Dead End High

‘Unman…’

‘Present, Sir’

‘Wittering...’

‘Present, Sir’

‘And Zigo...’

‘He’s absent, Sir.’

‘Again?’

Adam had never heard such absurd names in his life. The roll call was part of a play. It was English class and Miss Crazy had decided to put aside To Kill a Mockingbird to focus on the literary masterpiece of Giles Cooper – Unman Wittering & Zigo. It was a novel idea. A teacher had been murdered and the new teacher, Mr John Ebony, had taken over only to discover the entire class may have been involved in a plot to murder their former teacher. And now the students were forcing him to do what they wanted, intimidating him.

Ironically, the character Zigo was never in the play. He was always absent. The irony was even more evident this morning as further students had failed to show for school. Three were missing from English: Natalie McKinnon, Phil Masters and Catherine Millan. Teachers as usual, buzzed around trying to find out whether anyone had seen them over the weekend or before school. Of course, nobody had.

‘Incompetence, that’s what it is,’ commented Scott just before class started. ‘Why can’t they get their act together and find out what’s going on?’

‘Typical,’ agreed Darren, looking at them gloomily. ‘Makes you wonder what’s wrong with the lot of them.’

‘It’s the usual scenario, dude.’ Scott said. ‘They won’t do anything unless someone loses their life.’

‘Life,’ Darren sighed, ‘don’t talk to me about life.’

‘You ok, Darr?’ Adam looked at him with concern.

‘I guess all these disappearances are starting to get me down.’

‘Yeah, well I don’t blame you.’

Despite the disappearances of a handful of classmates, that morning they had gained one new student. She was already in the classroom when Adam arrived. She was short and had very long brown hair, big beautiful brown eyes and a rounded chin. As soon as he entered the classroom, she noticed him, which actually made him feel quite chuffed. She seemed to have no interest in Drake and most of the girls in class couldn’t help but gaze at him whenever they had the opportunity.

Scott nudged him. ‘I think she likes you, frood. Must be your lucky day.’

Adam smiled at her and she smiled back, then turned her head to conceal her blushing.

‘She does, man! How amazingly cool is that?’

‘I don’t know. Wouldn’t want to jump to conclusions, you know.’

‘Everybody!’ Miss Crazy stepped to the front of the class. ‘Today we have a new student with us. Her name is Robyn Litchfield. I’m sure everyone will do their best to make her feel welcome. Adam, I was hoping that you might be able to show her around the school after class this morning.’

Adam’s eyes widened. Maybe this was his lucky day after all. He looked across at Robyn who smiled before quickly looking away like before. The excitement disappeared when he began to wonder why Miss Crazy had chosen him and not a female student.

‘Is that all right, Adam?’

‘Uh… of course.’ Adam looked at her with one eyebrow raised.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes.’ Adam smiled. ‘I’d be happy to.’

‘That’s what I like to hear.’

Scott leant over and whispered in his ear, ‘You lucky dog!’

Adam looked over at Daisy, catching her making quick glances between him and the new girl. She scrunched her nose up, as if unimpressed. Was he imagining a little jealousy in her expression?

Wishful thinking.

‘Today, I want us to do something a little more interactive.’ Miss Crazy gathered up a pile of books and began handing them out. ’This is a play entitled Unman Wittering and Zigo. I’d like us to read through this play today. Now unfortunately all the roles involve males – as the story takes place in a boy’s school. But we needn’t discriminate, so we’ll give some of the parts to girls.’

‘No way,’ Vanessa Michaels called out, ‘I don’t want to play the part of a…’

‘We’re not going to actually perform this play.’ Miss Crazy didn’t even look at Vanessa. ‘We’re just going to read it and study it, because it is a great little social commentary about school systems. And I think it will be a lot more fun than just reading a book.’

’Especially a boring book like To Kill a Mockingbird!’ Will called out. Adam looked over at him with a grin, but it disappeared from his face as Will’s body began to fade, becoming transparent, just like Michael Matthews the previous week.

