Paige Harbison - Here Lies Bridget

I knew I’d been unnecessarily cruel to her, and I felt kind of guilty. But my day had sucked so far, too, and no one was apologizing to me. “Bridget—”

“So I ran into Anna today,” I started, cutting off Michelle. I knew she was going to give me grief and I just couldn’t deal with that on top of it all. Plus, I had to pretend that what had just happened didn’t bother me.

“And she introduced herself to me and all—she already knew my name—and then told me that Liam had told her to ‘look out for’ me. What do you suppose that means?”

Jillian, always interested in a good outrage, gasped and dropped her celery stick.

“He said that?”

I enlightened her on my theories of what he might have meant, and we talked about it for the rest of the period, eventually agreeing that he must have meant that I am so popular she’s bound to run into me, and to then introduce herself.

As soon as the bell rang indicating the end of lunch, I told Michelle about the deal I’d made with Brett. Well, I told her the half she needed to know, which was that she was sitting with him on Monday at lunch.

She raised her eyebrows at me.

“I’m what?”

“It’s no big deal. Seriously, I said I’d get him a date, and all he wanted was to ask you out himself.” She stared at me.

“Oh, my God, Michelle, just say no to him, it’s not that hard.” “Bridget, you can’t just—” What, now she was going to start rebelling, too? “Well, you’re going to sit with him, so …” I let the so hang in the air, letting her fill in the blank for herself with stop arguing with me. I smiled superficially, wiggled a goodbye with my fingers to Jillian and then strutted off to class. I didn’t look back to see what Michelle did next.

As I walked away, I began to wonder if what I was about to do was wrong. Sure, chances were that Brett wouldn’t get caught helping me, and that he wouldn’t dive into a depression when Michelle said no to his date. But still—what if we did get caught? What if he did fail the class, and it was my fault? What if between that and Michelle rejecting him, he did slip into a depression? Anyone would, after being expelled from this school. It was such a high-profile place that anything that happened here was practically in the society pages.

But no, I thought to myself. I was giving my actions far more credit than they deserved. Brett would be fine. We wouldn’t get caught, and even if we did … Brett would be fine.

My conviction wavered a bit once I walked into my NSL class and saw that there was a substitute teacher.

Okay, this could go one of two ways. Either the sub was nicer than Mrs. Remeley, our usual teacher, or she could be nasty.

Nasty like that teacher we’d had in middle school who kept telling us to sit up straight and hold our books a certain way during reading time.

Nice like my first-grade teacher with Valentine’s Day candy and the inability to stop me from doing what I wanted. Which, in first grade, was to use Brett to my advantage.

On my way to my seat, I watched her. She looked to be about in her fifties, but according to the chalkboard, she was a “Miss.” Miss Smithson. She was mousy and looked nervous. I instantly felt some indefinable emotion for her.

Brett was in his seat looking down at his notes when I sat down. I tapped him on the shoulder.

“Hey, Brett?”

“Yeah?” he asked, eyes still on his paper. I clicked my tongue at his lack of interest in what I had to say.

“I talked to Michelle.” I grinned as he looked up at me.

“She’s looking forward to Monday.”

I could tell that he wasn’t sure if I was telling the truth or not. Whatever, he was probably hopeful enough to choose to believe I was telling the truth. And there was nothing wrong with giving him some hope. Especially because my hope was that this encouragement would stop him from backing out.

The bell rang, and Miss Smithson cleared her throat.

“Good afternoon, students!” She waited for a response. Though she didn’t seem to notice, the only response she got was a raised eyebrow from me.

“As you know, you’ve got a test today. It’s only three pages long, and it’s all multiple-choice. I’m sure you’ll all do fine.”

Really, you are? I thought, unnecessarily.

She started passing out the papers.

“Be sure to write your names in the upper right-hand corner!”

This spurt of enthusiasm had me raising both of my eyebrows.

When the test finally got to me, I wrote my name and took a look at the first question.

What the hell was “gerrymandering”?

I looked over at Brett’s paper, which already bore the answers to three questions on the first page. I circled the a on the first question and hurried to write the other answers. He couldn’t go this fast, or I wouldn’t keep up.

“Slow down!” I commanded in a whisper out of the side of my mouth.

He looked at me, looked at the substitute and then ripped the corner off of the first page of his test. The teacher looked up, and we both tried to look busy. She finally put her nose back into her romance novel, and I glared at Brett.

I inhaled deeply as I saw that he was writing something to me in his slanted handwriting, which gave all of his letters long stems.

He slid the note onto my desk. After one glare at him for his entire lack of stealth and several discreet glances at the teacher, I opened the note and read it.

I can’t do this. You have to do the work.

My eyes and mouth widened and I turned toward Brett, who was staring determinedly down at his paper. What was happening to everyone? No one ever said no to me!

I spoke through my teeth. “You. Have. To.”

“I can’t,” he whispered.

“I can’t risk it.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Miss Smithson stand up and walk toward us. I shushed Brett, who was no longer making any noise, and went back to my test. My heart was beating so hard, I was sure she would see the pounding in my chest. I circled the other answers that Brett had put down and answered the two following without reading the questions. I heard her soft, non-heeled steps come closer and finally stop in front of our desks.

“Could you two please step out into the hall?”

There were times when I was trying to get away with something but felt positive that the fact that I was practically swallowing my face would give me away.

This was one of those times.

How was this possible? Out of absolutely nowhere, everything I did today was failing. Nothing was going my way. And truthfully? That’s not how my life works.

I looked up to see Brett’s panicked glare and then Miss Smithson’s disappointed gaze. We walked out into the echoing hall and she followed us. Once in the hall, she headed for the staff lounge a few doors down.

Brett and I stood in silence for a few seconds.

“I, um …” I wasn’t sure what I was going to say, whether it would come out as an apology or as an accusation. I didn’t have time to decide because, at that moment, Miss Smithson came out of the lounge. Chubby little Ms. Chase, whose mouth was full of food and who had clearly just been pulled from her lunch period, followed.

Ms. Chase waved jovially at Brett and me, and then walked into the NSL classroom to chaperone. To make sure no one else was cheating, I guess.

What was I going to do if my father found out about this? He was no tyrant, but he would definitely find cheating unacceptable. There would be angry words. Punishment. Disappointment. Though that might be my own, once Meredith was proven right about me. That I could not handle.

When I had done something wrong was the only time I was even a little not-horribly-resentful that my mother had died in a car accident when I was seven. That way I had only one parent I worried about, one stepparent I couldn’t care less about and one parent I tried never to think about.