“Remember to get those tests signed by your parents and bring them back on Monday! I’m looking at you, Peter. Have a good weekend everyone!”
Izzie yawns and shoves her test inside her backpack before zipping it up. Sounds of laughter fill the room as the students group up and discuss their plans for the four-day weekend. Not that there is anything exciting happening in Happy Springs, Wisconsin. Not that there ever is. Even with Thanksgiving the next day the most there is to look forward to is some paltry day after sales unless they drive for a few hours to Green Bay. She slouches down in her chair and fiddles with her backpack zipper, pretending it is stuck so she has an excuse to stay seated while the crowd pushes out the door on their way to freedom.
She smiles and waves at well-wishers as they pass, assuring a few that she will have it unstuck in no time, and they should go before they miss their bus. Finally, they are all gone. Through the open door, lockers rattle and clank and then go silent as the horde passes through. Izzie stands up and puts her arms through the straps of her bag. She looks around, eyes settling on the teacher's desk. Logan is hunched forward over it as he talks quietly to the Language Arts teacher, who is alternating sad smiles and head nods. His face is filled with distress when he straightens and turns around. Instantly, the expression is whisked away and replaced with a cheerful grin.
The young man bounds over as she adjusts her straps and settles the pack between her shoulders. "Isabella Harris, what are you still doing here?"
Izzie frowns at him, but there is no point pretending she is angry. A smile breaks through quickly. "Only you and Mama call me that. Congratulations, you have the coolness of a 45-year-old woman."
"Your mom is both hot and cool, I will accept that!"
"Eww," she laughs as she smacks his shoulder. "I'm telling Stacy you have a crush on my mom."
"Please! You wound me implying I would ever keep things from her! She knows she shares my heart with the luscious Mrs. Harris."
"I need to go bleach my brain. My mom is not luscious."
They laugh as they walk into the hallway, now nearly devoid of students. Not far from the classroom, a pretty blonde in a pair of tight jeans is leaning against the wall. A smartphone in a furry case rests in her hands, her thumbs tapping at high speed on the screen.
"Aww, she waited for you! You don't deserve her," Izzie gushes in a pseudo-sweet voice, pushing the lanky young man toward his girlfriend with a smile. "Stacy, Logan was just telling me that you know all about his shared love for you and my mom."
"Eww," the girl replies without taking her eyes off her phone. "No offense to your mom or anything, but she is, like, old. He'll get over her someday. Or so I keep hoping."
"Never gonna happen," Logan responds, pulling her into his arms as she half-heartedly swats at him with one hand and types with the other. "My desire for you both knows no end."
"Ugh," the two girls respond in unison. They look at each other and scrunch up their noses as they laugh. Izzie pulls Stacy away from her boyfriend and links arms with her, shepherding her gently down the hall. Stacy giggles and slides her phone into her back pocket. Izzie wonders how she does it. The jeans look tight enough that a wish couldn't fit into the pockets, let alone a phone.
"Alright, my dad says I can stay out until 9 tonight. I argued him up from 8 and he agreed on account of my being the most awesome cheer captain that ever shook a pom pom."
"Yes, you are, babe." Logan wraps his arm around Stacy from the other side. "So what are we doing tonight?"
The group of three saunter down the hall and out of the building. It has been less than ten minutes since school ended and the parking lot is almost empty, save for Logan's beat-up truck and Izzie's little blue hatchback parked alongside it. She smiles fondly at her car as they approach, mentally covering the grey Bondo spots with a snazzy new layer of paint. Soon, she promises herself, digging out her keys from the front pocket of her backpack. Soon there will be enough money in her account to cover the cost of a paint job at Willy’s Autobody. Opening up the back of her ten-year-old Yaris, she tosses her bag inside before turning to face the couple leaning against the grill of the old pickup. She grimaces when they touch heads as they whisper to each other.
“Aww, come on guys! I already have to go to therapy to deal with Logan’s obsession with my mom, I don’t need to watch you two suck face as well.”
Stacy giggles and plants both hands on Logan’s chest, gently pushing him away. “Well, Iz, if you would just find someone of your very own to gyrate genitals with you wouldn’t be so hung up on who is making out in front of you.”
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“Well, if you can get Henry Cavill here by tonight then I will leave you alone to make out in public if you want. I’ll be too busy then.”
“Eww, what is with you two and old people? Geriatric kink?”
“Okay, one, he is not old. He is finely aged.” Izzie grins and sticks her tongue out from between her teeth. “And two, Logan is just weird. Don’t lump me together with him. You would drool on Henry’s face too if he were here.”
“I will neither confirm nor deny that.” Stacy primly smooths down the invisible wrinkles in her canary yellow cotton-poly blend shirt before sashaying to the passenger door and shooing Logan to the driver’s side. “I am starving, guys. Let’s hit the diner and get some food. Then I want to go to Rusty’s.”
Izzie frowns and pulls the back door close, wincing when it slams shut. “Rusty’s? You mean Rusty’s Tractor Mart and Value Bonanza? Jeez, that’s a mouthful.”
As soon as the words come out she tries to pull them back, but it’s too late.
“That’s what she said!” Her two friends respond in unison, laughing far harder than the joke is worth. Izzie shakes her head, letting them get it out of their system. Ever since Logan discovered vintage SNL online he says the line every chance he gets. Eventually, they calm down, and Stacy climbs up onto the sagging bench-style seat of the trusty Ford. She closes the door, thumping her hand on the panel outside of the already-opened window. “I want to see the baby chicks, don’t judge! Anyway, we need to get food now or I am going to eat Logan.”