Miss Crazy took no notice of Will. ‘Seeing as we have a new girl, she can play the character of Cloistermouth. Adam, I want you to be the teacher Mr Ebony. And seeing as you are the teacher, I’ll let you assign roles to everyone else in the class. How about that?’

Adam still stared at Will, whose body went from transparent, to solid, then back to transparent again.

‘Adam?’

Will’s body solidified again and this time he stayed solid.

‘Adam, I asked you something. Will you play Mr Ebony and assign the roles to the other students?’

Adam came to his senses and looked at Miss Crazy, wishing she’d stop picking on him and give someone else all the attention. It was creepy, but he didn’t argue as this was the day he was going to tail her and find out what she was really up to, so he didn’t want to make her suspicious.

‘Ok.’ He looked back at Will again who looked off into the distance uninterested.

Adam shuddered and turned back to look down at his copy of the play, trying to tell himself he wasn’t losing it and that in a few days he’d stop having these hallucinations.

He felt funny about assigning roles to his classmates. Even though a few were missing, there will still far more people than parts, so it was tricky deciding who to include.

Miss Crazy didn’t seem to mind at all whom he chose. She just sat back in her chair with an open book, ready to read along with them.

They began to read. When it came to Robyn, she seemed to be a little confused. Sometimes she would interrupt the previous reader, reading her lines too soon. Other times she seemed unaware that it was her turn. Adam began to wonder if it was nerves at being in a new school, or perhaps she just wasn’t very bright. That probably explained why she seemed to have taken a liking to him.

Then there was Scott. He started reading his part in an exaggerated American accent. Miss Crazy didn’t seem to mind, but then another classmate started reading in a Scottish accent. And from there it gradually got worse. Jack decided to read his lines in an old fashioned English accent and even added in extra words like ‘I say’, ‘Old Chap’, ‘What’ and other such words, making him sound like a character out of a Biggles novel. Darren on the other hand read his lines in a very monotonic voice. At first Adam thought he was doing it for a joke, but his manner never changed, even between lines.

Miss Crazy didn’t seem to be paying attention. She focused beyond the book, deep in thought. Maybe she just didn’t care. Maybe she didn’t mind them having a bit of fun, just as long as they read the play.

After class, Adam met up with Robyn. He wasn’t used to talking to girls, let alone acting as a host to one. She smiled at him as he made his approach. ‘I guess it’s time to show you around the school.’

‘Yeah,’ Robyn said, ‘I guess so.’

‘You’ll have to excuse my classmates.’ Adam gave a wry smile. ‘They were getting a bit carried away with their silly accents.’ He chuckled.

‘Huh?’ Robyn looked at him with a puzzled frown. ‘Silly accents?’

It then occurred to Adam that maybe she might have thought they were their real accents. ‘Oh… you know, the guys reading their lines. They don’t really have accents like that.’

‘Oh…’ Robyn’s face turned from a frown to a smile. ‘I didn’t even notice.’

Perhaps she was just a little bit slow. Just his luck to be escorting a mentally challenged girl around the school. But as he led her around, showing her the sights, he soon learnt she wasn’t all that dumb. In fact, she appeared bright and friendly. She even had a sense of humour, laughing about Mr Vennie’s new rules – particularly the one about nicknames for the teachers.

‘You could call Miss Casey, Miss Hardcasey perhaps?’ She giggled. ‘Or Miss Nutcasey!’

Adam chuckled, ‘Yeah, well we have been calling her Miss Crazy.’

Robyn giggled some more. ‘That’s mean, you know.’

Adam tried to laugh again, but someone gave him a shove from behind and he stumbled forwards a few steps. He spun around and his face paled when he saw Todd Spencer standing there.

‘Watch it Braddock, you’re in my way!’

Adam felt a sense of courage come upon him, especially seeing as he was with a reasonably pretty girl. Not only that, but he also had an ally in Drake. ‘Leave off, Spencer!’ Adam snarled, surprising himself. He glared at Todd whose nose turned up in response. Robyn stepped back, her eyes wide. ‘Adam, what...?’

