Hot Pterodactyl Boyfriend (15 page)

“He's in Jonathan's grade. I think so far his marks have been okay. Nobody's mentioned—”

Jonathan spoke up. “He might've come to us through a disturbance of the time-space continuum.”

Their mother glared at him until he returned to his dinner.

“Science can't explain everything.” Shiels tried not to sound patronizing. “But the fact is he's here, he's delightful, he's unique.”

Her mother's gaze did not indicate a softening of any sort. “This has been going on for how long? And the administration is just now getting around to—”

“I think it's fair to say there's been a settling-in period—”

The two women in the family kept at it while Jonathan and their dad, though still listening intently, were tucking into the seven-cheese lasagna with Creole garlic and portobello mushrooms.

“This is the creature you danced with? Who turned your nose purple? When you said he was pretending to be a pterodactyl?”

“I never said ‘pretended,' ” Shiels said. “Dad said Pyke thought he was a pterodactyl.”

“But you didn't correct him. You let us both continue to blithely assume—”

“I'm sorry there was confusion,” Shiels said. “But you're against him simply because of his species orientation,” Shiels said.

“His
what
?”

“He's different from us. He's not from our tribe. So you're against him. You have been from the beginning.”

“This isn't the beginning. The beginning, I gather, was some time ago, and yet—”

“If he were a student of color, you would be all in favor of integrating him,” Shiels said. “If he came from a different country, or had an unusual sexual orientation—”

“Do not call me a racist, or a sexist, or—”

“It's speciesism,” Shiels said simply. “You can't believe someone from a different species, from a whole different era of evolution, could benefit from a normal high school education. Or could teach us anything—”

“This is ridiculous!”

“Is it? I spent half of today cleaning up the gym after Saturday's dance. And you know who helped me? About a thousand crows. And they were so much more organized, efficient, and pleasant to deal with than any of my own team of so-called volunteers.”

“Now you are just raving!”

“Parents never understand!” Shiels said. She clapped her cutlery down. This was so . . . satisfying. To get to say those words.

“I can hardly wait for this meeting,” Shiels's father said, and he helped himself to another glass of wine.

•  •  •

“Thank you, folks. Thank you all for coming tonight on short notice,” Manniberg said. The microphone screeched. He had to step back from the podium—and someone in the back, Jeremy Jeffreys, yelled, “Pyke! Pyke!” which got everyone laughing.

Well, the students laughing. The parents didn't seem to know what to make of it.

Pyke was sitting alone onstage beside Manniberg in one of the skinny, wooden orchestra chairs. His wings were folded, his beak was tucked, as if perhaps Manniberg had advised him to stay as small, as unthreatening as possible.

Shiels was not sitting with her own parents. She preferred to roam an event like this—not that there had ever been an event like this at Vista View. But since she wasn't speaking, she needed to be free to see, to work the room.

Sheldon was on the other side of the auditorium, sitting with that same group of cronies he'd exploded umbrellas with some days before—Ron Fornelli and others. Rachel Wyngate. (Why did Rachel Wyngate look like she always belonged wherever she happened to be?)

Sheldon was texting someone.

“Yes,” Manniberg said, finding the right distance from the microphone, “this meeting is about a new student we all know as Pyke. If you remember in the fall newsletter, I did make reference to the Vista View Cultural Outreach Program, about how we are embracing many forms of diversity just as a lot of you have asked us to do—”

A father with a black stubble beard, sitting near the front, yelled, “What does this have to do with a freaking pterodactyl?”

Pyke raised his beak slightly. He seemed to inflate with the implied threat.

It was hard for Shiels to take her eyes off him.
If I need to,
she thought,
I will rush the stage and get him out of here.

(But, no, this would not be the time for any reckless rescue attempts. This meeting was for talking it all through.)

Pyke looked a little lost, up there without Jocelyne Legault. It was painful for Shiels to realize. Probably Manniberg had warned Jocelyne away too, because of her own purple nose.

Shiels imagined herself sitting up there beside Pyke. They were on the right side of history, she knew. This might be one of those moments.

