Magnet & Steele (8 page)

“All right, all right,” Mr. Conner
chimed in. “Let’s everybody calm down. Now listen folks, the
newlyweds already called, go and sit down in a corner somewhere
while we get on with the rest of the class…”

Francine waited and watched as the
pairs doubled up. Five minutes passed, then ten, fifteen, until a
chair pulled up beside her. Not moving her head much, she rolled
her eyes around first to notice him and then his arrogance. It was
the Jock with the milk incident. Oh great.

Leaning his chair back, exposing his
argyle socks, Derek Magnet smiled a cocky smile. “Well,” he said,
leisurely scanning her body from toe to tip, “I always wondered
what my wife would look like.”

That Evening

Petula Clark was singing and
Francine switched the volume up on her HI-FI and threw herself down
on her bed to cry. “I have no friends,” she suffered, “I hate this
house, I hate California…Everyone at school now thinks I’m a
joke.”

Closing her eyes, continuing to
shell out emotion, Francine went over the events of her day. She
was wet…wet and sticky, starting to reek from the milk being
splashed all over her body, but still, something happened to her
today that was more poignant than some embarrassing moment. She met
Derek Magnet…he was her economics partner…he was stuck with her for
at least a week as his make-believe “wife” and was suddenly hers to
freely inspect at her leisure. Why was he so bitchin’ anyhow! She
had never been into jocks before; she was into the studious type, a
dude and straight-A student. Derek Magnet aka “Derrie” to his
closest friends, was athletic, hip, wore mod shirts and was very
popular and she couldn’t believe she was chosen to be his partner?
After his comment, Francine went into student style and gave him
direction on how to establish a household budget and Derrie just
took the route and wrote along with her. After what felt like an
eternity, ten minutes later the school bell rang and he said
nothing more to her, so she said nothing further to him and left
the class feeling a bit short changed from the brief enchantment
they seemed to share.

Rolling her body over, Francine
grabbed her pillow and held it against her body. Hearing the sound
of a motorcycle driving up to her neighbors’ house next door,
Francine got curious and then stumbled over to her window. Looking
down through the trees limbs, Francine viewed two teenagers through
the brush. The fella got off the motorcycle first, then grabbed at
the waist of his passenger and gently placed her down. Leaning her
torso seductively back onto the bike the girl seized the fellas’
body to hers and kissed him long and hard.

Francine then left the window,
“Great,” she said angrily, throwing her pillow to the bed. “And
hippies live next door to me.”

The next morning, Francine
prematurely woke up to the sound of the same motorcycle she heard
the day before. With its engine revving, she squinted towards a
nearby alarm clock horrified: Five-thirty? “Five-thirty!? It’s
five-thirty in the morning? Nobody wakes up at five-thirty in the
morning on a Saturday!”

Francine then covered up her ears
with a pillow; it didn’t help. She pulled the sheets up over her
head; that didn’t help either. The engine noise continued. “God! I
don’t believe this!” She then stumbled out of bed and headed
towards her window. At the sill, she opened up the window only to
hear the noise even louder. She yelled down and out her window,
“Hey! People are trying to sleep up here!”

The fella looked up at her but
apparently didn’t see her through the thick leaves of the tree on
her side of the house. “What?” He yelled back.

“Could you please keep it down, down
there?” Francine yelled back down at him and the fella responded,
but Francine couldn’t hear him through the revving of his engine.
“What? Turn your engine off! I can’t hear you!”

Exasperated, the fella gets on his
bike and revs up the engine even louder and then sped
off.

“Thank you…I think,” Francine ended
up saying, heading back towards her bed.

*****

Nancy and Francine were in their
backyard attempting to garden. Their barren backyard was taking
shape now. Green grass was beginning to grow. Flowers were
beginning to bloom, there was even a squared off area with a white
picket fence around it for an herb and vegetable garden.

Nancy and Francine were on their
knees pulling weeds from inside the herb garden when Francine
looked up for a moment and watched her mother vigorously pulling
weeds from around the basil. “Mom?”

“Yes?”

“Do you think Suzy’s all
right?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Well, we haven’t seen any letters
from her. Do you think she’s all right?” Francine asked again,
uncertain.

Nancy got up off her knees and
grabbed the hoe next to the brick wall and started to over-turn the
soil. “I want to believe that she is,” she grimaced, sticking the
hoe into the hard ground.

“Do you think dad will ever let her
back into the family?”

Nancy dug a nice hole in the soil,
“That remains to be seen.”

Francine shook her head. “He can’t
do that to us, can he?”

Nancy stopped and looked over at her
daughter, “Yes Francine, he can.”

Just then, a Frisbee came whirling
down and landed on top of one of her mother’s tomato
plants.

“What the—”

“Excuse me?” A muffled voice on the
other side of the stone wall asked.

Francine looked oddly at her mother
and they both started to smile. “Yes?” Francine answered
back.

“Could you please toss that Frisbee
back over the wall?”

Francine stood next to the stone
wall. “What Frisbee?” She asked with the Frisbee now in her
hands.

Nancy thought it was funny too and
began giggling alongside with her.

“Um…didn’t a Frisbee just come over
the wall?”

“Ooooh, you mean this bright colored
object that just chopped off some of my roses?” Francine quipped,
twirling the Frisbee around in her hands once more.

“Yeah, that’s it, sorry.”

