MAGGIE BADGERED HER mother into teaching her how to drive to school. Nola instantly got used to it. Every morning, after her father left, Maggie went out and started the Jeep. Nola put a long puffy coat on over her robe, thrust her sleepy bare feet into Peter’s felt-lined Sorels. With a thermos go-cup of coffee in hand, she settled comfortably into the passenger’s seat. LaRose took the backseat. On the half-hour drive, it was Nola’s job to make encouraging noises and dial through the radio channels, finding the Hallelujah stations. Rush rants. Perky pop and stolid farm reports. It woke Nola up, freed her from the sticky webs of benzodiazepines. The radio and its familiar chaos flipped a pleasure switch in Maggie’s brain. Because she had her mother belted in safe beside her and LaRose safe in back, because she was in charge, she was light with relief. She hummed and tapped her fingers on the wheel. Through snow, through black ice, slippery cold rain, Maggie was a fully confident and careful driver.
When she got to the school drop-off, her mother kissed her dreamily, then walked around to slip behind the wheel and drive home. Maggie let her go. She let LaRose go. She walked down the high school hallway, flipped her hair, and now said hi to many girls. She called home sometimes, from the school office, just to hear her mother’s voice. On one hand, Maggie was now a stable, caring, overprotective daughter—adjusting slowly to the fear smother of her mother’s fragility. On the other, she was still a piece of work.
A disciplined piece of work.
She was cute in an early-supermodel-Cheryl-Tiegs way except her hair was dark, her eyes either gold or black, and except that sometimes there was hot contempt in her skewed gaze. She made it her business to study boys. How their heads, hearts, and bodies worked. She didn’t want one, but she could see herself controlling one. Maybe each of the so-called Fearsome Four, hunt them down, skewer their hearts. Have them for lunch although she was trying to be a vegetarian—because good for the skin. She was strict with herself.
Somehow, hulky Waylon got past all that. He stood by her locker and watched her exchange a set of books—morning books for afternoon books.
So are you okay here? Anybody bothering you?
She found it surprising that he would ask her this question, and weirder than that, she answered yes. Though nobody had bothered her at all.
Waylon’s interestingly lush features focused. He had an Elvis-y face, which Maggie knew only because Snow actually liked that old music. He was thick and broad, with soft skin over cruel football muscle. His hands were innocent, expressive, almost teacherly. His summer football practice crew cut was growing out into a thick fuzzy allover cap of furlike hair. He was taller than Josette but not quite as tall as Snow. Maggie stared at his hair intently, then decided that she liked his hair, a lot.
Waylon’s look had turned somber.
Who? he said at last.
What?
Who bothered you?
It wasn’t kids here, said Maggie. It was kids at my old school.
He nodded gravely, without speaking. He let his face talk, lowering his brows to let her know he was waiting for more. Maggie liked that, too.
There’s some guys, call themselves the Fearsome Four?
Waylon’s jaw slid sideways and his teeth came out sharply, gripping his bottom lip. He leaned his head to the side and squinted his sleepy eyes.
Ohhh yeahhh, he drawled. I know those guys.
Those guys bothered me real bad, said Maggie with a comfortable, bright smile. Especially Buggy. Wanna walk me to class?
Waylon swayed slightly as he walked, as if his heavy body needed to be set upright after every step. With Maggie beside him, so tensely pretty and purposeful, people looking at them, shy pleasure made him blush.
Whenever Nola and Peter had gone to teacher conferences at Maggie’s school in Pluto, it was the same: careless homework, trouble in the classroom, mouthing off, probably she wrote the c-word in a bathroom stall. However, test scores always perfect. That meant she was smart enough to change her behavior, if she wanted to. Clearly it was all on purpose, said her teachers. Peter had always left Maggie’s classroom gasping for control. Nola was silent, clutching his arm, her lips moving. They would walk unsteadily down the hall. After LaRose started school in Pluto, however, LaRose’s teachers had consistently erased Maggie’s distressing reviews.