“Pyke, who is a pterodactyl,” Manniberg said, “is right here beside me. He's a student, he has a name, he has as much right to respect and privacy as anybody else's children in the school. Let me just say”—his voice was picking up confidence; he could be a strong speaker when moved—“that in a short while I have come to know this young student very well. I am so impressed! He does come from a remarkable background. He brings his own wealth of cultural knowledge and experience—”

“Where the hell
does
he come from?” another father yelled. “How sharp are his teeth?”

Others called out as well. Manniberg smiled gamely. “I
will
take questions. This is meant to be your session. Let me just explain, though, that there are strict privacy regulations, the same ones that protect your child, ensuring that I do not divulge personal information in a public forum like this. So I can't discuss background except to say Pyke came to us with the proper credentials. The board is behind this initiative, which, frankly, I think is an excellent opportunity to expose all of us to new ideas and ways of—”

“Would you stop marble-mouthing and just answer the question?” a woman barked. “You sound like a bloody politician!”

Laughter. Nervous energy snapping in the room.

“Someone asked about his teeth. Pyke has none.” Manniberg turned to the pterodactyl. “Please, son, if you could just stand up, open your beak . . .”

Pyke did so. He was being careful not to stretch his wings, not to look frightful.

“You see, not a biter,” Manniberg said. “He eats in the cafeteria with the other students, with his friends. Just ask any of your kids. I think you'll find he has integrated quite—”

“He looks like a freaking monster!” the first dad yelled, the angriest one.

“I assure you, sir—” Manniberg was starting to lose control of the room. If he'd ever had it. Shiels moved quickly, quietly back to Jeremy Jeffreys.

“What exactly does he eat?” someone else yelled. “What was all this shrieking business over the weekend?”

“Jeremy,” Shiels hissed, and pulled the huge boy aside from where he was standing by the back wall.

“Maybe we need to hear from Pyke himself at this point,” Manniberg said.

“What?” Jeffreys asked.

“Get a football. Now!”

“What? Why?”

“Just do it!”

Jeffreys was practically twice her size, but he could not stare her down. He was gone in a moment, out to his locker.

Pyke hop-hipped to the podium. It was hard to see him. At the bottom of the podium was a small box that could be pulled out. Shiels tended to use it to stand on whenever she was speaking in the auditorium. But no one had told Pyke.

Shiels texted Sheldon:
Rescue him now!

Pyke clicked his beak and shuffled awkwardly in front of everyone. “Hllo hum,” he said. “Zorry, zorry trubbled maker. Hah?”

When I say,
Shiels texted.
It's about W Wallin.

Sheldon turned around, trying to see where she was.

“What bloody planet are you from, you freak!” the angriest father yelled. “Do I need to get my shotgun?”

It wasn't funny, but some people laughed. Pyke glanced at the man like . . . maybe he might skewer the guy for dinner.

Jeremy Jeffreys, at last! Hands wrapped around a football.

Make it about fb,
Shiels texted. At the same time she said to the quarterback, “Do you think you can throw it onstage from here?”

Manniberg rose to join Pyke at the podium.

“Of course!” Jeffrey said.

“Show me!”

Manniberg said, “There's no need for threats or even jokes about—”

Jeffreys reached back and sent a perfect spiral arcing over the heads of the audience. Even Shiels could appreciate the strength and accuracy of the throw. It snaked left a bit near the end. Pyke had to leap and stretch . . . but he nabbed it out of midair as fast as an eyeblink.

“Hey! Don't give away our secret weapon for Walloping Wallin!” someone yelled—Sheldon! And Ron Fornelli leapt to his feet too. “Hoo, hoo!” he yelled. “Vista View!”

“Are you kidding me?” the angry father yelled. “This guy plays football?”

Manniberg retrieved the ball from Pyke's jaws and tossed it—not badly at all—to the man with the stubble beard. “Try to get one past him!” Manniberg said.