Francine seemed to annoy the person
rather than amuse them.

“Could you just throw it
over?”

“Poor sport,” Francine said to her
mother, “Can’t take a joke.”

“Just flip it over Fran,” Nancy
directed, going back to her digging.

“OK mom, now how am I gonna do this?
This is crazy, you know I can’t throw. I can’t even toss what
should I do?”

“Just kinda flip it over,” Nancy
suggested.

Grabbing the Frisbee with her right
hand, Francine whirled it as hard as she could and the Frisbee
seemed to take flight and landed in an unreachable boundary of a
tree in her neighbor’s backyard.

“Crap!” She heard the fella
say.

“Oh man, I’m sorry!” Francine
apologized running up to the wall. After hearing nothing from the
other side, Francine took a few steps backwards and watched her
neighbor as he climbed the tree to retrieve the Frisbee. The young
man climbed his way up the branches, reached over for the
toy…reached…but couldn’t seem to get it…then fell!

“Oh my God!” Francine yelled, making
Nancy flinch.

“What’s going on Fran?” Nancy asked
now, her elbow resting on the handle of the hoe. “What’s happening
over there?”

Francine ran over to the wall. “Oh
my God mom, he fell! The guy next door, he just…fell!” She
exclaimed, running to the wall and then running backwards to take a
look up at her neighbors’ tree again.

Nancy watched her daughter as she
scampered around her and flew out the backyard.

Moments later at her neighbor’s
house, Francine repeatedly knocked on their front door.

A short, plump Italian woman
answered, “Yes? May I help you?”

Francine stared at her for a moment.
“Hi, I saw your son fall from a tree. Is he OK?”

The short, plump Italian woman was
Sophia, in her late sixties, and her son was in his forties…and he
fell from the tree? She looked oddly at Francine. Did she
misunderstand? She knew she didn’t speak very good English, but
even this sounded a little unusual. “Are you the girl who called
earlier?”

Francine nodded her head, “No, I’m
not the girl who called earlier. I’m your neighbor, and I saw your
son fall from a tree. Is he OK?”

Sophia widened the door to look
behind her, she then left Francine alone and
dumb-founded.

Francine was just about to leave
feeling a little stupid now when Derek Magnet appears out of
nowhere and crowded the doorway. “Francine Steele…what are you
doing here?”

Francine stood taken-back. “Did you
just come out of that house?”

Just then, the boy who Francine saw
actually fall from the tree came out of the same front doorway and
left from behind Derrie.

“See ya Derrie,” he said, trotting
down the sidewalk.

“Hang loose, man,” Derrie said,
patting his friend on his back before he left.

“This is your house?” Francine asked
still unconvinced watching his friend’s exit.

“Yeah, why?”

“Oh my God and you live
here?”

Derrie chuckled, “Yeah, that’s
usually how it works. What are doing here? Did you follow me home?”
He asked a little cocky.

Francine humpfed, “Get real, I was
the one who threw the Frisbee over the wall.”

“Oh yeah? Visiting my new
neighbors?” He asked, taking a peek over at his next door
neighbor’s home.

“I live there.”

Derrie stared at her for a moment
and Francine stared at him back. Unusual thoughts ran through her
sanity; a football falls in her lap for no apparent reason, she’s
suddenly paired up with the cute guy and now she conveniently lives
next door? Was this just a coincidence?

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Derrie
finally said.

“Are you OK? Did you hurt yourself?”
Francine asked, gazing at his whole body for possible
injury.

“Wasn’t me. That was my friend. I
would never compromise getting hurt like that. I’ve gotta think
about my throwing arm.”

“Oh my God, that was so scary. Is he
OK?”

“Yeah, he’s cool, he’s my center and
he’s used to getting bumps and bruised up.”

Francine let go a giggle and Derrie
stared down at her lips as she laughed. Derrie studied her face for
a long moment and Francine’s lips part. Intense, obvious attraction
made them both nervous.

Feeling a little awkward now,
Francine headed down the steps backwards. “So, OK, so if you need
anything…I’ll just be next door,” she explained, pointing across
the street and not towards her house.

Derrie cleared his throat. “Got some
time?” He asked, clearing it once again. “Maybe we can get to work
on our school project?”

Francine thought about it for a
moment and her heart skipped a strange beat. Hmmm, gardening with
mom, or working on a school project with the school hunk? “Yeah, um
sure, I’ve got some time. Let me just tell my mom where I’m at and
I’ll be right back.” She began to walk away when she thought about
something else and quickly turned around. “Hey Derrie?”

“Yeah?”

Francine thought about the last
couple of Saturday mornings. “Can we talk about getting rid of your
motorcycle?”

His room was trimmed in navy blue
and white. Football trophies, helmets and balls of every sport
occupied every inch of the floor. After-shave and an electric razor
tied up the top of his writing desk, while a typewriter filled up
the rest. Feeling compelled to read what was on his wall, Francine
walked over to it and began to read the couple of plaques hanging
next to his desk. Intrigued by his accomplishments, they stated:
“DEREK MAGNET – MVP – ALL LEAGUE 1965 FOOTBALL REGIONAL
CHAMPIONSHIP” and another, “DEREK MAGNET – MVP – ALL-LEAGUE 1966
FOOTBALL REGIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP”. She felt almost proud to know him,
Ray was the only other boy she knew who achieved such honors in
sports and her sister had Ray.