenty-two-year-old impostor among them—but didn’t challenge him, just kept up their own manic chatter. It took him a second to tune in to their frequency, and when he did, he realized that all the buzzing was about the shooting. Of course.

Old Giff was sitting in a chair on the stage, and in the split second before he realized he was being observed, he reminded Peter of a particularly poignant Malvolio from a Lincoln Center production of Twelfth Night, and it wasn’t just because he wore bright yellow trousers. Giff had a rubbery, comic countenance, the kind made for Neil Simon’s earlier plays, but left to its own devices, Old Giff’s face sagged into melancholic lines and folds. He looked lonely and unloved, and in full knowledge of the fact that he was lonely and unloved. In high school Peter had refused to think about Giff’s sexuality, not that he had a problem with people being gay or whatever.

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