"I heard the Reverend's back." The SGA president spoke as he hauled a box of decorations along the sidewalk.
Carolyn nods quickly beside his footsteps, hauling a second box of 20-year-old decorations from the church.
"How was your uncle?"
Carolyn pushed open her fence with her old sneakers and then she responds. "He's quiet."
The president mutters to himself: "No wonder."
The SGA president and vice president threw down two large crates of leftover party decorations onto Carolyn's front porch. Carolyn plopped on her front steps and the president settled down beside her.
He stretched out the legs of his long brown pants in front of him. "Thanks for all your help last time--it was a gas! We got a few pictures too, for yearbook: The SGA Saves Homecoming!" The president drew out a large school newspaper headline with a dramatic swipe of his hand and laughs.
Carolyn only smiles weakly as she thinks about Michael leaving soon.
Carolyn's co-officer pries. "What's wrong?"
Carolyn shakes her head and looks away from the distance to give him a painful, but convincing, grin.
The president returns it with relief. "It's kind of weird--it all went by so fast." He watches a car speed by and nods. "You've...we've changed so much since first grade." The president fidgets with his glasses. "Are you going to homecoming, Carol?"
Carolyn nods and hugs the knees of her overalls to her chest. Her ponytail licks in the fall wind like the tail of a lonely horse on a prairie.
The president raises his eyebrows in surprise. "I am, too." He quickly adds, "It'll be our first and last." He swallows steadily. "You have a date?"
Carolyn shifts at an unfamiliar sight walking along the fence of her house: Jason, Roxanne and Dick. The three walk uninvited onto Carolyn's lawn and crowd around the two officers.
The president looks back and forth between Carolyn and the three members of the neighborhood gang to try to form a connection that made any sense. Jason volleyed a dusty baseball between his hands.
Before long, Dick hoists the president by the collar and tosses him onto Carol's lawn. "Beat it."
The president nearly stumbles on the grass, but then he smiles at Carolyn's honest wave goodbye and disappears.
Roxanne blinks annoyedly when she finally hears the president's footsteps ebb away from behind her ears. "You didn't rat on us, did you? If there's one thing I hate, it's a snitchy bitch." Even though Roxanne was the punchline for every one of the gang's inside jokes, her pointed eyebrows and ice-cold brown eyes reminded Carolyn what Roxanne was truly capable of doing. Jason and Dick stood still for Carolyn's reply.
Carolyn shook her head strongly.
Roxanne's expression melted into a cheery, hot-lipsticked grin. "Alright. Well, we also came over to tell you that Judy left."
Before Carolyn could ask, Jason stepped in. "She just got in a stupid fight with Dick over the black guy in the diner."
"It was so fucking stupid." Dick echoed under his breath. He blinked quickly and slowly shook his head, remembering some cutting words.
"She was just acting weird lately--talking shit about Nixon and stuff." Jason picked at the red thread of his baseball between his palms and looked off into the house next door. "I don't get it."
"She doesn't hang around anymore." Roxanne added after a moment of flashbacks. "No communists allowed." There was a brief murmur of agreement between Jason and Dick.
Roxanne followed Jason to the sidewalk, but shoved Dick quickly before she jogged away from Dick's immediate glare. The two snickered down the sidewalk, trading turns with catches of Jason's baseball.
Dick sat down beside Carolyn, looking oddly defeated and sad. Carolyn squirmed on the brick stairs uncomfortably: she wasn't used to seeing him like that, or being that close to him. In the bright sunlight, she could recognize a tiny dimple in his chin that she remembered being there as long as she had known him. It had faded over the years, but it was still there.
"Where have you been?" His voice asked gruffly. "You haven't shown up at Biggs for a while."
Carolyn looked down. "I'm busy."
"You're always busy!" He looked at her and shook his head. "And quiet." Dick's chest squeezes and expands with every fuming breath he takes. He digs a pebble from the wedge of the stairs and hurls it onto the street. It bounces only once, and Dick watches the pebble while it sits motionless on the road.
"I'm sorry." Carolyn stares back in his eyes.
Dick's blue eyes meet Carolyn's gaze and move imperceptibly over the way her fluttering brown hair creates a floating halo around her forehead.
Carolyn's front door opens. The reverend steps out carefully and lifts a box of decorations into his arms. "Come start dinner." He tells his daughter. His glasses settle on Dick.
"Hi." Dick mutters.
"How is your father?"
Dick shrugs. "How do you think he is?"
Reverend Hill tenses his lip understandingly. He calls Carolyn in again and shuts the door behind him. Carolyn patiently sits for a passing minute next to Dick, but then she starts lifting the remaining box of decorations inside the house.