Adam placed his hand on Robyn’s shoulder. ‘It’s ok Robyn. This is Todd Spencer and he thinks he’s the big man of the school, don’t you Todd?’

Todd’s face reddened and Adam could almost see steam coming from his nostrils, ‘Braddock, you piece of sewer slush! You think you can talk to me like that? Radnor ain’t around at the moment to save your hide, punk!’

‘Just leave us alone! We didn’t do anything to you.’

Robyn’s eyes were wide and her mouth open. Perhaps she was afraid about what this boy might do. But Adam knew there wasn’t much he could do, not at school. Adam might regret it later, but right now, he still felt confident.

Todd let out a haughty laugh. ‘Oh you think you’re Mr Smooth now, don’t you, Braddock? You have Radnor doing you’re dirty work for you… Miss Casey seems to think you’re something special and now you have the new girl to escort around the school. Oh, you’re a real ladies man, aren’t you? Hey girl, why don’t you let me escort you instead? Drop this boring loser, he’s nothing!’

Adam moved to protect Robyn. He was not about to let Todd try to cut in on him. Robyn stepped back and said nothing. It seemed she was content to let Adam deal with the situation. ‘Todd, get out of our faces! Why would she want a Neanderthal like you to show her around? Just leave us alone will you? We didn’t do anything to you.’

‘Just you being here is starting to piss me off! And I’m gonna do something about that real soon!’ With that, Todd scowled and bowled away, without looking back.

Adam breathed a sigh of relief. He turned to Robyn who still seemed freaked out. ‘It’s ok. He’s gone now and if he tries to bother you, just tell me, ok?’ He felt quite proud of himself for how he handled the situation. He felt very brave and almost macho. Hopefully Robyn would be impressed.

But she didn’t appear to be impressed. In fact, she still looked concerned. She tried to speak but stammered a little. ‘His... his name is Todd?’

‘Yeah, he’s a total creep. But like I said, don’t worry. He’s all hot air.’ But that wasn’t true and Adam knew it. Todd would not forget what happened, he never did. He also knew that Todd would seek revenge at some point. But he didn’t want Robyn to think he was worried.

’Okaaaay.’ Robyn let out a long breath. ‘If you say so.’

Adam continued his tour with Robyn. But that incident with Todd seemed to have disturbed her quite a bit. She only smiled when Adam made a humorous comment and continually looked about, as if expecting Todd to reappear. It wasn’t long before the bell rang for class again. They both had different classes, so went their separate ways.

Adam met up with Scott and Darren as they made their way to their next class.

‘You ok, Darr?’ Adam asked as they circled around to the front of A-Block. ‘You don’t seem to be your usual cheery self.’

‘I’m feeling a little depressed.’

‘Why, what’s up?’

‘It’s not important. You don’t need to worry.’

Adam wasn’t sure how to reply. He looked across at Scott who just shrugged and grinned. Adam was about to say something else when a new structure appeared before him. He came to a halt and stared stunned at the site of the new pavilion. It now stood, fully erected before him. He blinked a few times; just to be sure he wasn’t seeing things again. ’Wait. This can’t be right. They’ve only just been laying the foundations. It was still at that point this morning. How can this be?’

‘Dude, I think you’re losing it,’ Scott said. ‘They finished building this thing last week. What are you talking about?’

Adam stared at Scott for a moment, wondering if it was all some kind of elaborate joke. ’Come on! They were still down to the foundations. I’ve never even seen any builders doing any work here!’

‘You’re having us on, right?’ Darren looked at Adam strangely. ‘How can a building be erected so quickly? That means they would have had to have put up the walls and roof in only a few hours.’

Adam continued to stare at the pavilion, wondering if it was possible he might have been hallucinating. But no, even his illness had never caused that sort of trick on his senses. He was positive the building had been at its foundations the last time he had seen it.

‘Come on, monkey man.’ Scott sniggered. ‘We gotta get to the next class.’

‘Yeah.’ Darren looked at him without a smile. ‘There’s no point in silly jokes, Adam.’

For a few seconds more Adam stared at the building, then shook his head with a deep sigh and continued on after his mates.