The guy had a rifle arm. He sent a bullet straight at Pyke's head. Shiels winced—but Pyke nabbed the ball like a natural, and even flipped it back to Manniberg like the principal was his caddie or something.

Did they have caddies in football?

A half dozen fathers, and one mother, in the audience took turns throwing the ball to Pyke, who only dropped one pass, a wobbler that slipped from the hand of the passer. “Sorry, son—sorry!” the embarrassed dad called. “It's been a while since I tried this sort of thing.”

Manniberg picked up the ball and tucked it under his arm. The student body gave Pyke a standing ovation. Shiels was worried that Pyke might ruin it all by opening his beak and shrieking . . . but he knew enough to just bathe in the applause.

“All right, okay,” Manniberg said, giddy with the moment. “We don't want news of our secret weapon to get out, do we? Vista View hasn't beaten Wallin in, what is it, eight years now?”

“Seventeen!” Jeremy Jeffreys called out.

“Seventeen years. So we'll just keep this under our hats until game time, all right? When is it, next week? Thank you all so much for coming tonight. Thank you for your understanding, your sense of community, your generosity of spirit. The society we're building here at Vista View is inclusive, it's supportive, it's striving for acceptance of diversity every day. Thank you again. Thank you!” He smiled, he waved, he laughed and shook the football at Coach, who was standing with his arms crossed, scowling.

Well, the man was always scowling.

Jeremy Jeffreys slapped hands with teammates and well-wishers. And Sheldon—

Where was he?

Gone already.

•  •  •

Jeremy Jeffreys's arcing pass stayed in Shiels's mind: the elegant spin of the ball, the snake to the left, the coil in Pyke's movement as he spied the incoming shadow then leapt and stretched, wings gigantic, to gather the ball into his wide-open beak.

It was an exquisite gesture for that moment, the whole thing a complex act of grace—how Shiels had pictured it happening, and found exactly the right words and movements—the order to the quarterback, the texts to Sheldon, all while keeping an eye on the unfolding disaster at the podium. Shiels had been invisible at the center, calling and executing the play, almost like a quarterback herself, or a coach, an unseen mover.

Perfect.

Too perfect.

As the assembly broke up, there was Jeremy Jeffreys surrounded by acolytes, reenacting the pass like he'd just won the Super Bowl with seconds draining on the clock. And there were Rebecca Sterzl and Melanie Mull and others from the council laughing with one another. “And now he's a football star!” Rebecca exclaimed, without a glance in Shiels's direction.

Of course Jeremy Jeffreys was not going to say, “Shiels Krane told me to do it!” And Sheldon Myers, who did not hang around, was not there to say, “Shiels texted me just before I yelled.” (He would have before. He had deflected all light to Shiels, almost to a fault.)

Pyke of course was gone seconds after Manniberg turned off the mic.

In the lobby after the event, in the press of people talking, laughing, reenacting the whole unbelievable spectacle, Shiels felt herself standing alone, still the girl with the purple nose.

Walloping Wallin was not going to happen all by itself—her council would have to lay on the buses, organize the rally, negotiate a block of tickets for as many people from the school who wanted to go (which now would be everybody, practically). It was the forty-seventh year of the rivalry; Wallin and Vista View had been the first two high schools in town, and although now there were fifteen schools, this was the game that counted. Or at least it used to count, before Wallin had became a football power.

Seventeen years since the last Vista View victory! In truth, Shiels had not been expecting to have to do much organizing for Walloping Wallin. Last year, when Vista View had hosted the game, fewer than a hundred people had come from the home side. But now, thanks to her invisible manipulations, her almost instinctive grasp of how to influence a nearly chaotic situation, another amazing event was set to unfold.

Why did she feel so miserable?

•  •  •

Alone in her bedroom that night: Was it just her purple nose, the wrangle dance? Was that why she'd been so abandoned? She was not the only one who had lost her head. That disaster zone of a gym after Autumn Whirl!

But it was as if something unthinkable—unspeakable—had happened. Shiels actually called Rebecca Sterzl and began to leave a pleading message—the weakness in her voice!—but stopped herself.

She had more pride than that.