“Oh god, get a room you two!” Izzie slides into her much lower car and turns it on so the windows can be rolled down. The stuffiness inside is whisked away instantly.
“Not that kind of eat, smut brain. He’s not that lucky.”
“Maybe later?”
Izzie pulls away as the teenage boy's hopeful question floats through the air.
“Eww,” she whispers to herself. She steers the car out of the parking lot, turning right on Main Street. The high school and the elementary school next door to it fall away in her rearview mirror. Houses perch at the edge of the sidewalks bordering the two-lane street that makes up the main thoroughfare for the town of Happy Springs. She smiles, her eyes crinkling up at all the festive turkey-themed decorations covering porches and bushes on the way. Quickly the houses turn into businesses lining what nobody would describe as downtown unless they were being very charitable. She turns the corner onto a side street when she passes Two Bites, the town’s only restaurant, except for a pizza parlor that only does deliveries and pick-ups. A line winds from the front door and around to the side and it takes her a moment to find two spots along the curb to park. She sighs, knowing Stacy is going to be hungry for a while longer, and will probably continue to bounce in her seat in her haste to get eat and move on. Baby chickens, after all.
By the time they arrive at Rusty’s, the sun is setting. Lavender-colored clouds are scraped across the darkening surface of pinks and oranges above them. The spaces around and under the branches of the box elders at the edge of the wide parking lot are dark, impenetrable to Izzie’s casual gaze. A worker chains the riding mowers on display across the lot. They are too close to the tree line, in the shadows. She can’t see if it is someone she knows to wave hello.
The air has a bite to it. In the morning, the grass will be hoary, tips of frost weighing each blade down just a little. Izzie pulls the sleeves of her sweatshirt down over her hands, clutching the edges with her curled fingers.
“Jeez, I’m freezing my ass off out here! Let’s go! Baby chicks!”
Stacy bounces past, her slim arms clenched to her sides. Likely, her stylish tops will be covered by equally stylish jackets when they see each other in school again on Monday. Izzie smiles again and follows her inside, Logan trudging along next to her.
“What’s up with the baby chick craving?” She asks as they stay just out of earshot behind the shivering blonde.
“Her mom sent her some meme this morning, baby chicks huddling together in a basket. Or a bowl. I don’t know, it was hard to make out with her waving her phone at me and squealing.”
“Aww, that sounds cute!”
He glances down at her from his considerably more impressive height. One sandy eyebrow arches up sardonically. “Oh, our spicy Latina has a gooey center? Do you like puppies and baby cows too?”
Izzie slaps his arm, her smile growing wider. “I like baby cows even more when they are biting you.”
Logan clutches his forearm dramatically, rubbing it through his letter jacket. “You are never going to let me forget that, are you? We were eight, Iz, and I thought it was fake.”
“Thought what was fake?” Stacy hugs her arms around her torso, one hip thrust out dramatically as she waits just out of reach of the automated doors. “And why are you taking so long? Cold! Baby chicks!”
Izzie hurries her steps and pulls the shivering girl inside the brightly lit store. “That baby cow on that field trip.”
Stacy nods and hums her understanding. “Yeah, my boyfriend is an innocent. Let’s go!”
“We know. Baby chicks.” Her two friends laugh as they respond in unison.
To the immediate left, a bank of four registers guards the entrance to the store. Only one has its number sign lit up above it. A pale boy scans items on a conveyor belt before putting them in plastic bags with the store’s name emblazoned across the front. The smile fades from Izzie’s face for just a moment before she turns to follow her friends down the wide aisles toward the back of the store. Stacy weaves across to the next aisle over when they reach a cross-section and continues her march, never slowing. Logan stops to look at shovels hanging along one side of the second aisle, and the two girls leave him behind.
Ahead, at the back side of the store next to the swinging doors leading to the stock room, is a metal pen. “It looks like the type of pen that people put their little dogs in out in the yard,” Izzie thinks to herself as she approaches. Through the narrow gaps, she can see eddies of yellow fluff swirling around inside. Stacy dashes the last few yards and squeals loud enough to drown out the sound of dozens of little bodies cheeping merrily. “OhmygodIzzieTheyAreSoAdorable!”
Izzie takes a moment to parse out her friend’s words, spoken in a single breath and bookended by excited squeaks. She walks up next to her and looks down into the pen before agreeing that the little puff balls are, in fact, adorable. Stacy crouches down to get closer and Izzie feels the urge to pat her on the head.
The doors to the stock room swing open and then close again after spitting out a young man carrying a large plastic container. “Hey, Stacy,” he calls cheerfully, walking up and setting the 20-gallon tote down next to the pen. “You here to see the chicks? I was just about to move them to their night area since we’re about to close but I can wait.”
“Hey, Joseph.” Izzie bites her lip and then hastily lets it go when the young man looks up. Her stomach buzzes as his dark eyes meet hers.
He pauses, then shoots her a small grin. “Hey, Izzie. How-”
Whatever he is about to ask is cut off by a loud noise from the front of the store. All three of them snap their heads up and look toward the sound. Not far down the aisle, they can see Logan doing the same. A short shovel in one hand and his head turned toward the front.
The sound repeats, this time continuing. A long, drawn-out scream. Voices rise up around it, fear making them carry across the vast space. They look at each other, eyes wide, then back to the front. They only have a moment, heads craning to see anything at all. Then, the lights go out.