"You're going with me to homecoming, alright?" Dick calls from behind her figure. "Look real pretty by six that weekend and I'll swing by in the Chevy." Carolyn turns to find Dick strutting away from her porch without another word.
"But...!" Carolyn protests. She quickly turns to Dick, who is paused by the wooden planks of the Hills' fence.
"We'll have a nice time." Dick interjects. His blue eyes blink slowly and honestly.
Carolyn breathes in her place.
"And there's an after party, if you're interested. It's more Judy's crowd, but I think you'd fit right in." His eyes shift. "Don't tell your Pa I said that." Dick walks on towards his house at the end of the block.
Later on
Jason dug in his leather jacket for some syringes stuck deep in his pockets. "And for the afterparty--" His hands peeked out some small syringes from his zipper. "I've got it these."
Roxanne squealed. "Where?"
"From the clinic-lady." Jason leaned toward the diner table. "Nurse wasn't lookin' so I just took the whole stack." Roxanne and Jason shared a grin.
Carolyn's eyes flared with curiosity. "What are they for?"
Jason shook his head and Roxanne sipped on her sweet tea innocently.
Dick playfully jolted Carolyn on his lap. "Don't worry about it, huh?" He waited for Roxanne to blabber to Jason again before he whispered in her ear. "What are you wearing?"
Carolyn blubbered. "Um...it's Roxanne's dress." She braced at the sound of disapproval she thought she could hear in his voice.
Dick took a long inhale in her neck. "That's not what I meant."
Michael came back around to their table, twirling his pencil impatiently. "Have you all made up their minds?" He kept his eyes away from the new couple in the corner of his eye.
Jason sighed loudly, but there wasn't complete annoyance in the sound. He straightened up in his chair. "We get the same thing mostly every week. Me--water. Roxanne--fries and sweet tea. Carol-Jean--a malt. Dick--nothing. I mean...it ain't rocket science, boy."
Dick's chuckle faded at the sight of the storefront from outside. The cowbell clanged on top of the door to welcome the new customer.
Judy's shoes clicked across the checkerboard tiles and stopped threateningly at the table nearest to the bar. She folded her arms on her hips and looked deadly at Dick, who kept his head high and averted. Carolyn couldn't rip her eyes away from Judy fast enough because the look that Judy gave her nearly dissolved her soul.
"Actually--" He faced Carolyn's fainty alarmed look. "Give me a cheeseburger." Dick grasped a handful of Carolyn's thigh. "With extra juicy, red tomatoes."
Michael's eyes flashed to Dick's hand, but he retained a neutral frown for the whole table. "I'll be back." He stuck his pencil behind his ear and looked back at Carolyn's blushing face. "And I'll get your malt for you." His smile was oddly genuine.
"You want extra whip cream with that?" Judy spat at Carolyn.
Jason snickered with Roxanne until they had to muffle their own giggles.
Dick glared at a rusted Route 66 sign on a far-opposite wall. "You bitch."
"Look who's talkin'." Judy replied.
"Why are you even here, sweetheart?" Roxanne sipped questioningly on her tea.
"I'm here because I have great news!" Judy smiled brightly and sat on a stool in front of the table. "The principal finally found out who did it. But, thanks to Carol-Jeanie, we're not in trouble."
"But...." Carolyn started.
"Don't act dumb." Judy silenced her with a humorous squint in her eyes. "SGA gets almost everything from the church. They won't ever punish you." She exchanged looks with her forgotten gang. "Looks like she did you all a favor. You should thank her."
Michael started to leave.
"Hold on--" Judy held Michael's arm. The whole table was instantly bewildered at Judy's sly glance at Dick. Judy looked back at Michael with an inviting grin. "Why don't we go to homecoming together?"
Roxanne's mouth dropped wide open, and Jason couldn't keep his sights on anyone's expression without volleying to another pair of bulging eyes. He cackled nervously. "Judy. I know you've changed but--come on, now."
Michael swallowed uncomfortably. "I don't know."
"Why?" Judy spoke gently between her and Michael, ignoring the look Dick was giving him.
"Because...." Michael glanced earnestly at the kitchen he was dying to hide in.
"Leave the black kid out of this--come on, Judy!" Jason whined.
"Don't mind him." Judy stared deep into Michael's eyes. "You think I'm pretty?"
"Well..." He admired her blonde, curly hair. "I guess, but..."
"Then, what's the problem, honey?"
Michael darkened at a mental image of Carolyn curled up against Dick. "Nothing."
"Alright." Judy lit up at their unspoken approval and released him. Michael looked around uneasily and left to the kitchen. Judy stood and glowered at all of them. "It's time this town changed around here. And it's gonna start with me." She smugly walked towards the exit.
"Niggerlover."
Judy slowed for only a second, the amount of time it took for the word to stab her chest, but she kept walking and pushed out the door to walk herself home.